1
00:00:01,000 --> 00:00:03,375
- Midway is the
punk rock, you know.

2
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Downloaded from
YTS.MX

3
00:00:03,375 --> 00:00:05,625
They're like The Ramones
or The Sex Pistols

4
00:00:05,625 --> 00:00:07,750
of the video game industry,

5
00:00:07,750 --> 00:00:09,041
the guys who are like,

6
00:00:08,000 --> 00:00:13,000
Official YIFY movies site:
YTS.MX

7
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"Oh, this is how you
think we should do it?

8
00:00:10,458 --> 00:00:12,875
"These are the rules that
you think we should obey?

9
00:00:12,875 --> 00:00:14,250
"Well, what if we
go the other way?"

10
00:00:14,250 --> 00:00:19,250
[music]
[character screaming]

11
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- What was the culture
of Midway in the '90s?

12
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And my take on it
was aggressive.

13
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- It's being, pushing the
boundaries of maybe good taste.

14
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- [Character] I love it.

15
00:00:34,291 --> 00:00:36,916
[car screeching]

16
00:00:39,541 --> 00:00:41,333
- I don't think that there
a single gamer that exists

17
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that never played a Midway game.

18
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- They were the only
company, in a lot of ways,

19
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that could make
fantastic sports games

20
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that anyone could
pick up and play.

21
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[character yelling]

22
00:01:01,916 --> 00:01:04,250
- It looked so real to
me, that I was like,

23
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Boop, you just killed me.

24
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[character yelling]

25
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- I remember thinking to myself,
wow, I'm working with gods.

26
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- We made great games.

27
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And at one point,
we led the world.

28
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[gentle music]

29
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- I call it like the Big Bang
of the video game universe.

30
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I mean, we want
from blank screens

31
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to very rudimentary
games like Pong,

32
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to all of the sudden,
we've got Space Invaders,

33
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Pac-Man, Donkey Kong.

34
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You know, we came
out with Defender.

35
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- [Announcer] Within months
of appearing on the market

36
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in 1981, his game Defender shot
to the top and stayed there.

37
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For Williams, the
company that owned it,

38
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his idea was worth $100 million.

39
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- Well, it's sort of the,
it's the ultimate fantasy

40
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where you are the only force
left between evil and good.

41
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- You'd go into a place,

42
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I mean, there'd be
eight Defenders.

43
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People would be standing
in line, you know,

44
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three or four, five deep.

45
00:02:29,583 --> 00:02:30,500
It was a golden era.

46
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But then we got to '84.

47
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All this great stuff
got kind of buried

48
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under like this stinking
pile of shitty clones,

49
00:02:45,208 --> 00:02:48,375
and you know, six-week
Atari 2600 ports.

50
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- Anything was
selling at the time,

51
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as far as the home
market was concerned.

52
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And people started just
shoving garbage out the door.

53
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And at some point in time,

54
00:02:58,291 --> 00:03:00,208
the customer got fed
up with the thing.

55
00:03:01,708 --> 00:03:05,333
- This year's hit is the
next year's firewood.

56
00:03:05,333 --> 00:03:07,041
- It's that tough,
this business?

57
00:03:07,041 --> 00:03:08,750
- It is, I mean
three years from now,

58
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you'll ask somebody
what Defender was,

59
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and they'll go,
hmm, I don't know.

60
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- The consumer got disenchanted
with what was going on

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with, I think, the
consumer product.

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It affected how things were
going on in the arcades

63
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and how the game's
earnings went down.

64
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And we did backtrack.

65
00:03:27,250 --> 00:03:29,291
- The whole video game
crash, we just kind of like,

66
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wow, man, this is
like game over.

67
00:03:31,541 --> 00:03:34,250
And went back to school for
a couple years in California.

68
00:03:36,000 --> 00:03:39,875
But I just couldn't get the
video game thing out of my head.

69
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So it was like, yeah, man,
we gotta do a new game,

70
00:03:42,958 --> 00:03:44,375
get the band back together.

71
00:03:44,375 --> 00:03:49,083
So back to working at what
was known as Williams.

72
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I just remember him, before
he started doing anything,

73
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coming to New York when
I was still in New York,

74
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talking about the idea of
doing another video game.

75
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- Eugene came in and
wasn't really prepared.

76
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But he knew in his mind
what he wanted to do.

77
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And he wrote down on a big
piece of paper, N-A-R-C.

78
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He held up the piece of
paper, and it says NARC.

79
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And they said, "What's NARC"?

80
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- Guy, you know, protecting
the world from this scourge

81
00:04:18,791 --> 00:04:21,958
of drugs and pushers
and drug dealers.

82
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I felt like video
games was always

83
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in some kind of fantasy
world, you know.

84
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It was always like, oh,
we're men in tights.

85
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We're running around with swords

86
00:04:30,625 --> 00:04:33,583
and casting spells on people,
and spears, and stuff.

87
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And like, why can't a video
game be about something real?

88
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We wanted to make an
impression to the world

89
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that Williams was back.

90
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- My job was in field service.

91
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Like I answered the 800 number.

92
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And I would badger
the programmers at ni

93
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to understand what they did.

94
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So then I would go to college

95
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and I would try to find classes

96
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that somehow matched
what these guys knew

97
00:05:01,166 --> 00:05:03,250
because I wanted to
know what that was.

98
00:05:03,250 --> 00:05:05,250
You know, my goal was
to program a game.

99
00:05:05,250 --> 00:05:07,250
And I just, there's
no way you can learn

100
00:05:07,250 --> 00:05:08,583
You just have to
do it on your own.

101
00:05:09,000 --> 00:05:10,875
- You think about the
casualness of this era,

102
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you know, you're kind of
like putting together a team

103
00:05:12,583 --> 00:05:17,041
and like man, I need a
programmer for this game.

104
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And then, you talk
to a couple people,

105
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and here's some kid, you
know, just got out of college.

106
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Actually, I think he's
still trying to finish

107
00:05:24,958 --> 00:05:26,875
the last couple of
courses [laughs]

108
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- I'm gonna be, this is,

109
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I did visualize that
as the opportunity,

110
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the video game opportunity
of a lifetime for me.

111
00:05:33,000 --> 00:05:35,500
I mean, if Eugene's
starting video

112
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and I'm not on the ground floor,

113
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I mean, if I wait six months
to go do summer school

114
00:05:40,583 --> 00:05:42,083
or whatever, I'm
gonna miss something.

115
00:05:42,083 --> 00:05:44,958
- Jack Haeger was
really the lead artist

116
00:05:44,958 --> 00:05:47,958
and then kind of
the art director.

117
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- Jack has a great history
where he went on to be

118
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one of the founders
of the Amiga.

119
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- What more can you say?

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[audience laughing]

121
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- When we started, I guess
there wasn't a clear sense

122
00:06:00,083 --> 00:06:01,916
of what we were going to do.

123
00:06:01,916 --> 00:06:05,083
It was more let's develop
a hardware and a software.

124
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- I always thought
with video games,

125
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when you make them, someone
would come with this great,

126
00:06:07,916 --> 00:06:09,791
like this book, here it is.

127
00:06:09,791 --> 00:06:11,416
This is what we're gonna
make, and we start page one

128
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and we start making it.

129
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It was never like that.

130
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It was like, so what
do you guys wanna do

131
00:06:15,291 --> 00:06:18,500
- At the time, then, the
Japanese games had such,

132
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they had this animation down.

133
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I mean, they had just armies
of incredibly talented artists.

134
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How can you compete?

135
00:06:26,583 --> 00:06:29,375
- I started playing
with video digitization.

136
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That became a huge thing
for me during my career.

137
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The idea of taking actual
images, video images,

138
00:06:35,958 --> 00:06:39,083
and getting them
into a video game,

139
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that was kind of revolutionary.

140
00:06:40,916 --> 00:06:43,375
- The only thing that had
happened like this prior

141
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was a game called Journey.

142
00:06:44,958 --> 00:06:47,583
They actually like digitized
the heads of five frames

143
00:06:47,583 --> 00:06:49,541
of the band members,
and they would like, go.

144
00:06:49,541 --> 00:06:52,458
[video game music]

145
00:06:56,166 --> 00:06:59,916
A normal company, right,
would go out and buy

146
00:06:59,916 --> 00:07:02,125
tens of thousands of
dollars worth of equipment

147
00:07:02,125 --> 00:07:03,583
and cameras and studio
setup and everything.

148
00:07:03,583 --> 00:07:06,166
But no, we worked
for Eugene Jarvis.

149
00:07:06,166 --> 00:07:09,750
He's like, "Yeah, go out, I
bought a camera at Target."

150
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It's like one of these,

151
00:07:11,375 --> 00:07:13,250
you remember those RCA cameras
where you put the videotape

152
00:07:13,250 --> 00:07:14,583
in the side and you
held it like that?

153
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That's what we had,
right, it was [laughs]

154
00:07:17,333 --> 00:07:19,708
- We bought a treadmill
that we were able

155
00:07:19,708 --> 00:07:21,416
to take the top off,
'cause I realized

156
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we would have to film
people walking in place.

157
00:07:24,791 --> 00:07:29,625
And teaching actors how to
be a video game character.

158
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And to my mind, nobody had
done that up to that point.

159
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- Jack Haeger approached
me one day and said,

160
00:07:36,041 --> 00:07:39,166
"Hey, Mark, I got this
concept for this character.

161
00:07:39,166 --> 00:07:40,625
"I think you'd be
perfect for it."

162
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- [Jack Haeger] I came up
with that character

163
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basically from the
old Ironsides TV show

164
00:07:47,375 --> 00:07:49,958
with Raymond Burr
in a wheelchair.

165
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And the wheelchair was
mounted with guns, of course.

166
00:07:52,875 --> 00:07:54,958
- It really was, at the
time, just another day.

167
00:07:54,958 --> 00:07:56,875
I don't think it hit
me till decades lat

168
00:07:56,875 --> 00:07:59,333
that oh my gosh, my
image is still in there.

169
00:07:59,333 --> 00:08:01,250
I have daughters now,
they're gonna see this.

170
00:08:01,250 --> 00:08:02,541
- I did have a question.

171
00:08:02,541 --> 00:08:04,625
At that point, we had
filmed a few characters.

172
00:08:04,625 --> 00:08:06,958
We had filmed the environments.

173
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And I asked, okay, we're,

174
00:08:10,000 --> 00:08:12,875
a rocket launcher is
one of your weapons now.

175
00:08:12,875 --> 00:08:15,875
And I said, "Okay, when a player
fires the rocket launcher,

176
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"what happens?"

177
00:08:17,125 --> 00:08:18,458
And people said,
"What do you mean?"

178
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I go, "Well, I can
make it look real.

179
00:08:21,000 --> 00:08:23,000
"These are real people."

180
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The mission was to
no, make it look real

181
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- The body parts would fly.

182
00:08:30,583 --> 00:08:34,750
I mean, I guess this was one
of the first body part games.

183
00:08:34,750 --> 00:08:36,291
I think maybe the first.

184
00:08:36,291 --> 00:08:38,166
- I remember George was like,

185
00:08:38,166 --> 00:08:39,625
"God, this is so cool,
I can't believe this!

186
00:08:39,625 --> 00:08:40,958
"It's so cool!"

187
00:08:42,875 --> 00:08:45,750
And I came up and I was really
being very gentle about it

188
00:08:45,750 --> 00:08:49,125
and I just said, "I
mean, it is cool.

189
00:08:49,125 --> 00:08:52,875
"But do you think that's
a good thing to put

190
00:08:52,875 --> 00:08:55,958
"in an arcade where
little kids are there?"

191
00:08:55,958 --> 00:08:59,000
- You have to understand,
arcades at that point

192
00:08:59,000 --> 00:09:02,541
were still very
democratic environments.

193
00:09:02,541 --> 00:09:07,041
Any family, any age could
walk in without concern.

194
00:09:07,041 --> 00:09:09,583
- And this escalated
into a huge argumen

195
00:09:09,583 --> 00:09:12,708
And I just remember, it was
a huge, huge screaming match.

196
00:09:12,708 --> 00:09:14,291
And all I'm saying is,

197
00:09:14,291 --> 00:09:15,375
"I'm just saying we
should think about i

198
00:09:15,375 --> 00:09:17,375
"I'm not trying to
limit your creativity

199
00:09:17,375 --> 00:09:19,000
"I'm not trying to censor you."

200
00:09:22,250 --> 00:09:24,875
- You know, I think,
and I think, too,

201
00:09:24,875 --> 00:09:29,250
with a game that involved
realistic content,

202
00:09:29,250 --> 00:09:34,041
when we crossed that
bridge of digitizing life,

203
00:09:34,041 --> 00:09:37,541
the game was no
longer an escape.

204
00:09:37,541 --> 00:09:40,500
- I remember actually a member
of the board of directors

205
00:09:40,500 --> 00:09:45,250
of Williams called the game
a surrealistic nightmare.

206
00:09:46,500 --> 00:09:49,958
And he was really concerned
that there might be some,

207
00:09:49,958 --> 00:09:53,416
you know, negative ramifications
from releasing this game

208
00:09:53,416 --> 00:09:58,166
to the public, and felt that
the game should be canceled.

209
00:10:02,750 --> 00:10:04,583
- With the coin-op business,

210
00:10:04,583 --> 00:10:08,250
you're selling that game
a quarter at a time.

211
00:10:08,250 --> 00:10:10,541
With the home business,
once you sell the cartridge,

212
00:10:10,541 --> 00:10:12,291
if it was back in the old days,

213
00:10:12,291 --> 00:10:14,250
it was a cartridge
that fit into a Sega,

214
00:10:14,250 --> 00:10:16,333
fit into a Nintendo.

215
00:10:16,333 --> 00:10:19,958
And it was a crappy game,
okay, you made your money.

216
00:10:20,166 --> 00:10:23,000
Coin-op, it was one
quarter at a time.

217
00:10:24,375 --> 00:10:26,791
And if that game sucked,
the second quarter

218
00:10:26,791 --> 00:10:29,541
or the third quarter, the
fourth quarter wouldn't happen.

219
00:10:29,541 --> 00:10:33,375
And in our case, we wouldn't
even get out of the test phase.

220
00:10:36,000 --> 00:10:39,291
- We had this magic
number of like $700.

221
00:10:39,291 --> 00:10:41,958
I don't know how
that number came up.

222
00:10:41,958 --> 00:10:44,750
But we wanted to
earn $700 in a week.

223
00:10:44,750 --> 00:10:46,833
That would be, if
we could do that,

224
00:10:46,833 --> 00:10:49,541
we felt like we've
got something.

225
00:10:49,541 --> 00:10:52,791
- So we put it out there.

226
00:10:52,791 --> 00:10:54,166
I remember, actually,

227
00:10:54,166 --> 00:10:55,291
I actually think we
had some champagne.

228
00:10:55,291 --> 00:10:56,791
You know, we were
drinking champagne

229
00:10:56,791 --> 00:10:59,166
in this high school arcade.

230
00:11:00,666 --> 00:11:02,250
- I remember the first
two guys that played it.

231
00:11:02,250 --> 00:11:03,791
They were literally
drug dealers.

232
00:11:03,791 --> 00:11:07,958
I was like [laughs],
these guys walk in.

233
00:11:07,958 --> 00:11:09,875
I'm like, these are
some bad characters.

234
00:11:09,875 --> 00:11:11,875
They're like, oh, check
this out, you know,

235
00:11:11,875 --> 00:11:13,500
and they start playing it.

236
00:11:13,500 --> 00:11:16,500
- The cool thing was the
kids really dug the game.

237
00:11:16,500 --> 00:11:20,083
And just this whole new world
of kind of like reality.

238
00:11:20,083 --> 00:11:21,625
No one had ever seen
anything like that

239
00:11:21,625 --> 00:11:23,166
in a video game before.

240
00:11:23,166 --> 00:11:25,000
- Even with all of the problems
in the software and stuff,

241
00:11:25,000 --> 00:11:27,541
I think the first week,
it earned like $742.

242
00:11:29,250 --> 00:11:31,416
And we're like we've done it!
[triumphant video game music]

243
00:11:31,416 --> 00:11:32,958
We are successful!

244
00:11:32,958 --> 00:11:35,500
Yeah, that was the first
time that we actually started

245
00:11:35,500 --> 00:11:38,208
like going, maybe, you know,
maybe there's something here.

246
00:11:38,208 --> 00:11:39,333
And that's when we
got confident enough

247
00:11:39,333 --> 00:11:41,000
to actually make
a plan to sell it.

248
00:11:42,291 --> 00:11:44,750
I think then management
all of the sudde

249
00:11:44,750 --> 00:11:46,625
all of the sudden,
he actually goes,

250
00:11:46,625 --> 00:11:48,791
"Well, maybe we should order
some parts for this game.

251
00:11:48,791 --> 00:11:50,541
"Maybe we should actually
plan to build this game

252
00:11:50,541 --> 00:11:52,166
"at some point."

253
00:11:52,166 --> 00:11:52,875
- I don't know if they thought
about canceling the game,

254
00:11:52,875 --> 00:11:54,458
but it made so much money,

255
00:11:54,458 --> 00:11:56,958
I think that thought
kind of quickly vanished.

256
00:11:58,416 --> 00:11:59,958
[Reporter] - The new game is called NARC.

257
00:11:59,958 --> 00:12:02,625
It's manufactured by
a company in Chicago

258
00:12:02,625 --> 00:12:04,416
by Williams Electronics.

259
00:12:04,416 --> 00:12:07,083
And it's currently the
number one video arcade game

260
00:12:07,083 --> 00:12:07,875
in the country.

261
00:12:08,208 --> 00:12:08,916
- People were talking
about this game

262
00:12:08,958 --> 00:12:11,000
that was extremely violent.

263
00:12:11,000 --> 00:12:13,500
And people could explode
and this all other stuff.

264
00:12:13,500 --> 00:12:15,916
But it was okay, because they
were drug dealers [laughs]

265
00:12:15,916 --> 00:12:17,125
- [Reporter] For some players,

266
00:12:17,125 --> 00:12:19,000
the carnage is
part of the appeal.

267
00:12:19,000 --> 00:12:20,625
- I love the gore and the blood

268
00:12:20,625 --> 00:12:22,208
and the guts
spilling everywhere.

269
00:12:22,208 --> 00:12:24,208
Then when you hit people,
they go flying through the air

270
00:12:24,208 --> 00:12:25,416
and their heads smash
on the pavement.

271
00:12:25,416 --> 00:12:26,458
It's really cool.

272
00:12:26,875 --> 00:12:28,083
- Still ahead of its time,
Pac-Man sitting next to it,

273
00:12:28,083 --> 00:12:29,500
and things like Donkey Kong.

274
00:12:29,500 --> 00:12:30,916
And now here's NARC.

275
00:12:30,916 --> 00:12:33,791
It was like fast sports
cars, drug dealers

276
00:12:33,791 --> 00:12:35,041
trying to like take you down,

277
00:12:35,041 --> 00:12:36,250
and body parts
flying everywhere.

278
00:12:36,250 --> 00:12:37,333
And it looked like a movie.

279
00:12:37,666 --> 00:12:40,000
[guns shooting]
[characters yelling]

280
00:12:40,000 --> 00:12:44,000
- We weren't aware of
the changing groundswell

281
00:12:44,000 --> 00:12:46,125
and the appetite for

282
00:12:47,583 --> 00:12:50,958
aggressive or realistic
types of games were,

283
00:12:50,958 --> 00:12:54,750
and what NARC brought
to that evolution.

284
00:12:54,750 --> 00:12:59,458
[characters yelling]
[guns firing]

285
00:13:02,500 --> 00:13:04,375
- One of the things that
Williams was so successful

286
00:13:04,375 --> 00:13:09,333
at doing was hiring very
creative, dynamic designers.

287
00:13:09,333 --> 00:13:11,791
But in order to do that,
creative people have a tendency

288
00:13:11,791 --> 00:13:16,791
sometimes to be kind of
off the wall situation.

289
00:13:16,791 --> 00:13:18,250
But we tried to
bring those people in

290
00:13:18,250 --> 00:13:19,958
because we knew that
they could design

291
00:13:19,958 --> 00:13:21,333
the most successful games.

292
00:13:21,333 --> 00:13:22,666
- Ken goes, "Oh, I want
you to meet this guy.

293
00:13:22,666 --> 00:13:24,291
"He's flying in, his
name's Mark Turmell

294
00:13:24,291 --> 00:13:25,958
"He's coming from California."

295
00:13:26,416 --> 00:13:29,041
And here comes this
larger than life dude

296
00:13:29,041 --> 00:13:33,125
tall, big like
permed blond hair.

297
00:13:33,125 --> 00:13:35,500
- What's funny, the
interview process in Chicago

298
00:13:35,500 --> 00:13:38,625
was a little bit crazy because
I was kinda Mr. California.

299
00:13:38,625 --> 00:13:40,458
I had kinda long hair.

300
00:13:40,458 --> 00:13:43,333
And I think I came in there
with some white pants on

301
00:13:43,333 --> 00:13:46,583
and a blue vest, and, you
know, kinda looking funny.

302
00:13:46,583 --> 00:13:48,625
- Pretty much the
conclusion was this guy

303
00:13:49,333 --> 00:13:51,250
you know, like he's
Hollywood, he's crazy

304
00:13:51,250 --> 00:13:53,541
He'll never be able to
actually do any real work.

305
00:13:55,041 --> 00:13:57,625
- No, no.

306
00:13:57,625 --> 00:13:59,041
- They did not wanna hire Mark.

307
00:13:59,041 --> 00:14:00,291
We said, "No, we're hiring Mark,

308
00:14:00,291 --> 00:14:01,625
"whether you like it or not."

309
00:14:01,625 --> 00:14:03,458
- We're going, "Oh,
this is a big mistake."

310
00:14:04,875 --> 00:14:06,625
But you know, actually,
he turned out to be

311
00:14:08,375 --> 00:14:09,583
one of the most brilliant
designers we ever had.

312
00:14:09,583 --> 00:14:11,500
- Even when I interviewed,

313
00:14:11,500 --> 00:14:15,583
I said I wanted to revive
the dual joystick mechanic.

314
00:14:15,583 --> 00:14:18,083
The dual joystick
mechanic of Robotron i

315
00:14:18,083 --> 00:14:19,791
again, it's one of my favorites.

316
00:14:19,791 --> 00:14:20,958
- Crazy thing about Robotron,

317
00:14:20,958 --> 00:14:23,500
I remember when we came up with

318
00:14:23,500 --> 00:14:25,041
that dual stick control
thing, and we felt, okay,

319
00:14:25,041 --> 00:14:26,750
this is going to be
the new standard.

320
00:14:26,750 --> 00:14:29,625
Every video game from now
on will have to have this.

321
00:14:29,625 --> 00:14:32,708
Yet no one copied it.

322
00:14:32,708 --> 00:14:34,291
- Robotron, when I
think about that,

323
00:14:34,291 --> 00:14:35,708
it's sensory overload.

324
00:14:35,708 --> 00:14:38,250
There's so many rainbow
of colors coming at you,

325
00:14:38,250 --> 00:14:40,041
and the sound effects.

326
00:14:40,041 --> 00:14:41,416
And so I was kind
of in that vein

327
00:14:41,416 --> 00:14:44,333
of trying to duplicate
that experience.

328
00:14:44,333 --> 00:14:47,250
And so we started kind of
plugging away at the game.

329
00:14:47,250 --> 00:14:50,208
And it only took maybe
a couple of weeks

330
00:14:50,208 --> 00:14:52,083
before I realized
this John Tobias guy

331
00:14:52,083 --> 00:14:54,416
was just a rock star.

332
00:14:54,416 --> 00:14:56,791
- You know, the first game
I worked on was SmashTV.

333
00:14:56,791 --> 00:14:58,083
The funny thing about it was

334
00:14:58,083 --> 00:15:00,000
I always looked at
it as temporary.

335
00:15:00,000 --> 00:15:02,083
I thought I'm gonna
do this for a while.

336
00:15:02,083 --> 00:15:03,708
I'm gonna save my money.

337
00:15:03,708 --> 00:15:05,291
And I'm either gonna
draw comic books,

338
00:15:05,291 --> 00:15:08,208
or I'm going to CalArts.

339
00:15:08,208 --> 00:15:09,791
- I remember when
we brought him in,

340
00:15:09,791 --> 00:15:11,458
I thought he hated me.

341
00:15:12,500 --> 00:15:13,791
I thought he was like,

342
00:15:13,791 --> 00:15:16,750
'cause he doesn't
smile that much.

343
00:15:16,750 --> 00:15:18,500
He doesn't talk that much.

344
00:15:18,500 --> 00:15:22,041
And I just go, wow, this
guy, I think he hates me.

345
00:15:22,041 --> 00:15:23,541
- I remember thinking
to myself, wow,

346
00:15:23,541 --> 00:15:25,250
I'm working with gods.

347
00:15:25,250 --> 00:15:26,875
I mean, I thought
that these are gods.

348
00:15:26,875 --> 00:15:31,125
And just was super excited
about working with them.

349
00:15:31,125 --> 00:15:34,083
- A big film at the time,
of course, was Running Man.

350
00:15:34,083 --> 00:15:36,708
Robocop was in that same era.

351
00:15:36,708 --> 00:15:38,625
- I'd buy that for a dollar.

352
00:15:40,750 --> 00:15:43,250
- We just had the idea
to take these characters

353
00:15:43,250 --> 00:15:45,125
and turn them into a game show.

354
00:15:46,583 --> 00:15:48,750
- I'd buy that for a dollar.

355
00:15:50,125 --> 00:15:52,541
[video game shooting]

356
00:15:52,541 --> 00:15:56,333
- This consumerism gone
crazy, futuristic world where,

357
00:15:58,125 --> 00:16:00,666
you know, a toaster is more
important than human life.

358
00:16:00,666 --> 00:16:02,416
[cheering]

359
00:16:02,416 --> 00:16:05,416
- You know, Eugene was the king.

360
00:16:05,416 --> 00:16:07,625
We would all go
to him for advice.

361
00:16:07,625 --> 00:16:11,416
- We were just starting
the Boss Master,

362
00:16:11,416 --> 00:16:13,333
which I guess was Mutoid Man.

363
00:16:16,541 --> 00:16:19,125
And we reached the point
where you blew off his head.

364
00:16:19,125 --> 00:16:21,541
- And so I remember creating
the little blood spatters

365
00:16:21,541 --> 00:16:26,208
and watching the characters
onscreen kinda explode.

366
00:16:26,208 --> 00:16:27,541
I remember the first
time I had done it,

367
00:16:27,541 --> 00:16:29,250
I kinda minimized the impact,

368
00:16:29,250 --> 00:16:31,250
because I thought, oh,
that's looking pretty gory,

369
00:16:31,250 --> 00:16:32,875
and I dialed it back.

370
00:16:32,875 --> 00:16:36,500
- I think John was opposed to
just how many bloody chunks

371
00:16:36,500 --> 00:16:38,083
I put on the screen.

372
00:16:38,083 --> 00:16:40,083
- Everybody goes, "Oh, that's
amazing, that's awesome."

373
00:16:41,416 --> 00:16:42,916
And I was going,
"Yeah, it's all right."

374
00:16:42,916 --> 00:16:47,500
Then I go, "You know, multiply
that by 100." [laughs]

375
00:16:48,208 --> 00:16:50,750
- They pushed, hey more,
more blood, more blood.

376
00:16:50,750 --> 00:16:53,416
- This boiling fountain
of blood, you know,

377
00:16:53,416 --> 00:16:56,583
it was like, that's gonna
get people's attention.

378
00:16:56,583 --> 00:16:58,541
But it, oh man, it
looked so alive.

379
00:16:58,541 --> 00:17:01,958
It was just like this cauldron
of just boiling blood.

380
00:17:03,250 --> 00:17:05,583
- He said, "Now, you
know what a game is

381
00:17:05,583 --> 00:17:07,250
I said, "No."

382
00:17:07,250 --> 00:17:09,250
He said, "A game is 100 of
those fucking cool things.

383
00:17:09,250 --> 00:17:10,541
"And now you have one."

384
00:17:10,541 --> 00:17:12,250
And he walked out of my office.

385
00:17:12,250 --> 00:17:14,291
So I was like, okay, so
I'm on the right track.

386
00:17:16,000 --> 00:17:18,125
- In terms of how the
games did earn money,

387
00:17:18,125 --> 00:17:19,791
we call that percentaging.

388
00:17:19,791 --> 00:17:22,333
And that was largely

389
00:17:24,875 --> 00:17:26,708
up to the game designer
to pay attention

390
00:17:26,708 --> 00:17:28,250
to moments in the game

391
00:17:28,250 --> 00:17:31,333
where you might want
to lock down a player,

392
00:17:31,333 --> 00:17:33,541
and you might want to give
them a greater challenge.

393
00:17:33,541 --> 00:17:36,000
- We wanted to crush the player.

394
00:17:36,000 --> 00:17:38,583
And if you're like crushed
by some little guy,

395
00:17:38,583 --> 00:17:42,500
or you get shot in the
back by a ant or something,

396
00:17:44,291 --> 00:17:46,708
I mean, it's like, wait a
minute, that's not fair.

397
00:17:46,708 --> 00:17:48,333
That guy couldn't have
killed me, that guy's a wimp.

398
00:17:48,333 --> 00:17:51,708
But if it's some monstrous
guy that's 30 feet tall

399
00:17:51,708 --> 00:17:55,916
on like tank treads running
around, and he kills you,

400
00:17:55,916 --> 00:17:57,958
it's like, well, you
know, the dude was badass.

401
00:17:57,958 --> 00:17:59,541
I mean, that was a badass dude.

402
00:17:59,541 --> 00:18:01,583
I mean, obviously he's
gonna kill me a few times

403
00:18:01,583 --> 00:18:03,000
before I figure
out how to do it.

404
00:18:04,541 --> 00:18:06,416
You accepted it.

405
00:18:06,416 --> 00:18:09,000
You accepted your death
and gladly paid for more.

406
00:18:09,000 --> 00:18:10,791
- Arcade games were built around

407
00:18:10,791 --> 00:18:12,416
you play for this chunk of time,

408
00:18:12,416 --> 00:18:14,291
and then you give
us another quarter.

409
00:18:14,291 --> 00:18:17,750
It's like, aw man, I was
hoodwinked for decades.

410
00:18:17,750 --> 00:18:20,250
Like people complain about
mobile game microtransactions,

411
00:18:20,250 --> 00:18:22,708
but arcade games were doing
that decades before that

412
00:18:22,708 --> 00:18:24,750
in way more nefarious ways.

413
00:18:25,208 --> 00:18:28,375
- Supposedly, within
SmashTV, was this

414
00:18:28,416 --> 00:18:31,083
Pleasure Dome that

415
00:18:31,583 --> 00:18:33,166
never existed.

416
00:18:33,166 --> 00:18:34,416
- Well, I guess I'm
a bit of a scammer.

417
00:18:34,416 --> 00:18:36,208
I just kind of did it on a whim

418
00:18:36,208 --> 00:18:39,958
because I couldn't bring
myself to just having a message

419
00:18:39,958 --> 00:18:42,958
that said
congratulations, go away,

420
00:18:42,958 --> 00:18:45,416
and never play this game again.

421
00:18:45,416 --> 00:18:48,541
It didn't make sense
to just shun people

422
00:18:48,541 --> 00:18:51,250
- And he figured,
eh, you know what,

423
00:18:51,250 --> 00:18:52,791
we'll just tell them it's there.

424
00:18:52,791 --> 00:18:54,291
And since it's so
late in the game,

425
00:18:54,291 --> 00:18:56,375
the majority of players
will never even know.

426
00:18:56,375 --> 00:19:00,166
[Ernest Cline] - I remember
just feeding mountains

427
00:19:00,166 --> 00:19:02,958
of tokens and quarters
into SmashTV in the arcade

428
00:19:03,041 --> 00:19:05,125
trying to get to the
Pleasure Dome

429
00:19:05,125 --> 00:19:06,666
and could never make it there.

430
00:19:07,791 --> 00:19:10,416
And I figured, well, I
didn't try hard enough.

431
00:19:10,750 --> 00:19:14,333
- So when Ken Fedesna found
out that I had done that

432
00:19:14,333 --> 00:19:16,333
and that there was
no Pleasure Dome,

433
00:19:16,333 --> 00:19:19,791
he said, "You've gotta
resolve it somehow."

434
00:19:19,791 --> 00:19:23,291
And so we put
together a new room,

435
00:19:23,291 --> 00:19:24,875
and we actually supported it.

436
00:19:24,875 --> 00:19:29,416
But of course, not every
distributor or arcade owner

437
00:19:29,416 --> 00:19:33,250
would get the new EPROMS
to upgrade their machine.

438
00:19:33,250 --> 00:19:35,541
- You know, with a lot
of things that happened

439
00:19:35,541 --> 00:19:38,416
in those days, we
may not like it.

440
00:19:38,416 --> 00:19:40,125
But if the game
ended up doing well,

441
00:19:41,625 --> 00:19:43,583
we kind of would shrug
our shoulders and say,

442
00:19:43,583 --> 00:19:46,791
"Okay, well, let's move
on to the next thing.

443
00:19:46,791 --> 00:19:48,208
"Don't do that again."

444
00:19:48,208 --> 00:19:50,000
We wouldn't make that
big of a deal of it

445
00:19:53,041 --> 00:19:56,500
[Ernest Cline] - So I
managed to find a guy

446
00:19:56,500 --> 00:19:59,791
much like myself, who like

447
00:19:59,791 --> 00:20:01,416
had probably spent
his whole life,

448
00:20:01,416 --> 00:20:04,000
like I'm gonna find these
goddamn Pleasure Domes.

449
00:20:04,000 --> 00:20:07,500
And he somehow found a
version of the ROM chips

450
00:20:07,500 --> 00:20:09,625
that had the Pleasure
Domes in them, the upgrade.

451
00:20:09,958 --> 00:20:12,291
I remember getting
this chip in the mail

452
00:20:12,291 --> 00:20:13,791
and swapping it out
and booting it up

453
00:20:13,791 --> 00:20:15,458
and seeing the new version.

454
00:20:15,458 --> 00:20:18,583
And then finally, finally, I
reached the Pleasure Domes.

455
00:20:18,583 --> 00:20:21,416
And it was really just a bunch
of like girls in bikini icons

456
00:20:21,416 --> 00:20:23,083
that you could run
around and scoop up.

457
00:20:23,083 --> 00:20:26,875
[triumphant video game music]

458
00:20:28,250 --> 00:20:29,083
It was pretty...

459
00:20:29,666 --> 00:20:30,166
...lame

460
00:20:31,458 --> 00:20:33,125
Whoever was responsible
for, you know,

461
00:20:34,250 --> 00:20:37,250
for that quest taking
me like 20 years

462
00:20:37,250 --> 00:20:39,666
to reach the Pleasure Dome,
you should just be ashamed.

463
00:20:39,666 --> 00:20:41,583
And if you never reached
the Pleasure Domes,

464
00:20:41,583 --> 00:20:43,041
if you're one of those people,

465
00:20:43,041 --> 00:20:45,000
I will tell you, it was not
worth it once you get there.

466
00:20:45,000 --> 00:20:48,125
It's just a, yeah, just shitty.

467
00:20:48,125 --> 00:20:50,250
All right. [laughing]

468
00:20:57,041 --> 00:21:00,166
- There was a grittiness
about producing product,

469
00:21:00,166 --> 00:21:02,625
about making games at
Williams Electronics,

470
00:21:02,625 --> 00:21:05,791
that I think certainly had an
effect on the types of games

471
00:21:05,791 --> 00:21:06,958
that we produced.

472
00:21:06,958 --> 00:21:09,041
- We were in a big factory.

473
00:21:09,041 --> 00:21:10,958
We had rats coming
through ceilings.

474
00:21:10,958 --> 00:21:14,000
We had water leaks, floods.

475
00:21:14,000 --> 00:21:16,916
It was part of
what Neil fostered,

476
00:21:16,916 --> 00:21:21,666
was a hungry, dirty,
grungy atmosphere.

477
00:21:23,458 --> 00:21:25,958
- Yeah, being in Chicago, I
think it comes out of the grit

478
00:21:25,958 --> 00:21:30,208
of the manufacturing process.

479
00:21:30,208 --> 00:21:33,500
- I think it's a lot to
do with the personalities

480
00:21:33,500 --> 00:21:36,625
of all the people, and the
collective personalities,

481
00:21:36,625 --> 00:21:41,375
as we all kind of went for
the down and dirty sometimes.

482
00:21:41,375 --> 00:21:45,125
- We weren't afraid and we
weren't troubled by the idea

483
00:21:45,125 --> 00:21:48,125
of having people compete,
because, you know,

484
00:21:48,125 --> 00:21:50,041
we thought that it
would be helpful

485
00:21:50,041 --> 00:21:52,750
enhancing their animal spirits,

486
00:21:52,750 --> 00:21:54,416
to really come up
with something special

487
00:21:54,416 --> 00:21:57,250
- When you go back
to the pinball days,

488
00:21:57,250 --> 00:21:59,833
you know, in the '60s and
'70s, and all that other stuff,

489
00:21:59,833 --> 00:22:02,625
you had basically three
major pinball companies.

490
00:22:02,625 --> 00:22:05,250
You had Gottlieb, you had
Bally, and you had Williams.

491
00:22:05,250 --> 00:22:07,333
Bally was the
leaders at the time.

492
00:22:07,333 --> 00:22:08,625
They were the first
ones to come out

493
00:22:08,625 --> 00:22:10,708
with solid state
pinball machines.

494
00:22:10,708 --> 00:22:12,291
They acquired Midway,

495
00:22:12,291 --> 00:22:13,916
and then they were
running the whole thing.

496
00:22:13,916 --> 00:22:16,375
And they then were able
to get Space Invaders,

497
00:22:16,375 --> 00:22:18,000
and of course, Pac-Man,
and all the other stuff

498
00:22:18,000 --> 00:22:19,625
that went on at the time.

499
00:22:19,625 --> 00:22:24,375
- The rivalry between
Bally Midway and Williams

500
00:22:24,541 --> 00:22:29,250
was, you know, a really
longstanding, highly competitive

501
00:22:30,583 --> 00:22:33,916
love/hate, maybe more hate
than love relationship.

502
00:22:33,916 --> 00:22:36,083
- [Reporter] Well, this is
supposed to be Bally's big new,

503
00:22:36,083 --> 00:22:37,791
you know, answer to Pac-Man

504
00:22:37,791 --> 00:22:39,083
and all of that kind of stuff,

505
00:22:39,083 --> 00:22:40,541
the next Pac-Man,
the next generation.

506
00:22:41,500 --> 00:22:43,375
Think you'll ever
play Roto again?

507
00:22:45,541 --> 00:22:46,958
- I probably would, you know.

508
00:22:48,125 --> 00:22:50,000
I'm trying to figure out
what's going on, you know.

509
00:22:50,000 --> 00:22:52,583
- Everyone at Bally
Midway had been

510
00:22:52,583 --> 00:22:54,375
looking at Williams
for years as Them.

511
00:22:54,375 --> 00:22:56,333
They were the other guys.

512
00:22:56,333 --> 00:22:59,000
They did these type of games

513
00:22:59,000 --> 00:23:00,916
that required enormous skill.

514
00:23:00,916 --> 00:23:03,791
And I did games that were
idiot-proof and silly and funny.

515
00:23:03,791 --> 00:23:06,875
- And so we really wanted
to bury those guys.

516
00:23:06,875 --> 00:23:08,541
We wanted to bury Bally Midway.

517
00:23:08,541 --> 00:23:13,291
We felt that they relied on
licensing brands too much.

518
00:23:15,083 --> 00:23:19,208
So we just felt they were
phonies and incompetents

519
00:23:19,416 --> 00:23:21,791
and we were going to
teach them a lesson

520
00:23:21,791 --> 00:23:24,416
- And they were
them and we were us,

521
00:23:24,416 --> 00:23:27,916
and all of a sudden,
now they were buying us.

522
00:23:27,916 --> 00:23:29,458
[Ken Fedesna] - They were
diversifying into

523
00:23:29,458 --> 00:23:30,875
health clubs and casinos.

524
00:23:30,958 --> 00:23:33,125
♪ Bally's, Bally's

525
00:23:33,125 --> 00:23:35,708
- They decided to get out
of the coin-op industry.

526
00:23:35,708 --> 00:23:38,375
So it became available
for us to buy,

527
00:23:38,375 --> 00:23:40,250
and that's why we ended
up purchasing them.

528
00:23:40,250 --> 00:23:43,625
- Yeah, we won the war,
we killed these guys.

529
00:23:43,625 --> 00:23:47,125
And then the crazy thing
is, then we like hired

530
00:23:47,125 --> 00:23:50,750
all their managers and they
became our managers [laughs]

531
00:23:50,750 --> 00:23:54,250
And then it was, I don't
know, it wasn't a year or two

532
00:23:54,250 --> 00:24:00,125
before we had our name
changed to Midway [laughs]

533
00:24:02,666 --> 00:24:05,541
[Neil Nicastro] - We changed the
branding of our video games

534
00:24:05,541 --> 00:24:07,333
from Williams to Midway

535
00:24:07,333 --> 00:24:11,583
because Midway had a
stronger consumer presence.

536
00:24:11,583 --> 00:24:14,208
- I think I could see
Eugene's emotion in it.

537
00:24:14,208 --> 00:24:17,583
We were fighting a
war for our jobs,

538
00:24:17,583 --> 00:24:19,541
to get video started.

539
00:24:19,541 --> 00:24:21,250
It was the Williams name.

540
00:24:21,250 --> 00:24:23,541
And a lot of us, we all
took very much pride

541
00:24:23,541 --> 00:24:24,833
in the Williams name.

542
00:24:24,833 --> 00:24:26,625
- We won this war,
we're Williams.

543
00:24:26,625 --> 00:24:28,291
Why are we Bally Midway?

544
00:24:28,291 --> 00:24:31,250
I mean, they should, Bally
Midway becoming Williams.

545
00:24:31,250 --> 00:24:34,291
And he goes, "You know what,
I paid five million bucks

546
00:24:34,291 --> 00:24:36,500
"for that fucking name,
we're gonna use it."

547
00:24:36,500 --> 00:24:38,625
[laughs]

548
00:24:40,375 --> 00:24:42,583
- The only people that we
were able to actually attract

549
00:24:42,583 --> 00:24:44,916
was Brian Colin and Jeff Nauman,

550
00:24:44,916 --> 00:24:47,041
who had done Rampage
and Xenophobe

551
00:24:47,041 --> 00:24:49,250
prior to the acquisition,
and then came over,

552
00:24:49,250 --> 00:24:50,958
and their first game
with us was Arch Rival,

553
00:24:50,958 --> 00:24:53,041
which was a big
success at the time.

554
00:24:53,041 --> 00:24:55,708
- The income from Arch
Rivals basically paid for

555
00:24:55,708 --> 00:24:58,333
the entire price of the merger.

556
00:24:58,333 --> 00:25:00,125
So really, it was a free deal.

557
00:25:00,125 --> 00:25:02,875
It was actually, Williams
got Bally Midway for nothing.

558
00:25:02,875 --> 00:25:05,250
[laughs]

559
00:25:05,250 --> 00:25:08,000
- I'll have to send you
the waving goodbye photo.

560
00:25:08,000 --> 00:25:09,541
You'll appreciate it.

561
00:25:09,541 --> 00:25:12,291
It shows what people
thought about the buyout.

562
00:25:16,333 --> 00:25:18,916
[George Petro] - I got
a call, my phone rang

563
00:25:18,916 --> 00:25:21,250
and it was Neil
Nicastro, the CEO.

564
00:25:21,250 --> 00:25:23,333
And he goes, "Hey,
what would you think

565
00:25:23,333 --> 00:25:25,041
"about doing a
Terminator 2 game?"

566
00:25:25,041 --> 00:25:28,500
And I was like, "There's
gonna be a Terminator 2?"

567
00:25:28,500 --> 00:25:32,791
- Arrangements were made
for George and I to fly out

568
00:25:32,791 --> 00:25:36,541
to Hollywood to meet with
Jim Cameron and his people

569
00:25:36,541 --> 00:25:38,500
and to show demonstrations

570
00:25:38,500 --> 00:25:43,000
of what our digitizing hardware
and software was capable of.

571
00:25:43,416 --> 00:25:45,500
- We put on this videotape
of us creating NARC.

572
00:25:45,500 --> 00:25:48,625
And Jim Cameron sees it
and he just freaks out.

573
00:25:48,625 --> 00:25:51,708
He's just like, he's
like, "This is awesome."

574
00:25:51,708 --> 00:25:53,375
- Cameron was great.

575
00:25:53,375 --> 00:25:54,500
I mean, it was like, you
guys are making movies

576
00:25:54,500 --> 00:25:56,416
like we are.

577
00:25:56,416 --> 00:25:58,416
- And he just stands up
at one point, he goes,

578
00:25:58,416 --> 00:26:01,500
"Give these guys
everything they need."

579
00:26:01,500 --> 00:26:03,791
And we're like,
Jack and I are like.

580
00:26:03,791 --> 00:26:05,416
- What was interesting
to us when we mad

581
00:26:05,416 --> 00:26:07,708
the Terminator 2 arcade
game is I'm pretty sure

582
00:26:07,708 --> 00:26:09,375
it was the first
movie that ever had

583
00:26:09,583 --> 00:26:11,208
on the set of the movie,

584
00:26:11,208 --> 00:26:13,291
shooting simultaneously
through the movie

585
00:26:13,291 --> 00:26:14,958
the arcade game people.

586
00:26:14,958 --> 00:26:16,708
- We had access to all of
the actors and everything

587
00:26:16,708 --> 00:26:18,375
from the movie.

588
00:26:18,375 --> 00:26:21,625
But like Arnold, we didn't
really have access to him.

589
00:26:21,625 --> 00:26:24,208
He was a little more
expensive, more difficult.

590
00:26:24,208 --> 00:26:27,583
But we had access to his stunt
double that we could use.

591
00:26:27,583 --> 00:26:30,250
And once he put, he had a
prosthetic jaw that he put on,

592
00:26:30,250 --> 00:26:32,291
and he could look
exactly like Arnold.

593
00:26:32,291 --> 00:26:34,916
[shooting]

594
00:26:34,916 --> 00:26:36,791
- What's not commonly known
is that Linda Hamilton

595
00:26:36,791 --> 00:26:39,416
actually has a twin sister,
who's a stunt double

596
00:26:39,416 --> 00:26:40,750
and also her stand-in.

597
00:26:40,750 --> 00:26:42,583
And in fact, at the
end of Terminator 2,

598
00:26:42,583 --> 00:26:46,250
there is a sequence where
the T-1000 replicates itself

599
00:26:46,250 --> 00:26:47,500
as Sarah Connor,

600
00:26:47,500 --> 00:26:49,416
and then the real Sarah
Connor comes behind.

601
00:26:49,416 --> 00:26:51,333
And actually, there's no trick
photography in that shot.

602
00:26:51,333 --> 00:26:53,250
That's actually her
and her twin sister.

603
00:26:53,250 --> 00:26:55,291
So her twin sister came
in and did all the stuff

604
00:26:55,291 --> 00:26:56,666
and was quite happy to do it.

605
00:26:58,375 --> 00:27:01,291
- Robert Patrick
was so enthusiastic,

606
00:27:01,291 --> 00:27:03,375
he kept asking me, "So
it's gonna look like me?"

607
00:27:03,375 --> 00:27:05,416
And I said, "Yes,
it's going to be you.

608
00:27:05,416 --> 00:27:06,708
"We're gonna digitize you."

609
00:27:06,708 --> 00:27:07,875
He goes, "Really?"

610
00:27:07,875 --> 00:27:09,208
"We're gonna videotape you,

611
00:27:09,208 --> 00:27:10,500
"and it's gonna be
you in the game."

612
00:27:10,500 --> 00:27:12,083
I think he was just
as excited about tha

613
00:27:12,083 --> 00:27:13,958
as he was about his
role in the movie.

614
00:27:15,583 --> 00:27:17,250
- [Character] Excellent.

615
00:27:17,250 --> 00:27:19,541
- I think what's really fun
about the arcade experience

616
00:27:19,541 --> 00:27:22,416
with peripherals is
it kind of allows yo

617
00:27:22,416 --> 00:27:24,000
to have a gaming experience

618
00:27:24,000 --> 00:27:26,125
that you might not be
able to get in your house.

619
00:27:26,125 --> 00:27:28,250
Having that thing that
you're holding in your hands

620
00:27:28,250 --> 00:27:30,250
makes it feel more
like a performance.

621
00:27:30,250 --> 00:27:31,916
[Ernest Cline] - That was
one of the most egregious

622
00:27:31,916 --> 00:27:33,208
quarter-sucking games, too.

623
00:27:33,208 --> 00:27:34,708
Like you would get killed
after three seconds

624
00:27:34,708 --> 00:27:36,375
and have to put it
in, but the graphics,

625
00:27:36,375 --> 00:27:38,750
again, it was like graphics
from the movie scanned in.

626
00:27:38,750 --> 00:27:41,750
So you're actually playing
Arnold and fighting the T-1000

627
00:27:41,750 --> 00:27:43,416
and there were elements
from the movie.

628
00:27:43,416 --> 00:27:45,083
So it really felt like
you were in the movies.

629
00:27:45,083 --> 00:27:47,291
- [Character] Hasta
la vista, baby.

630
00:27:48,958 --> 00:27:50,750
- But by the time
you reached the end

631
00:27:50,750 --> 00:27:53,708
and defeated the T-1000,
you had spent more

632
00:27:53,708 --> 00:27:56,125
than it would cost to
watch the movie 10 times.

633
00:27:56,125 --> 00:27:57,750
- See, when a game
went on test, we all,

634
00:27:57,750 --> 00:28:00,208
we all went out and kind of,

635
00:28:00,208 --> 00:28:03,125
we'd go watch it and have
dinner and come watch it.

636
00:28:03,125 --> 00:28:04,958
And the game was
killing people in like,

637
00:28:04,958 --> 00:28:07,583
I mean people were literally
lasting like 18 seconds.

638
00:28:07,583 --> 00:28:09,875
I remember John Tobias one time,

639
00:28:09,875 --> 00:28:12,250
he's like standing next to
it and we're watching it,

640
00:28:12,250 --> 00:28:15,333
and these guys just got wasted.

641
00:28:15,333 --> 00:28:17,583
And he just turns around, he
goes, "That was 18 seconds!

642
00:28:17,583 --> 00:28:19,250
"They died in 18 seconds!"

643
00:28:19,250 --> 00:28:20,875
And it was like, you
know, he's yelling.

644
00:28:20,875 --> 00:28:22,000
I'm like, "Don't tell them
they just lost their money."

645
00:28:22,000 --> 00:28:23,958
It was so funny.

646
00:28:23,958 --> 00:28:27,208
- T2 was a good
success for Midway.

647
00:28:27,208 --> 00:28:32,916
It opened the door for a
more cinematic experience.

648
00:28:33,125 --> 00:28:35,125
- It got Midway to a new level.

649
00:28:35,125 --> 00:28:36,958
It just all of a sudden was
like, this is what it means

650
00:28:36,958 --> 00:28:39,291
to sell a crap ton of games.

651
00:28:39,291 --> 00:28:41,375
And this is what it means
to earn $1,000 a week.

652
00:28:41,375 --> 00:28:43,125
And just, you know, I
mean, it was just nonstop.

653
00:28:44,125 --> 00:28:46,208
- [Character] It's Judgment Day.

654
00:28:46,208 --> 00:28:51,208
- So we released T2, and
it did, it was doing great.

655
00:28:51,208 --> 00:28:52,583
And I think this was
around the holidays

656
00:28:52,583 --> 00:28:53,791
Matter of fact, I
know it was around.

657
00:28:53,791 --> 00:28:56,708
It was New Years Eve.

658
00:28:56,708 --> 00:28:59,625
And our marketing person
called me at home and said,

659
00:28:59,625 --> 00:29:01,500
"Jack, are you available
on New Years Da

660
00:29:01,500 --> 00:29:04,791
"to come downtown to the studio

661
00:29:04,791 --> 00:29:09,125
"and be interviewed by
Entertainment Tonight?"

662
00:29:09,125 --> 00:29:12,125
So I went down the next day,
and there was a reporter there,

663
00:29:12,125 --> 00:29:14,708
and the game was
there, and she was asking

664
00:29:14,708 --> 00:29:16,333
lots of questions
about the development.

665
00:29:16,333 --> 00:29:18,583
Like, "How did you get
Arnold into the game?"

666
00:29:18,583 --> 00:29:20,625
and "Wow, that really
looks like Robert Patrick,"

667
00:29:20,625 --> 00:29:21,875
those sort of questions.

668
00:29:21,875 --> 00:29:24,208
And right in the middle
of it was a question

669
00:29:24,208 --> 00:29:26,375
that was framed very different
than any other question

670
00:29:26,375 --> 00:29:28,000
she had been asking me.

671
00:29:28,000 --> 00:29:32,500
"So in the game, you are
shooting police officers.

672
00:29:33,583 --> 00:29:36,583
"How do you feel about that?"

673
00:29:36,583 --> 00:29:37,875
- It's very clear in the movie

674
00:29:37,875 --> 00:29:40,000
that Arnold never kills anybody.

675
00:29:40,291 --> 00:29:41,375
He shoots them in the knee.

676
00:29:44,500 --> 00:29:47,208
And they fall over and
they're no longer a threat.

677
00:29:47,208 --> 00:29:49,750
And that's exactly what
happens in the game.

678
00:29:49,750 --> 00:29:52,375
[characters crying out]
[shooting]

679
00:29:52,375 --> 00:29:55,333
- And I told her to stop
right then, and I said,

680
00:29:56,791 --> 00:30:01,375
"You need to convey my
answer in its entirety,"

681
00:30:02,875 --> 00:30:05,583
because I felt very
personal about this.

682
00:30:05,583 --> 00:30:09,750
And I said I had family members
who were in the police force

683
00:30:09,750 --> 00:30:12,916
so I took it very seriously.

684
00:30:12,916 --> 00:30:17,125
And what it ended up being was
kind of this real accusatory,

685
00:30:17,125 --> 00:30:20,041
hard-hitting like,
"So how do you feel

686
00:30:20,041 --> 00:30:22,583
"about making a video game
that encourages people

687
00:30:22,583 --> 00:30:24,000
"to shoot cops?"

688
00:30:24,000 --> 00:30:28,125
- And it was, it was
our first experience in

689
00:30:30,125 --> 00:30:34,083
how video games were
directly impacting

690
00:30:35,250 --> 00:30:37,291
the entertainment community,

691
00:30:37,291 --> 00:30:41,166
and through the media,
society as a whole

692
00:30:43,416 --> 00:30:46,000
- You know, in some ways,
I think the old saying is

693
00:30:46,000 --> 00:30:48,666
bad publicity is
never really bad.

694
00:30:48,666 --> 00:30:50,208
It's publicity.

695
00:30:50,208 --> 00:30:52,791
And it gives you some
notoriety and some attention.

696
00:30:52,791 --> 00:30:55,833
And maybe people that
might not have been aware

697
00:30:55,833 --> 00:30:57,833
of the game before have
now become aware of it

698
00:30:57,833 --> 00:30:59,416
because of this free publicity.

699
00:30:59,416 --> 00:31:02,625
So it worked to our
advantage, ultimately

700
00:31:07,250 --> 00:31:10,375
- By the early '90s, I mean,
we were on a roll at Midway,

701
00:31:10,375 --> 00:31:12,333
and the whole NARC technology,

702
00:31:12,333 --> 00:31:17,083
our photorealistic digitization
was just killing the world.

703
00:31:17,375 --> 00:31:22,291
But as studio head, I really
didn't have the cycles

704
00:31:22,291 --> 00:31:24,625
to like do something new.

705
00:31:24,625 --> 00:31:27,791
A dream of mine was what's the
next phase of the industry,

706
00:31:27,791 --> 00:31:29,708
and it's 3D texture mapping.

707
00:31:29,708 --> 00:31:31,541
I could see that that
was going to happen

708
00:31:33,041 --> 00:31:34,750
And I really wanted
to do a driving game

709
00:31:35,958 --> 00:31:37,916
- Go in to work Monday morning,

710
00:31:37,916 --> 00:31:42,000
and the person that had
to office next to me

711
00:31:42,000 --> 00:31:43,666
I noticed was empty.

712
00:31:43,666 --> 00:31:46,416
And I was like, well,
what's going on?

713
00:31:46,416 --> 00:31:48,291
And I noticed a couple
of cubicles were empty.

714
00:31:48,291 --> 00:31:52,291
I called Ken, I'm like, "Did
I miss something?" [laughs]

715
00:31:52,291 --> 00:31:54,291
"Did I miss something
that was going on?

716
00:31:54,291 --> 00:31:55,958
"I don't understand."

717
00:31:55,958 --> 00:31:59,833
And he said, "Oh
yeah, Eugene and Mark,

718
00:31:59,833 --> 00:32:01,500
"they had a project
they wanted to work on.

719
00:32:01,500 --> 00:32:04,000
"But they're gonna work
on it out of house."

720
00:32:04,000 --> 00:32:06,125
And out of house
meant they had quit

721
00:32:06,125 --> 00:32:07,666
and they started
their own company.

722
00:32:07,666 --> 00:32:10,416
And it was like, uh.

723
00:32:10,416 --> 00:32:12,708
- You know, they had
tremendous talent.

724
00:32:12,708 --> 00:32:17,083
And you know, it was
Turmell, Petro, Jack Haeger.

725
00:32:17,083 --> 00:32:19,875
The art side had John Tobias.

726
00:32:19,875 --> 00:32:21,208
- The first time I heard that,

727
00:32:21,208 --> 00:32:23,791
I remember feeling
lost a little bit.

728
00:32:23,791 --> 00:32:25,958
It's almost like your
parent is leaving the house

729
00:32:25,958 --> 00:32:27,208
kind of a thing.

730
00:32:27,208 --> 00:32:29,083
- You know, in true
Williams style,

731
00:32:29,083 --> 00:32:31,208
nobody decided to say anything.

732
00:32:31,208 --> 00:32:35,750
They never sort of like
dealt with the fact

733
00:32:35,750 --> 00:32:39,000
that the manager of the
video department was gone.

734
00:32:39,000 --> 00:32:41,250
They just kind of
left us, you know,

735
00:32:41,250 --> 00:32:43,541
Lord of the Flies style.

736
00:32:43,541 --> 00:32:45,208
- I always looked at him as
being kind of the Godfather

737
00:32:45,208 --> 00:32:47,958
of the industry and sort
of a leader of, you know,

738
00:32:47,958 --> 00:32:49,291
of our studio.

739
00:32:49,291 --> 00:32:51,125
And so when he was walking away,

740
00:32:51,125 --> 00:32:54,541
that was not a good feeling.

741
00:32:54,541 --> 00:32:57,166
Here we've got the Godfather,
the Doctor of Video Games,

742
00:32:57,166 --> 00:32:59,666
Eugene Jarvis, creator of all.

743
00:32:59,666 --> 00:33:01,000
Some call him God.

744
00:33:01,000 --> 00:33:02,625
What do you call yourself?

745
00:33:02,625 --> 00:33:04,500
- Ah, [beep] face.

746
00:33:04,500 --> 00:33:06,333
[laughing]

747
00:33:06,333 --> 00:33:07,666
- [Woman] That's a wrap.

748
00:33:07,666 --> 00:33:09,125
- That's good, that's
a wrap, let's end it.

749
00:33:10,250 --> 00:33:12,416
- In the early '80s,
the games were metaphor.

750
00:33:12,416 --> 00:33:16,375
So it wasn't real space men.

751
00:33:16,375 --> 00:33:19,000
It was little
metaphorical bleeps,

752
00:33:19,000 --> 00:33:21,208
and you know, little
animated sprites

753
00:33:21,208 --> 00:33:25,250
that represented a human
or an alien or a spaceship.

754
00:33:25,250 --> 00:33:27,916
The more you got into
realism, definitely

755
00:33:27,916 --> 00:33:35,750
I think brought in more of the
male aggressive game player.

756
00:33:35,750 --> 00:33:37,041
- The games were louder.

757
00:33:37,041 --> 00:33:38,416
The graphics are more detailed.

758
00:33:38,416 --> 00:33:39,625
There's lots more blood.

759
00:33:39,625 --> 00:33:41,750
Like it feels different.

760
00:33:41,750 --> 00:33:43,916
And that's something
that the companies

761
00:33:43,916 --> 00:33:45,708
were really actively
advertising.

762
00:33:45,708 --> 00:33:47,041
Games have always been violent,

763
00:33:47,041 --> 00:33:48,625
so I'm not saying that
comes out of nowhere.

764
00:33:48,625 --> 00:33:50,208
But it's not the thing

765
00:33:50,208 --> 00:33:52,333
that they were kind of
leading with before, right?

766
00:33:54,250 --> 00:33:55,708
[Neil Nicastro] - I think
everybody by this point

767
00:33:55,708 --> 00:33:57,291
knows the story about
Mortal Kombat.

768
00:33:57,291 --> 00:33:59,416
It wasn't Mortal Kombat
to start out with

769
00:33:59,416 --> 00:34:03,708
And this is probably the
greatest story of Midway

770
00:34:03,958 --> 00:34:05,875
Ed Boon and John Tobias.

771
00:34:05,875 --> 00:34:09,041
[John Tobias]- I think the
first time I met him was...

772
00:34:09,041 --> 00:34:11,958
he was playing his radio
really loud in his office.

773
00:34:11,958 --> 00:34:13,875
He kept coming next door to us,

774
00:34:13,875 --> 00:34:15,416
you know, knocking on
our door and coming in,

775
00:34:15,416 --> 00:34:17,625
sticking his head in and going,

776
00:34:17,625 --> 00:34:18,541
"Hey, is that too loud?

777
00:34:18,541 --> 00:34:20,416
"Sounds too loud."

778
00:34:20,416 --> 00:34:21,666
And he'd go back and lower
his volume a little bit

779
00:34:21,666 --> 00:34:22,708
and he'd come back.

780
00:34:22,708 --> 00:34:24,291
"Hey, is that too loud?"

781
00:34:24,291 --> 00:34:27,250
And you know, so that was the
first time that I met him.

782
00:34:27,250 --> 00:34:29,916
I think my first reaction
was, who the fuck is this guy?

783
00:34:29,916 --> 00:34:32,708
[Neil Nicastro] - We had about
a three-month gap

784
00:34:32,708 --> 00:34:35,375
in the factory's
production line.

785
00:34:35,375 --> 00:34:37,583
And they said, "We
can give you a game."

786
00:34:37,583 --> 00:34:39,708
It was like some
ridiculous break time.

787
00:34:39,708 --> 00:34:41,166
It was like six months.

788
00:34:41,166 --> 00:34:44,000
"A new game in six
months to fill the gap."

789
00:34:44,000 --> 00:34:45,083
"All right, what is it?"

790
00:34:45,083 --> 00:34:46,583
"It's a fighting game."

791
00:34:46,583 --> 00:34:49,416
[John Tobias] - Karate Champ was
a fighting game that I had

792
00:34:49,416 --> 00:34:51,250
played in high school,
and I loved that game.

793
00:34:51,250 --> 00:34:53,250
And I thought, wow,
that would lend itself

794
00:34:53,250 --> 00:34:56,125
to sort of this one-on-one
fighting game idea.

795
00:34:56,125 --> 00:34:58,958
I was a huge martial arts fan.

796
00:34:58,958 --> 00:35:01,250
I loved old Kung Fu movies.

797
00:35:01,250 --> 00:35:03,125
In the early '90s,

798
00:35:03,125 --> 00:35:05,583
there were two up-and-coming
martial arts stars.

799
00:35:05,583 --> 00:35:08,750
There was Van Damme, and
then there was Steven Seagal.

800
00:35:08,750 --> 00:35:12,125
We thought, wow, we have to
get one of those guys involved.

801
00:35:13,958 --> 00:35:15,458
- Not bad kid.

802
00:35:15,458 --> 00:35:18,958
- And we're gonna use
Jean-Claude Van Damme's image

803
00:35:18,958 --> 00:35:22,333
in this game like we, you know,

804
00:35:22,333 --> 00:35:25,000
now have begun doing in
our other video games.

805
00:35:25,000 --> 00:35:26,500
Okay.

806
00:35:26,500 --> 00:35:28,916
- We wanted him to come
in to do some videos

807
00:35:28,916 --> 00:35:31,416
you know, to digitize
him, and things like that

808
00:35:31,416 --> 00:35:32,708
the voiceover, whatever.

809
00:35:32,708 --> 00:35:35,541
What I remember is
he just wasn't cooperative

810
00:35:35,666 --> 00:35:37,208
- This was a filler game for us,

811
00:35:37,208 --> 00:35:39,125
you know, just something
to fill the gap

812
00:35:39,125 --> 00:35:42,625
And excuse my language,
okay, but I said

813
00:35:42,625 --> 00:35:44,791
"Kenny, tell him to go fuck off.

814
00:35:44,791 --> 00:35:48,000
"Tell these guys, make
up their own characters

815
00:35:48,000 --> 00:35:50,208
"and put their own
characters in the gam

816
00:35:50,208 --> 00:35:52,333
"Make a fighting game
with their own characters.

817
00:35:52,333 --> 00:35:54,250
"Forget about
Jean-Claude Van Damme."

818
00:35:54,250 --> 00:35:55,875
- Actually, I thought
that was great.

819
00:35:55,875 --> 00:36:00,333
Like, I thought the freedom to
sort of create our own story

820
00:36:00,333 --> 00:36:04,250
and our own characters and all
those things was appealing.

821
00:36:04,250 --> 00:36:06,000
The first character we
taped on Mortal Kombat

822
00:36:06,000 --> 00:36:07,750
was Johnny Cage.

823
00:36:07,750 --> 00:36:10,208
- I remember first showing up
to the first day

824
00:36:10,208 --> 00:36:12,791
of shooting Mortal Kombat,
showing up to film

825
00:36:12,791 --> 00:36:16,333
and literally having to spend
an hour with John and Ed

826
00:36:16,333 --> 00:36:18,375
cleaning up an area
for us to film,

827
00:36:18,375 --> 00:36:21,250
because there was no room
for us to film anything.

828
00:36:21,250 --> 00:36:24,250
[John Tobias] - When we taped the
Johnny Cage character,

829
00:36:24,250 --> 00:36:26,333
I think we might have
worked on the game

830
00:36:26,333 --> 00:36:30,208
for at least a month before
we taped the second character.

831
00:36:30,208 --> 00:36:33,750
I think the idea was we wanted
to kinda take our learnings

832
00:36:33,750 --> 00:36:36,791
on Johnny Cage and figure
out really what it was

833
00:36:36,791 --> 00:36:38,458
that we were messing with.

834
00:36:38,458 --> 00:36:41,791
If a character threw a kick,
you know, they would always,

835
00:36:41,791 --> 00:36:44,208
they'd wanna throw it
as fast as they could.

836
00:36:44,208 --> 00:36:47,500
And so the problem for us
was it would become a blur.

837
00:36:47,500 --> 00:36:49,875
- John is like, "Bup
can't you float?

838
00:36:49,875 --> 00:36:50,791
"Try to float.

839
00:36:50,791 --> 00:36:52,083
"Hold yourself in the air,

840
00:36:52,083 --> 00:36:53,500
"because it's gonna
come out blurry."

841
00:36:54,666 --> 00:36:56,333
I was like, Bup, really?

842
00:36:59,250 --> 00:37:00,666
- And that was a
learning process.

843
00:37:00,666 --> 00:37:02,666
We didn't walk in
with all the answers.

844
00:37:02,666 --> 00:37:06,958
It was just sort of, we would
tape a character doing moves

845
00:37:06,958 --> 00:37:09,208
and then we'd go back and
work with the actual artwork.

846
00:37:09,208 --> 00:37:11,958
Ed would start to work with
the graphics and the game.

847
00:37:14,750 --> 00:37:16,625
He would kinda come back
with the reality of,

848
00:37:16,625 --> 00:37:19,791
well, we have to do that in
three frames, or four frames.

849
00:37:19,791 --> 00:37:21,958
Speed was super
important to him.

850
00:37:21,958 --> 00:37:23,791
- Then we'd go on our review.

851
00:37:23,791 --> 00:37:24,583
We'd go look at the games.

852
00:37:24,583 --> 00:37:26,250
And it was early on.

853
00:37:26,250 --> 00:37:29,416
When we saw up on the screen,

854
00:37:29,416 --> 00:37:33,875
they had fighters
fighting fast as hell.

855
00:37:33,875 --> 00:37:35,875
[Mortal Kombat music]

856
00:37:35,875 --> 00:37:39,791
[characters yelling
and grunting]

857
00:37:42,375 --> 00:37:43,375
We said, holy shit.

858
00:37:44,291 --> 00:37:46,375
This thing is great.

859
00:37:47,208 --> 00:37:51,875
And what was a six-month
production time

860
00:37:51,875 --> 00:37:56,625
to fill a hole in the factory,

861
00:37:57,208 --> 00:37:59,583
we threw that out the
window and realize

862
00:37:59,583 --> 00:38:00,708
continue where you're going,

863
00:38:00,708 --> 00:38:02,750
because this thing is great.

864
00:38:02,750 --> 00:38:05,000
[characters yelling]

865
00:38:11,291 --> 00:38:13,125
[Game] - Test your might.

866
00:38:26,333 --> 00:38:28,541
Liu Kang, wins.

867
00:38:28,541 --> 00:38:30,208
[applauding]

868
00:38:30,208 --> 00:38:32,708
[John Tobias] - That's
just an obnoxious moment

869
00:38:34,416 --> 00:38:35,958
[Daniel Pesina] - John
wanted to do a ninja

870
00:38:35,958 --> 00:38:38,958
And right away, I
was like, ninja?

871
00:38:38,958 --> 00:38:40,541
Ninja's already been,

872
00:38:40,541 --> 00:38:43,208
you know, everyone's a
ninja, it's friggin' '80s.

873
00:38:43,208 --> 00:38:47,958
But there's, in China
there's these type of ninja.

874
00:38:49,458 --> 00:38:51,375
- The Chinese Ninja Connection
was the name of the book.

875
00:38:51,375 --> 00:38:53,625
It was written as this
historical book about

876
00:38:55,041 --> 00:38:58,000
some order of Chinese
assassins who had

877
00:38:59,375 --> 00:39:01,958
sort of predated
the Japanese ninja.

878
00:39:01,958 --> 00:39:03,625
- So actually, he
bought that book,

879
00:39:03,625 --> 00:39:07,416
and Scorpion and Sub-Zero are
originally from that clan.

880
00:39:07,416 --> 00:39:09,583
- The whole thing was
like, the name was made up.

881
00:39:09,583 --> 00:39:11,708
The whole story was
gonna be bullshit.

882
00:39:11,708 --> 00:39:13,708
- You have people
out there who care

883
00:39:13,708 --> 00:39:15,041
about the lore of Mortal Kombat.

884
00:39:15,041 --> 00:39:16,916
You have people that
can go through, lik

885
00:39:16,916 --> 00:39:18,125
well, this is
Sub-Zero's brother,

886
00:39:18,125 --> 00:39:18,791
and he's not wearing
the mask here.

887
00:39:18,791 --> 00:39:20,250
And this is original Sub-Zero,

888
00:39:20,250 --> 00:39:21,625
and then there's
classic Sub-Zero.

889
00:39:21,625 --> 00:39:23,416
They can run all that stuff down

890
00:39:23,416 --> 00:39:26,666
because those characters
have just become so iconic

891
00:39:26,666 --> 00:39:28,500
over the years.

892
00:39:28,500 --> 00:39:30,333
I mean, wrestling was stealing
stuff from Mortal Kombat.

893
00:39:30,333 --> 00:39:33,208
Glacier, the wrestler,
was just Sub-Zero

894
00:39:33,208 --> 00:39:34,291
[video game yelling
drowning out announcer]

895
00:39:34,291 --> 00:39:36,541
[Announcer] -
Combination of styles.

896
00:39:36,541 --> 00:39:39,041
[John Tobias] - You know,
while I may have created

897
00:39:39,041 --> 00:39:42,250
maybe the visual qualities
of the characters,

898
00:39:42,250 --> 00:39:44,583
you know, the back-
story and whatnot,

899
00:39:44,583 --> 00:39:48,791
really, the core of the
product was its playability.

900
00:39:48,791 --> 00:39:51,541
And that started with Ed.

901
00:39:51,541 --> 00:39:54,291
That always came from him
sort of playing the game.

902
00:39:54,291 --> 00:39:56,125
And he would sit in
his office for hours

903
00:39:56,125 --> 00:39:58,000
and call people in to kind of,

904
00:39:58,000 --> 00:39:59,541
"Hey, try this, hey, try that."

905
00:39:59,791 --> 00:40:03,208
- His games reflect
his personality.

906
00:40:03,208 --> 00:40:06,416
I think his games bring
out the way Ed really feels

907
00:40:06,416 --> 00:40:09,500
about things, because
his nature is outrageous.

908
00:40:09,750 --> 00:40:12,000
- There was a period
at the end of a match

909
00:40:12,000 --> 00:40:15,416
where you kind of got a free
hit off of your opponent.

910
00:40:15,416 --> 00:40:18,541
And we wanted to kind of
put an exclamation on it.

911
00:40:18,541 --> 00:40:21,250
For us, it was always, hey,
watch me go do an uppercut.

912
00:40:21,250 --> 00:40:22,791
Somewhere along the way,

913
00:40:22,791 --> 00:40:26,958
Ed put in Johnny Cage punching
off the opponent's head.

914
00:40:29,208 --> 00:40:31,958
- I was like, you can't,
I was like, in shock.

915
00:40:31,958 --> 00:40:33,541
I was like, you can't do that.

916
00:40:33,541 --> 00:40:37,458
Holy cow, it looked so real
to me, that I was like,

917
00:40:37,458 --> 00:40:38,500
Boop, you just killed me.

918
00:40:40,583 --> 00:40:42,250
- [Game] Cage wins.

919
00:40:42,250 --> 00:40:43,291
- And he was like, "Yeah,
isn't that really cool?"

920
00:40:43,291 --> 00:40:44,666
And I was like, "Dude,
you can't do that

921
00:40:44,666 --> 00:40:47,000
And he goes, "We can
do whatever we want

922
00:40:47,000 --> 00:40:48,458
And I was like, looked
at him, I was like

923
00:40:48,458 --> 00:40:51,125
"You're right, we can"
because no boss has ever let,

924
00:40:51,125 --> 00:40:53,416
I've never seen a boss
hanging out with us.

925
00:40:53,416 --> 00:40:55,833
We can shoot whatever we want,
and that's what they get.

926
00:40:55,833 --> 00:41:00,708
- I was never telling Ed
Boon, "Hey, don't pull that,

927
00:41:00,708 --> 00:41:02,625
"don't decapitate
that guy's head."

928
00:41:02,625 --> 00:41:07,583
Instead, you know, I would,
I remember suggesting to him,

929
00:41:07,583 --> 00:41:10,250
"Can't you do a fatality where
you rip the guy's leg off

930
00:41:10,250 --> 00:41:13,875
"and beat the crap out
of him with his own leg?"

931
00:41:13,875 --> 00:41:16,875
[character yelling]

932
00:41:18,250 --> 00:41:21,250
From a management
standpoint, we also believed

933
00:41:21,250 --> 00:41:22,916
that's what the customer wanted.

934
00:41:22,916 --> 00:41:25,750
- He buried it in some
button, joystick combination

935
00:41:25,750 --> 00:41:28,500
that he thought no one
would ever discover.

936
00:41:28,500 --> 00:41:30,875
I remember the players
discovered it right away.

937
00:41:30,875 --> 00:41:32,541
Like it was the first
weekend, they discovered it.

938
00:41:32,541 --> 00:41:36,541
And we were there at some
point watching the reactions.

939
00:41:36,541 --> 00:41:40,708
- Oh, everybody kind of, when
they saw the fatalities...

940
00:41:40,708 --> 00:41:43,791
[characters yelling]

941
00:41:51,375 --> 00:41:53,375
They knew this was
something different.

942
00:41:53,375 --> 00:41:55,333
- We knew right then,
there, that there was no way

943
00:41:55,333 --> 00:41:57,041
we were going to ever
take those things out.

944
00:41:57,041 --> 00:41:59,166
And if anything, we
need to give them more.

945
00:41:59,166 --> 00:42:01,416
- Back in the day, I had
a little piece of paper

946
00:42:01,708 --> 00:42:05,041
that had all of the combos for
the fatalities written down.

947
00:42:05,041 --> 00:42:07,333
I mean, obviously you have to
memorize them at some point.

948
00:42:07,333 --> 00:42:09,541
But I would like whip that
little cheat sheet out

949
00:42:09,541 --> 00:42:11,541
and like quickly type
in all the buttons

950
00:42:11,541 --> 00:42:12,833
to make sure I got it.

951
00:42:12,833 --> 00:42:14,791
- They've got this
game, Mortal Kombat,

952
00:42:14,791 --> 00:42:16,541
and you could kill people.

953
00:42:16,541 --> 00:42:18,333
And I was like, I didn't,

954
00:42:18,333 --> 00:42:20,291
it's hard to even know
what that even meant.

955
00:42:20,291 --> 00:42:21,625
But I'm like, all right, dude.

956
00:42:21,625 --> 00:42:23,500
I'm gonna go, we're
gonna check this out

957
00:42:23,500 --> 00:42:26,750
And sure enough, in the back
of this skateboard shop,

958
00:42:26,750 --> 00:42:29,750
they had an MK machine.

959
00:42:29,750 --> 00:42:32,708
And I just took one
look at it and was like.

960
00:42:32,708 --> 00:42:34,000
- [Game] John Cage.

961
00:42:35,250 --> 00:42:37,416
- They are killing people.

962
00:42:37,416 --> 00:42:38,916
- It was like a big
F-U to everybody.

963
00:42:38,916 --> 00:42:39,791
It was like, oh,
you don't want us

964
00:42:39,791 --> 00:42:41,083
to make video games like this?

965
00:42:41,083 --> 00:42:42,625
Well, how about we
turn it up to 11

966
00:42:43,666 --> 00:42:45,375
and just make that even worse
than anything you could imagine?

967
00:42:45,375 --> 00:42:47,375
I'm sure they were all
just laughing heartily.

968
00:42:50,166 --> 00:42:51,791
- You know, we're doing
the stuff with Liz.

969
00:42:51,791 --> 00:42:53,166
She's athletic, kickass.

970
00:42:53,166 --> 00:42:54,416
- Then she goes up into that.
- Yeah.

971
00:42:54,416 --> 00:42:55,458
- Okay.
- Then pose.

972
00:42:56,583 --> 00:42:57,625
- Right!
- Yeah!

973
00:42:59,416 --> 00:43:01,958
- We're going to
go into fatality.

974
00:43:01,958 --> 00:43:03,875
And Liz looks at him and goes,

975
00:43:03,875 --> 00:43:05,875
"I'm not going to do a fatality.

976
00:43:05,875 --> 00:43:08,250
"Why can't I just give him
like a flower or something,

977
00:43:08,250 --> 00:43:09,583
"and peace and love?"

978
00:43:09,583 --> 00:43:11,291
[character yelling]

979
00:43:11,291 --> 00:43:13,250
- [Game] Sonya wins, fatality.

980
00:43:17,250 --> 00:43:19,791
- And then, of course,
came the brutalities,

981
00:43:19,791 --> 00:43:22,750
the babalities, which
were so ridiculous

982
00:43:22,750 --> 00:43:23,708
and the friendships.

983
00:43:26,916 --> 00:43:28,916
- By the end of
its production run,

984
00:43:28,916 --> 00:43:31,291
the first Mortal
Kombat game, I believe,

985
00:43:31,291 --> 00:43:34,791
ended up selling
about 27,000 units.

986
00:43:36,625 --> 00:43:38,875
- And I guarantee if you
ask Ed and John separately,

987
00:43:38,875 --> 00:43:40,333
there's no way they had a vision

988
00:43:40,333 --> 00:43:42,875
that it was going to go
the way that it went.

989
00:43:42,875 --> 00:43:44,333
I mean, none of us did.

990
00:43:44,333 --> 00:43:46,250
None of us could imagine
that you could sell

991
00:43:46,250 --> 00:43:48,708
that many games
again in our era.

992
00:43:48,708 --> 00:43:51,958
[music]

993
00:43:55,625 --> 00:43:58,291
- Being a nerd and
being aspirational

994
00:43:58,291 --> 00:43:59,791
about the games
industry in general,

995
00:43:59,791 --> 00:44:02,125
from a young age,
I knew some names.

996
00:44:02,125 --> 00:44:04,250
I knew Mark Cerny had
created Marble Madness.

997
00:44:04,250 --> 00:44:06,333
And I remember
hearing these stories

998
00:44:06,333 --> 00:44:08,375
about a guy named Mark Turmell,

999
00:44:08,375 --> 00:44:12,375
who had created Toy
Bizarre for Activision.

1000
00:44:12,375 --> 00:44:14,500
- [Announcer] Mark is one of
nation's leading designers

1001
00:44:14,500 --> 00:44:15,958
of home video software,

1002
00:44:15,958 --> 00:44:18,541
a former boy wonder
who did not burn out

1003
00:44:18,541 --> 00:44:22,625
A creative computer whiz with
a dinosaur-like age of 23,

1004
00:44:22,625 --> 00:44:25,541
he's still cranking out video
games for the home market.

1005
00:44:25,541 --> 00:44:26,875
How many teenagers, after all,

1006
00:44:26,875 --> 00:44:28,166
make it into People Magazine

1007
00:44:28,166 --> 00:44:30,416
and find themselves
in other articles

1008
00:44:30,416 --> 00:44:33,416
described as the hottest
designer in the industry?

1009
00:44:33,416 --> 00:44:34,541
- I love golf.

1010
00:44:34,541 --> 00:44:36,208
I go on streaks on golf.

1011
00:44:36,208 --> 00:44:38,291
I get addicted and
then I get frustrated

1012
00:44:38,291 --> 00:44:41,583
But I love basketball
and gambling.

1013
00:44:41,583 --> 00:44:44,916
- So when I recognized
Mark Turmell's name

1014
00:44:44,916 --> 00:44:48,541
in the credits of NBA Jam,
that was a revelation.

1015
00:44:48,541 --> 00:44:50,083
I know that guy.

1016
00:44:50,083 --> 00:44:51,750
I don't know that guy,
but I know that guy!

1017
00:44:51,750 --> 00:44:53,041
I remember, I remember hear,

1018
00:44:53,041 --> 00:44:54,416
whatever happened
to Mark Turmell?

1019
00:44:54,416 --> 00:44:57,750
Oh, he's making one of
the greatest arcade games

1020
00:44:57,750 --> 00:44:58,541
of all time.

1021
00:45:02,500 --> 00:45:04,875
[Mark Turmell] - The rules of
basketball are so perfect

1022
00:45:04,875 --> 00:45:07,000
You've got a three-point line.

1023
00:45:07,000 --> 00:45:09,208
You've got timers
for the shot clock.

1024
00:45:09,208 --> 00:45:13,291
You've got periods that
we can tighten up to be

1025
00:45:13,291 --> 00:45:14,750
the right timeframe.

1026
00:45:14,750 --> 00:45:17,750
So just the inherent
rules of basketball

1027
00:45:17,750 --> 00:45:22,166
made for really a
great product strategy

1028
00:45:25,166 --> 00:45:27,333
- People have asked me
about the influence of

1029
00:45:27,333 --> 00:45:30,333
Arch Rivals on
NBA Jam, obviously,

1030
00:45:30,333 --> 00:45:32,666
'cause a lot of the same
game-playing mechanic.

1031
00:45:32,666 --> 00:45:34,250
We were first.

1032
00:45:34,250 --> 00:45:36,708
But all I really know
is that I've been told

1033
00:45:36,708 --> 00:45:39,875
that Mark Turmell was a fan.

1034
00:45:39,875 --> 00:45:41,708
- You know, I think maybe
I've played that game

1035
00:45:41,708 --> 00:45:44,208
three or four games
total in my life.

1036
00:45:44,208 --> 00:45:48,375
It's just not a game
that appealed to me with,

1037
00:45:48,375 --> 00:45:49,625
you know, you kinda
pull the pants down.

1038
00:45:49,625 --> 00:45:51,208
They had a punch.

1039
00:45:51,208 --> 00:45:53,791
- He asked us about our interest
in doing licensed products,

1040
00:45:53,791 --> 00:45:55,958
officially licensed products.

1041
00:45:55,958 --> 00:45:59,083
And we were resistant,

1042
00:45:59,083 --> 00:46:01,875
mainly because on my side was,

1043
00:46:01,875 --> 00:46:03,916
I didn't want to do
photographic stuff.

1044
00:46:03,916 --> 00:46:05,958
I wanted to keep doing cartoons.

1045
00:46:05,958 --> 00:46:08,291
I felt that's where
the humor was gonna be.

1046
00:46:08,291 --> 00:46:10,250
- Neil Nicastro came
into my office one day,

1047
00:46:10,250 --> 00:46:13,541
and he said, "How
come you're not pursuing

1048
00:46:13,541 --> 00:46:14,791
"the NBA license?

1049
00:46:14,791 --> 00:46:17,250
- If they're the real
basketball players

1050
00:46:17,250 --> 00:46:19,791
that's what the players
are going to want to be.

1051
00:46:19,791 --> 00:46:21,125
They're going to want to,

1052
00:46:21,125 --> 00:46:23,125
they have their
favorite basketball stars

1053
00:46:23,125 --> 00:46:25,625
They want to play as
those basketball stars.

1054
00:46:25,625 --> 00:46:26,791
That what we have to do.

1055
00:46:27,791 --> 00:46:28,666
- Made the pitch.

1056
00:46:30,541 --> 00:46:31,833
- [Announcer] Williams
Electronics is
currently developing

1057
00:46:31,833 --> 00:46:35,125
an arcade-based, four-player
video basketball game,

1058
00:46:35,125 --> 00:46:38,541
one which employs lifelike
digitized graphics.

1059
00:46:38,541 --> 00:46:41,000
First, basketball players
are videotaped in the studio

1060
00:46:41,000 --> 00:46:43,375
performing hundreds of moves.

1061
00:46:43,375 --> 00:46:46,791
Artists digitize this footage
into individual frames,

1062
00:46:46,791 --> 00:46:49,625
which are stored and
played back in sequence,

1063
00:46:49,625 --> 00:46:52,625
or animated to create a
video basketball player

1064
00:46:52,625 --> 00:46:55,583
capable of performing
on command.

1065
00:46:55,583 --> 00:46:58,333
Well, the NBA's
immediate reaction was,

1066
00:46:58,333 --> 00:47:00,625
hey, thanks, but no thanks.

1067
00:47:00,625 --> 00:47:03,208
Their kind of understanding
or perception

1068
00:47:03,208 --> 00:47:06,416
of the arcade business
was rooted there

1069
00:47:06,416 --> 00:47:10,625
in Times Square, which was a
very seedy area at the time.

1070
00:47:10,625 --> 00:47:15,375
And they did not want
the NBA logo presented

1071
00:47:15,375 --> 00:47:16,791
in that atmosphere.

1072
00:47:16,791 --> 00:47:19,750
- I remember a
comment internally

1073
00:47:19,750 --> 00:47:22,375
"Don't they realize how much
money they're gonna make?"

1074
00:47:22,375 --> 00:47:24,250
Seriously, I mean, we're not
even gonna cover the salary

1075
00:47:24,250 --> 00:47:25,916
of one player, let's face it.

1076
00:47:25,916 --> 00:47:29,333
The NBA will continue whether
they do a game with us or not.

1077
00:47:30,083 --> 00:47:31,666
- So our video guy,
once again, he said,

1078
00:47:31,666 --> 00:47:33,250
"I can solve this."

1079
00:47:33,250 --> 00:47:35,541
He went out to family
entertainment centers

1080
00:47:35,541 --> 00:47:38,916
around Chicago and
he took videos to sho

1081
00:47:38,916 --> 00:47:40,375
what a real arcade is like.

1082
00:47:40,375 --> 00:47:42,708
We sent that back to the NBA

1083
00:47:42,708 --> 00:47:46,750
to tell them this is what
it's like, not Times Square.

1084
00:47:46,750 --> 00:47:48,541
They accepted that,
they understood,

1085
00:47:48,541 --> 00:47:52,208
and they started talking
deal terms with Roger Sharpe.

1086
00:47:52,208 --> 00:47:54,250
- Understand and appreciate
that there's never been

1087
00:47:54,250 --> 00:47:57,250
a professional sports
team licensed in coin-op.

1088
00:47:57,250 --> 00:48:00,291
- Well, the logistics of
getting all the players

1089
00:48:01,291 --> 00:48:05,250
in our studio, and then the
logistics of having them do

1090
00:48:05,250 --> 00:48:07,916
every animation over
and over and over again,

1091
00:48:07,916 --> 00:48:09,333
because there was a
few hundred animations,

1092
00:48:09,333 --> 00:48:11,500
and the logistics of
then going through

1093
00:48:11,500 --> 00:48:14,333
and stripping out all
those, it couldn't be done.

1094
00:48:14,333 --> 00:48:16,333
Like there's just no way.

1095
00:48:16,333 --> 00:48:18,500
- [Man] Okay, all
right, that's good.

1096
00:48:18,500 --> 00:48:22,250
- We figured out
a system for using

1097
00:48:22,250 --> 00:48:25,333
an attachment system
that games typically used

1098
00:48:25,333 --> 00:48:28,000
for putting like different
types of guns or weapons

1099
00:48:28,000 --> 00:48:30,125
or props in characters' hands.

1100
00:48:30,125 --> 00:48:32,541
[Mark Turmell] - And so Shawn
Liptak trimmed off a head

1101
00:48:32,541 --> 00:48:36,208
and he pasted that
head on to prove

1102
00:48:36,208 --> 00:48:39,125
that we could kind of change
up a different flesh tone,

1103
00:48:39,125 --> 00:48:40,708
a different look.

1104
00:48:40,708 --> 00:48:43,208
- There were 16 different head
angles that we had to use,

1105
00:48:43,208 --> 00:48:45,375
one looking forward, one
looking up, one looking down,

1106
00:48:45,375 --> 00:48:46,958
one looking left,
one looking right,

1107
00:48:46,958 --> 00:48:49,083
one looking left up, one
looking left down [mumbles],

1108
00:48:50,666 --> 00:48:52,250
all the way around.

1109
00:48:52,250 --> 00:48:54,375
- And again, this is
before the internet

1110
00:48:54,375 --> 00:48:59,125
This is before, you know, any
easily accessible resource.

1111
00:48:59,958 --> 00:49:01,750
So we were looking at VHS tapes

1112
00:49:01,750 --> 00:49:03,916
of the biggest
dunks of all time,

1113
00:49:03,916 --> 00:49:07,958
looking at the athletes
and trying to trim out

1114
00:49:07,958 --> 00:49:12,375
their faces at these
different angles.

1115
00:49:12,375 --> 00:49:14,583
- We thought, hey, why
don't we put our heads in.

1116
00:49:14,583 --> 00:49:17,375
Like let's be in
the game ourselves.

1117
00:49:17,375 --> 00:49:18,708
How cool would that be?

1118
00:49:18,708 --> 00:49:21,000
That's worth doing the
game right there for.

1119
00:49:22,875 --> 00:49:25,250
We got, you know,
everybody from around

1120
00:49:25,250 --> 00:49:26,541
who wanted to be in there.

1121
00:49:26,541 --> 00:49:27,875
And we'd get them
into the studio,

1122
00:49:27,875 --> 00:49:29,166
and we'd shoot all our angles.

1123
00:49:29,166 --> 00:49:30,583
And then there was one
guy that we worked with,

1124
00:49:30,583 --> 00:49:35,250
Sheridan Oursler, who came in
with a derby hat on his head.

1125
00:49:36,958 --> 00:49:39,250
And we're like, "Hey Sheridan,
you want us to shoot you

1126
00:49:39,250 --> 00:49:40,916
"with that hat on your head?

1127
00:49:40,916 --> 00:49:42,958
He was like, "Yeah,
yeah, this is my derby."

1128
00:49:43,958 --> 00:49:45,250
And so we go, "Okay."

1129
00:49:45,250 --> 00:49:47,750
And so we shot him with
a derby on his head

1130
00:49:47,750 --> 00:49:48,958
and put him in the game

1131
00:49:48,958 --> 00:49:50,291
and like didn't
think anything of it.

1132
00:49:50,291 --> 00:49:52,291
And then I think we
put the game on test

1133
00:49:52,291 --> 00:49:55,375
And people freaked out
because it was a person

1134
00:49:55,375 --> 00:49:56,708
with a derby.

1135
00:49:56,708 --> 00:49:57,916
You've never seen a
person with a derby

1136
00:49:57,916 --> 00:49:59,958
playing a basketball
game before.

1137
00:49:59,958 --> 00:50:02,416
So like within a
few weeks, you know,

1138
00:50:02,416 --> 00:50:04,583
throughout the arcades
that we had it on test in,

1139
00:50:04,583 --> 00:50:07,291
everybody's playing Sheridan's
head with a derby hat.

1140
00:50:07,291 --> 00:50:09,375
- [Game] Go up,
delivers the special!

1141
00:50:10,791 --> 00:50:12,083
- Funny, because
we got NBA license,

1142
00:50:12,083 --> 00:50:13,708
but people liked playing
the special characters

1143
00:50:13,708 --> 00:50:14,958
more than they liked
playing the NBA players.

1144
00:50:14,958 --> 00:50:17,375
- Well, we were
doing things now,

1145
00:50:17,375 --> 00:50:20,375
like putting in the
Mortal Kombat characters.

1146
00:50:20,375 --> 00:50:22,958
[NBA Jam music]

1147
00:50:23,958 --> 00:50:26,250
- The NBA had a fit

1148
00:50:26,458 --> 00:50:28,000
when they saw there were
Mortal Kombat characters.

1149
00:50:28,000 --> 00:50:31,333
[characters yelling]

1150
00:50:31,333 --> 00:50:33,208
- And I thought, oh gamers
are gonna love that.

1151
00:50:33,208 --> 00:50:35,333
A little crossover,
thing, that's great.

1152
00:50:35,333 --> 00:50:37,708
And so Mark says that on
the record in an interview,

1153
00:50:37,708 --> 00:50:40,625
and I go and I type it up.

1154
00:50:40,625 --> 00:50:44,291
And a week-and-a-half later,
I get a phone call from Mark,

1155
00:50:44,291 --> 00:50:46,416
which I'm not expecting.

1156
00:50:46,416 --> 00:50:49,041
And he goes, "Yeah, I
needed to follow up with you

1157
00:50:49,041 --> 00:50:52,125
"on something that came
up in our interview.

1158
00:50:53,583 --> 00:50:55,666
"Remember that thing
about the Mortal Kombat

1159
00:50:55,666 --> 00:50:57,375
"secret characters
in Tournament Edition

1160
00:50:57,375 --> 00:50:59,250
I'm like, "Yeah, I'm
looking forward to that."

1161
00:50:59,250 --> 00:51:02,708
He goes, "Yeah, we've been
on the phone with the NBA,

1162
00:51:02,708 --> 00:51:07,458
"and they're, they're not
really into the idea." [laughs]

1163
00:51:08,083 --> 00:51:09,791
- And it was not
a good situation.

1164
00:51:09,791 --> 00:51:11,333
And we had to scramble
very, very quickly

1165
00:51:11,333 --> 00:51:13,416
to produce a new set of
ROMs that did not have

1166
00:51:13,416 --> 00:51:16,583
the Mortal Kombat
characters in them.

1167
00:51:16,583 --> 00:51:19,083
- [Game] Get that outta here!

1168
00:51:19,083 --> 00:51:21,875
- That traditional
gaming audience

1169
00:51:21,875 --> 00:51:23,291
that wants to find secrets,

1170
00:51:23,291 --> 00:51:25,875
that needs to collect
every coin in the game,

1171
00:51:25,875 --> 00:51:28,375
that wants to know every
secret warp in every level,

1172
00:51:30,000 --> 00:51:32,208
that absolutely was catnip

1173
00:51:32,208 --> 00:51:34,250
to all of the hard-core
gamers that were like,

1174
00:51:34,250 --> 00:51:36,000
"Well, I know something
you don't know."

1175
00:51:36,791 --> 00:51:38,000
- [Game] No way!

1176
00:51:40,083 --> 00:51:41,541
Jackson [cheering
drowns out words]

1177
00:51:41,541 --> 00:51:44,291
- Having actual announcers,

1178
00:51:45,666 --> 00:51:48,625
I couldn't push them
into the high energy part

1179
00:51:48,625 --> 00:51:51,333
of being an announcer voice

1180
00:51:51,333 --> 00:51:53,791
for a quarter-at-a-time
video game

1181
00:51:53,791 --> 00:51:55,083
in an arcade setting.

1182
00:51:55,083 --> 00:51:57,125
- I had never done
any voiceover before.

1183
00:51:57,125 --> 00:51:59,375
I had never done any
sports work before,

1184
00:51:59,375 --> 00:52:01,166
related to acting or voiceover.

1185
00:52:01,166 --> 00:52:03,125
It was just acting
work, stage work,

1186
00:52:03,125 --> 00:52:04,875
and work at Second City.

1187
00:52:04,875 --> 00:52:06,291
- So I got Tim in.

1188
00:52:06,291 --> 00:52:10,333
And he was kinda doing
his Marv Alpert

1189
00:52:10,333 --> 00:52:12,333
but really, he
just became himself

1190
00:52:12,333 --> 00:52:14,125
and became that actor.

1191
00:52:14,125 --> 00:52:15,041
- It was like this.

1192
00:52:15,041 --> 00:52:17,000
John came in, gave me a script.

1193
00:52:17,000 --> 00:52:19,375
He said, "Big," he said, "Loud,"

1194
00:52:19,375 --> 00:52:23,291
and I went, "He's on fire,
rejected, boom shakalaka!

1195
00:52:23,291 --> 00:52:24,500
"He's heating up!"

1196
00:52:24,500 --> 00:52:27,333
And that was about it. [laughs]

1197
00:52:27,333 --> 00:52:29,250
- And think about
making that system work

1198
00:52:29,250 --> 00:52:33,208
We're talking about a
system that is calling

1199
00:52:33,208 --> 00:52:37,708
the play-by-play action,
splicing in player names,

1200
00:52:37,708 --> 00:52:39,583
at different levels
of inflection.

1201
00:52:39,583 --> 00:52:41,750
- The reason for the
different inflections is

1202
00:52:41,750 --> 00:52:45,250
just for that variety
of before a shot,

1203
00:52:45,250 --> 00:52:47,541
after a shot, in the
middle of a shot.

1204
00:52:47,541 --> 00:52:49,750
Pippen for three!

1205
00:52:49,750 --> 00:52:51,375
Pippen with the dunk!

1206
00:52:51,375 --> 00:52:54,041
Pippen with the monster jam!

1207
00:52:54,041 --> 00:52:57,833
Pippen, Pippen, Stockton,
Stockton, Stockton!

1208
00:52:57,833 --> 00:53:00,125
- [Game] Rebound,
Jams it in!

1209
00:53:01,583 --> 00:53:04,250
- And there used to be a game
called Run and Gun by Konami

1210
00:53:04,250 --> 00:53:06,250
that was the first game that
actually the camera work

1211
00:53:06,250 --> 00:53:08,125
seemed to like follow
you down the court

1212
00:53:08,125 --> 00:53:09,583
I go down, I listened
to that game,

1213
00:53:09,583 --> 00:53:12,791
and I hear the guy
go, "Nice shot."

1214
00:53:12,791 --> 00:53:17,000
- [Game] Fakes him up, put
it up, three, yes, good shot.

1215
00:53:17,000 --> 00:53:18,250
Way to go.

1216
00:53:18,250 --> 00:53:19,250
- What is this guy?

1217
00:53:19,250 --> 00:53:20,958
Is he medicated or something?

1218
00:53:20,958 --> 00:53:23,416
That's not how you
call a basketball gam

1219
00:53:23,416 --> 00:53:25,250
I go down to the
other end and hear,

1220
00:53:25,250 --> 00:53:27,125
"Get that stuff outta
here, rejected!"

1221
00:53:27,125 --> 00:53:28,875
And I could feel the
effect that my voice had

1222
00:53:28,875 --> 00:53:31,250
on that extra amping
up of the situation

1223
00:53:31,250 --> 00:53:33,333
So sometimes I'd
sneak up behind him,

1224
00:53:33,333 --> 00:53:35,291
guy would take a shot,
and I'd go, "Ugly shot!

1225
00:53:35,291 --> 00:53:36,208
"Puts up a brick!"

1226
00:53:36,208 --> 00:53:37,958
or "Get that stuff outta here!"

1227
00:53:37,958 --> 00:53:39,083
He'd turn around and go,
"Hey, you sound like the guy!"

1228
00:53:39,083 --> 00:53:41,125
And I'd go, "I am
the guy, dude."

1229
00:53:44,125 --> 00:53:46,500
- Eugene Jarvis always
told me, you know

1230
00:53:46,500 --> 00:53:48,125
make sure the player
gets more powerful.

1231
00:53:48,125 --> 00:53:50,208
Never take something
away from him.

1232
00:53:50,208 --> 00:53:52,750
But what if we, you know,
put the player into a mode

1233
00:53:52,750 --> 00:53:54,791
where he's on fire and
everything's a swish?

1234
00:53:54,791 --> 00:53:58,541
And we knew right away that
there was a mechanic there

1235
00:53:58,541 --> 00:53:59,833
that made sense.

1236
00:53:59,833 --> 00:54:02,500
- And I was saying,
"Oh, that's unrealistic.

1237
00:54:02,500 --> 00:54:05,500
"That's not cool, it's
gonna be fantasy then.

1238
00:54:05,500 --> 00:54:07,291
"People aren't gonna take
it seriously," or whatever.

1239
00:54:07,291 --> 00:54:08,541
And they're like, "No,
no, it's video game.

1240
00:54:08,541 --> 00:54:10,000
"It's totally video
game, it's totally cool.

1241
00:54:10,000 --> 00:54:11,583
"It's totally cool!"

1242
00:54:11,583 --> 00:54:13,125
And I'm all like [muttering]
"It's not gonna be cool at all.

1243
00:54:13,125 --> 00:54:14,291
"Nobody's gonna like that."

1244
00:54:15,125 --> 00:54:17,125
- He said, I won't
give you the art.

1245
00:54:17,125 --> 00:54:19,291
I won't give you flame art.

1246
00:54:19,291 --> 00:54:22,041
So I actually went
back into SmashTV

1247
00:54:22,041 --> 00:54:26,791
and took the flame explosions,
attached them to the ball,

1248
00:54:28,250 --> 00:54:31,250
and we started the Smoke
Mode and the On Fire.

1249
00:54:31,250 --> 00:54:34,791
- First time that we
had seen in the arcade,

1250
00:54:34,791 --> 00:54:37,250
and these kids who are
playing the game already

1251
00:54:37,250 --> 00:54:40,708
for a couple weeks had
seen, you know, On Fire,

1252
00:54:40,708 --> 00:54:43,250
and slamming and
shattering the backboard

1253
00:54:45,583 --> 00:54:47,500
and the guy just went, "Ah!"

1254
00:54:47,500 --> 00:54:50,625
Raised his arms up in
the air, "Oh, hell no!"

1255
00:54:50,625 --> 00:54:53,708
And ran around the
arcade, inside.

1256
00:54:53,708 --> 00:54:55,875
He ran around four times.

1257
00:54:55,875 --> 00:54:57,375
Everybody screamed.

1258
00:54:57,375 --> 00:54:58,791
Everybody was like, "Ah!"

1259
00:54:58,791 --> 00:55:00,666
They're holding their
heads like they just saw

1260
00:55:00,666 --> 00:55:02,583
the Second Coming.

1261
00:55:02,583 --> 00:55:04,416
And we were like looking at
each other, like oh my God.

1262
00:55:04,416 --> 00:55:07,375
It's just such an
iconic part of,

1263
00:55:07,375 --> 00:55:10,250
and just felt so good
to see people get

1264
00:55:10,250 --> 00:55:11,916
that excited about something.

1265
00:55:11,916 --> 00:55:13,333
We're like, yeah, I think
it's gonna be pretty cool.

1266
00:55:13,333 --> 00:55:15,958
- This is bad, man, this is bad!

1267
00:55:16,750 --> 00:55:19,333
[NBA Jam music]

1268
00:55:21,416 --> 00:55:23,041
- If you're playing
against the computer

1269
00:55:23,041 --> 00:55:25,916
it's never going to allow
you to get too far in front.

1270
00:55:25,916 --> 00:55:28,333
You'll start missing shots.

1271
00:55:28,333 --> 00:55:30,333
Or the computer will
start missing shots a lot,

1272
00:55:30,333 --> 00:55:32,375
if the score's too far in front.

1273
00:55:32,375 --> 00:55:34,291
So it doesn't allow the
scores to get too far apart,

1274
00:55:34,291 --> 00:55:35,625
and it keeps the excitement of,

1275
00:55:35,625 --> 00:55:37,250
oh, I can so overtake
you, the last minute,

1276
00:55:37,250 --> 00:55:39,125
the last throw, I can win!

1277
00:55:39,125 --> 00:55:40,750
- If you're in the
fourth quarter,

1278
00:55:40,750 --> 00:55:44,041
and you have, you know,
just a few seconds left

1279
00:55:44,041 --> 00:55:45,750
and have an opportunity
to tie the game,

1280
00:55:45,750 --> 00:55:47,291
to have it go into overtime,

1281
00:55:47,291 --> 00:55:50,541
and take a shot at the buzzer,

1282
00:55:50,541 --> 00:55:52,958
the chances are so much higher

1283
00:55:52,958 --> 00:55:54,541
from the half court line

1284
00:55:54,541 --> 00:55:57,416
than it would be
from laying it up

1285
00:55:57,416 --> 00:55:59,125
at any other point in the game.

1286
00:55:59,125 --> 00:56:01,166
- Rubberbanding is,

1287
00:56:01,166 --> 00:56:03,958
I don't know if that
was a Mark Turmell call,

1288
00:56:03,958 --> 00:56:05,083
or what the deal was,

1289
00:56:05,083 --> 00:56:07,250
but the rubberbanding in NBA Jam

1290
00:56:07,250 --> 00:56:09,250
and then later in NFL
Blitz, and Showtim

1291
00:56:09,250 --> 00:56:10,375
and all that sort of stuff,

1292
00:56:11,541 --> 00:56:14,375
it's almost evil.

1293
00:56:14,375 --> 00:56:16,375
But also, it makes for
really heightened moments

1294
00:56:16,375 --> 00:56:17,875
of like, oh man, we
went to overtime again!

1295
00:56:17,875 --> 00:56:19,166
What are the odds!

1296
00:56:19,166 --> 00:56:20,958
Turns out the odds
are pretty good.

1297
00:56:20,958 --> 00:56:24,125
- [Game] At the
buzzer, he scores!

1298
00:56:24,125 --> 00:56:28,166
- We were getting calls
about games that were broken.

1299
00:56:30,000 --> 00:56:31,250
I said, "What?"

1300
00:56:31,250 --> 00:56:32,875
Because that's
one of the things,

1301
00:56:32,875 --> 00:56:36,125
you put a game on test,
you know, it's gotta work.

1302
00:56:36,125 --> 00:56:38,500
And to have a game
that's not working,

1303
00:56:38,500 --> 00:56:40,583
it's like the
height of stupidity.

1304
00:56:40,583 --> 00:56:42,041
- The game was supposedly down.

1305
00:56:42,041 --> 00:56:42,791
We said, "What the
heck's going on here?

1306
00:56:42,791 --> 00:56:44,416
So we go out there,

1307
00:56:44,416 --> 00:56:45,791
and you couldn't put any
more quarters in the game.

1308
00:56:45,791 --> 00:56:48,416
- It had accumulated
so many quarters,

1309
00:56:48,416 --> 00:56:50,208
it had jammed the coin mech

1310
00:56:50,208 --> 00:56:52,708
and you couldn't put
any more quarters i

1311
00:56:52,708 --> 00:56:53,958
- [Announcer] Unheard
of collections.

1312
00:56:53,958 --> 00:56:55,708
At all of our test locations,

1313
00:56:55,708 --> 00:57:02,375
NBA Jam is collecting between
124 and 167 percent

1314
00:57:02,375 --> 00:57:05,583
of what Mortal Kombat did
during its first six weeks.

1315
00:57:05,583 --> 00:57:08,916
- Jurassic Park was the
biggest film at the time,

1316
00:57:08,916 --> 00:57:11,250
and it was breaking all
kinds of earning records.

1317
00:57:11,250 --> 00:57:14,083
It made $350 million.

1318
00:57:14,083 --> 00:57:16,375
And that was a milestone
that people said

1319
00:57:16,375 --> 00:57:20,291
we can't believe it,
it's incomprehensible.

1320
00:57:20,291 --> 00:57:22,916
And here comes NBA Jam,
and Mark said, I said,

1321
00:57:22,916 --> 00:57:25,750
"Can you tell me about how
popular this really is?"

1322
00:57:25,750 --> 00:57:27,000
"I can tell you this.

1323
00:57:28,458 --> 00:57:31,500
"NBA Jam made a
billion dollars."

1324
00:57:31,500 --> 00:57:33,250
And I said, "In quarters?"

1325
00:57:33,250 --> 00:57:37,541
- Anybody that just liked
games and liked sports

1326
00:57:37,541 --> 00:57:40,041
and walked around a mall
would hear and see that game,

1327
00:57:40,041 --> 00:57:41,541
because in malls,
they were like arcades

1328
00:57:41,541 --> 00:57:43,250
and there was always
groups of people around.

1329
00:57:43,250 --> 00:57:44,125
And you're like, what's that?

1330
00:57:44,416 --> 00:57:45,791
- And when people
were playing together,

1331
00:57:45,791 --> 00:57:47,250
they're probably more
likely to keep playing,

1332
00:57:47,250 --> 00:57:49,083
because you can't just
walk off from your friend

1333
00:57:49,083 --> 00:57:50,291
that you're playing with.

1334
00:57:50,291 --> 00:57:51,875
- Whereas some
games are abstract,

1335
00:57:51,875 --> 00:57:53,375
or some people just don't
want to blast aliens,

1336
00:57:53,375 --> 00:57:55,125
or they don't want
to fight other people

1337
00:57:55,125 --> 00:57:57,583
the idea of, it's
like basketball,

1338
00:57:57,583 --> 00:58:00,375
but without all of
those pesky rules.

1339
00:58:00,375 --> 00:58:03,958
That becomes a very
appealing thing to people

1340
00:58:03,958 --> 00:58:05,291
that would be into sports,

1341
00:58:05,291 --> 00:58:07,416
but wouldn't be caught
dead in an arcade

1342
00:58:07,416 --> 00:58:09,541
But here, this is
the perfect gateway.

1343
00:58:09,541 --> 00:58:12,791
[game announcer yelling]

1344
00:58:17,125 --> 00:58:19,750
John Tobias - The home versions
of the early Mortal Kombat games

1345
00:58:19,750 --> 00:58:21,375
were released by Acclaim.

1346
00:58:21,708 --> 00:58:24,208
- Mortal Kombat!

1347
00:58:24,208 --> 00:58:26,291
- I remember seeing
TV ads for the games

1348
00:58:26,291 --> 00:58:30,333
that partly fueled
the kind of concern

1349
00:58:30,333 --> 00:58:32,500
that parents had
about Mortal Kombat,

1350
00:58:32,500 --> 00:58:35,333
because it always emphasized
gangs of like young kids

1351
00:58:35,333 --> 00:58:38,583
running around streets
yelling, "Mortal Kombat!"

1352
00:58:38,583 --> 00:58:39,750
- Mortal Kombat!

1353
00:58:41,250 --> 00:58:42,875
- I think parents felt
there was a revolution

1354
00:58:42,875 --> 00:58:44,958
about to happen, because
that's how it was portrayed

1355
00:58:44,958 --> 00:58:46,875
in the marketing materials.

1356
00:58:46,875 --> 00:58:49,625
That somehow their kids were
involved in this weird thing,

1357
00:58:49,625 --> 00:58:50,958
and suddenly they turn around

1358
00:58:50,958 --> 00:58:53,291
and it'd be like a
1984 kind of situatio

1359
00:58:53,291 --> 00:58:55,416
where all of the parents
would be thrown into jail

1360
00:58:55,416 --> 00:58:56,500
and kids would run amuck.

1361
00:58:59,416 --> 00:59:01,791
- You know, the home
games, when they came out,

1362
00:59:01,791 --> 00:59:06,750
they were marketed, I think,
to a younger audience.

1363
00:59:06,750 --> 00:59:08,041
- You know, when we filmed it,

1364
00:59:08,041 --> 00:59:09,083
we didn't film it
for a home version.

1365
00:59:09,083 --> 00:59:10,333
We filmed it for arcade.

1366
00:59:10,333 --> 00:59:12,958
And who is, you
know, at the arcade?

1367
00:59:12,958 --> 00:59:15,000
Kids with their own money.

1368
00:59:15,000 --> 00:59:16,291
- Actually, when I think back

1369
00:59:16,291 --> 00:59:17,916
of all of the time
I spent in arcades,

1370
00:59:17,916 --> 00:59:19,375
I don't remember seeing too
many moms walking around.

1371
00:59:19,375 --> 00:59:21,791
- [Reporter] After a $10
million advertising campaign,

1372
00:59:21,791 --> 00:59:24,708
Mortal Kombat, debuting
in home video today,

1373
00:59:24,708 --> 00:59:28,750
is expected to sell two
million copies at $50 a pop,

1374
00:59:28,750 --> 00:59:30,708
a horrifying
possibility for parents

1375
00:59:30,708 --> 00:59:32,625
who can't believe the game
makers are fantasizing

1376
00:59:32,625 --> 00:59:35,041
about decapitation and murder.

1377
00:59:35,041 --> 00:59:40,041
- So now moms and dads
are looking at their kids

1378
00:59:40,041 --> 00:59:44,708
playing this game, and they
see heads being decapitated,

1379
00:59:44,708 --> 00:59:47,041
skulls being pulled
off of bodies.

1380
00:59:47,041 --> 00:59:48,250
- I don't know think
we'll have this at home.

1381
00:59:48,250 --> 00:59:49,833
- You don't think so?

1382
00:59:49,833 --> 00:59:51,166
- No, they're too violent.
- You look a little startled.

1383
00:59:51,166 --> 00:59:52,583
- Yeah, it's a little
too violent, I think.

1384
00:59:52,583 --> 00:59:53,791
- That's pretty bad.

1385
00:59:53,791 --> 00:59:55,583
That's just plain gross.

1386
00:59:55,583 --> 00:59:57,291
- I'm sure moms were walking
through the living room

1387
00:59:57,291 --> 00:59:58,958
and looking at the
game that their

1388
01:00:00,541 --> 01:00:04,125
kids were playing, and writing
a letter to their Congressman

1389
01:00:04,125 --> 01:00:06,541
like, "I bought
Mortal Kombat thinking

1390
01:00:06,541 --> 01:00:08,000
"it was a fun fighting game."

1391
01:00:09,541 --> 01:00:11,666
- It's crazy to me how some
people don't see the humor

1392
01:00:11,666 --> 01:00:13,208
in Mortal Kombat.

1393
01:00:13,208 --> 01:00:15,291
I mean, one of the
taglines is Toasty!

1394
01:00:15,291 --> 01:00:16,875
What game does that?

1395
01:00:16,875 --> 01:00:20,625
I think that humor was
essential to its success,

1396
01:00:20,625 --> 01:00:23,333
because without it, I think
it just would have been

1397
01:00:23,333 --> 01:00:26,000
almost violent for the
sake of being violent.

1398
01:00:26,000 --> 01:00:28,250
- Seeing Mortal Kombat
held up as a scapegoat

1399
01:00:28,250 --> 01:00:31,708
for societal ills
was a direct parallel

1400
01:00:31,708 --> 01:00:33,250
to what rock-and-roll
had gone through

1401
01:00:33,250 --> 01:00:35,000
through the '50s
through the '70s,

1402
01:00:35,000 --> 01:00:37,500
what comic books had
done in the '50s.

1403
01:00:37,500 --> 01:00:40,125
It was the latest thing
for the previous generation

1404
01:00:40,125 --> 01:00:43,541
to blame society's
problems on and say,

1405
01:00:43,541 --> 01:00:45,750
"These kids today, they're
gonna ruin the world."

1406
01:00:45,750 --> 01:00:47,166
- [Reporter] Children
of different ages.

1407
01:00:47,166 --> 01:00:48,625
And that is exactly what--

1408
01:00:48,625 --> 01:00:53,083
- Many companies would
shudder when they see

1409
01:00:53,083 --> 01:00:57,000
their product talked about
in an unfavorable light

1410
01:00:57,000 --> 01:00:58,541
by a US senator.

1411
01:00:58,541 --> 01:01:02,041
- The game narrator instructs
the player to finish,

1412
01:01:02,041 --> 01:01:03,708
and I quote, "finish
his opponent."

1413
01:01:03,708 --> 01:01:06,583
The player may then
choose a method of murder,

1414
01:01:06,583 --> 01:01:09,291
ranging from ripping
the heart out

1415
01:01:09,291 --> 01:01:12,250
to pulling off the
head of the opponent

1416
01:01:12,250 --> 01:01:14,250
with spinal cord attached.

1417
01:01:14,250 --> 01:01:16,583
- I personally delighted in it,

1418
01:01:16,583 --> 01:01:21,583
because we saw a clear
effect every time someone

1419
01:01:21,583 --> 01:01:26,208
was making a big deal in the
press about Mortal Kombat,

1420
01:01:26,208 --> 01:01:30,208
it was on TV, we saw the sales
in the home product jump up.

1421
01:01:30,208 --> 01:01:32,541
And if we happened to have
something in the arcade,

1422
01:01:32,541 --> 01:01:35,875
you know, it was probably also
seeing the benefit of a jump.

1423
01:01:35,875 --> 01:01:37,958
- And we hope very
much that you step ba

1424
01:01:37,958 --> 01:01:40,416
and take into account

1425
01:01:40,416 --> 01:01:44,000
our counter-responsibilities
as citizens here,

1426
01:01:44,000 --> 01:01:45,916
and not only as people
who are employed

1427
01:01:45,916 --> 01:01:48,416
to maximize profits.

1428
01:01:48,416 --> 01:01:53,125
- Then you had the issue
of Nintendo and Sega.

1429
01:01:55,958 --> 01:01:57,958
- We were starting to encroach

1430
01:01:57,958 --> 01:02:00,375
on Nintendo's share of market.

1431
01:02:00,375 --> 01:02:03,750
And one of the reasonswas that we were appealing

1432
01:02:03,750 --> 01:02:05,375
to an older age group.

1433
01:02:05,375 --> 01:02:08,750
And part of that older age
appeal became Mortal Kombat

1434
01:02:08,750 --> 01:02:10,375
in its original form.

1435
01:02:10,708 --> 01:02:12,250
- the Nintendo version
was very neutered

1436
01:02:13,333 --> 01:02:15,458
The blood was turned
into like a sweat.

1437
01:02:16,916 --> 01:02:18,500
- People who played it
knew what was happening.

1438
01:02:18,500 --> 01:02:20,500
So I thought that was
a silly thing to do

1439
01:02:20,500 --> 01:02:22,958
And I thought it
detracted from the game

1440
01:02:22,958 --> 01:02:25,208
So I was committed that
we were going to show

1441
01:02:25,208 --> 01:02:29,000
all the blood that existed
in the arcade version

1442
01:02:29,000 --> 01:02:30,416
of Mortal Kombat.

1443
01:02:30,416 --> 01:02:31,583
- It had that blood code.

1444
01:02:31,583 --> 01:02:33,541
It had two codes.

1445
01:02:33,541 --> 01:02:37,375
It had the A-B-A-C-A-B-B,
the main blood code,

1446
01:02:37,375 --> 01:02:38,916
and then it had
the builder code,

1447
01:02:38,916 --> 01:02:40,416
down-up-left-left-A-right-down

1448
01:02:40,416 --> 01:02:42,041
for the cheat menu.

1449
01:02:42,041 --> 01:02:44,291
And then you could get Reptile
and do all this other stuff.

1450
01:02:44,291 --> 01:02:48,916
And yeah, so the Genesis
version was the version,

1451
01:02:48,916 --> 01:02:51,833
as far as anyone I
knew was concerned.

1452
01:02:51,833 --> 01:02:54,375
This NES version
was just a wreck.

1453
01:02:54,375 --> 01:02:56,541
- We wanted to be different.

1454
01:02:56,541 --> 01:02:58,083
We wanted to be edgy.

1455
01:02:58,083 --> 01:03:00,416
We wanted to make the
point that we weren't

1456
01:03:00,416 --> 01:03:04,041
this nice, clean, young kids
company that Nintendo was.

1457
01:03:04,041 --> 01:03:07,250
- Sega used the slogan like,
we do what Nintendon't.

1458
01:03:07,250 --> 01:03:08,541
Nintendo would never do this

1459
01:03:08,541 --> 01:03:09,875
because they're so
family-friendly.

1460
01:03:09,875 --> 01:03:11,083
But we do other things.

1461
01:03:11,083 --> 01:03:12,416
And there's something like

1462
01:03:12,416 --> 01:03:14,625
really delightfully
salacious about that

1463
01:03:14,625 --> 01:03:18,958
- We outsold the
Nintendo version by
about five to 10 times

1464
01:03:18,958 --> 01:03:22,625
more than what sold on
the Nintendo system.

1465
01:03:22,625 --> 01:03:24,500
- Will you ever draw
the line where you say

1466
01:03:24,500 --> 01:03:25,041
it's too violent?

1467
01:03:26,916 --> 01:03:28,875
- Yeah, there's, of course,
we're gonna draw the line,

1468
01:03:28,875 --> 01:03:29,666
sure, yeah.

1469
01:03:31,083 --> 01:03:35,625
[metallic slicing]
[body parts plopping]

1470
01:03:36,958 --> 01:03:39,625
- [Game] Scorpion
wins, fatality.

1471
01:03:42,250 --> 01:03:45,000
- There's an ad for a
poster in the Attract Mode

1472
01:03:45,000 --> 01:03:46,666
for Revolution X.

1473
01:03:46,666 --> 01:03:49,583
And since playing through
that game start to finish,

1474
01:03:49,583 --> 01:03:52,708
I've been one button click
away about four times

1475
01:03:52,708 --> 01:03:54,541
from buying that poster on Ebay.

1476
01:03:55,000 --> 01:03:57,000
It's got the girl with
the New World Order,

1477
01:03:57,000 --> 01:03:59,791
no was it, the New Order?

1478
01:04:00,583 --> 01:04:02,041
But yeah, that game,

1479
01:04:02,500 --> 01:04:04,333
I would really like to know,

1480
01:04:04,333 --> 01:04:05,958
I'm looking forward to
watching this finished product,

1481
01:04:05,958 --> 01:04:08,208
because I hope you have the
story about how that game

1482
01:04:08,208 --> 01:04:11,500
came to be in there,
because...what the hell?

1483
01:04:17,750 --> 01:04:21,000
[George Petro] - I got this
speech two times from Neil

1484
01:04:21,000 --> 01:04:24,875
It was like, "Okay, you can
do whatever you want, but,"

1485
01:04:24,875 --> 01:04:28,083
[laughs] "it comes from
these three choices,

1486
01:04:28,083 --> 01:04:31,541
"sports, driving,
fighting, or gun.

1487
01:04:31,541 --> 01:04:33,791
"You can't do sports,
you can't do driving,

1488
01:04:33,791 --> 01:04:34,958
"and you can't do fighting.

1489
01:04:34,958 --> 01:04:37,125
"So take your pick."

1490
01:04:37,125 --> 01:04:39,333
It was, so I guess we're
doing another gun game.

1491
01:04:39,708 --> 01:04:42,500
It was supposed to be
Generation X with Public Enemy.

1492
01:04:42,500 --> 01:04:45,541
That was the original
concept, yeah.

1493
01:04:45,541 --> 01:04:47,333
So two things happened.

1494
01:04:47,333 --> 01:04:50,250
Number one, we got a letter
from, I believe it was Marvel

1495
01:04:50,250 --> 01:04:53,000
that said, "We own
Generation X, so back off."

1496
01:04:53,000 --> 01:04:56,958
- I remember George being
very, very angry about that.

1497
01:04:58,500 --> 01:05:00,958
He wanted to put into Generation
I remember him saying,

1498
01:05:00,958 --> 01:05:02,625
"You know what, I'm so
pissed at this, I'm so angry,

1499
01:05:02,625 --> 01:05:04,541
"I think we should put
some sort of superhero

1500
01:05:04,541 --> 01:05:06,958
"all in yellow spandex that
you get to shoot a lot."

1501
01:05:06,958 --> 01:05:09,041
- The second was
is Public Enemy,

1502
01:05:09,041 --> 01:05:10,250
who would have
nothing to do with us.

1503
01:05:10,250 --> 01:05:11,916
So, don't know why.

1504
01:05:11,916 --> 01:05:16,541
So we had to really like,
okay, strike one and two.

1505
01:05:16,541 --> 01:05:17,916
So what are we going to do now?

1506
01:05:17,916 --> 01:05:19,500
So we changed the
name to Revolution X,

1507
01:05:19,500 --> 01:05:22,250
and we started thinking really
hard about who we would have.

1508
01:05:22,250 --> 01:05:24,000
We knew we wanted
music in the game.

1509
01:05:24,000 --> 01:05:28,750
- Initial premise was that
we were going to get bands,

1510
01:05:28,750 --> 01:05:30,875
plural, together,

1511
01:05:32,625 --> 01:05:34,000
we do country-western

1512
01:05:34,000 --> 01:05:35,625
do hard rock.

1513
01:05:35,625 --> 01:05:38,750
Do this, do this, and it
was just like, seriously?

1514
01:05:40,541 --> 01:05:42,625
- Our marketing person, Roger
Sharpe, God love him, said,

1515
01:05:42,625 --> 01:05:46,291
"Jack, how would
you like to go out

1516
01:05:46,291 --> 01:05:48,125
"and speak with Aerosmith?

1517
01:05:49,750 --> 01:05:51,083
"What do you think
of Aerosmith?"

1518
01:05:51,083 --> 01:05:53,625
And I'm like, my God,
Aerosmith is awesome.

1519
01:05:53,625 --> 01:05:55,708
And I loved their music.

1520
01:05:55,708 --> 01:05:58,250
I bought their music with my
own money since I was a kid.

1521
01:05:58,416 --> 01:05:59,541
- So we got in front of a camera

1522
01:05:59,541 --> 01:06:01,083
and just like made our pitch.

1523
01:06:01,083 --> 01:06:02,583
Jack was really good.

1524
01:06:02,583 --> 01:06:04,916
I was horrible on the pitch.

1525
01:06:04,916 --> 01:06:07,041
It was like, we're
super pasty white.

1526
01:06:07,041 --> 01:06:09,083
And we're just like,
hey, we're from Chicago

1527
01:06:09,083 --> 01:06:10,250
and make video games.

1528
01:06:10,250 --> 01:06:12,541
We wanna use you
in a video game.

1529
01:06:12,541 --> 01:06:15,750
And I go, "This is
gonna go zero far."

1530
01:06:15,750 --> 01:06:17,708
- Hi guys, I'm Jack Haeger.

1531
01:06:17,708 --> 01:06:19,375
- Hi, George Petro.

1532
01:06:19,375 --> 01:06:21,708
- And we're from Williams
Bally Midway in Chicago,

1533
01:06:21,708 --> 01:06:25,375
makers of exciting and new
pinball and video games.

1534
01:06:25,375 --> 01:06:28,041
There were things I heard
on the radio at that time

1535
01:06:28,041 --> 01:06:30,750
that were dealing with
the impact of music

1536
01:06:30,750 --> 01:06:35,500
on youth culture and how
it literally saved lives

1537
01:06:36,958 --> 01:06:40,583
and gave meaning to
every generation.

1538
01:06:40,583 --> 01:06:42,333
They can't go to their parents,

1539
01:06:42,333 --> 01:06:43,958
because their parents didn't
grow up with computers.

1540
01:06:43,958 --> 01:06:45,375
They don't know what's
happening in the world

1541
01:06:45,375 --> 01:06:47,250
or what's gonna happen
in the next 20 years.

1542
01:06:47,250 --> 01:06:49,125
It's a real difficult
time to grow up.

1543
01:06:49,125 --> 01:06:54,625
But the one stable thing that
has always kept kids sane

1544
01:06:54,958 --> 01:06:56,625
is their music.

1545
01:06:56,625 --> 01:06:59,083
- You know, you're this youth
that's getting like oppressed,

1546
01:06:59,083 --> 01:07:01,250
and Aerosmith becomes
your guiding light

1547
01:07:01,250 --> 01:07:03,333
They leave clues all
through the world

1548
01:07:03,333 --> 01:07:05,333
and they leave these videos.

1549
01:07:05,333 --> 01:07:08,000
You just go to see them
at an underground club.

1550
01:07:08,000 --> 01:07:09,500
You get right
close to the stage.

1551
01:07:09,500 --> 01:07:11,125
Aerosmith's jamming.

1552
01:07:11,125 --> 01:07:13,291
All of the sudden, these New
Order troops come on the stage

1553
01:07:13,291 --> 01:07:15,291
and push Aerosmith
off of the stage.

1554
01:07:15,291 --> 01:07:17,000
And it's like, what
happened, you know,

1555
01:07:17,000 --> 01:07:18,625
and you guys are
like, whoa, come on,

1556
01:07:18,625 --> 01:07:19,958
you know, get away from me.

1557
01:07:19,958 --> 01:07:21,500
And you decide, hey,
I'm gonna fight this

1558
01:07:21,500 --> 01:07:23,250
So you use your gun,
you're shooting everybody.

1559
01:07:23,250 --> 01:07:26,791
So we did it, we wrapped
up the video tape,

1560
01:07:26,791 --> 01:07:28,125
sent it to their management.

1561
01:07:28,125 --> 01:07:30,208
And like a week later,
they called, they go,

1562
01:07:30,208 --> 01:07:31,625
"Yeah, the band saw
it, they love it.

1563
01:07:31,625 --> 01:07:32,958
"They wanna do it, they're in."

1564
01:07:32,958 --> 01:07:35,958
So we, um, we're like, what?

1565
01:07:35,958 --> 01:07:37,875
- Aerosmith has always
been one of those bands

1566
01:07:37,875 --> 01:07:41,083
that was the most eager
to take digital risks.

1567
01:07:41,083 --> 01:07:44,250
They did a game for PC

1568
01:07:45,625 --> 01:07:48,291
that was a virtual
guitar, early, early on.

1569
01:07:48,291 --> 01:07:49,916
This was way before Guitar Hero

1570
01:07:49,916 --> 01:07:52,750
or any of the other guitar
abstraction music games.

1571
01:07:52,750 --> 01:07:54,916
So when Revolution
X became announced,

1572
01:07:54,916 --> 01:07:56,916
all of my friends were
like, "Wow, Aerosmith!"

1573
01:07:56,916 --> 01:07:57,708
I'm like, this is what they do.

1574
01:07:57,708 --> 01:07:59,250
They were the risk takers.

1575
01:07:59,250 --> 01:08:00,708
They thought digital
entertainment was fun.

1576
01:08:00,708 --> 01:08:02,916
That seemed like a
perfect fit to me.

1577
01:08:02,916 --> 01:08:05,708
Besides, I'm sure they looked
at Journey back in the day

1578
01:08:05,708 --> 01:08:06,875
and said, "We can do that."

1579
01:08:06,875 --> 01:08:09,250
[video game music]

1580
01:08:09,250 --> 01:08:10,833
[George Petro] They showed up.

1581
01:08:10,833 --> 01:08:12,291
We got this big bus that they
came from the airport in.

1582
01:08:12,291 --> 01:08:14,291
Steven Tyler was the
first guy off the bus.

1583
01:08:14,291 --> 01:08:15,875
He had watched everything.

1584
01:08:15,875 --> 01:08:18,333
- There's Steven Tyler up there,

1585
01:08:18,333 --> 01:08:21,375
and George is just saying,
"Do this and do that."

1586
01:08:21,375 --> 01:08:23,583
I mean, he's doing
whatever we ask.

1587
01:08:23,583 --> 01:08:24,416
- [Director] Action.

1588
01:08:24,416 --> 01:08:26,083
- Hey, come on in.

1589
01:08:26,083 --> 01:08:29,333
You got your wings,
welcome home.

1590
01:08:29,333 --> 01:08:30,625
- Yeah, we didn't
have a drum set,

1591
01:08:30,625 --> 01:08:32,541
because I remember the
drummer had to air drum.

1592
01:08:32,541 --> 01:08:35,416
And we said, we're gonna
build your drum set digitally.

1593
01:08:35,416 --> 01:08:37,500
Remember where all
your drums are, so,

1594
01:08:37,500 --> 01:08:38,875
and he would play
them, because I mean,

1595
01:08:38,875 --> 01:08:40,708
he's a professional
drummer, so he just.

1596
01:08:40,708 --> 01:08:43,500
[Aerosmith music]

1597
01:08:48,333 --> 01:08:50,125
- [Director] Cut! Cut!

1598
01:08:51,375 --> 01:08:54,083
- We had a whole looping
session with the band.

1599
01:08:54,083 --> 01:08:56,291
So we would take all the,

1600
01:08:56,291 --> 01:08:58,000
we took all the footage,

1601
01:08:58,000 --> 01:08:59,541
and then we sent it to
the sound department

1602
01:08:59,541 --> 01:09:01,000
and they brought up the footage.

1603
01:09:01,000 --> 01:09:02,875
- This is all like combat stuff,

1604
01:09:02,875 --> 01:09:06,875
I mean, like heat of the
battle kind of, "No, no, no!"

1605
01:09:06,875 --> 01:09:08,875
Stuff like that, so you know,
pretty high energy level,

1606
01:09:08,875 --> 01:09:10,958
and that kind of yelling stuff.

1607
01:09:10,958 --> 01:09:12,500
About that long, too.

1608
01:09:12,500 --> 01:09:14,375
Give me just three
or four of them.

1609
01:09:14,375 --> 01:09:18,625
- No, no, no, no!

1610
01:09:18,625 --> 01:09:20,208
- [Man] That's great.

1611
01:09:20,208 --> 01:09:20,750
Can you give me one that's like
really deep in your throat,

1612
01:09:20,750 --> 01:09:22,291
like a "No!"

1613
01:09:22,291 --> 01:09:23,541
- No!

1614
01:09:23,541 --> 01:09:24,625
- [Man] That's cool, all right.

1615
01:09:24,625 --> 01:09:25,541
- Awesome.

1616
01:09:25,541 --> 01:09:26,583
- [Man] Excellent.

1617
01:09:26,583 --> 01:09:27,583
- Excellent.

1618
01:09:27,583 --> 01:09:28,500
- [Man] All right!

1619
01:09:28,500 --> 01:09:29,791
- All right.

1620
01:09:29,791 --> 01:09:31,250
- [Man] Rock and roll!

1621
01:09:31,250 --> 01:09:32,625
- I'm not gonna say that.

1622
01:09:32,625 --> 01:09:33,500
- [Man] Okay, I'm sorry.

1623
01:09:33,500 --> 01:09:35,125
That's just too much.

1624
01:09:35,125 --> 01:09:36,958
- I think, oh, like rock and
roll, it's like, come on.

1625
01:09:36,958 --> 01:09:38,875
- [Man] Okay, fair enough.

1626
01:09:38,875 --> 01:09:39,791
♪ Sweet

1627
01:09:39,791 --> 01:09:41,208
- These guys are maggots.

1628
01:09:41,208 --> 01:09:43,291
They're putting
chemicals in all our foo

1629
01:09:43,291 --> 01:09:44,625
♪ Emotion

1630
01:09:44,625 --> 01:09:46,791
- Aerosmith looks like
they had half an hour

1631
01:09:46,791 --> 01:09:49,291
to come in and sit
down and go like,

1632
01:09:49,291 --> 01:09:51,916
you know, it's just
like, "Yeah, all right!"

1633
01:09:51,916 --> 01:09:54,208
And then the keys fly
out of the screen.

1634
01:09:54,208 --> 01:09:55,375
You get the videotape
in put it in.

1635
01:09:55,375 --> 01:09:57,000
Here's Steven Tyler going like,

1636
01:09:57,000 --> 01:09:59,708
"You did good, now go do this."

1637
01:09:59,708 --> 01:10:03,541
That stuff is so corny,
but like kind of amazing.

1638
01:10:03,541 --> 01:10:09,541
- It's a gun game, but what
if the gun shot compact discs.

1639
01:10:09,833 --> 01:10:13,500
And it's a crazy idea, I
know, makes little sense.

1640
01:10:13,500 --> 01:10:16,958
- The sound of a CD launching
like a grenade launcher,

1641
01:10:18,500 --> 01:10:19,791
[mimics shooting]

1642
01:10:19,791 --> 01:10:21,958
like that is part of the
core experience to me.

1643
01:10:21,958 --> 01:10:23,416
And I can listen
to that all day.

1644
01:10:23,416 --> 01:10:26,291
- So much of the
discussion of should it be

1645
01:10:26,291 --> 01:10:28,000
Revolution X: Music as a Weapon

1646
01:10:28,000 --> 01:10:29,791
or Revolution X: Music,

1647
01:10:32,208 --> 01:10:35,041
was it Music as a Weapon or
Music Is the Weapon? I think

1648
01:10:35,041 --> 01:10:38,000
There was this humongous
amount of email

1649
01:10:38,000 --> 01:10:39,458
going backwards and forwards
about whether it should be

1650
01:10:39,458 --> 01:10:40,291
Music as a Weapon.

1651
01:10:40,291 --> 01:10:41,916
Who the hell cares?

1652
01:10:41,916 --> 01:10:44,583
- Unfortunately, people have
come to use Revolution X

1653
01:10:44,583 --> 01:10:46,166
as a punchline.

1654
01:10:46,166 --> 01:10:50,000
I still unironically
like it [laughs].

1655
01:10:50,000 --> 01:10:51,416
- It doesn't match up to T2.

1656
01:10:51,416 --> 01:10:53,041
It just didn't have the,

1657
01:10:53,041 --> 01:10:55,375
T2, who had so much momentum
because of what it was,

1658
01:10:55,375 --> 01:10:57,166
the movie, the robots.

1659
01:10:57,166 --> 01:10:58,916
You know, Revolution X
was just kind of our,

1660
01:10:58,916 --> 01:11:00,583
you know, our sort of creation.

1661
01:11:00,583 --> 01:11:01,583
- We had this thing where
we were supposed to take

1662
01:11:01,583 --> 01:11:03,416
a quarter every 45 seconds.

1663
01:11:03,416 --> 01:11:04,416
That was what you
were aiming to do

1664
01:11:04,416 --> 01:11:05,958
with these arcade games.

1665
01:11:05,958 --> 01:11:08,125
NBA Jam and Mortal Kombat
did that, actually.

1666
01:11:08,125 --> 01:11:10,041
But most of the
other games didn't.

1667
01:11:10,041 --> 01:11:12,625
And you ended up having to
try and make story games

1668
01:11:12,625 --> 01:11:15,208
really, really difficult to
be constantly taking money.

1669
01:11:15,208 --> 01:11:16,541
Well, there's only
so much difficulty

1670
01:11:16,541 --> 01:11:18,916
that someone's going to
do to pay for it once,

1671
01:11:18,916 --> 01:11:19,958
because you play through once

1672
01:11:19,958 --> 01:11:20,875
and it costs you
an arm and a leg,

1673
01:11:20,875 --> 01:11:21,791
and you don't wanna do it again.

1674
01:11:21,791 --> 01:11:23,041
- But the game just didn't earn.

1675
01:11:23,041 --> 01:11:24,583
I mean, it's all
about the earnings.

1676
01:11:24,791 --> 01:11:26,208
It always is about the cash box.

1677
01:11:26,208 --> 01:11:28,500
How does the cash box, is it
filled or isn't it filled?

1678
01:11:28,500 --> 01:11:29,791
What's my return
on investment?

1679
01:11:29,791 --> 01:11:32,250
I paid 4,000 or
$5,000 for a game.

1680
01:11:32,250 --> 01:11:33,708
I would expect the
operators are looking

1681
01:11:33,708 --> 01:11:34,666
for a little return
on their investment

1682
01:11:34,666 --> 01:11:35,958
in six to nine months.

1683
01:11:36,166 --> 01:11:38,583
- We all realized
that we bit off a lot

1684
01:11:38,583 --> 01:11:43,333
in combining such major talent
with a cinematic experience.

1685
01:11:45,416 --> 01:11:49,125
And flying by the seat
of our pants game design

1686
01:11:49,125 --> 01:11:51,958
wasn't going to hack
it in the future.

1687
01:11:51,958 --> 01:11:53,375
- As video games are
moving towards movies,

1688
01:11:53,375 --> 01:11:55,000
this is definitely a step
in the right direction.

1689
01:11:55,000 --> 01:11:57,291
That's what I
think is different.

1690
01:11:57,291 --> 01:12:00,166
It's history, man,
history in the making

1691
01:12:00,166 --> 01:12:02,250
- One thing that I think
really sunk it home

1692
01:12:02,250 --> 01:12:04,958
for a lot of these guys
who were still at Midway

1693
01:12:04,958 --> 01:12:06,625
was that Eugene Jarvis,

1694
01:12:06,625 --> 01:12:08,625
who used to be one of
their fellow coworkers,

1695
01:12:08,625 --> 01:12:10,708
had left Midway.

1696
01:12:10,708 --> 01:12:14,125
And I think that kind of
put in each of their minds

1697
01:12:14,125 --> 01:12:19,000
that there's opportunities
for their talent.

1698
01:12:19,000 --> 01:12:23,500
- At one point, we were
contacted by Universal Studios.

1699
01:12:25,500 --> 01:12:27,958
- They wanted to spin a
story around this new thing

1700
01:12:27,958 --> 01:12:30,541
called GameWorks that they
were trying to start off.

1701
01:12:30,541 --> 01:12:32,250
- [Announcer] GameWorks,

1702
01:12:32,250 --> 01:12:34,250
the ultimate
entertainment destination.

1703
01:12:34,250 --> 01:12:36,625
Games, drinks, music, and food.

1704
01:12:36,625 --> 01:12:38,125
- And so they were looking
for people to develop

1705
01:12:38,125 --> 01:12:41,958
their location-based
arcade game.

1706
01:12:41,958 --> 01:12:43,583
- So we go on this
ridiculous trip

1707
01:12:43,583 --> 01:12:46,416
where the Universal jet that
Steven Spielberg flies on

1708
01:12:46,416 --> 01:12:48,041
is showing up at Midway Airport,

1709
01:12:48,041 --> 01:12:51,000
and we're all to get on
it and like fly out to,

1710
01:12:51,000 --> 01:12:52,666
fly out to California.

1711
01:12:52,666 --> 01:12:56,583
And it was, it was the
best experience ever.

1712
01:12:56,583 --> 01:12:58,750
Number one, it turns out you
can get to LA in like two hours

1713
01:12:58,750 --> 01:13:01,041
if you fly really fast.

1714
01:13:02,125 --> 01:13:04,125
We meet with the
president of Universal.

1715
01:13:04,125 --> 01:13:06,375
We have lunch with
him in the commissary

1716
01:13:06,375 --> 01:13:09,125
Like, here's all these
goofy video game guys.

1717
01:13:09,125 --> 01:13:12,250
- So I was usually the guy
that would have the balls

1718
01:13:12,250 --> 01:13:14,416
to like propose some numbers,

1719
01:13:14,416 --> 01:13:16,541
or you know, paint the picture.

1720
01:13:16,541 --> 01:13:18,708
- It was just the
epitome of Mark,

1721
01:13:18,708 --> 01:13:20,958
just throwing out
these huge numbers

1722
01:13:20,958 --> 01:13:23,375
that they're gonna demand.

1723
01:13:23,375 --> 01:13:26,375
And it was fun, because it
was like this confidence

1724
01:13:26,375 --> 01:13:30,583
with these guys that they
realize they were the value.

1725
01:13:30,583 --> 01:13:34,708
- I remember hearing all of
the rumors of competitors

1726
01:13:34,708 --> 01:13:36,875
courting our guys.

1727
01:13:36,875 --> 01:13:39,291
- Some of the guys would
be getting comments,

1728
01:13:39,291 --> 01:13:42,250
innuendos, and remarks
from management

1729
01:13:42,250 --> 01:13:45,750
about your obligation to
the employee agreements.

1730
01:13:45,750 --> 01:13:47,250
Well, what would
happen if they left.

1731
01:13:47,250 --> 01:13:50,000
- If they were gonna
screw us and leave,

1732
01:13:50,000 --> 01:13:52,625
we're gonna sue the
crap out of them,

1733
01:13:52,625 --> 01:13:56,416
because we created this
contractual relationship,

1734
01:13:56,416 --> 01:13:59,291
which prevented them from
working for a competitor

1735
01:13:59,291 --> 01:14:02,291
for at least a year
after they left us.

1736
01:14:02,291 --> 01:14:04,875
- And it was more about
making your life difficult

1737
01:14:04,875 --> 01:14:06,708
than it was about the
clause actually being legal.

1738
01:14:06,708 --> 01:14:08,000
It was about suing you

1739
01:14:08,000 --> 01:14:09,583
and you having to
defend yourself,

1740
01:14:09,583 --> 01:14:11,083
and him having
more money than you

1741
01:14:11,083 --> 01:14:12,125
and being able to
outspend you with lawyers,

1742
01:14:12,125 --> 01:14:13,333
just making your life difficult.

1743
01:14:13,333 --> 01:14:15,375
So other employers
didn't want to hire you.

1744
01:14:15,375 --> 01:14:16,916
- In the pinball area,

1745
01:14:16,916 --> 01:14:21,625
when a bunch of guys
left our pinball business

1746
01:14:22,750 --> 01:14:25,791
to work for an upstart,

1747
01:14:25,791 --> 01:14:30,333
we unleashed our legal dogs

1748
01:14:30,333 --> 01:14:35,083
on everybody associated
with that to sue them,

1749
01:14:36,833 --> 01:14:39,416
take them to court, and make
their lives so miserable

1750
01:14:39,416 --> 01:14:42,000
that they would just
eventually throw up their hands

1751
01:14:42,000 --> 01:14:43,291
and say, "We give up."

1752
01:14:45,500 --> 01:14:48,250
- You know, he really felt
ownership over all of us.

1753
01:14:48,250 --> 01:14:50,333
You know, he would
yell and say, you know

1754
01:14:50,333 --> 01:14:51,750
"Get your ass back here!

1755
01:14:51,750 --> 01:14:53,875
"What are you doing?"

1756
01:14:53,875 --> 01:14:57,000
He was pretty strong
in his opinions.

1757
01:14:58,875 --> 01:15:00,708
- Although the Universal
deal didn't get penned,

1758
01:15:00,708 --> 01:15:05,500
it did produce the negotiating
point and motivation

1759
01:15:07,333 --> 01:15:10,208
for Midway to pay these guys
what they really were worth

1760
01:15:10,208 --> 01:15:12,916
and recognize the value that
they really were bringing

1761
01:15:12,916 --> 01:15:17,000
to Midway's role and
placement in this industry.

1762
01:15:21,958 --> 01:15:24,208
[John Tobias] - I remember Ed
and I were in the studio

1763
01:15:24,208 --> 01:15:28,958
and Larry Kasanoff was brought
through by Ken Fedesna.

1764
01:15:30,541 --> 01:15:35,916
And Larry was familiar with
Midway through Terminator 2.

1765
01:15:36,208 --> 01:15:38,333
- I heard through the
grapevine that Midway

1766
01:15:38,333 --> 01:15:41,000
was testing an arcade
game that was on track

1767
01:15:41,000 --> 01:15:43,000
to beat our Terminator 2 record.

1768
01:15:43,000 --> 01:15:44,666
We couldn't have that.

1769
01:15:44,666 --> 01:15:47,041
So partly, just to keep in
touch on a friendly basis,

1770
01:15:47,041 --> 01:15:48,625
and partly out of
competitive spirit,

1771
01:15:48,625 --> 01:15:50,166
I went to play it.

1772
01:15:50,166 --> 01:15:52,500
And I played the game in
Neil Nicastro's office

1773
01:15:52,500 --> 01:15:54,333
on the arcade for 15 minutes.

1774
01:15:54,333 --> 01:15:56,791
It was Mortal Kombat, and
I turned to him afterward,

1775
01:15:56,791 --> 01:15:58,333
and I said, "If you give
me the rights to this,

1776
01:15:58,333 --> 01:16:00,458
"I guarantee you, I promise you,

1777
01:16:00,458 --> 01:16:02,291
"I will make it in every
medium in the world,

1778
01:16:02,291 --> 01:16:06,125
"movies, TV, animation,
music, live stage

1779
01:16:06,125 --> 01:16:07,750
"you name it, 'cause
I think this Star Wars

1780
01:16:07,750 --> 01:16:09,250
"meets Enter the Dragon."

1781
01:16:09,250 --> 01:16:11,708
And Neil said, "You're crazy."

1782
01:16:12,333 --> 01:16:14,750
I went home and I wander
around our arcade in Westwood,

1783
01:16:14,750 --> 01:16:17,416
and I was hanging around
the Mortal Kombat game.

1784
01:16:17,416 --> 01:16:20,250
And a little 11-year-old
kid slaps a quarter down,

1785
01:16:20,250 --> 01:16:21,958
and he looks up and
he challenges me,

1786
01:16:21,958 --> 01:16:23,958
and then he beats me.

1787
01:16:23,958 --> 01:16:25,625
And he was so
empowered, you know,

1788
01:16:25,625 --> 01:16:27,875
"You lose, Sub-Zero
wins," and I lost,

1789
01:16:27,875 --> 01:16:29,208
and that kid was thrilled.

1790
01:16:29,208 --> 01:16:31,125
And I thought, I'm gonna
make this into a movie.

1791
01:16:31,125 --> 01:16:32,750
- I was an aspiring filmmaker.

1792
01:16:32,750 --> 01:16:34,291
I grew up in the
north of England,

1793
01:16:34,291 --> 01:16:36,333
and then discovered
no one made movies

1794
01:16:36,333 --> 01:16:38,041
in the north of England.

1795
01:16:38,041 --> 01:16:40,083
So I moved to London and then
discovered no one in London

1796
01:16:40,083 --> 01:16:41,291
made the kind of movies I loved.

1797
01:16:41,291 --> 01:16:43,250
So I ended up moving to LA.

1798
01:16:43,250 --> 01:16:45,083
And the first movie I
did when I moved to LA

1799
01:16:45,083 --> 01:16:46,750
was Mortal Kombat.

1800
01:16:46,750 --> 01:16:48,708
And I had become
really obsessed with it

1801
01:16:48,708 --> 01:16:50,375
when I played it in
arcades in London.

1802
01:16:50,666 --> 01:16:54,333
- Paul Anderson had a
tremendously great, great,

1803
01:16:54,333 --> 01:16:56,791
great manager who kept
calling me and saying,

1804
01:16:56,791 --> 01:17:00,500
"You gotta see this guy's film."

1805
01:17:00,500 --> 01:17:02,625
And I thought, this guy's done
some small, British art film.

1806
01:17:02,625 --> 01:17:03,916
There's no way.

1807
01:17:03,916 --> 01:17:05,583
But in Paul's small,
British art film,

1808
01:17:05,583 --> 01:17:07,250
there was one three
minute fight scene.

1809
01:17:07,250 --> 01:17:09,708
And I liked the energy
of the fight scen

1810
01:17:09,708 --> 01:17:12,416
[hard rock music]

1811
01:17:12,416 --> 01:17:14,791
[man yelling]

1812
01:17:24,750 --> 01:17:28,375
- It's always a cultural clash
with the video game company

1813
01:17:28,375 --> 01:17:30,791
and the movie people, again,
because the video game people

1814
01:17:30,791 --> 01:17:33,541
are used to not having
to make story decisions.

1815
01:17:33,541 --> 01:17:34,833
Left, right, center, fine.

1816
01:17:34,833 --> 01:17:37,041
It's what, remember,
you the audience want.

1817
01:17:37,041 --> 01:17:39,750
The movie, you have to make
decisions for the character.

1818
01:17:39,750 --> 01:17:41,625
So they were
incredibly involved,

1819
01:17:41,625 --> 01:17:44,041
but it was always a little
bit of that, you know,

1820
01:17:44,041 --> 01:17:45,666
odd two cultures
meshing scenario.

1821
01:17:45,666 --> 01:17:47,458
It always is.

1822
01:17:47,458 --> 01:17:48,875
It still is with any video
game company and movie company.

1823
01:17:48,875 --> 01:17:50,958
- The first thing I
remember was thinking

1824
01:17:50,958 --> 01:17:52,375
well, how are these
guys gonna change

1825
01:17:52,375 --> 01:17:53,583
what we produced.

1826
01:17:53,833 --> 01:17:56,083
- The question in
Mortal Kombat was

1827
01:17:56,083 --> 01:17:57,583
what to do with the
finishing moves,

1828
01:17:57,583 --> 01:17:59,333
because they were
extraordinarily violent

1829
01:17:59,333 --> 01:18:01,541
It would have made
the movie Rated R,

1830
01:18:01,541 --> 01:18:04,416
which would have negated a
lot of kids from seeing it.

1831
01:18:04,416 --> 01:18:06,625
And it would have
made you lack empathy

1832
01:18:06,625 --> 01:18:08,125
with the main character.

1833
01:18:08,125 --> 01:18:09,875
If Johnny Cage ripped
people's spines out

1834
01:18:09,875 --> 01:18:12,291
in a movie, which is more
real than a video game,

1835
01:18:12,291 --> 01:18:13,625
you wouldn't have liked him.

1836
01:18:13,625 --> 01:18:15,291
- I think they ended
up being PG, right?

1837
01:18:15,291 --> 01:18:16,541
Weren't the Mortal
Kombat movies PG?

1838
01:18:16,541 --> 01:18:18,500
You can't make a
Mortal Kombat movie

1839
01:18:18,500 --> 01:18:21,125
and have it be accurate
unless it's like NC-17.

1840
01:18:21,125 --> 01:18:22,333
And then it's gonna
play in art houses,

1841
01:18:22,333 --> 01:18:23,708
and who's gonna go
see Mortal Kombat

1842
01:18:23,708 --> 01:18:26,875
in an art house?

1843
01:18:26,875 --> 01:18:29,750
Me, I probably would, but...

1844
01:18:29,750 --> 01:18:31,541
- Well, the most difficult
thing in the movie

1845
01:18:31,541 --> 01:18:33,750
was actually Goro.

1846
01:18:33,750 --> 01:18:38,750
- Good ol' Goro, the
last great physical

1847
01:18:38,875 --> 01:18:41,125
animatronic character
didn't work quite as well

1848
01:18:41,125 --> 01:18:42,708
as we wanted to.

1849
01:18:42,708 --> 01:18:44,041
So we had to cut down
some of the lines of Goro.

1850
01:18:45,500 --> 01:18:48,208
- The producers had
committed to him

1851
01:18:48,208 --> 01:18:50,625
before I became
involved in the movie.

1852
01:18:50,625 --> 01:18:52,250
So they're already building him.

1853
01:18:52,250 --> 01:18:54,708
And you know, ultimately,
I don't know whether

1854
01:18:54,708 --> 01:18:56,333
I would have gone
in that direction.

1855
01:18:56,333 --> 01:18:58,041
You know, we built Goro.

1856
01:18:58,041 --> 01:19:00,708
It was like, it was
a man in a suit,

1857
01:19:00,708 --> 01:19:04,000
who then on his shoulders
wore big, animatronic torso

1858
01:19:04,000 --> 01:19:05,750
with another two arms.

1859
01:19:05,750 --> 01:19:08,250
And of course, he just
broke down all the time.

1860
01:19:08,250 --> 01:19:10,083
Goro became like the
biggest diva on set

1861
01:19:10,083 --> 01:19:11,458
We're always waiting for Goro.

1862
01:19:13,541 --> 01:19:16,375
- So we go and we decide
we're gonna show Neil Nicastro

1863
01:19:16,375 --> 01:19:18,000
the movie before it comes out.

1864
01:19:18,000 --> 01:19:20,625
So we bring out this, some
bad copy of the movie,

1865
01:19:20,625 --> 01:19:22,500
and we show it to him.

1866
01:19:22,500 --> 01:19:26,958
He looks at me, he goes,
"Based out of 10, maybe a 3."

1867
01:19:26,958 --> 01:19:28,791
And so, he just hated the movie.

1868
01:19:28,791 --> 01:19:31,625
- And I remember thinking,

1869
01:19:31,625 --> 01:19:34,041
when they did the first trailer
and they used that music

1870
01:19:34,041 --> 01:19:36,416
and they basically just
showed these characters.

1871
01:19:36,416 --> 01:19:37,250
[Mortal Kombat music]

1872
01:19:37,250 --> 01:19:39,250
- [Announcer] Kano.

1873
01:19:39,250 --> 01:19:40,791
Liu Kang.

1874
01:19:40,791 --> 01:19:42,541
Raiden.

1875
01:19:42,541 --> 01:19:43,500
Johnny Cage.

1876
01:19:44,583 --> 01:19:45,125
Scorpion.

1877
01:19:46,291 --> 01:19:47,083
Sub-Zero.

1878
01:19:47,958 --> 01:19:48,750
Sonya.

1879
01:19:50,625 --> 01:19:52,125
- It's not terribly imaginative.

1880
01:19:52,125 --> 01:19:54,000
I was a little disappointed,
to be honest

1881
01:19:54,000 --> 01:19:56,750
And then I saw it
play in cinemas.

1882
01:19:56,750 --> 01:19:58,291
And I was sitting in the cinema,

1883
01:19:58,291 --> 01:19:59,958
and there's a couple of
Mortal Kombat fans, obviously,

1884
01:19:59,958 --> 01:20:01,291
in front of me.

1885
01:20:01,291 --> 01:20:02,791
And they loved it.

1886
01:20:02,791 --> 01:20:04,125
They loved it.

1887
01:20:04,125 --> 01:20:05,916
And what they loved
was that you could s

1888
01:20:05,916 --> 01:20:07,416
they were making a
mental checklist.

1889
01:20:07,416 --> 01:20:08,500
Scorpion, tick.

1890
01:20:08,500 --> 01:20:09,791
Sub-Zero, tick.

1891
01:20:09,791 --> 01:20:11,333
Raiden, tick.

1892
01:20:11,333 --> 01:20:13,083
And they actually said
that to one another.

1893
01:20:13,083 --> 01:20:14,750
It's like, oh,
they're all there.

1894
01:20:14,750 --> 01:20:16,416
- [Man] Mortal Kombat!

1895
01:20:16,416 --> 01:20:20,000
[Mortal Kombat theme music]

1896
01:20:23,125 --> 01:20:25,250
- [Announcer] Kombat begins.

1897
01:20:25,250 --> 01:20:29,041
- So now it comes the
most nerve wracking time

1898
01:20:29,041 --> 01:20:31,541
in the life of a movie
producer or director.

1899
01:20:31,541 --> 01:20:33,041
The movie's essentially done,

1900
01:20:33,041 --> 01:20:35,125
and now you're waiting
for it to be released.

1901
01:20:36,416 --> 01:20:38,375
- [Reporter] Mortal Kombat
as a video game

1902
01:20:38,375 --> 01:20:41,750
is already a two billion,
with a B, dollar business.

1903
01:20:41,750 --> 01:20:44,250
The take is going up this
weekend with the debut

1904
01:20:44,250 --> 01:20:45,916
of the feature film
based on the game,

1905
01:20:45,916 --> 01:20:47,791
starring Christopher
Lambert as Raiden.

1906
01:20:47,791 --> 01:20:49,375
- New Line calls me up and says,

1907
01:20:49,375 --> 01:20:50,791
"I've never seen
numbers like this.

1908
01:20:50,791 --> 01:20:52,375
"We're breaking records
all over the world."

1909
01:20:52,375 --> 01:20:54,000
You go, oh, thank goodness.

1910
01:20:54,000 --> 01:20:56,333
And then you have
a great weekend.

1911
01:20:56,625 --> 01:20:58,625
- I mean, he was a
very smart producer.

1912
01:20:58,625 --> 01:21:00,333
This guy got Mortal
Kombat, you know,

1913
01:21:00,333 --> 01:21:02,250
and set it up as a movie,

1914
01:21:02,250 --> 01:21:03,791
when a lot of people,
I think, were doubting

1915
01:21:03,791 --> 01:21:06,708
whether it was good idea to
adapt video games or not.

1916
01:21:06,708 --> 01:21:09,250
- Did Neil ever own up
to his prediction to me

1917
01:21:09,250 --> 01:21:11,625
that I was crazy and it
would be an utter failure?

1918
01:21:11,625 --> 01:21:13,250
I don't think he did.

1919
01:21:13,250 --> 01:21:14,750
I think he probably
owes me that.

1920
01:21:17,375 --> 01:21:19,958
[Neil Nicastro] - We
had a very entrepreneurial

1921
01:21:19,958 --> 01:21:25,041
compensation structure so that
if you were running a team,

1922
01:21:25,041 --> 01:21:29,750
and that game became
very successful,

1923
01:21:29,750 --> 01:21:31,416
you were gonna make
a lot of money.

1924
01:21:31,416 --> 01:21:35,000
Guys were walking away with
million-dollar checks, plus.

1925
01:21:35,000 --> 01:21:37,250
- They had a limit of how
much bonus money

1926
01:21:37,250 --> 01:21:39,250
they would ever pay
you over one title.

1927
01:21:39,250 --> 01:21:40,416
I think it was $2 million.

1928
01:21:40,416 --> 01:21:42,875
And as Neil explained
it, it's like,

1929
01:21:42,875 --> 01:21:45,000
"Well, I'm not gonna pay you
any more than $2 million,

1930
01:21:45,000 --> 01:21:46,291
"because the moment I do,

1931
01:21:46,291 --> 01:21:48,291
"you don't need to
come into work anymore

1932
01:21:48,291 --> 01:21:50,125
"And I want you to carry
on making games for us."

1933
01:21:50,125 --> 01:21:52,083
- Each team was
really competitive.

1934
01:21:52,083 --> 01:21:54,750
Ed Boon and I were
kind of at the top

1935
01:21:54,750 --> 01:21:56,541
of the competition scale.

1936
01:21:56,541 --> 01:21:57,791
I don't know if
this is true or not,

1937
01:21:57,791 --> 01:21:59,458
but Ken Fedesna actually told me

1938
01:21:59,458 --> 01:22:03,375
that when it came time
to negotiate contracts,

1939
01:22:03,375 --> 01:22:06,250
Ed wanted to make
sure he had a salary

1940
01:22:06,250 --> 01:22:08,791
that was one dollar
higher than my salary

1941
01:22:08,791 --> 01:22:13,250
- We were talking about
the compensation structure

1942
01:22:13,250 --> 01:22:16,625
and how some may view that as

1943
01:22:18,458 --> 01:22:20,666
creating a bad atmosphere
where you're pitting teams

1944
01:22:20,666 --> 01:22:21,666
against each other.

1945
01:22:23,250 --> 01:22:26,208
And I could understand
and appreciate that.

1946
01:22:26,208 --> 01:22:28,500
Some people think
that is destructive.

1947
01:22:28,500 --> 01:22:31,875
But I think those are the
same, you know, thoughts

1948
01:22:31,875 --> 01:22:35,583
that think that communist
consciousness works,

1949
01:22:35,583 --> 01:22:39,041
that we have a
desire to work hard

1950
01:22:39,041 --> 01:22:42,291
for the benefit
of our fellow man.

1951
01:22:42,291 --> 01:22:43,791
I think that's bullshit.

1952
01:22:43,791 --> 01:22:48,708
- Everybody, every
designer, every developer

1953
01:22:48,708 --> 01:22:51,291
on the Williams, and
I'm still to this day,

1954
01:22:51,291 --> 01:22:54,250
I think of them as
the Williams side,

1955
01:22:54,250 --> 01:22:58,916
were very, went out of their
way to make us feel welcome,

1956
01:22:58,916 --> 01:23:00,458
but in a way that
was very different

1957
01:23:00,458 --> 01:23:05,250
from what we were used
to at old Bally Midway.

1958
01:23:05,250 --> 01:23:08,041
I mean, guys like
Eugene and Jack Haeger

1959
01:23:08,041 --> 01:23:12,041
and Ed and Mark, all would
come up to us and say,

1960
01:23:12,041 --> 01:23:14,625
"Hey, this is the
way it works here,"

1961
01:23:14,625 --> 01:23:17,958
and "Glad to have you guys.

1962
01:23:17,958 --> 01:23:19,250
"You're gonna do
great stuff here,

1963
01:23:19,250 --> 01:23:21,000
"but don't go talk to them.

1964
01:23:22,625 --> 01:23:23,958
"They're not doing it right."

1965
01:23:23,958 --> 01:23:25,375
- And it would just push them.

1966
01:23:25,375 --> 01:23:26,708
People have that drive.

1967
01:23:26,708 --> 01:23:29,500
It would just push
them to do better

1968
01:23:29,500 --> 01:23:34,125
because the people that just
wanna help everybody else out,

1969
01:23:34,125 --> 01:23:37,416
they typically don't
have that burning desire

1970
01:23:37,416 --> 01:23:38,958
to prove something.

1971
01:23:38,958 --> 01:23:40,583
- If you look at thehistory of the department,

1972
01:23:40,583 --> 01:23:42,250
we started out with nothing.

1973
01:23:42,250 --> 01:23:46,500
And we had to build this
whole department, and get,

1974
01:23:46,500 --> 01:23:48,125
I mean, we were nobody,

1975
01:23:48,125 --> 01:23:50,333
and we were fighting like
the Ataris of the world.

1976
01:23:50,333 --> 01:23:52,875
And there was a point
when we all were together.

1977
01:23:52,875 --> 01:23:54,625
Like everybody's like clicking.

1978
01:23:54,625 --> 01:23:56,583
We're all working
with each other.

1979
01:23:56,583 --> 01:23:59,250
And then, you know,
I'll be very honest,

1980
01:23:59,250 --> 01:24:01,625
success came and screwed
the whole thing up.

1981
01:24:01,833 --> 01:24:03,583
- Footage came from
the Tokyo Game Show.

1982
01:24:03,583 --> 01:24:05,083
- [Game] Ready, go!

1983
01:24:05,083 --> 01:24:08,250
[fighting and punching]

1984
01:24:09,666 --> 01:24:12,000
- And the footage was
of Virtual Fighter

1985
01:24:12,000 --> 01:24:14,000
And the moment that was seen,

1986
01:24:14,000 --> 01:24:15,875
everybody looked at
each other and went,

1987
01:24:15,875 --> 01:24:16,875
"We need to be doing this."

1988
01:24:16,875 --> 01:24:18,125
And then forced their turn.

1989
01:24:18,125 --> 01:24:19,750
This was when Mortal
Kombat 3 was happening.

1990
01:24:19,750 --> 01:24:21,500
They turned to Ed, and
Ed's like, "I'm not ready.

1991
01:24:21,500 --> 01:24:23,083
"I'm elbow-deep in
Mortal Kombat 3.

1992
01:24:23,083 --> 01:24:24,708
"I'm not doing this."

1993
01:24:24,708 --> 01:24:26,583
And so this other team that
was making a tank game

1994
01:24:26,583 --> 01:24:28,875
decided, we're gonna
make a fighting game

1995
01:24:28,875 --> 01:24:33,000
[inspirational musical burst]

1996
01:24:33,000 --> 01:24:34,958
- We were making a fighting
game in the company

1997
01:24:34,958 --> 01:24:36,250
that made Mortal Kombat.

1998
01:24:36,250 --> 01:24:37,541
And I think that was
a huge challenge,

1999
01:24:37,541 --> 01:24:39,083
because I think a
lot of people thought

2000
01:24:39,083 --> 01:24:43,625
War Gods was going to be
Mortal Kombat 4, or whatever.

2001
01:24:43,625 --> 01:24:44,875
And it was not.

2002
01:24:44,875 --> 01:24:46,875
- You know, it seemed
like thematically,

2003
01:24:46,875 --> 01:24:50,500
they were a little closer,
too close to Mortal Kombat.

2004
01:24:50,500 --> 01:24:53,250
- It was unadulteratedly
a ripoff of Mortal Kombat.

2005
01:24:53,250 --> 01:24:54,958
They used all exact
control mechanisms

2006
01:24:54,958 --> 01:24:56,541
with the joysticks
and the buttons.

2007
01:24:56,541 --> 01:24:58,333
It was just, it was no
beating around the bush.

2008
01:24:58,333 --> 01:25:00,583
This was Mortal
Kombat, but in 3D.

2009
01:25:00,583 --> 01:25:02,666
[characters yelling]

2010
01:25:02,666 --> 01:25:04,250
- Nobody had it.

2011
01:25:04,250 --> 01:25:06,041
Nobody has a corner
on ideas, you know?

2012
01:25:06,041 --> 01:25:07,958
Just kind of ideas
come and flow,

2013
01:25:07,958 --> 01:25:10,583
and we needed to do what
was best for the department.

2014
01:25:10,583 --> 01:25:14,041
But it could get very
difficult sometime

2015
01:25:14,041 --> 01:25:16,791
- People would
walk past an office

2016
01:25:16,791 --> 01:25:19,000
where some of the Mortal
Kombat guys were in there.

2017
01:25:19,000 --> 01:25:20,583
If you were on
the War Gods team,

2018
01:25:20,583 --> 01:25:22,500
they would literally shut
the door in your face.

2019
01:25:22,500 --> 01:25:25,375
- Did we get any help from
the MK guys on War Gods?

2020
01:25:25,375 --> 01:25:26,875
And that answer is zero.

2021
01:25:26,875 --> 01:25:30,291
- It was, it was ugly. [laughs]

2022
01:25:30,291 --> 01:25:31,750
- You know, that's the way,

2023
01:25:31,750 --> 01:25:34,000
you know, the way
management pitted the teams

2024
01:25:34,000 --> 01:25:35,333
against each other.

2025
01:25:35,333 --> 01:25:37,333
That kind of didn't
help the situation.

2026
01:25:37,333 --> 01:25:39,958
- I think I remember
one of the reviews,

2027
01:25:39,958 --> 01:25:41,333
we all had a good
chuckle at this,

2028
01:25:41,333 --> 01:25:44,000
one of the reviews was
War Gods, God Awful.

2029
01:25:46,625 --> 01:25:49,000
[dance music]

2030
01:25:50,791 --> 01:25:53,000
[Eugene Jarvis]- Well, we had
been working on Cruis'n project

2031
01:25:53,000 --> 01:25:55,250
for, God, I don't know, maybe,

2032
01:25:55,250 --> 01:25:58,166
I guess two-and-a-half,
maybe only three years.

2033
01:25:59,708 --> 01:26:02,125
You know, we were
running out of money

2034
01:26:02,125 --> 01:26:07,541
and kind of over budget
and over time [laughs]

2035
01:26:08,375 --> 01:26:12,250
- At the time, Nintendo
was touting their Ultra 64.

2036
01:26:12,250 --> 01:26:14,291
[Announcer] - Project Reality.

2037
01:26:15,875 --> 01:26:17,583
Leagues beyond any
currently available

2038
01:26:17,583 --> 01:26:19,250
or anticipated hardware,

2039
01:26:19,250 --> 01:26:22,250
Project Reality will bring
to home video players

2040
01:26:22,250 --> 01:26:25,000
the same types of
astounding visual effects

2041
01:26:25,000 --> 01:26:27,250
seen in movies,
like Terminator 2.

2042
01:26:27,250 --> 01:26:29,708
- They were making
a push just to show

2043
01:26:29,708 --> 01:26:31,916
that we've got this
incredibly powerful,

2044
01:26:31,916 --> 01:26:36,041
polygon generating
new video game system

2045
01:26:36,041 --> 01:26:40,708
- So the Ultra 64 was really
vaporware at the time.

2046
01:26:40,708 --> 01:26:42,291
They didn't have anything.

2047
01:26:42,291 --> 01:26:43,958
They were a year away.

2048
01:26:43,958 --> 01:26:48,958
So they came to Neil Nicastro
and they came to Williams

2049
01:26:48,958 --> 01:26:51,250
and said, "Listen,
what do you guys have

2050
01:26:51,250 --> 01:26:53,208
- You know, went to
Eugene, and I said,

2051
01:26:53,208 --> 01:26:56,208
"Hey Gene, if I can get
you this amount of money,"

2052
01:26:56,208 --> 01:26:58,958
I think it was "give
me all your rights

2053
01:26:58,958 --> 01:27:00,583
"to the home side of it."

2054
01:27:00,583 --> 01:27:02,791
Eugene says "Yes,
if you get me X.

2055
01:27:02,791 --> 01:27:05,208
"I'll be happy with that."

2056
01:27:05,208 --> 01:27:08,041
And then we ended up getting
another figure from Nintendo

2057
01:27:08,041 --> 01:27:10,708
that was like a
big multiple of X.

2058
01:27:10,708 --> 01:27:13,583
- And so we decided

2059
01:27:13,583 --> 01:27:17,416
rather than going broke, that
we would go back to Midway.

2060
01:27:17,416 --> 01:27:19,750
[laughs]

2061
01:27:19,750 --> 01:27:22,250
- So Nintendo was bragging
that it was going to based

2062
01:27:22,250 --> 01:27:24,625
on the N64 and
everything else and stuff

2063
01:27:24,625 --> 01:27:27,291
Well, of course, showing
it at the CES Show

2064
01:27:27,291 --> 01:27:29,250
was not running on N64.

2065
01:27:29,250 --> 01:27:31,416
It wasn't anywhere near N64.

2066
01:27:31,416 --> 01:27:33,250
- You know, we kinda had to
swallow hard on that one,

2067
01:27:33,250 --> 01:27:35,958
because it was, it
was our hardware.

2068
01:27:35,958 --> 01:27:37,916
It was hardware that
we created in there

2069
01:27:37,916 --> 01:27:40,791
And they were labeling
it the Nintendo hardware.

2070
01:27:40,791 --> 01:27:45,166
- [Announcer] Only
on Nintendo Ultra 64.

2071
01:27:47,250 --> 01:27:49,958
- Nintendo system being
in the Cruis'n game?

2072
01:27:49,958 --> 01:27:51,708
Somebody in their marketing
department made that up

2073
01:27:51,708 --> 01:27:53,375
after the fact.

2074
01:27:53,375 --> 01:27:55,083
[video game music]

2075
01:27:55,083 --> 01:27:56,750
- When the Nintendo
thing came along,

2076
01:27:56,750 --> 01:27:59,041
it enabled us to come
back and really ha

2077
01:27:59,041 --> 01:28:01,291
a longer runway for
us to finish the game

2078
01:28:01,291 --> 01:28:05,375
And the advantage that
we had by doing that was,

2079
01:28:05,375 --> 01:28:07,208
I'm not saying that we
were doing it in a bubble.

2080
01:28:07,208 --> 01:28:10,625
But we weren't amongst
the Turmells of the world

2081
01:28:10,625 --> 01:28:12,625
and the Boons of the
world, and so on,

2082
01:28:12,625 --> 01:28:15,416
that could give us
valuable information.

2083
01:28:15,416 --> 01:28:17,333
- And they were kinda
brutal on our game

2084
01:28:17,333 --> 01:28:18,625
I mean, the Cruis'n USA.

2085
01:28:18,625 --> 01:28:22,708
I remember Fedesna was
like, "Yeah, snoozin'."

2086
01:28:22,708 --> 01:28:23,750
That was his term for it.

2087
01:28:23,750 --> 01:28:24,875
- I do remember that.

2088
01:28:26,416 --> 01:28:28,708
But I don't remember
who gave it that name.

2089
01:28:28,708 --> 01:28:31,333
But it had to be one
of the other guys.

2090
01:28:31,333 --> 01:28:33,125
It wasn't me that gave
it the name Snoozin'.

2091
01:28:33,125 --> 01:28:35,333
- Here was the guy
that abandoned them

2092
01:28:35,333 --> 01:28:36,583
in the coming back.

2093
01:28:36,583 --> 01:28:40,208
And it was a little bit
awkward for a while.

2094
01:28:40,208 --> 01:28:41,958
- Oh, when that game
came in, it was garbage.

2095
01:28:41,958 --> 01:28:44,125
It was like, it
was such garbage.

2096
01:28:44,125 --> 01:28:46,583
And Eugene knew it, too.

2097
01:28:46,583 --> 01:28:48,083
That's why he came back in.

2098
01:28:48,083 --> 01:28:49,875
He was wise enough
to know he needed,

2099
01:28:49,875 --> 01:28:53,958
you know, he needed that punch,
that he would get Turmell.

2100
01:28:53,958 --> 01:28:55,000
I mean, Turmell would
sit around that ga

2101
01:28:55,000 --> 01:28:56,958
and just write stuff.

2102
01:28:56,958 --> 01:28:58,250
You know, I would talk about it.

2103
01:28:58,250 --> 01:29:00,250
- We got that energy,
like that negative vibe,

2104
01:29:00,250 --> 01:29:03,000
like, you know, like
ooh, you know, like

2105
01:29:03,000 --> 01:29:05,541
and then we got movin'
and it was cool.

2106
01:29:05,541 --> 01:29:08,083
It was really cool to
get that frank input.

2107
01:29:08,083 --> 01:29:14,041
What really hurts is
the truth [laughs]

2108
01:29:14,583 --> 01:29:17,500
- The common denominator
in everything that we did

2109
01:29:17,500 --> 01:29:19,541
was that we all
worked for Eugene.

2110
01:29:19,541 --> 01:29:23,250
And we all like, we all
grew up on Eugene's games.

2111
01:29:23,250 --> 01:29:25,375
Ask Mark Turmell, Eugene fan.

2112
01:29:25,375 --> 01:29:26,916
Ask Ed.

2113
01:29:26,916 --> 01:29:27,833
You know, we all
worked for Eugene.

2114
01:29:27,833 --> 01:29:29,125
He was our guy, you know?

2115
01:29:29,125 --> 01:29:33,208
He was Stan Lee, man. [laughs]

2116
01:29:33,208 --> 01:29:37,208
- Cruis'n was a huge
commercial success.

2117
01:29:37,208 --> 01:29:41,958
But critically, actually,
it took a lot of flack,

2118
01:29:42,875 --> 01:29:46,000
because it was more of a
casual player's driving game.

2119
01:29:46,000 --> 01:29:49,416
Actually appealed
a lot to girls.

2120
01:29:49,416 --> 01:29:52,791
Like teenage girls loved
the driving mechanic

2121
01:29:52,791 --> 01:29:55,000
and loved, you know,
like pre-drivers,

2122
01:29:55,000 --> 01:29:57,083
like practicing
for their license.

2123
01:29:58,208 --> 01:30:00,250
- The startup cost to going
to play a fighting game

2124
01:30:00,250 --> 01:30:02,250
is high, right, like
everyone's paying attention,

2125
01:30:02,250 --> 01:30:04,708
and you're having to
play with another person.

2126
01:30:04,708 --> 01:30:06,791
You're probably looking for a
slightly different experience.

2127
01:30:06,791 --> 01:30:08,125
You might be lookingfor a machine

2128
01:30:08,125 --> 01:30:09,791
that's not as crowded
so you can go play

2129
01:30:09,791 --> 01:30:10,958
and kind of be left alone.

2130
01:30:11,125 --> 01:30:12,625
- You know, we just
took all this flack,

2131
01:30:12,625 --> 01:30:15,291
that we were sellouts,
and our game sucked,

2132
01:30:15,291 --> 01:30:16,958
and there was no skill.

2133
01:30:16,958 --> 01:30:21,708
And you know what's crazy is
I look at Cruis'n USA today

2134
01:30:21,708 --> 01:30:24,750
and from today's
standards, which is,

2135
01:30:24,750 --> 01:30:27,333
I guess 28-odd years later.

2136
01:30:27,333 --> 01:30:29,333
The game actually is
horribly difficult [laughs]

2137
01:30:31,583 --> 01:30:33,291
So if you put it out
in an arcade today,

2138
01:30:33,291 --> 01:30:35,333
people would refuse to
play it, it's so hard.

2139
01:30:36,416 --> 01:30:40,708
[voice speaking on overhead]

2140
01:30:40,708 --> 01:30:43,541
[music]

2141
01:30:48,458 --> 01:30:52,125
- When I interviewed Ed and
John about Mortal Kombat 3,

2142
01:30:52,125 --> 01:30:54,250
we had already spoken
a few times before

2143
01:30:54,250 --> 01:30:56,625
and I said, you know,
"You're on your third game.

2144
01:30:56,625 --> 01:30:58,250
"Are you tired?"

2145
01:30:58,250 --> 01:31:00,083
And they actually did
sound a little bit tired.

2146
01:31:01,500 --> 01:31:02,833
- [Ed Boon] To some degree,

2147
01:31:02,833 --> 01:31:05,125
we've become like a
Mortal Kombat factory

2148
01:31:05,125 --> 01:31:09,291
in the sense that we
know exactly how to
do the backgrounds.

2149
01:31:09,291 --> 01:31:11,041
We know exactly how
to do characters.

2150
01:31:11,041 --> 01:31:14,583
We know how to do all the
throws, and the filming.

2151
01:31:14,583 --> 01:31:16,125
We're just like
an assembly line.

2152
01:31:16,125 --> 01:31:17,666
- [Dan Amrich] Right.

2153
01:31:17,666 --> 01:31:19,291
- [Ed Boon] So in that respect,
we're like, you know,

2154
01:31:19,291 --> 01:31:20,500
you kinda wish at getting
a chance to do something

2155
01:31:20,500 --> 01:31:21,916
completely different.

2156
01:31:21,916 --> 01:31:24,416
- Apparently, there
was at the time a pitch

2157
01:31:24,416 --> 01:31:26,125
for a Star Wars game.

2158
01:31:26,125 --> 01:31:27,291
And when we started
talking about

2159
01:31:27,291 --> 01:31:28,958
what that potential
Star Wars game could be,

2160
01:31:28,958 --> 01:31:30,791
on the record, they lit up.

2161
01:31:30,791 --> 01:31:32,375
They were so happy.

2162
01:31:32,375 --> 01:31:33,875
And I could tell, these guys
need their batteries recharged.

2163
01:31:33,875 --> 01:31:36,375
They needed to shift
gears out of Mortal Kombat

2164
01:31:36,375 --> 01:31:39,208
to keep Mortal Kombat
interesting for themselves.

2165
01:31:39,208 --> 01:31:42,541
And I really believe that
that's what The Grid became.

2166
01:31:42,541 --> 01:31:48,791
The Grid was a six-player
competitive death match game

2167
01:31:48,958 --> 01:31:52,125
with completely
different controls.

2168
01:31:52,125 --> 01:31:54,750
- And then it had all
these sensibilities

2169
01:31:54,750 --> 01:31:56,625
that came from SmashTV.

2170
01:31:56,625 --> 01:31:58,000
- Good luck.

2171
01:31:58,000 --> 01:32:00,000
You'll need it.

2172
01:32:00,000 --> 01:32:03,541
- You've got two minutes
to get five points.

2173
01:32:03,541 --> 01:32:04,333
Good luck!

2174
01:32:06,208 --> 01:32:08,708
Mike Mika - It was trying to
be this thing that was creating

2175
01:32:08,708 --> 01:32:10,958
a sport out of this
new kind of interfac

2176
01:32:10,958 --> 01:32:12,041
a new kind of way to play.

2177
01:32:14,208 --> 01:32:15,583
It had all the makings
and the trimmings

2178
01:32:15,583 --> 01:32:18,041
of what would be a
big e-sport today,

2179
01:32:18,041 --> 01:32:20,250
but all the way
back in the '90s.

2180
01:32:20,250 --> 01:32:22,208
- We'll get people
here that it's like,

2181
01:32:22,208 --> 01:32:24,041
hey, we're gonna be
on The Grid all night

2182
01:32:24,041 --> 01:32:27,333
If anybody's saying we need
to be off, let us know,

2183
01:32:27,333 --> 01:32:29,833
just because we just
wanna grind out and play

2184
01:32:29,833 --> 01:32:31,333
for six hours of The Grid.

2185
01:32:31,333 --> 01:32:33,791
- The Grid was Ed
Boon having fun.

2186
01:32:33,791 --> 01:32:36,708
He really did, he
let it all out.

2187
01:32:36,708 --> 01:32:38,875
He let himself do
something different.

2188
01:32:38,875 --> 01:32:41,791
And you can see that
there's a joy in that game,

2189
01:32:41,791 --> 01:32:43,791
of him being able to shift gears

2190
01:32:43,791 --> 01:32:46,250
and stretch a different
part of his design brain.

2191
01:32:46,250 --> 01:32:49,500
I always see it as sort
of Ed Boon's vacation game

2192
01:32:49,500 --> 01:32:50,958
that he worked so hard on

2193
01:32:50,958 --> 01:32:53,250
that it was not a
vacation at all.

2194
01:32:53,250 --> 01:32:56,000
- We only sold 550 Grids,
it was, approximately.

2195
01:32:56,000 --> 01:32:57,333
There was nothing.

2196
01:32:57,333 --> 01:33:00,625
Grid earned terribly
as a single unit.

2197
01:33:00,625 --> 01:33:03,083
If you had four or
the six units togethe

2198
01:33:03,083 --> 01:33:04,750
The problem there was, though,

2199
01:33:04,750 --> 01:33:07,583
you gotta buy four cabinets
or four sets of electronics

2200
01:33:07,583 --> 01:33:08,916
and everything else.

2201
01:33:08,916 --> 01:33:10,583
So now in order to
get the earnings,

2202
01:33:10,583 --> 01:33:12,208
which you're talking about,

2203
01:33:12,208 --> 01:33:15,083
you had to invest, instead of
X, you had to invest 4X.

2204
01:33:16,875 --> 01:33:18,583
- You know, the operators
expected every game

2205
01:33:18,583 --> 01:33:20,750
that comes out has
to earn, you know,

2206
01:33:20,750 --> 01:33:23,208
so much money per week.

2207
01:33:23,208 --> 01:33:25,083
There was no way that every
game was going to come out

2208
01:33:25,083 --> 01:33:26,791
and earn two grand a week.

2209
01:33:26,791 --> 01:33:29,083
It just wasn't going to happen.

2210
01:33:29,083 --> 01:33:30,875
- All management
wanted to do was just,

2211
01:33:30,875 --> 01:33:32,500
they wanted to stamp out.

2212
01:33:32,500 --> 01:33:33,875
Basically, if they
could have stamped ou

2213
01:33:33,875 --> 01:33:36,875
more Mortal Kombats,
you know, in a row,

2214
01:33:36,875 --> 01:33:38,541
that's what they would've done.

2215
01:33:38,541 --> 01:33:41,875
- We went to the well too many
times with the same mechanics

2216
01:33:41,875 --> 01:33:44,500
or not enough innovation.

2217
01:33:44,500 --> 01:33:47,500
- But it was in the late
'90s I saw the warning signs

2218
01:33:47,500 --> 01:33:50,875
that things may be
getting more difficult

2219
01:33:50,875 --> 01:33:52,083
in the coin-op area.

2220
01:33:54,041 --> 01:33:56,208
- The consoles for the home
get more sophisticated.

2221
01:33:56,208 --> 01:33:58,333
The CD-Rom is a hugely
important technology.

2222
01:33:58,333 --> 01:34:01,041
And it brings that kind
of arcade-style graphics

2223
01:34:01,041 --> 01:34:02,375
into the home.

2224
01:34:02,375 --> 01:34:06,500
- I could feel that what
we could do as a company

2225
01:34:06,500 --> 01:34:10,500
on the hardware side wasn't
going to be able to approach

2226
01:34:10,500 --> 01:34:16,666
that what a whole team of
engineers could pull off.

2227
01:34:16,958 --> 01:34:21,916
- Console gaming really
changed how I felt about games

2228
01:34:21,916 --> 01:34:24,250
because I was able
to take my time.

2229
01:34:24,250 --> 01:34:25,958
I was able to play
games without somebody

2230
01:34:25,958 --> 01:34:27,791
looking over my
shoulder and judging

2231
01:34:27,791 --> 01:34:28,916
whether I was good or not.

2232
01:34:28,916 --> 01:34:32,416
And I was able to experiment.

2233
01:34:32,416 --> 01:34:35,875
I was really happy when
consoles came about,

2234
01:34:35,875 --> 01:34:38,000
because then there
were games for me, to

2235
01:34:38,000 --> 01:34:40,375
Whereas in a arcade, there is,

2236
01:34:40,375 --> 01:34:42,541
you know, if I weren't
good at Street Fighter,

2237
01:34:42,541 --> 01:34:45,958
you know, the whole sort of
experience kind of stopped

2238
01:34:45,958 --> 01:34:47,000
at a certain level.

2239
01:34:48,916 --> 01:34:50,625
- I think the other
thing that had a huge impact

2240
01:34:50,625 --> 01:34:51,833
was the internet.

2241
01:34:51,833 --> 01:34:53,708
So the social aspect
of the arcade,

2242
01:34:53,708 --> 01:34:56,375
where that's where you would
go and trash talk your buddy

2243
01:34:56,375 --> 01:34:59,541
and friend, you could
now find ways to do that

2244
01:34:59,541 --> 01:35:02,500
playing your game, but
also via the internet.

2245
01:35:02,500 --> 01:35:04,708
- In fact, I remember an
operator telling me once,

2246
01:35:04,708 --> 01:35:09,208
when the Monica Lewinsky
conversation got published

2247
01:35:09,208 --> 01:35:13,958
on the internet, that he saw
a decline in his audience.

2248
01:35:14,416 --> 01:35:17,541
Like, it seems weird,
but the internet became

2249
01:35:17,541 --> 01:35:19,583
like this entertainment factor.

2250
01:35:19,583 --> 01:35:23,916
- I did not have sexual
relations with that woman.

2251
01:35:23,916 --> 01:35:26,708
- And people stopped
going to arcades.

2252
01:35:26,708 --> 01:35:30,000
- So it was that period
of time where, you know,

2253
01:35:30,000 --> 01:35:33,541
you feel yourself being,
you see your future,

2254
01:35:33,541 --> 01:35:36,000
and your future looks crappy.

2255
01:35:36,000 --> 01:35:37,500
And you feel

2256
01:35:38,958 --> 01:35:43,208
somewhat paralyzed to
actually make a change.

2257
01:35:43,208 --> 01:35:46,500
I'd say that's probably
the crappiest time.

2258
01:35:46,500 --> 01:35:49,500
- You know, Neil basically
had a meeting and he said,

2259
01:35:49,500 --> 01:35:51,958
"Hey, I think the
days are numbered

2260
01:35:51,958 --> 01:35:53,958
"for the coin-op business."

2261
01:35:53,958 --> 01:35:55,250
- So the writing
was on the wall.

2262
01:35:55,250 --> 01:35:57,375
Things started falling
apart very quickl

2263
01:35:57,375 --> 01:36:00,000
And you had this millions
of dollars of overhead

2264
01:36:00,000 --> 01:36:01,791
in coin-op and it
was decided, okay,

2265
01:36:01,791 --> 01:36:03,083
we're gonna get out of coin-op

2266
01:36:03,083 --> 01:36:04,416
because there's so
much more money,

2267
01:36:04,416 --> 01:36:06,541
theoretically to be
made, on the consume

2268
01:36:06,541 --> 01:36:07,791
than there was in coin-op.

2269
01:36:07,791 --> 01:36:09,541
And that was the end of coin-op.

2270
01:36:09,541 --> 01:36:12,250
Pinball first, then came Midway,

2271
01:36:12,250 --> 01:36:13,750
as far as coin-op was concerned.

2272
01:36:22,333 --> 01:36:25,250
- Games were focused
direct-to-consumer now.

2273
01:36:25,250 --> 01:36:28,250
You know, Sony, et cetera.

2274
01:36:28,250 --> 01:36:33,000
And it took all of the
arcade mechanics out.

2275
01:36:34,250 --> 01:36:36,250
It took the ways that
we percentaged games,

2276
01:36:36,250 --> 01:36:38,500
the way we would bring
a player through a game.

2277
01:36:38,500 --> 01:36:41,500
Certainly, consumer development
is a lot more complex

2278
01:36:41,500 --> 01:36:46,250
and requires, you know,
higher structure in a team,

2279
01:36:46,250 --> 01:36:47,916
and more team members.

2280
01:36:47,916 --> 01:36:52,541
But that did change what
Midway was for all those years

2281
01:36:52,541 --> 01:36:54,708
in the '80s and '90s.

2282
01:36:54,708 --> 01:36:57,083
- When you look at it sort of
in the grand scheme of things,

2283
01:36:57,083 --> 01:36:58,375
it was fairly short-lived.

2284
01:36:58,375 --> 01:37:01,000
My career at Midway
spanned, I think,

2285
01:37:01,000 --> 01:37:02,958
a little bit longer
than maybe a decade.

2286
01:37:02,958 --> 01:37:07,666
And I experienced the
rebirth and then the death

2287
01:37:07,666 --> 01:37:08,708
of an industry.

2288
01:37:10,250 --> 01:37:11,500
- You know, we had
this great thing,

2289
01:37:11,500 --> 01:37:13,083
and it was kind of like
the party was over.

2290
01:37:13,083 --> 01:37:15,083
You know, it was just
like, it's two AM.

2291
01:37:15,083 --> 01:37:16,916
Everybody's got a headache.

2292
01:37:16,916 --> 01:37:19,750
And we had, what a ride we had.

2293
01:37:22,958 --> 01:37:24,625
But they're closing
up the disco, man.

2294
01:37:28,250 --> 01:37:30,541
And you go home with a
headache, and that was it.

2295
01:37:33,375 --> 01:37:36,041
[video game music]

2296
01:37:48,708 --> 01:37:50,083
- There was just nothing
like the experience

2297
01:37:50,083 --> 01:37:51,541
of going to an arcade.

2298
01:37:51,541 --> 01:37:55,625
It was like a dark cave
filled with simulators

2299
01:37:55,625 --> 01:37:59,250
that were like portals
to other realities

2300
01:37:59,250 --> 01:38:00,708
Like I could pilot a
starship over here,

2301
01:38:00,708 --> 01:38:02,500
or kill drug dealers over here,

2302
01:38:02,500 --> 01:38:04,375
or be a NBA champion.

2303
01:38:04,375 --> 01:38:06,416
You know, any fantasy
that you could have

2304
01:38:06,416 --> 01:38:07,791
you could go and
put in a quarter

2305
01:38:07,791 --> 01:38:09,541
and live out that fantasy.

2306
01:38:09,541 --> 01:38:11,500
- Whenever you think
of arcade style,

2307
01:38:11,500 --> 01:38:14,916
an arcade-style product,
a fast-paced product,

2308
01:38:14,916 --> 01:38:18,291
I think that was birthed by a
lot of what we were producing.

2309
01:38:18,291 --> 01:38:22,541
- You cannot plan that
coalescing of the talent.

2310
01:38:22,541 --> 01:38:24,791
Just the way everybody
came together,

2311
01:38:24,791 --> 01:38:28,416
you know, that made all
these games is so ridiculous.

2312
01:38:28,416 --> 01:38:31,208
Nobody planned that.
Nobody wrote on a

2313
01:38:31,208 --> 01:38:32,583
piece of paper, now I
need a Mark Turmell.

2314
01:38:32,583 --> 01:38:34,250
Now I need an Ed Boon type.

2315
01:38:34,250 --> 01:38:36,250
Now I need a Eugene
Jarvis, or whatever.

2316
01:38:36,250 --> 01:38:38,125
- Remember who's
creating these games.

2317
01:38:39,666 --> 01:38:43,208
Guy from Michigan, guy from
California, guy from Illinois.

2318
01:38:43,208 --> 01:38:46,000
And as they're, they
went through their life,

2319
01:38:46,000 --> 01:38:48,250
playing all these
different things,

2320
01:38:48,250 --> 01:38:50,333
they said, "You know,"
their brains are turning,

2321
01:38:50,333 --> 01:38:52,791
"Wouldn't it be interesting
if you could do this?

2322
01:38:52,791 --> 01:38:56,000
"Wouldn't it be interesting
if you could do that?"

2323
01:38:56,000 --> 01:39:00,625
Then these guys grow up, and
they come knocking on the door,

2324
01:39:00,625 --> 01:39:04,000
or they get a job working
for a company like Midway

2325
01:39:04,000 --> 01:39:06,916
or Williams, and
somebody says to them,

2326
01:39:06,916 --> 01:39:08,708
"Okay, what's your idea?"

2327
01:39:08,708 --> 01:39:10,708
"Oh, I got this brilliant idea!

2328
01:39:10,708 --> 01:39:11,791
"I want to do this!"

2329
01:39:13,000 --> 01:39:14,333
"Okay."

2330
01:39:14,333 --> 01:40:12,000
[upbeat video game music]

2331
01:40:12,000 --> 01:40:19,125
- I definitely put in code to
have Pistons score in

2332
01:40:19,125 --> 01:40:22,541
late periods at a higher rate,
than the Bulls

2333
01:40:22,541 --> 01:40:26,375
Because in that era,
it was Pistons Vs Bulls

2334
01:40:26,375 --> 01:40:29,875
[Josh Tsui] So you're a
Detroit fan working in Chicago

2335
01:40:29,875 --> 01:40:34,000
- Yeah, I was a Piston
fan living in Chicago

2336
01:40:34,000 --> 01:40:40,625
and I had to watch the Jordan
era unfold night after night

2337
01:40:40,791 --> 01:40:45,041
So I did my little part
to make the Pistons

2338
01:40:45,041 --> 01:40:48,125
better than the Bulls.
At least in NBA JAM

2339
01:40:48,125 --> 01:40:52,166
- I first discovered the game
when I went to church

2340
01:40:52,166 --> 01:40:55,375
and I was going across the
street to get some candy

2341
01:40:55,375 --> 01:40:57,625
and I ran into this brand
new game that showed up

2342
01:40:57,625 --> 01:40:58,625
called Mortal Kombat

2343
01:40:58,750 --> 01:41:01,958
Blew my mind, I saw this
one person playing and...

2344
01:41:01,958 --> 01:41:05,041
it was the perfect balance
between gore and competitiveness

2345
01:41:05,041 --> 01:41:09,250
and a chance for a a nerdy
little Asian kid to actually...

2346
01:41:09,250 --> 01:41:12,250
be toe to toe against all
kinds of different people

2347
01:41:12,250 --> 01:41:14,500
I hated going to church, so
every Sunday...

2348
01:41:14,500 --> 01:41:17,041
I would tell my mom I'm going
to church all of a sudden

2349
01:41:17,041 --> 01:41:20,000
When I would go, I would
go across the street

2350
01:41:20,000 --> 01:41:23,041
and play this videogame,
literally for 2 hours straight

2351
01:41:23,041 --> 01:41:24,583
My mom didn't have a clue,
but all of a sudden...

2352
01:41:24,583 --> 01:41:28,208
She didn't know why I
loved church so much

2353
01:41:28,208 --> 01:41:31,958
- It was the mid 90s and I was
approached by a PC programmer

2354
01:41:31,958 --> 01:41:33,708
about doing a
possible skate game

2355
01:41:33,708 --> 01:41:38,333
I went with him to
pitch to publishers

2356
01:41:38,333 --> 01:41:39,791
and we ended up at Midway

2357
01:41:40,208 --> 01:41:45,916
It was probably the most
defeating meeting I ever had

2358
01:41:45,916 --> 01:41:49,333
The whole meeting
felt contentious,

2359
01:41:49,333 --> 01:41:51,625
it was almost like we
were wasting their time

2360
01:41:52,250 --> 01:41:55,291
They said, "Skateboarding
is not even popular

2361
01:41:55,291 --> 01:41:58,458
"why would anyone want to play...

2362
01:41:58,458 --> 01:42:00,250
...a videogame based
on skateboarding?"

2363
01:42:00,250 --> 01:42:02,333
I've been in plenty
of pitch meetings

2364
01:42:02,333 --> 01:42:04,500
I didn't necessarily
expect everyone to

2365
01:42:04,500 --> 01:42:06,875
or there'd be bidding
war for our game

2366
01:42:06,875 --> 01:42:10,583
but at the same time I didn't
expect to be just beat down

2367
01:42:10,583 --> 01:42:15,333
I think I needed to go
through that, it me up to

2368
01:42:16,791 --> 01:42:19,708
for what became Tony
Hawk's Pro Skater