# IBTL Episode 28: Pinball Around the Horn + Alice First Impressions, Guests Dirty Pool and Hans **Source:** In Before the Lock Live Streams **Type:** video **Published:** 2025-07-15 **Duration:** 81m 28s **Beat:** Pinball **URL:** https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=e5jt-mS3KBY --- ## Analysis In Before the Lock Episode 28 features hosts Rob and Davey with guests Jeff (Dirty Pool Pinball) and Hans (Hyperbe Company operator). The episode covers Jeff's recent purchase of Alice's Adventures in Wonderland by Dutch Pinball, including first impressions and a manufacturing issue with reversed spinners that affected all 25 US units. Hans discusses operating eight locations in Southern California and opening Hyperbe Company arcade in downtown Anaheim. Rob details a custom topper expansion for Alice designed by his company featuring Cheshire cat-themed art and lighting integration via Davey's mod system. ### Key Claims - [HIGH] All 25 Alice units shipped to the US had reversed spinner wiring that caused them to drain balls instead of saving them — _Rob discussing Alice first impressions and posting on owners thread about spinner issue_ - [HIGH] Dutch Pinball's Alice is shipping finally after delays, with first 25 units arriving in the US — _Rob explaining Alice availability and shipping status_ - [HIGH] Alice was designed to match John Papaduk's original layout from a storage locker archive purchased by Melvin Williams from Chris Turner — _Rob explaining the genesis and design philosophy of Alice_ - [HIGH] Hans operates eight locations in Southern California, multiple breweries, and is partnering to open Hyperbe Company arcade in downtown Anaheim with 40-50 games — _Hans describing his operator portfolio and new arcade venture_ - [HIGH] Jeff started making content about five months ago and has a post-production background — _Jeff explaining his recent entry into content creation_ - [HIGH] Rob's topper expansion for Alice includes interchangeable Cheshire cat phrases, forest scenery, and lighting controlled by Davey's modular system — _Rob describing the custom topper expansion design and functionality_ - [HIGH] Melvin Williams stated he wants five topper expansions for Alice to give to friends and cannot see the topper without the expansion now — _Rob recounting Melvin's reaction to the topper expansion prototype_ - [HIGH] Jeff's content strategy emphasizes transparency between manufacturers and consumers, advocating for production timelines and code update roadmaps — _Jeff explaining his goals and philosophy for content creation and industry change_ ### Notable Quotes > "I want transparency in the marketplace between manufacturers and consumers. I feel like there's a huge disconnect between like what it's like to buy a game and have a game in your home now versus being an arcade operator back in the 70s and '80s." > — **Jeff (Dirty Pool Pinball)**, N/A > _Core philosophy driving Jeff's content and industry critique; reflects broader community sentiment about manufacturer communication_ > "I can never not see this topper without addon." > — **Melvin Williams (paraphrased by Rob)**, N/A > _Strong validation of Rob's custom topper expansion from the manufacturer; suggests high-quality complementary product_ > "This is not the game that you want to own as your only game in your collection. It's a game you want to own if you want something very different than what else is out there." > — **Rob (paraphrasing Melvin Williams)**, N/A > _Honest positioning of Alice's niche appeal; sets expectations for buyers on depth vs. simplicity tradeoff_ > "I pride myself in in making games accessible to people. And um if if something gets too tough, I'll just put it put it back in the shop and swap it out with another game." > — **Hans**, N/A > _Operator philosophy on game selection and venue management; reflects willingness to experiment with diverse titles_ > "They give no shits. They'll tell you exactly how it is and what they're dealing with." > — **Jeff (referring to Rachel and Kale)**, N/A > _Recognition of transparency and authenticity in operator-focused content; praise for Electric Bat Arcade podcast hosts_ ### Entities | Name | Type | Context | |------|------|---------| | Rob | person | Co-host of In Before the Lock; operates topper business and was early adopter of Alice with custom expansion; interviewed Melvin Williams about Alice design | | Davey | person | Co-host of In Before the Lock; designed lighting mod system for Alice toppers; recently had Jeff on his personal podcast for workshop tour | | Jeff | person | Content creator (Dirty Pool Pinball); started making pinball content five months ago; recently acquired Alice; advocates for manufacturer transparency; focuses on audio work and interviews | | Hans | person | Arcade operator managing eight Southern California locations; opening Hyperbe Company arcade in downtown Anaheim partnership with Asylum Brewing; has JJP Guns and Roses on order; has three Spooky machines in operation | | Melvin Williams | person | Designer/manufacturer for Dutch Pinball; purchased John Papaduk storage locker archive from Chris Turner; developed Alice's Adventures in Wonderland; collaborated with Rob on topper expansion strategy | | Alice's Adventures in Wonderland | game | Dutch Pinball/Dutch Pinball Exclusives title; based on John Papaduk's original design; shipping with initial 25 US units arriving; features spinner issue affecting all US units; designed with intentionally simple layout; includes multi-channel audio and advanced lighting | | Dutch Pinball | company | Manufacturer of Alice; partnership with Dutch Pinball Exclusives; Melvin Williams involved in game design and production decisions | | In Before the Lock | organization | Podcast/video show hosted by Rob and Davey; focuses on pinball industry discussion, guest interviews, mod demonstrations, and game reviews | | Hyperbe Company | organization | Upcoming arcade venue in downtown Anaheim (Center Street Promenade); partnership between Hans and Asylum Brewing owner; planned 40-50 games; 8+ during day, 21+ at night | | Rachel and Kale | person | Operators of Electric Bat Arcade; hosts of pinball-focused podcast praised for transparency and authenticity in discussing arcade operations and management | | John Papaduk | person | Classic pinball designer; storage locker archive of original designs purchased by Melvin Williams; Alice layout based on his original vision | | Chris Turner | person | Sold John Papaduk's storage locker archive to Melvin Williams; archive contained original game designs and assets | | Dirty Pool Pinball | person | Content creator alias for Jeff; produces pinball content focused on audio work, interviews, and industry transparency advocacy | | Maria Keller | person | Artist based in Mexico; commissioned to design custom Alice topper expansion artwork matching original game aesthetic | | Asylum Brewing | company | Brewery in Anaheim partnering with Hans to open Hyperbe Company arcade venue in downtown Anaheim | | Robo in the Zone | person | Early Alice adopter in Netherlands; streaming gameplay on platform (Twitch implied); avoids international shipping | | Pins and Needles | organization | Historical speak-easy pinball venue in Los Angeles back room of punk rock studio; operated by Pinball Molly; featured System 9 and System 11 games | | Pinball Molly | person | Introduced Jeff to pinball about 20 years ago via Pins and Needles speak-easy in Los Angeles; formative influence on Jeff's passion for the hobby | | Road Kings | game | Vintage pinball machine; Jeff's first game purchase for ~$200 with ~$150 in needed repairs; learning project for understanding pinball restoration | | Circus Voltaire | game | Classic game comparison point for Alice's layout; loaned to Rob by Mad Pinball for 6-8 months for research and comparison | ### Topics - **Primary:** Alice's Adventures in Wonderland (Dutch Pinball) - first impressions, design philosophy, and gameplay, Custom topper expansion for Alice featuring Cheshire cat and forest theming, Manufacturing quality issue: reversed spinner wiring on Alice US units - **Secondary:** Jeff's content creation strategy and philosophy on manufacturer transparency, Hans' operator portfolio and new Hyperbe Company arcade venture, Davey's modular lighting system and mod ecosystem for Alice toppers, Industry transparency and communication gaps between manufacturers and consumers - **Mentioned:** Arcade operations, maintenance strategies, and location management ### Sentiment **Neutral** (0) ### Signals - **[product_concern]** All 25 Alice units shipped to US had reversed spinner motor wiring causing save mechanic to drain balls instead of saving them; issue confirmed by Dutch Pinball support with FAQ resolution provided (confidence: high) — Rob detailed the issue extensively, with confirmation from Dutch Pinball's service FAQ; affected all US initial shipment units - **[product_launch]** Alice's Adventures in Wonderland shipping began with 25 US units arriving; described as 'quite a bit behind' on schedule (confidence: high) — Rob states 'they shipped their first 25 uh units to the US. Um and so they are starting to arrive'; characterizes as delayed - **[design_innovation]** Alice topper expansion by In Before the Lock represents first complex APPC-controlled mod outboard system on a new game; enables seamless lighting integration with Davey's modular system (confidence: high) — Rob explains: 'This is one of the very first games or is the very first game to have uh a very complex mod outboard system. It's an APPC controlled mod outboard system' - **[content_signal]** Jeff (Dirty Pool Pinball) emerging as content creator with five months of production; rapid growth in algorithm visibility and community engagement; focus on authenticity and transparency advocacy (confidence: high) — Rob notes Jeff's content 'everywhere now'; Jeff confirms starting five months ago; discussed leveraging post-production background and streamer community support - **[operational_signal]** Hans expanding arcade operations from eight established locations to new flagship venue (Hyperbe Company) in partnership with Asylum Brewing in downtown Anaheim's packing district (confidence: high) — Hans describes 40-50 game arcade planned; 8+ daytime access, 21+ nighttime access; targeting premium location in newly developed packing district - **[operational_signal]** Hans reports strong reliability across manufacturer portfolio (Stern, Spooky) with recent addition of technical staff; emphasizes preventative maintenance; hasn't deployed JJP titles yet (confidence: high) — Hans: 'I finally have a tech helping. Yeah it's it's crazy... with good maintenance, the games are pretty dang reliable'; mentions three Spooky machines and no JJP experience yet - **[design_philosophy]** Alice designed with intentionally simpler layout compared to modern Stern games; Melvin Williams positioned it as not suitable as sole game in collection but valuable for variety; shorter play time and straightforward scoring philosophy (confidence: high) — Rob explains Melvin's design intent: 'this is not the game that you want to own as your only game'; contrasts with Godzilla's lengthy 45-60 minute play time - **[gameplay_signal]** Alice features shorter mode timers and fewer shots per mode compared to modern Sterns, but offers hidden letter collection mechanic for wizard mode progression; Rob describing early learning phase of game depth (confidence: medium) — Rob: 'there's not really like a crazy amount to stack in here. The modes are interesting because they're short timers'; notes mysterious approach to wizard mode progression - **[code_update]** Dutch Pinball deliberately delayed code development beyond alpha state to gather active user feedback from owners before major tweaks; some modes contain placeholder text suggesting ongoing development (confidence: high) — Rob explains Melvin's rationale: 'they wanted to be further along with the code, but that was only because they thought they were going to have a lot more units'; Rob appreciates being part of code evolution process - **[sentiment_shift]** Strong positive reception to custom Alice topper expansion from both designer (Melvin) and community; Davey predicts potential for 500+ unit sales; expansion described as transforming base topper into complete package (confidence: high) — Davey: 'I would be highly surprised if you don't sell 500 of them'; Melvin's statement: 'I can never not see this topper without addon'; Rob notes expansion makes topper 'blend in so much nicer' - **[industry_signal]** Jeff's platform explicitly advocating for manufacturer transparency including production timelines and code roadmaps; characterizes current pinball industry communication as outdated operator-era mentality vs. modern software development standards (confidence: high) — Jeff: 'I want transparency in the marketplace... road maps are a common thing in all of software development on almost every platform and pinball machines are software... this stuff shouldn't be held secret' --- ## Transcript [Music] [Applause] Heat. Heat. [Music] What is up everyone? Welcome to In Before the Lock episode 28. You're here with Rob and Davey. Davey, how you doing buddy? I'm very well, thanks mate. I'm very well. Sorry for the delay, everyone. Yeah, we're not going to bore you with how painful the last 30 minutes of our lives were, but we told some jokes. We shot some [] It was fine. We were good. We're good. Jeff and Hans are joining us today. Jeff, how you doing, buddy? Dirty Pool Pinball. What's up? I'm here. I hear we're going to talk about some mods and stuff. You got You got a You got a What? You got a a new game? We got We got it all, baby. We got it all. You know, we're we're always talking about pinball. Yesterday or I guess two days ago was a new pinball day for me. We all know what that's like. I got a Alice's Adventures in Wonderland. So, I'm going to tell you guys about that today. Uh Davey's got a big lineup of mods. And then we've also got Hans with Hyperbe Co and many other projects as well. Hans, how you doing? I'm doing great. Thanks, Rob. Appreciate you and Davey for having me on. Great to be along with Jeff here as well. So, yeah, let's get to it. Yeah, definitely. So, uh, I've kind of come across you guys in different ways, uh, since I've been a part of the hobby. Hans, I've run into you at I think probably Expo and TPF. Does that sound right? Are you are you an attendee at both those? And, uh, then, uh, I'll go ahead and brag. You came in as a customer. And I'm like, hey, I gotta hit this guy up. Um, uh, so, thank you for that. Uh, great to have you part of our topper uh, family. Um, and it sounds like uh, well, well, first of all, we'll get this out of the way real quick. We have been spending the half an hour celebrating Hans's birthday. Happy birthday, Hans. Thank you. Very exciting. And then you've got a new arcade you're working on. Is this like a first for you? I know you're an operator, but it's Yeah. So, I've been operating for, you know, a little bit of history. Grew up playing pinball at the local bowling alley and that sort of thing. And um as soon as I just got a driver's license and discovered girls, I um stopped playing pinball. So, I'm I'm kind of an odd duck. Everybody's favorite decade, the '9s. That's my least favorite decade. So, I'm lucky I don't have to spend 10 to 15,000 on games that are old and don't shoot that well. I mean, as far as, you know, age and that sort of thing. So, I love the remakes. I'm an operator and they and they um they hold up really well on location. Uh but I've been an operator for a long time. Um I had a um a mall arcade and a and a putt putt golf course in upstate New York years ago and then kind of went away from it when the kids were young and now I'm back into it. I've got eight locations here in Southern California, multiple breweries. Um, and I, you know, host tournaments at those and such. And then finally, one of the breweries I'm at, I'm partnering with the brewery owner. It's Asylum Brewing here in Anaheim. And he and I are partnering in opening up Hyperbe Company right here in downtown Anaheim. It's in the packing district, which is a really cool um new area where they they refurbished an old packing house for um Citrus back in the 100-y old building. 30 restaurants and bars in there. And um we're right around the corner from that on Center Street, Center Street Prominade. It's going to be Hyperbe Company about uh 40 to 50 games and beer on tap. Amazing. All eight during the day and 21 and over at night. Nice. Well, that's that's amazing. Is that just an excuse to drink loads more beer, Hans? Yes, indeed. So, man, eight locations. How do you keep all these games working? So, I finally have a tech helping. I'm glad you asked, Jeeoff. Yeah, it's it's crazy. I got to tell you, it's surprisingly knock on wood. Um, with good maintenance, the games are pretty dang reliable. They really they I've had good luck with um um pretty much all the manufacturers. I don't operate any JJPs yet. I've got a Guns and Roses right behind me that's going to go into Hyper. Um and uh probably Harry Potter as well, but um the Sterns are great. Um Spookies, I've had good luck with Spookies. I've got three of them out there. Um so that's good. And um yeah, I just, you know, a lot of preventative maintenance. You know, listen to listen to Kale and Rachel. They tell you all about that because their volume's crazy. And um I I really love their podcast and learning about you know how to operate better and that sort of thing. So Yep. Yeah. Very cool. I love how transparent they are. Yeah. And you you interviewed them recently, Jeff, right? Or I did. Yeah. Just a couple weeks ago. Yeah. They just they they give no they give no shits. They'll tell you exactly how it is and what they're dealing with. And I mean their their income. and they're just it's a rare thing it seems in the arcade community to have a couple that is just like just this is how we run our business and we're going to tell you about it. It's really cool. What did Hans have you man? Oh, sorry Dave. Catch you off. That's right, man. Carry on. No, we we'll hit the questions. I want to make sure we get a chance to get Jeff. Uh so Jeff, uh I kind of came across you relatively recently. I feel like for me at least you you came out of nowhere. I mean, I see like your content everywhere now. Maybe it's the algorithms targeting me, but uh I'm curious like how long you've been, you know, making content because it seems like you you must have at least recently really kicked it up a notch. I'd love to hear about that. Yeah. No, I I started this about five months ago and that's when I started making content. Yeah. Uh no, I mean I have a I have a post-production background and uh so I mean it was it was kind of a easy transition into start to to make stuff, but I don't know. I'm figuring out it as I go. And the people that I've met and run into like on Twitch and whatnot have been like super helpful about how to online and figure out how to do stuff. Like people hooked me up with like streamer bot stuff in order to get things working for the stream and whatnot. But uh yeah. No, I don't know. I just figuring it out as I go. So So other than combing your hair a little bit differently than everybody else, what are you trying to do different in this space that uh like makes you stand out because it feels like you got a little bit of a different vibe going? I know. That's a good question. I don't know. Honestly, I'm trying to be like just as authentic as possible. Like I'm, you know, other than the whole Great Pyramid vibe, which became kind of a gag because of Twilight Zone, which was, you know, the first game that I streamed and did work audio on. So, that kind of like launched everything. Uh, and thank you again for having me on the podcast, you know, I feel like after I said I was going to buy a Twilight Zone Topper, I got the invitation. So, to to Hans's credit, it seems like Wait, that that came second. Hans, that's fair. That's fair. No, whatever. same sentence, but no. Um, yeah. No, I just, uh, I I'm trying to I want transparency in the marketplace between manufacturers and consumers. I feel like there's a huge disconnect between like what it's like to buy a game and have a game in your home now versus being an arcade operator back in the 70s and ' 80s. And I think a lot of the pinball manufacturing companies are stuck in that older mentality of how they're building a relationship with consumers. And that like really needs to change in terms of like being more transparent on like production timelines in terms of like okay when are code updates coming like uh you know road maps are a common thing in all of software development on almost every platform and pinball machines are software they have a hardware box around it but for the most part like this stuff shouldn't be held secret from the consumer and I'm just as well as trying to be like entertaining on Twitch and doing audio stuff for pins I just want to interview people and try to make a better connection and a better landscape between people buying pins and the people making them. So, have you been into pinball for a long time or are you kind of new to that? So, I actually pinball Molly got me into pinball about 20 something years ago when she was running uh her speak easy in in California. So, her and you know running before 2, which is this kind of a staple location in Los Angeles. Uh you know, she had this speak easy in the back of a punk rock studio and you would go back there and she had a big That's right. Pins and needles. That's the one. Probably love that. Yeah. A million years ago. It It truly was like it encompassed everything about what pinball the pinball vibe was for me, right? Like it was like not known. It was this speak easy hidden in the back of this place. Like every game was, you know, either a system 9 or a system 11 game for the most part. And it just like it smelled old. It smelled like an old pinball machine. Like it just had a lot of character to it. And uh I don't know, man. She really like popped my cherry. And then I was talking to Ellen about how to fix my first game. I bought a Road Kings and it was a pretty pretty much of a wreck, but uh you know, I learned a lot trying to get it working 100%. Was that um was that one of his recommendations or was that just one that popped up? No, I found one for like, believe it or not, when you could get pinball machines for like $200 and uh you know, it needed about $150 worth of work, which seemed like a mountain at that point, but now I don't even want to look on pins. I bet a road kings is probably like $14,000 or something now. Like every pinball machine. But anyways, yeah, I think you need to buy those wrecks though at times to, you know, really jump in at the deep end. Um because as we all know, like you can't be involved in this hobby without knowing how to fix them. Um, and so the the sooner you can learn, you know, well, the sooner you can learn to not be intimidated when you lift the playfield for the first time and wonder how the hell you're ever going to learn all this stuff, you know, the better. Yeah. So, I think I think buying a wreck as your first machine is probably the right move. They slap all these stickers everywhere telling you you're going to explode if you open a pinball machine, you know, and it's like there's not a whole lot in there that's carrying 120 volts. So, one or more watch those. Yeah, keep an eye out for that. How's my audio, guys? I got a couple of comments. Am I coming through okay for you? Fine for me, man. Okay, good. Good. All right. Well, uh yeah, or Jeff, welcome to the show, man. Uh great to have you. Uh I know you had Davey on recently. Did you guys have a good uh good little chat about some mods over there? We did, man. Yeah, it went uh went really long, too, didn't it? Um I don't know how Yeah. Well, we got into all sorts of Yeah. Yeah. Well, and and we talked about for half an hour after the show, too, didn't we? I think we uh you know, talked about the stuff that you can't talk on show, you know, all the important stuff. But um yeah, it was really good. We uh we did a we did a workshop uh tour that uh will go down uh in history as one of the best workshop tours um ever to be put down on a podcast. Uh we were doing an homage to like silent films really. I think that people didn't realize that that was a totally planned thing to have no audio running for the entire tour. So, I mean, you know, it looked like a technical uh difficulty uh issue, but it it wasn't. It was totally planned. Um yeah, we just talked mods, we talked pinball. Um I don't know where the time went. Well, speaking of time, we got a lot of people that are joining to hear a little bit about Alice because I've been uh bragging about uh getting mine finally. Um, and uh, it sounds like Davey, you've played it on and off, off and on, but not any recently. And then Jeff, you had one show up recently at what, Ace Goji, and no luck today. Yeah, Shane Shane's got one. It's not on the floor. I shot over there this morning in hopes to play it. Uh, I've been watching Robo in the Zone. He's a gentleman that had bought one really early. He's in the Netherlands, so he was able to get one without having to deal with any international shipping stuff. It looks I'm I'm excited to talk about I want to know about the game. It looks it looks like a Papadoo game because it kind of is because it's a deep root asset, right? And I'll talk about it from that context, too. Hans, have you got a chance to play it at all? I played it at Expo and it was there and I've got one on order, too. So, it will be a house of beer in Anaheim. Only Orange County location. Lucky lucky folks. So, so guys, this is Dutch Pinball's latest game uh done in partnership with Dutch Pinball Exclusives, which is we won't get into exactly what that relationship is, but Melvin Williams uh did the Whitewood from a uh uh he actually bought a storage locker of John Papaduk's um content and ultimately wanted to make this exact game from Chris Turner. He bought from Chris Turner. Yeah. So, we've we've done a show on that, but um long story short, it is shipping finally. Uh they're quite a bit behind right now. Uh they shipped their first 25 uh units to the US. Um and so they are starting to arrive. I don't know how many are in in Europe, but uh we're we're doing a topper uh add-on for this game. So, we were fortunate enough to uh not only be early because, you know, Dave and I were connecting with him, but also I've been working with Melvin on the on this topper thing. Um, and it it's great. I mean, I I like Well, let me let me go back a little bit. So, get the game. Um, and we know it's beautiful, right? Like, I'm not going to talk a lot about the beauty. The sculpts in this thing are amazing. There's there's no art plastic, right? So, there's no like typical handdrawn arts on the slings or all that. It's all sculpted and the sculpts are beautiful. Uh the overall package is is really incredible, but at the same time, we knew the layout was on the more simple side um because Melvin was uh adamant about bringing that very specific layout that John Papaduk had designed. Um I actually have had uh at least in my possession for the first time a Circus Voltater. Um had that for six or eight months. Uh thanks to the guys at Mad Pinball for letting us get our hands on that. Um, and uh, you know, it's that's kind of a game I'm comparing it to, right? It's like a more simple shooter. Um, that's exactly what this was meant to be. And what is what are some of the differences in that? Um, I think Melvin has been the first to say like this is not the game that you want to own as your only game in your collection. Uh, it's a game you want to own if you want something very different than what else is out there. Um, and and where this game has really delivered for me is the overall production value. Like I feel like I'm playing like a 90s Bal Ballet Williams classic, but it's got all these things that even the remakes I feel like don't have because you've got an amazing speaker system with like really high-end audio that's designed for like multi-channel, you know, output. You've got a light show that goes way beyond what a c uh a Chicago gaming remake light show uh gives you. It's lighting up all of these elements that are really fantastic compared to what you know you're used to normally seeing. And then you've got really good really good soundtrack. I mean like there's there's a lot of people that saw that first video and they were like this this music's really slow. But the every track like I I find myself like really enjoying. Um, Kong's been kind of doing that for me a little bit. Like when you start a spider multiball, like the audio changes, and I really like that. On this one in particular, there's five or six modes where the audio changes, and I feel like it's doing a really, really good job of bringing you in. Um, and the sound effects are really cool, too. It actually reminds me uh a little bit of some of the interesting sounds you hear in Labyrinth. Um, where you're hearing these kind of different effects that are not really like slot machine. I think they're doing a good job of making them different but not slot machine. And I think that um the wi-i with with Alice, it's it's it's really doing that well. So, um there's and and beyond that, I mean, there's like I'm learning the shots, I'm learning the modes, I'm learning the nuances, I'm learning how to get the playfield multiplier going. I'm learning uh some of the depth in it. Uh I'm experiencing the upper play field and kind of forming some opinions on that. Um, I'm learning how to use the little spinners and the swirls, which initially, um, I thought that was going to be silly, but I really like that aspect of it. Um, so we can definitely keep talking about it. I'll kind of open it up to questions since I'm the really the only one that's played it a lot, but overall, very happy with the decision to purchase it and very impressed with the package as a whole, for sure. So, I noticed um, you made a post this morning on the owners thread uh, regarding those outline spinners. You want to talk us through that? Yeah. So, there was a handful of small issues out of the box. Um, like the start button was loose. There was a screw in the upper playfield where it was a tiny bit loose. Nothing like too out of the ordinary. Um, it did travel a very long distance. Um, there was two sensors on it. Uh, one of them was a tilt sensor and one of them was an impact sensor, but the impact sensor was like weirdly positioned and it was red. I was really happy to see that nothing was broke, but there was a couple couple small things um that that came up. Uh but there are these like spinners uh that are on the left and the right out lane and the idea is that you can earn this save mechanic and you can spin these little spinners and they're they're designed to kick the ball back into the center of the playfield. And basically, uh, the way those motors work is like if they're wired one way, they spin one way. And they're wired the other way, they spin the other way. And they were wired to spin the opposite way than they were supposed to. So, it was basically like sucking the ball down the drains. And Oh, no. I was uh I was kind of I was kind of pushing Melvin on this and he's like, "No, like you know, they're not they're not they're they're not supposed to do what you're describing." And I finally he uh had me p put a piece of masking tape on the spinners. I was like, "Send me a video um and show me which way they're spinning." And they're they're spinning inward towards the inlanes. And you would think that's the way they're supposed to spin, but they actually should be spinning outwards towards the outlanes. And as soon as I made that change, um it made it a pretty cool experience. And apparently all 25 that went to the US had that issue. So that was my next question. Did the pinite thread confirm it really quickly? They they put out one of their service FAQs on it and um are helping people to address the issue. It's not a major change. I I proposed a solution that was a little more harder than uh what brands uh their support guy ultimately. But yeah, uh that's that's been kind of the big thing I guess. Um other things have been just about like leveling and whatnot. There's a little bit of a leveling thing with like the upper play field you want to keep an eye on. uh that I found out. That's great. You're getting me really excited about it now. I mean, I enjoy it's so beautiful and I love Davey's Davey's contribution to it. It's insanely cool. But I I can't wait to can't wait to get it. And you're People think I'm crazy to operate a game like this. I don't care. I'm going to have a Twilight all those possible games. I I pride myself in in making games accessible to people. And um if if something gets too tough, I'll just put it put it back in the shop and swap it out with another game. Yeah. So, so Davey did the side rail. So, there in that picture you see there, like the side rails light up and ultimately, um, we saw an opportunity with the topper. Uh, and we were kind of talking to Melvin pretty early on in Expo about it is like, hey, like this topper is amazing. I mean, it's incredible. The eyes have video screens in them and but they're not just like direct video screens. Like there's actually like a shell above them. So, they actually look like eyes, but the eyes change for different modes. And the idea was he was kind of coming out of the looking glass. But u we instantly saw an opportunity to build a world around the Cheshshire cat. Um and fortunately that job was even easier because of Dave Davey's uh lighting mod. So our lighting in our topper expansion, which should be revealed in a week or two, uh now that we have the game, we've got to do the video and whatnot. Um will um light up the entire area. Um, just to kind of describe it to you guys. Basically, there's a forest on the left and the right. Uh, there's lots of cool things inside the forest that are from the world of the game, like the trees are based on the trees on the back glass. There's mushrooms. There's a Jabberwocki hiding behind the trees. Uh, he actually is controlled by a motor. So, there's this world and then there's an arch going over uh the Cheshire cat. Um, and it actually has interchangeable phrases. There's so many amazing phrases from the world of Alice and Wonderland. Um, and that's lit in a really amazing way. So, Davey's lighting system controls not only the side rails, but also the shooter lane lighting. So, the archway lighting is controlled by the shooter lane lighting. So, you see you've got a matching kind of rainbow effect whenever you're ready to punch the ball. And then every mode has its own lighting. Um, so, uh, you know, taking the words out of Melvin's mouth, he's like, I once I kind of showed it to him and then sent it to him, uh, not only did he immediately say like, I want five of these. I want to give them to my friends, but he was like, I can never not see this topper without addon. Yeah. Um, so it it really did it really does, I think, complete the package. Again, an amazing topper. They've done a kick-ass job with it. But, um, it's So, it sounds like this is like your it's like an expansion to their topper. This is like your first like Yeah, it is. and fortunately I mean uh because of Davey's work like all of our toppers have a brain and their own lighting system. The brain is the Arduino control system. This topper expansion didn't require that because you're able to just simply add it to Davey's mod uh output. And I think going back to whenever we were originally talking with Melvin about his what he's doing with Dave, like this is one of the very first games or is the very first game to have uh a very complex mod outboard system. It's an appc controlled mod outboard system. It's not even just like some some uh uh 12volt and 5volt hookups, right? It's like literally a whole thing. Um so it's it's been really cool to work with Davey on this too and and super excited to show it. We kind of decided not to reveal it until we've got the official video done and of course we've only had the game for a couple days. So, we're we're actively working on that. I was um speaking to Melvin today um about a bunch of things and stuff and he showed me uh the topper uh the tap topper expansion on his game and you know you know it just it does you know really look amazing Rob. Um, and I would be I'd be highly surprised if you don't sell 500 of them because it's it's one of those ones where I mean I I loved the topper when I first saw it, you know, and I'm not much of a you know, a topper guy per se, but you know, I thought this topper just sort of and it is so simple, you know, um, you know, but the cat's eyes and the way it sort of looks around the playfield is so menacing and um, and I just I just loved it straight from the outset. But, you know, with that expansion, I I think as it is now, it's it's wonderful and amazing and stuff, but it sort of doesn't really blend in with the rest of the game, I don't think. Whereas, when you see it with the expansion, it it does blend in so much nicer with the rest of the package. And it just sort of becomes complete in a way. And I guess that's what Melvin was talking about when he says, "I can't see it without that expansion." Yeah. When did they involve you in the process? Cuz it really looks like the topper. I mean, there's real estate available for you to be creative with it, you know. So, we So, Davey and I were fortunate enough to to interview uh Melvin when he kind of first announced that he was not only doing a John Papa game, but also like going to make it as exact to the original as possible based on that that have you seen that black and white kind of thing that the original like deep rooted asset thing? Yeah. If you don't mind, Davey, see if you can find that. man. And that was pretty controversial decision on his part because John Papa did um unfortunately burn a lot of people and a lot of people were go get you a magic girl for frustrated with that but but at the same time like Melvin really was like look this is what I'm doing. Um and then uh at expo you know he knew of me but I kind of approached him and I was just like actually approached Ren their support guy. I was like, "Hey, do you think Melvin would be offended if I suggested that this thing needs a little more on the topper?" Um, and he was like, "No, it's interesting uh that you say that because like it's something that they talked a lot about, but ultimately decided, you know, it didn't make sense uh for a number of different reasons. I'm sure there was like a bomb related reason or something. I mean, there's so much in this game." Um, but yeah, it kind of just snowballed from there. And I think he was a little hesitant to um bring in something that, you know, wasn't part of the original design, but the artist we hired, uh, Maria Keller, she's based in Mexico. She's amazing. Um, she really, uh, matched the art and then ultimately Melvin gave us a lot of his original art for us to like really like fine-tune and hone in on. Um, and then al and and we did actually use the Jabberwocki from the back class in the topper. So there is a little bit of artwork from his original art package, Melvin's original art package as well. If you hadn't mentioned the looking glass thing, I would have no I just thought it was a piece of metal around. I really I mean it just scream. And it's and it's interesting because there's no lighting on that. So it doesn't actually do anything interesting. But with with our topper expansion now you've got multicolor lighting kind of hitting that. Um so it's it's a nice effect. So is the game fun? I think that's my only question. So, so again, like I do think the comment about it fitting in a in a in a small to medium to large size collection, I'm talking about five plus is probably appropriate because I don't know yet like how deep it is compared to a modern stern. Like it's not got just a lot of the things that you're finding in that like combos and stuff like that. I don't know if there's going to be stacking. Um, there's not really like a crazy amount to stack in here. The modes are interesting because they're short timers and there's small amounts of shots. Uh, that's not true of all the modes, but there's some interesting uh, decisions on there. Um, but generally like I'm really really enjoying it because like I feel like, you know, there's something to be said about a game that's got a little bit more of a concise play. I mean, my biggest issue with Godzilla after owning it for two years was like I kind of loathed a a 60-minute game, you know? It's like just the idea of like to get a full experience out of it to have to play for 45 minutes or 60 minutes across like two or three games or whatever it is. I I think there's a place for something more straightforward, but um I'm also realizing there's a lot of depth to getting to the final wizard mode and the way that they're doing that is a little bit different. you have to basically have to spell wonders and there's like different ways you get the letters. It's a little bit more of a they're hidden actually throughout the game. So, there's just a just a mysterious different approach to this game that so far uh I'm really enjoying shooting it. Um even though there doesn't feel like there's nearly as many shots in a typical stern and it's because it's like it's it feels like it's an experience. Rob, how does the code compare now um in the one you unbox versus what we played at Expo? It's a little hard to say. I mean, they had the whole two ball thing, so it was a little hard to get deep into it. Um I do know based on some conversations with Melvin that they wanted to be further along with the code, but that was only because they thought they were going to have a lot more units out there and ultimately he didn't want to be making a lot of code tweaks without getting like active user feedback. So, they've kind of delayed that process, which I kind of as an owner appreciate because I certainly loved being a part of that process on Bond and I'm loving being a part of that process on King Kong. Um, so it's pretty cool to be like there and kind of see how it's going to evolve. I mean, there's a couple modes that start and like there's placeholder text. So, like it's way further along in my opinion than like Bond was or some of the other infamous Stern ones, but at the same time, like there are some things that are definitely missing. Yeah, it's it's funny how divisive I feel like the world is in terms of code releases. It's it's either the camp of like they want to see it develop and the the feedback is important to making an even more polished product or it's people complaining that the game should be finalized on on release date and I don't know they both camps seem to be really passionate about I do often wonder though that the people who bang on about incomplete code are they really so good that they're getting to the end of the game im I mean I know some people obviously would be um sure and and fair dues to them to be able to like complete what's there and be irritated that they don't have more. But for the amount of people that go, "Give us a code update. Give us a code update." Are they really seeing the extremities of the game? I mean, I wouldn't consider myself a terrible player, but I'm certainly not top tier, and I'd probably be below average, I would say, in comparison to um, you know, people that I tend to play with in shows and stuff. But, you know, like, you know, there's no way I'm getting close to like Rob's score on Kong, you know, even though I tried to implement your Rob gave me some advice about how to score higher on Kong during our last show and I'm like, "Okay, cool. I'll climb the building and I'll, you know, let it go through the uh the swamp and things like that." Literally the same score, Rob, as I've been getting the whole time. I'm curious what your score is. Well, 200. I'll tell I'll tell you my score. I'll tell you my score, but it's uh I think what it is so like Kong is actually probably I think it's it's not not real great depth wise. And I think it doesn't have to do with how good you are. I mean, okay, so my high is 800 and Dave says it's like 300, right? So like regardless of why that is, I've been a lot further in the game than he has. And uh there's things in Kong that are obviously coming. The issue like the power up shot. Yeah. So, as you climb the building, you can unlock the New York City events and but the problem is there's only one New York City event. But the cool thing they did on the last update, which like read like a pretty basic update, was they allowed you to play three flavors of that one New York City event. So, you could play a three ball multiball worth. Yeah. uh a limited flips uh mode worth 2x and then a two ball uh no I'm sorry a timed mode worth 3x. So that's really cool to like let you decide kind of how much riskreward you want to take. Yeah. See I've been there. I've been to that been to that bit but I'm still only getting 300k. So I don't know there's there's some key thing that you're doing differently to me. I surely can't be that much ball game, Dave. I play and I've got mine set up really steep and I always set them up steep. So that's the real reason I played a little lot. I I think I I kind of make up a story that I play a lot more pinball than you. To to your previous point that there's like two types of code updates, right? There's stuff that's just flat out fixing stuff that's like broking or missing content. And then there's stuff that is like makes the game more interesting and adds additional features in ways that like bring a lot to it, you know? And you see that with I don't know, you can think of a billion like Godzilla you mentioned is a good example. I mean, they added two mini wizard modes that really like kind of shook it up and changed how a lot of that like functions. That's they wouldn't have gotten that without player feedback. So, I don't know. I'm just curious how DPX is going to expand if the game does have kind of limited depth like that's fixable in code if the shots are fun and flow. Yeah, there it's there's a I'm learning a lot of there's a lot of classic things like I I love how the scoop kicks out to the to the right flipper and then bounces over to the left limber just like Twilight Zone. Like that's just like Twilight Zone all day and then you can backhand this captive ball, this Newton ball on the left and five hits on that. If people are not enjoying the game right now, I think a lot of it has to do with there is not a uh the adequate amount of onscreen indicators of key elements. So, for example, that Newton ball right there on the left, you get a nice little animation of a ball going under a card guy, but there's nothing telling you five five total shots on that starts a multiball. Um, you've also got a spell eat me in the center with these interesting targets to activate the playfield multiplier, but there's nothing tracking that. And I know a lot of that is that a lot of that is coming. Um, but it's You mentioned circus. What other game does it kind of feel like if you had to I know comparison is such a dumb thing. So, so one thing is like the big plastic ramps like people are not doing those so much anymore. Um, so that feels very much like circus or like Toan just like how the ball kind of moves um through those. Um, there's definitely that really close scoop on um that's also there on Twilight Zone. That's memorable to me. I mean, Melvin and I were kind of talking about games that play fast and and what Stern's doing a lot is just like leaving that entire middle open and just kind of letting the ball go in a lot of games. and uh you're not getting that. But at the same time, like these flippers feel great. I mean, they feel arguably better than than uh than Labowski for me. Um and I feel like I can get to all the shots, but there's also some really far out shots uh on either side. So, I feel like there's kind of a mix of things. Um the center I think they made some Speaking of the flippers, I think they made some significant improvements to the circuit design of those flippers for this game. So, even though it's the same architecture as what was used on TBL, um, is it fast? Do you know what the platform they're using is or? No, it's PR. Perrock. Well, it's it's so PR. Yeah, Prock is the the architecture and then the actual game code is so the the coder for this is Yanos Kiss um who worked on Funhouse 2 uh and is part of uh Team Pinball um in the UK actually and they worked on Mafia and a few other games and stuff and we've sort of known Yanos for a while and Yanos has pretty much got his own sort of uh pinball coding platform I guess if you will um that he sort of can le you know he sort of works on different systems with that. So Funhouse 2 was fast. This is Prock but he can he can sort of interface with both. Um so he's coder on this. Oh sorry Amy it's all right. How's the um upper playfield the magnifi zone? So that probably gets to my biggest criticism of the game is like a major mech to get excited about. Um there's no bash toy there's no exploding castle you know it's like there's not that. And then of course the main thing is the upper play field. Um, and at the end of the day, uh, it's a it's a it's a slightly bigger version of like the Twilight Zone upper play field with a little bit more to shoot at. Um, it you don't go up there a ton. Uh, when you do go up there, uh, it is interesting. Sometimes you only have a limited time up there, sometimes you have longer up there. Um, I am starting to figure out some of the nuances of it. Um, I feel like it's going to be up to him on the coding side to like really make that possibly interesting in terms of what you have to do up there because at the end of the day like it just is what it is, you know, uh, as far it being its major thing. It's I think um I think it shoots I think it shoot like when you're up there I think the functionality of how it works is way better than Twilight Zone in terms of how it Well, they're spread the the spots are spread out and it's bigger. So, like I think I think the magnets are bigger as well. Melvin was describing how they put that together and I think they've used bigger magnets and stuff. So, it feels better than the Twilight Zone one, which I always thought was a bit [] to be honest. Yeah. Um, but having said that, because it's better, it also makes it slightly easier as well. So, you can you can tend to stay up there quite quite a long time. So, I personally think that that's not a good thing. Um, but fortunately what they've done with that upper is they've made it so that uh the the rubbers that sort of protect the outline I guess um can be changed over so you can create sort of larger gaps up there to make it trickier. Um now um you know when I sort of questioned Melvin on it um he sort of explained that sort of concept to me and I I think that was a really good idea. Um, and it's probably what I'm going to be doing for mine because I I do think it's slightly too easy up there and you can sort of hang about up there and it's it's not the, you know, it's not sort of fast-paced. It's quite a slow sort of section of the game and stuff. So, I think it's better to like all upper playfields really to be a quick experience rather than a long one. Yeah. Now, there are a lot of shots up there. Um, there's a captive ball that goes back and forth. There's three targets and there's there's a there's a a saucer. Uh, but even the saucer right now doesn't really do anything. It just kind of resets the ball. So, I'll be curious to see what he comes up with it. Um, but overall, yeah, we got we got Neil in the house. Neil, have you, uh, have you got your game yet? Are you excited about it? We know. We're talking about Alice's Adventures in Wonderland. He says he says, "Which game?" Yeah. Have you seen a lot of buzz for it in terms of topper like feedback? I mean is when did you guys announce that you were doing a top for Alice? The game is in a weird place right now because they're way behind on shipping. The actually with these last 25 machines that shipped to the US only half of them had the topper because they had an issue with the manufacturer that delayed the whole process so much that they decided to not delay the games any longer. They're going to be shipping the topper separate. And then you've got this tariff situation which is really really difficult situation for the consumer especially because you've got for so I paid 10% extra on my game and right now as of apparently August 1st it's going to go up to 30% which is just like it's like $4,000. It's crazy. There's no way that anybody would want to get nobody wins from that. But on the other hand it's it's all their profit, right? So, it's like you can't you can't it's it's got to be probably more than their profit, $4,000 if they were have to to pay that. So, Oh, for sure. It's a bad situation. You know, you know, not wanting to get into the politics of it um at all. But um you know, I'm just hoping that again it's going to be sort of a negotiating tactic position and it will change um like these things have changed in the past. I mean, I know that they have been in negotiation, you know, for the last couple of months. Um, and I assume that that's ongoing. So, for Dutch Pinball's sake, I hope that it's a shortlived thing and that, um, you know, they get some relief from that because that's going to, you know, completely screw them over. And other options are to hold on to the game until the tariffs change again, but then by then then other games might be out and people are more interested in those. Somebody else was making the argument too that like what's to say that once you have them in the air that things change at that point, you know, it's a big risk for point taker or whatever, right? Because it's all about when it comes. Exactly. Also, the the problem with the u with delaying it is everybody can get their re their refund their refunded their deposit back by the end of the year. That they had no idea this was coming when they set that that term, right? That was a fair term. Get them all out in 2025 or get your money back for your refund if you want. But if they hold them to wait for the tariff to end perhaps then then everybody it opens them up for people to cancel their order which is painful as well. I don't I don't know that's I think there's a demand regardless for 500 of these worldwide easily in my opinion because as long as long as it's not a 30% tariff right yeah so I'm I don't think many people are going to cancel like you know if if we get to January or whatever and we're all sort of just holding out for some tariff relief. I'm not sure too many people are going to cancel except those people who sort of really need the cash, I suppose, or need to transfer that deposit onto another game. Um, you know, I think that the people who have been waiting are committed and they're excited. Um, you know, the obviously the owners thread on Pinid's had its ups and downs over the last 3 to four months. Um, but we're currently on an up and I think that uh the the sentiment has changed a bit. Um, I think everybody's getting really excited. I think early reports um from owners has been almost overwhelmingly positive. Um, and you know, now we just need Dutch to get a bit of a break in terms of, you know, getting these getting these games into the US so they can get them to owners. Yeah. I mean, you're buying a Dutch pinball machine. You're you're buying a collector's piece. I mean, it happened with Big Labowski. I mean, people know what they're going to get for the most part. It's like a well-built thin bot machine. Exactly. People have been so happy with the with the build quality. I mean, that's been one of the over I mean, obviously there's always, you know, a couple of issues out of the box and stuff that people have been mentioning in thread. None of them have been monumental. Um, but the overwhelming feedback, other than sort of how beautiful it looks, which is what we all know, is how well it was it's been built. Um, so people are very happy uh with that. And I'm sure Dutch have been very pleased to read that, too. It's always um really heartening as a maker to uh when people receive things to say, you know, for them to remark on how well it's been made. So, we'll uh we'll do a stream on it soon. I mean, there's a bunch of streams out there. Um I'm obviously biased on multiple levels on this game, but I do think the fact that it it is a great playing game kind of goes well with the fact that yeah, I think they'll end up moving a lot of these. I just hate that, you know, even for them, right, are going to have to wait, you know, so long to to capture the hard work, the payout for the hard work they did. Yeah. Um, so I know it's been really stressing, really stressing Barry out behind the scenes, um, as you can imagine it as a business owner and a small business owner really, you know, you consider them a small business. Yeah. Is um, this would just be the most stressful situation to be in for them. So, uh, I'm reading I'm reading Neil's comments. Yeah, he re Neil reckons that he should root that they should, uh, root all the games through me here in the UK and I become a worldwide sprinkling magic dust on it to fix the situation. I don't know what he's just trying to get you to have like 50 50 Alice's in your stock house. Fill up that back room with Alice. Yeah. I'd have to move the uh pole dancers first, wouldn't I, Jeff? So, yeah. Um yeah, uh that's a good suggestion, Neil. Neil, thanks. Uh but probably it's not going to happen. So, are we all tired of talking about Predator or we uh want to move on to mods? What how did that game the other day with you? They need to stop [] on Predator. Like, nobody's played it and everybody has an opinion on it. It's unbelievable. It's yeah that that we won't get into that. Uh I was part of conversation with Jeff the other day with with somebody and he was getting into it with him a little bit and I think the main thing was like your point is right like we've got to got to give it a chance because like there's a lot going on with it even if it doesn't give us everything we could possibly want. Sure. I mean if look at Alice look at Predator. Yes. the outlanes spinning the wrong way is frustrating and that's probably aggravating some people. Yes, the tariffs are not a cost that anybody wants to swallow, but it's not the pinball manufacturers problems. Like, do you want these two companies to be in business next year? Like, do you want new pinball machines to come out? We need them in business. Like, Right. Exactly. So, you know, it's up to the consumer to not blow a, you know, pop a fuse of of fury and direct it at these pinball companies for something that is is truly so like insignificant. It's different for Predator for people that are like so obsessed with the theme and and are upset that Schwarzenegger is not in it. You know, we were on a a Discord call with somebody that was pretty passionate about how that was very important to them. To me, it doesn't matter. But hey, I'm not really in the market to buy a Predator, and the person that is in the market to buy a Predator is very upset about it. So, you know, that's feedback that that Pinball Brothers should probably take into account in the future. But they did also update Alien with callouts that included Ripley. So, you know, don't [] on them until you know what's coming. I wonder um I wonder what uh cuz obviously that must have been a very difficult thing for them to negotiate. Must have taken a long time. probably they would have had to have coughed up quite a significant sum. I wonder how many extra games they sold as a result of that Ripley edition on Oh, you mean once the code came out? I That's a great question. I would love Daniel to answer that. Yeah. Well, the big thing with that is the price was amazing. I mean, it was like 8,500 bucks and you're not seeing that on a lot of levels with this one. I mean, you're paying you're paying for it all. And I think that's I mean think about the conversation we had with our friend Hector at at uh at TPF. It's like if I'm going to pay the price I want all the stuff. Yeah. And and I mean look like even that guy that you were talking to Jeff was like you were like would you have preferred it was not made and his answer was yes. Yeah. I was like would you prefer there was no predator? He said yes. Yeah. Okay. But he's frustrated. I I mean he wanted he wanted it all. He's He's at this point not getting it. So, is he a Predator super fan then? Well, he he understood the IPA better than I do for sure. At least had theories on what would make a better Predator game. Like he kind of outlined the the reasons why. And um it's not doing that for him. So, okay. I mean, yeah, whether he's right or wrong, it's what he wants and he's the consumer that's paying money for the game. So, you know, to a degree kind of automatically right. Yeah. And and when these guys are the vocal minority, you know, they can make or break a game when they're being very vocal about it. And that's certainly been happening with with Predator. Um, you know, if every video you see has people [] on it. Um, and I I don't actually think that's the case with Predator. I think from the videos that I've seen and stuff, there's been a lot of positive comments being made on Facebook and YouTube and stuff, which is great to see. Um, for sure. But when the overwhelming sentiment, you know, as a pinball consumer is one of derision and where's Anie, you know, I mean, I I don't think there's a Predator video that exists where somebody doesn't mention where's Anie like in the comment section like right near the top. Um, you know, that's going to color your judgment of that game. Like, it's going to reduce your hype for it, your excitement. And, um, you know, I know that that's going to that's going to be impacting the sales of of Predator massively. Um, I guess my question to those people that are like vocally, you know, [] all over this game for not having this, that, or the other thing and are really passionately upset at the company about it, you know, if and when Pinball Brothers goes out of business because of that, like do you post like, "Yeah, we did it." Like, what was like Yeah. What's the value? Yeah. Right. Like what did you want out of it? There's some there's a better way to communicate like Okay. like find out why they didn't tell people that Predator wasn't in or I'm sorry, Schwarzenegger's like stuff wasn't in. Maybe they I heard that they the team that was handling the IP stuff got switched like at the last second and then they had a new team that was handling it and at some point like yeah there is I think that the consumers are owed a certain amount of transparency but at another point like that's like really just behind the scenes business stuff that it's it's nobody's business at that point. It does affect the end product and that should be communicated, but like I don't know. Like I get you're really mad Schwarzenegger's not in it. But more pinball or less pinball? Which one do you want? Yeah. There's plenty of options out there. And I think that having them ship a game that's that that's so popular and titled and they're actually shipping games. Let's remember that, right? this is a company that ships and delivers games versus I won't mention several others but we know the story of of being dangled something that's so great and everybody wants it and people lose their money and all that junk. So I think that that right off the bat is um was a bit of positive light as well. I think maybe they had could have had more to ship when it came time to to reveal it so they can get them out faster and get some people streaming and get some excitement about it. that that's hurting him because you know when we're left to our own devices to think and talk about stuff you know where this community goes almost every time right Neil's saying he said they misled their customers I'm curious when pinball brothers misled their customers I guess we got to wait but took him days to clear up what was in and out of the game I mean that's a fair criticism but Yeah. Yeah. I'm trying to think about my perspective on it and across that timeline. Of course, I wasn't in, you know, so it's like I guess Well, okay. So, people got misled because of a video that leaked, right, that they didn't want to leak. So, that would be I guess the most core example is a video that they supplied got. That's what Neil saying. I mean, that's unfortunate. That's really unfortunate. I mean, I I think that that kind of shows me that they they thought they had it because they're Yeah, that's what I'm thinking, too. They're getting distributors excited about something. They can't afford to do that unless they think they have it and then they don't have it. Uh there was there is no world that exists where they where they think that they would have like, "Oh, we we fooled them." Like, do do they did they really think that people weren't going to notice that Arnold suddenly wasn't in the game? So, there something else is going on. that doesn't sound like a deliberate like uh attack on the consumer, you know, the reputational damage um and the loss of hype around that and the negative publicity, you know, would negatively impact the sales of the game way more than a few additional sales due to one video, one initial video. Yeah, I'm not sure, Neil. I mean, yeah, look, I I see that I see that that's the way that it could be interpreted, and I can see why people might be upset and irritated. Um, and I think the point that you're making is that they didn't address it adequately enough in their coms after the fact, then that's probably a valid uh accusation, I think. Totally. And their launch was pretty like strange in terms of being able to give footage of the game in its best form. I mean, Daniel I when he was on my podcast, he owned up to the fact that they didn't really do a great launch. But then they released gameplay footage of him kind of like dry monotone playing the game and it wasn't the you know it was not great play of him playing it. It didn't show off a lot of the interesting features of it. It's just no the whole you get one chance to show your game off like do a good job. Yeah, it was a was an absolute schmoszle that's for sure. Good Carrie. Car's on the Car's on the chat. Hey, man. Um, comes comes in right at the controversial section. You always know the spot, don't you, Carrie? Yeah. No, no main character for sure. Um, there's there's a lot lot working against it. I mean, we wouldn't be talking about Daniel's demeanor on that video probably if those other things weren't, you know, so much of an issue. So, it's a it's a slippery slippery sl. But let's let's let's just quickly talk about the game rather than the controversy and the noani stuff like um I think it actually looks quite decent. You know, I think that um so uh who's sort of renowned on pin side uh he he's done sort of a I guess you call them mods but he's done sort of alternative back glasses for the shadow. So, he's done uh quite a famous uh orange shadow back glass, which is sort of more on the comic book theme rather than the movie sort of version of the shadow. And I think um and I I believe he worked for Highway as well back in the day. Um which was the original pin pinball brothers incarnation. Um so he he's the guy that's done all the artwork on Predator. Um and I think the artwork looks looks great. personally, you know, I mean, I always quite fancy a jungle theme anyway. Um, so so you know, I think it I think it looks I think it looks good. I think the game looks like it shoots quite well. Um, you know, I was pleasantly surprised considering that I thought that ABBA was just like not great really. I mean, Alien wasn't really a home design. They purchased that. So, this is kind of their first offering that is I know I know Alien's got a massive uh fan base with a lot of people who really love it, but I'm not a fan of it at all. Um, I thought that uh Queen was okay, but I know that a lot of people hate it and I thought ABBA was the worst of the lot personally. So seeing this come out and seeing the way it shoots and seeing the ball paths and you know it looks I guess a lot more traditional in the way it's laid out in comparison to some of their other stuff which looks sort of poorly thought out and just like ramps placed anywhere. Um so yeah, I'm I'm pleasantly surprised. I think probably the one thing that to me sort of makes it look like a bit of a letdown is the code uh work, particularly around the animations and the sequencing and the movie clips and the overlays and stuff like that. I think it looks a little bit slap dash uh on the on the uh on the screen. And that's too bad cuz Alien doesn't feel like that at all. I mean yeah I mean that's Kelly their animator. He's generally like his stuff has been pretty amazing at least on you know Alien. I have not personally played Abba or Queen and I'm not going out of my way to with the you know multitude of feedback on it. So with ABBA and Queen you had it just didn't shoot well and I mean one thing going for Predator is it is based on the new fast board system which is the same as like what's in uh Labyrinth as well as the new Funhouse. Um, and I I know they did a lot of lighting work. There's that cool like lighting apron and stuff. So, hopefully it shoots a lot snappier. I would expect it would since it's based on like Bali Williams parts. It It looks like it does. Like it looks like it shoots quite well from from the footage that I've seen. I haven't watched loads of it to be honest. Um, but I think it looks like it shoots quite strong. So, so we cannot afford to talk about Potter, guys, because we're going to be here a whole another hour. Uh, we do need to talk about BJP doesn't need the money. We do need to talk about some mods. Uh what what do you like what are we looking at lineupwise here? What do you what do you have for us? Like five or 10 or how many do we have? Loads. So do you want to just do a really quick run through? Now that we're on the old do that helicopter mod that [Music] helicopter mod helicopter. Okay, we're just going to jump straight to the helicopter mod. Uh, we'll just jump straight to helicopter mod. Uh, okay. Yeah, that was you. So, I'll get to that in a sec. So, uh, we were talking about this one a little bit before the show. Um, this is a new mod that's come out from Pino Pinball Mods. It's a it's an it's an old mod um that's just been updated. Uh, it's for Jurassic Park. Uh, it's a helicopter that updates the quite crappy uh uh acrylic helicopter that's in Jurassic Park. A really sort of bad feature of Jurassic Park was quite a not great acrylic helicopter that's in the um in the on the right hand side of the playfield. And so Lionel from Pino Pinball Mods um did this uh helicopter a while ago. Um there was essentially a static helicopter um whose rotors spin via a motor. Um now Lionel contacted me uh a little while ago um to ask whether he could um potentially use the lolly board um to control uh the spinning of the rotor blades um specifically if he could do it in a way that could sort of variably rotate those blades. Um and and then also um work and LED um in the cockpit. You can see that it's changing depending on the mode that's struck. So we've sort of uh been looking at this over the last couple of weeks. Um and this is the final result. So he's going to be reissuing uh this mod um with the lolly board as uh uh an additional um to have it sort of more interactive with the game. That's the position that it is on Jurassic Park. Um and then for existing customers, I think he's going to provide um different packages uh that will enable them to upgrade um should they wish to. So really great. Uh Jeff sort of brought this up before the show and sort of noticed that um that uh you know I'd been working on this with one of the other mod makers and and what I sort of mentioned to him was how pleased I was um to be able to do these kind of collaborations. I think it's one of the um bits about the the hobby that I enjoy the most. Uh you know, sort of working with somebody that you know, you sort of haven't met before and has got a cool idea and just trying to come up with something fun and cool uh that can sort of capture the imagination. So, yeah, really pleased with this one. Very cool. Have you uh does he have an idea when they're coming out? I swear I want one for sure. Oh, cool. Yeah. Um I imminently I think like he he we I still need to get him over sort of production level uh boards. Um so I think probably what he's going to do is just kind of gauge the uh reception for them, work out how many uh boards he needs to order, then he'll get in touch with me. Um and I have a lead time of a couple of weeks uh to get the boards over to him. So it's probably going to be a month or two, I would have thought. Do you uh are you a Jurassic Park Stern fan? Do you like that one? Absolutely. Yeah. Love it. Love the game. Um, this looks cool. I've already got a couple helicopter mods on. I have two of them. I have a premium and a pro and they have one just it's just a nicer looking helicopter. It's got it's just a rotor really, not the rest of the copter, right? But when you launch the ball, it gives it a nice spin. So, this is much much more interactive and and unique for sure. Have you guys Speaking of Jurassic Park, I'm going to do a bit of self-promo here. Some shameless self-promo. Whoops. I'm just going to my There we go. Um, you're a millionaire, Davey. Showing all my orders in the game. Yeah. Um, so have you guys seen my electric fence mod for Jurassic Park? Oh, dude, this this is so cool. Like, I want to get my Jurassic back just because it's wild, which that's the litmus test, right? Getting people get it back in their Exactly. So, this is that's like a little video of like the So, so basically it sort of um it will I'll see if I can pull up the YouTube just quickly. Um turn the sound right down. Skip ahead. So basically, uh the idea is is that um so there's the electric fence around the um the T-Rex and um so it's looking like a sort of a sparking electric fence uh when it's not triggered and then when you hit the ball uh through the uh uh well over the ramp over the T-Rex ramp then it sort of flames up uh and and lights up around him. There's a couple of new sort of lighting effects that I've used on this. It's kind of using the the flame, which I've sort of used on a lot of other mods, but I've sort of integrated that with uh the glitch effects to sort of give it this sort of sparking uh electric effect uh on the on the uh wires. The other cool bit about this is these wires themselves. So, um I'll just scroll back briefly. So, these these LED strips um are brand new sort of custom uh strips that I've designed that are on a you can see it's obviously a flexible PCB um that's sort of backed with some florist wire and then and then shrink uh um uh shrink film shrink wrap but anyway so these are one by one uh LEDs so really microsized things very very tiny um and never been done before um in the pinball world. You can't even buy these as strips. They're not available. Um so, brand new. Really excited about them. Um and you know, we're going to be looking to use them on a lot of other a lot of other mods in the What's the install process like? It seems like it's probably a pretty easy one to put in compared to some of them. Yeah. So, I I haven't actually sorted it out yet cuz originally the the original idea was that um they were just going to go on the original mounts of the uh plastics that came out of here. So, there's there's plastic uh posts here with um you know wire um attached to them um that sort of you know the stock plastics that are in the game. And I the original idea was just that I'd take those out and stick these back in on the original mountings, but because these come forward a bit, um there's issues with the way that the T-Rex when he moves his head sort of bashes into them. And I know that other people have been approaching um you know, these kind of post replacements have had the same problems. So I know Mezel sort of did did a version of them and they had problems with it clashing as well. So I'm going to have to rethink that a bit. Um possibly changing these rock formations so they're a slightly different design. um moving it right over to the left here and then kind of mounting it in a different way. So, I haven't quite worked that out yet, but in terms of the install difficulty, it should be quite easy, I think. Um, whatever it ends up being. Certainly not on the scale of some of the mods that I produce. Yeah, it looks great. And, you know, kudos to you for pushing the the tech, you know, in the direction of how far it needed to go. I'll be curious to see how you use these again. Um, yeah, it's uh I'm sure there's it's you got to pick and choose your battles with it, but at the same time you can do something pretty cool with those. Yeah. Well, you know, as soon as Melvin saw them, he's like, "You got to send me a couple of those for testing." So, uh, yeah. So, those couple of those will be going over to him and who knows, you know, maybe we'll see them on the next game that he's working on, whatever that is. Yeah, this these incorporated to into the Yeah, there's a lot could be done with it. Okay. So, uh, also for doing a mod on a six-year-old game, that's pretty awesome to I feel like a lot of people expect your mods to only come out on new games now. So, I feel like a lot of JP fans might be pretty stoked. Yeah, that's a really interesting comment actually because um, and I know it's something that me and Rob have been talking about a lot really, like which games do you choose to do mods? Now, traditional thinking is that you always go for the latest releases because that's where the hype is. That's where all the sales are. And generally that sort of rings true. Um, but obviously everybody's kind of worked that out now. So, you know, when Kong comes out, you know, you sort of it's it's quite tricky because, you know, you sort of be working on something and then suddenly somebody will bring something out in that exact place doing that exact same thing. So for me as well, my stuff generally takes a bit longer to produce just because there's a lot more going on. You know, you got to order circuit boards and um you know, different sort of resin components and stuff that all sort of go into it. Um so I'm quite late at sort of coming to the party usually. Um, and like Kong, um, uh, people, uh, you know, release stuff, uh, you know, you know, I had to sort of chuck stuff out because people had released stuff. But, you know, with Jurassic Park, it was sort of a bit of a test case really just to see whether um, you know, an old game like Jurassic Park, which does have like a really strong fan base, uh, it's a game that still, um, gets snapped up quite quickly on the secondhand market. Um, you know, is the fan base strong enough to support, you know, a mod, you know, coming out like this. Um, and yeah, it's it's had pretty good reception. Um, don't know how many are on the list at the moment. Um, but probably over 200 or something close to that. Um, so it's it's not been it's not been bad really. Um, considering it is like quite an old game. Um, so we'll probably be doing a couple more for Jurassic Park as well in the future. Nice. Dave, I got to share with you. You inspired me. Um, you guys probably don't know this, but I actually did a little bit of mod I dipped my toe in the mod making world myself. Oh, really? Did you? Yeah. So, I I ordered the Tokyo Neon. I think we communicated on on the um the the Pinside chat on that. And then I just realized um and this is to your to your success, but I could I could tell by just rough numbers how successful you were. And I'm like, I got to get into this. So, I'm not an artist and I don't create 3D models, nor do I paint or um or um you know, create new circuit boards and that sort of. So, I stood over my games. Instead of taking popular games, I picked rarest Led Zeppelin to do my mods on because that's what I had. Um and so because you inspired me, so I created a um exploding Zeppelin mod. So, that's the Hindenburg. That's Zeppelin one album cover over my shoulder there. So, everybody knows it's the Hindenburg exploding. So, when I stood over Zeppelin like why isn't it exploding on this game? So I i created an exploding Zeppelin shameless plug. I created an exploding Zeppelin mod where it actually makes it you know it flashes red. I think I saw that recently. Did you Were you talking about that relatively recently, Hans? Um I don't know. Maybe I've seen I've seen something. So we'll uh pick it up, man. I'm so pleased. I'm so pleased that uh you know and that's like you know that's what I love about what we do so much. you know, like everybody there's a real camaraderie between everybody and you know, like you may not know how to, you know, 3D design or, you know, how to find a supplier that can get you cables or or whatever, but you know, everybody's really sort of open about that kind of stuff. So, you know, I'm constantly, you know, uh there's there's a guy that we're about to feature here, um called Raiden Mods, uh Raiden Gorby, uh who's a lovely guy. Um and he just recently released some X-Men fixes. So, X-Men's got a lot of sort of shooting problems and stuff, and he's uh recently, um released a whole bunch of sort of fixes for those things. Um, let's see if I can quickly. So, these are these are kind of his his fixes for this is for the ball hop on the flipper lane. Um, which sort of sits there and stops the stops the ball hop on the flipper lane. And then there's a bunch of other um fixes as well. I mean, that's another one of those um which sort of stop uh the ball bouncing as it's going up sort of ramps and things like that. Um, so really great stuff to make X-Men, uh, much better game. But the interesting thing about these mods is the material he used. So, it's basically like a it's it's 3D printed, but it's like a rubber sort of material to withstand ball hits. Now, that's really hard to find that kind of stuff. Um, and really useful because, you know, you're constantly looking for translucent material that can be hit with a ball and not break like resin does, which is quite brittle. Um, so you can bet that, uh, Raiden, I'm going to be hitting you up to find out exactly what you used for this so that I can steal the idea cuz they're awesome, man. They're really awesome. Cool. Uh, right. Should we see a couple more? Let's do it. Um, okay. Back to the browser. Let's do two more. I'd say uh two more. All right, I'll quickly roll through them then. So, we got uh uh so this is the this is uh this is TDD's concave mod. Um this is the one. So, I was working on a concave as well and uh Tom then released this one. I'm like, god damn it. So, yeah, I'm not doing a mod anymore. It's so awesome. Yeah. So, yeah, that one's he's done a really good job of that. Tom Tom never disappoints. Um he's done a really uh kick-ass job on that. So, awesome, awesome work, Tom. Um, you should sell a bunch of those, I'm sure. I'm going to quickly roll through a whole bunch. This is by Stella Pinball. So, uh, this is why I was showing this video before. So, we did an unboxing on the show, um, last show, which is a couple of weeks ago with a Star Trek Next Generation Photon Cannon mod by these guys, Father and Son, Stella Pinball. These things were amazing. I was so impressed with them. I was basically just like nerding out on the show with how awesome these things were. Um, unfortunately my Star Trek Next Generation isn't uh here at the moment, so I haven't been able to fit them. Um, but you can bet that as soon as it's back, uh, I will be doing that. Now, this is the latest mod that um, this father and son team have put together, and it's a biplane attack. Yeah, this is Kong. Now, don't be put off by the size of that sort of motor contraption that you can see there. Um, I've played the wrong video. Um it's gone through a couple of iterations. I think maybe this is the latest one. Um and you can see that uh they have sort of made it a lot sort of blended it in a lot more with the game now. So essentially you can sort of hardly hardly even see it. There it is there. You can select sort of the different you can hardly see it now. So they've done a really good job. They were responding to a lot of customer feedback that it was sort of too significant, too overpowering. Um, and so they they've uh addressed that and then come out with this and I think, you know, they've done a fantastic job of that and it's getting a lot of respect. You can see as well uh these cuffs that are on Kong's arms. That's another one of their mods as well. It's the Kong cuffs mod. Um, Kong, which is Kong. What are the for those servos on the like plane mod and for like the helicopter mod? Like how what is the longevity of those tiny motors? Oh, that's a good that's a good question. Um, uh, well, look, with a servo, um, generally if they're not under strain, um, then they can, you know, they can last indefinitely. Um, now there's probably people who would say that's not the case. Um, and people who say that servo motors shouldn't, uh, shouldn't be used in pinball. Um, but obviously Kong himself here is three servo motors, one for his body and two for his arms. Uh, and they're quite significant servo motors, so they'll be a bit bigger. I'm sure the one they're using for the for the plane here is going to be a lot smaller. Um, but it really just depends on whether they are if if they're if they're if they're working against strain, so they're sort of over working themselves, then that's when they tend to die. Um so as a maker you have to be really you have to be really observant to that. So there's not you know you so to create as the least amount of friction as possible um for the path of the servo. Uh make sure that the uh end points the maximums and minimums are observed so they don't sort of push against any stops or anything like that. Um so yeah I think I think for this particular one I don't sort of see there being any problems with longevity with that servo motor. Um but as makers we always try to make it so that um if you are using a servo then it's easily replaceable. Um so they're not they're not expensive. So I think the best thing is like as long as the changeover is easy you know and not uh you know you don't want to be splicing cables or anything like that. So when we tend to use servo motors, um they come with quite a weird connector um and so instead of cutting those cables and rewiring them or buying the servo motors from a supplier with a particular connector, you want to just reuse that connector and have an adapter for it into whatever you need to to do so that when the time comes, if the time comes when a customer needs to change it over, they can just rip it out, stick on, you know, stick the equivalent one from Amazon and it just plugs straight in. Uh, so that's the concave. Uh, TDD did another one for Metallica quickly. Uh, just quickly show that. So, um, some more Metallica remastered mods. There's kind of like a skull bell. Um, Tom loves doing these mods where the ball sort of interacts, uh, with the mod as it goes past. Don't know whether we're going to be able to see that. So, the ball hits that skull and there he goes. Wow. You see a lot of like wood at plastic wood in mods currently. Like Jos has a ton of them. I feel like that's like the 2025 like theme. Get wood. This is one by uh Jez Jazz Bush. Uh good mate of mine. He's done a Butch for Pulp Fiction. Um so this is a static mod. Um but just tries to be as close to an accurate representation of Butch as possible. Um, which is good cuz Butch is sort of under represented in the game. Um, he goes next to the burger there. Um, and yeah, I think he's done a I think he's done a solid job of that. Um, I think the paint works really nice. I think it actually looks like Bruce Willis, which is really good. He's got a little cutter on his nose. Um, and you know, the grace decal on the side of the motorbike, so that's really awesome as well. Um, and look, maybe what we should probably do is just leave the other mods that I've got for another day because I I could probably be here all night. Um, yeah, unless you want me to keep going. Give us one more. Wait, I I have a Jaws. I want to see this. Oh, okay. This Well, this is the I actually promised John that I would do this one um on the show tonight. So, if he ends up watching the show and he doesn't see his mod, he's going to be really pissed off at me. So, um this is John's torch mod. This is also using uh lolly board. Um, and their torches to replace the spotlights above the slings and also um, a bunch of other lighting components. I think he's got some strips in the apron. Um, and it's all sort of game reactive, so it's um, responding to sort of game events. You can see the lighting is sort of then changing color to green and red depending on what's hit. I think you hit the chum bucket uh and it goes red uh much like uh my um uh my boy mod goes red when you hit the chum bucket. So the same thing happens um uh with the with the lighting down here. Um so it should should sort of replicate for a very He's got a lot going on there. He's got the building there in the back corner too. Uh yeah, he does. That's that's a good shout. I didn't see that. All that all that lighting that's your stuff. Uh yeah. Yeah. Most all the Yeah. So um so he's done a really good job of that. So it's really sort of interactive. I don't know what I'm watching now. Um really interactive. Uh he's had a lot of interest. So um you know, people on the thread have been, you know, making a lot of comments and making sure they get uh on the list. Uh I don't think I'm on the right sort of uh release there, but yeah, the other video that I saw there was like loads of people sort of getting signed up for that. So, yeah, he's done a done a tiptop job of that. Uh, well done, John. Good to see that one come out. It's been Did you uh You didn't make any more promises, did you? We don't want to We don't want to leave anybody disappointed. Always making promises, just rarely fulfilling them. Yeah. Uh well, guys, uh thank you so much for being here uh with us. Obviously got our super late start, so we're getting late here, but always great to have folks kind of come on, chime in on the mods. Uh, anything you guys got coming up that we should know about? Uh, anything fun on the horizon? I got Manu coming on tomorrow, I believe. Uh, we're going to talk VP stuff on the podcast. I have a Dennis appointment. VP stuff. Pretty excited about that. Hans, when's your uh when's your arcade open up? Yeah, so starting construction this week, I think, in about four weeks of construction and the decor after that, I got a lot of surprises in decor. It's not going to look like any other place you've seen before. We'll leave it at that. It's almost, in fact, I'll even say it's a we're modding the room, right? So, I'll leave it at that. But, um, yeah, we've got some really cool Hollywood stuff planned for it. And, um, um, it's going to be cool. So, I don't have a grand opening date yet, then until the city gives me a final and I've been in, um, retail construction for many years. That's my day job. And, um, got to be real careful with with committing to dates. But, look, it's looking it'll be uh, fall this year for sure. Gotcha. We're only we're only a few weeks out. And we didn't get to talk about Harry Potter, but Davey, have you got yours yet? Are you Are you still waiting? No, man. No, no Potter. Um, the latest additions here are Kong and D&D. Um, so I've been playing quite a bit of D&D, actually. Surprised about how much I'm enjoying that. And we've got a mod coming out for that very soon as well. Nice. And Jeff, have you have you played Have you streamed it yet? Have you got in on some Potter yet? I have. I thought you were making a D&D joke. Uh, I I haven't. I'm not getting a Potter. I have played it. They have one at Ace. Uh it's fun. I think it's I think it's a good it's a good JJP game. None of their IPs have really like hit me as a like must buy. Uh I actually kind of liked Avatar's layout and play, but I just don't really care about Avatar the franchise uh enough to own a pinball machine for it. But uh yeah, I don't know. It's it's a fun game. People should check it out. Still haven't played it here, but looking forward to it. All right, everybody. Episode 28. We're going to wrap it up. Uh thank you for being here with us. We will be back soon. And Jeff and Hans, thanks again, guys. It's been great. Well, thanks for having us. Thanks, guys. Appreciate it. See you later. _(Acquisition: youtube_auto_sub, Enrichment: v4)_ --- *Exported from Journalist Tool on 2026-04-13 | Item ID: cc1e6ba3-874a-4096-850c-6a6c929db7d4*