Early Installment Weirdness/Web Video

"Yugi: Remember when Li'l Kuriboh could barely voiceact? That's what's 'appinin' now, Guvnah!"
 * The very first entry of Ask a Ninja was much slower in pace, versus the later episodes which rely heavily on frenetic editing and rapid-fire comedy. The suit is also just two black shirts, one of them over his head (jeans can briefly be seen in some shots), and he is standing up and rarely moves his arms.
 * Yu-Gi-Oh the Abridged Series sounds very unpolished in its early installments.
 * The audio in early YGO:TAS episodes is very bad compared to later episodes; presumably, Little Kuriboh was recording the series with cheap microphones, and got more professional equipment once he found the niche.
 * Episode 48 lampshades an incident in episode 6 in which Little Kuriboh inadvertently slipped into a British accent (being British himself) while voicing Yugi.
 * One April Fool's special consisted of an episode done in the style of the earliest installments, with the characters constantly pointing out ways it differs from the current style.


 * The early episodes of Metal Gear Solid the Abridged Snakes are of a noticeably lower quality than the later ones; a fact that gets lampshaded later on, in keeping with the series' No Fourth Wall.
 * The HD remix of the first six episodes is an attempt to fix some of the problems present in the originals.
 * The first episode of The Nostalgia Critic, in which he reviewed the 2007 Transformers movie, portrayed him as more-or-less Chester A. Bum. He returned to this style for his review of the sequel as an homage. Even after that, the episodes were much shorter (the Cartoon All Stars to The Rescue episode, for instance, is more of a recap than a review, and is only 5 minutes long) and the Critic character was initially much less of a Psychopathic Manchild.
 * Perhaps fittingly, the first few episodes of The Nostalgia Chick had her pretty much be a slightly calmer version of The Nostalgia Critic. She even did the muggy reaction shots and the "Wha-wha-WHA!" Running Gag he has. Later she developed her own style, where she would analyze and spoof themes and broad plotlines instead of following the story in a linear fashion.
 * Early episodes of Atop the Fourth Wall have many differences, including Linkara speaking much more quietly and the lighting being worse. The first review, of Spider-Man #56, even has shots of the comic pages from Linkara's POV along with scans from the pages (something he calls himself out on the commentary). Also, the "magic gun" was originally a suicide pistol.
 * The pilot of Happy Tree Friends from way back in 1999. The character designs were radically different; Lumpy was a dinosaur with a Hair Trigger Temper instead of a stupid moose; and the episode was less than a minute long.
 * The Angry Video Game Nerd felt a lot different in the first couple of episodes; he didn't even show his face in the Castlevania II video, and didn't really go in-depth with the games as much as his later ones. Later reviews would even have him point out the positive aspects in some games.
 * James Rolfe explained that this was largely because these were old reviews he had made just to share with his friends. He actually uploaded them on YouTube years after he had filmed them, and only continued the series based on the positive reaction.
 * He even made another review of Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde, this time actually playing the game (the original video consisted mostly on the Nerd saying it was the worst game he's ever played and about 1 minute of gameplay footage).
 * Raocow's earlier vids had him sounding dull and tired, with nary a joke in sight. Over time, he evolved into the very idiosyncratic Talkative Loon we've come to love.
 * He also had a much thicker accent in the early days; in fact, on some of his earliest videos (on Dailymotion instead of Youtube), he can be pretty hard to understand at times, often lapsing back into French. Eventually, he developed a higher-pitched, wackier voice with almost no trace of an accent.
 * The early videos didn't have chipmunk time, singing along to the in-game music, or singing along to the in-game music in chipmunk time either.
 * Early episodes of Zero Punctuation have a bit of a different feel from later instalments...
 * Yahtzee's speaking tone sounds very deadpan, like perhaps he's trying to imitate a news anchorman.
 * The cuts from frame to frame are a little less quick and not as clean.
 * Until the Webcomics review, all episodes would open and end with a short clip of two random songs that tied in with the review or game's content. After this, the official electric guitar theme was used.
 * EPICMEALTIME. Harley doesn't have a beard, and isn't anywhere near as hammy! Muscles Glasses talks! And nary a bacon strip in sight!