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Arcade Game to Blockbuster MOVIE?! - Interview w/ the Producers!

RetroRalph·video·1h 6m·analyzed·May 3, 2023
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claude-haiku-4-5-20251001 · $0.025

TL;DR

RetroRalph discusses his arcade passion and interviews filmmakers about Doc Mac's documentary.

Summary

RetroRalph interviews Year of the Phoenix Productions about their documentary film 'Ghost Lord and the Quest for Dark Presence,' which chronicles Doc Mac's 28-year journey building a fighting game. The conversation covers RetroRalph's background in arcade collecting, his YouTube channel growth from Arcade1Up content to real arcade restoration, his top 5 favorite games (Galaga, Miss Pac-Man, Narc, Baby Pac-Man, Street Fighter II, and Pac-Man), and his admiration for Doc Mac's Galloping Ghost arcade as a community safe space.

Key Claims

  • RetroRalph started YouTube in 2018 after modifying Arcade1Up cabinets with real arcade boards, growing at 1,000-2,000 subscribers per month

    high confidence · RetroRalph describing his channel origins: 'this company came out in 2018 called Arcade1Up...And I did a couple videos. The YouTube channel was growing at 1,000 subscribers a month, 1,500, 2,000.'

  • Narc was Doc Mac's first arcade cabinet, purchased as a teenager for his bedroom

    high confidence · Producer discussing Doc's cabinet history: 'Narc was the first cabinet he ever bought...He bought it when he was a teenager, so it was in his bedroom.'

  • Doc Mac sold his original Narc cabinet to help fund his fighting game development

    high confidence · Producer: 'While making the game, he sold the cabinet off amongst other collections to help fund the making of the game.'

  • Doc Mac's original Narc cabinet was located by another arcade owner but was sold to someone else rather than returned to Doc

    high confidence · Producer describing reunion attempt: 'The guy sells it to somebody else. So Doc's original cabinet is out there somewhere still.'

  • Galloping Ghost arcade has a special Narc machine with a hidden level coded by George Petros not accessible elsewhere

    high confidence · Producer: 'George Petros, right before they had a Narc Developer's event at the arcade, he borrowed the board and coded the level into the board for Doc. So that Narc machine at Galloping Ghost has some level that I don't think is accessible elsewhere.'

Notable Quotes

  • “I knew like how to use the boards and set them up and everything and I showed a buddy of mine I'm like, Jon Hey, I put a real arcade board in this cheap arcade one-up thing. And he's like, dude, that's cool.”

    RetroRalph@ 2:01 — Describes the moment that sparked his YouTube channel and entire career transition

  • “People are sick of the non-social aspect. Like, gaming has become so social in the sense that you're online, talking to someone on a headset but you're not face to face there's no like personal interaction anymore”

    RetroRalph@ 3:26 — Reflects on why arcade collecting and physical arcade venues resonate with people

  • “She shoots and kills him. And I'm like, he wasn't a threat. Like, what are you doing?”

    RetroRalph@ 9:06 — Anecdote about his wife's exceptional reaction time during a police training simulation arcade game

  • “I think that's kind of why that game always like stood out my mind...sometimes i think with arcade games I fall in love with the artwork and the design just as much as i do the game or sometimes more than the game”

    RetroRalph@ 17:35 — Explains his aesthetic appreciation for arcade cabinet design beyond gameplay

  • “He's created that for them and there are a lot of people that go there that i think feel like it's a safe place where they can go and be themselves and and like no one judges them”

    RetroRalph@ 52:02 — Describes Doc Mac's Galloping Ghost arcade as a community safe space for marginalized people

  • “He is one of the busiest people i've ever met in my life to an extreme...he almost collects tasks for himself”

Entities

RetroRalphpersonDoc MacpersonYear of the Phoenix ProductionscompanyArcade1UpcompanyGalloping Ghost arcadeproductGeorge PetrospersonElectric Bat Arcadecompany

Signals

  • ?

    community_signal: Galloping Ghost arcade positioned as community safe space where marginalized people feel accepted and non-judged

    high · RetroRalph: 'there are definitely people that come to the arcade that maybe his arcade that maybe feel like outcasts or they feel like they don't really have a place to go where they can be themselves...It's a safe place where they can go and be themselves and and like no one judges them'

  • ?

    event_signal: Year of the Phoenix Productions' Kickstarter campaign for 'Ghost Lord and the Quest for Dark Presence' successfully met funding goals following marathon livestream on RetroRalph's channel

    high · RetroRalph: 'it was a marathon livestream where they were trying to get over the hump of their Kickstarter campaign, and I'm happy to announce they actually did that'

  • ?

    design_philosophy: Arcade cabinet design and artwork aesthetics valued equally or more highly than gameplay mechanics by enthusiasts like RetroRalph

    medium · RetroRalph: 'sometimes i think with arcade games I fall in love with the artwork and the design just as much as i do the game or sometimes more than the game'

  • $

    market_signal: Arcade1Up's launch in 2018 catalyzed broader interest in authentic arcade restoration and real cabinet collecting within YouTube creator and enthusiast communities

    medium · RetroRalph: 'a lot of those people went from buying these like Arcade1Up arcades to like actually collecting real arcade games...it was like a really interesting opportunity'

  • ?

    community_signal: Doc Mac characterized as extremely prolific and task-oriented, constantly pursuing new projects with obsessive energy

Transcript

youtube_groq_whisper · $0.200

0:00
Hey guys, welcome back to the channel. Recently, I got a chance to sit down with Year of the Phoenix Productions. They're the company responsible for Ghost Lord and the Quest for Dark Presence. It's a movie about Doc Mac's journey building a fighting game for the past 28 years that hasn't come out yet. There's another video on my channel of the official trailer for that. But this was a marathon livestream where they were trying to get over the hump of their Kickstarter campaign, and I'm happy to announce they actually did that. So we sat down we talked a little bit about my favorite games how I got into YouTube a little bit about Doc Mac and the filming of the movie and I think you guys will really enjoy it it was only shown on Twitch so here it is exclusively on my channel I hope you guys enjoy it. Well, I've been into this forever. My cousin was an engineer. When I was a little kid, he used to just drop off computer stuff. And just be like, oh, figure this out. Because I was always intrigued seeing him work on his computer stuff. So I got to an age where he'd just drop it off. And I don't know. My mom used to say, you always like tinkering with stuff. So my cousin's like, well, let's just see what he can do with it. And so it was like a Commodore 64 and then IBM stuff and then Apple stuff. And so, of course, when you have computers back then, what is the thing you do? It's not like I was making spreadsheets. I was like playing games. Right. And he'd give me these these big, huge manuals. And it'd be like you'd type in all this code and your screen would turn like four colors. It was it was like a lot, you know, a lot to just to get an outcome that wasn't all that exciting. But, yeah, I just always been into gaming. And then the like retro Ralph thing started because a buddy of mine, he's like. so I don't know if you know this but there's this company that came out like I've always collected arcade related things so I was like collecting arcade boards so like Doc probably talks a lot about that right like he went and bought all these boards but he didn't have the cabinets for them and stuff so I used to buy the boards I don't know what I thought I was going to do with them but I was like buying arcade boards and this company came along in 2018 called Arcade One-Up and I knew like how to use the boards and set them up and everything and I showed a buddy of I'm like, hey, I put a real arcade board in this cheap arcade one-up thing. And he's like, dude, that's cool. And I turned it into something else. He's like, you should just make a video and start a YouTube channel.

Producer (from Year of the Phoenix)@ 53:38 — Characterizes Doc Mac's personality and work ethic

Todd Tuckey
person
Ghost Lord and the Quest for Dark Presenceproduct
Art Institute of Los Angelescompany

high · Producer: 'he is one of the busiest people i've ever met in my life to an extreme...he almost collects tasks for himself'

  • ?

    personnel_signal: George Petros verified as developer with direct access to Narc cabinet boards and reverse engineering expertise

    high · Producer: 'George Petros, right before they had a Narc Developer's event at the arcade, he borrowed the board and coded the level into the board for Doc'

    • 2:17
    I'm like, I don't really have any interest in doing that. Plus, I'm like, no one's going to care. And I did a couple videos. The YouTube channel was growing at 1,000 subscribers a month, 1,500, 2,000. I was like, holy crap, people actually care about this. So I kind of started with that. And then really, as I built the audience, I was like, well, I'd rather this isn't really what I'm really into. I'm really into like the real arcade stuff. So I started kind of putting that aside and the audience came with me. And a lot of those people went from buying these like toy arcades to like actually collecting real arcade games. So it's turned into like a really interesting, I guess, in so many cool opportunities, like getting to work, you know, even though we haven't worked directly together. I mean, helping promote that. Like, I don't, I have, you know, I didn't have the ability to do that at the beginning because I didn't have an audience, you know, and now I do. So it's cool. And they're all into the same stuff. Like, they just, it's a very nostalgia-based hobby. And a lot of people have really cool memories from their childhood. And this brings them back to that time.
    3:19
    And I think people are sick of the non-social, like, gaming has become so, it's social in the sense that you're online. talking to someone on a headset but you're not face to face there's no like personal interaction anymore and so i think a lot of it is bringing people together it's exactly what doc does with his arcade it's just it's such a cool it's just an awesome hobby but anyways that's a long winded answer to your question but hopefully that gives you some perspective yeah what so where are you at you're on the west coast is that right yeah i grew up in um in lincoln rhode island which is a really small town in a really small state and um after high school i always was like oh man i want to live in california and so i moved to california i wanted to actually went to school for video production i wanted to be like i wanted to be like behind the camera or and in front of the camera and an editor i like want to do all that so i i literally like drove out with a couple things in my car to santa monica and i went to the art institute of los angeles and uh it was kind of a train wreck like it was a total mess but um and i kind of left that behind and anyways but um i moved from there to phoenix arizona so i'm in phoenix now but uh i was kind of leaving california kicking and screaming at that time i didn't want to move to phoenix but at the time it was like it was getting really expensive to live in california and i didn't really want to go home and so phoenix ended up being the place but yeah are there any good arcades classic style arcades yes yeah phoenix actually has a lot like um there's this one right here i'm wearing the hoodie of um electric bat so electric bat's like uh it's run by pinball enthusiasts they have some arcade games it's mostly pinball but like they're they're awesome like really cool people and the place has got this it makes you feel like it makes you feel like you're i don't know how to explain it like if the band nirvana no not nirvana that's not right if you think about like 90s grunge scene if someone were to create an arcade in current times and make it seem like you're in a 90s grunge scene like that's what it is it's super cool it like transforms you back they have a lot of local bands that are definitely kind of of that time period but yeah there's a lot of other great arcades there's one called star fighters which is all collectors and they just started their own so nothing compared to what doc has at galloping ghost but yeah we have actually a couple pretty good pretty good arcades and barcades out here yeah that's very cool yeah so how often do you actually go to the arcade uh pretty often because there's one only 15 minutes there's an amusement park about 15 minutes from my house which is like it's kind of like a weird arizona icon it was built in 1979 it's called castles and coasters and uh they don't have alcohol there which is like i usually like to like have a beer and play or whatever but can't really do that there but it's it's actually pretty close to my house so i go there like a couple at least by minimum at least a couple times a month and there's like a really cool uh barcade up here that does mostly pinball but they have some cool arcade games too but it's like it's close by my wife is like not as into it so she likes pinball but she gets bored with arcade games i don't know why she but she really likes pinball and she's really good at it like like just good at it for no reason like like The first time she went to a pinball machine, it was this one called Tales from the Arabian Nights, which is a pretty classic pinball machine. She was kicking ass on her first ball. I'm like, how are you doing? Were you born knowing how to play pinball? She's like, no. I don't know. She has some laser reaction time. I don't know. She's some kind of lady. Women seem to be really drawn to and good at pinball. I'm not very good at pinball. I think it's a reaction time thing. I don't know what I'm doing. I'm just like, I don't know. I you're you're right on that I think it's like a reaction time thing like she's so much faster to react actually I have kind of a funny story that I'll tell really quick I'll tell it fast so my wife she wanted to go on this she's like let's do like a different kind of date night let's go out and do something different and this was before the pandemic and there was this place that popped up here and it was called um uh modern round and it's it's it's total Arizona thing too because like everyone's very much like into guns and stuff but anyway so the you go to the restaurant and it's swanky though it's like a cool restaurant it's got like almost a club vibe to it and you walk in and there's all these um you know how like in movies they'll always show like people passing money in like a silver briefcase kind of thing they had all these silver briefcases and they're like oh what guns do you want so they were like okay cool whatever and they open up the case and your two guns are in there not real guns they're like light guns for like arcade games but it's not really an arcade game so they're like well what would you like to do today like what would your journey like to be? And there was a couple options. One of them is you could be police officers. And my wife's like, oh, I want to be a police officer. This is going to be awesome. I'm like, okay. And so they take you to your little booth, and there's a big screen, and you have your guns. And I guess the owner, I found this out later, the owner of this place used to create training videos for real police officers. So the situations they put you in are the same situations they'd put, like, an officer in training. so like so my we the first thing we get they they're like okay this is the situation they kind of explain it to you like it's a domestic issue you pull up and uh we don't really know what's going on but we need you to go out there so i'm like okay cool and my wife's like i'm ready she's got her fake gun and uh so the scene opens up and this guy pulls up and the wife is comes out of the house and she's yelling at him oh you you know you're drunk you need to get in the house and And so keep in mind, the car pulls up, the door opens, and it's supposed to be a simulation. So a bunch of beer cans fall out and he rolls out of the car. And within a moment's notice, she shoots and kills him. And I'm like, he wasn't a threat. Like, what are you doing? We just lost. And it says, like, you lost on the thing. And I'm like, okay, let's try to do better the next time. That was a quick day. Yeah, so she kills this dude for doing nothing other than just having a little too much to drink. I mean, he was drinking and driving. so I'm like all right the next situation because they they're like oh you know cadet you didn't do well whatever we're gonna bring you to this next thing so the next scenario starts and it's um we're at a warehouse and it says there's a disgruntled employee at the warehouse and he's like he so you pull up and and he comes out and he's fidgety like he's got his hands like he's kind of being weird and I look at her I'm like hey he's he's just being fidgety but so far he's not saying anything weird so let's just chill and he's like yeah this place that i'm working overtime blah blah blah and he's he like sticks his hand in his pocket she kills him shoots him i'm like come on man and so they so they tell you they play you what actually happened and he was going to grab his cell phone he was going to grab his cell phone i'm like you know what let's not be cops because clearly we weren't we weren't supposed to be well you're fine it's like you're not the problem i I never even got to shoot because she was shooting everybody. She's like, shoot to get home. It's that reaction time. So, yeah, I was trying to pare it back to the reaction time. So sometimes the reaction time can be bad. So it was just our car ride home was so funny because I was like, wow, I have a way more respect for police officers at this point. And we should never be police officers, either one of us. So I don't know. It was just funny. But anyway, sorry, that was a long, long story. But it was just that was fun. What are your we were talking earlier so like our first guest we had on it actually a guy that works at a vinyl store so vinyl record and we were talking top five albums of all time so what are your top five what are your top five games of all time? I had a feeling you know what I knew you were gonna ask this and I was like man they're gonna ask this and it's gonna be one of those I'm gonna have to go into those one of those malfunction modes where I can't I can't come up with my top five but I have a I have I have a pretty good gauge of my top five so my number should I start at five maybe I'll do top okay so one that's probably not so number one is is gonna I'll end in number one so my fifth one would probably be uh it's it's a staple that everyone loves um it's a game called galaga i mean it's it's just a staple everyone knows galaga like everyone loves galaga it's it's just it's and the reason why that game that game is really important to me because there was a chinese restaurant in our town and what my parents would do is we'd go there and there'd be this little waiting area and there was a cocktail table with that game on it you know the ones where you can kind of like sit there and have a drink and they kind of you know the screen will flip for the other player and i just remember at that time like i was a young kid so that was that was just really cool and i remember she only gave me two quarters and she's like that's it when you're done you're done and i'd always i ended up getting to the point where i was good enough that i could play and they'd still be seated seated and so then she's like well i'm only giving you one quarter next time so i was like wait what but yeah so galaga's galaga's my number my number five my number four would probably be miss pac-man not pac-man i don't know why but miss pac-man was like one that i really loved didn't they play with your games on those tables a lot of times yeah they did there's a lot of miss pac-man cocktail tables and it's weird because uh it's funny in this in the scene of like the arcade space uh a lot of the younger guys will like say i'm the old one that likes a little a lot of these older games i'm not that old i mean i just turned 44 uh two days ago i think so yeah thanks i think i'm 26th yeah so um they make fun of me they're like oh you like all the you like all the old games but i don't like just all the old games but miss pac-man is definitely my number my number four my number three is actually one of doc's favorite games called narc yeah you've probably seen it he's probably taught does he talk about it in the movie yeah oh yeah we shot a whole little like narc sequence with him that we haven't I haven't done anything with him yet in terms of the promotional bits we're putting out.
    13:32
    Nark was the first cabinet he ever bought. Okay, I don't even know if I knew that was his first cabinet. I did interview Doc once and he did say that was his favorite game, but I don't know that he said it was. That's pretty interesting. I didn't know that part. Well, but he bought it when he was a teenager, so it was in his bedroom. Really? I didn't know that. That's fun. That's cool. While making the game, he sold the cabinet off amongst other collections to help fund the making of the game.
    13:59
    He probably did not want to do that. He did not want to do that. When he started the arcade, I don't think Mark was in the first batch of games. In fact, his original Mark cabinet, I won't say the name of the person. It was another arcade owner. Alderman said, I think I have your cabinet that you sold off so long ago. And Doc talked to him and realized it was, in fact, Doc's cabinet, because I don't remember what it was. Something etched on it or whatever. Yeah. And Doc said, will you sell it to me? And he goes, I don't think I'm in the market to sell it. And Doc said, okay, if you are in the market to sell it, sell it to me.
    14:43
    The guy sells it to somebody else. So Doc's original cabinet is out there somewhere still. Yeah, it wasn't a happy ending. Oh, that sucks! He does have an art cabinet. He does maybe have the only art cabinet with a hidden level or whatever. It's a special level that got put into his cabinet at the arcade. They never finished when they were programming it. And George Pietro, right before they had a NARC Developer's Day at the arcade, he borrowed the board and got the level into the board for Doc. So that NARC machine at Galapagos has some level that I don't think is accessible elsewhere. Just, you know this already, Ralph. Yeah, yeah. Well, actually, the funny thing is just the other day, I have a buddy who lives in Minnesota. Actually, I met him through, like, he was someone that watched my channel and we became like really good friends, like really good friends. And he's come, he's flown out. We've done like, he'll come over to my house. we'll do like restoration projects together on arcade games we just definitely have have that shared passion and he like probably like a year ago he's like do you think that doc would give us the files or like you know the rom the roms he's like would he give us the roms for that secret level i'm like i don't know because it's kind of a unique thing to the arcade like i don't think he'd do that so the other day i don't know i was just like shoot i'm gonna just ask them so i i didn't ask doc directly but i sent the an email to galloping ghost uh productions which is the production company which you guys know i'm sure but now but uh they're like yeah we can't do that because uh george petros specifically like coded the rest of it for us so we can't really do it i'm like shit i was like well i tried i tried but maybe one day i'll get him to do it but yeah so nark nark's pretty cool it's a cool game it was like one of those by the way when you were kind of getting into the research of doing this whole project did you guys ever watch the insert coin movie yeah oh cool all right it awesome so in that insert coin movie they talk a lot about how just crazy nork was like it was it was one of those games where when you saw it the first time you're like what what the heck like you could you know to shoot a rocket at i mean because it's kind of interesting right like your bad guys are these like drug dealers and but it's okay to like like you shoot them with a rocket and they blow up into pieces everywhere so at the time that was so crazy right like you never saw anything like that in a video game so i think that stuck with me so that's kind of why that game always like stood out my mind it's it's from a replayability standpoint like it's not like i play it a lot like i have it in my collection but it's like a really unique looking cabinet as you guys have seen right it's like it's weird looking you know like it has like almost this monitor and then it kind of goes gets skinny and then it has a big control panel it's just weird looking the whole thing is just i don't know it's like sometimes i think with arcade games i fall in love with the artwork and the design just as much as i do the game or sometimes more than the game so that's how i feel about i absolutely feel that way about um dragon's life oh that's such a cool and doc has it with like the flame things on top and stuff in the arcade so it's even cooler it's i wouldn't say it's not it's a cool con it's one of the most beautiful games i've ever seen the hand-drawn animation like i above my computer at home i have this massive dragon's letter print uh and i love the artwork and the story's fun but the game itself not fantastic well it's kind of like it's not easy it's definitely like not it's not like you walk up to it it'll like kick your ass instantly if you don't know what you're doing. Oh, you were very smart. I wonder how your wife would do it with the reaction time thing. She'd probably kick ass at it, I'm sure. I mean, that's all. It's just reaction time. So I love that on the port, I have the PlayStation port of it, you can just choose, there's a mode you can choose to just play all the video in a row. I would just play it to watch it. The game, I wouldn't say I particularly enjoy playing, but it's so beautiful. I wish it was just a movie. I wish it was just a movie. I thought they were making a movie from it. I thought that was something that they announced at some point. I don't know if that's happening, but... I thought they said like, what's his name? Wasn't it like Ryan Reynolds was supposed to be in it or something? Yes, Ryan Reynolds. He's bland. He's not bland. He's bland, let me say that. Oh, so wait, you would... We won't let him know that you wouldn't cast him in the movie. I thought he would cast him in the movie. He's probably watching this right now. He's like, oh my gosh. probably probably it's in my entire career he was ready to pull the trigger on my career's gone yeah he was gonna get me through the gates he's actually the mystery 5000 yeah he's like i'm jumping i'm rescinding my 5k i uh my internet's not working here yeah details on the dragons later in that book's adaptation netflix adaptation of dragons oh all right all right yeah i thought they i thought i heard that um that was in 2022 yeah so we'll see what happened you know who would have been great as a jerk do you know dragon's way bruce campbell yeah oh my god i can see that
    20:08
    you should why don't you you should do the movie well we'd have to do the tron thing where we digitally de-age him you know what i mean actually what we'll do is we'll just pick a much younger man so he has the physicality necessary and we'll just put a young young Bruce face on him and then we'll use his voice and put him now I think we're just gonna have to find a different actor probably okay so I lost track what number are we on uh you said that was that was his third yeah I was like a miss pac-man okay the next one's surprising because I didn't grow up with it I only discovered it from a friend and it's and doc has it he has it at the pinball location and it is a video game but it's also a pinball machine um so i don't know if you've ever seen a baby pac-man but that's like the um it's basically he has it at galloping ghost at the pinball thing so it's half arcade game and half pinball machine so the top part looks just like pac-man looks right like a normal pac-man except you have no power pellets so you have no way to destroy the ghosts so your whole point is you got to get yourself down to this tunnel at the bottom and when you go through the tunnel your pinball shoots out the bottom and you play the pinball you you play pinball to get power pellets and then once you get back into the top part it's really freaking cool it does it it sucks when you don't know how to play it though if you go up to it and no one tells you how to play it you'd be like this game sucks this is like this is like a a bad version of pac-man but once you understand how to play it it's very addicting it's super fun the biggest problem with it is it broke down a lot so um that's kind of the reason why i think it doesn't have quite it has kind of like a cult following now but it is a problematic game to keep running so i think that's probably part of the reason why it doesn't have as much like fanfare but it's really cool then there's a then there's a game that's similar to that because they made two of these sort of half video game half pinball and that one's called granny and the gators and i've never really spent any he doc has that too i've never spent any amount of time with that to know whether that's a good game or not but i really do like baby pac-man it's fun so yes they have granny and the gators and caveman so i don't know caveman similar or not but i don't know caveman i don't know caveman but uh Wait, so I only have one more left? Yeah. Oh, I screwed up then. Oh.
    22:39
    You have two more. Well, Street Fighter 2 is definitely... Has to be up there because... That was like... I got a chance to... Because of my age and when I went to arcades, I got a chance to see that whole, like, rebirth around fighting games. Now, I'm not the best at fighting games. I enjoy fighting games, but I'm not very good at them. And I think it's because... I don't know, sometimes, like, I can't... Street Fighter II is where it kind of ended for me because Mortal Kombat got so confusing with how to do a fatality. I can't even... My buddy Nick just now taught me all this time later how to start doing the fatalities and I can do them. I can't do them either, so don't kill me. Yeah, Mortal Kombat always intimidated me because there was always... I learned Street Fighter and that was like... You had the original Street Fighter, which no one really cared about, and then Street Fighter II came in. So I feel like I learned that together with the other people in our arcade. But when Mortal Kombat came in and then Mortal Kombat 2, it got really complex. I mean, there were people like selling cheat sheets, like they would write down how to do the moves. I don't know. I always was like, I was actually like, I don't know, like I'd get stressed out. Like I remember young me being like sweaty in line. I'm like, I can do it. No, no, no, no, I'm not going to play. And I'd like back out of the line. Like I wouldn't even put my quarter on the glass because I would be so intimidated by it. I was like, and I just back away from it. But yeah, Street Fighter 2 was one. I'm not great, but I play it, and I really enjoy the character. And Ryu, who's got the red bandana, was always super cool to me, and chumly. And all the characters were just really... The animation of it, I was really into. So Street Fighter II has to be on the list. That's pretty important to me. I love that game.
    24:25
    And now my number one. I kind of mix. Normally, I usually say maybe Pac-Man's my number one. Oh, duh. cinestar is my number one even though i didn't grow up with that one either that was one that a buddy of mine a buddy of mine introduced me to but again it's one of those games where if you saw it at first glance and someone said play this you'd think you're playing some weird version of like asteroids and you would have no idea what you're doing and those games at those times the reason why that game i think wasn't successful is it wasn't like obvious what you were supposed to do like pac-man it was pretty obvious like i pick up the pellets i and i get the power pellet i eat the ghost like i move on i clear the board this game sinistar is not like that but it once you know how to play it it's another like really addicting game too and it's got like a horror element to it it's scary the the bad guy in the game is basically this like constructed face that eats you when you it's really cool so doc has the cockpit version of it but it's way in the back so so i'm sure you guys know that place way better than you ever thought you would but where that um where the six player x-men is it's tucked in the back like it's tucked in the corner you almost don't even notice it yeah it's really dark yeah but you definitely sit in it and play it's just weird like and it was one of the first games that had real speech to it and it would say things that were kind of like it's the speech is intentionally louder than everything else so when it does talk it like really scares you it startles you so it's it's a really neat game and but it's weird it wasn't one i grew up with the only one out of that list i grew up with really would have been galaga miss pac-man and and uh three fighter two but the other two i didn't grow up with so i think that's the cool thing about the hobby like you go to a place like galloping ghost and you're going to discover a game out of the 900 or whatever he has that you might not have never known even existed you know so it's so cool are you ever sad or discouraged by the fact that there will never be a new classic arcade game so she got me into musicals when we first started dating i think i want you to watch singing in the rain and i was like yeah no and she said no no i really think you're gonna like it i watched it and i fell in love with it And I said, I have to see every, your computer's about to die. I have to see every musical. You know, it was every Gene Kelly movie, then every Fred Astaire movie, and fell over. And it always bums me out that there will never be another classic Hollywood musical made. You can make new ones. You can do something different. You can attempt to resurrect the past. But there will never be a new classic musical. So do you feel similarly ever? I know there's a lot of vintage games out there. There's a lot of retro games, but there will never be any more than there are. How do you feel about that?
    27:23
    That's a really good question, actually. And it's weird. I have mixed feelings about it because part of the reason why I love the hobby so much is it does. I mean, it's so rooted in now. Not everyone can say that they had these like glorious memories from their childhood. But my grandfather, he was like the perfect grandfather in the sense that even if he didn't like what I was into, he tried to show interest in what I liked.
    27:55
    And he'd always bring me, before I was old enough to go to the arcade by myself, we would always go together. and so I have all these awesome memories and I definitely connect certain game titles with him because they were ones that excited him like when Top Gun came out the After Burner game was kind of like very similar as a matter of fact if you if you look at the screen there is they actually I don't know I think they didn't even have the rights to do it I think they just shoved it in the game but Tom Cruise it quickly is in the beginning of that game when it's like going through the uh the um like a track mode screen so i have a lot of these like awesome memories of that time so i don't know like when you say when because if something new came out like a new classic i don't think it would have the same impression on me because it was all tied back to like these childhood memories you know what i mean so it does it what makes me more sad is that like my son like they don't know what that is like they never had this social like i feel lucky to grow up to have grown up when i did because i think just normal socialization was easier for us because that was all like that's how you played a game like your consoles were kind of there like you had atari and stuff but if you wanted to play the games with the better graphics and all that stuff you had to go to an arcade and you naturally because i grew up in a small town you met a lot of the same people and so those became your friends and so i don't know i it does make me sad that there won't be any new ones but i think what makes me more sad is that like there's a whole generation of kids and people that will never have experienced the excitement of an arcade like unless they go to a place like galloping ghost um and maybe that'll help them understand what it was like i don't know but it's a little different though because as you described it was part of a lifestyle like now oh it's more of a novel yeah i mean that's my uncle used i'm just a few years younger than you and my uncle would take me to the arcade late at night and it's like i don't know what he drove but it was low to the ground and there's only two doors and choosing oh like one of the old cars were like the whole door it was like the whole side of the car opened up almost and i just would be low down and the dash would be glowing and we'd cutting through the night and then we'd arrive at this building with just no windows and just hanging out on the outside we'd go in and there'd be all these games there and i remember like joust seeing that like you said the aesthetics of it are sometimes as attractive as the yeah and as exciting as the game itself the promise of what it could be or the story it contains so now you guys ever interview paul niemeyer as part of the movie yeah and he was actually here We did a 24-hour stream a couple weekends ago. Okay. And he came in and hung out with us for a while. It's really cool to get his perspective because he's such a... Because he was doing all the artwork for, like, the marquees and stuff. It's really cool to... Like, when he... Because a lot of times he didn't have a good grasp of, like, what the game would be about sometimes. But they'd give him, like, a generalization. And then he'd create this awesome artwork that had to kind of coincide with the game. And, you know, he... he's just amazing to see that stuff. So yeah, the art itself, some of the art on some of those older games is just so impressive. And then you think about it, right? Like an 80s kid didn't have movies like we do, like the movies with like all the crazy animation and stuff we have now. So some of it is like, you have to put your imagination into it too. And then you didn't have all this other stuff. So you were like, wow, like you could see yourself being like, I'm in space, you know, even though to us now, you can actually play a game makes it seem like you're actually in space or virtual reality space or whatever so yeah there's a lot of like imagination goes into it too like you kind of have to put some of that into it too so yeah the art is a big part i think uh it's just different now like i wouldn't trade now because of the accessibility and things that i sought to find films and books and things that you just couldn't find now it's you know the book's not in pub published anymore you can find a pdf of it it's like there's something amazing about that but at the same time everything's very disposable so like you said like i have a stack of probably 10 games i've not played yet that i bought in my playstation i probably have 20 games i never started that i bought digitally and i probably won't even get too many of those games whereas when we were younger it was very different there was everything was rarer.
    32:34
    Even when you got a movie, you had to know the movie you wanted to watch. You had to pick it at the video store and you only had a day to watch it. You couldn't be like, instead of doing that, I'm going to do this now. So I think it was just very different. I don't know if it was better, but of course there's the feeling of nostalgia that we have being of that era looking back and then saying, you know, kids now aren't going to have the opportunity to experience that. And I just don't think with our kids that they will but what makes me I don't know warms my heart is when you see like we did a shoot at Galbino's for the film where we brought a bunch of families as actually cool because we wanted to show the family you know that we wanted to see kids not just usually we do it in the demographic Their skews more probably like 25 to 50 generally But there's a lot of there is a lot of family. There are a lot of families and younger people that come in. So we did this shoot and it was younger people. And to see these little kids that are like six, seven, eight, nine, 10 years old falling in love with these games. Like I was watching two little girls that were probably eight. Go ham on war gods. the juxtaposition was was great but you realize like these kids they still love this stuff and you're like why they have the most cutting edge technically advanced experiences at their fingertips but i think part of it is actually what you are saying it was it's like the art it's the whole aesthetic experience it just looks cool and you know and it's and like the crt monitors is a different vibe than what you're looking to do in terms of, you know, LCDs or whatever we're doing.
    34:21
    I'm pontificating. Do you ever watch the video? You just made me think of this for some reason. Do you ever watch those videos? I think they don't make them anymore, but it's like that. It's a YouTube channel, and they'll introduce kids to some old technology. Do you ever watch those? Yes, yes. Those kids are all, like, grown now, too. Yeah. it's just like kids react yeah I think it's kids react too and then they put in the thing I just watched one kids are like older teenagers those are so great I love those I just watched one where they had people play actually I have it playing in the background I just did a restore Doc has this game too Michael Jackson had an arcade game it didn't do very well it was by Sega called Moonwalker but there was a console version of the game too on the Genesis and he had they had people go on the show and it was young kids playing it and they loved the game like they loved the game and I'm like this is so cool because at first they were kind of like oh whatever you know but then as they played it they had so much fun with it and all of their reaction at the end was like this was a super fun game this was cool and I think maybe there's the problem is I don't think they'd get introduced to it unless you showed it to them right like my kids I when they were little they stopped now because I have daughters in college and then my son's 15 but he doesn't care about the arcade games now but when I introduced him to them when he was young he really did like them I played of course the normal ones like Teenager Ninja Turtle he loved that game but I think if you introduce kids to them they'll be totally into them but if you never do they'll just you know they're not going to find it themselves because these places are kind of tucked away right like I don't know.
    36:07
    Our niece, she's 15 now, but I showed her the new Street Fighter trailer. And I'm like, this is amazing. Like, this looks awesome. She's like, I don't know. I'm like, what's wrong with it? I like the old art and stuff. She likes the two-dimensional sprites.
    36:25
    That's cool. There's a lot of beauty, beautiful art in these old games. I mean, that era particularly, the 90s, is more i gravitate more towards that than the old old games that were really kind of pre us um but it's still a valid aesthetic form you know don't you think the music the music in the 90s games can sometimes like especially sega like sega did a really good job with music like they really focused on like some of the stuff they were able to do with the technology they had you know it wasn't you know it was pretty primitive in comparison to today's stuff and it's it's good like the music's cool like it stays in your mind i can't tell you how many people uh i did an afterburner video because i finally found one not the one that he had not the one doc has it's like a cockpit one i wish i had the room or money to buy that but um that game has a very distinct like when you put the quarter in it makes this noise and everyone remembers it like they remember the noise it makes if you put the quarter in or like even on michael jackson's moonwalker he makes his like there's a you know i'm not gonna try to do it because i can't get to that high octave but it's all you know lumbo says killer instinct one music still holds up today i don't remember the music awesome music in that game yeah great great music i suck at that talk about a fighting game i completely suck at i respect that game but i'm terrible at playing it but the music is very good in that game they did a really good job with that yeah there's so many good i don't know i love this stuff it's just one of those things like my wife when we got married said she put in her wedding in the wedding vows like i will and believe me i do remind her of this a lot when she but she put i will like support your crazy arcade hobbies and ideas uh but some some stuff has changed like before we got married like i kind of it was out of control like i had arcade stuff everywhere like there was an arcade in my bedroom you know she's like no like we're not no so like i have a dedicated space to it now but i but i do think that's the right thing like i would never want her to feel like i've overrun the house with with arcade stuff so i kind of have it in a dedicated room and then and then i do consume the entire garage but outside of that that's it like And I promised her, like, it's not going to... But it can easily get out of control if you don't. Because I really have become a collector. By accident, though. I didn't really ever think I'd become a collector of arcade games. I was kind of almost an accidental thing. So, you know you buy a couple. It's like anything. I think people that start collections of anything, they're like, oh, yeah, this is cool. And they buy two. And they're like, oh, it would look cooler if I had, like, four. And then they're like, oh, maybe, but I like this game. Or I like this statue or figure or whatever. so collecting can get dangerous if you don't keep it under control doc doesn't know anything about that yeah does he talk about that in the movie at all like oh yeah we talk about it i i've spent so much time with him in the past two years and just peeling as many layers away as i could because i've been fascinated by him and what he's done and what he's trying to do that we definitely talk about And he's very self-aware, which is interesting. He's like a crazy collector, you know, to a degree beyond anyone.
    39:58
    Potentially my friend James over here who collects movie props. He makes a lot of props in his collection, though. I don't know. He's better at it. Yeah.
    40:10
    Movie props, that's exciting. Movie props, that's a cool thing. We're actually raffling some off. He brought four costumes from the movie Immortals. And then a saddle from the 2001 Planet of the Apes. It was one of the... Wow, that's awesome. That is local pickup only. I just want to keep stressing. We've got to figure that out. He brought some really cool stuff here. Xena's sword. Oh, wow. Oh, yeah. Robocop's gun.
    40:43
    Robocop's gun? Do you have it right there? Can I see it? You got it? Give me that. Yeah. I'm Will's guitar. That was great.
    40:57
    Lumbo says, thanks for doing the YouTube video for the Kickstarter. Well, I can't also cannot thank you enough. Drew and I were talking the way that you're Bill, you're a good storyteller, man, and you put everybody in the right headspace how you intro the trailer. I couldn't tell you how grateful I am for your I appreciate you saying that it was funny because I had my garage door open I filmed that in my oh my gosh what the heck that's awesome oh my gosh that is so cool Robocop was like a big childhood movie for me even though oh man when I watch it now I'm like how did I not end up being a messed up kid because the violence in that movie is so over the top but oh that's awesome what i'm you guys get so mad when i point guns at you yeah let's not point the gun at anybody even if it's a prop just in case um yeah you know what anyways uh shoot i forgot what i said oh yeah so i filmed that in my garage but i was like so i have this thing in my head where uh and i only done this a couple more times there was a technology that i was really excited about and i was like i'm gonna do this video opener like i'm doing a wrestler promo like i'm a wrestler from the 90s or 80s and uh and i but the thing is i had my garage door open when i was filming that and then my the houses in the neighborhood aren't super close but i i can see there's like a um it's not an apartment complex it's like a condo but it's across the road. And the guy, like, I must have been so loud that I just saw him like this. Like, I saw his face, like, trying to look out. And I'm like, okay, and I closed the garage door. But I messed up so many times after that because I got in my head. All I could see is, like, the guy being like, what are you doing in the garage? So it took me, like, ten takes to do that the right way or the way I liked it. But I appreciate you saying that, though. It was amazing. You're a great storyteller. you have a flair for what you do so we were really shall I say tickled pink when we saw that come across our screens no we're really grateful for it thanks it was weird because I sort of remember hearing the rumblings of you guys doing this and I want to say how long has it when was the first like when you talked about it somewhat publicly that you were doing this It's got to be like at least a year or more ago, right? Or is it longer than that? No, more. Well, we literally started like we had our first initial chat with Doc in July 2021. So we haven't it hasn't really been a secret project or anything. Like we've been talking. Trying to be very public about it because
    43:53
    we wanted people to know we're doing this. We want people to rally behind it. You know, I run a video production company for 15 years now, but the whole reason I started the company was to put food on the table and refine my skills while I was pursuing my filmmaking career. And it's 15 years later and I haven't done a feature yet. I've done a ton of shorts, I've done a ton of music videos, fashion films, stuff like that. It was bite-sized creativity. And now everything just fell into place and the ball just started rolling on this. And it was like okay now's the time and we're making this movie and um it's we we want people to know we're making it because we want to build the foundation that we could continue to build off of as we move forward with filmmaking and yeah i think so it's been we've been pretty public with it for the we met in July I think we started filming in July T20 no that would have been like August but it was we pretty much got the ball rolling right away yeah I want to say I saw something it was like I saw something posted and I even like reposted it somewhere I don't remember when it was but I want to say it might have been around the time that I played the game and so I was like that's cool like is someone actually doing I don't know why but I didn't pay i have no idea why i didn't pay enough attention to it at that time but i was like that's cool but i i guess i felt like maybe the way it was written that it was like an idea like it wasn't actually happening so i think when i posted i said oh this would be really cool if someone could tell this story like that's awesome but i guess i didn't think it was as like that you were probably filming it at that time or at least having conversations at that time but then when um when i saw like how serious it was and it was actually a thing i'm like this is awesome because doc is like i don't know doc that well i met him that i met him a couple times but he's he i i will admit this like i get weird around him i don't know why like he's so cool and he's so like he's a chill guy like he'll talk to you i get weird like i'm like i'm meeting some arcade god and i need to make sure like i don't know i just get funny i get like sweaty and uncomfortable but i like it he's not he doesn't make it i don't know what it is but like it takes you back to standing in line at this you're quite a cheap machine it does i don't know why i get really nervous i don't know why i think because he's kind of like this very first of all i know how cool he is i see all the things he does for others he gives back to you know he shares his business model model with other arcades so they can get started like he's such a i don't know i don't know what word to say other than he's like such a good steward of the culture of arcade gaming and there's only one other person I know that probably I'd put next to to to um Doc in that kind of vein and it's Todd Tucky at TNT Amusements like they are both pretty much lifers when it comes to supporting this hobby and I don't know why I get uncomfortable I wish I didn't because there are times where like I've I've had opportunities to have longer conversations with them but as soon as I was done with the interview I was like I gotta go like I just ran away I was like weird like I hope he watches this and realizes I'm not weird. I don't know why. I get starstruck from him. Lumbo says nothing to be nervous about. Lumbo is in the game. And he was a flop since they were 17. He kind of goaded Doc on to really start working on the game in earnest. And Lumbo says nothing to be nervous about. Is it the gloves? I don't know. He's not intimidating looking to me. It's just I think I don't know. I think I look up to I think there's a lot of people like look up to them and and and trust me like I have that dream of maybe one day I'll open up an arcade too or something like that it's been something I've always thought about doing um I don't know I don't know why I have that reaction I need to figure that out because I'd like to actually have a longer conversation with them when a camera's not on because when a camera turns on I kind of like flip a switch into like a different mode. I don't know. I'm not shy. I'm kind of a little shy, but when the camera turns on, I'm not shy at all. I'll do and say anything. And then when the camera turns off, I get a little bit more reserved and shy again.
    48:18
    I think people don't think I'm that way, but I am. Originally, I always said, because we've been in the area for a long time, our studio's three minutes from the arcade. And I'd seen Doc for years. You'd see him on the main strip Bogden Avenue. He literally lived directly across the street from my old business partner, so I'd see him there. Oh, no way. And you'd see this guy with the long black hair, the big sort of Chinese kung fu jacket with a ghost on the back,
    48:47
    fingerless Kevlar knuckle gloves, black gloves, a guy in a black Corvette that said Ghost Lord. And I always said, I honestly, I was like, this guy's going to be a complete dick.
    48:58
    Oh, no. He's like, cool. He seemed like, do you ever watch Stranger Things? Yeah, of course. Yeah, Stranger Things. Big fan. I thought he was going to be like a Billy. Oh, really?
    49:13
    Did you tell him that ever? I don't think he's familiar with Stranger Things. I told him that I originally thought he was going to be a jerk. I don't know if he likes that. I think he likes it often. But that's the funny thing. is that immediately upon meeting him, the first time we sat down to talk, we talked for like four hours. And he's a really generous, nice, just wonderful dude. And I'm very happy to say that we've become pretty good friends. That's awesome. You know, spending so much time together and coming from somewhat similar places with our interests and stuff. He's a great guy. But it's like my ex-business partner. He's one of my best friends. And when I first met him too, I was like what a piece of He just seems like such a piece of trash And I love him I was the best man in his way I think if my first reaction to someone is that they a piece of garbage they ultimately become cool. They become cool. They're cool people. The first time I met Stephen, I was like, this guy's kind of cool. Well, the first time you met me, too, I guess. Well, you are kind of a... I don't know that that's changed, but no. I'm kidding. I'm just trying to entertain the guys. Truthfully, though, yeah, I thought you did. No, I know you did. Keep that going. So I do think if I think someone at first just seems totally like just their piece of crap, you usually become really close. Piece of crap. I think we need to change the subject. I don't know the tension in that room. I can feel it over the Zoom. In fact, he told me this very early on, too. He was like, oh, yeah. That was his first question. Probably on Thursday, and I was like, man, you seem like kind of a bitch, you know?
    51:12
    I'm kidding. I get it. You do have a... uh yeah but he is a wonderful guy she's a wonderful girl and that's the moral of the story yeah yeah well i think you know it's obvious like i obviously know like i don't i don't know the reason why i get that that way around him i think it's just i i do look like i've watched me and my buddy nick we've watched every video interview doc's ever done we're fascinated by there's some really cool things that he's done that i don't know other people know about like i feel like he there are definitely people that come to the arcade that maybe his arcade that maybe feel like outcasts or they feel like they don't really have a place to go where they can be themselves and he he's like created that for them and there are a lot of people that go there that i think feel like it's a safe place where they can go and be themselves and and like no one's judge them and I think that's really cool so like I know I know enough about him and people that know him well to know he is a nice guy I just don't know what it is I get nervous around him and I think it's just because um I don't know like we're into such it'd be like if you met a celebrity like that you that you watched a lot on tv I was like that when I met Todd Ducky Todd and I would become uh I would say we become pretty good friends like now I don't get that way with Todd but I was even that way with Todd when I met him I was like oh my gosh I've seen you like he used to I don't know if you've ever I'm sure you know Todd but he he does this uh I remember watching this old video where he does this bit where he was kind of like this he was trying to sell arcade and pinball machines but he did this bit where he's opening up a pinball machine and in his he put a fake hand in his thing and he closes it he's like oh oh oh and he's like fooled you but it's like so i i watched that when i was like young so it was just weird to meet these people that you kind of don't you just see over like a tv or the internet you know so anyways i don't know i'm being fired now i hope he doesn't watch this now i didn't think i'm a total weirdo
    53:21
    you know what i mean well i think i relate to you and i think also dr personal because he has a very definite look he owns the largest arcade in the world he's a cool guy you just feel at first kind of intimidated by that and i did too when i first and it really took you know getting to know him better but i will tell you he is one of the busiest people i've ever met in my life to an extreme you know and i think that it's uh he's always got 100 things going on and that's part of i think his obsessiveness with like collecting he almost collects tasks for himself yeah the idea that popped into his head it's like okay that's what we're doing now um he's a great dude and i think he's very interesting person he is a very eccentric person he's had an eccentric background um origin and i think that you know the film will show all of that because he's he's done a lot he's done a lot for the community and it's interesting to me that he's sort of i don't know one of the forerunners in the arcade community for sure most people don't even know that he's working on a game and there's a lot of things that like people you said like you didn't think people are aware of a lot of things about him and it's true and people constantly tell me things about him that are not accurate so there's a lot of misinformation out in the world surrounding doc too yeah you know so it'll be interesting to see everyone's reaction to the to the film and oh i think the community is going to absolutely like i'm so number one you know congrats on on the kickstarter i think that's awesome i knew you guys would make it i knew even if that person didn't come in with like i was fully prepared to like get into a fight with my wife and be like if they don't make it i don't care we're figuring out a way to help contribute the rest of the money like i was ready to sell some stuff like i was so excited for this project yeah i'm not even joking i'm not saying that i truly mean that but i just think this is like there's just such a cool story i don't even know if the like even just watching the trailer my My whole thing is, I think it's also an inspirational movie where he had this idea as a kid and he made it happen. Now, granted, it's not out yet. I'm sure the movies and get into that. But like, that's so cool. Like people can do like crazy things if they just do it. And a lot of times it's the fear of if I'm going to fail or, you know, whatever. I don't want to I don't know what I'm doing, but he didn't know what he was doing either. And look, he made it, you know. So I think just I don't know. I think there's going to be an element of people that are going to be also like encouraged and inspired by the fact that he's done what he's done from starting in his, you know, like you guys show, by the way, did you recreate his bedroom?
    56:06
    So the vision for me was to create. Yeah. What could have been, it's a room that was like, if his adolescent psyche exploded between four walls, it would be that room. Cause I was like, damn, his bedroom was cool as shit. Well, so about, about half of the stuff in there was, was good stuff.
    56:35
    Artifacts. Uh, and then the rest of it was authentically tailored to his interest, but via eBay, you know what I mean? Yeah. That was cool. That, and that intro, I think gives a really strong sense of a lot of the things we want to do in the film, which is find interesting ways to resurrect the past and bring a story that's already happened in so many ways, bring it to life on film, so to speak, which is one of the big reasons we're trying to raise the money to do it. So, yeah, no, he is an inspiration. His quest is an inspiration. And that's not something I knew going into it. Going into it, I was just like, this is a wild story. Let's see where it leads. And it became a very inspirational story and is a very inspirational story. So I agree with you. I just warned you that, you know, after watching the movie, I think you might open that arcade. Oh, no, I've been trust me, I've gone back and forth a million times. And you had someone else on the I don't remember his name, but you had someone else on like a couple of guests before me. And he was talking about virtual reality. And there was a point where I was really thinking, I wanted to do something not classic gaming, like try to go into more of the future gaming stuff. Because actually, I really do like virtual reality. Like I've been a supporter of VR ever since like the development kits for Oculus way before Facebook bought them. and I like that stuff because it's sort of like it kind of goes against all the other stuff I'm into but I like this idea that like there are certain elements now where you really do feel transported into a different place and sort of like it's like what a what an old school arcade game was trying to do before but it was so I don't know like uh it's the word I'm looking for I mean it was it was like rudimentary like there was no not rudimentary the word what's the word like when it's something archaic like uh okay we'll just use archaic yeah sure like it wasn't you know what it could it achieved it but like i said earlier you had to use a lot of your imagination and now there's like these these vr systems that can truly make you some sort of feel like you're in a different world and so i had thought about like maybe i don't open a traditional arcade maybe i do something like a vr thing but i don't know i don't know what i'm going to do but i know I want to do something. And I like craft beer, but I don't know. So beer, arcade, I don't know. I don't know, but I hope it happens someday. My whole thing is I watch a lot of Bar Rescue, so I'm like, I can't open a barcade. John Taffer's going to come in and be like, shut it down. That's it. These nachos suck. And like, that's it. Like, I'm dead. But I don't know.
    59:11
    I will tell you, and then we'll let you go. I know it's taking a while. I'm not waiting for a hot sauce challenge here, But making the film has changed my life in the fact that, like I told you, I always wanted to make movies, had started a business that's relatively successful. You know, we don't have any debt, so that's good. We pay all our bills. Oh, hey, that's awesome. Yeah. Yeah, I've heard. So, but I'm not, you know, but it's like, hey, that's not what I feel like I was destined for. Right. and started kind of just working on this film. It was a passion project, but listening to everything Doc said and just the relentless pursuit of, no, this is what I want to do and this is what I think I'm supposed to do by my own definition really pushed me to say, okay, we're not just making a film here. We're starting a new lifestyle that is geared towards finding ways to create a whole new filmmaking ecosystem where this is one, then there's two, then there's three, and we're already developing our ideas for the next suite of content that we want to put out there. So I think in watching the movie, you risk experiencing something similar, and this is part of the magic of Don, is that he does inspire. And when you look at, like, shit, if this guy was willing to put all this work in, hold on for so long, never give up on the dream, be relentless, really just truly 100% DNA belief, no, this is going to happen and it's going to be good, you're going to be like, yeah, I'm opening an arcade now. And if we can inspire people to some extent of that when they watch the film, I think it'll be an excellent cinematic experience for people. But definitely didn't set out to be like, let's make an inspirational film that challenges people to achieve their dreams. That would be artificial i think it just organically organic yeah i mean the trailer makes me feel that way and because i'm but i also know a little bit more about like i've played the game and i know so i know a little bit more than what the trailer that's on but there's a scene in the trailer that gives me like when i this is when i was like oh my gosh i need to support this this is freaking awesome the scene where he's in the chair if you just whatever i don't know who i don't know who picked the music for that scene the way that scene ended i love the freaking scene where he's like dark presence will come out and then it like fades to black i was like i get goosebumps saying it i'm not even like i swear that scene but our presence will be out did it for me i was like i need to promote this this is freaking awesome it was just i don't know like it i love that so whether it clearly comes off as organic which is awesome but um like i i'm excited because i have a friend that And I told him, now I haven't seen the movie, obviously, but I told him, I said, because he's going to be leaving his job. He's taking a little bit of risk. He's feeling, like you said earlier, he's feeling like a bit unfulfilled with what he's doing for his work. And he's real passionate about arcade gaming and he wants to open this arcade. But the thing that, the skill that he possesses is very similar to Doc. He was a youth pastor. and so he's really good with kids and he's really good at like making kids feel safe to tell because a lot of the kids that he sees they don't have great home lives right like they don't have they don't have people that are really guiding them at all and so they look to him for that and i said dude open up your arcade but your whole thing is make it make it that place that everyone feels safe and you'll create a a community that's that that kind of like what doc has i do think there's a lot of people that go there i met one of them i did you ever meet uh i can't recall his last name jose did you meet him he's a regular at galloping ghost like he he's one of those guys like he feels 100 safe there feels like he'd be himself there and and they've made him like he's kind of like a celebrity in this place like in any other world in any out in the outside of that building no one probably knows that jose is this like amazing arcade you know player but people there have such a this like respect for him anyways long story short i think my friend nick can can do something similar to what doc does and he doesn't need alcohol and he doesn't need even though like you know if i ever did it i'd probably want to do more of a barcade than they but but i he has a unique skill of making people feel comfortable be themselves feel like part of a family and a community and he's a really nice guy just like doc so i don't know i feel like he's gonna watch movie and it's going to put him over the edge it's gonna like and i told him i even when he saw the trailer i'm like you're gonna get so hyped when you see this trailer and he did he's like oh man i can't wait to see this so uh when does it come do we have like a release date for the movie i'm just gonna get you with the hard question right at the end there oh that's okay i mean i've been asked that a million times i think and i say it's always funding the independent so we have now achieved the next you know big thing which is unlocking the kickstarter funding here that's going to put us into production mode very soon i mean we've never stopped we did two interviews last week but we're going to be able to start doing some of that more interesting stuff uh to help resurrect the past and the place um so i would love for it to be done by the end of the year but i can't promise anything i would love for you to be involved either in person or virtually whatever works for you in the test screening I would love to get you involved in that for you to kind of see a preview of the film and give your thoughts on it I already told my work that whatever happens with this well here's the cool thing I support Chicago for my work so I actually support Central and West so I can easily happen to be there on a work trip during the time that something's happening I have it all planned out already. So I'm like, yeah. So whatever capacity I can participate, I would love that. Awesome. Well, our wings just got here for our hot sauce challenge. So if you want to be amused, watch the Twitch.
    65:37
    All right. Yeah. Thank you for so much time. You're a great guy, Ralph. I really like talking to you. I really am grateful for your support and all the kind things you have to say about where we've gotten so far. Anybody who hasn't checked out your channel, I already saw one person in the chat. Yeah, I saw that motion mirror. Yeah, he subscribed. Oh, sweet. Anybody who hasn't checked out Retro Ralph's channel on YouTube, absolutely check it out. A lot of quality content. Great guy. Ralph, I hope to talk to you very soon. Yeah. Well, the feeling is mutual. You guys have all been awesome during all of this, so I appreciate it. And yeah, just let me know when it's happening. I'll be on my way to Chicago. Awesome, man. Thank you so much. All right. Thanks so much for having me on. I appreciate it.
    66:41
    you