Atari: Game Over Page #6

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the hell are they talking about?

E.T. was a really hard game.

It was the kind of game

that was brutal, unfair,

it didn't make a lot of sense.

I:

grew up in London,

and there was a video

game store in my town

that let you rent... I don't know

what the rental was, like 50

pence for a weekend...

and I still remember

feeling like I wasted my money.

Because it just... it was bad.

People aren't liking it.

And people aren't

liking it a lot.

And what made it particularly

bad was my memory of the movie

was SO great.

I loved the movie.

Everyone loved the

movie when it came out.

It's a great movie.

Still is it is a

classic movie today.

And so this massive

chasm that existed

between the quality of the movie

and the quality of the game

that was based on, I think just

made it seem that much more

like a slap in the face.

OK, well, maybe it

won't sell six million.

Maybe it will only

sell four million.

Or three million,

that would be OK.

And then there's, like, returns.

People are returning the game.

They made too many.

How many they made,

I don't even know.

They made, like, four

million cartridges.

That means there could be

millions of carts coming back.

So what do you do with

useless, worthless product'?

How do you get rid of it?

Bury it.

That's a pretty good answer.

Well, career change

is not anything new for me.

I've been through a number

of different careers.

I actually went and got

a California real estate

license, and then

a broker's license,

and did that for a while.

And I did that just

long enough to know

this was, like, the last thing

in the world I wanted to do.

And now I am a licensed,

practicing psychotherapist

in California.

And I'm a very unique therapist,

in that I have a Master's

of Engineering and I also

have a Master of Arts

in counseling psychology.

I mean, I'm the Silicon

Valley therapist.

I'm very good at translating

between English and nerd.

And this is the first time since

I left Atari that I feel I'm

doing what I really love doing.

So it took me 30 years

to get back to a place

that I don't feel I'm a step

down from where I used to work.

And that's many,

many different jobs.

I know this dig is coming up,

and I'm going to be there.

I'm going to be

standing right there.

And I am going to literally

watch my past being dug up.

And that's a weird kind

of thing to anticipate.

My hopes are in one way, and

my expectations are another.

And I don't know what

it's going to be.

I really don't know

what it's going to be.

I don't know what it's

going to mean to me when,

if something comes

up, if it's there.

Part of punk archeology

is that sense of community.

And the fact that we're

helping each other out

to address the issues

that we're interested in.

And most of the time we're

doing it on a volunteer basis.

It's going to be interesting to

see how they decide to excavate

in order to clear a

better area, you know,

so that we can get at more

of the content that we need.

One of the people down

there did confirm finding

a Donny and Marie poster.

Yeah, yeah, which is awesome.

Well, basically,

because we're going

to treat this as a

salvage excavation,

we will dig a trench.

We'll go through and excavate

the material in the pits

that we dig.

At which point, we'll send

them up to the tables.

We'll sort through the material.

We'll weigh it.

We'll count it.

Identify it.

And, yeah, that's the plan.

What's

happened so far today?

Basically, we started

digging in the hole,

and the trucks have

already started

going through the train.

So, just so people understand...

and probably, right now I'm

cutting to an awesome

diagram of this.

There's, like, 20

feet of garbage

that's on the top of wherever

the games are buried.

Garbage and dirt.

Sorry,

garbage and dirt.

In the diagram it's

going to be pretty clear.

And so, that all has

to be taken away.

Yeah,

we'll get the vast majority

of the hole excavated out.

And so far,

have we found anything?

Found any Atari games?

No, nothing.

Nothing.

Nothing yet.

And Son, I mean, you

seem pretty nervous.

Right.

Are you?

Oh yeah, terrified.

Terrified.

OK.

I gotta be honest,

I'm nervous as sh*t.

I don't know if that'll help

motivate you guys, but...

Yeah, that did it for us.

We need to get back to work.

Yeah.

Great.

Let's go.

Go team.

Way to go.

Son, calm down, buddy.

People say nerd or geek.

I say enthusiast.

I love things, and I love

people who love things.

But if you spend all your time

focusing on all the amazing,

like, art and entertainment

that's being made,

there's so much of

it happening now,

you can't even take it all in.

And it's like the dig.

When I tell people, like, the

right kind people about it,

they're like, I can't believe

that it's finally happening.

And that you're going

to get to be there.

You know, I get,

look, goosebumps.

Goosebumps talking about it.

My local video game shop

in Austin, Texas, Game

Over Video Games, they gave

me every copy they have

of every one of Howard's games.

Little known fact... E.T. has the

very first official video game

Easter egg ever in a video game.

Warren Robinett had the

very first one in Adventure,

but he did that without

anybody knowing.

Howard asked if he could

put Easter eggs in the game,

and Atari said yes.

If you go find the

geranium, and you

make the germanium

regenerate, it turns

into Yar, from Yar's Revenge.

And he flies away.

The first time it happened to

me, when I was 11 years old,

I sh*t myself.

And then if you do it

again, it turns into Indy

from Raiders of the Lost Ark.

So Howard hid characters

from this game

and this game in this game.

Hello.

Hi, good afternoon.

Welcome to the Lodge.

Well, it's nice to be here.

Are you checking in?

- Absolutely.

Great.

Can I get the last name.

Warshaw.

W-A-R-S-H-A-W.

Howard.

That's me.

So it's the day

of the actual dig.

And my Wife and I are in a van,

on our way to the landfill.

It was a strange feeling.

I mean, I was, like, nervous.

And I didn't really

understand why.

But I just had this sense...

just like a tingly thing...

that something is

going on here today.

And as we pull

into the landfill,

there were already people there.

And there's more people.

And we go on, and

there's more people.

And it just keeps

going and going.

I guess it sort of felt like

a religious pilgrimage to me.

I called up some

friends, and said, hey,

can we get down there?

And I asked my brother-in-law

if he wanted to go.

Heck, let's do it.

Let's check it out.

And my wife said, whatever.

It's one of those

weird monumental video

game based events that only

comes around once a century.

This is our generation's

urban legend.

Billions of cartridges

out in the desert.

Growing up, you always read

the little rumors about it.

I grew up playing

an Atari, which

my babysitters had given me.

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