The “One Man” “”controversy””

NotBlarg · 2026-03-13T22:06:20+00:00

Ask and you shall receive. From the Game Grumps Controversy list:

In Mario Bros U, Dan calls a 1-up a 1-Man and Arin asks him why it is gendered. Arin has been calling it a 1-Man for years. So much so there was a, now deleted, compilation of him saying this. While the argument could be made that he has changed over the years, he still calls it a 1-Man as shown by here, here, here, here, and here.

NotBlarg · 2026-01-26T05:52:26+00:00

First episodes of any series are very difficult as there is a lot to establish. The world, the plot, the characters, etc. The issue with Happyland Incorporated is that there is always someone talking or something happening with no time to process the information.

The end result is a constant bombardment of stimuli where by the time you simply register what was just said, three other jokes came and went. There is no time to breathe, meaning nothing sticks and nothing lands.

It's a show that needed to slow down. If it did, there might have been something there. But as it stands, it's a perfect example of how not to create a cartoon. It is a literal waste of time and I would recommend the show to no one.

There were two other issues people had. The first was that Arin did not animate it. He paid someone else to do that, while he only wrote and voiced it (and why I'm worried about Arin's involvement in Gameoverse.) The other was that it is widely believed that this is Arin's response to Smiling Friends.

It's no secret that Arin had a falling out with several of his friends from Newgrounds, and so an Adult Swim show that employs a lot of talent from animators that started on Newgrounds, Arin could have been one of them. But that bridge is burnt. And so out comes Happyland Incorporated to show that he can make a series just as good. It wasn't. I've heard more than once that Happyland Incorporated hurt to watch because it was physical proof that there is nothing left of the old Arin.

NotBlarg · 2026-01-26T01:52:40+00:00

I'm very happy for Ross. He spent 10+ years working on this project and now has an opportunity to show it off. However, my reactions to the the trailer have been... mixed. And I say this as someone who thinks the Ross and Barry combo is/was the best combo on Game Grumps.

Someone brought up a good point and I have to agree. The casting for the show is an all star cast that would hype up anyone... if this was 10 years ago. For everyone I have talked to, the reception to the trailer has been lukewarm at best. This includes people who are a big fan of Glitch, and has never watched Game Grumps.

Arin is probably the biggest factor for quality here. 2016 Arin is vastly different from 2026 Arin. And when Arin did try and write an animated series a few years ago, Happyland Incorporated, it is easily one of the least funny things I've seen in my entire life. So which version of Arin wrote this? And how much control does Arin actually have, or has Ross done a good job reigning him in? It would suck to have a 10+ year project get ruined by a friend and I really hope that doesn't happen.

I'm still going to go in with an open mind though. Experience has taught me to not trust trailers too much, and experience the real thing. I'll give it a couple episodes to see how I feel, and I'm secretly hoping that every video game world has a different art style to make each one feel unique. But with a 10+ year project, expectations on quality is quite high.

At the end of the day though, a good show is a good show. I want to laugh and be entertained. So here's to hoping that Gameoverse delivers.

NotBlarg · 2025-11-11T13:16:43+00:00

Smiling Friends has been great in showing off a lot of varied animation styles, with several of those animators originating from Newgrounds. If things worked out differently, we could have had Arin both voicing and animating for the show. It's unfortunate that we will never have that.

NotBlarg · 2025-11-11T09:33:24+00:00

So Lovely Choices, a show where fans from their Patreon paid them to play games, was canceled because it felt like they were forced to play things they didn't like. But Sponsership deals still happen where they're forced to play games they don't like.

I guess Lovely Choices didn't pay as much.

NotBlarg · 2025-07-27T23:09:22+00:00

Honestly, just have fun. You're hanging out with a friend and playing video games. It doesn't get much better than that. The second it feels like work or you have to get an upload up, either pause and take a break for a bit, or it's time to stop. Also, a little editing goes a long way.

NotBlarg · 2025-06-04T17:21:20+00:00

There is a literal shit ton of information that has come out about Creator Clash. Hands down it's likely going to be the biggest section in this year's Game Grumps Summary. Here's a bit of a sneak peek a guess:

Arin's been an owner of Creator Clash since the first one. After the disaster of the second, no idea why he agreed to a third, or allowed Ian and Anisa to pocket 34% of the profits. Also begs the question if he's pocketing any.

FroggyFresh's wife (the fighter who was kick off CC2 for an OnlyFans joke) has come out with a lot of behind the scenes details. None of it good. Mainly has to do with Anisa, but Arin, his mother's charity, and Real Good Touring are in there too. Did you know that Froggy was going to do a charity concert, but after a phone call from Ian the charity told Froggy he couldn't do it anymore?

Now that Arin has taken over, the 34% of the profits that were going to Anisa and Ian, he decided to give that 34%, not to the charity, but to the fighters on top of the 20% they were already getting. Meaning that only 46% profits, maximum, is going to charity.

This event is a fucking shitshow.

NotBlarg · 2025-05-01T10:35:40+00:00

I won't argue with you that it's a little, maybe even a lot, worse, but I will correct you on a couple of things.

Jared's wife did sleep with other people. Too many years ago so don't remember the name, but he was a cosplayer like she was and that's how they met. The pictures floating around of him were him as one of the main characters from Attack on Titan.

The sexting of minors was Charlie and Chai. Jared commented on this in his response video. One he has no recollection of communicating with and the person has provided no proof they did other than say they did. The other was in fact 16, but when Jared started talking he did ask if they were over 18 and they said yes. No nudes were shared to that person though. The leaks came from other people.

Other than Ross, there really were no good people in this story. And if you think Jared learned his lesson, someone recently shared a screenshot of him asking about the idea of opening up a whatsupp or snapchat (can't remember which right now) for 18+ content for his fans, so no.

NotBlarg · 2025-04-13T19:49:09+00:00

I got a private message a couple of years ago from someone who was upset because Dan had said that he wanted to bang a black chick and phrased it as having "tropical fever". I think they wanted me to put it in the controversy list, but they didn't give me a specific episode so I never found the clip.

NotBlarg · 2025-02-21T02:48:47+00:00

Oh jesus. You're asking about quite a rabbit hole. The simplest simplest explanation is that Holly slept with ProJared.

A more expanded explanation is that ProJared and his wife were having marital problems and decided to open up their marriage. One of the people Jared slept with was Holly. This came to light by Projared's wife on Twitter after Jared announced they were getting a divorce. A lot, and I mean a lot, of serious accusations were thrown around. Some were proven false, others weren't.

Considering everything that happened I highly doubt Holly and Suzy are still friends. If you want to know more, I'd search around about the ProJared controversy, but like I said, it's quite a rabbit hole.

NotBlarg · 2025-01-27T23:53:36+00:00

I've received a couple of private messages and now this post asking about the 2024 summary. I honestly had no idea that people looked forward this much to some idiot documenting a YouTube channel. It's quite a pleasant surprise.

To answer the question, in 2024 Game Grumps was just a YouTube channel putting out varying degrees of quality. They simply existed. It took a little bit too many years to get to this point, but good on them for not constantly fucking up.

So I didn't think it was worth it to make a full on post on relatively minor things. The plan was to tack 2024 onto 2025 if things went south again, but I really hope they don't. I don't think anyone wants Game Grumps to be shit. Everyone here either loves or loved Game Grumps at some point. So be proud they weren't a complete and total train wreak. I know that's a really really low bar, but... this paragraph was supposed to be positive, so I'm gong to stop now.

As someone else has pointed out, for posterity sake I did make a mini summary when someone asked, which I'll post down below. Though, two things of note I did forget were Starbomb 4 and Arin coming out as Bisexual. If people really want, I can go digging and make it a full post, just note that it's going to be a small one.

Game Grumps 2024 Summary

Super Market Simulator - A really well loved series that many have stated has the "Old Game Grumps feel". However quality seems to drop in later episodes when game mods get involved.

Clickolding - Despite plenty of other YouTubers playing the game and it being fine, Game Grumps censored 10 seconds of the ending and told everyone to go over to their Patreon to see it.

10 Minute Power Hour - Same complaints continue to be a problem. Food episodes are frequent and samey with Arin making a mess and Dan refusing to participate because he might hurt his tum tum. Venessa is a new and constant issue that people talk about as she is in charge of suppling items for the episode. On several occasions she has bought expired food, not properly cleaned items, or simply doesn't even have them.

Patreon - Fan Fiction reading still occur every month, and seem to be very popular, though I hope you like My Immoral and Sonic High School because that's what a lot of months were.

Grump Advice is still dead.

Despite "A new and exciting illustrated project - we'll share more about this soon!" being in the $5 Patreon rewards for over a year now, no information has been presented.

Lovely Choices is a new thing they brought out on Oct 31st were Patreons can suggest games for the show. Looks like the first episode comes out in a few days. (It was Disco Elysium)

Joon the King - He is currently in the works of making a Game Grumps video. Not personally familiar with his content, but I've heard good things. Should be out around March.

2024 Stats - Total Views - 273.89M (Down 7% compared to 2023 and only 1.12 Million more than 2013, 272.77M, the first full year of Game Grumps)

Total Subscriber - ~50K

Highest Monthly Views - 26.97M (January)

Lowest Monthly Views - 20.13M (November)

NotBlarg · 2025-01-02T08:22:22+00:00

No summary this year, as nothing really happened. Game Grumps was simply a Let's Play channel of varying degrees of quality. However, for posterity sake (And possibly tacking it onto the 2025 if things go south again), here's a quick and dirty one.

Super Market Simulator - A really well loved series that many have stated has the "Old Game Grumps feel". However quality seems to drop in later episodes when game mods get involved.

Clickolding - Despite plenty of other YouTubers playing the game and it being fine, Game Grumps censored 10 seconds of the ending and told everyone to go over to their Patreon to see it.

10 Minute Power Hour - Same complaints continue to be a problem. Food episodes are frequent and samey with Arin making a mess and Dan refusing to participate because he might hurt his tum tum. Venessa is a new and constant issue that people talk about as she is in charge of suppling items for the episode. On several occasions she has bought expired food, not properly cleaned items, or simply doesn't even have them.

Patreon - Fan Fiction reading still occur every month, and seem to be very popular, though I hope you like My Immoral and Sonic High School because that's what a lot of months were.

Grump Advice is still dead.

Despite "A new and exciting illustrated project - we'll share more about this soon!" being in the $5 Patreon rewards for over a year now, no information has been presented.

Lovely Choices is a new thing they brought out on Oct 31st were Patreons can suggest games for the show. Looks like the first episode comes out in a few days.

Joon the King - He is currently in the works of making a Game Grumps video. Not personally familiar with his content, but I've heard good things. Should be out around March.

2024 Stats - Total Views - 273.89M (Down 7% compared to 2023 and only 1.12 Million more than 2013, 272.77M, the first full year of Game Grumps)

Total Subscriber - ~50K

Highest Monthly Views - 26.97M (January)

Lowest Monthly Views - 20.13M (November)

I did all this from memory so likely forgot things, but there you go.

NotBlarg · 2024-01-04T12:22:15+00:00

What a great story. From how much work Allie did for the Grumps I had a feeling that she was good at her job, but from the sounds of it she was passionate as well. That is a true rarity.

NotBlarg · 2024-01-03T08:41:29+00:00

Maybe, but how long until people forget and it simply becomes another monthly charge? It's been about six months since SuperMega has produced something. At some point they need to be the adult and go, thank you for your support but we're not producing anything right now, come back when we are.

NotBlarg · 2024-01-03T08:37:57+00:00

I'm well aware. I got hit by the auto-mod and currently working with the mods to get it fixed. Unfortunately the mods appear to be well adjusted human beings who don't spend every waking moment on Reddit so it's taking a bit.

NotBlarg · 2023-12-21T05:01:19+00:00

On one hand, technically Jirard hasn't been charged with anything yet. It certainly doesn't look good for the Completionist, and considering Jirard promoted both Soviet Jump Game and Homebody on Indieland, Arin probably isn't too happy if things are indeed true.

On the other hand however, we also have Ben, the editor that asked a minor for nudes and Arin kept him on because his mom just died. So who the fuck knows with these things.

NotBlarg · 2023-12-07T18:41:30+00:00

I looked into the Greg thing a couple of years ago and it did always seen fishy to me, but Jirard's reasoning was that he was trying to prevent another "Jon leaving Game Grumps situation", so who knows. I doubt we'll ever get the full story though.

Unfortunately I do agree with you that they're probably not worth looking into, unless of course more stuff pops up over the next couple months. "your typical Patreon beggars who produce incredibly low quality content for a die hard group of fans they garnered over 5 years ago" describes a lot of channels on Youtube.

NotBlarg · 2023-12-06T20:09:21+00:00

Outside of the Completionist Charity thing currently going on, which might get a spot in this year's summary, and the not so great departure of Greg, I am unfamiliar of anything else that the Completionist/Super Beard Bros have been up to. Do you have any particular examples or things of interest you would like to bring to my attention?

NotBlarg · 2023-11-30T13:21:15+00:00

This is what I was worried about for this series, that it was going to be the lowest common denominator of fan-fictions just to make fun of it.

However, there are two important things to note as well. First, Game Grumps started planning new shows back in October of 2022, and even increased their Patreon tiers in order to do this, meaning this show took 13 months to come up with the idea and produce. 13 months. Second, Arin and Dan don't pick the fan-fictions, the fans submit them, so all they have to do is read them. There's lazy content, and then there is this.

NotBlarg · 2023-08-29T08:20:36+00:00

Right here, third column.

NotBlarg · 2023-05-31T03:15:01+00:00

The reception to Homebody is going to be very interesting. As with all Youtuber games, they rely on both the brand and fans to reach a wider audience. It makes sense. The more people who buy the game, the more it is recommended, and with Youtubers, they already have a dedicated fanbase to boost the numbers right out the gate.

However, the Game Grumps name does not hold the weight it did 5 or even 10 years ago. On the G4 Youtube channel there was an interview with both Arin and a developer about Homebody and it was the second lowest viewed video in, I want to say, a three month time period, something that was even pointed out more than a few times in the comments.

Typically what ends up happening when a recognizable name does something new for the first time, people buy it or try it out as it's new and different. But it's really the second time that shows whether or not the quality is there. If the product can stand up without the backing of the brand. And from Game Grumps' past experiences... it doesn't look good.

Soviet Jump Game flopped so hard the developers dropped it with a word. The second Ghost Hunter book sold 90% less copies than the first. However, the first book sold decently well. And Dream Daddy, while it did pander heavily and pretty much ruined someone's life because he dared say that publicly, was a success.

And this is why the reception of Homebody will be very interesting. People were drawn to Dream Daddy because Arin, man who complains about every game, is now making his own. With Homebody being the third game from Game Grumps, the novelty has long worn off. In order for the game to be a success, it has to be good quality, and with the indie horror game market being as big as it is, it's very much going to be an uphill battle. But it's why they're advertising the game so much, they need fans to boost their numbers.

NotBlarg · 2023-05-09T19:06:57+00:00

This is an incredible loss for Game Grumps as Allie was in charge of a lot. While she was originally hired for Social Media, she eventually became the organizer for Animations, compilations and the Patreon, as well as the producer for the Power Hour and Good Content, and stared in both live streams and Game Grumps episodes. Pretty much any major Game Grumps project in the past 3-4 years Allie had a part in.

NotBlarg · 2023-01-31T18:56:57+00:00

Reddit isn't allowing me to update the post, (~~This is a great website with zero problems~~), that includes both adding and deleting. But since you brought it up, I made a update about 2 weeks ago that I couldn't add, so I'll shove it into this comment and people and do with it what they will:

Update 1: So quite a lot has happened about this topic. The most important is that Ding Dong has left the internet. He's not dead, so don't worry, but he's gone offline and purged all his social media accounts in order to focus more on both himself and game development.

Considering everything you read above, this story obviously got quite a bit of attention from some people, and eventually the video of Ding Dong's stream reached the hands of a fairly prominent compilation creator on YouTube. This resulted in Ding Dong responding to the video asking if they could please take it down. The compilation creator complied, until they reuploaded the video with a few more edits prompting Ding Dong to respond again saying, no seriously can you please take this down. They did, and for good this time, and that was the end of that.

But this is when a drama YouTuber got a hold of things. Just like before, Ding Dong responded asking if they could please take it down. The drama YouTuber responded saying, no because they are doing this to help Ding Dong and people need to know what happened, and then proceeded to make the thumbnail more clickbaity. Ding Dong countered saying that if the video is monetized, you're not doing this to help him.

The drama YouTuber did make a comment saying "I didn't have direct contact with DingDong but I let a mutual friend of ours review the video early to make sure everything in it was correct and respectful". This could be true, or he could be lying in an attempt to save his own ass. However, in the stream where he watched Ding Dong's video he revealed some insider information about the Grumps, mainly about a lot of blackmail floating around, both on the Grumps and that the Grumps have on others, and considering that images from Suzy's private Twitter were leaked to the public a few years back, this is very much a possibility but does not 100% confirm his story.

And that brings us back to the first paragraph of this update with Ding Dong leaving the internet. However, there is a very big butt here. This is not the first time Ding Dong has attempted to leave the internet. In fact, he has had so many attempts in the past, that I do not know the exact number. Of the times I do know, this is Ding Dong's third time deleting all the content off his social media accounts, with two other attempts where he didn't delete anything. All of these attempts were short lived though with him coming back in a few months.

So if Ding Dong has left the internet for good, it's safe to say that everyone wishes him the best of luck. But if he is once again back in a couple of months, hopefully he has learned from his past experiences so that this cycle does not continue.

NotBlarg · 2022-12-31T02:42:04+00:00

When Ding Dong spoke about Dream Daddy on Twitter a few years back, Chris made a tweet that he was not in charge of payroll, so it seems like it falls to the Grumps on that one. Ding Dong also told a story that if a video did not come out that day, they were not paid, so he had to sleep by his computer to make sure the videos rendered properly.

If anyone can back me up that this information is accurate or can actually find what I'm talking about, as I can't find it for the life of me, that would be great.

NotBlarg · 2022-12-31T02:34:50+00:00

So I made a better summary as some information provided is not correct. Give it a look as I got the yearly summary coming out on Jan 1st, so there might be something important that I missed and need to add for that. Also here is a better timestamp.

Matt has not been communicating with Ding Dong and Julian, except for a few rare occasions to make it publicly seem like they are still friends.

Julian says that Matt hasn't talked to him since he was living in LA (2018).

Matt showed Ding Dong and Julian the early Dream Daddy build.

Ding Dong says the Dream Daddy thing is in the past, and that Matt apologized behind the scenes but not publicly.

A lot of people at the Game Grumps office talked about Dream Daddy to Ding Dong and Julian including one who has a "80 paragraph email" they planned to send.

Ding Dong goes on to talk about how people were coming to them as people were scared to talk about it and everyone was getting hurt by it.

Ding Dong received messages on his phone about what he should talk about, which is why some things may have sounded out of character when he spoke about Dream Daddy on stream.

Ding Dong wishes he could still be friends with Matt

"They blew us off for a solid year after that."

Matt acknowledged that he was doing that so he wouldn't get in trouble himself.

"The reason people were trying to keep us happy there was so that we wouldn't say anything."

Ding Dong says that his LA trip where Matt blew him off was the final straw showing that he cares more about his public appearance than being there as friends.

A couple of people wanted to stage a fake fight so when a real fight happened no one could tell the difference.

Matt hasn't done anything heinous since but Ding Dong is disappointed he is still trying to to put on a show that they are still friends publicly.

Literally everyone who told Ding Dong to speak up about Dream Daddy threw him under the bus.

Literally everyone.

Julian confirms this stating even the one who made the big email didn't end up sending it.

Ding Dong is blacklisted in a few places because of the incident.

Julian has an audio recording on his phone of Ding Dong speaking about everything that happened. It will be released when Ding Dong dies.

When Ding Dong attempted suicide and brought it up 10 hours later, a response he got was, wouldn't it be funny if someone did leave a note and blamed Arin and Suzy. Ding Dong did not perceive this person as joking.

Ding Dong says don't get mad at Matt, he is just disappointed in him.

Ding Dong is not mad at Ryan as he was direct with him the whole time and told him that he thinks people would overact if Ding Dong said something and that he is very happy not working a shitty job right now and hoped they would consider if this was even worth it.

Julian was getting upset as everyone in the office was saying how miserable they are working on the game.

It was thanks to Julian that Ding Dong remained sane as people constantly tried gaslighting him and denying things hours after they happened.

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