Rooster Teeth Productions, LLC is an American
digital media company headquartered in
Austin, Texas
Austin is the capital city of the U.S. state of Texas, as well as the seat and largest city of Travis County, with portions extending into Hays and Williamson counties. Incorporated on December 27, 1839, it is the 11th-most-populous city ...
. Founded in 2003 by
Burnie Burns
Michael Justin "Burnie" Burns (born January 18, 1973) is an American writer, actor, producer, comedian, host, and director previously based in Austin, Texas. He is a co-founder, former chief executive officer, and former chief creative offic ...
,
Matt Hullum
Matthew Jay Hullum (born September 29, 1974) is an American director, producer, writer, actor and visual effects supervisor living in Austin, Texas. He is one of five co-founders and former CEO of production company Rooster Teeth, which specializ ...
,
Geoff Ramsey
Geoffrey Lazer Ramsey (born Geoffrey Paul Wright, later Geoffrey Paul Fink on June 19, 1975) is an American voice actor, film producer and internet personality. He co-founded the production company Rooster Teeth and is known for voicing Dexter G ...
, Jason Saldaña,
Gus Sorola
Gustavo Raul "Gus" Sorola III (born February 22, 1978) is an American actor and podcast host. He is best known for his work with Rooster Teeth.
Early life
Sorola was born in Austin, and raised in Eagle Pass, Texas, near the Mexico–United S ...
, and
Joel Heyman
Joel Pearce Heyman (born September 16, 1971) is an American actor, best known for voicing Michael J. Caboose in the Rooster Teeth web series '' Red vs. Blue'' from 2003 until 2020. He co-founded Rooster Teeth with Burnie Burns, Matt Hullum, Geof ...
,
Rooster Teeth is a subsidiary of Warner Bros. Discovery Global Streaming & Interactive Entertainment, a subsidiary of
Warner Bros. Discovery
Warner Bros. Discovery, Inc. (WBD) is an American multinational mass media and entertainment conglomerate headquartered at 230 Park Avenue South in New York City. It was formed after the spin-off of WarnerMedia by AT&T, and its merger with Di ...
.
Rooster Teeth began with the production of ''
Red vs. Blue'', which premiered in April 2003 and is still in production, making it the third longest-running episodic web series of all time. Due to server and web hosting costs, the founders created "Sponsorships" which is now known as "FIRST", a subscription to exclusive and earlier access to content and discounts on their merchandise store, among other benefits. The company later branched out into
live-action
Live action (or live-action) is a form of cinematography or videography that uses photography instead of animation. Some works combine live-action with animation to create a live-action animated film. Live-action is used to define film, video ...
shorts, series, comedy,
Let's Play
A Let's Play (LP) is a video (or screenshots accompanied by text) documenting the playthrough of a video game, often including commentary and/or a camera view of the gamer's face. A Let's Play differs from a video game walkthrough or strat ...
videos, and full animated productions. Other projects include reality shows, video game development, entertainment news programs, and
podcasts. In 2015, Rooster Teeth released its feature-film debut ''
Lazer Team
''Lazer Team'' is a 2015 American science fiction action comedy film directed, produced, and co-written by Matt Hullum. The first feature film produced by Rooster Teeth, it stars Burnie Burns, Gavin Free, Michael Jones, Colton Dunn, Allie DeBe ...
'', a
science-fiction
Science fiction (sometimes shortened to Sci-Fi or SF) is a genre of speculative fiction which typically deals with imaginative and futuristic concepts such as advanced science and technology, space exploration, time travel, parallel unive ...
action comedy
Action comedy is a genre that combines aspects of action and comedy. The genre is most prevalent in film with action comedy films, though several TV series fit this genre.
Film
The action comedy film is a film genre that combines aspects of acti ...
. The company hosts an annual convention,
RTX, in
Austin, Texas
Austin is the capital city of the U.S. state of Texas, as well as the seat and largest city of Travis County, with portions extending into Hays and Williamson counties. Incorporated on December 27, 1839, it is the 11th-most-populous city ...
and formerly also in
Sydney and
London
London is the capital and List of urban areas in the United Kingdom, largest city of England and the United Kingdom, with a population of just under 9 million. It stands on the River Thames in south-east England at the head of a estuary dow ...
.
The company's videos are regularly released on its own website and app while podcasts and Let's Plays are still released on their
YouTube
YouTube is a global online video sharing and social media platform headquartered in San Bruno, California. It was launched on February 14, 2005, by Steve Chen, Chad Hurley, and Jawed Karim. It is owned by Google, and is the second mo ...
channel as well. As of September 2021, Rooster Teeth's primary YouTube channel has 9.18 million subscribers and has over 6 billion video views.
Including all of their other channels, they maintain over 37 million subscribers.
History
![Rooster Teeth Congress office (2548207067)](https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/2/21/Rooster_Teeth_Congress_office_%282548207067%29.jpg)
While attending the
University of Texas at Austin
The University of Texas at Austin (UT Austin, UT, or Texas) is a public research university in Austin, Texas. It was founded in 1883 and is the oldest institution in the University of Texas System. With 40,916 undergraduate students, 11,07 ...
, Burnie Burns and Matt Hullum collaborated with actor Joel Heyman on a 1997
independent film called ''The Schedule''. The film helped Hullum and Heyman to find work in Los Angeles, but otherwise had limited success.
[Moltenbrey] Working for a local company named Telenetwork, Burns later met
Geoff Ramsey
Geoffrey Lazer Ramsey (born Geoffrey Paul Wright, later Geoffrey Paul Fink on June 19, 1975) is an American voice actor, film producer and internet personality. He co-founded the production company Rooster Teeth and is known for voicing Dexter G ...
(then named Geoff Fink),
Gustavo Sorola
Gustavo Raul "Gus" Sorola III (born February 22, 1978) is an American actor and podcast host. He is best known for his work with Rooster Teeth.
Early life
Sorola was born in Austin, and raised in Eagle Pass, Texas, near the Mexico–United St ...
, Dan Godwin, and Jason Saldaña, and the five formed drunkgamers.com, a website where the five reviewed various video games while drunk. According to Ramsey, the group tried to receive free games to review, but "incurred the wrath" of several game developers in doing so.
[Konow, 1.]
One of the non-gameplay videos that the drunkgamers crew created during this time was a live-action parody of the
Apple Switch ad campaign
Switchers was an advertising campaign launched by Apple Computer, Inc. (now Apple Inc.) on June 10, 2002. It featured what the company referred to as "real people" who had "switched" from the Microsoft Windows platform to the Mac. An internation ...
. This video featured Sorola as the main actor, used
Peter Tchaikovsky
Pyotr Ilyich Tchaikovsky , group=n ( ; 7 May 1840 – 6 November 1893) was a Russian composer of the Romantic period. He was the first Russian composer whose music would make a lasting impression internationally. He wrote some of the most popu ...
's "
Dance of the Sugar Plum Fairy" as background music, and focused on the lack of games available for the
Apple Macintosh
The Mac (known as Macintosh until 1999) is a family of personal computers designed and marketed by Apple Inc., Apple Inc. Macs are known for their ease of use and minimalist designs, and are popular among students, creative professionals, and ...
computer.
[Mac Gamer Switch Parody.] Sorola and Burns said that the name change from 'Drunk Tank Podcast' to 'Rooster Teeth Podcast' was for the same reason that 'Drunk Gamers' was changed to 'Rooster Teeth': Nobody would give games or sponsor something with 'drunk' in the title "because it was so unprofessional."
On settling on Rooster Teeth, Burns stated, "We named it something else to give people the idea that we were going to be doing more than that".
The name "Rooster Teeth" is a
euphemism for "cockbite", an insult from the original ''
Red vs. Blue'' trailer that Burns described as a "touchstone for the audience".
Among the company's core philosophies, Burns stated, "we only make content that we would want to see ... it comes from a very genuine space. I think that our audience appreciates that voice".
As of 2017, production costs for an episode vary from $15,000 to $100,000.
Rooster Teeth's business strategy is a hybrid model composed of subscriptions, preroll ads, YouTube preroll ads, licensed studio productions, branded merchandise, and annual live events.
Rooster Teeth has attributed their success to maintaining their community site and was reluctant to join
YouTube
YouTube is a global online video sharing and social media platform headquartered in San Bruno, California. It was launched on February 14, 2005, by Steve Chen, Chad Hurley, and Jawed Karim. It is owned by Google, and is the second mo ...
initially, stating they viewed them as a "competitor".
In 2014, having signed a two-year lease, the entire company (now consisting of over 90 employees) moved into Stage 5 at
Austin Studios
Austin Studios is a film and video production facility with 10,000 square feet (1,000 m2) of production office space and over 100,000 square feet (10,000 m2) of production space established in 2000. The space includes five production stages conve ...
. In November 2014, Rooster Teeth was acquired by
Fullscreen for an undisclosed amount. Rooster Teeth agreed to be bought to give itself "the resources and tools" needed to compete against other producers. Burns elaborated by saying they consider
Netflix
Netflix, Inc. is an American subscription video on-demand over-the-top streaming service and production company based in Los Gatos, California. Founded in 1997 by Reed Hastings and Marc Randolph in Scotts Valley, California, it offers a fi ...
,
HBO, and
Amazon
Amazon most often refers to:
* Amazons, a tribe of female warriors in Greek mythology
* Amazon rainforest, a rainforest covering most of the Amazon basin
* Amazon River, in South America
* Amazon (company), an American multinational technolog ...
their current competition.
On February 3, 2015, Burns confirmed that Rooster Teeth would be establishing an office in Los Angeles. These offices were used by a whole new division,
Funhaus
Rooster Teeth Productions, LLC is an American digital media company headquartered in Austin, Texas. Founded in 2003 by Burnie Burns, Matt Hullum, Geoff Ramsey, Jason Saldaña, Gus Sorola, and Joel Heyman, Rooster Teeth is a subsidiary of W ...
. The company released their
feature film
A feature film or feature-length film is a narrative film (motion picture or "movie") with a running time long enough to be considered the principal or sole presentation in a commercial entertainment program. The term ''feature film'' originall ...
debut in 2015 with ''
Lazer Team
''Lazer Team'' is a 2015 American science fiction action comedy film directed, produced, and co-written by Matt Hullum. The first feature film produced by Rooster Teeth, it stars Burnie Burns, Gavin Free, Michael Jones, Colton Dunn, Allie DeBe ...
'', a
science fiction
Science fiction (sometimes shortened to Sci-Fi or SF) is a genre of speculative fiction which typically deals with imaginative and futuristic concepts such as advanced science and technology, space exploration, time travel, parallel uni ...
comedy
Comedy is a genre of fiction that consists of discourses or works intended to be humorous or amusing by inducing laughter, especially in theatre, film, stand-up comedy, television, radio, books, or any other entertainment medium. The term o ...
.
In 2016, Rooster Teeth hired three content executives to help with audience expansion: Luis Medina as Senior VP of Partnerships, Evan Bregman as Director of Programming and Ryan P. Hall as Head of Development. It was announced that Medina would co-manage the ''Let's Play'' family with Ramsey, including
Achievement Hunter
Achievement Hunter is an American video gaming division of Rooster Teeth Productions. Founded by Geoff Ramsey and Jack Pattillo on July 6, 2008, the website is largely based on the achievement mechanic in video games. Since its founding, Achie ...
, Funhaus, and ScrewAttack, and manage partnerships with third-party brands such as Cow Chop and Kinda Funny. Bregman will be responsible for programming strategy and boosting growth across all platforms such as apps, the community site, YouTube, and Facebook. Hall will oversee Rooster Teeth's development slate and lead efforts to identify up-and-coming projects and talent.
Each year, the company participates in
Extra Life
In video games, a life is a play-turn that a player character has, defined as the period between start and end of play. Lives refer to a finite number of tries before the game ends with a game over. It is sometimes called a chance, a try, rest ...
, a gaming-themed fundraiser with Rooster Teeth's proceeds going to
Dell Children's Medical Center of Central Texas. During their 2017 Extra Life stream, they raised a total of US$1,209,970.73. The 2018 Extra Life stream raised US$1,417,288 for Extra Life and Dell Children's Medical Center. The 2019 Extra Life stream raised US$1,222,371. Due to the
COVID-19 pandemic
The COVID-19 pandemic, also known as the coronavirus pandemic, is an ongoing global pandemic of coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19) caused by severe acute respiratory syndrome coronavirus 2 (SARS-CoV-2). The novel virus was first identi ...
, Rooster Teeth shortened the 2020 stream to 12 hours. It raised a total of US$1,163,801 for Dell Children's Medical Center.
On January 26, 2018, Fullscreen President and former COO Ezra Cooperstein was appointed as President of Rooster Teeth.
In May 2018, Rooster Teeth piloted five shows named ''Branded'', ''Gorq's Quest'', ''Achievement Haunter'', ''Million Dollars, But ... Animated'', and ''Rooster Teeth's Murder Room'', and also announced ''Spikeface'', a new 2D/dark comedy show to be coproduced with
Rob McElhenney
Robert McElhenney III (; born April 14, 1977) is an American actor, producer, writer, podcaster and co-owner of Wrexham A.F.C. He is best known for his role as Ronald "Mac" McDonald on the FX/FXX comedy series ''It's Always Sunny in Philadelp ...
and his RCG Productions.
In December 2018, Otter Media restructured Fullscreen, consolidating Rooster Teeth, along with
Crunchyroll and
VRV, under Ellation. The companies will align sales efforts to attract advertising and partnerships. During the transition, Otter Media CEO Tony Goncalves highlighted the foundation of increased programming quality at Rooster Teeth, pledging changes to the company would be minimal in order to preserve the brand.
Machinima would be subsumed into Fullscreen.
On December 18, 2018, Rooster Teeth added to their overall content library by partnering with animation channels CypherDen and Flashgitz, premiering their future content on Rooster Teeth First. On January 31, 2019, Yvonne Secretan,
COO of Rooster Teeth, announced her retirement. Ezra Cooperstein stepped down as President of Rooster Teeth on April 26, 2019. On September 12, 2019, Hullum announced Rooster Teeth had laid off 13% of its workforce, approximately 50 employees. Two weeks after announcing the layoffs,
Jordan Levin
Jordan Levin (August 30, 1967) is an American media executive, producer, and entrepreneur. He is general manager of Rooster Teeth, an Austin, Texas-based digital-media and events company owned by AT&T's WarnerMedia. A strategic advisor and busi ...
was named General Manager with most of Rooster Teeth's founders stepping down into creative roles: Matt Hullum stepped down as CEO and became Chief Content Officer, Burnie Burns stepped down as Chief Creative Officer to Executive Producer and Geoff Ramsey became Executive Creative Director.
In December 2019, Rooster Teeth promoted Doreen Copeland to VP, Head of Production, and Joe Clary and Sean Hinz to Co-Heads of Animation, leading day-to-day operations across all of Rooster Teeth's animated productions; Clary and Hinz will report to Copeland, who will oversee all physical production. In June 2020, Heyman said that he was "laid off" from Rooster Teeth and would no longer perform in ''Red vs. Blue''. Burns resigned in June 2020, maintaining a
first-look deal
A first-look deal is any contract containing a clause granting, usually for a fee or other consideration that covers a specified period of time, a pre-emption right, right of first refusal, or right of first offer (also called a right of first neg ...
with Rooster Teeth.
In August 2020, Rooster Teeth announced it was reviewing its online content library as part of a diversity initiative.
In April 2021, it was reported that AT&T was looking to sell Rooster Teeth and that the company's revenue had dropped nearly $20 million in 2019. However, no such sale occurred and the company was included in the completed merger that formed Warner Bros. Discovery in April 2022.
In the month before, Rooster Teeth and WarnerMedia Access announced the creation of the Rooster Teeth Digital Creators Program, which is intended to support underrepresented talent.
Productions
Rooster Teeth Animation
Rooster Teeth Animation is a division of Rooster Teeth that was founded in 2014, with
Gray Haddock
Gray G. Haddock is an American actor and film producer. He is the former head of animation at Rooster Teeth, a production studio in Austin, Texas, where he created the 2019 mecha web series '' Gen:Lock''. He is known for voice roles such as Locus ...
as the former head of the department. On December 13, 2019, it was announced that Joe Clary and Sean Hinz were promoted to co-heads of the department to replace Haddock.
''Red vs. Blue''
In a parody of science-fiction films and games
[Leggat] and of military life,
[Burns, ''et al.'', 2003, Audio Commentary, episode 2.] ''Red vs. Blue'' tells the story of two groups of soldiers fighting a
civil war
A civil war or intrastate war is a war between organized groups within the same state (or country).
The aim of one side may be to take control of the country or a region, to achieve independence for a region, or to change government policies ...
in a desolate and isolated box canyon. Initially, Rooster Teeth expected the series to consist of only six to eight episodes.
[Burns, ''et al.'', 2003, Audio Commentary, episode 4.] However, the series quickly became very popular, receiving 20,000 downloads in a single day, which contributed to bringing Rooster Teeth to fame.
[Thompson, 1.] Accordingly, Burns conceived an extension of the plot.
[Waters.]
''RWBY''
''RWBY'' (pronounced "Ruby") is an
anime-styled CG-
animated
Animation is a method by which still figures are manipulated to appear as moving images. In traditional animation, images are drawn or painted by hand on transparent celluloid sheets to be photographed and exhibited on film. Today, most ani ...
web series
A web series (also known as a web show) is a series of scripted or non-scripted online videos, generally in episodic form, released on the Internet, which first emerged in the late 1990s and became more prominent in the early 2000s. A single in ...
that was created and directed by animator
Monty Oum
Monyreak Oum ( ; June 22, 1981 – February 1, 2015) was an American web-based animator and writer.
Oum attracted attention within the gaming community after releasing an animated video in 2007, titled ''Haloid'', where characters from the ''Halo ...
, and written by Miles Luna and Kerry Shawcross. The first episode of ''RWBY'' premiered on July 5, 2013, at
RTX 2013 and was released on the Rooster Teeth site on July 18, 2013.
The story takes place in the world of Remnant, which is filled with supernatural forces and shadowy creatures known as the "Creatures of Grimm". Prior to the events of the series, mankind waged a battle of survival against the Grimm before discovering the power of a mysterious element called Dust, which allowed them to fight back against the monsters. On February 1, 2015, Oum died due to a severe
allergic reaction
Allergies, also known as allergic diseases, refer a number of conditions caused by the hypersensitivity of the immune system to typically harmless substances in the environment. These diseases include hay fever, food allergies, atopic derma ...
during a medical procedure, but the series he created continues.
The success of ''RWBY'' also resulted in a secondary series by Rooster Teeth, ''
RWBY Chibi
''RWBY Chibi'' is an American animated comedy web series produced by Rooster Teeth Animation for Rooster Teeth. It is a spin-off of ''RWBY'', where each episode consists of several scenes where aspects of RWBY's characters are usually exaggera ...
'', which features the show's main characters in
chibi form, with a focus on comedic elements and humor.
''Rooster Teeth Animated Adventures''
![Rooster Teeth Animated Adventures logo](https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/c/cd/Rooster_Teeth_Animated_Adventures_logo.png)
In July 2010, Jordan Cwierz released the first ''Rooster Teeth Animated Adventures'' (''RTAA'') episode (then known as ''Drunk Tank Animated Adventures''), featuring animations depicting stories told on the ''
Rooster Teeth Podcast''. In October 2011, Cwierz was officially hired to produce the animated shorts full-time as a feature of the podcast.
On October 8, 2014, Rooster Teeth debuted ''Let's Play Minimations''. It features highlights from
Achievement Hunter
Achievement Hunter is an American video gaming division of Rooster Teeth Productions. Founded by Geoff Ramsey and Jack Pattillo on July 6, 2008, the website is largely based on the achievement mechanic in video games. Since its founding, Achie ...
's Let's Plays, initially using 3D animation that resembles the sandbox game, ''
Minecraft
''Minecraft'' is a sandbox game developed by Mojang Studios. The game was created by Markus "Notch" Persson in the Java (programming language), Java programming language. Following several early private testing versions, it was first made pub ...
'' and later machinimated using ''
Grand Theft Auto V''.
''Camp Camp''
![SDCC 2015 - Lindsay Jones and Jordan Cwierz (19047494994)](https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/e/eb/SDCC_2015_-_Lindsay_Jones_and_Jordan_Cwierz_%2819047494994%29.jpg)
On April 1, 2016, Rooster Teeth announced Camp Camp with a trailer that aired on their website and YouTube. The series premiered on June 10, 2016, as part of Rooster Teeth's ''Summer of Animation'' promotion. It focuses on a young boy named Max, voiced by
Michael Jones, who is forced to go to summer camp but makes two friends there who help him constantly torment their camp counselor, David, voiced by Miles Luna. It airs on Fridays for Rooster Teeth FIRST members and Saturdays for site members. The show was created by Jordan Cwierz and Miles Luna. The first season was extended by two episodes due to positive reception, for a total of 12 episodes in its first season. ''Camp Camp'' composer is Benjamin Zecker, with Miles Luna writing the outlines for "The Camp Camp Theme Song Song" and "Better Than You." The DVD/
Blu-ray
The Blu-ray Disc (BD), often known simply as Blu-ray, is a digital optical disc data storage format. It was invented and developed in 2005 and released on June 20, 2006 worldwide. It is designed to supersede the DVD format, and capable of st ...
combo pack of the first two seasons were released on May 22, 2018, with its third season premiered on May 25.
Its fourth season announced on May 20, 2019 and premiered on the Rooster Teeth site on June 1, 2019.
''gen:LOCK''
At RTX Austin 2017, Rooster Teeth Animation announced that they would be making a new series called ''
gen:LOCK'' that is a
mecha
In science fiction, or mechs are giant robots or machines controlled by people, typically depicted as humanoid walking vehicles. The term was first used in Japanese after shortening the English loanword or , but the meaning in Japanese is ...
action drama series by ''RWBY'' producer, Gray G. Haddock.
It was teased at
New York Comic Con
The New York Comic Con is an annual New York City fan convention dedicated to Western comics, graphic novels, anime, manga, video games, cosplay, toys, movies, and television. It was first held in 2006.
History
The New York Comic Con is a ...
and RTX London.
It was originally set for a late 2018 release, but was pushed back to January 2019. On May 21, 2018, it was revealed that the main character, Julian Chase, is voiced by
Michael B. Jordan
Michael Bakari Jordan (; born February 9, 1987) is an American actor. He is known for his film roles as shooting victim Oscar Grant in the drama ''Fruitvale Station'' (2013), boxer Adonis Creed in ''Creed'' (2015), and Erik Killmonger in ''Bl ...
. Jordan is also set to co-produce the series through his production company, Outlier Society Productions. The series premiered on January 26, 2019. The first season concluded on March 9, 2019.
On October 24, 2019 the series was renewed for a second season, which premiered first on
HBO Max
HBO Max is an American subscription video on-demand over-the-top streaming service owned by Warner Bros. Discovery. Launched in the United States on May 27, 2020, the service is built around the libraries of HBO, Warner Bros., Cartoon Netw ...
on November 4, 2021 and concluded on December 23.
Others
In May 2004, at the
E3 gaming convention, Rooster Teeth was introduced to ''
The Sims 2
''The Sims 2'' is a 2004 strategic life simulation video game developed by Maxis and published by Electronic Arts. It is the second major title in ''The Sims'' series, and is the sequel to ''The Sims.'' The game was released for Microsoft Windo ...
'' and realized that the game would be suitable for a series that parodied
reality television
Reality television is a genre of television programming that documents purportedly unscripted real-life situations, often starring unfamiliar people rather than professional actors. Reality television emerged as a distinct genre in the early ...
. The game's publisher
Electronic Arts
Electronic Arts Inc. (EA) is an American video game company headquartered in Redwood City, California. Founded in May 1982 by Apple employee Trip Hawkins, the company was a pioneer of the early home computer game industry and promoted the ...
allowed them to continue with the project. The result was ''
The Strangerhood
''The Strangerhood'' is a comedy series created by Rooster Teeth Productions. The series is produced primarily by using the machinima technique of synchronizing video footage from video game to pre-recorded dialogue and other audio. The animation ...
'', a comedy series that centers on eight strangers who awake one day unaware of where they are or how they arrived there.
[Williams.] Its first season of 17 episodes completed on April 27, 2006.
[Saldaña.] In 2005, the group collaborated with
Paul Marino
Paul Marino (born March 10, 1980) is a film director, producer, animator, voice actor, and author currently focused on machinima, the art of using engines from video games to create films. He is a co-founder and the executive director of the ...
[Burns, ''et al.'', 2006, Audio Commentary, ''Strangerhood Studios'' episode 6.] on ''
Strangerhood Studios
''The Strangerhood'' is a comedy series created by Rooster Teeth Productions. The series is produced primarily by using the machinima technique of synchronizing video footage from video game to pre-recorded dialogue and other audio. The animation ...
'', a
spin-off commissioned by the
Independent Film Channel
IFC (formerly known as the Independent Film Channel) is an American basic cable channel owned by AMC Networks, originally launching in 1994 as a TV channel devoted to independent films. The Independent Film Channel originally operated as a com ...
.
[Machinima Theater.] This spin-off was the first machinima series to be commissioned for broadcast
and won an award for Best Editing at the
2005 Machinima Film Festival
This is a list of film festivals dedicated to machinima, the use of real-time 3-D engines in filmmaking. The Academy of Machinima Arts & Sciences (AMAS) regularly holds such festivals, and recognizes exemplary machinima works through awards nick ...
.
[Mackie Winners Announced!.] The second season premiered on September 29, 2015, after the stretch goal was reached for ''
Lazer Team
''Lazer Team'' is a 2015 American science fiction action comedy film directed, produced, and co-written by Matt Hullum. The first feature film produced by Rooster Teeth, it stars Burnie Burns, Gavin Free, Michael Jones, Colton Dunn, Allie DeBe ...
''s
Indiegogo crowdfunding campaign.
In 2006, Rooster Teeth partnered with Maybeck Productions to create ''PANICS'', a short series filmed on ''
F.E.A.R.'' that chronicles the misadventures of Bravo Team, a group of soldiers sent to investigate a
paranormal
Paranormal events are purported phenomena described in popular culture, folk, and other non-scientific bodies of knowledge, whose existence within these contexts is described as being beyond the scope of normal scientific understanding. Not ...
disturbance.
The four publicly released episodes were released between September 27, 2005 and October 18, 2005,
[FearFans.com.] and a prequel was released with ''F.E.A.R. – Director's Edition''.
[Gersh.] The mini-series won an award for Best Writing at the 2005 Machinima Film Festival.
Rooster Teeth's other machinima productions are ''1-800-Magic'', a four-episode mini-series created in 2006 using the game ''
Shadowrun
''Shadowrun'' is a science fantasy tabletop role-playing game set in an alternate future in which cybernetics, magic in fiction, magic and fantasy creatures co-exist. It combines genres of cyberpunk, urban fantasy and crime fiction, crime, with ...
'', and ''Supreme Surrender'', a 2008 mini-series made using ''
Supreme Commander''. On February 13, 2017, Rooster Teeth premiered the teaser trailer for their upcoming animated series titled ''Sex Swing'' featuring members of their Funhaus division based on a recurring joke in their videos where they portray a fictional band of the same name.
At RTX 2014, a new animated show called ' was announced, starring Ray Narvaez, Jr. as X-Ray and
Gavin Free as Vav. The show is directed by
Lindsay Jones (who also voices Hilda) and Jordan Cwierz, with art direction by Patrick Rodriguez. The first episode was released on November 27, 2014. The second season premiered on July 19, 2015. Narvaez and Free reprised their roles as the show's titular heroes, with the addition of
Michael Jones as the anti-hero Mogar,
Jessica DiCicco
Jessica Sonya DiCicco (; born June 10, 1980) is an American actress. She is known for voicing in animated television series and video games. Her first voice role was the announcer for Nickelodeon's educational channel Noggin. DiCicco has since v ...
as news reporter Ash Samaya, and Ryan Haywood as The Mad King. There are currently no plans for a third season, and the show has not been referenced since its conclusion by Rooster Teeth. When asked by a fan if he would return for a third season if asked, Narvaez stated, "Not interested. I am happy with how Season 2 ended, plus as fun as voice acting was I have no interest in doing it anymore."
A new 2D animation show was released on Rooster Teeth First on March 16, 2018. Created by Georden Whitman, ''
Nomad of Nowhere
''Nomad of Nowhere'' is an American 2D animated web series released on the website of Rooster Teeth on March 16, 2018. The show, which was created by Georden Whitman, is a western-fantasy hybrid focused on a mute wanderer hunted for being capabl ...
'' is a western-fantasy hybrid focused on a mute wanderer hunted for being capable of using magic to give life to inanimate objects.
On February 15, 2019, it was announced Rooster Teeth would partner with
Hasbro
Hasbro, Inc. (; a syllabic abbreviation of its original name, Hassenfeld Brothers) is an American multinational conglomerate holding company incorporated and headquartered in Pawtucket, Rhode Island. Hasbro owns the trademarks and products of K ...
for a 2020 animated
Netflix
Netflix, Inc. is an American subscription video on-demand over-the-top streaming service and production company based in Los Gatos, California. Founded in 1997 by Reed Hastings and Marc Randolph in Scotts Valley, California, it offers a fi ...
series based on the ''
Transformers: War for Cybertron Trilogy'' toyline.
Live-action production
''Rooster Teeth Shorts''
Rooster Teeth first ventured into
live action
Live action (or live-action) is a form of cinematography or videography that uses photography instead of animation. Some works combine live-action with animation to create a live-action animated film. Live-action is used to define film, video ...
in 2009 with ''Captain Dynamic'', a mini-series to promote the online game ''
City of Heroes''. The series tells the story of a team of writers hired to use the new in-game content creation tools to promote the title character, Captain Dynamic, the 'worst superhero in the world'. Directed by
Matt Hullum
Matthew Jay Hullum (born September 29, 1974) is an American director, producer, writer, actor and visual effects supervisor living in Austin, Texas. He is one of five co-founders and former CEO of production company Rooster Teeth, which specializ ...
and written by
Burnie Burns
Michael Justin "Burnie" Burns (born January 18, 1973) is an American writer, actor, producer, comedian, host, and director previously based in Austin, Texas. He is a co-founder, former chief executive officer, and former chief creative offic ...
, the series starred
Ed Robertson
Lloyd Edward Elwyn Robertson (born October 25, 1970) is a Canadian musician, best known as the lead singer, guitarist, and songwriter of the band Barenaked Ladies. He, along with former member Steven Page, founded the group in 1988. As of Page's ...
of the
Barenaked Ladies, who is a long time friend and fan of Rooster Teeth. A number of Rooster Teeth employees were present throughout the series, notably
Joel Heyman
Joel Pearce Heyman (born September 16, 1971) is an American actor, best known for voicing Michael J. Caboose in the Rooster Teeth web series '' Red vs. Blue'' from 2003 until 2020. He co-founded Rooster Teeth with Burnie Burns, Matt Hullum, Geof ...
as Captain Dynamic's primary writer. Actor
Shannon McCormick
Shannon McCormick is an American film and voice actor. He is known for his work with Rooster Teeth, voicing Agent Washington in '' Red vs. Blue'' and Professor Ozpin in ''RWBY''.
His other roles include Kuroudo Akabane in ''GetBackers'', Masahi ...
appears as the series' antagonist, Great Face. The series also led to the release of an
iPhone app called the ''Awesome Button''.
Following the positive reception of ''Captain Dynamic'', Rooster Teeth began producing another live-action series, ''Rooster Teeth Shorts'', a
sketch comedy which parodies life at their offices in a similar fashion to the webcomic. The series features the staff of Rooster Teeth, who all play caricatures of themselves, as well as occasional appearances from voice actors from some of their machinima series. The first season ran for twenty episodes, which along with ''Captain Dynamic'' has been released on DVD.
The second season of ''RT Shorts'' debuted on April 23, 2010, with new episodes released weekly via the Rooster Teeth website until a hiatus during late July 2010, during which the team focused all their efforts towards ''Red vs. Blue'' episodes. With production on ''Red vs. Blue'' complete, weekly ''RT Shorts'' episodes began again on August 28, 2010, until the second season's conclusion with its twenty-fourth episode and DVD release in early December. Shortly before season two's conclusion, Rooster Teeth collaborated with the team behind ''
Mega64
''Mega64'' is a webseries, video production company and comedy troupe created by Rocco Botte, Derrick Acosta, and Shawn Chatfield, in 2003. Originally conceived to be a public-access television show, the original five episodes produced were later ...
'', a video game-centered comedy series. Together they produced four ''Rooster Teeth Shorts'' episodes, which were released on the Rooster Teeth website as the beginning of season three.
Halfway through season four, Burns announced the cancellation of ''Rooster Teeth Shorts'' for several new series. However, on April 1, 2013, Rooster Teeth announced ''Rooster Teeth Shorts'' would return with a fifth season, on the same day, the season premiere episode ''Reunion'' was released and marked the tenth anniversary of the company.
On August 22, 2013, Rooster Teeth released six 6-second mini-episodes exclusively through the video sharing service
Vine
A vine (Latin ''vīnea'' "grapevine", "vineyard", from ''vīnum'' "wine") is any plant with a growth habit of trailing or scandent (that is, climbing) stems, lianas or runners. The word ''vine'' can also refer to such stems or runners themsel ...
. Six more were published on September 13, 2013. The third set was released on October 11, 2013, followed by a fourth set on November 8, 2013.
''Immersion''
''Immersion'' is a series in which
Burnie Burns
Michael Justin "Burnie" Burns (born January 18, 1973) is an American writer, actor, producer, comedian, host, and director previously based in Austin, Texas. He is a co-founder, former chief executive officer, and former chief creative offic ...
and Gus Sorola (
Griffon Ramsey in the first season) test the concepts of video games in real life, such as whether the
heckling that sometimes occurs in
multiplayer video games
A multiplayer video game is a video game in which more than one person can play in the same game environment at the same time, either locally on the same computing system ( couch co-op), on different computing systems via a local area network, or ...
would negatively affect the performance of real soldiers. Burns joked in the Rooster Teeth podcast that the series started as an "elaborate way for
hem
A hem in sewing is a garment finishing method, where the edge of a piece of cloth is folded and sewn to prevent unravelling of the fabric and to adjust the length of the piece in garments, such as at the end of the sleeve or the bottom of the g ...
to do fun stuff and get paid for it."
Geoff Ramsey
Geoffrey Lazer Ramsey (born Geoffrey Paul Wright, later Geoffrey Paul Fink on June 19, 1975) is an American voice actor, film producer and internet personality. He co-founded the production company Rooster Teeth and is known for voicing Dexter G ...
and Gus Sorola were the
test subjects throughout the first season.
Gavin Free and
Michael Jones served as the test subjects from the second season onwards. Various other Rooster Teeth employees have served as test subjects in certain episodes including Miles Luna, Kerry Shawcross, Blaine Gibson and Chris Demaris.
During
PAX East
PAX (originally known as Penny Arcade Expo) is a series of gaming culture festivals involving tabletop, arcade, and video gaming. PAX is held annually in Seattle, Boston and Philadelphia in the United States; and Melbourne in Australia. PAX wa ...
in late March 2010, Rooster Teeth released a
teaser trailer
A teaser (or more specifically teaser trailer) is a mini- trailer and a form of teaser campaign advertising that focuses on film and television programming. It is a videography pre-release move or television show advertisement. Short in length, te ...
for a series with a
pilot
An aircraft pilot or aviator is a person who controls the flight of an aircraft by operating its directional flight controls. Some other aircrew members, such as navigators or flight engineers, are also considered aviators, because they a ...
episode that tested how easy it would be to drive a car from a
third-person perspective
Narration is the use of a written or spoken commentary to convey a story to an audience. Narration is conveyed by a narrator: a specific person, or unspecified literary voice, developed by the creator of the story to deliver information to the ...
. Nothing was mentioned of ''Immersion'' until October 2010, when
Burnie Burns
Michael Justin "Burnie" Burns (born January 18, 1973) is an American writer, actor, producer, comedian, host, and director previously based in Austin, Texas. He is a co-founder, former chief executive officer, and former chief creative offic ...
stated during the company's podcast, ''The Rooster Teeth Podcast'', that production had begun on further episodes.
Soon after, on November 23, 2010, the company released pictures on
Reddit
Reddit (; stylized in all lowercase as reddit) is an American social news aggregation, content rating, and discussion website. Registered users (commonly referred to as "Redditors") submit content to the site such as links, text posts, imag ...
of a door in their office turned into a safe-room door from the video game ''
Left 4 Dead
''Left 4 Dead'' is a 2008 first-person shooter game developed by Valve South and published by Valve. It was originally released for Microsoft Windows and Xbox 360 in November 2008 and for Mac OS X in October 2010, and is the first title in the ...
'' to build hype for the series' debut the following day. The post became the most popular post of the day on Reddit. Rooster Teeth re-released a tweaked pilot episode the following day to begin the weekly series, which concluded with its seventh episode on January 5, 2011.
A new episode of ''Immersion'' premiered on June 17, 2011, after five months on hiatus. The episode's filming took place on May 29, 2011, during Rooster Teeth's convention, RTX, as well as 400 participants dressed as zombies. The episode shows Geoff Ramsey and Gus Sorola defending themselves from a horde of zombies.
On June 17 Burns stated during a panel at Supanova Sydney, that they would be producing a second season, and they were developing concepts. They also confirmed that Gavin Free and Michael Jones of Achievement Hunter would be joining the cast in the second season, replacing Sorola and Ramsey as the test subjects. In the Rooster Teeth Podcast, it was confirmed that the second season began production in 2013. Burns stated in an episode of the ''Rooster Teeth Podcast'' that several television stations were interested in picking up the series for its second season.
During RTX 2015, Burns announced that there would be a third season of ''Immersion''. The third season premiered in November 2015. Airing on August 3, 2019, Burns, Free, and Jones did an episode of ''Immersion'' for Discovery channel's ''
Shark Week
Shark Week is an annual, week long TV programming block at the Discovery Channel, which features shark-based programming. Shark Week originally premiered on July 17, 1988. Featured annually, in July or early August, it was originally devoted to c ...
.'' Along with being shown a demonstration of mechanical shark jaws, it involved them riding a mechanical shark, surfing on the back of a shark-like boat, and ultimately ended with both of them diving with sharks with shark expert Luke Tipple. The episode is available to watch on the Discovery website.
''The Slow Mo Guys''
''The Slow Mo Guys'' is a science and technology entertainment web series from Thame, England, United Kingdom created by Gavin Free, starring himself and Daniel Gruchy. The series consists of a wide variety of things filmed in extreme
slow motion
Slow motion (commonly abbreviated as slo-mo or slow-mo) is an effect in film-making whereby time appears to be slowed down. It was invented by the Austrian priest August Musger in the early 20th century. This can be accomplished through the use ...
using a range of
Vision Research
''Vision Research'' is a peer-reviewed scientific journal specializing in the neuroscience and psychology of the visual system of humans and other animals. The journal is abstracted and indexed in PubMed. The journal's impact factor
The impact ...
Phantom
Phantom may refer to:
* Spirit (animating force), the vital principle or animating force within all living things
** Ghost, the soul or spirit of a dead person or animal that can appear to the living
Aircraft
* Boeing Phantom Ray, a stealthy un ...
high-speed cameras, capable of shooting over 1,500,000
frames per second
A frame is often a structural system that supports other components of a physical construction and/or steel frame that limits the construction's extent.
Frame and FRAME may also refer to:
Physical objects
In building construction
*Framing (con ...
. The series premiered on 15 October 2010. On 20 February 2013, Free confirmed that the series had been picked up by Rooster Teeth and that further episodes of the series would be released on Rooster Teeth's website, as well as the series' existing YouTube channel. A best of compilation was released by Rooster Teeth Productions for home video on 10 September 2013.
''Day 5''
![Day 5 Shoot - Downtown Austin (7601365636)](https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/5/5a/Day_5_Shoot_-_Downtown_Austin_%287601365636%29.jpg)
At RTX 2012, 1,800 fans were used as extras for a scene in post-apocalypse short series called ''Day 5'', which initially followed a man fighting to stay awake after a virus spreads that causes anyone who falls asleep to die. The trailer premiered at RTX 2014.
While the premise was kept the same, the overall story and characters were later changed drastically. In March 2016, the cast was announced, with filming starting that same month. The first episode premiered on June 19, 2016 on both Rooster Teeth's website and YouTube, though the rest of the series was released exclusively on Rooster Teeth's website for FIRST members, making it the company's first premium exclusive show. Its first season concluded on July 31, 2016. Showrunner Josh Flanagan held a Reddit AMA the following day, answering many fan questions about the show. In February 2017, a second season of the show was announced, along with a second season of ''Camp Camp''.
''Million Dollars, But ... ''
''Million Dollars, But ...'' is an ongoing series in which three Rooster Teeth employees or a special guest each come up with a typically difficult scenario—which the cast comically re-enact—as a condition for which they will be given a million dollars; for example, the person has to date
Adolf Hitler
Adolf Hitler (; 20 April 188930 April 1945) was an Austrian-born German politician who was dictator of Nazi Germany, Germany from 1933 until Death of Adolf Hitler, his death in 1945. Adolf Hitler's rise to power, He rose to power as the le ...
for a year. The early episodes usually featured
Burnie Burns
Michael Justin "Burnie" Burns (born January 18, 1973) is an American writer, actor, producer, comedian, host, and director previously based in Austin, Texas. He is a co-founder, former chief executive officer, and former chief creative offic ...
,
Gavin Free, and
Barbara Dunkelman
Barbara Julie Dunkelman (born July 2, 1989) is a Canadian actress and internet personality. She is known for her work with the production company Rooster Teeth, where she serves as a Creative Director and was formerly the Director of Social and ...
, but as time went on, the cast became more varied. The pilot episode premiered on May 21, 2015, with the series continuing on July 9, 2015. The series now features special episodes devoted to specific themes, such as animation, with all the scenarios revolving around animation. ''Million Dollars, But ...'' has developed a card game that had a very successful Kickstarter, reaching their goal of US$10,000 within 2 minutes and later surpassing $1 million. The card game was released in mid-June 2016.
''On the Spot''
![On the Spot logo](https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/3/34/On_the_Spot_logo.png)
''On the Spot'' is the name of the Rooster Teeth game show that involves members of the Rooster Teeth cast and crew, split into two teams of two people, playing various improvisational games to gain points awarded by the host Jon Risinger. The winning team is awarded a golden trophy that resembles Gustavo Sorola, affectionately called "The Golden Gus". Although promised to the winner, after being broken several times, the trophy now does not leave Risinger's desk. A frequent theme of the show is the chaotic humor; contestants will frequently attempt to annoy and antagonize Risinger, and to mock his show. The points are assigned arbitrarily and inconsistently based on the random whim of the host, as well as being assigned by the broadcast team that is running the show. In an effort to bring variety to the show, the next few seasons have been themed, with the first themed season being "On the Spot goes to Hell!", where Jon, his show, and his contestants go to hell because his show was too bad. The second themed season is "On the Spot: Lost in Time" with each episode being set in a different time period due to a break in the space-time continuum caused by Chris Demaris. The third themed season involves a "family friendly" version of the show titled "On the Spot: The Happy Room", where each episode has a learning subject such as weather or family which the game prompts are based on. The latest themed season, "On the Spot and Chill", has a TV show theme.
Commercial and external partners
In 2014 a bi-weekly series premiered called ''Happy Hour''. The series chronicles the drunken adventures of Geoff Ramsey, Gavin Free, and Griffon Ramsey. This series ended on September 24, 2017.
Created to test elaborate social experiments, ''Social Disorder'' follows Chris Demarais and Aaron Marquis as they compete for points as a game show. The first episode, The Body Bag Experiment, debuted on September 15, 2014, in which Demarais and Marquis had to drag each other around in a body bag trying to get bystanders to help them out. Points were awarded for making up reasons as to what was in the bag or why they were dragging the bag in the first place.
Crunch Time is a web series that initially aired in September 2016. The original trailer was featured on
The Nerdist's announcement article, and depicted university students creating a machine to allow them to enter other people's dreams. The show stars
Samm Levine
Samuel Franklin Levine (born March 12, 1982) is an American actor, comedian and podcaster. He is known for his portrayal of Neal Schweiber on NBC's ''Freaks and Geeks'' and PFC Hirschberg in the 2009 film ''Inglourious Basterds''. Levine was al ...
of ''
Freaks and Geeks
''Freaks and Geeks'' is an American teen drama, teen comedy-drama television series created by Paul Feig and executive producer, executive-produced by Judd Apatow that aired on NBC during the 1999–2000 United States network television schedul ...
'' and ''
Inglourious Basterds
''Inglourious Basterds'' is a 2009 war film written and directed by Quentin Tarantino, starring Brad Pitt, Christoph Waltz, Michael Fassbender, Eli Roth, Diane Kruger, Daniel Brühl, Til Schweiger and Mélanie Laurent. The film tells an altern ...
'' fame, as well as Good Neighbor's
Nick Rutherford
Nicholas Rutherford (born August 7, 1985) is an American actor, comedian, writer, and co-founder of the sketch comedy group Good Neighbor. He has performed live stand up and sketch comedy in Los Angeles and New York. He was a writer for ''Saturday ...
; also starring
Jessy Hodges and Kirk C. Johnson, who starred in Rooster Teeth's first feature film, ''
Lazer Team
''Lazer Team'' is a 2015 American science fiction action comedy film directed, produced, and co-written by Matt Hullum. The first feature film produced by Rooster Teeth, it stars Burnie Burns, Gavin Free, Michael Jones, Colton Dunn, Allie DeBe ...
.'' Supporting the main cast is comedian
Brent Morin
Brent Morin (born August 31, 1986) is an American stand-up comedian, actor, musician and writer. He was a panelist in the sixth season of ''Chelsea Lately'' and played Justin Kearney on the NBC sitcom ''Undateable'' and the agent Hobbs on the sc ...
and ''
True Detective
''True Detective'' is an American anthology crime drama television series created and written by Nic Pizzolatto. The series, broadcast by the premium cable network HBO in the United States, premiered on January 12, 2014. Each season of the ...
''
's
Michael Hyatt
Charlene "Michael" Hyatt is a British-born American actress. Before her work in film and television, she performed on stages throughout the United States, particularly in ''Ragtime'' on Broadway. She has played Brianna Barksdale on ''The Wire'' ...
as agents Hobbs and Mullins, respectively.
On Halloween 2012, a partnership between Rooster Teeth and
Blip
Blip may refer to:
* Beta-lactamase inhibitor protein
* Blip (website), a defunct web video platform
* Blip.pl, a Polish social networking site
* Blip, a message in the Apache Wave (formerly Google Wave) collaboration platform
* Blip Festival, a ...
was announced, with the premiere of their new 10-episode, reality game competition series sponsored by
GEICO. ''The Gauntlet'' followed gamers from around the United States competing in contests of skills, concentration, agility and stamina, inspired by reality competitions ''
Wipeout'' and ''
The Voice
The Voice may refer to:
Fictional entities
* The Voice or Presence, a fictional representation of God in DC Comics
* The Voice (''Dune''), a fictional ability in the ''Dune'' universe
* The Voice, a character in the American TV series ''Cleo ...
''. The first season was hosted by Ali Baker and Burnie Burns. Season two was hosted by Burns and Joel Heyman and began on September 7, 2013.
Starting in 2014, Rooster Teeth employees Miles Luna and Kyle Taylor started playing video games and recording the gameplay and facial camera footage to create a show originally called ''Sponsor Play'' and it was featured as part of the Sponsor Cut portion of the RT website, an incentive to become a sponsor for their production. This series was renamed to ''Backwardz Compatible'' in November 2016 along with the change of sponsorship format. The whole series features gameplay of ''
Fatal Frame
''Fatal Frame'', titled in Japan and ''Project Zero'' in Europe and Australia, is a Japanese survival horror video game series created, published and developed by Koei Tecmo (originally Tecmo). Debuting in 2001 with the first entry in the seri ...
,
Resident Evil 7
''Resident Evil 7: Biohazard'' is a 2017 survival horror game developed and published by Capcom. The player controls Ethan Winters as he searches for his long-missing wife in a derelict plantation occupied by an infected family, solving puzzles ...
,
Sonic Adventure 2
is a platform video game developed by Sonic Team USA and published by Sega. It was the final ''Sonic the Hedgehog'' game for the Dreamcast after Sega left the home console market. It features two good-vs-evil stories: Sonic the Hedgehog, Tail ...
,
Alien: Isolation,
Dark Souls III
is a 2016 action role-playing game developed by FromSoftware and published by Bandai Namco Entertainment for PlayStation 4, Xbox One, and Windows. The third and final entry in the ''Dark Souls'' series, it is played in a Virtual camera system# ...
,'' and a few other titles.
![SDCC 2015 - Colton Dunn (19047506394)](https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/b/b3/SDCC_2015_-_Colton_Dunn_%2819047506394%29.jpg)
On September 27, 2015, a sketch comedy show ''RT-ES'', or ''Rooster Teeth Entertainment System'', premiered for Rooster Teeth First members on roosterteeth.com. The show is produced in Los Angeles, California and is hosted and created by
Colton Dunn
Colton Dunn (born June 30, 1977) is an American comedian, actor, writer, and producer. He is perhaps best known for his role as Garrett McNeil on the NBC workplace comedy '' Superstore'' (2015–2021) and for his work on Comedy Central sketch co ...
. The show consists of Dunn giving interviews, talking about relevant topics, and showing many sketches throughout: it features comedy, music, and games.
In a Sponsor-Only video, Burnie Burns stated that ''RT-ES'' would be put on hiatus. Burns began by saying "occasionally we make some missteps," referring to ''RT-ES''. He elaborated by saying Rooster Teeth would be looking at all the audience feedback and apply it to the show in the future.
Commercial work
In mid-2006, Electronic Arts commissioned Rooster Teeth to direct
["Red Vs. Blue: The Cash Is Always Greener".] commercials for their
EA Sports
EA Sports is a division of Electronic Arts that develops and publishes sports video games. Formerly a marketing gimmick of Electronic Arts, in which they tried to imitate real-life sports networks by calling themselves the "EA Sports Network ...
brand of games, including ''
Madden NFL 07
''Madden NFL 07'' is an American football video game based on the NFL that was published by EA Sports and developed by EA Tiburon. It is the first in the video game series to debut for the PlayStation 3 and Wii consoles as launch titles and the ...
'' and ''
NCAA Football 07'', for broadcast on television.
[Hullum, "Working Vacation".] Rooster Teeth released some of this work on their website.
[Hullum, "Ahh ... Memories".] In late November 2006, controversy arose over a ''Madden NFL 07'' commercial, when
Indianapolis Colts tight end
The tight end (TE) is a position in American football, arena football, and Canadian football, on the offense. The tight end is often a hybrid position with the characteristics and roles of both an offensive lineman and a wide receiver. Lik ...
Dallas Clark
Dallas Dean Clark (born June 12, 1979) is a former American football tight end who played 11 seasons in the National Football League (NFL). He played college football for the University of Iowa, earned unanimous All-American honors, and was reco ...
complained about his depiction in the commercial.
[Chappell.] Hit and tackled multiple times in the advertisement by
Philadelphia Eagles
The Philadelphia Eagles are a professional American football team based in Philadelphia. The Eagles compete in the National Football League (NFL) as a member club of the league's National Football Conference (NFC) East division. The team play ...
players, Clark stated, "I haven't seen the commercial, but I'm upset about it. It makes me look like a punk."
In response, Rooster Teeth posted a
director's cut, in which Clark plays and dominates every position.
[Robinson.]
They have also made a trailer for a free to play PC game called ''
Loadout
''Loadout'' was a free-to-play multiplayer video game, multiplayer third-person shooter game developed by Edge of Reality, originally released on Steam (service), Steam for Microsoft Windows, then co-published as a special PlayStation 4 version w ...
'', developed by Austin-based
Edge of Reality.
Film projects
In February 2014, Burns confirmed that the company was going to launch a
crowdfunding campaign for a feature film, as a way to offer more support options while gaining publicity.
In June 2014, an
Indiegogo campaign for ''
Lazer Team
''Lazer Team'' is a 2015 American science fiction action comedy film directed, produced, and co-written by Matt Hullum. The first feature film produced by Rooster Teeth, it stars Burnie Burns, Gavin Free, Michael Jones, Colton Dunn, Allie DeBe ...
'' was launched. The fundraiser hit its $650,000 target within 11 hours and reached over $1.6 million two days later. The film was due for release in 2015. , Lazer Team is the second-most-funded film project on Indiegogo, raising just under $2.5 million.
Production for Lazer Team began on October 9, 2014. On February 21, 2015 the first official teaser trailer was released, and on March 16, 2015 the full trailer was released. The film premiered at
Fantastic Fest
Fantastic Fest is an annual film festival in Austin, Texas. It was founded in 2005 by Tim League of Alamo Drafthouse, Harry Knowles of Ain't It Cool News, Paul Alvarado-Dykstra, and Tim McCanlies, writer of ''The Iron Giant'' and ''Secondhand ...
on September 24, 2015, where it received a generally positive reception. It was released in theaters on January 27, 2016.
On August 5, 2016, Burns and Free announced that ''
Lazer Team 2
''Lazer Team 2'' is a 2017 American science fiction action comedy film directed, produced and co-written by Matt Hullum and Daniel Fabelo. The film is a sequel to 2015's ''Lazer Team'', and follows the team travelling through a wormhole to find th ...
'' had been green-lit by Rooster Teeth in partnership with YouTube Red (now
YouTube Premium
YouTube Premium (formerly Music Key and YouTube Red) is a subscription service offered by the video platform YouTube. The service provides ad-free access to content across the service, as well as access to premium YouTube Originals programming ...
), who financed the film, and that pre-production had begun. In December 2016, Matt Hullum confirmed Rooster Teeth is aiming to shoot ''Lazer Team 2'' in late Spring in Texas followed by release in 2017. Daniel Fabelo co-directed the sequel with Hullum.
Nichole Bloom
Nichole Sakura O'Connor (born December 15, 1989), formerly credited as Nichole Bloom, is an American actress and model. She is best known for her role as Cheyenne in the NBC sitcom '' Superstore.''
Career
She had the recurring role of Amanda o ...
and
Victoria Pratt
Victoria Ainslie Pratt (born December 18, 1970) is a Canadian actress, author, and fitness model.
Early life
Pratt grew up in Chesley, Ontario, a self described "tomboy at heart." She attended the kinesiology program at York University in Tor ...
also joined the cast. Filming for the sequel concluded in April 2017.
At
RTX Austin 2017, Rooster Teeth announced ''
Blood Fest
''Blood Fest'' is a 2018 American comedy horror film written and directed by Owen Egerton and starring Robbie Kay, Seychelle Gabriel, and Jacob Batalon. Other cast members include Barbara Dunkelman, Nick Rutherford, and Tate Donovan, with a ca ...
'', a horror-comedy film directed by Owen Egerton and starring
Seychelle Gabriel
Seychelle Suzanne Gabriel is an American actress. On television, she portrayed Lourdes Delgado in ''Falling Skies'' (2011–2014) and voiced Asami Sato in ''The Legend of Korra'' (2012–2014). She has also appeared in the films '' The Spirit'' ...
,
Robbie Kay, and
Jacob Batalon
Jacob Batalon (; born October 9, 1996) is an American actor. Batalon achieved international recognition playing Ned Leeds in five Marvel Cinematic Universe superhero films, beginning with '' Spider-Man: Homecoming'' (2017). Cameos in '' Avenger ...
. Other cast members include
Zachary Levi
Zachary Levi Pugh ( ; born September 29, 1980) is an American actor. He received critical acclaim for starring as Chuck Bartowski in the series '' Chuck'', and as the title character in '' Shazam!'' and its 2023 sequel, as a part of the DC Ex ...
,
Barbara Dunkelman
Barbara Julie Dunkelman (born July 2, 1989) is a Canadian actress and internet personality. She is known for her work with the production company Rooster Teeth, where she serves as a Creative Director and was formerly the Director of Social and ...
,
Nick Rutherford
Nicholas Rutherford (born August 7, 1985) is an American actor, comedian, writer, and co-founder of the sketch comedy group Good Neighbor. He has performed live stand up and sketch comedy in Los Angeles and New York. He was a writer for ''Saturday ...
, and
Tate Donovan
Tate Buckley Donovan (born September 25, 1963) is an American actor, comedian and television director. He is known for portraying Tom Shayes in ''Damages'', Jimmy Cooper in '' The O.C.'', and the voice of the title character in the 1997 Disney ...
.
Video game development
''Rooster Teeth vs. Zombiens''
Rooster Teeth vs. Zombiens is a game made by Team Chaos that features some of the main Rooster Teeth personnel in their fight against zombies in the Rooster Teeth office and parking lot. It was made for
iOS
iOS (formerly iPhone OS) is a mobile operating system created and developed by Apple Inc. exclusively for its hardware. It is the operating system that powers many of the company's mobile devices, including the iPhone; the term also include ...
,
Android and
Steam platforms. It has since been taken down from IOS and Android platforms.
''RWBY: Grimm Eclipse''
At
RTX 2014, Rooster Teeth announced during the ''RWBY'' panel on July 4 that a ''RWBY'' video game was in development, under the working title ''RWBY: Grimm Eclipse'', making this the first video game ever created by the company. An early demo of the game was available for consumers to play at the event. Rooster Teeth CEO
Matt Hullum
Matthew Jay Hullum (born September 29, 1974) is an American director, producer, writer, actor and visual effects supervisor living in Austin, Texas. He is one of five co-founders and former CEO of production company Rooster Teeth, which specializ ...
stated, "''RWBY'' is a natural choice for us to focus on for our first in-house produced video game. Fans can expect that we will bring the same level of originality in action, comedy and design to the video game that has made the ''RWBY'' animated series such a hit."
''RWBY: Grimm Eclipse'' was initially developed as a
fangame
A fangame is a video game that is created by fans. They are usually based on one, or in some cases several, video game entries or franchises. Many fangames attempt to clone or remake the original game's design, gameplay, and characters, but ...
by Jordan Scott over the course of five months. A demo version was released on April 1, 2014, to celebrate Rooster Teeth's 11th anniversary, but the demo is no longer available for download. Scott stated at the time that it was not an ongoing project, and he had no plans for any future updates. He described it as a "survival-based action RPG" set in the world of ''RWBY''.
On December 1, 2015, the game was released as an
Early Access
Early access, also known as alpha access, alpha founding, paid alpha, or game preview, is a funding model in the video game industry by which consumers can purchase and play a game in the various pre-release development cycles, such as pre-alph ...
title on
Steam after rapidly being approved through Steam's
Greenlight
To green-light is to give permission to proceed with a project. The term is a reference to the green traffic signal, indicating "go ahead".
Film industry
In the context of the film and television industries, to green-light something is to ...
feature.
''Vicious Circle''
''Vicious Circle'' was first announced on episode 526 of the
Rooster Teeth Podcast by
Burnie Burns
Michael Justin "Burnie" Burns (born January 18, 1973) is an American writer, actor, producer, comedian, host, and director previously based in Austin, Texas. He is a co-founder, former chief executive officer, and former chief creative offic ...
and
Gus Sorola
Gustavo Raul "Gus" Sorola III (born February 22, 1978) is an American actor and podcast host. He is best known for his work with Rooster Teeth.
Early life
Sorola was born in Austin, and raised in Eagle Pass, Texas, near the Mexico–United S ...
. It is an uncooperative multiplayer shooter and Rooster Teeth's first original IP game. It was released on August 13, 2019 on Steam.
Subsidiary channels
Achievement Hunter
Achievement Hunter is a
video gaming
Video games, also known as computer games, are electronic games that involves interaction with a user interface or input device such as a joystick, controller, keyboard, or motion sensing device to generate visual feedback. This feedback ...
channel and division of Rooster Teeth, originally created in 2008 by
Geoff Ramsey
Geoffrey Lazer Ramsey (born Geoffrey Paul Wright, later Geoffrey Paul Fink on June 19, 1975) is an American voice actor, film producer and internet personality. He co-founded the production company Rooster Teeth and is known for voicing Dexter G ...
and Jack Pattillo as a new creative outlet during production of season 6 of
Red vs. Blue. The channel was largely based on the
achievement mechanic found in
seventh-generation video game consoles after being made popular with
Microsoft
Microsoft Corporation is an American multinational technology corporation producing computer software, consumer electronics, personal computers, and related services headquartered at the Microsoft Redmond campus located in Redmond, Washin ...
's release of the
Xbox 360
The Xbox 360 is a home video game console developed by Microsoft. As the successor to the original Xbox, it is the second console in the Xbox series. It competed with Sony's PlayStation 3 and Nintendo's Wii as part of the seventh generati ...
with the channels produced by a rotating cast Rooster Teeth employees. Achievement Hunter has since become its own division with a consistent cast and has become a core component of Rooster Teeth Productions. In addition to main live-action channel, Achievement Hunter hosts gameplay content on the company's LetsPlay channel. They formerly also managed GameFails and LetsPlay Community channels on YouTube, but those are no longer uploaded on and currently serve as an archive of past GameFails and LetsPlay Community content.
LetsPlay
The LetsPlay channel has served a variety of uses since its launch, being most consistently used as the
Let's Play
A Let's Play (LP) is a video (or screenshots accompanied by text) documenting the playthrough of a video game, often including commentary and/or a camera view of the gamer's face. A Let's Play differs from a video game walkthrough or strat ...
channel for Achievement Hunter.
LetsPlay Network
The LetsPlay Network is a former
multi-channel network
A multi-channel network (MCN) is an organization that works with video platforms to offer assistance to a channel owner in areas such as "product, programming, funding, cross-promotion, partner management, digital rights management, monetizat ...
(MCN) operated by Rooster Teeth. It was founded by Rooster Teeth co-founder
Geoff Ramsey
Geoffrey Lazer Ramsey (born Geoffrey Paul Wright, later Geoffrey Paul Fink on June 19, 1975) is an American voice actor, film producer and internet personality. He co-founded the production company Rooster Teeth and is known for voicing Dexter G ...
and was run by Luis Medina alongside Ramsey. Under this new venture, partnerships with several other YouTube channels, in addition to its own Achievement Hunter and Funhaus, would be established to would provide merchandise, promotion, and other benefits for its partners.
On March 28, 2016, a partnership with
Kinda Funny was announced. Members of the group appear in Rooster Teeth content, and Kinda Funny merchandise became available on the Rooster Teeth Store. ''Kinda Funny LIVE!'' was presented by Let's Play and hosted by Burnie Burns. A partnership with The Creatures was announced on April 4, 2016. Upon their separate formations, channels Cow Chop and Game Attack were separately confirmed to be part of the “LetsPlay family”. Game Attack, which was initially spun off from ScrewAttack before becoming its own independent entity, and Cow Chop both had their own sections on Rooster Teeth's website. On May 11, Achievement Hunter announced a partnership between the LetsPlay Network and video game publisher
Ubisoft
Ubisoft Entertainment SA (; ; formerly Ubi Soft Entertainment SA) is a French video game publisher headquartered in Saint-Mandé with development studios across the world. Its video game franchises include '' Assassin's Creed'', ''Far Cry'', ...
. Streams and gameplay videos done by any of the Let's Play family members featuring games published by Ubisoft will be released exclusively on the Ubisoft US YouTube channel. On May 31, 2017, it was announced that YouTubers JT Machinima (now JT Music), NoahJ456,
LazarBeam
Lannan Neville Eacott (born 14 December 1994), better known as LazarBeam, is an Australian YouTuber, professional gamer and Internet celebrity, Internet personality, known primarily for his Let's Play, video game commentary videos, "comedic rif ...
, and
Sugar Pine 7
Sugar Pine 7 (abbreviated SP7) is an American production company and comedy troupe. The company was founded in 2017 by Steven Suptic, Clayton "Cib" James, and James DeAngelis; together, they operate a YouTube channel initially based on a vlog ser ...
had joined Let's Play, with JT Machinima being the first of which to have merchandise sold through the RT Store.
On July 12, 2017, it was announced that The Creatures would be disbanding, ending their relationship with Rooster Teeth. In April 2019, Cow Chop announced a "GOING OUT OF BUSINESS SALE", implying the channel would disband by the end of the year. On December 31, Cow Chop posted their final video. In May 2019, Sugar Pine 7 also announced their departure from the Rooster Teeth family. On May 1, 2019, Craig Skistimas of Game Attack announced they as well were now independent, had no further business relationship with Rooster Teeth and was no longer a part of the LetsPlay family. Since their departures, content from The Creatures and Game Attack are no longer hosted on Rooster Teeth's website and Cow Chop & Sugar Pine 7's content are now consolidated under the “Friends of RT” section.
While Rooster Teeth still maintains relationships with
Kinda Funny and JT Music, along with new deals with other entities, the “LetsPlay Network” has not been referenced since the mentioned departures. A similar kind of partnership with UK based
The Yogscast
The Yogscast, officially registered as Yogscast Limited, is a British entertainment company based in Bristol that primarily produces video gaming-related videos on YouTube and Twitch, and also operates the Yogscast multi-channel network for a ...
has occurred, a deal that includes their own section on Rooster Teeth's website and apps, but the LetsPlay branding and channel has reverted to its function as the gameplay channel for Achievement Hunter.
Inside Gaming
Inside Gaming is the gaming news division of Rooster Teeth. Originally founded as The Know, an entertainment news division that discusses current events in movies, TV shows, gaming, technology, and media. It was mainly hosted by
Ashley Jenkins and Brian Gaar, with a selection of other Rooster Teeth staff from each division within the company. It was initially a single news show hosted on Rooster Teeth's main YouTube channel before moving over to its own channel, where it has since expanded into several different categories of entertainment and tech news as well as several different shows, with the latest being ''Glitch Please'', a successor to their earlier podcast ''The Patch'', that was greenlit for a full series after six pilot episodes.
Previously The Know had hosted ''Leaderboard'', where
Meg Turney
Megan LeeAnn Turney (born March 12, 1987) is an American streamer, internet personality, cosplayer, glamour model, and vlogger. She became an internet personality through her hosting work, formerly with ''SourceFed'' and Rooster Teeth's '' The Kno ...
had discussed
esports news, ''The Patch Game Club'', where the hosts of ''The Patch'' would discuss a new video game they've played each week, and ''Screen Play'', a film and TV podcast. In June 2016, Turney announced on her vlog she was leaving Rooster Teeth to focus more on cosplay.
In October 2017, ''Variety'' announced Eric Vespe would join The Know as senior writer responsible for original reporting, interviews and developing new entertainment shows. Vespe had previously worked at
Ain't It Cool News
Ain't It Cool News (AICN) is an entertainment news website founded by Harry Knowles and run by his sister Dannie Knowles since September 2017, dedicated to news, rumors, and reviews of upcoming and current films, television, and comic book pro ...
for 20 years.
On February 14, 2019, Rooster Teeth revived
Machinima's Inside Gaming brand, renaming The Know to Inside Gaming. The Know and Machinima's social team were combined with Inside Gaming. Lawrence Sonntag, Adam Kovic, Bruce Greene and
Alanah Pearce
Alanah Pearce (born 24 August 1993) is an Australian video game writer and former journalist. Since 2020, Pearce has worked for American game developer Santa Monica Studio.
Pearce has reported on video games for various news outlets including en ...
from Funhaus hosted Inside Gaming, which includes gaming news, features and reviews. Greene and Sonntag left in 2019.
Autumn Farrell, formerly of Sugar Pine 7, took over Sonntag's position. Farrell and Pearce departed the company in October 2020.
On January 5th, 2021 it was announced that Inside Gaming daily would end and all hosts would be joining Funhaus, however, the Inside Gaming weekend round-up would continue.
Funhaus
![Funhaus crew at PAX Prime 2015 (20821586879)](https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/b/ba/Funhaus_crew_at_PAX_Prime_2015_%2820821586879%29.jpg)
Funhaus (pronounced "funhouse") is a division of Rooster Teeth Productions, based in Los Angeles, California. The channel launched on February 16, 2015, by the former cast of
Inside Gaming: Adam Kovic, James Willems, Bruce Greene, Lawrence Sonntag, Matt Peake, Sean "Spoole" Poole and Joel Rubin, later joined by former
GameTrailers talent
Elyse Willems
Elyse Willems (born May 3, 1986) is a Canadian internet personality, comedian, and writer. She is best known for her work as a cast member and producer at Funhaus, a division of Rooster Teeth Productions, since November 2015. Since then, Willems h ...
in November 2015 and former
IGN
''IGN'' (formerly ''Imagine Games Network'') is an American video game and entertainment media website operated by IGN Entertainment Inc., a subsidiary of Ziff Davis, Inc. The company's headquarters is located in San Francisco's SoMa distri ...
host
Alanah Pearce
Alanah Pearce (born 24 August 1993) is an Australian video game writer and former journalist. Since 2020, Pearce has worked for American game developer Santa Monica Studio.
Pearce has reported on video games for various news outlets including en ...
in August 2018. Funhaus produces gameplay videos in a similar manner to Achievement Hunter. In addition to gameplay, Funhaus also produced segments for The Know up until November 2016. It produces many shows such as ''Open Haus'' (Q&A), Google Trends, podcasts called ''Dude Soup'' and "Film Haus", gameplay series such as ''Demo Disk'' and ''Wheelhaus'', a current live stream called FunhausTV on YouTube, and the now-defunct Sex Swing: The Animated Series. Shows produced by Funhaus for Rooster Teeth TV include "No Idea", "Arizona Circle", and "Last Laugh".
In 2016, Poole and Rubin left Funhaus. Greene and Sonntag left in 2019.
Kovic departed the company after breaching its code of conduct in October 2020.
Pearce announced her departure in late October.
ScrewAttack/
![Death Battle RoosterTeeth thumbnail logo](https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/0/0b/Death_Battle_RoosterTeeth_thumbnail_logo.png)
ScrewAttack is a video gaming website started in 2006 by Craig Skistimas (known as 'Stuttering Craig' on the site) and Thomas Hanley (known as 'Handsome Tom'). The site grew to prominence through a partnership with
GameTrailers which hosted their original content such as the SideScrollers podcast, Top 10, and Clip of the Week. Alongside ScrewAttacks original content was the hosting of content from other Video Game content creators most notably
Angry Video Game Nerd
''The Angry Video Game Nerd'' (abbreviated as ''AVGN'') is an American retrogaming review comedy web series created by and starring James Rolfe. The series centers on Rolfe's titular skit character, often simply shortened to "the Nerd" (sometim ...
was hosted on ScrewAttack from 2006 to 2011. From 2009 to 2013, ScrewAttack hosted an annual gaming convention, which included a competition called "Iron Man of Gaming" to find the best all-rounded gamer. On November 4, 2015, it was announced that ScrewAttack would become a division of Rooster Teeth and Let's Play. Its website was updated to be consistent with Rooster Teeth's branding, along with all its previously existing users becoming Rooster Teeth users and its forums being absorbed into Rooster Teeth's forums. In 2019, the YouTube channel officially rebranded as ''DEATH BATTLE!'' and began only producing the show.
The website is primarily known for the web series ''Death Battle'', in which they pit pop culture icons against each other in a fight to the death and determine who would win and who would die based on research of the characters (notable examples include
Optimus Prime
Optimus Prime, , is a fictional character in the ''Transformers'' franchise. The Transformers characters were developed for an American market after Hasbro representatives visited the 1983 Tokyo Toy Show. The characters were modified and the ...
against the
RX-78 2 Gundam,
RoboCop against the
T-800 Terminator,
Crash Bandicoot
''Crash Bandicoot'' is a video game franchise originally developed by Naughty Dog as an exclusive for Sony's PlayStation console. It has seen numerous installments created by various developers and published on multiple platforms. The series c ...
against
Spyro the Dragon
''Spyro the Dragon'' is a platform game developed by Insomniac Games and published by Sony Computer Entertainment for the PlayStation on September 9, 1998. The first game in the '' Spyro'' series, it stars the title character, a young purple ...
, and the
Megazord
''Power Rangers'' is an entertainment and merchandising franchise built around a live-action superhero television series, based on the Japanese tokusatsu franchise ''Super Sentai''. Produced first by Saban Entertainment, second by BVS Entert ...
against
Voltron
''Voltron'' is an animated television series franchise that features a team of space explorers who pilot a giant Super Robot known as "Voltron". Produced by Peter Keefe (Executive Producer) and Ted Koplar through his production company World ...
, amongst many others). After the research is finished, a scenario of the characters fighting is shown using various distinctive animation styles (using 2D
sprite-based graphics, 3D models or 2D traditional animation), and very rarely—live action. The show is hosted by Wizard aka "Wiz" (voiced by Ben B. Singer, creator of the show), a mad scientist with a robotic arm, and Boomstick (voiced by Chad James), an alcoholic country man with a shotgun for a leg. Another primarily Death Battle host named “DUMMI” first appeared in the blocked
Beerus
is a fictional character in the '' Dragon Ball'' franchise created by Akira Toriyama. Beerus made his first appearance in the 2013 feature film '' Dragon Ball Z: Battle of Gods'' as the main antagonist and returned as a supporting character in ' ...
vs
Sailor Galaxia, he is likely based on
Crash test dummies. Other content includes animated fight shows without research and relying on a vote to decide the winner called ''DBX'' (''Death Battle Exhibition'') (which is mainly hosted by Marshall, aka "Ringmaster" (voiced by Billy B. Burson III) since season four, and uses
Unreal Engine 4
Unreal Engine (UE) is a 3D computer graphics game engine developed by Epic Games, first showcased in the 1998 first-person shooter game ''Unreal (1998 video game), Unreal''. Initially developed for Personal computer, PC first-person shooters, i ...
for the arena background. Boomstick hosted the show for the first three seasons, but later returned as a guest in season six, alongside Wiz and DUMMI) and One-Minute Melee, a behind-the-scenes podcast called ''Death Battle Cast'', an informative show about various combatants called ''Desk of Death Battle'' which is hosted by another character called “Jocelyn The Intern”, and a limited show based on fictional vehicles racing called ''Death Race'' with Ringmaster as the host and Wiz and Boomstick as commentators. On February 4, 2019 the ScrewAttack
YouTube
YouTube is a global online video sharing and social media platform headquartered in San Bruno, California. It was launched on February 14, 2005, by Steve Chen, Chad Hurley, and Jawed Karim. It is owned by Google, and is the second mo ...
channel was re-branded to Death Battle to better match the channel's main content. The ScrewAttack section of the Rooster Teeth website was turned into an incomplete archive for the channel's old content. Since his departure from Rooster Teeth Craig Skistimas has stated that working for Rooster Teeth was "the worst three years of my life". He has accused Rooster Teeth of stripping creative control over ScrewAttack from him and making decisions regarding ScrewAttack without input from himself or other ScrewAttack members.
Game Kids
Game Kids was a division of Rooster Teeth Productions aimed at creating kid- and family-friendly content. The channel launched on December 1, 2014 and featured the series "Sim Sisters" featuring Millie Ramsey, the daughter of Geoff Ramsey, and her nanny Chelsea playing Sims together, "Kids Play" featuring Matt Hullum and his children Webb and Mills or Burnie Burns and his children JD and Teddy, appearing on alternating weeks playing various games, and "Bro Gaming" featuring Rooster Teeth employee Caleb Denecour and his younger brother Jordan playing various cooperative games including an ongoing series in ''
Minecraft
''Minecraft'' is a sandbox game developed by Mojang Studios. The game was created by Markus "Notch" Persson in the Java (programming language), Java programming language. Following several early private testing versions, it was first made pub ...
'' and ''
Disney Infinity 2.0''. Burns announced on a podcast that the channel was quietly put on hiatus to figure out where the company wants to take it, with the channel not having been active since March 28, 2016.
Events
Community-run events have occurred regularly since 2005. These included RvBTO in
Toronto
Toronto ( ; or ) is the capital city of the Canadian province of Ontario. With a recorded population of 2,794,356 in 2021, it is the most populous city in Canada and the fourth most populous city in North America. The city is the anch ...
(the first event, now retired and replaced with Toronto:Unconventional), RvBCanWest in
Vancouver
Vancouver ( ) is a major city in western Canada, located in the Lower Mainland region of British Columbia. As the List of cities in British Columbia, most populous city in the province, the 2021 Canadian census recorded 662,248 people in the ...
, RT Philly in
Philadelphia
Philadelphia, often called Philly, is the List of municipalities in Pennsylvania#Municipalities, largest city in the Commonwealth (U.S. state), Commonwealth of Pennsylvania, the List of United States cities by population, sixth-largest city i ...
, RooTeeth in
Melbourne
Melbourne ( ; Boonwurrung/Woiwurrung: ''Narrm'' or ''Naarm'') is the capital and most populous city of the Australian state of Victoria, and the second-most populous city in both Australia and Oceania. Its name generally refers to a met ...
, and SideQuest in Austin. In February 2011, Sorola announced the date for the first
RTX, the company's first official fan event. Burns credited RTX "starting" with the early fan events in Canada.
RTX
In May 2011, Rooster Teeth held their first official community event in Austin, Texas. Initially planned as a small gathering for 200 people, demand was so high that over 500 tickets were accidentally sold within minutes of being made available online. Since RTX 2012, each event has been held in the
Austin Convention Center
The Neal Kocurek Memorial Austin Convention Center is a multi-purpose convention center located in Austin, Texas. The building is the home of the Texas Rollergirls, and was also home to the Austin Toros basketball team, until their move to the Ce ...
, with the attendance growing from 5,000 in 2012 to 45,000 in 2015. In June 2015, Rooster Teeth announced RTX Australia, later rebranded as RTX Sydney, a collaboration with Hanabee and
Supanova Pop Culture Expo. In February 2017, RTX London was announced, taking place October 14–15 of that year. Amid the
COVID-19 pandemic
The COVID-19 pandemic, also known as the coronavirus pandemic, is an ongoing global pandemic of coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19) caused by severe acute respiratory syndrome coronavirus 2 (SARS-CoV-2). The novel virus was first identi ...
, RTX 2020, dubbed "RTX at Home", was held virtually from 15 to 25 September.
Let's Play Live
''Let's Play Live'' is an on-stage event produced by Rooster Teeth in which Achievement Hunter and members of the Let's Play family play video games and perform comedy sketches in front of a live audience. Their first event was held on February 20, 2015, at the
Moody Theater
Austin City Limits Live at The Moody Theater (ACL Live or Moody Theater) is the theater and studio for ''Austin City Limits'', completed in February 2011 as part of the Block 21 complex.
The Moody Foundation of Galveston granted $2.5 million to ...
in Austin, Texas. On September 14, a documentary was released about the event for sponsors on their website.
Starting in 2016, LPL toured through multiple cities across North America.
LPL returned to Austin the night before RTX 2018 began. In August 2018, Rooster Teeth announced they would replace RTX Sydney 2019 with three
Let's Play Live events in different cities.
Podcasts
Rooster Teeth Podcast
On December 9, 2008, Rooster Teeth launched the ''Drunk Tank'' podcast. It was renamed the ''Rooster Teeth Podcast'' in 2011, due to the previous name not being attractive to advertisers. The podcast is released weekly, and has won several honors, including being the most downloaded podcast on iTunes and winning the Best Gaming Podcast award at the
Podcast Awards
The People's Choice Podcast Awards, better known as the Podcast Awards, are global awards given annually to the best podcasts as voted by the general public. Founded in 2005 by Todd Cochrane of Podcast Connect Inc., the Podcast Awards changed han ...
in 2013 and 2014.
Other podcasts
* On May 18, 2013, Sorola announced that Rooster Teeth would begin a second weekly podcast focusing on gaming because their main podcast – which started as a gaming podcast – had become more of a comedy podcast. Sorola stated "starting next week we will be kicking off a new gaming focused podcast. We realize that the Rooster Teeth Podcast doesn't talk about gaming too much so we're launching a brand new weekly podcast that focuses solely on games." The first episode of ''The Patch'' was released on May 21, 2013. On June 21, 2013 they also began producing special episodes of ''The Rooster Teeth Podcast'' titled ''The Rooster Teeth Spoilercast'' in which they discuss television shows, movies, and video games in full detail after they have been released. As a stretch goal for ''Lazer Team'', Rooster Teeth also began producing ''Screen Play'', a podcast that focuses on television and film. On April 15, 2017, they released the first episode of a new gaming podcast, ''Glitch Please''.
* The Know released the first episode of ''The Patch'' on May 21, 2013, ending the podcast on December 29, 2016. The Know also released the first ''The Patch Game Club'' episode on March 18, 2015, with the last episode released on September 7, 2016.
* On February 9, 2015, Rooster Teeth launched the Funhaus podcast, ''Dude Soup''. The podcast stars four rotating members of Funhaus, with occasional guest appearances from other Rooster Teeth employees. Dude Soup focuses on comedy, gaming news and game culture in general. Funhaus also hosts a
FAQ Podcast.
* On October 30, 2015, the Achievement Hunter-specific weekly podcast ''Off Topic'' premiered for Rooster Teeth First members. The first four episodes, regarded as "test episodes," are only available to Rooster Teeth First members. All following episodes are available to the general public on YouTube and iTunes. The podcast does not focus on any one topic, but bounces around from television to video games to stories from the life of the Achievement Hunter members, which includes the entire AH team, and not just the "core 6" members. The podcast is hosted and produced by Michael Jones.
* On February 19, 2016, the podcast ''Fan Service'' premiered. Fan Service features the Rooster Teeth Animation department to talk about anime and animation. The first four episodes were "test episodes" Rooster Teeth First members. Eventually it was confirmed through the Rooster Teeth Twitter to premiere on YouTube October 21, 2016.
* On September 1, 2016, the podcast ''Always Open'' premiered for Rooster Teeth First members. Always Open stars
Barbara Dunkelman
Barbara Julie Dunkelman (born July 2, 1989) is a Canadian actress and internet personality. She is known for her work with the production company Rooster Teeth, where she serves as a Creative Director and was formerly the Director of Social and ...
and guests to talk about life, love, sex, etc. The first four episodes additionally being "test episodes," only being available to Rooster Teeth First members.
* On March 21, 2017, ''Relationship Goals'' premiered, starring
Geoff Ramsey
Geoffrey Lazer Ramsey (born Geoffrey Paul Wright, later Geoffrey Paul Fink on June 19, 1975) is an American voice actor, film producer and internet personality. He co-founded the production company Rooster Teeth and is known for voicing Dexter G ...
and
Griffon Ramsey discussing modern relationships with other couples. The series went for 7 episodes, ending on August 17, 2017.
*On October 10, 2019, ''Good Morning From Hell'' premiered, starring Chris Demaris as a version of himself in Hell and Blaine Gibson as Clayton, Satan's little brother, revisiting characters they created on an episode of On The Spot. They interview the different characters of Hell, often played by other Rooster Teeth employees or other podcasters on The Roost network.
*On October 18, 2019, ''Face Jam'' premiered, a food review podcast focusing on limited time only items in fast food restaurants. It stars Michael Jones and Jordan Cwierz, but often has producer Eric Badour and sound engineer Nick Schwartz adding their thoughts. It was billed as the "Michael Jordan Fort-night podcast" in the early advertising. Due to the massive amount of listener contribution, they livestream "Snack Attack" where Jones and Cwierz eat only the snacks they've been sent and review them. On October 28, 2020, Face Jam announced they were buying a van to record in and from November 3 to December 15, 2020 they released four 'vodcasts' where Jones, Cwierz, Badour, Schwartz, and a guest on a video call reviewed a chosen food.
*On April 16, 2020, ''Black Box Down'' premiered, an aviation incidents podcast hosted by Gus Sorola and Chris Demaris. Sorola's interest in these incidents has him explaining the incidents to Demaris, and then explaining what the aviation industry has done to prevent any incidents like this from happening again. On November 5, 2020 they began releasing Rooster Teeth First exclusive videos called Crash Simulator, where they attempt to recreate the incidents they've talked about using
Microsoft Flight Simulator
''Microsoft Flight Simulator'' is a series of amateur flight simulator programs for Microsoft Windows operating systems, and earlier for MS-DOS and Classic Mac OS. It was an early product in the Microsoft application portfolio and differed sig ...
.
*On June 3, 2020, ''F***FACE'' premiered and is hosted by Geoff Ramsay, Gavin Free, and Andrew Panton. The podcast was originally billed as a podcast about shooting yourself in the foot for a laugh, with the title of the podcast coming from Billy Ripken's 1989 Fleer baseball card where the phrase "
Fuck Face" was written on the knob of the bat he was holding. The podcast has strayed away from this main idea, and they generally end up talking about their personal lives, especially Panton who they describe as " guy with no social boundaries and too much time on his hands."
*On July 6, 2020, ''Red Web'' premiered, an internet mystery/true crime podcast hosted by Trevor Collins and Alfredo Diaz. Mystery enthusiast Trevor informs Alfredo of the mysteries, and they discuss popular theories and their own ideas of what it may be. With Pigeon Studios, they introduced ''Red Web Radio'' on January 15, 2021, a 59-minute video of "mysterious, chill, and low fi beats that you can chill/relax/investigate to."
*On March 3, 2021, ''No Dumb Answers with Mark & Brad'' premiered, a podcast about the fictional show 'No Dumb Answers' whose hosts had left and it was up to the crew of the show to keep the podcast running. Hosts Kayla Milton, Mariel Salcedo, and Zoe Hunter talk about whatever they want to keep the podcast running until Mark & Brad return. The podcast ended July 21, 2021 with Mark and Brad returning to host the final show along with Milton.
*On April 22, 2021, ''Annual Pass'' premiered as a podcast focusing on theme parks and roller coasters. Hosts Jack Patillo and Geoff Ramsay explore different theme parks, theme park news, roller coasters, and advice to all park-goers.
*On May 5, 2021, ''Tales From the Stinky Dragon'' premiered as Rooster Teeth's newest Dungeons & Dragons actual play podcast. Gus Sorola takes the helm as the Dungeon Master with Blaine Gibson, Chris Demaris, Jon Risinger, and Barbara Dunkelman as the player characters. Various employees within Rooster Teeth and special guests provide voices for Non-Player Characters.
*On October 18, 2021, ''The Most'' released its first episode in podcast format. Previously only streaming live on RTTV, starting with the October 18 episode, they are being released on podcasting platforms. Hosts Andrew Rosas and Drew Saplin interview 2 guests every week and ask them a series of questions that ask the guests "the most" questions.
The Roost
In June 2017 Rooster Teeth launched its own podcast network, called ''The Roost'', representing creators such as
h3h3Productions
h3h3Productions is a YouTube channel hosted by Ethan Klein and Hila Klein, an Israeli-American husband-and-wife duo. The majority of their content consists of reaction videos and sketch comedy in which they satirize internet culture. The ''H3 ...
,
Game Grumps
''Game Grumps'' is an American Let's Play web series hosted by Arin Hanson and Dan Avidan. Created in 2012 by co-hosts Hanson and Jon Jafari, the series centers around its hosts playing video games. After Jafari left the show in 2013 to focus o ...
,
Shane Dawson
Shane Lee Yaw (born July 19, 1988), better known as Shane Dawson, is an American YouTuber, actor, fimmaker, writer, and musician. One of the first people to rise to fame on YouTube, he began making videos in 2008 at the age of 19 and garnered ...
, ''
Getting Doug With High
''Getting Doug With High'' is a video and audio podcast hosted by American stand-up comedian and actor Doug Benson.
Guests are interviewed while smoking marijuana alongside Benson. Each episode features different strains of ''sativa'' and ''in ...
'' by
Doug Benson
Douglas Steven Benson (born July 2, 1962) is an American comedian, marijuana rights advocate, television host and actor, best known for hosting the podcasts and TV series ''Doug Loves Movies'' (2006-present), ''The Benson Interruption'' (2010-20 ...
, ''Tiny Meat Gang'' by
Cody Ko
Cody Michael Kolodziejzyk ( , Polish: ; born November 22, 1990), better known online as Cody Ko, is a Canadian YouTuber, comedian, podcaster and rapper. Kolodziejzyk first became popular on Vine in 2014, before becoming a commentary YouTuber o ...
and Noel Miller, and ''
The Valleyfolk
The Valleyfolk is a YouTube-based comedy group originating in Los Angeles, California. The group was founded by former SourceFed hosts Joe Bereta, Elliott Morgan, Lee Newton, and Steve Zaragoza. The channel launched in January 2018 and gained o ...
'' by Joseph Bereta,
Elliott Morgan
Elliott Christopher Morgan (born February 22, 1987) is an American stand up comedian, actor, writer, host, producer and YouTube personality. Morgan is best known for being a co-host of the YouTube channel '' SourceFed''. Morgan attended the Univ ...
, and
Steve Zaragoza
Esteban "Steve" Zaragoza (born June 9, 1982) is an American online personality, singer-songwriter, musician and web series host, notable for his work on the current events and news series '' SourceFed''. Zaragoza became a host on the series in 201 ...
, among others. In July 2018, The Roost added ''
The Last Podcast on the Left'', hosted by Ben Kissel, Marcus Parks, and
Henry Zebrowski
Henry Thomas Zebrowski, Jr. (born May 1, 1984) is an American actor, podcast host, and comedian, known for his work on the Adult Swim series '' Your Pretty Face Is Going to Hell'', the NBC series '' Heroes Reborn'', and the podcast ''The Last Pod ...
. On September 5, 2018 it was revealed that The Roost would also support both current and upcoming podcasts from The Beam, another podcast network, as part of a partnership between Rooster Teeth and
Hello Sunshine.
A.J Feliciano became the head of the network in August 2020. In October 2020 The Roost began representing prop collecting podcast ''The Stuff Dreams Are Made Of.'' Rooster Teeth and
AEW AEW or aew may refer to:
* Airborne early warning, airborne radar system for detecting aircraft
* Aerosvit Airlines, an airline based in Kyiv, Ukraine (ICAO airline designator: AEW)
* AEW Capital Management, a property investment management company
...
partnered to create the podcast ''Wrestling With The Week'' in January 2021.
Anthony Padilla
Smosh is an American YouTube sketch comedy- improv collective founded by Anthony Padilla and Ian Hecox. In 2002, Padilla created a website named "smosh.com" for making Flash animations, and he was later joined by Hecox. They began to post vide ...
, and
Grace Helbig
Grace Anne Helbig is an American comedian, actress, and internet personality. She is the co-creator and co-host of the podcast ''This Might Get Weird'' (2018–present) alongside frequent collaborator Mamrie Hart and is the voice of Cindy Bear ...
and
Mamrie Hart
Mamrie Lillian Hart (; born September 22, 1983) is an American comedian, actress, writer, and performer. She gained popularity in 2011 through her YouTube show ''You Deserve A Drink,'' for which she has won two Streamy Awards: in 2014 for Actress ...
launched podcasts with The Roost in early 2021.
As of September 2021, The Roost network has over 100 shows and receives 300 million impressions per month.
Rooster Teeth said the network increased its viewership by 50% and quadrupled revenue in 2021.
Community and website
Overview
On October 4, 2004, after closing their
phpBB
phpBB is an Internet forum package written in the PHP scripting language. The name "phpBB" is an abbreviation of ''PHP Bulletin Board''. Available under the GNU General Public License, phpBB is free and open-source.
Features of phpBB include ...
forums, Rooster Teeth publicly launched an
online community
An online community, also called an internet community or web community, is a community whose members interact with each other primarily via the Internet. Members of the community usually share common interests. For many, online communities may fe ...
and
social networking website as a way to stay in touch with fans while maintaining their own platform for distribution.
This site included features such as community statistics, journals, an image gallery and a "mod point system" or "emodomy" that was meant to help members moderate the site with options to like or dislike posts.
Currently, it receives 5 million unique monthly visitors and is home to over 2 million registered users of which 135,000 pay $5 per month as FIRST members.
Rooster Teeth FIRST
To host their own videos, Rooster Teeth paid a
co-location facility $13,000.
The cost from server fees prompted Rooster Teeth to implement a site wide program called "Sponsorships" in 2003 (later rebranded as Rooster Teeth FIRST members), which gave paying members access to content before being offered to the public, in addition to extra site features, exclusive videos and merchandise. Sponsorships have been credited with "keeping the lights on" in the company's early years and a "major reason" for Rooster Teeth's growth and the first way that they monetized content.
On July 1, 2016 the ad-free "Sponsorship" program was rebranded as "FIRST" and offered a new option to upgrade to an even higher-level tier called Double Gold that included such perks as: a 10% discount on all Rooster Teeth items, first access to live event VIP passes and a box of merchandise carrying a value more than $60.
Community
Rooster Teeth's founders often emphasize the importance of the community and how it has helped them to remain relevant in web culture.
In 2010, Burnie Burns stated he, "could not imagine RedVsBlue or Rooster Teeth without the community site."
In 2014 Gus Sorola stated, "From the beginning we have always maintained and promoted our own community site, since before YouTube even existed". Building community is key to having an engaged, active audience who really enjoy your content." Burns expanded on this in September 2014, attributing how they've managed to build a global audience to constantly engaging in a two-way conversation with the company's "hyper engaged core". In 2016, Burns reiterated their growth again to listening and taking the community's feedback to heart.
Burns repeated in 2016 that he considers the secret to the company's successes is their community and their conversation with the community. "Our model revolves around being the home for a core community, and growing it year-after-year ... the loyalty of a community to spread the gospel of your brand is absolutely critical" Fullscreen CEO George Strompolos, after acquiring Rooster Teeth, cited the "insanely powerful community" as a reason they felt the company was a perfect match to buy and later attributed ''Lazer Teams success to the power of the community. In 2015, during the production of Rooster Teeth's first feature, co-founder and Director Matt Hullum stated, "We would not have been able to make ''
Lazer Team
''Lazer Team'' is a 2015 American science fiction action comedy film directed, produced, and co-written by Matt Hullum. The first feature film produced by Rooster Teeth, it stars Burnie Burns, Gavin Free, Michael Jones, Colton Dunn, Allie DeBe ...
'' without the community and really I don't think we would've wanted to." In 2017, Burns re-emphasized that "community is the cornerstone of Rooster Teeth" and one of their core values they impress upon new employees.
Distinguished community members
Community members have distinguished themselves on and beyond the website. Notable people to come from the community include
Gavin Free,
Barbara Dunkelman
Barbara Julie Dunkelman (born July 2, 1989) is a Canadian actress and internet personality. She is known for her work with the production company Rooster Teeth, where she serves as a Creative Director and was formerly the Director of Social and ...
, and
Kent Nichols. In October 2008, community member "Jeffson" became the first person to post that
Barack Obama
Barack Hussein Obama II ( ; born August 4, 1961) is an American politician who served as the 44th president of the United States from 2009 to 2017. A member of the Democratic Party, Obama was the first African-American president of the ...
's presidential campaign had taken out billboards within the Xbox 360 version of ''
Burnout Paradise''. After being posted to his journal, the story was picked up by major news outlets, including
GamePolitics
GamePolitics.com was a blog which covered the politics of computer and video games. GamePolitics was launched by freelance journalist Dennis McCauley in March 2005. At the time, McCauley was the video game columnist for ''The Philadelphia Inqui ...
,
MTV and ''
Wired
''Wired'' (stylized as ''WIRED'') is a monthly American magazine, published in print and online editions, that focuses on how emerging technologies affect culture, the economy, and politics. Owned by Condé Nast, it is headquartered in San ...
''. In 2010, Achievement Hunter community members "AxialMatt" and "Hightower" garnered attention with their ''Japan World Cup 3'' video. For ''
Red vs. Blue: Revelation'', Rooster Teeth used 10 community members to help unlock ''
Halo 3
''Halo 3'' is a 2007 first-person shooter video game developed by Bungie for the Xbox 360 console. The third installment in the ''Halo'' franchise, the game concludes the story arc begun in 2001's '' Halo: Combat Evolved'' and continued in ...
'' armor suits for machinima production purposes. In February 2011, Burns tweeted that community member "madmanmoe" discovered the Rooster Teeth website was not blocked by the Libyan government and was blogging events on the website from
Tripoli
Tripoli or Tripolis may refer to:
Cities and other geographic units Greece
*Tripoli, Greece, the capital of Arcadia, Greece
* Tripolis (region of Arcadia), a district in ancient Arcadia, Greece
* Tripolis (Larisaia), an ancient Greek city in ...
during the
Libyan Civil War
Demographics of Libya is the demography of Libya, specifically covering population density, ethnicity, education level, health of the populace, economic status, and religious affiliations, as well as other aspects of the Libyan population. The ...
. The longest-running external resource site, RoosterTooths, has existed since 2005 and contains transcripts, biographies, and a history of the ''Red vs. Blue'' title screen.
Community members have been utilized for RT productions at every single
RTX. In 2011, some 400 community members were used as zombie extras for a Horde Mode episode of ''
Immersion
Immersion may refer to:
The arts
* "Immersion", a 2012 story by Aliette de Bodard
* ''Immersion'', a French comic book series by Léo Quievreux#Immersion, Léo Quievreux
* Immersion (album), ''Immersion'' (album), the third album by Australian gro ...
''. In 2012, 1,800 attendees were used as extras for a scene in the RT production, ''Day 5'', which involved shutting down the main road in downtown
Austin.
In 2013, hundreds of fans were used as extras for a water-bomb attack in an episode of
The Slow Mo Guys
''The Slow Mo Guys'' is a science and technology entertainment web series from Thame, England, United Kingdom created by Gavin Free, starring himself and Daniel Gruchy. It has been described as the biggest channel for slow motion videos on YouTu ...
. In 2014, casting calls and auditions for minor speaking roles in ''
Lazer Team
''Lazer Team'' is a 2015 American science fiction action comedy film directed, produced, and co-written by Matt Hullum. The first feature film produced by Rooster Teeth, it stars Burnie Burns, Gavin Free, Michael Jones, Colton Dunn, Allie DeBe ...
'' were held for RTX attendees. In 2015, attendees were invited to participate in an interactive, "narrative-driven experience" called ''Murder at The RTX'' which involved hunting clues at prepared "crime scenes". On June 20, 2016 Rooster Teeth confirmed they would be filming audience members at an RTX panel for use in their latest production, ''Crunch Time''.
Many employees have come from the community. In 2014, Burns estimated "at least a third" of the company of 85 started in the fan community, adding it "keeps us grounded" and "makes a whole lot of sense from a business standpoint ... I don't have to explain to them what this company is trying to do." Ben McSweeney, illustrator of Rooster Teeth's logo, was hired by Burns after being found on the site's community forums in April 2003.
Others include creative director Barbara Dunkelman, composers
Nico Audy-Rowland
Nico Audy-Rowland is a French musician, originally from Saint Barthélemy in the Caribbean. He is founder of experimental rock band, Trocadero.
Born in Saint Barthélemy, he moved to the US as a teenager. He has also been involved in writing ...
and Jeff Williams of
Trocadero, cartoonist Luke McKay, Achievement Hunters Caleb Denecour and Ray Narvaez, Jr., ''Rooster Teeth Animated Adventures'' creator Jordan Cwierz, and ''
RWBY
''RWBY'' (pronounced "Ruby") is an American anime-influenced computer-animated web series created by Monty Oum for Rooster Teeth. It is set in the fictional world of Remnant, where young people train to become warriors (called "Huntsmen" and ...
'' writer and director Kerry Shawcross. In August 2014, former intern and current content producer Blaine Gibson garnered media attention when he posted photos proposing to
Disney Princesses at
Walt Disney World
The Walt Disney World Resort, also called Walt Disney World or Disney World, is an entertainment resort complex in Bay Lake and Lake Buena Vista, Florida, United States, near the cities of Orlando and Kissimmee. Opened on October 1, 1971, ...
. In July 2014 it was announced at RTX that fan Jordan Scott would be making the ''RWBY'' video game after posting footage of a demo he had made to his YouTube page. It was also announced during the RTX 2014 Achievement Hunter panel that Community Hunters Matthew "AxialMatt" Bragg and Jeremy "Jerem6401" Dooley would be joining AH as its newest employees.
Controversies
Sexual harassment accusations
In February 2019 Rooster Teeth cut all ties with actor
Vic Mignogna
Victor Joseph Mignogna (); born August 27, 1962)Birthday tweet:
* is an American voice actor and musician known for his voice-over work in the English dubs of Japanese anime shows, such as Edward Elric from the '' Fullmetal Alchemist'' series ...
due to accusations of sexual harassment.
In October 2020, Achievement Hunter's Ryan Haywood and Funhaus co-founder Adam Kovic were both involved in scandals involving their leaked nudes; Kovic parted ways with the company.
Days later, multiple allegations of grooming underage fans came out against Haywood,
and he was subsequently fired.
Toxic work culture accusations
Animation and "crunch"
In June 2019, dozens of anonymous reviews from
Glassdoor
Glassdoor is an American website where current and former employees anonymously review companies. Headquartered in San Francisco, California, it has additional offices in Chicago, Dublin, London, and São Paulo. Glassdoor also allows its users to ...
gained exposure, highlighting a negative
crunch culture of long and unpaid hours, poor management, and over-reliance on temporary employees at Rooster Teeth Animation. Gray Haddock, Rooster Teeth's Head of Animation, stepped down two days after the allegations.
Bigotry and harassment
Former Achievement Hunter host
Mica Burton
Michaela Jean Burton (born July 8, 1994) is an American actress, cosplayer and host. She is known for her contributions in the gaming space, having hosted for Achievement Hunter, The Know, the Overwatch League and voicing a character in '' 100 ...
departed the company in April 2018, during her time there she experienced much sexist, racist discriminatory abuse by the audience leading to her departure. During the 2020
George Floyd protests
The George Floyd protests were a series of protests and civil unrest against police brutality and racism that began in Minneapolis on May 26, 2020, and largely took place during 2020. The civil unrest and protests began as part of internat ...
Burton stated that a larger reason for her leaving was because of the companies response to this abuse, following this a host of personalities at the company apologised for the incidents.
In October 2022, Kdin Jenzen, a former Achievement Hunter employee, posted online about her experiences working at the company. She accused the company of still having a "crunch" culture, not paying her fairly, and homophobic and transphobic abuse by upper management, to the extent that her nickname at the company was a slur.
Hours later, Achievement Hunter cast members, including Rooster Teeth co-founder Geoff Ramsey, responded to Jenzen's message apologizing for their prior behavior at the company, as well as announcing a reduced release schedule for the future.
The following day Rooster Teeth released a statement addressing the situation, claiming that they were taking steps to improve their work culture and reviewing pay parity at the company.
Following Jenzen's message, numerous other former employees spoke up about their experiences working at Rooster Teeth, adding more accounts of unpaid work and discriminatory abuse while at the company.
Rooster Teeth then released a second statement apologizing for harmful behaviors, listing changes made since 2020 including the introduction of pay bands and the replacement of the entire Human Resources department.
Other
In November 2019, Rooster Teeth was accused of plagiarizing a fan-made weapon in an issue of RWBY DC Comics. In a statement posted on their website, they acknowledged the similarities and stated the artwork will be changed.
On November 20, 2019, Rooster Teeth Vice President Michael Quinn was arrested for assaulting his wife. Quinn was fired three days later.
In January 2020, ''RWBY'' fans accused Rooster Teeth of
queerbaiting
Queerbaiting is a marketing technique for fiction and entertainment in which creators hint at, but then do not depict, same-sex romance or other LGBTQ+ representation. The purpose is to attract ("bait") an LGBTQ+ or straight ally audience with th ...
after the death of a character in chapter 12 of volume 7 (With Friends Like These).
See also
*
List of works produced by Rooster Teeth Productions
This is a list of productions produced and/or distributed by the Austin-based productions studio Rooster Teeth.
Films
Series
Current series
Upcoming series
Past series
Podcasts and Past Shows
Documentaries
Discography
Releases
...
References
Bibliography
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Further reading
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External links
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{{Authority control
2003 establishments in Texas
2014 mergers and acquisitions
American companies established in 2003
Companies based in Austin, Texas
Dubbing studios
Entertainment companies based in Texas
Entertainment companies established in 2003
Film production companies of the United States
Internet properties established in 2003
Multi-channel networks
Online mass media companies of the United States
Otter Media
Shorty Award winners
Video game culture
YouTube channels launched in 2008
YouTube channels
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