After our long summer break its time to get back to school our regular podcast. We welcome our first guest of the season: Jake Tucker, founder of the educational VideoBrains event and freelance games journalist.
What have you been playing?
- Jake has spent the day sealed away in a Vive in a basement somewhere, so we quiz him about his time on Hollowpoint and what it’s like to return to meat space. We also give recommendations for keeping cool while in VR (parental discretion advised).
- Jake has been playing Rainbow 6 Siege every day since it was released and sets about trying to impress upon us how good it is. He’s also been playing Rimworld, which is like Dwarf Fortress in space, just without the broken bits (well, apart from broken limbs).
- Dean has realised that Smite wasn’t all that and has fallen hard for his first MOBA love: Paragon. As a consequence he hasn’t been playing much else…
- Susan tells us about her Summer of Starbound. And she’s playing some Picross game?
Guest Spotlight
- We talk to Jake about the trying time of Q4 as a freelance games journo and try to get him to spill his beans on his favourite writing gig. We regret asking him what his weirdest experience was when we hear about the catnips game, and get his advice on getting into games journalism.
- We also learn more about his project VideoBrains, a super cool monthly event in London that’s been described by Vice as ‘The Ted Talks of Videogames’. We find out about how they pick speakers, their new Zine
- Jake recommends some standout talks to watch on their Youtube channel: 3 Things I Learnt Making Nuclear Throne by Rami Ismail, 20 Years a Doom Modder by Matthew Tropiano, Pop Up Pirate Extreme by Grant Howitt, and How to Ruin Videogames by Meg Jayanth.
Theme of the Week: Back to School!
- After our unexpected summer break, it’s time to go back to school! To cheer ourselves up we think about our favourite games set in school and Jake wins for thinking of the most relevant game.
Two Truths, One Lie
- The hosts won last season (and not because we deliberately quit while we were ahead, honest). Jake kicks us off with some statements involving ridiculously huge Blu-Ray collections, video game events on every continent and full-body xenomorph suits.
You can follow Jake on Twitter (@_jaketucker) and find out more about his work at jaketucker.com. Find out more about VideoBrains, or maybe follow them too (@videobrains).
The next VideoBrains event (and also their 2nd birthday!) takes place on 27 September in London – get tickets here.
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Ready Up Podcast theme music courtesy of Tommy Tallarico
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