Article contributed by David Allen
In the world of video game entertainment, streaming reigns supreme. Platforms like Twitch host countless entertainers glamouring for attention and ad revenue. Watching others play video games has become a cultural phenomenon. Turner Tenney, better known in gaming circles as Tfue, owned the most followed active Twitch account as of July 2020, with a mind-blowing 7.8 million subscribers.
Streaming, however, is not the alpha and omega of gaming-related entertainment. On YouTube, fans of video games have a long history of creating imaginative and unique content. In the streaming arena, content creators set themselves apart based on the games they stream or the personalities they adopt. YouTube content creators, however, have achieved a delightful diversification and specialisation.
YouTube gamers offer some of the most unique, interesting, and informative takes on gaming-related content. Here are five YouTubers who deserve a lot more subscribers.
5. Larry Bundy Jr. – 385K Subscribers
Larry Bundy Jr, also known as “Guru Larry”, is a well-known entity, particularly among European gamers. He’s popped up on several British gaming television channels in the past, including Rapture TV, XLEAGUE.TV, and Game Network. A former manga-style artist who worked with companies such as Bungie and Rockstar, Bundy now creates several series on his YouTube channel.
The best of these series, by far, is Fact Hunt. The show, by its very nature, deals with obscure, weird, and fascinating gaming facts. The Fact Hunt banner covers a diverse range of topics, including Six celebrities who ruined their own games, Five angry programmers who hated their own games, and Four cases of idiotic censorship of retro games. Bundy has a real knack for digging up little-known facts about gaming history.
The success of Bundy’s YouTube series has even spawned a book, Fact Hunt: Fascinating, Funny and Downright Bizarre Facts about Video Games. Much like his YouTube videos, Bundy’s book digs deep for weird, obscure, and forgotten incidents in gaming history.
In short, Bundy’s channel is a treasure trove of information for any fan of the gaming industry.
4. Stop Skeletons from Fighting – 281K Subscribers
Derek Alexander began his YouTube career paying homage to James Rolfe’s work. Rolfe, of course, created the “Angry Video Game Nerd” character, whose profanity-laden reviews of retro games have made him one of the most successful YouTubers of all time.
Alexander started his YouTube career as the Happy Video Game Nerd, reviewing games in a style that mimicked AVGN while shifting the tone from outrage to joy. In 2015, Alexander began collaborating with filmographer, writer, and producer Grace Kramer and renamed the channel Stop Skeletons from Fighting.
The overarching theme of Alexander’s work is still “the joy of gaming”, but the style and quality of content has changed radically. Freed from the constraints of trying to imitate AVGN, Alexander and Kramer have created an exuberant examination of video games.
Although SSFF has created several series, the best, by a country mile, is Punching Weight. Alexander describes the series as “a celebration of the weird, ambitious, and unnecessary” and it delivers in spades. Topics range from Ambitious Game Boy Color Ports to Randomly Generated N64 Games. With a smile on his face and a twinkle in his eye, Alexander explores games that were ahead of their time or bit off more than they could realistically chew.
Punching Weight is simply a fun series, made all the more special thanks to Alexander’s unapologetic love for all things video games.
3. Game Sack – 248K Subscribers
Game Sack is such a blast of fun. The show began in 2011 with hosts Joe Redifer and Dave White. Recently, White left the show and Redifer decided to continue on solo. Although the interaction between the two hosts is sorely missed, Game Sack continues to create high-quality content.
Game Sack is all about presenting the breadth of video games. Episodes usually last 30 to 40 minutes and create a fast-moving overview of games that fit into a particular category. In essence, most episodes are a string of mini-reviews. It’s a blast of content that allows viewers to fully explore a particular gaming niche.
Game Sack includes console and gaming series overviews, but its absolute best content is focused in two series: Left in Arcades and Left in Japan. Left in Arcades focuses on video games released in arcades that were never ported to home consoles. Left in Japan, on the other hand, focuses on Japanese video games that were never localised in the west.
Both of these series allow gamers without extensive arcade experience or extensive collections of imported games to explore some of the very best, and worst, those gaming experiences have to offer. Redifer’s delivery is detail-oriented, yet filled with humour.
With less than 250,000 subscribers, Game Sack is an often-overlooked gem of a show.
2. SNES Drunk – 174K Subscribers
Whereas each Game Sack episode presents a variety of games, SNES Drunk keeps it short and sweet. SNES Drunk is the brainchild of Alex, a mid-30s gamer from Minnesota who attempts to answer a simple question: is a particular retro video game still worth playing today?
Although SNES Drunk features some list-based content about rom hacks or forgotten games, the bulk of content focuses on short reviews that explore the modern playability of retro games. Reviews are usually three to five minutes in length and are perfect little sips of content in between activities.
Modern gamers who are curious about exploring retro games through services like Nintendo Switch Online or the various mini-consoles released in recent years can rely on SNES Drunk to provide succinct evaluations of retro games and how they mesh with modern sensibilities.
1. Jeremy Parish – 53.5K Subscribers
In the world of games journalism, Jeremy Parish has certainly been around the block a time or two. He’s been an editor at 1UP.com, IGN, and USGamer, and currently works as a media curator for Limited Run Games. He also creates a podcast, Retronauts, and regularly publishes content on YouTube. Although he did not coin the term, Parish famously played a role in popularising the term “metroidvania”.
The crown jewel of Parish’s YouTube content is, without a doubt, his Works series. Here, Parish attempts to chronicle the entire output of games for a particular console in order of release. Some videos focus on a singular game, while others combine an overview of two or three games into a single video.
What works best about Parish’s videos is that he brings his experience as a gaming journalist to his video projects. His content is meticulously researched; he always makes an effort to place a particular game into its historical context. His delivery is authentic and authoritative. There have even been several spin-off books of the Works series, which each chronicle a single year’s releases for a particular console.
The biggest drawback of Parish’s project here is that it is simply too big. Given the sheer number of video games released, and the fact that he has begun separate series focused on the NES, the Game Boy, the SNES and the N64, it is highly unlikely that Parish will ever actually manage to achieve completion.
The journey, however, is definitely worth it, even if the destination seems out of reach. The fact that Parish barely has over 50,000 subscribers is a crying shame.
