Cup of Jones - August 5, 2019 (Patreon)

One more week of paternity leave and I'm back at work! Not only that, but next week will be a big one for this Patreon. We're going to be making a lot of changes, and we'll go through all of them during next week's Tuesday night group stream. These changes are based on the recent survey we  posted that got a ton of responses, as well as your continued focus on improving Easy Allies through this show. Thank you for your ideas and patience!

- Brandon


BUSINESS QUESTIONS

BRANDON K GANN
Building off of both a question you answered in the above post and with Easy Livin now in the rearview, I was hoping you could speak as an outside viewer, what did you think did well and could use improvement from a viewer perspective (as opposed to being in the thick of it the past two years)? JONES - It’s all about the venue. Unlike our anniversary shows, we don’t take the time to go and see the venue in person before the event, and I think Easy Livin’ has evolved beyond that. If we do it again next year, I want to have more hands-on time with the venue before our reservation begins, so we don’t have to improvise with the equipment when we get there. The camera setup last year was great, but with no AC the living conditions were very uncomfortable, and I LOVED having the banner in the background this year instead of just throwing a blanket over the windows to block the sun. So every year has stuff I love and stuff I wish was better the next year. The only way to really take advantage of the venue is to plan more beforehand. It’s just tricky to spend a whole day traveling just for prep-work. We haven’t had a post-mortem on this year’s Easy Livin’ yet. I’m looking forward to hearing what went right and wrong from the team and what we could do better in 2020.

ALEX CASTELLANOS
Since you all are re-thinking how you all go about things and re-evaluating tiers / goals / etc., I would suggest that you also re-think one other thing: displaying that amount of money you make per month on Patreon.  I understand why you do it, and to be honest, I like having it shown.  But, most of your contemporaries no longer show the amount of money that they make per month on their Patreon pages and one would assume that it's for good reason.  With all of the changes that EZA is looking to make or not make, could you possibly consider re-formatting things in such a way where the $$/month goal is not at the front and center ($55k goal, $60k goal, etc.) but rather the number of patrons becomes the goal? or some other metric entirely? JONES - This definitely came up during our meeting, and we looked at the positives and negatives of this and lots of other possible changes we could make to goals. There’s no easy answer because it works both ways. It makes our Patreon look good when people see how much we’re bringing in, but it also makes us look bad to our Patrons when that number visibly drops. We’ll obviously talk more about this in the coming weeks, but that was definitely considered.

KIRBU
Any chance you could give us a check-in with your Builders 2 progress in the future, assuming you're sticking with it by then? JONES - Amanda and I will definitely stream it at some point and show off all the stuff that we’ve been building. She’s been great at pointing out small details that I missed because I just blazed through the story stuff.

SAMUEL CARDWELL
A few comments on Easy Livin'. Firstly, it was great! Secondly, I did think the set-up was a little bit of a downgrade from last year. I presume the lack of multi-cam was purely down to logistics, but I did miss the quick and easy changes from co-op cam to multi-ally. I also think the wider set-up made it easier to get  a large group involved - this time, it did sometimes feel like the people at the back of the group were a bit ancillary. Obviously, you've got to take whatever house you can get, but worth bearing in mind for next time! Thirdly, I think the selection of games was really good - a nice mix of new, retro, good, 'dumb'. In hindsight, Shrek was maybe a little TOO dumb, but the allies were still on great form until the last hour or so when it became a bit gruelling. I did miss a properly *long*  full playthrough. I enjoyed DKC2, but it wasn't quite as engaging as either Sunshine or MGS. Finally! Freezy Livin'? Obviously it'd be a big commitment to do it twice a year, but it a cosy winter marathon might be a good way to freshen things up. Ian and Don Hit the Slopes. BLOODWORTH - I miss having multi-cam and the beach shot too. It kind of went down the way it did for two reasons. First, we didn’t want to have to tear apart both the stream room and the control room. Secondly, our view of the beach really couldn’t have avoided including random people you’d be able to identify. Kyle really liked having his coop cam setup, so maybe next year, we can prepare a way to do that without needing the switcher. A lot can definitely change based on the location. We couldn’t have even put the banner up correctly in a lot of places, but the loft allowed us to hang it from the second floor. “Freezy Livin’” though I was already feeling this year. It got surprisingly cold that first night we were streaming. 

STRAWHATNINJA
Would there ever be a game release that would make you move Easy Livin' to a different week? JONES - I imagine there could be, although once the house is booked and everyone’s cleared their schedule for that weekend it’s difficult to move things around, so we’d just have to move forward.

MEGAN LINART
Wondering what the plans were for Gamescom this year? Are you going to do something similar to last year and just react to the trailers? Or not do anything at all. JONES - Right now we just plan to do reactions, similar to last year.


PERSONAL QUESTIONS

STEVES
Do you still get excited to this day when Mr Jones by Counting Crows gets played? JONES - Definitely. It is the song of my people. I should probably learn the words one of these days.

VARUN KACHHWAHA
Thought I'd ask you some questions that were asked on the previous podcast because I was interested in your perspectives on them. Mainly the question about what you think can fail in Death Stranding, and do you think games need to be fun? What do you look for when you play a game? JONES - I think Kojima needs to ease up on the “stranding genre” talk. He made a really supernaturally obscure game, but seems frustrated that people don’t understand what he’s going for. I think he needs to make up his mind, because if he thinks there’s a specific way people need to enjoy Death Stranding he’s setting himself up for disappointment. I hope that he can step back and let the game speak for itself. And I usually look for freedom in games, whether it’s freedom of creativity in DQ Builders, freedom of exploration in GTA or Zelda, or freedom of choice in Telltale games or Life is Strange. I’m not a fan of when games tell me I have to play it a particular way, which is why it took me so long to get familiar with the Souls franchise. 

ASBO ZAPPRUDER
I have two random, probably unanswerable questions that came up during Easy Livin' but are too stupid and don't deserve to be read out loud: 1. Why has Cranky Kong aged so much but Mario and Pauline haven't? 2. In both Disney games played by Ben and Damiani, Donald was dragged for having a big butt. Is this a running gag that I somehow missed my whole life or is it just a weird coincidence? JONES - 1. There are some really weird things going on in the Mushroom Kingdom and beyond, and I don’t know if we’ll ever understand the reasons why. Multiple dimensions is one way to explain it, but then there’s the complicated relationship between Peach and Bowser. And all the Baby versions? Very confusing. 2. This is not a running gag to my knowledge. I know that he caused scandals in some foreign countries because he doesn’t wear pants. I don’t think he has a big butt. I think it’s just his prominent tail feathers. This sounds like hit-detection nonsense.