For a couple of weeks now, I’ve been recording gameplay footage and providing running commentary for each of them. Although I really fumbled my way through the first couple videos — which took countless takes to finally get right — they’re becoming a lot less painful to do, which is a good sign.

My first one, which is already kind of difficult to watch, can be found HERE. Just listening to it, I can tell I was very distracted by the sound of my own voice in the room, and I was also likely trying to be quiet since family was on the other side of my closed door. Focusing through distractions I surely wasn’t.

For my second attempt, I tried something a little different, opting to do a preview of the game I’m currently playing, NES Remix 2 for the Wii U:

I wanted it to be slightly more formal, but still feel casual, and I think it turned out OK. There are, of course, a lot of things I would change, but instead of iterate endlessly on the same thing and risk it losing any sort of spontaneity (and me getting burnt out in the process), I decided to stop with what I had and publish it.

One of the most important bits of advice I ever heard was from one of my favorite YouTubers, boogie2988, who said to just keep creating content and get it all out there, no matter how you’re feeling, and eventually you’ll build up a base of fans, subscribers, and new friends. Check him out if you haven’t; he has a lot of great things to say. He also partially inspired me to start this whole GHG journey.

Anyway, I like the overall flow of that video, and I’m glad I was able to squeeze in the parts about Super Luigi Bros. and Championship Mode, which I still haven’t really spent any time with as I continue through the main game. One thing I do regret is not getting the information about Championship Mode right. A little pre-recording research would have made me sound less like an ignoramus! Oh well, c’est la vie.

My third video was a singular set of NES Remix 2 replays for Zelda II: The Adventure of Link:

What I wanted to do with this one was showcase a single, focused theme, going through all of the game’s challenges in order. I was also admittedly pretty proud of some of my times, so it’s a mildly selfish opportunity to show off a little bit, which is tough, since I don’t like bragging about much.

My voice still sounds a bit hesitant, with odd pauses, mixed-up tenses, phrases that don’t go together, and the dreaded “speaking from the throat”, which is a clear sign of nervousness.

This took me quite a few restarts to get going, and after about the tenth fail, I almost gave up. Good thing I didn’t, because about 95% of the audio here is from the final take that followed.

Today, I did my fourth video, which walks through all twenty of the first Remix I stages from the same game:

I feel like I’m starting to catch my stride here. Not only did I get this in just two takes, but I think I’m sounding more comfortable and relaxed.

Much like my blog posts, I need to work on better word variety, stamping out fillers like “you know”, “uhh”, “yeah”, etc., and like the First Impressions video earlier in this post, doing more research and preparation prior to hitting the record button would really help. It’s a small detail, but it’d be nice to be able to call out the actual enemy names and such instead of falling back on generics like “that guy”, “those baddies”, and “the boss”.

This is also my longest video at just about 12 minutes. That’s a lot of talking from someone known for being a pretty quiet guy.

Anyway, I’m having a blast doing this, and apologies again for everything being so NES Remix-focused recently. It’s such a fun series that I hope we see more of in the future. Just between the Game Boy Color, Super Nintendo, and Game Boy Advance, the possibilities are endless!