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In what has already been a sad year for gaming media (see Narratorway's thread on the death of Nintendo Power magazine), it looks like the television channel G4 - as we know it - is also going to bite the dust.

Let's face it: much like Nintendo Power's death, G4 sorta had it coming. They lost a couple of their major, veteran hosts on top of being excluded from some of the coverage packages they'd once been listed in. A lot of people thought G4 went down the tube way back when it ceased to be Tech TV. Regardless, things weren't exactly going in their favor.

It's been quite a long time since I watched G4 with any regularity (they were cut from my basic cable package years ago), but I have fond memories of watching Adam Sessler and Morgan Webb host X-Play, which I was allowed to watch if I could prove to my mom that I had completed a sufficient amount of homework between the end of school and the start of the show.

This particular article expects G4's 'rebranding' to completely change the channel from a videogaming-exclusive network to one centered on men's interests in general. Such a development probably isn't a bad idea; even while gaming has become much more of a cultural mainstream activity, 24-hours-a-day gaming television still seems like a bit of a stretch, especially considering that a bulk of the gaming populace is interested in videogames as a casual hobby. On top of that, I feel most of G4's current target audience are the kind of people who would also be interested in some of the programming the new channel will include.

It's impossible to imagine the restructured G4 without programs primarily concerned with the videogaming industry. Who knows - fewer videogame shows may very well mean that those that do still cover videogaming will be better.

Anybody still watch G4 regularly? Is anybody interested in checking out what the restructured G4 will look like?

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I really never watched G4 with any regularity - I don't think I ever had it available when it was still TechTV, and once I did have it, I really only watched it when it was E3 time (and I thought their E3 coverage really tried too hard to be clever and cool rather than just giving out the news). To that end, I'm surprised it outlasted Nintendo Power in any incarnation.

They were already kind of heading towards being a bro-network, I believe, so these changes probably won't really mean that much in the long run. However, there already are a good number of networks aiming at guys of our age, like Spike and to lesser extents FX and even Comedy Central. I'm not sure taking them on will be that great of an idea.

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I haven't watched G4 in quite awhile (since we had cable or dish... one of the two). That being said, last time I watched it, I was getting turned off to its programming. To me the death knell was bringing in shows like COPS. The programming choices were starting to make less and less sense and becoming more of a channel like Spike.

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It's been quite a while since I lost watched G4 with any consistency (and, like Josh, most of the hours I did log were logged during their E3 coverage).

Since their programming hasn't really interested me lately, I'm hoping the shift will bring in a few more interesting shows. And no more reruns of Cops. General nerdiness--such as is seen during their E3 coverage--would go a long way to converting me.