Tuesday, January 02, 2018

'Nick Arcade' Host Phil Moore Returns To His Roots For MAGFest

'90s Nickelodeon fans may remember Phil Moore's days hosting the hit Nickelodeon game show Nick Arcade.


What you might not know is that he's a Baltimore native and went to school with WBAL NewsRadio 1090 AM's own C4, going back to Hilton Elementary through Polytechnic. He's back in town this week for the video game convention MAGFest in National Harbor, where muscle memory will guide him as the emcee of MAGFest Versus. He's also set to do some panels and take some questions about his time on Nickelodeon.

Moore, whose family is still around town, popped in to chat with his old friend Tuesday as he talked about how he fell into comedy and the weirdness of complete strangers walking up and saying they grew up with him.

His journey to Nickelodeon Studios began when he was on strike and picketing with his AT&T coworkers in Orlando. He was cracking some jokes with coworkers, which led to him quitting his job and disregarding his engineering degree to try his hand at stand-up.

"I had no plan. Nothing was on the agenda. So you never know when life is never going to make a turn," Moore said.

Nick Arcade pitted two teams of two against each other, guiding the avatar Mikey around a game board. New squares could unlock trivia questions, puzzles, automatic points or, naturally, video game challenges. The games featured included classics such as Sonic the Hedgehog, Battletoads and Gradius 3. Nick Arcade turned out 84 episodes in a run that lasted from January to November 1992, but lived a long afterlife in reruns.

"People have evolved. People have grown. This little show that I did, I literally called it like The Cinderella Show," Moore said. "My show was the show that has absolutely no merchandise you can buy."

Most pictures from the set are blurry, he said, because they never had a photographer either.

After Nickelodeon, he moved behind the camera, writing and producing. He still comes to town every now and then, though, and he's always ready to reach into his so-called "Baltimore drawer."

"I've got my gloves, my hats, I got my scarves, I got my thermal underwears," he joked. "Like 1966 Batman, man, I always come prepared."





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