# Jamie and Cale go LIVE with special guests Jeff and Serge. **Source:** JBS Live **Type:** video **Published:** 2026-05-25 **Duration:** 158m 55s **Beat:** Pinball **URL:** https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=yjfHdIhWuVE --- ## Analysis Jamie and Cale host a live JBS show with Serge and Jeff discussing recent pinball industry news, including Stern's awkward AI-generated placeholder imagery on their website, the upcoming Star Trek announcement for Stern (after Fallout), speculation about an unreleased Dracula-themed game, and operational challenges facing Jersey Jack Pinball machines at location venues. The hosts also discuss Pokemon Pinball code delays attributed to licensing issues with the Pokedex feature. ### Key Claims - [MEDIUM] Stern is releasing Star Trek as the next Keith Elwin game after Fallout — _Canada released information on Saturday Morning Spectacular; Jamie and Cale reference this as recent news_ - [MEDIUM] Stern's website and Insider Connected app are using AI-generated images of women as placeholders, suggesting staffing issues — _Jamie was sent screenshots showing Stern running these ads on Facebook; confirmed via contact with Stern software team member_ - [HIGH] Pokemon Pinball Pokedex feature is delayed due to licensing issues; George Gomez stated Niantic and IC are competitors, requiring renaming of Pokedex to 'Collection' — _Multiple audience members confirmed George Gomez's statement in chat about trademark/licensing issues_ - [LOW] An unreleased Dracula-themed Stern game is in development, likely designed by Brian Eddy and possibly Dwight — _Jamie made educated guesses using ChatGPT for unlicensed properties; speculation based on D&D team and Victorian Gothic setting_ - [MEDIUM] Jersey Jack Pinball machines have recurring issues with off-the-shelf USB-C connectors on lightboards causing glitches — _Kale (operator at Electric Bat Arcade) explained technical issues experienced with JJP games on their location floor_ - [HIGH] Stern is prioritizing getting Pro versions of new games (like Transformers) to operators quickly before Premium versions — _Jamie praised this as a smart move; confirmed Eureka Heights getting Pro and Premium Transformers_ ### Notable Quotes > "Stern's running an ad with these weird AI images with women in it to use as placeholders on the website" > — **Jamie**, N/A > _Documents apparent operational/staffing problems at Stern through unusual marketing artifact_ > "George Gomez said Niantic was the problem and said IC is a direct competitor... they need to rename the Pokedex to collection" > — **Audience member (Aussy) via chat**, N/A > _Confirms licensing dispute explanation for Pokemon code delay_ > "They use just like off-the-shelf USB-C connectors for all of their lightboards... it's not like a lock a serious locking connector that most of all the other manufacturers use" > — **Kale**, N/A > _Technical critique of Jersey Jack design decisions affecting reliability at locations_ > "The choices they are making on on games is A+... why not do Star Trek? It has always worked in pinball" > — **Jamie (discussing Stern's Star Trek announcement)**, N/A > _Validates Star Trek as strong IP choice for pinball despite market saturation_ > "We're so spoiled that if it's not here now, forget it. They just dump it, you know?" > — **Kale (on Pokemon code delays)**, N/A > _Commentary on community impatience and disposability culture in hobby_ ### Entities | Name | Type | Context | |------|------|---------| | Jamie | person | Co-host of JBS Live, operator at Electric Bat Arcade, podcast personality discussing industry news | | Kale | person | Co-host of JBS Live and Electric Bat Arcade podcast, operator managing machines at location venues | | Serge | person | Guest on JBS Live, pinball community member | | Jeff | person | Guest mentioned in title; appears to be guest on show | | George Gomez | person | Stern Pinball CCO; acknowledged in chat as having commented on Pokemon Pokedex licensing issues | | Christopher Franchi | person | Pinball artist/designer; joined show later; worked on Galactic Tank Force and other titles | | Keith Elwin | person | Legendary Stern designer; Star Trek confirmed as next game after Fallout | | Brian Eddy | person | Suspected designer of unreleased Dracula game (speculation); worked on D&D | | Canada | person | Content creator who released Star Trek information on Saturday Morning Spectacular; involved in Van Halen licensing bet with Jamie | | Stern Pinball | company | Major manufacturer; subject of discussion regarding AI placeholder images, Star Trek announcement, Pokemon code delays, Transformers release strategy | | Jersey Jack Pinball | company | Boutique manufacturer; discussed for recurring technical issues with lightboards and reliability at location venues | | Electric Bat Arcade | venue | Location-based arcade owned by Jamie and Rachel; discussed as operator managing Stern and JJP machines | | Eureka Heights | company | Operator acquiring Transformers Pro and Premium machines; expanding to three locations (Eighth Wonder mentioned) | | Star Trek (Stern) | game | Upcoming Stern game announced by Canada; confirmed as next Keith Elwin title after Fallout | | Dracula (Stern, unreleased) | game | Speculated unreleased Stern title; Victorian Gothic theme with vampire hunter gameplay; suspected designers Brian Eddy and Dwight | | Pokemon Pinball | game | Stern release with delayed Pokedex code feature; licensing conflict with Niantic/Pokemon Company requiring feature rename | | Transformers (Stern) | game | Recent/upcoming Stern release; Pro versions being distributed to operators ahead of Premium versions | | Dungeon and Dragons (Stern) | game | Recent Stern release; referenced as example of RPG elements in rule design that may influence Dracula | | Insider Connected | product | Stern's digital ecosystem/mobile app; mentioned as venue where AI placeholder images appeared | | Pinside | organization | Community forum mentioned in context of game rankings and secondary market discussion | | IFPA | organization | Tournament organization referenced in context of competitive pinball discussion | ### Signals - **[product_concern]** Jersey Jack Pinball machines using non-locking USB-C connectors for lightboards causing frequent glitches and disconnections at location venues, affecting casual player perception of reliability (confidence: high) — Kale's detailed account of lightboard failures at Electric Bat Arcade; explains design choice difference vs. competitors - **[operational_signal]** Location operators experiencing cumulative reliability issues with JJP games that impact player retention and venue profitability (confidence: high) — Electric Bat Arcade operator commentary on Avatar game breaking down; casual players abandoning machines when errors appear - **[code_update]** Pokemon Pinball Pokedex mobile app integration significantly delayed due to licensing conflict between Stern and Niantic/Pokemon Company over competitive positioning of Insider Connected (confidence: high) — Multiple chat confirmations of George Gomez statement about Niantic being problem; Pokedex rename to 'Collection' required - **[personnel_signal]** Stern experiencing significant staff departures leading to operational gaps in website/marketing management evidenced by AI placeholder imagery (confidence: medium) — Jamie's observation of staffing issues at Stern; Stern contact admitted uncertainty about AI image usage - **[announcement]** Star Trek confirmed as next Keith Elwin game following Fallout; original series IP chosen for broad appeal and pinball pedigree (confidence: medium) — Canada released information on Saturday Morning Spectacular; Jamie/Serge confirm as credible source - **[rumor_hype]** Victorian Gothic Dracula-themed Stern game in development with suspected designers Brian Eddy and Dwight; likely features vampire hunter gameplay and character selection elements similar to D&D (confidence: low) — Jamie's ChatGPT-assisted speculation validated by audience agreement; connects to D&D design team trajectory - **[product_strategy]** Stern prioritizing Pro model distribution to operators before Premium models, enabling faster location deployment and revenue generation (confidence: high) — Jamie praised this strategy; confirmed with Eureka Heights example getting Transformers Pro first, then Premium later - **[licensing_signal]** Stern's Insider Connected digital integration creating licensing friction with Pokemon Company over competitive app positioning; trademark protection forcing feature redesign (confidence: high) — George Gomez statement confirmed in chat; explains months-long delay for Pokemon code update - **[market_signal]** Location-based players showing declining interest in Pokemon Pinball due to extended code delay; machines losing novelty appeal in arcade rotation (confidence: medium) — Kale noting Pokemon fever 'dried up' at his local arcade; community expectation mismatch with delivery timeline - **[competitive_signal]** Stern's continued selection of strong IP properties (Star Trek) and innovative designers (Keith Elwin) positioned to maintain market dominance; community sentiment remains positive despite operational issues (confidence: high) — Jamie/Serge praising Stern's IP choices as 'A+'; Star Trek described as obviously correct decision with proven pinball history - **[community_signal]** JBS Live planning controversy-focused episode cataloging pinball industry controversies spanning 60 years; potential platform for industry criticism or accountability discussion (confidence: medium) — Jamie/Kale announced controversial art pinball podcast project with Christopher Franchi focusing on Stern/JJP controversies - **[venue_signal]** Eureka Heights expanding to three locations with multi-tier acquisition strategy (Pro + Premium machines); attributed success to Electric Bat Arcade podcast mentorship (confidence: high) — Jamie explicitly praised Eureka Heights growth and credited Electric Bat Arcade podcast guidance; confirmed locations: primary, Eighth Wonder, and third --- ## Transcript have technical difficulties. Not really. Just Riverside learning Riverside and learning this thing. So, we're going to do something a little different tonight. Yeah. What's going on? You know, I just I got I got the bat signal. You told me to turn my computer on. And here I am. Here I am. Yeah. I Well, Janine's out of town. That's the rub, right? Janine's out of town. I'm bored. Out of my mind. I see what's going on. And you were available. Yeah. and Kale was not. So, Ralph was not. So, I am Kale. I know Ralph was not. All right, let's see how I get my chat up here. Uh um. Oh, right here. Okay. Is there a chat on Riverside? Yeah, down at the bottom I bottom. Isn't the bottom right? You hit chat or you're the host, so it might be at the top. Okay. Just want to be able to see. Yeah, it's not. I can't see it. Yeah, I can see trash can ninja in there. Pinball steer. Oh, there it is, dude. Aussie in the house. Hello. Okay, so there it is. Studio chat. Give us a second, ladies and gentlemen. We're new to this. Oh, there it is. Pinball Studio. What's up? Hello gents Aussie. Okay, you see you see it now. I got it. Cool. I just can't see any super chats. I'm not asking for super chats. I just can't see it on Riverside. Right. That's that's the the uh like the humble brag. Yeah, it's I'm going to mention super chats, but I don't want any super chats. Hey, uh uh Azy's in the house. Is Azie sent me a video earlier. Is Yuri Samo in your Is that your coach? It's pretty cool. If that's a deal, that's some That's some BJJ stuff, Jamie. Oh, no. I got you. I figured going I figured it was George Gomez in the house. The real George Gomez. Yeah, the one of them. Okay. I've known George for a while. Okay, good. It's not the It's a It's the George Gomez that hangs out with Don from Don Swimbo Podcast, right? Uh yeah. Yeah. Yeah, I've met him. Nice dude. Yeah, I met him at TPF. Yeah, he's great. Yeah. Uh so round table. Here's what we're going to do. We got twothirds of the round table tonight. Ralph's hanging out with the wife and that is much more important than what we're doing. We're going to go over some news. We're going to do it live here and then later on if you stick around, I'm going to give you the link and you can join and ask us questions live on the air. Uh I tried to do a call-in show, Kale, but I couldn't figure it out within the hour that you said you were available. So, I was close. That's what I've been doing the last hour thinking it if I could get like a 1-800 number or 1 1900, you know, not 900, but Well, you you can do that with the uh the what is it called? The Roadcaster, right? Yeah. I just couldn't figure it out in an hour. But don't you don't you like literally hook up a phone to it? Yeah, you'd have to hook up my phone to it. But then I'd have to have my number through there. We have to figure that out. Wouldn't that be fun? A call-in show? Yeah. Azette. Uh, that that's your employee. How crazy is that? What What's the deal? I guess you own a gym or something like that. Yeah, he owns a UFC gym. This is phenomenal. Uh, Yuri is just a world champion. Um, you know, he's constantly in ADCC, which is, you know, considered to be like a world champion of no ghee grappling. It's a um, actually I saw him at the last one. Uh, that's fascinating. Uh, sorry to derail your fun, Jamie. This this It's okay. Hey, listen. If somebody comes in and starts talking Celtic with me, we're going to talk Celtic soccer. So, Arsenal, you're you're uh Oh, okay. Oh, how how crazy is that, ladies and gentlemen? He's going to explain what's going on at Yucatum. Go ahead, sir. Um, it we check the So, you know, they all meet up there like 500 a.m. or something crazy. Yeah, because it's, you know, it's UK time over, you know, and that's when the matches start. When Rachel and I woke up and we checked the cameras at the bar, it was just wall to- wall. It was absolutely packed. So, you know more about this than I do. Apparently, Arsenal has done inc like historically well. Yeah, they won the title today. Yeah, it's a huge deal. It's a huge deal. Today was the title trophy presentation for the EPL, which is the English Premier League, which is the biggest league in the world. And Arsenal haven't won in a long time. And uh my buddy I have a few buddies that are Arsenal supporters and they love it. Fantastic. Good. Cheers to Arsenal. There you go. Yeah, they beat Man Arsenal fans in the chat. Um can we start off making fun of someone a little? Whoever's running the Stern website is Yeah, that's where I was going to go. You want to go there real quick while we only have 17 in here so far? Tell your friends. Okay, we're going to make fun of this. Can you I can share my screen. Let me pull this up. Okay, give me a second. Ladies and gentlemen, we we just decided to do this. And I'm not Serge. Serge is the man. Okay. Oh my god. But this photo right here. Okay, this is worth it, people. Just hold up. It's worth it. It's so ridiculous. Share screen window. Here it is. Share. Okay. This is the stern. Do do you want to do Do you have the other one, too? Oh, uh, yeah. Okay. So, the the other one. Yeah. Don't Don't show any nudie photos. Oh, here it is. These are just videos of Jamie. Okay. So, I was like I was at home. What's up, Buck? What was that? Buck LTM. Um, so just like an like hour or two ago, I uh I got a message from somebody and it was this it was a screen grab and it's like what's going on over at Stern, you know, as far as like with them posting photos to uh their website or app or wherever they do it. Uh because, you know, I mean, we all know now that uh you know, somebody accidentally posted the the Transformers photos to uh to the the IC app, right? So, so I get a screen grab and I'm like, "Is this real?" Now, this is my screen grab what we're looking at here. So, you sent this to me. They had a they had a cropped version and I was like, "Is that real?" He's like, "Yeah, it just popped up on my feed." So, I went to Facebook and I'll be damn Stern's running an ad. Uh, so what what is that? Okay, so please explain it to me. I reached out to a buddy at Stern that deals on the software side and and jokingly said, "Are you guys is this how you guys are trying to get clicks now?" And you know, and lol um that's not my department. So, he didn't know any details about what's going on here or why this is happening. It it it appears to me uh and that uh they're they're creating these weird AI images with women in it to use as placeholders on the website. I mean when you actually go to the product page it's the same thing which is you have that image too. Yeah. the product page like what what's going what what did they do it what I don't understand this and and in all seriousness there um I mean there's a staffing issue there's a lot of people leaving and okay and they're not like hiring people to take their place um yeah there's there's a lot of weird stuff going on but um let's hope they can keep going for at least another couple years cuz they have some banger banger games on the way. Yeah, you and uh our friend Canada released uh the information on Star Trek. Oh, I haven't seen that yet. What's What's the deal? You didn't see it? No. Um Canada released it on his Saturday morning spectacular yesterday. I had to watch it, re-watch it. He It was It was honestly his best one he's ever done. He He tore up the uh Oh my god, he made me laughing. What did he do? He tore up the uh the NDA, the official NDA from uh Jersey Jack. Jersey Jack. Unbelievable. Yeah, he had some fun. It was It was fun to watch him, right? But uh he did say that uh Stern is the next Keith Elwin game after Fallout is the original Star Wars and Star Trek. Star Trek Star Trek that that's phenomenal. And they they are really um I think the choices they are making on on games is A+. Oh yeah. Like why why not do Star Trek? I mean, it's like it it has always worked in pinball. Yeah. Always. They could do so much. They could do it like Batman 66. I mean, not the layout, right? But the the way it was incorporated so perfectly with all these episodes and all that. They can totally do that with Paramount, don't you think? Yeah. Azie, that I know he's talking about the Crayon NDA. Oh, yeah. The crayon. Azie, are you getting uh OG Star Trek? Are you getting NLE? Do we need Do we need another Star Trek? Jamie, what what's your take? Do we need from Trash Ninja? Do we need eight pinball manufacturers? I mean, that's the real question. K. Hey, look. If you hover over a chat, can you There should be a button that pops up where you can put it on the screen. Yeah. Yeah, I like that. Don't you like that? Love it. Thank you. We're doing this together, dude. If if somebody watches the VOD, they can follow along. Do we need another Star Trek? What? Go. Jamie, what's your opinion? Well, look, I I was going to say we got nine to 10 pinball manufacturers out there spitting out pinball machines and Stern's going to do one. Someone's going to do a Star Trek and and it's a it's a good it's a good license. I'd play the [] out of it, right? Why wouldn't you play that? Yeah. Um, it's not Starfleet Academy. He's right. You can't have that. No, it's got to be the original OG Star Trek or Wrath of Khan. How about Wrath of Khan? I was that thing whatever that little bug was that was in the fish tank. [] me up. Terrified me, dude. I couldn't sleep that night. Yeah, it [] me up cuz I was like cuz that that came out around like 83, 84. I'm like 10 years old and I think a [] bug is going to come in. thought something was going to go in my ear. And I lived I lived in New Orleans at the time. I mean, there's roaches everywhere, dude. Roaches and mosquitoes. Um, the Star Trek. Uh, do we need another one? Man, you know what? We don't need any of these things. Tell you the truth. Tell the truth. Um, but I am I'm actually excited about this IP. Hold. I got I got to turn my monitor down. I'm a little I'm a little loud for myself. Okay. Um, there we go. All right. Check, check, check. We're doing it. Um, I think this is I think it's a great IP. Yeah. Especially Especially for pinball because it's always worked for for some reason. Star Trek has always covered the pinball demographic, no matter what no matter what generation it was. Um, and I I I think it'll be dope, you know. Yeah. And Ellen. Owen. Yeah. I mean, come on. It's Owen. you give him anything. But you Yeah. Yeah. This this is a very cool IP, you know, especially since it's like the OG. Come on. With the I mean, this is where it all started, you know. This is this is original sci-fi when it was popular, you know, on television. I think it's going to be great. All right. What's What's going on with chat? We need a Batman 89 Stern from Pinball Studio from I don't know which one is that Batman's Jack Nicholson and Mr. Mom. Yeah, Michael Keaton. That's a good one. I had that on VHS. That is Yeah. Who didn't? That was good. That would be nice. Well, yeah, Richie, you're right. Richie Star Trek is Richie Star Trek is amazing. That's a great game. That's one game we don't have at the bat that I always wish we did. Really? Um, yeah, Mark Pearson operated one at the bat. It was a great tournament game. It's just a fun game. Um, and he it was a pro, which the the pro is great. Bo, both versions are great with that game. Um, he has some kind of opto issue he couldn't ever figure out, so he just took it home. He he does that with games. He's got so many games if one breaks, he just swaps them out. Yeah, that's nice. It's a nice problem for you to have as as his operator, you know. Yeah, he's a great guy. So, let's talk Transformers. You getting one for the bat? Yes, I'm in on the Pro. Okay. Eureka Heights is in on the Pro and the Premium. They're going to do the Pro Premium. Oh, so they'll get they'll get the Pro first and then when the Pro comes in, they'll move the Pro to some one of their other locations, Eighth Wonder or um Very cool. Yeah. So, they're they're at three locations now, John and Taylor. Amazing. I'm so proud of those guys. I know, right? And you know what? Listen, they they listen to the Electric Bat Arcade podcast. They learned all the tips and tricks. They they they took the tips and made and made made them their own. Mhm. Right. And and they're they're successful. That's why you should always listen to the electric bad guys. I they I would say they would say a lot of that is true. Okay. Seriously. And you were so helpful in the beginning. A lot of texts I would send to you and and Rachel and uh you know, anyone that doesn't listen to Electric Bats out of their mind, but if you want to become an operator at any time, start at episode one and keep going. and they're really good listens and the two of them are a great pod. There you go. But you don't need me to promote you. You do great. You don't need the plug. You're the number one podcast. You're [] last Twippy owner. Twy. That's right. Uh oh, pro. I'm getting the pro. Um yeah. So Rachel and I, you know what? The premium look premium Ellie layout looks amazing. Amazing. Yeah. So, they're going to get the premium, you know, later. But the cool thing about what Stern's doing for operators, dude, is getting those pros out right away. And that's the best move. It's the It is such a Oh, man. Good. Kudos on them, right? And then if there's something wrong like there was on the Pokemon Pro, you guys are so good, you fix it. That's right. Yeah. Yep. We have uh And we still have both Pokemon games on the floor. We're gonna we're gonna have to sell one. Yeah, we just don't have enough room to keep them all around. Um, and but when that code comes, you'll get another probably resurgence on the Pokemon, don't you think? I mean, if if it comes, I don't this this is what I'm um it's taking so long. This this is what I'm worried about. Uh, for one thing, you know, I was to I was I was keeping two games, two Pokemon games in the arcade because I I thought once the uh the the code they were talking about on the loser, I think it was the loser kid podcast when when Tanya held up the phone and showed Yeah. showed the Pokédex. Pokedex, right? Uh when we all thought that was coming, I was like, "Oh, that might be a good idea to keep two games around for a little bit longer." Uh because once that comes out, people are going to just be parking on the game trying to catch all these little creatures. Uh yeah, but but you know it some something's going on. I I don't think we know the details. Anybody knows the details? Uh you know, outside of Stern, but it kind it seems like um they're having trouble implementing that. And and if you just think about what what's going on, I mean, they probably like approved uh you know, licensing for like for them to build a pinball machine and they did a bangup job. I mean, the game's beautiful. Some of the coolest sculpts. I mean, it just it looks like the Pokemon license come to life, you know? Like just in the truest sense. Totally agreed. But for them to implement the gaming side of it on a mobile device, I bet they've run into issues because wouldn't be surprised because uh Nintendo or or Game Freak or the Pokemon Company, whoever is deal they're dealing with, I bet they would consider that a separate game. and so not an I could see there's yeah I could see where there there's something's not copathetic yeah licensers in that aspect you know they're they're doing the it's a licenser thing it could be still I I'm not saying we're not calling them liars right we're just saying it could be a litany of things yeah that well that issue I'm talking about is a licenser thing technically that's true like Doc Mario says Pokemon fever my local pen has totally dried up. I see that. Right. I mean, isn't it weird? Well, we're so in this hobby particularly because we're really at a spoiled time. I think we're spoiled rotten that you think just now. It just started. It just started recently. But we really are, dude. We've been spoiled for years, man. I know, man. We're so spoiled that if it's not here now, forget it. They just dump it, you know? I'll pick one up later because they don't have to worry about it. It's not like a Winchester, right? Oh, put Aussy's thing up there. George Gomez said Niantic was the problem and said IC is a direct competitor. So, so this does sound like they have to rename the Pokedex to He says they need to rename the Pokedex to collection. See? So, what I was guessing is spot on. Boy, you really have an uncanny ability, ladies and gentlemen. I I I tell him this all the time off camera, but it's really freaking amazing. Like, you pulled Dracula out of your ass. That scared me. Did it? But but you know, I I can't I take the credit. I was it on Was it Hold on. My my tripod's messed up or whatever this thing's called. my boom. No worries. Um, you I told you how I got that, right? Yeah. You said it was an unlicensed game and you went through I put it in chat GPT. Yeah. And like what makes sense? You know, Stern Pinball's working on a game to come out next year with a um uh what what do you call it? Like a loyalty a like a property. Unlicensed property. There you go. um what would what would make the most sense and can you give me a list of unlicensed properties that would make sense? Right. F the first thing it said was Dracula and then it went down some other monster stuff. Um because I think like like generic Wolfman stuff like that. Okay, maybe that makes sense. There was a whole list, but at the top it said Dracula makes the most sense. Uh Yeah, but that was just a wild guess. Plus me slash uh me and Jack GPT. Um, nicely done, dude. Nicely done. Pulling the Dracula. And are you hearing some more about Dracula? I can guess like I did before. Okay. You want me to guess? I want you to guess some more because you're doing really well with this. So, I mean, you're batting really well on your guesses. I imagine it being uh in like the like a 1800s um like a Victorian like Gothic setting. Yeah. Um well, you know, the success of Winchester maybe make it dark, right? Make it Oh, it would be good. Okay. And I have a feeling you're not actually you're not Dracula. Yes. You like this? Yes. Because you gota you gotta think this this team um they just did uh Dungeons and Dragons, right? Pin pal S can you want me to give Serge if I send you a link? Can you come in here? Yeah, let's get Serge in here. Yeah, I would love that. Um, okay. So, 1800 Victorian Gothic looking uh you're a vampire hunter and I would imagine they want to since they did so well with the RPG elements in Dungeons and Dragons, I think you're going to see those elements here where you have you'll be able to select different characters, you know. So, do you know it's Dwight and Brian Eddy? Uh, I know it's Brian Eddy. I'm just guessing it's Dwight. Makes sense, right? Yeah, it has to be. That's the team. But they've been work. They What else did they work on? Um, a Venom Mandalorian. Yeah. Oh, was Dwight on that? I'm I don't know if Dwight was on that. I might be talking. Chad, will Chad tell us? Chad? Yeah. Um, no question. um DND, but um I think you be you'll be able to select multiple players and go off like you'll have different areas to play in like like Romania, London, you know, around places around Europe where you would Now we're just guessing, Doc, but Doc wants to know like a Buffy or Van Housing Hling. I see more Van Hling like old, you know. Right. Exactly. Van Heling. Yeah. and how Man, this is this is going to be a really interesting thing because this is going to be hard to sell. Yeah. You know what I mean? Yeah. Like I think the pin heads will be into it, but I It's a hard sell for like new pinball players, but I think I think the pin heads are going to be really into it. It It sounds like I mean the whole premise sounds super super cool. It really does. What's up, Dustin? Welcome. Um, we're gonna have people join later. We're waiting on Serge to see if he could do it. But, uh, later on, you know, when we hit the 45 minute hour mark, I'm going to throw the link into the chat. And people want to come and ask us questions directly, come on in. Why not? Uh, yeah. Hold on. Uh, I got you, Serge. Hold it. Hold tight, buddy. He said, "I'll join if I'm not interrupting your bro time. Get in here. Get in here, sir." Guy's the best. Yeah, I got him. I got him. Okay, cool. Um, yeah, but we'll give that out later. We were again, we were trying to do the call-in show, but we just couldn't figure it out. But I I know who there's somebody in chat who can figure that out, and that's Sterling. Yeah. Uh Jeff Kale has not given I mean uh Jack has not given me an Harry Potter, but you know right now I wouldn't want a Harry Potter. What would I want? Yeah, you want a Sonic right here. You want the new one? The shiny new toy. Uh so check it out. Um in the chat, Frank D'Python Anghelo, he where was it? The Pokedex is a tra they're trademark issues. So what I what I guessed was right um okay I see it right here. So they they just have to and and the guys are stern smart. They can figure out they can figure out how to make this happen. You know what I'm saying? Yeah. They got to though. They got to but in the interum I know but in the interim at least let us see on the display right I mean I know it flashes up slowly but let us like pause it and scroll through it somehow I I don't know you got to man you just got to Christopher Franchie in the house hello Mr. Franchie, thank you again for joining the round table. We are twothirds of the round table tonight. Yeah. You want to get in here, Chris? Um, you need to download one of those call apps that connects your number and connect your phone to your Roadcaster using the Bluetooth setting. See, you were right. Oh, you you don't even need a phone. He says you connect your one of those call apps. Gives you access to a number. Well, we're gonna do it. We're gonna The next time we go live, we're gonna do a call-in show. It's gonna be like Art Bell. I would love Yeah. Hell yeah I do. I would love to do that. That would be an absolute hoot. Having people call in asking their questions. Only people who are possessed line. It's like stuff like that witches line. You remember all that? I I don't remember listening that much to him. I just remember who he was. I do. You know, Rachel and I listen every night. Uh, really the Yeah, the rerun. Well, all the stuff's on um, uh, Spotify. I mean, it's on YouTube. It's all over the place. Um, ready. Buddy's ready. Buddy Andrew is ready for Van Halen, you know. Um, you're ready for Van Halen, Jamie. And you're also ready to give Cana You bet Canada 100 bucks they could not get that IP. They couldn't land that IP. Well, I still want to see them announce it and then I'll Venmo them $100. You know, right now they could have the IP and never make it. That doesn't count. They got to make the damn thing. I think but the quote was that they'll never get it. But he never even accepted the bet though. He didn't have to. You said, "I bet you." Yes. And but I told him to take it. Let's ask Chad. If I said to Kale, "Hey, Kale, I bet you $100 I can beat you in arm wrestling." And Kale doesn't say anything, then uh you know, the bet's off. You got to There's a Hey, Serge, what's going on, gentlemen? If I bet if I bet you a hundred bucks, go on. Okay. And you don't accept a hundred bucks and then I wind up losing the bet, do you come back and get a hundred bucks? I'm not that kind of better. No, I I take the bet or I don't take the bet. That's right. So, Canadian never officially took the bet. I've got the chat. I mean, we've got it. Hey, Jamie, that that's not Christopher Franchie. Oh, it's Tranchy. That's Christopher Tranchy. I love Tranchy just as much. All right. I don't think Van Halen has the fan group anymore to to get Ellies. That's my opinion on it. Oh, really? I'm not saying I don't like uh Van Halen. I'm not saying that people don't like Van Halen, but I'm saying I think I don't actually think they have the draw that like a manu Metallica does as bands from that era go. Do you disagree with that? Uh I think the fan base is not as strong as Metallica. That that's hard. Metallica sells out stadiums. Yeah, they're the biggest like rock/metal band in the world. uh in the world and and they're the probably they're still playing and they're still touring and they're probably the biggest American band ever made. All right. I would have a tough time saying anyone else than Metallica. So are they smaller or bigger than Rush? Oh, bigger. Metallica. No, sorry. Van Halen. Van Halen versus Rush. Like just by brand name, popularity, fan base, devotion, that sort of thing. I think Van Halen is bigger. Are we What do you think? I also think I also think that's true. Yes. And I'm just I'm trying to level set because I'm like, you know, it also matters. Is it a good game and all of that, but also um Thanks so much. It's also But hey, Serge, can you turn your camera just a little bit so you're centered? Oh, yeah. You're right. We want to see you, S. All right, one second. Let's see. How's that? It's nothing. No change at all. Wait, how about that? There you go. My technique was moving my dude. That was the Penn says there's only two Van Halen albums. That's crazy. Come on. You know what's interesting? I was thinking about this uh yesterday. I was at a friend's house for a for a party and boil. There were a lot of kids around and um Were you the only adult? It wasn't. We weren't on an island. Okay. Uh, do you know the do can I tell the joke you did on that Predator game or no? Yeah, absolutely. All right, this is what I got to Did you tell the joke already online? I don't I told this somewhere on the on the uh Dude, this is what this guy does. I'm sorry. I have to let you tell your story, but but first, we get this game one night only at Electrobat Predator. And so then they wrap it up and bring it to I forget which expo or something. Expo. Yeah, Kale cuts out a picture of Jeffrey Epstein and puts it on instead of the Predator and the Predator's picture and then the ship that closed the game. He doesn't tell anyone and they open it there on the floor of Expo and I don't think they noticed for a while. They did not. Don from Don's Pinball podcast noticed it. It's a pretty funny joke though. I'm just saying. Uh, you know what? Sorry, you go. You have to have somebody like me around. A necessary evil. You have You have to. And what would this world be without the agents of chaos, right? Right. You're like chaotic neutral or whatever. Right. Maybe chaotic good. If you want the rock and roll, you want the Rolling Stones, you want the Beatles, you're going to have to handle doodoo in the street sometimes. Yeah. I'm just saying. Well, anyway, I think Rush didn't sell that well, did it? you know, as these things go. And uh and so I'm trying to get a sense of the band in com, you know, against other band music pins. Do we know is it Elliot Elliot Eismin doing not Elliot Elliot Eismin? Um Markid, Mark Seiden doing Van Halen. Do we know that? We have no We have no clue there, right? Were you an Avatar guy, Jamie? Um not really. Okay. I think the crab was really kind of cool. All right. Oh, the little lower playfield. I I thought that was kind of neat and I know that got [] on a lot, but I thought it was kind of cool, but it was definitely a beautiful game. Um, it Beautiful game, too. Right. Yeah. I just couldn't get into it. And there was there wasn't one around, so I'm a location player, so it's hard it's hard for me when there's not one around. We had one at the bat that uh Game Room Goodies let us borrow. We had fun with it, but then it was it was it kept breaking. So that's the problem with JJP's at the bat. Yeah, they can't really handle the play, man. That's why Jack needs to send me a Sonic so we can test it. But Kell, what broke? Was it the guy arm going up and down on the slingshot? I mean, what's there what was there breaking? Oh, well, that did, but we were able to easily fix that. Um, it would it was just a bunch of other issues. Um, you know, the they always have problems with their lightboards. because they um and I don't know if this is the problem. Some people hypothesize it is, Rachel thinks it is, but they they use just like offtheshelf USBC connectors for all of their lightboards. And I don't know if it's the vibr it's not like a lock a serious locking connector that most of all the other manufacturers use. Um Spooky may I know they use USBC for some stuff. I maybe they have gotten away from that. Um, but it just they would it would cause the lightboards to glitch out and and like not work and then and then a big screen flashes or a big window flashes on the screen saying, "Uh, this lily pad something's out. Check it out." And so then, you know, casuals or even like experienced players think, well, the game's broken, so they turn it off, you know. So, and that that always happens with Jersey Jacks. Uh, we have the real Christopher Franchi in the house now. And the and Chris Tranchy and we want to see them fight. Oh, I don't, you know, I don't think we need that, but I think it's all love here at the JBS show and Kale and Jamie live. A year ago, um, we set up a an controversial art pinball podcast and Kale and I just never did it. Um, we always found a reason not to do it. What are you gonna say, Kale? We're doing it with Frankie. We're This time we're really going to do it. Yeah. We kind of cataloged all of controversies from like recent um different things in Sterner and JJP all the way back to like 60 years ago. And uh all with all these different categories of controversies and we're just going to show the art and talk through it. And I thought that might be interesting, but it definitely is like the episode that gets us canceled. Nah, you won't get cancelled. Everybody loves the the pin pals. Who the hell doesn't love pin pals? Also, we're not worried about getting cancelled because if we get cancelled, we'll just go back to the electric bat arcade and play some games and hang out. Yeah, we're going to do it on Rumble, right, K? Go on about our life. Yeah, Rumble. There you go. All right. Do you want to uh do you want to go through some topics with with Serge? Yeah. Oh, did we we didn't show Serge the uh the shop the stone shop shop? No, the show go let's go back to that because there's probably more people in the chat now that need to see this because you showed it at the beginning of the show. Okay, so Serge um somebody got in touch with me just like a couple of hours ago and sent me a screen grab and was like, "What the hell is this? This is the Stern uh store collection of all products. What is this thing here, Serge? Is that That looks like Lo del Rey or something. Stern jersey sweatpants. I mean, what is this? Oh, that's Jamie. Oh, what's going on? Jamie. Here it is. Okay, here we go. So, um, the person sent me the screen grab. I was like, is that real? First of all, it's an AI lady and he said, "Go check it out." So, I went to Facebook and it immediately popped up in my feed. So, uh I did I reached out to somebody at Stern because, you know, I wanted to let them know this. We'll put that on our AI and art controversy, right? Yeah. You got Yes. Perfect. Because I don't think that that lady is real, Kale. No, it's not. No, it's not a real person. Um I already sent her $100. Yeah. On Grinder. Yeah. She's like top 10 on only fans or something. All right. George is arcade says he wants to hear some juicy nuggets of info. He doesn't like what we're doing so far. George. Well, I know. Sorry. You go, Kale. Um, well, there was a rumor on Canada. We'll give the credit to Cana's podcast that Yeah. which I don't know if you talked about it already, but that after Jamie did. Jamie did. I did. Did we already bring it up here? I won't say it. I won't we'll drop it real quick. Drop it real quick. There might be some new chatters. Yeah. So for people join joining that uh Elwin is doing Star Trek which I'm I'm excited about I'd say because uh first of all like uh the themes he gets sometimes Jaws is a huge theme right and but um but I think that having like a branded theme that could be bigish on its own plus Elwin can be really really good. um you know like Iron Maiden kind of some people not their cup of tea. Um I guess Jurassic Park is big enough but I think that's a great point Sergey and because somebody asked in the chat do we really need another Star Trek and I think you're answering that. I think it's a worldwide known property that combined with uh a great designer like for you take Godzilla like now Godzilla there was a lot more Godzilla that's come out Godzilla minus one and there's an Apple TV show or whatever but when he made Godzilla I wouldn't have said that that's a that's a particularly huge fan base maybe you'll hate that people hate me saying on that like everyone knows Godzilla and but but they're they don't have like Godzilla bed sheets or whatever and I think that that he made it what it is um and he made it as popular as it is. So, by giving him something that already has a lot of big fan base out there, um I think it's going to be that much more of a banger, you know. A and also Star Trek, no matter which version or generation it was, has always worked in pinball, right? Maybe not like the newest like Starfleet Academy kind of stuff, but like I think people were bringing that. Yeah, they were bringing that up. Nobody wanted Starh Starfleet Academy, right? And if it's Starplay Academy, it may not go as well. But like the original series still has its fa favorites, you know, and uh and you know, William Shatner is still alive. He's like 95 or whatever he is, but he's still uh still with it. Maybe he could do the call outs. He could still do call outs. And he would love he would love to do some call outs, right? Yeah, he'll do call outs. Denny Crane. Yeah. You know who would do call outs? What about Hey Now, uh George Teay. Hey now. Oh, that would be phenomenal. George Decay multiball. [] I don't know. I played George Decay multiball. He's 89 right now. He's still with us, right? Yeah. Yeah, he is. Yeah. Okay, there we go. Now, they want to know, is it the OG movies or the OG TV show? We don't know. I bet you it's a TV show. I bet you it is, too. Yeah. Just like Transformers is the TV show, you know, but I don't think that's like I I know like um I might people might be more into movies than TV shows. Same for Transformers or whatever. The G1 movie. I mean, but I think that in pinball getting the TV show, which is like usually another like layer of corniness actually works for pinball, you know? It's like you want the campiness in pinball. Yeah. We were talking about Batman 66. How campy that is. That's it. I mean, it's just Camp City, but it's so absolutely absolutely I remember Tribbles. Yeah. Oh my. That's right. Is that Is that Joe Sherina? That looks like his image right there. Right. Okay. We got a question. Is Star Trek a nightmare to operate? Which one? I mean, the the TNG is, right? But not um but I wouldn't think Stern Star Trek is. Well, can Ninja really work? Ours Mark took the one we had at the arcade home because he couldn't figure out what was going on with it. And maybe he just, you know, he has so many games he just if something happens to one, he'll just swap them out. So, um, you know, it may have been something somebody else could fix. Um, but I think I think they a lot of people operate them. Uh, G.I. Joe over Star Trek. Oh, is there not a GI Joe? God, we me and we talk about this all the time. Well, Star Trek is a better move for sales, but I would rather see a G I'd rather see Keith do GI Joe. Star Trek, do you think has better sales than GI Joe? Yeah, I agree with that. I agree with that as well. But God, GI Joe, would I love that. Is my echo cancellation on again? I need to check something real quick. So Kale and I are doing a podcast tomorrow, right Kale? Yep. Tomorrow night we're meeting with Ray D Raymond Davidson, if you will. Uh we're doing uh going over the full Star Trek Fall of the Empire deep dive. Star Wars. That's what I Damn it. I blew that. Star Wars. I did it earlier. I did it earlier before you joined. That's what I right. Which is a great coded game. It is. Right. I know. I know the layout is not for everyone and I get that. But the code is amazing on it. The layout though. Which one are you guys talking about? We're talking about we're Star Wars. Star Wars Fall of the Empire. Oh, we're doing the podcast tomorrow with Ray. And going into a deep dive of the code and I was just saying the code is great on that game. You don't like the layout, huh? No. You know what's interesting? Um, I heard that the uh the Death Star shot, the Notorious shot that everybody's like, you know, rejects and Yeah. Tom Tom has always been talked about this on Triple Dre. It's just like like it's it's a running joke, right? This is a very hard shot to to hit even after you install that new new part, right? Um, so originally that Death Star was that playfield level. That's how that's how it was designed and it was um it was it was a scoop that was very easy to hit. You could even back very easily backhand it. Um like on the Data East Star Wars that John Borg designed like 30 years before or whatever the time is. There you go. Right. which was also a backhandable kind of Death Star, right? So it so it was like a last minute change. Um just to get the the Death Star like front and center like up in the air instead of on the on the ground. Yeah, that's a mistake. Hindsight game. We're playing a little hindsight game, Serge. Well, I won't ask I won't ask tomorrow about it about that, but that is interesting. Yeah, because it would be interesting to ask like uh you know what's it like? You know, maybe you already had code for it in one location and then now the shots more difficult. How does that change the way you think about code? But uh no reason to get into that. Yeah, sure. Christopher Franchie wants to wants to see your other brain. Oh, it's it's in the shop. In fact, do you in fact have two brains? That was a great Steve Martin movie. Now my head my would you do you think my head is bigger than your head? I think with your hair. Yes. My skull and everything. With the hair definitely. The skull. Well, you know there used to be a science of phronology where you would people feel people's head. Here we go ladies and gentlemen. And understand what they what like you know what they were good at, what they weren't based on the shape of their skull or whatever. Yeah, but you've been you've been hit in the skull a few times, right, Gale? I have. I've taken some hits, man. That's what's wrong with him, ladies and gentlemen, if you were wondering. H. But your brain, I think, is more is more dense than mine. Well, you know, uh, first of all, it's very kind, and I don't know that, but I would say that um, you know, like we're all good at different things, and I have my things that I'm good at, and I have lots of things I'm really stupid at, you know. I was I had some like like my family makes fun of me cuz I had like a deodorant that I was like trying to put on for like 3 weeks and I'm like you know I just don't think this thing is giving me the coverage I need you know and then they looked at it and like I never took off the plastic piece you know under the cap or whatever and like you know what does that have to do with you can't win them all is what I'm saying. What does that have to do with memorizing pinball code very little? So, what you know, now that I've got you here, technically it's a somewhat of an interview surge. Oh, don't don't you tell Dirty Pool. Okay. So, I win. Oh, man. I got you first. Yeah. Jamie and Kale, we got you. Right. That's very kind of you. It's been it's been a running joke that like Kale like like you know like Jeff asked me and some other people to go on and like I just I feel weird about doing interviews or whatever. Like it's such a weird thing like it's such a niche hobby already, you know, and I'm just somebody talking about a niche hobby. Interview of somebody who's talking about a niche hobby feels like too meta for me or whatever. And so like I was just like I'm not going to do anything. And um um but uh but you might technically you might have technically won now. I guess I did win. And um you could get me with the impromptu thing. I guess but so now I'm going to ask you an interview question. Tell the story of how you walked up to Kale and when you how you got into streaming with him. Tell that story. Kale told me I should do it and I'm like nah or whatever. And he's like no we should just get on and talk about it because we like to talk at in after league night about all sorts of dumb stuff and uh I don't know Kayla maybe you tell it better but that's that's what I would say. Uh, so I I think was wasn't the first time. So we got all the rig parts together, me and John Chappel like did all the troubleshooting trying to get it together and we still didn't have it dialed in. As you know, Jamie, you know, it takes a long time. Yeah. When you start from nothing. Um, so I think we did one stream before uh Arizona State Championships. That's why we got the stream, the rig together, cuz the the state championships were going to be at the electric bat and they're going to be at the electric bat this year. Great. Serge, you ready for that? Put that on your calendar. All right, let's do it. And you're going to stream that, right? Oh, hell yeah. I mean, come on. That's where you need a second rig, though, Kale. So, Serge sits down next to me and nobody had any idea what to expect. And we were just all like I mean anybody who seen the stream we were just blown away like like Serge he did he did his research. He knew the rules to every single game we were streaming and we were we were like like immediately we were like this is a thing now. Right. This is I'll admit it's a it's a pet peeve of mine when people do like commentary on very big tournaments like really big tournaments and they just don't know the games and you like know the games in advance on in those tournaments right? I'm not saying everyone's got to know all the rules of every game. I get that. you know, it's it's hard to do, but if you're gonna if you if you know you're going to a tournament where you know the games that are going to be there and you already know you're going to be doing commentary on those games, yeah, I think you should look up the rules. That's what I think. Yeah. You Jamie No, no, no, no. I used to stream a lot and what I would do is I made sure there was a surge. Now, there's only one surge, but there was a surge st sitting next to me, okay? and not particularly just a kale. Meaning the kale's job on the stream is to keep it flowing and not know everything about every particular machine. That's where you come in and help him out. Okay. And that's what a dynamic duo does. Okay. You know, uh Ko and I played the role of, you know, Joe Buck. Yeah, that fair too. But like also like you also don't have to know the rules of the game, but like there are a lot of these games that just have the rules online. And so you could look you could have like a laptop next to you of the rules while you're commentating. I don't think there's anything wrong with that either. Mhm. And then but and you could say, well, you can't be sitting there and looking rules up or whatever, but then I'll hear people do commentary where they have like five minute discussions on trying to figure out the rules but not look them up. And I just I'm always surprised at that. I'm like, you know, it would it would be much faster just to look it up. Yeah. All right. get off my high horse about it. Yes, it's okay. It's all right. You're very, very good at this and that's why you want it. You know, this is your I was a freak when I was at the old joint on quality of audio and video. That is what drove me to know and tail was if the video quality wasn't good enough with the two rigs. God, just I lost my [] Couldn't handle it. We We do have a trivia question in chat a little higher, which was what was the first game to have a physical ball lock? I'm going to try to think of the answer for that. The first thing I would say when you ask me is the first game to have a multiball was was uh firepower um 1980 uh firepower, right? Um and that had physical ball locks, but you could argue that there was multiball before that was the first solid state game with a multiball. There was like balls of pop in from an an electromechanical from like decades earlier. And you could argue like that kind of has physical ball. So I'm not sure if that's what we mean, but um I'll stop there. Are you guys now? No, I have no idea. But the it's probably some game where there was just like a saucer that held a ball and then you know you could play with another one and and then it popped out. I don't know after you drain like there might have been a physical ball lock where it's like kind of like a ball save where it holds the ball and then see this is the type of thing if I was on a if I was on some sort of live commentary I would look that up if I didn't know it. That's what I'm saying. Someone said firepower and that's what I just said. Okay, so I think you got it right. All right, fair enough. There you go. Oh, thanks. Thank you, Bon. Is is Matt from Barrels of Fun? He has a little Barrels of Fun logo. Do you know that guy? Yeah, that's Matt Rodon. You know you know all the Barrels people. I know a lot of the Barrels people. What do they wear? I play pinball with what are they? They won't tell me. They won't tell me anything. In fact, I I I don't even know if Matt knows to be truthful. They keep their circle so tight. That's how they do it. They are the only that can that can do that. Yeah. It's probably maybe it's a smaller team, but also like if you ask me, if I can have my dream team made by any company right now, for me, it's barrels. That's that's what would make be making my dream team over Jersey Jack or Stern or Really? That's a hot take. Yeah, maybe that might well be a hot take. I know and I know they've only made like three games. Um but uh yeah, I think it's also about what you want in a game. Um it's I'm not saying the answer from like an operator's perspective like Hail, but for me they are very much about integrating a theme and making moments. That is you could tell that that's the thing that they're going for. How many moments can we fit into a game? That's what I think that's what I think when I play their games. And it's not like nobody else is thinking that or that's a new thing that nobody ever decided upon trying for in moments, but I don't think anybody's doing it as much as they are. Aussie wants to know, do they have Masters of the Universe? Nobody knows. Azie, I have I have no idea. Oh, Joe Teravino is here with some trivia answers. Okay. Baffle Ballock. What's he saying? Yeah, that that's a tricky thing which is like there there was um before even flippers and I saw this on a YouTube video uh not so long ago that we sent on the electrobat discord, but they were they had on expo um the guy who who collects all the flip all the flipperless bagel type uh you know pinball machines and they they had a multiball on that one that had a physical ball lock and they had the first multiball there. Nice. Jeff, you know what's really great about this, Jeff? This is great. Because now I wrong. Does it look like Serge is here? What's going on here? Thank you for What the hell? You know, I was just trying to do that and uh I'm so glad you gave this to him. It's so [] great. What is going on here? What's going on here? What is this? Uh we invited you because we thought, you know what? Let's do it together. Let's interview Serge together. It's a collaborative experience. What's going on, guys? How are you, man? Great to see you, Jeff Dodson. I see that you've convinced Serge to be on a non electric bat uh live stream slash tournament. I know. That's how good we are. Well, in fairness, I didn't think this was an interview. First of all, I just turning into one. I didn't expect an interview. And I asked him one question. I asked him one interview question just so that I could beat you to it. We should ask him two. Well, go ahead. Ask him one. Jeff, before you do that, uh, Sure. Did you Did you catch all the nice things he was saying about Barrels of Fun just now, which I just realized I heard I heard a little bit that you said that Barrels of Barrels of Fun has tight lipped ships, which you are absolutely correct about. That's true. But what I was saying, what I was saying was, and apparently it's a hot take and people uh who don't love me in chat necessarily for this, but if I had one dream theme and I could say which company I'd prefer to make me be made by, for me, it's Barrels of Fun. That's what I would say. Oh my lord. You're just saying that cuz I joined. No, no, no, he didn't. He said it. I mean, I don't think you're wrong. I think Barrels of Fun has and and he had a great reason for it. Go ahead, Serge. Yeah, my reason is that Hey, uh, real quick, chat wants to know, can you turn down your audio just a little bit? Is it is it is it feedbacking? That's what I was thinking. Here, I'll tell you what. I'll do one better. I'll put headphones on. Oh, okay. Thank you, Cascade. There you go. Shout out to you, Cascade. And for Chris Rantry, if I could have art from one one artist on any pinball machine, it would be Chris Rantry. And I'm not just saying that because he's in chat. They want to know where is Ralph is not because he's under NDA. He is Azie out with the wife. He's right. Yeah, he is. He's traveling a lot uh this this coming week. So, he's spending Memorial Day weekend exclusively with the wife, which is a smart smart thing because she's an awesome person. Yeah. Don't get in trouble with the misses. Right. That's rule number one of pinball. Right. How's How's the uh How's uh dirty pool audio, everybody? Am I too hot? I can turn that down, too. Yeah, turn it down just a little bit. Yeah. What are you using, bro? You got like a shotgun mic or something pointed at you? No, I'm using a good old U87, man. Oh, damn, bro. Yeah, it's the same mic we recorded the call outs for Winchester on. What a flex. Oh, he's flexing that thing. Just in the arsenal. Um, part of the process. Uh, is that better? Am I not as loud now? No, you're good now. Much better. Well, I'll say because because we like chat and we pay attention to chat around here that a few questions on like, hey, what's a moment? What makes the moment? And also, have I played the new uh Dune code, you know, with it? And the answer is yes for both. Um, and uh to say like a moment, you could make a moment out of a mech. That's easy to do, right? Like if you have a ship firing a ball like on JJP's Pirates, that makes a moment without a doubt. That's that's like a very good and important way to make a moment. But what impresses me more is when somebody does it purely through zeros and ones on code. You know, like in Jurassic Park, the the smart missile shot, 3 2 1 fire, and you hit that smart missile shot, that is a moment. It feels like a moment. Of course, it's a cool moment when the premium T-Rex or LE T-Rex eats the ball and throws it. And that's of course an easy a cool moment. But to make it out of just the smart missile shot, that's just coat that's doing it, you know? So that to me takes another level of artistry I would say where it makes people feel like intense spike in adrenaline in a single moment of the game in pinball already has adrenaline going but when you have this one thing you have to do and something cool happens in it that is for me what makes a moment and and it especially impresses me when it's codebased and so I take like Dune for example you know like obviously I could say oh the worm mech is like really cool and it is you know but and that's a moment fine desert power multiball and the ball comes up But first of all, they do a lot. It's not just the mech. The screen goes big, for example. They get rid of all the display. They don't show any animations. It's just the screen and the desert power and they pause for it. And then like non-mech moments, for example, like just the pain box idea. Every game has these days has two flippers and an action button. You know, you could drain a ball and then have the same moment happen where you have to hold down an action button and then move your hands left and right. But they thought of doing it and other people hadn't. And so I'm saying you can make it. That's a code. That's just a moment purely out of code as an example. So that's what uh that's what impresses me with Dune to jump on that a little bit too. I think that it moments are moments but it's the choreography between everything that is what really makes a moment like absolutely sell because you've got to orchestrate all of the lighting, the sound, the animation, the actual physical max moving. And if you don't have all of those things triggering together, like that's truly what a moment is. just having the ball dump off the worm is cool and all, but the fact that it like builds up to that moment and all these different things play off. I think that's that's the modern pinball like you know serotonin rush. Yeah. And and essence saying another one I was about to say too which is the coliseum mode. Uh it's like uh it's it's a white mode where all the shots are white. I think you get it after like your fifth uh mystery award Benade Jesuit award on the left orbit. Um, and then it the entire game turns white, which is already cool cuz that never that's never otherwise happens in the game with that lighting, but also the screen is white. The these clips are in, you know, the black and white kind of thing. And then they do the thing, they sync it up to the movie clips where in the movie he's wearing this sort of what do you call it? The body armor that like, you know, like it's like electronics on shields. There it is. Thank you. There's shields around it. And um and so for the first half of the mode, the game every time you make a shot, it's or or certain switches hit happen, it like does that kind of shield effect in the game and your ball save is still on, but then eventually in the movie he turns off the shield and similarly your ball save turns off. And so it's just like there's there's a lot of movie integration and theme immersion in those moments like that that is just next level on that game, for example, and tells me, "Hey, these people really care about integrating the theme." Uh, wait. So, what's your dream theme that you want barrels to make? Oh, damn it. I wasn't even ready for that. Uh, no. Francancy wants to know. Chad's dying to know, man. Boy, I don't think I Isn't that weird? I don't think I was ready. You guys talk amongst yourselves. I'm going to think about this for a second. I have a thoughtful answer. Cam and I always say GI Joe, right? That's the one that's driving that's driving us crazy is uh I want a badass Destro with a hooded Cobra Commander. The hooded Come on. Do you think the success of Transformers is going to determine if the GI Joe pinball machine happens? Yeah. I mean, they're in the same like family. Well, right. Yeah. But they always have been. In the comics, there were always crossovers and and it's and there's two weird universes to cross over, but it does. And in the comics now, um it's it there's a whole new series. Sorry, got it. Sorry, I was thinking about it for a second. All right, let me give you a few. I would have said Batman the animated series. Uh, first of all, sorry, that was interesting for me. Um, I would have said um Zelda, which is like not a mysterious one to mention and that people have wanted and maybe other video game themes that I've wanted like a better Mario or even Metroid uh something like that. I know they're making Sonic or whatever, but I was a Nintendo kid. So anyway, I think I would say like Batman the animated series, you know, it was a funny circular thing with that. So, the person that taught me my ear training and a lot of my like music theory is the uh he did two episodes of Batman the animated series. He scored them and then orchestrated all the rest of them. So, that would be a cool circular moment. I would love to work on Batman the animated series. I think it's peak peak Batman. It also I know they've been Batman games before, but I think the animated series particularly works well for pinball. Um I think they've got a lot of episodes with a lot of villains and a lot of modes. They've got a lot of clips that can be used, you know, that can fill up. They've got orchestral music and the animations are already there. So, I think it just it works well. And I know the voice is has died unfortunately a few years ago, but um but I think they could do a lot with it. Sure. I mean, Star just showed that you can make a pin out of like fully animated assets as well. So, breaking here. Christopher Francie says if it's Batman animated, he's he's in on art. Yes. Hey, Rachel. I'm in on that LA, too. No to Zelda. No, Zelda. What you got against Zelda? What' Zelda do to you? I don't know. He doesn't You don't want You guys know we almost had a Zelda. Gladiators were supposed to be Zelda. Really? Yeah. Glad the old Gotautle game. Really? But yeah, but something happened in the They weren't something fell apart while they were making it, so they switched it over to just a generic Gladiators. Oh. All right. Talk amongst yourselves. I need a Diet Coke, boys. All right. Are you going to pee, too? Yeah. Okay, good. I'm just looking out for him. What do we What do we got? What's up? Speaking of Franchie art in the background, check out that Batman 66. I'm jealous. That's a great game. Isn't that awesome? I watched that show, too, a lot as a kid. And that was I I love that like that integration in there, too. But I'll tell you one thing. Alex Gomez just said that game is so awful. How dare you speak poorly of Batman 66. That's an LFS code. That's a Gomez design. Batman 66. Hopefully he's talking about Gladiator. What did I miss? Yeah, if he's talking about he's talking about Gladiator. If he's talking about um He's got to be talking about Gladiator. If he's talking about Batman 66, you have to ban him, Jamie. Okay. It's like it's this needs to be done. Yeah. Because this could be this could be on my Mount Rushmore. Okay. It's Gladiators and we can rest easy. Everyone calm down. We almost had to kick somebody out, boys. You You know what's weird? You both have Gomez games behind you. Yeah. Look at that. I have two, actually. I have a Lord of the Rings over there on the other side. Oh, I can see. Ready? Let's go on a rotating journey. Oh, that's Shadow. That's Shadow. Lord of the Rings is under the rig. I forgot that I moved it today. We're We're trying to get to Valenor again for the next stream. So, it's Lord of the Rings time. Hey, Serge, real quick. If they do a Batman 66 anniversary edition, right? And they remaster it. Batman animated series version. Sorry. Okay. No, you couldn't do the animated because, you know, you got everybody, right? You got Crane and [] But, don't you think it would be a nice little add-on is if you lit Mystery, you could get a TV letter once in a while. Uh because you know because otherwise you're not playing those TV modes enough. I think that's a nice add-on for people who would like that. I think I would like that a lot. No. Yeah. No, I get what you're saying. Can we grill Serge a little bit? Yeah. Some pop quiz questions. All right, let's do it. Serge, what do what do you think's a game that has the most underutilized modern code? Like modern rule set? like a game that had the layout to have potential but just like the rules didn't bring it to where it needed to be. I would say uh well that's an obvious answer. Um that's still in development though. I think the game it needs to be a complete game. I'm going to give you an answer Jeeoff but I'm going to give you another hot take about Pokemon is for me which is like people like eventually they're going to have presumably more things in the code including achievements and all of that. But I don't think they were ever going to have the things in the code that people thought they were. I thought they thought people thought like you were gonna have Pokemon and you were gonna evolve them and you could trade them with your friends and everything like I don't think that was ever part of the plan whatsoever. Agree. It was just like it was going to be what it still ended up might be which is in my guess is just achievements like okay I got this Pokemon I got that Pokemon and you're collecting several hundred of them and every time you collect them you're basically collecting them the same way. you're getting a bunch of switch hits and then you have to spell catch by hitting certain shots and then you hit the scoop and you get them and it's just that recurrent thing and you would try to collect them all and that's fine or whatever and I'm not saying there's anything wrong with that but I think people had higher expectations of the code than were ever planned for even though right now they have underwhelmed on the on on just giving the standard code I think even if they had given the code I don't think it would satisfy people I got a follow-up one for you then do you think expectations from IPs are damaging actual pinball releases Cuz I'll use the example of Winchester, like there's no IP, there's no expectation of what like the game should have been. So instead of coming in with like a preconceived notion of what the game's supposed to be, it's a clean slate. Yeah. But there were also no preconceived notions, Jeff, because nobody knew the [] thing was coming out until the night before Expo. Well, sure. But nobody was going to be like, "Well, they knew you need to journey through a haunted house this way, you know, or that way." Like, it's it's different than, you know, there's How many Pokémon video games are there? like all the rules are like there in a different format. Yeah. Now, in a way, there was a preconceived notion with Winchester because there are 725 or whatever how many people that love Carl and want to get a piece of his first machine. Yeah. But also, that's not his first machine. He's talked about it. He helped on Dune, you know, he was involved a tiny bit on Labyrinth. like that knowledge is is out there. It's not his first like exclusive design, but go ahead. Did people did Did people know that? I I didn't know that. It was not on release, but afterwards it was discussed cuz Carl, you know, people were like, "Well, how long have you been working for Barrels?" And like, you know, Carl's an honest honest man. So well I first of all I think there's there's it's not you know pinball is a niche hobby but within pinball there are enthusiasts who treat it I think like some people treat films versus movies where there are people who really want the oour you know who is the director and also the writer like your Tarantino fans or uh like you know Francis Ford Copa or something like that and I think when people see Carl they're like this is a person who's going to be the designer of the game layout but also the rules designer he's you know not every most designers aren't that you'll have like Elliot Eismin is doing the John Wick and somebody else does the rules. Jack Danger did an amazing job with Uncanny X-Men and the design. There are some issues with it, but like it's a pretty awesome interesting design, but the rules weren't there and everything. And so when you see somebody like an Elwin or a Carl D'Python Anghelo who is known in the hobby, is passionate about the hobby, and is not only designing a game, but coming together with the rules, it gives people, I'd say, like me, confidence that boy, this is going to be a banger because I know this person. This person cares about what they do. it's obvious their passion and they're going to try, they're going to be obsessive about the whole package, you know, they're going to look into it. And I think that's what you got with Winchester. And I think that come came across instantly. Carl and Carl's too humble. Like I'll say it right now. Carl does quality control on it. He's like testing the game every day. Like all the new modes that come out, all the new like uh releases for the code, he's in there trying to find as many bugs as possible. Like he is extremely the complete package. the the document he put together that like explained all the modes, has lore behind it and like all the different like backstory for the characters. I mean like he he is the entire package. He is like I think one of the best things that has happened to pinball in in a long time. I don't know why he wasn't designing games sooner, but here we are, right? And and that's what I think when I and I I didn't even know all that detail, but I could assume all that detail, you know, with what Carl does. You could see it on a stream, but also you could see like when somebody has so much passion and they're going to oversee the entirety of the project. Not I mean I don't want to say every obviously you do sound and all that but I mean like rule the rules and the layout that is an otour you know in a certain sense and that's somebody who like just like people follow Elwin and they're excited for what he releases and they trust in him because he kind of tries to control a lot of the process maybe less so like in the beginning of like Iron Maiden like he's not just doing the design, he's doing the rules. He's people talk about him as like the best designer in pinball and and probably he is, but he's also the best rules designer in pinball, you know, and people see that and they they want that. So, that's one element I think that worked in Winchester's favor. And then another thing is that there are some IPs that um people have expectations on. There's some IPs that actually turn people off. Um and then there's some IPs that then are some things that are fairly unlicensed. I know Winchester is technically licensed but like not wellknown that you're not bringing in a ton of expectations for and it's hard to bring in a ton of expectations for so it's sort of easier to not disappoint people I would say when it comes to something like that anyway so it sort of depends on like I think I think a game like I don't know Back to the Future which I know is rumored to come out too I think people have expectations around that and there's nothing you could do to avoid people having expectations around that you know they want to see there better be a Delorean there. You can't have you're not going to have Back to the Future without Marty McFly, you know, if you It's not like a Predator thing. You can't you can't just have you just can't have the game without that. So, as soon as a game has expectations, it also has disappointment with it. It's unavoidable, right? Those those two come hand in hand. So, what do you which I think more What do you think, Jeff? On our last podcast, what's up, Enzo? Sorry, Enzo. On our last podcast, we had Christopher Franchie on and he uh said that he wishes more companies would just release it like they do a movie trailer. What's your thoughts on that, boys? I saw that. Yeah, but then as soon as you plant that, then you plant the expectation seed, you know, by dropping it all of a sudden there's an immediate, okay, this is what we did with the game. So instead of people thinking what it should be, they are just playing the adventure that the people that designed it, the intention they had immediately. There's no time to build a kind of like idea of what you think something should be in your head over a year or six months or however long it should be. I I think there's certain IPs that would benefit from it. Like if a concepts leaked and like some art came out or something like we'll use Spooky as an example, right? Like there's like a very large implication that Goonies is going to be the next game based on those assets they s found, right? So like instead of trying to make it a surprise like build the hype, start the start the hype train, you know? Yeah. I don't Serge, what do you think? Well, I think a few things. One, uh, with Goonies, there's a lot of expectations already. There's going to be a ship in there. There's going to be a chunk multiball or whatever. And I think you there is a to Jeff's point, I think there's a way to start teasing that. You don't have to show the playfield, but you could just start giving the you know, they may not have licenser ability to do this. That's another issue. But if you can start showing like um you know the clip clips on the display or the sounds of like a chunk multiball or maybe a chunk frenzy frenzy mode or or something like that. Um then hey you guys multiball. Yeah. Hey you guys multiball and you just hear the call out. Yeah. I think that's going to get people really excited and you could drop that. Um but you know pinball hasn't traditionally done that with you know buildup releases. It's always like a certain way that it's done for for all manufacturers. Um, and then it's just crazy that it hasn't changed in like 40, 45, 50 years. Like the only thing that's really changed is like they used to put games on location to test them out. A lot of the sales went through, you know, like operators and now most of it is to home users. So I mean like the business has changed, but like how do you successfully market a pin to show people that the the best foot forward for it, right? And a question from chat which is follow up from what you asked me earlier Jeff is just uh what about monsters and other game you know asking me what code might be lacking and yes I would say monsters is lacking and I would also put venom there too and um but but what I would say is those are both fan layout games and um you could have a fan layout with great code and we're talking to Ray De tomorrow who did Star Wars Fall of the Empire and that is great code on that game. So I think it is uh I think like Monsters which has a very good feeling fast flowy two flipper fan layout game could could have had great code. It just doesn't to me. I could be very specific you know as to why which is to say like I think people expect in today's modern day and age mostly expect a a mode-based game first of all like um and Venom and Monsters is not quite and you could argue what the definition of mode is but they're not. And it's hard to make a non-modebased game great. The exception would be Metallica, but with Metallica that had like built-in audience already and people knew the game and loved the game, you know, like you don't need it for Attack from Mars, you know, really is not a mode based game. Um, and mo by mode I mean you get into a scoop or saucer or something happens and a 30 second timer comes on and it's a clip from the thing you care about. Like a ladder game, stacks of ladders all over it. Yeah. That sort of thing. And um and so uh yeah, I'd say like Tron and Metallica don't have modes in that sense, but they are beloved games for historical reasons, you know, that way. And it the code works for them, but generally it's really hard to and to keep people entertained with a theme they love if you don't give them scenes through modes. What do you prefer? Uh, boys, do you prefer a Beetlejuice type of mode where it's random or do you prefer you have to hit a shot to get a mode or do you prefer picking a mode with your action button? Am I able to share my screen here? Yeah. All right. I'm going to do something to answer while you guys answer that question. You know, I'm I'm prepared even when I'm asked impromptu to come on. This guy is the best. He's the absolute greatest laser. All right, I have the answer to that question here. So, here is pinball charts. Here's a chart of all mode choices of all mode type modes and how you choose them. So, for example, does the game actually choose the mode for the player? Um, or all the way up to hey, you can actually choose your mode, right? you know, for completely. And there's there's all these I'm just I'm not I won't kill you guys with the entire chart here, but what I will do is just Kale, you could go to sleep if you'd like. And also Jamie, too, but I thought you were going to ask me to sing. I'm here. I'm good to go. No, no, no, no. You're right. But uh but what I mean is um yeah, basically I would say like this goes from most freedom, least freedom to most freedom, you know, random like the game just chooses for you versus like semi- random. You can hit switches like in James Bond pops pop bumpers change the mode. It's I hate it's such a pet peeve. I hate that. Correct. I hate that. It It is technically not uh totally random because you could change them, but you can't predict how it changes, you know, because how many pops will move the mode. So, that's like semi-random. Semi-choice is that you could hit switches, but the switches are more purposeful. So, for example, in John Wick, you choose one of the shots. Let's say you want the leftmost mode, you make the leftmost shot. If you want the rightmost mode, you make the rightmost shot. And then you hit the scoop. So that's like sort of semi- choice. Then you could choose via shot. That's like Star Wars, Fall of Vampire or Stranger Things, you know, or Jaws, uh, as an example. Scars, you just hit that easy ramp and then you're in the scars mode. Or Ghostbusters has that, you know, mode ladder kind of thing. Uh, choice via flipper is like is, uh, let's say Alviv House of Horrors, the light moves on the building. Uh, and it's also there in the new Transformers game in the same way where uh, Lord of the Rings actually Jeff that you have, right, is like this too. um where the flippers move the modes and then finally these are um uh full freedom where uh the the ball stops in a saucer in a scoop and then you choose what thing you want. Um and that's going to be a bunch of games too like King Kong, Foo Fighters, you know, what van mode do you want? That sort of thing. Maybe the last category and then I'll shut up is games without any modes. [] great. Is this too much? Did I go too far? No. I love it. All right. So then games without modes. um are here's here's your games without modes. And these are all fun games. Like I love TNA, you know, for as one example. Um Elton John's super fun. Uh Tron is great. Metallic is great. You know, I don't I'm not into Venom and Monsters, but I like Iron Man. Uh too. So, you could do you can get away with games without a traditional mode, too. But anyway, those are all of those games focus their mode basically on like a super multiball or multiballs that can be like stacked with each other. That's exactly right. Right. That's the strategy if you want to make a good game. uh like it's chaining multiballs together like more scoring based it should play fast. If a game doesn't have a mode it should play fast I would say because modes are like 30 seconds sometimes 60 seconds and they they you know they're good for longer playing multiple flipper type games. You know what's the the most heinous offense other than the random pops like changing modes? It's when when a designer puts like a standup that's like hidden in the middle of nowhere and it's the like change mode standup. like they couldn't think of anything else to put on that. And and like Dune, I'm going to throw Dune under the bus here. Dune also has what I think is probably the worst mode selection as well. Many people don't know that you can select your mode in Dune. And it's either if you hit the left or right orbit, it is the SW. It changes the mode one direction one way or one direction the other, which who the hell is going to want to shoot in orbit and risk, you know, draining over changing the mode instead of just shooting the scoop to start it. That's why I have it over here as here I have it as Dune. Um, switches will change the mode via purposeful choice. You know, that sort of thing. And here's my here's my from least freedom. Oh, to most freedom. I was wondering why there was a hammer and sickle. But then also here's here's no choice whatsoever. That's North Korea if you're wondering. Wow. Awesome. You get no modes and you'll like it and you better like it. So great. I do like the TNA and I'm going to take a screenshot of this because you have TNA and the North Korean flag right next to each other. Let's send that to Scott. Well, let me fine. But let me Wait, but but they should No, no, it's okay. It's okay that it's just TNA in the North Korean fight. I should at least explain it. No, I like TNA for again. I want to stress. I think it's a great game. This is hilarious, boys. Thank you so much. I appreciate it. How How much longer do you want to go, Kale? Uh, I don't know. I'm good for another couple minutes. Whatever. All right. We were gonna invite the chat to come in. What do you think of that, boys? You want to stick around for that or you want to uh I I don't I I didn't think we expected to have what we have going on. We have going on. Yeah, let's stick with this. We'll just stick with the four of us for another 10 minutes. How about that? Yeah. Franchie sent another good question. He wants to know what he Serge what you think Lemon Sheets is like Swanson code is. Um Lyman Sheets is the you know just about the greatest coder ever. Of course I still wouldn't make an argument that Elwin is a great rules designer too um that way. But uh what made Lyman so great uh without being I could be quite specific but from a like 20,000 foot view is that was the first pinball coder that you could sense the art behind the code I would say you know like a lot of people make movies and some people make films and when you you know you could watch like the good the bad and the ugly which is like just a in a sense a dumb western with a bad plot but somehow it's oporadic you know because it's like Sergio Olone if you're into films but what I would say is similarly like he make medieval madness and you sense the soul of medieval madness and the soul behind Attack from Mars. And so like there there is you could really feel the I believe pinball code can be art. It doesn't it's not always it doesn't it's not on all games but I think you can actually sense the art behind it and uh and like a sensitive soul and you you could with all Lyman games. More specifically though um is what I you know I would say Batman 66 or Alvivara. I would say Batman 66 over Alvara. Even though I love both codes are great. No, no problem with I don't have much bad to say about either one, but I would say and how could I, right? But I would say what like makes Batman 66, one of the things that makes it great is it has multiple mode trees. So when I say mode trees is you could play all the main villains. That's one mode tree. You know, you have to hit their shots and then hit the phone and you could play one of four main villains doing that. But but separately, there's a completely different mode tree. It's not just that the game has lots of modes, but it has different areas to access modes. So, you can do um you can do a mode tree on the TV modes and then you play all those mini villains. And Dune is like that, too. You have the prophecy modes, but you also have harvester battles. They're two different sets of modes with two different feelings of and two different ways to access them, one in day and one in night. But, uh and I think generally games with that I like mode based games. I still like non-modebased games when they're done artfully. uh like Tron is and Metallic is and those are great, but if you're going to do a modebased game, I even like them tend to like them more when there's multiple mode trees. So, it just gives you other things to do. Jurassic Park, there's T-Rex modes and control room modes. And so, I think um so that's one thing that Lyman did well uh with several of his games is that kind of giving the player those modes, giving them different places to start the modes. And I'll say another thing he did that was innovative. There's just so many things he did that were innovative, but um but he was the sort of innovator behind um kind of uh um let's call them side quests, things you do over the course of three balls, missions or side quests. Like in Walking Dead, there are modes, but at the same time, you're killing zombies, you're killing walkers, and there's achievement for getting as many walkers as you can in the background. So anyway, that's my my love for Lyman section. It's hard to disagree with you, sir. Did I say anything crazy? No, I think Batman 66 it it's one of the first games my friends John Spates lets me rotate his machines in my house that he doesn't have room for and I'm going to have a tough time giving this back, boys, you know, because I play it the TV mode way. Okay, I I could give a [] about the major villain. It's not really important. I kind of want to get through two of them so I can get an extra ball. All right, that's as quickly as I want to get through. And I don't know if you know, if you hold this flipper down, do you do you know this? If you hold the flipper down right before you launch and you let go and then hold it again, you can reduce the amount of jackpots that you can get for it takes to get the final jackpot for each. What? It's a very strange. It's like a secret, huh? It's a secret. Nobody really knows it. Now, Elizabeth hooked us up. Thank you so much. Thank you. This is like Brandon gift memberships. 20 gift memberships. Oh my gosh. Oh my god. See, we can't tell that, ladies and gentlemen. We can't see it on Riverside. And Kale and I said that in the beginning of the particular podcast that we can't see any super chats. We can't see any gifts. I'm so sorry. You know what you got to do? That's why I'm take look. You take out your phone and you just look at it. Yeah. You just look at it, dude. Aussie is like the the superhero fan. Like, he is he's on all the all the channels. He's supporting all the influencers. I mean, like, he's just a rock star when it comes to supporting pinball content. He He really is. And one of the nicest guys I I got to meet him. Uh did you get to meet him, Jeff, at uh a few times TPF? And uh he was at Stern Media Day, too. So, how was Stern Media Day? It was good. Um, first and foremost, like I don't think there's enough discussion talking about how Elizabeth Gizki is like the first lead programmer that is a a female in like the history of pinball. Like the fact that that's not more center stage for CERN is like kind of mind-blowing. But they didn't do the like, you know, they normally like they have like a they stand in front of the game and do like a presentation like firing squad style. Like they didn't really do that. They did the like distributor video. Okay. All right. That's a little different. Yeah. Which I was bummed out about. Like that should have been that's like part of the experience is like forcing them to give this awkward presentation in front of their game and talk about everything. Do you think they were just Do you think they were just nervous because maybe Elizabeth and and what's his name are a little shy? Elliot Eismin Elliot. Yeah. They She's not Elliot Eismin seemed a lot more reclusive. Yeah. Okay. Gizki's like very she was up and immediately up next to the game when people were playing telling them what to do and like what to shoot at and answering questions. So I I think it was just they they forgot about it to be honest. Jeff, did you ask him why the return right in lane guide rail looks like a can opener? It did not. But I would guess that but why? Yeah, it it does very much look different. Um well, it has that like lip, right? So it can dump off, right? It seems like there's like both the way to feed the in lane and also it could like kind of fall off into the regular playfield that way. Uh the gun points down the middle apparently. I didn't see that because it can it can feed the upper right flipper and like kind of dribble the ball out in addition to launching it like on the ramp which is neat. Um but yeah, I don't know. Media day was great. It was media day. Bunch of people raiding. When you played it, did did the What's up, Sid? Uh, when you played it, did it did the ball did the cannon only launch it to that like little metal platform or did it launch it to other places? No, it it feeds the upper right flipper as well. So, like it goes it aims up and shoots it over the thing and then it also kind of points down and dribbles it out. That's already in the code. So, so far in the code, my understanding, Jeff, is that when when it fires the cannon by making the right ramp shot, which is a hard to hit right ramp from what I saw on the stream, um that you hit the right ramp shot, it feeds the cannon, the cannon fires it to the left towards the left in lane through that kind of catcher mitt plate. Then, correct, if you happened when it's coming back through the left lower left flipper, if you happen to hit that right ramp again to refeed the cannon, that's when it will shoot towards the upper flipper. Interesting. Okay. I didn't know what triggered it, but I did successfully get it to feed the upper right flipper. And someone else that was at media day said that it also shoots straight down the middle towards the right flipper, like the lower right flipper. Not like straight down the middle, but like, you know, uh, so I think there's three locations that it can currently feed. And by that same logic, if it can do those three, then it could probably do a lot more if they wanted to expand on it in code. Yeah. I mean, I think a cannon fire, anytime a cannon fires in pinball, a ball across the playfield, it's a big deal. That's what I said. And it's coming at you, not like away, right? Like how many games like what Houdini shoots it away from you, right? But how many games shoot it like physically at you? Very few. I know Final Resistance from P3 can do that. Um, and not many actually shoot it at you. There's games that shoot it up chat. What are the games that shoot it up the middle versus games that shoot it side to side versus games that shoot it at you? Right. I know some answers here, but I'll let chat do the rest in the meantime. The Pokemon Homebrew shoots it side to side. You're right. Out of Shout out to Luke Underwood. Oh, that one. I'm sorry. I thought you talking about Pokemon premium which like shoots it out out of this like little It's not cannon though. No, no, no. The Pokemon Homebrew that they had at Yeah, I like that cannon. Uh I don't what what type of example? DND is another one. DND Dragon shoots it at you. That's another example. Correct. Mhm. Rocket shot. That's a kicker, you know, I'd say. I don't think consider that a cannon. It's not so different. Rocket on like Guardians, it's not so different from Harry Potter in the Death Eater shot that kicks it at you. But I'm talking like or Iron Man, isn't the whiplash kind of the same thing with that? Yeah. Right. War machine uh kicker and it kicks it at you. Like that's fine. Uh too, but it's not the same thing. I'm saying like the cannon. We're like centimeters above or inches above the playfield and a ball is shooting. Boys, we reached 100 people. Oh, amazing. That's all of the pinball community. Hey, we're all here. We're all here. We're the entire pimple of this niche that we are. We're all here. Final resistance. Yes, final resistance. 14. Does that count? I guess they're talking about the Jagger show. Yeah, that's kickers. And that's a kicker and that's great. But that is the first in a certain sense of how you define it. Ball save in pinball. Um, you know, if it shoots it out and you lose the ball right away, you get flight insurance and it brings the ball back. Back then they didn't have ball save at the beginning of balls but that was the first time they implemented ball save in a game. Feel like the rule needs to be it's airborne. An airborne ball that's being shot at. An airborne ball I would say. Farthest distance though might be Houdini. Yeah. No doubt that wins. Houdini is pretty awesome. That's a nice moment. Yeah. If you could say backbox. That's another you know if you want to use backbox shooting but I'm talking playfield cannons. Okay. T3 Circus Voltater stuff. TN Next Generation. It's not at you, but Next Generation Council T2. Yeah. NBA Fast Break. NBA Fast Break on the Backlass. Yeah, that's true. Cool. Big guns quiz quiz show. JJP Pirates. Uh, I don't know if we said that. Jamie, did you put this thing in the show notes about the Ron Jeremy pinball machine? I I did. Kell, that wasn't Canon shoot something at you. I'm looking at that right now, but I don't have a picture of it. Do you have a picture? Is that a real thing? Yeah. So, okay. Zingy Bingy 2.0. Pinball. That's in our art episode that we're planning to do with Christopher. So, Great American Pinball had an in had game titles that they had as dream theme list and Ron Jeremy's Land of Magic was in that list. Did you see this? I'd call that a bad idea. I'm going to go out and say that's a bad idea. Do you know uh I mean, what are they thinking? That's disgusting. You know, before before he went to prison, he used to call me every once in a while. Ron Jeremy did. Yeah. Uh he was very close to a a a high school friend of mine and and she's known Ron Jeremy for years and years and years. And whenever we were hanging out, he would call and like play piano for us. He's he's a wild dude. Uh but you know, I mean, he's locked up now. He he did some bad stuff. But that's you. You can't How can you h How can you uh have that as a pinball machine? Like this dude's locked up for doing like terrible things. It was great. It's not a good idea. I think it was a bad idea before he was locked up, I would have said. Yeah, but they put it in a post. Great American Pinball had a list of interesting game titles and the last one was Ron Jeremy's Land of Magic and me and Kale were chatting. So weird and we're like what are these people doing? Did AI write this and it slipped through the cracks? I mean it's just ridiculous. What are we doing here? You know who you know who would design that game, right? Oh no. John Trudeau. Yeah, he's out. I thought you were gonna say that. He's out. Oh let's talk about that. He's out of prison. Okay. We know he makes great games. Can you can you make a game with him? I mean, how long does does somebody have to be locked up? Like like can you separate the art from the artist? Kale. There we go. I mean, it's the same thing with like films and actors, right? Like watch Kevin Spy film, right? You know, my a buddy of mine just shot a film with him. It's like it's like Kevin Spacy's return. He shot it out here in Arizona. I think it depends on three things. I think it depends on the severity of the crime, how good the pinball designer is, and how recent the situation was. Those the timeline thing. So, if you're a really good pinball designer, you could there's a you can get over a certain amount of heinous crime. So, what's the what's the lines? I think the answer the answer I'm not saying that's what I believe. I'm saying that's what believes. That's what I'm not saying that's right or wrong. I'm not advocing that Jeff. I mean, I feel like if Haggus Pinball was still around, they would pick up John Trudeau, right? Like I'm saying Trudeau is not as good as a designer as Elwin is is what I'm trying to say. And I'm saying that no one's going to touch this, dude. No one's Yeah. I don't think it's there, right? Yeah. There you go. All right. Uh, the other thing I wanted to talk about with you guys is sound. Okay. And I'm not crapping on the loser kids, Kale. I'm not. Oh, wow. Already a hot take here. I'm not. I love the loser kids. Love them. Mhm. But Stern, you've got We sent you a microphone, right? We did. The round table sent you a microphone. I'm glad Jeff's here because we're going to have a professional give his opinion on it. Okay, Jeff, here's the deal, right? You're out there and loser kids are the They get the first podcast, okay? They interview and they do a really good job and they get us excited for this launch. Right. Elizabeth and uh Elliot sound like they're in a phone booth. Yeah. They were using like laptop microphone and they're sitting like 15 feet away from it so they can both be on camera, you know? I mean like how distance to the microphone is like everything for lowquality mics. But we sent we sent this to them. Yeah. Like Ralph spent money and sent it he sent them a very expensive shore microphone. Okay. It takes if it's USB it takes a whole 15 seconds to plug it into your computer, make it the default mic and then whatever Zoom or whatever recording platform you're using, use it. There really it shows a a like lack and kind of like unpreparedness for the actual interview. And if you know that you're doing an interview even a full day beforehand, I just don't think there's an excuse. like it's 2020. What year is it? I don't whatever year it is, right? This is the time that it should not be difficult to have good sound for an interview. Also, you can get a just fine USB microphone for like 30 or 40 bucks. Totally. And also, don't they have Jack Danger working there? Yes. We don't know. I mean, or maybe I don't know. I'm sorry. I don't know what he does. You know what? Just said the same thing. Okay, look what look what Cascade said. Okay, Jack is a friend streamed for many years. How do you not use him to set up a good environment for interviews? I don't know. I mean, come on. So, I I'm not not ragging on anybody. We're getting towards the end of the night. Okay. All right. I've had a few diet coats. started my loose lips and it just like you know we have a group chat me and Kale and Ralph and we're like what's going on? What are we doing? Yeah, it it does. Here's here's what I would say. Stern should they have tons of rooms there. Put a room in there that has the mic already plugged in with the shittiest little laptop you could possibly set up and just have it ready to go. And it's like it's the interview room, right? And if people are from home, it's on them to make sure that they do it right. But if you're going into Stern to do an interview, just have it set up so no one has to think about it. You just plug and play. Yeah. What what really blows my mind is the these guys are not making pinball machines in the garage. This is a big serious company and when they when they do their sizzle reels for the for the games, it's not they don't just do it with an iPhone and no microphone, you know? They like George Gomez like combs his hair and takes a shower and puts a you know little lapel mic on. I didn't take a shower for this. Me neither. I smell horrible to be honest. Yeah. But every time disgusting every time you do an interview with anybody from Stern it it's like they they it's just not uh computing with them that that's a that's a big deal. But like man, you you're promoting this game that you need to sell. you need to push this thing. You need to tell us how awesome it is and we want to be able to hear you. Thousands of people are going to watch that and a thousand people in the back of their mind at least at least 500 are going, "God, they sound like shit." There definitely people watching it that if it's like an exciting interview where they're talking at the game and they seem really passionate about it that they're that will turn into sales. It makes your product seem more premium. If like the presentation is nice, then you immediately like, you know, lizard brain style think that you're getting a nicer thing. So, you know, for 15 minutes worth of effort and $50 worth of microphone, I feel like I would just like to be able to hear it better to be honest. Like I remember, you know, there was been a few Elwin interviews where it's just like, you know, you're like you're talking to Charlie Brown's mom or something. You know, his are always like that. his he like he just and I feel so bad for for Josh and Scott, right? Because they're just like Yeah. What do you do? Like we when when we interviewed Gomez, Ralph actually bought a microphone and a and a head and he used it. Um yeah. All right. Anyway, that was my what are we doing here segment of the JBS show. Okay. drives me crazy. Kale, it's a public service announcement. Really? It's a public service announcement. Grateful Dead Pinball. Okay, that's that's what NAP is saying. Somebody and I'm watching Jeff's face right now. I just burped. Some company some company is making a Grateful Dead pinball apparently. Pinball machine. I told you our next game's Raven 2000. I told you that already. I'm on an elite on the Grateful Dead. Any any dead fans here? No, I meant for Raven. Raven. Oh, yeah. Yeah, he had the Oh, no. No. Grateful Dead. I guess you'd have like a dancing bear roto target maybe. Just trying to think what I'd do for like Grateful Dead. Every bear could be a different mode, right? Like each color for the bears. Oh, very good. The topper should totally be tiedye going to the the ceiling. A lava lamp. A a lava lamp. Some something. Okay. And uh it comes with uh you can only sell them in Arizona and California and states that have legalized marijuana. Yes. And and just like the band, you know, the the balls last forever, you know. Yeah. Tie. It's easy. 15inute modes. 20 minutes also multiball. Yeah. Uh you got to have you got to have a spinning wheel. That's the tie-dye too in the center of the playfield. Like spinning wheel of color, right? Like spinning disc. Okay. You take you take the girl the dancer girl from Elton John and you switch her switch it with like a skeleton marionette. You know that dancing toy that they use or whatever. I'm just just throwing out some ideas here. Yeah. I like it. Casey Jones. Do the do the lamp from uh Totan, right? Like for the spinning color disc, but make it like the size of the playfield. Absolutely. Just like the biggest spinning disc possible. You have to have like the the parking lot vegan burrito on there somewhere. I lost food truck multiball. Food truck. We tried meat, guys. It doesn't sell. Okay. No one's really into food multiballs. And no, that's not going to work. Multiball. There's diner. That's my That's my last foodbased game. Right there. I There was barios, but I don't think we needed one after Dino. We didn't need it. It's unnecessary. You wouldn't play like eat a sandwich. The pinball machine. I'd eat a sandwich if not the pinball machine. My funniest thing from American Pinball. The old American pinball. Not the new American Pinball, but the old American Pinball. That was that David Fix was telling his salespeople to call barbecue joints and get these pinball machines. Oh god, what were they thinking? You know, it's the irony is like it's it's a bad idea for any restaurant obviously. Like they're not going to do it. There's a bad it's too expensive. It doesn't work for mom and pop restaurants. Obviously, it's a bad idea, but it's in particular a bad idea for barbecue joints with the dirtiest, greasiest fingers. People come in on the side of that game. Like like Ace Gogi, like in LA, like you know, it's a Korean barbecue place and that's where the pinball machines are. Like I I bet if you bought a game from from Shane that that your house would smell like barbecue for the rest of your life. Like you just you're never getting rid of that smell. It's a wonder why they got bought, right? Jeeoff, I'm going to be there in July. We should go to Ace Goi together. Let's do it. Yeah, we talked about it. Let's It's on, man. We're going to do the pinball tour. Let's do it. Can I make you stream with me here? I think so. I'm down. Nice. What game do you want to play? You got to let me know. So, I put it under the uh under the rig. I'll still never have played um you know Winchester. Do you have that there? I don't have my Winchester yet. No, we're still like People are so ornery about getting their Winchesterers that Carl and I are like don't you dare send us one cuz if you do like Pitchforks are coming out. What else do we got? Ace has one. Yeah. Oh, nice. What else do we got, Kale? Anything else? Any more information you dropped? Let's see. What did What did you drop today? Oh, you dropped Dracula possibly. Thinking that maybe we hunt Dracula. You guys missed that earlier. You like a Van Helsing Gothic style. Yeah, they already there's two Draculas out. What the What rumor is this? There's Stern Dracula classic, you know, in the 80s and then there's Bram Stoker's in the 90s. But this is a Brian Eddy rumored title coming out maybe is it next year? Yeah, it'll be it'll be the first game of next year. I think I think that could work except for uh 750LE's, you know, or whatever. Like you don't need an unic before you guys came on. That's that's what I was talking about. Like that's a really hard sell to nonpinball people. Yeah. I mean, it is. But but what's cool, I mean, if they if they can pull off what they want to do, it's going to have like RPG elements, you know, set in like like 1800s. Dwight code, isn't it? It's already Dwight Code be Dwight and you know you go to different areas like Romania and London and you'll have multiple uh playable characters. Uh it it be almost like a Jack the Ripper style murder mystery. You look like you're reading notes for this. I mean that sounds awesome. I always my biggest disappointment with D and D was that it the layout, you know. So if if they are making a horror themed Dracula game, like it would be cool if it was like D and D. Is it the lower scoop that then shoots it to the other upper flipper? Yeah. My biggest issue with D and D is the entire flow of the game is that everything is about getting it to that upper right flipper and it's just an uninspired area of the playfield. Like like you shoot the left orbit, it goes to the upper right flipper. You shoot the FSMO shot, know, you shoot the center shot and you get it back at the bottom to get back up there. There's the inner right upper. Yeah. I was just it's a layout issue I have with DND, not not a not a code thing. Yeah. My opinion on the Canada thing there, shout out to Canada, no no shade whatsoever, is that actually other uh other podcasters get this information, but he's the only one willing to talk about it or talk about it first. That's my opinion. You guys could disagree or agree with that. I don't disagree with you. Did I say something terrible? No. No, I don't think he's the only one who knows it. I just think he's the only one who's happy to say it. That's who he is. I'm not saying that's bad or good, but that's who he is. And other people won't do that. Wild man. He's asleep. We got him on tonight. Do we have a question? Well, the question was, uh, what about these leaks? Are they all from Canada? Oh, no. No. I think like you said, he actually doesn't get any anymore. I mean, he has the he has the the he has a unpopulated playfield shot from Sonic and he has photos of like a early uh Back to the Future, but he doesn't get information like he used to. I wonder why. I don't know. I could think of a handful of reasons. All right, boys. I think that's about it, right? That was a fun little hour and 50 minutes. Yeah, it was awesome. I want you want to go 12 13 more minutes. You want to go 13 more minutes to make it 13 more minutes for you. Well, if if we're going 13 minutes, Jeff, I want to ask you. So, you played the new Transformers, right? Yes. One question I had is because you were just talking about how you have to feed the upper flipper and Transformers also has this upper flipper and it has uh like an upper flipper shot that's not a loop, but instead it's a ramp. How many times did he make go for that shot? How many times did he make that shot? Which which one? The ramp shot on the left. The ramp. Yeah, the side ramp. So, you're on the flip. Both Oh, uh side ramp that can only be the upper flip. There's that one's not as difficult as the There's like a con like dead end like saucer shot that's right below it. That's the extra ball shot and it is hard. It's so freaking hard to hit that. And yeah, it it's pretty much just like on Shadow, like you got to catch it way off the end of the flipper and just for me. But again, like I put maybe five, six games on it. So I'm like not a really good metric for it. The ramps on the left are further back on the playfield. They're not like way up in your face like Shadow. I think the playfield plays a lot like Jurassic Park. I was calling it kind of like Jurassic Park light cuz you've got you've got your spinner in the center. You've got your, you know, you bang Optimus's dong is kind of like hitting the uh the T-Rex shot, right? You've got your ramp on the right. You've got your right orbit, which is kind of like the O shot. That whole cluster on the left is got, you know, it's essentially like the shooting the ramp there is very much like feeding the raptor pit. It's got the uh even further left to that is the uh control room, but instead of it being a dead end, it like feeds the ramp and then feeds the right flipper. But in terms of layout, there's a lot of stuff in familiar places, but it just it flows just a little bit better in my opinion. Like my Jurassic Park has always like been a little bit like brutal and mean and this game played a lot easier than that. So, I don't know if that answers your question. No, it does. That's helpful. Actually, play it. It's It's so fun. Like, when I went there and played Fall of the Empire, like I was just like I didn't really want to talk about it. Like, I don't like fan layouts. I was having clunky shots left and right. When Stern puts that camera in front of you? No, they they put the camera on me. I was just like, "I'm good. Thanks." Yeah, dude. I I love I remember your star what you were saying about Star Wars. It is really refreshing to get, you know, you're really honest. I try to be very honest, but back it up with like reasoning. Like I talked about how the Death Star was rejecting and people on Facebook were like, "You don't know what you're talking about." Blah blah blah. And like it was a problem. It was a real issue. You know what's funny? People from Stern told me about that. They they were like, "Yeah." And then Jeff realized what was going on because um I I don't think you were here for this. This will probably make more sense the the layout of it. Um originally that Death Star ramp was not there. Interesting. It was the Death Star was at the playfield level and it was a it was a scoop and it was very easy to hit and you could even backhand it. So they wanted to make it more difficult. No, I think they just wanted probably wanted to make it more theme immersive, right? Death Star higher up. At the last minute, uh, somebody involved was like, I don't like the Death Star here because it looks like it had crashed, so you need to raise it up. And so it was like a lastm minute thing. That's that's that's why it seems like it's that's the one disjointed thing in the whole game. Yeah. Well, I mean, they fixed They said there were three different things that were causing the rejections on it and the person at Stern I talked to ran through them and then you know they redid the mech and released it and I I mean we have one at ACE and it's a lot easier to hit. I haven't seen any issues on it now and plus Ray like absolutely smashed that code out of this park. It's so fun doing Ray tomorrow and is is that going to be live? Yeah, we're doing it live tomorrow. We're doing a deep dive of full fall of the empire code and it is like a real deep dive. So let's hope uh Ray is up for it. That's good. I need that. They've added so much [] to it. I don't even know what I'm doing on there anymore. It is awesome. It's one of the greatest coded Stern games. That's what I would say. Mhm. But it's so hard to get to these modes. That's That is also true. Okay. Well, because it's going back and forth going bananas and uh I don't know. I just it's a great I I call it a warm-up game when I'm playing in a tournament, gents, because if I could put up 400 million on that game while I'm warming up, hitting balls on the range, then I know I'm going to in for a good night. Okay. If I'm shanking all day light, all night, then I know I'm in for a tough night. I have uh should I don't know if this is uh another Are you guys ready for another chart? Is it too many charts, Jamie? Just a chart time. Let's go. Let's see it. Is it too many? How many charts do you have? Do you have just like all these charts ready to go? Like a bag of charts? I That's what they called me in college. Bag of Surge bag of charts. Nice. You know, I'm a data guy. I like analyzing things. And so if I think of something interesting to do a chart on, so help me. I will do that. Share away, brother. Um, so I this I was going to do this uh already show this to Raya tomorrow, but I'll do a little spoiler on that point here. And what time are you going live tomorrow? Uh, we are going live at 9 at 10:15 p.m. Eastern. Sorry, I haven't showed this. Whatever that That's really specific. Yes, that's that is specific, but that is Yeah, it's 10:15 p.m. Eastern or thereabouts. That's that's what I would say. So, I was trying to show this. Just focus on this. This is showing interesting a four-player game at the these are all times at the electric bat on stern games um that have them measures in measurements of them in the audit. And so um uh what this is saying is that fan layouts like all of these are fan layouts. Two flipper games arranged shots in a fan. All have generally an average fourplayer game time far less than non-fan layouts. If you add an upper flipper, if you add more shots, King Kong, for example, has these two upper flippers and there's a whole mode there crossing the chasm where you can keep the ball if going if you're good enough on two upper flippers, you know, at the top half of the playfield. And so, generally speaking, fan layouts will always have um shorter ball times than non-fan layouts. And Star Wars in particular um had on a four-player game even less than John Wick. So, it's a tough layout. I was just going to back up your point, Jamie, with this chart I presented. Brilliant. I love data. I thought John Wilk would have a 4minute average time. Well, I'm shocked that it's I'm shocked that it's in the 20s. Let me actually follow that up. So, this data this data was from like this was our like first or second episode ever, you know, of Kale and I's show, our our pin pal show. Since then, in preparation for tomorrow, I've got more recent data. Uh, thanks to John Choppel, our local excellent on the scene reporter for Pen Pals at the Electrobat. And so, here's the more recent data. Oh my god, look at this. Wow. And I'm getting better with my presentation, too. So, so the uh fan layouts, now we have many more. We have 12 fan layouts here at the bat, 12 non-fan layouts at the bat. And again, this is uh this is for single game. Um, so a single average game time for one player game and it's like 20 22 seconds longer on non-fan loadouts. And then specifically what you were asking there uh Jeff for John Wick, where the heck is that? 3 minutes and 28 seconds is the uh typical one player average game time. That sounds about right. And black sword rage makes total sense because you guys have throw there you have but but that plays so much quicker. You could probably put TNA on there and it'd be double digits. Oh, yeah. [] you, Scott. Yeah. I mean, um, one thing I found interesting though here is, you know, pros of Stern usually play faster. But there's one game that at the Electric Bat Kale has Kale and Rachel have that's both the Pro and the Premium, and that's Pokemon. And so they have the Premium and the Pro. And the Premium has slightly faster game times, uh, but stat statistically relevant. So, uh, has faster game times than the Pro. It's one of the only premiums that might be faster than a pro. And I think that's because the premium has the magnet that shoots it away from the center playfield. And that makes sense. That makes sense. That makes total sense because I was going to argue that the premium is a little bit easier because you could backhand to capture your Pokemon. Yeah. What I mean um anything else? You're right. The magnet. It's the magnet. Yeah. There is that catch, but the magnet just flings it more more crazily. Kale, do you do you notice any difference on the premium versus the pro having them both there at the bat for for what? Ball times. For ball times or otherwise? I haven't haven't paid attention to it, but I will tell you uh you know, we got more games on the way. We have to get rid of one of the Pokemon. You have to get one of the Pokemon, right? Which which one do I keep? I mean, I don't think that from an operator's perspective, pro or premium matters on that game, personally, especially because they both have the sculpts. Yeah, but you know, so we already have the premium. I'm That's the one I want to keep. Well, then why are you asking? Well, I just want curious which way which one which one's collecting more quarters, right? When you do your reports, do they save Do they both have the same amount of quarter drop, Kale? On they perform the same because I know you got them at different times. The premium earns more. Interesting. That's a That's a bit surprising actually. I mean, I know it has more in it, but I didn't know players even register that they're so different. H could that be? It's in a different positioning at the bat. Well Well, they're they're both on end caps. Yeah, that's true. They're both on end caps, but they're they're in separate rooms, you know. We had to put Yeah, we had to put them in separate rooms because people during tournaments would get confused. Yeah, that makes sense, too. All right. Should I stop sharing my charts? Yeah. I I will say one other thing with the media day, they they talked about performance for their games. And Pokemon is like out selling everything by like a mile. It's the fastest launch like and most units sold than any Stern game in the history of like whatever modern Stern. So, I mean, that's insane. Tactical. Um I I know there are people still waiting for their uh Pokemon games. So, I'm guessing they built all they're going to build and then they have to obviously go into Transformers. Um, I would imagine that's why people are waiting, right? They had a sheet talking about what's on the line for the rest of the year. I forget. It's like, you know, it's Jaws, Godzilla. I mean, it's all the stuff that you would imagine would be there. But, you know, they they mentioned, you know, they listen to the market. So, the more the distributors get told what games they want, then they change what they're going to be putting on the line for further further down the line. Do you guys think like I I know that the the real reason the code gets delayed is licenser approval, but do you think that the game selling so well puts more of a fire for them to get through the get to the code or less of a fire because the game's already selling well? Less, right? There's no sense of urgency here. The sense of urgency is for Kale because eventually people are going to they've seen the game. They've done it. No, it there's definitely a sense of urgency with the folks at Stern because there there are two this is all you hear about with this game is where where the hell is the code, right? You know, the if the they you know, they can bring in some code, build the hype back up. Um I mean the the sticking point is that the Pokédex where I I don't think they're going to let them do that. Yeah, we talked about that earlier, Jent. Uh Kale and I were here and it was confirmed in chat that they're probably going to drop the name Pokédex, right, Kale? Yeah, cuz they can't use that name. Yeah. What about like furry animal collection mechanism? Yeah. Because I would think uh fathom. You got a fackum. You heard what I said, Jeff. the Pokemon company once you put elements of uh their the the Pokemon world onto a a separate device that's basically like you're doing a video game and and they only did the license for like you guys make a pinball machine. So that's the sticking point right now. The code release stuff I think is person dependent because Raya I think Mr. charts. Serge, I bet you should do a chart for uh how long it takes a go game to get code complete based on individual like programmers. And I bet cuz Ray is like a machine. Like there are more code updates coming out for Falling the Empire, you know, for uh what the hell was this music pen Metallica? I mean like he put in Rush. I mean like you know that the release schedule for him specifically seems to be higher. So I think it's down to the individual programmer. Well, first of all, let me answer to say that I will make that chart, Jeff. I appreciate that suggestion and I don't have it ready yet. That would have been too hard to do while you were talking, but I will will get that because I think that's a good one. And I know that they would say and maybe there's this is the majority of the truth that any delays are because of licenser approvals. But I also think there's something to what you're saying Jeff which is and this is I wouldn't I would never ask Ray this because it's I don't want to put him in any uncomfortable position but I'd say that it goes back to something I said earlier when you when you have some coders who you could like are really passionate about what they're doing and I think there are differing levels of passion about in in all life in all jobs of what people do and I think you see somebody like G Elizabeth Gizki or Ray Ray or I'd say Ellen uh who I know is not a the programmer but he has a rule designer and those games generally like Elvin games come pretty far along once they're launched you know and and those are can be some big properties too that's my experience yeah to also sorry Kale go yeah well to answer Joe in the chat Joeino um from from what I understand it's the fact that the Pokedex is on a separate device which is considered they they would consider that like a separate game and that's like the sticking point. Um, and then somebody who apparently had some knowledge earlier that was in the chat said that was the case that what what they were naming the thing that was you could view all of your Pokemon man on. There you go. I'm already writing the prompt, Jeff, by the way. Um, because I'll tell you how I Claude, are you in Claude? I'm in all of them. But I'll tell you how I do it is because on Stern's website, they have their um you could, you know, in their game code section, they have every update and the date that the update was launched. And so you can you can track that over time and then with correlating with launch dates and you could get a very specific answer. Not hard to get. So chart to be I'm looking forward to this chart. Oh man, tomorrow night ladies and I won't do it. I I was going to say that you know u we do deep dives on our show and I'm usually like I'll tell you whether I like like the code things I don't like the code or but you know with Ray coming on um I would only invite him on and to talk through the code. It's because the code is great. You know if I was going to say like I really hate this thing you did or whatever I wouldn't have I wouldn't even ask him you know to come on and I would just talk about the code separately with Kale. But I think the job he did with this code is just so good on Star Wars that I I really only have nice things to say about the code. I also specifically suggest that that I think that the releases for the code updates are probably programmer dependent, right? Like I think some people like to have really big updates that have a lot of specific things in them and other want to have like really short updates that add immediate fun to the game. You know, I think Ray had a lot of like really incremental stuff as opposed to some of the updates for like I don't know D and D had like you know artifacts and all this like just huge [] in it. So it's interesting that some of them are launched differently like you know the remaster of Walking Dead was launched with very little code you know really the same. Did they update that yet or no? Yeah, it's it's it's updated um much better and much more achievements. It's definitely become Did they make the change? Do you happen to know? Actually, didn't follow up. Did they make the changes that they were talking about? They were going to add mini wizard modes along, you know, walker kill, stuff like that. You probably don't know that level, but I haven't gotten that well yet. Okay. I'm just still trying to bust ass on blood bath every time I play it. So, I I think that I think that they could have done better on sales. I mean, I it don't think a lot of people who buy sales are like, "How deep is the code?" I don't think that's the case. But I think with Walking Dead specifically, it's like a game that's known in the community. So, I think coming out and saying, "Here's what we have and it would have been if it were ready." I think it would have made a big difference. I know they can't always get things ready on time for lots of reasons, but um Farah, thank you so much, uh, Buck to let us know that. Like, he is the operator at Eureka Heights. He says it's not really updated enough yet. So, well, but I mean, the game was already 1.0 because it's a remaster, right? ish. Yes and no. When the game came out, the code was actually worse than the original Walking Dead. It wasn't better. It wasn't the same, but it was actually worse. So, there were things that it like it would freeze up on. It wouldn't show you in the game if you got to this thing or that thing and it would say light pending license or pending approval or whatever, you know, like Yeah. And and it that didn't do that in the 2014 Walking Dead. So, it was actually in some ways worse, I would say. Yeah. and George I I think it was I can't remember who somebody told us that the issue with that they thought hey we've already done this game so we can just like redo it but like they had to work with a whole different licensing company and like they were like well we wouldn't have approved what you did in that old game either and so that was the issue. That's great right that's a good email to read. They have to change go recall all those games now. Mhm. Holy [] I mean, I'll tell you, it sucks though. I feel bad for like, you know, you start getting into the development with a certain IP holder and you, you know, when they want the deal to go through, right? So, they're going to be like, oh yeah, no, things are cool. And then you get into the weeds, right? And I imagine, you know, Stern starts hitting these brick walls and you're just like, [] like, well, now what? And I I wonder like how many games like had decisions that had to get, you know, changed and not a way that the fans or pinball people wanted. And it's like, you know, it's licenser problems, right? But like with like Wo Nelly, what happened with that? Yeah, they got melons. 20 years for that game. So excited for it. They got a they got a juicy melons in the um Jeeoff, did uh did Winchester ever say, "Hey, that house, that's not our house. Get rid of it." I mean, there was I mean, I wasn't involved in a lot of the IP discussions. It gets talked about a little bit in meetings and things, but like you know, I mean, the Winchester House was just stoked to have a pinball machine. And for the most part, like just like they saw and knew that what was coming from it was like really cool and interesting. They're not none of these licensed people are pinball people, right? Like it's not like they're like, "Hey man, you should really change the art on that left orbit. It's not indicative of a staircase to nowhere or something, you know?" Right. a question for you that's an opportunity for a humble brag for you which is like like in Winchester the layout the call outs have like a lot of fun like energy to them that they're like they really have acting to them and a lot of and in a way that a lot of '90s callouts did like Lord of the Lord of the Rings was more recent but like obviously that has like great callouts and Indiana Jones Medieval Madness and and Mars were the two references yeah real passionate call out that was was that let me ask you this why do you think other pinball manufacturers have such a hard time with is even when they get the actors from the you know shows or movies or whatever with the specifically the energy in the call out easy they don't have a a technical director for it they don't have a call they don't have a voiceover director during the the thing I did the the directing for the session when it happened you know they send a call out sheet to some you know actor or voiceover actor and they'll just say send these back you know or they'll sit in on a Zoom call and and not you know interrupt him or direct them and they just read it like it's a script and it's not you you know, you're you're trying to make like these movie moments. You talked about these choreographed moments and it's like you got to go over the top. Like they should be ridiculous and you know, did you like you said it's a reference for you was Attack from Mars Medieval Madness. Do is that part of your direction to them? Like did you give them those sources of callouts? Oh yeah. I I had it pulled I mean we recorded it here. You know Tyler the voiceover actor for uh Winchester Mystery House you know came over and I was just like look like he has my Attack from Mars for one. So it made it really easy. I I needed space for other games and I gave him my attack from Mars and uh I was just like, you know, listen to the jackpot call outs. Listen to how, you know, the enthusiasm that's in it. The other thing that I think is an issue with modern I was going to do a video on this, but I'll talk about it now. I think one of the biggest issues with modern pinball callouts is they're too wordy. Shut the [] up. It only needs to be like three or four words. Like the people that are writing these scripts are like think they're like these virtuoso, so they're going to like, oh, blah. you. I'm looking forward to going to the Metallica mansion and taking a voyage in the cemetery. It's like nobody wants to hear that. You want to know what they hear? They want to hear hit the tombstone, you know, like that's the call out. So, and they each one of those needs to be memorable. And it's when you start talking too much, it's not memorable. Damn, that's a good answer. That's really good. That is really [] good. Thank you, sir. Well, you're right. Uh, you know, when you you did a great job, ladies and gentlemen, I want to give Dodson a big prop here at TPF. That was so fun. He set up. Anyone that did it that's in chat, let me know if you loved it. But I can't wait for someone to buy a Jamie Burchil pinball machine. You're cut up. Your your voiceover is cut up. How long How long did that take? By the way, by the way, shout out to my boys, dude. I got two uh DJR Pinball and Slinger, two of my Discord uh friends, cut all of it for me. I did the mastering and cut out the master sessions and did all the like processing so that they were like finalized, but they went through and did all the little segment cuts out for it. So, they absolutely saved me hours and hours of work. So, we're almost done. There was like 50 total like group sheets of it and each one of those have whatever 50 callouts. So, you know, it's it was not a small amount of work. No way. Yeah. community, man. Dude, the cult of pinball rocks hard, man. Are you going to bring that to uh expo? Yeah, I think so. Uh dude, it's a no-brainer. Dude, Marco hooked it up. They bought that entire like sound booth and all of the decor in it and stuff. Like Emoto like she took care of everything. She was just like I was like, I got the call out sheet. She was just like, I got the booth. I'll take care of it. I'll set it up. And I was just like, I will dedicate all my time to this to make it as cool as we can. So, it's not the it's not the first thing we're going to do. So, or the last thing, one of those things. Well, awesome. Do it because uh I just found out that we have a cor my new gig has a corporate office in Chicago. So, guess who's going to be working remote the week of uh Expo? This guy. So, I'll be there Thursday through Sunday. Now, I was only going to come up Saturday this year. Serge, are you going to Expo? I do. I'm not. I don't travel for stuff. I'm sorry. I got too many things going on. I'm not able to. But one day you'll see about 10 years. Got to make his charts. Got to make charts. Well, who's making these charts? Waking up at 4:00 a.m. to build Barnes. It's almost midnight here and I'm still going with you clowns. But uh I said five minutes and I keep saying 10 minutes. This is what happens with Kale when I hang out with him. We uh our our lives go way too long. But I'll keep going. I don't give a [] if you guys want to go for a little. Well, I got one more. I I'll Jamie. I'll go until you pass out. I'll just z in it. I'm rocking the zen, so I'll be okay for a little bit. You're pouched up. I'm pouched. Jeeoff, I have I have another opportunity for humble brag question for you there. Oh, damn it. Which is that sometimes, you were just saying this too, like pinball call outs are like too much, but sometimes pinball call outs are like so informational, like hit the ramp three times and then do this or that or whatever, and it's just like so pinbally and that can take you out of the theme immersion. One of the things I feel like I I register on Winchester is that you have some call outs that are um very much like go for the jackpot, like not telling you where it is, and then other call outs that are more specific and it seems like you alternate them and when they play so that maybe players get a sense of them, but you don't rely on it too much, like you switch up between theme immersive versus non-themersive callouts. Did I say that right? Yeah. No, for sure. So, there's like two categories of call outs in the game. Speaking of talking too much, so since he is a tour guide, there are these call outs which are just information about the house. It's totally not pinball related whatsoever. Like he's like, "Oh, the blah room is like, you know, where Sarah Winchester used the blah." And it's cool cuz that's like color for the environment, but when it comes to like actual pinball callout, the only ones that matter are the other ones you're talking about. And most of those have multiple alts, right? So they'll be like, "Shoot the right ramp." And they'll they'd be like, "Shoot the staircase to nowhere." Right? In this case, they're not the same shot, but in the format. And usually the the first one is the actual name of the shot and then later on it'll just be like shoot the ramp. So it condenses the amount of information to leave space for the rest of the soundsscape because it doesn't need to be cluttered. And you know you're working with both a finite amount of mixing space. You're working with a finite amount of time. I mean your ball times what 2 minutes. Well it's a D'Python Anghelo game so your ball time's 45 seconds. But you know you have to like really coordinate and choreograph how the information is getting to the player in that specific amount of time. Damn it. That's good. It uh Hey Kale, let's ask him some questions, right? We got Dirty Pool here. Let's ask him some more. Do you mind that I turned it into like an I asked some interview questions? I hope you guys didn't mind. Yeah. Wasn't weren't we supposed to be interviewing you this? No, I don't do that. You tricked me. Yeah. So, do you have Dungeon Crawler Carl? Does Does Bar don't What's Dungeon Crawler Carl? Is that a movie? It's the [] that's blowing up all over the place, man. Never heard of it. I never heard of it. I got more pinball people coming up to me about Dungeon Crawler Carl than any other IP. They're like, "Does Barrels have Dungeon Crawler Carl?" They I get this all the time. I'm like, I don't know anything they have. They don't tell me a thing. Has it has anybody here read the book or No, my buddy John Spates is reading the book right now and he he gave me the rundown of it. It sounds awesome. It's going to be my summer beach reading. Oh, are you going to listen to the audio book? Supposedly he does the voices summer beach listening. I've heard because the audiobook is good. I'm you know I'm driving in California in July and I'll I'm going to be listening to it on that. Well, it's supposed to be graphic. I don't want your kids listening to it, buddy. No, I I put in the headphones so I don't hear anything. All right. Okay. All right. Getting cozy. You're putting your like, you know, sleeping mask on while you're driving. Get your earbuds in. Like get the whole thing going. Be lulled to sleep. So chat wants to know, Enzo thinks you have muppets. Enzo, what are you doing? Isn't it early there? Muppets, you guys don't give anything. How do you do that? How do they do it? Because it's way cooler when people are surprised. It sucks giving like any information out. I'd rather lie my ass off and then when it comes out, you're like, Jeff, you son of a [] Like, that's the moment I want. I do think Muppets would do well. I think do think Muppets would do reasonably well. I do too because I think it's like a harmless theme. People don't hate it, you know. I'm not saying there's like muppet tattoos on people except for Kale, but I think that people I think it would do decent and I think it's like a family friendly. You have a fullback like Kermit the Frog tattoo when when he does his lifts it it turns into Miss Piggy. It folds. That's Yeah, that's my only tattoo. It's on my back. Kermit. Huh? Rock and Kermit. All right, it's 1 PM for Enzo. That's not bad. There you go, Enzo. Thank you so much for joining. This was just an impromptu stream. If you're joining us just now, uh where the hell you been? We've been doing this for 2 hours and 15 minutes, but it was just going to be me and Kale, and we couldn't get Ralph because he was spending time with his wife. Uh, and I told him to feed her turkey tonight. Get the tryptophan to get going and put her to bed and join it. That's a That's a myth, Jamie. I I I'm sure it is, but I was trying everything I could. Kale. No, like it has tryptophan, but so does steak and so does pork. Okay. Probably duck. I don't eat duck, but anyway. So, it was just going to be us. And then we were trying to figure out a way to do a live call-in show, but Sterling Martin's going to help me with that. Wouldn't that be fun, Serge? A live call-in show. Oh, that'd be great. I think that's a fun time. Fun idea. As long as it's your phone number. Well, that's the rub. I'm probably get a Google phone. Get a Google phone, right? Yeah, that could work. I think Jeff and I are like 80% of a Ralph together. Yeah. We make a whole Ralph. You just got to laugh more at my jokes. That would help me out. I I don't I didn't get the paycheck. No, that's true. Well, I don't get a paycheck either, but Aussie gave us a nice super chat and I Yeah, that was a big paycheck. That was It was very very nice. We can't see the super chats on here, so if you have done it, again, I apologize. No, I've I've been uh monitoring it. Oh, okay. That wasn't a that wasn't an ask, ladies and gentlemen. I'm not Christopher. Earlier, someone asked, "What is our favorite um unlicensed theme?" Everybody, let's start with Jeff. Go ahead. That's already been done. You mean? Yeah. What do you mean? Oh, to pick a game that has already been released that's unlicensed. Yeah. I'm going to choose barbecue, so don't choose it. Okay. I won't pick that. Okay. Uh, I mean most of my favorite themes are just single word like things like you know uh Viking sorcerer grand lizard like I like a thing like yeah like fish cup of milk like cup of milk pinball would be like a really awesome pin. I want to see that made. What' you choose? Kale sorcerer. I was going to say sorcerer. I'll choose a modern one. Surge. This is going to be a hot take. Tell me. Dialed in. Oh, good choice. Okay. Oh, terrible choice, but good choice. He's saying it's a terrible choice is because totally agree. Let's not take because of the sim card shot, right? Is that Oh, no. I was just I It depends on how what we mean by this question. I just I thought what we meant was like what is a good choice for an unlicensed theme? Not like what's an unlicensed theme that's a great pinball machine. Oh, okay. Like because dialed in is like a terrible choice for a theme like because nobody cares about their old phones and nobody like what pinball is like in itself an act of getting away from your phone you know in itself. So it's like plus the mom jeans and everything. Um is it a great game? Yes, it's a good very good game though that I could I think some of the the best unlicensed games are like concepts, right? Like Safe Cracker for example, right? Like that's like a thing to do, right? So like you already not only is your like your theme have an objective, but it also is its own style to begin with. I love Safe Cracker. Who WHO dunnit? Yeah, right. Another good choice. I'll give a boring choice, which is Medieval Madness. Canyon. Yeah. Cactus and Western. Medieval Madness. It's a boring choice, but I think they they do what they need to, which is just one incredible mech that uh makes you feel the theme and makes you feel silly while playing it. Hard to argue with Azie here. Yeah, TNA. You know, uh if you are a fan, a lot of TNAs, a lot of TNA's in the chat. TNA. The problem with TNA if you go if you're an operator and I I doubt Buckle Tim is still here because he's probably in sleep but it doesn't make any money people you know oh the game the game makes no money in Texas you talking about in Texas I'm just talking about a Eureka Heights okay it it doesn't it didn't make any money it's too brutal you know Eureka is different than uh electric bat in so many ways But one of it is just new new players. There's so many new new players come to a brewery drinking and go, "Hey, let me try these pinball machines." Ramps. They had a spooky row, boys. Mhm. From uh Looney Tunes. They had everyone except Texas Chainsaw and Domino's. But I think they're getting a Domino's. They have Jetsons. Uh Jetsons makes no money. Oh, that game sucks. Oh, I believe that. No money. Yeah. Like I think they just put it there for their own amusement is what I'm saying. I'm like I make fun of him. I'm like you guys operators or what? I mean you got the spooky row which is which is great. I mean Evil Dead Beetlejuice and then and then uh Halloween. They put Ultra they put the Ultram Man code on Halloween for a week. Whoa. Which is kind of funny. Oh, that's kind of funny. Yeah. And they put a sign up there says ultra wine. Whatever kind of What was the What was the haunted house one they did? That was that was great. It was America's most It was a purchase game. It was um what's his face that like they acquired the design and then produced it. It wasn't internally designed. The one take inspiration with Winchester from America's Most Haunted. Not that I'm not that I'm aware of. No. You know, uh Scott Danesi is coming to the arcade next Monday. Oh, really? Very exciting. Yeah. Cool. Scott Danesi is one of the nicest people I've ever met in my entire life. Yeah. All right. He's He's just way up there with Rachel Best. Okay. Just uh he asked what was best on license. Tell them better pants for Jamie. Okay. Commenter on most people's on most pinball videos out there. I think he's referencing the uh live version kale that we did in Arizona where I wore shorts and was very subconscious with my legs. Oh, and then then you put a blanket on yourself and I put a blanket on myself and you felt better, right? You got beautiful legs. Beautiful, dude. You know, when I'm on the Pelon, I got good legs, but I at that point I was off. Let's see them. Can we see them right now? Yeah, sure. Show us your gams. Let's see them. All right, hold on. Can you stand on the chair? Yeah. Look at that, man. Are you kidding me? That's not bad. Oh my god. That's beautiful. Hold on. I got a I got a tattoo on the other side. Is it Kermit? That's holding charts. That is my dog Turtle that passed away. And I got his paw print put there. That's adorable. His name was Turtle. He had one eye and uh he was my little buddy. My little buddy. Now that would be a great unlicensed theme. Turtle. Turtle dog. My oneeyed dog. Barracuda is like turtle adjacent, right? Just can't hit half the playfield. Uh, America's Most Haunted at Next Level in Oregon feels like a quality homebrew. Yeah. So, you know, my point of saying this was uh they got enamored with spooky row and some of these machines just don't like TNA and uh Jetsons. Nobody comes in there and plays Jetsons. It's a terrible game. No offense to Spooky, but it's just I'm sure they won't take offense of that. They They know it, too. I don't want Frank to yelling at me that Spook, you know. Okay. Beetleju is still cleaning up though, right, Kale? Oh, yeah. He's killing it. He's loose. Quarter's loose. But I mean, it's the only one in Arizona. Oh, okay. That helps, right? Yeah. That doesn't hurt feelings, you know. Do you like Beetlejuice, boys? Do you like to play it? Why is everyone quiet? I don't know. Crickets. There's There's two shots on it that really bug me. And I don't like how many scoops there are. Like, I think it's a fun game and the theme integration is really awesome. Like, it's it's a it's a good game, but I'm not like blown away by it. I just think that left orbit dumping into the upper playfield and that left spinner are just too hard. They're just weird. They feel wonky. It's weird, right, Jeeoff? I have a really tough time when I'm hitting that left orbit to realize I got to I got to get that off at the I don't know if this is always true, Kale, but last time I played it at the bat, like it wasn't strong enough, the right flipper, to get it up that left orbit into that upper area, and so it just was making to the pops and falling back down. I haven't played it enough to notice. Okay. All right. I'll put it on the Discord. I'm just saying. Yeah, you should. I should I should have done it right away. I should have done it right away. I mean, that should tell you a lot. I don't I don't ever play it. I mean, I'm playing like all kind of other stuff. I I don't know. I mean, I think it's beautiful. People People absolutely love it. And uh I I just I nothing's talking to me. Well, I'll say can't pull you off Barios. Every day, 24 hours a day playing Barryos. Yeah. I'll say that it looks beautiful. The art is perfect. The theme immersion is amazing. The code is pretty darn good. It's got a lot of modes. It code is great. Even the mechs are great in the game. I think what maybe people don't respond to as much is the excitement and the layout probably. Is that fair? Yeah. I have a problem as a as a tournament player that I can't choose my modes and I'm stuck with Deo and this other guy gets to dig up. You know, you can hit that upper left slingshot to change the modes. It's not easy to do, but good luck, right? Yeah, you There you go. That's That's one of those you could bring out your chart, right? It's like it's in there. What a strange way to cycle the modes in a way that just I don't agree with that decision, right? I don't think that's the way you should change a mode. I think do it by flipper choice. Do it by, you know, give you saw my communism flag. I think they should change that. They can still change that though, right? Big flag. They could change that. They could change it anytime. And I think as I recall they had the same thing on Looney Tunes where like people just wanted to be able to play their favorites clips and they initially didn't help you you know with your choice on the mode but then they uh allowed you to in later code. And I think the problem with Beetlejuice though uh Jamie is there's an insert that says mode change you know right there on the slingshot. So they could not that they couldn't change the code but the insert's already there you know so they're sort of uh they're they're pot committed in a certain sense. It's interesting because like Bug will say on his streams, they don't care about points. Like they don't just don't care. That's just not their bi wick. I mean, they just not what they care. And I care because I'm trying to score points for for how critical I feel like we're being. I do want to I think it's a top three spooky game easily. Like it's a great game. Oh yeah, easily. Yeah. Without a doubt. Evil Dead. I would take Evil Dead over it, though. I would take Evil Dead over it, too. I would take Evil Dead over it though. What about you, Kale? Evil Dead. Oh, yeah. Right. So, Evil Dead comes out and it's such a banger. Well, it also has the call outs which are great. I know. And and they both have great code, but actually Evil Dead's code is better for now. Yeah. Maybe people don't feel that as much, but Evil Dead's been out for seven months, eight months more. Yeah. Evil Dead has the most mini wizard modes of almost any game in all pinball history. So much so that they have like a challenge screen where you could pick any one of them, you know, with spooky coins or whatever they call it. Um, and there's just there's just so much to do in the game with has so much depth. And Beetlejuice is getting there, too, I'm sure. And it's probably there already. Where do I put Rick and Morty? That's a good question. I like Rick and Morty. Uh, I'm one of the few that likes Rick and Morty. I like I like I like it a lot. Um, I think you gota you got to get mega seeds, buddy. If you're not getting magazines, Alex Gomez, you're in deep trouble on a tournament. It's all about those megas. But but I'm a weird guy. My favorite I'm a weird guy. My my favorite spooky game I'm not going to get agreement here from people. I know is Looney Tunes. That's my favorite spooky game. Deal with it. I know everyone's looking at me like I said something like I know you heard me. But okay, this is what I don't I don't get. I'll make an argument for it. It's the same. Well, the code's better on um Chainsaw for sure. It's the same layout. So why Well, first I haven't played Texas Chainsaw, so I can't say I can't I can't speak to that's my I want to say that like I don't know the I know I've heard that, but I haven't played it so I don't know. What I like about Looney Tunes, first of all, two mode trees and dozens of modes. So you could play all these scenes from the show up the middle or there's these Marvin the Martian modes on the left orbit. Um so I like that. I like that they have all these uh like perk weapons and things you can use. Um, and uh, I like that it has all these ramps. Um, and um, I uh, I guess I like Looney Tunes, too. Um, but um, the hot take here is that you have not played Texas Chainsaw Hasker because I think that you would be like Texas Chainsaw Massacre is way better if you have played it. That may well be the case. I look, I'm willing to be give an honest opinion even though I know that I'm not going to get agreement on it is what I mean. Yeah. Sorry everyone. I haven't played TCM. I haven't played Chad's hammering you on the TC. I didn't look I haven't played it is what I'm saying. I would play Kale. Get a TCM. Malcolm, you didn't get a TCM there. Because Mark uh he went with the Looney Tunes because he didn't think the violent theme would make as much money. Yeah. Do you think he's right? I don't know. Okay. I think at a familyfriendly place where you're bringing your kiddos maybe. And this ain't it. And the back. I mean, that's not, you know. Yeah. That's interesting. All right. I love tiki drinks. All right, I will play TCM. I'm sorry, everyone in chat. I I will. I like the I'll go to pin map for you and see where there's one near you. Yeah, if there's one in Arizona, let me come over and play your TCM. Let me understand this code. Let me play it. I will come back. There's got to be somebody in chat that has one. Do you want to go to a stranger's house and play TCM? He won't even come on our podcast, but I'll go to a stranger's house. Well, I trust strangers more. That's fair. I mean, do you blame him? When I first got into the hobby, I went over, you know, I went to pinside and I was like, I wanted to play all these games to learn, hey, what game should I get or whatever. And so this guy, I went to his last name, but Greg, local player in Arizona, like famed collector in Arizona, let me come over his house to play his games. And I just showed up to his house, you know, randomly play his games. He had the nicest collection, beautiful games. And he told me something that changed the trajectory of my pinball hobby career, you know, within pinball, which is like I was like, "Wow, look at all these." Like, I never saw all these pinball games before. And I just wasn't this is like I don't know years ago. And uh he said um and I was I was like oh these designers they must be like really so smart to make all this. And he's like no it's not the designers that are smart it's the coders that are smart you know that's that's who you're going to be impressed by when you get into the hobby. And uh and he was absolutely right for me. You had mentioned like games that have soul and you kept listing the ones that have like the best code in the world. Do you think that the code is like what gives a game its soul? 100%. I think that said, this is a it's a team effort. Pinball really is collaborative. I think you need the sound and you need the lighting and you need the design and you need the mechs and you need the theme and the theme immersion and the code. But uh I would rather play I would rather play a bad layout with a great code than a great layout with bad code. But you can change code, you can't change a layout. Although you can change code, you rarely do. And when it happens, the code the game can get much better. Like like example, there are not that many games if you really go back and say, "Hey, they radically redesigned the code." You could say Walking Dead is an examp would would yell at me for saying that because he would say, "Actually, we always had the plan to make that the code." That was not a rehaul. It just took a long time to get license approval. Isn't that fair, Kale? Yeah, that's correct. It's that actually wasn't a 2.0 code. That was the the code that's in that game, which is great code, was planned from jump. The only ones the only ones he came in and like kind of took it in a different direction because maybe one wasn't going in any direction. Uh X-Men and Wick. Yeah. So, I guess it comes to let's let's let's put it this way actually and I will uh although maybe this is controversial prior to speaking to Ray Day tomorrow. All right. You might agree perhaps that X-Men has a has X-Men compared to Star Wars: Fall of the Empire. Which has the better layout? Let's start with that. X-Men. You know, these things are subjective, but for sure. And yet, they're not. X-Men has the better. No, they're not. Which has the Which has the better code. Follow the Empire. Empire. Follow the Empire. It's no question. That's not even a question. And so then my next question to you guys is, and you might feel differently about this, which one would you prefer to play long term? X-Men. Oh, probably Fall of the Empire because I want to try to get to the Speedraer code and some of this [] in your hypothetical good enough. Is that Are they going to release another X-Men update in this hypothetical crazy wacky surgery world that we're living in? They're done with they've already they have this is their this is their they've done it already with X-Men. They did try to rehaul it or whatever and they did a fairly decent job at it. I'm just still the case that Star Wars is the better code. I think that's objective, frankly. But the so the question is now you can have both games for a year, you know, in your house. Which game would you rather? Forget about the theme and what you're more passionate about or whatever. Same question for chat. Probably Star Wars. Yeah, it's obviously Star Wars. Well, because you get there's only a limited amount of that like serotonin release you get from hitting a quality shot, right? It's a linear situation. Like you hit the shot, you get the right. But if you get good code and you start stacking all that stuff, you can have like multiple ooze and that's way better. Yeah. And frankly, neither game as I recall is at 1.0 code now. Uncanny X-Men or or Star Wars Follow of the Empire. But there's just a Star Wars and maybe people don't have and hopefully tomorrow if they watch a show, they'll appreciate what I'm talking about, the depth of code that it has and the and how good that code is. And I think if I'm going to have a game for a year, I personally would would pick if I had to pick those two. Yeah. I'm just saying in that in this choice constrained choice of those two and not the thousands of games that are out there, I would say I'd pick Star Wars: Fall of the Empire over Uncanny X-Men in a home environment. But chat disagrees here. There's a lot of people for Uncanny X-Men. All right. Well, I challenge you with a different question. Out of those two games, right? If you had them for 17 minutes, which one would you pick? Uncanny X-Men. No question. Without question. It's got the better mechs. It's got the better layout. It's more interesting layout. Um, and it's and it's not like I'm not even saying it's ter it's terrible code. It's just one is better and you know the the layout of Uncanny X-Men is much better than Star Wars. That's true. Um, but especially for people who are like like practiced in pinball and have played a bunch of games. Um, I also just wish it's not that I by the way it's not that I don't like fan layouts either. Um, I just don't particularly like that fan layout is what I would say. Yeah. Like John Wick is a fan layout that I think plays pretty cool for a fan layout. It's too hard. Yeah, I know you feel that way. It's too hard. Just too hard. There's also enough things that trick you into thinking it's not really a fan layout, right? Like just how the ramps and stuff are located, the car and the weapons crate. Like you don't feel like you're playing a fan layout. Like Jaws like is obviously a fan layout, but the side flipper and the, you know, utility pop give you enough of a like not really. I don't know. People say that's a fan layout because I get that their shots arranged in a fan, but first of all, there's an upper play field on the Premium LE. that's its own thing, you know, which is a requirement. You cannot own the pro. It's just no point. I personally agree with that unless you're an operator. Sorry, Kale. But also, but uh and then you have that upper right flipper that does open things up side to side and does make this cool shot and you could sometimes make the orbit and the orbit flies in a weird way. And so I think I think it's maybe a twist on a some sort of fan layout, but it's enough different that I wouldn't even put it in that category. I think it's just weird enough, you know, on its own. Um but um yeah, like and then and then I'd rather a game, frankly, like Jaws that has a great layout and great code. Yeah. Yeah, I totally agree with you. Not a hot take. That's not a hot take. The hot take was comparing Star Wars and Uncanny X-Men, I think. And I did Texas Chainsaw Massacre. I'm sorry. I haven't played it yet. I think I'm fading, boys. It's midnight. It's 12:07, right? That's enough. We push to the We're good, man. Thank you for having me on. I love my little like surprise. I loved it. I'm so glad Kale sent that to you. Thank you, Kale. Thank you, dude. Always a good producer. So, everybody needs to hang out in here, right? So, it'll upload. Yeah, wait till it to upload. So, when I shut this off. But guys, thank you so much for joining. We had consistently close to 100 people for most of the night, which is totally ridiculous just what listening to us talk gibberish about how much we love this pinball hobby of ours. We are a pimple on a pimple and uh who cares? We love it. And I I thank Serge so much for joining and uh being my this interview here. Uh for me to be the first to interview you is so exciting and uh I really appreciate it. And Jeff from Dirty Pool Dodson. You know what? I'm gonna do this. I think it's a joint interview and I think we did it very well together, buddy. Can we also give credit to Enzo, by the way, in chat. He asked also around the same time that you guys asked and I I said I can't I'm not doing I don't do things like interviews or whatever. And Enzo's in the chat, too. And I'm sorry, Enzo is what I mean. It's okay. Enzo's the best. He's a great dude. And three more hours, says Sterling. Are you crazy? I got to go to a pimple on a pimple. Yeah, you know, Tom, we are. I mean, we're just crazy in love with this hobby and I just wanted to do a stream where you guys can hang out with us live. Uh cuz we were jonesing. My wife's out of town. She's in Sedona living it up. Oh, nice. And if I had planned this properly, I should be in Arizona at the bat, but I didn't plan it properly. So, that's on me. Uh thank you guys so so much. Thank you Azie for everything. We really appreciate you all. And uh I'm going to close this, but these guys are going to stay here for 5 minutes. Not even 2 minutes while it uploads. God bless you all. Thank you guys. _(Acquisition: youtube_auto_sub, Enrichment: v5)_ --- *Exported from Journalist Tool on 2026-06-06 | Item ID: 18e3e54e-a49d-4d3b-af4e-e6a24dceff4c*