Overly Positive

Even before these “tough economic times”, gamers have always been looking for ways to save a buck or two. Whether it’s through a used game, or a deal that happens at a local vendor, or a package that has more to offer than taking away your productivity, gamers are always looking for a deal. Enter Cheap Ass Gamer, a site that’s been around for a number of years and has built credibility as a community site for people to find great video game deals, read reviews, and more recently, trade games with one another. Loyal CAGs have been visiting the site for quite some time, and “Internet Space Pimp” CheapyD has built a decent livelihood from running it.

Cheap Ass Gamer has a podcast called CAGCast. CAGCast was around when podcasting was pretty much brand new, which means they’ve gone well past the 150 episode mark, making it one of the longest lived gaming podcasts I’ve had the pleasure to listen to. The podcast consists of CheapyD, staffer and contributor Wombat, and the occasional guest, whether it is reviewer Shipwreck or members of the gaming industry. Consistent topics covered include news from the “Big 3″ – Microsoft, Nintendo, and Sony – as well as talk about what games Cheapy and Wombat are currently playing. A mailbag chock full of listener questions rounds out the on-topic agenda.

The average length of a CAGCast is typically an hour and a half to two hours, which means the podcast is ideal for listening to during a day job as you get work done, during a workout, or on a weekend drive to run errands. Part of the show’s charm, which explains its extended length, is the drifting, yet personable, nature of the show. Cheapy and Wombat don’t just talk about games – they talk about their personal lives, the trials, tribulations, and humor of being relatively recent fathers, Cheapy’s dealings with living in Japanese culture, and tangents into randomness. If a sidetrack into the wonders of poop bothers you and you want a more focused podcast, this might not be the podcast for you. But I think that the tone of the show and where it goes is great, because it humanizes the hosts and shows that they aren’t just faceless members of the gaming media conglomerate. Because of this, the show typically listens as if you were sitting in a restaurant, a bar, or in someone’s living room talking casually about games, giving it an interesting personal charm.

Personality dynamics between Cheapy and Wombat contribute greatly to this charm. Cheapy is generally easygoing, but also opinionated in his gaming thoughts, while Wombat brings in a sardonic wit and sharp commentary. Because of this combination, there are times when the hosts will clash on a variety of gaming and non-gaming related topics, leading to plenty of fodder for discussion and feedback on the part of the listeners. It isn’t unusual to see one of the hosts taken down a peg by a jab from the other host, or from an extremely negative but interesting piece of listener mail. A positive and sunny person like me can still respect the fact that CAGCast doesn’t hide from the more inflammatory bits of listener feedback, turning it into entertaining discussion.

CAGCast is definitely worth a listen if you’ve wanted a podcast that contains plenty of gaming discussion with a heaping helping of personality – even if that personality means talking about poop, weed, and love hotels.