Back in December I gave my thoughts on the future of West Indies cricket, during their embarrassing tour of Australia. It wasn't a positive outlook, particularly for the notion of the 'West Indies' continuing as one team.
For much of the cricketing world, their first ever success in the Under-19s World Cup is a much needed sign of something blooming in the West Indies, a sign that maybe, just maybe, things were looking up for cricket in the region. Well, I don't mean to be a downer (even if I did, Tony Cozier got there first), but this seems unlikely.
I said in December that 'the biggest problem facing the Windies is not talent.' This is evidently true, else they would not have won this World Cup. Talent has not ever, and will never, be a problem for the islands of the Caribbean. To be honest, I doubt talent is really, truly much of a problem in any country at all. Cricket is the kind of sport that really only needs a small amount of gems to create something magnificent.
As such, this win is not a sign of a turn-around in the administration or coaching of cricket across the islands. If anything, it can be attributed to the right circumstances coming at the right time. If we hold, as I do, that disunity is the fundamental problem with the West Indies, then clearly the solution is to unite them again. So, can you think of anything that happened during the U19 WC that could have united this team?
I can.
Their win over Zimbabwe.
It is unfair on mankading to call the end of that game a mankad, but whatever it actually was, it brought the ire of the majority of the cricket community on their young heads. The language of some of said ire was actually just as poor as the incident itself, and it seems to me that few things can unite a group as much as unfair criticism (perceived or real) being heaped upon them. Keep in mind, prior to this the team had been far from impressive, with just a loss to England and an untidy win over the out-of-their-depth Fiji to their name. Prior to that they had been whitewashed by the Bangladesh U19s in a pre-tournament series. Not exactly the form of a world champion.
But after the win over their poorer full member cousins (as amazing as it is that there can be teams poorer than them), the team just seemed to click. Everything started working, and nothing could stop them. They were, like the Windies teams of old, united.
But this doesn't really mean much in the long run. It's the most short-term solution you can imagine: a one-off event for a tournament most of them will never play in again, though hopefully many will end up playing in the full version in the years to come.
It does nothing to address the fundamental issues facing the senior players, a group they will soon join. It does nothing to address the fundamental issue of total disunity at the (inter)national level. If some of these players get thrown into the national squad straight away, the likely result would be another generation of players thrown away to a war that can't be won.
It's not as though the disputes between players and board have gone away. They're right there, looming over the World T20, just waiting for another chance to interfere in the playing of international cricket.
So all the best to the winning Windies, I hope they savour the victory. But I suspect many of these young men will end up playing international cricket in colours other than maroon.
(As an aside, these are the nations that these players divided into:
Antigua and Barbuda: Alzarri Joseph
Barbados: Chemar Holder, Shamar Springer
Grenada: Ryan John, Emmanuel Stewart
Guyana: Shimron Hetmeyer, Tevan Imlach, Keemo Paul
Jamaica: Shahid Crooks, Michael Frew, Odean Smith
Saint Vincent and the Grenadines: Obed McCoy, Gidron Pope
Sint Maarten: Keacy Carty
Trinidad and Tobago: Jyd Goolie, Kirsten Kallicharan)
Thursday 18 February 2016
Monday 15 February 2016
GameTrailers - Remember Them
Today, out of habit, I once again time 'ga' into my address bar, and clicked on the YouTube channel for GameTrailers, which was the first option.
There I saw that the last video put up on the channel was a "fixed" Bloodborne review, which was uploaded a week ago.
There was no Final Bosman this week. No Huber Hype, no GT Time, no top ten or Mandatory Update.
I still don't really want to believe what I first read a week ago, leaving me mouth agape. It wasn't that I didn't expect it, I just didn't expect it to happen yet. In the back of my mind, and surely everyone else who followed GT as well, this was always going to come. But why now? Surely, they can't have done it yet.
But the GT Reviews channel is also empty of new videos. There hasn't been a Twitch stream for a week either. It really happened.
GameTrailers is no more.
Let's be clear: This is not a surprise. At the very least since it was bought by Defy Media, GT has basically been treading water. Looking back, the signs were there well before that buyout, but when that happened in mid-2014, with half of their staff being fired...that was the beginning of the end. By my (possibly faulty) count, GT was left with fourteen staff after the buyout. Later that year, they were left with eleven, and then ten, then back to eleven and finally ten. By the end of 2015, that had fallen again to nine.
No 'big' website can possibly be run by nine staff, no matter how talented. It is actually quite extraordinary that GT managed to do weekly shows and review so many games for as long as it did with such a skeleton staff. What's even more extraordinary is that they didn't just do these videos - they did the best videos. There was not one other website that I would go to to find out about a game before I went to GT. Not one. Nowhere could you find such a variety of tastes amongst a group of people who were clearly passionate and positive about video games.
No-one sums this up better than Kyle Bosman. He was (despite probably wanting to deny it) the face of this last era of GameTrailers. He had a weekly show that was, in essence, punditry, but unlike most video game punditry on the web, it was made purely out of love and joy, even when the subject matter was deserving of anything but. Somehow, he managed to create his own lore throughout the show that didn't really make sense or go anywhere, yet was somehow still thoroughly watchable, and usually funny. As moderator on GT Time, Bosman was all too happy to acquiesce to another panellists view to keep the tone of the show light, while not giving up on points worth sticking to.
But the one show that stuck out the most was the Twitch stream known as Dumb Game Monday. Unfortunately, most of it has been lost to history, even though the playthrough of Chicago Enforcer should be put in a museum. The show was all about celebrating the kind of games we got as kids, which weren't bad, just silly. We got to appreciate the details of games that no-one else paid any attention to, and, just for a time, learn to value games that aren't the 'best ever'. I loved watching these streams, and while I understand the logic in saying that not saving them leaves them as a moment in time, these were streams worth saving.
Bosman was hardly alone. The eleven staff that recent fans would know best created a community unmatched amongst gaming websites, celebrating the existence of video games, embracing them as a refuge from daily life that is meant to be enjoyed, rather than argued over as sport or followed as an industry.
It wasn't that they were always right. I just finished listening to an early GT Time podcast where everyone (except the far-thinking Michael Damiani) was totally, utterly wrong about how Nintendo's Digital Event would go at E3 2014. It's that they were always worth watching and listening to.
Where now will I get my hype, if not from Huber? Who can match Bloodworth's calm wisdom about games? Who can I listen to talk accurately with a balance of emotion and logic other than Ben? Who can I double down on without Don?
I don't need to speak about how Defy made a massive mistake in not investing in a brand that was building something strong, or how Viacom basically brought about their demise through a long series of bad decisions. I can't talk about the early days, because I wasn't there. All I want to remember is the group with too many Bs in their names that I know as GT.
Matt Blair
Daniel Bloodworth
Kyle Bosman
Don Casanova
Michael Damiani
Brad Ellis
Ian Hinck
Michael Huber
Brandon Jones
Ben Moore
Elyse Willems
You've done a lot for games and the gaming community, even if it may not look like it. Hopefully, we'll see you all again soon.
There I saw that the last video put up on the channel was a "fixed" Bloodborne review, which was uploaded a week ago.
There was no Final Bosman this week. No Huber Hype, no GT Time, no top ten or Mandatory Update.
I still don't really want to believe what I first read a week ago, leaving me mouth agape. It wasn't that I didn't expect it, I just didn't expect it to happen yet. In the back of my mind, and surely everyone else who followed GT as well, this was always going to come. But why now? Surely, they can't have done it yet.
But the GT Reviews channel is also empty of new videos. There hasn't been a Twitch stream for a week either. It really happened.
GameTrailers is no more.
Let's be clear: This is not a surprise. At the very least since it was bought by Defy Media, GT has basically been treading water. Looking back, the signs were there well before that buyout, but when that happened in mid-2014, with half of their staff being fired...that was the beginning of the end. By my (possibly faulty) count, GT was left with fourteen staff after the buyout. Later that year, they were left with eleven, and then ten, then back to eleven and finally ten. By the end of 2015, that had fallen again to nine.
No 'big' website can possibly be run by nine staff, no matter how talented. It is actually quite extraordinary that GT managed to do weekly shows and review so many games for as long as it did with such a skeleton staff. What's even more extraordinary is that they didn't just do these videos - they did the best videos. There was not one other website that I would go to to find out about a game before I went to GT. Not one. Nowhere could you find such a variety of tastes amongst a group of people who were clearly passionate and positive about video games.
No-one sums this up better than Kyle Bosman. He was (despite probably wanting to deny it) the face of this last era of GameTrailers. He had a weekly show that was, in essence, punditry, but unlike most video game punditry on the web, it was made purely out of love and joy, even when the subject matter was deserving of anything but. Somehow, he managed to create his own lore throughout the show that didn't really make sense or go anywhere, yet was somehow still thoroughly watchable, and usually funny. As moderator on GT Time, Bosman was all too happy to acquiesce to another panellists view to keep the tone of the show light, while not giving up on points worth sticking to.
But the one show that stuck out the most was the Twitch stream known as Dumb Game Monday. Unfortunately, most of it has been lost to history, even though the playthrough of Chicago Enforcer should be put in a museum. The show was all about celebrating the kind of games we got as kids, which weren't bad, just silly. We got to appreciate the details of games that no-one else paid any attention to, and, just for a time, learn to value games that aren't the 'best ever'. I loved watching these streams, and while I understand the logic in saying that not saving them leaves them as a moment in time, these were streams worth saving.
Bosman was hardly alone. The eleven staff that recent fans would know best created a community unmatched amongst gaming websites, celebrating the existence of video games, embracing them as a refuge from daily life that is meant to be enjoyed, rather than argued over as sport or followed as an industry.
It wasn't that they were always right. I just finished listening to an early GT Time podcast where everyone (except the far-thinking Michael Damiani) was totally, utterly wrong about how Nintendo's Digital Event would go at E3 2014. It's that they were always worth watching and listening to.
Where now will I get my hype, if not from Huber? Who can match Bloodworth's calm wisdom about games? Who can I listen to talk accurately with a balance of emotion and logic other than Ben? Who can I double down on without Don?
I don't need to speak about how Defy made a massive mistake in not investing in a brand that was building something strong, or how Viacom basically brought about their demise through a long series of bad decisions. I can't talk about the early days, because I wasn't there. All I want to remember is the group with too many Bs in their names that I know as GT.
Matt Blair
Daniel Bloodworth
Kyle Bosman
Don Casanova
Michael Damiani
Brad Ellis
Ian Hinck
Michael Huber
Brandon Jones
Ben Moore
Elyse Willems
You've done a lot for games and the gaming community, even if it may not look like it. Hopefully, we'll see you all again soon.
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