Some of Team Qore in London

When I joined the team at Qore in April of 2008 (April Fool’s Day!), I don’t think any of us had any idea of what to expect. Nothing like Qore had ever been done before. A subscription-based digital magazine? Available on the PlayStation? All I knew was that this was going to be interesting.

Since the show launched, I’ve had the opportunity to meet some of the smartest, most interesting people in the gaming industry, traveled the world to speak with incredibly creative game developers, and even had the opportunity to voice characters in the DLC for one of my favorite titles of all time. Plus, we’ve had an unbelievably talented group of people at Future Studios US that made the whole thing possible.

Qore is a growing and changing program, and one of those changes will be a new host for Episode 43 and onward. There will be more announcements coming soon, like who Qore’s new host will be (I think you’ll be super excited to get to know them!), so keep your eyes on the PlayStation Blog.

As for me, well, I’m already in overdrive with new project ideas and possibilities, and I’m excited to get started with the next chapter (I mean that literally too… I’ll be using some of this time to start my first NaNoWriMo novel)!

Thank you so much to the Qore viewers who have made doing the show so much fun, and to everyone on the Future Studios team (and at Future US in general… all my friends at PlayStation: The Official Magazine, GamesRadar, OXM and PC Gamer) for all their hard work, and of course to Sony and the folks at PlayStation for making it all possible.

As always, you can keep up-to-date with me on Twitter, Google Plus, Tekzilla, Sword and Laser, and right here on this blog. I’ll see you on the outside!

And if you’ve never seen Qore before, here’s a preview of Episode 41, out now!

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Remember I mentioned that I was recording voice over for an upcoming game? I’m excited to say that I’ll be voicing not one… not two… but three characters (not all human) in the upcoming DLC for Fallout: New Vegas Old World Blues! There will be many more details coming in the next episode of Qore, hopefully out next week, including the names and descriptions of all the characters I’m voicing (none of them are named Felicia… sorry everyone!).

Anyhow, I really excited about it! The whole experience of recording voices for actual characters (and not just being myself) was totally new to me, and I loved it. Thanks especially to Jason Bergman from Bethesda, who helped to set the whole thing up! It’s safe to say that this truly is a dream come true for me.

And no, I don’t have any secret insider info on when the PSN situation will be resolved, but hopefully it’s soon!

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Whew, that was a big trip! I went with the Qore team to Japan for two weeks for shoots, and we travelled from Osaka to Kyoto to Tokyo on a whirlwind tour of the country. This was my fourth time in Japan, but it definitely the most comprehensive (and exhausting!) trip I’ve probably ever taken!

I can’t tell you too much about the developer interviews that we did, but I’ve posted TONS of photos from the culture piece that we shot. From snow monkeys to toilets, we covered some really random and awesome stuff.

I can’t believe how much news I missed around here, too. I didn’t even know HP bought Palm until yesterday. /facepalm.

Anyhow, happy to be home! Keep your eyes open for Japan content on Qore in upcoming months, and in the meantime check out the trailer for the new episode, out today!

Related posts:

1. Introducing Qore!

I’m sorry you had to hear me sing! Oh, and here’s the trailer for Issue 2, which is out today:

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I did an interview with PlayStation: The Official Magazine for their August 2008 edition! It goes on sale July 1st (isn’t it weird that magazines do that? I don’t get it). P:TOM and Qore are both owned by Future US, so I suppose I had a bit of an “in.” Anyhow, it’s my first time interviewed in a paper magazine, so I’m a bit excited over the whole thing!

Favorite line? “I never knew there were so many bacon-themed products out there!”

Photo in the mag by the wonderful Lan Bui.

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So is Rev3 involved in any way? Or are you working for both Rev3 and Sony’s Playstation unit now?

Nope! Rev3 is not involved in any way. Technically, I work for Future US, the publishers of such magazines as Playstation: The Official Magazine, PC Gamer, and MacLife. I am not a Sony employee!

Might have to give you the ol’ quizzical eye when you start talking consoles on Tekzilla.

Hah! We don’t talk about consoles very much to start with, since we’re not a gaming show, but I’ll probably recuse myself in the future from giving any major opinions. Not because I’ve stopped playing other consoles or games (trust me, I have not) but to prevent any issues from coming up with viewers.

How long can we expect the episodes to be?

We’re running about 40 minutes of video in this first episode.

Are you serious? It’s $2.99 an episode? No way! That’s robbery!

I don’t have any say over the money-making end of this machine. But considering I paid more than that for Lemmings last week at the Playstation Store…. well, it’s 40+ minutes of totally original video content with exclusives downloads bundled in. It’s not just like getting the news off a blog, trust me. I think people will enjoy it.

Do I need a PS3 to watch it?

Yes. Maybe someday we’ll be able to host the video elsewhere, but right now it’s only available on the PS3. Sorry!

Can you give us any hints on what episodes 2 and 3 have in store?

Well, there’s this. Otherwise, I don’t want to give to much away, but we’ll be looking at some major titles (and possibly taking a big trip to Europe too meet developers over there!).

UPDATE:
Really good write-up over at VentureBeat that might answer some more of your questions.

Related posts:

1. Introducing Qore!

Honestly? It’s one of the coolest looking things I’ve seen in a long time, and I’m not just saying that because we’ve been working our asses off on it! Unfortunately, I don’t get to be in the first episode as much as we’d like, since I came into the project towards the end of the shooting cycle. But the stuff we’ve done already for episodes two and three is very fun.

Everyone is already fixating on the free demos, themes and betas, but it will take them until Thursday (when it goes live) to see how the video segments and behind the scenes clips are really what I think this whole thing is about. I’m just psyched that I get to be a part of it, and talk to the developers and artists behind some truly cool upcoming games.

There’s way more info on the Playstation Blog, but if you have any questions for me drop them in the comments and maybe I’ll whip up a FAQ for the next post!

Related posts:

1. Back from Japan!
2. Questions and Qomments (see what I did there?)