Phil Salvador and Robin Kunimune chat with Chloe Appleby, games curator at the Powerhouse Museum in Sydney, Australia, who shares how she turned her passion for games into a dream role blending community, culture, and quirky preservation. From Sydney’s post-COVID game scene revival to tracking down lost media and organizing a free indie games festival, Chloe shows how playful curiosity can power serious cultural impact. She emphasizes the importance of community engagement and the museum’s efforts to preserve Australian game history, including notable games like Untitled Goose Game and Nightmare.
Mentioned in the show:
Nightmare: Nightmare Presenter Video
Dan Dare: Pilot of the Future 87/697-3 and Shogun 87/697-6 (specifically the leaflet)
Sega World audio: Sonic Live in Sydney (Full & Complete CD – 1997 – Sega World Sydney)
You can listen to the Video Game History Hour every other Wednesday on Patreon (one day early at the $5 tier and above), on Spotify, or on our website.
See more from Chloe Appleby:
Linktree: @chloeappleby
Instagram: @c.appleby_
Bluesky: @chloeappleby.bsky.social
X: @AppleBee180
See more from Powerhouse:
Website: powerhouse.com.au
Instagram: @powerhousemuseum
Video Game History Foundation:
Email: podcast@gamehistory.org
Website: gamehistory.org
Support us on Patreon: /gamehistoryorg
TRANSCRIPT
–Transcript edited by Jeremy Seith
Phil Salvador 00:08
Hello and welcome to the Video Game History Hour presented by the Video Game History Foundation. I’m Phil Salvador, library director at the Video Game History Foundation. I’m here with Robin Kunimune, our producer,
Robin Kunimune 00:19
Hello!
Phil Salvador 00:20
Hi Robin. What do you think the most common question I personally get about my work here is, Robin?
Robin Kunimune 00:27
Oh, you’re putting me on the spot. I would guess a request for an item.
Phil Salvador 00:34
Well, sometimes that happens. We are recording this before we’ve launched the library, so people don’t really know what we have. But the most common request, the most common question I get right now is, how do I get your job? And that’s not really an easy question, because it’s kind of a small profession. A lot of us have kind of made these jobs, so I figured we should start having episodes where we bring on people who work in this field to talk about what they do, how they got there, and what the world of video game history, video game curation, video game preservation looks like To that end, we have our guest today, Chloe Appleby. Chloe is the games curator at the Powerhouse Museum in Sydney, Australia, all the way on the other side of the globe from where we’re recording. And yeah, Chloe, welcome to the show. Thanks for joining us.
Chloe Appleby 01:15
I’ll give a g’day. Hello.
Phil Salvador 01:19
Thank you for the novelty of Australian guests being on Thank you.
Chloe Appleby 01:23
Had to do it. Had to do it.
Phil Salvador 01:25
So, yeah, you’re here on the show today, genuinely, just because we want to bring on folks who work in a video game, let’s say cultural heritage broadly, and just talk about what that means and the kind of work they do. We met you at the Game Developers Conference last year. You were in attendance and you moderated a panel I was on, the What’s New in Game History panel.
Chloe Appleby 01:44
Yeah, that was a lot of fun.
Phil Salvador 01:45
That was a great panel, and it was kind of a crash course in, Hey, welcome to the American game history community.
Chloe Appleby 01:51
Yeah, I got really thrown into it.
Phil Salvador 01:51
You got really thrown into it. This was your first time in the US, and we were supposed to get lunch, and we were trying to figure out where to go and I was like, Oh, you’re in the US for the first time. We have to go to Denny’s. We have to go–
Robin Kunimune 01:54
Really?
Chloe Appleby 01:55
We went to Denny’s.
Phil Salvador 01:56
Yeah.
Chloe Appleby 01:57
Afterwards I had to lie down.
Robin Kunimune 02:00
What did you think>
Chloe Appleby 02:10
It was so salty. It was great. But afterwards I’m like, Well, this is just a sodium hit that I was not expecting.
Phil Salvador 02:24
I knew we were in for an experience when we sat down, the first thing you said when you looked at the menu is, What is ranch? I knew we were in for a good time.
Chloe Appleby 02:32
I didn’t know. I knew it was a sauce, a condiment, but no idea what was actually made from ranch. Yeah.
Phil Salvador 02:42
Well, if I come into the Powerhouse, or if, like, ACMI in Australia is throwing a conference, you can have me eat a spoonful of Vegemite. We’ll balance it out. We’ll solve the equation.
Chloe Appleby 02:51
I won’t be too mean to you. I take you to the wonders of banh mi and other things that are around. But maybe I will also do the spoonful veggie bite just for fun.
Phil Salvador 03:00
Well, fine. Okay. Well, anyway, Chloe, so you are the games curator at the Powerhouse Museum. I think a lot of folks, especially listening to us, are not in Australia and aren’t familiar with the Powerhouse Museum. What is your job? What do you do at the museum?
Chloe Appleby 03:13
Great question. So I guess what I’ll start with first is, what is thePowerhouse? I feel like I’ve seen a few questions about the museum, and I’m like, Yeah, that’s fair, just because we’re quite a large institution. So the Powerhouse is actually the largest museum group in Australia. So we actually have four sites associated to us. We have two museums, well, three museums, one being built currently in Parramatta, which is meant to be on the same scale, when I say meant to be, it is the same scale of the Opera House in terms of funding, which is pretty cool, as well as we have one in the city in Sydney called just a normal Powerhouse Museum, which is currently going revitalization, much needed, and it’s going to be for fantastic new building for everybody to see objects in and come together. We have a storage facility as well as the Sydney observatory, so people can come and look at the stars, which is beautiful.
Phil Salvador 04:13
So the storage facility is open to the public?
Chloe Appleby 04:16
Oh, yeah, we have an open facility.
Phil Salvador 04:18
Wow. That’s really unusual, wow.
Chloe Appleby 04:19
Yeah. It is one of my favorite things. I think it’s also a very much a trend coming along in Australia, I think, but, yeah, you can come to our site and see things in storage like massive trains and spaceships and that kind of thing. We even have Sydney Olympic costumes on display that you can come and look at. It’s quite incredible. But you can also see them in the stillages, so that’s big wooden frames that we use to hold everything together. It’s quite fantastic. So I highly recommend seeing any open storage facility that you can for a museum.
Chloe Appleby 05:00
I didn’t know any public ones ever existed.
Phil Salvador 05:03
Same, yeah.
Chloe Appleby 05:04
Surprise! It’s quite a wonderful space. Yeah, you can look into it, but you can also, we do tours going into it as well. So it’s pretty cool. And we’ve been doing that for years, actually. Yeah, so we’ve got applied arts and sciences. So applied arts just means, instead of fine art, we look at things that are more a design perspective, and then applied sciences is how you utilize sciences to do many other things. I hope that explains it to a lot of listeners.
Phil Salvador 05:39
Well, you mentioned a lot of things. You mentioned, like Olympic uniforms, you mentioned trains, you mentioned applied sciences. Like, there’s a lot in there. How did games fit into that?
Chloe Appleby 05:48
Yeah. So we actually have a very extensive computing collection as well. And this is pre-me, because I’m young. Listeners, I am young. Yeah. So we have things ranging from in the 1950s all the way to up to today in terms of computing history. And we started collecting games in the ’80s. So there were things bought like the Sega Master System, as well as other floppy disks and cassette tapes, and slowly bringing in Nintendo, the SNES as well as Game Boys. And then recently, we started collecting more contemporary works as well since a few people started doing that, including myself. Games just naturally fit in. It was just inconceivable that we weren’t doing it originally. Games are so important to not only the Australian client, but globally as well, the representation of it in a collection. And it was quite exciting that it was starting to be taken a bit more seriously across the whole institution, when they’ve recognized, Oh, games are a very important contemporary media and a platform and a medium for people to express stories, as well as a crucial display of design, and that includes not only artwork, but coding as well. So it was, yeah, pretty exciting that they’re like, Oh, we’re doing this now. I’m like, Ooh, okay.
Phil Salvador 07:18
Yeah, it’s always interesting to see what angle museums take into games because, like, I’ve been to science museums that had game exhibits. I’ve been to, like, the Smithsonian American Art Gallery had a game exhibit. But it sounds like that’s exactly the intersection of where you are, where it’s like, applied arts and sciences and games are kind of both those things. Yeah.
Chloe Appleby 07:35
Games were the literal perfect example of what our museum is. It’s both which I’m like, Oh, great. It’s beautiful.
Phil Salvador 07:42
It’s interesting. So, how does it become a big enough thing that you are the games creator there? Like, what’s your story? Because you sort of made that job up, not really, but like, how did that happen?
Chloe Appleby 07:55
I kind of did, yeah. My journey at the Powerhouse. So while I was doing my master’s degree in museum and heritage studies, I was also volunteering extensively in the museum as well, because unfortunately, in any cultural institution job, you must volunteer or intern to just get your foot into the door. It’s quite a competitive industry, and especially now with the video games section as well, becoming a bit more niche and a bit more popular and a lot more competitive, it’s good to get your foot in the door originally. Yeah, so on that, I just learned everything about the museum, as well as different processes, what works on displays of different type. Worked in many exhibitions as well, and then I got a real job in the museum. So I’ve got a full time role, and worked in registration. So we go through, we catalog objects as well as assist with storage, put things onto display, and we’re also part of digitization of the entire collection. So if you were to go to the Powerhouse Museum collection website, we have quite an extensive number of our over 500,000 objects on display online, and we’re still going and working through that today. So it’s very, very extensive project. And then I got into curatorial because I worked hard for that, and with my previous experience, I was able just to apply that to different mindsets, different programs, as well as exhibitions. And the whole time, I kept talking about how much I loved games. I’m like, Have you played this game? Have you done this? Have you done that? And I actually, for clarification, I have no formal training in games. I just was a– I also have a degree in ancient history as well. So utilizing that, you know,historical setting, as well as looking at ways people made, that was what I was really, really interested in. So one day we had a– we actually announced it two years ago. It was our tripartite which is a agreement with the Australian Center of the Moving Image, called ACMI, as well as the National Film and Sound archive in Australia, so NFSA. May have heard those before, listeners. I don’t know why I’m talking to the listeners.
Phil Salvador 10:29
I think we may even be talking about some of those folks. One of our previous episodes, we went to the Save the Games conference because there was some representation from Australia this.
Chloe Appleby 10:37
Yeah, Chris Arneil, yeah.
Phil Salvador 10:39
That’s Chris Arneil, yes, yeah. I was gonna say in terms of Australian game curators, I know you and Chris, that’s kind of the folks in our orbit. So it’s a small industry.
Chloe Appleby 10:45
We’ve got to introduce you to the third one, which is Jini Maxwell and then you’ve met all three amazing like ticking them off.
Robin Kunimune 10:56
Collect ’em all.
Chloe Appleby 10:57
Little Pokemon cards. So from that meeting, they invited me in, which was really lovely, from folks at the Powerhouse. Oh yeah, come and listen in. We know you have an interest in this. And then it kind of very quickly snowballed into doing a games event. So, for context, the Sydney landscape is post-COVID In 2020 it was quite, what’s a nice way to say, I don’t want to say barren. But it was– not much was happy. There weren’t many events. People were coming together.
Robin Kunimune 11:37
Quiet.
Chloe Appleby 11:37
It was very quiet. Quiet is much more lovely than barren.
Phil Salvador 11:41
Thank you, Robin.
Robin Kunimune 11:43
No problem.
Chloe Appleby 11:44
Not much was happening, and then people needed a reason to come back together, and that’s not just the audience, the players, but also community. That’s what we refer to as industry in Australia. So I was like, Let’s do a games event, and it was led by our digital team in the museum. And they were like, Hey, do you want to come on and add some programming? And I’m like, Sure. And then from there, I kind of–
Phil Salvador 12:13
I want to jump in really quick and mention, for lay people, mentioning who aren’t in this field, because you mentioned you worked in programs, they brought you in to do programming. What does that mean for museums? When we talk about like a program at a museum.
Robin Kunimune 12:24
Yes, and a follow up clarification for us, lay people, not you two experts, you also mentioned this curatorial arm and What is that? How is that different?
Chloe Appleby 12:36
Okay, I will, sorry. I ramble.
Phil Salvador 12:40
That’s why we’re doing this podcast. We wanted people who don’t know what it’s like to actually work in a museum.
Chloe Appleby 12:43
Exactly. Okay, great. So museums have many branches. In terms of collection and like public engagement, there’s say the collection stream, so that we look after the collection objects as well as the exhibition stream. So curatorial falls under collection and exhibitions as well. So exhibitions, obviously, put things onto display. We develop exhibitions. We put stuff out there for the public, and try to show a narrative that makes sense for the public, but also, while not dictating what they must experience, what they must get out of it. That’s what a good curator, in my opinion, should be doing. It should be allowing the visitor to come in and experience their own journey for it, while still giving them some sort of pathway to that and then for programs. So that’s you know, when you go to a museum, like, Oh, great, there’s this workshop on that I can join in and learn about how to code, as well as, Oh, there’s other things that you can go into where, like, say, it’s a drop-in for children. With the Powerhouse we’re doing a lot of because– we’re currently going through a revitalization, so we don’t have any open buildings, except for the two, which is our storage facility and our Sydney observatory, which is not a bad thing. It’s given us an opportunity to really look into how we want to represent ourselves and put programs out for the community as well. So programming that we’ve been doing is like, say, late night events. We did those previously, before the museum went under revitalization, and that was to allow for people who couldn’t get to the museum during the day or on the weekends. So after work, they could come in and still experience a museum and experience a different type of culture that probably they won’t be able to, which is pretty exciting. They were quite successful, as well as, say, drop in food activities or doing scholarships and that kind of thing. So program is a big, big word defining many thing, which is good for public
Phil Salvador 15:02
I want to add some things to that, because when you were mentioning the curation versus, yeah, that was something I learned a little bit like early on in my career, from Rachel Donahue, friend of VGHF, is the idea that preservation and interpretation are two separate activities. And sometimes you do both. But like, saving a thing is different than presenting a thing and the museum does both those
Chloe Appleby 15:24
Exactly.
Phil Salvador 15:25
That’s a good example, that.
Chloe Appleby 15:26
Yeah. And then even presenting things online. So we have a thing when we put objects out onto our online collection called a significance statement, so it just gives a bit more further detail about the history of the objects, as well as why it’s important for it to be in the museum collection, and we have to be careful there not to show a curatorial bias, because at the end of the day, all curators are biased onto their preference. You can actually see it when people come in to collect and they like focus on one certain thing, and someone would take over the role after they’ve finished, and it’s like, it’s a different thing. So you can– almost like a– oh, my goodness, what is the thing called? I did archeology and I should know this. When there’s layers–
Phil Salvador 16:12
Chloe’s holding her hands up like she’s holding a sandwich right now, I’m trying to–
Chloe Appleby 16:16
there’s layers in the ground, and it starts with an S. No, they’re gonna roast me!
Phil Salvador 16:21
Not stratification.
Chloe Appleby 16:25
Strata! Strata levels, no?
Phil Salvador 16:26
Okay, close, close. Yeah, yeah.
Chloe Appleby 16:28
Strata is an apartment thing that we have in Australia. But listen, you’ll see there’s layers like an onion. Let’s use a Shrek analogy.
Phil Salvador 16:39
That’s the S word. It starts with S. It’s Shrek, okay, we got it.
Chloe Appleby 16:42
That’s right, language is Shrek. I forgot what I was talking about.
Phil Salvador 16:49
Everyone brings their own lens into it,.
Robin Kunimune 16:52
Bias?
Chloe Appleby 16:52
Bias, yes. So everyone brings their own biases into their own collecting so you have to be careful about not showing that. If that makes sense.
Robin Kunimune 17:03
Sure.
Phil Salvador 17:03
Yeah. I mean, and that always happens, like, by the time this airs, our digital library will have launched. And I think a lot of folks will notice that there’s a direction in the collections, in both the direction of unreleased NES games and Myst and it’s like, Wow, it’s like, Frank and Phil were involved in this.
Chloe Appleby 17:18
I really enjoyed the Myst episode, so I’m like, I’m excited.
Phil Salvador 17:22
So that inevitably is going to happen, but, yeah, it’s good that that’s something that you know you keep in mind when you’re presenting things, you try to manipulate that. The other question I had before we get back to your story, is, you mentioned food events. Has there yet been an overlap between a game thing and a food event?
Chloe Appleby 17:38
Yes, there has.
Phil Salvador 17:39
Really? Oh my goodness. What was it?
Chloe Appleby 17:40
I’ve done it. I’ve done it. It’s actually collecting. So there was a– we have a thing called the Australian Culinary Archive, which is, we’re going through with a whole bunch of chefs. I’m not a part of that one, which is because I’m like, Oh God, I’m too busy. We’re going through and collecting stories, recipes, different cookbooks, other things related to food in Australia that I am blanking on because I’m only focused on video games.
Phil Salvador 17:55
But not the food itself. You’re not like preserving like a–
Chloe Appleby 18:18
We have water bottles in the collection full of water. So we– oh! No, we have a biscuit. We have 101-year-old Osborne biscuit in the collection in a sealed container, which we recently exhibited, and I was part of that show, and that was my favorite object of the whole exhibition. Like, look at this biscuit on the wall. It’s so good. I highly recommend googling that one.
Phil Salvador 18:49
As we’re talking I’m going to do that right now.
Chloe Appleby 18:50
Yeah. You’re going to look and be like, This? Yeah. So we had a, in Melbourne, there was a game jam, and it was celebrating the Australian Women’s Children’s Cake Cookbook, which is a very iconic book in Australia, where, I don’t know if you’ve ever seen them online, like the train cakes, there’s a duck cake, but it’s like these very complex works of art that you must craft in your kitchen, and you are expected to have this insane level of baking skill, but you’re just someone who tried to make a cake for a child. So it’s they often come out in complete disaster, which is insane, and I love it. And there was a studio called Paper House, and they’re based in Melbourne, and decided to do a game jam themed around this cookbook. So they asked developers to come in and create a work based around this cookbook. And I reached out being like, I need to be involved. The Powerhouse definitely needs to collect some of the works here, because we actually have the Cake Cookbook in our collection. So it made a lot of sense to showcase, Hey, this is a different interpretation of a recipe that we’ve got represented in the collection. So we had a game based on a massive cake castle, and that was collecting candles and trying to save this person’s birthday party with very much Australianisms of a party, which is a sausage rolls, fairy bread. Fairy bread is hundreds and thousands sprinkles with butter on white bread.
Phil Salvador 20:39
Okay? Robin’s face just lit up on that one.
Robin Kunimune 20:42
It sounds delicious.
Chloe Appleby 20:44
It’s fantastic. If the bread’s a little bit stale, fantastic. It’s been out for hours. We also– like sausage rolls, pies. There’s a whole, like, lollies, that kind of thing. So that was just scattered across a picnic table. So you go through, played that. There was a board game where you had to compete making a cupcake based on one of these cakes in the cookbook. But you also got to destroy the other person’s cake slowly in the process. So you roll the dice and be like, Oh, I’m going to take all your toppings off. Sorry. It was so fun. I actually hope that one does eventually get made into a game which is quite cool. And a experimental artwork actually, which was a game that was projected onto a cake. And the whole premise was, you had to, yeah, yeah. Had to follow the instructions and slowly pick apart this cake or decorate it or do what you want. And in the end, there’s a beautiful video of it being played with all the developers coming in and then singing happy birthday at the end. Yeah. So that is one way that we have crossed the streams between games and food through collecting. But I’m hoping to do a lot more with that as well.
Phil Salvador 22:07
Honestly, that was a joke question I had. Dtidn’t expect to go down that path.
Chloe Appleby 22:11
We’re going down all the paths.
Phil Salvador 22:13
I did search for the biscuit. There it is. It’s a little moldy. It’s doing okay.
Chloe Appleby 22:19
It’s a little moldy, but it’s 101 years old and it’s a little moldy. I think that’s great.
Phil Salvador 22:24
That’s pretty impressive. Yeah, okay, we have to get out of the biscuit hole. We have to go back to your life. You’re in your career. Yeah.
Chloe Appleby 22:32
You’re right. We need to move on, back to me.
Phil Salvador 22:35
So you’ve been doing programming. They brought you in to do some video game programming because they wanted to fix the quietness of Sydney post-COVID.
Chloe Appleby 22:43
Well, it was something that they didn’t actually think of. They didn’t know about the scene, if I’m going to be completely honest, this was something that we stumbled into and filled a gap that we didn’t realize needed to be needed or needed to be filled, basically. Yeah, so we made this event where we got people from the industry or the community to come and give short, little micro talks. We had games playable as well as showing different collection objects. And a streamer called Lara de Wit, who does piano online. She’s doing other things, now, don’t look that up. So she’s on the piano and then live-streaming to Twitch, which we projected onto this insane, massive wall projector where people come and interact. It was quite a beautiful experience, where grandparents would just sit there and watch and then ask her questions or ask her to play different tunes from classical music or from video games, students with notebooks writing furiously when they had industry experts tell them facts or how to get into the industry, This is what you have to do to make a certain type of game, and it was quite a beautiful experience. So that was held on like a Thursday, from five to 9pm and we got 500 visitors from that, and they’re like, Wow, this is really cool on a Thursday. Let’s do it again. And then we did it again. And I was with one of my colleagues who now works for South by Southwest Sydney. So Luella, she did such a good job she also got promoted. When we say promoted, poached. So, yeah, we had this event where we showcased board games. We had video games that were works in progress on display for people to come in and play test. We had the talk series as well, and we had quite a few other aspects to it that people weren’t expecting. And then from that event, we had 1500 people come in to the door, and they were like, Okay, so we did it again, and then we did it again. So in total, those events garnered like over, I think it’s all around about 4000 visitors in total, on a very short time frame, which is kind of insane that that even happened, particularly in a museum. And from there, because of these people coming in, game developers were able to get insane feedback that they couldn’t get from, say, going to any standard convention, normally it’s gamers coming in who have played games, and they’re like, Oh, we can come in do this and then tell you what we think, or like, We hate your game. And then with these events, it was people who liked museums, or people who did like games that were like, Oh, we can’t actually afford to go to these conventions, so it’s actually really nice to come to this free event. So they were able to get feedback that they couldn’t get, which helped to help develop their game. And that was something that I took into any programming that I’m moving forward. So in terms of my role, it became more a facilitator to create a platform of support for developers in Sydney, on top of preservation as well. So my job is quite broad now, and because of that success, they were like, All right, so you’re going to do this now as a job. You got to obviously apply for my job. And I did apply for my job, and I got my job, yeah, so it was, it’s kind of a roller coaster, but I basically made my job by helping community and accidentally revitalizing a whole scene. Actually won an award for it last year, too.
Phil Salvador 26:43
Congratulations.
Robin Kunimune 26:44
Congratulations.
Chloe Appleby 26:46
Weirdly, it’s an Australian game developer award, the rising star. So I think I’m one of the only people who haven’t made a game or done anything in the games industry that has this sitting on my desk now.
Chloe Appleby 27:00
I feel like you’re developing the developers. That’s why you’re considered in the category.
Chloe Appleby 27:05
Thank you. Excellent. Great.
Phil Salvador 27:08
Keighly, if you’re listening, future idea for Game Awards 2025.
Chloe Appleby 27:13
Yeah, best developer developer.
Chloe Appleby 27:16
Happy to share my tips.
Robin Kunimune 27:21
So how long ago was that that your position became official?
Chloe Appleby 27:24
Technically, one year ago. I’ve been doing this for one year, officially, unofficially, three. Yeah.
Phil Salvador 27:32
I think there’s some really important lessons there, because it’s, I mean, there’s a couple things I noticed when you were telling that story. The first is that what you described, it sounds like it’s unusual for both game developer ,the gaming community, but also museums where game developers don’t get that kind of feedback, they don’t get that audience. But how often is a museum doing an event where, like, the artist is present and they’re showing a work in progress? And that’s unusual.
Chloe Appleby 28:03
So, I think for museums, I mean, I know ACMI also does that too, with their RMIT Work in Progress nights previously, where they had students or different work in progress works on display. And that wasn’t just games, it was also film works and different types of media works where people would come in and give their feedback. So I feel like it’s a nice, not a new concept for Australians. So we’re like, Oh, great. This is something that I think we’re leading in. And it does help. Like someone told me, Oh, I mentioned the game because they didn’t want– I think they probably keep it quiet, but they, because of that event, they were actually able to take a concept that they initially thought wasn’t a great idea and run with it, and took it to different types of expos, and now they’re actually going to get published and be a be retailed game because of that event. So, yeah, it’s quite nice hearing these stories like, Oh, it’s working.
Phil Salvador 29:01
I think it’s also interesting, because the path that you took into this, you did not come with this, like, Hey, employer, let’s do a video game thing. Like I had tried to, at my old employer do that before. Like, Hey, we should have video games. And they’re like, why? And it makes me think about there was an event I used to volunteer with. It was a gaming community event where they were laying out, like, Here’s the core values of our organization. It was about, like, community and participation and bringing people in and being experimental. And someone said, What about video games? And I had to explain it, like, well, video games isn’t a value. Like, that’s the thing that we do with that. But the core of what we are is doing this. And so for you, it’s a similar thing where, like, this was very much the focus wasn’t let’s do a video game thing. It was, let’s foster a community. Let’s bring people in in this space where this is empty. And that led to, hey, people care about video games
Chloe Appleby 29:50
Exactly. Yeah, it was the employer who came to me and was like, do event. I’m like, Okay.
Phil Salvador 29:58
I think that’s important. I think there’s a lot of, sort of, like, essentialism around like, games are special. Games are unique. But every time we see people who have gotten into these kind of roles, it’s because it’s part of this bigger picture of what museums are doing.
Chloe Appleby 30:10
Absolutely. That was just me being like, absolutely sorry.
Phil Salvador 30:13
Oh, okay, cool. I wasn’t sure. I wasn’t sure if it was– since we have a video call going from California to Sydney right now, the feeds are a little a little unstable, so I couldn’t tell if Chloe was getting ready to say something else or not.
Chloe Appleby 30:24
Sorry about that, guys, it’s 7:43 in the morning. I’m doing my best.
Phil Salvador 30:29
I’m gonna blame the internet and not you. So you’re continuing to do the same sorts of things now, in terms of facilitating bringing people in to have exhibits or event– are you doing any like exhibit curation too, or is it primarily this programming focused approach?
Chloe Appleby 30:44
So a little bit of I got my pie. My thing is many pies, so doing a lot of collecting. So as I mentioned earlier, the food program, the food collecting, as well as looking at trying to source lost media as much as possible, or expand on the collection that we have, which is quite small. We only have 233 items in relation to video games and then you also got the computing collection on top of that as well. So trying to expand on that. In terms of exhibiting, I’ll just say a little bit. Yes? I can’t go too much into detail, because obviously we’re still developing it, but trying to incorporate games in a bit of a more of a unique way, rather than being like, here’s just a big game exhibition. But my feeling on it is, and it’s something similar to what you were like, What about values of games? And I’m like, Well, when we do display them, why don’t we just put them in as not an everyday object, but like they’re there. They’re not going to have to make a big song and dance of it. Games are a critical part of our culture, and they are present, so let’s just represent them as they are. They’re just here, similar to every other object in the world. Yeah, and then for programs, I’m mainly doing a lot of programming, and that’s probably gonna lead into my next question, I don’t know.
Phil Salvador 32:20
Well, we’ll get to that in a second. We have a new thing that’s coming up that we’ll get to in just a moment. But there were a couple, a couple things that I want to follow up on. The first was, I feel like we should have a thing where, when someone says lost media, I just have, like, a gong that I hit, and we just, like, stop discussion and talk about that. But when you talk about that in terms of, like, Australian video game history and things that are lost, what does that mean?
Lost Media Gong 32:38
[gong sounds]
Chloe Appleby 32:40
Means a lot. So we have many people working, obviously, before I even came into this area preserving media. So there’s the first person I think of for Australian games lost media and trying to preserve it and leading the charge of that is Melanie Swalwell. Highly recommend. Yeah, she’s fantastic. She’s helmed the Play it Again project, so looking at preserving lost media from 1980s and 1990s and that was in collaboration with ACMI as well. And she’s, yeah, they’re also working on other things, which I’m not gonna talk about, but yeah.
Phil Salvador 33:19
Which I do want to shout out to Melanie Swalwell, by the way, because I believe she just got a pretty substantial grant, like almost a million dollars of a grant from the from the Australian Government for working with, like, game emulation in Australia, which, oh my goodness, that’s, that’s really substantial.
Chloe Appleby 33:34
It’s so, so exciting. Thanks government. Thank you for recognizing this important work.
Phil Salvador 33:39
Thanks government. Thank you, Melanie. Yeah, so great stuff. So yes, Melanie, a standout figure in the field of Australian game history and preservation.
Chloe Appleby 33:47
Highly recommend all her articles. So yes, she has been leading the helm of that, and then from there, I see her as the pinnacle, and in terms of lost me for what we’re doing in Sydney and in I mean, Australia-wide is worth trying to collect games that not only are contemporary, but things that we wouldn’t be expecting. So, for example, there is a game that recently got resurfaced on Bluesky. It’s called The Sydney Mystery. It’s a full motion video game where this guy has filmed his family and he’s trying to solve his uncle’s kidnapping. And it is insane, and I love it immensely.
Robin Kunimune 33:53
When was this made?
Chloe Appleby 33:59
April 13, 2003. It took the Sydney game scene by storm. They’re like, What is this game? What is this thing? Even took me by– I was like, Whoa, this is crazy. Even David Smith, who is a games journalist, wrote a whole piece about the game and we did some investigating, and we found the guy who made it, who lives in the US. I’m not too sure where we’ll be at the time of this release of the recording, but I have got a meeting with him next week, and I’m very excited. I tracked that man down, and I messaged him on LinkedIn. I’m like, We need to talk. So it’s apparently available, like on, like My Abandonware, and it’s such a great game because it’s got imagery of Sydney at a certain period of time. So 2003 would have had our monorail, which was a disaster in Sydney. It’s so funny. But yes, we had all these, like, different types of footage from this game. So very, very excited to see how that progresses, but trying to capture lost media as much as possible.
Phil Salvador 35:55
So, the other thing I wanted to tease out a little bit was we were talking about, you know, we, you know, obviously, like we do game preservation, game history, a lot of what you do is focused on current developers. And I’m curious how a lot of that fits together. Because when we think about, and we were just talking in the Game History Foundation Discord, about Australian game history, we were like, oh, Beam Software, the people who were getting, like, outsourced all the weird titles no one in the US wanted to make. But then we think about, like, the current Australian game history, think about, like, Untitled Goose Game, right? So, like, so I’m curious what that looks like when you’re doing this sort of curation and the sort of collection aspects of your job, when you’re trying to balance current history versus past history at the Powerhouse. What that looks like.
Chloe Appleby 36:34
It’s tricky, but good. I mean, I feel like with Australian games in general, we are known for being weird, silly, a lot of focus on animals, which rocks, and trying to represent that on top of the historical aspect too. It’s trying to find that really nice balance. For a lot of the historical elements other museums have covered that as well, but in terms of Sydney, not too much so trying to find those stories there. So, and it doesn’t have to even be about game-making. It can be about an associated company. I was going to mention something, but I know there was a question later, so I’ll wait for that. There’s, or like, it was called BigWorld who created this software, and they’ve now gone on to– they were acquired by Wargaming, and now they’re acquired by Riot Sydney. So there’s that history there of trying to capture these larger studios, but it’s also hard when the games industry is quite tumultuous, where studios are shutting down, or things aren’t going to be shared with us, or they play, Hey, we’ve got rid of everything. We’re like, Okay.
Robin Kunimune 37:13
Didn’t want it anyway, it’s fine.
Chloe Appleby 38:02
It’s fine. I don’t need it.
Phil Salvador 38:04
I’m over it anyway, yeah.
Chloe Appleby 38:06
I’m not salty about it. Not gonna mention on the podcast.
Phil Salvador 38:10
Gonna go get an ankle tattoo instead.
Chloe Appleby 38:12
I did get one. Anyways! Yeah, so trying to find that balance. But I think currently having that representation of a bit more of a contemporary for– contemporary media for our collection, makes a lot of sense, because collecting, probably after the ’80s, ’90s representation, hasn’t been too apparent. So getting things in like a Nintendo Switch to represent a COVID story. As well as we did, we actually acquired Untitled Goose Game with ACMI and the National Film and Sound Archive, which is so, so, so exciting. So that’s like pinnacle for me, of Australian games.
Phil Salvador 38:53
I’m so curious, because you are collecting things that are in more of the digital age. Are you getting like, retail copies, like, here’s the executable you can get from like Steam or GOG, or are they giving you, like their game binaries or source? What does that look like?
Chloe Appleby 39:06
Depends, and the big statement is copyright? And who owns that? So we have acquired, like, retail copies of things, because it’s mass produced, it’s fine, as long as we’re not, like promoting things. But say, for Untitled Goose Game, for example, we don’t have every part of the code which is fine, and that just stems down to Nintendo IP and who owns that. So it just really depends on the situation. So say, for other games, we have acquired a indie queer game called bear with me, Queer Man Peering Into A Rock Pool.jpg by Fuzzy Ghost. And that is the actual title of the game, and we had that on display in an exhibition called Absolute Queer, where we celebrated WorldPride, and for that we have everything. So that includes Blender files, all of their code, that kind of thing. So it really depends on a case by case basis, but when we do acquire we are trying to capture the design process as best as possible. And if sometimes it’s just the retail version, and we’re able to tell the story, great. If we get everything, even better.
Robin Kunimune 40:26
I’m curious, because I don’t know how libraries work. Go figure. Do you guys have a legal team that helps smooth over that process with a company who’s willing to do that sort of thing?
Chloe Appleby 40:39
Do we have a legal team? We don’t have a legal team. We have a standard, like, clause and that kind of thing that we go to. And if we do need to get legal advice, we get legal advice. But we’re normally pretty good about not doing anything bad.
Robin Kunimune 40:58
Of course.
Chloe Appleby 40:58
Like, we’re not going to go out of our way and be like, Yeah, we are going to acquire– if it’s something that’s crazy that we’re like, Oh, we must, we must. We will seek out legal advice when needed. But normally, like, 10 times out of 10, it’s fine. Yeah.
Phil Salvador 41:18
I think that’s really good insight into how you’re collecting this stuff, because people always ask, what are you doing about digital games? And people often imagine, like, having just copy a thing off Steam. Or, I know there is like, you know, when the Strong tries to preserve like, PT, they just have a PS4 with a hard drive hooked up, and have to hope it never dies. But unfortunately, yeah,
Chloe Appleby 41:36
But if that’s what you’ve got to do, yeah.
Phil Salvador 41:38
Yeah, but it sounds like you have an interesting approach, because you are focusing a lot more on the kind of the local indie game community. And in those cases can be like, yeah, here’s the union files, like you can– and you have a unique angle to it. You’re not trying to collect like Super Mario Bros. You are focusing on things that mean a little bit more to Australia.
Chloe Appleby 41:56
Exactly.
Phil Salvador 41:57
Which I think leads well into some of the questions that our patrons asked.
Chloe Appleby 42:01
Hello patrons.
Phil Salvador 42:02
Hello patrons. For people who are on the $10 tier on our Patreon, you can get access to our Video Game History Foundation Discord, where we let patrons ask questions for upcoming episodes. And folks have some questions for Chloe about the work that you do. So Robin, take it away.
Robin Kunimune 42:18
Our first question comes from and I’m really gonna try hard on this one, Wietse van Bruggen, they said I found it a little tricky to find out what this museum really is. But I do have a question, what do you think is something that you’ve preserved at the museum that you feel the world should know about? And then second question, what is an interesting story video game, or computer game or developer, that you think is vital to understanding the relationship that Australia has with video games?
Chloe Appleby 42:52
Yeah, I hope that my explanation earlier of the Powerhouse has clarified what we are, but it also, I mean, I get why you when you log into the museum website, you are, because our main primary focus at the moment is programming while we’re developing exhibitions behind the scenes, because we currently revitalizing our buildings. So I totally get why you go and you’re like, What’s going on here, but we’re very much a community focused and community driven museum, and trying to capture Sydney and Greater Sydney as well as much as possible in that. In terms of stories, I love a silly, goofy story, but it’s for me, my favorite in the collection I’ve got many favorites, I could go on, but one of them is the video board game Nightmare.
Phil Salvador 43:52
Oh yeah, let’s go.
Robin Kunimune 43:56
What is that?
Chloe Appleby 43:59
So also, for clarification, in Europe, is called Atmosfear.
Robin Kunimune 44:03
Ooh, that’s a good name.
Chloe Appleby 44:06
There’s, like, twelve versions of this thing. It’s wild, but basically it’s the first video board game where, so you know, like you say, there’s a video playing alongside you while you’re physically playing this game. It’s giving you instructions, and it’s a countdown coming on. But the main thing is the gatekeeper, where he’s just this guy dressed in a, like a hooded robe, and he’s like, Maggots! And it starts like yelling and barking instructions to them. But, and then there’s a second version where they’ve got different characters that you, you have different monsters that you play in the game. The second version is the Baron, and he says, Thrill me, which is important for later when I come back to why this story is insane. So you play this game. It’s quite hard, and there’s videos online. And I was first introduced to it by people just playing let’s plays online. And I’m like, What’s this? And then fell in love with this game. I’m like, this is insane. And then I go into work the next day, and I happen to be like, Let’s look in the collection properly and found it. I’m like, Someone’s acquired this game! Initially, it was for a project called Powerhouse Know-How, where it’s– gonna get that right, actually, yeah, Know-How CD-ROM Publication where it’s the first online interactive thing where we did for the Powerhouse collection, which is super cool. It’s actually been preserved by EaaSI so I think if you go onto the EaaSI website, you might be able to find the Powerhouse Know-How CD-ROM thing, which is great for folks.
Phil Salvador 45:55
EaaSI is Emulation as a Service Infrastructure, which we talked about on the Strong episode that aired a while back.
Chloe Appleby 46:00
And if you haven’t listened to it, maybe you should. Yeah, this game, so there’s these two guys. It was, look at the names, right? It was Philip Tanner and Brett Clements. And they made this game in 1990-1993 but they worked in film, so they were trying to pitch different types of videos and different works, eventually landing to, We should make a small indie horror film. And then from there, it turned into, Let’s make a video board game, which blew up. So there was initially in Australia, 5000 units sold, which then became, years later, 4 million.
Robin Kunimune 46:44
Wow, that’s impressive.
Chloe Appleby 46:45
It’s very impressive. And then, like, to the point where this fandom that was created, there was a theme park in Western Sydney. So Western Sydney is, like, 40 minutes out of the main center of Sydney. It’s where I grew up, in Western Sydney, has a thing called Wonderland. Wonderland was a theme park, and it’s a bit of a fever dream when I think about it now, because I used to go to, I went to Wonderland while I was baby, and there was like powerful characters there. But for this game, they held a under-18 rave party.
Phil Salvador 47:23
Oh.
Chloe Appleby 47:24
There’s a video online of this thing where they’ve– the rave party standard, because they also made a music video of the Baron being like, Thrill me. And then there’s background, thrill me, baby, thrill me if you can. That’s also exactly the way song goes. I’ve memorized it. And then they go to these dance parties and dance to these songs made for the game, as well as other classics back then. And it’s so funny because there’s video footage of these, like, 13-year-old kids come, he’s like, This is the best night of my life. Or being like, trying to– it’s just so funny. I’m happy to send you the video.
Phil Salvador 48:13
We’ll have to put that in the show notes for sure.
Robin Kunimune 48:15
Yeah, we could include it in the show notes, yeah, we’ll link to it.
Phil Salvador 48:19
I think that that does show I mean, we talk about how video games are at the intersection of so many art forms, and I always quote Laine Nooney’s thing about how games can lead us somewhere else. So we just had a story where it was people doing experimental video work somehow ending up at teen rave party themed to an interactive board game. And somewhere at that intersection is video games, like, that happens at some point in there, yeah.
Chloe Appleby 48:43
Absolutely. And there was, I mean, they had, like, yeah, they had 12 versions of it. And they did recently their 30th anniversary Kickstarter for Nightmare, which is, yeah, it’s one of my favorite stories. And then to answer the second part of the question, of like, what I think is the quintessential Australian video game representation in the collection. Particular, obviously, it’s Untitled Goose Game. It’s well, one, where– indies are very easy to work with and collect, because you call them, hello. But it just is a genuine representation of the success of weird, silly game where people started talking about it, online celebrities were getting involved. It’s not just for one age group, it’s across many. The people who made it, it stems throughout the history of Australian video games, where in 2008 there was this insane crash,f recession, I’m pretty sure, in Australia. And then people moved back to the US, because that’s where work was for video games. But a few people stayed in Melbourne and then grew an indie scene where the most indie games and mobile games were the most prominent. So having these indie games in the collection, as well as showing them globally, maybe we’ve got Unpacking, Hollow Knight. I’ve blanked on every other game made in Australia, but there’s so many. It’s because it shows that the indie scene is what defines Australia.
Chloe Appleby 48:47
And Untitled Goose Game also got funding from a Victorian film agency, right? Right, yeah?
Chloe Appleby 50:31
Yeah, exactly. So Untitled Goose Game, so we actually have many funding bodies, which is great. So we have Screen Australia, which gives funding to games Australia-wide as well as individual states giving games funding based on where they’re living in the state. So we have Victoria, we have New South Wales, Queensland, actually, every state does it, Tasmania, Western Australia, Northern Territory, South Australia. Everyone gets funding, and it’s to really try and help bolster the games industry, the economy, and I haven’t really seen that done anywhere else. So Australia really tries to give back to the Australian games community industry through funding, through support, through cultural initiatives. So yeah.
Robin Kunimune 51:19
Yeah. Our next question is from Kate Willaert, previous guest several times on our show. They have more of a comment on a question. Has Powerhouse looked into adding any OziSoft games or issues of Australian Personal Computer to its collection, or, even better, any OziSoft catalogs behind the scenes, documentation, etc. Not sure if it was just the limitations of the search function. She’s referring to the collections on your website. To continue their quote, But was surprised to not see anything come up for those.
Chloe Appleby 51:56
So, yes, I received this question yesterday, and I was like, I’m sure there’s something. So the answer to your questions a bit of both where we had limitations to the search function, but also, like, we’re still in our infancy in collecting for the museum, we’re still– this is something that’s new for us or it wasn’t a primary focus initially. So trying to get all these in, and it’s only just a few of us doing it, it’s going to be quite a slow process. And trying to identify what is the gaps and what fits best for our collection development policy is just constant. So we actually do have two games in the collection, happy to send those through. So we have a Dan Dare: Pilot of the Future cassette game. And what, unfortunately, what you don’t see online, and I’ve changed that, so by the time that you see this, Kate, it will be there, is a OziSoft logo on the front. And there’s also another game called Shogun in our collection too, and both of those have a little copyright pamphlet in the game, which is like the warnings associated to it, but then it says OziSoft Surrey Hills associated to, like, this is the people that you’re going against. So we do have a small amount of OziSoft games or public, like, publishing distribution in our collection, hoping to get a lot more. And then one of– my white whale, is Sega World. Sega World is a theme park that was built in Piermont, which is close to the Ultimo site for the Powerhouse Museum, and it was as the name says Sega World and OziSoft Sega were one of the main driving factors convincing Sega to put money into this theme park. It wasn’t obviously successful, because it’s not there anymore, but it was this red and blue building, like almost, you know, when you stack blocks on top of each other. So just a red block, red big scale block and a cone, a blue cone stacked on top, and that’s what it looked like. And that was Sega World. They built those rides in it. But they also did, like, a live show where Sonic sings
Phil Salvador 54:38
Like someone in a sonic costume, or?
Chloe Appleby 54:40
Yeah, yeah. So the footage is lost, but,
Robin Kunimune 54:44
Oh no!
Chloe Appleby 54:45
But the soundtrack is available on archive.org and there’s a love song between Sonic and the main character, which I think her name is, like, Sophia, or Sonia, or something like that. And I’m like, All right. Eggman comes in, does a song.Tails is there. So this is a mad fever dream that I’m like, Okay.
Robin Kunimune 55:07
It sounds like it, maybe you just made this all up.
Chloe Appleby 55:11
You’re right. I dreamt this.
Robin Kunimune 55:13
I’ve had Sonic dreams. We’ve talked about them on the show.
Chloe Appleby 55:19
Later tonight, you’re gonna have a dream about this insane theme park.
Phil Salvador 55:25
Chloe. You have a lot of links to send us after this is done.
Chloe Appleby 55:28
I really do. Actually, I should write them down. I’m gonna write–
Phil Salvador 55:32
We’ve got the Nightmare rave, we’ve got the Sonic Dream World. We got– it’s dreams and nightmares. It’s kind of the theme of this episode.
Chloe Appleby 55:39
Sega World, yeah, so there’s this– actually now I think about it’s a common theme in Sydney. We love a party, and we love to sing. We actually have two posters about Sega World, and they’re also about underage rave parties. We just love a party. So hoping to expand more on those collections and represent OziSoft in not just the catalogs and the distribution, but also in Sega World.
Chloe Appleby 56:16
I’m wondering if it’s, like, these are the things that you love in Australia, or this is the bias of the person before you, and these were the things that they liked.
Chloe Appleby 56:28
I feel like it’s a common thing for rich people to do something crazy, right? Like, so this feels correct. Yeah. So, I mean, if anyone knows anything about Sega World, listeners, and you’re like, Oh, my friend has this weird memorabilia, and they don’t want it anymore, let me know.
Phil Salvador 56:50
If your friend was Sonic, we want to have you on the show. We will do an episode about that. We’ll bring you back, Chloe.
Robin Kunimune 56:56
If your mom took, like, video footage, and we could, like, rediscover there’s some footage of it that would be amazing.
Chloe Appleby 57:04
Yeah, I’ve seen some things online of like, Sonic statues just around. I’m like, Where are you?
Phil Salvador 57:11
Just, like, showing up in the woods, right? Like, there’s, yeah.
Chloe Appleby 57:14
To a degree, yes. So we’ve got, I think that’s like, also the definition of like, what I’m doing, partly my job, is like, Where is this, then going out there and trying to find people similar to the Sydney mystery Nightmare, the rave thing. So there’s very, yeah, it’s now I’m rambling, because it’s so funny and I can’t stop laughing about it because I’m thinking about it. But yeah, that’s kind of the pinnacle of what I’m trying to do, where it’s not just acquiring game material, but also the wild and complex history that Australians have with video games and board games in general.
Phil Salvador 57:56
Yeah. Well, I think this is useful for people who want to do this kind of work, because they often think, like, I’m gonna preserve games, and it’s like, I have to find this game, where’s the unreleased, lost media build of this game? But it’s like, it can mean so much. There’s the cultural angle, there’s so many other things games can mean. I don’t know. I mean, I’m sure maybe, like, the people at Sega Retro might be aware of Sonic’s, former, you know, gf, Sophia, or whatever, yeah. But like, if you’re someone who just like, Oh, I really like this kind of thing. You might not know about these other ancillary things that happen around that, and that’s part of the history as well.
Chloe Appleby 58:27
110% and then even doing, like, we do, oral histories with developers as well. So we sit down and record with them and ask detailed questions of, how did you make this game? We want to know every single thing about it, so we’re not just collating their data that’s physical or digital, but also we want to hear their story from their selves, and we’ve even put that into an exhibition previously as well, just hearing directly from them. So it’s all I guess my role is a lot about the people, the community, and how we can foster that. Yeah.
Robin Kunimune 59:00
How do you guys exhibit your oral histories?
Chloe Appleby 59:05
Depends. We, for the Fuzzy Ghost exhibition that we did with Absolutely Queer we– alright. So, picture 20 screens. So we put a big display of 20 screens on. So the final screen was their game that was actually playable, the exhibition version of that, and the other 19 were stills or moving images of their creation of their game, going from the concept to creating the walk of the character, which was quite notable, and then the reception, and then three screens, which played a video of their story, with their voices coming through and how they made it. What was important about the walk and then the reception of it as well. Can also send a photo, because it’s madness, the 20 screens, but it worked beautifully, because then you follow their story through. Other ways is just like a sound cone of the people talking to you while you’re on display. But we’re also able to have put things in apps and that kind of thing, where you can listen to it by yourself. So it depends, and then that’s also available for people to come in, for researchers to listen to those histories that obviously we can’t put the whole oral history in. It was an hour and a half of us two yappin’, but yeah, they are available for the public to access as well.
Robin Kunimune 1:00:36
We have time for one last question, which I think we’ve addressed some of this, but maybe just to summarize from FRESHPOETIC, they say, Thanks for your efforts in game preservation. I noticed that on the about page of Powerhouse’s website, you all say that you house objects of national and international significance. And it sounds like they’re wondering, was this the feeling that that always included video games, or did you have to advocate for games to become a part of the scope or collection?
Chloe Appleby 1:01:10
Yeah, so we have, yeah, I think I previously mentioned that we did collect video games, and mainly consoles in the ’80s initially, and then from there, it kind of was just like bits and pieces, but it was never really a collection stream, until previously, where we had a curator called Angelique Hutchison, who was initially starting the conversations with ACMI and NFSA to collect Untitled Goose Game, and then that’s when she very kindly brought me into those meetings and in terms of advocating, yeah, I mean, initially, people like video games crazy, but it was the advocacy through the events where people started seeing not just numbers, but the interactions that people had between developers and themselves and the community that was able to foster. So the advocacy was by doing and showing, rather than being like, We must collect video games.
Robin Kunimune 1:02:11
Fist-shaking.
Chloe Appleby 1:02:13
It was just more of a Hey, this is a very important thing for a wide community, and then showing the numbers as well. Of being like, Hey, $4 billion was spent to play video games in Australia. How about we represent that in the collection?So, yeah, part of my role is to expand that collection as much as possible. Yeah.
Robin Kunimune 1:02:38
So, Phil, I have one question for you. So, in our planning meetings for these podcasts, Phil suggested you as a guest for the show. And so Phil, I’m curious, how did Chloe originally ever come across your radar? I assume that you saw Chloe and not the other way around, but maybe I’m wrong there.
Phil Salvador 1:02:59
Chloe just cold-reached out on LinkedIn and was like, Hey, I’m gonna be at GDC. Let’s get lunch. And, yeah, it was great. And so, and I was like, Okay, great. And then made Chloe go to Denny’s, and some things are forged in the hardest fires. And that, yeah.
Robin Kunimune 1:03:12
So Chloe, yeah. What was that about? What was your initial– How did Phil go across your radar then?
Chloe Appleby 1:03:18
I think, well, when I started in properly in the games role, and then even beforehand, I was just scouring the internet for who is working in this field. So I could be like, What do I have to compare to? Because I have no idea. All I knew was ACMI and NFSA in Australia. Yes, I’m like, What’s going on globally? And probably looking into it. And that’s when I came across Phil. And then I added him on LinkedIn, and then he very kindly accepted me back.
Phil Salvador 1:03:47
It’s the one time LinkedIn has worked. It’s truly astounding, yeah.
Chloe Appleby 1:03:53
And then I got accepted to go to GDC as part of the program, and then also work was like, Yes, go and make connections globally. I’m like, Okay, reach out to Phil.
Phil Salvador 1:04:04
Our panel’s moderator dropped out at, kind of, like, a couple weeks before, and it was, like, Oh, do we know anyone who can moderate? And it was like, I know a games curator who’s coming now, because they reached out on LinkedIn, yeah.
Chloe Appleby 1:04:15
Really quick, tell us a story about meeting, meeting Alexey Pajitnov.
Chloe Appleby 1:04:15
And then when you reached out, you’re like, Do you want to moderate? I’m like, Okay. I was not expecting that. So yeah, no. Thank you for letting me moderate and get more exposed to the American Games preservation scene. Well, now I know Laine and we actually met the creator of Tetris together.
Chloe Appleby 1:04:22
Oh, that’s a good one. Yeah, Laine and I were just chatting at a party at GDC, and then the creator of Tetris, Alexey, just like, walked past us and looked at us and was like, pointed to his badge, which said creator of Tetris, was like, Yeah. And we’re like, Wait, did you, did you actually create Tetris? He said, Yeah, do you want photo? I’m like, Okay, so there’s a photo of us three together with the creator of Tetris. And then he’s like, Okay, bye, bye. And then we didn’t get a chance to ask him a single thing. And then you came over, Phil and we were like, We just met the creator of Tetris. That was wild.
Phil Salvador 1:05:23
His entourage at the party was he was just being followed around by a very confused looking Yu Suzuki, that was a real experience.
Chloe Appleby 1:05:32
I just, I was like, the confidence. I’m like, Yeah, you deserve it.
Phil Salvador 1:05:35
Yeah. So as we wrap up here, I know by the time this episode is going to air, there’s a new initiative at Powerhouse that’s about going to be wrapping up by then. So what’s going on Powerhouse now, Chloe or then, I guess?
Chloe Appleby 1:05:48
So by the time this airs, I think I will be having the day off recovering. We’ll be having a games festival, which is very exciting. So that was a gap that I was like, Oh, this could be something that, for accessibility it’s totally going to be free except for, like, say, certain elements. And it’s going to be called AltGames. So alternative shortened into alt. It’ll be hosted in Parramatta, which is about 20 minutes-40 minutes from the CBD of Sydney, and that is to bolster the games community. So things that we’re going to try and do that are a bit different is pay for people to showcase their games, instead of them buying in or coming in completely for free. We have the ability to do so as a cultural institution, and that’s when they’re going to get that, again, that critical feedback in, so mainly focusing on digital games for the first one, as we continue to expand and grow the festival, as well as workshops of individuals who are industry leading experts, having a keynote from international people, as well as having experimental game section curated by a small video game collective called Serenade in New South Wales, and a public artwork. I was like, what– there’s one more thing I can’t– I’m in the planning hole at the moment.
Chloe Appleby 1:06:10
Out of the biscuit hole into the planning hole.
Chloe Appleby 1:07:11
Yeah. So having a public artwork on display as well that people can come and interact with. So that’s currently the festival. When it goes live, I’m sure you’ll see it. I don’t know if there’s going to be a change in the future, but it’s current. The programming I have in terms of talent haven’t got people confirmed yet, but I’m just shooting for the moon and then going to see what it gets.
Robin Kunimune 1:07:43
Seems like that’s worked well for you so far. Go for it.
Chloe Appleby 1:07:45
Yeah. I mean, I just, I just got Hello. What do you think about doing this? And I think it’s my charm that gets them in.
Phil Salvador 1:07:54
Nothing happens unless you go for it. This has been an odyssey. I wasn’t quite sure what to expect from this episode, but it has ended up in a completely different place than I expected, which I love.
Chloe Appleby 1:08:05
Sorry?
Phil Salvador 1:08:06
No, in a good way! Like I love things where it’s like, you go down a tunnel, then you come up, and you’re like, thousands of miles away, and you have no idea what happened. And I feel like we got there, we went in some real journeys.
Chloe Appleby 1:08:15
100% I Never thought I would be able to do video games in a museum and look at me now.
Phil Salvador 1:08:22
Look at you now. Folks– not folks, I’m addressing you specifically, Chloe. Chloe. Where can folks find you? You’re folk singular. Where can folks find you these days?
Chloe Appleby 1:08:32
Oh, I’m on a lot. So obviously I’ll plug the Powerhouse first, as I should. We have the Powerhouse website, which many of you patrons, and many folks who will be listening soon have discovered it’s powerhouse.com.au. Check us out. That’s where we put all our updates in, and then at some point, you will see a games page, yay. All our initiatives will be up on there. We also have our Instagram for Powerhouse Museum. For me personally. I’m on Instagram at C.Appleby will come up. Actually, it’s going to sound really obnoxious of me, if you Google me, it will come up. I’m also on Twitter, Bluesky. And I do have a Tiktok, where I’m very unserious. I’m happy to provide a Linktree and that you can do whatever you want from there.
Phil Salvador 1:09:29
Well, to tie it into a little bit more Australian game history as we wrap up to quote the noted Australian streamer, Macaw45, it sounds like your job is ultimate. Thank you for coming on and sharing your experiences with us.
Chloe Appleby 1:09:44
Oh no, thank you for having me. I’ve enjoyed it immensely. I’ll– whatever you need. You’ve got it.
Phil Salvador 1:09:49
Awesome. See you with the next Nightmare rave.
Chloe Appleby 1:09:52
Oh, that’s what I’m gonna do next, Nightmare rave. Perfect.
Frank Cifaldi 1:09:56
Thank you so, so much for listening to the Video Game History Hour. Brought to you by the Video Game History Foundation. If you have questions or comments for the show, you can email us at podcast@gamehistory.org. The Video Game History Foundation is a 501(c)(3) non-profit, and all of your contributions are tax-deductible. You can support us right now by going to gamehistory.org/donate, or by joining our Patreon at patreon.com/gamehistoryorg, one word. This episode of the Video Game History Hour was produced by Robin Kunimune and edited by Michael Carrell. Thanks so much for listening, and we’ll see you next time.
–Transcript edited by Jeremy Seith