Rooster Teeth has a brand new series from the good folks over at Achievement Hunter that was pretty much conceived following a bet between series creator Geoff Ramsey along with Gavin Free and the rest of the Achievement Hunter team. The bet is that Ramsey can train a bunch of children to beat them in any game, given enough time to prepare. Of course, the bet was accepted with some interesting (and permanent) stakes on the line. That’s how Schooled was created.
After sifting through hundreds of submissions and picking the four best kids, Ramsey and his 11-year-old daughter Millie teamed up to develop the skills needed to take down professional gamers in Ultimate Chicken Horse.
Can the Schooled Four take down the Achievement Hunters? Will Ramsey have to get an embarrassing tattoo?
We spoke with Geoff and Millie Ramsey about the series, why adults don’t give kids enough credit and how video games are a bonding experience.
Schooled ’s first episode premiered Oct. 3 and is now available to watch on the Achievement Hunter YouTube channel. Check out the first episode below.
The interview has been lightly edited and condensed for clarity.
Why did you want to do the show they way you did?
Geoff: “There’s a couple of reasons. One, I don’t respect the people that work for me in any capacity. And they have some sort of virtue on their own and I said that ‘I can hire some kids off the streets and replace you guys and no one would skip a beat. they’ll be better than you.’ And he [Gavin] called me on it and that’s when Millie stepped in and said that if I’m going to train a bunch of kids you need someone to speak their language. And that’s how the show was born.”
And Millie what is your role and how do you fit into this show?
Millie: “Well, the only way I would fit is as the 10-year-old coach because, you know, my dad isn’t 10. So it was useful for my role to be the person who knows what 10-year-olds my age like and I can help my dad train and a whole bunch of other things. [laughs]”
Do you two have a bad cop/good cop relationship with the other kids?
G: “The way it shook out was that I was the coach and Millie was the ‘froach,’ or the friendly coach, so she was the ray of sunshine to my Walter Matthau from Bad News Bears .”
Was there a moment that you had to pull your father to the side?
M “Yea, there was a part in one of the episodes, it was a crazy one where we had to throw darts at [the kids]. And I had to pull dad to the side and say ‘this isn’t working very well. This isn’t good enough.’”
How many submissions did you two get and how did you pick them?
G: “Oh wow, it was probably hundreds upon hundreds. It was a lot to parse through but I feel really confident that we picked the four clear winners. The kids that we chose are really fantastic.”
M: “Yea, I think they were the best out of the hundreds.”
What made them stand out?
G: “I would say confidence was a big one for me. I like a certain amount of cockiness and self-confidence. I think that’s important.”
M: “I thought they had a lot of strategy and confidence. But also personality.”
Did the kids who submit have a specialty in a specific game or genre?
G: “It’s true, people lump gamers in as one specific skill set. But it’s such a large community that straddles so many different things people can be good at. It’s kind of hard to narrow it down because we didn’t know what game we would be playing. We had a few options each were drastically different so we focused less on their individual skills and more on their overall gaming knowledge and experience.”
What made you choose Ultimate Chicken Horse?
G: “Well, first off it’s difficult to find a game that is competitive but also family-friendly. So that right there eliminates the vast majority of games. No one wants to see a bunch of 10-year-olds shooting each other in the head in Call of Duty . So that limited us and we had to be creative and think outside of the box. Ultimate Chicken Horse just checks all the boxes. The developers are great to work with, they were super receptive and as they described it to us, it’s the ultimate game of chicken and the ultimate game of horse at the same time. And I think every kid understands intrinsically on their time on the playground what chicken and horse are. So video games aside, that’s something kids grow up with so it just made sense for us.”
How much time did you have with the game before you went to teach the submitters?
G: “Millie and I did, they gave us a day to familiarize ourselves with it and get competent, maybe that is the word [laughs]. I’m already familiar with the game, my company makes videos on video games so my guys have already played it a few times and I have already played it myself but I was already familiar with the concept of the game. So yea, Millie and I had a day and that was more than enough to get the hang of it.”
M: “Yea, kids learn these things fast. Video games in general, it’s easy for us [kids] to learn.”
What other choices for games did you have?
G: “I can’t remember all of them because it was a little while ago but I know Rocket League was up there. There were four or five choices. The nice thing about Ultimate Chicken Horse is it presented us with a lot of opportunities to think outside the box because we wanted to get the kids out. We didn’t want a 9-episode series of kids sitting in front of a tv playing video games. I wanted to find real-world applications for it. To find creative ways to engage them around the game that also included being outside, physical activity and doing things that were energetic and fun. And luckily, Ultimate Chicken Horse provided us with a form full of activities.”
Can you give us a peek at the training?
G: “There are a lot of principles that we wanted to instill in them. Playing the game is one thing but as a professional gamer, one of the biggest things you have to deal with is the technology of gaming and getting under your player’s skin. That was something we focused in on, we wanted [the kids] to really understand their characters and really get behind the chicken, horse, raccoon and sheep and really learn to think as those creatures. We spent time on farms doing that while also teaching them how to compete against a bunch of grown ups. Psych them up, teach them how not to get scared or distracted. It’s a scary thing to play against a bunch of 27-year olds. Teach them how not to be affected by their crass language and their insults, how to dish it back. Just all the things to make them a competitor.”
Did Gavin and the team have time to play?
G: “We did our best to not let them. I think we gave them the morning before. These guys are pros, they play video games six to eight hours a week for 40 hours, and God knows what they do at home on their own time. So we didn’t want them to overprepare, for sure.”
How long did you have the kids for?
G: “It was intense. We were together for 12-15 hours a day. Off and on depending on the day, you know, child labor laws. We were together for as long as we were legally allowed to be around them but we made it work and it was awesome. I found all the kids to be fantastic. It was a little weird at first but we became friends and Millie now has relationships with the kids and they text and play video games over the weekend.”
Can you tell us about the kids?
G: “Yea, Gabriel was the stereotypical athlete, like, kind of alpha football player. He was great. Aashir was super self-assured and kind of cocky in the most endearing way. Alexa was really sweet and wonderful, but I can see her it seems like she can lead a band. And Teagan, I can imagine seeing her as an actress in the future. She was the consummate professional, she figures it out and at 11 years old it was super impressive.”
M: “I thought they were really nice. Gabriel was that athlete that also I thought Aashir was that fun but obnoxious kid, in a good way. Alexa was sweet nice, and friendly and Teagan was that professional.”
Was there something on- or off-camera that you didn’t expect to happen with the kids?
G: “I had a moment, about a third of the way through filming, when we broke for lunch and I have been intentionally trying to stay away from the kids off camera because my persona is this rough, like i said Walter Matthau character. And i didn’t want to get too friendly or familiar with the kids because when I was begrudging to them or kind of like the jerky coach I wanted them to have a sincere reaction to a degree. But i found it hard not to be endeared with them and by them. So I ate lunch with them for the first time on day three or four and they were playing a card game that Rooster Teeth created called the Million Dollars But. And i sat down and I was not expecting them to be familiar with my company let alone the products. So we all sat and played the game for 30 minutes and by the end we were all best friends. And I didn’t see that coming and it was the most gratifying and rewarding bonding experience because from that moment on I felt all our relationships got better and I realized that i was way off the mark by keeping my distance from them bc they were just fantastic kids.”
M “That was a fun day and lunch was very very tasty. But the first time I met them was honestly the best, because seeing them walk downstairs and I’m just like ‘yay’ and [dad] is just going ‘blah blah blah’ and it was fun to see their reaction. It was a weird way to meet in front of the cameras and they were like ‘hi.’”
G: “I can say too, I thought the bonding moments between you and them, Most of the time filming we are sequestered away. I have my scenes with them and Millie has her scenes and then we converge at certain points. But in a lot of the downtime Millie and I are in another area where we are doing interviews and they are filming b-roll with the kids. The best part is when the cameras stop rolling the kids want to keep playing. There’s a few instances later on where Millie was able to interact with them and jump in and watching Millie and the four kids who are all the same age finally be kids, and just play around together that was really great and it was fun to see them all bond outside the constraints of the show.”
What do you want the viewers to get out of this show?
G: “I hope that people take away from the show, whether they win or lose, that kids 10 or 11 are a lot more mature and capable than adults give them credit for. And when you do these apples and apples comparisons and put these 11-year olds against some 35-year-olds in a skill-based challenge, conventional wisdom says that the adults will wipe the floor with them, but I don’t think we give kids enough credit. They are sponges of knowledge and watching them absorb the techniques and tactics was very impressive and hopefully people will realize that video games are a great bonding experience for the family. It’s not the stigma of awkward people in their basements til 4 in the morning and being anti-social. This is something that parents and kids can play together and enrich and grow relationships and experiences with. And with Ultimate Chicken Horse, hopefully it will show that video games aren’t just violence and mindless fun, they have problem solving skills and they teach being clever and being able to think on your feet. And it can be fun for the whole family in a way that sitting around watching a television show just cannot touch.”
