The Community Spotlight 2025.02.22

Welcome to the latest edition of the Giant Bomb Community Spotlight! I, @zombiepie, am once again honored to be your host as we look back at the site-related news and best community creations from the past week!

So, this week, a wide swath of the Giant Bomb staff were either out sick, injured, or recovering from surgery. If you want a hint on how bad Dan's sinus surgery went, here you go. So, many thanks to the staff at GameSpot that filled in this week.

Speaking of GameSpot, this week marked the soft launch of something that has been in the works for a while. You may have noticed more Giant Bomb content on GameSpot as well as Fandom. For example, GameSpot has the live stream of Grubb playing Like a Dragon: Pirate Yakuza in Hawaii on top of Giant Bomb hosting it on its own YouTube account. There's really nothing nefarious about what's going on here as I feel like I've been talking about Giant Bomb working with the other sites for ages. The extra warm bodies allows the staff to cover more content and cross-posting live streams and videos increases their reach and impact. Nothing is being subtracted from Giant Bomb's normal programming unless it is a convention or major gaming-related event. Grubb is excited about some of the ideas and things the site has in the works. While I can't share exactly why, I can say that I'm right there with him.

The people behind Giant Bomb Forever have set up a bot on Bluesky that keeps you updated about every video that gets selected for the fan-run Giant Bomb Forever Twitch account. Give it a follow if you are on BlueSky and want to remain up to date about which videos get selected there.

And one final note before we transition into the actual Community Spotlight. The new anti-spam measures are clearly working and have so far done a great job of keeping the comments and forums clean. However, it does seem like they need about five or so minutes before they "catch" an offending thread or comment. Feel free to continue flagging anything you think is in violation of the rules, but be aware that while the new protocol does seem to work, it's not instantaneous.

Art

It Came From The Giant Bomb Discord! (By: Chron, @thecosmicfly, and @niflhe)

Moving forward, I want to do a better job of at least including the Giant Bomb Discord's invite link and a small exhibition of the cool stuff the community there makes. The issue is that people stopped pinging me about the funny photoshops, mock podcast banners, or weird staff-related works of art that gets posted there a month or so ago. Luckily, I took some time off to recover from a cold this week so I managed to nab these three works.

In the first, Chron shares their podcast art for a hockey podcast, "A Bomb From the Blue Line" led by Bakalar. thecosmicfly and niflhe, on the other hand, ran with maybe the most unhinged moment on Giant Bomb in the last two years.

Gallery

And Dan Ryckert, Who Did Not Shit Himself (By: moondoggydogg)

I mentioned earlier that Dan had surgery this week. If you want a fun extrapolation of Dan's biggest accomplishment this week using The Muppets, you have moondoggydogg on Bluesky to thank!

Bluesky

https://bsky.app/profile/writingongames.bsky.social/post/3lil5g5k3h22l

https://bsky.app/profile/xhp.ca/post/3lipm3neqb22o

https://bsky.app/profile/dennisbprice.bsky.social/post/3lin43rj6hk2f

https://bsky.app/profile/picklegiraffe.bsky.social/post/3liauudayz22w

https://bsky.app/profile/danny.page/post/3lipk3k2tak2j

Videos

GOD SOUP - (Season 7 PREMIERE) - An Animated Giant Bomb Blight Club Series (By: Pickle Giraffe)

With Dan defeating his torment, Drake of the 99 Dragons, it is Grubb's turn to lead some video game-based torture and goodness have they picked a real doozy this time! Yup, he's playing Blues Brothers 2000! To ease us into this jazzy exercise of video game bullshit, Pickle Giraffe has a video animating the debut of this new edition of Blight Club!

Activities

The GB Album Club 079 - Abyss by Unleash the Archers (By: @unclejam23)

This edition of the Giant Bomb Album of the Week club is for Abyss by Unleash the Archers! Have any of you heard of this group before? For fans of the group, most in the club have never heard of them and are interested in hearing more so your suggestions are greatly appreciated!

Kunitsu-Gami: Path Of The Goddess Is The Second Game Of UUGPGC Year 4! Finish By March 1! Mark All Spoilers(By: @bigsocrates)

Kunitsu-Gami: Path of the Goddess made a lot of GOTY 2024 lists but today it was announced as the next pick for the Giant Bomb Game Pass Game Club! If you have any thoughts, especially if you gave it props during GOTY time, share them over here!

Blogs

Why Are So Many Studios (i.e., BioWare, EA, Ubisoft, Take-Two etc.) Betting It All On One AAA Game? (By: @zombiepie)

It sure seems like BioWare has everything on the line for the next Mass Effect. However, as ZombiePie points out, they aren't alone in pegging their future on a single AAA game. Why is that a shared phenomenon by so many struggling studios and is there any record of success?

All PS1 Games In Order: Part 034 (By: @borgmaster)

borgmaster has another blog post looking at every single PS1 game that came out in North America in chronological order! This week, they looked at Crash Bandicoot, Killing Zone, Die Hard Trilogy, and Impact Racing!

Indie Game of the Week 408: Ghostrunner 2 (By: @mento)

Mento only has one blog offering this week for us but that doesn't mean you should skip it! For the latest edition of their "Indie Game of the Week" feature, they checked out Ghostrunner 2! Does the lightning-fast gameplay from the first game marry well with the second game's new powers and motorcycle combat? Read to find out!

Discussion Threads

Activision Sure Isn't Being Subtle About The Next Tony Hawk Game Being A 3 + 4 Remake (By: @zombiepie)

A new countdown timer just debuted on the Tony Hawk website and it "curiously" counts down to 03.04.2025. The numbers?! WHATEVER COULD THEY MEAN?! With it abundantly clear a remake in the style of Tony Hawk's Pro Skater 1+2 is coming for Tony Hawk's Pro Skater 3 and Tony Hawk's Pro Skater 4, what is on your wishlist?

Microsoft and Ninja Theory Are Working On An AI Model To Generate Gameplay And Video Game Assets (By: @zombiepie)

So Microsoft announced a new generative AI system that they claim can create video game assets and gameplay. Do you consider the announcement tone-deaf like others have called it? What do you think of Phil Spencer being front and center in the debut announcement of this AI system?

Is Elden Ring: Nightreign The Souls Game That Haters Of Souls Games Kept Asking For? (By: @topcyclist)

It's obviously the most "different" From product we have seen in a while, but who exactly do you think Elden Ring Nightreign is for? Is the experimental DLC for the hardest of the hardcore Elden Ring fans or people that haven't been on board with From Software's previous works?

NetEase Has Laid Off The Director Of Marvel Rivals And Their Team; NetEase Is Cutting Jobs Across The Board (By: @zombiepie)

NetEase has fired the director of Marvel Rivals and their team and seems to be making massive cuts and layoffs to all of their non-mainland China studios. That's despite the fact Marvel Rivals is making millions and one of the biggest hits of 2024. What are we doing here?

If About 20% Of People Finish Games...Should Devs Focus On Just Making The First Hours Creative & Not Waste Time On The Finale? (By: @topcyclist)

How important are the starting hours to a game in motivating you to see it to the end? Have you ever started a game and immediately knew you wouldn't finish it? Share your thoughts in this thread if a good start plays any role in setting up your motivations to complete a game.

Here's Every Trailer From The February 2025 State of Play; Does Sony Face Less Scrutiny Over Multiplatform Releases? (By: @zombiepie)

We finally have thread with all of the trailers from Sony's February 2025 State of Play event! Were there any highlights from the event for you? Also, do you think Sony gets more "grace" with its multiplatform strategy than Microsoft's?

Lists

Ranking of "Ranking the [Console]" (By: @mento)

As a fun experiment, moderator Mento decided to look at all of the video game consoles with North American or EU releases and rank them and their libraries based on how well they would lend themselves to a ranking video series.

Games I Want To Become Reality Part 2 (By: @alfred_vincent_svent)

The future of games is in a weird spot but Alfred_Vincent_Svent decided to make another list looking at the games they really hope will have a strong 2025 or 2026. Are there any games you'd like to make a strong impression on the Switch 2 or with the new GPUs coming out?

Games of the Year, 2024 (By: @frontman12)

Once again, we have another belated but appreciated GOTY 2024 list but this time from frontman12! As you can discover from checking their list out, they used most of 2024 to get back to a bunch of retro games which makes their list a bit of a treat!

Reviews

@vendettadylan's Poppy Playtime - Chapter 4 review looks at the fourth episode to the highly viral horror game that seems incredibly popular streamers and relays why it absolutely does not live up to the hype or what some of its fans make it out to be.

Wiki Of The Week

Tekken 5

Want a reminder of how you're getting older and no one wins their battle against Father Time? Well, the PS2 port of Tekken 5 is turning twenty this month! With Giant Bomb being a website well-established as being pro-Tekken, give the site's wiki page for Tekken 5 a read to learn all about why it is a widely loved entry in the series.