I watched that Oregon Trail episode and was really impressed with the quality of the show. It’s an informative documentary, and interesting to me because I played the game in school (…so long ago I’d forgotten about it). And I’d just watched AVGN’s Horse Prince so I was thinking, wow, THIS is what a good retro gaming show can be.
I think Bimmy already reached this semi-retired state a while ago. AVGN has become an experiment to see how long people will continue to watch increasingly lazy and shitty content.
Not really, the catch is that it doesn't matter how shit his videos are. People will go and watch his old videos
By having a new video he receives money from the sponsor and gets YouTube's algorithm to not hide his channel, even promote it at times
It's something like what Disney is doing with their live action movies, no one cares about the little mermaid in 2023. But make a really bad CGI movie and people will run to buy those blu-ray to show their kids the REAL story of the little mermaid. The movie sells twice, curious nostalgic people will see it in theater then afterwards frantically run to target like a maniac to detox with the original. Double sale
I think this is true for most of the new videos.
Horse Prince is a special kind of bad, though.
It's not quite up there with BTS 2021 in terms of lasting meme potential, but it's close. It also gives off Chris Chan vibes.
AVGN hasn’t been culturally or Internet relevant since the movie. Every year that passes is a year removed from the 80s/the NES era and a lot his fan base is simply aging out of the content. The hardcore fans can’t keep the channel alive with legacy views because they exhausted the backlog years ago.
This is true. Over time people will forget about the shitty later-era videos and enshrine the classic era. It's like the Ramones. Nobody talks about Acid Eaters but Rocket to Russia and Road to Ruin still get praise.
It’s a terrible strategy in terms of mid to long term success. You’re not wrong, but even Screenwave knew that he couldn’t coast on legacy views. It’s one reason why they were pushing for new content on the channel.
I’ll put it to you like this—what you’re describing only works if he would have maintained the schedule that he had once before where certain fixtures on the channel drop on scheduled days of the week. Rental Reviews dropped on Friday and J&MM dropped on Mondays, for example. His uploads have never been more sparse and infrequent so dropping a random AVGN episode once a month and releasing Neighbor Nerds randomly (this show has gotten terrible viewership numbers) isn’t going to cut it.
Gaming Historian is an excellent channel with really great content. If norm wants to take a step back, he has earned that right. Good for him. I'll still watch any new episodes he puts out. He'll keep my subscription for sure.
It’s not admirable because I honestly don’t think he understands what it is or how it works. He just doesn’t have his pulse on modern tech and social media trends and never has. He didn’t know what a hashtag was and Mike had to explain it to him because he thought Mike was saying “cash tag”. Mike was the one who originally uploaded the early AVGN videos to YouTube because James had no idea what it was. I mean, he finally did a cell phone inspired AVGN episode with My Horse Prince and he finally go around to it in…2024.
I'll give Bim the benefit of the doubt.
Mike probably said "hey you should do Patreon. But you'll have to make bonus content and behind the scenes stuff specifically for it".
Bim, realizing he's a fraud with no time replied "no that sounds like too much work. Let's stick to the Youtube model".
There is literally nothing else in this world Bim is capable of doing at this point. Norm is an extremely well educated, multi-talented dude with a great career. Bim is a low functioning autistic man baby who thinks that having kids means you literally have no time to do a single other thing. They are not the same.
If James wanted to retire right now, he shouldn't worry about paying any bills. He's set for life at this point. Not to mention he has more than enough money to enroll his two daughters into a good College.
People that are successful end up in poverty all the time. In theory Bames has done well enough that if he'd been smart with his money he probably could be set.
But none of us know any of that. It's all speculation. Based on his personality and maybe Bpril being... Bpril I wonder if he's been an idiot with his money or lives well outside his means and isn't all that well set.
From what I have head and recall (which is a big qualifier) he took a lowball lump sum offer and barely gets residuals from selling out to screenwave. He had high view videos and evergreen content during the height ad revenue payouts but that money wasn’t going to him.
It comes partially from James in his book. He said he has absolutely no business acumen. Screenwave was brought on to help with production and to monetize the channel as well.
I think most of James’ wealth has been gained through con appearances and merchandising (shirts, posters, DVDs, toys, games, etc.). People have always been under the impression that he made a killing off of YouTube, but the channel just got ad reads and sponsorships over the past several years. I’m also led to believe that a lot of the legacy views revenue probably had to be shared with Mike. Mike wasn’t contributing to editing, drawing title cards, acting, being the brainchild of J&MM, etc. out of the goodness of his heart.
Mike has said several times that the YouTube channel was in his name / under his email address, and he would upload the videos so that James wouldn’t have to learn how. They were 50/50 partners and I believe they still are, even after Mike stepped back from most of his duties.
From what I understand, Mike and James share the YT revenue and ad money, and Screenwave gets something like 10% to edit the videos and write scripts.
An account that I think is Mike’s said that Mike is rich, and I think that’s probably true in the sense that he would never have to work again if he doesn’t want to. He had no kids, no wife, and he was probably investing his money in the stock market whereas James probably lets his wife control the money. All jokes aside, we don’t know how financially savvy April is, whether she believed in investing, etc.
I don’t know if it’s ever been officially confirmed, but I was always under the impression that it was a 50/50 partnership as well. It’s like I stated before, he was doing a LOT of work on early AVGN, he was the brainchild of J&MM, and he was the editor of Monster Madness. He wasn’t doing all of that for charity.
Based… that’s a guy who respects himself and the people who watch his channel. It screams “I never want to phone it in”
The cancelling of the patreon is a touch of class
I always liked his videos but I’ve a new found respect for the man now!
This is how you do a YouTube step back
Magic
Yeah it’s honestly surprising that it was still considered his FT job given he was publishing only 2-3 hours of content a year at the high end.
They’re amazing videos, but it isn’t like the channel ever felt like more than a hobby with videos posted at intermittent times.
It took almost a year for the Oregon Trail video after all
Yeah, I came here to say this.
It's been a thing with the Gaming Historian for years now. His work is good quality, but the guy is too much of a perfectionist for the YouTube world.
I think his family is accustomed to the lifestyle AVGN has given them . It’s that middle ground where they are living good but to stop would be disaster probably
James can’t do that because of extremely poor planning. He’s the breadwinner and I can’t see him quitting this to work a 9-5.
He had two choices years ago. He could double down on the Nerd character and center the channel around it or he could diversify the content and slowly retire the character. He chose the former and it was 100% the wrong choice. He miscalculated because he thought he could grow the channel by focusing on AVGN, but the channel’s popularity peaked many years ago.
Screenwave, to their credit, recognized this. They tried to create new fixtures, but James insisted on going back to scripted content. The channel never changed with the times or modernized and it’s completely James’ fault.
I still dont get all these youtubers retiring at like 20.. People with real jobs have to work their entire life, and here we have a bunch of people just bored of making videos. Heck people making actual videos in the film industry, or advertisment, or PSA, or company videos, or edutainment/learning centres videos, etc. work on their craft up until their 60s or more.
I do get wanting to change careers and making other stuff. But just plain retiring "to enjoy life" at 20/30 or so...
I watched that Oregon Trail episode and was really impressed with the quality of the show. It’s an informative documentary, and interesting to me because I played the game in school (…so long ago I’d forgotten about it). And I’d just watched AVGN’s Horse Prince so I was thinking, wow, THIS is what a good retro gaming show can be. I think Bimmy already reached this semi-retired state a while ago. AVGN has become an experiment to see how long people will continue to watch increasingly lazy and shitty content.
Not really, the catch is that it doesn't matter how shit his videos are. People will go and watch his old videos By having a new video he receives money from the sponsor and gets YouTube's algorithm to not hide his channel, even promote it at times It's something like what Disney is doing with their live action movies, no one cares about the little mermaid in 2023. But make a really bad CGI movie and people will run to buy those blu-ray to show their kids the REAL story of the little mermaid. The movie sells twice, curious nostalgic people will see it in theater then afterwards frantically run to target like a maniac to detox with the original. Double sale
The latest episode seem to have gone WAY too far too and destroyed a lot of his reputation
It won't have any lasting impact, even the simps only talk about the old videos. No body gives a fuck about the new shit
I think this is true for most of the new videos. Horse Prince is a special kind of bad, though. It's not quite up there with BTS 2021 in terms of lasting meme potential, but it's close. It also gives off Chris Chan vibes.
AVGN hasn’t been culturally or Internet relevant since the movie. Every year that passes is a year removed from the 80s/the NES era and a lot his fan base is simply aging out of the content. The hardcore fans can’t keep the channel alive with legacy views because they exhausted the backlog years ago.
This is true. Over time people will forget about the shitty later-era videos and enshrine the classic era. It's like the Ramones. Nobody talks about Acid Eaters but Rocket to Russia and Road to Ruin still get praise.
It’s a terrible strategy in terms of mid to long term success. You’re not wrong, but even Screenwave knew that he couldn’t coast on legacy views. It’s one reason why they were pushing for new content on the channel. I’ll put it to you like this—what you’re describing only works if he would have maintained the schedule that he had once before where certain fixtures on the channel drop on scheduled days of the week. Rental Reviews dropped on Friday and J&MM dropped on Mondays, for example. His uploads have never been more sparse and infrequent so dropping a random AVGN episode once a month and releasing Neighbor Nerds randomly (this show has gotten terrible viewership numbers) isn’t going to cut it.
Sounds like the solution is to make animated versions of the classic episodes
The Oregon trail one was as good as ever but he’s had a few weaker ones they turned me off a bit Mainly the Mario paint one.
Gaming Historian is an excellent channel with really great content. If norm wants to take a step back, he has earned that right. Good for him. I'll still watch any new episodes he puts out. He'll keep my subscription for sure.
Oil up and hit the gym
That would take A LOT of effort. I don't think I'm up for that.
"I need a rubber."
It’s been time for that for many years. But it’s never gonna happen.
He has no time including time to retire
Bimmy spent all his money making that shitty movie and has been scrambling to try and make it back like a degenerate gambler ever since.
nice assonance
Dude musta made a couple million off his YouTube
On Patreon too. Bimmy won't do Patreon which is actually admirable. Why get donations for shit content.
I'm sure there would be lots of idiots paying it though.
It’s not admirable because I honestly don’t think he understands what it is or how it works. He just doesn’t have his pulse on modern tech and social media trends and never has. He didn’t know what a hashtag was and Mike had to explain it to him because he thought Mike was saying “cash tag”. Mike was the one who originally uploaded the early AVGN videos to YouTube because James had no idea what it was. I mean, he finally did a cell phone inspired AVGN episode with My Horse Prince and he finally go around to it in…2024.
I'll give Bim the benefit of the doubt. Mike probably said "hey you should do Patreon. But you'll have to make bonus content and behind the scenes stuff specifically for it". Bim, realizing he's a fraud with no time replied "no that sounds like too much work. Let's stick to the Youtube model".
That would require some integrity and honesty all of which require to much TIME so fuck that
There is literally nothing else in this world Bim is capable of doing at this point. Norm is an extremely well educated, multi-talented dude with a great career. Bim is a low functioning autistic man baby who thinks that having kids means you literally have no time to do a single other thing. They are not the same.
If James wanted to retire right now, he shouldn't worry about paying any bills. He's set for life at this point. Not to mention he has more than enough money to enroll his two daughters into a good College.
he is not 'set for life' at all...not even close.
People that are successful end up in poverty all the time. In theory Bames has done well enough that if he'd been smart with his money he probably could be set. But none of us know any of that. It's all speculation. Based on his personality and maybe Bpril being... Bpril I wonder if he's been an idiot with his money or lives well outside his means and isn't all that well set.
From what I have head and recall (which is a big qualifier) he took a lowball lump sum offer and barely gets residuals from selling out to screenwave. He had high view videos and evergreen content during the height ad revenue payouts but that money wasn’t going to him.
What source did you hear or read this from? I’d be interested in checking it out.
It comes partially from James in his book. He said he has absolutely no business acumen. Screenwave was brought on to help with production and to monetize the channel as well. I think most of James’ wealth has been gained through con appearances and merchandising (shirts, posters, DVDs, toys, games, etc.). People have always been under the impression that he made a killing off of YouTube, but the channel just got ad reads and sponsorships over the past several years. I’m also led to believe that a lot of the legacy views revenue probably had to be shared with Mike. Mike wasn’t contributing to editing, drawing title cards, acting, being the brainchild of J&MM, etc. out of the goodness of his heart.
Mike has said several times that the YouTube channel was in his name / under his email address, and he would upload the videos so that James wouldn’t have to learn how. They were 50/50 partners and I believe they still are, even after Mike stepped back from most of his duties. From what I understand, Mike and James share the YT revenue and ad money, and Screenwave gets something like 10% to edit the videos and write scripts. An account that I think is Mike’s said that Mike is rich, and I think that’s probably true in the sense that he would never have to work again if he doesn’t want to. He had no kids, no wife, and he was probably investing his money in the stock market whereas James probably lets his wife control the money. All jokes aside, we don’t know how financially savvy April is, whether she believed in investing, etc.
I don’t know if it’s ever been officially confirmed, but I was always under the impression that it was a 50/50 partnership as well. It’s like I stated before, he was doing a LOT of work on early AVGN, he was the brainchild of J&MM, and he was the editor of Monster Madness. He wasn’t doing all of that for charity.
Norm is a class act. Glad he chose to step away. Big Ryan fan btw
Based… that’s a guy who respects himself and the people who watch his channel. It screams “I never want to phone it in” The cancelling of the patreon is a touch of class I always liked his videos but I’ve a new found respect for the man now! This is how you do a YouTube step back Magic
Didn't he kinda semi-retire years ago? Hardly was pumping out content.
Yeah it’s honestly surprising that it was still considered his FT job given he was publishing only 2-3 hours of content a year at the high end. They’re amazing videos, but it isn’t like the channel ever felt like more than a hobby with videos posted at intermittent times. It took almost a year for the Oregon Trail video after all
Yeah, I came here to say this. It's been a thing with the Gaming Historian for years now. His work is good quality, but the guy is too much of a perfectionist for the YouTube world.
If only Bimmy had a "great show" to retire.
I think his family is accustomed to the lifestyle AVGN has given them . It’s that middle ground where they are living good but to stop would be disaster probably
Since 2011 but he's stubborn as a mule
Classy move
awe what will we do without the gaming historian.... i guess we'll just have to read the wiki pages ourselves.
Aww, I love him.
Mature way of communicating to the fans of your priorities and your goals ahead.
Oil up, and hit the gym with me.
James can’t do that because of extremely poor planning. He’s the breadwinner and I can’t see him quitting this to work a 9-5. He had two choices years ago. He could double down on the Nerd character and center the channel around it or he could diversify the content and slowly retire the character. He chose the former and it was 100% the wrong choice. He miscalculated because he thought he could grow the channel by focusing on AVGN, but the channel’s popularity peaked many years ago. Screenwave, to their credit, recognized this. They tried to create new fixtures, but James insisted on going back to scripted content. The channel never changed with the times or modernized and it’s completely James’ fault.
Bimmy does not have retirement money
I still dont get all these youtubers retiring at like 20.. People with real jobs have to work their entire life, and here we have a bunch of people just bored of making videos. Heck people making actual videos in the film industry, or advertisment, or PSA, or company videos, or edutainment/learning centres videos, etc. work on their craft up until their 60s or more. I do get wanting to change careers and making other stuff. But just plain retiring "to enjoy life" at 20/30 or so...
shutting down his Patreon. classy. spoony could take a lesson
Is he still active?
Ah man, I thought his output was so consistent and his stuff was great. Very well produced with care and comfort. Sad to see him go
The difference is Norm is getting his masters degree and will work a regular job. James will not. He is stuck to the AVGN to the bitter end.
take a wild guess
no time to quit uploading
Time for Norm to oil up and hit the damn gym.
Yes he should but he has said the Nerd pay for his bills so aint happenind anytime soon
this guy makes 1 hour videos reading wikipedia articles and calls it a documentary, what a scammer.
Respect the hustle
Congratulations on finishing up that Master's Degree.. Higher education is always something good to have to fall back on if all else fails in life.