Daniel John Hardcastle (born 23 March 1989), known online as Nerd³ or NerdCubed, is a British

YouTuber A YouTuber is an online personality and/or influencer who produces videos on the video-sharing platform YouTube, typically posting to their personal YouTube channel. The term was first used in the English language in 2006. Influence Influent ...

and author. Created in 2011, his YouTube channel primarily consists of video game-related content. As of July 2022, it has approximately 2.5 million subscribers and 1.3 billion video views. He is the author of ''

The Sunday Times ''The Sunday Times'' is a British newspaper whose circulation makes it the largest in Britain's quality press market category. It was founded in 1821 as ''The New Observer''. It is published by Times Newspapers Ltd, a subsidiary of News UK, whi ...

'' bestseller ''Fuck Yeah, Video Games: The Life and Extra Lives of a Professional Nerd''.

Career

Online

Hardcastle rose to prominence through a scripted, story-based

webcomic Webcomics (also known as online comics or Internet comics) are comics published on a website or mobile app. While many are published exclusively on the web, others are also published in magazines, newspapers, or comic books. Webcomics can be co ...

created within

Minecraft ''Minecraft'' is a sandbox game developed by Mojang Studios. The game was created by Markus "Notch" Persson in the Java programming language. Following several early private testing versions, it was first made public in May 2009 before being ...

. After creating his

YouTube YouTube is a global online video platform, online video sharing and social media, social media platform headquartered in San Bruno, California. It was launched on February 14, 2005, by Steve Chen, Chad Hurley, and Jawed Karim. It is owned by ...

channel on 20 March 2011, Hardcastle initially uploaded a series of comedic

vlog A video blog or video log, sometimes shortened to vlog (), is a form of blog for which the medium is video. Vlog entries often combine embedded video (or a video link) with supporting text, images, and other metadata. Entries can be recorded in ...

s before he uploaded his first

let's play A Let's Play (LP) is a video (or screenshots accompanied by text) documenting the playthrough of a video game, often including commentary and/or a camera view of the gamer's face. A Let's Play differs from a video game walkthrough or strateg ...

. His first let's play series, called ''Nerd³'s Minecraft Buildy Thing'', ran from 27 August 2011 to 22 August 2012. After creating videos on a few indie games, Hardcastle uploaded his first ''Nerd³ Plays'' video on 7 January 2012. In 2012,

Machinima Machinima, originally machinema () is the use of real-time computer graphics engines to create a cinematic production. Most often, video games are used to generate the computer animation. The word "machinima" is a portmanteau of the words ''ma ...

sponsored him to create the series ''13 Ways To Die''. In 2015, Hardcastle was nominated for a

Golden Joystick Award The Golden Joystick Awards, also known as the People's Gaming Awards, is a video game award ceremony; it awards the best video games of the year, as voted for originally by the British general public, but is now a global event that can be voted ...

for "online personality of the year". He has since amassed more than 2.4 million subscribers and 1.2 billion total views. On

Red Nose Day 2019 Red Nose Day 2019 was a fundraising event organised by Comic Relief, broadcast live from BBC Elstree Centre on BBC One and BBC Two from the evening of 15 March 2019 to early the following morning. The event was broadcast from 7:00 pm to 2:30 am, ...

, Hardcastle raised over £16,000 for

Comic Relief Comic relief is the inclusion of a humorous character, scene, or witty dialogue in an otherwise serious work, often to relieve tension. Definition Comic relief usually means a releasing of emotional or other tension resulting from a comic episo ...

over the course of an 11-hour livestream. In September 2019, Hardcastle's YouTube account was unverified for being not widely recognised outside the platform. Film In 2020, Hardcastle starred in the film '' Ashens and the Polybius Heist'' alongside his longtime collaborator

Stuart Ashen Dr Stuart Clive Ashen (born 16 December 1976), commonly known by his online alias Ashens ( ), is a British comedian, critic and YouTuber known for reviewing various products; his reviews usually include toys, video games and food. , his main Y ...

, who also co-wrote the film. Hardcastle himself also holds a small writing credit for the film, having written two jokes into it when Ashen gave him the script.

Books

Hardcastle began writing his first book, ''Fuck Yeah, Video Games: The Life & Extra Lives of a Professional Nerd'', in 2017. On 4 June 2018, he started

crowdfunding Crowdfunding is the practice of funding a project or venture by raising money from a large number of people, typically via the internet. Crowdfunding is a form of crowdsourcing and alternative finance. In 2015, over was raised worldwide by crow ...

the book through the website Unbound. The book reached 100% of its target on the first day and 1000% by 11 June. Reaching a total of 1903% of its initial goal, the book is the most successful crowdfunded book in the United Kingdom. The foreword of the book was written by founder of

Double Fine Double Fine Productions, Inc. is an American first-party video game developer of Xbox Game Studios based in San Francisco, California. Founded in July 2000 by Tim Schafer shortly after his departure from LucasArts, Double Fine's first two game ...

and game director

Tim Schafer Timothy John Schafer (born July 26, 1967) is an American video game designer. He founded Double Fine Productions in July 2000, after having spent over a decade at LucasArts. Schafer is best known as the designer of critically acclaimed games '' ...

, and another a chapter was contributed by YouTuber

. The book was released on 19 September 2019 and was a ''

'' best seller. On 26 September 2019, crowdfunding began for Hardcastle's second book, ''The Paradox Paradox'', a

science fiction Science fiction (sometimes shortened to Sci-Fi or SF) is a genre of speculative fiction which typically deals with imaginative and futuristic concepts such as advanced science and technology, space exploration, time travel, parallel unive ...

novel A novel is a relatively long work of narrative fiction, typically written in prose and published as a book. The present English word for a long work of prose fiction derives from the for "new", "news", or "short story of something new", itsel ...

which he described as "a bit ''

Star Trek ''Star Trek'' is an American science fiction media franchise created by Gene Roddenberry, which began with the eponymous 1960s television series and quickly became a worldwide pop-culture phenomenon. The franchise has expanded into vari ...

'', a bit ''

Doctor Who ''Doctor Who'' is a British science fiction television series broadcast by the BBC since 1963. The series depicts the adventures of a Time Lord called the Doctor, an extraterrestrial being who appears to be human. The Doctor explores the u ...

'', and a bit fucked up." The book achieved its funding goal within 20 minutes.

Personal life

Hardcastle is married to Rebecca Maughan, an artist who illustrated ''Fuck Yeah, Video Games''. Hardcastle's father, Steve "Dad³" Hardcastle, with whom he has regularly collaborated, started a YouTube channel in 2013; it has accumulated more than 300,000 subscribers and 23 million total views. Hardcastle studied

astrophysics Astrophysics is a science that employs the methods and principles of physics and chemistry in the study of astronomical objects and phenomena. As one of the founders of the discipline said, Astrophysics "seeks to ascertain the nature of the h ...

at the

University of Leicester , mottoeng = So that they may have life , established = , type = public research university , endowment = £20.0 million , budget = £326 million , chancellor = David Willetts , vice_chancellor = Nishan Canagarajah , head_labe ...

, but dropped out after the first year.

References

External links

Nerdcubed official websiteDaniel Hardcastle at the Internet Movie Database
{{DEFAULTSORT:Hardcastle, Daniel 1989 births Comedy YouTubers English humorists English webcomic creators English writers English YouTubers Gaming YouTubers Living people Patreon creators People from Essex People from Southend-on-Sea