Exploring military authenticity with Old Glory Studios: Weapons and Warfare

Hello, and welcome to another episode of Weapons and Warfare for Straight Arrow News

I'm your host, Ryan Robertson, and this week, guys, we have something special for you

A conversation with one of the creative forces behind Old Glory Studios

Started by combat veterans and experienced game developers, Louis Manilow and Matt Patak

Old Glory Studios boasts more than 25 years of expertise in the gaming industry

Before starting Old Glory, Manilow and Patak helped create some of the most

renowned tactical shooter games out there, some of my favorites, infusing their real-life experiences into the game development process

So, ahead of their release, Victory's Grave outflank, a squad-based shooter that's set in a post-apocalyptic version of 1980s Eastern Europe

I sat down with Lewis to talk about his journey to becoming a video game developer

All right, Lewis Manilow, thank you so much for joining us today. Co-founder of Old Glory Studios

also an Army veteran. You served with the 82nd Airborne in Afghanistan

and truth be told man you worked on some of my favorite games the Tom Clancy Ghost Recon series

you did Wildlands and Breakpoint you're a writer on those so I have a lot of questions for you

I'm really excited that we get a chance to talk to you but first and foremost how does a guy go

from you know jumping out of airplanes to making video games about people jumping out of airplanes

into war zones. Well, not on purpose. So let me go there

Thank you for having me, first of all. But yeah, so actually my background is actually in film and TV

So I went to NYU film school and I graduated that in 99

So I was actually already working a little bit in the industry, working in, you know, like doing sound recording jobs, a shot a documentary and stuff

You know, I had, yeah, like entry level games. I was like, we'll hold the tripod for the entertainment tonight career that went to whatever opening, you know

Like joining the military was really far from my mind. I mean, like I'd had relatives who'd served, you know, like my mother's father was like a guerrilla fighter in the Philippines in World War II

You know, my father's mother like got the GI Bill for something which in the Philippines, which no one will actually like really talk about

So I don't really know what, you know, what that was. Then, you know, like I had an uncle who was a Marine and another one who was, you know, like in the Navy

So, yeah, like that it's like it was part of my family's kind of thing

But it wasn't what anything I was going to do. But, you know, like I said, I went to NYU and then afterwards I moved to Jersey City, which is just across the street, across the Hudson River

Right. So on September 11th, like I watched the World Trade Center fall from my window, you know, so

So that's why I enlisted. And then, you know, I did end up going to Afghanistan a couple of times

But then when I got out, I tried to get back into film and film again and writing

um so basically like after a couple years I was um you know I was doing some uh producing for

documentary films but I also was still writing um and I had a reading of a play I wrote uh

and uh an old friend of mine came and saw it but he happened to be working at Ubisoft at the time

um and then like just knowing my background you know where I served and but I also the

documentaries I'd shot had produced had been shot in South America, right? Like specifically in

Columbia. So at the time, like Ubisoft was very much into authenticity and he's like

hey, you know, we're working on this game, like Ghost Recon Wildlands. It's about these

operators who are like fighting a drug cartel in South America. You want to write some stuff for us

You know, and it was like, it was really a good fit. You know, like when I, as soon as I started

I was able to send him like an interview I we'd had done with like a cocolero in Columbia

You know what I mean? And basically, I really enjoyed that experience, like working with him

And then after, you know, basically, I just kind of stayed on that that's franchise for a few more years

So, yeah. And then, you know, like, you know, I'm still writing other things as well

But basically, like I'm all in on video games. you bet well you know man like we've come a long way since uh like you work on you know tactical

shooters and stuff the first shooter was what like duck hunt that i probably played you know

we've come a long way since then right we don't have to blow in a cartridge anymore to get it to

work it's great um but you like you you mentioned the authenticity uh that ubis ubisoft was was

looking after or looking for um and you were able to bring that so i i kind of want to dive into that

a little bit more the game itself man like you know video games have good stories you know like

the the cut scenes and stuff like that like you know my wife comes in and she's like oh it's a

cut scene i can talk to you i'm like no no like i fought so i can hear what this person's about to

say like you know what i mean like you you feel vested in these characters right um how much of

your real life was you know interjected in it how much of it was it art imitating life and how much

of it was just like i've never actually seen this but man it's gonna look really cool like how much

how much of his reality verse make-believe sure so um again like the my mandate on ghost recon

wildlands was like reality was realism you know so um as a writer you know a lot of the story and

a lot of the characters had already been created by like don winslow uh you know writer of power

the dog and all these books um so like i didn't create like much much of that but i did write a

lot of the uh dialogue that ends up in the game so like and it like i don't know how like for

people who aren't familiar with the franchise like it's kind of the dialogue is kind of the

something that divides people there was a sergeant bookhart with the rangers when i was in the sandbox back in 03. because you know people who've served they're like crap that's how really that's

really how people speak you know what i mean but the way people really speak isn't the way people

you often see people you know military people like speak in movies and in other video games you know

so like that's the thing too for better or worse like i've made it like as real as i could you know

like uh like i served in brags i made like jokes about like certain areas of brag like area j which

is like where we'd always have to go run in like through sand and stuff you know things like that

I throw in. And that's stuff that like only people who have served and only people have come through

brag like that's an Easter egg that I would never get. You know what I mean? But but that's a that's

an authentic level that you know for the guys who have been through it or know about it or or gals

you know they they see it they hear it and they're like yep you know what I mean does that make you

feel like you know you're not you're not making crap you're making something that the people who

have actually done this stuff would be like yeah that's that's accurate well yeah sure like

authenticity is like that's definitely like kind of the one of the things that I definitely want

to bring like especially for you know the the military um but it's you know like all the fan

reactions are great you know what I mean like that that's sort of the thing so I know that probably

99.9% of the people who play the game don't don't know what area j is you know what i mean but like

just by the way that the people in the way that the characters talk about it you know like you the

there should be something that is conveyed to the people that feels real you know what i mean even

though it's like you know uh i'm trying to think of how else to another way to explain it but like

The joke specifically was there's parts where you drive around. You can basically drive like crazy in Ghost Recon Wildlands

You can drive up mountains and down the Andes and stuff. But basically I had some joke where people just go oh yeah it just like mudding in Area J You know what I mean Which is like which you weren really allowed to do but like on Monday runs or something or like if we go like on walking through there we always end up seeing some truck that somebody got stuck in the mud you know what I mean

Like up to the tops of its like wheel wells, you know? So, but it's something, there are details like that that feel real, you know what I mean

even uh even though they're there may be obscure to people who are in the military themselves you

know you bet i want to i want to kind of um double tap on the realism aspect of it because there

there are uh possibilities out there that the united states could potentially find itself in a

conflict with the drug cartels uh of of south america and and central and uh latin america you

know so having worked on a game like wild lands having served in the military um you know it how

much of it would be like those soft units going in making those local connections you know you

gotta you gotta help this guy because they're fighting you know what i mean like the when you

play a game like wild lands or um breaking point like there's the tactical level of it and also

So you got to you got to make friends. You got to make allies. Right. Because you're going to need those folks to help fight because it's it's not the America

It's not the 82nd Airborne dropping in. It's, you know, four or five guys here and there

Is that would that be how an actual conflict with the cartels might play out, in your opinion

I mean, I think for a lot of people, it might be like the fantasy version of how it would play out, you know

or if you're in the cartel, it might be the nightmare version of it, you know

Because definitely like the way that we tried to set up things in terms of the way that the missions flowed and even some of the some of the kind of Easter eggs we drop in the dialogue would allude to ways that operations would actually have worked

like for example in theater in afghanistan you know like we make little nods so the activity

you know which i think they go by a totally different name now but that's you know basically

the people who are out there gathering intel which then the operators uh use to uh for their

missions um but again like i think because you know a lot of these countries are straight up

allies you know what i mean i as in terms of the governments are allies uh it's probably going to

be pretty different. I mean, honestly, from again, like I don't know any more than anybody else you

like pays attention to the news, you know what I mean? But from my perspective, it, I would suspect

that the real benefits to declaring a cartel like a terrorist organization come from the fact that

now less people can actually work with them, you know, so and especially on the US side of the

border. You know what I mean? Like if you were, if you were, or happened to be someone who was

corrupt and let's say taking payments from the cartel, you're going to have to think about the

like the consequences of getting caught are going to be a lot different now, you know, or let's say

you're like a, you know, like a, a lot of, because they can't use your normal banking systems, like

a lot of dispensaries in some States, like they end up being like, they launder money for cartels

You know what I mean? But now it's like, oh, you're, now you're laundering money for a terrorist

you know yeah so it's a it's a really different the consequences are totally different now um

that's where i think like the real the the you know the a lot of the real differences are going

to be made in terms of the enforcement um but then also you know like you can see like it also

empowered the military to act very quickly you know like the 82nd airborne is already down there

like within 18 hours they were down at the border you know so all right let's go back into

uh video game territory a little bit more now um when we're talking about like the making sure that

the dialogue is there the nods to um guys would serve and that kind of thing um so much of you

know obviously shooter games third person first person is the weaponry um how much effort did you

you know a how much how much involvement did you have in making sure that the weapons that made it

of the game you know were true to form um and would would look and feel as much as you can when

you're playing on a you know on a control pad right um but when you're like the reload and the

sound like how much of that did you how much input did you have in that aspect of the games

okay sure so uh for the actual mechanics of how it feels the the like juice of the game like

that's that's a whole different team and that's like a really specialized thing and that's why

In some games, it feels amazing. And in other games, it might just feel a little bit off

You know what I mean? But it's part of the three Cs, which is basically how your character interacts with the world

So that's very specialized. I did, however, work very closely with the authenticity team that Ubisoft had at the time

He's no longer there, but the guy, Travis, who was like, I met him while working on this

and we're like still friends you know what I mean like years later so we worked together pretty

closely and you know I ended up writing I actually I wrote almost all the menus that are in the game

so the weapons descriptions as well so a lot of that stuff too it'd be like you know I'd have to

call them up and be like this isn't real is it you know what I mean like you can't have like a

I don't know like the the upper of a 249 on the lower of a m4 right you know what I mean and then

So, yeah, there's definitely stuff that's not real, definitely stuff that's exaggerated

But then, you know, there's definitely an effort, especially on Wildlands that I know of, to really make the guns feel real, to base them on actual guns

So if I can kind of take us on a tangent, like, there's basically been like an effort in the game industry to not license guns from actual gun manufacturers, you know

which is, it's kind of ironic, I think, you know, so many games are shooter games, but at the same time, you know

they're like, oh, well, we're not going to give any money to the, you know

these evil gun manufacturers. We're just going to copy their designs and call them something else, you know

So that's, that's where a lot of the, honestly, so that was sort of like the, the leak, I guess

in authenticity started there. And now there's even, there's less and less authenticity, I think, in a lot of military games

Yeah, you know, you look at Call of Duty, arguably one of the most popular first-person shooter games

Absolutely. You know, my kids play it, and I watched my 14-year-old

play it the other day, and there's like the skins, you know what I mean, that they're wearing now

and it's like, is that Santa Claus and his reindeer running down with an AK

Like, what's going on here? No, like you could play as like Cheech Marin in there now

and stuff yeah yeah which so that's i mean that's that's that's a a layer of gaming it's not for

everybody you know what i mean like i what i enjoyed about um you know the games that you

worked on was was kind of the realism of it and your your co-founder uh he worked on division one

and division two i'm literally replaying division two right now because there's the new dlc coming

out i'm like i i gotta you know remember how everything goes right um but you uh you know

Let's let's go to what you guys are doing now. Right. Old Glory Studios

This is, you know, you and your co-founder. Patak. Matt Patak. Right. Matt Patak. Yeah. Patak. Yeah

You guys, he's also a veteran. You guys decided to come together, create

create a new studio for you guys to make the things that you love to make

Right. So what describe what kind of games you're working on right now

there's the you have your one um the main one right the the show runner as it were um that

we're hoping that you know build it into a franchise hopefully so walk me through what

old glory's doing right now okay sure so you know like we were talking about a lot of games now

games that used to be this kind of like feel kind of authentic but you know we're still very

accessible they gone kind of further closer to more like fortnite kind of cartoony kind of games You know you can play a Snoop Dogg which is fun You know what I mean When you have your like blinging AK looking type gun and everything

But it doesn't feel real at all. You know what I mean? But then on the other side, there are games, let's say like Arma or Squad, which they go hardcore with the realism

you know and it's and depending on who you're playing with like it might end up feeling it

feels like you're almost doing like reenactments you know what i mean or like you're you're basically

playing in a museum kind of thing you know so basically there's this there's this big hole in

the market you know and it's the games that we love you know um so our what we're trying to do

is make combat games that feel you know very authentic you know like we were talking about

with Ghost Recon, Wildlands. But then at the same time, they're still very accessible as well

You know, like they're not going to be like as intense into like the, they're not going to be as rigorous

with the authenticity as like some of the like squad or at least some of the players in those kinds of games

might take things, you know, like, oh, you would never reload your gun like that in 1942

you know, things like that, you know. So to sort of bridge that gap and still create gameplay that's still kind of fun and basically pretty raw, really, we set up this world where basically it's called Victory's Grave

And kind of in the middle of the Cold War in 1984, like in the winter, there's this huge blackout, right

So electricity goes off all over the world, right? So now you have soldiers on both sides of the Iron Curtain, like NATO and Warsaw Pact

They don't know what's going on. Each side thinks we're getting attacked by the other. So, like, they just, you know, get reduced to Joe logic

So they just shoot. You know, they just start shooting everything. So a war breaks out

But, you know, like, because, like, the Soviet Union, you know, as we know now, they didn't really have as many supplies

They weren't quite as, like, as strong as the front they put on

You know, like, NATO ends up pushing to the east. but then eventually like you know the Soviet Union just kind of crumbles you know but then

so the Cold War has been won but now we're just left in this kind of wasteland where all these

soldiers are stranded in the middle of everywhere so some become bandits you know some try to become

warlords others like still try to like go on with the mission that they had before and within this

context of Victory's Grave our first game that we're putting together is called Victory's Grave

Outflank. And Outflank is a team-based PvP game where it's five people versus five

in an asymmetrical kind of warfare, but out in the countryside. So one group will hold a town, and there's

an objective in the town, and another group of five have to attack

and take over. And it's also round-based because I'm in my 40s, I got kids

you want to spend time with, you know, and we know a lot of other people like that too. Right. So

basically like, it'll be like divided into, uh, 10 minute rounds and the first team to win three

of those rounds by holding that town in the center, they went. So how deep are you going into

um, I mean, you're talking about like the complexities and it's, you know, oh, I got a

new gun in this game. Well, what scope do you want? What do you want on the underbarrel? Do you

want to silence or a suppressor do you want to like and all all the different options and everything

and then as you know all the quests and the side quests and some people really like it some people

don't like how deep into that type of of stuff are you guys going into so in a traditional like

triple a game like ghost recon wildlands or the division um it would be a game that tried to be

all things to all people right so like you're saying like before like there's cinematics in

there but you also have pvp but then you might have an open world where you can take over like

different bases and things right but you know what i learned uh i was really surprised and learned

this when i was working on ghost recon wildlands like not everybody likes to play everything you

know like specifically in ghost recon there are some people who are just really hardcore about

just the pvp you know but meanwhile like i'd spent like you know years or whatever writing all this

narrative stuff like right and we'd shoot and we'd shot all these cinematics and they would just skip

them as fast as they could, you know? So for us, you know, it makes sense, you know, as players

like, why would we pay for something that we don't, that we're never going to want? You know

what I mean? So it's just like, you know, like if we, if, like, if you had basic cable, you know

like I'm watching all the Clint Eastwood movies on TNT, but I'm not watching CNN. Why am I paying

for cnn you know what i mean so um that's our idea of splitting up uh this this one big uh project

that's in you know a narrative that goes across different games but that like first we'll have

in the pvp game later this year we're hoping to work on to start pre-production on just the

narrative part so basically each game will be like very narrow and focused you know so it's really

just going to be pvp like team based for outflank um but in terms of like personalization and stuff

like we were talking about like one of the reasons we did set it in the 80s was to limit the technology

um because it's kind of like at a certain point like and this is one of the lessons that i think

i learned from uh ghost recon breakpoint like drones aren't fun you know like fighting on a

battlefield with drones it's not it it's just it's it's not the same kind of experience as if

you guys if it's just you know the players and like trying to see you know trying to find out

where the other players are the image that's coming to my mind when you're describing the

gameplay and everything is like old school bond 007 on n64 you know what i mean it's like that's

the you got your gun i got mine yeah around you know what i mean that's the feel that that's the

feel that we want to have you know that kind of fun you know like yeah um like old school old call

of duty like where there's yeah you know the courtyard and there's like two gun options good

luck right i mean that's pretty yeah like more or less like like uh for me it was less called

dude but it was like halo you know what i mean like in the in the barracks we would literally

like we'd run cables like between like the barracks rooms and then it would just go like

four on four, like in that little red versus blue horseshoe that they had, you know

Yeah. So, but yeah, like that's, yeah. And that's, that's what we think is fun, you know

And, you know, like a lot of, you know, games with bigger budgets, you know, from like really

established, uh, IP, you know, properties, franchises, you know, they're probably going

to go really deep into it with the bells and whistles and stuff. But if a game's still not fun, it's just not fun

Right. so how like i i there's i saw on your website that there's a an island on fortnight like fortnight

island sure but if there's if there's people who want to play this right now is that an option or

is it just like uh you know you have your beta testers and then once the game is is ready for

for sale then then folks like where are we at in that process right now okay so um right now with

Outflank, we're working on the vertical slice, which is basically one level. It's one

combat map on Battlefield. Right now, we're working towards raising funds so that we can basically fund the rest

of the production. The Fortnite Island, that was basically we wanted to experiment with some ideas

We wanted to test some ideas out and see how they worked in the public. and like it's really yeah well it's a really yeah it's a very it's a very easy place to an

affordable place to like prototype something and just to put it right in front of like millions of

people you know what i mean so basically one of the things one of the pillars of victory's grave

is that it's there's a survival aspect to it you know what i mean so okay so what happens if we put

people in this, you know, in a PVP situation where they can build some stuff, you know

but not a lot of stuff, not as much as usual when they're doing Fortnite. And we give them a lot less bullets, right

So that was basically the experiment there And like you know people played it for a couple of days you what i mean um but we also learned a heck a lot about how to about player retention with that

as well um but it was you know there are learnings from that and then you know the island's still up

uh there probably aren't very many people visiting it these days but um you know we were we were

basically it was also a test for us to see like okay well how can we can we release something

You know, and it was a Fortnite item, you know, it's not anything to, you know, for the history books, but it is something that we were able to do

So, sure, sure. So we're in the process of getting getting the funding going for, you know, to complete the first round of production

um you know the the accessibility that it seems like game developers have nowadays

you know it seems i don't do it but it seems like what you're describing is it's a lot more open um

that the industry is a lot more you know just like with music and a lot of other uh content

creation avenues like you know more people have access to to be able to do these things now is

that accurate i mean 100 it's 100 accurate i think um there are a lot of different tools that make

uh game development more accessible to people um like different game engines that make it easier

like you don't need to be a master of c plus plus to be able to ship a game anymore um you know i

don't know what that means but i'm saying yes yeah yes exactly so the quality of these games is kind

you know like just you know it's it varies let me say you know what i mean um but that said like i

think it's at the end of the day i think it's a good thing that people have access to this stuff

you know like um coming from publishing you know we're sorry because i i also did uh i was a book

store manager for a while you know so coming from that side and also a buyer um just and it was right

when Amazon was coming out, you know? So I was working at a store when the iPad came out

you know what I mean? Yeah. So, but even then, like, you know

like it's not like books are gone, you know what I mean? But the difference now is that like

Markets changed. Yeah, the market's changed. Like there's this whole like, you know

separate market now of just people self-publishing, you know what I mean? So, and like they'll publish like huge fantasy series

that no one's ever heard of unless you're like reading that series and for that like those few

thousand people like that's awesome you know that's their jam and it you know makes that writer a

living so yeah you bet you know obviously i i would imagine i'm going to go out on a limb here

that you hope more than a few thousand uh end up playing outflank and uh we hope that we hope that

happens for you um thank you when uh you know in a few months from now uh or however long it takes

So will you come back and give us an update about where we're at so our audience can know where and when and how they can play this

Oh, absolutely. I mean, right now, actually, the game is we have a Steam page, Victory's Grave Outflank

So just go on Steam. Please wish list it. Give it a follow. And then, you know, if you want to support us, you know, and just learn out more about the studio, you can go to oldglorystudios.us

You bet. I guess I should have asked this earlier, uh, without flank is, are you, is it going to be a console agnostic or are you, you know, you mentioned halo earlier. Is it, is it going to be an Xbox exclusive or PlayStation exclusive

right now we're we're focusing on the pc release um that is where you know like we i spoke earlier

about the kind of more hardcore you know like military sim simulator kind of players and

they're all in there and that's kind of who we feel would be like our first adopters really you

know we you know like those games are too difficult for me you know what i mean but

I figure there has been a desire from that niche. Those people, they would like to have some kind of eSport

That's a milsim kind of eSport. And this checks that box for them

But then also, a lot of people don't know. It's actually quite expensive

It can become quite expensive to port your game to other systems, to other platforms

And right now, it's preventative for us. We're absolutely not against it

you know, like, yeah. Um, you know, like whether it be like PlayStation, Xbox, or even mobile

you know, like, uh, those are all things that, that we're definitely considering. And, you know

we kind of plan ahead for the possibility of that kind of thing. Um, like, especially in, uh, like

game menus and stuff, the, the UI there, like you can tell when some game it's just like, well

this would be easy to navigate if I had a mouse, but now that I have a controller, I can't do

anything you know so gotcha i guess yeah that's a level of complexity that you don't really

think about unless you're making the thing right yeah and that's the thing we we don't want people

to have to you know we don't want players to have to be to have to have the reaction of just like oh

i should have got this on pc so i could actually like navigate yeah you know so you bet makes sense

makes sense all right sir really appreciate your time thank you so much uh and you know like i said

earlier when you have an update for us, when we, when, when outflank has

is out there for the masses, uh, you know, writ large, let us know and we'll let, let our audience know

All right. Awesome. All right. Appreciate it. Thank you, sir. We'll be right back

Real quick, I want to thank Lewis for sharing his time and his story with us

If you're interested in helping Lewis and Brian fund their ambitions, you can just go to Old Glory Studios' website on your screen

and find the link in the story below. And that's going to just about do it for us on this week's episode of Weapons and Warfare

But before we say adieu, I'm going to spend a few more minutes talking about gaming

If you couldn't tell by that previous segment, I'm a gamer. Video games, board games, yard games

If there's competition involved, I am there for it. Games are great, because yeah, they're fun

I mean, duh, right? But games are also highly informative. They can teach us a lot about ourselves and our world

When we were at this year's Modern Day Marine Expo in DC, I saw a booth that really stood out from the rest

because unlike all the other vendors featuring weapons, vehicles, drones, electronic warfare devices

or other items meant for the battlefield, the Mission Match booth featured a kid's game

Based on the old memory matching game, the purpose is to find matching cards

But Mission Match also features characters from the U.S. service branches. And since it's 2025, there are also QR codes on some of those cards

which take players to sites with all sorts of history and information about different US service organizations

Now, Mission Match isn't available for commercial sale just yet. The people behind it are still in the process of bringing it to market

But I think the idea behind the game is awesome. The United States of America is such a wonderful nation for so many reasons

and while it's not perfect, we can't let the good we do be forgotten by future generations

And if kids can have some fun while learning about that history

and start thinking of ways that they can contribute themselves, all the better

For senior producer Brett Baker, video editor Brian Spencer, and graphics artist Dakota Patio

I'm Ryan Robertson, Mestradero News, signing off