Rooster Teeth Productions

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Rooster Teeth Productions is a production group that specializes in the creation of machinima, or films created using real-time, interactive engines from computer and video games. They are best known for the creation of Red vs Blue which led to the creation of Reconstruction, the miniseries Relocated and Recreation. The name originates from a common insult in Red vs Blue, "cockbite." As such, the company logo consists of a silhouette of a rooster and a wind up chattering-teeth toy.

History

In 2006, Rooster Teeth Productions formed its own webcomic series, Rooster Teeth Comics. The strip portrays the staff members in humorous situations often relating to real life events in the lives of the staff, or other widely recognized current events. It is drawn by Luke Mckay, a Rooster Teeth employee, and written by Griffon Ramsey, the wife of Geoff Ramsey.

In late 2007, Rooster Teeth created a Halo 3 multiplayer gametype called Grifball, played on the maps Foundry and Sandbox. Bungie has included the gametype in Double EXP Weekends in Halo 3. Rooster Teeth has organized an official Grifball league.

"To completely tell the story, I'll need to go back a few years.

The mid 90s were a confusing time for our nation. Being politically correct was envogue, Madonna was just beginning to show the first signs of old age, and three sub-standard students met on the campus of the University of Texas At Austin. Realizing that their grades would no doubt keep them out of any of the higher paying jobs the world had to offer, Burnie Burns, Matt Hullum and Joel Heyman began to explore other ideas. A seed was planted, and an independent movie was born. Burnie and Matt (being the ugliest of the three) wrote and directed the film, while the much more aesthetically pleasing Joel starred in it. It was called "The Schedule" and centered around a regular Joe who got stuck with the unfortunate duty of collecting souls for Death, the lowest paying employer of them all. They trio toured the film festival scene, and encountered some success. Unfortunately, as their friendship grew, so did other feelings. As love triangles usually do, their relationship ended in shambles. Joel, unable to handle the complicated feelings and emotions, fled to Los Angeles to further pursue a career in acting, the other lowest paying job of them all. Matt was torn, but decided to follow his heart (i.e. Joel), and ended up in LA as well. Still too ugly for acting, he began a career in Hollywood doing visual effects. He also began the long process of healing and growing said relationship with Joel.

Burnie was crushed. To deal with this double heartbreak, he became emotionally vapid, and did the only thing available for the apathetic and soulless, he entered the tech industry. His entropy helped propel him to the top, and eventually he became the Director of Operations at a tech support center, where a new group of poor students were just beginning to emerge.

Gustavo Sorola, fleeing from his stunning failures at Rice University, met Geoff Fink, a man who was simply too dumb for College. They embraced their low paying tech jobs, falling in love with the primary colors and blinking text of the internet. A kinship was formed, and the pair became fast friends, often playing video games till all hours of the morning while sharing their feelings and desires. Pillow fights were had, toenails were painted, and much alcohol consumed. It was heaven on earth.

The two quickly became disillusioned with the internet and learned to hate its mocking ways, so they created a website in defense. It was called Uglyinternet.com and it was mean. Too mean for the world. Lawsuits were filed, and death threats issued. The pair bought a baseball bat and hid in a closet for 6 months. When they emerged, they had a dream, to start another website, one that combined god's two greatest gifts to mankind - drinking and video games.

Drunkgamers.com began soon after in the spring of 2000. The site began to grow a small following, and much like the moth is drawn to the flame, Burnie was drawn to their radical ideas and raw passion. Slowly, Geoff and Gus taught Burnie how to care again. He began to write for them, and soon became the most prolific drunken video game writer of all time.

Drunkgamers quickly grew, adding a cheese-loving, shoe-hating hippy named Dan Godwin, and a pseudo homeless kid named Jason Saldana. Not a lot is known about how Jason actually became a part of the group, but one can assume it had a lot to do with pity. A few other staffers were added, but they all died in a car crash. It was sad.

Trying to find a way to weasel his quasi-filmmaking experience into the site, Burnie started adding weekly gameplay videos. No one watched them, but he refused to stop. One day while making a video showing how great he thought he was at Halo, he remembered a recent conversation during a game of CTF. It might have gone something like this.

Burnie: Hey, do you ever wonder why they call it a Warthog? I think it looks more like a Puma!
Geoff: You're an idiot.
Gus: Die.

Burnie couldn't shake the thought provoking conversation. It haunted him. Why WAS it called a Warthog? Not a single other person in the entire world cared (and still doesn't), but he had to know. So he decided to create his own answer, and RedVsBlue was born. He frantically called Geoff and Gus to tell them about his new idea, a movie INSIDE of a video game. They mocked him (and continue to, to this day). The world wasn't ready for his idea. No one could grasp the concept. Undaunted, he "filmed" a trailer to show them. They still didn't care. Burnie was heartbroken. Soon after, in a completely unrelated incident, Drunkgamers.com ended. No one knows exactly why or what caused the sites demise, but some sources say a middle finger (possibly two), combined with six Irish Car Bombs, were partially to blame. This looked like the end.

Until...

One day, four months later, Computer Gaming World contacted Geoff, to ask if they could use an old drunkgamers video on one of their cover mount CDs. Geoff graciously accepted, and he and Burnie lamented about the pointlessness of having a video in a magazine of such stature, with no website to point to it. The group reunited in a flurry of activity. Plans were made, schemes were hatched, and just as they were settling on the idea of a Justin Timberlake fan site, Burnie remembered his little Halo movie. He knew there was only one way to convince Gus and Geoff (who were already drawing up scanning in their Timberlake pics), so he got them stinking drunk. They awoke the next day, hung over and strangely sore (but that's a story for another day), to see that Burnie had convinced them to sign their lives away for the promise of more Banana Daiquiris. They were beaten. He immediately called Matt and Joel to gloat, only to discover that they too were beaten. Broken down by the harsh and unforgiving Tinsletown machine. They begged him for a job, even if it was just washing cars. Burnie decided to be the bigger man, and fences were mended (literally, he made them build a fence in his back yard).

They were onboard.

And the world was without the best Justin Timberlake site ever..."

— Rooster Teeth History

Projects

Halo Based

• The Blood Gulch Chronicles
  • Red vs Blue: The Blood Gulch Chronicles - The original series composed of five seasons.
  • Red vs Blue: Out of Mind - A miniseries in between Season 4 and Season 5 of The Blood Gulch Chronicles.
• The Recollection
  • Red vs Blue: Recovery One - Taking place after Out of Mind, this miniseries sets up Reconstruction and the Recollection story arc.
  • Red vs Blue: Reconstruction - A sequel series taking place after The Blood Gulch Chronicles and Recovery One. This begins the three season Recollection story arc.
  • Red vs Blue: Relocated - A miniseries that takes place between Reconstruction and Recreation.
  • Red vs Blue: Recreation - The series set up by Relocated.
  • Red vs Blue: Revelation - The series that conclusion the Recollection story arc.
• Red vs Blue: Season 9 - A sequel and prequel series that tells the events after the Recollection story arc, as prior to The Blood Gulch Chronicles story arc.

Non-Halo Based

• The Strangerhood
• 1-800-Magic
• Stroyent Commercials
• Achievement Hunter
• Rooster Teeth Shorts
• P.A.N.I.C.S.
• Captain Dynamic

Trivia

Miscellaneous

• Rooster Teeth staff made an appearance by voice acting for Halo 3. See Password-Lacking Marine for more.
• Rooster Teeth had a preview of Blood Gulch in Halo: Reach on the 7/7/2010. Two months before the release date. They made a machinima for Bungie Day in the Halo: Reach engine.
• The Reach PSA ending references the ending of the Halo: Combat Evolved Macworld trailer from 1999.

References

• If you look closely at a Warthog's tire, you will see the word "PUMA" on the tire. This is a reference to the second episode of Red vs Blue where Sarge and Grif were arguing whether to call the LRV a Warthog because of the "tusks" at the front or a Puma because it looks like a large cat.
• In Halo 2's Turf multiplayer map, you can find two soda machines. One has a picture of a rooster with a blue silhouette on it, the other has teeth with a red and green silhouette. One of them is near the tent and the other is in the "warehouse", the room with the swing doors. This Easter Egg is referenced in an Easter Egg from the season five DVD in which Church shows Doc the logo. Despite Church's many hints to Doc, he never gets it and just thinks that it says "Soda pop".
• In Halo 2's Beaver Creek multiplayer map, You can find the words "Why am I here" written behind a rock near one of the sniper spawns. This is a reference to the first episode of Red vs Blue episode "Why are we here".
• In Halo: Reach some of the soldiers names in the Fireteam mechanic are the names of some of the people of Rooster Teeth.

Links

• Official Site