1:30:00-2:09:02
GUS: What.
MILES: No.
BURNIE: No, what the fuck.
JOEL: Like with the machine?
BURNIE: What are you watching?
LINDSAY: McDonald’s tapes?
MILES: Is this a new- is this a new Time Warner commercial? What the fuck is this?
BURNIE: Yeaahahaha.
JOEL: In the new time where they were-
BURNIE: This is Babe 3.
MILES: Hoho.
BURNIE: It was only-
MILES: That joke made me sad.
LINDSAY: Pi-Pig in the Chitties.
BURNIE: Only released in Russia.
JOEL: how are we gonna get that e- get a bottle opener?
BURNIE: So d- so Gav comes back, so next time today, so next podcast I will talk to him. He was legitimately mad at me for like 2 hours.
GUS: I-I would be mad too.
JOEL: I like- I like how you were like- add the word legitimate like it was- it’s not legitimate.
BURNIE: Have you ever seen, y’know, Gavin mad ever?
LINDSAY: It’s true, Gavin’s not very angry.
GUS: I kicked him in the butthole and he wasn’t mad.
LINDSAY: He gets fake angry, he does the frown where he’s like Huuuhhhmmm.
MILES: Gavin’s like, “Oh y’doughnut!” Then he walks off, like that’s Gavin being mad to me.
LINDSAY: Yeah.
GUS: No show-
LINDSAY: Oh wanker!
GUS: No shower will ever clean your dick again after that. I-I don’t care what you do.
BURNIE: It was bad.
JOEL: I mean - Now, Gav has an STD-
LINDSAY: Dude.
BURNIE: No.
JOEL: - and he can’t even get to have-
LINDSAY: Cheese!
BURNIE: Y’know-
JOEL: -fun.
BURNIE: It was fun. It was fun though.
JOEL: I mean if you’re gonna get an STD, at least have fun getting it, like-
MILES: Oh god.
JOEL: - delay, that’s not…
LINDSAY: Can one have fun getting an STD?
JOEL: he did not have-
BURNIE: I don’t even know.
LINDSAY: I can’t- does this happen?
JOEL: You don’t want Burnie to give ‘em to ya.
BURNIE: Next thing you know your arms are numb.
JOEL: Oooohhhhh.
LINDSAY: NO, GOD.
GUS: F-
BURNIE: When I was in Japan, they had- es-especially in the airport, we didn’t talk about this, they had all of the different kinds of toilets. So they had the Japanese toilet with the sprayers which looks like a normal American toilet.
LINDSAY: Normal toilet.
GUS: Right.
BURNIE: With extra stuff added on. Then they had the foot things with just the hole in the ground.
GUS: Yup.
MILES: What the fuck.
BURNIE: Then they had the racecar toilet? I-
MILES: What the fuck?
BURNIE: -don’t know how to describe it? The Japanese toilet which is like the normal one-
LINDSAY: I thought you sit in the car…?
BURNIE: You sit on like a motorcycle?
GUS: Oh yeah that one. Yeah yeah I know that one.
BURNIE: you know that one too?
LINDSAY: Cool!
BURNIE: So in the bathroom you get to pick which kind of toilet you want to use. In the airport I never saw-
MILES: Choose wisely.
BURNIE: -that anywhere else.
GUS: Th-There’s-
JOEL: You never saw them anywhere else?
BURNIE: oh we went to the restroom like in the hotel, they just had the normal western toilet.
GUS: Yeah.
BURNIE: They didn’t have the racecar toilet.
GUS: I-I don’t-
MILES: God ??
LINDSAY: Classic Western.
GUS: I don’t know if you encountered this, but uhmmmmm… I went to this one restaurant when I was there in Japan where you go to the bathroom, and the c- like where you wash your hands, the sink?
MILES: Mmhmm.
GUS: That’s communal, men and women. And the stalls are all- like they’re individual-
LINDSAY: Gender separate.
GUS: -toilets.
BURNIE: Huh.
GUS: No they’re not gender separated.
LINDSAY: Oh no.
GUS: So men and women go to the same bathroom but stalls are like, floor to ceiling wall-
LINDSAY: That’s weird. That’s a-
GUS: -With a big closing door, so it doesn’t matter, everyone goes to the same bathroom, but you have your own little private toilet space.
LINDSAY: Huh.
BURNIE: That’s actually totally legal in the US too.
LINDSAY: Yeah.
BURNIE: That doesn’t violate any codes.
GUS: D- I- I had no problem with it. But, you never see that.
BURNIE: No.
MILES: I’ve also never seen a race car toilet.
BURNIE: Alright, I gotta show you this.
GUS: Yeah show it quick ‘cause we-we’re going long.
BURNIE: Oh really? This is gonna be where we stop?
LINDSAY: A bit loonng and strong.
BURNIE: We g- we got Lindsay right here.
LINDSAY: Hey.
BURNIE: Lindsay, do we have to stop?
LINDSAY: Never stop.
GUS: We have a segment at the end of this podcast-
LINDSAY: Can’t stop.
GUS: -I haven’t told you yet.
BURNIE: Oh right! Japanese motorcycle toilet, I don’t know w-
MILES: WHAT?
GUS: After RTX I interviewed uh Justin from Robot Entertainment.
LINDSAY: Well!
JOEL: That’s cool.
GUS: and s-so that’s-that’s coming up after this podcast.
JOEL: S-what’s –we’re supposed to stop?
GUS: Yeah we’re almost dying here from c-
LINDSAY: I love Robots.
MILES: I love where you were going.
BURNIE: So this section is the motorcycle toilet, so…
GUS: I do love your Kerry.
BURNIE: I was gonna say something else.
MILES: You and Kerry are always on the phone t-
JOEL: W-W-Wait wait… You look up motorcycle toilet, and you actually found a motorcycle
toilet?
BURNIE: A motorcycle toilet, I did. I did-
JOEL: And he ended up f- There's a page of motorcycle toilets?
BURNIE: It looks like that.
GUS: Mmhmm.
BURNIE: And you just sit on it. You put your legs on either side and you just sit down on it.
MILES: I’m gonna be honest I’m disappointed, I was expecting an actual motorcycle.
BURNIE: But you’re s- you’re sitting on a motorcycle like, you’re like this a-
MILES: No.
BURNIE: -it’s got handles.
MILES: No, it’s better in my head.
BURNIE: I can show you a picture of a motorcycle toilet. I have the goddamn internet, you want a picture of a motorcycle toilet? I’ll show you a picture of one.
GUS: He w- he went to Japan, he can get a woman dressed like a motorcycle and it would be a toilet.
LINDSAY: On the toilet!
MILES: Awhhh ewww.
JOEL: Wh-what do you take when you’re in Japan?
MILES: That’s creepy.
BURNIE: That’s the other version of it right there.
MILES: Okay.
GUS: I feel like I-I saw those all the time, at uh train stations, is where I would always see those. Did y’all take the subway much?
BURNIE: We took the train from the airport into Tokyo which is like a two hour endeavor.
GUS: Yeah I told y’all, I told y’all it was long.
BURNIE: You did. You did.
GUS: I said make sure you take the Bullet Train. It’s gonna take a long time.
BURNIE: It sucks. Yeah.
GUS: Yeah b-because well I… When I went I had like no idea, I thought like oh yeah, it’s just like an airport, like thirty minutes? MmMmm.
BURNIE: MmMmm. Half your day.
GUS: Hate that fucking train.
BURNIE: Essentially ‘cause you, y’know, you have to navigate everything…
JOEL: S-So you did take the bullet train or you did not.
BURNIE: We did take the train. But also it takes longer to get on a train ‘cause it’s that feeling of I’m committing when you get on a train? It’s like if we get on the wrong one… we’re in China somehow.
LINDSAY: Yeah. Same with Europe. They take Bullet Trains everywhere.
GUS: You took the train from the airport to Shinjuku then, you were staying there. That’s like the biggest train station they have there.
MILES: That’s cool.
BURNIE: That is correct.
GUS: That place is fucking massive.
BURNIE: Pretty nuts.
GUS: Yeah.
BURNIE: Yeah.
GUS: There’s so many people there. I walked out of there one time like during rush hour, and there was like a mass of people- I’m sure you encountered that once just like-
BURNIE: Gav has footage of it we can give you. Yeah.
LINDSAY: Yes please.
JOEL: So…
GUS: You can’t move. There’s so many people.
JOEL: See w-w-you’re at the train station, you took the train, arrived in Tokyo, went to the hotel?
BURNIE: No, we got off the train at the train station but had to take a cab from the train station to the hotel.
JOEL: Jeez, okay, how long was that.
BURNIE: That was like another fifteen minutes.
JOEL: No one spoke English?
BURNIE: No, we did okay we were really okay.
JOEL: Was there ac-
BURNIE: Actually I shouldn’t s-
JOEL: Did they try and speak English?
BURNIE: -I-I shouldn’t say they spoke English. Everyone we ran into spoke English. They were extraordinarily helpful.
JOEL: Everyone spoke English?
BURNIE: It was a little disappointing, Joel to be honest with you, ‘cause I wanted to be stuck not knowing a word of Japanese, but everyone was like, “I’ll help you out, hey what’s goin’ on.”
LINDSAY: Yeah. I just know stuff from anime.
BURNIE: You go, “Do you speak English?” and they go,” A little, a little.” And then you’d say-
JOEL: And then they spoke a lot.
BURNIE: Yeah, and they were fine.
JOEL: And then you just like-
MILES: That’s incredible.
BURNIE: Yeah we went to uhhh we kind of toured around Shinjuku-
JOEL: Uh-huh.
BURNIE: -Which is this big like commercial district. Uh we were only there 36 hours, and we stayed at the hotel where they filmed Lost in Translation?
MILES: Oh!
BURNIE: So that was pretty cool.
LINDSAY: Yay.
MILES: I was thinkin’ about that one, while you were telling the story.
BURNIE: Yeah, and it’s weird because the level of service in that hotel was unlike anything I
could imagine.
MILES: Wow. Really?
BURNIE: For- the front desk clerk- there was a front desk, you just, you just sat down at a table? Gavin said it was like we were buying property together, because we sat beside the signs and stuff, and then he got up and said okay let’s show you your room, and he walked us to our room.
MILES: Ohhhh.
LINDSAY: Wow. That’s cool.
MILES: That’s so cool.
BURNIE: And then- and then if you were walking down the hallway and ran into housekeeping, they would stop and bow, and not move until you were out of the hallway.
MILES: That’s weird man.
BURNIE: It did. Every American was like please, please, just don’t pay so much attention to me.
MILES: Yeah.
BURNIE: Y’know? Like I was at the gym-
JOEL: Di-Did you feel like you guys stuck out?
BURNIE: I- maybe, I mean, but I didn’t feel weird at all at any point and time. Well it might have been Gavin with the camera and he was filming the uh intersection with all the pedestrians?
GUS: Uh-huh.
BURNIE: I felt like we were in people’s way, and I felt that was the only time I felt like Ohh we’re tourists. But we were just-
GUS: Wow.
BURNIE: -we were just havin’ fun. Gavin is… Gavin is a great guy to travel with ‘cause he doesn’t care.
JOEL: Yeah.
LINDSAY: He’ll deal with them.
BURNIE: He’ll do whatever, he does not give a shit. You’re thing is- Honestly Joel, you’re a little harder to travel with ‘cause you’re very rigid…?
JOEL: High maintenance.
BURNIE: Ye- And like, when you- when you get your itinerary, that’s it, like Gus was telling the story about how, he went to Amsterdam-
JOEL: Well it’s because I’m scarred from bathroom stories.
BURNIE: I don’t blame you.
JOEL: With you.
BURNIE: I don’t blame you.
LINDSAY: All the shower stories.
JOEL: See now Gavin’s- hey Gavin’s gonna be like why. Burnie.
BURNIE: Yeah I noticed that’s a trend now, I have a history now of-
JOEL: In the bathroom.
BURNIE: -like ambushing people in the bathroom. That’s not a good reputation to have.
JOEL: it makes people feel vulnerable.
MILES: You’re the BBQ and bathroom ambush guy, Burnie.
BURNIE: But we went to New Zealand uh w- Gu- Joel stayed in Auckland while we had some fun adventures in New Zealand. He was like,” I’m- I’m happy here I’m doing my thing-“
GUS: Yeah.
MILES: Yeah, y- you’re very much on your own.
JOEL: Well there was gambling there, and it was a city, and it had people in it and… You guys wanted to go look at cows or whatever.
BURNIE: We did.
JOEL: We have cows in the United States.
BURNIE: We did, we did stay at a pony farm at one point.
JOEL: So. Well.
LINDSAY: It’s an Australian pony farm. It’s different.
BURNIE: So, she’s engaged.
GUS: Are you?!
BURNIE: Look show- show the hand.
LINDSAY: I am not engaged.
BURNIE: Look!
GUS: Then why are you wearing a fucking engagement ring on that finger!
LINDSAY: Talk to the man next door.
JOEL: Yeah, why are you… These rules and rings are-
GUS: That’s what I said!
JOEL: a lot of rules and rings.
BURNIE: So what’s the promise ring?
LINDSAY: Uhh, well, I mean this is-
GUS: IS that what that is?
LINDSAY: Yeah, essentially this is just kind of a gift I was given, uhh after we decided to start dating, that was like hey, I really care about you-
BURNIE: You just watch her she smiles from ear to ear every time she talks about it too.
LINDSAY: I’m sorry.
BURNIE: Get a picture of that. She’s like nothing but grins.
LINDSAY: Sorry.
BURNIE: And blushing.
LINDSAY: But yeah, just kind of…
BURNIE: Well it’s a very beautiful ring.
LINDSAY: It was like ‘sup bitch I like you, and I was like yo bitch I like you too. And here we are.
MILES: Bitch dumpster.
BURNIE: I feel like that’s exactly how it went. That’s the script.
JOEL: I’ve never- I’ve never had a situation in my life where I have a conversation with a g- with a female, and then she smiles at the end of it.
BURNIE: Was she she-
LINDSAY: And then she says bitch I love you.
BURNIE: -she likes you too.
JOEL: It’s kind of weird.
GUS: Alright, well let’s wrap this up.
BURNIE: So we’re doing an interview with Justin…
GUS: Yes.
BURNIE: …from R-Robot-
GUS: Robot. Yes.
MILES: Robot.
BURNIE: Which seems okay. Right? And then we’re doing, also next week we’re doing… wanna tease what we’re doing next week?
GUS: I’ll just say we’re doing another interview-
LINDSAY: Don’t tease us, Gus.
GUS: -next week.
BURNIE: From the developer of a game we’ve been talking about that came out lately that we like a lot.
GUS: Yes.
BURNIE: And then we play.
MILES: [creepy voice] Jeez, that’s cool, that sounds really neat, I wonder what that is.
GUS: You with the voice.
BURNIE: Yeah that was Miles by the way.
MILES: Don’t judge me.
LINDSAY: Miles could give us any guest in the rec- in anything.
GUS: So ending this portion of the podcast, but keep listening but there is more podcast.
BURNIE: Where are we gonna go to eat. Dell.
GUS: We have some…
LINDSAY: Rudi’s.
GUS: … barbecue…
BURNIE: Hey give me a good restaurant to go to in Austin, like a good going out at night to eat at a restaurant-
GUS: You know where I ate the other day at RTX? I ate in the restaurant at the lobby of the W.
BURNIE: Okay.
GUS: And they have a Rib eye there where they tell you for two people but one person can eat. I’m thinking about that right now. And when you’re done, they have this thing called drunken doughnuts? Which is d-d-
LINDSAY: Awesome.
GUS: -doughnuts served with like liquor toppings?
BURNIE: Yes.
LINDSAY: Holy shit.
BURNIE: Like melted caramel with liquor, and melted chocolate with lace.
MILES: Go on.
GUS: Like eat- you’ll eat a steak for 2, and then eat drunken doughnuts. At the W.
BURNIE: I’m currently in the midst of trying to get permission to air this? But I actually bet Grace from Daily Grace and Hannah from My Drunk Kitchen that they wouldn’t just shoot those-
GUS: Awhh.
BURNIE: They gave us- we were there, like really late one night and they jus- the bartenders just gave us drunken doughnuts?
MILES: Uh-huh.
BURNIE: And I had them do a shot of the-
GUS: Uh-huh.
BURNIE: -dessert dips.
LINDSAY: Euuughhhh.
BURNIE: And they’re pretty big.
MILES: Eeeeeewwhhhh.
LINDSAY: That sounds gross.
BURNIE: And it’s a pretty goddamn funny video.
LINDSAY: Eughh that sounds disgusting.
BURNIE: It was like, “Hundred bucks? I’m in”, and they’re funny as shit, so…
GUS: Yes.
BURNIE: Hopefully I get permission to show that video.
GUS: Alright.
MILES: So wanna get fat and drunk?
GUS: Yes let’s do it.
LINDSAY: Yes please.
GUS: Well thanks for listening, but keep listening.
[Start interview]
GUS: Hey everyone, we have a special segment now, uhh I have Justin here from Robot
Entertainment. We just finished wrapping up RTX 2012, and Robot was kind enough to come down and be part of the show on the floor, and uhh we know- being such a big fan of uhh the games you guys put out, I thought- I gotta grab you before you leave town. Get you on here so we can chat a bit about- about the show and how it went for you.
JUSTIN: It was awesome. I gotta say this is our first RTX- Well you’ve only done 2 but this is the first time we came down here and uh it’s nice to have a local show, we got to drive down and, the show itself was a lot of fun.
GUS: So um you you guys were here, uh you’re from Dallas right?
JUSTIN: Yea. We’re-
GUS: You’re based out of Dallas right?
JUSTIN: North Dallas yea
GUS: So you drove down. Not too bad of a drive. So um this is the first year- this is the first time we’ve had RTX, you know, in the Austin Convention Center.
JUSTIN: Um Hm
GUS: So um what was your experience? How was the flow for you guys and uh interacting with the people here?
JUSTIN: I really liked it. We weren’t sure what to expect, you know we’ve gone to other conventions we kinda know what we’re getting coming here it’s like well let’s go see what this- what this is like. The community here was actually really awesome. We had a lot of people. Well you know because of Rooster Teeth’s community is largely born out of Halo we were really little, we were showing PC and iOS stuff so we were like “Well, are console people going to react negatively?” And surprisingly
everyone was really stoaked to play on PC, and they were bringing Hero Academy of Steam we had that playable here for the first time and um, people were like, gushing over “I can’t believe it’s coming to Steam! This is great!” So it was a really warm reception here I mean it was- it was nice to interact with everybody .
GUS: Yea I guess we should tell everybody what games you make and what-
JUSTIN: Yea
GUS: games you’re showing off. So Robot they uh, of course Orcs Must Die, Hero Academy , and Orcs Must Die 2, which is coming out in a few weeks right?
JUSTIN: Yea. 3 weeks from today in fact, July 30th.
GUS: Wow that’s crazy. Ummm so uh Hero Academy you said is coming to Steam so it’s uh um I play Hero Academy like fucking crazy on my iPhone all the time. So when it’s moving to Steam is it, I haven’t had a chance to check it out yet, is it going to be, like, I guess you use the mouse to click and indicate where you want your-
JUSTIN: Yea. You select your guys and move em’ the way you would a little, if it was a board game or something on- on- on the PC. Yea it works pretty much exactly the same we’ve done some UI changes but in fact it’s cross platform playable so the game is completely the same you can take your matches wherever you go.
GUS: So when you say its cross platform does it mean you can play on the PC you can play against iOS players-
JUSTIN: Yea. Yea.
GUS: And vice-versa?
JUSTIN: Yea it’s one giant community of players. So you got your Hero Academy Account you sign in with either on your phone, iPad, or on Steam and um- um- yea. If you don’t have an iOS device you can now play everybody over there or if you have you both you can play some matches on your lunch on your PC then pick up your iPhone when you get home and keep going, so. . . .
GUS: That’s awesome. I think everyone I play with is probably, I play with a lot of other guys at the office and I think they’re all really pissed off at me because I’ve been so busy with RTX planning and stuff I don’t think I’ve submitted a turn in that game in over a week.
JUSTIN: Yea I’m the same way, I’ve got a mountain of games piled up I think my notifications says 33 games waiting for my attention. So, I’ve got to get back to it as soon as I’m back in the office.
GUS: Yea I had to turn the notifications off so I wouldn’t feel guilty about it. And it’s only until I load the game is when I’m like, “Oh there’s so many waiting-
JUSTIN: Yea I can’t do it I have to have them when I check my phone I need to know who's sending their turns back to me it’s like, I know I’m biased but I’m completely addicted to it so I’ve played every day since it came out .
GUS: It’s a fun game. And I like that- uh- that it’s the kinda game you can play without having to spend any money if you don’t want.
JUSTIN: Yea.
GUS: And if you want to have different teams with different abilities you can play and typically I feel I like supporting those types of games, and I uh. . . I think I’ve bought- I know I’ve bought every team that has come out for it.
JUSTIN: Yea, thank you.
GUS: I uh uh paid for some color customizations and Avatars like the kinda thing “Oh yea it’s only 99 cents yea sure why not I’ll get that.
JUSTIN: Yea I mean it’s- you can play for free yea the- the iOS version anyways is a free App it has ads but it comes with a team that we really work hard to balance out with the rest of the teams so it’s not like a a paid team you're gonna in automatically
GUS: Right.
JUSTIN: You can play for free. Forever on iOS if you want, the Steam one is a paid for download because we don’t have ads in there.
GUS: Right.
JUSTIN: So- but yea, a huge chunk- a massive chunk of our player base plays the free version and remains competitive.
GUS: Yea uh the council is the free team yea they have uh-
JUSTIN: human fantasy characters basically.
GUS: They uh I- I- I hate- I get pissed off every time I play them because one of their abilities is that the health potions heal them much more than other teams.
JUSTIN: Yea.
GUS: And I believe you can also use health potions on downed characters.
JUSTIN: Yea, revive them.
GUS: And you cannot do that as any of the other teams.
JUSTIN: That’s their- Well each team has like “their thing” and the council’s is the healing and the- yea it’s when you play other teams you play against the council you have to factor that in, because they can revive from quite a bit of distance.
GUS: Right even if the-Even if the healer is on the field they drop a potion and it’s like “Ah I forgot about that, dammit”
JUSTIN: Yea, that’s saved me many times in many many battles, so, I’m grateful for it.
GUS: Yea I feel like when a new team comes out I’ll play that team exclusively like a ton just to learn them inside and out and then once I know I just go back to random and just cycle through whatever team I get.
JUSTIN: Yea I play random all the time but I get the luxury of playing the teams before they come out to get used to them so-
GUS: Um hm
JUSTIN: Yea. Now it’s um we got 4 teams out and the Steam version is going to have the Team Fortress 2 team, exclusive to that. So it’s all 9 Team Fortress 2 characters as a playable team in the game and once you’ve unlocked it on Steam you can play it on your iOS device.
GUS: Ahhh . . . dammit.
JUSTIN: They’re a lot of fun.
GUS: Alright well I guess I’ll be picking that up. Ummm so in addition to Hero Academy you’re also showing off Orcs Must Die 2 as well, right?
JUSTIN: Yes.
GUS: When- Is that also coming out here pretty quick?
JUSTIN: Yea yea Well Steam Hero Academy is coming August 8th and Orcs Must Die 2 is July 30th. They’re a week apart.
GUS: So is that killer that you have like a like a huge team working on this stuff or are there a bunch of guys freaking out?
JUSTIN: Surprisingly dull. I mean our development team, the Orcs 2 team is about the size of the first game and the Hero Academy team is 5 or 6 guys.
GUS: Wow
JUSTIN: Yea I mean It- It’s a little surprising to me, I’m- a lot of these guys work together on ensemble so they’ve worked with each other for years I’m new to the mix and coming in it’s surprising to me how much they can get done and how quickly.
GUS: Um hm. So yea a lot of- it’s interesting you mentioned that a lot of the Robot Team started originally from um um I don’t know how-
JUSTIN: The closure of the Ensemble Team.
GUS: from the old Ensemble Team. Yea Once Ensemble was closed they moved on and made this so how long have you been with Robot now?
JUSTIN: 2 years now.
GUS: 2 years? Wow.
JUSTIN: I came in about a year after they opened.
GUS: Where did you come from?
JUSTIN: Most recently before that I was at Microsoft. Uhh I was up there doing community on Gears of War for a while, then on Halo, on the Halo Waypoint stuff and then, came down- and that’s how I met you guys. Was on Halo Waypoint. And now I’m down in Texas being very hot and running from tornadoes.
GUS: So uh- yea you all had bad tornadoes recently don’t you?
JUSTIN: Yea every- It’s every April. That I’ve been here, 3 years in a row now- 3 Aprils in a row now, I’ve been terrified by tornadoes that come through. Its horrible.
GUS: I don’t wanna get into-
JUSTIN: Oh sorry!
GUS: I’m not going to go into a huge tangent- a huge weather discussion on the podcast. It’s weird to me how there are always tornadoes north of Austin and in the Hill country, and especially in the Dallas area, but there are never tornadoes in Austin itself.
JUSTIN: You’re lucky
GUS: There are tornadoes in the suburbs to the north uh there’s a suburb called Cedar Park which is probably 8 or 9 miles from downtown Austin and they’ll get tornados but never here.
JUSTIN: Never in Austin. Well we’re lucky we’re all North of the city in Dallas and it all starts South and comes up, then dissipates over the city. We’ve lucked out everytime but its its every time I see the big red path on the TV it goes over the Studio and my house, and I’m like please stop please stop please stop.
GUS: At least it doesn’t get to the black or purple color.
JUSTIN: Yea
GUS: It’s like whenever I see it I’m like, “Oh shit.”
JUSTIN: Yea it’s- it’s a new experience for someone in California to have to worry about tornadoes. But….
GUS: Ummm, long- Frequent listeners of the Podcast will know I’m obsessed with earthquakes and I’ve never been in one I wanted to feel one- not a major one
JUSTIN: Yea
GUS: not talking like I want to be in a huge one but I wanna feel a smaller one would you- did you ever sit through any earthquakes?
JUSTIN: I mean yea- yea- I lived in the Central Valley, so the big ones were all over on the coast and we didn’t get a ton of them but like, when the big one in San Francisco hit we felt that and I was 3 and a half hours from San Francisco where it was and we felt it I mean, every- it was probably a couple times a year you get little ones through there. You Shake a little bit.
GUS: Someone- umm someone made an earthquake survival kit for me it’s in my office we- I wish we could have- we’re recording at the Convention Center since we just wrapped the show I wish we were at the studio so I can show you. Someone made me an “Earthquake Survival Kit™”that hangs on my wall.
JUSTIN: Wow.
GUS: And it gots little uhhhh individual bottles of Jack Daniels and little party stoppers.
JUSTIN: Nice..
GUS: To celebrate it
JUSTIN: To celebrate it. That’s awesome.
GUS: It’s in a glass case and it says “In case of Earthquake, break glass.”
JUSTIN: Do you have all your furniture like nailed to the wall just in case?
GUS: No, no
JUSTIN: Just waiting for the Texas Earthquake?
GUS: I don’t think it’ll ever happen here. But everytime I travel to the west coast or when earthquake happens it’s like “Oh this is it. I can feel it!”
JUSTIN: Anticipating
GUS: But it has yet to happen.
JUSTIN: Nice
GUS: So how long have you personally been working in the game industry?
JUSTIN: I’ve been- It’s been about 6 years now April was 6 years
GUS: Um hm
JUSTIN: Yea in fact its been almost exactly on my 4 year anniversary that I started with Robot so I started at EA doing all the shooters at EA which were at the time Medal of Honor, and then I was there for a couple of years then I went to Microsoft.
GUS: I think a lot of our listeners you know are people who aspire to to join the video game industry and they wanna know how, how did you- if you don’t mind sharing. How did you get your start?
JUSTIN: Kinda accidentally, ironically. Ummm I’m a huge comic book nerd and I used to run a superman website called “bluetights.net”
GUS: I like the sound of that
JUSTIN: Yea it was a big superman site I ended up connecting to Warner Brothers and sorta becoming the official fan site for the “Superman Returns” film and while covering all that stuff EA invited me down to the Tiberon Studio where they were making the “Superman Returns” video game
GUS: And that’s in Orlando?
JUSTIN: In Orlando yea. So I went down there to cover the development of the game for my site there I met with their community- their online marketing manager at the time, uhh for that product a guy named John Long, ummm and he’s a huge superman nut too and so like the first night we went to Orlando we spent the entire night at like at a bar drinking and talking about Superman and then on the way back we got stuck at the airport for like 3 hours and I just talked to (((Zerof))) for literally 3
hours about community management and how I thought community management should run and the differences between video games and film and what not and that’s it I thought that was the end of the conversation then 2 days later he just called me up and said “hey Los Angeles needs a community manager for Medal of Honor are you interested?” And then I think about 3 weeks later I lived in LA and I was working in games. It was a very random whirlwind kinda thing
GUS: Aww that’s crazy
JUSTIN: But yea that’s a weird question “How do you get into the games industry? “ cause I’ve heard a hundred different ways.
GUS: That’s why I always ask.
JUSTIN: Yea
GUS: Is I- Is I feel that I’m-I’m lucky enough to kinda work in the industry as well so I get to ask and find out .
JUSTIN: Yea
GUS: Unlike other people you know who necessarily don’t get those experiences want to know.
JUSTIN: Well we’ve- I- I always bring it up in the conversation. Our design crew at Robot is like the most collective group of people. We have an ex-Navy Rescue Swimmer, an ex-Biologist, an ex-Lawyer, and an ex-Rockstar. Who are our designers. Like, they didn’t come from a game school, or anything like that, they just came from all these random walks of life and love games and ended up getting into Ensemble at the time and here they are now. So it’s like everybody- I get the question a lot like “What should I be doing to get into the game industries?” It’s like. . . . I have no idea.
GUS: Yea.
JUSTIN: There’s a hundred different ways so. . . .
GUS: Yeah a lot of times people you know they- I feel like a common thing is like they’ll start off as testers or apply into a contract position then work their way up. Uh but I like hearing the stories like- like the ones you have where you were passionate about something unrelated to the games industry, you kinda, somehow strangely, got looped in.
JUSTIN: Yea. I mean I’m like a hardcore community guy. I’ve been running community sites since as long as I can remember, so it was nice to come over to like the film side of the world, of the entertainment world. They’re not big on that kinda stuff but the video game side is huge on that. So it was nice to come into an entertainment kind of… uh- industry that was really embracing communities at the time so, it’s still on. So.
GUS: Yea that’s really cool. Umm so here while we’re
JUSTIN: *cough cough*
GUS: I’ll edit that out. So here at the show umm so you guys were right, you know, you were right up front near the door
JUSTIN: Yea.
GUS: Ummm you know next to the Halo 4 booth and there were other exhibitors behind you as well I don’t know if you got a chance to see any of them- Did you- Well did you get a chance to walk the floor?
JUSTIN: I did actually yea it was actually kinda nice it wasn’t the big uber show cause I could take a few minutes and go walk the floor and see everybody and say hi to everybody and check on all the other booths- I also got to see quite a bit of the show. In fact everything but the main stage in the back really I got to see.
GUS: What was the most interesting thing, you think, you saw, here at the show?
JUSTIN: Oh man… ummmm… Lets see
GUS: Well I don’t know-
JUSTIN: Well probably Ha- Outside of- outside of our own games, Probably Halo 4 stuff.
GUS: Um hm
JUSTIN: I didn’t want to play cause I I- I- wanna save myself for when its out I want to put it in and have my time with it, but I went over several times and watched it played, and it looks beautiful.
GUS: It looks awesome
JUSTIN: It looks amazing.
GUS: I don’t know if you saw but there was another booth pretty close to you guys I know right behind where you were was like um… umm.. uh was like a little aisle of booths so it was behind you then to the right. There was this other- there was this company that has this- they’re also from- they’re from your-
JUSTIN: You’re talking about Motis? Yea yea they had the zombie
GUS: Did you see there the set up they had was mobile?
JUSTIN: Yea they were rolling it around with that TV. It was crazy one of their guys was telling me about it they had to rent these special kind of cell batteries and a charger that would charge these massive batteries every 30 minutes or something and yea they had a massive like TV.
GUS: It was a 70 inch TV
JUSTIN: Yea it was vertically oriented on a little cart with wheels and every time it rolled by the both it was like “There’s no way this can go wrong.” And it worked out fine for em but it was like crazy and they had a zombie on there and whoever was doing the voice, it was skyped in and talking to people it was a pretty crazy setup
GUS: Yea.
JUSTIN: Yea I dunno it was interesting.
GUS: Yea yea I like seeing those kinda things you know when we- uhhh when we approach the show one of the things that was important to us was to find. . . ummm . . .people and exhibitors that would enter- I don’t wanna say entertain people, but that would give people the opportunity to get a like a hands on something.
JUSTIN: Yea
GUS: Like in your case you have games that aren’t out yet which is awesome and in that case it was a rolling zombie you can interact and talk with.
JUSTIN: Yea. Very strange technology.
GUS: Yea.
JUSTIN: But ummm You know you asked me what was cool that was one of- That was something- I didn’t know how much were leaning into the “internet meets gaming” thing but like freddy wong was walking around and the 501st guys were all- I love the costume guys by the way. So the 501st and the 405th guys were really cool, but yea it was like, seeing some of those kinda people walking around I was like woah this is not like- you usually don’t get that at a gaming only show it had the
cool internet culture going on as well I really like that about it.
GUS: Yea when I was ummm one of the setup days I think it was Friday I had to make a delivery we put all of our special guests at one hotel so I had to go deliver some of the stuff over there so I was delivering it dropping it off and I was coming back to the convention center and I was walking by registration and I overheard a woman checking in like “Oh I’m here to check in.” I was like “oh what’s your name?” She said Hannah Heart. I was like oh shit that’s Hannah Heart from “My Drunk Kitchen.”
JUSTIN: Yea that’s weird like it’s- it’s an interesting mashup you guys have of gaming and famous internet people. It’s- It’s cool.
GUS: Yea.
JUSTIN: We had that conversation at the both its like “There’s just people here who are just famous on the internet” and its like a thing that didn’t exist 10 years ago really. I mean you couldn’t have that kinda person but, I mean you guys were, you started it. I’m gonna blame you.
GUS: Well when we started you know Rooster Teeth is a little over 9 years old now, it was before YouTube existed
JUSTIN: Yea
GUS: So if we wanted to do something it was all these little islands everywhere we’d have to “Oh this video, I go to this website”
JUSTIN: Yea. Yea
GUS: “Go to that website” And now I feel like- you know a lot of it is really focused and channeled now over there which is good and bad but now there is one place to have um…. Almost like a repository for video. But I feel like that also takes away from community. Which is something you're big on.
JUSTIN: Yea yea
GUS: Cause you can’t really follow- foster, I feel anyways, can’t foster community on YouTube. You still need your own website and your own place to
JUSTIN: Yea
GUS: to do all that stuff
JUSTIN: Exactly. Yea and that- that’s going on the professional side of it that’s what I look at all the time is like “how much do we lean into developing our own forums and websites v.s. using what facebook has for example.
GUS: Um hm
JUSTIN: You know you can do a lot there it’s already built in but your community is there instead of with you you know it’s a- yea, I- I do navigate those as much as possible if you can roll your own then do it, you know. Keep them in the fold.
GUS: Right.
JUSTIN: But. . .
GUS: Yea we struggled for a long time as well you know with the same questions “Oh we have you know a lot of people who like us on facebook but we have our own community site you know like are we in comp-“ for a long time, I feel like we weren’t sure if we were in competition with facebook
JUSTIN: Yea exactly
GUS: or how we should leverage it you know to help us. And I think we’re getting a lot better about that you know we have a lot of people who are dedicated to community and dealing with those kind of issues before we didn’t
JUSTIN: Yea.
GUS: It’s really helped we’ve done a lot of growing in the past, uh couple of years. For a long time it was just 6 of us and now there’s, God almost 40 I think.
JUSTIN: I’ve been wondering how big you guys are now it’s 40?
GUS: Yea I think it’s
JUSTIN: Wow that’s about as big as Robot is I think we’re 49.
GUS: Oh wow. That’s crazy.
JUSTIN: You guys should start making games.
GUS: It’s funny we do a lot of work with games and we’re fans of games but I don’t think we could ever “make” a game.
JUSTIN: I dunno. Penny Arcade did it.
GUS: that’s true. I have- I have not played their new one yet.
JUSTIN: I haven’t either I haven’t had the chance.
GUS: Just cause there’s no Mac version yet. Yea I know-
JUSTIN: Well yea…
GUS: they’re gonna make one but uh… once it comes out I’m sure I’ll pick it up.
JUSTIN: Yea. I- I just like- that’s one of the things that’s been the weirdest is as soon as I started working on games, I just didn’t have time to play games anymore. I’ve played – and I’m almost embarrassed to admit this- I play less now than I think I’ve ever had.
GUS: Really?
JUSTIN: and most of it is actually on my phone and and my iPad because- I just have 5 minutes I just want to play something real quick. And I just play an Asynchronous game- Or- I’m just obsessed with Adventure Towns right now, so it’s like, anymore it’s that’s all I’m doing, and my iPad is a nice little,you know “I’m just gonna spend a quick little 30 minutes” and that’s it.
GUS: So- so that kinda brings up an interesting question, like how do you- what do you think is going to happen to games? Because it seems to me like, people are really pushing for mobile stuff like iPhone and asynchronous stuff seems to be really popular now.
JUSTIN: Yea.
GUS: Like do you think that that’s gonna eventually overtake like a traditional- what’s considered a gaming experience or does it cannibalize the mobile market as we know it now?
JUSTIN: I don’t think it’ll- I mean I don’t think it’ll overtake it there’s room for both, it’s just we gotta find out what works best where. You know I mean – I mean for my iPhone I’m- I’m a snob about a lot of I but there’s only really a handful of things on iPhone and iPad that I really like and I think really lean into the value of the experience and not just cheap- pull the port over
GUS: Um hm
JUSTIN: You know like, shameless plug, but Hero Academy is one of those things that was explicitly designed to be used on those types of devices originally, and it played to their strengths, but, I dunno I don’t- I don’t think it’ll cannibalize it personally. I- It’s- I always go back to film right? There’s romantic comedies, there’s action movies, there’s horror movies, and there’s a place for all of those out there, of varying qualities and everything they all have their market and I think games will find
that equilibrium and it’s just we’re on this crazy cycle right now of “lets all do social games, lets all do iOS games,” and and it’ll all level out I think.
GUS: I think uh- personally I think that uh mobile gaming systems like the DS
JUSTIN: Yea.
GUS: they have a lot more to lose.
JUSTIN: Yea I agree with you on that. Yea when I can do all of that, and make phone calls, and keep my calendars I don’t really – I don’t own one right now. I don’t own a video game device aside from my iPhone.
GUS: Yea.
JUSTIN: So
GUS: I had something interesting when the 3DS came out, the day it came out, I went and I bought one. I took it home, then I was “why did I buy that?” I didn’t even open it I took it back to the store to return it.
JUSTIN: Wow. Really?
GUS: Yea cause I was like “Wait wait a minute what was I looking forward to?”
JUSTIN: Yea.
GUS: Oh nevermind.
JUSTIN: Yea that’s been, I dunno it’s neat; I’ve played with it at shows and it’s- I’ve seen some interesting demos but I just haven’t gotten it I have to get it now. You know
GUS: I’m sure they’ll be a killer app or something that’ll come out for it.
JUSTIN: That’s what- maybe I’m in the- I need like 10 killer apps before I buy something you know? Like again, I know, shameful, but I don’t own a PS3, but like the Uncharted games makes me wanna own a PS3 and there are a couple things like that but I need like a library before I can really commit to it I’m not gonna do it for 3 or 6 games you know? So I dunno…
GUS: The “Uncharted” series is a great-
JUSTIN: Yea.
GUS: It’s a great series of games.
JUSTIN: I know a ton of people with PS3’s I’ve seen people beat it and everytime I see I’m like “I want to play so badly” but I just can’t- I’m not gonna buy a system for it. I dunno.
GUS: Yea yea
JUSTIN: I’m that guy
GUS: No I can totally understand it’s a big investment
JUSTIN: It- I mean yea well I mean and the times- I’ve heard a great article on Gamasutra this morning about um… somebody I don’t even remember who it was now, were writing about how, the gamers who started gaming early on the early systems are now grown up and they’re married with jobs and kids and they don’t have 40 hours to play Skyrim or something. Umm the whole article was about-
ummm a market that’s not being met for movie length games you know, a really good narrative experience in a game that’s 2 to 3 hours, but only costs $20 like a DVD
GUS: Interesting.
JUSTIN: And I’m – I’m a big proponent- I think that’s a brilliant idea I would do that I would buy a 3 hour solid- if it’s solid good gameplay all the way throughout 3 hours, I’d buy that for $20.
GUS: Yea.
JUSTIN: But umm. I’m that guy; I’m that target audience now. I love hanging out with my kids you know I got 2 little ones and I just don’t- I haven’t even started Skyrim yet because I know as soon as I’m in it it’s like, well, there are divorce papers on my desk.
GUS: Go feed yourself kids.
JUSTIN: Exactly. It’s like whatever you can reach on the shelf that’s what you’re eating for dinner.
GUS: Yea. I feel like there’s another side of that I read an article similar talking about gamers getting older and like the- the rise of father figures in games and how there are a lot of games now that foster or that feature main characters with children and a lot of it is about predicting you know “The Last of us.”
JUSTIN: That looks fantastic.
GUS: Yea it’s kinda along those lines you know even to a lesser extent you can say Bioshock or Bioshock 2 the Big Daddies and the Little Sisters and stuff.
JUSTIN: Yea absolutely. And now that I’m a dad stuff I gravitate towards that stuff I find that more interesting you know but. . . I’m biased against you know. . .
GUS: It’s interesting to see the industry and games in general follow that curve of the- that as their fanbase ages you know to those kinds of things.
JUSTIN: and the guys that make them like, its interesting to me now to see- we’re getting now to the point where- somebody said it last year, we’re-we’re- for the first time we’re a viable 2nd generation of game developers. Like the people who were making games in the 80’s can have kids getting into game development now and this it the first time this has ever happened. That this industry has the next generation of developers and I think that’s interesting, that it’s gonna, as we get to 2 and 3
generations it’s gonna start changing how games are put together.
GUS: It’s truly next-gen.
JUSTIN: Yes it truly is. Yes.
GUS: Umm so what- what’s the next show Robot is gonna be at?
JUSTIN: This is it. This is our last big one of the year.
GUS: Nice.
JUSTIN: Yea.
GUS: Did you hear that everyone? Last big one.
JUSTIN: Yea we did PAX East and this one and that’s all we were doing. Ummm in fact that’s a big reason we wanted to come here your timing was great with the show it was right before we got our 2 games coming out and so we wanted to to get out one last time and and talk with actual gamers before we got the stuff out and now it’s just shift the games and support them through launch and
we’re looking for ideas for DLC for Orcs Must Die 2 and gonna start working on that stuff as we wrap up the game. So the rest of the year is just supporting our products.
GUS: Nice so um uh I know you haven’t made any further announcements you all have more stuff down the road in the horizon.
JUSTIN: We’re talking about stuff yea.
GUS: Good
JUSTIN: Yea we- we’re very busy down there.
GUS: Good that’s awesome to hear. Umm and you don’t have to answer if you can’t but uhh how much- I know you already mentioned Hero Academy which you’ve already mentioned is coming onto Steam in a couple of weeks, how are you all looking at many more teams down the road as time goes on?
JUSTIN: We’re gonna get Steam out then we’re gonna take a look at that. The teams have been really good on iOS uh we just announced there’s a Chinese version being developed of Hero Academy strictly for the Chinese market that they’re gonna be on their own servers and everything, and the partner we’re working with have developed a kung-fu based team just for that market and we had a
lot of people asking to bring that over to the western version, so we’re looking at those kinda things figuring out the next right move for Hero Academy without overwhelming people with too many teams cause it is if your new now you go in and there’s 4 teams there then there’ll be 5 in a few more weeks, um we just want to make sure we’re finding the right balance with it that we’re not overwhelming people with stuff and we do have a lot of hardcore players who made a lot of feature
requests in the past months while we’ve been developing the PC and we want to get to some of those requests and stuff so, we’re in a cycle now of, finish up PC and take a big picture look at what we’re gonna do with Hero Academy.
GUS: Yea I never thought about it. Approaching it again as a new player I think when I started player I remember it was just the Council and the Dark Elves.
JUSTIN: Yea, right at the beginning
GUS: So… Yea so it’s a lot- When you’re like that after- once you’ve been playing a game and you're used to 2 teams and anytime a new team comes out-
JUSTIN: Yea.
GUS: It’s not as much as a learning curve.
JUSTIN: Yea exactly.
GUS: But jumping from new and (((???))), a ton of teams might seem too intimidating.
JUSTIN: I- I- I mean it’s nice in that you have some options and we just added the- the single player challenges in so if you don’t own a team you can now play with them and learn some of their mechanics which is really helpful but now a new player to the game now can come in and get the free Council team, and originally you buy the Dark Elves cause that was the only other team but now it can be I got the free council team and I only bought the Tribe or the Dwarves so the mix-ups get a lot more interesting now or if they buy the Steam version they’ll just have Council and TF2, so like I said we’re taking a look at all the numbers of how people are playing and how many people are playing so we’re just gonna figure out where to go from there.
GUS: Yea so the teams right now as they exist it’s uh Council, Dark Elves, ummm Dwarves, The Tribe-
JUSTIN: And TF2
GUS: And TF2 will be coming out. That’s a good mix.
JUSTIN: Yea it really is. Especially once, you know, when they start mixing up like any one team has different strategies against whoever you’re playing you know I’ve played Dark Elves differently when I’m playing against the Council versus The Tribes. As well as the Dwarves.
GUS: What’s your favorite team?
JUSTIN: Uhh that’s rough. Right now I think it’s the Tribe.
GUS: Um hm.
JUSTIN: Because they’ve been out for a while and they work really really well together, like if you combine units together they’re good in little teams, and most people haven’t realized that yet. Despite how long its been out a lot of casual players haven’t realized it yet. So I like to go in with the tribe and do crazy moves and scare people. Frankly.
GUS: I think they’re probably my favorite as well right now.
JUSTIN: They’re fun. They’re a lot of fun. But then TF2 is coming. They- They’re amazing.
GUS: God I can’t wait to see that.
JUSTIN: Yea it’s cool that- it’s like the team that’s had 5 units a piece, and the TF2 team has everyone. It has all nine units so it’s been a really interesting balance task and figuring out how each- each different type of unit can bring something to the table that’s different than the previous teams but also doesn’t completely screw the balance up.
GUS: So when you’re dealing with 9 characters versus 5 is there more overlap between roles?
JUSTIN: ummm
GUS: Or is there more utility amongst them?
JUSTIN: The- There’s a little bit of overlap. We haven’t talked to much in detail what the units do yet but they they take a little bit of elements from multiple teams then we’ve about things the weapon upgrades a little differently with the TF2 teams so we’ve been able to do some really interesting stuff that keeps all the characters true to like who they are in TF2, but they play like Hero Academy characters still.
GUS: That’s going to be interesting trying to bring- like these are characters that people are really familiar with since TF2 has such a large passionate community so you got to- have to approach it very carefully to stay respectful to the characters and what people expect from TF2 even though it’s not a TF2 game it’s the characters they know and love-
JUSTIN: And that’s was- we had that conversation over and over during tests, like “I know I expect that the engineer can do this” or “I expect that the sniper can shoot across the map.” Like that’s my expectation, he’s a sniper. And so we got a ton of TF2 fans in the studio already so there was a lot of familiarity there to just pound out those conversations like “What’s it gonna take to make this character feel like he’s doing exactly what you expect him to do”, and I think we got it there.
GUS: That’s good. And the great thing about the internet is you’ll hear instant feedback
JUSTIN: Yes! In an instant it's remarkable how fast feedback comes now.
GUS: God well now I’m really looking forward to that. Uhh I don’t wanna go too long I know you’ve got to- to get out of here and head back up to- to the Dallas area. So I wanna thank you for coming and sitting down with me
JUSTIN: Thank you for having me.
GUS: And I want to remind everyone we’ve talked in the podcast before, if you’re not playing, you’ve got to check out Hero Academy.
JUSTIN: Yea.
GUS: You got to check out Orcs Must Die 2, they’re coming out really soon. And uh thanks for listening thanks for coming out Justin. Oh and if people want to find you on the internet do you have like a twitter handle or anything you want to plug?
JUSTIN: Uhh yea you can find me I’m just six okay, all spelled out “sixokay,” um but RobotEnt for Robot Entertainment, and then our games Orcs Must Die and Hero Academy are both on twitter as well.
GUS: Great. Well thanks so much for coming out man.
JUSTIN: Thank you.
MILES: No.
BURNIE: No, what the fuck.
JOEL: Like with the machine?
BURNIE: What are you watching?
LINDSAY: McDonald’s tapes?
MILES: Is this a new- is this a new Time Warner commercial? What the fuck is this?
BURNIE: Yeaahahaha.
JOEL: In the new time where they were-
BURNIE: This is Babe 3.
MILES: Hoho.
BURNIE: It was only-
MILES: That joke made me sad.
LINDSAY: Pi-Pig in the Chitties.
BURNIE: Only released in Russia.
JOEL: how are we gonna get that e- get a bottle opener?
BURNIE: So d- so Gav comes back, so next time today, so next podcast I will talk to him. He was legitimately mad at me for like 2 hours.
GUS: I-I would be mad too.
JOEL: I like- I like how you were like- add the word legitimate like it was- it’s not legitimate.
BURNIE: Have you ever seen, y’know, Gavin mad ever?
LINDSAY: It’s true, Gavin’s not very angry.
GUS: I kicked him in the butthole and he wasn’t mad.
LINDSAY: He gets fake angry, he does the frown where he’s like Huuuhhhmmm.
MILES: Gavin’s like, “Oh y’doughnut!” Then he walks off, like that’s Gavin being mad to me.
LINDSAY: Yeah.
GUS: No show-
LINDSAY: Oh wanker!
GUS: No shower will ever clean your dick again after that. I-I don’t care what you do.
BURNIE: It was bad.
JOEL: I mean - Now, Gav has an STD-
LINDSAY: Dude.
BURNIE: No.
JOEL: - and he can’t even get to have-
LINDSAY: Cheese!
BURNIE: Y’know-
JOEL: -fun.
BURNIE: It was fun. It was fun though.
JOEL: I mean if you’re gonna get an STD, at least have fun getting it, like-
MILES: Oh god.
JOEL: - delay, that’s not…
LINDSAY: Can one have fun getting an STD?
JOEL: he did not have-
BURNIE: I don’t even know.
LINDSAY: I can’t- does this happen?
JOEL: You don’t want Burnie to give ‘em to ya.
BURNIE: Next thing you know your arms are numb.
JOEL: Oooohhhhh.
LINDSAY: NO, GOD.
GUS: F-
BURNIE: When I was in Japan, they had- es-especially in the airport, we didn’t talk about this, they had all of the different kinds of toilets. So they had the Japanese toilet with the sprayers which looks like a normal American toilet.
LINDSAY: Normal toilet.
GUS: Right.
BURNIE: With extra stuff added on. Then they had the foot things with just the hole in the ground.
GUS: Yup.
MILES: What the fuck.
BURNIE: Then they had the racecar toilet? I-
MILES: What the fuck?
BURNIE: -don’t know how to describe it? The Japanese toilet which is like the normal one-
LINDSAY: I thought you sit in the car…?
BURNIE: You sit on like a motorcycle?
GUS: Oh yeah that one. Yeah yeah I know that one.
BURNIE: you know that one too?
LINDSAY: Cool!
BURNIE: So in the bathroom you get to pick which kind of toilet you want to use. In the airport I never saw-
MILES: Choose wisely.
BURNIE: -that anywhere else.
GUS: Th-There’s-
JOEL: You never saw them anywhere else?
BURNIE: oh we went to the restroom like in the hotel, they just had the normal western toilet.
GUS: Yeah.
BURNIE: They didn’t have the racecar toilet.
GUS: I-I don’t-
MILES: God ??
LINDSAY: Classic Western.
GUS: I don’t know if you encountered this, but uhmmmmm… I went to this one restaurant when I was there in Japan where you go to the bathroom, and the c- like where you wash your hands, the sink?
MILES: Mmhmm.
GUS: That’s communal, men and women. And the stalls are all- like they’re individual-
LINDSAY: Gender separate.
GUS: -toilets.
BURNIE: Huh.
GUS: No they’re not gender separated.
LINDSAY: Oh no.
GUS: So men and women go to the same bathroom but stalls are like, floor to ceiling wall-
LINDSAY: That’s weird. That’s a-
GUS: -With a big closing door, so it doesn’t matter, everyone goes to the same bathroom, but you have your own little private toilet space.
LINDSAY: Huh.
BURNIE: That’s actually totally legal in the US too.
LINDSAY: Yeah.
BURNIE: That doesn’t violate any codes.
GUS: D- I- I had no problem with it. But, you never see that.
BURNIE: No.
MILES: I’ve also never seen a race car toilet.
BURNIE: Alright, I gotta show you this.
GUS: Yeah show it quick ‘cause we-we’re going long.
BURNIE: Oh really? This is gonna be where we stop?
LINDSAY: A bit loonng and strong.
BURNIE: We g- we got Lindsay right here.
LINDSAY: Hey.
BURNIE: Lindsay, do we have to stop?
LINDSAY: Never stop.
GUS: We have a segment at the end of this podcast-
LINDSAY: Can’t stop.
GUS: -I haven’t told you yet.
BURNIE: Oh right! Japanese motorcycle toilet, I don’t know w-
MILES: WHAT?
GUS: After RTX I interviewed uh Justin from Robot Entertainment.
LINDSAY: Well!
JOEL: That’s cool.
GUS: and s-so that’s-that’s coming up after this podcast.
JOEL: S-what’s –we’re supposed to stop?
GUS: Yeah we’re almost dying here from c-
LINDSAY: I love Robots.
MILES: I love where you were going.
BURNIE: So this section is the motorcycle toilet, so…
GUS: I do love your Kerry.
BURNIE: I was gonna say something else.
MILES: You and Kerry are always on the phone t-
JOEL: W-W-Wait wait… You look up motorcycle toilet, and you actually found a motorcycle
toilet?
BURNIE: A motorcycle toilet, I did. I did-
JOEL: And he ended up f- There's a page of motorcycle toilets?
BURNIE: It looks like that.
GUS: Mmhmm.
BURNIE: And you just sit on it. You put your legs on either side and you just sit down on it.
MILES: I’m gonna be honest I’m disappointed, I was expecting an actual motorcycle.
BURNIE: But you’re s- you’re sitting on a motorcycle like, you’re like this a-
MILES: No.
BURNIE: -it’s got handles.
MILES: No, it’s better in my head.
BURNIE: I can show you a picture of a motorcycle toilet. I have the goddamn internet, you want a picture of a motorcycle toilet? I’ll show you a picture of one.
GUS: He w- he went to Japan, he can get a woman dressed like a motorcycle and it would be a toilet.
LINDSAY: On the toilet!
MILES: Awhhh ewww.
JOEL: Wh-what do you take when you’re in Japan?
MILES: That’s creepy.
BURNIE: That’s the other version of it right there.
MILES: Okay.
GUS: I feel like I-I saw those all the time, at uh train stations, is where I would always see those. Did y’all take the subway much?
BURNIE: We took the train from the airport into Tokyo which is like a two hour endeavor.
GUS: Yeah I told y’all, I told y’all it was long.
BURNIE: You did. You did.
GUS: I said make sure you take the Bullet Train. It’s gonna take a long time.
BURNIE: It sucks. Yeah.
GUS: Yeah b-because well I… When I went I had like no idea, I thought like oh yeah, it’s just like an airport, like thirty minutes? MmMmm.
BURNIE: MmMmm. Half your day.
GUS: Hate that fucking train.
BURNIE: Essentially ‘cause you, y’know, you have to navigate everything…
JOEL: S-So you did take the bullet train or you did not.
BURNIE: We did take the train. But also it takes longer to get on a train ‘cause it’s that feeling of I’m committing when you get on a train? It’s like if we get on the wrong one… we’re in China somehow.
LINDSAY: Yeah. Same with Europe. They take Bullet Trains everywhere.
GUS: You took the train from the airport to Shinjuku then, you were staying there. That’s like the biggest train station they have there.
MILES: That’s cool.
BURNIE: That is correct.
GUS: That place is fucking massive.
BURNIE: Pretty nuts.
GUS: Yeah.
BURNIE: Yeah.
GUS: There’s so many people there. I walked out of there one time like during rush hour, and there was like a mass of people- I’m sure you encountered that once just like-
BURNIE: Gav has footage of it we can give you. Yeah.
LINDSAY: Yes please.
JOEL: So…
GUS: You can’t move. There’s so many people.
JOEL: See w-w-you’re at the train station, you took the train, arrived in Tokyo, went to the hotel?
BURNIE: No, we got off the train at the train station but had to take a cab from the train station to the hotel.
JOEL: Jeez, okay, how long was that.
BURNIE: That was like another fifteen minutes.
JOEL: No one spoke English?
BURNIE: No, we did okay we were really okay.
JOEL: Was there ac-
BURNIE: Actually I shouldn’t s-
JOEL: Did they try and speak English?
BURNIE: -I-I shouldn’t say they spoke English. Everyone we ran into spoke English. They were extraordinarily helpful.
JOEL: Everyone spoke English?
BURNIE: It was a little disappointing, Joel to be honest with you, ‘cause I wanted to be stuck not knowing a word of Japanese, but everyone was like, “I’ll help you out, hey what’s goin’ on.”
LINDSAY: Yeah. I just know stuff from anime.
BURNIE: You go, “Do you speak English?” and they go,” A little, a little.” And then you’d say-
JOEL: And then they spoke a lot.
BURNIE: Yeah, and they were fine.
JOEL: And then you just like-
MILES: That’s incredible.
BURNIE: Yeah we went to uhhh we kind of toured around Shinjuku-
JOEL: Uh-huh.
BURNIE: -Which is this big like commercial district. Uh we were only there 36 hours, and we stayed at the hotel where they filmed Lost in Translation?
MILES: Oh!
BURNIE: So that was pretty cool.
LINDSAY: Yay.
MILES: I was thinkin’ about that one, while you were telling the story.
BURNIE: Yeah, and it’s weird because the level of service in that hotel was unlike anything I
could imagine.
MILES: Wow. Really?
BURNIE: For- the front desk clerk- there was a front desk, you just, you just sat down at a table? Gavin said it was like we were buying property together, because we sat beside the signs and stuff, and then he got up and said okay let’s show you your room, and he walked us to our room.
MILES: Ohhhh.
LINDSAY: Wow. That’s cool.
MILES: That’s so cool.
BURNIE: And then- and then if you were walking down the hallway and ran into housekeeping, they would stop and bow, and not move until you were out of the hallway.
MILES: That’s weird man.
BURNIE: It did. Every American was like please, please, just don’t pay so much attention to me.
MILES: Yeah.
BURNIE: Y’know? Like I was at the gym-
JOEL: Di-Did you feel like you guys stuck out?
BURNIE: I- maybe, I mean, but I didn’t feel weird at all at any point and time. Well it might have been Gavin with the camera and he was filming the uh intersection with all the pedestrians?
GUS: Uh-huh.
BURNIE: I felt like we were in people’s way, and I felt that was the only time I felt like Ohh we’re tourists. But we were just-
GUS: Wow.
BURNIE: -we were just havin’ fun. Gavin is… Gavin is a great guy to travel with ‘cause he doesn’t care.
JOEL: Yeah.
LINDSAY: He’ll deal with them.
BURNIE: He’ll do whatever, he does not give a shit. You’re thing is- Honestly Joel, you’re a little harder to travel with ‘cause you’re very rigid…?
JOEL: High maintenance.
BURNIE: Ye- And like, when you- when you get your itinerary, that’s it, like Gus was telling the story about how, he went to Amsterdam-
JOEL: Well it’s because I’m scarred from bathroom stories.
BURNIE: I don’t blame you.
JOEL: With you.
BURNIE: I don’t blame you.
LINDSAY: All the shower stories.
JOEL: See now Gavin’s- hey Gavin’s gonna be like why. Burnie.
BURNIE: Yeah I noticed that’s a trend now, I have a history now of-
JOEL: In the bathroom.
BURNIE: -like ambushing people in the bathroom. That’s not a good reputation to have.
JOEL: it makes people feel vulnerable.
MILES: You’re the BBQ and bathroom ambush guy, Burnie.
BURNIE: But we went to New Zealand uh w- Gu- Joel stayed in Auckland while we had some fun adventures in New Zealand. He was like,” I’m- I’m happy here I’m doing my thing-“
GUS: Yeah.
MILES: Yeah, y- you’re very much on your own.
JOEL: Well there was gambling there, and it was a city, and it had people in it and… You guys wanted to go look at cows or whatever.
BURNIE: We did.
JOEL: We have cows in the United States.
BURNIE: We did, we did stay at a pony farm at one point.
JOEL: So. Well.
LINDSAY: It’s an Australian pony farm. It’s different.
BURNIE: So, she’s engaged.
GUS: Are you?!
BURNIE: Look show- show the hand.
LINDSAY: I am not engaged.
BURNIE: Look!
GUS: Then why are you wearing a fucking engagement ring on that finger!
LINDSAY: Talk to the man next door.
JOEL: Yeah, why are you… These rules and rings are-
GUS: That’s what I said!
JOEL: a lot of rules and rings.
BURNIE: So what’s the promise ring?
LINDSAY: Uhh, well, I mean this is-
GUS: IS that what that is?
LINDSAY: Yeah, essentially this is just kind of a gift I was given, uhh after we decided to start dating, that was like hey, I really care about you-
BURNIE: You just watch her she smiles from ear to ear every time she talks about it too.
LINDSAY: I’m sorry.
BURNIE: Get a picture of that. She’s like nothing but grins.
LINDSAY: Sorry.
BURNIE: And blushing.
LINDSAY: But yeah, just kind of…
BURNIE: Well it’s a very beautiful ring.
LINDSAY: It was like ‘sup bitch I like you, and I was like yo bitch I like you too. And here we are.
MILES: Bitch dumpster.
BURNIE: I feel like that’s exactly how it went. That’s the script.
JOEL: I’ve never- I’ve never had a situation in my life where I have a conversation with a g- with a female, and then she smiles at the end of it.
BURNIE: Was she she-
LINDSAY: And then she says bitch I love you.
BURNIE: -she likes you too.
JOEL: It’s kind of weird.
GUS: Alright, well let’s wrap this up.
BURNIE: So we’re doing an interview with Justin…
GUS: Yes.
BURNIE: …from R-Robot-
GUS: Robot. Yes.
MILES: Robot.
BURNIE: Which seems okay. Right? And then we’re doing, also next week we’re doing… wanna tease what we’re doing next week?
GUS: I’ll just say we’re doing another interview-
LINDSAY: Don’t tease us, Gus.
GUS: -next week.
BURNIE: From the developer of a game we’ve been talking about that came out lately that we like a lot.
GUS: Yes.
BURNIE: And then we play.
MILES: [creepy voice] Jeez, that’s cool, that sounds really neat, I wonder what that is.
GUS: You with the voice.
BURNIE: Yeah that was Miles by the way.
MILES: Don’t judge me.
LINDSAY: Miles could give us any guest in the rec- in anything.
GUS: So ending this portion of the podcast, but keep listening but there is more podcast.
BURNIE: Where are we gonna go to eat. Dell.
GUS: We have some…
LINDSAY: Rudi’s.
GUS: … barbecue…
BURNIE: Hey give me a good restaurant to go to in Austin, like a good going out at night to eat at a restaurant-
GUS: You know where I ate the other day at RTX? I ate in the restaurant at the lobby of the W.
BURNIE: Okay.
GUS: And they have a Rib eye there where they tell you for two people but one person can eat. I’m thinking about that right now. And when you’re done, they have this thing called drunken doughnuts? Which is d-d-
LINDSAY: Awesome.
GUS: -doughnuts served with like liquor toppings?
BURNIE: Yes.
LINDSAY: Holy shit.
BURNIE: Like melted caramel with liquor, and melted chocolate with lace.
MILES: Go on.
GUS: Like eat- you’ll eat a steak for 2, and then eat drunken doughnuts. At the W.
BURNIE: I’m currently in the midst of trying to get permission to air this? But I actually bet Grace from Daily Grace and Hannah from My Drunk Kitchen that they wouldn’t just shoot those-
GUS: Awhh.
BURNIE: They gave us- we were there, like really late one night and they jus- the bartenders just gave us drunken doughnuts?
MILES: Uh-huh.
BURNIE: And I had them do a shot of the-
GUS: Uh-huh.
BURNIE: -dessert dips.
LINDSAY: Euuughhhh.
BURNIE: And they’re pretty big.
MILES: Eeeeeewwhhhh.
LINDSAY: That sounds gross.
BURNIE: And it’s a pretty goddamn funny video.
LINDSAY: Eughh that sounds disgusting.
BURNIE: It was like, “Hundred bucks? I’m in”, and they’re funny as shit, so…
GUS: Yes.
BURNIE: Hopefully I get permission to show that video.
GUS: Alright.
MILES: So wanna get fat and drunk?
GUS: Yes let’s do it.
LINDSAY: Yes please.
GUS: Well thanks for listening, but keep listening.
[Start interview]
GUS: Hey everyone, we have a special segment now, uhh I have Justin here from Robot
Entertainment. We just finished wrapping up RTX 2012, and Robot was kind enough to come down and be part of the show on the floor, and uhh we know- being such a big fan of uhh the games you guys put out, I thought- I gotta grab you before you leave town. Get you on here so we can chat a bit about- about the show and how it went for you.
JUSTIN: It was awesome. I gotta say this is our first RTX- Well you’ve only done 2 but this is the first time we came down here and uh it’s nice to have a local show, we got to drive down and, the show itself was a lot of fun.
GUS: So um you you guys were here, uh you’re from Dallas right?
JUSTIN: Yea. We’re-
GUS: You’re based out of Dallas right?
JUSTIN: North Dallas yea
GUS: So you drove down. Not too bad of a drive. So um this is the first year- this is the first time we’ve had RTX, you know, in the Austin Convention Center.
JUSTIN: Um Hm
GUS: So um what was your experience? How was the flow for you guys and uh interacting with the people here?
JUSTIN: I really liked it. We weren’t sure what to expect, you know we’ve gone to other conventions we kinda know what we’re getting coming here it’s like well let’s go see what this- what this is like. The community here was actually really awesome. We had a lot of people. Well you know because of Rooster Teeth’s community is largely born out of Halo we were really little, we were showing PC and iOS stuff so we were like “Well, are console people going to react negatively?” And surprisingly
everyone was really stoaked to play on PC, and they were bringing Hero Academy of Steam we had that playable here for the first time and um, people were like, gushing over “I can’t believe it’s coming to Steam! This is great!” So it was a really warm reception here I mean it was- it was nice to interact with everybody .
GUS: Yea I guess we should tell everybody what games you make and what-
JUSTIN: Yea
GUS: games you’re showing off. So Robot they uh, of course Orcs Must Die, Hero Academy , and Orcs Must Die 2, which is coming out in a few weeks right?
JUSTIN: Yea. 3 weeks from today in fact, July 30th.
GUS: Wow that’s crazy. Ummm so uh Hero Academy you said is coming to Steam so it’s uh um I play Hero Academy like fucking crazy on my iPhone all the time. So when it’s moving to Steam is it, I haven’t had a chance to check it out yet, is it going to be, like, I guess you use the mouse to click and indicate where you want your-
JUSTIN: Yea. You select your guys and move em’ the way you would a little, if it was a board game or something on- on- on the PC. Yea it works pretty much exactly the same we’ve done some UI changes but in fact it’s cross platform playable so the game is completely the same you can take your matches wherever you go.
GUS: So when you say its cross platform does it mean you can play on the PC you can play against iOS players-
JUSTIN: Yea. Yea.
GUS: And vice-versa?
JUSTIN: Yea it’s one giant community of players. So you got your Hero Academy Account you sign in with either on your phone, iPad, or on Steam and um- um- yea. If you don’t have an iOS device you can now play everybody over there or if you have you both you can play some matches on your lunch on your PC then pick up your iPhone when you get home and keep going, so. . . .
GUS: That’s awesome. I think everyone I play with is probably, I play with a lot of other guys at the office and I think they’re all really pissed off at me because I’ve been so busy with RTX planning and stuff I don’t think I’ve submitted a turn in that game in over a week.
JUSTIN: Yea I’m the same way, I’ve got a mountain of games piled up I think my notifications says 33 games waiting for my attention. So, I’ve got to get back to it as soon as I’m back in the office.
GUS: Yea I had to turn the notifications off so I wouldn’t feel guilty about it. And it’s only until I load the game is when I’m like, “Oh there’s so many waiting-
JUSTIN: Yea I can’t do it I have to have them when I check my phone I need to know who's sending their turns back to me it’s like, I know I’m biased but I’m completely addicted to it so I’ve played every day since it came out .
GUS: It’s a fun game. And I like that- uh- that it’s the kinda game you can play without having to spend any money if you don’t want.
JUSTIN: Yea.
GUS: And if you want to have different teams with different abilities you can play and typically I feel I like supporting those types of games, and I uh. . . I think I’ve bought- I know I’ve bought every team that has come out for it.
JUSTIN: Yea, thank you.
GUS: I uh uh paid for some color customizations and Avatars like the kinda thing “Oh yea it’s only 99 cents yea sure why not I’ll get that.
JUSTIN: Yea I mean it’s- you can play for free yea the- the iOS version anyways is a free App it has ads but it comes with a team that we really work hard to balance out with the rest of the teams so it’s not like a a paid team you're gonna in automatically
GUS: Right.
JUSTIN: You can play for free. Forever on iOS if you want, the Steam one is a paid for download because we don’t have ads in there.
GUS: Right.
JUSTIN: So- but yea, a huge chunk- a massive chunk of our player base plays the free version and remains competitive.
GUS: Yea uh the council is the free team yea they have uh-
JUSTIN: human fantasy characters basically.
GUS: They uh I- I- I hate- I get pissed off every time I play them because one of their abilities is that the health potions heal them much more than other teams.
JUSTIN: Yea.
GUS: And I believe you can also use health potions on downed characters.
JUSTIN: Yea, revive them.
GUS: And you cannot do that as any of the other teams.
JUSTIN: That’s their- Well each team has like “their thing” and the council’s is the healing and the- yea it’s when you play other teams you play against the council you have to factor that in, because they can revive from quite a bit of distance.
GUS: Right even if the-Even if the healer is on the field they drop a potion and it’s like “Ah I forgot about that, dammit”
JUSTIN: Yea, that’s saved me many times in many many battles, so, I’m grateful for it.
GUS: Yea I feel like when a new team comes out I’ll play that team exclusively like a ton just to learn them inside and out and then once I know I just go back to random and just cycle through whatever team I get.
JUSTIN: Yea I play random all the time but I get the luxury of playing the teams before they come out to get used to them so-
GUS: Um hm
JUSTIN: Yea. Now it’s um we got 4 teams out and the Steam version is going to have the Team Fortress 2 team, exclusive to that. So it’s all 9 Team Fortress 2 characters as a playable team in the game and once you’ve unlocked it on Steam you can play it on your iOS device.
GUS: Ahhh . . . dammit.
JUSTIN: They’re a lot of fun.
GUS: Alright well I guess I’ll be picking that up. Ummm so in addition to Hero Academy you’re also showing off Orcs Must Die 2 as well, right?
JUSTIN: Yes.
GUS: When- Is that also coming out here pretty quick?
JUSTIN: Yea yea Well Steam Hero Academy is coming August 8th and Orcs Must Die 2 is July 30th. They’re a week apart.
GUS: So is that killer that you have like a like a huge team working on this stuff or are there a bunch of guys freaking out?
JUSTIN: Surprisingly dull. I mean our development team, the Orcs 2 team is about the size of the first game and the Hero Academy team is 5 or 6 guys.
GUS: Wow
JUSTIN: Yea I mean It- It’s a little surprising to me, I’m- a lot of these guys work together on ensemble so they’ve worked with each other for years I’m new to the mix and coming in it’s surprising to me how much they can get done and how quickly.
GUS: Um hm. So yea a lot of- it’s interesting you mentioned that a lot of the Robot Team started originally from um um I don’t know how-
JUSTIN: The closure of the Ensemble Team.
GUS: from the old Ensemble Team. Yea Once Ensemble was closed they moved on and made this so how long have you been with Robot now?
JUSTIN: 2 years now.
GUS: 2 years? Wow.
JUSTIN: I came in about a year after they opened.
GUS: Where did you come from?
JUSTIN: Most recently before that I was at Microsoft. Uhh I was up there doing community on Gears of War for a while, then on Halo, on the Halo Waypoint stuff and then, came down- and that’s how I met you guys. Was on Halo Waypoint. And now I’m down in Texas being very hot and running from tornadoes.
GUS: So uh- yea you all had bad tornadoes recently don’t you?
JUSTIN: Yea every- It’s every April. That I’ve been here, 3 years in a row now- 3 Aprils in a row now, I’ve been terrified by tornadoes that come through. Its horrible.
GUS: I don’t wanna get into-
JUSTIN: Oh sorry!
GUS: I’m not going to go into a huge tangent- a huge weather discussion on the podcast. It’s weird to me how there are always tornadoes north of Austin and in the Hill country, and especially in the Dallas area, but there are never tornadoes in Austin itself.
JUSTIN: You’re lucky
GUS: There are tornadoes in the suburbs to the north uh there’s a suburb called Cedar Park which is probably 8 or 9 miles from downtown Austin and they’ll get tornados but never here.
JUSTIN: Never in Austin. Well we’re lucky we’re all North of the city in Dallas and it all starts South and comes up, then dissipates over the city. We’ve lucked out everytime but its its every time I see the big red path on the TV it goes over the Studio and my house, and I’m like please stop please stop please stop.
GUS: At least it doesn’t get to the black or purple color.
JUSTIN: Yea
GUS: It’s like whenever I see it I’m like, “Oh shit.”
JUSTIN: Yea it’s- it’s a new experience for someone in California to have to worry about tornadoes. But….
GUS: Ummm, long- Frequent listeners of the Podcast will know I’m obsessed with earthquakes and I’ve never been in one I wanted to feel one- not a major one
JUSTIN: Yea
GUS: not talking like I want to be in a huge one but I wanna feel a smaller one would you- did you ever sit through any earthquakes?
JUSTIN: I mean yea- yea- I lived in the Central Valley, so the big ones were all over on the coast and we didn’t get a ton of them but like, when the big one in San Francisco hit we felt that and I was 3 and a half hours from San Francisco where it was and we felt it I mean, every- it was probably a couple times a year you get little ones through there. You Shake a little bit.
GUS: Someone- umm someone made an earthquake survival kit for me it’s in my office we- I wish we could have- we’re recording at the Convention Center since we just wrapped the show I wish we were at the studio so I can show you. Someone made me an “Earthquake Survival Kit™”that hangs on my wall.
JUSTIN: Wow.
GUS: And it gots little uhhhh individual bottles of Jack Daniels and little party stoppers.
JUSTIN: Nice..
GUS: To celebrate it
JUSTIN: To celebrate it. That’s awesome.
GUS: It’s in a glass case and it says “In case of Earthquake, break glass.”
JUSTIN: Do you have all your furniture like nailed to the wall just in case?
GUS: No, no
JUSTIN: Just waiting for the Texas Earthquake?
GUS: I don’t think it’ll ever happen here. But everytime I travel to the west coast or when earthquake happens it’s like “Oh this is it. I can feel it!”
JUSTIN: Anticipating
GUS: But it has yet to happen.
JUSTIN: Nice
GUS: So how long have you personally been working in the game industry?
JUSTIN: I’ve been- It’s been about 6 years now April was 6 years
GUS: Um hm
JUSTIN: Yea in fact its been almost exactly on my 4 year anniversary that I started with Robot so I started at EA doing all the shooters at EA which were at the time Medal of Honor, and then I was there for a couple of years then I went to Microsoft.
GUS: I think a lot of our listeners you know are people who aspire to to join the video game industry and they wanna know how, how did you- if you don’t mind sharing. How did you get your start?
JUSTIN: Kinda accidentally, ironically. Ummm I’m a huge comic book nerd and I used to run a superman website called “bluetights.net”
GUS: I like the sound of that
JUSTIN: Yea it was a big superman site I ended up connecting to Warner Brothers and sorta becoming the official fan site for the “Superman Returns” film and while covering all that stuff EA invited me down to the Tiberon Studio where they were making the “Superman Returns” video game
GUS: And that’s in Orlando?
JUSTIN: In Orlando yea. So I went down there to cover the development of the game for my site there I met with their community- their online marketing manager at the time, uhh for that product a guy named John Long, ummm and he’s a huge superman nut too and so like the first night we went to Orlando we spent the entire night at like at a bar drinking and talking about Superman and then on the way back we got stuck at the airport for like 3 hours and I just talked to (((Zerof))) for literally 3
hours about community management and how I thought community management should run and the differences between video games and film and what not and that’s it I thought that was the end of the conversation then 2 days later he just called me up and said “hey Los Angeles needs a community manager for Medal of Honor are you interested?” And then I think about 3 weeks later I lived in LA and I was working in games. It was a very random whirlwind kinda thing
GUS: Aww that’s crazy
JUSTIN: But yea that’s a weird question “How do you get into the games industry? “ cause I’ve heard a hundred different ways.
GUS: That’s why I always ask.
JUSTIN: Yea
GUS: Is I- Is I feel that I’m-I’m lucky enough to kinda work in the industry as well so I get to ask and find out .
JUSTIN: Yea
GUS: Unlike other people you know who necessarily don’t get those experiences want to know.
JUSTIN: Well we’ve- I- I always bring it up in the conversation. Our design crew at Robot is like the most collective group of people. We have an ex-Navy Rescue Swimmer, an ex-Biologist, an ex-Lawyer, and an ex-Rockstar. Who are our designers. Like, they didn’t come from a game school, or anything like that, they just came from all these random walks of life and love games and ended up getting into Ensemble at the time and here they are now. So it’s like everybody- I get the question a lot like “What should I be doing to get into the game industries?” It’s like. . . . I have no idea.
GUS: Yea.
JUSTIN: There’s a hundred different ways so. . . .
GUS: Yeah a lot of times people you know they- I feel like a common thing is like they’ll start off as testers or apply into a contract position then work their way up. Uh but I like hearing the stories like- like the ones you have where you were passionate about something unrelated to the games industry, you kinda, somehow strangely, got looped in.
JUSTIN: Yea. I mean I’m like a hardcore community guy. I’ve been running community sites since as long as I can remember, so it was nice to come over to like the film side of the world, of the entertainment world. They’re not big on that kinda stuff but the video game side is huge on that. So it was nice to come into an entertainment kind of… uh- industry that was really embracing communities at the time so, it’s still on. So.
GUS: Yea that’s really cool. Umm so here while we’re
JUSTIN: *cough cough*
GUS: I’ll edit that out. So here at the show umm so you guys were right, you know, you were right up front near the door
JUSTIN: Yea.
GUS: Ummm you know next to the Halo 4 booth and there were other exhibitors behind you as well I don’t know if you got a chance to see any of them- Did you- Well did you get a chance to walk the floor?
JUSTIN: I did actually yea it was actually kinda nice it wasn’t the big uber show cause I could take a few minutes and go walk the floor and see everybody and say hi to everybody and check on all the other booths- I also got to see quite a bit of the show. In fact everything but the main stage in the back really I got to see.
GUS: What was the most interesting thing, you think, you saw, here at the show?
JUSTIN: Oh man… ummmm… Lets see
GUS: Well I don’t know-
JUSTIN: Well probably Ha- Outside of- outside of our own games, Probably Halo 4 stuff.
GUS: Um hm
JUSTIN: I didn’t want to play cause I I- I- wanna save myself for when its out I want to put it in and have my time with it, but I went over several times and watched it played, and it looks beautiful.
GUS: It looks awesome
JUSTIN: It looks amazing.
GUS: I don’t know if you saw but there was another booth pretty close to you guys I know right behind where you were was like um… umm.. uh was like a little aisle of booths so it was behind you then to the right. There was this other- there was this company that has this- they’re also from- they’re from your-
JUSTIN: You’re talking about Motis? Yea yea they had the zombie
GUS: Did you see there the set up they had was mobile?
JUSTIN: Yea they were rolling it around with that TV. It was crazy one of their guys was telling me about it they had to rent these special kind of cell batteries and a charger that would charge these massive batteries every 30 minutes or something and yea they had a massive like TV.
GUS: It was a 70 inch TV
JUSTIN: Yea it was vertically oriented on a little cart with wheels and every time it rolled by the both it was like “There’s no way this can go wrong.” And it worked out fine for em but it was like crazy and they had a zombie on there and whoever was doing the voice, it was skyped in and talking to people it was a pretty crazy setup
GUS: Yea.
JUSTIN: Yea I dunno it was interesting.
GUS: Yea yea I like seeing those kinda things you know when we- uhhh when we approach the show one of the things that was important to us was to find. . . ummm . . .people and exhibitors that would enter- I don’t wanna say entertain people, but that would give people the opportunity to get a like a hands on something.
JUSTIN: Yea
GUS: Like in your case you have games that aren’t out yet which is awesome and in that case it was a rolling zombie you can interact and talk with.
JUSTIN: Yea. Very strange technology.
GUS: Yea.
JUSTIN: But ummm You know you asked me what was cool that was one of- That was something- I didn’t know how much were leaning into the “internet meets gaming” thing but like freddy wong was walking around and the 501st guys were all- I love the costume guys by the way. So the 501st and the 405th guys were really cool, but yea it was like, seeing some of those kinda people walking around I was like woah this is not like- you usually don’t get that at a gaming only show it had the
cool internet culture going on as well I really like that about it.
GUS: Yea when I was ummm one of the setup days I think it was Friday I had to make a delivery we put all of our special guests at one hotel so I had to go deliver some of the stuff over there so I was delivering it dropping it off and I was coming back to the convention center and I was walking by registration and I overheard a woman checking in like “Oh I’m here to check in.” I was like “oh what’s your name?” She said Hannah Heart. I was like oh shit that’s Hannah Heart from “My Drunk Kitchen.”
JUSTIN: Yea that’s weird like it’s- it’s an interesting mashup you guys have of gaming and famous internet people. It’s- It’s cool.
GUS: Yea.
JUSTIN: We had that conversation at the both its like “There’s just people here who are just famous on the internet” and its like a thing that didn’t exist 10 years ago really. I mean you couldn’t have that kinda person but, I mean you guys were, you started it. I’m gonna blame you.
GUS: Well when we started you know Rooster Teeth is a little over 9 years old now, it was before YouTube existed
JUSTIN: Yea
GUS: So if we wanted to do something it was all these little islands everywhere we’d have to “Oh this video, I go to this website”
JUSTIN: Yea. Yea
GUS: “Go to that website” And now I feel like- you know a lot of it is really focused and channeled now over there which is good and bad but now there is one place to have um…. Almost like a repository for video. But I feel like that also takes away from community. Which is something you're big on.
JUSTIN: Yea yea
GUS: Cause you can’t really follow- foster, I feel anyways, can’t foster community on YouTube. You still need your own website and your own place to
JUSTIN: Yea
GUS: to do all that stuff
JUSTIN: Exactly. Yea and that- that’s going on the professional side of it that’s what I look at all the time is like “how much do we lean into developing our own forums and websites v.s. using what facebook has for example.
GUS: Um hm
JUSTIN: You know you can do a lot there it’s already built in but your community is there instead of with you you know it’s a- yea, I- I do navigate those as much as possible if you can roll your own then do it, you know. Keep them in the fold.
GUS: Right.
JUSTIN: But. . .
GUS: Yea we struggled for a long time as well you know with the same questions “Oh we have you know a lot of people who like us on facebook but we have our own community site you know like are we in comp-“ for a long time, I feel like we weren’t sure if we were in competition with facebook
JUSTIN: Yea exactly
GUS: or how we should leverage it you know to help us. And I think we’re getting a lot better about that you know we have a lot of people who are dedicated to community and dealing with those kind of issues before we didn’t
JUSTIN: Yea.
GUS: It’s really helped we’ve done a lot of growing in the past, uh couple of years. For a long time it was just 6 of us and now there’s, God almost 40 I think.
JUSTIN: I’ve been wondering how big you guys are now it’s 40?
GUS: Yea I think it’s
JUSTIN: Wow that’s about as big as Robot is I think we’re 49.
GUS: Oh wow. That’s crazy.
JUSTIN: You guys should start making games.
GUS: It’s funny we do a lot of work with games and we’re fans of games but I don’t think we could ever “make” a game.
JUSTIN: I dunno. Penny Arcade did it.
GUS: that’s true. I have- I have not played their new one yet.
JUSTIN: I haven’t either I haven’t had the chance.
GUS: Just cause there’s no Mac version yet. Yea I know-
JUSTIN: Well yea…
GUS: they’re gonna make one but uh… once it comes out I’m sure I’ll pick it up.
JUSTIN: Yea. I- I just like- that’s one of the things that’s been the weirdest is as soon as I started working on games, I just didn’t have time to play games anymore. I’ve played – and I’m almost embarrassed to admit this- I play less now than I think I’ve ever had.
GUS: Really?
JUSTIN: and most of it is actually on my phone and and my iPad because- I just have 5 minutes I just want to play something real quick. And I just play an Asynchronous game- Or- I’m just obsessed with Adventure Towns right now, so it’s like, anymore it’s that’s all I’m doing, and my iPad is a nice little,you know “I’m just gonna spend a quick little 30 minutes” and that’s it.
GUS: So- so that kinda brings up an interesting question, like how do you- what do you think is going to happen to games? Because it seems to me like, people are really pushing for mobile stuff like iPhone and asynchronous stuff seems to be really popular now.
JUSTIN: Yea.
GUS: Like do you think that that’s gonna eventually overtake like a traditional- what’s considered a gaming experience or does it cannibalize the mobile market as we know it now?
JUSTIN: I don’t think it’ll- I mean I don’t think it’ll overtake it there’s room for both, it’s just we gotta find out what works best where. You know I mean – I mean for my iPhone I’m- I’m a snob about a lot of I but there’s only really a handful of things on iPhone and iPad that I really like and I think really lean into the value of the experience and not just cheap- pull the port over
GUS: Um hm
JUSTIN: You know like, shameless plug, but Hero Academy is one of those things that was explicitly designed to be used on those types of devices originally, and it played to their strengths, but, I dunno I don’t- I don’t think it’ll cannibalize it personally. I- It’s- I always go back to film right? There’s romantic comedies, there’s action movies, there’s horror movies, and there’s a place for all of those out there, of varying qualities and everything they all have their market and I think games will find
that equilibrium and it’s just we’re on this crazy cycle right now of “lets all do social games, lets all do iOS games,” and and it’ll all level out I think.
GUS: I think uh- personally I think that uh mobile gaming systems like the DS
JUSTIN: Yea.
GUS: they have a lot more to lose.
JUSTIN: Yea I agree with you on that. Yea when I can do all of that, and make phone calls, and keep my calendars I don’t really – I don’t own one right now. I don’t own a video game device aside from my iPhone.
GUS: Yea.
JUSTIN: So
GUS: I had something interesting when the 3DS came out, the day it came out, I went and I bought one. I took it home, then I was “why did I buy that?” I didn’t even open it I took it back to the store to return it.
JUSTIN: Wow. Really?
GUS: Yea cause I was like “Wait wait a minute what was I looking forward to?”
JUSTIN: Yea.
GUS: Oh nevermind.
JUSTIN: Yea that’s been, I dunno it’s neat; I’ve played with it at shows and it’s- I’ve seen some interesting demos but I just haven’t gotten it I have to get it now. You know
GUS: I’m sure they’ll be a killer app or something that’ll come out for it.
JUSTIN: That’s what- maybe I’m in the- I need like 10 killer apps before I buy something you know? Like again, I know, shameful, but I don’t own a PS3, but like the Uncharted games makes me wanna own a PS3 and there are a couple things like that but I need like a library before I can really commit to it I’m not gonna do it for 3 or 6 games you know? So I dunno…
GUS: The “Uncharted” series is a great-
JUSTIN: Yea.
GUS: It’s a great series of games.
JUSTIN: I know a ton of people with PS3’s I’ve seen people beat it and everytime I see I’m like “I want to play so badly” but I just can’t- I’m not gonna buy a system for it. I dunno.
GUS: Yea yea
JUSTIN: I’m that guy
GUS: No I can totally understand it’s a big investment
JUSTIN: It- I mean yea well I mean and the times- I’ve heard a great article on Gamasutra this morning about um… somebody I don’t even remember who it was now, were writing about how, the gamers who started gaming early on the early systems are now grown up and they’re married with jobs and kids and they don’t have 40 hours to play Skyrim or something. Umm the whole article was about-
ummm a market that’s not being met for movie length games you know, a really good narrative experience in a game that’s 2 to 3 hours, but only costs $20 like a DVD
GUS: Interesting.
JUSTIN: And I’m – I’m a big proponent- I think that’s a brilliant idea I would do that I would buy a 3 hour solid- if it’s solid good gameplay all the way throughout 3 hours, I’d buy that for $20.
GUS: Yea.
JUSTIN: But umm. I’m that guy; I’m that target audience now. I love hanging out with my kids you know I got 2 little ones and I just don’t- I haven’t even started Skyrim yet because I know as soon as I’m in it it’s like, well, there are divorce papers on my desk.
GUS: Go feed yourself kids.
JUSTIN: Exactly. It’s like whatever you can reach on the shelf that’s what you’re eating for dinner.
GUS: Yea. I feel like there’s another side of that I read an article similar talking about gamers getting older and like the- the rise of father figures in games and how there are a lot of games now that foster or that feature main characters with children and a lot of it is about predicting you know “The Last of us.”
JUSTIN: That looks fantastic.
GUS: Yea it’s kinda along those lines you know even to a lesser extent you can say Bioshock or Bioshock 2 the Big Daddies and the Little Sisters and stuff.
JUSTIN: Yea absolutely. And now that I’m a dad stuff I gravitate towards that stuff I find that more interesting you know but. . . I’m biased against you know. . .
GUS: It’s interesting to see the industry and games in general follow that curve of the- that as their fanbase ages you know to those kinds of things.
JUSTIN: and the guys that make them like, its interesting to me now to see- we’re getting now to the point where- somebody said it last year, we’re-we’re- for the first time we’re a viable 2nd generation of game developers. Like the people who were making games in the 80’s can have kids getting into game development now and this it the first time this has ever happened. That this industry has the next generation of developers and I think that’s interesting, that it’s gonna, as we get to 2 and 3
generations it’s gonna start changing how games are put together.
GUS: It’s truly next-gen.
JUSTIN: Yes it truly is. Yes.
GUS: Umm so what- what’s the next show Robot is gonna be at?
JUSTIN: This is it. This is our last big one of the year.
GUS: Nice.
JUSTIN: Yea.
GUS: Did you hear that everyone? Last big one.
JUSTIN: Yea we did PAX East and this one and that’s all we were doing. Ummm in fact that’s a big reason we wanted to come here your timing was great with the show it was right before we got our 2 games coming out and so we wanted to to get out one last time and and talk with actual gamers before we got the stuff out and now it’s just shift the games and support them through launch and
we’re looking for ideas for DLC for Orcs Must Die 2 and gonna start working on that stuff as we wrap up the game. So the rest of the year is just supporting our products.
GUS: Nice so um uh I know you haven’t made any further announcements you all have more stuff down the road in the horizon.
JUSTIN: We’re talking about stuff yea.
GUS: Good
JUSTIN: Yea we- we’re very busy down there.
GUS: Good that’s awesome to hear. Umm and you don’t have to answer if you can’t but uhh how much- I know you already mentioned Hero Academy which you’ve already mentioned is coming onto Steam in a couple of weeks, how are you all looking at many more teams down the road as time goes on?
JUSTIN: We’re gonna get Steam out then we’re gonna take a look at that. The teams have been really good on iOS uh we just announced there’s a Chinese version being developed of Hero Academy strictly for the Chinese market that they’re gonna be on their own servers and everything, and the partner we’re working with have developed a kung-fu based team just for that market and we had a
lot of people asking to bring that over to the western version, so we’re looking at those kinda things figuring out the next right move for Hero Academy without overwhelming people with too many teams cause it is if your new now you go in and there’s 4 teams there then there’ll be 5 in a few more weeks, um we just want to make sure we’re finding the right balance with it that we’re not overwhelming people with stuff and we do have a lot of hardcore players who made a lot of feature
requests in the past months while we’ve been developing the PC and we want to get to some of those requests and stuff so, we’re in a cycle now of, finish up PC and take a big picture look at what we’re gonna do with Hero Academy.
GUS: Yea I never thought about it. Approaching it again as a new player I think when I started player I remember it was just the Council and the Dark Elves.
JUSTIN: Yea, right at the beginning
GUS: So… Yea so it’s a lot- When you’re like that after- once you’ve been playing a game and you're used to 2 teams and anytime a new team comes out-
JUSTIN: Yea.
GUS: It’s not as much as a learning curve.
JUSTIN: Yea exactly.
GUS: But jumping from new and (((???))), a ton of teams might seem too intimidating.
JUSTIN: I- I- I mean it’s nice in that you have some options and we just added the- the single player challenges in so if you don’t own a team you can now play with them and learn some of their mechanics which is really helpful but now a new player to the game now can come in and get the free Council team, and originally you buy the Dark Elves cause that was the only other team but now it can be I got the free council team and I only bought the Tribe or the Dwarves so the mix-ups get a lot more interesting now or if they buy the Steam version they’ll just have Council and TF2, so like I said we’re taking a look at all the numbers of how people are playing and how many people are playing so we’re just gonna figure out where to go from there.
GUS: Yea so the teams right now as they exist it’s uh Council, Dark Elves, ummm Dwarves, The Tribe-
JUSTIN: And TF2
GUS: And TF2 will be coming out. That’s a good mix.
JUSTIN: Yea it really is. Especially once, you know, when they start mixing up like any one team has different strategies against whoever you’re playing you know I’ve played Dark Elves differently when I’m playing against the Council versus The Tribes. As well as the Dwarves.
GUS: What’s your favorite team?
JUSTIN: Uhh that’s rough. Right now I think it’s the Tribe.
GUS: Um hm.
JUSTIN: Because they’ve been out for a while and they work really really well together, like if you combine units together they’re good in little teams, and most people haven’t realized that yet. Despite how long its been out a lot of casual players haven’t realized it yet. So I like to go in with the tribe and do crazy moves and scare people. Frankly.
GUS: I think they’re probably my favorite as well right now.
JUSTIN: They’re fun. They’re a lot of fun. But then TF2 is coming. They- They’re amazing.
GUS: God I can’t wait to see that.
JUSTIN: Yea it’s cool that- it’s like the team that’s had 5 units a piece, and the TF2 team has everyone. It has all nine units so it’s been a really interesting balance task and figuring out how each- each different type of unit can bring something to the table that’s different than the previous teams but also doesn’t completely screw the balance up.
GUS: So when you’re dealing with 9 characters versus 5 is there more overlap between roles?
JUSTIN: ummm
GUS: Or is there more utility amongst them?
JUSTIN: The- There’s a little bit of overlap. We haven’t talked to much in detail what the units do yet but they they take a little bit of elements from multiple teams then we’ve about things the weapon upgrades a little differently with the TF2 teams so we’ve been able to do some really interesting stuff that keeps all the characters true to like who they are in TF2, but they play like Hero Academy characters still.
GUS: That’s going to be interesting trying to bring- like these are characters that people are really familiar with since TF2 has such a large passionate community so you got to- have to approach it very carefully to stay respectful to the characters and what people expect from TF2 even though it’s not a TF2 game it’s the characters they know and love-
JUSTIN: And that’s was- we had that conversation over and over during tests, like “I know I expect that the engineer can do this” or “I expect that the sniper can shoot across the map.” Like that’s my expectation, he’s a sniper. And so we got a ton of TF2 fans in the studio already so there was a lot of familiarity there to just pound out those conversations like “What’s it gonna take to make this character feel like he’s doing exactly what you expect him to do”, and I think we got it there.
GUS: That’s good. And the great thing about the internet is you’ll hear instant feedback
JUSTIN: Yes! In an instant it's remarkable how fast feedback comes now.
GUS: God well now I’m really looking forward to that. Uhh I don’t wanna go too long I know you’ve got to- to get out of here and head back up to- to the Dallas area. So I wanna thank you for coming and sitting down with me
JUSTIN: Thank you for having me.
GUS: And I want to remind everyone we’ve talked in the podcast before, if you’re not playing, you’ve got to check out Hero Academy.
JUSTIN: Yea.
GUS: You got to check out Orcs Must Die 2, they’re coming out really soon. And uh thanks for listening thanks for coming out Justin. Oh and if people want to find you on the internet do you have like a twitter handle or anything you want to plug?
JUSTIN: Uhh yea you can find me I’m just six okay, all spelled out “sixokay,” um but RobotEnt for Robot Entertainment, and then our games Orcs Must Die and Hero Academy are both on twitter as well.
GUS: Great. Well thanks so much for coming out man.
JUSTIN: Thank you.