Open Letter to Tom's Games Readers

Sad to see that. Best of luck.

Well, whereever you end up shove a link in the forums, they may be screwing around with the site but the forums for the most part are still ours.

Hope this isn't an indication of the type of change for the whole of toms.

sounds like the new site is going to suck. sorry to see you go. If you need a writer for your next project, shoot me a mail.

Second Take was THE replacement I found for gamespot's on the spot, which I had stopped watching after they fired Jeff Gerstmann for not giving a good game score to the site's sponsor game Kane & Lynch.
Jeff went on to make Giant Bomb, took staff with him, but it's too console oriented for me. Now I'm pretty much left without anything to watch.

Too bad.. Good luck Travis and Rob, you'll do fine elsewhere. I hope Ben will be OK too. Let us know where you're going afterwards, be it through PM or whatever.

Good luck Best of Media: You'll need it. I too think it's a bad move, I (we?) don't need another site clamped with time wasters, but I'm honestly hoping you'll find enough visitors.

Good luck to you guys. It's the same for me as Nicae said almost. I really loved following Second Take since it's one of the few features on the 'net these days that'll critically look at the industry and more importantly, stick up for PC gamers.

I'd really like to follow any more writing you do Rob because I like where you went with the PC side and really agreed with it all. Please let us know if you find another writing job.


Sincerely,
-A mournful Second Take watcher

Terrible.....
Flash games??? Like theres not enough of those already. If feel the same way I felt when Jeff got fired from Gamespot. Never returned to that site and I guess theres no reason to return to this one either.
I know thats not how real life works, but if you guys could join Jeff and his crew at Giant Bomb and be responsible for the PC section that would be sweeeeet.
Sad to see you go.

Wow that is lame, where the hell am I going to go for honest reviews now IGN (ha ha). Well if your guys are no longer involved I hope the "new toms game's" bombs so bad that it gives the CEO of best of media cancer. Best of luck to you guys if you start a new site it will definitely be part of my daily browsing.

It was really a blast doing reviews, second-opinions, interviews, etc. at Tom's Games and I'm going to miss the site as well. I really wish things were different, I think we all had our goals set to growing Tom's Games into one of the most trusted gaming sites out there. I cannot even tell you how hard we emphasized playing through games from start to finish before reviewing them, and we always took our time afterwards to ponder and discuss to make the best judgement call on final scores.

Kevin, Devin, and I will still be doing news at Tom's Guides, and we may begin doing some gaming news posts down the road to at least keep some gaming stuff around. Content however is pretty much nuked, and as you've seen Games is now a flash games portal.

Anyways, I would also like to say thanks to everyone for the support, and like you all I also wish Rob and Travis the best of luck. They're fantastic guys that I consider personal friends, and I plan on staying in touch with them for years to come.

To Ben, Rob, and Travis you will be missed. You have done an excellent job and we all will keep our fingers crossed hoping that we can see some more of your future content elsewhere.

I'm really disappointed in Toms Hardware. Toms Games was one of the best parts of the site, if not the best. Not being able to watch Second Take and no longer being able to read truly good unbiased reviews is a shame.

Flash games... wtf?

Best regards,
Former Second Take fan

Thanks to all of our regular Second Take viewers! I feel a bit like Rob, I don't want to get all Lifetime on ya either. It means a lot to me to have people watch and respond to our videos (Even the guys that liked to call me a 'console-loving noob'... I mean in addition to Rob). So thanks again!

Good luck guys, and thanks for all the hard "work" you've done!

Will my i7 and 2x 4870X2 be able to run flash games?

Shame that "Best"of Media don't value their own brand and are dumbing down Tom's. Ho hum.

Best of luck to Rob and Travis. If you pop down to The Other, I'm sure Wingy can guarantee you a "happy ending"...

Rob, Travis, Ben,

Thanks for all the content you have given us. Please let us know in one way or another where you guys wind up next. I presume you guys will try and stay in the game journalism scene?

kinda bs business though!
its like Microsoft saying they don't want to make windows anymore.
Or Blizzard deciding to shut down the WOW servers
Its like General motors saying they are only going to produce electric cars
Silicon Valley without the silicon - just a valley, a big hole.
A meat pie with no meat
Second take and all the game reviews are the ONLY reason i EVER visit toms games, and now the only reason to visit toms hardware is for... well the hardware, BUT IM NOT GOING FOR TOM! - i dont even know any toms!!!

all they are going to get is very young kids who only play dodgy flash games - not all of them are dodgy, but a good 99.99% of them are, so if your ready for the 7,8,9&10 year olds to spam your forum - cool. but the people who actually know what they are talking about, the people who are actually of value to the community here are going to leave because you no longer have anything to offer them.

the only person i can now rely on is Yahtzee from Zero punctuation for my game reviews!!! http://www.escapistmagazine.com/vi [...] -Unleashed

Travis, Rob and Ben, you will be missed.

Forum acting up again, can't modify my own post (synchronisation probably)

Let's open a new topic for that and keep this one for the sake of mourning what's come to pass.

*edit* O wait that topic already exists

Damn it.. I can't play flash games at work! (I can, but uhh.. I don't want to)

I think you're in the Steam group, if not, get in!

Now where will I go? IGN? Gamespot? Gametrailers? (oh gawd, good for vids, but that's about it).

Good luck guys in whatever's next for you.

Rob and Tom

Please make your own site, even if it is just to post videos every now and again that we can watch.

Second take was one of my favorite things of the week. When I say favorite things, I mean including outside of the net!

I was one of the viewers who would be checking the site crazily waiting for the new video to post, and would check a few times a day just to see if you had posted.

This really really sucks.

I wish you all the best for the future.

Cheers,

Phil

Amen to that, Bluntsky. It is a very sad day today, as I must remove the Tom's Games link from my FF browser. Farewell Rob, and farewell Travis. Second Take will be sorely missed.

It`s the worst present the site fans would ever have for Christmas, It isn`t only a shame but also a huge deception for everybody, specially cause the weeky video show "Second Take", whose been the best game reviews of it`s time.

I wish good luck for Rob. Ben and Travis, and they at least shoud follow the ST on te THG.

Regards and Merry Christmass,
Paulo Mauricio

There's Kotaku and shacknews.

Even though shacknews has gone down a bit of late and the things that made that site a gem aren't there anymore (pretty much non-exsistant replay couch, the short stint of shackers, and there's no more shackcast) they don't have the feel of complete sell out and a game site that is set up as one complete advertisement.


It's just that these sites don't have Second take or consistant game reviews that aren't based on how much the game studio/publisher has paid you to give it a good review.



EDIT:^ Travis, I really hope you guys pull something together. You guys can do it and I hope you find a way.

(Signing up for the Army of Darkness!)

P.S. You guys should make a montage of the best moments in second take kinda video. And have a firing squad instead of the hammer for Bioshock, for all the new games with the same DRM as your final blowout.

I was the same way. I finally figured out that new videos usually posted on thursday's and I would spend all morning constantly checking the site until it appeared. I am really going to miss second take.

Have you guys even looked at the new site??? the first game listed on it when I checked it out was called "Paris dress up" as in Paris Hilton. LAME!!! What FPS gamer is going to going to want to play that??? Instead of trying to reach a new fanbase by completely alienating the one you have, maybe you should figure out how to INCREASE the one you already have.

To Ben, Rob, and Travis.

Following along with the theme here, I hope you do start your own site of gaming news and reviews. I really enjoyed reading all the reviews you posted. That being said, it did seem like reviews were getting few and far beteen at the end and now I see why. A new site with daily updates ran by all of you at the old and better Tom's games would certaintly gain a large ortion of those who were just lost.

I do realize that starting your own site at the moment might not be possible but you will (I assume) be getting other jobs. Please let us know where that will be so we can all enjoy reading your columns once again. Your talents in this area would be a terrible thing to waste. Best wishes to you all and have a Very Merry Christmas and my God bless you as your life turns over a new page.

We will miss you greatly,
Adam

I can't believe that.
That was pretty much the only to-take-serious and grown up gaming website out there.

Once again the world has been dumbed down a bit more.

Harsh and very unfortunate, from my point of view anyway.

Rob, Travis, Ben - absolutely the best of luck with whatever future endeavors await!

I thoroughly enjoyed Second Take, including the DRM perspective in particular and not letting hype completely outweigh other important issues to many gamers. Certainly there must be another home (perhaps even better) for such editorial/commentary/discussion of similar format!

Take care.

I personally wish Best of Media all the best with their new direction. And a giant congratulations to them for this. Because of this, they're a shoe in for the 'How ****ing Lame Is That?' award that will be handed out whenever I get around to it.


Seriously though, you guys didn't deserve to be replaced by such tripe. But on the bright side, BoM will probably receive a huge jump in ad revenue now that they cater to the hentai flash games crowd. Love the /adult/ section by the way. Its stellar. No really.

agree w/ most everything said here. Flash games are like light beer to your intelligent stout. One is good and the other, well...

Time to reach into your six-demon bag, drink the magic potion and feel invincible. Waltz in and out like the wind.

As you go on to hopefully better things, remember to never drive faster than you can see and that it's all in the reflexes.

I look for your return to our world soon.