# Diving DEEP with Pinball FX's Peter Grafl

**Source:** BlahCade Pinball Podcast  
**Type:** podcast_episode  
**Published:** 2023-05-15  
**Duration:** 74m 17s  
**Beat:** Pinball

**URL:** https://podcasters.spotify.com/pod/show/blahcade-pinball-podcast/episodes/Diving-DEEP-with-Pinball-FXs-Peter-Grafl-e2476nn

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## Analysis

Blockade Pinball hosts an in-depth interview with Peter Grafl (Deep), head designer at Zen Studios, covering design philosophy, influences, and technical decisions. Key topics include why Zen doesn't implement rolling code updates like physical pinball manufacturers, ROM status carryover limitations, and UX issues with DMD messaging timing during critical gameplay moments.

### Key Claims

- [HIGH] Zen avoids rolling code updates primarily due to online leaderboard reset concerns—changing scoring rules requires leaderboard resets which they want to minimize — _Peter Grafl direct response: 'The main reason behind this is the online leaderboard. And if we change something in the table that affects the scoring possibilities, we would have to reset the leaderboard.'_
- [HIGH] Altering original Williams/Bally ROMs is 'extremely difficult' and Zen can only modify options available in the original ROM's operator menu — _Peter Grafl: 'Altering original ROMs is extremely difficult. It was an enormous task to implement these old systems into Pinball FX... we can easily change only the options that can be found in the ROM's original operator menu.'_
- [HIGH] DMD message timing during critical gameplay is intentional design—holding the ball for all text would be more frustrating than letting messages trigger during play — _Peter Grafl: 'I just imagine a table where the ball gets always held in a sinkhole or saucer and waits for the text to display. This would be much more frustrating in my opinion.'_
- [HIGH] Zen has implemented leaderboard resets multiple times during early access and console releases, contradicting the stated reasoning for not doing rolling code updates — _Chris Freebus and Jared Morgan discuss: 'their leaderboards reset all the time' and 'I've seen this going into the game, then having to redo all my scores on the leaderboard.'_
- [HIGH] Physical pinball code updates from manufacturers like Stern have included major gameplay additions (e.g., James Bond gaining five skill shots, Guardians of the Galaxy significantly improved) — _Jared Morgan: 'James Bond pinball machines... when they first released with the code, it was bare bones... latest code update... had like about five different skill shots.'_
- [MEDIUM] Zen designers are not maintaining/iterating on tables post-release; once a designer finishes, they move to the next project rather than spending additional time on feedback implementation — _Chris Freebus: 'Or maybe it just doesn't fit Zen's design model, which is, "Look, once the designer is done with the table, they're moving on to the next table," rather than having them... There's not a maintenance program in place.'_
- [HIGH] Williams Bally recreations haven't significantly influenced Zen's original design philosophy, though they did adopt GI (global lights) handling techniques from the recreation work — _Peter Grafl: 'I couldn't say so, at least not in terms of design... We took benefits from the handling of the GI, the global lights.'_

### Notable Quotes

> "The main reason behind this is the online leaderboard. And if we change something in the table that affects the scoring possibilities, we would have to reset the leaderboard, and this is what we want to avoid as much as possible."
> — **Peter Grafl (Deep), Zen Studios head designer**, ~20:30
> _Core explanation for why Zen doesn't implement rolling code updates despite pressure from the community and other manufacturers doing so_

> "Their leaderboards reset all the time. I've seen this going into the game, then having to redo all my scores on the leaderboard. So I don't see them being very averse to resetting leaderboards."
> — **Chris Freebus**, ~21:45
> _Direct contradiction of Zen's stated reasoning—leaderboards have been reset frequently across platform transitions_

> "Like, for example, a good example is the James Bond pinball machines that came out. Like, when they first released with the code, it was bare bones... But now they've got, like, the latest code update that I played had like about five different skill shots you could have."
> — **Jared Morgan**, ~22:15
> _Concrete example of how physical pinball manufacturers substantially improve games post-release through code updates_

> "There's not a maintenance program in place, essentially... Rather than having it be: the table is released, and that designer sticks with the table for another two months to register all the feedback and then potentially make further adjustments."
> — **Chris Freebus**, ~25:00
> _Identifies structural difference between Zen's process and other manufacturers' ongoing support model_

> "I just imagine a table where the ball gets always held in a sinkhole or saucer and waits for the text to display. This would be much more frustrating in my opinion than letting the instructions come and go as they're triggered."
> — **Peter Grafl**, ~32:15
> _Explains design philosophy behind DMD timing issue—Grafl believes releasing ball during text is better UX than holding it_

> "And I think it's just like there's been enough tables that we've mentioned that—I mean, even some of these new ones that we went over—where we were like, 'This could be better, this could be better, this could be better, change this.' We have to be able to play the thing first to be able to make suggestions."
> — **Chris Freebus**, ~26:00
> _Articulates catch-22: can't test/provide feedback on design issues until after release, but post-release updates aren't happening_

> "Make them skippable, but don't launch the ball while we're trying to read them. How about make the first time the info is important, you hold it? And thereafter, if you relight that same hole or whatever, or do the same thing, now you understand what is happening."
> — **Jared Morgan**, ~34:30
> _Proposes practical compromise solution for DMD timing issue that Grafl partially acknowledged_

> "I just remember when I played Iron Man, and I finally gotten to the wizard mode, and I start the wizard mode, and there was a block of text up on the DMD telling me what to do. And at the same time, I'm trying to capture the ball, but it's multiball, and by the time I had any kind of control, the message was already gone."
> — **Chris Freebus**, ~35:30
> _Concrete example of player frustration with current DMD implementation during high-stakes gameplay moments_

> "It seems that leaderboards, while they're great, are actually causing some degree of issue with how the games are presented to us as players. So I don't know what I'd want more. Would I want leaderboards or would I want these gameplay features?"
> — **Jared Morgan**, ~31:00
> _Identifies core tension: leaderboard preservation is constraining game design and post-release iteration_

> "Altering original ROMs is extremely difficult. It was an enormous task to implement these old systems into Pinball FX, making it possible to support the multiplication of the original scores with the upgrade powers."
> — **Peter Grafl**, ~27:30
> _Explains technical constraints around ROM modification that limit ROM status carryover features_

### Entities

| Name | Type | Context |
|------|------|---------|
| Peter Grafl (Deep) | person | Head designer at Zen Studios, provided video responses answering detailed technical and design questions about Zen's pinball recreation and original design philosophy |
| Chris Freebus (Shut Your Trap) | person | Co-host of Blockade Pinball Podcast, conducted interview with Peter Grafl, provided critical analysis of Zen's design decisions |
| Jared Morgan | person | Co-host of Blockade Pinball Podcast, provided technical feedback and comparison to physical pinball manufacturer practices |
| Zen Studios | company | Digital pinball recreation and original game designer; produces Pinball FX tables including Williams/Bally recreations and Zen originals |
| Pinball FX | product | Zen Studios' primary digital pinball platform supporting online leaderboards, multiple systems, and both licensed recreations and original designs |
| Stern Pinball | company | Physical pinball manufacturer frequently referenced for comparison; implements rolling code updates post-release (e.g., James Bond, Guardians of the Galaxy) |
| Jersey Jack Pinball | company | Physical pinball manufacturer implementing post-release code updates, contrasted with Zen's approach |
| Spooky Pinball | company | Physical pinball manufacturer implementing post-release code updates, contrasted with Zen's approach |
| Williams/Bally | company | Classic pinball manufacturer; Zen recreates their games within Pinball FX; recreations have limited ROM modification capability |
| James Bond (Pinball) | product | Stern physical pinball machine cited as example of substantial post-release code improvements (added five skill shots) |
| Guardians of the Galaxy (Pinball) | product | Stern physical pinball machine frequently cited as initially poor in early code, significantly improved through updates |
| Iron Man (Zen Table) | product | Zen original pinball table with wizard mode criticized for DMD messaging issues during critical gameplay |
| Theater of Magic | product | Classic pinball machine cited by Peter Grafl as favorite design influencing Zen approach |
| Medieval Madness | product | Classic pinball machine cited as favorite design; wizard mode referenced as example of good UI/messaging structure |
| Circus Voltaire | product | Classic Data East pinball machine; Zen recreates it; wizard mode cited as example of good segmented messaging design |
| Son of Zeus (Zen Table) | product | Zen original table featuring snake toy inspired by Metallica's snake locker mechanic |
| Metallica (Pinball) | product | Physical pinball machine with snake locker toy that influenced Zen's Son of Zeus design |
| Jurassic Park (Data East) | product | Classic Data East pinball machine featuring T-Rex toy cited by Peter Grafl as favorite design element |
| Twilight Zone | product | Bally pinball machine with Power Ball ROM status mechanic (carried over in Zen recreation) |
| Dr. Dude | product | Bally pinball machine with Dude meter that carries over between games; cited as example of ROM status feature |
| Addams Family | product | Classic pinball machine with calibration features that should persist; cited as example of desired ROM status carryover |
| Blockade Pinball Podcast | organization | Pinball discussion podcast hosted by Chris Freebus and Jared Morgan; conducted this deep-dive interview with Zen's head designer |
| Mel | person | Zen Studios representative frequently interviewed on Blockade Podcast; unable to answer technical design questions, referred hosts to Peter Grafl |

### Topics

- **Primary:** Zen Studios' post-release code update philosophy vs physical manufacturers, Leaderboard preservation as constraint on game design and iteration, ROM status carryover and technical limitations in Williams/Bally recreations, DMD (dot matrix display) messaging timing and UX issues, Zen's design philosophy differences from classic pinball tropes
- **Secondary:** Designer workflow and lack of post-release maintenance at Zen, Influence of classic pinball designers and games on Zen's work, New player onboarding and difficulty curve in digital pinball

### Sentiment

**Mixed** (-0.35) — Hosts express significant frustration with Zen's design decisions (leaderboard constraints, lack of rolling updates, DMD timing issues) while maintaining professional respect for Peter Grafl's technical explanations. Grafl's responses show thoughtful design intent but also reveal structural limitations and workflow issues that hosts find problematic. Community feedback frustration is evident but discussion remains constructive.

### Signals

- **[business_signal]** Zen's leaderboard-preservation policy contradicts industry standard practice and constrains gameplay design; leaderboards are reset regularly anyway during platform transitions, undermining the stated rationale (confidence: high) — Hosts confirm multiple leaderboard resets during early access and console releases; Grafl states leaderboards as primary reason for no rolling updates, but hosts directly contradicted this with personal experience
- **[community_signal]** Community frustrated with Zen's inflexible approach to leaderboard mechanics limiting gameplay feature implementation (progressive jackpots, ROM status) despite technical feasibility (confidence: high) — Extended discussion of how leaderboard protection prevents desired ROM status carryover; hosts propose tournament mode/local leaderboard compromise as solution
- **[community_signal]** Zen soliciting community feedback and willing to provide follow-up textual responses on technical questions, suggesting some openness to dialogue despite structural constraints on implementation (confidence: medium) — Hosts planning to send follow-up clarifying questions to Grafl on ROM status issue; Grafl acknowledged 'If you have suggestions for any of the tables that can make the rules better, please let us know'
- **[design_philosophy]** Zen's original table designs criticized for not following established pinball UX conventions around rule communication and progression, making learning curve steeper for new players (confidence: medium) — Hosts note new players on Discord frustrated with difficulty/unclear mechanics; discuss how classic games use lighting/callouts to communicate intent non-verbally rather than DMD text walls
- **[design_philosophy]** Zen intentionally diverges from classic pinball design tropes and conventions, prioritizing their own digital-native approach over established pinball language (confidence: high) — Grafl: 'We have more creative freedom when we design a table from scratch' and 'Williams Bally tables are different enough... because of the nature of digital pinball itself.' Hosts note this causes frustration when genre conventions aren't followed.
- **[market_signal]** Peter Grafl response acknowledges technical limitations (ROM modification difficulty) and design philosophy differences; defensive tone on leaderboard policy suggests awareness of community criticism (confidence: medium) — Grafl offers explanations and partial compromises (making messages skippable) rather than dismissing feedback; suggests designers 'used to hold the ball for most important text' indicating some awareness of issue
- **[community_signal]** Peter Grafl (Deep) revealed as head designer at Zen; communicated via video response rather than live interview due to language barrier and comfort level, indicating communication limitations at organizational level (confidence: high) — Chris Freebus: 'Deep's not quite comfortable doing a live interaction yet—language barrier and all... we fired off these questions. Deep went ahead and sent back video responses.'
- **[personnel_signal]** Zen lacks post-release maintenance workflow; designers move to next project after completion rather than iterating on feedback, contrasting sharply with Stern, Jersey Jack, and Spooky practices (confidence: high) — Chris Freebus: 'Or maybe it just doesn't fit Zen's design model... once the designer is done with the table, they're moving on to the next table... There's not a maintenance program in place'
- **[product_strategy]** Hosts propose specific UX improvements for DMD messaging: make first instance mandatory/ball-held, subsequent instances skippable; implement tournament vs casual gameplay modes with different ROM state handling (confidence: medium) — Jared Morgan detailed proposal: 'make the first time the info is important, you hold it. And thereafter... now you understand what is happening' and Chris Freebus' tournament mode suggestion with fresh ROM state
- **[product_concern]** DMD message timing during critical gameplay moments (especially wizard modes) is cited as recurring frustration across multiple Zen tables (Iron Man example); design rationale provided but community workarounds proposed (confidence: high) — Chris Freebus describes Iron Man wizard mode where message disappeared before ball could be controlled; Grafl acknowledges but defends current approach as better than always holding ball
- **[sentiment_shift]** Community perception of Zen's approach shifting negatively as expectations increase with physical manufacturers (Stern) demonstrating ongoing support model; gap between digital and physical widening (confidence: high) — Hosts repeatedly contrast Zen's static approach to James Bond/Guardians of the Galaxy receiving major post-release improvements at Stern; frustration evident throughout interview
- **[technology_signal]** ROM status carryover limited by technical constraints of integrating legacy Williams/Bally systems; some features implemented (Twilight Zone Power Ball) while others (vault letters, progressive meters) not carried over (confidence: high) — Grafl: 'Altering original ROMs is extremely difficult... we can easily change only the options that can be found in the ROM's original operator menu.' Hosts note inconsistency across different tables.

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## Transcript

 BlahCade Pinball Podcast this is the BlahCade Pinball Podcast i'm your host chris freebus aka shut your trap joining me as always halfway across the world jared morgan hello everybody how you going all right i don't know things are uh things are decent around here the the Carl Weathers's warming up. Went and saw Guardians of the Galaxy 3, and it was good. Oh, good. Yeah. It's on my list of things to watch. Trilogies are hard. The third movies, a lot of times, just don't do it. Yeah. It's like you shouldn't have really bothered. Just think of The Matrix, for example. Don't knock The Matrix. I love The Matrix. No, I think the difficulty is that the first movie, catches everybody off guard. The second movie makes good on and improves everything that everybody liked about the first movie. And then the third movie, they realize they have to wrap things up, but they also have to top whatever was in the other two, and I think that's where the stumbling block comes. Because there's just not it... Things aren't being done for creative purposes, they're being done for business purposes. Yeah. That's right. Yeah. And, you know, when directors have to, I guess, work within the constraints of money, that's where things tend to go to tank, I think. Yeah. But this one, I was very pleased in that. I'll put it to you this way. I still think Guardians 2 is my favorite of the three. It was great. But I didn't feel like this failed in any way. I think as a trilogy, and yes, okay, fine, throw in the holiday special because you kind of need it. Very self-contained. Good to know. Other than needing to know a little bit about what happened in Endgame. But other than, and Infinity War, that's really all you need. It's not beholden to all of the MCU. And so I really like that. Right, okay. because it gets more and more confusing as they release more movies like really it's like trying to watch everything in like the you know the equivalent of the razor order of star wars yeah is is ridiculously difficult now because there's so much material out there yeah you know it's a minefield yeah and you know there are some movies that really lean in heavily to you have to have watched this there almost should be a disclaimer at the on on this trailer saying before you watch this movie you should have watched this this and this you know in the mcu because that would actually help i think yeah the funny thing is uh i don't think i'm doing spoilers here for infinity war end game when i say that obviously uh gamora died and then got brought back thanks to time travel but being a different gamora uh that doesn't hadn't existed with the Guardians that entire time, so doesn't know their history with the group. Obviously, that's the stuff that you need to have seen those two movies for. But, and I think about with People's Grifes about Mandalorian Season 3, of oh, well, if you didn't watch Book of Boba Fett, you would have never known how Mando and Grogu got back together again. In my head, I'm like, well, why wouldn't you have watched that. I don't understand why you would have purposely skipped it and missed that. It's all part of the same story. It was literally released in between the two Mandos. Yeah, and so I find it interesting that the Guardians isn't getting any of that flack. Clearly, you would have needed to have seen those two movies in order to understand what's going on with Gamora. You know, that's I would have forgotten about that because I've seen those two movies ages ago now. It's almost like they need a previously in the MCU. But here's the thing. Once you hear it, you'll go, oh yeah, I remember that. But it's not dependent on all the minutia and details of what went on in that moment. It's more simply she died, she came back, she wasn't the same. End of story. Now let's continue with the story. You know. That's good. Enough said, right? Enough said. Yeah. Yeah. But, yeah, so I was really pleased with that. And then I'm very pleased because my Lakers basketball team is now advanced to the conference finals. We'll see how far they go. But I say that, and this is now all lost on Jared, who I'm sure does not follow the NBA. What's full? Right. But for a team that started 2 of 8 and had a 0.3% chance of even making it into the playoffs, they're doing really good. So we'll see how far this run goes. But yeah, I don't know. That's good. I'm in good spirits. That's what I'm trying to say. Well, that's good. It's good that you're in good spirits. Streaming has been going well on the Twitch channel. having I tried out the lunchtime streams local time here no one was on because it was ridiculous o'clock in the northern hemisphere at lunchtime for a lot of folk and so I thought okay well how do I solve that problem because I don't stream unless there's people around to interact with like why bother other eyes right you can easily just play the game by yourself and be done with it exactly and And, you know, I know some people like to watch people play to look at strategy and stuff. But, you know, I'm not one of the top players. So, you know, they'll probably have a mixed experience if they watch me for pro tips. But, you know, so I thought, well, how am I going to solve this problem? And I tried streaming my time about 10 p.m., which works out to be, according to what Wilbur's and M11 say, it's around 12 o'clock UK time and I think I don't know if M11's 12 noon? yeah 12 noon so 10pm is about 12 noon over there the previous day so that works out really well I've regularly had Wilbur's and M11 join and say hello and a few other people have dropped in occasionally as well so it seems like a good time to do it which means that it's after the kids go to bed in my time um i usually do 10 to 11 30 ish depending on how i'm feeling and then wrap it up after that i mean i'm staying up anyhow to that time generally so it doesn't really matter um so yeah that's uh that's what's going on and it's it's going well so i can definitely if you haven't checked out the streams yet um you can pretty much guarantee i'll be doing a stream on my Tuesday 10pm and my Thursday 10pm the schedule on the BlackApe Pinball Twitch page is updated to reflect that now it's not once time streams anymore so yeah come and check it out come and say g'day have a chat while we're playing I like to talk when I'm playing pinball it doesn't worry me some people are like weird like when I go to tournaments people go don't talk to me I'm playing pinball it's like dude like you really like you can't talk and play pinball at the same time it's not that hard two different parts of the brain working here so yeah come check it out I'd love to have you along and I'd love to have a chat cool I've been not playing so much pinball at all because I got myself back into Horizon Zero Dawn I played it a while ago on the PS4 got to a certain point I think I mentioned this before I was playing it at the same time as God of War that was a mistake because I wound up abandoning both of the games. Right, okay. But I've got it on PC now, and I finally caught up to where I was on the PS4. It feels like I was a little bit deeper than I expected. I'm about 20, 25, 28 hours in. But they're having a good time. What is the average game time experience for that game? I have no idea. I really have no idea. I'm doing my favorite thing, which is let's try and be as stealthy as possible and take out as many enemies as possible without them knowing I'm there. They're basically playing it like MGS. Yes. Yeah. So that means if I send an arrow into a machine and get its attention, I go into hiding mode and I don't fire another shot until it stops looking for me and then I fire another shot and so it's time consuming yeah right but I enjoy doing that you're still destroying the machine but you're doing it very slowly very methodically yes I'm not I don't like going out in a hail of bullets so it takes a little bit longer because I'm doing it that way I'm not really good at setting traps and things for it to run over on the ground and everything. Let me just fire some arrows off and see what I can do. Okay. But, yeah. That's where I'm at on that. All right, folks. So what did you tune in today? Well, we have always had a bunch of questions that whenever we talk to Mel, he's never able to answer because it gets a little too technical or a little too on the design end. And as Zen has grown, Mel has kind of gotten a little bit more and more stepped back from the, not the day-to-day operations, but the nitty-gritty of what is going on. Clearly, when you've all of a sudden hired a whole bunch more designers, that's more people to interact with and keep track of what their progress is as the company itself is growing. So we were referred to, you know, you should probably talk to Deep. and he's head designer, he'll have the answers. So that's exactly what we did. We wrote a whole bunch of questions, emailed them over, because A, scheduling is hard, and B, Deep's not quite comfortable doing a live interaction yet, language barrier and all. So we fired off these questions. Deep went ahead and sent back video responses. so this isn't us pretending like we're doing a live interview not at all we're going to read the questions off we're going to go to the video of what deep answers and then we'll talk a little bit about um what he says unfortunately obviously that means we're not going to be able to have any follow-up uh to whatever he responds with yeah but we do have some follow-up questions that we will try and get over to him so he can just answer in text and we'll update you what those answers are in a future show. Yeah. Just to qualify some of the points he made. So, yeah, there should be some good answers in the video, so I think you should enjoy it. Yep. So we should dive in. Yep, let's dive in. Let's let him... You can go and ask the first question, then we'll go from there. Yeah, all right. Well, we're going to let him first do his little introduction. Yeah. You know, because it's interesting. Here we go. It is. Hey everyone, thanks for having me. The machines behind me are part of my collection, but this is the only pinball machine I have at the moment. I hope I can get some Williams Ballypins in the future. Let's jump into the questions. Alright, so our first question for Deep was, who are some of your favorite pinball designers And what of their influences can we see on his designs? Let's see what Deep has to say. I don't really have a particular favorite designer. Every designer did good and not so good games. However, there are some pins that I like maybe a bit better, such as Theater of Magic, Skirt Stiff, Jurassic Park, Adam's Family, Medieval Madness, Monster Bash. but I could go on until tomorrow because almost every single pin has something that's fun or different than on any other. But to answer the second part of the question, it's not easy to come up with entirely original toys and ideas with every design, but I always try to think further to change things, even if some mechanic influence me. The possibilities are much wider in digital pinballs, so we have more tools to work with. For example, there's the giant snake on the Son of Zeus table. That was somewhat influenced by the snake locker on the Metallica pinball. But I reimagined it a bit so it could be more interactive. So I find that kind of interesting that he's taking influence of toys that are on some of these machines and then seeing how he can make them xenified. That's right. And, you know, we have seen that before and commented several times that, you know, a lot of the designs with Zen do play homage to other machines. So this just confirms the fact that, yes, they absolutely do look to other machines for inspiration, but not necessarily directly lift and copy. like there's always there's always iteration on it to make it suitable for for um digital which you know i think it's really hard with pinball not to these days because there's so much essentially prior art out there it's hard to come up with original ideas right yep all right well the the next question that we posed to deep was do you have a favorite pinball thing so you know Things like ramps, bash toys, drop targets, multiball, wireframe habits, you know, habit rails and all that sort of stuff. So let's see what Deep had to say about that. Sure, I do. I would mention Frankie from the Monster Bash, the T-Rex from Data East Jurassic Park, the Ringmaster on Circus Water, the Boxer and especially the Jump Rope Mechanics on Champion Pub. This list could also go on and on as well. I also like Curvy and Loopy Ramps, like the ones on Data East, Tales from the Crypt, and Star Wars. Curvy Ramps. Curvy Ramps. So I guess it's no surprise that he was responsible for Adventureland. Yeah, because that thing's full of Curvy stuff. Right? Yeah. And the same thing I think about just with, like, Return of the Jedi, how the ball does a lot of interesting traveling on that table, too. Oh, yeah, absolutely. Yeah. I like the idea that he likes the bash toy, too. And we've seen that in some of the more recent designs as well coming through. We get a lot of influence on Bash toys in the newer tables that we've seen in early access. So, you know, even if some of those designs weren't his, I think the influence on the Bash toy does seem to resonate through the designers. It's like a bit of a theme as well. So, yeah, there is definitely, it feels like there's a bit of influence there. Yeah. All right, so the next question was, why doesn't Zen follow the model of releasing code updates to tables as user feedback comes in, much like Stern, Jersey Jack, and Spooky? Even 90s era Williams had multiple ROM updates. So let's find out what he has to say about that. The main reason behind this is the online leaderboard. And if we change something in the table that affects the scoring possibilities, we would have to reset the leaderboard and this is what we want to avoid as much as possible. If we come out with a new title and we carry over legacy tables, we can alter the rules that affect scores or gameplay, so if you have suggestions for any of the tables that can make the rules better, please let us know. there is an exploit on a specific table. We try to fix it as soon as possible and we reset the leaderboard as we did already a couple of times in the past. We also try to fix the bugs you guys are constantly reporting which we are extremely grateful for. So, thank you. And keep them coming. So, it doesn't sound like... Well, A. Goddamn leaderboards. well this is the thing that i find it's a bit of a disconnect here right yeah like sure he states the leaderboards as a as a reason for not resetting things but then we've had several leaderboard resets over the course of early access and going into steam releasing consoles like their leaderboards reset all the time yeah and i've seen this going into the game then having to redo all my scores in the leaderboard So I don see them being very adverse to resetting leaderboards because they do it all the time now And I mean we gone down this many a time where it the wrong decision because and especially in light of what all your pinball manufacturers are doing you know, since their tables can be wirelessly connected, I'm not asking for simple, you know, a tweak here, a tweak there, and then you have to do the leaderboard. because the code updates that come out on these machines are major. I mean, they... Yeah, that's like brand new skill shot. Like, for example, a good example is the James Bond pinball machines that come out. Like, you know, when they first released with the code, it was bare bones. Yeah. There was nothing really in them. You can get multiball and, you know, that's about it. But now they've got, like, the latest code update that I played had, like, about five different skill shots you could have. You know? And that is a big gameplay change that would affect your ability to play on the leaderboard. And I remember people saying, and I don't have much access to physical pinball, but I know that Guardian specifically a lot of people pointed out to was terrible on its first code releases and now is a really, really good solid game. I just don't see it. I don't either. And I think it's just like there's been enough tables that we've mentioned that – I mean even some of these new ones that we went over where we were like this could be better, this could be better, this could be better, change this. We have to be able to play the thing first to be able to make suggestions. Yeah, we can't tell you what's wrong with it until we actually experience the thing. But if you've already put it out there and leaderboards are happening, well, then what? Exactly. And so I don't know if it was maybe that we just weren't clear enough in our question there or whatever. Or maybe it just doesn't fit Zen's design model, which is, look, once the designer is done with the table, they're moving on to the next table. rather than having them... There's not a maintenance program in place, essentially. Right, right. And rather than having it be the table is released and that designer sticks with the table for another two months to register all the feedback and then potentially make further adjustments. Because... And I think we're going to hear this answer in a little bit. Spoiler alert. Yeah. The designers, I think they get a bit of tunnel vision because of so much of what they're looking over and they're not getting the outside input yep that's right anyhow yeah let's move on to the next question like we said this is the segment of the show that we're going to show deep and see if we can with the context of our answers hopefully deep can provide a textual response to that that we can share with you later on because I think it's it's a big enough issue that it would be nice to just seek a little bit of extra scope on it yeah um so the next one is about rom status so we we posed the deep the question is there a reason rom status isn't carried over game to game for william's belly recreations some zen originals have this like epic quest and most recently brothers in arms uh we also made the comment as well for clarification as system 11 titles come into play this will be more and more critical so what is uh what did you have to say about that yeah altering original roms is extremely difficult it was an enormous task to implement these old systems into pinball effects making it possible to support the multiplication of the original scores with the upgrade powers. Basically we can easily change only the options that can be found in the ROM's original operator menu. However, this can be altered even during gameplay real time. Additionally, where it is a gameplay feature, we save the progress between games and Bollywood EMC was like the position of the power ball in Twilight Zone, for example. so obviously there with with twilight zone they did carry over that status but that is not technically a rom status it is a physical ball status so this is the i had to listen to this response a couple of times because there are a few things about deep's response here that that kind of i think it might have been lost in translation so this is something we want to clarify with you deep if you're watching this when we say rom status we mean things like vault letters we mean things like progressive jackpots in games these things are all stored as part of the rom so to refine this question a bit more we want to check with you why aren't those elements of the rom status carried over between games how would you keep that status of the rom carried over and is it possible? That's my question to you. Yeah, because we're not asking to alter the ROM. We're asking the ROM to just carry over say quarter to quarter. In Dr. Dude, the Dude meter doesn't reset every single game. It's progressive. Unless you're in tournament mode. Tournament mode obviously does reset. But it's those, like you said, vault letters. if they ever do A-Ball Deluxe. It's the Deluxe letters. Yeah. It's in Adam's family, having the thing flip, not have to recalibrate every single time you start. It should know game to game that, oh, on this machine, it's got it pretty dialed in. Yeah, that's right. Yeah, that's not a play feature to make it learn. No, that's exactly right. So that's what we're asking there. So hopefully we can get deep to provide some extra clarifying comments about that aspect. And I think like with Circus Voltaire, they did figure out, you know, there's a different set of judges every single time you play. Yes, there is. So something's going on there. Yeah, something. They're doing it on some and not on others, but there are definite play features that this is part of the table play. Yeah. Yeah. You know, even the other thing that if they can do things like inject scores and the power-ups and stuff like that, could they actually flip a bit here and there and actually credit us with four vault letters from the start? Or set the ROM so that it has a certain build-up of ROM letters randomly from game to game? So that would then, like, say you got a game started and you could see that there was four vault letters left, then you would change your gameplay strategy to go for vault letters and then you'd qualify vault multiball and then go and get vault multiball. So at least you could experience it. You know what I mean? So, yeah. Now, the only thing I can think of as a valid reason not to do this is, again, leaderboards. Because if you could stack, say, Dr. Dude to be all the way up until that final Super Dupe, purposely tank your balls, start the next game so that you, bam, are starting right off the bat with that, you could goose your score to what it needs to be. or for those things that have progressive jackpots, you could game the system to get there. So I don't necessarily know the answer to that. That's the other aspect of it too. It seems that leaderboards, while they're great, are actually causing some degree of issue with how the games are presented to us as players. so it's i don't know what would i want more would i want leaderboards or would i want these gameplay features which is going to be an interesting question that i think we can probably answer towards the end of this i mean honestly if i were to say anything with with regards with regards to leaderboards it's make the leaderboards with uh tournament settings and when i say tournament settings i'm not talking about slope of table or i'm not talking about pro versus classic here no i'm talking about just yes you're starting at a fresh rom state yeah that's the kind of gameplay that would put you on the leaderboard if you want to play it as experience it for your local high score that's stored on your computer then the rom carryovers would happen honestly i think that's the that feels like the most logical compromise here like have have it so there's like literally tournament mode and local leaderboard mode you know and that gives everyone the chance to actually experience these games as they're designed to be experienced yeah but also have that ability to be in a tournament setting and have that that tournament style experience yep where everything's turned off no advantage is there you know like a good example of advantage which I found the other day, there's a class of 8 and 12. If you're playing a four-player game or more than one-player game, there's a catch-up mode on that, which will just award you a whole bunch of points, so it brings you up with the other players. It just gives you 20 million points or something, so you catch up with the other players. Those sort of things need to be turned off. Because there's things that I want to experience on pinball machines without having to grind for 45 minutes to get to that status. Also, for new players, too. Like, we're seeing clearly some new players coming through on Discord that are just really frustrated with some of the difficulties. Like, when they're trying to learn a table and kind of perhaps a fresh pinball for the first time. Like, these tables, they're not easy. No. And, you know, I think to some degree it would be really nice for them to have like a big bang experience like this. Like, whoa, what is this? Yeah. Because that's the sort of things that it gets you back every time. I want to experience that again. you know so yeah it's a very it's a it's a problem that i think with this information would be interesting to explore solutions for i think all right so our next question is has working on williams recreations changed how you yourself design pinball uh and how so I couldn't say so, at least not in terms of design. The Williams Bullet Tables are different enough compared to our designs, mostly because of the nature of digital pinball itself. So we need to think differently. We have more creative freedom when we design a table from scratch. Many rules are the same, but a lot are different. I would rather say the real-life tables inspired us in many ways, of course, even before we started to work on the recreations. However, we took benefits from the handling of the GI, the global lights. We started to use the method for the GI on our tables as well that we developed for the Williams Volley Table recreations. Interesting. So they haven't really leaned in on any of the design aspects, but some of the more fundamental parts of pinball, they've sort of borrowed, I guess. I think that kind of also answers our question of why certain pinball tropes aren't followed. Yeah, because they actually don't follow them at all. It's like, no, we're doing our own thing here. We're doing it the Zen way, I guess. Which, I mean, again, I'm not necessarily angry at them because, no, we don't want all pinball to feel the same. And Zen tables have their own flair as compared to a Williams table. But when I get frustrated with a Zen table, it's almost always because they're not following what I think classic pinball design follows. It's more of a, even if you take the, I guess, the tropes of pinball out of it and just focus on how would a user learn your game without necessarily having to lean on the instructions. I mean, it does circle back to those common pinball tropes, but it doesn't necessarily mean that they don't have to use those exact things to communicate what needs to be done. There are ways of actually saying, hey, if you want a light kickback, then you do this in the game. And it's all about the DMD, and it's all about how you present the light show and all that sort of stuff, which Deep covers a bit later. Well, I was going to say, it's actually the next question if you want to read this, because I think it goes right into it. It sure does. And the question that we asked was, a gripe we've had for years and years with Zen Originals is how critical DMD info, which is dot matrix display info, often is displayed at the same moment the ball is heading towards the flipper. Is this by choice or is it a scripting issue and or is it something you've just never even noticed? So let's go to the answer This is something we can't and don't really want to always keep in control I just imagine a table where the ball gets always held in a sinkhole or saucer and waits for the text to display this would be much more frustrating in my opinion than letting the instructions come and go as they triggered. I personally used to hold the ball for the most important text then release it and make these messages skippable not to bore the more experienced players. I think this is a good compromise maybe. Totally agree. Make them skippable but don't launch the ball while we're trying to read them. I think for me, it's how about make the first time the info is important, you hold it, and thereafter, if you relight that same hole or whatever, or do the same thing, now you understand what is happening. So you don't need to display all that information again. I just remember when I'd played Iron Man, and I'd finally gotten to the wizard mode, and I start the wizard mode and there was a block of text up on the DMD telling me what to do and at the same time I'm trying to capture the ball but it's multiball and by the time I had any kind of control the message was already gone and I had no clue what to do and then I instantly drained and now I had to restart everything to light wizard mode And that was extraordinarily frustrating because it took forever to get there. And it's like, come on, when we're getting into something big like that, that takes a lot of effort to make that achievement happen, let us have that moment to digest what is coming out on the DMD. Or, as me and Jared have kept on saying, how about make better callouts that specifically tell you where to go, and you only have to do that callout once, the very first time. Yep, that's right. Or do, like, again, this is leaning in on pinball tropes that, you know, are there in most wizard modes. Like, think of Circus Voltaire wizard mode. It's broken up into segments, right? So you've got Spell Circus, like Destroy the Ringmaster, and I think then there's one more thing which I've forgotten. But it stages out, the point I'm making is it stages out the things you need to do. It doesn't go, big wall of text, now do all those things, and then off you go, because you're going to forget. Your heart's pounding, the adrenaline's rushing, because you're actually at the wizard mode. You're not going to remember anything. You need to be reminded. or I think about something like whether it be Battle for the Kingdom or was it Attack Mars? even Royal Madness where the light show tells you everything you need to know because that's where your eye is it's not up at the D&D it's down on the playfield and the light show tells you hey, why is this light roving from spot to spot? I bet if I hit it when it's in that spot something big is going to happen sure enough, that's a jackpot on Attack from Mars or with Royal Madness, the ball gets locked and it clearly tells you catapult, damsel, joust, multiball. And you're like, well, what about troll and dragon multiball? I didn't get those. Interesting. But the call-outs help you understand what it is and why it is that's happening. But you never have to look up the DMD. everything is right there in the light show on the on the table yep yes and this is the point like the light shows are important yeah which is probably actually the next question it is i'll just say that this gripe isn't specifically to zen because it's the same gripe i have about jersey jack pinball there's so much stuff happening on the display that i feel is for the audience and not for the actual pinball player. Yeah it yeah it seems to be like it all about enticing people over I think Yeah Yeah it is tricky And you know with Jersey Jack there just so much lighting Everything's lit. Everything's blinking. Everything's lit and glowing. There's no, there's like, with Jersey Jack, it's not just like shots of lit. There's varying intensities of light which tell you which ones are important. Yeah. All right. So, yeah, let's move on to this question. So, talk to us about lighting. On Xen Originals, physical GI lighting seems scarce compared to an actual machine. Does any thought go into how you'd light a purely digital table as if it were a physical machine? Table lighting was always a cool question at Xen. Many of us wanted the tables to be darker, like real-life tables, while some of us wanted them to be brighter so the ball can be more visible and easier to track. the latter one since this is a video game at first and pinball simulation has a close second so playability became the first priority however we always searched for possibilities how we could implement an option for the players adjusting the light somehow that won't ruin the experience also the light show is one of the most important visual feedback for the players on a pinball table. And I think we have quite some evolution to making this territory. I have some ideas how could we implement a much better show into our tables. Hopefully we can move forward with this very soon. That's encouraging. That's promising. It does. That really does sound promising. Because clearly they're aware that the light show can be improved. Yeah. I I'm trying to think what was the first part that struck out to me. I don't know, what was your thoughts there, Jared? Maybe it'll come back to me. I think overall they know it's a problem, which is great. This response is that it's a problem. The whole thing about the fact that it's a video game versus a pinball simulation is an interesting position to take. That's what I wanted to talk about. So Farsight obviously implemented a light slider. It wasn't the best, but it was something. Magic Pixel has not a light slider, but a time of day slider to make that effective. And here we are, Zen using Unreal. I think we were fully expecting the ability to fully customize what that look is um and it's instead baked in because i know that while we've kind of gotten our way with uh those of us that like darker tables with what they've done with the williams tables i know there's some people out there they're like they're too dark and then the flip side is we've commented about how we wished some of these zen tables were darker rather than being so cartoony bright to make the light show stand out a little bit more um so i i'm i'm curious to why zen hasn't put that in the user's hands and let us uh determine that yeah i've been messing around with hdr recently um and did a stream with it on which wasn't overly successful because it does weird things when you stream hdr um but in game it was looking amazing like the things like the belly williams tables with hdr on and you know you can you can adjust there's two things you can adjust you can adjust the uh i guess the contrast or the nits i guess i don't know what you really call it but there's a setting that makes that allows you to make the the interface really dark or really light light and make it really sort of overexposed or like a little bit darker and and i've got mine set down to like 500 which is the value. And it feels like the games are in a darkened room. Yet the light sources are actually coming out and being way more prominent in the game. So... I wonder if that... Because I don't have HDR screens, the only thing that's available to me is Gamma. And I almost feel like that's the same thing using the Gamma slider. Which isn't true affecting of lighting. All you're doing is, like you said, you're changing the brightness, you're changing the contrast, but that's not real-time actual lighting that's happening. That's just you messing basically with monitor settings. I think HDR gets it closer. Okay. I don't know. It would be interesting to see what the comments on YouTube say about HDR. Yeah. Like I said, I don't understand why we can't just have a slider or a three-setting thing where it's here's stadium lighting here's regular room lighting here's dark lights off mode lighting yeah yeah having three presets would make it a lot easier to experience i would agree with that so that's that's definitely something that would be helpful i think for just easy configuration for users you know because i'll even say in on a real table i don't like pin stadium lighting unless I'm playing in a tournament where yeah I want to see everything that to me is not pinball pinball is the mood of a table I'd actually say that I've played recently in a room that has not as much lighting and it actually was a little bit difficult to track the ball on some of the older games so having just a little bit of light almost like if you think about a central channel of lights running between the machines, like where you would walk, but nothing else. That's enough light. That's just enough light to see what's going on. But it'll be interesting to see if the lighting that he's talking about, if it is more to do with them working on their GI lights. Because I truly think that's the thing that's lacking in Zen tables. They so much depend on just the brightness of whatever cartoony thing they've got on their artwork to be bright and stand out rather than actual table lighting shining on or glowing through things and making it stand out in that manner. Yeah, that's right. A little bit like what you see on things like The Getaway where the GI lighting has a huge impact on what the game looks like. Or even on Space Station where the lights change from one color to green. you know that that sort of stuff is surely something that could be incorporated into designs yeah um but there's another question we have about uh lighting and i think we may as well yep seems like a good idea to launch into that now so the next question we asked was uh the light show on modern pinball machines has ramped up since jesse jack stepped onto the scene with wizard of oz a lot goes into it from making the liking lighting informational to help tell a story of what's going on with the mode. Some machines, as we know now, actually have over 300 RGB lights on them. So can we expect them to try and follow suit in this regard? It's funny you ask this, because I just started a thread in-house about our light shows, since I think they need some evolution. So I hope the quality could improve very soon. Regarding the quantity of the lights, it's a bit complicated i'm afraid we can't place too many more lights into a table because of technical limitations so we need to evolve mostly in design hmm interesting so there is a cap there is all right there's a cap on light so they need to be quite careful how they use them at the moment i wonder if uh is just it sounds like the way they've got their engine set up in Unreal, they've got like a path cap on how many individual points of light they can put into a game. Probably down to also the way that they interact with the ball and stuff like that, perhaps. So perhaps that's the reason why they've got a limit there. Maybe it's only a limit at the moment too, because they're still trying to improve performance. So perhaps when we, after the Switch release happens and all that sort of stuff, they might look again at just adding a few extra points of light in and see what happens with that, you know? Yeah. Yeah. That's, I mean, obviously, eventually, mathematics and how many polygons you have on a table affect gameplay. Yeah. You've got to balance what you see in the game versus performance, don't you? So I'd imagine totally it's to do with that. And if that's the hard limit, then that's the hard limit. There's nothing you can do about that. um really um but at least at least deep is like broaching the subject to the team yeah again he said that he feels that they need an evolution in their lighting so yep so if if you're saying that there's an evolution required that means that it's it's not technically impossible it's just that it needs some very it needs several iterations i would think to get it to the point where it's not going to affect performance yeah and totally fine but that means that you know we may see it it'll be incremental yeah which leads us into our next question which is uh uh maybe part of the reason for this um so we learned from the last pinball show that the lead designer shepherds every aspect of the table uh we know the layout is what designers are most known for but are they also responsible for scripting call outs creating game rules talking with licensors sound design etc Here at Zen, the designers are doing basically everything except creating graphics and sounds so layout, game rules, scripting all the texts, voiceovers music and sound and display designs answering licensors feedback, these are all designers' territory so yeah, they are pretty busy Yeah, that's ridiculous That's a lot on the plate that's a lot so you can that actually if you think about the whole rules piece and stuff like that if they're if they've done a game and then they probably i mean if they've done a game they've got another one probably heating up as far as you know needing to get it released as well because they'd be doing it in blocks right yeah they'd be down the gantt chat like that so they'd be probably running a couple of different tables at the same time so keep on top of that geez It must be hard. And this is, again, if you are so intimately involved with every single aspect of your table, you're going to start being blind to certain flaws because you just automatically know how to get past it. Yeah, that's right. So that's where it comes back again to the rules of a table. and to somebody fresh to the table they're not going to know the new rules, they're not going to know how to get there it's really complicated but if you've been living with this table for months on end iterating on it for months trying to get the rules right you're like the deep dive expert into these rules so nothing's going to surprise you and the same thing, if you're the one that's by that very nature, you're also writing all the call outs well why do I need this detailed call out? it's in the rules, I already know the rules So it's this circle that never branches out to the new. Yeah. To that fresh-eyed version. It's almost like they need that sort of halfway point interaction with impartial people who've never seen the game. Yeah. And before the point at which the rules are really dialed in, that's when because you know belly williams and stern they do location tests right they used to so they put a game out in a pub um in detroit and they collect feedback on it from people and then they will go back and fix a whole bunch of stuff in the tables based on that feedback before the game was actually finalized and released they then don't do that so they're missing out on that feedback loop from players it's kind of like they need a whitewood stage they need a whitewood yeah that's totally what zen needs here they need a whitewood well they need a not the stern does whitewoods anymore but they just do put it out like you said put it out in the wild get some feedback and then throw out a code change that's right they basically we are their beta testers yeah but you know and it's funny because if you think about but they, like, Stern don't reset their leaderboards. They're global leaderboards. They remain the same, regardless of when the ROMs are released and when they're not. So, as far as I'm aware, so if anyone knows it to the contrary, that Zen do leaderboard resets, global ones, then let me know. Yeah. But, all right. I think we might as well go on to the next question, eh? Okay, so, what Zen creation from the past do you think is great as is, And what design would you love to have a second go at, whether it be color palette, rules, music, or layout? And we also further clarified here, this is across the entire Zen catalog, not just your designs. I would love to give another go for our oldest tables, like Speed Machine, Agents, or Extreme, and completely revamp them for today's standards. That would be cool. So perfect pinball doesn't exist. I would work on a table for years if I could. But, for example, I think Sorcerer's Lair is pretty close to perfect. I would only change minor things on that table, like score balance, shot timers, raising number of necessary shots over time, maybe update to the new display, things like that. Well, if that doesn't sound like code update, I don't know what does. Yeah, that's what we're asking for. Yeah, that's exactly what we're asking for. Go do that, except across everything. So yeah, it sounds good to me. You know, I do like, though, that idea of going back to your older tables and all the things that you've learned, reapplying them to that and making it better. Absolutely. You know, my favorite table to complain about, V12. It's not that it's a bad layout. It's that it's a bad code. And it's just doesn't, it's not intuitive. The lighting is not good. You know, the light show, where to go. So, yeah, go revamp the crap out of it. Make it more fun to play. It's not that the layout's the issue. It's not that the toys are the issue. It's plenty of other things that are the issue. That's right. It's just old compared to the other games. Yeah. And, you know, you could say, well, isn't things like Taxi compared to Medieval Madness old in comparison? But I think the difference there is that there's a certain level of gameplay refinement in Taxi that's already there that isn't really in those early Zen tables. And that's the difference. You can see that the rules just aren't quite there. And, you know, that's some stuff. Well, I mean, what I would say with Taxi is, you know, that was released in the mid-'80s. Williams had already had 25 years plus of pinball experience to that point. So that's what's feeding into that. Now, if you want to go way back into those, you know, EM-era machines and tweak some things, I mean, unfortunately, that's kind of the character of an EM. That's what makes an EM an EM. Yeah, they were crazy, like mad professor stuff in EMs. Right, right. Yeah. But a good example of that is when Stern did Wonelli, and it was like, hey, here's our take on what a modern EM would be. Mm-hmm. it didn't rewrite all the rules but it corrected some of the things that i mean it still feels like an em but it feels like a modern em and i think that's what we're asking for is is and that would be a good idea for zen to go back to those early early tables is look you've got a zen style now just apply it you know what works on a screen with your color palette and for god's sakes change some of that music oh yeah geez it's the music i think is one of the biggest thing that dates these tables oh like it's that generic electronica and it just drives and drives and drives and has nothing to do with what mode you're in yep honestly that there's some marvel tables that really suffer from that generic oh there's some that i just playing turn off the music yeah the table's better without the music yeah yeah absolutely kind of like uh not noir uh what was the one that we just recently played that we were like oh uh elder gods elder gods yeah just turn off the music yeah turn off the music it's it's just definitely better oops wrong button yeah all right uh let's go into the next question which is uh switching to unreal engine what opportunities have opened up both for existing tables and new The new one's yet to be released. Will switching to Unreal 5 be on the horizon? And if so what challenges or advantages do you anticipate Unreal Engine has much more possibilities than the old one The new display that replaced the old dot matrix has definitely become possible with Unreal Engine. The material, particle and lighting system is also new, so better effects are possible now. Short and sweet. Short and sweet, no confirmation about Unreal 5. No. Which, you know, would be a big deal. And honestly, they're only really just into development on Unreal 4, trying to understand that engine. So that's fair enough. Yeah. Yeah. Short and sweet. I agree. Yeah. All right. Next question, Jared. Next question. All right. Different eras of machines have different mechanics. Flippers from an early 80s belly are nothing like a modern stern. Depending on the machine, springs or plungers have different tensile strengths such as Twilight Zone's Loose Spring. Do you use different physics on table parts to accurately simulate how a machine actually plays or do you have a one size fits all table parts for the ones that you've modeled? When we recreate a real life table, we always start with some play tests so we can see how the ball moves around on the specific table. We record the gameplay and also check other videos can be found on the internet since there are no two identical machines. Then we disassemble the machine, digitalize all the parts one by one. After this, when all comes together in the game, we hook up the ROM and the mechanics slides, then start to fine tune the collisions, which rubber should bounce the ball how much, which hole or up kicker should launch the ball how strong, stuff like that. This could however be very different between machines of the same title depending the age of the rubbers, how dirty the machine is, how much use the mechanics are. So this is not as straightforward as you would think. We always try to simulate a brand new out-of-box pinball experience with our older real-life pinball recreations as well as our original creations. I mean I guess it makes a lot of sense because I don't think that Zen is digitally recreating all the flipper mechanics of how a flipper actually works no they don't have the same mission as Farsight has to like preserve digital pinball which is what they're on about well but I mean not that Farsight really captured that in the end But you know what I mean. If you look at an early 80s Bally flipper compared to a mid-90s Williams flipper, the mechanics, how it's actually built and functions mechanically, they're different. But I guess it's not entirely necessary if, because digitally you can just dial it, and like he's saying, you can determine what the rubber is, you can determine what the strength of the flipper is. um so i guess it doesn't need to be modeled specifically uh after each thing and you know there's the the other point to this as well is that you know there's plenty of people out there to put things like titan bands on their machine which are like a completely different gameplay experience to what the designer intended yeah when they created the the game so you know i was playing a game on site the other day where i attempted like a dead bounce which should have happened off the slipper and it just lost all momentum and just rolled straight down the flipper you know so there was no there was no dead bounceable stuff and something so you know that's a factor as well there's going to be you know more modern things out there for pinball that do actually change the way people would have played these older tiles anyhow so i don't know is it really that important if they're aiming for new in box yeah um as experience which is obviously what you want when you're actually playing something brand new. I mean, that's probably a good baseline, really, isn't it? It is, and it's obviously very difficult because nobody today is getting to experience what a new-in-box Williams machine is. You know what I mean? Nobody has a funhouse lying around that's new-in-box and then being able to crack that open and go, oh, here's how it should actually play. The only way you can do it, the only way, would be to completely rebuild every mechanism in the game. Right. Like, you know, scrounge new old stock parts and just replace every single mechanism in the game. Yeah. You know, and some people have done that with some of these tables. I've seen it done, and it is interesting. But honestly, even if you're just replacing the fundamental parts of a machine, like just rebuild the flippers, that'll get you 80% of the way there. All the other mechanisms and stuff like that, you can, you know, like the scoops and stuff are the thing that really affect gameplay as well and consistency in those. So, you know, scoops and kickouts, if you can get those rebuilt to a point that's all new parts or mostly new parts, then you're pretty much getting a new in-box experience there anyhow really. Makes a huge difference to gameplay. A shop one versus a non-shop one. Like it's night and day. In a lot of ways it reminds me of people that do car restorations and are bringing the car back to, they're not modifying the car they're bringing it back to all original. Doing that kind of restoration. but the thing that they can't help themselves on is lining up the gaps between the panels because back in the day, no car manufacturer cared about it. The gaps varied all over the place, but any of these restoration people, they make it so the gaps are perfect like they are on today's car. So even that kind of detail is different than if you had bought it right off the lot back in the mid-60s for a muscle car. so yeah um i i guess in a lot of respects that's what zen is doing with these tables they're um recreating them to the best but they're also throwing in a little bit of the uh the modern bling yeah and making them yeah just a little bit more reflective of what you might see in an arcade now with stern yeah um yeah it's interesting isn't it it is that was a good response i found that quite informative. I did too. I did too. It kind of changes my view of how they assemble these things. So next question. Now that Cabot mode is a must and that Zen even had the cabs put out by Arcade 1-Up, do you think about in your designs things like rumble motors, solenoids, backglass interactions, etc.? Basically, I'm just asking, are you future-proofing your tables to make it so these things automatically happen? for cab stuff. We have a long list of cabinet features we would like to implement and plan to support the mode as much as we can going forward. We'll have more info on this as we go forward. I can't speak of these specifics yet. Boo! Boo! No specifics, but it sounds like, yeah, if you've got a cabinet, strap on. Strap in and strap on, because it's going to be interesting. Clearly designs are or plans are in the works and the fact that he can't talk about them means that they're juicy. Well, juicy but they're also contract related. It could actually be if he can't really divulge them. That's interesting as well. It is. Very interesting. This next question is going to be interesting. alright, let's dive straight into it so we asked Zen has avoided the dual flipper buttons yet certain titles like the Shadow or Black Knight demand it has this been a discussion point? Control input is a cruel subject for us designers we always struggle when we plan a bit more complicated minigame and we can use only the two flipper buttons and the launch button for it sadly this is a limitation we can't ignore because all and every button is used in a normal controller so we just can't use more the difference between the analog triggers and the digital shoulder buttons prevents us from forcing either for the players so if we bring for example the shadow into pinball fx uh we could only use the launch button for the ram diverters and you can see his disappointment in his face when he tells us this. Like, you just see it's like... I don't get it. Farsight can do it. I don't get it either. Farsight did it. Farsight did it. And I think Magic Pixel maybe has done it. I'm not quite sure if Magic Pixel has. But Farsight definitely did it. I don't... Yeah. And not only did they do it, they let you pick whether you were going to be using the triggers or the shoulder buttons. You could just swap them. But whatever you put for your main flippers, then the other buttons would be for your secondary flippers. Yeah, and that's exactly right. But, you know, when we played Black Knight, I say it's critical for that because it's where do you light the magnets? Are you lighting on the right or are you lighting on the left? Because you have the choice of magnets there. Yeah. You know, when we played Starship Troopers, now, granted, that's a Data East machine or Sega. I don't know which. anyway it's stern so it's not coming to us anyway um but it literally had the secondary mid flipper yeah it was a separate flipper and it was an actual gameplay feature that if you use that flipper independently you got more points by flipping it so just having it on all the time you know is is not what you want at all so i don't buy that i don't either and the other thing that bugs me is okay if i'm playing with a controller and hitting the the launch button to do one of these things it's not really a big deal right no if i'm playing on a cab if i have to reach all the way down and slap the front launch button that's that is a big deal because it's not that's going to actually twitch yeah that's absolutely going to affect the it's going to give an advantage to controller players over cabinet players for sure with that so i think that's they really need to rethink how they do dual flipper buttons there it's not it's not impossible that's that's the point it's not well there's prior art there's absolutely prior art with fastlight they did it and no one complained there was no accessibility issues with it no like you basically set your primary flipper buttons and the the other shoulder buttons uh something else and if you want to rem it like maybe his point is if you want to remap all the buttons well if you remap all the buttons then just move those functions to another button of the player's choice yeah and uh and here is the name here is the next question actually chris which goes quite nicely into what we've just been talking about so how about we dive into it um so uh i think it up yours but i can read it if you like yeah go ahead and read um so why can we not key map buttons to controllers in any way we want as opposed to the set controller options currently offered uh actually we are working on this so you'll find the option in an upcoming update oh there you go so you're saying that you can't remap buttons but you you can't well no he's I'm saying that they're going to remap buttons, but they can't assign new buttons. Like, they can't create one more button. And that's what I don't get, because when I'm playing currently, I'm either only using the shoulder buttons or only using the trigger buttons. There's nothing at all in Pinball FX that requires me to use both. No, there's not. So why can't we make one of these do the secondary function? MagSafe. I don't buy it. I don't buy it. I don't buy it as a reason at all. I think that needs to be absolutely revisited and make it so these extra functions can be put onto the flip. Because cabinet customers will not stand for it. Yeah. I can tell you that now. There's your market resource search right there. They won't want it. um so i i the other thing would be to maybe do what stern has been doing for years and i correct me if i'm wrong has jersey jack started doing it the center button on top of the lock bar yep that's well yes the end this is valid the center the certain button on the lock bar that is definitely used on things like black knight for the magnus a like black knight swords of Rage, and all Stern games pretty much have that center launch. So that's your launch button on the top as well. I guess I wouldn't... Look, the number of tables that actually require a second flipper button are few and far between. There are very few that need it. That's right. And they're mostly early solid states. So, if you were as an alternative to make that center button a function, On top of a lock bar so that whatever cabs you eventually produce have that built in. I would accept that. Here's my other thing. And I programmed this in or not programmed it. I built it into my pin sim. I built a third button. And so I had my two flipper buttons. And then below that, I had a third button. And that third button is for activating power. Right. So you could easily, if you were making your own cabinet, you could just go, well, if Xen aren't going to enable the second tier buttons for functions, I'll put those on my cabinet and I'll just assign them to a different button. Like I'll make it so both of those things are actually wired in for the launch or the A button or whatever it is on your controller that you're using. And that solves that problem, I guess. but you know i think if like if if we're going to see these commercial cabs coming out if that's going to actually come to pass then again look at the design tropes that are on modern cabinets today and that's going to be center lockdown buttons for sure yeah lockdown bar buttons for sure that is the standard set very consistently in place at the moment. So do that. So that was all the questions that we had for Deep. That is it. That was it. We really appreciate, Deep, that you took the time to answer those to the best of your ability for the information that you were actually able to. We understand that there's stuff that you couldn't divulge, plans that are in the works that you can't divulge. But absolutely, if there's anything you would like to follow up on, if there was anything that was lost in translation and you'd like to follow up on, either send more video or send us an email and we'll read the responses here as to what that's addressed. Yep, absolutely. We'd love to address any follow-ups you've got to our takes on your answers. But yeah, absolutely stoked that you were able to do it. And thanks to Akash for organizing the connection for us as well. Yeah. To our audience, you heard deep. Is there a table that you have a different set of rules that you would want applied to for the XANA originals? If you do, please go ahead, forward them to us. You could contact us via Twitter with a direct message, or you can send it to our email, blahblahblockade at gmail.com. and we will forward it directly to Deep. We have that address. That's right. So, yeah, if you guys have any ideas for how to improve some of these tables where it would be literally like doing a code update, send them along. We'll pass them forward. If Deep is open to receiving those, then we're happy to send them forward and see what comes of it. Yeah, for sure. Yep. The invitation's been put out. We'll take advantage of it. All right. So we hope all of you enjoyed that little deep dive into Deep's mind. We'll see what transpires next. Obviously, we have not heard anything about when next release is because we're obviously not getting monthly releases anymore. No. So we're not sure what's coming down the pipe, when the next pinball show is or any of that business. so odds are next time if nothing new has come we'll probably do another gameplay type of video so if there's any particular table you want us to check out I know we promised we'd maybe get to South Park but if there's anything else you want us to check out there's quite a bit for us now to take a look at yeah so yeah let us know and same goes for me as well if you want me to do any particular game during the stream you can tell me what I should play. I'm always looking for suggestions. Get on to Twitch and tell me what I should do. Alright, until next time though. Well, there's always everything that Jared likes to talk about. Which is, of course, stuff and things. Until then folks, bye bye. See ya.

_(Acquisition: groq_whisper, Enrichment: v3)_

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*Exported from Journalist Tool on 2026-04-13 | Item ID: 4f1e390d-9cda-4994-92bd-ebb296f5e0db*