#150 The Billion Dollar Video Game w/ Charles Huang, Co-Creator of Guitar Hero

In #150, Michael Sikand sits down with Charles Huang, co-founder of Red Octane, the company behind the legendary Guitar Hero franchise. Starting the company alongside his brother Kai in the early 2000’s, the gaming startup began by designing hardware for music and dancing games like “Dance Dance Revolution” and “In The Groove”. Soon however, the brothers realized a massive opportunity in delivering music games to an American audience (they were primarily popular in Asia) that were deeply rooted in culture. Despite having to re-mortgage their houses to make it work, the brothers launched Guitar Hero in November 2005. The game was an instant success and within a year of launching the game, Red Octane was acquired for $100M by Activision. Guitar Hero went on to be the second-ever game to reach $1B in sales, being the world’s best-selling game in both 2007 and 2008. In this episode, Charles shares lessons, stories, and insights from an entrepreneurial journey building a product that rocked the world. He also explains why Guitar Hero faded away from its massive success and provides career advice to young entrepreneurs. This is a must listen!

You Can Now Watch Interviews on YouTube: https://bit.ly/3hAS9IE

Subscribe to Our Future Newsletter: http://bit.ly/ourfuturenewsletter

Purchase Our Future Merch: http://bit.ly/ourfuturemerch

Attend Our Weekly Entrepreneurship Events: http://bit.ly/ourfuturecommunity

Follow us on IG: http://bit.ly/ourfutureig

Follow us on TikTok: http://bit.ly/ourfuturetiktok