the game rag

First off, allow me to begin by saying that the title of this piece is a bit misleading. The bitching is there - the nit-picking, the insults etc. What’s misleading is I really only spent twenty-ONE hours with G4, as they run three hours of non-game related paid programming from 5am-8am, and I refused to watch any of that. Actually I asked my editor if I could trade an hour of paid programming for, say, an hour of Fastlane, but he said no, and seemed resolute, so I dropped it. With that disclaimer aside, prepare to become ensconced, as I was, by the tale of a man on his ass, for twenty-one grueling hours.

It occurs to me that some of you out there might not know exactly what G4TV is. Well sit on down and I’ll fill you in. G4TV is, as they say, Television for Gamers, that is people who spend their entire day playing video games, but don’t have the internet. I throw the internet thing in there because everything you hear or see on G4 can easily be found online, be it cheats, reviews, or dorks arguing about Star Trek. But beyond that, G4 is a cable channel that thinks they truly understand YOU, the 20-something virgin nerd (that is you, right?). Any sometimes-viewer (and I pray to every god I can think of that they’re the ONLY kind of viewer) will tell you that G4’s programming is all over the board, and they’re right. But let’s step away from that for now.

When the muse came upon me to spend an entire day with G4TV (I was in the car, bored, and I guess I was thinking of other things that bore me) I knew I had to have a reason to do it. I mean, without a good reason, like, ‘I’m writing an article about this,’ I’d just be a lonely man watching bad television all day. Thank God for The Game Rag! The reason I came up with is I wanted to see G4 in one big panoramic view - , an entire day of programming, - to try and pinpoint exactly WHO they think their audience is, and to bitch and whine when they miss the mark (and I’ll tell you now, they miss the mark a LOT. A real lot). When I would tell people I was going to be watching an entire day of G4 in one long sitting, they’d call me crazy, most asked why, and more asked, ‘What’s G4?’ My friend Betsy knew the network well enough to try and prepare me for what would be the most tedious part of my mission. “G4 plays more reruns than Nick at Nite.” But that couldn’t be the case…could it? *bum Bum BUMMMM*

So to really get this article down, I decided the environment had to be perfect. I had to watch G4 like its real audience does. So I went to the place where every day thousands of…ok, hundreds of nerds hunker down to enjoy some really mediocre programming: My Parents House. I gathered some microwave pizzas, some hot pockets, and other microwavable fare (couldn’t exactly leave to go to McDonalds, could I?) and got to bed early, because G4 waits for no man, and I’d have to wake up at the most ungodly of hours…7:30am.

What follows are my notes, in chronological order, from my Day with G4TV…

[Next week: 8AM - NOON]