# Episode 824: "My Venom First Impression"

**Source:** Kaneda's Pinball Podcast (Patreon feed)  
**Type:** podcast_episode  
**Published:** 2023-07-19  
**Duration:** 21m 7s  
**Beat:** Pinball

**URL:** https://www.patreon.com/posts/episode-824-my-86304930

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## Analysis

Brian Eddy delivers a critical first-impression analysis of Stern's newly released Venom pinball machine, focusing on its accessible-but-confusing playfield layout, mechanically-stripped Pro model, complex 32-page ruleset, and $10,000-$13,000 pricing that he views as unjustifiable. He argues the game feels overpriced relative to its entertainment value, predicts secondary-market depreciation, and expresses broader concerns about industry pricing, software complexity, and distributor health amid oversaturation.

### Key Claims

- [HIGH] Venom Pro version has had all mechanisms removed; players must buy Premium or LE for mechanical features — _Brian Eddy, direct statement about Stern's strategy to incentivize higher-tier purchases_
- [MEDIUM] Venom's ruleset is 32 pages long — _Brian Eddy, citing overheard information about rule complexity_
- [HIGH] Stern sent email to distributors offering one additional LE if they buy four more games from Stern — _Brian Eddy, citing direct communication from distributor friends_
- [MEDIUM] Venom is not selling out and will depreciate 20-30% within six months — _Brian Eddy, citing distributor conversations and market observation_
- [HIGH] Stern's Pro/Premium/LE tiers differ only in cabinet artwork and trim (no mechanical difference between Premium and LE) — _Brian Eddy, observing official product lineup documentation_
- [HIGH] Venom's playfield layout is fan-layout style with nine to eleven linear shots from left to right — _Brian Eddy, direct visual analysis of released game imagery_
- [MEDIUM] Many collectors just purchased Foo Fighters and James Bond and lack time to master them before Venom's release — _Brian Eddy, observing market saturation and customer bandwidth constraints_
- [MEDIUM] Distributor inventory from Spooky and Jersey Jack Pinball remains unsold — _Brian Eddy, citing distributor feedback about industry-wide inventory issues_

### Notable Quotes

> "Stern's ultimate goal is to Trojan horse everybody into buying either an LE or a premium because that's where the margins lie."
> — **Brian Eddy**, ~10:00
> _Core critique of Stern's pricing strategy and Pro-tier gutting_

> "If you're a Venom fan, I bet you're eating all of this up. I am not a huge Venom fan. So I was looking at this utterly confused about who all these characters are, what is happening."
> — **Brian Eddy**, ~18:00
> _Articulates accessibility concern for non-fans; theme dependency issue_

> "Pinball machine is not a video game. And I think we're starting to see those lines blurred a little bit."
> — **Brian Eddy**, ~28:00
> _Core philosophical concern about ruleset complexity and 30+ minute playtimes_

> "This machine will never sell for more than you buy it today. Remember that. this machine will never sell for more money than you buy it today."
> — **Brian Eddy**, ~40:00
> _Definitive statement on secondary market trajectory and depreciation certainty_

> "At these prices, distributors are in a really sticky, icky situation. And it's not just Stern who's put them there."
> — **Brian Eddy**, ~32:00
> _Highlights ecosystem-wide financial pressure on distributors amid overstock_

> "FOMO is dead on these kinds of titles. The only place that FOMO is still alive is with a AAA game."
> — **Brian Eddy**, ~46:00
> _Market sentiment shift away from urgency; only premium IPs retain collector urgency_

> "I know it's going to be fun, and I'm going to have more fun than anyone who buys this game because I'm going to be able to play it with $20 and then go home with $13,000 still in my bank account."
> — **Brian Eddy**, ~52:00
> _Sarcastic summation of value proposition: location play vs. ownership cost_

### Entities

| Name | Type | Context |
|------|------|---------|
| Brian Eddy | person | Host of Kaneda's Pinball Podcast; primary speaker and analyst providing first-impression critique of Venom |
| Zombie Eddy | person | Artist credited with Venom's cabinet artwork; mentioned by Brian Eddy as collaborator on visual design |
| Dwight Sullivan | person | Guest on episode alongside Brian Eddy and Zombie Eddy; specifics of contribution unclear from transcript |
| Venom | game | Marvel-themed pinball machine by Stern Pinball released today; subject of entire episode analysis |
| Stern Pinball | company | Manufacturer of Venom; primary focus of criticism regarding pricing strategy, design philosophy, and market practices |
| Seth Davis | person | Stern representative or media personality who presented Venom's Pro and Premium formats; Brian Eddy critiques his marketing approach |
| Lyman Sheets | person | Legendary rules designer/programmer referenced as exemplar of balanced ruleset design; contrast to current complexity trends |
| Foo Fighters | game | Recently released Stern game; mentioned as recent purchase by collectors who lack time for Venom |
| James Bond 007 | game | Recently released Stern game; cited alongside Foo Fighters as competing collector purchase for discretionary pinball spend |
| Jaws | game | Upcoming Stern release; referenced as higher-tier theme that will cannibalize Venom interest |
| Back to the Future | game | Upcoming Stern release; cited as premium title that will compete with Venom for market mindshare and collector budgets |
| Pulp Fiction | game | Previous Stern title; used as comparison example of superior artistic clarity and emotional impact vs. Venom's crowded playfield |
| Godzilla | game | Recent Stern release; mentioned as current title collectors are playing; will be displaced by newer releases |
| Godfather | game | Recent Stern release; mentioned as example of recent high-value purchase competing for collector budgets |
| Scooby-Doo | game | Recent Stern release; mentioned as recent high-value purchase competing for collector budgets |
| Jersey Jack Pinball | company | Competing manufacturer; mentioned as source of unsold distributor inventory affecting market health |
| Spooky Pinball | company | Competing manufacturer; mentioned as source of unsold distributor inventory straining distributor cash flow |
| Stern Insider Connected | product | Stern's subscription/membership service for unlocking continued gameplay features and save progression |
| Keith Elwin | person | Designer referenced as creator of upcoming title that will compete for collector interest; next project after Godzilla |
| Naps Arcade | organization | Implied competing media/news outlet; Brian Eddy notes distributor email was not shared publicly on Naps Arcade |

### Topics

- **Primary:** Playfield Layout & Design Philosophy, Pricing Strategy & Market Segmentation (Pro/Premium/LE), Ruleset Complexity & Software Bloat, Secondary Market Depreciation & FOMO Death, Distributor Financial Health & Inventory Stress
- **Secondary:** Theme Accessibility & Fan Dependency, Visual Clutter & Artistic Clarity, Mechanical Features & Component Removal

### Sentiment

**Negative** (-0.72) — Brian Eddy's tone is critical and pessimistic throughout. While he acknowledges Venom will be 'fine' and 'fun to shoot,' he expresses clear frustration with pricing ($13K LE/$10K Premium deemed unjustifiable), design philosophy (confusing playfield overcrowding, ruleset bloat, software takeover), and market conditions (depreciation certainty, distributor distress, collector fatigue). Sarcasm is prevalent. Despite this negativity, he maintains respect for craftsmanship ('nothing cheap') and acknowledges Venom will appeal to committed fans. Overall stance: cautionary, market-skeptical, value-questioning.

### Signals

- **[product_concern]** Venom's playfield criticized for extreme visual clutter with too many inserts, characters, and detail elements competing for attention; design philosophy of 'everything louder than everything else' creates accessibility barrier for non-fans (confidence: high) — Brian Eddy: 'There's so much going on. It is utter confusion when it comes to all the different inserts and characters... sometimes negative space doesn't always have to be filled with stuff.'
- **[product_strategy]** Pro model stripped of all mechanical features; Premium and LE retain mechanisms. Strategy explicitly designed to force home collectors toward higher-priced tiers where margins are superior (confidence: high) — Brian Eddy: 'Stern's ultimate goal is to Trojan horse everybody into buying either an LE or a premium because that's where the margins lie. They will happily yank everything out of the pro.'
- **[market_signal]** Venom expected to depreciate 20-30% within six months; no secondary market strength anticipated; FOMO dead except for AAA-tier IPs; collector appetite suppressed by recent releases and high prices (confidence: high) — Brian Eddy: 'This machine will never sell for more than you buy it today... you could just wait and see, and you'll absolutely be able to get it for easily like 20 or 30% off in six months.' Also: 'FOMO is dead on these kinds of titles.'
- **[business_signal]** Distributors sitting on unsold inventory from Jersey Jack and Spooky; Stern offering incentive deals (1 free LE per 4 games ordered) to move Venom; distributor cash flow severely constrained at current pricing levels (confidence: high) — Brian Eddy: 'Distributors are in a really sticky, icky situation... Stern just sent an email that they are willing to give distributors one more LE if they buy four more games from Stern.' Also citing distributor friends: 'this thing's not selling out.'
- **[design_philosophy]** 32-page ruleset; continued gameplay requiring Stern Insider Connected subscription; extended play sessions (30+ minutes to reach wizard modes); concern that pinball is becoming a video game rather than a 3-5 minute casual experience (confidence: high) — Brian Eddy: 'The rule set for this game is 32 pages long... if we go down this road where pinball is no longer a three ball five to seven minute experience... it gonna take to get all the way through the game... Pinball machine is not a video game.'
- **[sentiment_shift]** Widespread collector hesitation due to recent high-value purchases (Foo Fighters, James Bond, Godfather, Scooby-Doo) and insufficient time to master existing games before new releases arrive; saturation concern reducing urgency (confidence: high) — Brian Eddy: 'a lot of people just got Foo Fighters and they just got James Bond... And now you're going to drop another game with a 32-page rule set into the pinball marketplace at $13,000... I think a lot of us out there are just at the point now where you're like, I don't know if I need another game right now.'
- **[product_concern]** Venom's appeal heavily dependent on existing fan base familiarity with narrative and characters; non-fans find playfield iconography and character references opaque and emotionally disconnected (confidence: high) — Brian Eddy: 'If you're not a Venom fan, you have to ask yourself a question... Are you willing to go deep into this Venom narrative and learn all of this stuff?... When I look down at this Venom game, I have absolutely no idea what any of this stuff is trying to telegraph to me.'
- **[market_signal]** Venom priced at $13K LE/$10K Premium; Brian Eddy views pricing as unjustifiable relative to entertainment value; anticipates broader price resistance as cumulative cost of entry rises; value perception declining (confidence: high) — Brian Eddy: 'This game isn't priced like it's a filler game... And for $13,000 or $10,000, I just expect more... I don't want to drop $13,000 on this game. No way would I drop $10,000 on a premium.'
- **[industry_signal]** Brian Eddy observes that distributors now must significantly increase community engagement and content creation to maintain sales; passive distribution model no longer viable at current price points (confidence: medium) — Brian Eddy: 'the distributors that are making content that are hyper-present every day, they're gonna be the ones that are gonna win out in this battlefield. You can't just rest on your laurels and anything put in a box you're gonna sell, especially at these prices.'
- **[product_concern]** Spider mechanism with dangling targets described as 'clunky looking' and resembling 'three USB sticks hanging from that mechanism'; not groundbreaking mechanically despite novelty (confidence: medium) — Brian Eddy: 'that weird Spider with too many arms and legs who pops out... it is kind of weird and clunky looking. It looks like three USB sticks hanging from that mechanism.'
- **[product_launch]** Venom officially released today by Stern Pinball; available in Pro ($13K estimated), Premium ($10K), and Limited Edition ($13K) variants; marketing video omitted LE variant despite cabinet/trim-only differentiation (confidence: high) — Brian Eddy: 'The game was released today... It's weird that they didn't show the le in the video and then you see the stern le on the website... why wouldn't you just put all three models into that video?'

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## Transcript

 We're in trouble. Something's come along and it's burst a bubble. Yeah, yeah. Uh-oh. We're in trouble. Sit up, sit up, sit up, sit up, sit up, sit up, sit up. Ah, we are finally here. The worst kept secret in all of pinball. Venom from Stern Pinball. Brian Eddy, Zombie Eddy, Dwight Sullivan. The game was released today. I had a very busy day, but I'm looking at the game. I'm looking over what they put into it. I'm looking at the artwork. First impression, right? This is just first impression. I haven't played it. But you know what's interesting is you can kind of tell how the game is going to shoot. It is a fan layout. I mean, it's as fan layout as I've seen Stern do in a long time. Like there's even like lines that just look like a fan. But look, there's a reason why they use this layout all throughout the 90s because it's really inviting for people to play because you can look up the play field and know exactly where to shoot and what it leads to so here's how i want to tackle this i want to tackle this on a few levels i want to give you just my first overall impressions as i saw the game i saw the video i saw seth davis talk about the two formats of the game the pro and the premium it's weird that they didn't show the le in the video and then John Youssi the stern le on the website like does stern not understand that the internet exists. Like, why wouldn't you just put all three models into that video? It's a really strange decision because there's nothing different between the premium and the LE other than the cabinet artwork and the trim, but for some reason they left it out. Here's my first impression on the layout of the game. It looks pretty damn easy to shoot. There is basically nothing in the middle of this game. There's absolutely nothing. It is wide open until you get to like the back half of the game. And then you've got, let's count them, one, two, three, four, five, six, seven, eight, nine. It looks like nine different ways for the ball to go, maybe 10 or 11, right? But these shots are literally just one, two, three, four, five, six, seven, eight, nine, 10, 11, just going from left to right or right to left. That is how this game is going to play. There's no third flipper. There's no interesting shot. It is just a game in which the ball is going to be going from the flippers to the top of the game. It doesn't look like there's going to be a lot of left to right action in the game. And there's not a lot to shoot at other than what's past the middle of the playfield heading towards the top of the playfield. Now, look, this is coming after Foo Fighters, which had a much more original layout. It's coming after games like Rush that had a different layout, games like Godzilla. But again, you have to remember, this is Stern Pinball. They want to make something for everybody, and they are clearly making this game to be more inviting for casual players with the layout. Now, here's the other part. This is a casual inviting layout for a pinball machine. And then I look down at the game itself, and there's so much going on. It is utter confusion when it comes to all the different inserts and characters and what's going on here. I don't really know. And that's the part is like I also heard that the rule set for this game is 32 pages long. We're going to talk more about that. But there's this weird sort of dichotomy going on of simple, easy to understand layout with seemingly overly complex inserts and rule sets to the game. Why do they keep doing this? You shouldn't look down at a pinball machine and just be completely confused about what you're looking at. What's going where? I don't know. There's just something about it that is just utterly confusing to me and not in a good way. There's just seems like so much going on here. I'm not sure why they keep doing this. It's like they're trying to cover every inch with detail. I think it would be good for Stern to understand that sometimes negative space doesn't always have to be filled with stuff. That that can kind of put an emphasis on certain things. Because right now, I don't really know what to look at. All right, so we'll talk more about that. But then let's go over to the mechanisms in the game. Yes, there are mechanisms in the game, which is good. Now, the big debate is in the pro version of the game, Stern has basically taken out all of the mechanisms in the game. I mean, if you want to get the mechs, all the fun stuff in this game, you're going to have to buy the premium or the LE. People, what did you think was going to happen? I've been telling people this for the longest time. Stern's ultimate goal is to Trojan horse everybody into buying either an LE or a premium because that's where the margins lie. They will happily yank everything out of the pro and just make the pro version of the game what an operator would buy. So if you want to buy a pro for the home, you really are going to be missing out on a lot of stuff mechanically in the game. Because you've got the carnage that slides back up into like, I don't know, like that sanitarium. I think you might get the bell tower in the pro Then you got that Argo lab that rotates and turns into three different shots It looks like there a target Then it opens up into like a loop shot that goes back into the habit trail And then you got that weird Spider with too many arms and legs who pops out and has those three dangling targets hanging from that Spider-Man. I mean, when I was looking at that mech, it is kind of weird and clunky looking. It looks like three USB sticks hanging from that mechanism. And so I watched the video over and over again. I watched it over and over again. I was looking at the artwork. You know, look, it's Zombie Eddie. I love his art style. I was looking at all the details on the play field. And my first thought was this. If you're a Venom fan, I bet you're eating all of this up. I am not a huge Venom fan. So I was looking at this utterly confused about who all these characters are, what is happening. I have not been someone who's been plugged into the Venom narrative. And I think if you're not a Venom fan, you have to ask yourself a question. And I mean this. You have to ask yourself a question. Are you willing to go deep into this Venom narrative and learn all of this stuff? And in the process of learning all of this stuff, do you feel like it's going to click with you emotionally? I mean, I'm looking at this game right now and how crowded the play field is and how there's all this stuff going on. And none of this speaks to me on an emotional level the same way this stuff does in Pulp fiction, which has so much less going on from an artistic standpoint. When you look at Pulp Fiction, you can see and identify with everything in that game based on the iconic movie we've all seen. When I look down at this Venom game, I have absolutely no idea what any of this stuff is trying to telegraph to me. And again, I'm not a Venom fan. But when you look at Foo Fighters, I feel like it's a little bit easier to understand what's happening in the game, what's happening in the art package. And I think this might suffer a little bit from just a lot, right? Everything louder than everything else is not always the best approach to try to get people to walk away to understand, you know, what is happening. And if you think about it like this, there's a lot of different ways you can go with like what you want to put on a pinball play field. Like it could be depicting a scene. It could be depicting all of the characters. And I think in this game they obviously are showcasing all of the characters and then all of the different modes and different ways to score and multipliers and what you're going to use with the action button all of that's going to be happening and telegraphed to you on this play field now not seeing this game in action you know just by looking at it i can tell you right now for a lot of you out there you're not going to want to put in the time to understand everything happening in this game and I think it begs a very simple question. Is Stern Pinball going overboard when they think about the rule sets of a pinball machine? Are they turning pinball machines into video games in which the pinball machine itself is becoming the controller? And should pinball be easier to understand? Should you walk up to a machine and see less on it from like an artistic standpoint, from an insert standpoint? And should you let the actual world under glass be what comes at you? As I look at it right now, it's like everything's competing with itself for my attention. And again, it's just hard for me to sort of fall into this Venom world and really understand why all of this stuff is here. Again, I don't know what they were going for, like what they wanted people to sort of feel as they looked down at the game. I think the mechs look interesting, nothing totally groundbreaking. obviously some original stuff, but here's my overall feeling, right? Game looks good. I think Venom fans are going to be happy, right? I don't see anything here that I dislike. Like there's nothing here that makes me be like, oh, that's super cheap or, oh, how could they do that? Like, oh, that's not going to be fun. I think this game is going to be fun to shoot. I think this game is going to be super fun for Venom fans. I think this game is going to be fine, right? And I've always felt this way about Venom. I never felt like it was going to be this AAA theme, like blow us away game. It always felt like it was a little bit of a filler game to get to their bigger releases like Jaws and Back to the Future and other stuff that is coming down the road. But here's the problem. This game isn't priced like it's a filler game. It is priced at $13,000 and a premium is $10,000. And they also are starting to do more stuff now because there's so much in this game that you can continue where you left off with your pinball experience, right? That's like a video game. And you have to be a member of Stern Insider Connected to implement that into your gameplay. And I'm getting a little nervous with this because if we go down this road where pinball is no longer a three ball five to seven minute experience and we want to start coding these games to be half hour 45 minutes one hour It gonna take to get all the way through the game and then you gonna require people to sign up for like Downloadable content and become an Insider Connected member to make their way through the game I don like it I don't want pinball to go down this road. You can make a pinball machine hard. You can make a pinball machine challenging. You can make it rewarding to play it over and over again. But man, I'm starting to get a little bit nervous. we're starting to see software absolutely take over the entire pinball experience. And the right amount of software is the perfect amount of software. And I think Lyman Sheets understood that. He understood how to code a game where in three to five minutes, you're going to have a very rewarding pinball experience. For a very good player, you'll get further into the game in maybe 20 minutes. But now I feel like it's getting a little bit crazy. it's getting a little bit crazy how much they want to bake into these games. And look, I'm just going to say this. I don't want to have to spend 30 minutes every time I play a pinball machine to see wow magical moments. I don't. If I want to do that, I'll go play freaking Diablo 4. If I want to do that, I'll go play Xbox and PlayStation. I'll go play Last of Us on PlayStation. Pinball machine is not a video game. And I think we're starting to see those lines blurred a little bit. Now, back to the point that this thing is priced like every other Stern now. My major takeaway after seeing this game, after seeing the mechs, after seeing Spider-Man pop out, after seeing the bell tower, after seeing Carnage slide up the ramp, I had one simple feeling. It felt like, okay, this is a pinball machine. This is a toy. It felt like a toy. Like it looks like a toy, especially when you have comic book artwork on a pinball experience. It felt like a toy. It felt like a toy that I would spend at most on this game, at most, like $75,000 to $8,000 for an LE. I would spend maybe like $7,000 for a premium. And man, I wish it was still $5,500 or $5,000 for a pro. When I look down at this game, I'm like, no way would I ever drop $13,000 on this game. No way would I drop $10,000 on a premium. I think this is going to be one of those games that makes so many of you just pause and wait and see because you know that if you want to get an LE, you're absolutely going to be able to get one in just a few months for less than $13,000. I've already heard from my distributor friends, this thing's not selling out. And Stern just sent an email. You're not going to hear this on Naps Arcade. They just sent an email that they are willing to give distributors one more LE if they buy four more games from Stern. There's a real issue happening behind the scenes in the pinball space. At these prices, it's not just Venom at these prices. At these prices, distributors are in a really sticky, icky situation. And it's not just Stern who's put them there. Remember, these distros are sitting on a lot of unsold inventory from Spooky, a lot of unsold inventory from Jersey Jack Pinball, and now they're being asked to fork over all this money for Venom when the buyers might not be there. Yeah, the one that's most likely to sell will be the LE, but even at 1,000 units for 13K, I don't think you're going to see people kicking down the door to get one. And the other reason why I don't think you're going to see it is a lot of people just got Foo Fighters and they just got James Bond. And if you got those two games, you recently got them, right? And you spent a lot of money on them. And none of you have really spent enough time on both of those games to unpack everything in them. And now you're going to drop another game with a 32-page rule set into the pinball marketplace at $13,000 or $10,000. And I think a lot of us out there are just at the point now where you're like, I don't know if I need another game right now. I don't know if I need another deep game right now because I haven't even really gotten into the game I just bought. And think about it. If you go two LEs in a row, $26,000 on two pinball machines where you barely have enough time to scratch the surface of what's in Foo Fighters. And then you're going to go learn the rule set for this game? I think everyone's just going to wait it out. I mean, I'm not even mentioning all the people that maybe just got Godfather or you just got Scooby-Doo. I think we're at a point now where we're realizing this is what happens when so much comes out on top of itself. and these games cost so much money, you're really probably wondering, do I really need four cars, five cars to just get from A to B? And if you want to get from A to B in the pinball world and get a game that plays well and has deep rule sets, well, what happens in a world in which every game now delivers that? And what happens in a world in which you know you don't need another one three months from now? Because three months, you haven't even gotten close to getting to the final wizard modes on any of the games you currently own And that the thing is that you can just look at these games in a vacuum You know Seth Davis wants you to look at these in a vacuum He wants you to buy the only game that on the line now And I think what we going to start to see is more and more of these dealers and distros are going to have a harder time committing to these kinds of launches if they keep coming out, especially if they're sitting on older inventory. It's weird to think about this. You hear nobody talk about this, but a Jersey Jack game that is a flop is also going to hurt Stern Pinball. Any pinball machine that is a flop that dealers invested in is going to hurt Stern Pinball because dealers are the ones who are out of money. And unless those themes are AAA themes where the dealers feel confident that they're going to sell every one they order, you're going to start to see dealers tightening their wallets more and more, and they're not going to be able to commit. I mean, imagine trying to commit to Venom. Let's just say it's 10 premiums. You're going to write Stern a check for $80,000. Like you've just frozen $80,000 and you sent that money to Stern. And now you got to go find 10 customers. And that is why I think a lot of distributors now are going to have to realize something. They're going to have to get better at attracting customers. They're going to have to start engaging the community even further. and the distributors that are making content that are hyper-present every day, they're gonna be the ones that are gonna win out in this battlefield. You can't just rest on your laurels and anything put in a box you're gonna sell, especially at these prices, everybody. You know, there's a lot of really interesting things happening and this is why I love pinball because it's not just as simple as artwork and code and mechs. There's a lot happening in this hobby and we've never seen pinball get this expensive We've never seen so many companies trying to sell you pinball machines. And we've never seen such a variety, right, of themes and designers and approaches to pinball. I would argue that pinball doesn't need all of this. I would also say that pinball can't absorb all of this. And that's why today the ultimate feeling I had was just relief. I don't want one. I'm going to keep $13,000 in my pocket. This machine will never sell for more than you buy it today. Remember that. this machine will never sell for more money than you buy it today. And that's maybe how it always should have been. Scalping is dead. And unless you're a diehard Venom fanatic that's going to bolt this game to the floor, there's a very sobering reality now. If you want this game, you could just wait and see, and you'll absolutely be able to get it for easily like 20 or 30% off in six months. Everybody knows that. What do you think is going to happen to this game when Jaws comes out? When Back to the Future comes out? When everyone tries to move on from Godzilla? Not because it's a bad game, but because you've been playing Godzilla for three years and now you want Keith Elwin's next title. What do you think is going to happen when everybody looks down and realizes, oh my gosh, this isn't the cheap and cheerful hobby anymore. You're not just losing $500. You are now losing thousands of dollars if you rush into these games. Look, FOMO is dead on these kinds of titles. The only place that FOMO is still alive is with a AAA game. I think Venom suffers a little bit from the fact that we've known about this title forever. We've known who's doing the artwork forever. We've known who's designing it forever. And nothing that we saw today is absolutely like throwing you back in your seat. It's not. There's nothing you saw today that is going to throw you back in your seat. The only thing that's going to throw you back in your seat is the 32-page booklet on the rules of the game that you now have to study in order to learn how to approach this game. I think they're getting too complex with the rule sets. I think there's too much going on on the play field, and I can't wait to play it. I know it's going to be fun, and I'm going to have more fun than anyone who buys this game because I'm going to be able to play it with $20 and then go home with $13,000 still in my bank account. Everybody, I'll talk to you soon. We're going to talk more about this game as we see the gameplay, but those are just my first impressions on this game. It looks like a really fun pinball toy that Stern is bringing out into the world. But for $13,000 or $10,000, I just expect more. And I'm not sure anything Stern makes will live up to those expectations because they've doubled the price on everything over the last five years. I think the more and more we're asked to shell out the money, the more and more we're all going to start retreating. Everybody, let me know how you feel. Am I way off? Am I incorrect? Let me know how you feel. Hit me up on the Patreon page. Email me privately. Whatever you want to do. I'm curious what your thoughts are on this game and if you moved in on one after seeing what you saw today. Later. March on the double. Uh-oh, we're in trouble. Something's come along and it's burst our bubble.

_(Acquisition: groq_whisper, Enrichment: v3)_

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*Exported from Journalist Tool on 2026-04-13 | Item ID: 81630b90-befc-4a2d-8662-84fa42d50f85*