Gaming podcast review 5 Yog-Sothoth.com: Horror on the Orient Express
Horror on the Orient Express (HotOE) is an audio recording of the Bradford Players going through one of the classic Call of Cthulhu scenarios. It comes from Yog-Sothoth.com and the same group as Yog-Radio. The Keeper of Arcane Law is Paul of Cthulhu, one of the regular hosts of Yog-Radio (see podcast review 1) and also has the other regular hosts of Yog-Radio among the players. The players are from the Bradford roleplaying group that the hosts of Yog-Radio belong to.
Content
It is interesting to hear a gaming group in action and it is striking how similar the experience of play is to my experience, though this may be more typical of groups in the UK than elsewhere. I have to admit when I first heard of podcasts of gaming sessions I was skeptical about how entertaining they would be to listen to, but this podcast has changed my mind.
Got to admit I find the group in play seem to be very keen on their meals in character, but more seriously it is interesting to hear how the game progresses and how another group of gamers interact. There has been a change in the player line up, which is not always unusual with a long running campaign and this is done with a change in the adventuring party membership. The interplay between the group shows that many of the players have gamed with each other before and there are references to the Masks of Nyarlathotep campaign audio recording that was also released through Yog-Sothoth.com.
Technical
The technical quality is good on HotOE, with the audio being clear and lacking background or microphone noise. It is recorded in surround sound and it is possible to hear where each of the players are around the table. It is easy to distinguish the different players by their voices and this is a tribute to how cleanly the podcast is recorded.
Conclusion
I think this is an entertaining podcast, which overcame my initial reluctance to listen to gaming sessions and is one of the podcasts where I have listened to all the episodes. If you want to try listening to a gaming session podcast I'd recommend trying starting with episode 1 of this podcast and if you know that you enjoy listenting to this type of content then it is recommended.
Saturday, February 02, 2008
Friday, February 01, 2008
Gaming Podcast Review 4 Meeples & Miniatures
Gaming podcast review no 4.
Meeples & Miniatures is a podcast that covers wargames and boardgames. It has an associated guild at boardgamegeek and website at Meeples & Miniatures. There is one regular host, Neil Shuck, and I have to admit that I do still prefer multi host podcasts, though he does do a good job. On reviews I really feel that having two people compare notes is better, though of course as a text reviewer my efforts are usually solo.
Content
Meeples & Miniatures has frequent reviews, interviews and listener feedback as its regular content. What brought me in to listening was the interviews and these are probably the highlight of the content to me. The reviews are also useful to me and listener feedback is an important part for any podcast to engage with its audience. It does look like there will be an increased focus on miniatures games in 2008 which is something that I welcome.
Technical
The technical quality is respectable on M&M, with the audio being clear and lacking background or microphone noise. Generally the editing is pretty unobtrusive and helps make the content easy to listen to.
Conclusion
I do like this podcast and will be a regular listener in future, particularly as I do find the content useful, about my only reservation is my preference for multi host shows.
Meeples & Miniatures is a podcast that covers wargames and boardgames. It has an associated guild at boardgamegeek and website at Meeples & Miniatures. There is one regular host, Neil Shuck, and I have to admit that I do still prefer multi host podcasts, though he does do a good job. On reviews I really feel that having two people compare notes is better, though of course as a text reviewer my efforts are usually solo.
Content
Meeples & Miniatures has frequent reviews, interviews and listener feedback as its regular content. What brought me in to listening was the interviews and these are probably the highlight of the content to me. The reviews are also useful to me and listener feedback is an important part for any podcast to engage with its audience. It does look like there will be an increased focus on miniatures games in 2008 which is something that I welcome.
Technical
The technical quality is respectable on M&M, with the audio being clear and lacking background or microphone noise. Generally the editing is pretty unobtrusive and helps make the content easy to listen to.
Conclusion
I do like this podcast and will be a regular listener in future, particularly as I do find the content useful, about my only reservation is my preference for multi host shows.
Tuesday, January 29, 2008
Gaming Podcast Reviews 3 Fear the Boot
Gaming podcast review no 3. Fear the Boot
Fear the Boot is a RPG podcast which has been running for a number of years having reached nearly 90 episodes. This has a strong humorous element in its content which usually works on a round table discussion between the hosts about a RPG related topic. The hosts come from a pool of gamers including some female hosts, which in my listening so far has been unusual.
Fear the Boot is very much in the 'zoo' format that has been used by some talk radio shows, this is reasonably successful, but does give a tendency for the hosts to be talking to each other rather than the listener. The upside of this is that it does give plenty of viewpoints in discussion.
Content
There is useful discussion of gaming topics in the episodes I've listened to, for example common GMing mistakes and common player mistakes. I will admit I've only sampled a limited amount of the total number of episodes as it has a frequent update schedule and had hit 88 episodes by the time I started sampling Fear the Boot.
Technical
The technical quality of this podcast is high with all the hosts voices being clearly heard and the music not drowning voices during talkover. There is not any additional content (at least with the iTunes Music Store that I used to download the episodes) on the episodes like pictures or additional content.
Conclusion
I find that Fear the Boot is high on the entertainment factor, but it can be hard to get directly to the useful content like gaming tips. This doesn't apply to all the episodes and I will still listen to it, but it doesn't have the must listen appeal of Yog-Radio to me. I think that this is a successful podcast given the frequency and continuity of the episodes so I suspect that there are many people who do like this podcast.
Fear the Boot is a RPG podcast which has been running for a number of years having reached nearly 90 episodes. This has a strong humorous element in its content which usually works on a round table discussion between the hosts about a RPG related topic. The hosts come from a pool of gamers including some female hosts, which in my listening so far has been unusual.
Fear the Boot is very much in the 'zoo' format that has been used by some talk radio shows, this is reasonably successful, but does give a tendency for the hosts to be talking to each other rather than the listener. The upside of this is that it does give plenty of viewpoints in discussion.
Content
There is useful discussion of gaming topics in the episodes I've listened to, for example common GMing mistakes and common player mistakes. I will admit I've only sampled a limited amount of the total number of episodes as it has a frequent update schedule and had hit 88 episodes by the time I started sampling Fear the Boot.
Technical
The technical quality of this podcast is high with all the hosts voices being clearly heard and the music not drowning voices during talkover. There is not any additional content (at least with the iTunes Music Store that I used to download the episodes) on the episodes like pictures or additional content.
Conclusion
I find that Fear the Boot is high on the entertainment factor, but it can be hard to get directly to the useful content like gaming tips. This doesn't apply to all the episodes and I will still listen to it, but it doesn't have the must listen appeal of Yog-Radio to me. I think that this is a successful podcast given the frequency and continuity of the episodes so I suspect that there are many people who do like this podcast.
Monday, January 28, 2008
Gaming Podcast Review 2 All About Miniatures
And I produce the second of my gaming podcast reviews, there was a big of a struggle deciding which one to review as I have been listening to several recently and I enjoying them. I decided on a change of topic from the RPG slant of the first one to a miniatures gaming podcast. So this was a choice between All About Miniatures and Meeples & Miniatures.
Gaming podcast review no 2. All About Miniatures
I've now listened to all of these that have been released. All About Miniatures is a podcast, that is self explanatory in its name. Sadly we've not had any episodes released recently (at time of writing). The miniatures wargames that it covers includes historical, fantasy and SF games largely using larger scale miniatures (25-28mm). The regular hosts John and Dan (John Widerman and Daniel Martin) are engaging and this show has the multi presenter format that I favour. The show is linked to the Miniature General blog, which is John Martin's blog and is again has not been updated recently.
Content usually includes rules and miniatures reviews with many episodes split into two parts to keep the longer part close to the hour mark. The other regular features are feedback and battles in the month. They also have interviews, convention announcements and occasional guest features.
The most useful part of these podcasts to me is definitely the reviews as it is nice to hear a couple of opinions on a set of rules that has definitely been tried out by the reviewers. Another good feature with the reviews is that they do not always agree with each other so there is still a difference of opinion reflected.
Conclusion
A good podcast with a nice interplay between the presenters and useful reviews. I don't like it quite as much as I do Yog-Radio, but I would still say that I recommend it. Hopefully we will get some new episodes this year.
Gaming podcast review no 2. All About Miniatures
I've now listened to all of these that have been released. All About Miniatures is a podcast, that is self explanatory in its name. Sadly we've not had any episodes released recently (at time of writing). The miniatures wargames that it covers includes historical, fantasy and SF games largely using larger scale miniatures (25-28mm). The regular hosts John and Dan (John Widerman and Daniel Martin) are engaging and this show has the multi presenter format that I favour. The show is linked to the Miniature General blog, which is John Martin's blog and is again has not been updated recently.
Content usually includes rules and miniatures reviews with many episodes split into two parts to keep the longer part close to the hour mark. The other regular features are feedback and battles in the month. They also have interviews, convention announcements and occasional guest features.
The most useful part of these podcasts to me is definitely the reviews as it is nice to hear a couple of opinions on a set of rules that has definitely been tried out by the reviewers. Another good feature with the reviews is that they do not always agree with each other so there is still a difference of opinion reflected.
Conclusion
A good podcast with a nice interplay between the presenters and useful reviews. I don't like it quite as much as I do Yog-Radio, but I would still say that I recommend it. Hopefully we will get some new episodes this year.
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