Wow, end of an era, even for people like me that fell off the RT train years ago. RvB was such a hit (at least the first several seasons, it seems like they ended up making 19?!), and they pivoted to different types of content and kept trying to diversify revenue streams ever since (games, movies, podcasts, etc.)
RT should be remembered as failing in selling out to Fullscreen/AT&T/TimeWarner, etc, etc., but more importantly, engaging in honestly some pretty horrific working conditions that were exposed over and over again throughout the years. They eventually made some changes that moved the company away from being a bro-fest for pals, but only slightly and way too late.
The IP should still have immense value, so it will be interesting to see what happens in that arena.
I think, other than RvB, my favorite memories of RT revolve around Gavin and Monty (RIP). Hopefully the less popular/wealthy employees are taken care of, somewhere far from Austin. The founders though… Gus, Bernie, Geoff, Matt, etc. are all multi-millionaires and/or long gone anyway, and I’m pretty sure each of them have their own controversies to deal with…
Gus Sorola was always a complete piece of shit in my humble opinion and this was never more clear than his lame attempt to attack Jeff Gerstmann over Fallout 4 while hosting what was clearly a Bethesda funded podcast.
Yeah, his shtick of being the weird anti-social sardonic ass got old real fast once it became clear that it wasn’t an act (or once it was an act for so long that it just became his personality). I think working around him and Geoff specifically would have been extremely draining, having to walk on eggshells all the time lest you become the object of ridicule on the podcast/let’s plays.
Looking up all the RT employees that I remember on Wikia, though, it was pretty surprising to see that they ended up being some of the least problematic people there, at least from a legal standpoint. They had their issues, which I don’t want to diminish, but it was always very transparent with them admitting they’re assholes pretty much every chance they got. But, like, Ryan was fired for sexual harassment and grooming, what in the actual fuck?
Obviously this is all parasocial, so who knows what they were, or now are, really like, but playing a dick for 20 years might just make you a bit of a dick.
Ryan being a sociopath was a lot less surprising than it should have been.
And then the post-bro-culture company fired Matt Bragg, a blameless font of positivity and beloved addition to any video. This was a long time coming.
Even if they hadn’t betrayed Ray over streaming, the whole Let’s Play format was going to trend down as Youtube stomped around blindly across people’s livelihoods. The company maybe could’ve been ahead of the curve on managing streamers? But ehhh. Their live content was never as good as their edited content.
These dudes who did the thing > IP
Welp, guess I’m gonna go pirate those too. Fuck you WB. Add it to my collection with Final Space.
Lmao get fucked.
I was a committed fan back when they were so proud of being an indie studio. I paid for sponsorship because I loved supporting them as creators.
Then they sold themselves out, changed sponsorship to a subscription service, tried to squeeze every last penny out of their audience with adds and shitty merch and low quality loot crate shite, all the while they massively expanded their productions as fast as they could, way beyond their means.
And anytime they did some shitty business practices that actually caused some controversy they essentially said “fuck you, we’re right” even when they completely shat on the legacy of Monty, fucked over his Widow, and fired the guy that was essentially his apprentice because he disagreed with all the changes they made to his visions and all the cost saving measures they implemented that tanked that quality of RWBY.
They leadership and key talents all had their heads so far up their own assess they thought they could do whatever they want and get away with it. Whether it was abusing their staff, lying to their audience, being openly homophic and trnasphobic or grooming 16 year old girls.
Honestly it’s a tragedy that it took so long.
Although I do feel slightly bad for the tiny handful of their staff that were genuinely nice people, but overall this is a good thing.
Sheesh, can’t say I’m surprised to see it go. Wishing the best for some of my favorite personalities.
Will Zaslav sell it all off to pay the bills, or just shove all the content into his precious “vault” never to be seen again?
Let’s talk about that.
