3841

No more Brian Leahy on Weekend Confirmed. No goodbyes, he just isn’t on anymore starting with today’s episode. Anyone know what happened?

3842

What I read sounds like he got another job. There was a twitter post about him leaving. I really liked him on that show. He was a voice of reason when the others went off in weird directions and a voice for hardcore gamers.

3843

I miss the 1Up golden age of podcasts.

3844

Yeah, Brian was easily my favorite person on the show. He really was the only one who seemed to either have his head on his shoulders or wasn’t interested in manufacturing the schmaltz or “debate” that the other hosts did. If he shows up on another podcast I’ll definitely check it out.

3845

I’m bummed to hear that Brian is leaving. I haven’t listened to the latest Weekend Confirmed episode yet. Does it at least sound like the parting was friendly? I checked Brian’s Twitter feed and he said his new job is outside the game industry entirely.

3846

Just a short comment about “Brian has moved onto different opportunities and we wish him the best.” Of course, I usually read that same sentence at work in emails after someone was fired or laid off…

3847

nah, he mentioned on NeoGAF that he got some great job opportunity unrelated to games writing or game development and wanted to do something new, so he jumped on it.

3848

I know what you mean, but that “age” lasted like a year or a year and a half, and we need to forget about it. It’s also the paradigm for a lot of people because that’s when they started listening, but that doesn’t mean it was wholly the best.

3849

I’m taking the end of the year Bombcasts very slowly, so I know this is old news, but I wanted to acknowledge that you guys did not exaggerate the length or stupidity of the Minerva’s Den vs. Lair of the Shadow Broker discussion. What killed me is that Brad essentially filibustered his way to victory. He refused to give up and thus, even though no one else agreed with him, GB awarded Minerva’s Den the best DLC award. Again, Jeff Gerstmann was a total asshole during the discussion. He hadn’t played either DLC, but felt the need to interject his opinion regularly, stating over and over that Bioshock 2 was not very good and so he wouldn’t vote for Minerva’s Den.

3850

I suspect his “month-long illness” was actually a “month-long job acquisition.” Good for him; I hope he has great success at his new gig.

That said – why is it so hard for Garnett to get four regular cast members (assuming that’s his goal)? I would think that LA game media types would be jumping at the opportunity to get on Weekend Confirmed.

3851

I’ve really been getting into the Gameshark podcast recently.

Originally I was just listening to episodes with Tom in but I went back and started listening to the first few and am really enjoying it. Everyone’s approaches to subjects are pretty thoughtful and there has been absolutely no sense of platform bias whatsoever.

3852

I wonder what is going on with the Shack. Gamefly hasn’t really done anything with it.

3853

I dunno. The guys seemed to genuinely think that Brian was in bad shape. I don’t think he’d need that much time to interview for jobs either. I guess it doesn’t matter either way now.

Regarding Garnett being able to get four regular cast members, I would think that if you’re doing it for free, appearing on Weekend Confirmed would lose it’s thrill after awhile, especially if you have to fight L.A. traffic to get there. Brian will be sorely missed on WC, that’s for sure.

3854

I generally felt like Brian was the relentlessly cynical soggy blanket … To the point where you could almost always predict exactly how he was going to react to any given subject - usually beginning with a snort.

I haven’t been much enamored with Weekend Confirmed overall, though.

3855

That’s a fairly accurate description. He always seemed to be looking on the bad side of things, even with things he really enjoyed. Garnett and Jeff tend to be relentlessly positive, so I almost welcomed Leahy bringing them back to Earth sometimes. I definitely trusted the guy not to gloss over negatives to tout positives. If something wasn’t great about a game, he was going to let me know.

3856

Yes. Its now one of my must-hears no matter who is on.

3857

During the “filmed before a live studio audience” episode Brian was supposedly out in the audience but too sick to participate in the podcast. Or maybe he had lost his voice? Either way, if he was pretending that’s taking it all the way. Although I find the idea of a Brian Leahy cardboard cutout fooling everyone pretty funny.

And I agree that he wasn’t so much cynical as he was realistic and grounded. Jeff was often effervescent with every thing being “so good” or “awesome” (I swear they over use those two phrases) and Garnett loves or hates something else he overblows every issue for the sake of what he thinks is good radio.

If they get a third chair to replace Brian they should really find someone that balances those things out like he did.

3858

This is Jeff’s biggest problem. Even on TRS he tends to be hyper-positive about video games (though he’ll be more contentious when it comes to movies), and I usually have to bail out of Weekend Confirmed by the half hour mark to avoid the urge to reach through the internet and strangle the joy and happiness out of him. Brian sort of got on my nerves from time to time, but he was by far the most grounded of the three. That show needs a Scott Sharkey or a Ben Croshaw to find fault with anything and everything just to counterbalance the unmitigated positivity and unreasoning stridency from the other two dudes unless they want to be the Sunny 97.pi (you know - that radio station that the one secretary you kind of think is going to just snap one day and start whacking people with a length of pipe keeps going in her cube pretty much all the time) of video game talk, which I have no interest in.

Hell - even 8-4 Play is usually on the positive end of whatever it is they’re talking about (and I can’t blame them - they ARE in the business) and I find them more tolerable.

3859

They had another Shacker on as a guest months ago that I thought was fantastic, but I can’t recall the guy’s name. It wasn’t Zav.

3860

I can dig what you guys are saying about the existing imbalance. I’m probably more sensitive to the cynical these days than the sap. Though, at least Jeff can surprise me sometimes, whereas I don’t feel I’ve ever heard Brian not Comic Book Guy any given subject.

And maybe the balance issue is probably where I just don’t enjoy Weekend Confirmed as much as the old shows. Feels like there was more diversity of personality, that it didn’t require any significant counterbalances.

Regarding the ‘so good’, it’s the ‘so’ alone that drives me nuts. I’ve never much tolerated people using sooooo in place of actually useful modifiers, and for that Garnett ends up being, like, a capital adverbocider for me.