Regulation Podcast - An Announcement

Episode Date: March 6, 2024

An announcement for the ages. https://store.roosterteeth.com/products/letsplay-officially-licensed-ratyboy-heavyweight-t-shirt Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Make your nights unforgettable with American Express. Unmissable show coming up? Good news. We've got access to pre-sale tickets so you don't miss it. Meeting with friends before the show? We can book your reservation. And when you get to the main event, skip to the good bit using the card member entrance.

Let's go seize the night. That's the powerful backing of American Express. Visit amex.ca slash Y Amex. Benefits vary by card. Other conditions apply. Hey, it's Andrew. I'm just setting the stage for this announcement. First of all, it's good.

This isn't bad. I know seeing a thing that's just called the announcement must be terrifying. This is ridiculous. Great news that you're about to hear. This is something that was recorded back in December. It has been in the works for quite a while, and I'm so excited that we could finally talk about it. This is, if you remember quite a while ago, there was an episode where at the end of it,

I discussed something with everyone, and I said that if we couldn't release it, then we'd edit it and put it out later it is now a time we can release it get ready for an announcement that is absurd that I can't wait for you to hear and I will be uh back on the back end just to clarify because I don't remember necessarily the specifics of what's talked about but just to clear up the details of what exactly this announcement entails thank you so much love you bye you know what we can record is your thing that you wanted to talk about go okay so recently talking about let's plays we recorded a let's play and,

and none other than the game of the year. Rady boy, ratty boy, everyone's favorite, tiny little rat, cute little guy. Everyone loves it. Great character,

great personality. Nick's on board. It's changed my way. How I view weights. Whenever I see weights now, I think a rady boy and his struggle is climbing. So obviously that was so much fun making that video it was a disaster I was dying Nick was dying Gavin got sick Eric was annoyed it was perfect it was a perfect video you can watch it now on let's play as well you can't yes you can watch on the YouTube channel you watch it first

um but I was I was curious because I was like this is such a ridiculous game who made this like that's one of the things I love about the game is there's no credits on it it just you you see like a developer but you can't I couldn't find anyone that had credit towards ratey boy that had it that that like claimed I made this and so I did some research and I found out it was made by a company named 909 games and it was published by a company called weak fish studios and so i reached out to weak fish studios was like hey could you could you put me in touch with anyone at 909 games i would just i'd love to i'd love to talk to them just in like any

Aspect like I can't find anything on who these people are and they replied 909 games is an internal studio within us. We're technically 909 games. It's all the same and I said that's Fantastic, I would like to buy the ratey boy IP from you and completely own the rights of the character Rady boy. And that was that was their reply. Eric was what? What are you? What are you talking

about? This is unexpected. Why? Like, what are you offering? And so I've been planning this for a few days now.

I've been going back and forth with the guy that owns Weakfish, trying to secure the rights to Rady Boy. Now, originally, it was full, just I own the character from this point forward. But then that wasn't, I couldn't offer a lot as a person for that. So we're looking at more of like a Spider-Man deal situation where we would have the rights to Rady Boy in every context outside of video games. But they continue to make Rady Boy games, and

that's their life. So I've been active in negotiations. It's kind of cooled off a little bit recently. I was hoping to have this deal closed. But I wrote a press release for us to post on social to announce our big character acquisition if it were to take place and there is no better way to celebrate an acquisition than with a t-shirt so i reached out to our good friend tony about coordinating a shirt that we could we could release it

and so it's your you're a rat Eric you love rats so this is the original design I had mocked up I gave some instruction this is what we came up with between one or the other

no no some great options wonderful art by Tobin very shortly after I got a final Give him back to me. I don't want it. Very shortly after, I got a finalized version of the shirts. I said which one I wanted. So we have a variety to pick from.

Let's go. Unfortunately, red was not available as a print on demand. So these are the two shirts that will ultimately be available if I am able to close this deal which it has gone a little bit cold well it's the holidays man it is the holidays if we don't get it should we just sell that

shirt with like redacted over ratey boys face just change him to fucking Bart Simpson I hate him I hate him I don't know why because you're number one ratty ratty boys clearly as it says you guys love each other

you're always hanging out I don't want him I hate him you have the chance to be friends with an IP Eric look how much you love ratty boy on that t-shirt I hate ratty boy I hate him so much you love Rady Boy on that t-shirt. I hate Rady Boy. I hate him

so much. You know what? We were never able to successfully secure IP for the Smashing Sportsman. Maybe Rady Boy is our superhero protector. That was my thought. I don't want Rady Boy. Give him back. Give him back

to the studio. I wrote a press release. I emailed Jordan Levin about this to see studio we're trying to i wrote a a press release i emailed jordan levin about this i wanted to see if he wanted to provide a quote about our exciting acquisition if it were to happen and he very politely declined which i respect you don't say an actual businessman yeah yeah so this is well it's this is business i have a press release about the read right here ratty boys news release it is with great excitement we here at face announced something truly spectacular in entertainment whether we're talking movies sports or games the need for iconic characters has never been more essential it's very rare for

an iconic character to be available but i'm'm thrilled to say that Andrew Payton and the amazing team at weak fish studios have come to an agreement on an industry changing deal. From this point onward, all IP rights outside of video games for everyone's favorite rat ratey boy belong to Andrew Payton. Weak fish will continue to support known the video game side of creating excellent,

radical games that we are excited to see, uh, in the future. Uh, we that we are excited to see in the future we wish them nothing but the best in the future and what this means for us at face and uniform is the immediate inclusion of the greatest rat ever seen into our family the future has never looked brighter for Brady boy so to celebrate this monumental

day allow me to reveal this launch reveal shirt it features our new hero alongside his number one fan Eric Badour we're so excited to deepen the rady boy lore and hope you're excited as we are for the future as it comes long live the number one rat game

long live the number one rat long live rady boy sincerely so that is what I've been up to I don't know if this deal will close by then. So I wanted to put this at the end of the show. So if we need to edit it and I'm hoping it will come to you and we'll figure it out. But I wonder if the Warner Discovery stock will go up when the commission hits the news.

Andrew, you are just the gift that keeps on giving. What a visionary. You're going to you're it's going to be ideas like this that lead on giving. What a visionary. It's going to be ideas like this that lead us to success in the future. Thank you so much. Of course. I like that he's, once again, deploying people all over the company. And also emailing.

The general manager? Emailing the head of Rooster Teeth. Who, you know, has tons going on all the time. Hey, can you provide a quote for Ratty Boy Adventures? We might get him. What? Who? What? Oh my god. Oh, that shit.

I hate him. I hate him so much. I'm glad. Have you thought about one of the things you want to, like, how you want to expand the Ratty Boy universe, Andrew? I mean, we could do so much. I hate him. I'm glad. Have you thought about one of the things you want to, like how you want to expand the Radio Boy universe, Andrew? I mean, we could do so much. Because we could do shirts. Radio Boy technically doesn't have a voice. Eric could be the voice of Radio Boy.

Yeah, we could do narratives. We could do radio plays. We could do comics. Like, there's no end of. There's so much we could do. Yeah. He could even show up in our smut. Oh, I wonder what kind of surprises we'll have in the smut. Who knows can even show up in our smut. Oh, I wonder what kind

of surprises we'll have in the smut. Who knows who will show up in our smut? This sucks. Insane. I want to see an Ian Radyboy face

is what I want to see. Like, he's countless. Oh, God. Merry Christmas, Eric. Yeah, thanks, man. What a way way to what a way to end the year

and ring in the new one just with this insane shit that somehow has found its way to me um Jesus Christ so if you're listening to this and you're not 100% sure what's going on you should really watch the Rady Boy Let's Play over on the Let's Play YouTube channel

or on the Rooster Teeth channel. It's one of the better ones we've done, and they're all good. Don't get me wrong, but this one's like a good plus. Also, buy the shirt. It will be available if you're listening to this. It is ready to launch. Do you think the deal's going to be closed by then? Well, if it is, it'll be very quick like everything is ready to deploy all of this it's just i need an agreement with

them and look forward to the sometime in 2025 the ratey boy graphic novel it's just like but he's a rat if you're wondering when all of this is recorded and if we know if there's a deal in the middle of this i tweeted i hate right i hate ratey boy i hate him uh so find that that's where it is being explained to me that i'm on a shirt with this little fuck sucks i'm so excited for the beginning of phase one of the ratey boy universe hey guys let's not overdo it by phase four like Marvel did let's learn from their mistakes absolutely Treat this we got to treat this IP preciously

Cranking out ratey boy shit god that shirt just means so little to most of the planet to so many Never has a shirt meant so little to so many. Oh, fuck. Oh, my God. I love it so much. Yeah, it rules. Well, bye. Well, we already said goodbye, so we can just stop talking yeah

hey so just to clarify the the finer points of the deal now that it is done and locked in we acquired the media and merchandising rights for ratty boy well weak fish still has all the video game stuff they're going to continue to make great games with Ratty Boy that I'm so excited to see what will be next. And we have the ability to implement him into our other content as well as merch. And it's going to be the greatest mascot that anyone's ever seen. So get excited for that. I know I am.

I can't believe that this is the thing that came together. I love how much it annoys Eric. It's just all around one of the best things that could have happened. So thank you so much for supporting us and allowing us to do these crazy things that we do. I hope you enjoyed this and I hope you're as excited about all of this as we are. It's totally ridiculous. Once again, love you. Bye.