This is something that is about to change with the launch of XBLG Hub and we at The Games Cast cannot wait!

XBLG Hub is a centralised service offering a range of different ways for multiplayer gamers and clans to connect, organise matches and tournaments, blog about their escapades and build up a reputation as the best! The beauty of the system however is that anyone who wants to game online can use XBLG Hub to find like-minded players and get some gaming sessions going, either just with friends, by invitation only or open to all comers.

We here at TGC have been around long enough to see the world of multiplayer gaming change and evolve from a couple of mates huddled round a Spectrum, some friends duking it out on N64, blowing the competition away on Xbox, to taking on the world on Xbox Live. So it’s great to finally see a focused centralised service for all gamers and clans to enjoy.

What’s also good about the service is the way it will provide a stable platform for everyone to get involved with, including blogs from the site writers and registered gamers, video content on YouTube including Walkthroughs, trailers and montages, and leagues and tournaments organised by XBLG Hub themselves. Tournaments start from 31 May so make sure you get registered so you don’t miss out!

You never know, we may even sign ourselves up; we’d be easy meat for most of you guys, but therein lies the core of XBLG Hub. It’s for everyone to get involved in. They even have plans afoot to spread their wings onto PlayStation Network to try to give something for all console gamers.

Get yourself along to  www.xblgamerhub.com on Saturday 19 May to register yourself and start getting some games going, meet some awesome new people and make the most of your online experience.

S02E11 – Pick and error, any error!

Heard it? Good!

For those of you that thought “screw that I’ll listen later!”, lets do a quick recap.

This week we went over the Diablo 3 errors and player problems, including Blizzard’s assertion that the game should really only be played online; Sony’s continued sales problems and Jack Tretton’s stance on blocking pre-owned games at a console level; GAME Australia’s fate and Jade Raymond’s desire to get games to grow up.

So if you haven’t listened yet that should get your juices going. Don’t forget that we still want to hear your comments about the topics covered!

You can get those to us by leaving a comment on the Episode 11 wall, Tweeting us @thegamescast or dropping an email to show@thegamescast.com.

Why are we so bothered about your feedback and input after the live show? Well we have an idea for an extra show with your feedback post show being integral to it! More will be revealed soon.

Finally, there are two quite big changes that are happening. One is the switch from a 45 to 60 minute show to give us chance to let the conversations breath a bit more (Episode 11 was the first one to be an hour, even though it was about 68 minutes in the end).

The second affects next week show because we are moving days from Tuesday to Friday. This means that there won’t be a show on Tuesday 22nd May; Episode 12 will go out on Friday 25th May, but still at the usual time of 9pm. We’ve done this for two reasons; the kind of show we make suits more an end of the week slot to let us pull in the weeks big happenings, and there has been a slight change in circumstance amongst the team which means that we can now make sure all three of us are more regularly on the show.

That is if you ignore the fact that Phil is away for the first Friday show, and I’m away the week after…..yeah that bit wasn’t so well planned!

Anyway, our focus still remains on bringing you a great show every week and to get you guys involved with it and to help with the interaction we have an awesome way to make that more direct! We just can’t announce it yet sadly.

That’s it for this update, but you can always get us on Twitter and Facebook and comments on this site and our Spreaker page.

Your faithful host,

Duncan, aka Second Ranter in Command

If not, you will do tonight as we’ll be talking always online gaming with the Diablo 3 issues to kick start the discussion about the pros and cons of gaming that requires an always on connection. If you’ve got an opinion make sure you tweet us @thegamescast, drop a message on our Facebook wall, or join in with the chat live during the show via Spreaker.com.

In addition we’ll be covering:

• Sony’s stance on pre-owned gaming
• Touchy-feely controllers
• Activision paying out lots of money
• Free BF3 servers on the brink of extinction
• Jade Raymond wants games to grow up

That lot should keep us going for a while!

As mentioned above, we’re on Twitter as well as Facebook so feel free to drop us a message or three to get involved in the show and share your thoughts with the TGC community.

And don’t forget, we’re live from 9pm, and we have some changes to announce so make sure you tune in to keep up to date!

It’s all stuff we’ve talked about here and there on the show or on Twitter/Facebook, but we’ll save the full details for Episode 11. If you have no idea what we’re talking about because this is the first time you’ve found this site, to make things simple get yourself over to this page and have a listen to what we do.

There is one idea that we haven’t talked about at all, anywhere, publically, but if all comes good then it’ll be a big development in giving you lovely lot a chance to directly influence the show. By “if all comes good” we mean assuming that Paul, Phil and Duncan can agree on how to work it properly. It is however an exciting development for us!

Also folks, remember that signups for our mini league are now open. To hear more details have a listen to the official announcement. We’d love to get as many of you involved as possible and all you have to do is either:

• Tweet or Direct Message @thegamescast with the message “Let me in!” and your XBL Gamertag.
• Email show@thegamescast.com with “Let me in!” as the subject and just your Gamertag in the message. You can put other stuff but right now we only need your ‘tag to be able to invite you to the games when they start.

We bet you thought we were quitting when you read the post title, didn’t you?

No chance, we’re loving this show too much!

Why are we surprised? During the broadcast last night we noticed some strange things happening with the Spreaker website with a number of people unable to connect to it, including our very own Phil and Paul. Despite this we plowed on with the show only to be greeted by a lovely “we under maintenance” screen when we stopped recording. We assumed this meant that the show had been lost to the ether only to be greeted by the sight of Episode 10 sitting happily on our show page the following morning.

Despite the fact that it is some 270 minutes long it is our normal show, it just decides to loop play about six times over in one file, the show is up in its multiple entirety at the following places:

The home of the show, Spreaker.com - http://goo.gl/NOyLj (download and listen again)

Download and subscribe via iTunes - http://goo.gl/9IbmY

Soundcloud - http://goo.gl/0m264

And if you enjoy the show we’d really appreciate a follow on Spreaker and Twitter or a like on Facebook. Or all three if you’re so inclined. Let us know you’re out there and listening to make it even easier for you to keep in contact with us when the show isn’t on. You can always email us too on show [at] thegamescast [dot] com.

What was I trying to say?!?

Nope, it’s gone.

Dragging this post back on topic, here’s a quick rundown on some of the things we’ll be running through from 9pm Tuesday 8 May:

• A $99 Xbox 360 for the US market, and the banning of Microsoft/Xbox in Germany.
• Leaked WiiU titles.
• Miyamoto’s opinion on the PS Vita
• Elder Scrolls Online

Now for the boring bit where we give you links and stuff.

You can listen to the show live from 9pm via our Spreaker.com page where you can also listen back to all previous episodes from Season 2, including the preview shows we did. During the show there will be a chat room open for you to voice your opinions about the topics raised and get them included in the show. Spreaker also have Apps for iOS and Android so you can even listen on the move.

We’ll also be signed in to Twitter and Facebook during the show so make sure you’ve give us a follow and a like to keep in touch.

But if you just can’t make it for the live broadcast, have no fear, because you can always catch up on Spreaker, iTunes or Soundcloud.

That’s you’re update so far, we’ll catch you all from 9pm Tuesday 8 May.

Let’s start at the beginning though; well Episode 9 at least, which, if you didn’t already know, is available now for your listening pleasure.

That means that next Tuesday (May 8th) will take us in to double figures for Season 2 of our show. To mark this occasion we are finally looking to deliver our brand new website for you guys!

Ok, so we’ve all been talking about this new fangled thing for a few weeks, probably teasing it too much, but safe to say it means that we can offer more of a central hub for you guys. This means that everything from our latest twitter and Facebook updates, the most recent episode of the show and an expanded chat facility will all be a click or two away.

Why are we doing this? Quite simply, the current website you see now has been mostly unchanged since the beginning of Season 1, and we have moved on quite a bit from where we began both in terms of site content and how we deliver the show. Our very own Phil has been plowing a hell of  a lot of time in to coding and testing the site and we all hope it makes your experience with The Games Cast easier to enjoy!

Outside of the website we finally have our game of choice for the first TGC League and you guys have chosen:

Trials Evolution

We’ll officially be opening sign ups during Episode 10 so make sure you tune in to find out how to get involved, as well as how it’ll work. That’ll be followed up by info on this site as a reference point. As we said in Episode 9 the votes were very close, meaning that Bomberman will be getting an outing in our next league. However, if you want to register your interest by commenting on this post we’ll add your name to the list.

Remember that we asked you about extending the show length as well? We listened, took on your opinions, and you may notice a change for Episode 10, if we can get it worked out in time. There we go with the teasing again!

That’s it for this update, except to say that we already have about three other projects in the pipeline once the website is updated and the League is under way. If you ever want to give feedback on anything about the show, this site or anything that we do you can always email us show [at] thegamescast [dot] com; we love reading your thoughts and opinions so feel free to get in touch!

You may have already seen the tweets and Facebook poll but we need to get some more feedback as currently opinion is split! And what are those choices I here you ask?

To keep it nice and simple, this is the first time we’ve tried this out after all, we’ve got just two choices, but their both goodies! You can either plump for old school with Bomberman, or go for bang up to date with the recently released Trials Evolution, both would be played over Xbox Live. You can place your vote right here by simply commenting with your choice, or pop over to the Facebook page and vote there. You can also vote on Twitter by tweeting @thegamescast with either #TGCTRIALS or #TGCBOMB.

We’re looking to get this going in a couple of weeks time but you only have until Episode 9 goes out on air (Tuesday 1 May 2012 at 9pm) before voting closes to give us the week after to organise it for you guys.

It’ll be a points based system to decide the winner, and although this is a for fun league, if all goes well, we’ll look to do it again and try to source some prizes for you to win. And yes, Paul, Phil and Duncan will be taking part in the league, but of course if we do offer any prizes for winning none of them will claim the prize for themselves; which of course is assuming the guys would have a flickering hope of beating all of you lot!

If you want to hear a bit more about it, go pick up Episode 8 from our Spreaker page and tune in.

Very quickly to finish, we still want your feedback on whether we should extend the show to an hour every week or not. Is an hour too long, or 45 minutes too short? Is an hour not enough? Again, just comment below, tweet us @thegamescast or send us a message through Facebook.

In tonight’s show we have a number things to talk about including:

• Console sales downturns
• More fallout from Mass Effect 3
• GTA V rumours
• Yet more Steambox twitterings

That’s just a selection of the stuff we want to talk about!

We’ll also be discussing the possibilities of the Bomberman league we mentioned last week and giving you all an update on the show, the website, and possible changes afoot.

Plus, we need to apologise, well, Duncan does, for not covering off the TGCQ last week. This is what happens when the show schedule isn’t updated properly.

We’re all looking forward to you guys joining us tonight for another 45 minutes of news, rants and no swearing. Maybe.

This week we’re talking about more rumours of the Valve Steambox, ridiculously expensive Limited Edition games, Molyneux talking about leaving Microsoft and why gaming is a positive in life, plus loads more.

We also have another TGC Question we want you to answer:

Which game has the best soundtrack and why did it catch your ear?

We’ll be discussing the answers in the final section of the show tonight so either reply to this post, tweet us @thegamescast with the hashtag #TGCQ, or reply to our Facebook page comment. While you’re on Twitter and Facebook, why not follow us or drop a like!

In other news, the new version of this very website is so close to going live we’re all super excited to get it out for you all to see. Hopefully it’ll mean that we can offer you all more of a central hub than asking you to go off to other sites to find out what we’re doing and when. All will be revealed but we hope you like it as Phil has been working his backside off to get it ready.

Once again, we would just like to thank all of you who have taken the time to listen to our show, either live or as a podcast. We’re not far off hitting a major milestone for the show in terms of listeners and it has really caught us off guard with how quick the show has gathered a loyal following. Every retweet, message, like or comment posted is a huge help to us and is massively important to keep you engaged in the show even when we’re not on air.

Down the line we are looking to make some changes to improve the show for you but where possible we all always involve you guys before anything changes as your feedback is just as important as anything the three of us come up with.

If you’re visiting here for the first time, then welcome along! To answer a common question we get, yes the show that goes out via Spreaker every Tuesday night is 100% live; the only pre-recorded parts are the adverts and background music we play. The podcast version is the whole show recorded as it happened, and then posted up straight away “warts and all”, to iTunes and SoundCloud as well as on Spreaker.com. It’s our way of trying to preserve the live feeling whenever you listen.

That’s it for now, but we’ll catch up with you all in Episode 7!