Speaker 1: One of the biggest publishing success stories of the twenty
Speaker 1: tens was Ready Player One. The book, which came out
Speaker 1: in twenty eleven, tells the story of Wade Watts, a
Speaker 1: gamer living in a dystopian future who tries to find
Speaker 1: real world treasure hidden by an eccentric game designer named
Speaker 1: James Halliday. Deciphering the game means uncovering the location of
Speaker 1: Halliday's entire fortune. This probably sounds familiar. The novel's author,
Speaker 1: Ernest Klein, spells it out on page forty two when
Speaker 1: Wade is asked if he recognizes an old Atari game
Speaker 1: series called sword Quest. Wade not only recognizes it, he
Speaker 1: can confirm the name of all four games, earth World, Fireworld,
Speaker 1: water World, and Airworld, and all their prizes the Talisman,
Speaker 1: the Chalice, the Crown, the Philosopher's Stone, and the Sword
Speaker 1: of All Time to miss Sorcery. Wade thinks Halliday took
Speaker 1: inspiration from the sword Quest series. Obviously, so did Ernest Klein,
Speaker 1: and he earned a treasure of sorts too. It's all
Speaker 1: pretty meta. Ready Player One was the subject of a
Speaker 1: bidding war for publication rights. It also got Klein a
Speaker 1: movie deal. Steven Spielberg directed the film adaptation, which came
Speaker 1: out in twenty eighteen. Both the movie and the book
Speaker 1: were widely but not universally loved. There was a podcast
Speaker 1: that reviewed the book in excruciating detail. The title was
Speaker 1: three hundred and seventy two pages will Never Get Back,
Speaker 1: so you can probably guess how the hosts felt about it.
Speaker 1: But nonetheless, Ready Player one was the kind of cultural
Speaker 1: sensation Atari had hoped sword Quest would be a multi
Speaker 1: media phenomenon, and no, Ernest Klein didn't wind up locating
Speaker 1: the sword Quest prizes and buying them for himself, at
Speaker 1: least we don't think he did. He's a Bout to
Speaker 1: the future fan, so he bought a Dolorian instead. Even
Speaker 1: though that's not where we're going with this, Ernest is
Speaker 1: still somewhat responsible for what happens in this saga. The
Speaker 1: concluding chapter.
Speaker 2: The Treasures, the Lost Treasure of sword Quest.
Speaker 1: That's Casey Jones. Casey works in video editing now, but
Speaker 1: back when Ready Player one came out in twenty eleven,
Speaker 1: Casey was employed at a coffee shop.
Speaker 2: So I'll back up again in two thousand and nine
Speaker 2: twenty ten, abouts I worked at a cafe in Toronto, Ontario, Canada.
Speaker 2: Who is a franchise location of Aroma Espresso Bars, an
Speaker 2: Israeli chain, and it was owned and operated by one
Speaker 2: Gabe Tremmeel, as well as his younger brother, Mark Tremmel.
Speaker 2: He was assistant manager or something like that supervisor.
Speaker 1: Aroma had a few dozen locations in Canada. Casey worked
Speaker 1: at one in Toronto. Casey is also a gamer, and
Speaker 1: he happened to pick up the book everyone was talking
Speaker 1: about Ready Player one, and of course he saw the
Speaker 1: mention of sword Quest, and then Casey realized something. The
Speaker 1: owners of the bar, brothers Gabe and Mark Tremmel, had
Speaker 1: the same last name as Jack Tremmeil, the former owner
Speaker 1: of Atari. Gabe and Mark were Jack's grandsons, and so
Speaker 1: one day Casey decided to casually bring up those missing prizes.
Speaker 1: It's a question no member of the Trammel family has
Speaker 1: ever publicly addressed, and one they're still unwilling to comment on.
Speaker 1: When the contest was canceled and the three remaining prizes
Speaker 1: went unawarded, were the treasures destroyed or did they wind
Speaker 1: up in the possession of the family. Atari historians have
Speaker 1: long wanted to find out we wanted to find out
Speaker 1: and Casey, well, Casey just asked.
Speaker 2: So I asked Gabe about the history, like, since he
Speaker 2: was related to Jack Tremmel, did he ever hear anything
Speaker 2: about this story, about these these lost artifacts of the
Speaker 2: sword Quest and sweet steaks or contests that they were
Speaker 2: doing but never finished.
Speaker 1: And then Gabe very matter of factly turned this story
Speaker 1: upside down. For iHeartRadio, this is the legend of sword Quest.
Speaker 1: I'm your host, Jamie Loftist, and this is the eighth
Speaker 1: and final episode, Endgame.
Speaker 3: I've been thinking, sister yes Tor, about abinging our parents'
Speaker 3: death at the hand of King taran Us.
Speaker 4: God.
Speaker 3: Sure, but I was also thinking about what else we
Speaker 3: could do if we found the Sword of Ultimate Sorcery.
Speaker 4: Lop off that demon's head.
Speaker 3: Yeah, absolutely, and then you know, maybe we.
Speaker 4: Sell it, sell it.
Speaker 3: What I mean, a lot of collectors would pay good
Speaker 3: money for this thing, Tor.
Speaker 5: The sword is for vengeance, for honor, not for commerce.
Speaker 3: Right, No, totally, but I'm just saying, if we find it, maybe.
Speaker 4: We should at least get it appraised.
Speaker 1: In telling the story of sword Quest, you eventually come
Speaker 1: to a fork in the road Bear left, and you
Speaker 1: can explore the enigma of the contest and the fate
Speaker 1: of the prizes, which have been presumed missing for nearly
Speaker 1: four decades bear right, and you can have a conversation
Speaker 1: about their actual material value, not necessarily their historical significance.
Speaker 1: Think of the ruby slippers from The Wizard of Oz.
Speaker 1: They're part of film history by association. They have a
Speaker 1: kind of magic, but they're also a commodity. One pair,
Speaker 1: and yes, there are several pairs sold for over six
Speaker 1: hundred thousand dollars back in twenty eleven. Like the sword
Speaker 1: Quest prizes, other pairs have gone missing, which oddly makes
Speaker 1: them the more valued and appreciated. So what would it
Speaker 1: really mean to find these pieces of video game lore
Speaker 1: from a monetary perspective, It depends on who you ask.
Speaker 6: Yeah, exactly, No, it looks fantastic, you know, and it's beautiful,
Speaker 6: and probably that's the most expensive because as sword and
Speaker 6: fantasy really as the ultimate I mean, I always think anyway,
Speaker 6: you're out in the action, you're battling here, you're slaying
Speaker 6: the dragon.
Speaker 4: Right.
Speaker 1: That's Lewis Checchia. Lewis is what you'd call uniquely qualified
Speaker 1: to offer an opinion about the actual value of these prizes.
Speaker 1: Today he's a part time jewelry appraiser, but more than that,
Speaker 1: he once worked at the Franklin Mint, the collectibles company
Speaker 1: that made the treasures.
Speaker 6: We were artisans, so you know, we did all sculptures,
Speaker 6: We did dicast cars, we did numismatics, we did stamps,
Speaker 6: we did leather bound books, dolls, pocket knives, pocket watches,
Speaker 6: you name it. And really in the business world, people
Speaker 6: could come to us with whatever and we could develop it.
Speaker 6: And it sounds like that's what Attari really did.
Speaker 1: No, he didn't have a hand in their creation. Lewis
Speaker 1: didn't arrive at the Mint until nineteen ninety two when
Speaker 1: he was an intern. That's a full decade after the
Speaker 1: prizes were produced. Later, he became a development manager for
Speaker 1: their mid precision models think mini cars. Lewis also worked
Speaker 1: with the airs of celebrities like John Wayne and Elvis
Speaker 1: Presley to make sure the license collectibles were on target.
Speaker 1: In doing so, Lewis realized the Mint wasn't just selling collectibles.
Speaker 6: We've done some amazing pieces of artwork for the Royal
Speaker 6: House of Faberge where we worked with the licensers there.
Speaker 6: We've worked with Ferrari and Lamborghini and Rolls Royce, and
Speaker 6: you know, each time I had to really visit those
Speaker 6: companies and it really helped drive home that you know,
Speaker 6: Franklin really wasn't selling products, they were selling experiences. So
Speaker 6: the the amount of work that we did to reproduce
Speaker 6: something and to capture the spirit of John Wayne and
Speaker 6: a John Wayne rifle, or to capture the exotic feeling
Speaker 6: the Ferrari or Lamborghini quintash was really phenomenal because you know,
Speaker 6: we worked directly with the people that developed them.
Speaker 1: Even though he didn't personally encrust the chalice with some jewels,
Speaker 1: Lewis understands how the sausage was made at the mint,
Speaker 1: which is important when you're trying to appraise items that
Speaker 1: you can't physically hold in your hand. And while you
Speaker 1: may think something related to gaming wouldn't be in the
Speaker 1: same arena as movie props or comics or antiques, you'd
Speaker 1: be wrong. Video game collecting exploded during the coronavirus pandemic,
Speaker 1: as did most other collectibles. Rare copies of video games
Speaker 1: still in their plastic shrink wrap now fetch thousands, tens
Speaker 1: of thousands, and even millions of dollars. A copy of
Speaker 1: Nintendo's Super Mario Brothers, looking like it was just pulled
Speaker 1: off a peg at Toys r Us sold for two
Speaker 1: million dollars. A copy of the ultra rare Atari game
Speaker 1: Air Raid sold for thirty three thousand dollars thanks to
Speaker 1: having a complete box and manual, and an original wooden
Speaker 1: prototype of a home version of the classic Atari game Pong,
Speaker 1: which helped launch the home gaming industry, sold for two
Speaker 1: hundred and seventy thousand dollars in twenty twenty two. But
Speaker 1: unlike movies, which have props and costumes, games are more ethereal.
Speaker 1: Once you go through consoles and cartridges, there's not a
Speaker 1: whole lot left. Sword Quest is one of the few
Speaker 1: times actual tangible gaming treasures were created, and they come
Speaker 1: with an incredible mythology surrounding them. If they ever did surface,
Speaker 1: then it's possible the owner could strike gold that auctioned.
Speaker 1: Remember the first prize, the talisman was awarded to Stephen Bell.
Speaker 1: Stephen sold it off relatively quickly to purchase his Pontiac Fear.
Speaker 1: He kept a tiny miniature sword from it that was
Speaker 1: later stolen from his bedroom. The culprit, possibly an ex girlfriend.
Speaker 1: But let's say it hadn't been dismantled for material, or
Speaker 1: let's say the jeweler that bought it from Stephen kept
Speaker 1: it intact. How much would it be worth today, we
Speaker 1: asked Lewis. Oh. Lewis, by the way, operates an animal
Speaker 1: rescue in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania. It's Morris Animal Refuge, and they're
Speaker 1: devoted to finding good homes for pets in need of them.
Speaker 1: Lewis was good enough to try and appraise some invisible treasures,
Speaker 1: so we wanted to make sure to mention his work there.
Speaker 1: But yeah, back to the talisman, which may have been
Speaker 1: destroyed in nineteen eighty three but still exists in photos.
Speaker 1: Lewis believes that if the medallion was worth twenty five
Speaker 1: thousand dollars in nineteen eighty two, it probably had around
Speaker 1: sixty three ounces of gold given the market rate at
Speaker 1: the time, so.
Speaker 6: That I ambul it without the stone, without the sword,
Speaker 6: it would probably be north of you know, definitely the
Speaker 6: value of gold in there. If it is eighteen care gold,
Speaker 6: probably be in the north of one hundred thousand.
Speaker 1: The only other prize to be awarded was the chalice,
Speaker 1: which contest winner Michael Rideout took home in nineteen eighty
Speaker 1: four after being kept waiting for a few months, and
Speaker 1: right now it's the only known surviving prize of the
Speaker 1: entire contest. Michael Rideout is still believed to be in
Speaker 1: possession of it, but he wouldn't confirm that with us,
Speaker 1: So we're left to wonder if the base of the
Speaker 1: chalice is hollow, which makes a difference in its value.
Speaker 6: Without the weight, it would be really difficult from that standpoint.
Speaker 6: But I mean that is a one off, you know,
Speaker 6: a beautiful chalice, and with the atari, I mean that
Speaker 6: should be well north of one hundred thousand dollars.
Speaker 1: But that's if the base of the chalice is hollow,
Speaker 1: if it's actual solid gold.
Speaker 6: If it was solid gold, it could infect double the
Speaker 6: value of that because you're talking a lot of gold
Speaker 6: in there.
Speaker 1: Then there's the Crown of Life, one of the three prizes.
Speaker 1: There's never been a picture of it, only illustrations, So
Speaker 1: this one is trickier. So is the Philosopher's Stone. No photos,
Speaker 1: just descriptions and some artwork.
Speaker 6: Yeah, and they're saying that those are twenty five thousand
Speaker 6: a piece of value. My guess is they probably use
Speaker 6: a similar weight of gold and jewels on there. Yeah,
Speaker 6: So my guess is you can reasonably say that all
Speaker 6: of these are, you know, at least one hundred thousand
Speaker 6: plus valued, you know, based just on their precious metal
Speaker 6: and jewel content.
Speaker 1: But for sheer presence, no sword quest prize is equal
Speaker 1: to the Sword of Ultimate Sorcery gilded steel but jeweled hilt.
Speaker 1: In nineteen eighty two, Atari claimed it had a value
Speaker 1: of fifty thousand dollars.
Speaker 6: And this is harder for me to come up with
Speaker 6: because that's saying it's two times more valuable than the others.
Speaker 6: But the others have a lot of gold in them,
Speaker 6: and I guess and the hilt on that is solid gold.
Speaker 6: That's probably the only way it gets to it. And
Speaker 6: maybe it's seven or eight pounds of gold that gets
Speaker 6: you to that price. So yeah, I mean, so that
Speaker 6: sort can easily be a couple hundred thousand dollars in
Speaker 6: precious materials if it's much heavier than the medallion or
Speaker 6: the talisman. Yeah, so that easily could be a three
Speaker 6: hundred thousand dollars piece at auction, just based off of
Speaker 6: its precious metals and the fact that there's only one
Speaker 6: made and it's gorgeous. You know the pictures, it looks gorgeous.
Speaker 1: But in collectibles, especially auctions, the story is everything, just
Speaker 1: like at the Franklin Mint, And if an auction house
Speaker 1: could tell the right story, the sky's the limit.
Speaker 6: I think this sword, if it was marketed correctly in
Speaker 6: at one of the major auction houses that you know,
Speaker 6: was part of a collection of either video game or
Speaker 6: fantasy or period in time eighties, there's a lot of
Speaker 6: ways they can cut it. I mean, I think that
Speaker 6: sort could find itself north of three hundred thousand dollars,
Speaker 6: and then there it could go much higher. I mean,
Speaker 6: you know, pieces like they could go for five hundred thousand,
Speaker 6: but you just never know who's going to come in,
Speaker 6: how much interest they have in it. But you know
Speaker 6: it's got so much more value than the precious metal content.
Speaker 1: Again big disclaimer, Lewis is making these estimates based on
Speaker 1: what little is known about how the prizes were made
Speaker 1: and what materials were used, along with their estimated size.
Speaker 1: They could sell for that much or much less or
Speaker 1: not at all, although that's a little hard to believe.
Speaker 1: But in a way, the potential value of these items
Speaker 1: speaks a little to whether they still exist. If someone
Speaker 1: owned three items worth hundreds of thousands, why wouldn't they
Speaker 1: have surfaced by now? Could they really be kept hidden
Speaker 1: for this long? If they exchanged hands, could that be
Speaker 1: kept quiet? It's possible, and it's possible if the items
Speaker 1: held some sentimental value for the owner, which brings us
Speaker 1: back to the Trammels, Aroma Espresso Bar and Casey Jones.
Speaker 1: Compared to Starbucks, Aroma Espresso Bar doesn't have a huge
Speaker 1: global footprint. It has about two hundred locations, most in Israel,
Speaker 1: where it was founded in nineteen ninety four, along with
Speaker 1: two in Ukraine and one in Miami, Florida. The rest
Speaker 1: are in Canada. It's got more or less what you'd
Speaker 1: expect from a coffeehouse.
Speaker 2: It's maybe not quite the scale of Starbucks, but consider
Speaker 2: it like an Israeli exported Starbucks. They did baked goods,
Speaker 2: they did coffee, they did sandwiches, salads. They're great if
Speaker 2: you ever have the chance to go to an Aroma
Speaker 2: Espresso bar. They're a bit pricey now, but if you
Speaker 2: ever have the chance, they make a very good halloomy sandwich.
Speaker 1: Again, that's Casey Jones in twenty eleven. It was a
Speaker 1: place for him to pick up a paycheck. Casey, you'll recall,
Speaker 1: was working at an Aroma in Toronto for a spell.
Speaker 2: Probably about two two and a half years, cycling between
Speaker 2: part time in full time. It was like a job
Speaker 2: in my early twenties.
Speaker 4: It was just a gig.
Speaker 1: The two operators at that location were Mark and Gabe Tremmel,
Speaker 1: a sibling business duo in their twenties who had taken
Speaker 1: over in two thousand and nine.
Speaker 2: There were decent guys. I mean, there was some level
Speaker 2: of grumbling from the staff sometimes because like, ah, Gabe,
Speaker 2: the boss is really pushing us hard or whatever. But
Speaker 2: I think those are just realities of operating a cafe.
Speaker 2: Gab and Mark as two individuals, I always got a
Speaker 2: good read from them.
Speaker 1: Casey was reading Ernest Klein's Ready Player one while working
Speaker 1: at Aroma, not reading while literally working at Aroma during
Speaker 1: his free time. It was a New York Times bestseller,
Speaker 1: moving right roughly one point seven million copies, so he
Speaker 1: was hardly alone. A lot of people had the book
Speaker 1: in their hands. For many it might have been the
Speaker 1: first time they'd ever heard of sword Quest, and then
Speaker 1: some probably wondered if it was a real game or
Speaker 1: if Ernest had just made it up. But Ready Player
Speaker 1: one wasn't the only reason Casey was thinking about sword Quest.
Speaker 1: Around the same time, a YouTuber known as the Angry
Speaker 1: Video Game Nerd had done a retrospective of the series
Speaker 1: and the missing prizes. Unlike the book, which didn't mention
Speaker 1: the name Jack Tremmel, the nerd did, which gave Casey
Speaker 1: more of a complete picture. Mark and Gabe, he discovered,
Speaker 1: were Jack's grandsons. Their father, Sam Tremmel, had worked at
Speaker 1: Atari under his father, and Jack had long been rumored
Speaker 1: to have taken possession of the prizes. So Casey found
Speaker 1: himself in proximity to two people who could possibly answer
Speaker 1: the question that's been posed by gaming historians for decades.
Speaker 1: When the sword Quest contest was canceled. Were the prizes
Speaker 1: sold off for their material value or did Jack Tremmell
Speaker 1: hang on to them. If Jack had taken possession of
Speaker 1: the prizes, then surely his grandkids had seen them, had
Speaker 1: picked up a sword of Ultimate Sorcery and waved its
Speaker 1: blunted rounded edge around as children. As we've told you,
Speaker 1: the Trammel's don't discuss it, but Casey wasn't a nosy journalist.
Speaker 1: He was just making conversation in a coffee shop. That's
Speaker 1: kind of what they're made for. So Casey posed the
Speaker 1: question to Gabe Tremmel. Gabe didn't walk away, he didn't
Speaker 1: say no comment. He started laughing, and then he said this.
Speaker 2: There was very little hesitation. He's like, oh, yeah, I've
Speaker 2: seen those. Yeah, he saw them, presumably at his grandpa's place,
Speaker 2: Jack Tremmell's place. I can't confirm. This was just a
Speaker 2: conversation that I had like thirteen years ago, so I
Speaker 2: can't confirm full veracity, details or anything. But he did
Speaker 2: say he was able to see them at Jack Tremmel's place,
Speaker 2: either at his personal home or in his office somewhere
Speaker 2: I don't know.
Speaker 1: According to Casey, Gabe then offered an even more astounding detail.
Speaker 2: And Gabe also claimed that he had had his picture
Speaker 2: taken with two of the artifacts. I don't remember exactly
Speaker 2: which two they were. I want to say it was
Speaker 2: the crown and the sword. I might be getting that
Speaker 2: wrong because I don't recall which of the artifacts were
Speaker 2: lost and which ones were paid out to the winners.
Speaker 2: But Gabe claimed very fondly like, oh, yeah, no, I
Speaker 2: have a picture of me wearing these. He didn't show
Speaker 2: me the picture. Presumably it was on film, and really
Speaker 2: that was it. Based off of that interaction, my understanding
Speaker 2: was that at some point in the intervening years after
Speaker 2: the end of the sword Quest contest, that those artifacts
Speaker 2: found their way in to Jack Tremmel's hands, or you know,
Speaker 2: he just took pictures of them with his grandson.
Speaker 1: You know.
Speaker 2: Maybe he had them in a safety deposit box, maybe
Speaker 2: he had them in a private residence. I don't know,
Speaker 2: but I can at least say he had them at
Speaker 2: one point, or he had access to them at one
Speaker 2: point and he was sharing enough with that access to
Speaker 2: let his grandkid get a funny picture with it. But
Speaker 2: unfortunately I've never seen the picture.
Speaker 1: Somewhere in the possessions of Gabe Trammel apparently lurked a
Speaker 1: photo of Gabe sporting a crown and waving a sword.
Speaker 1: Not a crown or a sword, but the crown and
Speaker 1: the sword. But there's a hiccup here. If someone asks
Speaker 1: you about an urban legend your family was allegedly involved in,
Speaker 1: maybe your tendency would be to joke about it. Oh, sure,
Speaker 1: my grandfather was in the CIA, that sort of thing.
Speaker 1: So we asked Casey, was there any chance Gabe was
Speaker 1: just kidding around.
Speaker 4: It's possible.
Speaker 2: It seemed too specific to just be a joke. Maybe
Speaker 2: he was just pulling my leg because I was asking
Speaker 2: these directed questions. It's possible he was joking around or
Speaker 2: exaggerating the story. But you know, when you work at
Speaker 2: a cafe with a manager, you get a sense of
Speaker 2: the way that they speak, and you know they're different tones.
Speaker 2: So I was familiar with Gabe's joking tone as well
Speaker 2: as his, you know, serious manager boss tones, and I
Speaker 2: didn't peg it as a joke. I pegged it as
Speaker 2: him telling the truth at the time. Whether or not
Speaker 2: I was correct, who knows.
Speaker 1: To the best of Casey's recollection, he brought up sword
Speaker 1: Quest once or twice more to Gabe, but by this
Speaker 1: point Gabe seemed to have grown reluctant to discuss it
Speaker 1: any further. It wouldn't be an ongoing topic of conversation.
Speaker 2: When I sensed that he put the brakes on the story,
Speaker 2: I sensed that it may have been because, oh, this
Speaker 2: is actually getting into some stuff that he doesn't want
Speaker 2: to speak about. Out in a public space with other
Speaker 2: people sitting at the bar overhearing him, or other people
Speaker 2: working overhearing him. And that was really the end of it.
Speaker 2: When I started digging into it more, I got a
Speaker 2: sense that he started realizing I was asking some very
Speaker 2: directed questions, and he started to shy away from the
Speaker 2: subject a little bit.
Speaker 4: There are a.
Speaker 1: Lot of unknowns here. When exactly did Gabe take the
Speaker 1: photo as a child or more recently.
Speaker 2: I got the sense that it was fairly recent when
Speaker 2: the photo was taken. Unfortunately, I don't have anything I
Speaker 2: can go back to to like pinpoint that it might
Speaker 2: just be my faulty memory. It may have been when
Speaker 2: he was young, it may have been when he was
Speaker 2: an adult. I got the sense at the time that
Speaker 2: it was within the last five years or something, so
Speaker 2: that would have placed it between two thousand and five
Speaker 2: and twenty ten.
Speaker 1: Gabe had no reason to lie about the photo, nor
Speaker 1: does Casey. He just happened to be in the vicinity
Speaker 1: of Gabe and armed with a little bit of knowledge
Speaker 1: when some wordquest trivia landed in his lap Mark. Gabe
Speaker 1: operated the Aroma location through twenty thirteen and then went
Speaker 1: on to different business pursuits. Casey left around the same time.
Speaker 1: We asked if there were any other employees who may
Speaker 1: have heard the story to corroborate it. Casey gave us
Speaker 1: two names. One doesn't recall anything about it. The other
Speaker 1: former employee answered our request for a comment by asking
Speaker 1: who gave you my name and then never responded again.
Speaker 4: This one knows something. I can feel it. It's no use, Tour.
Speaker 5: He'd sooner lop off his tongue than reveal his secrets.
Speaker 4: Fine by me. Better still, we could lop off his head.
Speaker 4: Tor No, fine, then we say he simply did not
Speaker 4: respond to a request for comment.
Speaker 1: We did, of course, contact Mark Tremmel. Though he wasn't
Speaker 1: the one who told Casey the story of the prizes,
Speaker 1: it seems likely that he'd know a thing or two
Speaker 1: about it.
Speaker 2: Gabe and Mark were quite proud of that fun little
Speaker 2: trivia tidbit that oh yeah, I'm you know, my granddad
Speaker 2: was the Tari guy. And when I asked them about
Speaker 2: the artifacts, they did claim to have seen them. I
Speaker 2: believe Mark confirmed. I don't remember specifically, but I do
Speaker 2: know at the very least that Gabe told me the
Speaker 2: story that he has been in the same room with
Speaker 2: the artifacts and has had his picture taken with them.
Speaker 1: But Mark didn't respond. The Tremmel cone of silence persisted
Speaker 1: and Gabe, well, we can't ask Gabe. Unfortunately, in twenty sixteen,
Speaker 1: Gabe Tremmeel passed away at the age of thirty two
Speaker 1: while living in New York City. According to the United
Speaker 1: States Attorney's Office in the Southern District of New York,
Speaker 1: a medical doctor and graduate student was convicted of selling
Speaker 1: Gabe Tremmel a lethal dose of fentanyl, a dangerous opioid.
Speaker 1: If there is a photo of Gabe posing with sword
Speaker 1: Quest prizes, we don't know if anyone has it, or
Speaker 1: if anyone knows where it could be. And assuming Jack
Speaker 1: had those prizes circa twenty eleven, Jack's death in twenty
Speaker 1: twelve would have placed them in other hands. Of course,
Speaker 1: this is speculation. We can't say, nor do we say
Speaker 1: the Trammels are in possession of the remaining sword Quest prizes.
Speaker 1: But like the game itself, it's become a part of
Speaker 1: the mythology of Atari and one no Tremmel family member
Speaker 1: seems willing to dispel. They're under no obligation to, of course,
Speaker 1: but it would be a simple way of getting people
Speaker 1: to stop asking you about it. If Jack did keep
Speaker 1: the prizes, Casey believes it would be symbolic a trophy
Speaker 1: representing Jack Tremmel on top of Atari, a pioneer of
Speaker 1: personal computing.
Speaker 2: Oh yeah, they'd be a hell of a nice keepsake
Speaker 2: of his victory and his battles to become the King
Speaker 2: of Atari.
Speaker 1: If the King of Atari had the treasures, then they
Speaker 1: might wind up where most treasures do, inside the hallowed
Speaker 1: halls of a museum.
Speaker 5: We're heading into one of our collection storage areas here
Speaker 5: at the museum.
Speaker 4: We have a.
Speaker 5: Keypad and the security card swape that I needed to
Speaker 5: do to get into this area. We're walking through an
Speaker 5: area that focuses on our arcade conservation. We're standing in
Speaker 5: a room that has an enormous amount of video games
Speaker 5: and collections objects.
Speaker 1: We're in Rochester, New York. It's an upstate community known
Speaker 1: for its medical university and for pop culture fans for
Speaker 1: being host to the Strong Museum of Play which is
Speaker 1: a massive collection of play things that fills almost four
Speaker 1: hundred thousand square feet and welcomes a half million visitors
Speaker 1: every year. Think of it like the world's biggest toy store,
Speaker 1: only it spans generations. Everything is here original barbie'es, Gi Joe's,
Speaker 1: and of course a deep collection of the electronic toy
Speaker 1: that's dominated for decades, the video game. The Museum is
Speaker 1: in Rochester because Rochester was once the home of Margaret
Speaker 1: Wood very Strong, a collector of toys and dolls and
Speaker 1: a lot of everything, whose collection grew so large her
Speaker 1: home became something of a dollhouse. When she died in
Speaker 1: nineteen sixty nine, she willed her belongings to a museum
Speaker 1: that eventually became her namesake, The Strong in nineteen eighty two.
Speaker 1: And while the Strong initially exhibited a lot of things,
Speaker 1: it was toys that became the focal point.
Speaker 5: And so we're standing in front of this massive television
Speaker 5: because we've recreated Home Pong as a massive interactive that
Speaker 5: people can play here at the museum. And so I'm
Speaker 5: using an oversized knob on a giant console. Oh and
Speaker 5: they got me.
Speaker 1: That's Jeremy Saucier. Jeremy is the assistant vice president for
Speaker 1: Interpretation and Electronic Games at the Strong. He has a
Speaker 1: PhD in history from the University of Rochester. Games are
Speaker 1: his relics, his barometer for our shared leisure habits. His
Speaker 1: focus is the International Center for the History of Electronic Games,
Speaker 1: a collection totaling around sixty thousand items and growing all
Speaker 1: the time. This stuff is well loved. You can see
Speaker 1: cigarette burns and handprints on some of the arcade machines,
Speaker 1: the evidence of the gamer who spent countless hours chasing
Speaker 1: pac Man.
Speaker 5: So just really thousands and thousands. We have the most
Speaker 5: comprehensive collection of play things but also video games anywhere
Speaker 5: in the world. So you're standing in part of that collection.
Speaker 5: But Atari is one of the first companies where this
Speaker 5: is what they're doing. They're making video games. You know,
Speaker 5: even Nintendo as a playing card company, Kaliko was a
Speaker 5: leather company. And so you know, when I think about
Speaker 5: Atari today, I think it's a combination of you have
Speaker 5: a generation of people who were introduced to video games
Speaker 5: through Atari, and I think they understand that on some
Speaker 5: level that that was important. And Atari plays an important
Speaker 5: role in that They're not the only ones, but they
Speaker 5: play a very important role. And you know, just like
Speaker 5: you know, you wouldn't have Tesla today if you didn't
Speaker 5: have Ford and GM, well, you wouldn't have Sony. You
Speaker 5: wouldn't have Microsoft in the Xbox if you didn't have Atari. First.
Speaker 1: The Strong's Atari holdings number well over nine hundred items, consoles, joysticks, games, manuals,
Speaker 1: original art, and naturally the sword Quest titles. But no,
Speaker 1: not the prizes. To get the obvious question out of
Speaker 1: the way.
Speaker 5: I mean, I can say for sure that we do
Speaker 5: not have them.
Speaker 1: But there are other treasures here.
Speaker 5: Because I'm going to handle a couple of objects here
Speaker 5: I'm going to put some gloves on. Is that we're
Speaker 5: standing in front of a KRT curator's cart that has
Speaker 5: a couple of the sword Quest games on it, and
Speaker 5: a September October nineteen eighty two issue of Atari Age,
Speaker 5: which was a publication that was sent to members of
Speaker 5: Atari's clubs with jewels encrusted on them worth many thousands
Speaker 5: of dollars gold objects. And so this contest is really
Speaker 5: at the height of Atari's power. Some would say it's
Speaker 5: at the height of Atari's hubris, because when the contest starts,
Speaker 5: it's nineteen eighty two, right, So if we open up,
Speaker 5: we're looking at this cover of Atari Age, and so
Speaker 5: this is September October of nineteen eighty two, and even
Speaker 5: right on the cover is this wonderful artwork that are
Speaker 5: showing the characters from the sword Quest games. And if
Speaker 5: I open this up, there is a two page spread
Speaker 5: promoting this contest. Sword Quest you can win fabulous prizes
Speaker 5: by solving the mysteries of four new cartridges.
Speaker 1: Part of the Strong's Atari collection is a lot of paperwork,
Speaker 1: game ideas, design ideas. There's even a map chest full
Speaker 1: of original art. But there's no slip of paper that
Speaker 1: traces where those items went, no invoice, no destroy upon receipts.
Speaker 1: Smoking Gun Atari was a poor curator of its own history.
Speaker 1: The items arrive piecemeal from employees or donors, and while
Speaker 1: there are still items to be inventoried, there's no sign
Speaker 1: any of it holds the clue.
Speaker 5: But also it is just a turn of history like
Speaker 5: they could have very easily have been thrown away, and
Speaker 5: a lot of this history is gone for the Strong.
Speaker 1: Gaming isn't a commercial endeavor. If they get their hands
Speaker 1: on a rare cartridge or console, or even an original microchip,
Speaker 1: it's cataloged and like a puzzle piece, snapped into place
Speaker 1: wherever it fits in gaming history. And while Jeremy's Landscape
Speaker 1: is pretty vast. Everything from early handheld games to Nintendo
Speaker 1: systems to Sony PlayStations are here. He's definitely aware of
Speaker 1: sword Quest, one of the biggest myths in gaming history,
Speaker 1: treasures that, if they were ever discovered, might one day
Speaker 1: wind up here.
Speaker 5: What's fascinating about these prizes, you know, is just there's
Speaker 5: so much speculation about it. It's been rumored that one
Speaker 5: of them was actually melted down and sold. I mean,
Speaker 5: obviously the person who wins it can do what they
Speaker 5: want with it. And if I was a college student
Speaker 5: trying to pay debt, then I might be hawking my
Speaker 5: gold jewelry as well, you know. But as artifacts that
Speaker 5: help tell this larger story and represent a time in
Speaker 5: video games where you're basically, you know, minting these fantastic
Speaker 5: gold artifacts, I think it'd be wonderful to have them,
Speaker 5: you know. It almost reminds me of the sort of
Speaker 5: Gilded Age.
Speaker 1: Right to Jeremy, the prizes represent something other than mastering
Speaker 1: a difficult video game. They're emblematic of Atari's success, and
Speaker 1: maybe they're hubris.
Speaker 5: You're these artifacts that kind of represent the height of
Speaker 5: the video game industry, the height of Atari that they
Speaker 5: would have invested in a contest like this, But Atari
Speaker 5: itself cracked. Atari itself crumbled. Though they're coming back now
Speaker 5: and they're doing things today. But yes, as a historian,
Speaker 5: as curators, we'd obviously love to see some of these things.
Speaker 1: In some ways, Atari is like a fallen civilization, once
Speaker 1: on top of the world, now a distant second to
Speaker 1: the xboxes and immersive gaming world of today. Like any
Speaker 1: other relic, the prizes, were they to surface, could be
Speaker 1: sold for Lewis Checchia amounts of money. It's a problem
Speaker 1: Jeremy runs into when adding to the strongest collection, a
Speaker 1: problem every museum runs into. Sooner or later that Picasso
Speaker 1: may not be available because someone paid a fortune for it.
Speaker 1: So it may be hard to conceive of the prizes
Speaker 1: being on public display one day for all to see.
Speaker 1: That can happen. Collectors can loan out art or collectibles,
Speaker 1: but so far the sword Quest stash has not been
Speaker 1: for public consumption. But it's certainly possible that someone listening
Speaker 1: does know where they are, and maybe at some point
Speaker 1: they'll consider the value of snapping that piece into the
Speaker 1: overall puzzle.
Speaker 5: Yeah, I mean it's difficult, you know. On the one hand,
Speaker 5: I can see that if these things do exist, whoever
Speaker 5: might have them. I mean, there's a chance that they
Speaker 5: don't even know that they have these sorts of things.
Speaker 5: It really is, you know, that's a possibility too. There's
Speaker 5: a community of people who would love to find out
Speaker 5: that these things exist, and even more they'd love to
Speaker 5: see them. So the argument to me is more I
Speaker 5: think along the lines of that these are potentially artifacts
Speaker 5: from a community of gamers, a community that's heavily invested
Speaker 5: in the history of Atari, in the history of video games,
Speaker 5: and so I think the argument is that, you know,
Speaker 5: if you possibly can, it'd be great to share that history,
Speaker 5: even if it's just acknowledging that they exist, even if
Speaker 5: it's acknowledging that something happened to them and that there's
Speaker 5: some evidence of that that helps to put the mystery
Speaker 5: to rest.
Speaker 1: Today, Atari is in Paris, well sort of. The video
Speaker 1: game company which pioneered home gaming, now has offices in
Speaker 1: New York and France. After changing hands a few times
Speaker 1: since the Jack Tremmel days, it wound up with a
Speaker 1: company named Infograms, a mix of the French words informatique
Speaker 1: and program. Atari now takes a more circuitous route to
Speaker 1: its branding. A few years ago, they announced plans to
Speaker 1: license the Atari name to backers of a hotel in
Speaker 1: Las Vegas. The Atari Hotel would be a giant, gaudy
Speaker 1: ode to retro gaming, with themed rooms and plenty of joysticks.
Speaker 1: That hasn't broken ground yet. What has materialized is an
Speaker 1: Atari twenty six hundred plus retro console, which was released
Speaker 1: at the end of twenty twenty three and delivers a
Speaker 1: dose of nostalgia. It looks virtually identical to the old
Speaker 1: twenty six hundred, right down to the wood grain finish.
Speaker 1: It can play original Atari cartridges, or you can select
Speaker 1: from some included games on a ten to one cart
Speaker 1: Atari did something else too. In twenty twenty two, they
Speaker 1: released Atari fifty, a software program celebrating the company's fiftieth anniversary,
Speaker 1: part game and part documentary. It included something gamers have
Speaker 1: been waiting for since the nineteen eighties, a fully finished,
Speaker 1: fully playable version of air World, the fourth and never
Speaker 1: released game in the sword Quest series. This isn't the
Speaker 1: original version as envisioned by sword Quest's creator Todd Frye.
Speaker 1: It's more of an homage to that idea, but it
Speaker 1: is an official release, and it does make for one
Speaker 1: less missing treasure in this story. But there was no
Speaker 1: fourth comic from DC, and therefore no conclusion to the
Speaker 1: sword Quest saga. That's fitting since the one in the
Speaker 1: real world is still open ended too. Those prizes could
Speaker 1: have been destroyed for their material value decades ago. If
Speaker 1: that's true, then the chalice is the only one that survived,
Speaker 1: and may be all the more valuable for it. There
Speaker 1: are three distinct perspectives here. The collector with deep pockets
Speaker 1: who wants to look at video game treasure in their
Speaker 1: basement trophy room, the archivist who wouldn't mind seeing them
Speaker 1: help to tell the story of gaming's ascendants from a
Speaker 1: seedier side of pop culture to a legitimate art form.
Speaker 1: And a family who may now consider the prizes to
Speaker 1: be a kind of heirloom, unwilling to give the public
Speaker 1: a glimpse treasures that have taken on a more personal meaning.
Speaker 1: All of these are valid. The only thing we can
Speaker 1: say with certainty is that sword Quest is a part
Speaker 1: of a shared cultural history. The contest anticipated the multimedia
Speaker 1: explosion that would arrive in the coming decades, where giant
Speaker 1: conglomerates use all of their assets for one unified sales pitch.
Speaker 1: When Warner Brothers wanted to raise awareness of Barbie, they
Speaker 1: draped all of their reality television in pink. When Warner
Speaker 1: Communications wanted to promote sword Quest, they recruited all of
Speaker 1: their companies of that era to the task. Atari the
Speaker 1: Franklin Mint DC comics. It was a radical innovation caught
Speaker 1: in the middle of a transition in gaming that was
Speaker 1: termined for cost. Tor and Tara, the hero and heroine
Speaker 1: of the story, were effectively laid off before their mission
Speaker 1: was complete, and most of their expected rewards are still
Speaker 1: unaccounted for. But there's a reason they call it the
Speaker 1: hero's journey and not the hero's destination, even though it
Speaker 1: was never completed. Without sword Quest, we wouldn't have the
Speaker 1: pioneers of competitive gaming, people like Stephen Bell, Jackie Custer,
Speaker 1: Burt Wardahl, and Michael Rideout. Today's esports stars play for millions.
Speaker 1: They played for some fleeting glory and a cool sword.
Speaker 1: Those prizes may be gone, but their memories remain of
Speaker 1: long hours spent mastering games. Before gaming was truly mainstream,
Speaker 1: sword Quest was something increasingly rare these days, a true original,
Speaker 1: a spark for imagination, decades later, There's still never been
Speaker 1: anything quite like it.
Speaker 3: The sword eludes us. Tara, the one who wields it,
Speaker 3: will not step forward.
Speaker 4: Perhaps they fear harassment or robbery. Perhaps, but can something
Speaker 4: be taken that belongs to the people? What do you mean, Torque?
Speaker 3: Someone may be able to put their hands on its hilt,
Speaker 3: to keep it under glass, Yet it represents so much more,
Speaker 3: a shared history.
Speaker 4: Perhaps one day all can see it, perhaps, or perhaps
Speaker 4: it's gone forever. What now, sister, What of our story?
Speaker 3: Now?
Speaker 4: Now we find tyrann Us and vanquish him another way,
Speaker 4: But how now we write our own ending? Come on,
Speaker 4: let's go adventuring.
Speaker 1: The Legend of sword Quest is a production of iHeart
Speaker 1: Podcasts and School of Humans. This episode was written by
Speaker 1: Jake Rawson and hosted by Jamie Loftus producers are Miranda
Speaker 1: Hawkins and Josh Fisher. Executive producers are Virginia Prescott, L. C. Crowley,
Speaker 1: Brandon Barr, and Jason English.
Speaker 4: Our show editor is Mary Doo.
Speaker 1: Audio engineering by Graham Gibson, Research and fact checking by
Speaker 1: Austin Thompson and Jake Rosson.
Speaker 4: Original score by Jesse Niswanger. This episode was sound designed
Speaker 4: by Josh Fisher.
Speaker 1: Mixing and mastering by Miranda Hawkins. Show logo by Lucy Quintonia.
Speaker 1: Voices in this episode are provided by Haley Ellman and
Speaker 1: Graham Parker.