LP Advice

I've been considering making Let's Plays as of late. I just made a Youtube account, and I think that it will be easy to get and register a Hypercam 2.

Still, how exactly does the recording technology work? Does it still function with most T Vs? Is the method of recording game footage legal?

If I DO make an LP, I may start with Uncharted.

Recording from Consoles is different from recording from a PC, if you record from a pc you just need the right programs but from consoles you need the right cables and a capture card. I would also recommend against Uncharted since there is already a good LP of that on the Lets Play Archive , making it rather pointless if you have nothing new to contribute.

I mean, it kind of depends on the kind of audience you want to play towards, but you could do a helluva lot worse than striving for the effort put in by the majority of people on the LP Archive, and the Something Awful LP forums in general. I've kinda been lurking the Something Awful LP forum like a creeper for over a year, so if my opinion counts for anything, here's an extremely basic, not-at-all-the-full-extent list of the kind of things you should do to make a good LP:

• If your recording isn't good — as in the quality is low, you screwed something up that you wanted to show off, whatever — don't say "welp" and upload it anyway. Throw out the bad footage and rerecord it. Be prepared to replay the portion of the game you're showing off over and over and over again until you get it just the way you want it. If your reaction to that idea was "ew, I don't want to do that!" then unfortunately, you probably aren't cut out for LP.
• Hypercam is a PC screen-recording program, if I'm not mistaken. If you want to do a console game, you have to figure out what kind of equipment you're going to need to use — and if you want the footage to be good, you have to be prepared to shell out real money. Dazzle, Hauppage PVR, and Roxio's dedicated video game recorder are all good options, from what I've heard, but they're all around $100-150.
• Don't feel an obligation to your viewers. I don't mean "don't put in the effort to make a good, watchable video" because you should absolutely do that — I mean "don't feel like you have to shit out videos to make a schedule." Spend however long you need editing each video to make it a good watch.
• Don't do live commentary (as in commentating as you play the game). Just don't. There's very little live commentary adds that post-commentary (recording the footage first and recording the commentary later) doesn't do just as well, if not better. Post-commentary gives you a chance to sort out your ideas, what you want to talk about, the things to point out in your recording that are interesting, gameplay mechanics, neat trivia, and so on. If you can do all of those things live, great! I have AccountingNightmare on the brain because I'm literally in the middle of watching her latest Devil May Cry 4 video — she's one of the few exceptions to this rule, she's able to provide interesting and insightful commentary while she's playing the game. A game with an incredibly complex combat system. On the hardest difficulty. I have no idea how the fuck she does it. If you can't do what she can, just record your commentary later.
• Edit your videos. Don't just upload the raw footage. Cut out uninteresting travel sequences, periods of repeated game overs, and bad fuckups. Figure out how to splice together footage from different recordings to show off the best possible playthrough. Again, this might be something you have to shell out real money for. I don't really know what's a good video editing program, though (hint: Windows Movie Maker or iMovie will not at all suffice). I've heard AviSynth, if you're good with coding; I also have a thing called Sony Vegas that's obtuse, but I managed to wrangle a couple of watchable videos out of it.
• Above all, don't take it too seriously. You're probably not gonna get internet-famous, but there's nothing wrong with that. Doing a good LP takes a ton of effort, but if you're willing to put in that effort and have fun with it, then your audience is gonna have fun too.

edited 2nd Nov '11 1:37:49 PM by WildKnight

Recording off T Vs is kind of costly. Not too bad, but a capture card or capture box can run you 50-80 bucks for a cheaper one, and if you're on a budget, that can be kind of a squeeze.

Also, if you're going for a vocal one, it's good to get some practice first. If you'll be going solo, practice just talking over some games without recording them. If you've got a buddy who will join you and bounce off you, though, that's even better. I have a personal preference for group L Ps over solo ones, since the chatter becomes more organic, but that's only a thought.

And if you're by yourself, you need to be able to talk about enough things to limit the amount of dead air, but also not so much that the audiance wants to never see the next update via annoyance.

And make sure to stay on topic. Minor flavor stories that stray from the game are okay in very small doses, but talking about how you got soap in your dick this morning is not a story that anyone needs to hear.

edited 2nd Nov '11 2:18:38 PM by GIG

This is a very important point, I think. If you're gonna do commentary, make sure you actually have something to say about the game. For this reason, it also helps if you know the game inside out beforehand. Also, there is no need to point out everything, as some players are prone to do.

See, this is the only point I disagree with. Yeah, some games do benefit from post-recording commentary, but some games benefit just as well from live.

For example, my LP group does all our commentary live. Mostly because the thought of post-com has never even crossed our minds but that's beside the point. Post-com really only works if it's an infomative LP. If it' just a playthrough of a game, then live works just fine.

THIS IS EVEN MORE IMPORTANT! Going with little knowlege is asking for trouble. LP's should be after a few playthroughs, so you know what's coming, and how best to commate on the events in game.

And for the love of God, never do a blind LP. Almost always this ends up a trainwreck in the worst way, with the few that can pull it off still looking pretty weak compared to their other outings. just stick with things you know and have played.

yeah, live vs. post commentary is really all about the game you're playing, the kind of LP you're going for, and if you're doing it solo or have a friend to bounce stuff off of.

Just keep in mind though, there's also something to be said about LPing a blind run of a game. There's few things I enjoy more than hearing someones initial reaction to a "holy shit!" moment in a game.

edited 2nd Nov '11 2:36:33 PM by Blissey1

You people keep saying these things.

Blind LPs aren't that bad. For some games, like the Zelda series, yes make sure you know what you're doing. But for simpler games, like Mario, blind LPs aren't that bad.

edited 2nd Nov '11 2:36:31 PM by Metaflare

Fair enough, it's just that the worst LPs on Youtube tend to be blind (meaning sometimes several videos of the player stumbling around not knowing what to do) or with crappy live commentary (the Narrating the Obvious that was mentioned, talking just to fill dead air, and such). It's not that they can never be done well, but actually doing it well requires more effort than the initial recording. If you do a blind LP and spend half an hour dying on something or stumbling around trying to solve the puzzle, edit the video in post-production and cut those boring bits out. If you're doing live commentary, try to at least have an outline of the sort of things you're going to touch on (which, by its nature, means you probably shouldn't also do a blind run), and redo the commentary in post if it doesn't end up well. I don't really see a solo, blind, live-commentary LP working out well at all.

Hell, the only blind and live-commentary LPs I can think of that worked out well are pokecapn and friends' LPs of the modern Sonic games, and that was more about 'holy shit this game is so terrible' or 'this game is kinda meh but at least it isn't completely awful' or 'oh hey this game is actually really good, thank god it's not like that first one!'

If you absolutely need that "holy shit!" reaction and that "blind run" feeling, generally it seems like the best way is to grab a friend who hasn't played the game and be the informative one explaining things to him/her. You still get their reactions, but you don't have the stumbling around going "what the hell do I do now?" problem that blind LPs do.

Like, okay, blind runs aren't impossible to do well, live-commentary isn't impossible to do well, but you have to really know what you're doing, and genuinely interesting or funny blind & live-commentated LPs are...basically limited to pokecapn.

edited 2nd Nov '11 2:46:19 PM by WildKnight

You obviously haven't watched the Freelance Astronauts LP of New Super Mario Brothers Wii

I did. It was alright, but the Freelance Astronauts aren't really my style. I also did mention that solo, blind, live-commentary doesn't usually work out well. Groups or even a second person are a different matter.

Oh. Well solo-blind is pretty dumb, yeah

If you want to know how NOT to do a lets play just watch retsupurae.

I don't know if you're joking, but that's actually legitimately a good idea.

I don't see how watching someone who knows a game inside and out play a game is any fun. If it's a game with puzzles, that just makes it a walkthrough, not a Let's Play. And if it's, say, an RPG, you miss all the reactions someone who's new to the game would have.

I don't know. It just doesn't seem entertaining. Now, if you, perhaps, are stuck in one spot for longer than thirty minutes with no progress, by all means, cut that crap out. But otherwise, I find it fun to watch people try to figure things out.

Or the Persona 4 Endurance Run. but yeah, solo blind L Ps... just don't make sense.

Some games just lend themselves to that kind of style. For instance, TheMeInTeam does tons of Civ 4 stuff, and I think he's really nailed the informative LP style. Then you have stuff like Hellfire Commentaries, where it's not just knowledge of the game, but they also give you factoids about the voice actors, composers, and other inside stuff.

edited 2nd Nov '11 3:06:44 PM by Blissey1

On the other hand, it's one of my favorite LP styles. Sometimes people have really insightful commentary to provide while they're playing, making it a sort of fanmade DVD Commentary.

There's actually a good point in there that you probably weren't thinking of: not all game genres are suitable for video LPing. An 80-hour RPG just gets ridiculous. Most good LPs of RPGs that I've seen have been a series of screenshots within the post itself, transcribing text when the screenshots aren't extremely interesting, and so on. If videos are involved at all, they're just of important cutscenes or boss fights or whatever.

...And again, that's probably something that could be fixed if you're willing to put in the huge amount of effort to edit the videos in post-production. I haven't really seen a good video LP of an RPG, though. Best example I've seen on Youtube doesn't even record every minute of the game he plays, just, as I mentioned, the cutscenes and boss fights.

...Ultimately I think the central point is that there are a million different ways to do a good LP, and even if you are doing a solo blind live-commentary LP, if you're a genuinely interesting and insightful person and can make the videos interesting, more power to you! Just...don't do anything that Retsupurae would mock.

edited 2nd Nov '11 3:11:10 PM by WildKnight

Things that I've seen LPers do to fix this include editing out any random encounters, and possibly editing out really long backtracking sessions.

I really don't see the point to blind Let's Plays unless there's a lot of editing involved, and even if that was done, the Let's Play in question might have been done non-blind anyway.

On live commentary, I don't agree with not doing it. I've seen quite a few LPs that make it work. But yeah, if you can't come up with stuff on the fly, which you will have to do A LOT of in live commentary, just do post. It's much easier that way.

Very good ideas, but like I said, that requires effort. Which is more than the majority of LPers on Youtube are willing to do. >.>

...I'm kind of bad at conveying the point I want to make, but it's something along the lines of "not everything I'm saying is a hard and fast rule." You don't have to do post-commentary just because I feel like live commentary is usually uninteresting. Do whatever style you want, just make sure to put in the effort required to make it exciting, or at least decent, to watch, instead of an unbearable slog.

edited 2nd Nov '11 3:17:42 PM by WildKnight

See, I don't particularly care for "informative" L Ps, I prefer L Ps that are more of a humourous running commentary. And I feel that can be accomplished just as well when you're blind as when you know everything.

*shrug* Depends on how funny/interesting you are. The Freelance Astronauts are good at that sort of thing, sure. But there are plenty of people on Youtube who don't realize that they sound like whiny prepubescents and are not being funny when they're quoting three-year-old memes or whatever.

Basically, I guess humorous LPing works if you could seriously go for a career in stand-up comedy, or if you and your friends are generally the life of the party. A lot of young nerds on the internet can't do either.