Zero Punctuation Ends As ‘The Escapist’ Faces Mass Resignations After EIC Firing

(Link) (Archive)
By Paul Tassi
drown bitch.png
When people ask me how to get into games journalism these days, my main piece of advice is “don’t.” I’m really not kidding, as while I am privileged to be where I am, it’s an almost impossible path to walk given the state of the industry and the instability found within.

Case in point, a wild scene unfolded last night as long-time gaming site The Escapist fired some of its team members, including EIC Nick Calandra, for reportedly not meeting goals set by its parent company Gamurs.
muh goals.png
(Link) (Archive)
After Calandra was fired, Escapist staff members, contributors and producers all took to Twitter to announce they were also leaving the site, with many of them indicating they would be working on some new project with Calandra directly.

The departures and firings essentially cleaned out the entirety of The Escapist’s video department, including most significantly at all, the departure of Yahtzee Croshaw, the voice of Zero Punctuation, one of the oldest and most famous game criticism video series, and one I grew up watching long before I started doing this for a living. Croshaw resigned, but he does not own the rights to Zero Punctuation itself, so whatever he does next, it will be without that branding. Though it’s obvious the branding can’t survive without him, even if The Escapist retains it.
muh goals 2.png
(Link) (Archive)
By all accounts Calandra was a great EIC, and clearly inspired a lot of loyalty in those working for him, given the events of last night. Gamurs feels like yet another company trying to squeeze blood from a stone with likely unreasonable growth targets in an industry where large increases are more or less impossible. Their video section pivoted from native video to mostly YouTube, which can gain more views but produce less revenue, but clearly the entire endeavor ended up backfiring, and now The Escapist does not have a video department at all, it seems.

As of this morning, The Escapist is still publishing new articles, as the site hasn’t lost all its writers or contributors. It remains unclear what level of staff or freelancers remain at the company, and what plans may be to rehire for a new video section. But it’s safe to say that without the old team or an icon like Yahtzee, it might just be over altogether.

As for Calandra and his new project, that’s certainly the more interesting endeavor, as that team has a lot of fans and hopefully they can put something together that works for them and their audience without dealing with corporate neck-breathing. More on that as details emerge. I’ve reached out to Gamurs for comment and will update if I hear back.
 
which makes me wonder what made change his mind.
Probably the fact that checks signed by “The Escapist” are becoming increasingly more likely to bounce and/or he’s managed to acquire what he needs to secure himself.

For some people, fuck you money is home ownership and enough in capital to pay the bills through dividends or other investment strategies, which you don’t even need a million dollars to accomplish.
 
Trying to find who the "Cold take" guy is... But I'm to sleepy or dense to find out.

Maybe Yahtzee will resurrect the "Fully ramblomatic" name

Edit: Maybe I'm into something...
View attachment 5475754
Really pity they couldn't keep let's drown out going what with Yhatzee moving, unreliable Australian internet and Gabe at least attempting some realy world employment. That series was great.
 
He actually signed over the rights to Zero Punctuation?

What a moron.
I imagine that was the deal in 2008 when he joined the Escapist. I don't think YouTube was monetised (or close to be) back then and it probably seemed like a good deal.
Probably the fact that checks signed by “The Escapist” are becoming increasingly more likely to bounce and/or he’s managed to acquire what he needs to secure himself.

For some people, fuck you money is home ownership and enough in capital to pay the bills through dividends or other investment strategies, which you don’t even need a million dollars to accomplish.
He writes books and does the Audible for them, some of them were audible exclusive before print which I image gets you some more cash in advance and since he narrates them himself presumably gets more from that. Makes his own little games, often for free, but one or two I think were a few bucks. Seems to have enough to do whatever he wants really and maintain his home, wife and kids. I don't even begrudge him for getting less edgy as he's gotten older. Is probably one of the few creators from that early era who made it out and persevered beyond being a shadow. Certainly more than his former colleagues like Sterling and MovieBlob who it's clear have no love at-all for their mediums anymore.
Fuck me I can't believe Let's Down Out finished 7 years ago. I remember watching that last episode when it came out.
 
Yahtzee became a bit of a writing success with his fantasy and sci-fi books.

Something a certain child'ing fatass never could do, so while ZP is still his major income the monies he gets from him books and audio books isn't tiny and after listening to his podcast a few times it's clear writing is what he really loves to do.

But on the plus side now is a perfect time for Movie Blob to make a come back! He can totally swoop in and say the day for The Escapist because he's got such a massive gut following and fan base right?t

Personally I tossed ZP once Yahtzee moved to Commiefornia as it was clear the people around him were have a major impact on his world view. You can't move to Sodom and think it won't change you.

So for me it's win-win-win.
 
I don't agree with his politics but his videogame critique is usually pretty spot-on and his was the only critical opinion I actually seriously considered, especially since he was the only one willing to not give free rides for indies or triple-A. Ah well, that's another weekly ritual I'll have to drop, terrible it had to end with such a dull game but I think he'd be in the right to retire from the industry.
 
  • Like
Reactions: Koby_Fish
He actually signed over the rights to Zero Punctuation?

What a moron.
Not really, you have the value inverted, HE is the property of value, not some brand name. Its like the Top Gear guys moving to The Grand Tour, the Top Gear branding just floundered and died because you could not replace the three amigos. Not to mention the internet of 2008 was far more ephemeral than of 2023 and there was no expectation that Zero Punctuation would last a few years. I'd have sold the rights off as well.
 
Escapist is dead... Meanwhile I log back in to my 17 year old Newgrounds account and find the site to be the opposite of dead. What a time to be not dead.
Meanwhile I log into my 20 year old CSCentral/CSBanana/FPSBanana/GameBanana site and find it riddled with trannies and mods who once made gay jokes and said 'nigger' loudly on ICQ & XFire now banning people for saying they're tired of Pride and BLM protests. I cry.

I imagine that was the deal in 2008 when he joined the Escapist. I don't think YouTube was monetised (or close to be) back then
YouTube was monetized as far back as late 06 with their whole "Think you're funny? Show us all!" summer campaign. The thing was that being monetized was a rare privilege that was mostly reserved for original content, and gaming reviews weren't considered original content back then. So in a way I can see why he would choose to sign off his then-unproven IP for a rare chance to make a buck acting like an angry autist. It wasn't until Doug Walker broke the million dollar revenue mark that YT and it's users realized that making serious money was a possibility on the increasingly-popular website that had only begun to pick up steam and had yet to become a household name with the arrival of 4G and the iPhone having YT as a pre-installed app (Seriously, if YT wasn't pre-installed on the iPhone [and later on androids] there's a good chance YT never becomes more than the NewGrounds of it's time).

Lmao of course MovieBob is quick to endorse hitching his fat rotting corpse on a more famous and relevant person.
As for Jimbo, he hates videogames now. He wants opportunities in activism and wrestling, not gameshit.
 
Last edited:
Man I hope this doesn't mean Jack is going to have more time to fuck around with Red Letter Media now. These past few months without him on BOTW have been amazing.

I think that's why he's been absent in general. I'd assumed Jay, Mike, and Rich basically knew how he liked to mouth off on other sites and didn't want that mucking up their content. The funny thing is, I don't recall the exact instance where I first realized Jack was trying to be world's biggest libtard, I just remember him mouthing off in one video and thinking, this faggot just needs to shut up and never speak again.
 
Last edited:
Never watched them. Never actually heard about them before.
Question: They review and talk about games? How many of them are trannies and do they actually talk about games or just tranny shit?

Guess I try to say I care little about a site I never heard about before imploding.
But it was due to trannyism wasn't it?
 
Never watched them. Never actually heard about them before.
Question: They review and talk about games? How many of them are trannies and do they actually talk about games or just tranny shit?

Guess I try to say I care little about a site I never heard about before imploding.
But it was due to trannyism wasn't it?

What's noteworthy about the Escapist is they were one of the few video game websites that refused to shut down discussion about GamerGate. For a time, that is. I think they caved eventually, but people saw it as a feather in their cap.

Other names might get mentioned, but the only worthwhile contributor to the site was Ben Croshaw, or "Yahtzee." He would publish his "Zero Punctuation" videos for the autistic crowd, but would also sometimes publish very thunk-provoking articles in "Extra Punctuation" about topics like Why the N64 Majora’s Mask Could Not Be Made Today As a AAA Title.
 
"Zombie Site Finally Gets Double-Tapped"

Yatzee has been the only person of value on The Escapist for years. I would actually have been embarrassed for anyone who admitted to working there.

Giving up the "IP" of Zero Punctuation is meaningless. He can do the exact same thing if he wants to and just give it a different name, like Andrew Callaghan did to All Gas No Brakes. Hopefully Yatzee isn't a sexpest shitlib with crippling TDS.
 
Back