The trip to Kazuhira Johnson’s compound, located in the scalding wastes of the Nevada desert, is shorter than expected. This is because the driver sent to pick me up, a mute albino the size of one of Shaquille O’Neal’s bigger shits, has a propensity for speeding (in both the vehicular and pharmaceutical senses). We pull up to the compound’s entrance – composed of interwoven strands of some exceedingly-rare mineral – and barely have time to stop before the gates swing wide, beckoning us in like the extended hand of an experienced usher.
Johnson’s driveway is long, narrow, and lined with rows of cacti that stand at attention like terracotta soldiers. The sun beats down on the car, burning through the tinted windows, and I am thankful for the car’s industrial-strength air conditioning (which the driver had set to Cryogenian temperatures a short time into our trip).
The driveway terminates in a tight roundabout fronting a structure that could best be described as the bastard child of a pueblo and Soviet collective housing. The exterior is undecorated (save for two rows of perfectly square windows); you can almost hear the paint baking in the sun.
As soon as I’ve shut the car door behind me, it’s gone: the driver and his metal steed have vanished, hopefully to somewhere less sunny. I find myself at a momentary loss, until the front doors (composed of what look to be two massive slabs of onyx) swing open with a sound like God burping.
Inside stands the man, the legend, Kazuhira “Buster” Johnson: reclusive director of such classic video games as the early-2000s FPS “Crater Shock,” the horror-themed adventure “Deathmoor,” and the VR jellyfish simulator “Man-o’-War.”
Johnson was, to put it lightly, extremely challenging to get in touch with. Our intern needed to solve a series of increasingly-complex riddles hidden in the bowels of the New York Public Library, revealing the address of a P.O. box to which I sent my request for an interview. A few carrier pigeon exchanges later, and here I am, meeting Kaz Johnson in the flesh. He’s wearing a silk kimono (no doubt eye-wateringly expensive), a pair of wooden clogs that don’t look very comfortable, and an array of necklaces that I can only describe as “Criss Angel-adjacent.”
His voice is like it is in old interviews: quick and incisive, like he knows more than you do but is excited to tell you all about it. After we exchange pleasantries, he waves me into what he describes as the “spirit chamber” (it looks a lot like a living room to me) and I get my sound equipment set up. As I do so, Johnson stands to one side, throwing javelins at a wall made of corkboard.
When I’ve gotten the equipment sorted – this is after about six javelins have been thrown – Johnson comes over and sits down across from me, toying with his dark evil jewelry. His sunglasses glitter in the light cast by the candelabras atop the table between us.
We begin.
The Scrub Report: Hi, Mr. Johnson, thanks for agreeing to this interview. I know you’ve got a busy schedule –
Kaz “Buster” Johnson: Happy to have you – you can call me “Kaz”. Now hit me with some questions before this blow wears off – I boofed a quarter gram before you got here, but that won’t last forever.
TSR: This is all on the record.
KJ: Yeah, ask me if I give a shit.
TSR:
KJ:
TSR:
KJ:
TSR: Any current projects you’d care to shed light on? I know you’ve mentioned something called “Devilhammer” pretty recently. Is that one word, like “Devilhammer,” or two words, like, “Devil…Hammer”?
KJ: Ah, yeah, on Joe Rogan’s podcast. Good guy, maybe goes a little hard on the elk. Not that it’s a bad meat. Gamey, yeah, but sometimes gamey is good, right?
TSR: Sure. But –
KJ: Exactly. So I’m telling him, sure, I like to bow-hunt my own jerky as much as the next guy, and Joe takes me back to this walk-in freezer he’s got, and – I shit you not – the guy gives me six hundred pounds of elk meat. Fuckin’ bequeaths it to me.
TSR: That’s a lot of elk meat. How many elks is that? Two? One and a half at least, I’d wager.
KJ: The plural is just ‘elk’.
TSR: Oh, my mistake.
KJ: Indeed.
TSR: So…did you take the six hundred pounds of elk meat?
KJ: What do you think?
TSR: I mean, I’m not sure how you would move it…but when Joe Rogan gives you elk meat, you take the elk meat. Right?
KJ: Exactly. So I took the elk meat.
TSR: Can I ask how you moved it?
KJ: No.
TSR: Cool. We were talking about your recent projects?
KJ: Right, right. I’ve been developing a few things, mostly for personal use – maybe if there’s enough interest, they’ll see a public release.
TSR: Sure. Are these new projects in line with your previous work, or have you been genre-hopping a bit? I know you spoke briefly about the new RPG you’d been developing. Devil Hammer, or Devilhammer?
KJ: I believe that was just before Joe gave me the elk.
TSR: I guess so? I think they cut the mics before the, uh, bequeathing.
KJ: Makes sense. I wouldn’t want to let people know I had that much elk meat in my house. They might stage some kind of…meat heist.
TSR: I mean, you kind of did just do that, though. With the elk meat.
KJ: What makes you think the meat is in my house?
TSR: Uh…basic logic?
KJ: That’s where you’re wrong, my friend. I keep my most precious meats off the grid. I’m like Gene Hackman in Enemy of the State with that shit.
TSR: You mean you keep your most precious meats in a sewer?
KJ: It’s the last place anyone would look.
TSR: I guess you’ve got me on that one. What’d you think of that movie?
KJ: What?
TSR: Enemy of the State.
KJ: Oh. It was fine, I guess. The Mexican standoff at the end was good.
TSR: …with Will Smith hiding under the table.
KJ: Yeah. Always liked that scene. Otherwise, I could take it or leave it.
TSR: I’ve got to ask – and you may have spoken about this previously, but I wasn’t able to find any instances of it – but what’s the origin of the nickname “Buster”?
KJ: I used to cum in my pants a great deal when I was a teenager.
TSR: Oh.
KJ: What, did you expect something else?
TSR: Um…well, honestly, I wasn’t sure what to expect.
KJ:
TSR:
KJ:
TSR:
KJ: Hey, do you want to see my collection of historical smoking implements? I have Hitler’s hookah back there. Hits like a champ.
TSR: Does the pope shit in the woods?
[Interview to be continued in PART 2]