Visiting Tokyo with Arin (Game Grumps) & Jirard The Completionist!

[Badnik Mechanic]

Ok so let me elaborate with my stance on this video today.

When I used to watch Game Grumps back when jonTron was on it, it made me laugh, I enjoyed it.

Other than that, I don't have any real thoughts or opinion regarding Arin or Jirard, I'm aware of Jirard's stuff, but I don't watch it.

Now look at this video, they invited the pair to Tokyo, all expenses paid to make a video to promote Sega/TSR. I'm assuming it's for TSR since that's how the video ends and we see some blury over the shoulder game play during the video.

What does any of this have to do with promoting Team Sonic Racing? There is nothing here that makes anyone excited for the game, nor does it do anything to show a consumer how much fun it is or how the game works.

The fact they've picked Arin is irrelevant. The fact they picked Jirard is irrelevant.

They could have asked me to go. They could have paid anyone else on earth to go. They could have just hired an intern, put a sock puppet on their hand and done the exact same video...

.... And it still wouldn't have advertise or promoted the game in any worthwhile respect.

The issue is, the video was just a paid holiday for two people who don't work for Sega to pretend to promote the game, the video does nothing for the game in any respect you could replace everyone who appears in this video with anyone else on earth and it still wouldn't promote the game. 

 

That's why it's awful. That's the real controversy here, it's a completely pointless video which doesn't do what it should be doing and must have cost in the tens of thousands of dollars to make, the flights and hotel costs alone put it close to the 10k mark.

[RedFox99]

15 minutes ago, dbzfan7 said:

Hell I have an image now of a dorky virgin Sonic trying to appeal to the Chad Arin right now. That is how cringy and bad this partnership is.

D-do you wanna talk?

[dbzfan7]

13 minutes ago, RedFox99 said:

D-do you wanna talk?

Virgin and Chad is a meme thing.

Spoiler

 

[RedFox99]

54 minutes ago, dbzfan7 said:

Virgin and Chad is a meme thing.

  Reveal hidden contents

 

I was making a jokey

[pastelspectre]

yknow i quite liked this. perhaps im biased, as i love the game grumps (even if havent been watching them lately) and i do watch jirard on occasion. i thought it was some odd marketing, but i liked it nonetheless.

and i dont think arin necessarily hates sonic. you have to remember, his.. persona on game grumps is exaggerated. im sure he doesnt hate sonic nearly as much as he seems to on the show.

[Rummy]

I know it's been repeated over many times now but i have not seen much gameplay of TSR since TGS 2018. Look, Delaying a game is fine but if you got nothing to hype up, then don't bring it to the table.

Regards to Jirard and Arin, I do think Jirard makes sense as he explained his love for the series and has a more favourable view of it, Meanwhile Arin feels like a misstep, I get he can be pretty good to talk to and is very likely a good person to communicate with. But i fail to see how this helps promote anything, at least if the video was more hands on with the game and such i'd he acceptable, but this is pretty fruitless.

[Badnik Mechanic]

36 minutes ago, Skye said:

yknow i quite liked this. perhaps im biased, as i love the game grumps (even if havent been watching them lately) and i do watch jirard on occasion. i thought it was some odd marketing, but i liked it nonetheless.

and i dont think arin necessarily hates sonic. you have to remember, his.. persona on game grumps is exaggerated. im sure he doesnt hate sonic nearly as much as he seems to on the show.

So what exactly did you learn about the game that got you interested in it? Based on this video?

[pastelspectre]

Just now, Mayor D said:

So what exactly did you learn about the game that got you interested in it? Based on this video?

i didn't say i learned anything about the game. i just said that i enjoyed it. admittedly because of arin. to be honest i have barely seen any marketing for the game asides from music, but there could be more that i have not seen.

[Badnik Mechanic]

1 minute ago, Skye said:

i didn't say i learned anything about the game. i just said that i enjoyed it. admittedly because of arin. to be honest i have barely seen any marketing for the game asides from music, but there could be more that i have not seen.

Well... there we go...

 

That's why people are saying this video was terrible. It didn't matter who was in it, it told people nothing about the game it was supposed to be advertising.

[pastelspectre]

Just now, Mayor D said:

Well... there we go...

 

That's why people are saying this video was terrible. It didn't matter who was in it, it told people nothing about the game it was supposed to be advertising.

that's fair. and that's okay. i didn't say the video was great. i just enjoyed it because of arin. i know people are entitled to their own opinions.

[Meta77]

And that is why they did it. Not to show off anything but for name recognition. You see the title. You then see who they are brining into it. Bam a large segment is sold on that alone. Again as i stated a while back on another thread, Sega can sell sonic to many on his name alone. No gameplay needed.

 

That said Im still baffled why they cater to someone that hates on sonic so much and treats it as a joke. I mean I know some say its his persona. But I like Shantae. I never go out my way to hate on a aspect of it I dislike and then try to ask WF for special treatment or accept any if i did  act that way toward their product.

[Tara]

I think people sort of get the wrong idea of what it means when Arin says his personality on Grumps is exaggerated.  It doesn't mean that what he says isn't his actual opinion (although by nature of the show, it is a more on-the-fly opinion, as opposed to a critical and analytical opinion), but that he exaggerates the actual emotions it brings out in him as a joke.  For example, yeah, obviously I can tell that the "beautiful little moment" bit from the Sonic '06 playthrough was Arin exaggerating his personality for humor's sake, as I don't think anyone outside of certified sociopaths are naturally that theatrical about their disdain for a bad game, but I don't think it changes that the portion of the game in question was, indeed, quite bad, and was the sentiment being conveyed.

Sort of like when someone says "I wouldn't wish this on my worst enemy," with the literal implication being that something is so wretched and inhumane that even the lowest form of scum don't deserve to endure it, but rarely does someone ever actually mean it.  Arin's shtick is pretty much the same principle, but blown up to 11.

[StaticMania]

2 hours ago, Mayor D said:

...it told people nothing about the game it was supposed to be advertising.

Sooo, what exactly is the point of the video then?

What game is it even meant to be advertising? It must not be new.

[JezMM]

I don't mind the video in concept but there was nothing really to it.  The little montages showing off the various things they went to were the only engaging part, and then after we get Aaron summing up what they just did and Jirard and Arin giving almost monosyllabic responses.  The only joke in the video, the ridiculous lighter animation, came from Aaron and the guy editing the video, like... why were Arin and Jirard even there other than to appear in the thumbnail?  I guess the Big the Cat song is kind of their thing but it just all seemed very unsubstantial.  I guess the answer is exactly that though, to appear in the thumbnail lol.

Just seems like a wasted opportunity really, and the whole thing with Game Grumps in particular is very awkward because GG as a brand is not intended for children so Arin can't really act on-brand at all.  If they're gonna do GG stuff they really need to get Dan involved coz like... there's a reason the show is a two-man act, they bounce off each other well and Dan would be there to offset Arin's negativity.

Jirard is a fine fit, though his videos are more script-based as far as I'm aware, he doesn't really do improv like Arin does, so he doesn't really generate any content in this video for that reason either.

[Plasme]

4 hours ago, Mayor D said:

Well... there we go...

 

That's why people are saying this video was terrible. It didn't matter who was in it, it told people nothing about the game it was supposed to be advertising.

No. That's why you don't like the video. Although it's a fair reason not to like it.

The vast majority of people here dislike the video because they think Aaron and the rest of the Social Media team are preoccupied with indulging 'Sonic haters' and that the video is representative of the team's self mockery and self humiliation of the franchise.

[Tracker_TD]

7 minutes ago, Plasme said:

No. That's why you don't like the video. Although it's a fair reason not to like it.

The vast majority of people here dislike the video because they think Aaron and the rest of the Social Media team are preoccupied with indulging 'Sonic haters' and that the video is representative of the team's self mockery and self humiliation of the franchise.

It is possible to dislike the video for more than one reason. As is the case for most people here.

[Plasme]

3 minutes ago, Tracker_TD said:

It is possible to dislike the video for more than one reason. As is the case for most people here.

No one was using Mayor D's point up until his posts. And if anyone was it was a tiny majority of posts.

The vast majority of posts, and the most heavily upvoted ones, were for the reasons I outlined above.

[Tracker_TD]

17 hours ago, Tracker_TD said:

This game's marketing continues to confuse me. At least we hear some tiny snippets of music - Super Sonic Racing has a new remix. 

 

17 hours ago, Jack the Shadow said:

So this was actually marketing for the game? Okay… it sure is something unexpected. I totally didn't connect it with TSR until the end.

 

16 hours ago, Tornado said:

It never ceases to amaze that the company that once came up with "GENESIS DOES" and "Welcome to the Next Level" has decided that the best way to advertise their Sonic games (even above and beyond memeing how much Sonic fucking sucks on Twitter) is to fly YouTubers famous for shitposting about how terrible Sonic always was all the way around the world to so they can get that sick internet meme cred from the people who still think[...]

 

15 hours ago, Wraith said:

why are they spending time and money on things like this instead of game

the best way to advertise games is to...show them being played and enjoyed

do sega employees not even want to play this shit anymore? i'm confused.

 

14 hours ago, GentlemanX said:

This video though... there's virtually no content to it and no relevance to TSR. If you're not going to have your guests talk about the game, there's no reason to include them in the video.

Also, the Tokyo Game Show was last September. Even before the delay, why did it take so long to put this out? This is like early marketing material to try and get people ready for more info, not something for a month and a half from release.

And this was just all the complaints about the marketing as opposed to Arin from the first damn page. Not even all of them, I was wary of making this post too obscenely huge.

[Soniman]

Yeah it's a waste of time but I don't really havr much to get mad over honestly. Believe me I'm tired of this "lel self ironic memes and hey our games suck and we know that and instead of improving anything well keep shitting on ourselves while continuing to make bad content" Era of marketing as much as the next person but it ain't like TSRs fate is riding on this video. Arin has cred and his reputation will attract attention of the kids that watch him regardless of his infamy with Sonic. It's lazy and half hearted marketing but it'll still work

[KHCast]

2 hours ago, Soniman said:

It's lazy and half hearted marketing but it'll still work

I mean, if the goal is to get people to have Sonic in peoples minds for a few minutes no matter the context, sure. But outside that there’s no evidence this would positively help the brand, so I fail to see what “works”. What is this designed to do, and how is it a benefit for both parties? Audiences and children that are fans of Arin aren’t going to suddenly become Sonic fans or tell people to check Sonic shit out. They know and laugh at the guys constant “Sonic sucks” material more than likely