How Rooster Enamel expanded past Crimson vs. Blue to the Roost Podcast Community

Rooster Teeth lower its tooth in 2003 with Red Vs. Blue, a humorous machinima present that used purple and blue Grasp Chief characters from the Halo video games. The creators added humorous voices and dialogue to the sport characters and turned them into animated quick movies.

Eighteen years later, Warner Media’s Rooster Teeth continues to be making episodes of Crimson vs. Blue. Nevertheless it has additionally expanded past that, beginning in 2005, to leisure podcasts. And in 2021, the corporate is launching a half-dozen new podcasts that it hopes will gentle up the web with humor and perception.

The lineup options millennial and GenZ centered reveals like Annual Go, which scopes out the most recent in theme parks hosted by Rooster Enamel’s Geoff Ramsey and Jack Pattillo, and How Ya Been?, which serves up extra comedy from Grace Helbig and Mamrie Hart. (For an additional nice podcast, you need to take a look at Jeff Grubb and Mike Minotti’s GamesBeat Decides present).

Rooster Enamel began podcasting with video greater than 15 years in the past, and it launched audio-only podcasts in earnest in 2020. The podcasts noticed a 20% enhance in listeners in 2020, little question helped by the pandemic when individuals had been starved for some type of human contact. The Roost Podcast Community has added 22 new partnerships, and it’s attempting to be a fan-driven, community-built leisure firm.

New podcasts like The Real Canon purpose to be on the forefront of “nerd media” and “nerd tradition.” The Roost Podcast Community has greater than 280 million incremental views and 10 million audio month-to-month downloads throughout its community. And Rooster Enamel has greater than 45 million subscribers to its YouTube community, 1.2 million distinctive month-to-month guests throughout its apps, and greater than 4 million registered group members.

I spoke about Rooster Enamel and the podcasts with Rooster Enamel host/producer Trevor Collins and Luis Medina, senior vice chairman and normal supervisor of the Let’s Play community at Rooster Enamel.

Right here’s an edited transcript of our interview.

Above: Rooster Enamel’s Trevor Collins, Matt Bragg, and Fiona Nova.

Picture Credit score: Rooster Enamel

GamesBeat: I needed to get a really feel for Rooster Enamel normally. How lengthy have you ever each been there?

Luis Medina: I’ve been with the corporate for somewhat over 5 years. 5 years in November. I began in late 2015, early 2016.

Trevor Collins: I’ve been on the firm for somewhat over six years. Began in November of 2014.

GamesBeat: What was it like if you first received there, in comparison with right this moment?

Collins: Smaller, for positive. The place to begin? It’s undoubtedly completely different. We had been a smaller firm. Headcount and bodily. We used to have morning conferences the place we might see everybody within the firm each Monday, and now we’ve expanded our manufacturing slate. Which is cool, and that clearly necessitates much more workplace house in additional buildings. We’re extra unfold out than we was once. However simply as tight-knit as ever.

GamesBeat: Are you working remotely at this level, although?

Collins: Sure, we’re arising on nearly a 12 months working from residence, minus any important workers.

Medina: We strategically reopened the studio for manufacturing, utilizing COVID pointers. We’ve completed that each in Austin and Los Angeles. However the majority of our again workplace of us, conferences, all fingers, stuff that will be unsafe to do in individual, we do that completely high-quality remotely.

GamesBeat: I’m very accustomed to Rooster Enamel’s early historical past, Crimson vs. Blue and issues like that. Might you carry me up to the mark? How has it modified now?

Medina: The three pillars of the corporate from the start had been comedy, gaming, and animation. They proceed to be lots of our core focus. In the beginning that meant Crimson vs. Blue, a scripted comedy that used a online game to provide primarily a puppeteered animated sequence. From that single kernel we’ve expanded into an organization with a footprint over 45 million subscribers throughout completely different social platforms — YouTube, Twitch, Fb. We even have our personal web site, roosterteeth.com, which is obtainable on iOS and Android and all of the set-top field apps.

In its easiest phrases, the corporate has transitioned from a present, 18 years in the past, into model and a studio that produces leisure for a web-based viewers that loves these three issues — comedy, gaming, and animation. That may be something from our sturdy slate of podcasts and our podcast community to gameplay content material, on demand and on YouTube or stay on our web site and apps. We’ve got a program known as Rooster Enamel Reside that runs daily, with 50-55 hours of stay content material each week. We’ve got a sturdy animation studio the place greater than 100 of us produce a number of reveals, together with RWBY, which is our flagship 3D animated present, and Gen:Lock, which is our followup 3D animated present, the place we’ve been working with HBO Max on the second season.

Collins: It’s the identical thesis, however a broader footprint.

Medina: We’ve got these complementary, parallel manufacturing studios that develop various kinds of content material. It’s all a part of the ecosystem.

Above: Rooster Enamel: left to proper: Lindsay Jones, Trevor Collins, Jeremy Dooley, Michael Jones, Fiona Nova, Alfredo Diaz, and Gavin Free.

Picture Credit score: Rooster Enamel

GamesBeat: Trevor, what’s your view of how the corporate has modified?

Collins: I was a fan. I used to observe all of the content material as an viewers member. Now I work on the firm. My perspective is somewhat completely different. As a fan it was at all times centered on Crimson vs. Blue, after which I watched as the corporate expanded into the comedy realm, into stay motion sketch comedy with RT Shorts. Then they began to enter the podcasting house. That they had Drunk Tank. That was they at all times had occurring. Drunk Tank changed into RT Podcast, which we preserve to today. Manner over 500 weekly episodes now.

It went from this tight-knit, smaller, extra centered staff the place everyone labored on the few initiatives that had been there, like Crimson vs. Blue, after which it expanded as these departments began to develop and materialize. That’s the place the gaming division began to return out with gaming and comedy, with Achievement Hunter, after which Crimson vs. Blue paved the way in which for RWBY, which opened up the door for Gen:Lock. It opened up the animation studio portion of the enterprise. It’s been superior to observe the corporate go from a handful of huge hitters to now this broad slate that actually faucets into lots of completely different items of popular culture in lots of completely different genres.

Medina: Achievement Hunter is our flagship gaming model inside Rooster Enamel. Roughly 12 years in the past, arising on 13 this summer time, among the authentic founders, Geoff Ramsey and his colleague Jack, determined they needed to do extra–initially it was the inklings of the Let’s Play revolution. That’s when it began to select up. Geoff was fascinated by it, and he began to provide a present known as Achievement Hunter and introduced alongside Jack to provide it with him. That present grew to become a slate of reveals. It grew to become an ensemble solid as they employed on extra individuals to provide content material with it. It grew to become gameplay content material and stay streams, every little thing that you just see within the gaming leisure house on YouTube or Twitch.

Now, 13 years later, it has its personal channels, its personal model. It has a reasonably sturdy ensemble solid of creators who work out of Austin and produce content material collectively. They do fairly a couple of podcasts collectively as effectively. Gaming grew to become the entry level and our manner of incubating new expertise, of us like Trevor. As they grew and developed as expertise, we expanded on that footprint and constructed completely different reveals round them.

Collins: It was a humorous happenstance that constructed out of the know-how and what they had been doing with Crimson vs. Blue. Breaking the sport to make a enjoyable present. Utilizing that know-how and that ideology, they had been in a position to make video games inside video games, make guides and stuff like that, and that’s the place it received began. It got here out of the Crimson vs. Blue mindset.

Above: Ify Nwadiwe and Fiona Nova.

Picture Credit score: Rooster Enamel

GamesBeat: It’s attention-grabbing that the corporate has been round so lengthy that it’s crossed the completely different transitions. Players perhaps used to solely care about taking part in video games, however they got here to care about spectating video games, speaking about video games on podcasts. There’s a lot media round gaming now, versus simply inside gaming itself.

Collins: Gaming is type of our shared–within the workplace in addition to the viewers, now we have that shared ardour for what video video games have to supply so far as storytelling. The video games are the medium we use to create comedy and have this witty banter and these distinctive interactions that our personalities are in a position to have. That’s Achievement Hunter’s forte. Having these ardour initiatives and powerful personalities that–sure, they’ll play video games, and the viewers member is that fifth individual on the sofa. If 4 individuals are taking part in a recreation collectively, the viewers is part of that. They get to narrate to us and watch alongside.

We’ve moved on from that now to focus extra on the personalities of the expertise and their ardour initiatives. What are the subjects that they’re fascinated by? That set us up effectively for a way we entered the podcasting house. That was our recipe for leaping into these new territories, whether or not it was quick meals or speaking about baseball playing cards or unsolved mysteries on the web. They’re all out of the wheelhouse of gaming, however very a lot in tune with our personalities and our pursuits. That’s the place these podcasts received their begin.

GamesBeat: Was there some extent the place you began to imagine in podcasts, that they could possibly be so broadly accepted?

Medina: That began with the Rooster Enamel podcast 13 years in the past, which was a pure outgrowth of notably the founders of the corporate, but additionally lots of the opposite of us who labored there wanting to speak with one another outdoors of the reveals they had been producing. It’s very natural. However over time–after we speak about podcasts, we usually use the phrase “broadcast,” as a result of we’re not essentially restricted to sure podcast setups. We’ve got our podcast studio in Austin, which is a multi-camera manufacturing studio that produces primarily speak reveals, which we do in video for our web site and for YouTube, in addition to audio platforms. That differentiator, the video podcasts being a spotlight for us, is what helped us stand out early in that house. It’s a differentiator when it comes to monetization as effectively, by means of our podcast community gross sales efforts.

Collins: There was a second the place–I believe the primary second we knew we needed to take this step, we had been all in a room along with a whiteboard up, and we began markering down all of those subjects and podcast genres that we needed to faucet into. We had Off Matter, our flagship podcast for the Achievement Hunter model, very like the Rooster Enamel podcast for the broader firm. That’s all about our lives, what’s occurring in our lives, video video games, new, simply something. There isn’t any particular subject. However all the thrill was popping out after we talked about these genres and issues we by no means had an avenue to speak about.

Medina: From that preliminary funding in manufacturing, we began so as to add on different podcasts that we felt like had been related on the time. The Achievement Hunter of us needed to do their very own spin on it, so that they did the Off Matter podcast. As we began to get into the final couple of years, with among the reveals working for a few years, there have been lots of subjects we hadn’t hit. We talked about individuals’s lives and existence and gaming, stuff that was core to us, however lots of the creators at our firm have completely different passions that we thought can be nice to precise by means of podcasting, which at that time, within the final three years or so, has expanded when it comes to style and focus. It was a superb time for us to do that out. There was lots of curiosity internally.

That’s the place lots of enjoyable new titles got here from, the place we’re taking the personalities that people know. They in all probability know them in a technique, as avid gamers and on-line creators. However they’re in a position to categorical themselves in reveals like Crimson Net, which Trevor hosts and conceived of.

Collins: Crimson Net is all about–when you take a look at Venn diagram, you wish to have a little bit of familiarity. It’s all about unsolved mysteries and true crime, which is a step in a brand new course, but it surely maintains a foothold again in web tradition, as a result of lots of our stronger mysteries all come from the web. We figured there was a distinct segment, an urge for food for internet-centric mysteries, as a result of there are fairly a couple of which might be very intriguing. We’ve used that as a launch pad to speak about issues like Cryptids — Bigfoot, the Jersey Satan, issues of that nature — and lengthening into true crime, taking a look at mysteries as a complete. That’s been attention-grabbing, to step into a brand new enviornment and watch the viewers resonate with that new format.

Above: Rooster Enamel thrives on goofy reveals.

Picture Credit score: Rooster Enamel

Medina: Our speculation was that–everybody on the firm, we’re avid gamers, however now we have lots of completely different pursuits. We all know our viewers displays our creators as effectively. We had been proper, judging by the response we’ve had round reveals like Crimson Net, or Face Jam, one other present we produced lately which is actually a quick meals assessment present, comedy present. Our viewers, and the gaming viewers normally, are omnivorous. They’re fascinated by a number of issues. We all know that they love science fiction and fantasy. They’re watching TV reveals. They’re consuming content material in numerous genres. We’re completely satisfied to leap into some new subjects.

GamesBeat: How have you ever handled altering know-how? I’ve come to love occurring Clubhouse and hanging out on this recreation business cocktail hour room. I don’t know whether or not that is one thing we’ll all be doing one in all as of late. Possibly Twitter or Fb could have one thing by means of audio as effectively. However how do you consider issues like that, which might be presumably new platforms?

Medina: We’re desirous about that social audio house proper now. After we transfer into a brand new platform, just like the audio slate we simply described, the query we ask ourselves is, “Do now we have one thing to say that must be stated on this type?” Relatively than essentially chasing developments in that manner. Within the case of the audio slate, it was some extent the place we realized we had loads to say, loads to provide, and we thought we might do it effectively. Within the case of Clubhouse or different apps like that, that’s the query proper now. Can we do that our manner, in a manner that may resonate with our group? That’s after we’ll take the leap.

GamesBeat: How do you take a look at competitors as of late, at rising above the noise of every little thing on YouTube and different platforms?

Medina: We at all times do issues our personal manner. We’re a bit distinctive. I’ll give an instance. We talked about that we ramped up our stay streaming content material over the past 12 months. A part of that was a response to working from residence, having set ourselves up to have the ability to produce remotely. It gave us the chance to do issues stay and change up how we’re doing manufacturing. We ramped up our stay streaming from about 10 hours per week to round 50 hours per week, which was an enormous shift.

As we had been doing that, clearly Twitch and YouTube Reside are huge platforms, a number of avid gamers there. The query for us is, how can we do issues our personal manner? We’ve got a terrific broadcast staff. We’ve got a terrific ensemble solid. We’re in a position to do issues to provide our content material in a manner that few others are within the house. Reside switching, multi-camera setups, digital broadcast desks. We had a terrific present we placed on for some time Retaining the Lights On, which was a late night time speak present with a totally digital set — inexperienced display company, inexperienced display hosts. That degree of sophistication comes out of the manufacturing capabilities we’ve constructed over the past 18 years.

It goes again to what I used to be saying earlier than. How can we do issues our manner and make it possible for our group feels uniquely Rooster Enamel? Generally that’s issues like manufacturing worth, however typically it’s simply our personal specific spin that conveys our persona.

Collins: I can communicate to extra of the in-the-weeds particulars. There’s a problem, because the market grows, because the business will get noisier because it had been. Sustaining authenticity is likely one of the fortes of Rooster Enamel. We’re at all times attempting to check and check out new issues and experiment with what’s acquainted, but additionally what’s new, whereas sustaining our distinctive voice. There could be lots of people doing one thing comparable, whether or not it’s podcast, gaming, comedy, however will they’ve our voice? No. Will they do it the way in which we do it? Not possible.

Relating to Achievement Hunter, it comes all the way down to the personalities that now we have, and fostering new expertise, elevating their voices, and persevering with to take a look at the distinctive views every member brings to the staff. Taking a look at how they wish to deal with–as an illustration, Face Jam, that meals present. Nobody’s going to assessment a McDonald’s pizza or one thing foolish like that the way in which our personal Michael Jones or Jordan Cwierz would. That’s how we are able to keep aggressive in a rising market. It’s that distinctive voice, tackling anticipated genres and anticipated codecs in new methods, retaining issues contemporary.

I at all times prefer to suppose that so long as a undertaking comes from a spot of ardour, there will probably be an inherent reference to the viewers. The viewers is there as a result of they really feel related to the content material and the staff. If it comes from that place, the staff will probably be captivated with producing that product, and the viewers will take pleasure in it, as a result of there’s a degree of authenticity there. That’s essential to us after we go to the drafting board and develop new reveals.

Above: Rooster Enamel has been round since 2003.

Picture Credit score: Rooster Enamel

Medina: The stay stream house and the audio podcast house have additionally been nice low-cost incubators for us, permitting newer expertise to chop their tooth and check out new issues and experiment. That’s been refreshing. It doesn’t have the stress of the finite quantity of actual property on a YouTube channel or one other platform like that. That’s been thrilling for us as effectively, to make use of these new platforms and alternatives to let our creators go wild and check out new issues. We’re in a singular place the place we develop creators internally. A number of of us joined us and constructed their careers as on-line creators in-house.

Collins: That’s at all times going to be a chunk of our DNA. Going again to being a fan and first stumbling throughout Crimson vs. Blue, watching for a few years, after which becoming a member of the staff, there’s nonetheless that startup mentality, that bootstrap mentality. You don’t should spend huge budgets to make one thing occur simply since you’re an enormous studio.

I’m completely satisfied that now we have an enormous studio and lots of alternatives to do issues, however I nonetheless love that now we have these platforms like RT TV to pilot concepts and see how the viewers resonates with it, having that stay suggestions proper there. We’ve got the feedback as effectively. We will ask the viewers and faucet them on social. How do you’re feeling about this? How do you prefer it? We get that instant suggestions loop. Okay that is figuring out. That’s after we had the whiteboard second, speaking about podcasts. That was the primary piece of the recipe. Then the viewers suggestions, as soon as we piloted every of those productions, these podcasts, that’s after we knew we had one thing else. That’s traditionally how we’ve continued to develop.

We’ve got lots of completely different avenues with which we are able to entry and speak to and work together with the viewers. Whether or not it’s RTX as a stay occasion, or Achievement Hunter Reside, the touring present we did on stage by means of many cities internationally, or RT TV’s stay feed, or our social. There’s lots of other ways. That’s one of many distinctive components–in reality, I might perhaps contemplate that our fourth pillar, that group. It’s one of many distinctive values that this firm has thrived on. It’s one purpose why the corporate has grown in key areas from the group. Who is aware of this firm higher than the people who find it irresistible? That’s the place I come from.

The attention-grabbing factor is that–if you speak about one thing like HBO Max, there’s lots of merchandise there they usually’re all unbelievable, however individuals are followers of reveals there. We’re not simply an umbrella wrapper on a slate of reveals. We’re a definite group, a definite set of creators that work together with that group in that suggestions loop of communication, all the way in which as much as that suggestions loop the place many individuals throughout the firm got here from that group. That’s nonetheless what makes Rooster Enamel tick, and it’s an enormous a part of our longevity. We’ve been making movies since earlier than you can stream them on YouTube. It’s fairly uncommon for an organization like ours.

GamesBeat: Did you handle to do all proper in Austin whereas the snow bogged every little thing down?

Collins: It definitely received in the way in which. It was very unlucky. A lot of the workers of the corporate had been impacted to numerous ranges. Electrical energy and water and gasoline–there was lots of fallout.

Medina: The pandemic didn’t cease us. We’d transitioned to working from residence. We stored rolling and bringing content material. However no energy, that’ll do it.

Collins: We get forward. We’ve got this broad content material slate. We’ve got a really real reference to the viewers. They’re very understanding. It goes again to that authenticity. It’s a type of moments the place the viewers will get it. After we come again the subsequent week, the viewers is there to assist us. We’re excited to be again. We’re off to the races once more. It’s a little bit of a hiccup, however we’re no strangers at this level to fast pivots within the face of the surprising.

Above: Michael Jones, Lindsay Jones, Jordan Cweirz, Alfredo Diaz, Gavin Free, and Fiona Nova.

Picture Credit score: Rooster Enamel

GamesBeat: What do you consider new competitors, like Venn and G4 coming on-line? And what do you concentrate on conventional tv as a part of the leisure weight-reduction plan as of late?

Medina: It’s attention-grabbing. We’re doing our personal factor. Venn and G4 are attention-grabbing as nascent studios–or at the least I name G4 nascent, since it is a new incarnation. There are many issues that really feel just like what we’re doing. Multi-camera broadcasts and extra life-style content material. The place we really feel good is that over the past 20 years, almost, we’ve developed a robust and dependable group that’s the core of every little thing we do. They’re our evangelists. We really feel strongly about our place in that manner. The extra content material on the market like our personal, in a manner, the higher. It simply continues to develop the gaming house differently, past one webcam in a single bed room into extra subtle manufacturing and sorts of content material. It will increase that market.

TV is attention-grabbing to us as a part. It’s now not an finish purpose, if that is sensible. It’s now part of a bigger ecosystem for a model to contemplate. What can linear TV, or alternatively what can streaming by means of the streaming apps, do for our model when it comes to our manufacturing firm? We’ve talked about HBO Max with our subsequent season of Gen:Lock. We additionally produced, with Hasbro, a Transformers sequence by means of our animation staff for Netflix. We’ve developed unscripted specials for the Discovery Channel. A couple of years in the past we did a present known as Immersion for Shark Week, the place we introduced a online game sensibility to Shark Week. All of that stuff feels to us like thrilling alternatives. It expands our footprint. It exposes our model to new audiences. Nevertheless it’s not essentially the top zone for us.

I don’t suppose it’s a zero sum recreation. There are such a lot of different sorts of leisure that people are balancing that the selection between two or three gaming leisure manufacturers isn’t going to interrupt the financial institution when it comes to their consideration. They’ve their new Xbox or their new PlayStation. They’ve video games and flicks and TV reveals. When issues open again up they’ll be again within the theaters. I don’t essentially see it as an either-or.