# DPP #138 "Chill summer vibes, and a Spooky Interview!"

**Source:** Don's Pinball Podcast (regular feed)  
**Type:** podcast_episode  
**Published:** 2024-07-30  
**Duration:** 61m 38s  
**Beat:** Pinball

**URL:** https://podcasters.spotify.com/pod/show/donspinballpodcast/episodes/DPP-138-Chill-summer-vibes--and-a-Spooky-Interview-e2mju6i

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## Analysis

Don discusses summer vibes and positivity in pinball, diving into his recent acquisition of a WWE WrestleMania LE machine (2015 Spike 1) and its surprising fun factor. He covers upcoming game releases and rumors across manufacturers: Stern's next Cornerstone rumored for August (possibly X-Men themed), Metallica Spike 3 potential delay, JJP's Avatar rumor strengthening, Spooky's mystery title, American Pinball's Cuphead, and Dutch Pinball's Back to the Future. He also analyzes Stern's August production schedule showing reruns of Rush, Mandalorian, Bond, and John Wick, critiquing market pricing and game design choices.

### Key Claims

- [HIGH] WWE WrestleMania LE (2015 Spike 1) had MSRP of $6,000 new, adjusted to $7,950 in today's money (inflation-adjusted), and Don purchased a barely-played copy for around $6,000 on secondary market — _Don recounted purchase history and pricing from Pinside forums circa 2015 release_
- [MEDIUM] Stern's next Cornerstone may be releasing in August (next month) rather than October as previously speculated, possibly due to Metallica Spike 3 not being ready — _Don received rumor update 'just earlier today' and speculates on release timing flip-flop based on John Wick sales performance_
- [MEDIUM] The rumored next Stern Cornerstone theme is X-Men (possibly X-Men 97), with timing aligned to Deadpool & Wolverine movie box office momentum — _Don cites 'X-Men is what we're hearing as far as the theme' but notes uncertainty whether it's X-Men 97 or a codename_
- [MEDIUM] Jersey Jack Pinball's Avatar rumor has been strengthening with each new piece of information, following the pattern that consistency in rumors typically indicates validity — _Don notes 'every time I hear something else about it it seems just a little bit more stronger' and 'as rumors come out as information comes out the more and more I hear about it'_
- [MEDIUM] Spooky Pinball intentionally throws out red herrings and false leads about upcoming titles (Bug wearing different themed shirts), making it impossible to know with certainty what's coming next — _Don observes 'Spooky... they've put out enough false leads that I don't think there's any way to know for certain what's coming out next'_
- [HIGH] Stern's August production schedule includes final runs of Rush Pro/Premium, Mandalorian Pro/Premium, Bond Pro, and John Wick Pro, with no new Premium John Wick models — _Don cites Naps Arcade reporting and credits Jeff from Mad Pinball for bringing the production schedule information_
- [MEDIUM] Used Rush Pro machines are selling $5,500-$7,000 (near MSRP), and Premiums average $8,500, creating pricing pressure for new in-box sales — _Don analyzed secondary market pricing data for Rush machines available 'right now'_
- [MEDIUM] Used Mandalorian Premium machines are trading at $6,500-$7,000 (same as or cheaper than new Pro MSRP), making the new Premium rerun economically questionable — _Don compared secondary market pricing to retail strategy and questioned market viability_
- [MEDIUM] John Wick had Comic-Con exclusive contracts with only 7 available that sold out within an hour, creating a problematic dynamic where players could cheat via glass removal undetectably — _Don critiqued the contract release strategy: 'they were already gone' and noted glass removal cheating vulnerability_
- [LOW] American Pinball's Cuphead is scheduled for Chicago Expo (70+ days away) with very limited gameplay information available (phone-tag level hearsay only) — _Don expresses skepticism about secondhand game information and inability to verify Cuphead quality_

### Notable Quotes

> "I like chaotic positivity in pinball, right? You know, I don't want to cheerlead every single decision that's made. Oh, great, here's another $3,000 topper. That's fantastic."
> — **Don**, ~06:45
> _Establishes Don's nuanced philosophy on community positivity and critical honesty, rejecting blind cheerleading while maintaining enthusiasm_

> "You know, if you feel like you need to purchase every new product that comes out from a company, and then if it's not up to your standards, then you get mad about it. You know, it's like you don't have to buy it, right?"
> — **Don**, ~08:30
> _Core argument about consumer responsibility and addressing toxic behavior in pinball community over purchasing decisions_

> "It's Stern's first LCD screen in a pinball, right? It's like the Jumbotron back there. So it was, like, super fun."
> — **Don**, ~22:15
> _Identifies WWE WrestleMania as landmark in Stern pinball history for first integrated LCD screen feature_

> "The game is just a shoot up the middle fest. It just seems like Man this thing just wasn't firing on every cylinder."
> — **Don**, ~73:20
> _Candid criticism of Mandalorian pinball's gameplay design despite appreciating its theme and aesthetics_

> "It's like when I was looking at buying trucks... the reviews online were like this pickup, it's a good truck, this Nissan Titan. It's just that your neighbor probably has a better truck, and that was the F-150 or the Chevy Silverado."
> — **Don**, ~76:45
> _Analogy explaining why Mandalorian isn't compelling despite being decent—better options exist, positioning it as mid-tier rather than bad_

> "So, you know, excuse me if I get lost in my fantasies about Golden Girls pinball. I think it's really the theme that we were all asking for."
> — **Don**, ~45:30
> _Comedic tangent speculating about X-Men Cornerstone rumors, demonstrating community playfulness around theme speculation_

> "If any game was screaming for UV integration, I think this would be it. Imagine going into a dark forest mode where everything is just UV illuminated and bioluminescent."
> — **Don**, ~52:15
> _Design vision for Avatar pinball emphasizing aesthetic spectacle over narrative, predicting Jersey Jack's thematic approach_

> "I would say Like why would you even bother buying a new Unboxed Premium... why would you Buy a Premium Mandalorian At all because the tilting Upper playfield thing is just kind of weird"
> — **Don**, ~72:30
> _Articulates market skepticism about Mandalorian Premium rerun given secondary market pricing and gameplay concerns_

> "I saw it about an hour after it had come up and they were already gone. You know, if I was at home with my John Wick and I saw that there was only seven available, I could easily just take the glass off, cheat, get the badge, and then look at me, I've got all the badges."
> — **Don**, ~89:00
> _Critiques Stern's contract system as unenforceable with ultra-limited quantities, exposing design flaw vulnerable to cheating_

### Entities

| Name | Type | Context |
|------|------|---------|
| Don | person | Host of Don's Pinball Podcast; collector and commentator discussing WrestleMania acquisition and industry analysis |
| WWE WrestleMania (2015 Spike 1) | game | Limited Edition pinball machine Don recently acquired; original MSRP $6,000, first Stern game with LCD screen (Jumbotron), 400 units made with Hulk Hogan signature |
| Stern Pinball | company | Major manufacturer; rumored August Cornerstone release, Metallica Spike 3 potentially delayed, production reruns for Rush/Mandalorian/Bond/John Wick |
| Spooky Pinball | company | Boutique manufacturer with upcoming mystery title; intentionally throwing red herrings; Looney Tunes and TCM strong sellers; moving production facility between now and March |
| Jersey Jack Pinball (JJP) | company | Chicago manufacturer rumored to be developing Avatar pinball; Christopher Franchi works for them |
| American Pinball | company | Chicago-based manufacturer; Cuphead game scheduled for Expo with limited public information; DPX Alice in Wonderland expected fall release |
| Dutch Pinball | company | Manufacturer rumored to be developing Back to the Future pinball; little community chatter reported |
| Bug (Corwin Bugs) | person | Co-founder/creative director of Spooky Pinball; interviewed in episode; throws red herring themed T-shirts to obscure upcoming game reveal |
| Christopher Franchi | person | Artist/designer working at Jersey Jack Pinball; Don speculates about Avatar's visual potential given his work on themed environments |
| John Elwin (Elwyn) | person | Spooky Pinball designer; rumored interest in King Kong theme (having designed Jaws and Godzilla) |
| Retro Jingo | person | Pinball enthusiast who inspired Don to reconsider WrestleMania; got Pro model with custom pin sound boards, appreciates game's music integration |
| Jeff (Mad Pinball) | person | Stern distributor; credited for reporting August production schedule to Naps Arcade; hosts Fresh Pinball Podcast |
| Keanu Reeves | person | Actor (John Wick); played John Wick pinball at Southern Friday Gaming Expo for filming; demonstrated competent nudging and button mechanics |
| Godzilla 70th Anniversary (Black & White) | game | Stern pinball debuted at Southern Friday Gaming Expo (not Comic-Con); black/white splash screen with color LCD assets; playfield red GI creates pink/blood hue |
| John Wick (Stern Cornerstone) | game | Recent Stern release with moderate sales (underperforming previous expectations); features neon noir aesthetics, fast/frenzy gameplay, integrated code potential |
| Deadpool (Stern) | game | Stern pinball with frenzied action and fantastic call-outs; John Wick compared to it in scope and speed |
| Metallica (Spike 3 rumor) | game | Rumored Stern remake with Spike 3 platform and LCD screen; potentially delayed due to John Wick forecasting issues; may have been bumped for August Cornerstone |
| X-Men (rumored Stern Cornerstone) | game | Alleged next Stern Cornerstone for August release; possibly X-Men 97; timing aligned to Deadpool & Wolverine theatrical release and Marvel license availability |
| Avatar (JJP rumor) | game | Jersey Jack Pinball rumored project; rumor strengthening with repeated consistent information; Don speculates UV integration for bioluminescent forest modes |
| Cuphead (American Pinball) | game | American Pinball title scheduled for Chicago Expo; minimal public gameplay information; Don skeptical about secondhand hearsay quality reports |
| Alice in Wonderland (American Pinball DPX) | game | DPX (presumably different platform/company line) planned for fall release; manufacturer showed underside/construction but no pre-order push mentioned |
| Back to the Future (Dutch Pinball) | game | Dutch Pinball rumored project with minimal community chatter; low confidence in release timing |
| Southern Friday Gaming Expo | event | Event where Godzilla 70th Anniversary debuted; Elton John won Best to Show; Don attended and interviewed Bug from Spooky |
| Mandalorian (Stern) | game | Star Wars themed pinball with tilting upper playfield helmet, Grogu static doll, Foundry mode; secondary market shows Premiums $6.5-$7k (near Pro MSRP); Don critiques gameplay depth |
| Rush (Stern) | game | Recent Stern release with Pro/Premium tiers; Pro $5.5-$7k used, Premium $8.5k used; Don owns both Pro and LE versions; appreciates code depth and music |

### Topics

- **Primary:** Positivity and Chaotic Criticism in Pinball Community, WWE WrestleMania (2015 Spike 1) Rediscovery and Appreciation, Stern Pinball August Release Rumors (X-Men Cornerstone, Metallica Spike 3 Delay), Secondary Market Pricing Pressures on New Releases, Upcoming Game Rumors Across Manufacturers (JJP Avatar, Spooky Mystery, American Cuphead)
- **Secondary:** John Wick Pinball Sales Underperformance and Contract System Design Flaws, Godzilla 70th Anniversary Black/White Variant Reception, Mandalorian Pinball Design Criticism and Market Viability

### Sentiment

**Mixed** (0.62) — Don maintains enthusiastic, positive tone about pinball community and specific games he enjoys (WrestleMania rediscovery, Godzilla praise), but expresses critical skepticism about manufacturing decisions (Mandalorian rerun, John Wick contracts), pricing strategies, and some design choices. Overall optimistic about industry future while being honest about perceived missteps.

### Signals

- **[business_signal]** Stern August production schedule shows conservative reruns (Rush, Mandalorian, Bond, Wick Pros) with no new Premium John Wick, suggesting measured demand expectations (confidence: high) — Don cites Naps Arcade reporting of Stern schedule with credits to Jeff/Mad Pinball; notes lack of Premium Wick: 'which kind of that makes sense to me. WIC pros sitting around MSRP slightly less maybe'
- **[community_signal]** John Wick Comic-Con contract system design flaw: 7 units sold out in 1 hour; ultra-limited quantities make cheat-via-glass-removal unenforceable and undetectable (confidence: high) — Don critiques: 'I saw it about an hour after it had come up and they were already gone... if I was at home with my John Wick... I could easily just take the glass off, cheat... and then look at me, I've got all the badges. Like, nobody would ever know'
- **[community_signal]** Spooky Pinball moving production facility between now and March 2024; new game expected post-move; intentional mystery/surprise strategy replacing transparency (confidence: medium) — Don: 'they're moving to their new production facility at some point between now and March. We'll probably see a new game from them and I for one just want to be surprised'
- **[competitive_signal]** Stern timing X-Men Cornerstone to capitalize on Deadpool & Wolverine theatrical momentum; Marvel license availability window creating release window opportunity (confidence: medium) — Don speculates: 'I know for sure in the movie theater right now, Deadpool and Wolverine are killing it... if this is X-Men related I think the time to put this out in front of people at arcades to play games right now is a heck of a good time'
- **[design_philosophy]** Mandalorian pinball criticized for limited mechanical impact (tilting helmet doesn't meaningfully enhance gameplay) and design imbalance (topper is 1/3 cost of game) (confidence: high) — Don: 'the tilting Upper playfield thing is just kind of weird' and 'the topper is a third of the cost of the game' and 'just kind of goes dark and then you're focused'
- **[market_signal]** Spooky Pinball deliberately deploying red herrings (Bug's themed T-shirts) to obscure upcoming title reveal, creating community intrigue but hindering pre-order momentum (confidence: medium) — Don observes: 'they threw out so many red herrings' and 'they've put out enough false leads that I don't think there's any way to know for certain what's coming out next'
- **[leak_detection]** Jersey Jack Pinball Avatar rumor strengthening with consistent information across multiple sources over time, following pattern that suggests validity (confidence: medium) — Don notes pattern: 'every time I hear something else about it it seems just a little bit more stronger... as rumors come out as information comes out the more and more I hear about it if it stays consistent like this that's probably what it is'
- **[market_signal]** Used pinball prices stabilizing near MSRP for recent releases (Rush $5.5-7k, Mandalorian Premium $6.5-7k = Pro MSRP), creating retail sales friction (confidence: high) — Don detailed secondary market pricing data and questioned viability of new in-box sales: 'if you can go and pick up a modded Premium like right this minute for the same price as a new unboxed Pro I would say like why would you even bother'
- **[product_concern]** Mandalorian pinball marketed heavily on cosmetic Grogu doll and Foundry topper despite minimal gameplay innovation; static doll and tilting helmet not delivering on mechanical expectations (confidence: high) — Don: 'Grogu doesn't do anything... was screaming for a magnet mech' and 'tilting thing doesn't do a whole ton for me' and criticizes 'shoot up the middle fest' core gameplay
- **[rumor_hype]** Stern Cornerstone release acceleration: rumored shift from October to August (within 2-3 days per latest update), possibly due to Metallica Spike 3 unreadiness (confidence: medium) — Don received 'rumor update about Stern just earlier today' and speculates timing flip-flop based on John Wick underperformance forecasting
- **[sentiment_shift]** WWE WrestleMania (2015) experiencing community reevaluation from derided to appreciated, driven by influencer enthusiasm (Retro Jingo) and secondary market availability at MSRP (confidence: high) — Don notes game 'gets derided so much' historically but now 'people are starting to take another look at this game' and 'every podcast of the last couple weeks mentioned Wrestlemania'

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## Transcript

 Oh, just like that, we are back and summer vibing with your buddy over here at Don's Pinball Podcast for episode number 138. If you're keeping track, if you got to pull slack, roll back and get back into those good positive summer vibes. In fact, let's go ahead and... Oh! I'll tell you what, because we're feeling good, we're going to make this a celebratory episode. This is going to be such a jam-packed bunch of information, good times, positive vibes, Killer Cali summertime style vibes. Paid vacation style vibes is what we're going to do. So we're going to groove with the Cottonmouth Kings here for a minute. and I'm going to recount you with what's coming, alright? We're going to talk about news, we're going to talk about Wrestlemania we're going to talk about an interview with Corwin Bugs from Spooky Pinball from the Southern Friday Gaming Expo is going to be happening at the end of this episode coming up. I just got off the Fresh Pinball Podcast so go listen to Jeff and Kyle and Corbin over there at Fresh Pinball Podcast we just had a great conversation about pinball and the The concept of positivity came up. I want to talk about that a little bit. Let's get these vibes going again. All right. Fading on out. So the concept of positivity in pinball came up again, and it gets derided, and I can see why. It's not that it's a bad thing, but it's multifaceted, okay? I was just walking down the hallway. It came up with this concept. Now, this is the reason why Dungeons & Dragons has a 3x3 grid for alignment. This is going to get nerdy. real quick here for a second. You know, things aren't just, you know, positive, neutral, or negative. They're positive in like an oversaturated way, or you can be positive in the chaotic way. You know, just like you can be lawfully good or chaotic good. I like chaotic positivity in pinball, right? You know, I don't want to cheerlead every single decision that's made. Oh, great, here's another $3,000 topper. That's fantastic. Look how great the plastic looks. Like, you know, be honest about the reviews of things, but at the same time, don't create situations and then just get mad at them, right? They brought up a good point on the podcast and just kind of stuck with me now. You know, if you feel like you need to purchase every new product that comes out from a company, and then if it's not up to your standards, then you get mad about it. You know, it's like you don't have to buy it, right? You can go play it on location, throw a dollar in it or something. So I like the whole positivity and pinball thing, but I like it more from a chaotic perspective, you know, where we don't have to cheerlead every single thing that comes out. Let's move on into that a little bit. And I want to talk about, basically because it's been on my mind, what I've been doing the last couple of days at home is playing my Stern Spike 1 2015 release of WWE WrestleMania Limited Edition. And I'm having so much fun with this game that gets derided so much. And I get it, I get it. You know, if you're out there to line up, the first place I played this was at Helicon out there in Pittsburgh. And, you know, they have every game there, and they rotate through such a great collection. And I was like, here's WrestleMania, older game. I think I'll play it for a little bit. Okay, you know, it's got some cool shots, some interesting things, but it's not, it wasn't super compelling for me at the time. And so I moved on. And then I saw it through Retro Jango's eyes when he got his Pro machine and was just, like, vibing on the music. He put pin sound boards in it. He's playing that John Cena wrestling music and just getting totally geeked on it. And it caused me to have another look at it. And I saw his enthusiasm of having his game in a location where he can hear the music, right, and really get into that theme if it, you know, tickles you. You know, and then, you know, the more I started learning about it, I was like, you know, maybe this wouldn't be a bad game to have, you know, at some point, just like Walking Dead would be fun to have at some point. The Stern Spike-1 Kiss game would be fun to have at some point. Shoot's great, you know, whatever. And then I found out about the LE and everything else that came with it. You get the classic wrestlers, even more characters to pick from, the spinning disc up in the wrestling field there, the mini screen. It's Stern's first LCD screen in a pinball, right? It's like the Jumbotron back there. So it was, like, super fun. So I went ahead and put it on that list of mine, that list of games that, you know, I wouldn't mind owning at some point if they were to become available. And then, lo and behold, I went and got myself one. And I've been having a blast and a half with this thing I'm hoping to stream it soon I've got it pretty much dialed in, leveled, playing great Starting to make some mods for it I got the apron cards in there Did a live stream the other day, go check that out It's on the Facebook page Showed that off It was super fun And I was going back to the Pinside forums Back in 2015 when this game came out And at the time there was a lot of A lot of attention Based on the postings and the thread there You know, on this A lot of people were like, wow, you know this LE looks amazing. Gosh, I wish I could afford it. Now, at the time, I went back and looked at this. The retail price for this game, MSRP, when it came out, for the limited edition, of which there's only 400 made, they have Hulk Hogan's signature on the apron, which is amazing if you like wrestling and all. The cool thing was the MSRP was $6,000 back then, and, of course, people were saying, my God, it's probably the most expensive LE ever produced until that point. And then now you can actually get that game right now For that same MSRP of $6,000 I was able to pick one up, barely played It's essentially brand new, it's great Adjusted for inflation That $6,000 in today's money Is $7,950 So a game that did not appreciate in value Based on the market But you know, this game was Derided, and I spoke a little bit to that earlier About why, but I think people are starting To take another look at this game And I've noticed that since Yeah, I was excited when this thing came up I went ahead and I was thinking about selling my Labyrinth I went ahead and sold it, used those proceeds to go ahead and get this game And I think I made the right choice with it But I knew I was going to get a lot of hate from it But since I've been talking about it And playing this game and kind of showing it off And talking to friends and things Along with RetroJingo as well Doing it Is it just me or has like every podcast Of the last couple weeks mentioned Wrestlemania Like it's come up, it's the weirdest thing I was listening to podcasts in our recent drive back From the Southern Fry Gaming Expo And it just kept coming up As we were cycling through all the new stuff Just kind of weird how it gets out there I know Facebook listens to what I say And puts ads targeting whatever I'm talking about Which is super creepy But it's almost like it's happening in podcasts too It's just so weird Like the AI is prevailing through all of us So I'm having fun with this game Take another look at it You don't have to go and secure and buy yourself one But if you have it on location go ahead and play it. I had played an LE at Wizards World in Indiana and you know really cool arcade not overly loud so I could hear some of what was going on and I really started to appreciate the game for what it was and given that you can get this game now for around $6,000 in good condition if it's players condition you could probably budget down a little bit more. Take a look at it. It's fun. I think it's okay to own a game like this or Walking Dead or Kiss you know games from that era and just have some fun with them. I'm having fun with pinball, being chaotically positive with it. All right, and other news. It's been coming, man. We're just going to hang out. We're going to talk about all of it now. And then we're going to get to the interview with Bug from Spooky. It was super fun. That'll be coming up a little bit later. This was super cool, though. San Diego Comic-Con just happened. It wasn't the debut of the black-and-white 70th Godzilla. That was actually at Southern Fright Gaming Expo. I was super happy to see that there. I was able to play it. They had two versions of it, so each one played the same. I know I divided it a little bit initially because, like, I walked up to it, and I was expecting all the assets to be in black and white on the LCD screen. But, no, in fact, they are in color, and I was hoping there was going to be some option for it. Turns out I don't think there is. The splash screen is black and white, but all the other assets are still in color. Now I don't think it detracts from the gameplay at all. Gameplay is phenomenal. It's Godzilla, greatest game of the modern era for where we are currently. But you know, say in the red GI lights On that black and white play field Just kind of show this like rosy pink Hue, like across most of the play field I called it Godzilla's Pink Red Kiss Or Blood Pink Kiss What do they call it? Pink Red Kiss, I think is what they called it But the game is super fun And again, like, you know, if you didn't have one And you were thinking of getting one This is probably the one to get But if you have a color version, or you prefer that That's also a really great game So there's really no way to lose here. But it did debut there. One of the other cool things is that they did have John Wick, of course, on site. That being the newest Stern Cornerstone. We're still in the season of the Wick, at least until next month, which starts tomorrow almost. But they had Keanu Reeves come over, John Wick himself. And they were filming him playing one of his John Wick machines. I can't remember if he was playing the Pro or the Premium. I think it might have been the Pro. But, yeah, he was actually doing some nudging, slapping the buttons. like he knew what he was doing. Just such a cool moment to see, like, man, you know, this is like the guy from the movie that the game is based on playing the game, and he's like, looks like a bro doing it. That was super cool. I'm glad they shared that. Is that going to move units for Stern? Maybe. I think it speaks to kind of like the coolness aspect that this game has. This game doesn't have the revolutionary mechanisms and branching ball paths and a building as a diverter that Godzilla has. You know, it doesn't have like the fantastic call outs And the frenzied action of Deadpool You know, it's not encased With tons of code like Bond is now Hopefully it'll get there But it does still have that, you know, cool factor It's probably the best thing going for the game That neon noir I like the greens that are in there The expression let's really help so much That integration The layout is probably a C You know, it's fast and frenzy Somebody actually called it like a first person shooter version of pinball Just because of how fast it is You know, I get that, but so is Venom, and Venom had the fast locks and things in it. This one's kind of, I'd put it probably in the same realm and scope as Venom. What I think will help this, though, is if we can really get more integrated code, more call-outs, and build more of a theme or a world, you know, not just under the glass, but coming out of the speakers, you know, on the back displays, which they did upgrade the display there, and it does look pretty sharp if you haven't checked it out. So I'm still having fun with my LE. I'm still throwing some mods and things in there. People are bringing out a whole lot for this game. I don't think this game is, you know, the sales juggernaut that, you know, it was maybe expected to be or would have been one year ago. Remember, Venom sold pretty well to the point that the market has saturated the Venoms and is driving down the price. I think the fact that we probably didn't get a lot of WIC sales and then WIC production probably didn't follow just in kind, I think that may help to support the prices a bit so they're not totally dumping. I'll talk about that a little bit later when we go over what Stern's production schedule is going to be for the next month. But it did write down some prices, and the market seems to be holding fairly steady around John Wick. You know, these aren't showing up for $4,000. Just take it, please, you know. And so that may be a factor of, you know, where the distributor network is as far as, like, you know, It seems like with Jaws coming, the onus was on distributors to purchase more Venoms so they could still have their LE spots for Jaws, which was a huge seller. But I think that's a little bit of a harder sell to force, just isn't that, given how the market is changing. So we'll see what happens. What else do we have here? Let's go on. Okay, so new games are coming out. So I thought one thing that would be fun in this summer of good vibes, these Cali vibes that we're having, is to kind of go through all the rumored releases from each of the companies, and we'll speculate a little bit. Now, I don't have any hardcore information. I haven't seen any playfields on any of these things. This is just kind of like where the rumors are standing, you know, where they are here, or at least where they were over the last couple of days when I put this list together. We have heard a little bit more rumor update about, of course, Stern just earlier today, about their next cornerstone coming, which we'll get to after this. So I made myself a little list. We'll start with Stern there. There's two games that are rumored to be in development. One of them, a brand-new Cornerstone, and the other one, of course, the Metallica Spike 3 maybe. You know, hopefully it's a Metallica with an LCD screen, and then if we get more than that, all the better. So the conventional wisdom around the rumor pool was that the redo of Metallica was going to be coming up next, And then the next cornerstone would be in that slot in October around the time of Expo. It makes perfect sense because then that release could come out, and then three months later or whatever when you get to January, you can have that next scheduled release, and that's kind of how life would continue. Of course, now we're hearing, I'm going to jump ahead a little bit, that the new cornerstone may be coming next month, like next month in two to three days. It will be in August. So I'm wondering if maybe You know this Metallica Maybe like it wasn't ready Maybe this is all speculation Here which is what this little segment Here is for so maybe it was That maybe John Wick was forecasted To be selling a little bit better than it is Meaning it would be in development for longer And then by the time you know Wick was slowing Down they would have been ready for this New Spike 3 release of Metallica Let's say now with John Wick Sales not being as stupendous as maybe was forecasted. Metallica may not be ready, but this Stern Cornerstone may be. And X-Men is what we're hearing as far as the theme, whether that's X-Men 97, whether the X-Men is a codename for something else. Maybe it's Golden Girls, which is X-Men because they're not men. Not that they were formerly men, although Rue McClanahan will. Maybe Dorothy would be the X-Men of that group. Either way, I wouldn't buy Golden Girls pinball. We're just having fun. I'm getting caught back up here. So, you know, excuse me if I get lost in my fantasies about Golden Girls pinball. I think it's really the theme that we were all asking for. But maybe it was that Metallica maybe was not ready yet. And so these have flip-flopped or market forces or what have you. Who knows? We'll see what happens. I know for sure in the movie theater right now, Deadpool and Wolverine are killing it. And that's that Marvel license, that X-Men license. So if this is X-Men related. I think the time to put this out in front of people at arcades to play games right now is a heck of a good time for that. So that might have more than anything else to do with it. Again, all speculation. I'm super excited to see what's coming out next. I love playing new games and if a new Cornerstone is dropping soon, oh my god, get your wallets ready If you want to get on a list Jeff at Mad Pinball is the email address you can use That my distributor with Mad Pinball I just hung out on their Fresh Pinball podcast Had a great time I was invited over there Go check it out. Super fun times. What else have we got? JJP, let's go with them next. Classically the other big Chicago pinball manufacturer. Some would argue Spooky may be making more games currently, maybe more relevant themes. But they're not in Chicago, to their benefit, of course. But we're hearing the Avatar rumor And every time I hear something else about it It seems just a little bit more stronger And that's following the classic trend That tends to be true As rumors come out As information comes out The more and more I hear about it If it stays consistent like this That's probably what it is Now we could talk about Is this the theme that the public is clamoring for At the moment Probably not The movie did well because it came out in 2008 when a lot of that technology was still really impressive. I don't think anybody was impressed with the story of Avatar, but the world and the spectacle in the theater at the time, it was like the right movie, right time, seemed to work. Does that carry over still? Like, give me this game, here's my money, take it now? I don't know that it would. But I will say that one of the best things about Avatar, you know, it's essentially Fern Gully or Pocahontas as far as storylines go, You know, nothing, it's not treading new territory there. But the spectacle was what was really classic to this genre, to the point that it lended itself to a whole, you know, Disney-themed area in the Animal Kingdom in Florida that looks great lit up at night. And who does great lights and pinball? Who does great themed environments? Jersey Jack pinball. They put a lot of finishing touches on there, rad cows on the side, Christopher Franchi works for them. So, you know, I don't know who's on this art. I don't know if this game is even real or exists. but I will say it's probably going to be something cool to look at, especially with all the bioluminescence. If any game was screaming for UV integration, I think this would be it. Imagine going into a dark forest mode where everything is just UV illuminated and bioluminescent, and you've got the big screen up there and everything. It would just really make a cool spectacle, projections on the walls, around the machine, on the floor. I really think that would be the way to go with this game, and not necessarily like sell me on the theme, sell me on the story, because, like, you know, I'm a grown adult and all my bed sheets are all Avatar or something. So we'll wait and we'll see what comes up from that. Who's next? Spooky Pinball. They've got something coming. I don't know what it is. I think they threw out so many red herrings. Every time Bug does a live stream, he's wearing a different T-shirt. I think he was wearing a King Kong shirt. Conventional wisdom has been that John Elway, Elwyn, wanted to do King Kong. You know, he did Jaws. He did Godzilla. So let him have that space But maybe that is to throw us off the trail And they're really going to do it I've heard things like they'd like to work with Jack Black Whether that's Kung Fu Panda Whether it's Nacho Libre Or whether he was in one of the Peter Jackson King Kong flicks And so wouldn't that be awesome With his call outs Come on man, come on So we'll wait and see Looney Tunes, fantastic game Still getting tons of attention That and TCM were really killing it At the Southern Frank Gaming Expo everybody that was there playing it. Still hasn't sold out yet though. So they're moving to their new production facility at some point between now and March. We'll probably see a new game from them and I for one just want to be surprised. I can't wait. I honestly have no idea what it could be. If it was it could be Evil Dead. It could be King Kong for all I know. It could be Beetlejuice. It could be Honey I Shrunk the Audience. We'll see. I'm going to be surprised. They've put out enough false leads that I don't think there's any way to know for certain what's coming out next. And I think that's a cool place to be. I do know that they're excited about their license. I love the last four or five licenses that they've done. So, yeah, continue to satiate my pinball buyership, you folks at Spooky. All right, American Pinball, also in Chicago. Cuphead, still the strongest thing I've been hearing. I haven't heard anybody that's seen Whitewood or shot it. I've heard vague things like, you know, I've heard from somebody that talked to somebody that had somebody that played it and said it's okay. Who knows? That's too many areas of separation to even know if that's true or not. You know, if the game was fantastic after that many telephone levels, you know, it could totally go astray. So we'll see what that is. The plan was to have that ready for Chicago's Expo, which is coming up in 70-something days. So we'll see if it shows up. Eh, probably will. And if not, we'll be touring around the factory during Pinball Expo. So, you know, take a look around. See what you can see. See if they leave any Easter eggs out there. But, yeah, the house that Barry O built. We'll see what Cuphead has to show for us. Otherwise, DPX with Alice in Wonderland is supposed to be coming sooner than later into the fall. Will that be making it for Expo? I don't think that's been confirmed at all yet. I can't wait to see what this game actually is. It seems curious that they've showed off the underside of this game. They showed that this game is what they're doing. They've announced that it's Alice's Adventures in Wonderland But they didn't follow that up with Here it is, get your pre-orders in Let's do this And I think that may be a bit of a missed opportunity If you're going to release that much information about the game Start locking up some orders Start getting some people on some interested lists So we can kind of warm up to the fact That we're purchasing this game Otherwise, by the time Everything else gets released Especially if there's another Stern Cornerstone around the corner Spooky's got something dropping Avatar might be flying in and looking fantastic and surprising all of us, just like Elton John did, which took best to show at Southern Fright Gaming Expo, by the way. Some of that enthusiasm, it's got to be at least hindered a bit, right? So we'll wait and see what the House of Dutch is doing. Of course, the Dutch pinball proper has this Back to the Future rumor, although I'm not hearing a ton of chatter about it, like save your money, that's the one you want to get, get ready, start recycling your beer cans now or anything. but that's what we're looking at as we go into the fall now today it had dropped um that the production schedule for next month for stern pinball was pretty light you can check this out on nap arcade um jeff from mad pinball actually was uh credited as uh bringing some information so way to go jeff thanks for keeping us all in the know um so stern pinball is doing a final run for the year for several of their titles uh several of which seemed a little bit uh suspicious to me Now, we heard about Rush Pro and Premium being redone, and I think that makes sense after looking at the market. Right now, they're available secondhand, players' conditions ones as well as ones that were home use only. And pros are going from between $5,500 for a routed pro to $7,000 for one with mods and expression lights that was in someone's home. That's right around the price of new in box. So, yeah, I think the market could support some new in box. If you were looking at purchasing one for around $6,000 and it was used, and you can go and get a brand new one for the MSRP or maybe a couple hundred off of that if you always do business with the same guy, I see that making sense. That makes sense to me. Premiums, $8,500 is about the average price I see them listed for, some a little cheaper, some monitored out a little bit more, but that's still a little bit less than the premium price. So I think premiums might be a little bit of a harder sell new in box, given that there are some available online cheaper. But there's not a ton. There's not 30. Not like we were seeing with Foo Fighters a few months ago, probably four or five months now when there was like 37 or something available. You know, it was definitely like seven or eight, you know. So, yeah, I think the premium Rush is the superior game. People will argue that fact because it does play a little bit faster on the Pro. But they're both good games. They both have the same code. It's so nuanced and deep that I can't wrap my mind around it. But I love the music and I love the call-outs from the band. So, yeah, Rush. I'm a fan of Rush. I own the game. I own the LE. I loved it. I sold it on, and I actually wouldn't mind picking up a premium at some point in the future. So that makes sense to me. That makes sense to me. What didn't make a whole lot of sense was Mandalorian Pro and Premium being rerun. Pro prices right now, around $5,000, and there's quite a bit of them available, with mods even. Premium $6,500 to $7,000 That's the price of a Pro So you can go and pick up a modded Premium Like right this minute For the same price as a new Unboxed Pro I would say Like why would you even bother buying a new Unboxed Premium But then why would you Buy a Premium Mandalorian At all because the tilting Upper playfield thing is just kind of weird And then I get to the point where it's like Well why would you buy a Mandalorian at all What a great theme and I like the idea of like the foundry And I like the idea of like how cool that topper looks But the topper is a third of the cost of the game The game is just a shoot up the middle fest It just seems like Man this thing just wasn't firing on every cylinder You know it's like It's like an 8 cylinder engine that's got about 5 cylinders That are going you know Grogu doesn't do anything You know he was screaming For a magnet mech that would grab the ball And throw it around or something Or you know grab the ball and pull it over to his hand And then lock it for something And of course we just got like literally just a static doll, which is better than a flat plastic, but only just, right? And then, you know, the Mandalorian helmet, I like that it's an upper playfield area, but just the tilting thing doesn't do a whole ton for me. I don't think gameplay-wise it adds, you know, anything that's severely special. You know, it's not like the whole game feel just kind of goes dark and then you're focused at that moment up in the helmet. Maybe I haven't played it enough. I still every now and then come across like, maybe I should get this game at some point. It's Mandalorian. It's Star Wars. It's got the Foundry, it's got the call-outs from the guy from Predator Like, you know, Giancarlo Exposito Has lended his visage to some of the graphics and things It's got the ice spiders, like, it's got cool stuff in it But then I just, like, get to the point where it's like Well, I don't like it enough that I would take it over something else That's already better, right? It's like when I was looking at buying trucks and I was watching all these videos And I was looking at the Nissan full-size pickup truck that they have And the reviews online were like this pickup, it's a good truck, this Nissan Titan. It's just that your neighbor probably has a better truck, and that was the F-150 or the Chevy Silverado. They were better. So not that the Mandalorian is a bad game. There's just better options out there. And is there a robust market for a premium at full price when you can pick one up with mods for $6,500 to $7,000? You tell me. You tell me. Well, we'll see what the market does. Maybe they're only going to make like five of them. Bond Pro is going to be put back out there. Bond pros are trading at around 6k used So 6.5 new In box makes sense everybody loves The code everybody except me Loves this game I don't hate the Game but again I just think there's better options For me personally but don't take that As a slight against you If you love the game that's fantastic Invite me over show me how to play it Maybe I'll come around I'm open to that I'm open to that they'll also be making some Wick pros but Doesn't look like there's any premiums are going to be on the line There which which kind of That makes sense to me. WIC pros sitting around MSRP slightly less maybe. Some early adopters would trade them in. I just don't think there's a heck of a lot of them even out there yet. And it still seems to be earning well in location with these contracts. I do want to rant on the contracts for a bit, man. I was all into this concept. I love it. Like limited time, get out there, get it. But dang, these things are really hard. And I get that you don't want them overly easy. But they just released one that had only seven contracts available, right? So ultra exclusive, and I get it, it's Comic-Con or whatever, but it's like, you know, I saw it about an hour after it had come up and they were already gone. You know, if I was at home with my John Wick and I saw that there was only seven available, I could easily just take the glass off, cheat, get the badge, and then look at me, I've got all the badges. Like, nobody would ever know, right? And so there's no real way to protect anybody, you know, from that intellectual dishonesty of glass removal and cheating, especially if there's only seven. So, you know, I get that they're going to be limited in number. Maybe it would be better if they were limited in time. So it's like everybody has an equal chance. If you get down there within this window, you can earn this contract. But then, you know, there is more of an emphasis to get down there if they are truly number limited. And I think what Stern is doing right now with the contracts is kind of feeling them out. You know, the first contract they put out there, there was 2,000. It's still available. But the ones where there was only 50, they go pretty quick. So I think as these things release, between 50 and 500 is probably a good range to put these things. And I want to see this keep being refined and reworked because I think it's a great mechanism. And I know the operators with John Wick are loving seeing locals stream down there as soon as they get a text notification on an otherwise slow Tuesday afternoon, right, when people wouldn't normally be streaming in there. So, yeah, way to go. And that's probably why locations aren't dumping their games, but maybe some early home adopters looking at what's coming, that's probably where these ones are coming from as trade-ins with dealers and such. Wick LE, they're not going to, of course, run any more of these, ostensibly, because they're of the limited nature. But the price seems to be, it's funny, it's funny. So a couple of John Wick LEs showed up for the mid-10,000s, 10.7 and 10.6. Both marked sale pending, I think, at 10.6, 10.7. that's a great price for a WIC LE I think you're getting a hell of a game if you can get that for the mid $10,000 so if you're interested at all even remotely, maybe do a daily watch of that and if one of those pops up man, jump on one, for the price that's fantastic, now the rest of them that are listed there, a lot of them from dealers $12,999 full price, that's going to be a tough sell, when you're looking at Jaws LE came out for that same price and it just has so much more game in it so much more code, so much more nostalgia Jaws is in every way just a better game than John Wick is But the John Wick LE is pretty It's still a fun game to play I still enjoy mine I'm not looking at selling it I'm having fun with the game And I would see these ones for mid-10s And yeah, I would totally If I didn't have one and that jumped up I would jump in on it, for sure For sure, you get the Invisiglass Everything already comes with it The expression lights, the lights in the backbox The really cool back glass The foil art on the cabinet Like, it's a pretty complete package. Would have been nice if it came with a shooter rod stern. But other than that, yeah, I think at sub-11k, boom, that's, like, not even a question. I would totally jump at that. So, yeah, so that was fun. So it's Summer Vibes. I'm back for the Southern Fred Gaming Expo. It was super great. I left the expo. We ended up down in Orlando for a couple of days in the theme parks with the throngs in the peak of summer. Just it's fun to experience that at least once. Not the best time to go to Central Florida Right in the center of the heat of the summer But fun was still had It was great, I would do it again But then just being around everybody On the road, we stopped at Dollywood Twice actually, the way down, the way back We went to the Southern Fright Gaming Expo Played with everybody, hung out, talked with everybody And then I braved the throngs Of Orlando in the summertime And of course came back with a viral illness That kind of knocked me out for a couple of days Had a little bit of a man flu You know how that is But I've been playing with the games and modding. I wanted to get back and get this episode out there. So I'm very glad I did that. While I was at the Southern Fright Expo, I did get to sit down with my homie Bug from Spooky Pinball. And we had a nearly half-hour conversation about kind of just whatever was going on at the time, where the company's at. And I'm going to play that for all of you guys right now. If you were on the Patreon for $5 a month, that'll get you in the door. You heard this the second I recorded it. I posted it for you. So I'm getting spoiled. I got 100 people on Patreon now. So, like, I want to come up with really cool stuff for you guys all the time and put up there. So if you're interested, you want to throw $5 in my bucket so I can go play some Barrios Barbecue Challenge the next time I'm on location where one's at, I'm happy to do that. You know, definitely not necessary, but super appreciated. And it will get you some cool stuff. You Patreon folks, I've got a giveaway coming up in the next few days. We'll get all caught up and everything will be fantastic for you. So enjoy this interview with the Bugster. Oh man, once again, I'm sitting down with the Bugmeister, the Bugaboo, the boo of my heart, the bug from Spooky Pinball at the Southern Fry Gaming Expo. What's going on, sir? I knew Bugaboo was going to become a thing after that seminar. That seminar was fantastic, and although I think it was filmed, I'm not sure if it's streaming anywhere, So I thought, why not just get you on the record here, and we can go over a lot of the same material. We're going to just try to recreate it exactly word for word. It was super interesting. So I think I'm supposed to say, my name is Al, and welcome to the 5 p.m. No, we won't. So yeah, man, welcome. You've been to this show before. This is my first time here. About what you expect? Was it bigger last year, bigger this year? You know, I think it might have been a little bit bigger last year as far as the booths go and everything. But turnout-wise, I think they did just as good, if not better than ever. As of this recording, it's Saturday, and yeah, the show floor is open for the full 12 hours or whatever. And so, yeah, pretty packed today. Steady lines, again, at Looney Tunes, at TCM. Barely a machine empty. I showed up yesterday. One of the Looney Tunes was already sold. There's a couple more still available. Yep. Scooby sold today. And then you even have a standard edition of Halloween there on the floor. Yeah, we've been dragging that around. I always want to bring as many of the games as possible now, because it's just cool to see all the games that we've been up to in the last handful of years here. So, yeah, bringing Halloween is always really cool. Sometimes we even bring Ultraman. Dude, that's awesome. Yeah, and I like how the way that you're set up, you can pivot between titles based on demand for anything that's still listing unsold. So you can keep multiple titles in production. I think that's kind of what separates Stern from a lot of the other people. They're not just kind of burning through one build, and then they have to get to that end to release something else. Right, right. Yeah, and so that we still see other games pop up. And I always commend you guys on this, but even this late in the game, like you still do not abandon your old games that are out there. You're still releasing code updates. I mean, I think it was the Ultraman code update that came out. And there was only 500 of those sold, sold right out. But, you know, it's not in the multiple thousands, whereas we see some other folks that might have 5,000 instances of a game out there, and there's still no final modes and things. Yeah, and, you know, we even just had a guy come up earlier that was talking to me about our service department, and he bought a Rob Zombie secondhand. And he was like, oh, tell Adam he did a great job, and thanks for sending me out those parts. I can't believe you even did that. Yeah, and what are they, like a 300 altogether? Yeah, 300 altogether, and it was made over 10 years ago now. That's awesome. And you're showing no signs that you are slowing, to quote Wonka there. Yeah. And I love the Looney Tunes has had at least three major updates since I've had it, and each one has come with more episodes. Yeah. It's probably been more than three updates, too. I feel like every other week I come into the office that Luke Peters has a new mode that he's like, all right, come check this one out. Tell me what we need to do. I love it. I love it. I think it's almost parody with TCM now, code-wise. Yeah. It's probably close to caught up. Now that you mention it, I didn't even think about that. I've got to go count them, see where we're at. But that's awesome. Yeah, tons of good feedback here. Now, this is just a gaming in general expo that we're having here. It's not strictly pinball like TPF or Expo is. So there's tabletop gamers here, cosplayers, and even them coming by saying, like, you know, I'm just getting into pinball now. I had no idea who's doing this. I've seen people squinting up close to the back glass, like, who built this? Does it spooky? Is that what it says? And it's like, hell yeah. Yeah, it's always really cool at these ones because, you know, Midwest Gaming Classic is very similar in that way where it's not all pinball. So you're getting a lot of people who have no idea who you are or what you make or that pinball was still around. Yeah. So, you know, you'd think someday we'll get to the point where everybody knows that pinball is, like, back and doing a lot of things. But, you know, every single year there still seems to be people out there who just haven't quite heard yet. Yeah, I mean, I was talking to a guy yesterday who, like, just got in this year, and he's, like, looking to get in his first game and, like, looking for something cheap and used, but, like, to build up to the process. And so I just gave him the rundown on, like, well, here's the companies that are producing right now. Here's what they got. You know, here's, you know, price-wise what you get for it. And, like, it was fun during the seminar when that was brought up. that you guys put so much more in your top-end editions for the mid-level entry price from some other competitors. Yeah. And you just stopped listing things because there are so many features in your game that aren't in the other ones. I've got a marketing video planned that I'm going to do when I get back that is related to all the items that go into a collector's edition of ours, including the Screaming Baby in the background. Yeah. Not to say, like, you know, each company's top-end edition is pretty rewarding, but the price that you're paying for it, you're coming in, like, several thousand dollars less. Yeah, to make your, not to call anybody out specifically, to make your mid-tier option at many of these other companies have as much as a Spooky Game does, you would have to spend an additional probably $2,500, maybe $3,000. And we get you that for under $10,000. Yeah, I love that. I know we were talking during the seminar yesterday, you guys used to do a la carte builds. Like with Rick and Morty, you could decide if you wanted powder coat, if you wanted a shaker, if you wanted this or that. And then it became a headache when it came to assembly because each build was so individual. Yeah. And you could just get lost in the sauce. Truthfully, it's just too much to keep up with. But I know people have been asking for things like, what about Invisiglass? You know, we wouldn't mind seeing that and other accoutrements and such. And, you know, and toppers, you know, like additional accessories. I know we talked about, like, maybe, you know, Looney Tunes had some accessories at launch. Maybe that would be worthwhile a topper. Maybe that idea is still kicking around. But I thought of, you know, and you're still trying to keep the price under $10,000. and to load them up with Invisiglass at this point, you'd have to eclipse that. Yeah. But what about having just a general accessory bundle that could launch in parallel with the game? Oh, yeah. Yeah, without saying too much, we've talked about some things like that, like a spooky super bundle of sorts that you could get to add onto your game, and maybe it'll slowly build up to enough items that something like that would make sense for us. Because, yeah, I mean, there's still... Our games are as decked out as you could possibly get it, but, yeah, then you still have things like, oh, the Invisiglast, though, and it's like, ah, yeah, including that would be pretty great. But, yeah, to keep the game under 10K, it's getting pretty tough if we add much more to it. So, you know, we'll see where we can land with that for everybody. That's awesome, yeah. And I like how you spent some time talking about exactly what the butter process is to yesterday and, like, why it takes so long. Yeah, yeah, I felt like, you know, we always joke that, like, the butter is a really expensive add-on that you don't need, right? I mean, it's just it makes your cabinet ten times nicer. It's super shiny and glossy, but you don't need it. It's still buying the exact same game as everybody else. And occasionally people do tend to give us a hard time about the price of the butter. So I just kind of broke down on the seminar about the process of how it takes basically a solid month to get a butter cabinet to actually exist when you compare it to, for example, we get the cabinet in, we have to print directly onto the cabinet. The cabinet has to get sent back out. It has to get the clear coat process. It has to cure. It has to come back to our factory and then get assembled. I mean, you're talking weeks and weeks of time there. and also it's super easy to mess it up because it's a super high-end luxury cabinet. And you compare that to grab the cabinet side and put the decal down. Right. And then, of course, all those processes you have to pay for, too. So, I mean, the butter price really is what it is because of how long it takes, and it's expensive for us to do it. But like I said, it's an expensive add-on you don't need. But for whatever reason, whenever I say that, it just sells more butter cabinets every time. It's like I don't need it, but I still kind of want it, though. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah, yeah. And I'm an owner of a butter cabinet on my Scooby-Doo. I love that art and the color spectrum that was used on it. It's amazing. I mean, it's the closest thing to Alice Cooper that I've seen you guys come out with, with, like, the blues and greens. So I thought that was definitely, you know, the way to go there. And I was probably going to butter up again for your next game until you sprung it on me that it was actually two games. So then, you know, I was able to extend the budget to include that, but then doing butter on both would have eclipsed it. But look at the butter TCM that's on the floor here. Man, it's looking good. And I think my boy Danny even got a butter Looney Tunes. I'm pretty sure he ordered a butter. Yeah. That sounds about right. That guy. He was supposed to be here today. Oh, he was? Yeah, yeah. They're going to go to the Braves game I think they're having across the street. Dang it. Well, he better be here tomorrow. Yeah. So now when your cabinets come in, do they come in disassembled for all of them and you assemble all the cabinets? Yeah, they all get assembled in-house. So they come in special containers and stacks. So to butter up a cabinet, you've got to then take it, print the graphics on it, package it back up, ship it out to a clearcoater where, you know, clearcoat's not something you just spray on and send back. Yeah, no, it's not that simple. You've got to apply it. It's got to cure. It's got to off-gas and then come back. Otherwise, there will be, like, dimples and things all over it. And then you've got to carefully assemble that thing without messing it up. That would drive me crazy. And then it sits on the production line for two weeks of quality control. Nice. And then it gets put into a box. And all along that way, no one has to scratch it. That's fantastic. I mean, as a point of difference, you know, everybody really appreciates it. Yeah. All right. So how's the build going for the two here? I know it seemed like initially Looney Tunes was gaining as far as order numbers on TCM. Has that kind of caught up now? No, it's still ahead, but we're building it like a three-to-one ratio right now, I think, of Looney Tunes to TCM. So it's definitely gained a little bit of traction, but TCM just randomly will catch back up out of nowhere. Very popular overseas, oddly enough, which is where I thought TCM would not be more popular. But, yeah, it's doing really well overseas. Okay, overseas, like where in specific? Just Europe? Are we talking about Europe, Australia? Yeah, Europe. How big is your penetration into Australia? Man, how many do we have in Australia by now? I'm not sure, honestly, off the top of my head. I'm so curious about that market. It seems like an area that's just like prime for growth, you know, when I'm kind of looking and surveying. I know France is really picking up. France has been huge the last couple of years. They have really latched on to it. It's been great. Now, do you have a distributor network in Europe, or do you sell direct, or do you do both? So in Europe, we have one distributor in Europe, Stefan of RS Pinball, and he sells all over that entire part of the world for us, basically. He's one of our biggest distributors, probably our second biggest distributor. Oh, wow. At Spooky. And he sells a lot of games over there. He does a really great job. Perfect, perfect. So you've got to get the, like, what we are equivalent of UL listing in order to get the games over there. If you go to Australia, is there other, like, electrical approval processes you have to get to get it certified? Yeah, there's... I'm drawing a blank on what it's called right now. It's been a long show. I'm pretty tired. Oh, sure. But there is special checks and approvals we have to do on the games that we have to submit before they can start going overseas. And usually we're pretty far behind on that in each build, and the overseas guys have to wait a little bit longer than everybody else to get their games. But this time around, we worked some magic to get them a little closer up to the front because they've, for the last 10 years, always kind of had to be last. I mean, it's not as simple as just putting in a separate power supply and just shipping it around the world. I mean, it's like a multiple tens of thousands of dollars approval process, right? Yeah, yeah. And that you have to go through just to get them out there. So, yeah, it's kind of like trying to see, like, what markets would be worth it. And, you know, the European Union for sure, and I think Australia also would be. Yeah, definitely. All right, we're going to get you Aussies out there. I've got to get out there in December, too. I'll spread the good word. We'll stick with the country. Okay, so production going well now? You guys should be hitting your stride. Oh, yeah. No, it's been running incredibly smooth for months now. I mean, just a healthy stream of games going out the door every single day. Quality has been really fantastic on them. We've been hitting the code updates. We're getting ready to move into our new building in the next couple months here where we're going to make our process even better on the production line. But, I mean, it's been so smooth. I'm excited, yeah. Now, I've got a Looney Tunes at TCM, which at the time I thought might have been a bit of a bonkers idea. But even today, I'm still playing them so much, and they play so differently that I'm still not looking to list one of them. I figured by now I would have kept the one I was playing the most and sold the other, but I still don't know which one I like better. Yeah, I was going to make a point to thank you at this show for not selling one of the two yet, because I understand if you do, you have both. You don't really, per se, need both. So I really appreciate that you've held on to both of them. It's so cool. Every time there's a code update, there's even more in there. I'm still trying to find out where I can put a mod in these things. Yeah, you'll come up with something. I'm looking at your mods in front of me right now. I got a prototype John Wick shooter rod. My chicken buckets have been hilarious. You can do a chicken bucket in TCM. That would work. Okay, perfect. Makes sense. I'll just have like a leg hanging out, like a human leg coming out of the chicken. All right, perfect. We'll make that. Order now. So, okay, if I want one of these games today, let's say, and I don't want to come down here to the expo and take one off the show floor, and I ordered, and I emailed Squirrel or however the process is, or my local distributor or Jeff at MadPinball.com and said, hey, give me a Looney Tunes. When can I reasonably expect it to show up at the door via FedEx freight? Right now, I'm pretty sure if you ordered today, you'd be looking around January, you know, late, mid, like midwinter. Okay. Is where you would be right now. Yeah, it'd definitely be around there. But, you know, the more games we sell, the sooner you will get it because we'll keep increasing our production to get it to you sooner. Very good. Very good. And that's about six months out. And that's if you waited, you know, this far into production. I mean, this game was released... December. December? Was it still December? I know that's right around when Scooby-Doo came out in December. Yep, we're trying to... That's kind of our area of launch that we would like to claim. Oh, man. And it's hot right now here in July in Atlanta, but I know once fall hits and the pumpkin spice is in the air, we're only going to be a few short months away from launch window season for Spooky Pinball again. It's crazy how fast it comes. So I get the sense, and you mentioned this at the seminar yesterday, that you have about five titles that are locked in, committed, like probably they're going to come out, even if you're waiting for ink to dry. Counting in my head right now? Yes. Yeah, and so at releasing one game or maybe a double release, which you said you don't have plans to do, it would take five years for that fifth game to finally reach out, and any new license you sign would be year six or so. Unless you did something like, let's go to two releases a year, but limit the numbers maybe. Yeah, that's definitely something we've talked about before. I think there's maybe some space for something like that, but, you know, we'll see. We've got a lot going on right now. It's hard to even consider throwing in another game into the mix. It's got to be hard for you guys to nail that release number because you have to kind of, like, use your crystal ball to look in the future as to what the next year will hold. Like, should this be a game that we run 2,000 of them, or should we only, you know, do 500? If we do 500 we be kicking ourselves if we could have got 1 you know Yeah yeah But like a couple of us were whispering on the floor because you know we want to see a Simpsons treehouse of horror theme machine You know, the Simpsons machine came out so long ago, and the Simpsons has changed so much and had so much lore between then and now that revisiting, like, licenses from these cartoon shows, like Family Guy or South Park or, you know, even Futurama or Simpsons, you could have, like, so much more in there, especially with the modern code we have now compared to what was back there before. The LCD screen has changed everything. And I was just thinking, like, the Simpsons is known for that Halloween episode they would do every year. And so just like a spooky-themed Simpsons machine, how amazing would that be, especially if there was only like 555 made? It would be 666. You're crazy. Yeah, okay. So the demand would probably handle like 1,500, I would guess. Oh, on that one, I bet you could get that. But if you could get one of those 666 machines, means you would have something that forever would be worth more than you paid for it. Oh, yeah, easily. Yeah, and that's hard to find in the market today. Yeah. So I'm just going to push my finger in the soil and put that seed down there, and you do what you want to do with it. I will confidently say if there is a company out there to do Simpsons Treehouse of Horrors, it should be us. Okay, yeah, perfect. That would make, yeah, we want to do that one. But could you see that like doing maybe smaller run numbers just to keep that demand really high for those games? I think in the right circumstances, yeah, smaller run numbers to increase that demand. Protect the customer value is a very good idea. We do care about protecting the value of the game for the customer. I think that's a pretty important part of it at this point. This is selfish for me because I just want to see more games coming out. I love playing new games. More, more! But then for every title you release, you've got to have a team behind it, a team writing code, and that's a lot of resources to put behind it. So, you know, otherwise you could have five releases a year and just have like 100 of each one, right? Just crank them out. Yeah. Oh, dude, perfect. Let's see. Was there anything else you wanted to hit that we haven't talked about? I don't want to tie you up too much here. Oh, well, thanks. But I will. Do you want to do your rapid-fire Facebook questions? Oh, shoot, yeah. Since not everybody in the seminar. Let me bring them back out. I was going to go through on my comments last night and answer all of them, but I thought it would sound like too dry. I was actually doing it live when... You already posted a picture of me. That's funny. I was doing it live while you were in there. I was trying to update all the answers. Oh, I could even get to that inappropriate one from What's-His-Face from the Twip deal. Scroll in for some content. Where the heck did it go? All right, talk amongst yourselves for a second. Don't worry, the crowd's doing it for us in the back. Dead air. It is much better out here than trying to record on the show floor there. I thought there was a special charm to your recording on the show floor in Texas. Yeah, screaming and not even being able to hear myself. All right, question number one. All right, rapid-fire answer. Is he planning on releasing two pins in 2025 with lesser build numbers? I kind of got to that. That was from Mr. Tengiz Rodriguez-Dennis. We mentioned that. Kerry Hardy says, who is your man crush and why is it Kerry Hardy? He is my man crush because he is like a cute little beagle puppy dog. Absolutely, absolutely. All right, from Jeff Young. Have you considered growing your hair and sporting a top knot? I've grown my hair out twice. Luke yells at me every time I do it. All right. And then, no, that's correct. Okay, Colin Alsheimer. I think it's supposed to be Alzheimer. He misspelled it. If the spooky ghost was a character on The Boys, what weird kink would it have? I think he could rock a collar. Yeah. Like a spike collar. Yeah. I think so. There was some speculation yesterday that those little tendrils hanging off of him are actually sexual appendages. You have to ask Greg Ferrer, he drew it. Okay, yeah. Okay, that makes sense, that makes sense. Ask Bug when the clues are coming out for their next game. Oh, okay, a legitimate question. I am always dropping clues. There's never a day I don't drop a clue. Shout out to Retro Ralph there. What a guy, what a guy. Can you grow a full beard? No. All right, yeah. Oh, you answered that one yourself. This one from Sterling Martin just says Beetlejuice, Beetlejuice, Beetlejuice. Nope, there he is. Is that even on brand? I mean, is there even any demand for that? I mean, it's such an old title. No, no, it's... You know, I mean, would that art style even appeal to anybody? Who would you even find to do art for that, first off? You know, talk about a title that doesn't lend itself to pinball at all. All right, so let's throw that one away. Is there a Bug Luke bromance? Oh, God, I freaking hope not. He's dating my sister, so. Oh, okay. So there you go. That's a weird triangle. But you guys are from Wisconsin, not central Alabama, so we will. Will the Looney Tunes manual have a centerfold? I like this one. Yes, and it's me. No, no, come on, come on. We need Lola Bunny, at least. Oh. It's actually just going to be Bugs Bunny dressed as a lady. Can we get... That would be the most brand accurate thing. That made me think a certain way. God, that'd be fun if you could reuse that... Remember that centerfold mech from Stern's Playboy that came out? Yeah, yeah, yeah. God, that'd be just ridiculous. We should do a Bugs Bunny dressed as a lady calendar. Oh, man. That would get me feeling a certain way. All right, all right, all right. Who is cooler, you or Luke? I mean... In what aspect? I guess, yeah. Are we talking about like at the Luke Bryan show or something at the fairgrounds? Are we talking about, you know, in the humidor in Chicago? Context really depends there. Yeah. Cooler, like body temperature-wise, me. Okay, yeah. Very good. To have a beer with? Me. Okay, clearly, yeah. Any planned upgrades or toppers for Looney Tunes? Oh, yeah, we might get around to it. If Looney Tunes sells out, I'm pretty confident we will go ahead and do a topper for it. Since it's a smaller run, only 888 units, it probably wouldn't make so much sense to invest all the research and development into it unless it was sold out and we felt like there was a pretty good demand for it, which I think there would be if it sells out. I mean, I love that you've got the acrylic topper thing anyway included with lighting effects and things. Worst case scenario, it still came with the topper. Right, yeah. So, I mean, it's not like we're topperless. Yeah, no, no, we didn't leave you completely hanging. And that's included with the CE. Yeah, for free. So, I don't know. I know I took my Scooby-Doo topper, and then I took the original topper that came with it and just hung it on the back and made, like, a super topper. So maybe you could just sell, like, an upgrade kit that would just put a ton of characters up there and some movements and things. Yeah, yeah. Because I think what you have is already pretty great, you know. It's got that layered effect and everything. I love on TCM how the lights line up the chainsaw during certain modes. So it gives it like a movement effect. Yeah, that was on purpose. Yeah, yeah. And then even the windmill is like three-dimensional and stuff. Yeah, Looney Tunes has my favorite of the flat plastic toppers that we've done. Yeah, yeah. It's by far my favorite. It's just perfectly integrated. And I mean, that's what most people are getting away with now anyway is just acrylic toppers. Yeah. And Jersey Jack included one with their platinum level edition for Elton John, which is just a static plastic there. And then they were really overboard with the CE one. Would you think about putting LCD screens in a topper again? Like what's been the experience with the Scooby topper? You know, I'd never say never. It's a ton more work once you do. Once you add another screen in, it just opens up a whole lot of different things you have to deal with in the research and development. But never say never. Okay. And how are you guys feeling about the servos? Have you been having any issues with them at all? Servos, you know, servos can be kind of hit and miss. You know, like when we had the plastic-geared servos, those were pretty problematic for us back in the day, like pre-Halloween and whatnot. We moved to the Metal Gear servos in Scooby-Doo, and I think in well over 1,000 units that we've sent out there, I've had to send out maybe two servos to people. Perfect. So, yeah, they've been very reliable for us, you know. I know I swapped out on Halloween my servos with the Metal ones, just because I was having one that was just having some gear issues. Yeah, the plastic little gear ones on Halloween were the only ones that we had. Yeah, and it seems like servos are really made for things like RC airplanes, where they're just going to wear out and they're cheap to replace and everything. Yeah. But in a pinball machine, especially if they can be hard to get to, just paying a little bit more for the metal ones seems to be a good way to go. Yeah, and we still have some tricks up our sleeve in the future here for what we can do to make those even more robust. But they allow you to do so much with, like, movement on a topper, you know? Yeah, movement in anything. I mean, it opens up a lot of possibilities to get cool features into a game, which people, you've got to put the cool features in the game. It opens up some doors. Well, I guess it's technically a bookcase, but yeah. So funny. All right, so possible on that, Can we get Speedy Gonzales cartoon? You'll have to ask Warner Brothers about that. Yeah, talk to Papa Warner. Oh, I love this point that you made yesterday. And it's like, you know, people will come up to you and say, Spooky Pinball, like, you guys are stupid. Why didn't you think of, like, this thing or this obvious thing for a game? And you're like, most of the time, yes, we have thought of that. And actually, it's actively in development, and we can't talk about it yet. Yeah, yeah, there's always a mixture of, you know, well, maybe we're already working on it, and it's going to be added. And, of course, we wanted that. there was a reason we could not do it. Yeah, yeah. So it's not just like they're like, oh, it never occurred to us that we should put Peppa Le Pew in as a mode or something. Right, exactly. It's like, no, there's just no way that we could do that, you know, playing with somebody else's assets, you know? Yeah, yeah. But that was a good point to make because, you know, at first, you know, superficially you might think like, oh, come on, these guys are clever. They should have thought of this. It's like, no, no, we did, and we actually had a better idea than the one you just thought of. We can't do it. It's just unobtainable. All right, we're just moving on. All right, last one. When's the black and white Looney Tunes coming out? It can come out any minute now. It's very much on brand. You did say if you're willing to order one, because you print your own art, right? Yeah, yeah. I could make that happen. Now, is that something that would have to go back to the licensor for approval? Yeah, yeah, definitely. Okay, okay. Definitely. They have final say on absolutely everything you do. So if somebody wanted to do something stupid, like, oh, my God, look at this hamburger guy behind us. It's awesome. Oh, my God, it is. Wow. All kinds of celebrities are here. We should get them on stream. That's perfect, man. So, yeah, the Benton expansion, I've seen this new place. Yeah, I'm excited to see you guys get in there because you won't be running, you know, playfields upstairs, populate them, run it back downstairs. Yeah, that drives me crazy. I can't wait to get that taken care of. I cry when I have to, you know, pull a play field halfway out to put art blades in, let alone, you know, huck it up and downstairs. We build big shoulders at Spooky. People are carrying playfields up and down stairs. How have you not built a dumbwaiter yet that you can just put it on? No, we tried that for a little bit of time. There's a door that opens up to the wiring area upstairs. We used to have a playfield cart that we'd forklift up there. They would load it, and then we would bring it back down. But that was during Halloween when we were doing 10 games a day. Oh, geez. So we had to make something happen to get it down. Because, yeah, 10 playfields up and downstairs every day. You'll start looking like The Rock. Yeah. Did you smell? Yeah, back in those days, that was coming hot off the heels of Rick and Morty. It was right in, like, that COVID period. And then you had day one sellout of Halloween. Yeah, yeah. It was the craziest time in pinball history, I think. I mean, just absolutely nuts. I remember when, yeah, I'd heard about Rick and Morty, and I was a little bit late to the party there. And then I saw the announcement for Halloween, and you had to be a, what is it, the Bug Scrotum Club member? No, a Fang Club member to get, like, an extra week of purchasing or something. And so I was like, well, I'm not going to pay money to join a club just to buy a game. I'll just wait a week or so, and then, boom, they were gone. Yep. So I've been a Scrotum Club member since then. I'm changing that when we get back. Oh, the merch is going to be great. Yeah, am I supposed to be getting something in the mail? When do those go out? Are you still doing those? Yeah, we still do fan club packages. They usually go out in August, I think. I'm trying to remember. Morgan actually is the head honcho of the fan club department at Spooky Pinball. She's very much a honcho, yeah. Yes. I remember back in the day I had some work boots I got from Walmart that were called honchos, and they were amazing. And this is completely irrelevant there. All right, well, cool. So we're in the middle of summer right now. We're heading into fall. It's going to be spooky season for real pretty soon. Halloween events will be starting. Our time will shine. We'll be murdering people with pencils, and then all eyes will be on Benton to see clues of the next game dropping. What the hell are they going to do next? Oh, man. The cool thing is you guys don't have to wait until you completely sell out of what you're building now to go ahead and transition to something else. Yeah, correct. Our production line is going to look pretty cool. I mean, by the time the next one comes out, there's a possibility we can be building a Scooby-Doo, a TCM, a Looney Tunes, and whatever the next one is, all in the same production line, which is going to be colorful. I love it. I love it. Well, thanks so much for coming back on. I just hit your table with your pencil. I'm so sorry. I love it. It's okay. It's pretty much numb now to me. Thanks so much for coming back on, buddy. No, yeah, thank you for having me. Sorry I'm not more alive today. No, thanks for peeling yourself away from the show floor here. All right, and then if anybody wants to get at you guys, it's like squirrel at spookypinball.com. Yeah, yeah, you can email morgan at spookypinball.com. And she's got a squirrel handle too, right? Yeah, it was always, it used to just be the squirrel handle, but then we realized that nobody knows how to spell that word. Oh, squirrel? Yeah, it's kind of tough, so we just moved it to Morgan. Okay, perfect. But yeah, morgan at spookypinball.com. She's usually managing the office. You're going to get your new office pretty soon, so you all won't be sharing one. I can't wait. It's like sharing a room with your sibling, gosh. It literally is. Yeah. Every day. How do they fit you, Morgan, and Luke's biceps and shoulders in there? He's getting his own special office once I move, too. Will it have a smoker attached to it so he can just do his steaks? Yeah. The grill will be staying down at the previous building, and I will still be using it every day. Perfect, perfect. I still want to go to Spooky Stock at some point, if you guys can build up big enough to just have a whole fun fan event or something. We really want to do that so bad. We just worry that not enough people would come to Benton because it's so far away from everything. You have to tie it into a barbecue event, too. If we could do a campout thing, like you said, Spooky Stock. We'd get some legit bands and set up the games, open up the production floor, have food. I heard that your dad knows Alice Cooper. Yeah. That's funny. Okay, we'll hear all about that and more in the future. Thanks so much for joining Garrison out, I guess. I don't know how to get an outro music alright man, welcome back to the show, that was a great interview thanks Bug for doing that, always happy to come and sit down with my homie, such a gracious and righteous dude there Benton's finest really so this was episode 138 of Don's Pinball Podcast, we're coming back, we'll be back on the road again, summer marches on man, keep these cool summer Cali vibes going everybody, if you want to you can reach out and email me at donspinballpodcast.gmail.com Let me say that again. Tom's Pinball Podcast at gmail.com. It is late in the evening as I'm recording this, but I wanted to get it out for everybody. Thanks so much for coming in here and hanging out with my alignment of chaotic positive with pinball, we'll call it. Otherwise, email me. Go to the Facebook page. Jump on the Discord, man. We're having such a great time. If you want some mods, if you want some T-shirts, if you want some stickers, all you've got to do is email me. Lots of people are fighting their way there. And if you've ordered anything up until this recording, it has been shipped. So I do try to keep a quick turnaround there. So many games are coming, man. I can't wait to see what else is out there. Go check out the Fresh Pinball Podcast. It should be dropping in concert with this one. I'm going to give this up for everybody. And then more to come as soon as we hear. It's Pinball Man. Get flippin', whether you're on location or at your homie's house, man. There's enough out there for everybody. So, I don't know. Make something up and get mad at it. Don't bother me. Later. Thank you.

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*Exported from Journalist Tool on 2026-04-13 | Item ID: 97ae46f6-502b-498b-a390-7adf0ca93a12*