Neal Mueller, 27, is no stranger to gaming. Nor is he a stranger to mountain climbing. It was only recently that he ever thought to put the two of his hobbies together on his expedition to Mount Everest. Along with fellow climber Chris Grubb, 25, Mueller ascended Mount Everest some 29,000 feet above sea level. When he wasn’t scaling walls of ice, he was enjoying his Nintendo DS which, despite rugged conditions like below freezing temperatures, lasted through the entire duration of the trip without fail. Mueller was able to take some time out of his busy schedule to have a talk with Advanced Media about games, mountains, and how much he sucks at Madden. Read on!
The following is a transcript of a phone conversation carried out between Neal Mueller and AMN’s Shawn Sinclaire on Saturday, June 25th.
Neal Mueller and Chris Grubb. Gamers on a mission to conquer the tallest mountains on all seven continents. Six down, one to go.
___________________________
AMN: So, to start this off, give us a little information about yourself.
Neal: Sure. Well, my name is Neal Mueller and I grew up in Minnesota. I went to school at the University of Pennsylvania, in Pennsylvania. I worked ever since I graduated there in 2000; I’ve worked on the East Coast and in Europe. I really got into climbing when I was living in Boston, I made good friends with a guy named Chris Grubb who worked at the same firm I’d worked in and we did a lot of climbing up in New Hampshire. When our company transferred us both to Europe, we got into a lot of climbing there and did a lot of the mountains and the Alps. I really kind of fell in love with it (mountaineering) then. Then we decided in 2001 that we wanted to see the tallest mountains on all seven continents and we’ve been doing that ever since. So, with Everest, I’ve done the tallest mountain on 6 continents.
AMN: What’s the one you have left?
Neal: Australia. A mountain called Kosciuszko.
AMN: That sounds pretty awesome.
Neal: Yeah, I’m doing that one in December.
AMN: So when exactly did you make the trip up Mount Everest?
Neal: Our expedition lasted from March 28th until June 9th. My summit occurred on 9am on June 2nd.
AMN: That’s a long expedition. And while you were on the climb, you brought the Nintendo DS with you, right? What made you think to do that on this climb?
Neal: I never really put a lot of thought into it…It kind of came out of misery [Laughs]. We were actually in Antarctica in January of this year, 2005, to climb the tallest mountain there. It was a pretty gnarly vacation. And so Chris and I were there together and so our Russian cargo jet didn’t arrive on time to pick us up, so we were totally stuck in Antarctica and it’s desolate. The climate…there’s just nothing there. Very few people, and we had a very small tent, there wasn’t much to do. So, you know, we talked a lot and played some cards, built an ice cave for fun, but that all got kind of boring. We vowed never to get stuck in that situation again. So, when we came back in February I thought: you know it might be crazy, I can’t imagine Nintendo would sponsor us, but may as well check and see. Oh but they jumped all over it. They said it was a pretty cool idea, so they gave us like twelve systems and we brought those systems to Everest and lent them out to a lot of people to use at base camp. Even the Sherpas, who are the indigenous race there at the base of Mount Everest, used the systems too and had a blast with them and so yeah, it was awesome. And you know they’re wireless, so we could use them between tents and they’re extremely rugged. We had things break like you wouldn’t believe. You know, like we had a computer screen break, we had several computer hard drives malfunction and we had multiple MP3 players fail, watches fail, all kinds of CD radios fail and those were kind of important.
Somewhere in all this stuff there are 12 Nintendo DS systems, all of which will be able to survive the rugged conditions.
AMN: Do a lot of gadgets like that break purely because of the height and temperature of where you were at?
Neal: Yeah and it was funny because a lot of the important things failed. None of the DS machines failed. They’re just amazingly rugged devices that aren’t susceptible to the high wind, the extreme cold down to like minus forty Fahrenheit, moisture, wetness, getting bounced around. We had them in our backpacks and we sit on these backpacks when we’re taking a rest, so they get sat on and none of the screens had any denting or anything. They’re (Nintendo DS) just tanks.
AMN: Everest is what, 30,000 feet high right?
Neal: 29,000 feet.
AMN: Okay, 29,000 feet. How far up did you get to play the Nintendo DS? Were you able to play them at the summit?
Neal: No, we were at 26,000 feet.
AMN: 26,000 feet is still pretty impressive
Neal: Yeah, that’s the high camp. The highest place where you can set up a tent on Everest.
Neal takes some time off in one of the tents
AMN: How did you charge the systems there? The battery is strong, but it couldn’t have lasted the two whole months.
Neal: No we had solar cells. The solar cells come in and the power from them is converted into a standard 220 volt plug and then you just plug them in there. The battery lasts a lot longer than you might think though. We didn’t have any external battery packs or anything, we just used the standard. We had the standard machine, they weren’t even made rugged for us, they were just what you’d buy in Target or anywhere in the US and we just charged them like normal. They would last a good time depending on what we were playing and if we did Wi-Fi. You know, when you do Wi-Fi they don’t last as long.
AMN: So what games did you play the most?
Neal: Uh, we had three games up there. We had Madden; we played that a lot. You can play wirelessly between each other, so we did that a lot. My climbing partner (Chris Grubb) kicked my ass [Laughs] repeatedly. I think his longest streak was about a 40 game win streak, which is pretty embarrassing.
AMN: Wow.
Neal: But I like the game and I don’t mind playing even though he makes it easy for me to lose.
AMN: [Laughs]You might want to keep that information off the record.
Neal: [Laughing] Seriously. Hey, it has been on the record before so I don’t mind. But we also played Mario 64 and both won the game and saved the Princess, and then we played this game called Touched.
AMN: Wario Ware?
Neal: Yeah, there you go. Bingo. Oh, and there’s a fourth one too. Metroid. The one that comes with the DS, the one we could play multiplayer with up to four people. So that was pretty sweet to get four people cranking on that.
AMN: So exactly how hard was it to play? It’s obviously really cold up there, so did your fingers get numb and make it difficult to play?
Neal: When we played each other, we usually played in the dining tent so you know, that stayed pretty warm. Or if we were playing in the same tent, two people are enough to heat up a tent enough so you could do without wearing gloves. Late at night if I was in a tent at base camp, where we all have our own tents, I’d be trying to beat Mario 64 and my hands got really cold so I’d have to play it during the day. But during the day, you know the sun is so bright that it’s hard to see the screen so you end up bearing the pain of playing it [Laughs]. Your fingers end up getting really cold and so you try to play one handed, and it can just be a disaster.
AMN: How many times did you use that excuse when you got your butt kicked in Madden?
Neal (right) plays wirelessly with Chris (left). From what we know, it’s probably safe to assume Neal is losing. A lot.
Neal: Yeah, like, whenever I….well it was just bad. But you know, he would like even play as the 49ers and I would play as the Patriots. And the 49ers are a terrible team, or at least they’re represented so in Madden. Their stats are like 70 out of 100 in all areas. Offense, defense, all that, and their special teams suck. And I played the Patriots who are like a dynasty, they’ve won 3 out of the last 4 Super Bowls. And, they’re like 95 in all their stats. Offense, defense; their special teams are just sweet. You know, they never miss a field goal. So I’d play Patriots and he’s play 49ers and he would still wipe the floor with me. It was pretty embarrassing.
AMN: So it sounds like you found ways around the cold, but what about the oxygen deprivation. The air is thin up there, so did that make the games a little more trippy for you or anything?
Neal: Uhm, yeah, but we were both playing it suffering the same oxygen deprivation. But you can feel the dexterity decrease, especially in games like Mario 64 and [Wario Ware] Touched, which both require a lot of dexterity. Like, you know you can fall in the lava pretty easily in Mario if your brain is not working correctly. And on [Wario Ware] Touched, you need the ability to recognize objects quickly and react fast enough. You can feel yourself getting worse at it as you go up on the mountain. While you can do simply things like walk around and maintain conversation and you can’t tell that you’re hypoxic. Hypoxic means you have lower than average oxygen in your blood. That’s what happens when you’re up there. And you can’t really tell, it’s a lot like you’re drunk. You can’t always tell when you’re drunk. But when you try to do something like play video games where it constantly forces you to think and make decisions, you can feel that you’re suffering a detriment, no question. In my opinion it’s like being at a third grade level and encountering new things. It takes awhile to get used to it so you can perform on a pretty normal level.
The view is spectacular on Mount Everest. Does this look cold? Because it is.
AMN: Would you like to see a video game based on mountain climbing in the future or do you feel it’s a purely hands on kind of activity?
Neal: You know, actually there is one. I’ve seen it and it sucks. Oh, the reviews of it are just embarrassing.
AMN: [Laughs] I haven’t heard of it, what’s it called?
Neal: Uhm, Everest, it’s called. It’s out on the PC and it’s just a terrible game. I don’t know, they just didn’t do it right. If the game was done well, I think maybe it could be interesting but there are two things about mountain climbing. Really, it’s very boring [Laughs]. You know, you’re waiting around for weather a lot. Additionally, there’s a lot of repetitive actions like walking or hand over hand climbing and those are the kind of things not well suited for video games. And there are better things to have video games about. Like, I don’t know, maybe one from the Civil War or something interesting like that. Strategy games and stuff, those are pretty cool.
AMN: Were you a pretty avid gamer before this trip?
Neal: Yeah, I did all kinds of gaming both as a boy, and since then. I play a lot of video games on the GameCube and the DS, and a lot of PC games over the internet. I like them a lot. All of those games like Police Quest and King’s Quest, and since then I’ve been involved in the Warcraft worlds and some of the awesome ones. And now the Nintendo games are getting even better as you can link them together.
AMN: Are you familiar with the game Ice Climbers?
Neal: Uhm, no…let me look it up on the computer.
AMN: It’s a very old NES game with two mountain climbers going up a slippery mountain, facing all kinds of dangers.
Neal: Oh, it’s ancient! I think I have played this I just didn’t know what it was called. I’ve totally played it, where you’re slipping and sliding around on the ice.
AMN: Was your trip up Everest anything like that?
Neal: Yeah, I’ve played this. [Laughs] Yeah, it’s nothing like this.
This is apparently nothing…
…like this. Looks like Nintendo isn’t so great at mountain climbing sims…
AMN: [Laughs] No crazy polar bears or anything flying at you, you weren’t whacking hammers every where?
Neal: No, not at all. No whacking hammers like Donkey Kong.
AMN: What about Pictochat? Did you use that at all to communicate between tents?
Chris works his way skyward.
Neal: Nah, we usually just scream. We only used it a couple times just for fun, and usually just to insult people. Well, not insulting, more humorous. Just little fun pictures of each other. And we’d usually just get like four people in the dining tent and just chat among us in range to, you know, like hit the other person, but you really just do it because you’re being funny. You do a lot of talking on Everest. We used April to climatize. In April, you have to use the whole month to get used to the altitude at camps one, two, and three. And in May, you kind of get ready for summit and wait for the summit window to open up so you can rush up the mountain, reach summit and feel that rush, and then come down as quickly as possible. You don’t want to stay there long and we spent all of May just waiting for weather so we had a lot of downtime, a lot of time to play the Nintendos. Most people summit around May 15th.
AMN: So do you have any future plans to return to Everest? Go back and climb again?
Neal: Yeah, we intend to return again and climb it from the North side. We’re not really sure, we kind of talked 2007. But we climbed Everest from the South side this year and I made it to the summit, but my friend Chris Grubb didn’t make it. He had a bad summit day, his oxygen malfunctioned. So you know, we want to fix the day up for him because he feels like the day is kind of broken.
AMN: Well, you’ve officially started what could be the new trend. Extreme gaming.
Neal: [Laughs] Hey, rock and roll.
AMN: [Laughs] Totally. So where would you like to take the DS next? You going 20,000 Leagues under the sea, or what’s your next Extreme DS outing you’d like to plan.
Neal: Well, I do a lot of mountain climbing so I’ll bring the DS there, no question. Well…my other hobbies….I like bicycling a lot, but you really can’t use it there. And I like dog sledding, but there’s really no time there. But yeah, on the downtime of all those activities it’s good to have something like that around. And you know, I like to do these activities with a lot of other people because it’s safer and less boring and at night, there’s always tons of downtime when you’re out at the bush. I mean, you like to look at the stars and look at the clouds but every once in awhile it’s nice to have a little civilization. So there’s a lot of times when it’s good to bring multiplayer things like this, you know. It’s like cards. You can only play Hearts so many times before you get sick and tired of Hearts. But with Nintendo, it takes a lot longer before it grows tiresome, especially when you can buy new games. So it’s a great way to pass the time together with whoever you brought on your trip.
AMN: What’s the next DS game that you look forward to bringing up a mountain the most?
Neal: I’m super stoked about all of the stuff they’ve got planned. I like the, you know, the Metroid type games. I’d like to see the DS come out with a few more strategy games. You know, games where you develop a character kind of like D&D [Dungeons & Dragons]. I’d like to see a couple of D&D games come out on the DS. You could like, play the multiplayer and then save, and you know. I think that would be really cool. I’d like to see some of those come out. They have them on all the other systems, I would just like to see one on the DS. That would be sweet. I’m also stoked about the Revolution, because you know, it’s going to incorporate all the DS games and the NES games, and the Super NES games, so I’m pretty stoked about that.
AMN: Well, that’s totally awesome man! Congratulations on your trip, and do you have any last words for any aspiring, gaming mountain climbers out there?
Neal: Oh, I don’t know. I think the DS is super rugged, so when you’re going somewhere where you’re going to beat the hell out of a game system and you don’t want to turn it into scrap metal, I’d recommend bringing the DS.
Congratulations and good luck to Neal and Chris as they continue their extreme gaming worldwide!
hi
