Journalist and researcher Nick Yanes brings us a piece of history not only from his own local area, but also from his own past in his recent article The birth and death of Budcat Creations, Iowa’s first (and only) Triple-A game studio. We take a peek inside the life of a development studio during a…
Category: Podcast
Frank and guest Chris Kohler recap their recent attendance of the 2023 D.I.C.E. Summit, a Las Vegas convention for executives and other high-level creatives in the interactive entertainment space. In this episode: a little history of the show’s atmospheric evolution, the D.I.C.E. Awards, ‘speed date’ networking, the best games shopping in Vegas, Frank apologizes to…
Frank Cifaldi takes the guest seat for this episode and shares the story of the most obscure caper in Carmen Sandiego’s criminal history, a story we shared in a blog post a few years ago. In this episode: we plan a TV series, deep fried steak with a Teddy Roosevelt impersonator, Broderbund’s involvement in the…
Polygon Senior Reporter Nicole Carpenter joins us to chat about the 1989 Legend of Zelda cartoon, the subject of her recent oral history piece: ‘Excuuuuse me, Princess!’: An oral history of The Legend of Zelda cartoon. In this episode: Zeldathon; this cartoon is basically Shakespeare; The Super Mario Bros. Super Show!; the wild west of…
Jonas Rosland, executive director of Hit Save!, shares their newest Guide to Start Video Game Preservation as an individual not necessarily affiliated with an organization. In this episode we look at the first steps to take, knowing what’s already been done, where to get more material, and we ask some philosophical and big-picture questions around…
Norm Caruso returns to discuss Super Mario Kart’s somewhat humble beginnings as laid out in his recent video essay The Story of Super Mario Kart | Gaming Historian. In this episode: looking for the SMK team photo, an invaluable go kart outing, Mario by any other name, the mechanics of drifting, Norm had to “git…
As we celebrate this milestone episode, we invite our editor, Michael Carrell, and producer, Robin Kunimune, to take a look back with us at some of our and our listener’s favorite memories from the last 100 ‘hours’. In this episode: how this podcast came to be, why we dedicate our time to this project, favorite…
Dreamcast Junkyard veterans Tom Charnock and Brian Vines join us to share their knowledge and experiences of the Dreamcast’s launch in both the European and US markets, respectively, and even a little on the Japanese market’s launch. In this episode: bonding over our strict video game upbringing rules; doing our darnedest to NOT derail into…
Dylan Mansfield, gaming historian and archivist, joins the show to share an odd piece of Sega history from his recent article Saving Sacred Pools: Sega’s Million Dollar Adult Game. This mid 90’s FMV game with adult themes was, until recently, considered lost. In this episode: we want to know why crappy games are crappy; once…
Chris Gliddon, archivist and producer at RocketSnail Games, takes a look back at the inception and evolution of Club Penguin, an MMO virtual world filled with games and activities from 2005. In this episode: Chris and Kelsey can barely contain their excitement, no one wants war – everybody just wants to chat and walk around,…