Charlie Brooker's Gameswipe

[Sulkdodds]

Last night I was standing around in my brother's room while he glared at me waiting for me to leave - a common activity for both of us - when he offhandedly mentioned three things I didn't know.

1) that acerbic TV critic Charlie Brooker likes videogames and used to work for PC Zone.
2) that Brooker had a new show out called 'Gameswipe'.
3) that Gameswipe was on right now.

I duly watched it. Did anyone else? If not, and if you A) in the UK or B) sneaky with IP changers, you can probably watch it on the beeb. Rock Paper Shotgun also did a post about it.

I wish this had been the beginning of a full series.

 

[Deleted member 56031]

I had no idea :O I love brooker going to watch it now

PS is this not a full series like newswipe and screenwipe?

 

[kupocake]

I wish this had been the beginning of a full series.

Well yeah. As it was, it was a fifty-minute long and quite tired in-joke that bewailed the rushed treatment video games get on TV that was... err, rushed. Also, it's not like he hasn't already covered games TV on screenwipe.

So it's hard to see who it was all for really. Not enough insight into the industry to be a true 'wipe' treatment of games, and probably not enough Brooker humour to keep regulars all that impressed. But then it's not easy to make a show like this. The cutaways to TV industry talking-heads were quite amusing, but I doubt they'd have played all that funny to someone who doesn't understand the quirks being talked about (because I, and everyone else here have had a conversation about 'that bit in game X' and fell about laughing with my geek friends whilst everyone else looks bemused, no matter how you try to deliver it). Still, the geek household still got to sit there cheering when their favourite games came up.

Nevertheless, Brooker just said via twitter that 'Gameswipe easily outdid both Screen & News Wipe in terms of 'numbers' last night'. So perhaps appealing to a supposed 'mainstream' is totally missing the point anyway, because 'x-wipe' has never been a prime-time series and games are totally more 'mainstream' than we dare to suggest. He also said that he tried to get Yahtzee on the show 'but there were contractual / practical hurdles'. Which is maybe a shame, maybe not... because I've always thought of Yahtzee as pretty much the same thing.

First PCZone review I ever read was one of his: of Final Fantasy VII nonetheless.

 

[comoxer]

I wish I knew this was on, I presume it will be repeated though.

Ill always remember reading one of Charlie Brookers controversial articles in PC Zone featuring pictures of kids hitting monkeys over the heads with hammers and other assorted violence towards animals. The Crazy guy

 

[kupocake]

11:20pm tomorrow, BBC Four.

First of six part video on Youtube

 

[Deleted member 56031]

Just watched it yeah and being a charlie brooker fan I did enjoy it but being a "hardcore" gamer I found it more general than I would have like considering brooker's background.

BTW:
-I wouldn't put COD5 in the same boat as GTA
-I can't believe they got in a reference about rapelay
-I really found the dara obriain bit cringe worthy. At first I agreed with him a little cos some games can just be ridiculously hard and unlokcing extra content can be a major pain in the arse but honestly I can not see how anyone (who at least made it that far anyway) can't finish gears of war at least on easy.

Also if they couldn't get yahtzee than how did they get someone else from the escapist?

 

[CR0M]

WHAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAA.... Charlie Brooker is funking ACE.
Thanks for the heads up Sulkdodds, I will be watching this with a giant bucket of popcorn and a hardon.

 

[Lobster]

I loved the montage of british videogame bannings over the years. It seems amazing that Death-Race caused such a fuss when it was 4 white icons flickering around a black void.

 

[Kadayi]

1) that acerbic TV critic Charlie Brooker likes videogames and used to work for PC Zone.

This I indeed knew.

I saw the link at RPS so watched it on the old BBC Iplayer.

The failing of it is the fact that its not a series. Trying to encapsulate gaming as a whole in a 50 minute show is an impossibility, to the extent that you can only gloss over subjects rather than go into depth on them. Were it one show about say the evolution of the platform game, or the FPS it would be better, because not only would you be able to introduce the principals, but you've also be able to talk about how they involved. I'd of liked to hear Brookers take on the GTA games in full, but instead were treated to a few derogatory remarks that don't really go anywhere.

Needs full series basically. Still entertaining otherwise.

 

[Deleted member 56031]

yeah I would love this to be a full series quite disappointed

Although new series of newswipe next year, I really liked newswipe

 

[Laivasse]

I just watched it and liked it more than I expected to, considering my response to Brooker's stuff is sometimes more lukewarm than that of most other people. I was worried that he'd fall into the apologistic trap of saying 'yes, all games are dumb, but look at this ONE really good game, PLEASE BELIEVE ME I'M NOT A DUMB KID LIKE THE OTHER GAMERS HONEST' - something that Yahtzee is prone to, incidentally. There was a little of that, but from his revelling in the violence of CoD, GTA4, etc. I was glad to see that, on the whole, Brooker doesn't think that games need to apologise over-much for tending to appeal to the lowest common denominator (since books, music and film are all guilty of this too).

I was also pleased to see the featurette on storytelling in games, but was disappointed when it became apparent how retarded the guy talking was. Does L4D really deserve to be mentioned in a section about STORYTELLING (other than as an opportunity to boast about having talked to Gabe Newell)? Is Driver really a better cinematic experience than GTA:VC because people jump out of the way of your car? REALLY??? CoD has a better story because of some guy's moustache???? What?! There is a good point to be made about storytelling in games but that guy derailed too soon and too spectacularly to be able to make it.

Dara O'Brien's part was just typical of someone appearing too old and unaccustomed to gaming to really know what they should be doing with a control pad. Perhaps the inaccessibility of games to certain demographics is an interesting topic, but it's hardly unique to gaming as a medium; in all other media, too, certain people find certain genres too difficult and unrewarding to be worth their time. That whole part came off as sounding like some middle aged man trying to talk with authority about the rap music his son likes.

I think there's definitely potential for a series, but I can't imagine how much work it would take to fit that kind of content and polish into a longer running show.

Should such a series ever come into being, a slot for Zero Punctuation would be absolutely perfect for it. Brooker and Yahtzee appear to view the gaming world (as well as the non-gaming world) with a very similar eye. They would have to wrangle over who would get to do all the reviews, but that would be a minor consideration in the face of how perfectly Yahtzee should be able to fit himself into Gameswipe as a minor feature. The pacing of it just made me think that Brooker was going to segue into an episode of ZP at any moment, and it would be similar to stuff Brooker has incorporated in the past (such as enlisting the aid of David Firth and his animation for Screenwipe). Of course, the Escapist aren't going to let go of their sole entertaining bit of content easily.

tl;dr- pretty good

 

[Dalamari]

Fun show, hope it gets picked up