To give context for "only thing keeping The Escapist afloat" - this isn't the first time The Escapist has imploded. Around 2013/2014(?) there was a big blowup, I think The Escapist was bought out, and the new owners terminated a bunch of people and only (really) kept on ZP. The owners basically bought The Escapist for ZP. They ran as a skeleton for quite a few years, and recently (2021?) they started doing more stuff. Their 3 Minute Reviews have been pretty good, and the Cold Take series has been great.
This is disappointing for me. I thought they were going in a good direction. It's too bad that management decided that they didn't want to keep funding interesting, well considered voices.
*Edit: I'm referring to the whole publication, parent comment might've strictly meant the Zero Punctuation show.
Anyway, I thought The Escapist died a long time ago, it's fun to reminisce about the one that I liked the most and to hear from everyone else about this later The Escapist that has died even to the point of angering the golden calf of ZP itself.