Hey folks, Harry here... The Legend of the Pit containing 3.5 Million Cartridges of the Atari classic, E.T. release. Many have been joking and jumping to an assumption that what was uncovered was a vast mountain of E.T. AICN had two great first hand Video Game Archeologists on hand. Wearing dustmasks and eye gear... the wisps of toxic ick... searching for a bit of our generational ROSEBUD... READY PLAYER ONE Author and FANBOYS Screenwriter Ernie Cline & AICN's own Tom Joad aka Jed Strahm (director of KNIFEPOINT)... well, they're kind of nuts... in that awesome way that have made them my friends for the past 17 years. Possessed by the legend of the E.T. Pit. Excited to be alive to see it uncovered. They went on a fairly fun journey to get there.
You see, Ernie Cline had loaned his spare DeLorean, deemed the ECTO88, to George RR Martin for his Sante Fe screening of BACK TO THE FUTURE, so he did... and he needed to pick it up - and well... The E.T. Pit excavation was going on - and Ernie was all about that - as well as checking out Roswell - as all good geeks should do. Ernie also needed his DRAGON EGG that he got in trade for the loan. WHAT A DEAL! Anyway - He picked up Strahm in El Paso and headed out for ALAMOGORDO. Ernie dressed in an Elliot Red Hoodie and a DIG DUG t-shirt arrived upon site in his mighty ECTO88!
I've been receiving hilarious updates from Cline & Strahm throughout their adventure... First there was the update that the dig had only reached the 90's... Then there was word of a newspaper being found with a headline about the legendary E.T. pit from the eighties. Then Saturday... with the sun high in the sky as the Video Game Archeologists digged... Indy and Sallah style through the trash of our ages. Then I began receiving photos through my phone of the heaps:
The dump is extensive - but thus far what they've discovered is a vast trove of EVERYTHING ATARI... STAR RAIDERS controllers, Indeed some sealed E.T. Cartridges shrink wrapped in their original boxes. Boxes and boxes of MISSILE COMMAND, DEFENDERS, ATARI CATALOGUES, Broken Crushed Consoles and there's... a ton of it. Probably tons. The city has come in - some of this is actually headed to the SMITHSONIAN as well as a local museum. The ATARI HEAPS... And still... perhaps we'll hear of 3.5 million E.T. cartridges... but there was a treasure trove of ATARI memories buried there... I am sure we'll all be hearing extensively about this moment. There's a documentary being filmed. I'm sure a book. Who knows what all this unearthing will belch into pop culture... But as a geek - this is all absolutely hysterical to me. Mainly because my chroniclers of it were Ernie & Jed.
Ernie even found a hunk of concrete that someone had written 1982 upon and took a photo with it... Behold our front line reporter from the dig!
You find out more from Ernie Cline himself over http://www.ernestcline.com/blog/ or at his Twitter! - They wanted you folks at AICN to have a look into the pit itself. Thanks Guys
