Remember The Blog #3 - Do you YouTube?

It's May Long Weekend! (Here in Canada, anyway.) Do the rest of you get a long weekend in May? If you don't, call in sick on Monday and take one with us. You earned it.

This is just a quick note to say thank you, thank you, thank you to all of you that have reached out with advice, words of encouragement, or just comments about video games since I started plugging this whole "level up project". I sincerely love talking about video games, and it makes me happy when I open Twitter or Instagram and see comments from people just talking about what they're playing, or sharing their opinions on a game I've posted about or whatever. My end goal with this is really to build a community where we can geek out together, and we're taking steps forward!

Our YouTube channel is coming together. You have to hit 100 subscribers to be able to name your channel, and luckily my old comedy YouTube channel was there. I don't post a lot of my stand-up online (although some of it is available at abcomedy.net!!), so I just converted over to a "Remember The Game?" channel.

All that's there right now is audio only videos of our podcasts (every episode except one, because I ran into a copyright issue). So if you're at work and need some background noise, they're a great option! More is coming though. Like I've mentioned already, I'm attempting to record some Let's Plays, retro game reviews, and some other stuff that'll all show up on there. If you're on YouTube and want to throw us a subscription, well that would be just incredible.

We're at youtube.com/rememberthegame -

Click the picture to go to our YouTube channel! Please????

And if you have a Youtube channel, leave it in the comments! We'll sub back! Let's pick each other up and support each other, dammit! 

Again, thank you all for supporting this stupid thing. Enjoy your long weekend (wink wink), and go play some video games.

Adam

Remember The Blog #2 - Let's Take Our Shot

Hey guys! Remember when I said I would post a weekly blog on here? And it lasted one week?

Of course you don't. I didn't either. Anyways...

First and foremost, I want to thank everyone that listens to the podcast. Again. I know I say it about twenty times per episode, but I'm incredibly humbled that anyone cares enough to listen to me and my friends rant and swear (that's mostly me) about old video games. Our listener numbers are still climbing, and I'm grateful.

When I launched this podcast last year, I didn't know if anybody would listen. I had a previous conversational comedy podcast that lasted about 80 episodes, and never did more than about 15 downloads per week. I had low expectations for Remember The Game?, and my goal was to simply find something I was more passionate about, and use it as a way to continue trying to get comfortable behind a microphone. Over the last 12 months, it's grown from a hobby into a full fledged side project, and after months of tire kicking, I've decided it's time to try and take the necessary steps to level this show up.

I'm not quite ready to reveal what those steps are in detail yet, but my hope and plan is to roll everything out with episode 50 in a few weeks. I've sunk a lot of time and a little money into everything I'm working on, and over the next month my focus will be on learning how to stream, edit videos, and bring all of the additional ideas I have up to a minimum level of quality you've come to expect.

And if you listen to Remember The Game?, you know how low that level of quality is.

Anyway, that's all I really wanted to say. I have a busy month ahead of me as far as stand-up comedy goes, but I'm still going to buckle down and really commit to the unofficially titled "Remember The Game? Level Up" project. I've dragged my feet on these ideas for months. I was afraid nobody would support it, watch it, or care. That's still a possibility, but like Michael Scott once said, "You miss 100% of the shots you don't take". So dammit, let's take our shot.

Thank you all for listening, reading, messaging, and nerding out with me. I hope you continue to enjoy the show, and I'm excited to show you what I've been working on.

Go play some video games.

Adam

Remember The Blog #1 - I Love Retro Gaming

I told you I'd blog eventually!

Thanks for checking out the blog. If you're reading this, you've (hopefully) been listening to the podcast. And if that's the case, thank you. Thank you, thank you, thank you. I know I say it about fifty times per episode, but I can't explain just how much I appreciate the support everyone has been showing Remember The Game? since we launched it last July. Our numbers have increased every month, and we're at almost a thousand downloads every thirty days. Those may not be big numbers to anyone making a living in the podcast world, but it's more than I ever could've imagined we'd see. So really, to all of you that have listened, downloaded, shared, appeared on the show, and supported me over the last thirty-two episodes...

 

I'm going to attempt to post a blog per week on here. Admittedly, it probably won't happen, but I'm going to give it a shot. I came up with the idea for the blog after doing a little homework and looking into ways to grow your podcast audience. One of the common themes in every article was to launch a website/blog to run alongside your podcast. I honestly don't know how many people read blogs in 2019, but I figure it can't hurt. It's also another excuse for me to talk about retro gaming, which is amongst my favourite things on the planet. 

I figured for blog number 1, I'd explain why that is.

I was born in 1983, and the NES launched in North America in 1985. I don't specifically remember when we got ours, but I also can't remember a time before it. I've been gaming my entire life. From playing the Super Mario Bros games with my little brother (we used to call fire power "spit"), to being obsessed with Earthbound, to spending way too many hours wrestling with my buddies on the Nintendo 64, I've loved video games forever. My favourite Christmas presents every year were new video games. We knew exactly how big the box for a game was, and we'd dig them out and put them on a pedestal on Christmas morning. Video games are as much a part of my life as breathing, eating, and sleeping. Some would call me an addict. I prefer the term "enthusiast".

We were a Nintendo household through and through. NES -> SNES -> Nintendo 64. We had Gameboys (separate ones of course. Sharing wasn't an option), so we could play video games on the road. I loved it. We all did, right? If you grew up in the 90's, you played video games. It wasn't as mainstream to be a nerd as it today, but we all were. Trading games with your friends or renting a game on the weekend and playing something new was the most exciting thing ever. Who didn't play a crappy game over and over and over as a kid, because it was the only game you had?? (Bart vs The Space Mutants, I'm looking at you). Just the best times. And when you weren't playing the games, you could watch their cartoon counterparts. Remember The Super Mario Bros Super Show?!

The NES was my gateway drug, but the Super Nintendo was my cocaine. To this day, the SNES is hands down my favourite console of all-time. The 16-bit graphical style is still the best in gaming history, in my opinion. And the games? C'mon.....

Link To The Past, Super Mario Kart, Super Metroid, Earthbound, Final Fantasy 2 & 3, Super Punch-Out!, Mega Man X, The Donkey Kong Country games, NHL '97, Turtles In Time, F-Zero, Sim City, Star Fox, Yoshi's Island...it's quite possibly the greatest library in gaming history. And it's capped off with my favourite game ever - Super Mario World. I'm excited just sitting here listing off these games...

I don't know why retro gaming pulls at my nostalgia heart strings like it does. I grew up watching cartoons, and listening to certain music, but those things just doesn't trigger the same emotions gaming does for me. I've never escaped Nintendo's grasp. When the Wii launched their Virtual Console, and games from my childhood started becoming readily available again, I lost my mind. I probably spent more money on the VC than I did on actual Wii games. It re-ignited the passion I had for those old titles.

When Nintendo released their NES and SNES classics (and I was finally able to get my hands on them), I was in heaven. Admittedly, I hacked both of them, and filled them with games from my childhood. I travel for work a lot now, and I take them on the road with me so I can get my fix while I'm killing time in hotel rooms. I constantly go back and replay games I've played through countless times before, instead of focusing on more of the new titles coming out these days. There's something about the simple graphics, the music, the ridiculous difficulty....it helps me relax. Maybe that's why they have such a hold on me. Retro games take me back to being a kid, before I had bills, responsibilities and grey hair. They're like a portal into an alternate universe, where my only concern is getting through this level without dying and losing my spread gun. (Bonus points if you know what I'm talking about).

I love retro gaming. If I could make a living just playing and talking about old video games, I would in a heart beat. And maybe someday that'll be option. But until then, they're just my go to hobby. Playing them is the best, but talking about them on a weekly podcast is almost as fun. It's another way for me, my guest, and my listeners to get our nostalgia fix. Knowing that so many of you enjoy talking about those games as much as I do feels really good. I'm glad you're all enjoying these trips down memory lane as much as I am. We're just getting started. 

- Adam