One last attempt to save my Game review and talk channel - What do you guys honestly think could save but not change the spirit of my channel?

[Sonic Boomer]

yeah my mental health is already back to normal without this nonsense weighing on me. It's sad I won't be able to show and share all I wanted to, but even if I do make the videos you still can't share squat when you see the same older videos staying on the same exact viewcount, retention and impressions for months so it's not like you're sharing anything more anyway by the videos just being up there.

 

[Graw]

In the first video, the biggest thing I would say is that you're too quiet and there's not a lot of tone to your voice. It's very dry and monotone sounding. It's nothing to do with your accent. It sounds like sitting in a lecture at a university or something. You don't sound like you're enjoying what you're doing.

I couldn't watch those other videos you posted. I can't stand the ai voice videos. Ai voices is an immediate ignore the channel for me. I have no interest in listening to a computer talk about stuff.

 

[Sonic Boomer]

That's definitely a first, I've never been told I sound like I don't enjoy this because I sure love talking about this stuff, I just try to sound as clear as possible given the fact that English isn't my native language.
I'm not a humorous guy or an up beat person and this is just the way I sound, if anything people in some of my comments before have said I sound relaxing and like I'm just explaining/talking to a friend.
Oh well it's good to hear someone has issues with my voice/narration it sheds light on all this, good thing im out this is all garbage.

 

[Antilocal123]

You ever seen Airsoftfatty? Hit a MASSIVE bong rip bro that’ll boost views like crazy! /j

 

[Sonic Boomer]

You ever seen Airsoftfatty? Hit a MASSIVE bong rip bro that’ll boost views like crazy! /j

I just checked this out, I can't watch this kinda stuff. I'm sure dude's doing a great job for his type of audience but I can't consume nor do I want to make content like this.

 

[Deleted member 179251]

This is my channel

Gaming Pal Ollie

- This is a personal channel where I express myself about video games. I simply want to share my thoughts and feelings on the games I play. My views are completely subjective and in no way, shape or form are my videos meant to inform or please an audience. I'm simply making this channel so I can...

www.youtube.com

First I'd like to give you guys some background on who I am and why I do youtube.
I'm a Slavic, Macedonian guy born in 1983 in the Balkans, in the Republic of Macedonia and gaming has been my entire life. There is huge misconception about my part of the world that we didn't have many video games or that we lagged behind when it came to gaming compared to the first world, but this isn't true. In fact, during the 90's we probably had more games than the US did thanks to piracy and lack or region restrictions.
My goal with my youtube channel was never to blow up or make money, but to simply share my thoughts and feelings on gaming as well as, hopefully shed some light on gaming history here in the Balkans, specifically Macedonia through my videos and stories. Eventually I would have made specific videos on the subject to summarize all I had said in my other videos.

I like to review both modern and retro games tho I focus more on retro games and new games released for old systems or bootleg games that were sold here in the early 90's but aren't well known in the 1st world.
I have a lot to show and a ton to tell about gaming, but I want to do it in my own, more relaxed, more slower paced way rather than this up beat, modern way of doing videos which I am too old and too tired to follow and pay attention to.

All my favorite Gaming channels, such as Game Sack, Classic Game Room back in the day, Gamester81 back then, 8bit Joystick, Crazy Burger (evercade), Retro Gamer Boy, RetroGamerNation and many many others have make calm, down to earth, slower paced videos too and I love this type of content and that is the content I myself love making.

Anything above 500 views is enough for my game reviews on a small channel like mine, I have around 1556 subs at the time of this posting which is great.
BUT, when it comes to certain videos such as my latest video series on the best ways to get into Retro Gaming in 2025:

I feel given the topic's popularity at least 1-1.5k views would suffice. HOWEVER views aren't the issue.

I can not hold people's attention to save my life.
I don't want to lose my identity or to lose my style of video making, my pacing or anything, who I am on youtube is who I am in real life.
But even tho my videos start with average or above average retention in the first 30 seconds, by the end only 7% are usually left watching, which is fine by me but youtube has a problem with this and kills my videos refusing to give them impressions and no impressions means no views of course.

I believe that the chief cause for my problems are my voice and accent, sure some find my voice and accent pleasant, but most native English speakers can't listen to accents like mine for long.

So what do you find most irritating about my channel? I'm probably going to quit but I want to hear what you think about it regardless even if I don't implement those suggestions for one reason or another. I'd like to hear how you think my videos could get better viewer retention while staying true to my current atmosphere and feel of the channel.

I want to talk about games and topics I care about
not what is trending
because if I have to make videos on popular things only then there's no point in me having my own channel, I don't do this for money.

Even so, it's degrading talking to walls, I want to share my thoughts and feelings on gaming with more people.

The reason I believe my voice and accent are the problem:
Although I make long form content, i did try my hand at shorts and here's something interesting.
this short I made with an AI voice got 14k views instantly DESPITE the quality of the video being abysmal (I've improved my CRT recording a great deal in my latest videos)

the same short WITH additional info on my main channel has 188 views

Still I make long form content, my most viewed video is the review for Sam's Journey on C64 and NES where as you can see my CRT recording has been drastically improved and like I do with most of my newer videos I combine CRT and emulation footage.

(I cant turn this into a link i dunno why it is what it is)

This video ends with 12% retention, which i am happy with but that is abysmal according to most youtube advice I've read

I despise youtube communities on reddit and such, it's all motivational drivel like "you got this! You are amaizing! you can do it!" or other such brainwashing nonsense or exceptionally high standards.

For example, the video on which games I, as a Balkan kid from the 80's and 90's associate with the holidays didn't do well at all despite it being liked by those who watched it.

The video wasn't going to get even 600 views, but I paid $10 for youtube to promote it :( which DESTROYED its retention, never doing that again for sure.

Speaking of liking my videos, my videos have either 100% like ratio or over 95% like ratio for each one, so those who do watch them seem to enjoy them yet youtube isn't pushing them at all.

I am gonna sound a bit mean without meaning too, but if you truly say you don't care about the views, then don't care about the views. And that includes retention span. If making these videos is your art and not commerce, then who watches it, drops it, and continues to watch it should not be your concern. Yanik Magnan gets barely 200 views per episode on his channel, but doesn't stop his passion for covering wonderswan games. Tara A Devil barely hits 1k-1.5k per video, but her art is that of translating untranslated games and 2chan stories. Because of which, while she is no youtube celebrity, she has a very minor but dedicated fan following. If she'd have concerned herself with views, then she'd have quit 2,000 or so videos ago.
If you believe, bringing in your perspective of art to the world is your art then do it regardless who watches it, drops it, or downloads it. Do not lower yourself to using ai voices because you are insecure about your accent. Be yourself and speak like a human. And humans all sound different, some may stick because of it and some may not.
As long as you are not one of those people who gambled their entire livelihood on youtube revenue, then you don't need to think about the commercial side of things like views and all. Just do what you do, love what you do, and improve on the areas that truly matters — making sure all the thoughts and expressions you wanted to convey to the world are conveyed as you intended in your head. Not what someone else may want it to be conveyed. That's should be your goal in terms of improvement. Improve your art and don't worry about the commerce. Commerce is worrying how someone may percieve it, how long they may stay, and how they may react. Art is worrying about, "did this media i made came out as i intended to". The later is what should be your concern.
Again, if you truly love what you do, then do not worry about what else matter. Maybe it is because i have seen too many people kill their own uniqueness to fit the mold, but, I always feel sad when people worry about who is listening, when they should be worrying if they are even speaking or not.
Sorry i think i am not the best advice giver here, but, again, believe in your art and as long as you haven't risked your entire life on it, don't worry about its commerce. We only have a short enough life to decide between two things: do we wish to make the things we always wanted to make or do we wish to get the attention we always wanted to get. Sometimes if you strive for one you may hit gold and get the another, but that's not guarantee. And even then, the nature of pursuit depends on you. Art or commerce, that's your final choice.
Just know that if you start caring about numbers and percentages, then whatever unique or cool you could've given is lost to the 10,000th same thing that a machine, an algorithm, of all things is responsible for picking up. Because then you won't be trying to please humans or your own inner expressions and thoughts that were bottled up for so long, you would be trying please the percentages and an algorithm, and one could make a scifi joke that, you would literally be trying to please your machine overlords.

But chances are, whatever i have said is bullshit and doesn't help you at all. In that case I am really sorry for wasting your time with this. I am pretty sure that other people here may help you better and I hope you find the feedback you need. My final words to end this would be this: If you enjoy doing this, and not the pretense of doing it, you actually enjoy doing this, then don't stop doing this, no matter what happens. Enjoy little things in life while you still can.

 

[Sonic Boomer]

It is bullshit and let me explain why lol
As I said, I get great views, views are exactly where I need them to be, retention is the problem, rather I don't know if my retention is ok or not maybe it is.

Here's why it matters and here's why I care about it.
People who keep saying "do it for the love of it" are naive, idealistic children or old pensioners who don't understand the time, effort and hard work that goes into creating some of these videos and think it's ok for a person to talk to themselves/talk to walls and somehow drink enough copium to see it as normal.

That whole "keep doing it for yourself" is a very idealistic way of thinking and doesn't apply to the real world much less to me.
Some compare it to keeping a diary, but when diaries were popular back in elementary school I found keeping a diary exceptionally suffocating and unfulfilling because nobody was there to hear my thoughts and for me to share my thoughts and feelings with.

it's ok for motivation to come from views and ESPECIALLY retention. In my case retention since I get enough views. And if you find that you are not reaching enough people because either you or youtube is doing something wrong, of course you are going to be mindful of stats. it's not as black and white as "do it for the love of it", it all depends on what you are doing and why.

if you do youtube to share your thoughts and feelings on a subject you care about with people, but youtube refuses to send your video out correctly and you end up talking to walls you might as well not make videos and sit in front of a wall and share your thoughts with it. Which to me is unhealthy.

With that said, as you can see I keep posting videos
I just don't stress about making sure they're always posted on the day after a week, I post them when they're done and if I need to or have to skip a week or two I will.

 

[Antilocal123]

It is bullshit and let me explain why lol
As I said, I get great views, views are exactly where I need them to be, retention is the problem, rather I don't know if my retention is ok or not maybe it is.

Here's why it matters and here's why I care about it.
People who keep saying "do it for the love of it" are naive, idealistic children or old pensioners who don't understand the time, effort and hard work that goes into creating some of these videos and think it's ok for a person to talk to themselves/talk to walls and somehow drink enough copium to see it as normal.

That whole "keep doing it for yourself" is a very idealistic way of thinking and doesn't apply to the real world much less to me.
Some compare it to keeping a diary, but when diaries were popular back in elementary school I found keeping a diary exceptionally suffocating and unfulfilling because nobody was there to hear my thoughts and for me to share my thoughts and feelings with.

it's ok for motivation to come from views and ESPECIALLY retention. In my case retention since I get enough views. And if you find that you are not reaching enough people because either you or youtube is doing something wrong, of course you are going to be mindful of stats. it's not as black and white as "do it for the love of it", it all depends on what you are doing and why.

if you do youtube to share your thoughts and feelings on a subject you care about with people, but youtube refuses to send your video out correctly and you end up talking to walls you might as well not make videos and sit in front of a wall and share your thoughts with it. Which to me is unhealthy.

With that said, as you can see I keep posting videos
I just don't stress about making sure they're always posted on the day after a week, I post them when they're done and if I need to or have to skip a week or two I will.

I’m sure they do lmao but some people don't view YouTube as seriously as others, no shit it doesn't apply to the real world but that doesn't mean it’s wrong for someone to do it for the love of the game nor that they don't appreciate the art-form.

 

[Sonic Boomer]

I’m sure they do lmao but some people don't view YouTube as seriously as others, no shit it doesn't apply to the real world but that doesn't mean it’s wrong for someone to do it for the love of the game nor that they don't appreciate the art-form.

I can't relate, I don't see it seriously either but dude, I take the time to edit videos, to match colors if needed, to match every aspect or moment of the game I talk about with what I say on screen. When recording I don't sit in my usual position to record but because the phone needs to be positioned and stuff I have to be slightly at an angle and sit slightly away from the TV which is a problem for me and so on.

So much work goes into this, I'm sorry but doing all that for walls is unhealthy. I don't do it for walls fortunately, as I said I get really good views for a small channel. I just got discouraged because I don't know if my retention is good or not.

Look at how much comparison I draw between the original GB version and the NES Port here:

or how I had to play through the game a few times to get footage for everything I'm saying and then I have to go through all that footage to find just the right moments

I'm happy with anything that gets above 400-500 views so for me, view count wise these videos are a success, I'm beyond happy with the views. Had I not "discovered" retention I wouldn't have made this topic lol
The tiny toons video has 2.1k views, the Rugrats one is still growing but it's well above 600, 611 at the time of this writing in my statistics which is awesome to me. decent retention too about 14% at the end.

The Switch overview one hit 2k views, but retention is abysmal lol

 

[Antilocal123]

I can't relate, I don't see it seriously either but dude, I take the time to edit videos, to match colors if needed, to match every aspect or moment of the game I talk about with what I say on screen. When recording I don't sit in my usual position to record but because the phone needs to be positioned and stuff I have to be slightly at an angle and sit slightly away from the TV which is a problem for me and so on.

So much work goes into this, I'm sorry but doing all that for walls is unhealthy. I don't do it for walls fortunately, as I said I get really good views for a small channel. I just got discouraged because I don't know if my retention is good or not.

Look at how much comparison I draw between the original GB version and the NES Port here:

or how I had to play through the game a few times to get footage for everything I'm saying and then I have to go through all that footage to find just the right moments

I'm happy with anything that gets above 400-500 views so for me, view count wise these videos are a success, I'm beyond happy with the views. Had I not "discovered" retention I wouldn't have made this topic lol
The tiny toons video has 2.1k views, the Rugrats one is still growing but it's well above 600, 611 at the time of this writing in my statistics which is awesome to me. decent retention too about 14% at the end.

The Switch overview one hit 2k views, but retention is abysmal lol

So if you don't relate don't go calling others childish and naive?!!! Someone gave a response and you just went on some tirade, cool, you put work into your vids, you could’ve just said that you can't relate or agree because you view the site differently.

 

[Sonic Boomer]

I'm banned from GameFAQs and tormented openly by the mods, I also developed Cubital Tunnel syndrome, so tying is insanely painful. I don't do scripts for my videos so this is my only way to express myself on gaming now. That's why i don't post as much here either, typing is too painful sadly.

Post automatically merged: Apr 13, 2025

So if you don't relate don't go calling others childish and naive?!!! Someone gave a response and you just went on some tirade, cool, you put work into your vids, you could’ve just said that you can't relate or agree because you view the site differently.

I said that view is childish and naive, to me, nothing wrong with that. I feel it's a chidlish and naive view. To me, I see that as chidlish and naive, I'd feel chidlish and naive if I was putting all that effort just to not be heard.

 

[Deleted member 179251]

I can't relate, I don't see it seriously either but dude, I take the time to edit videos, to match colors if needed, to match every aspect or moment of the game I talk about with what I say on screen. When recording I don't sit in my usual position to record but because the phone needs to be positioned and stuff I have to be slightly at an angle and sit slightly away from the TV which is a problem for me and so on.

So much work goes into this, I'm sorry but doing all that for walls is unhealthy. I don't do it for walls fortunately, as I said I get really good views for a small channel. I just got discouraged because I don't know if my retention is good or not.

Look at how much comparison I draw between the original GB version and the NES Port here:

or how I had to play through the game a few times to get footage for everything I'm saying and then I have to go through all that footage to find just the right moments

I'm happy with anything that gets above 400-500 views so for me, view count wise these videos are a success, I'm beyond happy with the views. Had I not "discovered" retention I wouldn't have made this topic lol
The tiny toons video has 2.1k views, the Rugrats one is still growing but it's well above 600, 611 at the time of this writing in my statistics which is awesome to me. decent retention too about 14% at the end.

The Switch overview one hit 2k views, but retention is abysmal lol

I am sorry if I insuiniated anyway you don't work hard. I absolutely believe you do. And yeah, i am not the most practical of people, so I don't think you should be worrying what i say. If its bullshit then there's that. As i said before, I hope you get the correct feedback that gets you motivated.

And wish you all the best with your videos in general.

 

[Sonic Boomer]

No I just responded to why it's important for me to be heard and seen. It's just that you said your post is bullshit so I jokingly used that to open my post, even added a lol at the end to indicate as much.
I don't think you said I don't work hard or anything.

 

[Sonic Boomer]

I often come across people who complain that video games and gaming in general aren't the same anymore, that they're bored of games yet most of these people know nothing about gaming tbh and I strongly disagree with their sentiments.

So I put this video together where I look at the 5 main reasons people find gaming boring and how they can fix that.

As I explain the reasons people find gaming boring or have gaming burnout I show many great games and label each one, so you by the end of the video they will not only understand the problem better, but also have a ton of new games to check out and play.

 

[Antilocal123]

I just refute these people by arguing that video games have never been good since I personally don't like them! ❦

 

[Sonic Boomer]

I just refute these people by arguing that video games have never been good since I personally don't like them! ❦

so you troll them basically?