Failed Former EIC Of The Escapist Nick Calandra’s Toxicity Follows Him To New Media Upstart “Second Wind Group.”

The former EIC of The Escapist and Kotaku’s Alyssa Mercante fanboy Nick Calandra apparently takes his toxicity everywhere he goes. We previously reported on how Nick Calandra instigated social media campaigns to have former World of Warcraft developer Mark Kern doxxed and YouTube video game analyst SmashJT’s website de-platformed.

It has now transpired that two content creators are leaving the gaming media journalist outfit Second Wind Group due to Nick Calandra’s toxicity.

The first resignation was Sebastian Ruiz (Frost of Rivia), who posted his resignation letter on X:

“When I joined SecondWindGroup I was under the assumption that  we are forming a team of creators with equal value and equal say. Individual creators would oversee  their personal series and the group would decide how to run the business together.

It is plain as day that we have recreated the toxic corporate environment that we abandoned, led by a petulant wanna be CEO who overspends, overpromises, underdelivers, sows division, tarnishes our image, asserts his creative vision (or rather creative blindness), and sabotages anyone’s attempts to correct him all while he fails his basic duties, joy rides around the world, clout farms, and expects the community and Yahtzee to foot the bill because Nick Calandra tanks our YouTube revenue and makes us undesirable for sponsors. It is beyond incompetence.

Nick Calandra operates in bad faith to serve his ego and this group lacks the attitude and processes to appropriately deal with inaction and inability to deliver the core capabilities of our roles. The board of directors lacks a knowledgeable enough majority to see through even the most basic Google searchable errors in Nick’s farcical directions and use their personal feelings as a substitute for information even when presented with ‘dumbed down’ versions at their repeated requests.

The rest of the owners have little knowledge of what’s going on and I don’t fault them because that’s the whole point of the culture of isolation: there aren’t enough leads at once thinking there’s a problem, the don’t know of the problems, therefore there are no problems.

All my personal attempts to make Nick see reason are ignored. All of my attempts to make the leads aware of Nick’s behavior are brushed off with minimal action. All of my attempts to raise concern for our systemic issues with leads are put off until after problems occur.

I refuse to be subjected to this behavior any longer, I believe I have done everything in my power to address the issues for over 6 months and I want no part in preying on the community’s goodwill and Yahtzee’s hard work simply because we can’t run a business. At this rate, we don’t deserve to run a business.

Consider this my formal resignation effective immediately.”

Not long after, another employee, Cisco Araneta, also confirmed that it was his last day at Second Wind Group. An apparent screen-shot from a message by Nick Calandra also emerged, wherein Nick Calandra himself confirms his toxicity caused the downward spiral at Second Wind Group. The message reads: “As clarified on Discord, I have been off for the last month as the team intervened with me, and made it clear that I would be fired (which I agreed with) if I did not reign myself in as I was spiraling mentally and hurting the business. This was addressed a month ago with the team and I’ve made the necessary changes to resolve it. - Nick”

The interesting part of the allegations made by Ruiz, namely that Calandra is “...a petulant wanna be CEO who overspends, overpromises, underdeliver....,” is that it sounds very much like the reasons given why Calandra was fired from The Escapist magazine. And considering how Nick Calandra stalked Mark Kern, SmashJT and other people in the gaming and journalism industry, it is not surprising to see his co-workers complaining of his toxicity in the workplace.

Let us know in the comments what you think about Nick Calandra and his Second Wind Group. Will they survive?

by Jack Dunn