Gaming network G4 TV teases 2021 relaunch, nostalgic fans question whether it can compete with YouTube, Twitch
Video game fans have a soft spot for the gaming network on television called G4 TV. Unfortunately for fans, the network shut shop in 2014. Six years later, however, it is now teasing a comeback. G4 shared a video on Twitter on Friday, July 24 -- its first tweet since 2013.
With the caption “We never stopped playing,” the clip showed the words “Incoming Transmission” on a TV screen, followed by “G4” and “2021”. The website G4TV.com is also back online, featuring a click-to-play Pong game.
A source confirmed to Variety that the relaunch of G4 TV is coming out of Comcast Spectacor, the company’s sports and esports division whose main businesses are the NHL’s Philadelphia Flyers and the Wells Fargo Center arena.
Interestingly, the teaser for G4 TV’s return comes less than two weeks ahead of the August 5 launch of VENN (Video Game Entertainment and News Network), a linear streaming network dedicated to gaming and pop culture, on Twitch, Twitter, Facebook Gaming and other platforms.
G4 TV is currently owned by NBCUniversal. It launched in 2002 and was a one-stop-shop for gaming news and features, and sundry pop culture shows. In 2013, NBCUniversal announced that it would rebrand G4 TV as the Esquire Network. However, a few months later, NBCUniverals rebranded Style Network to Esquire Network and shut down G4 TV in 2014.
One of the more popular shows on the channel was ‘Attack of the Show!’. It was hosted by actor Olivia Munn of ‘The Newsroom’ fame and Kevin Pereira. In fact, it was Munn’s first big TV break before she moved on to acting full time. Munn, seeing the G4 TV tweet, shared a GIF of herself from ‘Attack of the Show!’, captioning it, “Oh hey now... #G4 #G4TV”.
Adam Sessler, who had co-hosted G4 TV’s ‘X-Play’, welcomed G4’s reemergence with a tweet saying, “Woah, that’s a Twitter account I didn't expect to see again.” Morgan Webb, also a former ‘X-Play’ host, wrote on Twitter: “I’m just impressed someone remembered the password to the Twitter [account].”
Fans, predictably, went berserk over the news of the network’s promised return. At the time of writing this report, the G4 TV tweet had over 14,000 retweets, 36,000 likes, and more than 2,000 responses.
While many just cheered the return, some had constructive advice. Michelle Nguyen Bradley, a gamer and host, wrote on Twitter: “So many of my fellow hosting pals are posting about this today! We're all excited about the prospect of a revival, I just hope it comes with an acknowledgment that their old channel was pretty prevalently white males. Here's hoping for diversity in gender and race on the reboot @g4tv.”
Steven Spohn, the Chief Operating Officer of AbleGamers, a charity working to make video games more accessible to people with disabilities, wrote, “G4, may I suggest a show about accessibility in video games. X-able-play. I'll host. Talk about how each game plays for someone as profoundly disabled as me. I'll bring on other disabled players, ask them their views. We'd show how people play differently but enjoy the same.”
Amid the advice and nostalgia, however, was also some concern for the network’s success. A Twitter user wrote, “Things have changed a lot since G4 TV was last on the air. Gaming is bigger than ever but streaming and YouTube is the place to be. This will either be a huge success or total failure, no in-between.”
Another observed, “A lot of #ElderMillennial excitement for @G4TV. Meanwhile, the esports market that they are targeting, #GenZ doesn't even watch cable.” On similar lines, a Twitter user wrote, “Hmm IDK how I feel about it even though I watched it a lot when I was younger. Just have to wait and see.”
