"The Start" is the series premiere of the animated web series Epic Minigames. The episode was directed, written, produced and animated by creator Anthony O'Gallagher. It was released on July 2, 2012. The episode follows Damaris, who has been trying to develop and create his own game show, a project he has long been interested in as a child. After being turned down several times in a row and even kicked out once, he attempted to start his own game show and show to everyone that he is better without them.
Despite the fact that "The Start" had no challenges at all and that the actual series didn't start until "Avalanche," an episode that would be published two months later, "The Start" is the first episode of the first series (in the game) known as "Survival Games." Epic Minigames' development started in late 2010, and by January 2012, production had started.
"The Start" had been positively received by fans of the series.
Plot
An adult who is quiet yet content, Damaris is voiced by Anthony O'Gallagher. He was motivated to participate in the same way ever since the day he first watched a TV game show. He made the decision to develop ideas for his own TV program as an adult after deciding to base it on a TV series he had watched as a child. When preparing his first pitch, he first worries a lot that it won't be accepted by the studio he wants to work with, but before he was invited to meet with the producers, he started to worry more about his future, and ultimately he went in. He was rejected, as he had expected, along with the majority of the people he had met earlier today. However, before he stormed out in frustration, one of the producers asked him if it would take time for his idea to be approved. In reality, he meant that he "could never" get his show approved; as he later revealed, most of the people they met had given up and moved on to new lives.
By the end of the month, he had pitched to more than five studios, all of which had rejected his material. Damaris then made the decision to visit his last studio, where he would instead focus on developing the game alone and without help if he were to get another rejection. He chatted with the producers in the studio before presenting the broad concept and idea for his new game show. The producers then made the decision to eject him due to the fact that his game show was not permitted in their studio at all and that they were only interested in producing films, TV shows, and other types of entertainment, but not game shows, for which all of their prior attempts to develop one had failed. He got into a fight after becoming enraged and was eventually ejected. He was upset by this, so he made the decision to go home and start designing his brand-new game show lobby. When Damaris arrived at the destination, which was outside of the city, he started making plans in the lobby after gathering his supplies. Due to a severe lack of funding, Damaris was forced to build the entire game show by himself after the workers claimed they were unpaid and left him alone. He had initially started to raise money for his game show and had paid $5,000 of his money to get some workers to start working on the new game show.
The lobby and the minigames that Damaris had earlier devised were then put into construction. The construction procedure took two years in all, and by the time he was completed, he was too exhausted to continue. Then Damaris enters the lobby for the first time in its whole and beams. Damaris then turned to face the sky while wearing a dazzling yellow clothes that he had stolen two years before, before uttering the words "Here I go" to bring the episode to a close.
Release and reception
"The Start" was released publicly as the first episode in Epic Minigames on Youtube on July 2, 2012 and was marketed as the beginning for the series (in the game) known as "Survival Games". The episode had been mostly positively received by fans of the series.