December 31, 2024 • 58 mins
It's the four-year anniversary of Roll Play Grow! Thank y'all so much for being here.
This episode features an interview with Fondue, the creator behind Dice & Easy. We discuss topics ranging from the intricacies of tabletop role-playing games (TTRPGs) to the challenges and joys of content creation. Fondue shares his experiences transitioning into community management at Remedy Entertainment, his brief stint with professional DMing, streaming on Twitch, and creating videos for YouTube. The conversation also touches upon Foundry Virtual Tabletop, the evolving landscape of TTRPGs, and practical tips for budding content creators.
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Transcript
Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
Courtney (00:33):
Hey entrepreneurs.
Before I introduce today'sguest, I wanted to celebrate a
milestone with you all.
Roll Play Grow is officiallyfour years old.
My first episode dropped on newyear's day back in 2021.
And it is wild to think thatI've been doing this podcast for
so long.
Admittedly, it's been a littlesporadic at times.
(00:56):
And I don't have nearly as manyepisodes out as I thought I
would by now because of it.
But despite multiple breaks, Ialways love coming back to the
show and chatting with amazingpeople.
I've made so many friendsbecause of this podcast and the
online TTRPG community.
And I just want to thank all ofyou for hanging out with me.
As we look into 2025, I ambuilding out my interview
(01:18):
schedule.
If you are a creator in eitherTTRPG or board games and are
interested in coming onto theshow, feel free to reach out.
I have a contact form you canfill out at
LightheartAdventures.com/RPG.
I can't always get to everybodywho reaches out, but I would
still love to hear from you.
(01:39):
All right.
Today we are chatting withfondue, the creator behind Dice
Easy.
Fondue works in the video gameindustry, streams on Twitch has
a YouTube channel, which has alot of tutorials on using
Foundry virtual tabletop.
We cover a lot of topics intoday's episode, including Dming
tips, community management,Foundry and the grind of content
(02:03):
creation.
Fondue has some great advice,and I know that y'all are going
to enjoy it.
As always, I want to shout outmy favorite tea company, Friday
afternoon tea.
For Christmas, I was just giftedthree teas that are brand new to
me and a gift card, which I gotanother five bags of tea.
So suffice to say a, mycollection of their teas is
(02:25):
growing.
I absolutely adore Friday andher shop, and if you have been
hankering for tea blends thatare based off of your favorite
books and movies, you shoulddefinitely try them out.
They currently have their Lordof the Rings teas out, which
happened to include some of ourfavorites.
Like brother, captain king andthe gray wanderer.
Check them out at fridaytea.com,and if you use code
(02:47):
LightheartADV you'll get 10% offyour order and help support the
show.
Happy new years friends.
Here's hoping 2025 is betterthan 2024.
Let's go talk to fondue.
Hello, friends! Today I amjoined by Fondue, the content
(03:11):
creator behind Dice and Easy.
How's it going today?
Fondue (03:15):
Hello everyone, it's going great! I've had a very
relaxing day, went to the gym,so it's very nice.
Courtney (03:20):
Yeah, it's awesome.
I know you are ending your dayjust as I'm starting it, so time
zones are super
Fondue (03:26):
fun.
Yes! Time zones.
Courtney (03:30):
So to kick things off, I would like to know what is the
very first game that youremember playing?
Fondue (03:37):
The very first game- Are we talking like video games or
TTRPGs?
Courtney (03:41):
of the above.
Fondue (03:43):
Okay, I can do both.
For video games, the first one Iremember playing is Super Mario
Bros.
for the NES, because I got anNES as a birthday present when I
was 5 years old.
And I think I got Super MarioBrothers and Duck Hunt with
that.
What I didn't know at the timeis that my parents bought it,
like, pre owned, second hand.
But I was, I was very stoked.
(04:04):
I was, like, so happy.
Because the console had been outalready for, for some time
already at that point.
So they could get it, like, forcheap.
So they did, but I was stoked.
I was so happy to get thatthing.
At least that's what my momtells me, that I was very, very
excited.
And that's the first video gameI can remember playing is that
one.
And I've played games eversince.
(04:26):
And for roleplaying games, thefirst one I remember playing is
Middle MIRP.
But I played the Finnishversion, because I'm from
Finland and I grew up inFinland, it's called KERP,
because it's Keskimaa BroliPeli, Keskimaa is Middle Earth
in Finnish.
So, that's the first one Iremember playing, and I remember
it being very crunchy, and ithad like a whole critical hit
(04:47):
table of like, if you do acritical hit, then you have to
roll on this huge table ofthings that can happen, and they
were like very descriptive andvery precise on like, what part
of your body takes damage andhow, and We played that when I
was like, I was like 12 withlike a neighbor of mine started
playing there and then moved onto D&D 3.
5e eventually when I was ateenager.
Courtney (05:08):
Yeah, I, you know, whether being like, Finnish
version aside, I just, I havenot even heard of that one.
Fondue (05:15):
It's not a current game anymore It I don't know when the
last edition of that was.
It's very old.
It is like very very old I thinkit was second the second edition
of that that I played
Courtney (05:28):
Mm hmm.
Fondue (05:29):
yeah, that was in the late 90s early 2000s.
Yeah late 90s Yes so I have noidea what the latest version of
that would have even beenbecause now it's like the one
ring which is made by FreeLeague and then they've also
made the D&D one which I, it'skind of just called like Lord of
the Rings role playing game Ithink.
Courtney (05:48):
No, I was gonna actually ask, have you played
The One Ring?
Fondue (05:52):
I haven't, no, but it's Free League's it's, it's not the
D&D ones.
I'm, that's more exciting forme, personally and Free League
stuff is really good.
Like, I've, I've played Vassen,and Vassen is really good, or
Vassen as is the Englishpronunciation and it's really
good, and their overall, like,systems are very interesting.
So, I would definitely be intotrying it, but I've, haven't
gotten around to it.
Courtney (06:12):
Fair enough.
I'd say The One Ring isdefinitely one of my favorites
right now.
It's a very, yeah, it's a muchmore unique system, I think.
It's just, it's really fun andit, it takes place setting wise
in between like the Hobbit andthe Lord of the Rings
Fondue (06:29):
Ah, cool.
Courtney (06:30):
So you get to explore a lot of that time frame.
Fondue (06:34):
Yeah, yeah.
And trying different systems isalways interesting and seeing
how How like different genresand settings and whatnot can
benefit from having differentsystems because it always tends
to be like we made this 5thedition thingy and it's like
cool but I know exactly how it'sgoing to play.
There's not going to be anysurprises there.
I'm like sure there's peoplethat build stuff on top of 5th
(06:57):
edition and they'll have like webuilt our this system but at the
end it's 5th edition and I kindof know what I'm getting into.
I'm not going to really have anysurprises but with new systems
it's always like oh how did theyThink about the, you know,
problems that they have, or thecreative intent that they had,
and how does that come throughthrough the system, is
interesting.
Courtney (07:14):
Yeah.
What games are you playing thesedays?
Fondue (07:18):
I have one group at the moment, and the whole point of
that group is that we don't playD&D, we try different types of
things.
And we're currently playingBlades in the Dark, which is
really interesting.
It is a very, very interestingsystem.
We've had a bit of a break for afew months, because adult lives
have come into the way.
But I do like the way that itworks and the way that a session
(07:40):
is structured feels really nicelike you do basically one heist
in one session, roughlyspeaking, and I do like how it's
paced and how it all works out.
And the world is reallyinteresting.
Like, I find the, usually I'mnot really into the kind of
steampunk esque, like Dishonoredesque type worlds, but this one
is very interesting, like howthey've built it.
(08:01):
And it's like, it's technicallya post apocalyptic world, but it
doesn't feel like a postapocalyptic world.
And They have really interestingthings like the Devil's Bargain,
where anyone can basically belike you can get an extra die,
but something bad is going tohappen, or something unexpected
is going to happen, and the factthat even players can do that to
each other, I think is reallycool, because usually that's a
mechanic that you would give,like the GM is allowed to do
(08:21):
that mechanic, but playersaren't, but in this one it's
like, no, the players can also,you know, do that, And I think
it creates an interestingdynamic on the table.
Courtney (08:30):
Yeah, I really love games where it gets to be more
collaborative in the actualworld building itself.
Yeah, Which, I know, some ofthat too just depends on your
GM, but when, like, when theactual structure of the game is
there to help support that, Ithink makes it just a much more
interesting story.
Fondue (08:49):
Mm hmm.
For sure.
And I mean, Blades in the Dark,like, they do give you the
setting, but a lot of it islike, You can fill in the blanks
like, you know, there's thesefactions but what do the
factions actually do and who'sin the factions like it's not
really determined or even likethe different parts of the city
like they're described to youbut what's really in them is not
really described so like so thatwhen you're playing you know you
(09:12):
can fill those in the playerscan fill those in like oh I know
this bar over there calledwhatever and it's like okay this
bar is now here and I do alsolike although I do find The
challenge is that your tablemight have a hard time with
that, depending on what type ofgames they're used to.
If they're used to more like,well the GM is at top and then
(09:33):
they kind of describe everythingand then you react to them, like
D&D tends to be, then thosetypes of games can be very
difficult for them to wrap theirhead around, where they have
more agency and it's more like,even leveled I've found.
Courtney (09:45):
hmm.
Now that's actually reallyinteresting, because while one
of the groups I'm playing withwe're definitely trying to play
anything but D&D.
We're also still In basically,like, Baby's First D&D, with
some of our local friends thatwe met who had just never played
any game whatsoever.
And getting them out of theirshell to even just do a little
(10:06):
bit of roleplay, do a little bitof reaction, has been a
challenge.
Fondue (10:10):
Yeah, I mean it is hard because like role playing,
you're essentially acting oryou're playing.
It is play, the thing that wedid as kids, which was really
like natural for us.
But now as adults, it is seen asnot a thing that adults do.
It is seen as embarrassingbecause you have to be quite
vulnerable in those moments.
Because, you know, inevitablywhen you're acting, when you're
role playing, You'll dosomething that doesn't quite
(10:33):
land well or that it was very,you had a very clear idea of it
in your head.
And then when it comes out,you're like, that didn't, I
didn't mean to say it like that.
I didn't mean to do it likethat.
And those are vulnerablemoments.
People are afraid of thosemoments in general.
Like they're very difficult forus to do, especially if you're
with new people.
Like if you're not with a tablethat you've known for a really
long time, and it's even morescarier to try to do stuff.
(10:54):
Cause you're like, what if I,what if I make myself looks
silly or foolish and, and it'sunderstandable.
But the good thing with Playingother systems with people who
haven't played any games beforeis that they don't have any
preconceived
Courtney (11:05):
Mm hmm.
Fondue (11:07):
ideas.
Like if you're, you've beenplaying D&D for like five years
and then you try to play otherstuff, it's hard because you
have such a D&D kind of putsblinders on you and you're like,
oh, but in D&D it works likethis.
Yeah, but this is not D&D.
Like, this is very different.
It's not as strict and it's notas GM driven.
This is more collaborative andthen that can create problems.
I
Courtney (11:27):
Yeah, what techniques or methods have you seen work to
help those players make thattransition?
Fondue (11:36):
I think one thing that really helps is asking players
to do things, or like, askingplayers to describe things, for
example, in a scene.
You're like, you describe ascene, and then you go to player
A.
Like, player A, what is aninteresting thing that you see?
Or what is a thing that ismaking you feel uncomfortable
that you see in this scene?
So you give them kind of anopportunity to describe
(11:56):
something in a scene, forexample.
Or, if they see a, if they meeta character, then you can be
like, what's something that yourcharacter notices about this
character?
And that gives them a little bitof agency, but it's not usually
a huge situation there, but oh,They have a scar over their
their eyebrow and it's like,okay, now this is a detail that
(12:16):
we can together work on or likewe have together established
this detail.
So I think that's like a niceway of doing it.
Then in general, like having asession zero is always really
important with any, any groupand trying to there kind of lay
the groundwork.
Like, hey, we can, we can act,we can play, it's fine.
If you fail, don't worry aboutit.
So trying to be encouragingalways helps.
(12:38):
And For me, at least, I likerole playing, so I do it a lot
myself, and I feel like thatalso um, it helps to lower the
barrier for others.
If I'm doing a lot of sillyvoices and being silly and, and
looking, looking embarrassing,then they also feel less
pressured or they're, they don'tlike, oh, okay, well I can do it
too, because they're also doingit.
So I think those are sometechniques that really help.
(13:01):
On a personal level, if you'rethinking about how could you do
it yourself, I would say do someimprov theater classes.
They do wonders.
I've been doing improv theaterfor six, seven years.
I haven't done it actively for acouple years now.
But it's really good for fortabletop role playing because
you essentially just get to playaround and you do scenes and you
(13:22):
get to act characters, and thenyou usually, at least the
classes that I've had, weusually like, do a scene and
then we kind of stop and it'slike, Okay, what didn't work in
this scene, and why?
And it's usually the basics oflike, who are you, what was your
relationship, and where wereyou?
Those are like the basic thingsyou have to define in an improv
scene, which very often youforget, and then it makes the
scene very complicated and verydifficult to understand.
(13:46):
And what it also teaches you islistening.
Listening is really, reallyimportant and it sounds mundane,
but what it really means is youare listening to what the other
actors or players in thisinstance are bringing to the
scene.
So you're, you're listening,okay, they're bringing this
(14:07):
thing to the scene and then youbuild on top of that.
So you're like, what can I add?
Like one thing that I can addand then they can build off of
and then you create this kind offlow of you're all bringing
something to the, to the scenethat you're all building off of
together, which then leads toYou creating something that
couldn't have happened withoutyou doing it together If some
one of you would have like triedto script this it wouldn't have
(14:29):
happened.
It would have been verydifferent So this like listening
and taking a kind of step bystep approach to building things
in the scene It's reallydifficult by the way.
I don't mean to say that it'seasy.
It's really hard like in improvIt's really really difficult
because what ends up happening alot of times is You have your
own idea, you're like, I wantthis, this scene to go this way,
(14:50):
and I'm going to try tosteamroll that, and it never
works out.
It, it always creates a lot ofissues, it creates friction, the
other actors are like, what areyou doing?
It just never works out.
And then the other thing is,Even when you are listening,
okay, I'm going to try to bringstuff to the scene.
You bring too much, you bringtoo many things.
And then the other actors, like,I don't know what to grab onto.
There's too much stuff.
So trying to like be just onething and then step by step
(15:12):
build things.
It's, it's difficult.
Yeah, I guess those are somethings if, if that makes sense.
Courtney (15:18):
Oh, absolutely.
Like, it's so interesting.
I studied theater my whole life.
I used to work in theaters as astage manager after I graduated
college.
And what's so funny is I lovedperforming, and yet I hated
improv.
And now I'm playing tTRPGs allof the time.
It's
Fondue (15:35):
Yeah.
I've only done like improvtheater, so I don't, I don't
know like the traditional sideof things at all.
Really.
Yeah.
For me, it's like I get to playit's to me to me It's just
playing as an adult like we justget in the room like now we're
at an airport Like okay, cool Weare and now we're just gonna
pretend that we are and it'sjust like like being a kid again
It's really fun for me because Ijust like doing that.
It's just fun.
It's just silly
Courtney (15:55):
I know, I feel like if I were to go back and do it now,
that I'm not, I don't know,embarrassed or feeling the
pressure, I'd probably have alot more fun, and it's maybe why
I'm able to play games likethis, but Yeah, like, it's funny
how I'll advise people to, like,Hey, learn some improv
techniques.
Like, they're really helpful.
And I'm like, I know thesetechniques.
I hated it, though.
(16:15):
What?
Fondue (16:16):
It is very like improv, low key, like high key is very,
very, helpful when it comes totabletop role playing games.
If you want to get better at therole playing aspect of it.
Of course, if you don't want toget better at it, then
Courtney (16:29):
Then, like, why are you
Fondue (16:30):
playing?
You do you.
You do you.
I mean, there's different typesof games, you know, some people
like the more like wargame ysimulations type of thing where
they like having figurines androunds that take a long time and
a lot of strategy.
That's fine, you know, there's,there's different types of
games, you know, there'sPathfinder there's games that
are more crunchy.
That's, that's totally
Courtney (16:49):
Alright, I do want to transition into talking about
your content creation.
So I know that you're on Twitch,you're on YouTube, and I'd love
to just hear the story of howyou went from playing video
games, playing tabletop RPGs,into making content around them.
Fondue (17:08):
Sure.
I originally started because in2019, I Got a new job in Sweden
at a game studio calledAvalanche.
And just FYI, I work in thegames industry.
I used to be a producer, whichmeans project management stuff.
I am a community managernowadays.
But I got a new job in Malmö,Sweden, to work at Avalanche.
(17:32):
And I moved to Sweden, and Imoved by myself.
And when I was there, I wasmissing my friends a lot, and I
was feeling lonely, so I waslike, maybe I could, like,
stream to hang out with peopleabroad, like, abroad, and I
asked people on my Facebook,like, personal Facebook, like,
hey, would anyone wanna come andhang?
And they said yes, so I startedstreaming and The first stream
(17:53):
was terrible, as is for any newcreative endeavor that you do.
I didn't understand anythingabout audio production or, you
know, even not using your Wi Ficonnection because that's going
to create a lot of issues foryou if you're streaming.
You shouldn't use your Wi Ficonnection because it's really
unstable.
The game didn't run wellbecause, of course, like, I
didn't understand that, youknow, If you stream something,
(18:14):
it requires more resources fromyour PC, so it didn't go well.
But, I was like, I like this,and I'm gonna continue doing it,
so I, I continued streaming.
And, I did that for, well, I'mstill doing it, you know, I've
been doing it now for five yearsnow.
And, at some point I starteddoing YouTube stuff, I was doing
(18:34):
something very different more onthe political side of things for
a while.
But then I thought that, youknow, I'll, I'll, I wanna pivot
to something else.
I wanna do something that is notas tiring for me mentally.
So I was thinking like, whatcould I do that is something
that would kind of be differentthat, that I'm interested in?
(18:55):
And I had started running a gameof D&D on a Foundry VTT in, I
think it was 2020 or 2021.
I forget.
But I started running a gamebecause I wanted to play, and I
had some friends, so I askedthem, do you want to play
virtually?
So we did, we played on Foundry,and I loved tinkering around in
Foundry, and I loved checkingout all kinds of different
(19:17):
modules, and, and adding them,and seeing what, what can be
expanded upon in Foundry, andthat's like, one of the things I
really appreciate.
Fell in love with with Foundryis that is so expandable with
all the mods that you have forit.
Like you can you can add almostwhatever you want to it with the
mods and then the price pointbeing so cheap as well It's like
I think 60 euros with FinnishVAT Like it's really cheap and
(19:40):
then just the GM needs to buythat was like this Incredible
product so cheap and then youcan expand upon it and it's
great And yeah, so then I waslike, I could do tutorials.
Like I know a lot of stuff aboutFoundry.
So then I just started makingFoundry VTT tutorials.
And yeah, that's kind of how Iended up doing what I am doing.
(20:02):
Originally just streaming andthen, you know, Eventually doing
foundry tutorials and stilldoing streaming on that end as
well And then a little stint oflike pro gming as well there for
a while like about a year UntilI realized that I don't have the
energy for this because it's alot of stuff to do Because it's
not my this is not my full timething.
(20:22):
This is completely on my hobbyside of things my full time Nine
to five is my game industry job.
So at some point I was likerunning four different campaigns
like two paid and two of my own.
And then I was like, I can't, I,it's too much, I can't, I'm
tired, I want, I wanna haveweekends to myself at some
point, so, cut down on thoseyeah.
(20:43):
So that's kind of the short ofit,
Courtney (20:45):
Alright.
Digging into getting startedwith YouTube, what steps did you
take to start?
Fondue (20:55):
Well create a YouTube channel, the usual, yes, I had
already like been making videos.
So I knew how video editingworked and, but I took a
different approach for thischannel.
I was like, I'm going to scriptthe videos.
So that was like a different, orin the beginning I didn't
actually script or my scriptswere like bullet points.
(21:17):
So I would basically just startlike, okay, what do I want to
talk about?
Like what are some topics that Ithink are interesting?
Maybe some modules that I wantto highlight that I think are
really cool.
So I like, I started off withbasically thinking of things
that I want to talk about on myvideos.
And then writing scripts.
They were mostly just bulletpoint related stuff.
And then at some point I waslike, I want to write the
(21:39):
scripts like fully out.
Because when I was just doingbullet point stuff, it was like,
I would be like, okay, how do Iwant to formulate this?
And I have to kind of think ofit on the spot, which for the
style of video that I was doing,I don't think is the best.
Because it's more likeinformational of like, here's
how you do things.
First do this, first do thatfirst, and then do this.
And for that kind of, It feltlike it was better that I
(22:04):
formulated like beforehand sothat I just read it and then I
and that's like more clear andconcise.
So yeah, first things I startedis like thinking of what do I
want to talk about listing likejust putting those in a, in a
Not a monday duck.
Notion, in a notion boardbasically being like, here's the
type of videos I want to do.
That's like what I usually do islike, I have a notion board, and
(22:25):
then I have video ideas there,and then I will write like
thoughts in the, in that notioncard for the video like okay, I
want to talk about this and thisand this if I have any links
that I need I'll put them inthere and then eventually I
started writing the full scriptthere and all that stuff It's
kind of how I got started onthat
Courtney (22:44):
Yeah, for sure.
I can definitely relate to thebullet point versus writing
script.
Because like, I've started doingmini episodes where I'm very
informational and I'm like, wow,I just ramble if I don't have it
written out.
Fondue (22:57):
Yeah, and it really depends on like what the goal is
like For some stuff a moreconversational style can be
better like if let's say I wereto Talk about something that's
going on in the TTRPG industrythen a more conversational style
Could be better because it makesit feel a lot less like a news
(23:17):
show if I'm reading it but whenI'm like basically telling you
like here's how this moduleworks or or Here's how to use
this module Then usuallyscripting it out works better.
Although if I'm, like, I havesome videos where I, like, I
jump into Foundry and I'm doingstuff in Foundry and I'm
explaining what I'm doing as I'mdoing it, those I don't script
(23:38):
because it's quite difficult, orI could, but But capturing the b
roll would be a huge amount oftime.
Like, it would be really timeconsuming for me to capture all
that b roll of like, doing allthose things and then lining up
the VO to be like, good with it.
Like, that would be really timeconsuming.
I could do it, but it would bereally, really time consuming.
So it's easier for me to like,okay, well, let's just have my
(23:59):
camera here, and then I'm justgonna be like, okay, now I'm
doing this, then I'm gonna gohere, and then this, I'll do
this.
So, for those, it's more I'llhave the bullet points of like,
I want to, I have to go throughall these features, but I'll
just do it as I'm doing it.
But if it's like, yeah, just metalking to the camera, then
yeah, scripting works better forthe style of content that I do
for the informational purposesand like tutorial purposes.
But like there's no, there's noone right way to do it.
Courtney (24:22):
hmm.
That makes total sense.
I'm curious with Foundry too,like, I know that you have a
video where you talk aboutdifferent VTTs out there, so
maybe it's just a little shortpreview of that video that
listeners can go find.
Why did you pick Foundry overthe others?
Fondue (24:40):
So I didn't only pick Foundry.
I want to emphasize that thatvideo I gave my my top picks for
different types of content.
Use cases, and I think I pickedFoundry because this video is
almost, it's a year and a halfold, so I'm trying to remember
what did I pick Foundry for.
I think I picked it as the mostversatile VTT because it's, from
(25:03):
the others that are likeversatile like that, when I was
doing the research like a yearand a half ago.
The other ones that are outthere is like, Fantasy Grounds.
I found that really difficult touse.
Like, I found it, like, the UXof it was really, really
difficult.
It's really, it's also reallyexpandable.
But from my perspective, it wasvery hard to use compared to
Foundry.
Granted, I had a bias in thatbecause I've been using Foundry
(25:25):
for a long time.
And I, I'm, you know, I don'tshy away from that.
I do mention in the video thatI've been using it for a long
time.
So I'm, I'm biased.
Obviously, but one of thereasons were like it is
relatively speaking likestraightforward to pick up like
any of the more complex VTT'syou will there's a learning
curve like if you go to roll 20and You've never used a VTT.
(25:46):
It's gonna take some time beforeyou learn the ropes So if you're
like going for something morecomplex, you've never used a VTT
and I think learning those It'sa similar learning curve and
Foundry is relativelystraightforward on that and I'm
actually really excited for thenext version because then
they're going to redo the UI forthe in game stuff and I'm
interested to see like, wheredoes that go?
(26:07):
Because they've done that forthe landing page stuff already,
which some people don't like.
I personally do like becauseit's more modern and to me more
usable, but I understand thatnot everyone likes it.
But yeah, it's also theexpandability of Foundry that
it's so easy to just installmodules You just like I want to
install this module click boom.
It's there It's very easy toexpand upon You can get it to do
(26:28):
like really whatever you likewith as long as you do some
research on it and find themodules That you like so those
were kind of the reasons why Ipicked Foundry for that specific
category but there were likeothers like One more multiverse.
I think it's is it still calledthat because they they they went
away But then they came backwhich like most people don't
know You that they came back, sothey
Courtney (26:49):
When?
Fondue (26:49):
away.
Yeah, so they're they're back.
But the URL is different, no?
geez, it used to be, one moremultiverse I need to find it,
ahh But yeah, they they wentaway, because they were like
well, the they they ran out offunding, and then You know, they
were saying like, it's GG's, butthen they came back, I think
they have a Patreon now, andit's called PlayMultiverse.
(27:10):
com nowadays, but it's, now it'sstill, it's still going, and I
thought that that was a reallycool VTT that's really different
to anything else out there, andI was, I was kind of bummed that
it was going away, I was like,oh, it's really different and
interesting, so I also tried tolike, See what type of different
VTTs there are out there.
And then of course the wholelike 3D VTT stuff is still kind
(27:31):
of coming.
It was, it was way early a yearand a half ago, like Maneer,
which I have kickstarted.
I'm still kind of waiting to seewhat comes out of that.
Then Wizards of the Coast hastheir own 3D VTT that's coming
out.
I think there's one or two otherones.
That's also like an interestingthing on the horizon that I'm
working on.
Interested to see how that pansout because the problem with
(27:53):
those is that they're usuallyquite resource intensive and a
lot of TTRPG players don't havemega PCs.
So I'm also looking forward tosee how that works out.
Yeah,
Courtney (28:05):
some of the, or I guess like the local D&D group
that I play with.
We are starting to use D&DBeyond's new platform for at
least maps, which, I don't know,it's I feel torn.
I'm not the DM.
My husband's the DM.
And like, we've got Foundry.
(28:27):
We use the Forge, technically touse the Foundry.
Yeah.
I think it's just easier.
Mhm.
Fondue (28:33):
is great unless you're really into figuring out the
self hosting side of Foundrywhich, like, if you're into
that, cool, go for it.
Me, myself?
Nah.
No thanks.
I don't want to look into portforwarding and all that stuff,
so the Forge is phenomenal.
Courtney (28:46):
Yeah, but I'm like, okay, so we've got the
subscription to the forge, like,let's just use that! It's got
more features, at least for now!But I do get the ease of, all
right, you make a character onD&D Beyond and now you have a
token that you can just dropinto a map, and while
functionality is basic, it'sstill just, I don't know.
We'll see.
We'll see how long
Fondue (29:06):
I totally get that as well.
And it really does, like, dependon, like, what are your needs?
Like, if your need is, I justwant a token with a picture to
move on the map, But I'll doeverything else myself.
Then, yeah, Foundry is a bit toomuch.
Like, you don't really needFoundry for that.
You can just go for what is itcalled?
One of the, Albert Rodeo, forexample.
Although they've added a lot offeatures there, but that's,
(29:27):
like, quite straightforward, youknow?
So, it really depends on whatyou want to do, but if you're
like, I want the VTT to handleall the math stuff, I want it to
check, you know, skill checksand all that, it's like, yeah,
then you probably want somethingmore robust.
So, if you're thinking aboutVTTs, like, think about your use
case, like, what do you want todo?
If you want just a digital Mapon your, at your table that you
(29:51):
can just move stuff around.
Yeah, Foundry is a bit overkillin my opinion at that, that
point.
Courtney (29:56):
Fair enough.
how much time were you spendingon each of these videos?
Fondue (30:03):
I'm trying to remember.
Haven't made a video in a coupleof months.
It varies a lot.
It depends.
So if it's a video where I'mjust talking, those are the
quickest to make.
Those are like four ish hours tomake.
Like a video where it's just metalking, no b roll or very
minimal b roll.
Those are like four hours or so.
(30:23):
If there's, or like four to sixhours, if there's b roll
involved then it's probablygoing to be around 10 ish hours.
And then, like, the VTT one isthe one where I spent the most
time because I had to do a lotof research on that one.
So that one was probably like 30hours, I want to say, something
along those lines.
(30:44):
Like, that's, like, that's thelongest one, maybe even 40, with
all the research that I had todo and then all the b roll that
I had to capture for, fordifferent things.
So It varies a lot, but I wouldsay on average like 10 to 15
hours per video, I would say ittakes me I'm pretty quick with
the edit stuff So writing thescript is usually like an hour
(31:07):
to two hours or three hoursdepending on the script Then
shooting it is about an hour,maybe an hour and a half Editing
is the largest chunk of it.
Obviously that's going to belike Five to ten hours,
depending on what type ofediting I'm doing, because my
edits are not super complex.
It's mostly, you know, talkinghead.
(31:28):
Cuts add some b roll here, youknow, maybe some transitions and
that's about it.
It's nothing crazy And a simplecolor grade, but I just use the
same one every time so it's apreset and I use a Software
called recut which takes out allthe like silent parts out from
the video automatically for meSo I don't need to manually edit
although like there's a longsilent gap here So it just cuts
(31:51):
that out for me automaticallysaving me a little bit of time
and then, then I have to do theYouTube publishing side of
things, so I have to make athumbnail, that's usually an
hour or two to make a thumbnail.
I hate, I hate doing thumbnails.
I'm not good at them.
It's one of my big weaknesses asa creator.
It's just, I'm not a graphicdesigner, I don't really have
interest in that area, but I gotto do them and yeah, then doing
(32:15):
YouTube SEO.
So, you know, looking up like,okay, what's, what's the good
name for this?
I use a tool called TubeBuddy todo like competitive, like
analysis of like, okay, if I usethis title, how well does it
rank in the search?
Like, are, are these words,things that people search for
and if they do, is there a lotof competition in that?
So like, so that my video canpop up.
So that takes a little bit oftime to research and then
writing all that stuff.
(32:36):
So yeah, that's another hourish.
There, so that's kind of thebreakdown of it.
And at one point I also did haveanother editor that I worked
with who did do some of myvideos as well.
But it was, it was yeah, me andhim.
I would do some videos and hewould do some.
Courtney (32:51):
Thank those are some really interesting tools that I
need to go look up now.
Fondue (32:55):
Yep, mhm, and there's also, so TubeBuddy is one for
the, like, YouTube SEO stuff,other is vidIQ, I think that's
quite popular among theYouTubers, but yeah, it's, it's
very, very useful because itlets you basically check, like,
well this is the idea, I have itfor the title, and then it
basically tells you, like, itgives you a score based off your
channel compared to otherchannels in, that are using
(33:17):
those types of words, and thenare people even searching for
those words, because if no one'ssearching for that stuff, Then,
like, your views are gonna bebad because no one's searching
for that stuff, so it's reallyuseful in trying to find, like,
what's a good title for a video.
And of course, as is the name ofthe game, you have to try to
think of from a viewerperspective and kind of in a
clickbaity ish type of way,which sucks, I don't like it,
(33:38):
but unfortunately it is how youhave to make things.
I would just like to call it,Hey, check this, check out, this
is a cool module, but I can't doit like that, I'd be like, This
module will change the way youthink about maps, or something
like that.
And that's just how I have to doit, cause that's That's how the
attention economy works, and Idon't like it, but it is,
unfortunately, how it works.
And then it's me being like,whoa, like, I'm making a very
(34:00):
exaggerated face on thethumbnail, and then pointing at
something, and then there's acircle, you know?
Courtney (34:07):
Yeah, I was, I was definitely looking at your
thumbnails and I was like, allright, you got
Fondue (34:12):
They're like that because, they're like that
because it works, I'm not goodat the thumbnails, so it's what
I can do.
Like, if I was a really goodthumbnail artist, I would make
something a lot more interestingand unique.
But I'm not unfortunately.
Courtney (34:27):
Hey, I mean, it works, you know.
I can definitely relate, though.
I despise coming up with titlesfor this show.
Fondue (34:36):
Yeah
Courtney (34:38):
Ugh.
Yeah.
It's just, like, I am familiarwith SEO tools for, like,
websites and blog posts and, Imean, now that you say that, I'm
like, of course there's alsothat for YouTube.
It just, yeah.
YouTube isn't something thatI've really delved into yet.
Maybe in the future, but yeah,it's good to know ahead of time.
Fondue (34:57):
It's a whole it's a whole different it's a whole
thing
Courtney (35:28):
Okay, so talk to me about your Twitch streaming
journey.
Fondue (35:33):
so my twitch streaming yeah, as I mentioned I started
in 2019 of just like playinggames and talking with my
friends and Then I justcontinued doing it.
I was like, this is fun.
I'm really enjoying this At thattime I was also like, feeling
kind of tired of doing gameproduction, like project
management, I was kind of like,this is not really what I want
(35:54):
to do anymore, I'm kind of boredof it, it's not creative in any
way that is meaningful for me.
So I was like, I want to switchto doing something else.
So that was kind of a creativeoutlet for me and kind of be
like, maybe if I make thishappen, this could be my job.
But making it happen in contentcreation is really, really
difficult.
It's very difficult.
There's luck involved.
(36:15):
Not only luck, of course,there's a lot of other stuff
involved, but luck is a factorof it.
If you don't live in NorthAmerica, it also makes it more
challenging for you, dependingon where you live, of course.
Like if you live in France orBrazil or like a big country
with like a local language, thenyou can.
Do it with your local language.
I'm from Finland making contentin Finland.
(36:35):
The market cap is very lowThere's very few.
There's 5.
5 million people in Finland.
So you need to make like reallymainstream stuff and it's not
really my interest There's a lotof challenges in making it like
making a breaking through as acontent creator So I was doing
that as, you know, on the side,first just playing games, then
(36:59):
talking about politics stuff,and then eventually just moving
more towards now, just like,kind of, I'm more treating it as
a hobby nowadays, I've kind ofshifted to having it more like a
hobby thing.
Where I'm just doing what makesit feel good for me, right now.
Because I have my main job,which is now more creative, as
I'm a community manager, I getto flex more of my creative
stuff.
So, now I'm just kind of, withstreaming, kind of doing what
(37:21):
makes me happy.
A lot of the time is playinggames, talking about the games
industry a lot, because I have alot of insight into what's going
on in the games industry that alot of people don't or and
especially with how things arecurrently in the gaming space
there's a lot of misinformationgoing around there so I think I
can give some interestinginsight but yeah that's kind of
(37:41):
how it went down is just yeahfirst kind of being like hanging
out with friends then seeingcould I become like a full time
streamer and then realizing it'svery difficult and being Lucky
enough that I got this communitymanagement job, and then that
being kind of like where I do mycreative main thing, and then
now this is just like, I'm doingit for me.
(38:02):
I'm doing this for fun.
Courtney (38:04):
Yeah, so the community management is at Remedy
Entertainment?
Fondue (38:08):
Remedy Entertainment, yes, we are known for Control.
Alan Wake, Max Payne.
Those are our games.
Courtney (38:15):
So how did that job move happen?
Fondue (38:20):
So I moved back to Finland in 2022 because I had
been living in Sweden for, Ilived there for two and a half
years, of which two years I wasworking remotely because of the
pandemic.
I moved there half a year beforethe pandemic hit.
And so after being like a yearand a half working remote, I was
like, I'm really lonely, I don'thave any friends in Sweden, I
(38:40):
want to move back to Finlandbecause all my friends and
family are there, and then Iasked at work, like, hey, can I
move back home and work remotelyfor you, because I've been doing
it now for like a year and ahalf, and they said, no, that's
not possible, and I said, okay,well, then I'm going to quit.
I'm sorry, nothing personal it'snot that I don't like the
company, but I want to moveback, so I, I moved back and
then I got a job at Remedy as aproducer, working on a project
(39:04):
called Vanguard, which no longerexists.
And I did that for a year and ahalf?
Yeah, a year and a half ish.
And I mentioned to my boss like,Hey, I would like to transition
to this community managementjob.
If it would be possible withinRemedy, I would love to.
And at first they said, Well,it's not really possible at the
(39:26):
moment.
We don't have any, like,openings in that area at the
moment.
So unfortunately, it's notpossible.
And I was like, All right, well,I tried, but, you know,
whatever.
And then a couple of months goby and they're like, We could
really use someone here becauseAlan Wake 2 is coming out in the
fall and we actually need some,someone here to help.
Would you like to do it?
I was like, yeah, sure.
And of course.
(39:46):
So then I transitioned to thatjob a bit over a year ago.
So I've been doing that forabout a year or so.
And it's been a lot of fun.
I moved in to this role just asAlan Wake 2 launched.
And so I've been there for thePost launch of Alan Wake 2 for
all the updates and the twoDLCs.
And now we're, we're preparingthings for our upcoming game FBC
(40:07):
Firebreak for next year.
So it's very exciting.
Courtney (40:10):
Yeah, absolutely.
Absolutely.
That does feel like a bigtransition though.
You know, my background is alsoproject management and so just
thinking of moving from that todealing more directly with the
community, I feel like that,yeah, that must have been, well,
hopefully exciting, maybe alittle difficult at times.
Fondue (40:28):
Yes, but it was also very familiar because I'd been
doing content creation for likefour years at that point I have
my own discord community.
I talk with people on stream allthe time I do YouTube so I
interact with people like wheremy viewers through there So I
think and that was like one ofthe reasons why I was able to
like say like hey I haveexperience in this because I've
(40:49):
been doing this on my free timefor four years already So that
prepared me a lot for what itwas to be a community manager.
Of course, it's differentbecause now I'm representing a
company.
I'm not representing myself asmyself.
I can just be like, you know,whatever, blah, you know, and
you know, the stakes are a lothigher because I'm a very, very
small creator.
So the stakes are very low, butnow, you know, I'm dealing with,
(41:11):
You know, people who haveexpectations about the game and
the company.
So it's, it's been verydifferent.
And I guess the challenging partin the beginning was like, this
is only two came out.
So there was a lot of feedbackcoming in and like taking those
and filtering them towards theteam and then learning to,
Understand, like, what can Isay?
(41:31):
What can't I say?
What's the overall tone of howwe communicate?
Like that, I think, was the hardpart in the beginning, because I
was like, can I say this stuff?
Like, can I respond to thisperson and say this stuff?
Or can't I?
Like, I'm not sure.
Because every studio does itvery differently.
Like, some studios are verytransparent.
Like, they talk a lot to thefans and they answer everything.
Others are like, They postofficial updates and that's it.
(41:53):
So it's very different for eachstudio.
So it was, it was for surechallenging, but it was a lot of
fun.
I really enjoyed it.
And like having done contentcreation on like different
avenues.
So, you know, streaming,YouTube, short form videos as
well.
I, I've been doing myself for awhile.
That stuff helped like prepareme for that.
I already had the tools to dealwith that.
(42:16):
I understood, like, I know howdiscord works and I, I, I
understood like, you know, Ourdiscord was there, but we hadn't
really been using it asactively, so I was like, okay I
want to change the discord inthis and this and this way I
want to have these types ofchanges be done here and then
the rest of the team was like,yeah that that makes sense or
earlier this year I was like, Ithink we should do short form
(42:38):
video stuff.
I think that would be cool.
And then the rest of our teamwas like, well, we don't really
know much about it, but if youwant to do it, go for it.
So then we started doing shortform video stuff and that's been
really fun and it's been goodfor us.
So there's a lot also withinRemedy of like, if you want to
do something and you have thepassion and knowledge for it,
(42:59):
you can do it.
So there's like trust given topeople as well.
Courtney (43:03):
What does a normal week look like for you as a
community manager now?
Like now that you've kind ofsettled into the role.
Fondue (43:11):
So now especially like a year after Alan Wake 2's launch,
my week is like, in thebeginning of the week, I'll
usually plan like some fan artthat we retweet.
We usually do like two retweetsof fan art per week from the
Alan Wake account.
Cause we get a lot of reallynice fan art and like virtual
photography because we havephoto mode now.
(43:31):
The plan though is usually ashort form video of some sorts
as well.
Now there's been a lot ofplanning stuff for next year
because of FBC Firebreak.
So there's a lot of meetingsabout stuff and a lot of
planning and thinking.
I can't go super into detail,but yeah, a lot of meetings and
planning stuff for next year.
Talking to our fans on Discord.
(43:52):
I try to be at least a littlebit active every day.
At least.
Go in and say like happy timezone.
How's everyone doing?
So yeah, I'm not sure ifeveryone's familiar with like
the the happy time zone kind ofGreeting it's basically a way to
say like good morning withoutsaying good morning because it's
not morning for everyone So yousay happy time zone because you
don't know what time zoneeveryone's on so at least go in
(44:13):
there and say that and Kind ofkeep an eye on what's going on
in the discord at least brieflyAlso to some degree try to see
if there's any You Major issuesthat are being reported about
our game and then put like movethose forward to the dev team at
this point There's not as muchanymore Compared to like the
first few months when there wasa lot of feedback coming in that
(44:34):
we could filter through there Soyeah, that's kind of what it
looks like right now.
There's a lot of planning andpreparing stuff for next year
that we're at right now, butthen you know at different
points It looks very differentat one point.
We were doing an Alan Wake 2development stream series so
then my weeks in involved likeplanning the streams and then
Doing the production, so I didthe production side of those
(44:54):
streams, like I set up our OBSscenes and everything and how
that works and all the bots andeverything and I could do that
because I had done streamingmyself for, for four years so I
knew how all that worked so thatwas like, if I had done that
without ever having streamed itwould have been really
difficult.
It would have been very, verydifficult, but because we had
done it, I was like, okay, Iknow exactly what I want, I want
(45:15):
these and these and thesescenes, I'm gonna put the
microphones here, I'm gonna havethese filters, I'm gonna do
this, need to do some colorgrading, da da da da, so then I
could set it up.
So that was at one point I wasdoing that then also I have
made, we have like these actorinterview videos that we've been
posting for Alan Wake 2 I editthose, so some weeks are me
working on those videos, editingthem together.
(45:36):
So it varies a lot, but that'skind of what it looks like.
Making some content, usuallyhere and there.
Right now, planning a lot ofstuff for next year.
Posting stuff online.
Interacting with our communityon Discord.
That's kind of the short andsweet of it.
Courtney (45:51):
Yeah, it definitely sounds like a very busy job.
Fondue (45:54):
Yeah, I mean, there's never a lack of stuff to do in
the games industry.
Yes.
Courtney (46:01):
So one thing that I do like to talk about in these
interviews is, you know, you'reworking in the games industry,
presumably because you love it,but there can be some
challenges.
So, yeah, so talk to me about,you know, some of the most,
like, challenging things thatyou have been dealing with over
the last Several years since2019.
Fondue (46:23):
So if we're talking about, like, game development,
or are we talking about, like,The content creation side of
things.
I
Courtney (46:29):
do
Fondue (46:30):
want to make sure.
Okay, on the game developmentside of things, the hardest part
as like being a producer iscommunication.
For me, like, that's the hardestpart and that's where a lot of
issues in game development arisefrom.
is that people don't communicateenough or they don't make their
(46:51):
ideas or their intentions clearand then someone does something
that they weren't supposed to doand then that leads into issues
and cascades into problems.
So a lot of issues that I see ingame development are
communications related.
It's a bit reductive to say it'sjust communications, it's
definitely not.
There's a lot of other thingsOther challenges that come in
the way.
But I feel like communication islike a big deal of it because
(47:14):
it's the bigger you get, theharder that stuff becomes.
Cause if you're like Two friendsmaking a game.
It's really easy.
Like you, you presumably talk toeach other constantly.
You're very in sync.
It's easy for you to be like,I'm going to do this thing.
You do that thing.
Cool.
But then once you start beinglike 40 people, a hundred
people, it becomes a wholedifferent thing of like, you
(47:36):
have to make sure that thingsare being delivered on time,
that other people aren't blockedbecause of what you're doing
that, you know, all thedifferent departments are all
pulling in the same direction.
Like it becomes a huge.
I used to work at Ubisoft at onepoint, and Ubisoft has a lot of
producers, and they're kind ofknown for having a lot of
producers.
And it's because they need to,because a lot of the games have
(47:59):
like hundreds of people inseveral studios and several
times on, so you'll have likeThe head studio for this
Assassin's Creed game is inCanada, and then another studio
in France is helping, and then astudio in Romania is doing QA,
and like, you have so manydifferent parts that have to
communicate with each other,then you need people to
facilitate that communication alot.
So communication, I would say,is a really, Big challenge, not
(48:25):
because people are malicious oranything, it's not usually the
case.
A lot of it is just peopleassuming a lot of things, and
then that leading to issues.
And a lot of the stuff is alsothat the different areas of game
production, programming, design,art, audio, they talk very
differently.
(48:45):
And they have differentproblems, so when they talk with
each other, they don'tnecessarily all have the shared
language to describe theirissues with.
And that can lead tomisunderstandings and
frustrations.
So, having people who can kindof bridge that gap is always
really, really valuable.
Sometimes you have those peoplein production who are like,
(49:06):
Let's get together thesedifferent departments, and then
they talk with each other, andthen that person in the middle
is like, I think what you're, sowhat you're saying is This thing
and then they say yes, and thenI was like, oh, okay.
That's what you meant.
I'm misunderstood So sometimesit's really useful to have
someone in a meeting go likefrom what I'm hearing You're
saying this and then they cansay yes exactly or they can say
(49:28):
no.
No, that's not what I meant Andthen they clarify and that can
be very useful.
Sometimes it's production,sometimes you have people within
those disciplines who are reallygood at cross discipline
communication, which is alwaysreally nice.
Ideally, you would also alwaystry to have your teams, in my
opinion, set up to be crossdisciplinary around features,
rather than like, here's theprogrammers, here's the artists,
here's the designers.
Rather like, here's the teamthat's working on enemies, for
(49:51):
example, just a random example,and it has animators designers,
programmers, and so on, so it'sinterdisciplinary.
So that's like on the, on thatside, I would say, is a
difficulty.
As a community manager,difficulty is aligning like what
the team can do in the time thatwe have versus what the
(50:14):
community wants.
So community, the communitywants certain things, but you
know, not everything can be donelike this.
You know, there's priorities,there's other stuff that
happening and then being like,okay, what can we do with what,
what the community wants in acertain amount of time.
So that's kind of one thing.
And then for, you know, for anupcoming game, it's, it's more
like, okay, what can we.
What can we make sure that it,that we can do for the launch of
(50:35):
the game?
Then, for content creation,biggest challenge is, is the
treadmill, I would say.
Because you're like, I made avideo, it's out now! And then,
then the next one, and the nextone, and the next one.
So the, the constant, Treadmillof making content, which is a
(50:57):
weirdly dehumanizing way ofsaying art, because in the end a
lot of content is art, but wedon't see it as art, which is
frustrating kind of recent hangups I've been having with
content is that it's verydehumanizing in a way that it's
like it creates this kind ofdepersonal like product that
(51:17):
needs to be consumed, where it'swell, If we could have less of
it and it can be moremeaningful, that'd be cool.
Of course, we don't live in thatworld.
So it's like the ConcentrateMelodica.
You made, you made a video nowon onto the next one.
So like, you don't really get tosit with it that much.
Like you kind of have to move onto the next one.
And then finding that energyalways to make the next one,
(51:39):
finding the inspiration to makethe next one is, is a challenge
at times.
And sometimes you're just like,you just make a video.
You're like, well, I'll justmake this video to have.
Stuff out because usually youwant to have like a regular
cadence as well Let's say youhave a weekly cadence and then
sometimes you're just likeyou're just super out of the
juice You're just like I don'tknow man.
I'll just make this video.
Whatever To have something,which is, which is not a fun
(52:02):
feeling as cause if you're justdoing stuff to have, for, for
having stuff's sake, it's not afun feeling, but at the same
time, especially if you're fulltime, you have to do it, because
that's your livelihood.
If you don't publish a video,you're not making money, or if
you're a streamer, it's evenmore grueling, because if you're
not live as a streamer, you'renot making money, so you have to
go live whenever your schedulesays you go live, and then some
(52:25):
days you're just like, I don'twant to stream, I, I just don't
feel like it.
This fucking sucks.
I don't want to be perceivedright now.
I don't want to try to entertainpeople or whatever, but then you
have to do it and you have tojust like push through and you
just have to do the thing.
And that can be reallydifficult, I think.
The treadmill of making contentand finding the inspiration
creatively and the energy to dothat Consistently is difficult
(52:51):
No,
Courtney (52:53):
100%.
I can relate so hard.
Thank you.
I know that that was a lot to goover.
But I guess to not end on asadder note, let's flip it
around.
Fondue (53:07):
Yeah
Courtney (53:08):
What are some of the more rewarding parts of working
in this industry?
Fondue (53:13):
the more rewarding parts for me when it comes to the
content side of things isGetting the comments like this
video really helped me likethose are those are like I
really love those comments wherepeople like this video really
helped me like i'm My favoriteones are when people are all
like this video really helped methe content Your communication
is really clear and concise.
And that, those are like thecomments that I.
(53:34):
Resonate with the most becausethat's when I write my my
scripts for the tutorials andfor the videos that I make I try
to make it as succinct and tothe point while being Enough so
I don't want to make it toobrief so that it's not It's not
clear, but the point in mywriting and my communication is
(53:54):
that I want it to be clear andunderstandable.
And the way that I speak also oncamera, I try to enunciate and
make it really, really clearwhat I am trying to teach the
other person.
And then when I get commentssaying that, that, that did
happen, I'm like, awesome.
That's exactly what I wanted.
And it resonated with people.
(54:15):
And then on the communitymanagement side I think just
seeing our fans be really happywith what's coming out.
You know, we had theannouncement for FBC Firebreak
and people were very excited.
That was cool.
Or when Alan Wake 2 was comingout and people were really
excited, you know, that's cool.
Or the two DLCs came out andpeople were really excited.
So.
Seeing people be really excitedand then on a more personal note
(54:37):
like the stream series that wedid and the people were so
excited for that I was reallyreally happy with that because
that was like a thing that Iproduced so I was really happy
that people really liked thevibe of it and and the kind of
more laid back conversationalnature of it and like got a lot
of out of it.
So those are the types of thingsthat make me happy.
(54:57):
Well, FBC
Courtney (54:59):
Amazing! Well, I know that some of the videos have
been on hiatus for a bit, andobviously I know with your
professional job you're notnecessarily allowed to talk
about a whole lot of things, butwith all of that said, are there
any upcoming projects that youcan talk about that you're
excited about?
Fondue (55:19):
Firebreak, like it's, it's coming out next year.
I'm really, really excited forthat.
Cause like it's my first timeworking.
On a upcoming project as acommunity manager So it's like
my first time like planningstuff out for the launch of the
game Like how are we going to dothings and all that kind of
stuff?
So that's really exciting alsoterrifying because i've never
done this side of things as muchbefore i've more been on the
(55:42):
production side of things likehow do we get the game out the
door?
So it's really exciting thatthat part is is very very
exciting for me.
So That is like an upcomingthing.
I'm super super excited aboutBecause it's also something
different like it's a it's notthe type of game that we usually
do at remedy So it's also a newtype of game, which is exciting.
Courtney (55:59):
Okay, yeah, it'll be interesting to see how launch
goes and what the reaction ofthe community is.
Fondue (56:05):
for sure.
Yes.
Courtney (56:07):
All right, well, Fondue, this has been really
awesome.
If people want to find you,where should they go?
Fondue (56:14):
So on YouTube, it's dice and easy you can find me so dice
ampersand easy.
That's the Symbol over there,you can find me on YouTube, also
on Twitch, Dice and Easy butthen it's written out, Dice and
Easy together.
I stream every Monday andWednesday at 6.
30 p.
m.
Eastern European time, which is8.
(56:34):
30 a.
m.
Pacific and 11.
30 a.
m.
Eastern time for the Americantime zones.
If you want to come chat with meand watch as I play games,
you're more than welcome to.
Then on Twitter, you can find meat DiceAndEasyRPG, and on
BlueSky, DiceAndEasy.
Courtney (56:51):
I know.
So many places these days.
Fondue (56:53):
There are so many places these days.
Courtney (56:57):
Awesome.
I will have links to that in theshow notes, but seriously, this
has been so fun.
Thank you for coming on
Fondue (57:02):
Yeah, this was great.
Thank you for having me.
I had a blast being here.
Courtney (57:06):
Alright, lovely listeners, at this point we are
going to wrap up the interviewportion of this episode and
pretty much immediately jumpinto a fun little quick question
blitz for Patrons, where I'mgoing to ask him 10 additional
questions that are a little bitsillier.
So if you want to listen tothat, you can go to
patreon.com/rollplaygrow.
(57:30):
Thanks again.
Hey entrepreneurs.
Before I introduce today'sguest, I wanted to celebrate a
milestone with you all.
Roll Play Grow is officiallyfour years old.
My first episode dropped on newyear's day back in 2021.
And it is wild to think thatI've been doing this podcast for
so long.
Admittedly, it's been a littlesporadic at times.
(00:56):
And I don't have nearly as manyepisodes out as I thought I
would by now because of it.
But despite multiple breaks, Ialways love coming back to the
show and chatting with amazingpeople.
I've made so many friendsbecause of this podcast and the
online TTRPG community.
And I just want to thank all ofyou for hanging out with me.
As we look into 2025, I ambuilding out my interview
(01:18):
schedule.
If you are a creator in eitherTTRPG or board games and are
interested in coming onto theshow, feel free to reach out.
I have a contact form you canfill out at
LightheartAdventures.com/RPG.
I can't always get to everybodywho reaches out, but I would
still love to hear from you.
(01:39):
All right.
Today we are chatting withfondue, the creator behind Dice
Easy.
Fondue works in the video gameindustry, streams on Twitch has
a YouTube channel, which has alot of tutorials on using
Foundry virtual tabletop.
We cover a lot of topics intoday's episode, including Dming
tips, community management,Foundry and the grind of content
(02:03):
creation.
Fondue has some great advice,and I know that y'all are going
to enjoy it.
As always, I want to shout outmy favorite tea company, Friday
afternoon tea.
For Christmas, I was just giftedthree teas that are brand new to
me and a gift card, which I gotanother five bags of tea.
So suffice to say a, mycollection of their teas is
(02:25):
growing.
I absolutely adore Friday andher shop, and if you have been
hankering for tea blends thatare based off of your favorite
books and movies, you shoulddefinitely try them out.
They currently have their Lordof the Rings teas out, which
happened to include some of ourfavorites.
Like brother, captain king andthe gray wanderer.
Check them out at fridaytea.com,and if you use code
(02:47):
LightheartADV you'll get 10% offyour order and help support the
show.
Happy new years friends.
Here's hoping 2025 is betterthan 2024.
Let's go talk to fondue.
Hello, friends! Today I amjoined by Fondue, the content
(03:11):
creator behind Dice and Easy.
How's it going today?
Fondue (03:15):
Hello everyone, it's going great! I've had a very
relaxing day, went to the gym,so it's very nice.
Courtney (03:20):
Yeah, it's awesome.
I know you are ending your dayjust as I'm starting it, so time
zones are super
Fondue (03:26):
fun.
Yes! Time zones.
Courtney (03:30):
So to kick things off, I would like to know what is the
very first game that youremember playing?
Fondue (03:37):
The very first game- Are we talking like video games or
TTRPGs?
Courtney (03:41):
of the above.
Fondue (03:43):
Okay, I can do both.
For video games, the first one Iremember playing is Super Mario
Bros.
for the NES, because I got anNES as a birthday present when I
was 5 years old.
And I think I got Super MarioBrothers and Duck Hunt with
that.
What I didn't know at the timeis that my parents bought it,
like, pre owned, second hand.
But I was, I was very stoked.
(04:04):
I was, like, so happy.
Because the console had been outalready for, for some time
already at that point.
So they could get it, like, forcheap.
So they did, but I was stoked.
I was so happy to get thatthing.
At least that's what my momtells me, that I was very, very
excited.
And that's the first video gameI can remember playing is that
one.
And I've played games eversince.
(04:26):
And for roleplaying games, thefirst one I remember playing is
Middle MIRP.
But I played the Finnishversion, because I'm from
Finland and I grew up inFinland, it's called KERP,
because it's Keskimaa BroliPeli, Keskimaa is Middle Earth
in Finnish.
So, that's the first one Iremember playing, and I remember
it being very crunchy, and ithad like a whole critical hit
(04:47):
table of like, if you do acritical hit, then you have to
roll on this huge table ofthings that can happen, and they
were like very descriptive andvery precise on like, what part
of your body takes damage andhow, and We played that when I
was like, I was like 12 withlike a neighbor of mine started
playing there and then moved onto D&D 3.
5e eventually when I was ateenager.
Courtney (05:08):
Yeah, I, you know, whether being like, Finnish
version aside, I just, I havenot even heard of that one.
Fondue (05:15):
It's not a current game anymore It I don't know when the
last edition of that was.
It's very old.
It is like very very old I thinkit was second the second edition
of that that I played
Courtney (05:28):
Mm hmm.
Fondue (05:29):
yeah, that was in the late 90s early 2000s.
Yeah late 90s Yes so I have noidea what the latest version of
that would have even beenbecause now it's like the one
ring which is made by FreeLeague and then they've also
made the D&D one which I, it'skind of just called like Lord of
the Rings role playing game Ithink.
Courtney (05:48):
No, I was gonna actually ask, have you played
The One Ring?
Fondue (05:52):
I haven't, no, but it's Free League's it's, it's not the
D&D ones.
I'm, that's more exciting forme, personally and Free League
stuff is really good.
Like, I've, I've played Vassen,and Vassen is really good, or
Vassen as is the Englishpronunciation and it's really
good, and their overall, like,systems are very interesting.
So, I would definitely be intotrying it, but I've, haven't
gotten around to it.
Courtney (06:12):
Fair enough.
I'd say The One Ring isdefinitely one of my favorites
right now.
It's a very, yeah, it's a muchmore unique system, I think.
It's just, it's really fun andit, it takes place setting wise
in between like the Hobbit andthe Lord of the Rings
Fondue (06:29):
Ah, cool.
Courtney (06:30):
So you get to explore a lot of that time frame.
Fondue (06:34):
Yeah, yeah.
And trying different systems isalways interesting and seeing
how How like different genresand settings and whatnot can
benefit from having differentsystems because it always tends
to be like we made this 5thedition thingy and it's like
cool but I know exactly how it'sgoing to play.
There's not going to be anysurprises there.
I'm like sure there's peoplethat build stuff on top of 5th
(06:57):
edition and they'll have like webuilt our this system but at the
end it's 5th edition and I kindof know what I'm getting into.
I'm not going to really have anysurprises but with new systems
it's always like oh how did theyThink about the, you know,
problems that they have, or thecreative intent that they had,
and how does that come throughthrough the system, is
interesting.
Courtney (07:14):
Yeah.
What games are you playing thesedays?
Fondue (07:18):
I have one group at the moment, and the whole point of
that group is that we don't playD&D, we try different types of
things.
And we're currently playingBlades in the Dark, which is
really interesting.
It is a very, very interestingsystem.
We've had a bit of a break for afew months, because adult lives
have come into the way.
But I do like the way that itworks and the way that a session
(07:40):
is structured feels really nicelike you do basically one heist
in one session, roughlyspeaking, and I do like how it's
paced and how it all works out.
And the world is reallyinteresting.
Like, I find the, usually I'mnot really into the kind of
steampunk esque, like Dishonoredesque type worlds, but this one
is very interesting, like howthey've built it.
(08:01):
And it's like, it's technicallya post apocalyptic world, but it
doesn't feel like a postapocalyptic world.
And They have really interestingthings like the Devil's Bargain,
where anyone can basically belike you can get an extra die,
but something bad is going tohappen, or something unexpected
is going to happen, and the factthat even players can do that to
each other, I think is reallycool, because usually that's a
mechanic that you would give,like the GM is allowed to do
(08:21):
that mechanic, but playersaren't, but in this one it's
like, no, the players can also,you know, do that, And I think
it creates an interestingdynamic on the table.
Courtney (08:30):
Yeah, I really love games where it gets to be more
collaborative in the actualworld building itself.
Yeah, Which, I know, some ofthat too just depends on your
GM, but when, like, when theactual structure of the game is
there to help support that, Ithink makes it just a much more
interesting story.
Fondue (08:49):
Mm hmm.
For sure.
And I mean, Blades in the Dark,like, they do give you the
setting, but a lot of it islike, You can fill in the blanks
like, you know, there's thesefactions but what do the
factions actually do and who'sin the factions like it's not
really determined or even likethe different parts of the city
like they're described to youbut what's really in them is not
really described so like so thatwhen you're playing you know you
(09:12):
can fill those in the playerscan fill those in like oh I know
this bar over there calledwhatever and it's like okay this
bar is now here and I do alsolike although I do find The
challenge is that your tablemight have a hard time with
that, depending on what type ofgames they're used to.
If they're used to more like,well the GM is at top and then
(09:33):
they kind of describe everythingand then you react to them, like
D&D tends to be, then thosetypes of games can be very
difficult for them to wrap theirhead around, where they have
more agency and it's more like,even leveled I've found.
Courtney (09:45):
hmm.
Now that's actually reallyinteresting, because while one
of the groups I'm playing withwe're definitely trying to play
anything but D&D.
We're also still In basically,like, Baby's First D&D, with
some of our local friends thatwe met who had just never played
any game whatsoever.
And getting them out of theirshell to even just do a little
(10:06):
bit of roleplay, do a little bitof reaction, has been a
challenge.
Fondue (10:10):
Yeah, I mean it is hard because like role playing,
you're essentially acting oryou're playing.
It is play, the thing that wedid as kids, which was really
like natural for us.
But now as adults, it is seen asnot a thing that adults do.
It is seen as embarrassingbecause you have to be quite
vulnerable in those moments.
Because, you know, inevitablywhen you're acting, when you're
role playing, You'll dosomething that doesn't quite
(10:33):
land well or that it was very,you had a very clear idea of it
in your head.
And then when it comes out,you're like, that didn't, I
didn't mean to say it like that.
I didn't mean to do it likethat.
And those are vulnerablemoments.
People are afraid of thosemoments in general.
Like they're very difficult forus to do, especially if you're
with new people.
Like if you're not with a tablethat you've known for a really
long time, and it's even morescarier to try to do stuff.
(10:54):
Cause you're like, what if I,what if I make myself looks
silly or foolish and, and it'sunderstandable.
But the good thing with Playingother systems with people who
haven't played any games beforeis that they don't have any
preconceived
Courtney (11:05):
Mm hmm.
Fondue (11:07):
ideas.
Like if you're, you've beenplaying D&D for like five years
and then you try to play otherstuff, it's hard because you
have such a D&D kind of putsblinders on you and you're like,
oh, but in D&D it works likethis.
Yeah, but this is not D&D.
Like, this is very different.
It's not as strict and it's notas GM driven.
This is more collaborative andthen that can create problems.
I
Courtney (11:27):
Yeah, what techniques or methods have you seen work to
help those players make thattransition?
Fondue (11:36):
I think one thing that really helps is asking players
to do things, or like, askingplayers to describe things, for
example, in a scene.
You're like, you describe ascene, and then you go to player
A.
Like, player A, what is aninteresting thing that you see?
Or what is a thing that ismaking you feel uncomfortable
that you see in this scene?
So you give them kind of anopportunity to describe
(11:56):
something in a scene, forexample.
Or, if they see a, if they meeta character, then you can be
like, what's something that yourcharacter notices about this
character?
And that gives them a little bitof agency, but it's not usually
a huge situation there, but oh,They have a scar over their
their eyebrow and it's like,okay, now this is a detail that
(12:16):
we can together work on or likewe have together established
this detail.
So I think that's like a niceway of doing it.
Then in general, like having asession zero is always really
important with any, any groupand trying to there kind of lay
the groundwork.
Like, hey, we can, we can act,we can play, it's fine.
If you fail, don't worry aboutit.
So trying to be encouragingalways helps.
(12:38):
And For me, at least, I likerole playing, so I do it a lot
myself, and I feel like thatalso um, it helps to lower the
barrier for others.
If I'm doing a lot of sillyvoices and being silly and, and
looking, looking embarrassing,then they also feel less
pressured or they're, they don'tlike, oh, okay, well I can do it
too, because they're also doingit.
So I think those are sometechniques that really help.
(13:01):
On a personal level, if you'rethinking about how could you do
it yourself, I would say do someimprov theater classes.
They do wonders.
I've been doing improv theaterfor six, seven years.
I haven't done it actively for acouple years now.
But it's really good for fortabletop role playing because
you essentially just get to playaround and you do scenes and you
(13:22):
get to act characters, and thenyou usually, at least the
classes that I've had, weusually like, do a scene and
then we kind of stop and it'slike, Okay, what didn't work in
this scene, and why?
And it's usually the basics oflike, who are you, what was your
relationship, and where wereyou?
Those are like the basic thingsyou have to define in an improv
scene, which very often youforget, and then it makes the
scene very complicated and verydifficult to understand.
(13:46):
And what it also teaches you islistening.
Listening is really, reallyimportant and it sounds mundane,
but what it really means is youare listening to what the other
actors or players in thisinstance are bringing to the
scene.
So you're, you're listening,okay, they're bringing this
(14:07):
thing to the scene and then youbuild on top of that.
So you're like, what can I add?
Like one thing that I can addand then they can build off of
and then you create this kind offlow of you're all bringing
something to the, to the scenethat you're all building off of
together, which then leads toYou creating something that
couldn't have happened withoutyou doing it together If some
one of you would have like triedto script this it wouldn't have
(14:29):
happened.
It would have been verydifferent So this like listening
and taking a kind of step bystep approach to building things
in the scene It's reallydifficult by the way.
I don't mean to say that it'seasy.
It's really hard like in improvIt's really really difficult
because what ends up happening alot of times is You have your
own idea, you're like, I wantthis, this scene to go this way,
(14:50):
and I'm going to try tosteamroll that, and it never
works out.
It, it always creates a lot ofissues, it creates friction, the
other actors are like, what areyou doing?
It just never works out.
And then the other thing is,Even when you are listening,
okay, I'm going to try to bringstuff to the scene.
You bring too much, you bringtoo many things.
And then the other actors, like,I don't know what to grab onto.
There's too much stuff.
So trying to like be just onething and then step by step
(15:12):
build things.
It's, it's difficult.
Yeah, I guess those are somethings if, if that makes sense.
Courtney (15:18):
Oh, absolutely.
Like, it's so interesting.
I studied theater my whole life.
I used to work in theaters as astage manager after I graduated
college.
And what's so funny is I lovedperforming, and yet I hated
improv.
And now I'm playing tTRPGs allof the time.
It's
Fondue (15:35):
Yeah.
I've only done like improvtheater, so I don't, I don't
know like the traditional sideof things at all.
Really.
Yeah.
For me, it's like I get to playit's to me to me It's just
playing as an adult like we justget in the room like now we're
at an airport Like okay, cool Weare and now we're just gonna
pretend that we are and it'sjust like like being a kid again
It's really fun for me because Ijust like doing that.
It's just fun.
It's just silly
Courtney (15:55):
I know, I feel like if I were to go back and do it now,
that I'm not, I don't know,embarrassed or feeling the
pressure, I'd probably have alot more fun, and it's maybe why
I'm able to play games likethis, but Yeah, like, it's funny
how I'll advise people to, like,Hey, learn some improv
techniques.
Like, they're really helpful.
And I'm like, I know thesetechniques.
I hated it, though.
(16:15):
What?
Fondue (16:16):
It is very like improv, low key, like high key is very,
very, helpful when it comes totabletop role playing games.
If you want to get better at therole playing aspect of it.
Of course, if you don't want toget better at it, then
Courtney (16:29):
Then, like, why are you
Fondue (16:30):
playing?
You do you.
You do you.
I mean, there's different typesof games, you know, some people
like the more like wargame ysimulations type of thing where
they like having figurines androunds that take a long time and
a lot of strategy.
That's fine, you know, there's,there's different types of
games, you know, there'sPathfinder there's games that
are more crunchy.
That's, that's totally
Courtney (16:49):
Alright, I do want to transition into talking about
your content creation.
So I know that you're on Twitch,you're on YouTube, and I'd love
to just hear the story of howyou went from playing video
games, playing tabletop RPGs,into making content around them.
Fondue (17:08):
Sure.
I originally started because in2019, I Got a new job in Sweden
at a game studio calledAvalanche.
And just FYI, I work in thegames industry.
I used to be a producer, whichmeans project management stuff.
I am a community managernowadays.
But I got a new job in Malmö,Sweden, to work at Avalanche.
(17:32):
And I moved to Sweden, and Imoved by myself.
And when I was there, I wasmissing my friends a lot, and I
was feeling lonely, so I waslike, maybe I could, like,
stream to hang out with peopleabroad, like, abroad, and I
asked people on my Facebook,like, personal Facebook, like,
hey, would anyone wanna come andhang?
And they said yes, so I startedstreaming and The first stream
(17:53):
was terrible, as is for any newcreative endeavor that you do.
I didn't understand anythingabout audio production or, you
know, even not using your Wi Ficonnection because that's going
to create a lot of issues foryou if you're streaming.
You shouldn't use your Wi Ficonnection because it's really
unstable.
The game didn't run wellbecause, of course, like, I
didn't understand that, youknow, If you stream something,
(18:14):
it requires more resources fromyour PC, so it didn't go well.
But, I was like, I like this,and I'm gonna continue doing it,
so I, I continued streaming.
And, I did that for, well, I'mstill doing it, you know, I've
been doing it now for five yearsnow.
And, at some point I starteddoing YouTube stuff, I was doing
(18:34):
something very different more onthe political side of things for
a while.
But then I thought that, youknow, I'll, I'll, I wanna pivot
to something else.
I wanna do something that is notas tiring for me mentally.
So I was thinking like, whatcould I do that is something
that would kind of be differentthat, that I'm interested in?
(18:55):
And I had started running a gameof D&D on a Foundry VTT in, I
think it was 2020 or 2021.
I forget.
But I started running a gamebecause I wanted to play, and I
had some friends, so I askedthem, do you want to play
virtually?
So we did, we played on Foundry,and I loved tinkering around in
Foundry, and I loved checkingout all kinds of different
(19:17):
modules, and, and adding them,and seeing what, what can be
expanded upon in Foundry, andthat's like, one of the things I
really appreciate.
Fell in love with with Foundryis that is so expandable with
all the mods that you have forit.
Like you can you can add almostwhatever you want to it with the
mods and then the price pointbeing so cheap as well It's like
I think 60 euros with FinnishVAT Like it's really cheap and
(19:40):
then just the GM needs to buythat was like this Incredible
product so cheap and then youcan expand upon it and it's
great And yeah, so then I waslike, I could do tutorials.
Like I know a lot of stuff aboutFoundry.
So then I just started makingFoundry VTT tutorials.
And yeah, that's kind of how Iended up doing what I am doing.
(20:02):
Originally just streaming andthen, you know, Eventually doing
foundry tutorials and stilldoing streaming on that end as
well And then a little stint oflike pro gming as well there for
a while like about a year UntilI realized that I don't have the
energy for this because it's alot of stuff to do Because it's
not my this is not my full timething.
(20:22):
This is completely on my hobbyside of things my full time Nine
to five is my game industry job.
So at some point I was likerunning four different campaigns
like two paid and two of my own.
And then I was like, I can't, I,it's too much, I can't, I'm
tired, I want, I wanna haveweekends to myself at some
point, so, cut down on thoseyeah.
(20:43):
So that's kind of the short ofit,
Courtney (20:45):
Alright.
Digging into getting startedwith YouTube, what steps did you
take to start?
Fondue (20:55):
Well create a YouTube channel, the usual, yes, I had
already like been making videos.
So I knew how video editingworked and, but I took a
different approach for thischannel.
I was like, I'm going to scriptthe videos.
So that was like a different, orin the beginning I didn't
actually script or my scriptswere like bullet points.
(21:17):
So I would basically just startlike, okay, what do I want to
talk about?
Like what are some topics that Ithink are interesting?
Maybe some modules that I wantto highlight that I think are
really cool.
So I like, I started off withbasically thinking of things
that I want to talk about on myvideos.
And then writing scripts.
They were mostly just bulletpoint related stuff.
And then at some point I waslike, I want to write the
(21:39):
scripts like fully out.
Because when I was just doingbullet point stuff, it was like,
I would be like, okay, how do Iwant to formulate this?
And I have to kind of think ofit on the spot, which for the
style of video that I was doing,I don't think is the best.
Because it's more likeinformational of like, here's
how you do things.
First do this, first do thatfirst, and then do this.
And for that kind of, It feltlike it was better that I
(22:04):
formulated like beforehand sothat I just read it and then I
and that's like more clear andconcise.
So yeah, first things I startedis like thinking of what do I
want to talk about listing likejust putting those in a, in a
Not a monday duck.
Notion, in a notion boardbasically being like, here's the
type of videos I want to do.
That's like what I usually do islike, I have a notion board, and
(22:25):
then I have video ideas there,and then I will write like
thoughts in the, in that notioncard for the video like okay, I
want to talk about this and thisand this if I have any links
that I need I'll put them inthere and then eventually I
started writing the full scriptthere and all that stuff It's
kind of how I got started onthat
Courtney (22:44):
Yeah, for sure.
I can definitely relate to thebullet point versus writing
script.
Because like, I've started doingmini episodes where I'm very
informational and I'm like, wow,I just ramble if I don't have it
written out.
Fondue (22:57):
Yeah, and it really depends on like what the goal is
like For some stuff a moreconversational style can be
better like if let's say I wereto Talk about something that's
going on in the TTRPG industrythen a more conversational style
Could be better because it makesit feel a lot less like a news
(23:17):
show if I'm reading it but whenI'm like basically telling you
like here's how this moduleworks or or Here's how to use
this module Then usuallyscripting it out works better.
Although if I'm, like, I havesome videos where I, like, I
jump into Foundry and I'm doingstuff in Foundry and I'm
explaining what I'm doing as I'mdoing it, those I don't script
(23:38):
because it's quite difficult, orI could, but But capturing the b
roll would be a huge amount oftime.
Like, it would be really timeconsuming for me to capture all
that b roll of like, doing allthose things and then lining up
the VO to be like, good with it.
Like, that would be really timeconsuming.
I could do it, but it would bereally, really time consuming.
So it's easier for me to like,okay, well, let's just have my
(23:59):
camera here, and then I'm justgonna be like, okay, now I'm
doing this, then I'm gonna gohere, and then this, I'll do
this.
So, for those, it's more I'llhave the bullet points of like,
I want to, I have to go throughall these features, but I'll
just do it as I'm doing it.
But if it's like, yeah, just metalking to the camera, then
yeah, scripting works better forthe style of content that I do
for the informational purposesand like tutorial purposes.
But like there's no, there's noone right way to do it.
Courtney (24:22):
hmm.
That makes total sense.
I'm curious with Foundry too,like, I know that you have a
video where you talk aboutdifferent VTTs out there, so
maybe it's just a little shortpreview of that video that
listeners can go find.
Why did you pick Foundry overthe others?
Fondue (24:40):
So I didn't only pick Foundry.
I want to emphasize that thatvideo I gave my my top picks for
different types of content.
Use cases, and I think I pickedFoundry because this video is
almost, it's a year and a halfold, so I'm trying to remember
what did I pick Foundry for.
I think I picked it as the mostversatile VTT because it's, from
(25:03):
the others that are likeversatile like that, when I was
doing the research like a yearand a half ago.
The other ones that are outthere is like, Fantasy Grounds.
I found that really difficult touse.
Like, I found it, like, the UXof it was really, really
difficult.
It's really, it's also reallyexpandable.
But from my perspective, it wasvery hard to use compared to
Foundry.
Granted, I had a bias in thatbecause I've been using Foundry
(25:25):
for a long time.
And I, I'm, you know, I don'tshy away from that.
I do mention in the video thatI've been using it for a long
time.
So I'm, I'm biased.
Obviously, but one of thereasons were like it is
relatively speaking likestraightforward to pick up like
any of the more complex VTT'syou will there's a learning
curve like if you go to roll 20and You've never used a VTT.
(25:46):
It's gonna take some time beforeyou learn the ropes So if you're
like going for something morecomplex, you've never used a VTT
and I think learning those It'sa similar learning curve and
Foundry is relativelystraightforward on that and I'm
actually really excited for thenext version because then
they're going to redo the UI forthe in game stuff and I'm
interested to see like, wheredoes that go?
(26:07):
Because they've done that forthe landing page stuff already,
which some people don't like.
I personally do like becauseit's more modern and to me more
usable, but I understand thatnot everyone likes it.
But yeah, it's also theexpandability of Foundry that
it's so easy to just installmodules You just like I want to
install this module click boom.
It's there It's very easy toexpand upon You can get it to do
(26:28):
like really whatever you likewith as long as you do some
research on it and find themodules That you like so those
were kind of the reasons why Ipicked Foundry for that specific
category but there were likeothers like One more multiverse.
I think it's is it still calledthat because they they they went
away But then they came backwhich like most people don't
know You that they came back, sothey
Courtney (26:49):
When?
Fondue (26:49):
away.
Yeah, so they're they're back.
But the URL is different, no?
geez, it used to be, one moremultiverse I need to find it,
ahh But yeah, they they wentaway, because they were like
well, the they they ran out offunding, and then You know, they
were saying like, it's GG's, butthen they came back, I think
they have a Patreon now, andit's called PlayMultiverse.
(27:10):
com nowadays, but it's, now it'sstill, it's still going, and I
thought that that was a reallycool VTT that's really different
to anything else out there, andI was, I was kind of bummed that
it was going away, I was like,oh, it's really different and
interesting, so I also tried tolike, See what type of different
VTTs there are out there.
And then of course the wholelike 3D VTT stuff is still kind
(27:31):
of coming.
It was, it was way early a yearand a half ago, like Maneer,
which I have kickstarted.
I'm still kind of waiting to seewhat comes out of that.
Then Wizards of the Coast hastheir own 3D VTT that's coming
out.
I think there's one or two otherones.
That's also like an interestingthing on the horizon that I'm
working on.
Interested to see how that pansout because the problem with
(27:53):
those is that they're usuallyquite resource intensive and a
lot of TTRPG players don't havemega PCs.
So I'm also looking forward tosee how that works out.
Yeah,
Courtney (28:05):
some of the, or I guess like the local D&D group
that I play with.
We are starting to use D&DBeyond's new platform for at
least maps, which, I don't know,it's I feel torn.
I'm not the DM.
My husband's the DM.
And like, we've got Foundry.
(28:27):
We use the Forge, technically touse the Foundry.
Yeah.
I think it's just easier.
Mhm.
Fondue (28:33):
is great unless you're really into figuring out the
self hosting side of Foundrywhich, like, if you're into
that, cool, go for it.
Me, myself?
Nah.
No thanks.
I don't want to look into portforwarding and all that stuff,
so the Forge is phenomenal.
Courtney (28:46):
Yeah, but I'm like, okay, so we've got the
subscription to the forge, like,let's just use that! It's got
more features, at least for now!But I do get the ease of, all
right, you make a character onD&D Beyond and now you have a
token that you can just dropinto a map, and while
functionality is basic, it'sstill just, I don't know.
We'll see.
We'll see how long
Fondue (29:06):
I totally get that as well.
And it really does, like, dependon, like, what are your needs?
Like, if your need is, I justwant a token with a picture to
move on the map, But I'll doeverything else myself.
Then, yeah, Foundry is a bit toomuch.
Like, you don't really needFoundry for that.
You can just go for what is itcalled?
One of the, Albert Rodeo, forexample.
Although they've added a lot offeatures there, but that's,
(29:27):
like, quite straightforward, youknow?
So, it really depends on whatyou want to do, but if you're
like, I want the VTT to handleall the math stuff, I want it to
check, you know, skill checksand all that, it's like, yeah,
then you probably want somethingmore robust.
So, if you're thinking aboutVTTs, like, think about your use
case, like, what do you want todo?
If you want just a digital Mapon your, at your table that you
(29:51):
can just move stuff around.
Yeah, Foundry is a bit overkillin my opinion at that, that
point.
Courtney (29:56):
Fair enough.
how much time were you spendingon each of these videos?
Fondue (30:03):
I'm trying to remember.
Haven't made a video in a coupleof months.
It varies a lot.
It depends.
So if it's a video where I'mjust talking, those are the
quickest to make.
Those are like four ish hours tomake.
Like a video where it's just metalking, no b roll or very
minimal b roll.
Those are like four hours or so.
(30:23):
If there's, or like four to sixhours, if there's b roll
involved then it's probablygoing to be around 10 ish hours.
And then, like, the VTT one isthe one where I spent the most
time because I had to do a lotof research on that one.
So that one was probably like 30hours, I want to say, something
along those lines.
(30:44):
Like, that's, like, that's thelongest one, maybe even 40, with
all the research that I had todo and then all the b roll that
I had to capture for, fordifferent things.
So It varies a lot, but I wouldsay on average like 10 to 15
hours per video, I would say ittakes me I'm pretty quick with
the edit stuff So writing thescript is usually like an hour
(31:07):
to two hours or three hoursdepending on the script Then
shooting it is about an hour,maybe an hour and a half Editing
is the largest chunk of it.
Obviously that's going to belike Five to ten hours,
depending on what type ofediting I'm doing, because my
edits are not super complex.
It's mostly, you know, talkinghead.
(31:28):
Cuts add some b roll here, youknow, maybe some transitions and
that's about it.
It's nothing crazy And a simplecolor grade, but I just use the
same one every time so it's apreset and I use a Software
called recut which takes out allthe like silent parts out from
the video automatically for meSo I don't need to manually edit
although like there's a longsilent gap here So it just cuts
(31:51):
that out for me automaticallysaving me a little bit of time
and then, then I have to do theYouTube publishing side of
things, so I have to make athumbnail, that's usually an
hour or two to make a thumbnail.
I hate, I hate doing thumbnails.
I'm not good at them.
It's one of my big weaknesses asa creator.
It's just, I'm not a graphicdesigner, I don't really have
interest in that area, but I gotto do them and yeah, then doing
(32:15):
YouTube SEO.
So, you know, looking up like,okay, what's, what's the good
name for this?
I use a tool called TubeBuddy todo like competitive, like
analysis of like, okay, if I usethis title, how well does it
rank in the search?
Like, are, are these words,things that people search for
and if they do, is there a lotof competition in that?
So like, so that my video canpop up.
So that takes a little bit oftime to research and then
writing all that stuff.
(32:36):
So yeah, that's another hourish.
There, so that's kind of thebreakdown of it.
And at one point I also did haveanother editor that I worked
with who did do some of myvideos as well.
But it was, it was yeah, me andhim.
I would do some videos and hewould do some.
Courtney (32:51):
Thank those are some really interesting tools that I
need to go look up now.
Fondue (32:55):
Yep, mhm, and there's also, so TubeBuddy is one for
the, like, YouTube SEO stuff,other is vidIQ, I think that's
quite popular among theYouTubers, but yeah, it's, it's
very, very useful because itlets you basically check, like,
well this is the idea, I have itfor the title, and then it
basically tells you, like, itgives you a score based off your
channel compared to otherchannels in, that are using
(33:17):
those types of words, and thenare people even searching for
those words, because if no one'ssearching for that stuff, Then,
like, your views are gonna bebad because no one's searching
for that stuff, so it's reallyuseful in trying to find, like,
what's a good title for a video.
And of course, as is the name ofthe game, you have to try to
think of from a viewerperspective and kind of in a
clickbaity ish type of way,which sucks, I don't like it,
(33:38):
but unfortunately it is how youhave to make things.
I would just like to call it,Hey, check this, check out, this
is a cool module, but I can't doit like that, I'd be like, This
module will change the way youthink about maps, or something
like that.
And that's just how I have to doit, cause that's That's how the
attention economy works, and Idon't like it, but it is,
unfortunately, how it works.
And then it's me being like,whoa, like, I'm making a very
(34:00):
exaggerated face on thethumbnail, and then pointing at
something, and then there's acircle, you know?
Courtney (34:07):
Yeah, I was, I was definitely looking at your
thumbnails and I was like, allright, you got
Fondue (34:12):
They're like that because, they're like that
because it works, I'm not goodat the thumbnails, so it's what
I can do.
Like, if I was a really goodthumbnail artist, I would make
something a lot more interestingand unique.
But I'm not unfortunately.
Courtney (34:27):
Hey, I mean, it works, you know.
I can definitely relate, though.
I despise coming up with titlesfor this show.
Fondue (34:36):
Yeah
Courtney (34:38):
Ugh.
Yeah.
It's just, like, I am familiarwith SEO tools for, like,
websites and blog posts and, Imean, now that you say that, I'm
like, of course there's alsothat for YouTube.
It just, yeah.
YouTube isn't something thatI've really delved into yet.
Maybe in the future, but yeah,it's good to know ahead of time.
Fondue (34:57):
It's a whole it's a whole different it's a whole
thing
Courtney (35:28):
Okay, so talk to me about your Twitch streaming
journey.
Fondue (35:33):
so my twitch streaming yeah, as I mentioned I started
in 2019 of just like playinggames and talking with my
friends and Then I justcontinued doing it.
I was like, this is fun.
I'm really enjoying this At thattime I was also like, feeling
kind of tired of doing gameproduction, like project
management, I was kind of like,this is not really what I want
(35:54):
to do anymore, I'm kind of boredof it, it's not creative in any
way that is meaningful for me.
So I was like, I want to switchto doing something else.
So that was kind of a creativeoutlet for me and kind of be
like, maybe if I make thishappen, this could be my job.
But making it happen in contentcreation is really, really
difficult.
It's very difficult.
There's luck involved.
(36:15):
Not only luck, of course,there's a lot of other stuff
involved, but luck is a factorof it.
If you don't live in NorthAmerica, it also makes it more
challenging for you, dependingon where you live, of course.
Like if you live in France orBrazil or like a big country
with like a local language, thenyou can.
Do it with your local language.
I'm from Finland making contentin Finland.
(36:35):
The market cap is very lowThere's very few.
There's 5.
5 million people in Finland.
So you need to make like reallymainstream stuff and it's not
really my interest There's a lotof challenges in making it like
making a breaking through as acontent creator So I was doing
that as, you know, on the side,first just playing games, then
(36:59):
talking about politics stuff,and then eventually just moving
more towards now, just like,kind of, I'm more treating it as
a hobby nowadays, I've kind ofshifted to having it more like a
hobby thing.
Where I'm just doing what makesit feel good for me, right now.
Because I have my main job,which is now more creative, as
I'm a community manager, I getto flex more of my creative
stuff.
So, now I'm just kind of, withstreaming, kind of doing what
(37:21):
makes me happy.
A lot of the time is playinggames, talking about the games
industry a lot, because I have alot of insight into what's going
on in the games industry that alot of people don't or and
especially with how things arecurrently in the gaming space
there's a lot of misinformationgoing around there so I think I
can give some interestinginsight but yeah that's kind of
(37:41):
how it went down is just yeahfirst kind of being like hanging
out with friends then seeingcould I become like a full time
streamer and then realizing it'svery difficult and being Lucky
enough that I got this communitymanagement job, and then that
being kind of like where I do mycreative main thing, and then
now this is just like, I'm doingit for me.
(38:02):
I'm doing this for fun.
Courtney (38:04):
Yeah, so the community management is at Remedy
Entertainment?
Fondue (38:08):
Remedy Entertainment, yes, we are known for Control.
Alan Wake, Max Payne.
Those are our games.
Courtney (38:15):
So how did that job move happen?
Fondue (38:20):
So I moved back to Finland in 2022 because I had
been living in Sweden for, Ilived there for two and a half
years, of which two years I wasworking remotely because of the
pandemic.
I moved there half a year beforethe pandemic hit.
And so after being like a yearand a half working remote, I was
like, I'm really lonely, I don'thave any friends in Sweden, I
(38:40):
want to move back to Finlandbecause all my friends and
family are there, and then Iasked at work, like, hey, can I
move back home and work remotelyfor you, because I've been doing
it now for like a year and ahalf, and they said, no, that's
not possible, and I said, okay,well, then I'm going to quit.
I'm sorry, nothing personal it'snot that I don't like the
company, but I want to moveback, so I, I moved back and
then I got a job at Remedy as aproducer, working on a project
(39:04):
called Vanguard, which no longerexists.
And I did that for a year and ahalf?
Yeah, a year and a half ish.
And I mentioned to my boss like,Hey, I would like to transition
to this community managementjob.
If it would be possible withinRemedy, I would love to.
And at first they said, Well,it's not really possible at the
(39:26):
moment.
We don't have any, like,openings in that area at the
moment.
So unfortunately, it's notpossible.
And I was like, All right, well,I tried, but, you know,
whatever.
And then a couple of months goby and they're like, We could
really use someone here becauseAlan Wake 2 is coming out in the
fall and we actually need some,someone here to help.
Would you like to do it?
I was like, yeah, sure.
And of course.
(39:46):
So then I transitioned to thatjob a bit over a year ago.
So I've been doing that forabout a year or so.
And it's been a lot of fun.
I moved in to this role just asAlan Wake 2 launched.
And so I've been there for thePost launch of Alan Wake 2 for
all the updates and the twoDLCs.
And now we're, we're preparingthings for our upcoming game FBC
(40:07):
Firebreak for next year.
So it's very exciting.
Courtney (40:10):
Yeah, absolutely.
Absolutely.
That does feel like a bigtransition though.
You know, my background is alsoproject management and so just
thinking of moving from that todealing more directly with the
community, I feel like that,yeah, that must have been, well,
hopefully exciting, maybe alittle difficult at times.
Fondue (40:28):
Yes, but it was also very familiar because I'd been
doing content creation for likefour years at that point I have
my own discord community.
I talk with people on stream allthe time I do YouTube so I
interact with people like wheremy viewers through there So I
think and that was like one ofthe reasons why I was able to
like say like hey I haveexperience in this because I've
(40:49):
been doing this on my free timefor four years already So that
prepared me a lot for what itwas to be a community manager.
Of course, it's differentbecause now I'm representing a
company.
I'm not representing myself asmyself.
I can just be like, you know,whatever, blah, you know, and
you know, the stakes are a lothigher because I'm a very, very
small creator.
So the stakes are very low, butnow, you know, I'm dealing with,
(41:11):
You know, people who haveexpectations about the game and
the company.
So it's, it's been verydifferent.
And I guess the challenging partin the beginning was like, this
is only two came out.
So there was a lot of feedbackcoming in and like taking those
and filtering them towards theteam and then learning to,
Understand, like, what can Isay?
(41:31):
What can't I say?
What's the overall tone of howwe communicate?
Like that, I think, was the hardpart in the beginning, because I
was like, can I say this stuff?
Like, can I respond to thisperson and say this stuff?
Or can't I?
Like, I'm not sure.
Because every studio does itvery differently.
Like, some studios are verytransparent.
Like, they talk a lot to thefans and they answer everything.
Others are like, They postofficial updates and that's it.
(41:53):
So it's very different for eachstudio.
So it was, it was for surechallenging, but it was a lot of
fun.
I really enjoyed it.
And like having done contentcreation on like different
avenues.
So, you know, streaming,YouTube, short form videos as
well.
I, I've been doing myself for awhile.
That stuff helped like prepareme for that.
I already had the tools to dealwith that.
(42:16):
I understood, like, I know howdiscord works and I, I, I
understood like, you know, Ourdiscord was there, but we hadn't
really been using it asactively, so I was like, okay I
want to change the discord inthis and this and this way I
want to have these types ofchanges be done here and then
the rest of the team was like,yeah that that makes sense or
earlier this year I was like, Ithink we should do short form
(42:38):
video stuff.
I think that would be cool.
And then the rest of our teamwas like, well, we don't really
know much about it, but if youwant to do it, go for it.
So then we started doing shortform video stuff and that's been
really fun and it's been goodfor us.
So there's a lot also withinRemedy of like, if you want to
do something and you have thepassion and knowledge for it,
(42:59):
you can do it.
So there's like trust given topeople as well.
Courtney (43:03):
What does a normal week look like for you as a
community manager now?
Like now that you've kind ofsettled into the role.
Fondue (43:11):
So now especially like a year after Alan Wake 2's launch,
my week is like, in thebeginning of the week, I'll
usually plan like some fan artthat we retweet.
We usually do like two retweetsof fan art per week from the
Alan Wake account.
Cause we get a lot of reallynice fan art and like virtual
photography because we havephoto mode now.
(43:31):
The plan though is usually ashort form video of some sorts
as well.
Now there's been a lot ofplanning stuff for next year
because of FBC Firebreak.
So there's a lot of meetingsabout stuff and a lot of
planning and thinking.
I can't go super into detail,but yeah, a lot of meetings and
planning stuff for next year.
Talking to our fans on Discord.
(43:52):
I try to be at least a littlebit active every day.
At least.
Go in and say like happy timezone.
How's everyone doing?
So yeah, I'm not sure ifeveryone's familiar with like
the the happy time zone kind ofGreeting it's basically a way to
say like good morning withoutsaying good morning because it's
not morning for everyone So yousay happy time zone because you
don't know what time zoneeveryone's on so at least go in
(44:13):
there and say that and Kind ofkeep an eye on what's going on
in the discord at least brieflyAlso to some degree try to see
if there's any You Major issuesthat are being reported about
our game and then put like movethose forward to the dev team at
this point There's not as muchanymore Compared to like the
first few months when there wasa lot of feedback coming in that
(44:34):
we could filter through there Soyeah, that's kind of what it
looks like right now.
There's a lot of planning andpreparing stuff for next year
that we're at right now, butthen you know at different
points It looks very differentat one point.
We were doing an Alan Wake 2development stream series so
then my weeks in involved likeplanning the streams and then
Doing the production, so I didthe production side of those
(44:54):
streams, like I set up our OBSscenes and everything and how
that works and all the bots andeverything and I could do that
because I had done streamingmyself for, for four years so I
knew how all that worked so thatwas like, if I had done that
without ever having streamed itwould have been really
difficult.
It would have been very, verydifficult, but because we had
done it, I was like, okay, Iknow exactly what I want, I want
(45:15):
these and these and thesescenes, I'm gonna put the
microphones here, I'm gonna havethese filters, I'm gonna do
this, need to do some colorgrading, da da da da, so then I
could set it up.
So that was at one point I wasdoing that then also I have
made, we have like these actorinterview videos that we've been
posting for Alan Wake 2 I editthose, so some weeks are me
working on those videos, editingthem together.
(45:36):
So it varies a lot, but that'skind of what it looks like.
Making some content, usuallyhere and there.
Right now, planning a lot ofstuff for next year.
Posting stuff online.
Interacting with our communityon Discord.
That's kind of the short andsweet of it.
Courtney (45:51):
Yeah, it definitely sounds like a very busy job.
Fondue (45:54):
Yeah, I mean, there's never a lack of stuff to do in
the games industry.
Yes.
Courtney (46:01):
So one thing that I do like to talk about in these
interviews is, you know, you'reworking in the games industry,
presumably because you love it,but there can be some
challenges.
So, yeah, so talk to me about,you know, some of the most,
like, challenging things thatyou have been dealing with over
the last Several years since2019.
Fondue (46:23):
So if we're talking about, like, game development,
or are we talking about, like,The content creation side of
things.
I
Courtney (46:29):
do
Fondue (46:30):
want to make sure.
Okay, on the game developmentside of things, the hardest part
as like being a producer iscommunication.
For me, like, that's the hardestpart and that's where a lot of
issues in game development arisefrom.
is that people don't communicateenough or they don't make their
(46:51):
ideas or their intentions clearand then someone does something
that they weren't supposed to doand then that leads into issues
and cascades into problems.
So a lot of issues that I see ingame development are
communications related.
It's a bit reductive to say it'sjust communications, it's
definitely not.
There's a lot of other thingsOther challenges that come in
the way.
But I feel like communication islike a big deal of it because
(47:14):
it's the bigger you get, theharder that stuff becomes.
Cause if you're like Two friendsmaking a game.
It's really easy.
Like you, you presumably talk toeach other constantly.
You're very in sync.
It's easy for you to be like,I'm going to do this thing.
You do that thing.
Cool.
But then once you start beinglike 40 people, a hundred
people, it becomes a wholedifferent thing of like, you
(47:36):
have to make sure that thingsare being delivered on time,
that other people aren't blockedbecause of what you're doing
that, you know, all thedifferent departments are all
pulling in the same direction.
Like it becomes a huge.
I used to work at Ubisoft at onepoint, and Ubisoft has a lot of
producers, and they're kind ofknown for having a lot of
producers.
And it's because they need to,because a lot of the games have
(47:59):
like hundreds of people inseveral studios and several
times on, so you'll have likeThe head studio for this
Assassin's Creed game is inCanada, and then another studio
in France is helping, and then astudio in Romania is doing QA,
and like, you have so manydifferent parts that have to
communicate with each other,then you need people to
facilitate that communication alot.
So communication, I would say,is a really, Big challenge, not
(48:25):
because people are malicious oranything, it's not usually the
case.
A lot of it is just peopleassuming a lot of things, and
then that leading to issues.
And a lot of the stuff is alsothat the different areas of game
production, programming, design,art, audio, they talk very
differently.
(48:45):
And they have differentproblems, so when they talk with
each other, they don'tnecessarily all have the shared
language to describe theirissues with.
And that can lead tomisunderstandings and
frustrations.
So, having people who can kindof bridge that gap is always
really, really valuable.
Sometimes you have those peoplein production who are like,
(49:06):
Let's get together thesedifferent departments, and then
they talk with each other, andthen that person in the middle
is like, I think what you're, sowhat you're saying is This thing
and then they say yes, and thenI was like, oh, okay.
That's what you meant.
I'm misunderstood So sometimesit's really useful to have
someone in a meeting go likefrom what I'm hearing You're
saying this and then they cansay yes exactly or they can say
(49:28):
no.
No, that's not what I meant Andthen they clarify and that can
be very useful.
Sometimes it's production,sometimes you have people within
those disciplines who are reallygood at cross discipline
communication, which is alwaysreally nice.
Ideally, you would also alwaystry to have your teams, in my
opinion, set up to be crossdisciplinary around features,
rather than like, here's theprogrammers, here's the artists,
here's the designers.
Rather like, here's the teamthat's working on enemies, for
(49:51):
example, just a random example,and it has animators designers,
programmers, and so on, so it'sinterdisciplinary.
So that's like on the, on thatside, I would say, is a
difficulty.
As a community manager,difficulty is aligning like what
the team can do in the time thatwe have versus what the
(50:14):
community wants.
So community, the communitywants certain things, but you
know, not everything can be donelike this.
You know, there's priorities,there's other stuff that
happening and then being like,okay, what can we do with what,
what the community wants in acertain amount of time.
So that's kind of one thing.
And then for, you know, for anupcoming game, it's, it's more
like, okay, what can we.
What can we make sure that it,that we can do for the launch of
(50:35):
the game?
Then, for content creation,biggest challenge is, is the
treadmill, I would say.
Because you're like, I made avideo, it's out now! And then,
then the next one, and the nextone, and the next one.
So the, the constant, Treadmillof making content, which is a
(50:57):
weirdly dehumanizing way ofsaying art, because in the end a
lot of content is art, but wedon't see it as art, which is
frustrating kind of recent hangups I've been having with
content is that it's verydehumanizing in a way that it's
like it creates this kind ofdepersonal like product that
(51:17):
needs to be consumed, where it'swell, If we could have less of
it and it can be moremeaningful, that'd be cool.
Of course, we don't live in thatworld.
So it's like the ConcentrateMelodica.
You made, you made a video nowon onto the next one.
So like, you don't really get tosit with it that much.
Like you kind of have to move onto the next one.
And then finding that energyalways to make the next one,
(51:39):
finding the inspiration to makethe next one is, is a challenge
at times.
And sometimes you're just like,you just make a video.
You're like, well, I'll justmake this video to have.
Stuff out because usually youwant to have like a regular
cadence as well Let's say youhave a weekly cadence and then
sometimes you're just likeyou're just super out of the
juice You're just like I don'tknow man.
I'll just make this video.
Whatever To have something,which is, which is not a fun
(52:02):
feeling as cause if you're justdoing stuff to have, for, for
having stuff's sake, it's not afun feeling, but at the same
time, especially if you're fulltime, you have to do it, because
that's your livelihood.
If you don't publish a video,you're not making money, or if
you're a streamer, it's evenmore grueling, because if you're
not live as a streamer, you'renot making money, so you have to
go live whenever your schedulesays you go live, and then some
(52:25):
days you're just like, I don'twant to stream, I, I just don't
feel like it.
This fucking sucks.
I don't want to be perceivedright now.
I don't want to try to entertainpeople or whatever, but then you
have to do it and you have tojust like push through and you
just have to do the thing.
And that can be reallydifficult, I think.
The treadmill of making contentand finding the inspiration
creatively and the energy to dothat Consistently is difficult
(52:51):
No,
Courtney (52:53):
100%.
I can relate so hard.
Thank you.
I know that that was a lot to goover.
But I guess to not end on asadder note, let's flip it
around.
Fondue (53:07):
Yeah
Courtney (53:08):
What are some of the more rewarding parts of working
in this industry?
Fondue (53:13):
the more rewarding parts for me when it comes to the
content side of things isGetting the comments like this
video really helped me likethose are those are like I
really love those comments wherepeople like this video really
helped me like i'm My favoriteones are when people are all
like this video really helped methe content Your communication
is really clear and concise.
And that, those are like thecomments that I.
(53:34):
Resonate with the most becausethat's when I write my my
scripts for the tutorials andfor the videos that I make I try
to make it as succinct and tothe point while being Enough so
I don't want to make it toobrief so that it's not It's not
clear, but the point in mywriting and my communication is
(53:54):
that I want it to be clear andunderstandable.
And the way that I speak also oncamera, I try to enunciate and
make it really, really clearwhat I am trying to teach the
other person.
And then when I get commentssaying that, that, that did
happen, I'm like, awesome.
That's exactly what I wanted.
And it resonated with people.
(54:15):
And then on the communitymanagement side I think just
seeing our fans be really happywith what's coming out.
You know, we had theannouncement for FBC Firebreak
and people were very excited.
That was cool.
Or when Alan Wake 2 was comingout and people were really
excited, you know, that's cool.
Or the two DLCs came out andpeople were really excited.
So.
Seeing people be really excitedand then on a more personal note
(54:37):
like the stream series that wedid and the people were so
excited for that I was reallyreally happy with that because
that was like a thing that Iproduced so I was really happy
that people really liked thevibe of it and and the kind of
more laid back conversationalnature of it and like got a lot
of out of it.
So those are the types of thingsthat make me happy.
(54:57):
Well, FBC
Courtney (54:59):
Amazing! Well, I know that some of the videos have
been on hiatus for a bit, andobviously I know with your
professional job you're notnecessarily allowed to talk
about a whole lot of things, butwith all of that said, are there
any upcoming projects that youcan talk about that you're
excited about?
Fondue (55:19):
Firebreak, like it's, it's coming out next year.
I'm really, really excited forthat.
Cause like it's my first timeworking.
On a upcoming project as acommunity manager So it's like
my first time like planningstuff out for the launch of the
game Like how are we going to dothings and all that kind of
stuff?
So that's really exciting alsoterrifying because i've never
done this side of things as muchbefore i've more been on the
(55:42):
production side of things likehow do we get the game out the
door?
So it's really exciting thatthat part is is very very
exciting for me.
So That is like an upcomingthing.
I'm super super excited aboutBecause it's also something
different like it's a it's notthe type of game that we usually
do at remedy So it's also a newtype of game, which is exciting.
Courtney (55:59):
Okay, yeah, it'll be interesting to see how launch
goes and what the reaction ofthe community is.
Fondue (56:05):
for sure.
Yes.
Courtney (56:07):
All right, well, Fondue, this has been really
awesome.
If people want to find you,where should they go?
Fondue (56:14):
So on YouTube, it's dice and easy you can find me so dice
ampersand easy.
That's the Symbol over there,you can find me on YouTube, also
on Twitch, Dice and Easy butthen it's written out, Dice and
Easy together.
I stream every Monday andWednesday at 6.
30 p.
m.
Eastern European time, which is8.
(56:34):
30 a.
m.
Pacific and 11.
30 a.
m.
Eastern time for the Americantime zones.
If you want to come chat with meand watch as I play games,
you're more than welcome to.
Then on Twitter, you can find meat DiceAndEasyRPG, and on
BlueSky, DiceAndEasy.
Courtney (56:51):
I know.
So many places these days.
Fondue (56:53):
There are so many places these days.
Courtney (56:57):
Awesome.
I will have links to that in theshow notes, but seriously, this
has been so fun.
Thank you for coming on
Fondue (57:02):
Yeah, this was great.
Thank you for having me.
I had a blast being here.
Courtney (57:06):
Alright, lovely listeners, at this point we are
going to wrap up the interviewportion of this episode and
pretty much immediately jumpinto a fun little quick question
blitz for Patrons, where I'mgoing to ask him 10 additional
questions that are a little bitsillier.
So if you want to listen tothat, you can go to
patreon.com/rollplaygrow.
(57:30):
Thanks again.
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