Kevin Rose annouced last night on G4, and on the This week in tech podcast he is leaving G4. Kevin was one of the last original members from the Screen Savers that still remained on the show, now known as attack of the show. Kevin will still do tech oriented reviews and articles on www.thebroken.org and www.twit.tv.
That sound of crickets you hear in the background is the fact that nobody cares on account that G4 has sucked for about 1.5 years now. Kevin was a good host and this story is a good scoop. The question is typical: if a host of a show nobody watches anymore leaves, does it make an impact? Absolutely not...the giant sucking sound of Comcast messing with a decent concept rings true...RIP ZDNet and the old days...
I used to think Adam Sessler was an over-the-top, hyperactive douchebag. Watching him and Kevin Pereira (sp?) together makes the Sess look like Alan Greenspan.
The last few times I've bothered to watch G4, I kept a sharp pencil on hand just in case I needed a quick self-lobotomy when things got too painful.
That Kevin Pereira is the biggest fucking tool on television. He has no idea how to behave in front of a camera. I remember watching him walking around at GDC and making a complete ass of himself.
I don't understand exactly what G4 is trying to do with Attack of the Show. They have pretty much gotten rid of any reason to ever watch it. And Sara Lane isn't good looking enough to get me to tune in. I will watch Xplay for Morgan Webb however.
...they just don't care about the core gamers anymore.
Agree, hid...the core gamers take the biggest hit, and yet they now have 0 shows that are either hip or cool. It's disappointing because I think that the concept is good...
I just got Digital Cable yesterday for a free trial. So far I've enjoyed G4, so I imagine before the switch I would have loved it even more.
The network is also responsible for two of my personal most embarrassing Live TV moments. The one way back when that old guy was on, showing the antique, one-of-a-kind "sound tube" thing, I can't remember what it was called. It had something to do with Edison. Anyway, he accidently smashed it in his hands. Also, during their Life E3 coverage, they were interviewing a group of attendees when one of them from the front row had a huge, gushing bloody nose. The blood was smeared all over his face and neck, and he had no idea. No one even pointed it out to him.
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Every once in a while, they have a pretty good Icons on that I'll watch.
I used to Tivo The Screen Savers every day. I don't really know who these people are that watch G4. If only it would take it's content seriously, they'd have a great network. You definitely can't have a 24 hour video game network, but you can have a 24 hour geek network that focuses on games. They need to completely overhaul their on-air talent and get people who aren't complete tools trying to act like MTV VJs.
I would have to say that a lot of their shows have a good premise, but the jackasses in front of the camera completely ruin any chance of the shows being good.
I like to watch Judgement Day, Electric Playground and Reviews on the Run. Xplay is ok, but the parts that aren't game reviews are hard to watch. Why can't you just review a game instead of trying to crack 8 cheesy jokes and pander to the under-13 audience? Sigh.
Icons is almost always great, if only because it actually imparts interesting facts without trying to dress it up like an MTV commercial.
Aside from that and Call For Help (thank you G4/Tech TV Canada for getting Leo Laporte!), there really isn't anything on G4 worth watching. Attack of the Show is horrid. Filter can be interesting, but I never seem to be able to catch it.
The rest of the shows (Arena, Players, etc.) not only look like crap, they hold absolutely no interest for me (and I doubt most of the 'real' gamers would want shows about celebrities playing games or watching online deathmatches as opposed to game news and reviews.)
Ah well. One of these days I'll get digital cable and be able to watch the channel on a regular basis instead of at my in-laws...
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Attack of the Show is horrid. Filter can be interesting, but I never seem to be able to catch it.
How you can say that Filter is interesting is beyond me. It's basically a VH1-like top-ten show with a bimbo dressing up on topic, and it's sometimes about video games. It's a wretched waste of time, and that woman is a fucking actress, not a gamer. The same with the girl on Cheat. That kind of shit offends me.
I quite enjoy AOTS, but I only occassionaly watched Screen Savers. Hating on one show because it isn't a completely different show is pretty lame. Yeah, these people took over the Screen Savers after the old people were axed, but they changed that weird abomination into a different show. Crying over a show basically canned two years ago seems like a waste of time, get over it.
I'm not sure how long I'll continue to watch with Kevin Rose gone though, he was my favorite part of AOTS, and I get enough of Sessler on XPlay. He can be funny, but after the E3 week, i'm on heavy overdose of him and Fereira.
Oh, and Judgement Day and Electric Playground are great. As awkward and cheesy as Judgement Day is, it's still surprisingly entertaining, and Electric Playground takes the same team and makes it more of a tech show, with somehow decent production values (how does that happen? it's the same people.). Pretty cool stuff.
AOTS is horrid. Too much "Look we found a website dedicated to crap noone cares about" and none of the old good stuff like how to mod your Tivo or Xbox.
I still watch it for Icons and X-play. The Sess may be annoying, but for the most part their reviews seem to reflect my taste in games. Plus I'll admit it, I do like Electric Playground and Judgement day.
As for Kevin Rose leaving, good for him. The show was beneth him. He alwas seemed to have this look on his face when Kevin Perera would speak like "Why are you here and why r you talking. Please go do something usefull like stand in the corner and bang your head into a sharp object."
The network is also responsible for two of my personal most embarrassing Live TV moments. The one way back when that old guy was on, showing the antique, one-of-a-kind "sound tube" thing, I can't remember what it was called. It had something to do with Edison. Anyway, he accidently smashed it in his hands.
G4 as a network had nothing to do with that- that clip was from TechTV (maybe even ZDnet back then) and happened way before G4 purchased them. Because they were two different stations, long ago
That was a funny clip- the old guy kept emphasizing how it was one of a kind, but his hands were shaking so bad he finally fumbled it, yelling "SHIT" as it shattered. Good stuff.
Hating G4 is natural, but there's a couple diamonds in the rough.
Icons, in particular, shouldn't be missed. Icons is gaming's version of VH1's classic "Behind the Music" (before that show started running out of worthy artists to profile). It's VERY well produced and completely lacking in the attitude or "XXXtreme to the MaXX!! lol boobiez!" sophomoric approach that most G4 shows resemble these days. It's actually highly professional.
I had the misfortune of being interviewed for G4 at the 2004 E3 show. The convention had just started that morning, and my wife and I only had time to visit the Nintendo booth at that point. So they started asking me about which games I had seen, and of course after editing it down to sound bites of me saying "Resident Evil 4" "Starfox" "Metroid", etc., I came off as the biggest Nintendo fanboy in existence. My wife fared better than me, her full comments ended up being used throughout their show that day.
Yeah, Icons is probably the best show on that station, its incredibly informative and unbias. Everything else on that station is not worth mentioning to anyone who takes gaming as seriously as most of the people who have commented on this post.
