Polybius Lives! Part 1 (Premium E324)
In 1981 an arcade cabinet began popping up all over the Portland area called Polybius…or at least…that’s the claim. Released by a company called Sinneslöschen, the game used a graphics rendering technology that was impossibly ahead of its time. Kids that played reported having migraines, hallucinations, and memory loss while others became vehemently anti-arcade. But, just as quickly as the machines appeared, those same men in black soon took them away. No one has seen one since.
What is the truth behind Polybius? A military recruitment program? East German video game technology? Mere urban legend? In part one of this two-part episode, Jack LaRoche guides us through the background and usenet-sourced tales of this legendary arcade cabinet.
Jack LaRoche
https://bsky.app/profile/coyotespeaks.bsky.social
Thanks for subscribing to QAA on patreon.
Check out our new podcast series network Cursed Media and binge the entirety of our new show Science in Transition by Liv Agar and Spencer Barrows: https://cursedmedia.net
Produced by Liv Agar and Corey Klotz. Theme by Nick Sena. Additional music by Pontus Berghe. Theme Vocals by THEY/LIVE (https://instagram.com/theyylivve / https://sptfy.com/QrDm). Cover Art by Pedro Correa: (https://pedrocorrea.com)
QAA was known as the QAnon Anonymous podcast.
Comments (93)
Wolfenstein 3D is not only an early first person, it is easily the most inspirational one.
I learned to play blackjack via Leisure Suit Larry on our Atari home computer.
All time arcade faves: Centipede, Ms Pac Man (table top version), Streetfighter 2, The Simpsons, and fucking Terminator 2 Judgement Day pinball.
I beat Turtles in Time for the first time ever last Christmas and was very fucking disappointed to find the whole point of the game is to just SEND the turtles through time!!! At no point do you actually get to play through time!
Have to correct Jake that the Battletech center(the big sit on mech simulator) was at the North Pier Mall in Chicago not Navy Pier. There wasn’t any military involvement in that, I don’t not think. But the company that created Battletech was called FASA and they were located in a Chicago. So that is why we got a cool fucking game thing in the city
Holy crap boys I can’t tell you how much I needed this episode!
One might guess by my user icon I love pinball and vintage gaming. If anyone may be in the metro area focused on in this piece, I'll just say look up Next Level. Best arcade in the country, perhaps the world located in the Silicon Forest. If you want to drink too, Wedgeheads in east Portland is baller. Both are admission based free play arcades. This is my favorite episode of my favorite podcast. I know a lot of the lore from my Gen X older cousins and have just beamed in joy listening. A good Jake story or Liv exploration makes my week, but this is my heart. Well done team!
Really great episode! Looking forward to part two!
That Malibu ad at the end really took me back. I remember going there as a kid. Also, Tempest was my #1 jam!
23 minutes in and I love this episode! 🤓🤓
Can't wait for the worst movie night ever when they cover Joysticks
So I happen to suffer from migraines and I'm able to read scientific papers so I read the research on it pretty religiously. Migraines are genetic, you either have them or you don't. But they can change drastically over the course of your life. This is true especially during puberty. So a 14 year old boy getting his first migraine triggered by a visually overwhelming video game? Doesn't get much more textbook than that
Glory
Secrets of Nim is also a good book. Very fond memories from when I was a child
INCREDIBLE EPISODE
1. I own secrets of NIMH on DVD and I’ve had it for a long time 2. No Arcades in funeral homes but I live in a town that made national news for having a Starbucks in its funeral home …not even 10 minutes into this episode and you guys are hitting dingers
ANIMATORS MENTIONED RISE UP ANIMATORS
SIMPSONS ARCADE GAME MENTIONED
Love when a guest refers to a previous ep, more Jack in future plz 🙏
Jack is great, but the part about simultaneous vector and raster scan graphics being impossible isn't actually correct, technically. It's true that a single CRT tube can't support both at once, but some high-end machines (like those that Polybius might've ran on) could optically overlay the outputs of two different tubes using half-silvered mirrors. To the player it would appear as if both were happening at once.
Thanks for the technical breakdown. Tech royalty!
More Coonass correspondents please!!!!
Tempest is one of the all time great arcade cabinets, it holds up too. I've never personally heard of anyone having the vision and nausea aftereffects, not to say it isn't possible.
https://techland.time.com/2012/11/15/all-time-100-video-games/slide/tempest-1981/
You guys, there's really just nothing better than Jake.D railing the podcast to go nostalgic and also tell us to leave the patreon to go watch a f****** movie🤣🤣🤣🤣
QAA is now big enough to have an expensive music cue
have any of you checked out UFO 50? it came out in 2025, but it's a collection of 50 arcade-style games and it's like they were designed to be Good Games instead of quarter eaters
YVAN EHT NIOJ
"Your love's more deadly than Saddam / That's why I gotta drop da bomb!".
Read this as polybus and 👀❗️
that cat bus from Totoro hits differently now.
Last weeks TikTok jargon episode was too much for my primitive brain. Now this one is right up my alley!!!
I remember the "Winners don't use drugs" FBI warning in the arcade machines in the 80s, and it was in Italy, LOL
Hell yeah, the boys are back (the boys are back in town)
That old Real Ghostbusters game was a reskin of a Japanese game but it was so incredibly rad
We love a JJT episode, don’t we folks
What a coincidence, I just got an area 51 shirt last week. My dad and I played the shit out of that game but I never beat it until I got to play it for free.
I don’t know about that thing you was talking. But I need the info for your guest
Interesting story, can’t wait for part 2, good to hear about something that not relative to crazy politics, also glad to hear the big three for this episode.
Julian using the word “porcine”
When Area 51 was mentioned, the Area 88 arcade game popped into my head. Boy, only a decade adrift ....
I have emotional trauma from Secret of Nimh - that spider in the owls nest gave me nightmares for years
There’s an arcade called Galactix in Astoria, OR that has a playable Polybius. It’s a small batch homebrew, homage kinda thing. So still very rare! But they did a great job recreating the gameplay as it was described, complete with “subliminal messages”. It’s pretty neat!
I have a regional second honeymoon coastal trip in March and we WILL stop by. Thank you fellow PNW person. Come on down south and east to Next Level if you can!
This is a delightful episode
" Fingerloose" !!😂
Please please please do a spin off series talking about old video games
Julian and Jake began podcasting talking about video games and they will end podcasting talking about video games.
I’ve rewatched Secret of NIMH within the last year and it’s definitely worth it still. It’s from a time before children’s media started holding their hands so much. Dom DeLuise is a little distracting, as he usually is. Also you know you’re of a certain age when every cartoon that you cherish features Dom’s vocal stylings
That and The Last Unicorn were my favorite movies as a kid. The owl scene was freaking terrifying, but I loved it. Kid’s movies used to be a bit darker, for lack of a better term, back in the day.
Still listening, but the game play described sounds a lot like Tempest. The game the one sister in Night of the Comet is so good at.
Ok, Tempest now mentioned!
It’s so funny to me that “The Division Bell” was so heavily baked. It was not a good album (though the album cover is beautiful).
I’m a Roger Waters stan for life. But I still like Gilmore’s Floyd. It’s not the same and it’s not as good. But if you pretend it’s something else besides Pink Floyd, it’s pretty enjoyable.
As someone who lives in Portland now. This is just everything else in the podcast is really interesting.
So happy the band is back together! As much as I hate to be that guy, Jake + Julian is my favourite parasocial combo meal.
Never since the great clamp down on "Plasticine Action" has there been such an injust extrapolation of misread words
“Oooo…a sparkly”. If you know , you know.
The Secret of NIMH reference is hilarious. In our family the quote is "Move to the lee of the stone", but we're all redneck hay farmers.
Secret of NIMH mentioned!
Wargames had a PS1 game called Wargames Defcon One and I had it. Still have it lmao
Oh man this episode is so good. My broken brain needed that ridiculous Clavicular episode and this one.
Please Jack may I have some more?
Reminds me of Endorfun. A desktop game I know I played in the mid 90’s, just rolling a glowing cube around and changing colors on the screen. We were semi-addicted to it. My friends and I swore it was brain washing us. I’ve never been able to find it again since high school.
I swear they’ve already done this episode
Me too, I was scanning the comments to see if anyone else mentioned it. I’m not sure how I’d have already heard of this topic before otherwise
Unc's will say "I needed this." And its just a video game conspiracy episode of QAA. Also, I knew Jake was gonna day Lethal Enforcers.
Honestly. I was grinning like hell about area 51 and silent scope. Loved those. I remember when pizza hits all an area 51 cabinet. In my area anyway
Oy.
The mall where I grew up in Illinois had one of the last namco arcades
enough with the premiums i don't have that money
Jack! Jack! Jack!
One of the first podcasts I ever listened to (circa 2017-18) was a Radiotopia creepy limited series mockumentary one called The Polybius Conspiracy. I live in Portland and it has all kind of interesting local lore and texture. Cant recall exactly how but enjoying this series led me to Qanon Anonymous podcast soon after
I swear you guys always crack me up regardless of my mood 😭🖤
everyone clowns on jake but at least he's earnest and not flipping out over a light hearted joke about patrons canceling
Buddy no one was flipping out. Travis is the straight man its literally his job in the dynamic not to put up with stuff it's part of the bit lol
Jack is a great guest. Also Julian and Jake are such a perfect combo.
Wooo 'MechWarrior mentioned!
Shut up Jake! 🤭
In 2006 I played Kidō Senshi Gundam: Senjō no Kizuna when it first came out, and it gave me a nausea inducing migraine, and didn’t exactly put me off video games but I went back to the safety of the Tekkan franchise. Men in black suits were watching, but I think they were mostly there for the pachinko players.
Wait were you in Japan? Yakuza maybe?
Hell yeah Jack
As a nw resident and fan of radiotopia's take on this I look forward to this treat!
Polybius was MK Ultra for 80s skids
Love secret of nimh. My kids just can't get into it, though. Sad.
Yes the holographic cowboy game! And you would hit the button and nothing would happen and this Merlin character would run in a circle spouting nonsense about rewinding time!
Nimh- wasn’t that national institute for mental health?
Yes it is. There are also rats.
Polybiussy
H Y
Poly by us
Oh hell yeah.
Hell yeah