# The Great British Pinball Podcast Episode 5 **Source:** The Great British Pinball Podcast **Type:** podcast_episode **Published:** 2023-10-25 **Duration:** 102m 33s **Beat:** Pinball **URL:** Buzzsprout-13841867 --- ## Analysis Neil McRae and Scott Rundle discuss recent pinball events including the UK Open, NYC Pinball Champs, and Expo. Primary focus is Jersey Jack's Elton John pinball machine, which Neil praises as their best game ever with excellent layout and code, featuring three multiballs and a Rocketman feature. They also cover Stern's Venom, discuss production delays for Spooky's Cactus Canyon and Pulp Fiction, debate playfield quality issues with Mirco playfields, and touch on community drama around forum moderation and game leaks. ### Key Claims - [HIGH] Jersey Jack released two games in one year for the first time, showing production acceleration — _Scott Rundle on JGP's unusual pace: 'I think this will be the first time they've done two pins in one year which is a big change for them'_ - [MEDIUM] Elton John has approximately 1500+ LEDs underneath the playfield — _Neil citing Jack (JGP owner) at Pinfest/Expo conference: 'they said there was 1500 or something maybe more LEDs underneath that play field'_ - [HIGH] Elton John features three multiballs that must be earned through gameplay rather than awarded automatically — _Neil McRae: 'I got to three different multiballs but they weren't it wasn't like oh i press the button and i'm in multiball'_ - [HIGH] JGP increased flipper power above 40 volts, requiring additional electromagnetic interference certification — _Neil explaining JGP's flipper upgrade: 'they've turned the power up and the reason they didn't want to turn the power up before is because you need to go through it for another certification because you've you've kind of got 50 volts underneath'_ - [MEDIUM] Pulp Fiction production is behind schedule; Cactus Canyon had supply chain issues with the topper and apron — _Scott citing Josh: 'they've built the first Pulp Fiction... probably a little bit behind partly i think because cactus canyon fell behind because of some supply chain issues there was issues with the topper... issues with the um the apron um yeah wasn't of the right quality'_ - [MEDIUM] Venom was consensus least desirable of new game releases at Expo — _Scott: 'a lot of the consensus i heard at least was venom was the least desirable of the games available from the new releases'_ - [HIGH] Elton John is a three-flipper game with significant layout differences from Spider-Man and Star Trek despite surface similarities — _Neil describing layout: 'if you actually overlay them there's massive differences where the flipper is where some of the lanes are there's many more lanes'_ - [HIGH] Elton John wizard mode exists but was not fully coded and caused the game to crash during testing — _Scott referencing Rob Byers testing: 'he actually got to the he's a really good player like top 50 i think he actually got to the wizard mode but and the game crashed because they haven't coded it yet'_ - [MEDIUM] Mirco playfield quality issues are partly due to improper post installation techniques rather than playfield design alone — _Neil discussing production line issues: 'they don't provide cutouts around the posts... they're applying a huge amount of pressure to that clear and it's going directly on the artwork it will 100 percent lift'_ - [HIGH] Queues for Elton John at Expo were comparable to Pulp Fiction queues at TPF, significantly longer than other new releases — _Neil: 'the queues during the day were like Pulp Fiction length i mean this you know TPF the queues were for Pulp Fiction um at Expo the queues were for Elton John'_ ### Notable Quotes > "I know so much about what's coming out in the future. It's crazy, crazy, crazy." > — **Neil McRae**, early section > _Acknowledges insider knowledge about upcoming games while committing not to leak details; establishes credibility as industry insider_ > "Elton John was the best game there... some people are saying it's like a stern right it's funny how that's always the mark of quality for people isn't it" > — **Neil McRae**, mid section > _High praise for Elton John with meta-commentary on community standards for game quality_ > "I would have been on the phone with Phil saying put me down for a platinum no question about it" > — **Scott Rundle**, later section > _Strongest endorsement of Elton John despite stated distrust of JGP as a company; indicates game quality overrides other concerns_ > "the old jelly flippers of old from JGP are no more... Steve Ritchie i remember him saying one of his mandates when he joined was i have to change those flippers" > — **Neil McRae**, flipper discussion > _Confirms Steve Ritchie's impact on JGP's playfield mechanics; indicates systemic improvement at manufacturer level_ > "in Elton John you have to work for there's no gimmies right and personally i love that" > — **Neil McRae**, code discussion > _Articulates design philosophy difference from Guns N' Roses; praises game's difficulty and reward structure_ > "This Godfather you know you kill someone and it goes rainbow i'm like what... this is just bizarre" > — **Neil McRae**, LED lighting discussion > _Critiques JGP's previous LED implementation in Godfather; shows improvement with Elton John's more refined lighting_ > "the action is that you know the action is a very ball and flippers game you've got to earn things there's a lot of modes" > — **Neil McRae**, gameplay summary > _Summarizes Elton John's core gameplay philosophy; emphasizes player agency and mode depth_ > "my kind of right brain is a company that treats customers like shit i just can't deal with them" > — **Neil McRae**, JGP criticism > _Expresses fundamental distrust of JGP as company despite loving Elton John game; indicates persistent brand perception issue_ > "if you've got a jgp game i mean if they did a dial-in kit, I would definitely buy it" > — **Scott Rundle**, flipper kit discussion > _Indicates demand for JGP flipper upgrade kits; suggests testing on Guns N' Roses may lead to product_ > "you can't really like you know you've got to get in play enjoy the game capture what you can sort of thing" > — **Scott Rundle**, gameplay constraints > _Addresses logistical constraints of Expo play preventing deep game evaluation; contextualizes review limitations_ ### Entities | Name | Type | Context | |------|------|---------| | Neil McRae | person | Co-host of Great British Pinball Podcast; tournament organizer; known for UK Open and Expo tournament coverage; has insider knowledge of upcoming games; banned from Pinball Info forum for creating second account | | Scott Rundle | person | Co-host of Great British Pinball Podcast; building Fear of Magic homebrew game; involved in collector community; attended Expo | | Jersey Jack Pinball | company | Released Elton John at Expo; first game (Godfather) released earlier in year, marking first time JGP released two games in one calendar year; known for Mirco playfield technology and recent flipper improvements | | Stern Pinball | company | Released Venom; community consensus indicates it was least desirable of new releases at Expo; benchmark for game quality standards | | Spooky Pinball | company | Producing Cactus Canyon and Pulp Fiction; both titles experiencing production delays due to supply chain issues (topper and apron quality on Cactus Canyon) | | Steve Ritchie | person | Game designer at Jersey Jack; mandated flipper improvements to eliminate 'jelly flippers'; designed Elton John; Stern game designer (Led Zeppelin, Star Trek, Spider-Man); personal friend of Neil McRae | | Elton John | game | Jersey Jack's newest release at Expo; features three-flipper layout, Rocketman feature, ~1500 LEDs, three earned multiballs, wizard mode (unfinished); available in Collectors Edition and Platinum editions with acrylic toppers; had longest queues at Expo alongside Pulp Fiction | | Venom | game | Stern Pinball's new release at Expo; community consensus was least desirable among new game releases | | Cactus Canyon | game | Spooky Pinball remaster in production; behind schedule due to topper and apron supply chain issues; custom topper with game integration planned | | Pulp Fiction | game | Spooky Pinball title in production; first golden unit completed for production line training; behind schedule; had significant queues at Expo | | Fear of Magic | game | Homebrew pinball game being built by Scott Rundle; features custom silkscreen backbox artwork; Scott worked with Ant to create the backbox; near completion | | Guns N' Roses | game | Jersey Jack game; had earlier Mirco playfield issues with post installation; now has improved flipper kit being tested at arcade | | Godfather | game | Jersey Jack's first 2024 release; criticized for excessive rainbow LED lighting that Neil felt inappropriate for theme | | Mirco Playfields | product | Playfield manufacturer used by Jersey Jack; recent games have had quality/installation issues with post placement and clear coat cracking; issue partly attributed to improper production techniques rather than design | | Pinball Info | organization | UK-based pinball forum; banned Neil McRae after he created a second account (neil-ps3) while already under ban; Neil was using it to purchase games and occasionally post; moderated by Paul | | UK Open | event | Pinball tournament organized by Neil McRae; recent event attended by Scott | | Expo | event | Major pinball industry event where Jersey Jack debuted Elton John and other new games were released; had significant queues for Elton John and Pulp Fiction; Jack held conference panel discussing game features | | Rob Byers | person | Top Rope Pinball streamer from Texas; highly skilled player (top 50 ranking); reached Elton John wizard mode during Expo testing which caused game crash | | Ant | person | Friend of Scott Rundle; purchased Stranger Things LE and Alien LE games through Neil; provided silkscreen equipment and expertise to create Scott's Fear of Magic backbox | | Josh | person | Spooky Pinball staff member; provided production updates on Cactus Canyon and Pulp Fiction to Scott; working closely with Lyman Rees on game code | | Zeonic | person | Decal manufacturer for Fear of Magic game; produced defective decal sets for Scott's homebrew project | | Interium | venue | Arcade near Expo location; has Guns N' Roses with new flipper kit and Toy Story | | Spider-Man | game | Jersey Jack game; layout comparison point for Elton John; three-flipper game with similar but different geometry than Elton John | | Star Trek | game | Stern game; layout and mechanics comparison point for Elton John three-flipper design and ramp features | ### Topics - **Primary:** Jersey Jack Elton John gameplay and features, Pinball production acceleration and manufacturing timeline, Mirco playfield quality issues and post installation techniques, Spooky Cactus Canyon and Pulp Fiction production delays - **Secondary:** Pinball community forum moderation and bans, Game leaks and insider information handling, Flipper power and electromagnetic compliance certifications, Homebrew pinball building (Fear of Magic) ### Sentiment **Mixed** (0.65) — Highly positive sentiment toward Elton John game design and mechanics, but mixed/negative sentiment toward Jersey Jack as a company, Mirco playfield quality, and community politics. Frustration with production delays for Spooky titles. Neil expresses enthusiasm about upcoming unreleased games but commitment to not leaking information. ### Signals - **[product_strategy]** Jersey Jack released two games in one calendar year (Godfather and Elton John) for first time, indicating manufacturing capacity or strategic shift (confidence: high) — Scott: 'I think this will be the first time they've done two pins in one year which is a big change for them and shows that they're kind of progressing' - **[design_innovation]** JGP increased flipper voltage above 40V to eliminate soft/slow flippers, requiring additional EMI certification; Steve Ritchie mandated this change upon joining (confidence: high) — Neil explaining certification requirement for >40V and flipper power improvements on Elton John - **[gameplay_signal]** Elton John features all multiballs must be earned through gameplay rather than automatic awarding; no gimmee shots; high challenge design (confidence: high) — Neil: 'in Elton John you have to work for there's no gimmies right and personally i love that' - **[product_concern]** Mirco playfields have recurring post installation and clear coat cracking issues; attributed to improper production techniques rather than design flaws (confidence: high) — Neil discussing post cutout issues and pressure application cracking clear coat in Mirco playfields - **[supply_chain_signal]** Cactus Canyon production delayed by supply chain issues with topper and apron; Pulp Fiction first golden unit built but timeline slipping (confidence: high) — Scott citing Josh: 'probably a little bit behind partly i think because cactus canyon fell behind because of some supply chain issues there was issues with the topper... issues with the um the apron' - **[sentiment_shift]** Elton John experienced significant positive reception at Expo with longest queues; consensus best game of the releases; Neil praising as JGP's best ever (confidence: high) — Neil: 'i mean like i think by a mile elton john was the best game there' and queue observations; Scott: 'i would have been on the phone with Phil saying put me down for a platinum no question about it' - **[sentiment_shift]** Positive shift in JGP perceived quality (flipper improvements, Elton John design) but persistent negative perception of company treatment of customers (confidence: high) — Neil: 'my kind of right brain is a company that treats customers like shit i just can't deal with them' despite loving game itself - **[competitive_signal]** Community consensus at Expo: Elton John strongest reception, Venom least desirable among new releases, Stern games still benchmark for quality (confidence: medium) — Scott: 'a lot of the consensus i heard at least was venom was the least desirable of the games available from the new releases' - **[design_philosophy]** Elton John three-flipper layout has significant geometric differences from Spider-Man and Star Trek despite surface similarities; more lanes and different upper flipper placement (confidence: high) — Neil: 'if you actually overlay them there's massive differences where the flipper is where some of the lanes are there's many more lanes' - **[product_concern]** Elton John wizard mode not fully coded at Expo; game crashed when reached during testing by Rob Byers (confidence: high) — Scott: 'he actually got to the wizard mode but and the game crashed because they haven't coded it yet' - **[community_signal]** Neil McRae banned from Pinball Info forum; created second account (neil-ps3) while banned to purchase games and occasionally post; banned from returning after account discovered (confidence: high) — Neil's admission: 'I set up another account on Pinball Info... i was sitting at CanApp purely because i wanted to buy games off the forum' - **[rumor_hype]** Neil claims knowledge of multiple unreleased games from multiple manufacturers including a major 'monster game' and American Pinball titles; committed to non-disclosure (confidence: medium) — Neil: 'I know so much about what's coming out in the future' and 'i've got i've worked with some of the most secretive companies' and 'i've got i've worked with some of the most secretive companies' --- ## Transcript welcome to the great british pinball podcast and here are your hosts scott rundell and neil mccray welcome welcome everybody neil mccray here what a month it has been and it isn't even over yet i I'm Neil McRae. This is the Great British Pinball Podcast. I'm joined, as ever, by my super partner in crime. Scott Rundle, how are you doing? Yes, it's been definitely an interesting event for you, I'd say, at the recent Expo. A lot of releases, a lot of titles to discuss. It's definitely going to be an interesting show. Yeah, I mean, like I think we mentioned this in the last podcast, I kind of thought after TPF, the pinball year was done. and you know lo and behold it's not I mean obviously the odd release from Stern but if you'd said to me JGP would launch a game at Expo back at TPF when they just launched Godfather I would have laughed at you given their typical pace I think this will be the first time they've done two pins in one year which is a big change for them and shows that they're kind of We're going to cover a little bit about what you've been up to whilst I've been on the U.S. party train. I want to cover off a little bit about UK Open, how it went, a little bit about New York City Pinball Champs. I was there. It was a great gig. A little bit about Expo Tournament, and then we'll spend the bulk of the chat on Expo, and it'll be kind of like your job, Scott, to wring information out of me. And hopefully... Play interrogator. No problem. Hopefully giggles. I thought I would start... Before we get into that, I want to start with an amusing chuckle that occurred whilst I was in the US. So, yes, I set up another account on Pinball Info. I am guilty as charged. Lock me up and throw away the key. I think they did, didn't they? This time around they have. They've thrown away the key. So, yeah, look, I'm not trying to give Paul and the moderation team any aggro there. The reason I set it up, I've been on it for about, I mean, almost like a week after I got banned. And actually, I didn't try and hide it. So if you look at my email for that account, it's got neil-ps3 at domino.org. It's not like I wasn't trying to be underhand. I wasn't trying to hide behind a VPN either. and basically when I was in the US using my phone which was roaming, it came out as UK when I used wifi it came out as US and the thing changes depending on when you last post and I was mostly posting from my phone so the reason I was sitting at CanApp was purely because I wanted to buy games off the forum and then one of the evenings I'd had a few beers and someone who remained nameless was posting nonsense and I couldn't resist but to try and clear up the fact. Neil could now be Neil, guys. I'm sure you can understand that. Anyway, Luke, you know, there's a lot of great stuff in the forum and you'll miss me because I've seen the many threads demanding that I be reinstated. For those of you that have posted that, I appreciate it. But, you know, they've got a set of rules. If they don't follow the rules for me, they don't have to follow the rules for anyone. And there's been a few clowns on there that should have got banned. So, you know, Paul's right to ban me because I've broken the rules. Well, I'd argue I've only broken them twice, but because of the first incident. Shall we have a hearing? We can have a court hearing on it. What's that TV show in the US? Judge Judy. You want Judge Judy to be the adjudicator? No problem. Yeah, but look, it's fine. You know, I mean, this forum is lost as far as I'm concerned, but I know so much about what's coming out in the future. It's crazy, crazy, crazy. This time around, you're going to do your better judgment, though, not to leak it, right? At least. So I was told about something that I, because I was the person who told me, I'm not going to say anything. I'm not even going to name who told me. But there's a monster game coming out next year. I mean, you know, and this isn't one that you've heard of. and for clarification he hasn't even told me so he's doing well so far because Luke if I find out something in a kind of public way like Elton John I was in a meeting and someone said oh yeah we've we've licensed that for a pinball machine I was like oh really it happened twice it happened with Bond and it happened with Elton John because I'll be in a meeting and someone will say oh Neil's into pinball and then you know they just volunteer this information so So, actually, with Elton John, they didn't tell me it was JGP, but who else would it be, frankly? So, you know, that was, what, two years ago? And actually, it's kind of funny, and I might as well clear this one up as well whilst I'm here. Steve came over. Steve, Richie and I are great friends. We were out dinner. He loves my wife. And, you know, he was saying, where's Mandy? And he's a glorious guy. I love all of his games. I've got loads of them. I've got Led Zepp. I've got Star Trek. I've got Spider-Man. And he came over and said, you kind of gave me a Steve Ritchie hard time. It wasn't like... Some people have made it out to be like he came and beat me up with a stick. The story was that after I got told, he was grabbing you by the throat and saying, finish him. Not quite. I mean, look, they were frustrated that they leaked out especially so early right um and um you know look i could say if if you know hey if you want me to not find out what your pinball machine is tell me yourself so i also know a lot about uh the next american pinball games um because they told me i'm not going to tell a single person so um and i've got i've worked with some of the most secretive companies in the world uh you know apple for example i know what their roadmap is for some time um and you know it's professional courtesy um but if something leaks in the open air you know and and we think it's true then you know i'm like like everyone else it depends on as you say how that information is being presented i think exactly look if it's look if it's like it's like anything else got if you were to say hey neil and confidence you know i would never mention it to a soul right it's no different and and you know but i was you know in some ways for elton john i was kind of glad to find out because i was excited about steve's next game uh but then you know well and john um you know i think well i mean we'll talk about it in a bit but um definitely you know it's it's kind of you know um there's a lot of questions about it but we'll speak later so yes luke scott let's talk about you for a bit what's what's been going on in your world finally, obviously making progress on your fear of magic, which is great it's looking amazing man, it really is it's in the cabinet now finished off the backbox I did do a silkscreen backbox for you that is bloody hard silkscreening, anybody does it I was wondering if you'd taken the backbox to Anne, because I know he's got all the there's an interesting story behind that so basically, I'd known for a while that somebody was selling a Stranger Things LE and an alien LV and they were basically in a position where just like most people I suppose at the moment they were willing to let it go for a lot less than they had it advertised for and we're talking a lot less your mouth would drop to the floor if you knew what you got that Stranger Things for it was like literally below pro prices put it that way so that was low if anyone else is selling the Stranger Things LE below pro prices you know where I am yeah so to me it's like I knew about the deal I wanted it my wife was like for god's sake just buy it yourself and I was like I just couldn't fump up the money for both because it was the deal was you had to get both and I just thought right well yeah I think yeah but in all fairness like you know Neil you've already got one I can hear something yeah Avengers just started playing hold on let me Avengers has decided to play it's got the attack music on so basically I knew that you know how can I put it, Ant is a good friend of mine and I felt like he is a good guy and I thought there's somebody that I know would definitely appreciate having those games so I've contacted him, he's not looking for them but when he knew about the price he was like tell him I want it now so then we had to drive off to go get it I had to spend the day there because the guy wanted to work through me because I'd already bought a game for him previously so I had to kind of mediate and I said like look do you know what um you're doing me a one a massive solid game me these two games um how about I bring my silkscreen stuff down and we do Neil's backbox all right why not that's good yeah it was yeah so I thought you know that's that's great that sorts out because long story short with the backbox I had it originally and I thought I wasn't too happy with the back of it I said to you before I don't have the tools to get a silkscreen done And for anyone's context, it's quite difficult to do the silkscreen process. One, the kit isn't really readily available in this country. Two, the ink, because you don't use paint, you use ink. To get it in that specific color, you can only get it in the US. And you know as well as I do, trying to transport toxic materials from one country to another, they don't like it. So to get the paint is very hard. So, of course, he brought all that along. and it just made it a lot easier and it was an experience in doing it anyway it's like you know who can say they've done a silkscreen it's very few people so i felt like that was you know he's done me a solid i was i was i mean i was thinking like can i print out like a transfer or something and stick it on yeah i've seen some people do like decals where they take the final decal and they slap it on the back but it shows up yeah and then the minute you move the game or you do something it falls apart but look um um and and scott thanks for doing that i really appreciate I can't wait. I was showing pictures of the game to my wife last night. She's like, well, you know what's going on with it? So I was showing her all the pictures, and she was thoroughly impressed. I see the powder coats coming out right. I'm pretty damn close to finishing it off now. I think I'm fairly confident I might be able to finish it this weekend. Yeah, I mean, it's just a shame about the decals, but, you know, shit happens, man. Yeah, I mean, you saw yourself, right? I don't know if you saw on the forum. I put the decals up that were defective, and surprise, surprise, no one really has bought them. The thing is, if you're going to buy decals and I get it right, if they've got a mark on them, why would you want to replace them? Yeah, I mean, it's like so it's a hard sell. I think like at the end of the day, I said to Zianic, who's the guy who's made the set for us. And he's like, he goes, put that up. If it sells, just, you know, you can give me the money back for that and see if somebody wants the set. And I said, I'll try. But I don't think anyone's going to buy it. He's got to realize, I think, like anyone else. it's like if you're going to go for that effort of getting decals done they've got to be 100 yeah you can't you can't think about it's the same um my ex-members actually is in the garage from the uk open yeah i put this decal on the score thing it's a it's a picture of um magneto and and on the on the website it looked really cool and so i ordered it and it arrived and it looked really washed out and i was like and i was like no i'm not putting that on so i pinged the guys um i forget the name of them they're really good guys and they're like oh sorry they apologized said no it shouldn't be washed out so they said they sent me another one um but you know you you know just just you stuff like that it's you're spending money on it you you know it's not it's you spend money that you kind of don't have to right yeah well i i've spent to many people in this industry right and they they just go why why are you bothering to replace the decals for you don't even see them because the games you know most of the time it's in a lineup like yours is in the background there and you can't see the side art but exactly you know as well as i do if it doesn't look good it's in your head you're like it's a missing piece especially that game my wife bought it for me and it's gonna it's gonna be you know i'll probably be buried in it if if uh if if if i last that long and i'm not set on fire by the northern pinball info gang um but look that the um that the um it's looking amazing i can't wait to see it once once once we've got it in we'll we'll do a bit of a video and stream on it and um show show the show the world but uh as i say i'm excited any other any other exciting um any new toys any new mods any new just just like you really just still waiting for cactus canyon i mean hopefully that's going to be sometime soon um i actually spoke to ryan um and he as far as he knows they're all done and on the way so okay um but you know ryan's a good guy but he's never on the pulse of the latest info so take that right into salt um fair enough um but you know i one thing i i did hear from Josh actually related to this is they've built the first Pulp Fiction. It's the first, what they call the golden one, which is the one they use to train the production line. Template in a way then. Then once it's done and everything works, they then press the button on the big parse order. It's probably a little bit behind, partly I think because Cactus fell behind because of some supply chain issues. There was issues with the topper, right? I think yeah they've had more than one issue I think there was also issues with the um the apron um yeah wasn't of the right quality so they had so you know but I was they had a cactus canyonelli there just looks phenomenal plays plays really nicely fun game um Josh also said you know because I moaned about it on pin side just like Neil stop moaning the code's coming you know so i don't know when but he's he's josh is really i sense is you know he's really good friend of lyman's i sense that he feels he's got a civic duty to kind of get that get that out um as part of you know with with lyman and what happened to him so i'm excited about that um excited about getting that game i'm excited about getting um uh venom as well because i've played a bit more of it and actually i played it in a couple of tournaments which and it was a lot of fun so I was surprised by that most people have been trying to gather as much information as I can actually on the latest game releases at Expo and a lot of the consensus I heard at least was Venom was the least desirable of the games available from the new releases so it's interesting to see what you say about that I mean I think by a mile Elton John was the best game there I mean some people although some people are saying it's like a stern, right? It's funny how that's always the mark of quality for people, isn't it? It's like, does it shoot like a stern? Does it play like a stern? It's normally the requirement. And I have to say, right, the old jelly flippers of old from JGP are no more. So that's Steve Ritchie. I remember him saying one of his mandates when he joined was, I have to change those flippers. Yeah, well, his games were slow. you know you don't want to don't want to flow where you're kind of where's the ball because you know so how do you think they've achieved that then do you think they've just changed the mechs did they show you it no they've turned the power up um okay look the mechs that they're using there's you know look our coils are coil right i'm just trying to understand what what makes it there's one variable that makes it snappy one the switches which are standard i mean the jgp switches are no different to anyone else's um the second is the you know the system that you're using but but typically the flippers are ran oh crikey my bond just updated that's that's bizarre um new code update rebooting right now it just makes this weird noise when it all updates it did sound like a duck quacking i'm not gonna lie noise it's it's i've had it done i haven't i don't turn the games on usually when i'm in here unless i'm playing but as you can see it's now that is code update yeah so look the the they've turned the power up and the reason they didn't want to turn the power up before is because you need to go through it for another certification because you've you've kind of got 50 volts underneath and i think when you go above 40 volts you have to go through an extra special there's two certifications there's a safety one right there's also an electromagnetic interference one and that one is very difficult very challenging to pass and that's why you'll see Stern games with loads of these what are they called they take noise out of the cables or they stop noise from getting into cables they clamp onto a cable you'll see them in a lot of IT stuff but let's get into Elton John we've kind of drifted into it But, you know, like I say, when I heard that it was Alan John, I was like, I first of all didn't believe it because I'm thinking, really? But then you look at, I mean, it's like, it's also, I was looking at David Bowie's back catalogue because of Labyrinth as well. And, you know, these guys have got so many songs that, you know, sometimes you only hear them every now and again, but then you remember them. like and and you know elton john they've used you know in the game they've used the more upbeat tempo ones um so higher bpm music basically yeah so stuff you can kind of you know you can kind of move to um that's what it needs right i was worried that because he's got a lot of slow-paced music so yeah i mean yeah and and you know he's i mean there's some things in it i mean i actually haven't actually looked i think they published the song list i haven't actually seen it but of the of the you know i played it what or maybe eight times nine times you've got that many goes on it because i saw pictures and i was like there's substantial cues yeah i kept going back and actually i went we went we went so i went first thing and last thing at night it was a bit quieter because the cues the cues during the day were like pulp fiction length i mean this you know tpf the cues were for pulp fiction uh um at expo the cues were for ellen john barma lab around there was a bit of a queue but it was nowhere near as deep as elton john um interesting okay and they had i think they had there was three how many elton johns were there three there was an as a god that's a small number there was a ce and there was two platinum they stopped calling them le which i think is a good good idea considering they're not limited um yeah i'm glad actually because like as you say you want an industry standard really and the word limited seems to have lost its um lost its meaning in recently more than 500 means it's no longer limited in my mind so agreed but yeah they and um you know they had to they had like a the the platinum comes like this kind of cardboard topper which is okay it's not so i think it's lentic i did notice it's yeah it's more of like a uh acrylic topper right with lights on it sort of thing but then what was your view on that c1 because it's more like tv screens and i just yeah i mean look it's fine but i don't see the point of to on a topper i want something that's kind of you know i would like to have seen a crocodile dancing up there or something yeah do you know what i like i like toppers that interact with the game yeah which is why i was drawn to the cactus canyon one right yeah do a certain thing and then he's going to shoot his gun and stuff like that. And I just think that's what you want to do. I know we touched on stuff like, you know, you said other stuff I'm doing. Like, it's not ready yet, but I've nearly finished a roadshow topper. And part of the effort was trying to make it integrate with the game logic. You just want to have it integrate. Yeah, I shall maybe come back to toppers if we've got time later on. Yeah, of course. But, look, the game, I mean, the other big thing about the game, and for me this is huge. Look, Steve Ritchie can put out a great layout. He's done it time after time after time after time, right? What is it, a three-flipper game? Three-flipper game. I mean, it's very Star Trek, Spider-Man-like, right? Warp ramp is what I'm thinking of. Has it got that kind of warp ramp feel to it? I think, yeah, there definitely is, although I would say it's actually a bit harder because the placement of the upper flipper is way different. If you're able to get a Spider-Man and Star Trek layout and the Elton John layout, Now, you put them side by side and you're kind of like, yeah, they're similar. If you actually overlay them, there's massive differences. Where the flipper is, where some of the lanes are, there's many more lanes. Can you walk me through that ramp at the top? I didn't understand. I tried to visualize it and look at it, and it was hard to see from the gameplay because most people are doing this with the camera, and you're like, and it's over a top-down view or someone doing some stupid B-roll at such a speed. I can't really figure out where it's going geometry-wise. Can you just walk me through that? Yeah, so there's two ways you can, there's two kind of ways to get into that ramp. One is there's a shot that, it's like an orbit shot and it just swings round and down. Okay. Right, and it just drops out of the bag. And then the other, it swings round and round and comes straight out the front. And I think, I'm trying to remember. Is that dictated by diapers or? Yeah, no, I think it's dictated by the way the ball entry goes. And I think it's gravity that's actually driving it down different routes. So how many shots are there on that game? There's loads. So there's about... This is the thing. Again, this is what's also different about it. Like on Spider-Man and Star Trek, actually less Spider-Man, but less so Star Trek, there's a couple of shots on this side into the side. I would kind of like around the drop target area of – When you say this side, just for the people listening, is that left side? This side, the left side, right? There's a bunch of shots out now in Star Trek. There's a shot that's very similar to Star Trek. They have the kind of lockball shot, right, on the premium where it pops up. And it's a very similar shot. But the geometry is different, but it feels the same. And then there's another shot just kind of below – I'm trying to remember – below and up it. And then on this side, you've got a bunch of shots, but you've also got this thing, the Rocketman, which is not easy to see on the photos because it sits underneath the plunge ramp. It's a bit like... In some ways, it's a bit like the diver in Deadpool, but much further down the playfield. It's the Rocketman. The ball hits the rocket and it fires it, and that's where it goes around this loop, right? and that's one of the big challenges of the game is to fuel up the rocket right and it works the code bit of it I didn't finish that like I say Steve can put out tons of great playfields but the code in JGP I was worried about so go on was it diff by multiball or have they actually dropped that down no I think I got to three different multiballs but they weren't It wasn't like, oh, I press the button and I'm in multiball. Yeah. It feels like in Guns N' Roses. Everything in Elton John you have to work for. There's no gimmies, right? And personally, I love that, right? I like challenge. I like the fact that I have to go do stuff. What I couldn't figure out is if the records gave you different perks. And I didn't have a lot because you've got people standing by in the queue. You can't really, like, you know, you've got to get in play. enjoy the game, capture what you can sort of thing. Yeah, exactly. Go on then, give me a view on it. You say this is the best game they've ever had. Yeah. This is the ultimate test for me to whether or not you'd like it. Would you have it in your lineup? Absolutely. The only thing is I wouldn't buy a game from JGP. I know you said you been stung by them but still it positive to hear that if you got it in the second hand market I would have been on the phone with Phil saying put me down for a platinum no question about it It is If you like Spider if you like Star Trek, if you like Steve Ritchie, and even if you're not a massive Ellen John fan, the music's pretty listenable. It's not like it's freaking Rush where you're ready to commit to anything after them. They mentioned, I think I heard to, like, you know, is it Jack, the owner of it? isn't it? Jersey Jack. So when he was doing his conference with the audience at Pinfest, the expo, sorry, he did say like something along the lines of, I think they said there was 1,500 or something, maybe more LEDs underneath that play field. Did you feel like you were being dazzled or did it actually look good? No, it looked great. And this is the thing, you know, in previous Jersey Jack games, it feels like you're in some sort of rainbow land, right? Right. even Godfather I just couldn't believe this Godfather you know you kill someone and it goes rainbow I'm like what maybe it's playing Fortnite honestly I was like this is just bizarre this didn't work at all on Godfather which is a shame you know they could have gone like red black white you know and kind of made it they still could though right they could they won't because they know better but um right i mean i suggested that to eric and to keifer who's the coder and they're like well whatever okay and and look the the um the other thing is is there's no there's only there's no little screen in the game at all it's only the big one at the back now that's interesting because yeah it's not like uncommon for them to do that in their game yeah i don't think there's a game other than this one that doesn't have that maybe wizard of oz i can't remember but you know the the action is that you know the action is a very ball and flippers game you've got to earn things there's a lot of modes and clearly the code's not finished because a mate of mine rob byers from uh top rope pinball on twitch uh good really good guy from texas he actually got to the he's a really good player like top 50 i think he actually got to the wizard mode but and the game crashed because they haven't coded it yet which which is i think i think it's final they should have figured out pirates of the caribbean yeah not to make it crash they should have just like you know reset back to that's what pirates does really doesn't it doesn't really know what to do with itself when you get past that point i've heard that but um look the the game honestly i am i was excited and annoyed because i want to buy it but my my kind of right brain is a company that treats customers like shit i just can't deal with them um i think given like as you say that the issue we've had with the playfields and it is still a Mirco play field by the way oh yeah but to be fair like i've said this before with with the Mirco stuff i honestly think it isn't really down to his play field per se it's it's their knowledge and understanding of how to position a post so i'll give you an example in guns and roses where i had the same problem it was chipping and pulling and it was it was lifting up what they were doing was they didn't provide cutouts around the posts so you were literally when you they were talking in these posts at full pelt not hand tightening but they're talking the minute i've seen them do it on the production line they're applying a huge amount of pressure to that clear and it's going directly on the artwork it will 100 left i mean like in your game so when i've been building your fear of magic which again is a Mirco playfield as long as you and there's obviously in the older playfields anyway they provide cutouts but even then you still got the layer of clear what you don't want to do is dig into that clear because you can crack it you just gotta hand tight it it's got to be delicately done yeah i feel like that's maybe i think personally it's probably down to implementation rather than the play with itself i'm gonna say it's kind of 50 50 maybe maybe i've seen so many marco playfield issues oh don't get me wrong there have been them 100 there was a I think one of the alien again further to my point on that they listened to me because I did bring this up to them I still have the prototypes up behind me somewhere where the middle post is there's artwork and and then I asked them I said look don't do that anywhere you've got post book out if you look now even on the where that middle flipper is in the sort of center right yeah um there's cut out now in the new play but I think in the past though right if If you look at older games, they never used to do the cutouts. You know, they were quite – and this is partly because they've gone from a clear that was kind of petrol, petroleum-based. Oh, 100% because the production methods changed. Right. Yes. And that's part of the contribution to this. But, look, if Mirko and J.J.P. have figured this out, awesome. Great for people, right? I think it's crossed right. I mean, I haven't heard anything about Godfather, but then again, I don't – or Toy Story. but I don't think the numbers are there to give a decent sized response on that. Exactly. Elton John will be a good test I think as you say because I think it will sell. I had a good look at the Toy Story that was in Interium which is an arcade just across the road from where Expo was. Okay yeah. And I actually looked in pretty decent shape actually the reason I went over there because they've actually got Guns N' Roses with these new flippers on it and holy moly what a difference. I hope they release a kit because if you've got a JGP game, I mean, if they did a dial-in kit, I would definitely buy it. Oh, so you're saying, is this a bit like Precision Flippers? Have they done a new kit to address the sloppiness? Well, they've put it on this Guns N' Roses, and my assumption is why would you do that? Because you're not making any more games. So why do that if they're not going to come out with a kit? And I think, you know, it's something they can sell for a couple of hundred bucks. Easily. Yeah, people will do it. I think people will buy it. I think it will sell like hot cakes so i hope they do do that i don't know for sure if they are um but you know it would be good for them to kind of mold us well how to put it put this jgp flippers or spongy thing to bed because yeah actually excuse me sorry actually one of the things that came up with labyrinth was was there's you know some some questions about the flippers which you know we'll talk about yeah so let's move on to labyrinth then since you brought it up so I heard that as well so what what let's just start with the flippers then and then we can move on to the theme and everything like that look you know look I'm a as you know I'm probably more of a competitive player than just a random player I like to play games in the competitive scene right and and you know the the you know we just ran the UK Open went really well we had 175 players Ray Day, one of the former world number one, multiple world championship winner. He won it. No Brits won anything this year, unfortunately. We've got a couple of close, but when you play a game, you want it to behave in a certain way. And with JGP, it kind of feels a bit limp when you're playing it. You don't get the satisfaction, the connect, as Elwynn would say. The snuckiness, I would call it. It just feels spongy. So I played Labyrinth twice on Thursday. Okay. And I have to say, I was like, this game's never going to sell. If that's the flippers, it's never going to sell. And then I heard from a friend that they turned the power down on the flippers to keep the games going, which, if true, and I genuinely don't know if it's true, but the source it came from, I would believe, right? He's a good guy. fair i mean like if you're running a game at a convention it's going to suffer from flip a fade so maybe they did do that yeah but i think look i think that's that's fine but i still think even if you turn the power down you're still going to get the fade as well right it will just build up it will take longer to get there but it will get there on a day where it's the lines rammed you know you're going to get it so in my mind turn the power up right and and so um maybe they should start thinking about putting active calling in on just showroom machines on showroom stuff yeah that's what i would do right but anyway look i was you know the game look the theme is a shocker for me i i honestly can't imagine a worse theme than labyrinth i think the game is you're not a jim Joshua Henderson fan is that what you're trying to tell me i love the muppets right if he did a muppet pin i'd buy i'd buy 10 of them right what about dark crystal dark crystal maybe that this is what I mean, though, you're going into the mentality or the mantra of why they've chosen it. I think the Muppets, what would they do, Christmas Carol or the Muppets show, I suppose. They could do either of those two, maybe the Muppets show. But I don't know if that would be quite a good theme integration, the Muppets show. Well, the Muppets show, you could be like, you have to collect the characters for the show, like the band. Maybe. Animals, like the coolest guy on the planet, right? Dog, dog, thief. You know, I would kill for a Muppets game. I don't know, but it would be awesome. And, and, you know, you, they could get, you know, if, if, if they were smart enough, they could get a few random guests either from the pinball community or from, or celebrities or whatever that, you know, you know, they, they'd have a guest on each, each episode, you know, I think there's loads of stuff you could do Muppets. Labyrinth, like you're trying to, you're trying to, the way you're, the way it's working is, is you're the girl in the story and you're, you're trying to, you're, you're effectively playing the game through the story. Right. And, and I just never think that works that well because in Labyrinth, in any movie, the story is kind of linear. You sit in your ass, you watch it for an hour and a half, and it's finished, whereas with Pinball, you're kind of replaying certain pieces of it, you know, and I just don't think, especially video, especially real-life action movies, you know, with actors in it, I think it's quite difficult to make them into a game. Hence why I'm a bit sceptical about Harry Potter. I think that's going to be very challenging. I suppose, I mean, you could have taken the Godfather approach and do like a board game style Yeah, exactly. Or Avengers or Godzilla. Collect the stones. Yeah, you can do that in any order. You can kind of do stuff differently. Jurassic Park, where they effectively rewrote all the kind of, you know, they rewrote the they kind of rewrote the story around the escaping from the island it's yeah it's jurassic park but it's not the movie right yeah um so look anyway um and look some of there's some really little cool touches a bunch of little kind of interactive toys i think the sculpts look great and and the head i was gonna ask you about this right so yeah obviously you've got those those weird headless like goblin things i forget what they're called the the fire demon yeah like types that one comes out of the apron one comes out the top right yeah was that mech smooth did you hear it grind or anything like that very smooth but i honestly thought it was a bit of a laugh i mean it feels it feels i genuinely thought that was a nice bit of ingenuity that they built into it there because i thought okay normally you have something pop up and down and you can hear it yeah they're using a radio control servo okay and actually just just to qualify that right the pinball expo room was really noisy so you know maybe you couldn't hear it even if the game was challenging right um the one thing i had criticism wise on it for me at least was the slow you we were talking about beats per music bpm sorry beats per minute like uh music for a choice of a pin and you said oh they've chosen high tempo for elton john's uh list of music that you could hear at least yeah i was a little bit surprised that labyrinth was very like it's it's obviously of the film it's it's taken that music element but it's very slow paced it's very ethereal it's like we're in the wonderland i don't feel like that was maybe the right choice for the music at the start when you're launching maybe it was before you launched the ball absolutely fine as soon as you launch the ball use the electric guitar score that they've got in the movie use something else take some of of uh bon jovi's music and just some more of his music sorry yeah yeah yeah sorry that actually might be good if maybe it would be better yeah exactly yeah bon jovi is in you know he was a secret wizard in in the movie look there's there's one bit i mean i was playing it and uh actually let me let me just actually let me just finish on the flippers because i think it's gone so look i felt they're a bit bit spongy um i posted on pincit actually david reached out to me and said, come back and play. I went back and played. I had a really good chat with David. He's a lovely bloke, even though he's Australian. Nothing wrong with Australian. There's a couple of Australians listening to this. I'm just winding them up. He wanted to really get the feedback. He wanted to learn. He was writing away in his book. I played it again. The flippers were definitely snappier, but there was one thing I realized. I only played... because the line for Labyrinth was long, and I don't queue the best of times. I think I played it four, maybe five times. But the one thing that is definitely wrong with it, they've put these clear flipper buttons on that are not Ballywilliam flipper buttons, and they definitely press differently. I don't think that was the reason. Is it a lack of resistance when you press them? Yeah, they're much springier. that isn't the issue that I had when I played it there was definitely some other issue and I heard that they had the game open and they were fiddling with it but whatever it was they solved it and for that game and you saw it in the bone tutorial I don't know if you watched the bone video of it it was on YouTube a few weeks about a week ago the game's got flow there's no question about it I'll be honest with you it feels to me super Foo Fire like just some of the shots and that's a good thing It doesn't have quite the crossover shots that Foo Fighters have. Are they quite hard shots to make then? A couple of them are pretty tough, yeah. Most of them are okay, though. I mean, I think after a few games you'll find it. I'll be honest with you. I was surprised at the lack of, how can I put it, content around people's impressions on the game on the net afterwards. I expected to see people putting up reviews and saying, first impressions is what I think of it. There's quite a lack of content around it at the moment. I think that's partly because, I mean, I'm always reluctant to say something about a game unless I've played it like a hundred times. Because, you know, look, my goal in an event like that is, you know, is there any reason why I definitely don't want to buy this, right? Actually, Labyrinth, yeah, there's a definite reason I don't want to buy it. I was going to say, we go back to that same question, would you have it in your lineup? Yeah, no, because the theme's a shocker for me. I just can't, it's rare See I'm different, I like Jim Joshua Henderson stuff and I feel like the topper, which we'll talk about toppers later but for me, that's how you do a topper The topper is awesome, it's really well done, but the thing about the theme actually is it's less about the theme, it's the music that's killed it for me Well, that's why I'm wondering if I can do something with the music if I was to buy the game, because I am on the fence on it I've already approached the UK dealer on it and he's like going i can give you you know um i can get you what i can get with the topper you let me know and i'm like it's tough because my wife she wants it she was a little bit on the fence after seeing the gameplay and then more on the fence when i spoke to you and you said i don't like it and i was like i'm worried about buying a game that's quite a significant investment that might end up being a clunker yeah yeah it's not so it's definitely not a clunker it plays and shoots nice but okay you know i've i have come to learn and it's taken me a few years to learn this actually that's why that's why i don't like to give an opinion on a game after eight or nine plays i just it's not enough right other than i'm the opposite if the game hasn't caught me by eight eight or four ninth play it's probably not getting played again i'll give an example good old walking dead there right um i played it eight times and thought i'm never playing that shit ever again right hold up i need to turn that off yeah the um i i you know walking dead i played it about eight times so i'm never playing that crap again i thought it was terrible now it's my now it's my favorite game right um you've got it you've got to give you know it's like a good whiskey you've got to give it time you got to get give it a bit of time to to get used to it and you know it's like dialed in when i first played that again i'm never having that game but now it's you know I've got one. It's always been perceived as one of JJP's best, isn't it? Just the worst theme, but one of the best gameplays. Yeah, until Elton John came along, that was definitely true. But let me just sort of flip it. The game shoots really well, but the thing that has come to my mind that I can't get over on pinball machines is music. I can put up with any sort of crap on the art or any sort of brilliance, comics, real people, Photoshop, whatever. It doesn't bother me. right? The stuff on the video screen doesn't bother me. The colour of the rubber band... You're barely looking at it anyway most of the time. It doesn't bother me. The music bothers me, right? So Rush... For me, I'm very much the same thing. Theme integration's important. It's got to look good for me. I am not... How can I put it? I'm not vain in that respect. If the playfield artwork looks like some sort of Photoshop drop, I'm not interested for me call outs sound and music play very heavily into my choice of a game and I feel like if they aren't there, if elements are missing like they've got awkward call outs or lack of call outs I mean I could go back, we'll talk about maybe a rumour later around Back to the Future but if for instance certain people weren't calling out elements of that game it's a bit like Rick and Roy, right? I know you're not a massive fan of it, but Justin Justin Roiland did a huge amount of work with the voice acting on that. And it makes me laugh. Even today, I was playing it, and he said something I hadn't heard before, and I was like, that just made me laugh. Ricky Moy is one of the best team integrations, no question about it. I think, take Rush, right? It's an amazing game. I own a premium. I can't play the game because of the call-outs and the music. It's funny how singers can't act. It's weird, right? Because they perform, but they can't perform when it comes to saying a line. It is. So where's the range? Absolute killer, right? Iron Maiden. Oh my God, that music was ready. I was ready to commit suicide. Amazing game. What's the name of that guy in Stranger Things? Where he does the call-outs, the sheriff. What's the name of the actor? He's alright though. Me and my wife, I don't know if I said this to you before but when he says extra ball, we say all the time, extra ball. ball it's just the way he says it that's taking the piss out of good old afm it was a kind of it's just funny i mean there's another one with what the the guy plays dr bone the bones from in star trek and it's quite terrible yeah that's terrible some of them yeah was it don't shake or he was like i can't remember but yeah i mean it's kind of funny but it's not it's also some of them can be taken like oh this is funny this is cheese but other parts you're just like your delivery was off yeah retake the sound miss on the mix on star trek's rubbish as well you can barely hear half of it but i mean the the you know so you know that's why i put disco music on i made him but yeah the the okay so yeah back on the game then so you feel like music wasn't the right choice there the music like i remember i'm in a molly ball and then i hear this oh oh oh oh it's fucking um you know what's his face singing and i'm thinking my god that sounds terrible and look i'm i'm a was it that the speakers were poor quality no no the sound no the speakers are too good because i could hear it oh okay i don't want to hear that robert that that soundtrack is bowie's worst shit that he put out it's terrible wait wait wait wait wait wait stop you don't like dance magic dance no it's i love that song i'm sorry i'm putting it out there now it's one of his best songs i love that it's good i that that's a catchy song i'm sorry i like that song it's it's probably it's probably borderline right but it's not all right i'll give you it it isn't like okay i say it's not one of his best but it's certainly not one of his or you know is their life on mars or you know it just just doesn't it's just doesn't even scrape the sides mate it's it's and you know any any he's got that it's such the thing is is what's that what's missing from this game for you ignoring the theme right so let's take this let's take some of these elements aside so i can get to the crux of why you don't like it music get it not a big fan and it hasn't really it hasn't got the kind of high bpm adrenaline in music that we'd expect to see in a pin understood shots kind of narrow but seem okay actually foo fighters kind of level of good so that's all right what about code talk to me about that yeah i mean look i think when i saw the bowen thing i was again see this is the disadvantage you stick two big screens in a game and then you've got to fill them up now since the bowen thing i think they must have recorded that a few weeks ago because since that and since the one that was on the show, there's a lot more going on in the screen. The back screen, still not a lot, and I know that they're going to work on that. I think the back screen is going to be more like a status screen. I thought they were going to use it as a way to build the world, like add backgrounds to whatever mode you were in. It's not going to be playing videos of little guys running around. At least that was my take. I might be wrong on that. What's weird is is the way they've designed it, it looks like a stern. I mean, it's just so stern-like, with the speakers and the... It almost looks like they went into the stern factory and lifted a few parts, which, for me... Who's making the game? They're making it themselves. They built their own factory and tooling and everything like that. They built a factory in Texas, I think. Wow. And, you know, look, I got huge appreciation for the Barrels of Fun's guys, because if you compare them at Deep Root, right? Deep Root, I remember, like, ripping the piss out of Robert at Expo 2019 or 18. I can't remember which one it was. I basically told him, you're not going to build a single game, right? And he was like, oh, I know better. I'm a superman. I've saved the world. I was just a joke. I've dealt with people like him my entire life. There was no chance he was going to build a game. And then these guys, right? There's an old saying, do your fighting in the boxing ring, right? and these guys have done their fighting with the game, they've not hyped it they didn't talk about it, the first anyone knew about it and it's ready and you can order it and they've got games to ship, there's some there's a couple of games going on location in the Pennsylvania area yeah and you know when you the one thing I would say though is I think look I think they maybe went a bit early to get in time for Expo but I think that was a smart decision given the fact that they're trying to get ahead of Stern's next release because you only have to look at what Stern's doing right when they I think the same thing that happened yeah exactly we all know it's coming whether or not the assets fit all together was another question but we'll see but like yeah for me it's like you know the same thing that we have in the beginning of pulp fiction i think they came in you know got there but then they had to then foo fighters comes in and it's fighting against scooby and everything like that and then everyone went actually do you know what i'm not going to go with with scooby i'm going to throw my money with foo fighters in some ways look i get that but like this is the thing i think if you're a pinball manufacturer, the only thing... You don't want to launch the same week Stern launch, but Stern are going to launch three or four things a year. You're going to Slash with them to some extent. At the moment, their releases are just re-releases, right? At the moment, we've had the Elvira Bloodkiss edition, which we can probably talk about now, I suppose. And then we've had, obviously, the Stranger Things rerun, and I think the Next thing on the line after that is another James Bond run And I think it like another Stranger Things pro And maybe Guardians of the Galaxy I heard is coming up It like again I reliably informed they not making any more Guardians Oh, okay. I'm pretty sure that that has definitely entered the vault, was my information. But look, because I was asking about toppers. Well, let's talk about the Blood Red edition. What's your thoughts? I was blown away by it I'll be honest with you I expected to see it and think monsters, black and white, turd sure they've nailed it it looks so good in the flesh and if I didn't already have Elvira what's your thoughts on that being an Eleona though? I am not an Eleona so my Elvira is a premium with armor and LE bits on it yeah I mean this was actually I'm still a bit narced at Phil sorry Phil but he um so here's a quick story like right I wanted to buy Elvira Tony and I played the game Expo 2017 whenever it came out or 18 I can't remember we both played it we both thought this game is epic right we played it for like hours and um I wanted to buy one but buying a pinball machine where there's a woman with big on it is sure is somewhat challenging thing to get past the wife right yeah but then mandy and i went to the elvira seminar where cassandra who plays elvira was there and cassandra was phenomenal she's great yeah yeah she was amazing and she really impressed mandy and and we came out and she's like when are we getting the elvira game and I'm like are you joking me because by then Phil had sold all the LEs they're all gone so I got a premium and Mandy loves it again it's a nice it's an easier game and she appreciates the humour and she likes Scared Stiff as well Scared Stiff's my preference out of the three if I'm honest. Depends on whether or not you include all these other variations of the Stern releases different versions but if you compare House of Horrors and Scared Stiff, Scared Stiff's top for me yeah I like Scared Stiff I used to not like it but I've grown to appreciate it again for years I hated it but I got it in a couple of tournaments and played really well and I thought actually I quite like this, it's better than I thought but I think the key and then actually the other thing no one's seen this shit because it's not out they are releasing a big code update for it so it will be interesting I heard they've added additional funny call-outs for the gargoyles and stuff like that, which is pretty cool. But, I mean, let's go back to, like, the whole... We don't need to discuss the game in detail, but would you have it in your lineup? Elvira. The new Red Kiss edition? Yeah, 100%. 100%. But, I've got a premium. I put the armor on it. Basically, Phil thought he'd sold all the LEs, and then he got another one, and I was like, by that time, I'd already put the armor on it. I thought, to hell with it. it's not worth the aggravation of changing it. I suppose later on what you could do is look at trying to get one, I suppose, if the opportunity arose. If someone, you know, look, we're pricing in the world economy, I might, you know, who knows what stuff might come up cheap. I'll tell you the other game that, I mean, I'll just briefly mention it. It wasn't, you know, it was released this time last year, but holy shit, Bond has got so good. Yeah, you said last podcast. And there's so much more to come so Mike Vinikour actually actually if you want to watch the seminars which i highly recommend everyone does especially for the games they're interested in or the companies they're interested in they're on martin abe's pinball news youtube channel and they did a fantastic bond Mike Vinikour and and lonnie did a really great bond thing that i went to um and they were talking about stuff there's so much more to come in this game and also i learned a few things about some of the modes and it's such a great game now and and you know even at the tournament everyone was kind of raving about you know how cool it's got and you know it's still kind of one or two little issues but um it's got a lot more it's basically becoming more finished product now but if you genuinely if you have not played this game since i haven't yet to be honest i actually i lie i've played it at funland in london which is basically like yeah play somewhere where it'll be good um sometimes I do find they don't really do much levelling I mean this is the thing, it's so good I bought a premium for the club so Pinball Republic has got a premium and it probably needs a bit of setting up because I haven't been there since the UK I literally went to the UK Open and flew out to New York the next day so I've been in home for the first time I've been home in like almost a month and then Elvira they've actually, the other thing they've got and I was told that this is going to come out as an accessory. So they've got this dagger plunger. I saw that, yeah. I'm told that that is going to be available separately, which is great news from my point of view. It's better than the clown one, because I had the clown one. Yeah, the clown one's terrible, man. I don't know what they were thinking about that. But the dagger looks great. The artwork, they've made the playfield kind of glittery. It really, really is cool. So they've put some extra effort. I think the only issue, as I said, I've said it before, I don't really like it when they keep making multiple releases of the same game. I agree. I mean, actually, Seth and Gary, I did kind of vent my frustration around, look, Bond was supposed to have a limited edition topper and all these other things limited edition. Now you sell them to any Joe that turns up. I moaned about Jurassic Park 30. If not, I don't care about it that much. But I said, look, if you guys just keep devaluing this. that's the fear I get as a collector it's like I know everyone always says that don't treat these products like an asset but I also don't want my vendors to plummet the value of my game just so they can release another version if I sell my Jurassic Park you know 9 grand for the LE I've got so I'm making the numbers up and then 10 grand for a Theriot you know people are probably going to go for the Theriot although I think they are terrible on the Theriot but actually the art's terrible on both of them to some extent. Okay. Well, let's move on. Ninja by Turner Pinball then. He's laughing, but I am interested. Go on. Lay it on me. What did you think? So the game, I mean, so let me deal with the kind of burning part of it. The cabinet's a total shit show. I don't know what they were thinking. Yeah, so I saw the show. It looks like it's half the depth of a normal cabinet. I don't want to say a shoebox because that's a bit cruel, but it does look like a virtual pin, like a smaller version and a full-size cap. Is its dimensions the same, or is it just – So the playfield is a standard-sized playfield, right? Okay, that's what I mean. But they've got this thing where the thing moves, and, I mean, one thing, right, and this guy was part of deep root so you should know better there go there it goes it's just and this guy is part of deep root um he was involved in deep root and he he grabbed some of the assets i think on in the auction on the way out um i don't know the full details of it but um the the the cabinet when you play when you put your hands where the flippers are right and they had two modes set up for the game one where the lower flipper and upper flipper move one button or one you need two button the two button was a disaster i just i just i was playing that i walked away before the end of ball two because it was unplayable from my point oh wow okay that's pretty damning the other one where the where the flipper upper flipper was wired to the same button um actually the game doesn't shoot terribly right um it's wide open so you've got a lot of flow it's got a nice kind of star trek ramp shot on the on the from the kind of upper flipper it's not quite the same but it's close to it what do you think about the assets the artist work and that it's got all this ninja stuff on it it does zero for me was it drawn well did you think it looked it feels like it's been put on cheap the whole experience felt cheap it felt like hey we're going to make a cheap pinball machine and you know what's their market price then for that this is the point they've made what looks like a cheap pinball machine but they're charging 10 grand for it and i'm like what no yeah i shouldn't say it like that but that's a lot for something that looks that they're dead in the water i mean yeah you know there was you know if you wanted to play the game you walked up and you started playing it there's no cues there's no lines yeah it's surprising yeah and i i just thought i know so also i didn't finish this but where they've got the they've got this kind of weird border around the cabinet because the way they've they've got the glass in it but it makes it makes it really hard to put your hand on the game and play and use the flippers it feels it feels like there's you're like you're trying to grab onto something that isn't designed to be grabbed like square sort of thing and and the last game that had this was a deep root game and the razza prototype had the same issue right and i'm thinking what the you know what are they thinking they're just and this annoys me because they're thinking through the lens of oh wouldn't it be cool to build a pinball machine right yeah if you're a homebrew guy that's the way you think about it right if you're a pinball manufacturer here's your thing you should be thinking about how do i get a player to stick a quarter in my game right yeah and you definitely turn a profit you definitely don't do it by making it uncomfortable to play you just don't right and they've done that i'm like these guys are loons anyway look these guys are are allegedly trying and there's no coin actually there's no coin door on unless you buy a special version which is even more expensive um which made me laugh i was like really um because they're not aiming it at the it's not aimed at the operator operator again okay this is interesting you bring this up because i know that when dutch pinball not even necessarily not dutch when the bowser fun guys were talking to somebody on on youtube i forget i think it's johnny pinball yeah and he said to him i can't afford a you know ten thousand dollars for a new game and i said oh just put on location you make your money back that okay it's a little bit naive i think for people saying in this day and age yeah i don't think you can make money back on 10 grand personally like that that's a lot of quarters location yeah exactly um which doesn't which doesn't exist here in the uk i'm afraid 100 it doesn't exist in this country but yeah the um that statement then doesn't ring true for turner pinball because they haven't given an operator's option for us. So then asking that money is crazy. They're not trying to sell to operators. They're like trying to, you know, their thing is we're disrupting pinball. And I was like, no, you're not. Not with that price. Not with that price and not with that machine. Even if they sold the machine for half the price, it wouldn't defer me from buying a Stern Pro instead. This is the thing, when people try and build cheap pinball, even Stern, right? When they try and build with the Jurassic Park stuff, and actually Jurassic Park is a great game it plays okay but it still doesn't feel like you're playing a proper pinball machine sorry it doesn't it's good but it's not quite a cigar right and this was definitely true for this the ninja pinball stuff and I just kind of think I look out in the market and at 10 grand who's buying you know I could buy this for 10 grand or I could buy a library or I could buy a Pulp Fiction for 9 yeah I'm thinking no one's buying this game I just don't know what they were thinking so obviously easy answer then it's not going in the line up then it's not even I suspect we'll never see one this side in the UK I'm not even sure we'll see them in the US in any sort of volume would be my take but who knows the other thing I want to talk about and I didn't put it on the notes actually American Pinball yes what we reviewed Galactic Tank Force yeah so let me I just want to cover this very quickly and maybe we'll do a bit more depth in another podcast but David Fix kindly invited us Brits to the factory and you know I was thinking for the factory it's going to be like the size of this room and there'll be three people and a dog at it um right that was that was my take right that was your impression of it um um it's it's times like this where i could kiss myself for being wrong right um we went and let me tell you american pinball is a serious operation um i've seen the pictures they have a lot of like houdini's back on the line yeah are they putting houdini back out again is that a rerun yeah they're doing new Houdini's. Actually, interestingly, they're doing new Houdini's with an upgrade in them. Interesting. So they've changed, to make the game a little bit easier, they've changed this kind of middle lock shot so you can hit it from two directions. So really good change. I approve. I'm not a big Houdini fan. It's not, it's too bookie a game for me. I like flow. It's not, but it's, you know, and it's still got a bit of stop-start in it. But, yeah, basically... They're banking a bit big, though, aren't they? Because I don't think people were going, hey, where's Houdini? I need another run. In the U.S., what I was led to believe wasn't said in so many words, but it was kind of strongly ended. They're making 50. They've already sold them. Okay, so it's not a huge number, but, yeah. It's a sizable number. I mean, they're making probably, I'm going to guess, about 2,000 games a year tops, right? Okay. They're still pretty good, though, as a boutique seller sort of thing. Absolutely. The factories, look, the thing that people probably don't realize, on the other side of that factory is a company called Ametron that owns American Pinball, right? Ametron are huge. They make boards for companies, like electronic boards. Actually, they used to make node boards, spike one node boards back in the day. But when Stern heard they were setting up a pinball company, they stupidly didn't want to use someone else, which I think was madness and shows, you know, some questionable maturity in this industry. Anyway, nonetheless. Let's move on to something a bit more positive. But the topper elements, it's like even I want an alien topper. I don't even have the game anymore. It'll be the third time I chase after this bloody game, as much as you hate it. But I think the topper is phenomenal. Did you see it there? What did you think of it? Yeah, it was there. Look, I think I've probably got too much of a negative spin on Alien. and I was like, wow, there's a topper, right. It's like, you know, nine years after the game came out, they finally got their freaking ass out of jail for long enough to create a topper. And the guy who's the Art of Pinball guy, is that his name? I can't remember. Yeah, the guy who makes the sculpt, that's correct. Yeah, I mean, it's good because of him, right? And actually the new sculpts that they've got in the game are very nice. I took a couple of photos of them. I'm quite impressed by that. Unfortunately, it's still Alien with its janky electronics. Did it fall over much? They still had a couple of moments with it. Right. And, you know, look, it's great they're doing new code. It's great they've got Ripley. Thank you, Disney, for making it easier for them is my take. I think if Disney hadn't acquired Fox, they would never have got it. And actually, to be fair, they don't have it yet, right? so I think they're still waiting for final approval. But, look, they're, you know, the alien area, in very commas, that they had, they were sitting with the coin-ticker guys, was buzzing. Queen, it's just dead. I mean, they should, I don't know why they're flogging that horse anymore. They should just find a skip. It's sold very few units, hasn't it? It's been a disaster for them. but I think that's why they're revisiting Alien why wouldn't you if you're able to you know if two things have happened one perhaps that they've got a new license with Disney that's maybe a bit cheaper that's why they've been able to take the price out, they've got better I mean look they're the only company that's cut the price of a pinball machine in the last you know two years so you know they're the only one where the price is going down I'm not going to say much more than that. They get some tokens for that, but I'd rather pay, you know, if I was a punter, I'd rather pay a gram more and have a game that's reliable. Yeah. I mean, it depends, as you say, I get what you're absolutely, I'm coming from a guy who's owned the game twice, you know, the LVNSV. I think like, if the reliability is, as you say, still problematic, that is a problem. Yeah. It definitely is. Yeah. And, you know, And then the Dutch Pinball guys were there. They were very tight-lipped about Back to the Future, unsurprisingly. You know, my take on that is that they've got some sort of Back to the Future IP. Is it the right IP or the IP that's going to turn this into a great game? I'm very uncertain. I'm also very uncertain that, you know, this could be a bit of a CGC with Pulp Fiction in that they put a game out and you have to wait nine years to get yours. Do you know what? That's the problem though. Unlike Pulp Fiction though, this is the killer license. This is the license everybody just keeps saying. When, when, when, when, when. It used to be Stern. Everyone thought it would be a Kapow game. Now it's going to be potentially a Dutch pinball. I wouldn't rule out Kapow on still doing this. Joe is a massive... I don't know if I said this, but Joe Komenikov a good friend of mine really good guy um he was actually in the uk a couple of couple of weeks ago he was up at aston martin he's getting a factory tour because he's a big bond fan um and i was i was trying to meet up with him about the uk open up we weren't able to but i'm i'm in vegas and and a couple of months time and i'm i'm going to hook up with him but um he invested in the Back to the Future Broadway show. He was like, he got, on opening night here in the UK, he got me and my wife tickets, really good tickets, right? I didn't have to pay a penny for them. And he's an investor in that show, and he flew over, like, literally just before, I think just before COVID or just at some point, he flew over because he wanted to see it. I think it was when it was originally started in Manchester and then moved to London. That show was fantastic. They really nailed it. I don't know if you've seen it. If you haven't, you should take Holly to see it because it is very good. They really nailed it. Actually, when we were there, at the end of it, out comes on stage Christopher Lloyd, which was like a wow moment. I think there was a couple of other actors, but I'm not a massive Back to the Future fan. I like it. it's good you know i would love it i love and actually i'm probably more of a huey lewis fan than i am a back to the future fan but um the challenge with back to the future and i think i've covered this before is it's not oh we've got the license and you've got everything you just don't um you know you'll get you may get access to certain movie clips but much like um much like the license of of alien that doesn't mean to say that you've got ripley that doesn't mean to say you've got Michael G. Fox, that doesn't mean you see you've got Christopher Lloyd, right? Yeah, I mean, I've said this to you before, right? Christopher Lloyd, it's like, we had issues before with his likeness being represented even at Adam's Family Virtual Pin, where he didn't want to have his likeness as Uncle Fester on the playfield, so it's a different Uncle Fester at the bottom of the playfield, and it's like, that would worry me that if you can only get a likeness, it's similar vein to what happened with Alien, right? It concerned me when I first saw the Ripley edition, and they've obscured Sigourney Weaver's face so that you can't. They're not allowed to use it. There's two different licenses there, right? They've managed to get the wider set of movie clips with her in it, which in old Universal land would have been a click up. Sorry, old Fox land rather would have been a click up on the cost. I think Disney have got, you know, I've never dealt with Disney specifically I'm just trying to think I don't think I've dealt with Disney I've dealt with some Disney IP that wasn't theirs but they've acquired I think I'm trying to remember what is it a more simplistic model basically I think Disney want their IP to be good no matter who's using it so I think hey you've bought the IP to Tron here's all the Tron assets do what you like right again that still doesn't mean to say you can you know use a picture of so-and-so on the front without that isn't part of the package you know you you can't just create your own artwork and say hey you know um what's his face is on i forget to get the well you can't have like johnny depp for instance from pirates of the caribbean didn't call us but you could have him on the playfield for instance well you could have johnny depp on the on the back glass as long as it's the poster that went with the movie yeah the poster yeah you can do is johnny going you know and with a different or you just can't you can't use his likeness Or if you do, like the guys, and actually if you watch the Godfather seminar from TPF, they explained with Marlon Brando, you know, he's really happy to use his likeness, but only in the ways he defines, right? Okay, so he's got controls over it, right? Yeah, and there's a big long story about that in that seminar that helps explain this. So, you know, look, will they be able to put a DeLorean on the playfield because DeLorean went bust? They can do what they like with that, right? Right, yeah. Will they be able to put, you know, some of the other assets from, you know, into it? Because that's the problem, right? It could turn into like an asset dump, like, you know, so you can have the playfield where you can have like, you know, the two main actors in it, but they can be like from the film. You can't do an artistic impression on the playfield. So it will look like Photoshop dumps on the play field. And nobody wants that. And that assumes that that's included with the base package of rights. I mean, the other thing on this is, the other thing they could do, though, is they could have a guy in a radiation suit on the back glass. So Apollo 13 is a classic example of that. Tom Hanks. So all the other actors were happy to sign up to it. Tom Hanks wouldn't. so they put Tom Hanks on the front of it by putting him in a space suit. Right? On the back glass, you've got Tom Hanks there and you can't see him on the game. It's like, where's Tom Hanks? He's in the space suit. It was a genius move, actually. But they could do stuff like that. They could put a dog on there. They could have scored the face. And call it, what was it, Bernie or Ernie or whatever, I can't remember. sure the dog is but einstein isn't it einstein that's it they could put they could put a car with dung in it you know they could do stuff like that um they could put they could have a big speaker with a guitar in front of it you know they could do all these things around it but they are close to back to the future but not quite back to the future right so again if they don't get the music either the music yeah i mean i think they'll get the music because huey lewis typically not a big i mean they i'm pretty sure they own the rights to power of love um although they won't get that's the more yeah see that one's more key though yeah that one you know i don't i i think by default that wouldn't be included they'd have to license that separately this is what makes it really difficult to kind of accept if they do make it i it goes back to that i think you said this from a few podcasts before but if you've got to make something make it right 100% absolutely it's got to be made right if it's missing elements it's i think it was when we're talking about jaws that was it if you're going to make something make it right yeah it's got to be made right yeah i mean and look jurassic park a classic example right um where i think if the game wasn good stern would have been gunned down for that because there no assets from the film at all except Nedry right Which, you know, I think he gave it to them for free. He didn't really care. Which is good of him. Everyone's hacked the game and is running code that has the assets in it. It's ridiculous, right? So, you know, I don't think you know unless you've got a really strong pinball game which in jurassic park they absolutely did you know i think it's brave to um to go out um you know and i think right now so you know they'll have to talk to chrysalis who's got who owned the huey lewis um back catalog um and you know i wonder what it's like for license holders actually when they get approached by pinball companies i think for a lot of them is it just going to be like pinball still a thing yeah definitely but it's just like another you know if they want to put on lunchboxes but you know that but they you know again they've got like uh you know look these companies have got thousands of ips yeah they've got one i was speaking to a friend earlier it's like they were like oh you know they're running out of ideas aren't they for licenses i was like you're kidding right there's like literally thousands of ips you could be pulling from yeah i mean you know we talked about blues brothers and and you know there's there's there's more imagine die hard i said to my i said to my mate it said like take the godzilla building yeah and have him like shoot you off the building at the end of like can die hard that's a stern easy flip there you go free research for you guys but like it's just do you know i mean there's so many easy things they could integrate um and reuse mechs and keep things on the cheap there's i just think that they haven't they aren't going to run out of ideas anytime soon. No. But look, like you say, I mean, Back to the Future, for me, if it hasn't got Huey Lewis in it, it's dead. If it hasn't got the music in it, for me, it's dead. It goes back to what you were saying about music. Music is very, very high on my agenda. And actually, who's the designer? Because I don't know that Dutch people have got a designer. So that would be my next big question. I mean, if we go by the Big Lebowski, theme integration was on point. I'll give him that. I'm not a fan of the movie. They didn't have any of the music, though. No. Well, I said theme integration, not music integration. So theme, I think... Most people who've played Big Lebowski have played the hacked version. Oh, okay. It's got all the music in it. It's got a load of other stuff in it. Well, by that argument, maybe people will do what you just suggested, then they'll hack it. Oh, for sure. And they'll put the assets in where it's needed. But it's a shame that you'd have to do that in order to get the complete package. we're getting used to having to do that you know Stranger Things has got a hack Walking Dead's got a hack Turtles got a cartoon hack well Avengers Iron Maiden's got Disco Maiden well Star Trek's got a hack X-Men's got a hack so you know this is the thing people who love these themes will figure out ways of getting what they want. It's a pain in the ass for Stern and a pain in the ass for licensors generally. Then you look at like Batman or you look at Guns N' Roses where they had access to everything and look at the difference it makes. Or look at Pulp Fiction. When you get the license holder who is literally going, I love pinball, let's go with it. I think that's the perfect mix. I know Pulp Fiction. I mean, look... Quentin Tarantino. I'm so glad he was on board with all of it. Yeah, I mean, if they were launching Pulp Fiction at the show, you know, that would edge out Elton John for me. It's still... It's a phenomenal game. You're down for one, I take it. Yeah, I've got an Ellie on order, I suspect. See you in two years, then. Yeah. My prediction is kind of this time next year, genuinely. That's when I think we'll get it. I had a real moan at them about that, but lots of people did. But actually, their seminar, again, at Sun Pimple News, Gary Flower was the moderator. Actually, he played a really great card, which was, you know, he got that, you know, everyone went there to ask the question, when's it going to be out? And Gary just asked the question before they got started, which is a genius move. And they're like, you know, talk to CGC. And, you know, CGC are starting to gear up for it. And the thing I know is, is when the game arrives, it'll be perfect from a construction point of view. So I'm happy. way i actually we we were playing a bunch of the brits we were in interior and we were playing it there's one on location there i played it in the interior and play comp and i actually won the round on it is such a great game to shoot and and it's just funny when you you know when you uh when you nudge the game and you get a warning you get jewels going hey we're going to be cool We've got to be cool. And it's just so well done. It's still a very strong IP. I think everyone who's in on it won't change. I don't think you're going to find lots of people dropping out or buying it between now and getting them. But I do wish they'd hurry up and get on with it. There's no doubt they're working flat out. In fact, actually, they've got the golden version out this week, which is the golden version is like the kind of template version where they test all the parts, make sure everything works together, they train the assembly line. And when it goes through that first assembly process and they've got a game that's, you know, ready to ship, they press the button on ordering all the parts and ordering all the pieces at that stage because they don't want to order, you know, a thousand widgets that don't fit right, right? Sure. So they've got, you know, all the other games before were prototypes. They've got a proper production one now. That's a really good sign. They'll get all the parts are flowing. And, you know, I think they're probably three weeks behind where they wanted to be, is my take. But, you know, the game is so good. It just makes you laugh at various parts where you hear a call out that you've never heard before. Royale with cheese. Yeah. and it just does he do that part where he goes say that again does he do that or anything like that it's got like it's got a bit where it's like you know get out of the gimp, the gimp's asleep well go wake him up and you've got it's just freaking hilarious this game is going to be one where you've got a few mates around and you're drinking beers my wife still hasn't forgiven me because initially I was like oh oh low level game oh no i ain't having that i ain't having the game with like one level i still think it isn't for everybody right but sure they have it's it's this one they've they've nailed it in my view and um it looks there i mean i'd love to try it um yeah i mean i just and just before we move on just finish off we kind of started and veered off american pinball right they are a proper size company you know anyone who thinks they're going to go bust like next week or next year, forget that. They're here for good. They have got a proper facility. I think they're one step away from being in the big leagues. They just need the right pin. I would think, yeah, look, they need a smash hit. They haven't had a smash hit right. I was hoping it was going to be Galactic Tank Force, but I think there were some missteps with that one. Yeah, and I think they've learned from that is my take, but I think I kind of know what's coming from them. Again, I was told by them. Well, no, I already know. Most people should know. It's He-Man, right? No. It's not? I saw He-Man figures on the production line. I could have sworn it was He-Man. So, look, they've definitely got a relationship with Mattel because of Hot Wheels, right? Sure. Is He-Man coming at some point in time? I would say yes, right? But it's not the next release. I don't think it's the next release, but I might be wrong. I mean, they didn't seem to be that bothered by it, but Napper Arcade did show a lot of the production line, and then he zoomed in, and there was like a bunch of He-Man figures on the production line. Yeah. So I just figured, okay, it's He-Man then. No, I mean, I think that might have been there to kind of wind people up a little bit. Maybe a red herring. Okay. But, look, they've got something coming out that I think is pretty cool. they've got a couple of they've got a couple of they've got a couple of other things that they're working on that I think people will appreciate and I came away I went in there thinking this is going to be boring as hell I came away thinking oh my god these guys are huge and actually jumping on from that the other um factory tour i went to stern's new factory holy moly man it's huge um it is twice more than twice the size of the old factory um and it's and it's up that doesn't surprise me with the way they keep doing all these reruns they must have a lot of like it's a floor space it's a proper manufacturing facility the previous ones you know were more warehouse type places i I think they've definitely invested in, you know, proper ventilation and proper, you know, there's a few things that just feel a bit more as they should be. It's still, it's insane. They've got an office space area that's massive. I mean, I don't think they'll ever fill that space. If they do, they're going to be printing money. They'll be like selling 10,000 games a week. So, you know, they've got so many desks for like, you know, all the people there. And then they've got a studio that's separate, which we didn't see because it's where all the new stuff is. The factory floor itself. I mean, it just feels like they've stretched out the other one. You know, there's nothing new. That's the thing I find amazing. There's almost zero automation. And me and I was there with Davey Price, a good friend from Stumbler. And I was chuckling. I was like, why are they making their own looms? It's just bizarre. There's companies in Taiwan. That will do it for you a lot cheaper, yeah. A lot cheaper and probably better quality, I hasten to add. I find that incredible. The amount of parts and stock that they've got in this place is out of this world. Now, partly they've got another stock room where they've still got tons of stuff in there. They've got like a kind of a B&Q size forklift area now that they never had before. So they're able to store a ton of stuff. do you think that's just do you think that's them basically preparing for the next bid release then no i think this is well it's just maturing their offering story i heard about staying in stern's factory and this might be bullshit so take it with a pinch of salt is and i know at least one part of this is true where stern's old factory is has become a real data center epicenter so if you look on if you would go to stern's old factory if it's if it's still standing i suspect it is but it is now surrounded by i think six 20 megawatt data centers big big old data centers right and the next the the next usable space is where stern's factory is right i think the owner of the kind of elk grove industrial area, my guess is that they made it easy for Stern to move. Right. Because selling that space to a data center company is probably more than Stern will pay in 10 years' worth of rent, right? Yeah, I imagine. And, you know, they've got... It's either that or Stern was being proposed with the higher business rates on their renewals. Nah, I doubt that, because they would know Stern couldn't afford it, is my take. I think... Yeah, but I'm just thinking to shove them out so they can get the data center guys in. Yeah, the fact that Stern have moved... Yeah, it could be, but my guess is that Stern were given a massive incentive to move. OK. In fact... Oh, maybe because they were mid-contract. It wouldn't surprise me... It wouldn't surprise me if they moved to the new factory and didn't pay a penny of the move. it wouldn't surprise me it goes back to what I was saying about pricing why they put the prices up it wouldn't surprise me I would love it if we saw what they're doing with Pinball Brothers I'd love for prices to go back down to pre-Covid I think you've got two hopes of that Bob and no hope I know right the thing for me is here you've got Labyrinth joining the market and one of the ways they could get momentum is by pricing differently and they haven't no they've priced in at the premium price the few features that pop out those were like £3.50 mate honestly they're not well the servo is probably about fiver I'll give you that it's not it's not significant that it's making a big difference between the whole thing but look but look the whole I'm just conscious of time now actually we've been running for a bit the whole show I mean the Stern Factory was super impressive there's no question about it they have got an ability to scale that no one else has got no one's near it the volume of games they were making and it's probably more than all the other manufacturers put together. Most likely. In a week, in a day. They were building Venoms and... What was the other game? They were building an older game. I'm trying to remember what it was. Change of Things, no? They were building Petco and they were building Venoms and they were building a lot of them. I mean, a shit ton of them, basically. So, look... I think Stern have got lucky on our scale transaction that I think has been very beneficial to them. Like I say, I don't know if any of that's true, but it's my guess. Yeah, sure. It's all speculation. And also, actually, the one new thing I saw in the factory was they kind of had a dedicated topper building area. So I think we'll start to see toppers come on. Come on, Stern, do some proper, like, sculpted units with animatronics. I know they can do it. The Black Knight one I still think to this day is their best. Yeah, I mean, I hear that there's an interesting topper coming for Venom, was the vibe. I don't know if that's true. Actually, speaking of toppers, did you see the Twilight Zone topper that some company did? Yes, of course. Yeah, yeah, I know the one you're referring to. They've got a Godzilla topper out. I don't know if you've seen it. Yeah, I wasn't a big fan of that. It was a bit quirky. In person, it looks phenomenal. Oh, okay. I mean, I was trying to buy the one off them that they had there. It was a prototype. You wouldn't sell it to me. All right. I'm super impressed. I've watched the video behind it. They're creating it so it's quite modular. Yeah, exactly. So you can basically buy, like, a base model. Yeah. I have to say, I was impressed by that. And, look, to wrap up, let me – what else was I impressed by on the floor? project pinball big charity thing is so impressive to see so many folks donating stuff to that cause it's a great cause it's great to see that Stern Stern and actually Stern weren't there at all Marco pinball were there and normally Stern runs their own gig at the Expo my take is is that they let Marco run it because they've got this factory move going on. Well, that and the fact it wasn't a new release, really, was it? It was just more of what they had. They've been in this expo many times before a new release and they've run it themselves. My take is that they just didn't want the aggro of running the show themselves. I hope they do it again next year because they put down this lovely carpet. It was great to visit the Stern location. Brian, what's his face? Brian Eddy? oh Brian Allen loads of lovely stuff there there's a couple other vendors there selling lots of bits it was cool you could buy games there was a lovely shit was radical that had been re re-energized that was phenomenal renovation to be honest shame about the game but yeah I mean it was a really good show and I had a lot of people ask me hey Neil would you go to TPF would you go to this my answer used to be TPF and it kind of still is but next year TPF is going to be ran by a different set of people Kim and I forget the guy's name, they're really nice people, they've kind of taken retirement different bunch of people running it, it's a week early the tournament's run by a different guy because Colin couldn't run it because the week early for him doesn't work which actually I'm really happy about it because it normally clashes with my daughter's birthday so if it doesn't this year I'm looking forward to it. I don't know what will be there. But I imagine they'll try and hold the status quo. Yeah but look I don't think they're going to get six new releases. No I mean that was stellar let's face it. I mean I was super envious of anybody that went for this year. Yeah the other thing is the vibe from dealers was they're all feeling a bit frustrated. They've got loads of them with stock games are not selling generically it goes back to what we were saying about even you know we said the UK market is small I think the overall pinball market is small and now there's a lot of competition in the landscape there's only so much money to go around for these big ticket items 100% I think from a point of view again said this before you guys got to not love money if you're selling pinball machines because I think the days of me having to make a you know truckload of cash off of any release is just gone i think people being way more careful with their money look at like um any release now i had expected everything to sell out in the old days yeah yeah well one of the great things about that is the flippers who buy stuff just to sell it for two grand more or out of business for me oh they're gone but they'll they'll they're like any other flipper market they find the next big thing and they'll move into that it doesn't mean anything to them but um but look i you know pricing i look at what the labyrinth of pricing are i don't think pricing is coming down anytime soon probably not and and i think one thing avengers is keen for me to play it and i i don't think price is going to change i definitely see the the new buy market is super soft right now like i said i talked a lot to shibas the prices I was talking to distributors that buy and sell games as well. Use prices are plummeting in the US. I mean, they're not just going down. They're literally on a crash. They're spiralling, are they? And for me, I'm quite excited about that because I'll happily import games from the US. I think it'd be interesting to see what happens here in the UK. I get a sense that we're a bit more resilient about just dropping the price of stuff we want to sell. But I look on Pinball Info and there's an awful lot of stuff for sale. I think there's a Mando there that's been really cheap that still hasn't sold Mando LE you know I think if you've I mean here's my advice to folks if you're buying a new game and you think you're going to get your same money back when you sell it I don't think that's the case be careful it is a buyer's market and I'm a buyer which is glorious news look I think we're out of time there we've probably ran over um we have yeah there's a lot there's a lot we didn't cover um and you know maybe we'll pick up on that in a couple of weeks time but um it's great to see so much stuff going on pinball what but i have to say i'm nervous about you know is there a is there a big bust about to come in and it kind of feels like it um to me i think next year we'll be telling um for a lot of global markets and then we'll just have to see how it all how how the landscape appears in front of us and whether or not the next release from stern sells out because if that is another weak release like venom was and to an extent of what foo fires was i think it's gonna put the pause on a lot of manufacturers that outside of stern they're going if they're struggling to sell what what are we going to do yeah i mean look the the um the one thing i'll say is uh you know be cautious for your money if you're gonna if you think you're gonna sell something probably best sell it right now um i wouldn't wait i wouldn't wait a couple of months but especially january will be a blood bath for sales people will be skinned from christmas um and you know jaws will be there that's true yeah the next buy will come in yeah be interesting to see you know i mean i think jaws will sell out but but i think it won't be i don't think it'll be as big as godzilla because i just think people people don't have the money i am going to run one final thing i have a competition for folks to enter so okay and the way the way to enter this is if you go where this is on youtube you can post comments but um i have a signed flyer from Brian Eddy zombie yeti and dwight um the the guys and i actually i think i think the same guy um but his name just got out of my head uh he's a great guy as well anyway there's a bunch of them that have signed this limited edition flyer um if you could name Brian Eddy's first game on that channel we'll collect all the we'll collect all the names and we'll on the next podcast we'll randomly draw it and send you the flyer and the special show only venom gadget um that that you'll if you google you'll see them on on the the pin side thread they were handing out these things that i grabbed a couple and we'll give one away um with that thanks everyone for tuning in sorry we ran on a bit long but there's a lot to cover and we'll be back in two or three weeks time um you know enjoy pinball play pinball um there's a couple of events coming up i'm going to just plug pinball republic the monster meet in december please come um it's going to be a massive birthday event um and we're really looking forward to it's going to be super exciting um that's actually that's probably and then we got another one at the end of just before new year but i'll plug that in the next episode but yeah december first weekend of december we got a big gig four events over the weekend and it's going to be a lot of fun um anyway i am neil mccray and i'm scott rundle this was the great british pinball podcast episode five my god we've done five of these um actually we've done six but one one didn't make it um but yeah this time it seems to have worked better any feedback any subject you want us to talk about actually the next podcast we will have a guest um we keep promising no we we've got what happened this time absolute actually i need to schedule it with you for when when he's he's actually going to be here in person maybe you should come down for that one we'll do it yeah Yeah, why not? It's going to be the weekend, so we get some curries and beers and have a chat with this guest who I think you'll all like. I've definitely confirmed it, so it should be good. Anyway, thanks, everybody, for tuning in. We really appreciate it. I mean, it's amazing. I had a bunch of folks in the U.S. say, oh, we love your podcast. I was like, wow. Normally it's someone like Neil, you're rubbish on Twitch. it was really good to get so much feedback about the podcast and we love doing it, it's a lot of fun and we will see you next time, thanks from me and thanks from Scott Thanks guys, bye _(Acquisition: groq_whisper, Enrichment: v3)_ --- *Exported from Journalist Tool on 2026-04-13 | Item ID: 4f2a6ed8-8228-4c7d-b1e5-6866f2cf1a3b*