Page 24 - Old School Gamer Magazine Issue #42 FREE Edition

While both Showbiz and Chuck E. Cheese used Atari hardware, CEC lived and died by it, and it’s reported that in a single year, Bushnell’s pizza place lost $15 million.
Ironically, Bushnell’s attempt to recover cost the business $50 million over time, and once it was apparent Chuck E. Cheese couldn’t recover, the business filed for Chapter 11 bankruptcy on March 29, 1984. Robert Brock took the opportunity, purchasing their competitors and completely turning the tables on the pizza arcade wars. Chuck E. Cheese was enveloped under the Showbiz banner, now called Showbiz Pizza Time Inc. Surprisingly, the locations kept their Cheese-y theming, with The Pizza Players and the Rock-afire Explosion existing in tandem.
For the next five years, things continued in this way, but corporate greed pushed the continued existence of Showbiz as it stood into the abyss.
In 1989, Aaron Fechter was asked to give the rights for Rock-afire Explosion to Showbiz Pizza Time Inc. No monetary compensation was offered. Fechter declined, feeling that the characters had the ability to go beyond playing in the restaurants. Fechter was planning live shows, cartoons, albums, and much more, and wished to have creative control and to receive
a cut of the profits. In response, Showbiz Pizza Time Inc. removed the band from their locations and began to center their focus on Chuck E. Cheese and his friends.
The animatronics were re-skinned to be Munch’s Make-Believe Band, a more kid-friendly version of the Pizza Players.
The Rock-afire Explosion animatronics were either repurposed or destroyed. Finding any non-ruined, working examples of the characters was a rare sight, but a small group of fans had nostalgia for them. An online group, gathering on sites such as ShowBizPizza.com, worked together to rescue any leftover animatronics.
The fandom continued to grow thanks to a super-fan named Chris Thrash, who collected a full set of the band and programmed his own shows, releasing YouTube videos
of Billy Bob and crew covering songs such as “Love in this Club”
by Usher. A documentary on this fandom, the previously mentioned The Rock-afire Explosion, was released in 2008, focusing on both Fechter’s innovations and Thrash’s enthusiasm for the history of the band. The documentary is available on YouTube. The Rock-afire Explosion still plays shows today
at a restaurant called Billy Bob’s Wonderland in Barboursville, West Virginia, giving superfans a place to travel to and see the animatronics work in person.
Chuck E. Cheese continued to
exist as a staple of childhood birthdays for the next few decades, continuing to put on shows with their animatronics. Even with new forms of technology, Munch’s Make- Believe Band was in almost every location. It wasn’t until 2017 that
the tech was retired, and current restaurants only have a costumed Chuck E. walking around to greet children as they play games. During the COVID-19 pandemic, Chuck E. Cheese locations survived by selling their pizza on food order apps
under the name Pasqually’s, letting nostalgic adults have a bite of their childhood during a trying time.
Now, children see animatronics as both creepy and cool. Five Nights
at Freddy’s uses characters that were obviously inspired by both bands, initially positing the robots as killer machines, but recently putting them into a more positive light. Glamrock Freddy in the
game Security Breach protects the child protagonist, and he’s seen singing and playing instruments much like his predecessors. The initial association with horror
may have soured society’s view of animatronic bands, and it’s to be seen if a mainstream future exists for them. Locations such as Billy Bob’s Wonderland keep the spirit alive, and the fandom will always exist thanks to people like Chris Thrash and Aaron Fechter’s work at Creative Engineering, which is still working to make new experiences today.
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