Why the previous editor of Polygon is making a podcast for previous players

In a current episode of Post Games, host Chris Plante explores how video video games can assist gamers perceive dying. He’s interviewing Kaitlin Tremblay, who’s engaged on Ambrosia Sky, a sport about dying.

“What is it about games that is so useful for exploring the topic?” Plante asks.

“I think there’s something really lovely about the way in which games invite players in,” Tremblay says. There is “something quite lovely about asking a person to cooperate and to be a part of the story, and to move through the space.”

It’s a tone, and a substance of dialog, in contrast to any I’ve heard on a gaming podcast earlier than. And it underscores what’s so distinctive about Post Games — and the way it would possibly stand out from different gaming media, by appearing much more like a slower and extra cerebral NPR present.

Within weeks of leaving Polygon, the place he was the editor-in-chief, Plante began Post Games, which he describes as “a weekly podcast about how and why we love video games.” He’s concentrating on an older demographic and fashions Post Games after an NPR-like format with tightly-edited segments and weekly episodes that final for about an hour. And he’s asking followers for help through Patreon to assist maintain it going.

Many different online game podcasts are “almost entirely for people under the age of 30 who can afford to listen to multiple shows that are four hours long this week,” Plante tells The Verge. “Practically everything in games media targets young people — both because it’s being produced by young people and because it’s the demographic sales teams believe they have the best shot at selling.” But gamers over 35, he says, have “very different interests and expectations.” There are lots of people that fall in that class, with the Entertainment Software Association reporting that greater than half of the 205.1 million Americans enjoying video video games are older than 35.

“It’s really basic supply and demand shit,” he says. “And yet very few places want to meet this demand. The publications older audiences turn to for information — newspapers, magazines, and audio — have given gaming culture scraps at best, and worst, ignored it entirely.”

Before I am going any additional, I ought to make just a few disclosures. Plante, till May, was the editor-in-chief of Polygon, previously The Verge’s sister web site devoted to gaming and leisure. He was a co-founder of Polygon when it launched in 2012, and he later labored at The Verge from September 2014 to July 2017. I by no means labored with him straight, however I met Plante for the primary time in particular person earlier this 12 months over dinner on the Game Developers Conference.

This is all to say that when Vox Media introduced on May 1st that it offered Polygon to Game Rant proprietor Valnet, and Plante mentioned that he wouldn’t be a part of the positioning shifting ahead, I used to be bummed for him. But by the top of the month, he had printed the primary episode of Post Games, and he’s posted a brand new episode each week since. It’s an amazing podcast.

Each episode is about an hour lengthy and break up into three acts. Much of the present revolves round interviews on a sure subject, and a 3rd act options Plante discussing the information of the week. But the broader subjects of the episodes don’t at all times align with the present huge factor in gaming.

The first episode was concerning the historical past of the Independent Games Festival’s Seamus McNally Grand Prize, for instance. The second was about attractive video games. When the episodes do sort out subjects of the second, Plante tries to place his personal spin on issues; when Death Stranding 2: On the Beach got here out, Plante scored a uncommon interview with YouTuber videogamedunkey, who initially hated the primary Death Stranding however revisited it two years later.

The present is obtainable totally free with adverts, however individuals who pay a $5 per thirty days subscription on Patreon get early entry to ad-free episodes with a bonus phase and entry to an unique video each month. While planning out what Post Games could be “my logic was, if I wasn’t willing to spend $5 on it, then why would anybody else?” Plante says. The present simply hit 1,000 paid subscribers, and even when issues flatten from there, “that would be enough to cover my family’s health insurance.” If the present will get 2,000 by the top of the 12 months, “I’ll feel confident about this being my future.”

Game journalists who go away or have been laid off from conventional gaming publications are more and more doing their very own factor, such because the worker-owned Aftermath from former Kotaku writers and Patrick Klepek’s parent-focused Crossplay Substack publication. And whereas publications in every single place are going through strain from issues like AI serps and Google Zero, Plante argues there are a whole lot of audiences which might be underserved by extra conventional enterprise fashions due to their reliance on scale.

“As somebody in the media, you hear a lot about how great independent media is because of its benefits for the people who make the media, but I think there’s a larger conversation that needs to be had about the benefits that it has for the audience, for the readers,” Plante says. “I think if you focus on the readers and the audience, you will find more business opportunities for more independent creators or more just smaller funded creators.” He additionally says that if mainstream publications don’t need to serve the “humongous and growing audience” of older players, “I’m happy to.”

Plante sees Post Games as his factor for the subsequent lengthy whereas. “My only dream for the future of the show is that I’m doing this in 10 years,” he says.