# Episode 85 – Texas Pinball Festival

**Source:** Head2Head Pinball  
**Type:** podcast_episode  
**Published:** 2019-03-25  
**Duration:** 103m 25s  
**Beat:** Pinball

**URL:** https://www.head2headpinball.com/2019/03/26/episode-85-texas-pinball-festival/

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## Analysis

Martin and Ron report live from the Texas Pinball Festival, covering major manufacturer announcements including Jersey Jack's Yellow Brick Road Limited Edition Wizard of Oz ($11,500), Stern's Monsters Premium/LE variants, and strong rumors about Black Knight Unleashed as Stern's next release. Discussion includes gameplay impressions, designer interviews, and festival atmosphere with record attendance.

### Key Claims

- [HIGH] Yellow Brick Road Limited Edition Wizard of Oz costs $11,500, up from original Wizard of Oz at $6,500-$9,500 — _Ron Hallett stated the pricing directly at festival_
- [HIGH] Yellow Brick Road features sparkly gold glitter paint on playfield, rails, apron, and yellow brick road elements — _Martin and Ron discussed visible features of the wrapped machine and official Jersey Jack presentation_
- [HIGH] Winged Monkey mechanical feature has been removed from Yellow Brick Road edition — _Ron confirmed removal and replacement with animation_
- [HIGH] Jersey Jack has parts to produce 500 Yellow Brick Road units but plans to make only 200 — _Ron relayed Jack Guarneri's statement at seminar_
- [HIGH] Pirates of the Caribbean production is finished; Jersey Jack has license for 3 more years — _Ron cited Jack Guarneri's seminar statement_
- [HIGH] Jack Guarneri stated new machine will be announced when ready to ship within 2 weeks — _Ron relayed Guarneri's policy statement at seminar_
- [HIGH] John Borg (Monsters designer) stated this is his best layout — _Ron spoke directly with Borg at festival_
- [MEDIUM] Steve Ritchie's new game has 62-64 plastics, compared to typical ~40 on his games — _Martin relayed Ritchie's seminar comments; speculation about dual playfields or Black Knight design_
- [MEDIUM] Black Knight Unleashed is the rumored title for Steve Ritchie's next Stern game — _Martin cited Canadian distributor/operator confirmation; widespread rumor at festival_
- [HIGH] Texas Pinball Festival had record attendance this year — _Martin and Ron both confirmed record crowds, making it hard to access machines_

### Notable Quotes

> "They've removed it. Oh, that makes it super reliable."
> — **Martin**, ~15:30
> _Humorous acknowledgment that removing the problematic winged monkey mechanical feature solves reliability but raises questions about value justification for $2,000 price increase_

> "I have no intention of retiring."
> — **Steve Ritchie**, ~42:00
> _Directly addresses retirement rumors; clarifies he is not doing a 'swan song' game and plans to continue designing_

> "Absolutely, it is. I just feel so good when I shoot this. I believe it is my best layout."
> — **John Borg**, ~28:00
> _Designer confidence in Monsters layout quality despite mixed community reception; cited as validation of playfield design excellence_

> "Get ready for battle. He's the Black Knight."
> — **Martin**, ~50:00
> _Demonstrates cultural iconic status of Black Knight music and design; shows anticipation for potential Unleashed sequel_

> "It's got to have the bass line. It's got to do-do-do-do-do-do-do-do-do-do-do-do."
> — **Martin**, ~45:30
> _Expresses essential requirement for Black Knight musical identity in potential remake; illustrates iconic status of original theme_

> "The best LCD animations of any game I've seen with an LCD so far."
> — **Ron Hallett**, ~78:00
> _Praise for Alice Cooper: Nightmare Castle's animation quality; positions Spooky as technically advanced in LCD implementation_

> "This is the most it's been attended. Oh, yeah. Right? By a long shot."
> — **Martin and Ron**, ~55:00
> _Texas Pinball Festival confirmed as reaching unprecedented attendance levels, surpassing previous years_

> "I kind of see it as a bit of a novelty addition."
> — **Martin**, ~20:00
> _Assessment of black and white Monsters edition aesthetic appeal; downplays cosmetic-only differentiation value_

> "Did you see these whitewood pictures of Black Knight Unleashed that I have?"
> — **Festival attendee (relayed)**, ~48:00
> _Confirms whitewood (test/prototype) images of Black Knight Unleashed are circulating; suggests advanced development stage_

> "Well done Texas Pinball Festival. Well done Ed Van Der Veen, you've done an amazing job."
> — **Martin**, ~58:00
> _Recognition of festival organizer Ed Vanderveen's success; attributed to record attendance achievement_

### Entities

| Name | Type | Context |
|------|------|---------|
| Martin | person | Co-host of Head to Head Pinball Podcast; reporting live from Texas Pinball Festival |
| Ron Hallett | person | Guest/former PR at Jersey Jack Pinball; co-host for this festival episode; attended Jersey Jack seminar and spoke directly with designers |
| Jack Guarneri | person | Jersey Jack Pinball founder/executive; presented Yellow Brick Road LE at seminar; announced production plans and stated 2-week shipping window policy |
| John Borg | person | Stern Pinball designer; designed Monsters playfield; claims it's his best layout; spoke with Martin at festival |
| Steve Ritchie | person | Legendary Stern Pinball designer; held seminar revealing new game details (64 plastics, motor); denied retirement rumors |
| Dwight Sullivan | person | Stern Pinball rules/code programmer; designing Monsters code; frequently criticized by community for brightness and code simplicity |
| Bowen Kerins | person | Pinball content creator and designer; demonstrated Alice Cooper: Nightmare Castle rules and streamed with Ron; achieved wizard mode on first ball |
| Scott Denise | person | Spooky Pinball figure; deliberately spreading multiple false machine names to prevent spoiler leaks |
| Charlie Emery | person | Spooky Pinball staff; discussed production improvements between prototype and production Alice Cooper machines |
| Ed Vanderveen | person | Texas Pinball Festival organizer; achieved record festival attendance |
| Mike Vinicore | person | Stern Pinball figure; appeared alongside Steve Ritchie at seminar discussing new game details |
| Carl D'Angelo | person | Elite competitive pinball player; played Monsters Premium with Martin at festival; couldn't reach Monster Madness in two games |
| Jersey Jack Pinball | company | Boutique manufacturer; revealed Yellow Brick Road Limited Edition Wizard of Oz at Texas Pinball Festival; ceased Pirates of the Caribbean production |
| Stern Pinball | company | Major manufacturer; displayed Monsters in multiple editions (Pro/Premium/LE), Star Wars, and Deadpool; hinted at Black Knight Unleashed in development |
| Spooky Pinball | company | Boutique Wisconsin manufacturer; showcased Alice Cooper: Nightmare Castle production models with improved layout and rules |
| Yellow Brick Road Limited Edition | game | Jersey Jack Pinball's LE variant of Wizard of Oz; $11,500 price; sparkly gold glitter paint throughout playfield; removed winged monkey; upgraded mechs; production limited to ~200 units with parts for 500 |
| Monsters | game | Stern Pinball game; available in Pro/Premium/LE variants; praised for playfield design and shot quality but criticized for simple rules and lack of code depth |
| Alice Cooper: Nightmare Castle | game | Spooky Pinball game; features butter cabinets; praised for LCD animations and artwork; improved rules clarity from prototype to production |
| Black Knight Unleashed | game | Rumored Steve Ritchie/Stern game; alleged to have 62-64 plastics (vs. typical ~40); whitewood images circulating; Canadian operator confirmed title; speculation about dual playfields |
| Star Wars | game | Stern Pinball game on display at festival; described as 'growing on me' by Martin but not reaching 'great' status |
| Deadpool | game | Stern Pinball game on display; both hosts praised as 'great game' |
| Pirates of the Caribbean | game | Jersey Jack Pinball game; production halted; license valid for 3 more years; may be revisited in future |
| Willy Wonka | game | Expected next Jersey Jack Pinball release; heavily rumored but not officially announced; community disappointed it wasn't revealed at Texas Festival in favor of Yellow Brick Road |
| Texas Pinball Festival | event | Annual pinball convention in Frisco, Texas; record attendance; primary venue for manufacturer machine reveals; organized by Ed Vanderveen |

### Signals

- **[sentiment_shift]** Strong community disappointment that Willy Wonka wasn't revealed at Texas Festival; Yellow Brick Road perceived as safe/predictable choice. Hosts acknowledge community's deflated reaction. (confidence: high) — Ron: 'I think everyone was sort of a little bit deflated by it' and Martin: 'everyone was hoping that this was going to be the big reveal and it wasn't it's just another Wizard of Oz'
- **[design_philosophy]** Monsters game criticized for lack of depth and light/shade choreography despite excellent playfield design. John Borg claims best layout, but community feedback suggests rules are too simple, shot difficulty is low, and code lacks compelling dramatic moments. 'Too simple' is the most common complaint. (confidence: high) — Martin: 'Most of the complaints I've heard are too simple...I played it once and got to Monster Madness, like, immediately.' Ron: 'it there's no real light and shade moments yet in that as far as the the game choreography'
- **[design_philosophy]** Steve Ritchie emphasizes iconic audio/musical moments as core design principle ('You are Champion' callout, Black Knight bass line). Suggests next game will prioritize dramatic sound design moments. (confidence: medium) — Martin extended discussion of Black Knight 2000's iconic music and Ritchie's emphasis on memorable audio moments in classic designs; excitement about potential updated sound system on Black Knight Unleashed
- **[leak_detection]** Whitewood (prototype/test) images of Black Knight Unleashed reportedly circulating among pinball community members at festival, indicating advanced development stage and image leakage. (confidence: medium) — Unattributed festival attendee quote relayed: 'Did you see these whitewood pictures of Black Knight Unleashed that I have?'
- **[manufacturing_signal]** Jersey Jack's Yellow Brick Road uses 20% smaller production line than main assembly line; indicates tiered manufacturing capacity and strategic product positioning. (confidence: high) — Ron: 'they've got the main line, and then they've got the low run...So he actually said...Yellow Brick Road limited edition of Wizard of Oz is on their small run'
- **[market_signal]** Texas Pinball Festival reached record attendance, making it difficult for casual players to access machines. Established as new premier venue for manufacturer reveals (replacing traditional Expo role). (confidence: high) — Martin: 'I've been to like five of them, yes Yeah, so well done Texas People Festival...this is the most it's been attended. Oh, yeah. Right? By a long shot.'
- **[personnel_signal]** John Borg is designer on Monsters, indicating Stern's continued investment in classic designer talent for flagship releases. (confidence: high) — Martin spoke directly with John Borg at festival who confirmed Monsters is his best layout work
- **[market_signal]** Yellow Brick Road LE priced at $11,500 vs. original Wizard of Oz at $6,500, representing $5,000 price increase (77% increase). Hosts struggle to justify $2,000 more than original with removal of problematic winged monkey mechanic and gold paint being only tangible additions. (confidence: high) — Ron: 'it costs way more than the original wizard of austria 11 500 us dollars which i think was that two thousand dollars more than the original one' and 'I'm just trying to think of reasons for $2,000 more. The gold paint is expensive?'
- **[product_strategy]** Willy Wonka expected as next Jersey Jack reveal but not announced; speculation about whether Yellow Brick Road substituted due to scheduling conflicts or delayed Wonka production. (confidence: medium) — Martin: 'people were kind of hoping that they would be showing off willy wonka they didn't' and Ron on 2-week shipping requirement: 'If he can't do that, he's not going to announce it'
- **[rumor_hype]** Black Knight Unleashed (or Black Knight 3) identified as next Stern game by multiple sources including Canadian distributor/operator confirmation. 62-64 plastics mentioned by Steve Ritchie at seminar; whitewood images reportedly circulating. Speculation about dual playfield design. (confidence: medium) — Martin: 'I heard from at least one Canadian distributor or operator. they were like, that's what it is. It's Black Knight 3. That's the next game. They were 100% positive' and 'Did you see these whitewood pictures of Black Knight Unleashed that I have?'
- **[business_signal]** Scott Denise (Spooky) deliberately spreading multiple false machine names to prevent spoiler leaks and manage community hype/speculation. (confidence: high) — Martin: 'Scott Denise was saying that he is now putting out so many different names for what this new pinball machine could be that he may have actually said the title of his new machine, but you would never know because there's so many different things he's mentioned'

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## Transcript

 you're listening to the head-to-head pinball podcast find us on facebook Welcome everybody to the Head to Head Pinball Podcast. This is episode 85. And coming to you live in Frisco, Texas, my name is Martin and with me is Ron Hallett. Ron Hallett, what the hell are you doing here? Well, you didn't let me on your last show. Well, actually, yeah, it was my fault, but here I am and I'm in Texas too. And we've just been to, I don't know, a festival of some kind, people would say. the Texas Billboard Festival. You may have heard that I was going to be here and I'm here. How's the show been for you? Excellent. I thoroughly enjoyed the show. Yeah, look, overall for me, I've had an amazing show. I actually managed to stream a couple of times. We can talk about that later. And outside of the streaming, I probably played, I think I could count them on one, maybe a couple of fingers on a second hand. And that's mainly because, and you can probably hear it in my voice, I've done a lot of talking. And that's kind of the spirit of this festival is it's a lot of people sharing the passion for pinball and obviously talking about pinball. Yeah, lots of talking about pinball. I mean, I probably played a little more than you, but I try to just play things I know I haven't played before, which in this case would be things like the Monsters Premium, more Beatles Pirates of the Caribbean things like that that's what I go for because as I've stated on my own show I've played most everything you will see in there at least a few times well so then let's start with because we'll go around all the manufacturers and what they had to show and then we can talk about some of the smaller companies as well but Texas Pinball Festival we've talked about before it kind of became the new expo expo where effectively every year it's where manufacturers would choose to reveal their machines and this year was no exception when it came to mega reveals yeah um well there was a mega reveal there was kind of although i think most people already knew it was coming well not that I want to toot our own horn, but you will. I'm going to. That's what we do. I think we were the first people to mention the Yellow Brick Road edition and the fact that it had the sparkly gold paint. And that was a very long time ago. And I'm not, obviously I'm saying it because, you know, we're awesome, but I'm also saying it because that was a long time ago we mentioned this was coming and that's what happened. So when we got to the Jersey Jack seminar, it was the first seminar I went to. And up the front of the stage there was a pinball machine that was wrapped in plastic. But not wrapped enough. Because there were pictures, people started taking pictures of it. It was like a little small, like quarter inch section on the bottom you could see. And you could see it was gold. So immediately it just started like, the pin side thread blew up and it's like, it's going to be Yellow Brick Road. It has to be, look. Like they were investigating, they were taking cropping pictures of like all the different you know, Wizard of Oz versions and putting gold on it and it was it was quite impressive really all that in real time just for a little glimpse of color um so you know look people were kind of hoping that they would be showing off willy wonka they didn't um and they showed off yellow pick road the limited edition what do we know about it ron it costs way more than the original wizard of austria 11 500 us dollars which i think was that two thousand dollars more than the original one yeah and if you had the original original Wizard of Oz I believe it was $6,500. Wow, okay. So that's a bit of a price hike. But it's got more features than the original one. It does. It has more features. It has a topper. Yeah, it does have a different topper. I actually quite like the topper. Yeah, it's yellow. Yeah. It does have the Speckley gold paint which they said is the first that's been done. And I'm going to kind of say maybe not because I think there is that, there's an Australian company that did, I think they did like a re-theme of 8-Ball. Yeah, I'm pretty sure it's 8-Ball. And they called it Sunset Riders. And it's a surf theme and it's got the speckly gold paint through the play field. So that has been done. Innovative Australians. Right, you know, we're all about the innovations. So it's, you know, But not as prolific as this. Like this thing, the rails, like the habit rails, they're all sort of yellow now. There is the actual yellow brick road is all the glitter paint. So is the apron. Upgraded mechs? At least that's what it said. I don't know what that means. I think what it means is, what it said is, it's got the current cabinet form that they've made. And I think what they've done is they've probably re-engineered a lot of the mechs to make them more reliable. and I think probably the mech I'm being really facetious now the mech that they made a lot more reliable is the winged monkey the winged monkey yeah so they've made that more reliable Ron how have they done that? do they remove it? they've removed it oh that makes it super reliable it really does but it's still got the animation or it's got added animation for it and yeah it no longer has the monkey coming down and you know what i you know i've got a wizard of oz and i actually put the winged monkey mod on it to make it look more effective but on saying that it's kind of cool maybe the first or the second or the third time but it's so far at the back and it's dimly lit that you don't really care that much after a while so you don't really care so much that it's no problem that it's removed that's not the problem oh i think the problem that a lot of people had is that it's been removed and it's two thousand dollars more yeah yeah from a tech standpoint i'm curious about these these new ones if they have because the original wizard of oz had all the boards in the cabinet so it's starting with dialed in they went to the new design which is spearheaded by pat waller of just getting all the boards in the head and making it more traditional, like what you're used to seeing. And I'm wondering if that's like this on this new edition. Actually, I don't even know if the Ruby Red one has that either. I'm just curious. I have no idea. No, I don't think it does. I wasn't at the seminar. Did they do anything? Did they take the play field up or show anything, or did they just show it? I didn't see it after that because the next seminar was coming in, so we didn't get that chat. I'm just trying to think of reasons for $2,000 more. The gold paint is expensive? It could be that it's expensive. I don't know. And they said that they've got plans to make... I think the sentence was, they've got plans to make 200, but they've got parts to make 500. Yeah. They have a unique LE model. LE is just however many we can sell. Yeah, I think that's what it is. I don't know. It could be one of these things. I mean, he did say that they've been planning on doing this for a long time, and obviously we knew that because we mentioned it a while ago. but, you know, and it's actually going to go in there on their short line, right? So I've been to their factory, they've got the main line, and then they've got the low run. I couldn't remember the difference of how many they can produce each day, but it is probably about, I don't know, 20% the size of their main line, right? That's the size difference. So he actually said, and also the other thing he said was that Pirates of the Caribbean production is stopped. They're done. They may revisit it at a later stage because they've got the license for another three years, I think is what he said. But he said, if you wanted a Pirates of the Caribbean, it's done. This Yellow Brick Road limited edition of Wizard of Oz is on their small run because their next machine is currently on their main assembly line. Oh, wow. That's what he said. And I think what he said was, if you want a new machine, wait a couple of weeks. So what does that mean? Interesting. Does that mean that they're going to announce it in a couple of weeks? Because he also did say, this was Josie Jack, Jack Winari, he said, you know, they are only going to announce machines when they're ready to ship. So maybe that's it. They weren't going to have them ready, so he didn't want to announce it because it's a bold statement to make and he wants to be a man of his word. So, but I don't know whether it's going to be a couple of weeks away. Someone said, you know, it might be May. And what machine would this be? Well, everyone's saying it's Willy Wonka. There's a guy dressed up as Willy Wonka at the show. There's a guy as Willy Wonka at the show. So it could be. I don't know. If it is, it's the proper version, I hope. Yeah. What do you feel was the general reception to the Jizzy Jackson winner? Well, online it was disappointment. Yeah. Because they really wanted to see Willy Walken. And I think it was going to be really hard to be able to match the expectations that people had of, you know as I said before Texas Pinball Festival being the show where machines are revealed people were hoping that this was going to be the big reveal and it wasn't it's just another Wizard of Oz which we all know and we all love that's fine he can probably sell the units he'll probably sell the units right because I think there still is demand for new Wizard of Oz machines and this is the only way you can get a new one but yeah I think everyone was sort of a little bit deflated by it. Well the weird thing is if the new game, the new game, whatever it is, You can't say it's inverted commas, but I can say it. If the new game is on the line, then you would think it's ready enough to show? But if he said, and I think it was, he said, I want to be able to ship within two weeks of announcement. If he can't do that, he's not going to announce it. That's what I think it is. It's just a timing thing, but you know, Yellow Brick Road's been in development for a while. Maybe he just went, that's what we're going to go with. I don't know. Yeah, I can't imagine that, like, when they're getting their schedule out, I just can't see them like, oh, we've got to have it ready for this show, or we've got to have it ready for this. I mean, it's just when it's done. And if they run into any issues while they're developing the game, it's going to be delays, etc. I mean, you're not always going to be able to make the show dates. so yeah that was the only real reveal I mean Stern did a seminar on basically monsters they did and had how many monsters there I lost count oh my god there were I think I think before the show started I saw a list and I thought there might have been 16 machines that were there and that would sound about right there were a couple of pros stern themselves i think only had the premiums oh no i think they had a couple of pros as well um and so this was the the black and white edition if you will um but there was also pin stadium there he's bought a limited edition so he had his limited edition there so i got to play the premium and the le to determine whether i'd made the right decision with my purchase so what do you think I think I've made the right decision. No doubt the black and white looks really impressive but I kind of see it as a bit of a novelty addition. I really liked the black and white. I thought it looked awesome. I thought it looked... Stern, I mean lately they've been doing better I think at getting a whole atmosphere with their games. Like if you look at Monsters they have like the slings or custom plastics that are not the usual shape. They actually extend down. They have one of... I'm sorry, I didn't really watch the show. What's the wife's name? Oh, Lily. Lily. So they have Lily, and she's wearing her outfit actually extends down as the plastic. Just little details like that. The artwork is tremendous. I really like the lower playfield. I used to own a family guy, so I'm used to... What's the name of that mini playfield? Oh, that would be the Stewie Mini Playfield. Yes, on command. Yes, yes, that's true. Yes, yes. The Stewie Mini Playfield, they basically use the same, it's the same flipper mechs. And it has the exact same feel. It does, doesn't it? I own the game, so I'm very, so like, when you get down there to finish Grandpa, you have to hit both orbits and then the center shot. So immediately I just knew to backhand the orbits because that's how it was on Stewie, and it worked perfectly. it's like, yep, it's got the same thing. Hitting that center was very difficult for me. It's not much room to get in there, but I liked it. The funny thing is, all the other pinheads I talk to, whenever I say, you know, like, I liked it, they're like, I don't really like it. I'm like, am I the only one who likes monsters? Like, yeah, Ron, I think you are. It's all about the code, too. That's all they talk about is the whole code thing. I'm playing this game, and it's like, man, shots feel good the presentation is awesome i like the little you know the lower play field i liked it but i seem to be in the minority here yeah and and i'm in that same boat as well and but what was interesting i i it is the same thing i did ask a lot of people you know did you get to play monsters what do you think and people are like yeah i i like it but you know i'm like well what don't you like about it i don't really know so so why don't you like it no it's just not for me so people can't really put their finger on it um and i think it was kind of what we sort of said a couple of weeks ago in that it there's no real light and shade moments yet in that as far as the the game choreography you know everything's all on um and that's you know the polish comes later on I think that the rules are there as we know it feels great to flip I did actually feel that the premium and the LA were harder than the pro I think the pro is a bit more forgiving with its shots but as I said I don't think people can really put a finger on why they're a bit cool on the Munsters and I think maybe it's a bit of now group think everyone and sort of, you know, that's what they think now, so they, I don't know, it's probably a bit uncool to like it. I don't know. Most of the complaints I've heard are too simple. Yep. Too simple. Like, I played it once and got to Monster Madness, like, immediately. But, I don't know, I played it with Carl D'Python Anghelo. Of course. One of the better players in the world, and he could not get to Monster Madness in the two games we played, which I got on him for. But he still slaughtered me. but I just think it shoots awesome. I just love the way the shots feel in that game. Just from the brief time. Now, maybe the moments it doesn't have weren't as apparent because, frankly, you can't really hear it too well in the show. You can't hear much of anything, honestly. Yeah, it was very noisy. Very loud. But I thought it played good. I mean, I'm easier to please when it comes to, you know, it gave me a really good shooting play field. I'm way more forgiving when it comes to code and stuff than probably a lot of people are. Well, I had a chat to the designer, John Borg. Oh, God, it was very early this morning, or late this morning, whichever way you look at it. Because I'd said that I'd heard that he thought it was his best layout. And I asked him, I said, that's what I've heard. Do you think this is your best layout? And he said, absolutely, it is. I just feel so good when I shoot this. I believe it is my best layout. And I tend to agree. I think it is just he's got familiar elements of lots of his machines, but he's just managed to lay it out in a great way. So, you know, time will tell on that. I also did manage to speak to Dwight Sullivan about the rules. Didn't really give too much away about what's going to happen with it. he's still working on it so he just and and i would have imagined as well everybody would have been speaking to him about the code that he just probably didn't want to engage in it anymore see the most maligned coder at stern at this point between the it's too bright dwight you're blinding me dwight when are you going to finish ghostbusters what's with star wars what's with the super simple one you know monster yeah i almost called it monster bash monsters i i think he's getting the most criticism out of any of their programmers. Somewhere I think Lonnie's there like, yes, it's not me this time. Yeah, I think you're right. But I also think, you know, he's quite prolific as well. So he's a fairly easy target. Well, did you notice during the Twippies, I don't know if anyone notices, when Dwight came up to present, they were flickering the lights, the overhead lights. Did anyone other than me notice that? No, I didn't notice that. The house lights, like I'm on top. When he came up and started talking, I noticed they started just going off and on for no reason. And then when he was done, they stopped. Okay. But I think I'm the only one who noticed that. No, I was backstage at the time. That's right. Oh, we'll talk about that later. We'll talk about the Twippies. They were awesome. So that was Stern. Stern showing. I mean, obviously, they had some Star Wars there, and they had Deadpool as well. Great game, Star Wars. Just thought it's a... Deadpool, yep. Deadpool's great. Deadpool's great. Star Wars is growing on me, but it's never going to be a great game for me. Stern also had Steve Ritchie's seminar. Did you see that? Yes, I did. I kind of did. I saw the first 15 minutes and then realized that I left a bit of my streaming gear in my hotel room and I needed to stream in about 45 minutes. You didn't watch me. I'm your favorite designer. You have failed. so this was from the 15 minutes I was there this was interesting because this was the secrets are revealed and when he sat down he said right you know I said secrets are going to be revealed and secrets are going to be revealed and my first secret is I'm not going to talk about my new game and then 20 people left well no no they didn't but that wasn't entirely true so I didn't get to anything after I mean he was he was being a bit funny about the whole secret thing. Some of them were just useless trivia that he was just saying, well, number three is there are this many calories in something. I don't know what he said, but it was irrelevant. And it wasn't just him. It was him and Mike Vinikour. Mike Vinikour was there as well. So you then got to say, so what secrets were revealed from the seminar? Well, he's not going to retire because we know that's a rumor and it's been going around. It's his last game. It's a swan song. and they're going to let him do an original theme so he can retire. He says, like, I have no intention of retiring. Okay. So he's changed his mind. Yep. So he's changed his mind. So did he report he was retiring? Your sources suck. Sorry. He, you know, if you were paying attention, and goodness knows everyone was because everyone picked up on the same stuff. He mentions things like they were talking about the new spike system and how much harder it was to do, like, how many more programmers and people he has to talk to when he does a game. And he mentioned, at some point, he mentioned, like, a motor for, like, his new game. So you think, okay, so the new game has at least a motor in it. Sure. The most revealing thing, though, he was talking about plastics. How he said, you know, typically my games have around 40 plastics. And then he said my new game has, like, I think he said either 62 or 64 plastics. Okay. Or 20 more. So they got people thinking, what kind of playfield thing would require that many more plastics? Well, what happens if he had two playfields? No way. Maybe a bi-level design. Maybe a Black Knight 3000. Man, he would be completely unleashed if he did that. I'm just saying that because apparently it's called Black Knight Unleashed. Oh, really? That's what I've heard. That's what you've heard. Black Knight Unleashed. Then I have people telling me, like, well, he can't use the same music. And I'm like, what? I mean, you have to use the same music. If I don't hear that bass line, sorry. Well, I mean. I know Williams owns it, and I don't know how much. I really don't know what the whole deal is with the rights. Well, what I don't know, I mean, was that. What I don't know about. Okay, you're the best person to speak to because you know all the electronics for these machines. But was that back when they, were they like sampled sounds? They were synthesized. They were like a synthesizer, but they made, yeah, they made it as original songs, but it was like a synthesizer. And then the voices were just, they were sampled, so they always sounded kind of crappy. Yeah, but so it's actually the sound card itself that's generating the sounds as opposed to it being a recording. It's not a recorded track. Right, that's okay. So, as long as the song itself is there in spirit, update the sound. That's fine. It's got to have the bass line. It's got to do-do-do-do-do-do-do-do-do-do-do-do. It's got to. I played, just because of this, I actually seeked out and I found a Black Knight 2000 that was on the floor. It's like, you know, I haven't played this in forever. And you could hear it. So I just, you know, and again, it was kind of hard to lock a ball, but it was possible. And I got multiball started, and it's just like, oh, God, this is just the most epic intro. If it's anything like this with, like, the newer sound system cranking that thing up, oh, I just, I can't wait. I can't wait. He's like our designer. I mean, we're both, like, disciples of Richie. You're actually reminding me. There was a couple of times I walked past you, and you were probably sick of me by then, but I would literally walk past you and I'd go, get ready for battle. He's the Black Knight. Right. And it was because I walked past that machine. Well, actually, in fact, I played Mata Hari because, to be honest, getting on a machine at this festival was quite challenging because what I'd heard is that this is the most it's been attended. Oh, yeah. Right? By a long shot. I've been to like five of them, yes Yeah, so well done Texas People Festival Well done Ed Van Der Veen, you've done an amazing job But it meant that It was hard to get on machine So I got on Matahari And played a couple of games I was waiting for Mrs and Dr Pin to arrive So we played a few games, myself and my friend James And Black Knight was next to it So for like the ten minutes That we were there playing Matahari All you could hear was Black Knight and just those iconic sounds were just there. Like even, I mean, I can't do the sound, but you know when you get it into the wheel and it does the mystery award and it makes that sound. Ding, ding, ding, fight! Then the lightning bolt goes off and it fires out of the fuck at you. Like that. Like that right there is how you get iconic games, right? It's not just the layout and the art. Those are your moments, if you will. Correct. They really are. Like the beginning of Ransom. Oh, I better have some kind of thing like that. Oh my God. It just displays all, you know, like this is lit, this is lit, this is lit. Everything is lit. Even like when you get a high score, it replays the jackpot call out. You are champion. And you just sit there like, I don't even want to put my initials in. I just want to hear the music for another five minutes Is anyone else out there now wanting to hire Ron as your voiceover guy Oh God I love it He would be so good But you have to get in front of line Jeff Toulos is waiting You are champion. Honestly, my ACDC, that was one of the biggest. Me and Bruce were playing this after I first got it, before he had the bar, when he had something called time. And he was actually at my house. We're playing it, and one of us got a high score, and one of the little nuggets it has in it is it does the you are champion call out. Like in the same, they use the same exact tone. It's the same. It's not the gravelly voice what he does for the game. Right. It's more like you are champion and it's just like, oh, yes. Yes, it is. So, there you go. I think that's enough Black Knight. That was enough. So, anyway. So, Black Knight Unleashed. Black Knight Unleashed is what I've heard it's going to be called. And I heard from at least one Canadian distributor or operator. they were like, that's what it is. It's Black Knight 3. That's the next game. They were 100% positive. I don't know how they know this, but... Well, again, it's like everybody knows that Willy Wonka is next for Jersey Jack. And again, it's really funny because at these festivals, because it's all pinball people, you are in the epicentre of the bubble. So it's not like you're talking to people and they're speculating, they're like, nope, I know. It's definitely this. It's definitely this. It was kind of like, you know, this battle royale where everybody was just trying to one-up the other on information. So from the moment I arrived, people were like, did you hear this? Did you know that? It's like, oh, my God, can I just get to a machine? Did you see these whitewood pictures of Black Knight Unleashed that I have? Yeah, it was all that. So that's the nature of this, where everything is just really heightened. Do you like knowing this, or would you prefer it be more of a mystery? No, I much prefer a surprise. So would I. Yeah. Back in the day, you would learn what the new game was when they put it at the one test location that Stern always used. It would just show up, and people would start taking terrible cell phone grainy footage of the thing. But that's how you knew what the game was. now it's like it's like a year ahead of time you know what it is and it's just for anyone that knows me I am so strict when it comes to spoilers so things like if there's a movie that I'm interested in I will not go and read any review because I don't want to know whether it's good or bad I don't want to know any of the plot I just want it to be a surprise um the obviously i do a podcast so yeah i've got a report on this stuff yeah that's the other issue with this it's like i talk to so many people about so many things about so much information that i can't say on the air you know it's crazy it's crazy that way but like what how cool would it be if they go to unveil it it's like high speed three i know i know it's like oh my god Oh, what the hell? Because they've been leaking all this false information. I think they should start doing that. Just troll people. Just leak this stuff and it's not true. Well, okay, let's move then to Spooky Pinball because it's a bit of a segue here. I didn't get to see their seminar, unfortunately, because I was setting up for a stream. But I was talking to Scott Denisey and I was talking to Charlie Emery. Look at me, you know, rubbing shoulders with the who's who of pinball, right? And they knew your name too, probably. They did know me. Anyway, we'll talk about the hugs later. But it was really funny because Scott Danesi was saying that he is now putting out so many different names for what this new pinball machine could be that he may have actually said the title of his new machine, but you would never know because there's so many different things he's mentioned. So, anyway, so Spooky was there, and Spooky had, they had a couple of Alice Cooper Nightmare Castles at their booth. There was also some others out on the floor as well. This is the first time I had played it since the prototypes that were at Pinberg last year. Did you get to play it this year? I played it before, it wasn't at Pinberg, I played it at some show. Okay. Well, I did stream it. In fact, only a few hours ago, I streamed it with Bowen Kerins. Bowen Kerins actually came onto the Melbourne Silver Bowl League Twitch page and did a tutorial on Alice Cooper, Nightmare Castle. he had done a seminar the day before where he got to the wizard mode he did the same thing on his first ball on the stream which was amazing what's really crazy about that is Bo and Karen's explaining the rules looking at you whilst he's then putting up a 700 million score yeah and the crazier thing is he'll do this and then you'll play the game. And literally, I can't hit a right orbit. I can't even start anything. That's exactly what happened. It was very embarrassing. I will say, Alice Cooper, the artwork on that is insane. It's great. Especially the right side of the backbox, the picture of Alice Cooper himself. I mean, if I was Alice Cooper, I'd be like, oh man, whoever that artist is, hire him to do all my artwork. the cabinet art the playfield art is just insane and I said this on our podcast I'll say it again, it's the best LCD animations of any game I've seen with an LCD so far I would agree, and also this was the one that had the butter cabinets so it was the first time I got to see those they look great they do look great they look amazing, but after playing a couple of games I turned to Charlie and I said like has there been much change with these machines than the ones at pinbird because i didn't know that that prototypes production um and he said well yeah obviously these are production that so they are going to be slightly different and i said well it feels much better there's something about the layout now where the shots seem easier to make i also think it helps that it's actually now got fleshed out rules like really fleshed out rules so because you now know what to do you're not sort of flailing about missing your shots you actually know well i need to go for an orbit i need to go for the secret passage shot or i need to go a ramp or whatever it's just more intuitive but overall it felt so much better to play now and and i walked away loving it and it doesn't it doesn't use the flash everything at you theory it flashes individual like, okay, I guess I have to hit that. I guess I'm supposed to hit that. And look, you know, it was really funny because through the stream, you know, Bowen's going, oh, okay, well that needs to be fixed. And he was turning to, like Scott Danesi, he was there, and Charlie was there, and they're all going, oh, well we get it. So they're actually thinking about evolving the rules as they're playing it, and I think that's kind of really cool. So what he got, did he finish the wizard mode? No, he didn't finish the wizard mode. In fact, he pretty much squandered it. See, the thing is, I wonder if... I wasn't at the seminar, but I spoke to Bowen on this. How TNA just ends when you get the reactor. They were thinking of doing that for Alice Cooper. When you do the castle... Because think about it. When you get through his castle and escape or whatever you're supposed to do, what do you do now? Do you just do it again for more points? That would be all you do. so originally he talked about like there would be an ending but then there would be a setting where you can make it continue for maybe more points if it was like in a location so I really like that idea I like the idea of games ending just because then you can get to things like point pressing and that's more of a video game thing but like sure you destroyed nine reactors but what was your score how high did you get and it's just like what's the highest score because when you have things like nine reactors it's like there's only a max score you're ever going to get yeah so it's easier to like judge yourself it just makes it like i don't know the high score contests with video games are very popular with pinball it has never caught on they've tried to do it it has been a miserable failure because typically there's too many factors every game is different but i think that would be a cool thing and one thing is actually really interesting and i probably should have noticed it last year but i really notice it now is um you know spooky are really starting to now really kind of define their almost like their dna right so it's got a denisi lock and it's it's really satisfying i mean it's not the double denisi it's just a single denisi right yeah that's right i said that um but also um you know some of the rules like you know the the inlanes that that like your save um which is the coolest thing in tna the hardest thing to coordinate to try to relight and not take the one you already have it's harder than using an action button correct by a large margin yeah absolutely so as it is good to see that that they're evolving you know what they're doing rules wise and it's good that bowen's come in and he's adopting some of those as well bowen in a way is the perfect person because he's like the best tna player on the planet right and he just seems to get their stuff very like i think he plays spooky games better than anyone else plays spooky games he really does and it was really good to watch um so let's move to let's go cgc so chicago gaming they had quite a selection of machines there so i i don't know how many there probably would have been i reckon 12 maybe 16 machines and it was a mix of Monster Bash remakes and Attack of Mars remakes. I didn't... Was there any Medieval Madness? I don't think I saw... I wasn't in their display. Okay. So, I'm just going to talk about it then. Yes. Ronnie doesn't play remakes. He don't play that. Right. All original. I... Look, I really only got to play Monster Bash, and it was for the first time, really. Let me talk about the flippers. How are the flippers? Are they drooped? Are they right? What's the deal? I don't... I don't know. I don't know. But they felt a bit funny. Aha. So... Did you get classic? Like, is it a true Monster Bash? Do you hit that left ramp, have it come halfway up and then just roll back? Yeah, it did that. Okay, good. Yeah, yeah, yeah. Oh, yeah, it's good. That's good. So it's true to the original. Yeah, absolutely. But it just felt different. And I guess we're probably now used to the remakes feeling a little bit different. And, you know... What would you think if you'd never played an original? Would it even... No, you wouldn't. Yeah, that's the thing. No, but it's a comparison. And it's a comparison that's always going to be there. But again, we've sort of said this before, that if you had a new in-box Monster Bash right now, an original versus a remake, and you put them side by side, how different would they feel? Because we're really only now judging it against these machines that are 20 years old. I know which one I'd buy. Which one would you buy? The original. No. Not 100%. Well, I don't know. See, I'm thinking more, again, from a tech side. Sure. I mean, a known board set can be repaired. There's multiple resources on fixing things on there. You have the new games that have their own proprietary board set with probably using LEDs, like, mounted on boards that are, like, near impossible to replace. Probably all surface mount stuff. Their boards are, like, Marty's falling asleep with the tech stuff. The boards are just under the play field, which I just, there's something about putting circuit boards under a playfield that just never seems like a good idea to me. And people keep doing it. And I don't get it. What do you think? You think all that vibration is great to have those boards there? No, I don't. And I think that's coming back to the whole Jersey Jack thing. I think that's what people were sort of saying is good. Stick it in the headboard. Yeah, well, at least they had it on the bottom of the cabinet, and they had a shield thing over it, which is better than actually Chicago. They have it mounted directly under the playfield. It's mounted to the playfield, which is just insane. The point really with CJC was that their section that they had with those machines was one of the busiest areas of the show. Without a doubt, it was just incredibly popular. You have a known entity of awesome games that are going to play like new. Yep. Who doesn't want to play that? And they're way brighter than the originals. And people love light. Well, you know how much I love light. Yes. Um, so, so back to your, you know, what would you buy? A new Inbox original versus the new one? Original. I, yeah, I'm torn because I'd want the feel of the original, but I love the new lighting. Well, you could get an original and then just put PinStadiums in it. Boom! You're all set. Yeah, okay. Well done. So, at least that's not me Win Schilling this time. Anyway, that's your thoughts. Okay, so let's then talk about American Pinball. so they had they actually had eight they had eight Oktoberfest there seven were on the showroom floor four in their section and then there was three with other sort of distributors and they had one in box that was that was effectively being delivered and that's their first eight machines off the production line so these are now not prototypes production machines I streamed it twice so I got to play it a lot you came on the stream as well yeah and you got to play it as well eight machines and seven plumb bops guess which machine didn't get the plumb bob the one that we were on yes yeah so well no i'm sure we got some tilt warnings or something no no okay no i know i didn't oh there you go um so now the the two main changes that they made to october fest were the scoop and the angle of the flipper for the middle side ramp. I managed to get that side ramp once. Dr. Penn got it once. I shot it at least 15 times and could not hit it. Yep. So that's still a good challenge. I say a good challenge because, I don't know, I want it to be a challenge. The scoop now is fixed. Oh yes. And what they've done, which is really clever, instead of actually making like trying to adjust the metal, they've actually kind of now made the ball go back further. It goes beyond the scoop and then just falls into it. So what I found really interesting is it's much easier now to get that ball to go into the scoop, but now it's a lot harder to hit it from the left flipper. You can do it, but you've really got to do it by the right flipper. And now that it's not so dangerous, why not? Yeah. See, I think with the side ramp. I have, again, my Steve Ritchie sensibilities tell me. And they have the, what I call the Steve Ritchie shot. You hit a left orbit, it comes around to that upper right flipper, and you expect to hit the ramp. I mean, I do. That's just in my DNA, playing all these Steve Ritchie games. Well, you know, roller games start to my favorite Steve Ritchies. And it's just not that kind of ramp. It's the kind of ramp where you might hit it every once in a while. It's just... What else about it? The scoop is fixed. the... I was still confused with some of the modes. It was letting me pick modes multiple times. Yeah, you can. Again. Because they have a mode on there that's the juggler. It's like a two-ball, multiball. And every time I went in the hole to start a mode, I would just, okay, juggler. And two-ball, multiball. Yeah, I think you can keep selecting them until you complete them. See, I see that as an issue because you'll have people purposely not completing them, draining out, and then restarting it and just doing it over and over. For some of the tournament-type minds, I know we'll look for stuff like that and we'll be exploiting it. I thought the games also played very long, but I honestly don't have any issues with that at a show, because you've got to remember... I would say our pinball skills might be above average. Maybe. As you know, I streamed it for probably a total of six hours, so I never got the impression that they were long games. I thought they were long. Yeah, I think when they were long, they were long. They were long. But I also, because I was, you know, with them setting up for quite a few hours as well, we had some technical difficulties. So I got to watch a lot of Joe and Jane public. Yes. You know, 50% equal. Yeah, that's going to be fun. And they weren't having long games. Yes. That's basically what I was going to say. You can't go by, When you set up these displays for games you're trying to sell to Joe and Jane Public, I would say, wow, I don't believe I'm going to say I'm a decent player because I never say that, but I would say me and Marty are pretty good. We're both maybe beyond reasonable. We've won something, but it's like you can't go by us. We're going to play it longer, but if you have this at a show, you want people to be able to see the features, play the game, so you need to set them up easy. They were not jacked up, but the flippers were plenty strong to make everything, including the super airborne-like steep ramp on the left that goes up, and you could make it. I freaking love that ramp. And the cool habit trails. You could backhand it. The habit trails, which Ronnie's going to like because Lethal Weapon 3, it's got curly Q habit trails going on there. Playfield Art is very busy, like tons of stuff on there. I love the Playfield Art. I know that's been polarizing to some, but I actually really like the way it looks. I still like the way it looks. Yeah. I mean, I'll say it plays way better than Houdini. Sure. Okay. Smack. There you go. Except for that one voice in Houdini is great. I don't know what is that, that jailer guy. Yeah, yeah, yeah. I think he's great. He's very good. The Sydney jail is now open. You get that for free right there. so the code so I streamed it probably about 6 months ago and it was very early code I think there was, well obviously it hadn't had the scoop fix and didn't have the new flip angle and it might have had maybe 4 or 5 modes that had animation there was probably another couple of modes that worked but had no animation and then there was a few other modes that didn't work at all so I now got to play a near complete I don't even know what they call them tents I think The tent modes. Yeah, they're all like, the main modes are all tents. And I started scrolling through them, and it's like, damn, how many of these things are there? There were a lot of them. But again, I just kept hitting, well, Juggler's Multiball, yay! Yeah, no, I understand what you mean about that. But what I like about it now is it's actually become more situational. You can even try and go for Multiball. You can try to get a tent mode. you can go for one of the food modes as well. And, of course, you've got the magnabs where you can stop the ball. You have steins. And steins as well that give you perks. I think it's starting to become, rules-wise, really balanced. It's getting to the point where I don't understand what's going on. That means it's getting good, rules-wise. Once it gets beyond my level of comprehension, that means it's going to be satisfactory to a lot of players. Yeah. so um and a lot of people had sort of said that really octoberfest was probably the game of the show i don't know i wasn't there at the awards at the end to know who actually won we were supposed to do our research on our way here i don't know what actually won game of the show the show but um it was you know six to eight people deep pretty much the whole show yeah without without a doubt I would say like Oktoberfest and the Monsters were the yeah there was the main that sprawled the action was happening and again I'll say Alice Cooper as well because it you just couldn't get on it especially because they had just the two well they had more but the two main ones in the spooky booth and you couldn't get on them and there were some others around and you couldn't get on them and so that's actually why I stream so Dave Ennis who's been on the show so he does all the animations I actually said to him look oh man I just haven't been able to get on this game how about we stream this tomorrow and he's sure let's stream and I'm like oh thank god at least I'll get some play yeah I didn't because Bo and Karen's played for most of the stream which was just awesome so I was actually happy with that but I still got to play it so anyway so that was Oktoberfest who else was there other companies yeah okay that was really probably the main ones Beatles was there actually yeah You're Not Beatles was there. Before we go into some of the other sort of interesting sort of one-off type things as well, you know, other stuff that was happening in the show, you actually had, you know, the actors that played Eddie and Marilyn from Monsters. They were there. Yes. They were there all three days. Yeah. Which is a really solid effort. It was Butch Patrick and Pat Priest. Pat Priest, yeah. I sort of said Eddie and Marilyn because I couldn't remember her name. I knew it was Butch Patrick. And they weren't just there. There was a whole big-ass display. They had the car. Yep, they did. They had a couple of cars there. They did. And they were great. I mean, they're professionals, and they're paid to do what they do. But they were engaging with people. You know, there were some periods where, you know, people weren't coming up to them. But, you know, they were sitting there. They were very patient, and they were very talkative. And, you know, Butch Patrick presented one of the Trippie Awards, which was kind of cool. And you also had Christopher Franchi. He was there, the art of Christopher Franchi. that was cool. So that was, you know, what was going on around there. There was, you know, Marco Specialties had a really good booth there as well. Yeah. So, really well supported by a lot of companies. Cointaker had a big display there. Pinstadium, you know I love my Pinstadium. Pinstadium had like a tent. Pinstadium had a tent. To keep it dark so you can get the full power of the blinding light. I know. And here we go. You know, we can put brackets around this as Martin being a shield for Pinstadium again. But, you know, I got to see his Munsters LA, and I got to see the mini pin stadiums in the lower play field. I bought a set of them. Of course you did. Of course I did. Of course you did. Did, like, Dwight Sullivan just go over there and hang out for the whole show? He must have been in heaven in that section. He would have loved it. And so, look, the other thing that happened was... You forgot the other guest. Who was the other guest? The best guest. The one I popped for. Who's that? How do you say his name? John Rhys Davies. Oh, John Rhys Davies. Right. So he's the guy that does the voice. He did the voices for Lord of the Rings. Yes. My father literally texts me and he's like, the Lord of the Rings guy is here. Jackpot One guy is here. It's like, you're kidding. He's here. Yep. He was like right up front. I'm like, holy crap. Yeah. So has he done any other pinball callers? Because he's actually an actor, right? Yes. I don't know. He did Indiana Jones. Sure. The first one. Okay. A good one. And he did Lord of the Rings. Okay. yeah cool was he actually in the movie yes okay yeah like obviously giving it away that i have no idea yeah you should see the look on his face you can't see him but i can it's like i i know i know indeed indeed yes you come on you haven't seen where's the last ark yeah was he the old guy no no raiders old he was like in his 30s when that was filmed he's sala who's that indeed why does the floor move it's been a very long time okay um i know who the german guys are the trippy guys I remember them I know that you know spoiler everybody that when they open up the arc you know it melts their faces that was kind of kind of a bit cool well he's in Lord of the Rings and he's a character in there which I haven't seen in the movies so I think he's CGI'd in the movies but he's in there but he's like CGI'd right okay oh well just be proud of the fact that I've seen both those films can't remember them but I've seen them I know that um what was it What was the woman's name? You know, I hate you, Indy. Whatever her name was. Oh, Kate Capshaw? Yeah, that's the one. Well, I don't know her name in the movie. No, I don't remember. She's married to Steven Spielberg now, I believe. Okay, there you go. So there's some additional trivia for you, guys. Well done. I'm good for useless trivia. Thank you. So let's talk about Haggis Pinball. So I did the seminar with Haggis Pinball. It was a Q&A, and it was actually a really good session. We kind of winged it a bit. It was kind of like just... You wing it? I know, right? I can't see that. Well, this is kind of what I said to Damien. I can see the format the show format right in front of you right now It was exactly right It was like a blank sheet But I kind of said to him beforehand because he asked me to do the Q and I said well I do this every week Surely I could do this as a panel and it kind of worked. So here's what I can tell you about KELTS, which was there. Because this came out of the seminar. And I think there is actually an archive of this somewhere. But the summary is that they were working on Wraith, and then the partner that he was working with had to sort of step away for some personal reasons and take a couple of months off. So that meant that they would not be able to get Wraith at TPF as promised. So this happened eight weeks ago. So the moment he realized that he couldn't bring Wraith to TPF, he said, shit, I've got to bring another machine to TPF. and he had to from eight weeks ago come up with a theme put some code in there come up with a layout and bring it over to tpf and what he brought over was a play field and all the mechs and wiring and got a cabinet here and then spent three days at the convention center in the back room assembling the whole thing. Unfortunately, didn't get it flipping before the seminar, but it was flipping about two hours after the seminar. And the initial feedback has actually been really positive. I don't know whether you got to flip it. I think you said you got to see it. Yeah, I got to see it. I finally got to flip it probably about 15 minutes before the whole show finished. And I remember when Ryan said that he had played it, He said one of the best things is that the orbits feel really satisfying, and they do. It's got one of your favorite shots in pinball. That's the Space Invaders horseshoe. Oh, Silver Ball Mania horseshoe also. Yeah, I think they both have, don't they? I think they do. And so it's got one of those. and it's obviously it's a very very early Whitewood with very early code some of the feedback I heard was it's almost like someone said TNA 2.0 yeah I heard that I heard that also and that's actually high price I heard TNA with a horseshoe yep correct and so the premise of it is that you're playing in these like highland games so it'll be like dancing competitions that toss thing is it Cable or something? Cable? Yeah, they have something like that that Scottish games are called. And look, he's got big ambitions. We'll try and find the seminar somewhere, see if we can link it. We probably won't be able to, but it'll be out there and I do recommend you have a listen to the seminar. But, you know, Kelts was there in A-form. Were all the seminars streamed? I think they were. And being prepared, we know what channel to tell people to go to, right? Yeah. Damn it. I'm pretty sure they were all streamed. But the thing is, I think they were streamed by whoever was doing it. Correct. I think there was, do you know what? I think if you go to Twitch, I think there's a channel that's Texas seminars or Texas festival seminars or something like that. So we'll try and find it and link it to you. But a lot of the seminars are there. what else do we need to talk about with the the show floor itself before we get to the main event oh the tournament let's talk about the tournament yeah the tournament was not in the main hall this time they had a separate room yep and they had the main tournament which was the one it's the limited qualifying and had to you know like you had to it capped it so only so many players could be in it 20 games i think everybody got yeah it was 20 and then they had women's tournament yep had i think a child and parent tournament they did yeah and they had the classics tournament correct which i think the classics ended up being the issue because what happened is and i talked to colin on this Colin MacAlpine a guest he was on the show recently and i mean They wanted to give some for classics. They wanted to give something to people who couldn't get in the main tournament. Like, you can do this. Yeah. And they figured there'd be just so many people who would want to do that. Right? Turns out there was... Severe underestimation about how many people want to play competitive pinball. Really? Yes. So they had, how many in the main? I can't remember. Wasn't the main capped at 160 players? Let's just say it was 160. I can't remember. There was over 180 who played in Classics. Yeah. It was insane. I know. And the Classics, you know, they're older machines, so they play really quickly. Some of these queues were like 16, 17 deep. So they took an hour. Yeah, because my original plan was, like, I didn't make it into the initial, like, I was actually picking up the Prospector when it went on sale. And by the time I got Signal, it was already out. and I'm like, you know, I'm not even going to bother doing the wait list. I'm just going to play classics. Yeah, so. So before I even got there, I got a message from somebody. It's like, yeah, the classics queue is about an hour per game. Like, oh, okay, maybe I'm not going to do that then. So for the first time in a while, I actually didn't do any entries in a tournament. Usually I do something. So you didn't do it by a whole tournament. I didn't do it. I didn't do a single entry. Yeah. Thank you. But don't let that take away from the quality of the event. as the Classics Finals. It was on, was it Saturday? Saturday morning, I believe. And they had the mobile rig. They had a mobile rig, so it was all streamed on, I think, Space City. See, that one I actually know. So just search Space City, pinball. And they streamed the Classics Final, which was run by Bob Matthews, who's won that. And then the main tournament, they started at, I don't know, two or three? I think it was two. It went to midnight to get through all that because they had 24 spots, and it was won by Raymond Davidson, the number one player in the world, padding his lead. Yeah, and I can't remember the top four, but I know that Steven Bowden came second. And then the women's tournament was actually this morning. It was won by Kerry Wing. Oh, we like Kerry. Well done, Kerry. And as far as the novice or the parent-child, I don't know. I apologize. guys i you know i don't know but i do know that when whoever it was this kid that won they came out and the the mother of this child was so proud they came and told me i loved it just being out on the floor the amount of young people you see out there is very refreshing yeah because i mean i've been going to shows for 14 15 years and i mean and most of the time you would just see us old people yeah well i was younger then but you know you see like 40 year old males like everywhere and the only women you'd see is like their wives who are drug along yeah who probably don't even want to be there but now i mean there was tons of young people there okay so this is what i thought was quite noticeable as well is you know normally these shows you see parents with their children meaning young children up to the age of 10. What I noticed this year was the missing age bracket was there in plenty and that is from the ages of, let's say, 15 to about 23. That's usually that zone where kids are grown up and they're not doing what their parents want to do. Yeah, and they were usually playing games with their kind, if you will, not being forced by, you know. Direct. Come here, son. Let's play a game together or something. They were just playing amongst themselves. Correct. But it was really noticeable now that it wasn't just old farts like us that were, you know what? Old male farts like us. Yes. It was a really freaking diverse age and gender crowd. Probably the most mixed I've ever seen at a people show. Really noticeable. And that is awesome because we've been talking about it so many, you know, the pinball manufacturers themselves, they know if they don't solve the problem of the new generation of people getting into pinball, we're all going to die soon and they're going to have no one to sell their machines to. So it's actually really good to see that actually happening. You know what I also saw? What did you see? It was really weird. I saw, I think Jeff Teolis must be getting around because there was tons of gingers there. Do you know what? I am not kidding. Now, typically, when you go to these shows, I mean, as far as the general population, you don't see a lot of gingers. At least 10 or 15 gingers. It was enough that I was like, huh, I don't know if it's a Texas thing. You're the fourth person that's actually said that to me. So listeners of Head to Head from Texas, just let them know. Is this a Texas thing? Yeah, please let us know what's in the water. But everyone's come around. I spoke to a lot of people, and I'll explain this for those people that don't know. A couple of days before I arrived in Texas, Ryan put up on the Facebook page of Head to Head instructions. And those instructions were that you need to come up to me when you recognize me, scream Marty give me a hug and then put a selfie up and he put a picture there just in case just in case people didn't know what I looked like and just I'm sitting right next to him right now Martin is an incredibly handsome man thank you I do appreciate that really good to hear but I honestly could not tell you how many people did that. It was honestly, nearly every 10 to 15 minutes, almost regular intervals, somebody would come up and do it. So I got to speak to a lot of people. And therefore, the reason I'm making that point, I'm not just saying that I'm awesome and everyone loves me. That helps. Is that, because the first thing I asked people is, okay, what's your name? If I could say the name. But I was curious to know where people were from. not a lot of people from texas that that was my take out like there was obviously some but people were just from all over so the reason i'm making that point is i don't know whether it's a texas thing maybe it's a texas festival thing but no people from just everywhere and so many aussies i reckon they probably would have been about 15 16 which is very cool what's weird for me is, you know, I went there, like, they give you, if you prepay, you get a lanyard. So I purposely never put my lanyard on. So hopefully people don't recognize me. Oh, Ron. And that literally does not work anymore. And it's just, like, when you say you're asking people's names and where they're from, like, I'm so socially inept. I don't even think to ask. I'm just like, thank you, because most people, like, we like the show. Like, oh, thank you. And I never, like, continue on the conversation. Yeah. but um yeah i mean that was cool it's weird is when like designers and other pinball people know who i am it's like it's just weird i know it's so weird absolutely great and then the moment for me was when i went up dwight sullivan i said oh hi dwight how are you and he showed me how he was like yeah yeah good mate good and i went oh it's martin from head to head because you know taylor i have to tell people who i am and he's like oh my god i didn't realize it was you like i have to say hello to a lot of people but it's actually you and i'm like oh cool it is literally like a pin family like i see all the same people it is it is so good i mean i saw like uh well i don't think he's ever been on your show but our own greg waparelli you know the bigger drunker etc maybe on our show soon yeah oh because he was he was partying with Steve Ritchie in his hotel room until like 2.30 in the morning I always say that because he actually posted on Facebook so I'm not giving away any secrets here but it's like I wanted in on that so I tried to track him down but it was already done but I ended up finding a group of people and I was drinking until 5 o'clock in the morning damn in like he is like some who's who of people right So Tommy Floyd from Night of the Pinball, he was there, right? He was freaking awesome. Antoinette Marco, she was there. Jeff Teolis was there. Okay, so maybe not so famous. Yeah, whatever. John Borg and Joe Balsa, there as well. So just drinking and chatting and talking pinball till like five o'clock in the morning with these people was just freaking awesome. And for me, it wasn't like a Star Trek awesome. It was being able to have direct access with these people where you could have a conversation and hear it firsthand from these people. Yeah. That was freaking cool. That's what I loved. And the fact that they know who I am, obviously. I was asleep by then. Yeah, I did. I noticed my not drinking kind of unfortunately hurts me in a lot of these cool things. So where did you get all this booze that you were drinking? at this little get-together? Well, admittedly, some of it was brought in, but I did manage to get what we're referring to as a man-kay. Also, a longer version of that is a man-bo-kay, or a gin-bo-kay. So Mrs. Pin, and I don't know if anyone's put this up on Facebook yet. I know that Steven Bowden posted up there, But there's, she actually made me, instead of a bouquet of flowers, it's actually a bouquet made of sort of little tiny gin bottles and some lotto tickets because she knows I love lotto tickets. And there's a hip flask on there as well. And stickers of my head and Ryan's head and some head to head sort of logo stickers as well. So I managed to get through some of those sort of little bottles. So I kind of did say that they probably won't make it back onto the plane because I'm going to drink them before then. And I've got a whole day in Frisco tomorrow. And Ryan's head was bigger. Ryan's head was bigger. They said they were pretty disappointed, but Ryan's head is bigger. That is the fact. So there you go. So I've had a great time meeting all these people and obviously drinking with these people has been amazing. So there you go. So, shall we then talk about the Twippies? Oh, my. Oh, my. Well, it just so happens. I actually have the format for the Twippies here. Okay. So, we can go through. Which I saw. So, it has the awards in order. Okay. Let me bring that up. Let's see if it's on this week in Bimble already. Probably is, you know. Yeah. But not to be too disseminated, but this is where they were. That's from the podium itself. Okay. where it has like all the notes on who's presenting what yeah okay cool cool cool alright so and obviously there were some guest presenters as well yeah so the first well first the Twippies itself it's like a big event now yep I mean it was standing room only to get in like before they opened the doors I'm like oh my god it's just like wow I just never remember seeing anything quite like this before and everyone piled in there they had people standing in the back and it was done like a full out all out production like podiums like yeah full video clips and audio clips uh production quality was insane was freaking amazing from going from last year having it as an online video which i still thought was impressive because i thought they were just gonna like say who the winners were and they were doing whole little like pieces on each thing and this this was from uh zach and greg of straight down the middle yes i think greg actually put over that zach did all the uh the putting together of the video work yes so yeah it it looked like a professional award ceremony yep it was it was really good so uh what what were the award categories and We'll try and remember what won because nothing's been posted up yet, so I can't remember what won. All right. The first category was Best Music and Sound Effects. The presenter was Scott Denisey. It was Scott Denisey. And what won Best Sound Effects? The nominees were, and I think a lot of them were like the same three games. They had like Deadpool, Iron Maiden, and Pirates of the Caribbean. I believe Deadpool won. Yeah. Okay. Okay. And accepting was, I believe, a former guest, Jerry Thompson. Jerry Thompson, yeah, he did indeed. Oh, damn it, I went to go and say hello to Jerry. I didn't, hi, Jerry. I didn't get to say hello. Anyway. Yeah, so he won. They had guest presenters for various categories. Not always, but let's see. The next category was favorite homebrew pinball machine. and the presenters were Mrs. and Dr. Pin. Which was hilarious. Which was hilarious. It was very funny. And do you remember what that was? This is embarrassing. This is literally like less than 24 hours after and I cannot remember. I've also only had an hour and a half sleep. So you're saying it's my fault. Yep. Okay. I am saying that. We'll have that one there. Maybe we'll cut that out. Oh, what was the mod? What was the best mod? Oh, I'm sorry. I don't know what his mod was. Are you talking about Best Homebrew? Oh, the Best Homebrew. Sorry, sorry. I'm sorry to the winner of the Best Homebrew. No, I do know what it was. Oh, you do? What was it? It was The Nightmare Before Christmas. Oh, yes, that's right. And that's right. That's right. And they would show like these, it was like for each category, there'd be three different nominees, which we didn't even know who they were. No, we didn't. So when they would show them, it was fun listening to the crowd. Yeah. And that definitely got the biggest cheer. Yeah. Yeah, you could always tell what was going to win by the biggest cheer. Yeah. Well, not exactly. Whatever. I think the other nominees for that were Kill Bill was one of them. Yes. And I don't remember the first one. And I don't remember the first one either. No. So we failed. We failed. We suck. So the next one was Best Callouts. This was my favorite part of the show. This was the favorite part because who did we have presenting the award? Yeah, John Rhys-Davies come out. John Rhys-Davies came out. For Gonsala himself. Indeed. He comes out. I'm like, you know, I'm thinking like when Zach and Greg are saying, you know, the guest presenter is going to be in a famous Hollywood movie. And I'm like, they didn't get John Rhys-Davies to actually do this. Because I knew he was there. He was signing autographs at $40 a pop, I believe. It was pretty expensive. Okay, there you go. Yeah, yeah, yeah. But he, it's like, man, I wonder if they could get him. And sure enough, he comes down, he's looking good with his suit, and just as soon as he starts talking, that voice is like, Oh, my God. Dear God, I am in heaven. I'm in voice heaven. Okay. So this is what's really bizarre, is that I knew he was going to be there because I had a list of all the presenters because I was one of them. I completely, I just didn't realize that you didn't know that. So that was a big surprise. And what I loved, he said a couple of things. He said that, you know, we're amazing and intelligent people and we were a bunch of oddballs. But I think before that he said, I've been told I need to say Jackpot 1! Yeah. Jackpot 2! It's like, yes! The whole room just literally jizzed. It was awesome. Wow. Literally. Literally. I forgot. This is an R-rated podcast. As big as I would have ever wanted. Yes. And the nominees, I think, were the usual. Pirates, Deadpool, Iron Maiden. did Deadpool win? I think Deadpool won this as well maybe Iron Maiden won the first one I thought, or maybe not but it was Stern again so Jerry Thompson came down again I guess what was interesting is that I think everyone thought Iron Maiden was just going to scoop the pool and Deadpool, you know, did well Deadpool, I mean regardless of what you think of the play field and some of the shots I mean, if you want a game that has a certain atmosphere that they brought to life. That's it. Yeah, absolutely. And so the next one we had was Best Toys and Gimmicks. No, it was Favorite Pinball Tournament. Was it? Yes. And the next one was Best Pinball Tournament or Favorite Pinball Tournament. Which was presented by Crystal Gemnick. Crystal Gemnick, who's awesome. Not Gemnitch, like they said. They kind of screwed up the poor Crystal. Close enough. Better than Gemnick that she gets as well. so you're getting somewhere there. So the nominees were... Come on, you weren't there. You don't have a list of the nominees. Okay, well, I know one was Pinberg. Pinberg Tournaments, yeah. Yeah, Pinberg, Indisc, and I think Texas might have been the other one. Yes, it was too, and everyone cheered when it was Texas, but who won? Everyone knew who was going to win this one. It was Pinberg. It was Pinberg. It was Pinberg. We knew that. So then the next one was... Best toys and gimmicks. And this was Mr. Christopher Franchi. You know, it probably would have been the same people, but really it was always going to be Pirates of the Caribbean. Yes. Without a doubt. Yes. Yeah. And what was really interesting, I honestly can't remember the video, but when you saw the video footage of the first two... Yeah, you see Little Deadpool with his head on a spring. That's right. And then you see, I think, Iron Maiden with some of the gimmicks there. Sure. But then you see the rocking play field, the cannon going across the play field, the spinning, all that stuff. It's like, okay. You're going to win these. You can just tell. So that was really good. Maybe we should say who accepted the awards for these things. Favorite pinball tournament, who actually accepted? I think they said there was no one there, so I think Greg and Zach accepted. And then for best toys and gimmicks, I think they had... Who did that? Oh, it was Eric. Oh, Eric. Yeah, that's right. He did come up. So that was cool. So then we had favorite pinball mod of 2018. I do remember this one. I'm sure you do. I do. So Zach and Greg were the presenters of this. And it was Color DMD, Pin Stadium, and the Winged Monkey mod for Wizard of Oz. which was very cool because I've actually got all three of those, right? So, Martin, who won? Who won? It was, okay, so it was Scott from Penn Stadium, right? Okay, so obvious, right? Wow. Like, you know, like the big surprise. What a bright answer that was. I know. Ah, yeah, yeah, awesome. But do you know what I liked about it was that I had, well, I was actually sitting next to Scott at the time and not for any one second did he sit there thinking, I've got this. He was just thinking it could be anyone because no one knew who the nominees were, but obviously he was very pleased. So, Penn Stadium, you're awesome. So do you have an award-winning pinball machines now because they have award-winning products in them? Yes, I do. I don't know. No, I don't. What? What? Do you not have pin stadiums in anything? Yeah, I do. Oh, you mean I've got... Yes, you have award-winning pinball machines because you have award-winning mods. Oh, okay. I see what you're saying. That makes kind of no sense. Yeah, it's lame. Yes. I'm just trying to be funny. Should I do voices instead? Yes, please. It's so much funnier. You're just giving the fans what they want. Okay. Well, maybe I should do the next one. Let's see. The next one was Best Theme with Jack Danger. The funny thing about this was Jack... Jack Danger had major issues getting to the event. He was on his Twitter. Basically, he had like six-hour flight delays. He said it was the worst experience he ever had. So when he got there, he gets there like Saturday morning, and he's streaming in the Marco area. Right. And I actually get a message from a friend around 1 o'clock, 2 o'clock, asking me, has Jack Danger ever gotten in trouble for being drunk on stream before? And I there like well he been drunk on stream I seen several times where he been fairly inebriated and intoxicated Who would he get in trouble buying Twitch I was wondering if Twitch would have an issue But the funny thing is, she was, oh, let me cut that out because I just, you know. The friend kind of gave it away. I turned on the stream and, yeah, he was somewhat intoxicated. And literally the first thing I heard him say is, I'm going to get another beer. Really? And I'm there like, this is at 2 o'clock, and I'm there like, man, I hope he's not a presenter at the Twippies, because this could be a problem. Obviously, Twitch doesn't have a problem with people being drunk, unless they've really not... That's right, you're right! That's right! But I don't have the same anywhere near level of viewers that he does, so I'm not going to... Or his tolerance, obviously, because he was fine for the... Yeah, he was actually really cool. So either he stopped or has just slowed down or is incredible tolerance. But it was the best theme of 2018. And the nominees were, of course, the same three, the big three. We have Deadpool, Iron Maiden, and Pirates of the Caribbean. And who won it? I don't know. Did Pirates win? I can't remember. I think Pirates won, which was, or was it Deadpool? I think it was Deadpool. Wow. This is incredible. Awesome coverage. I said, shit. How do we not know any of these things? I know. I was just there. Well, Marty has an excuse. He had to leave at some point because he was being a presenter. When I saw you leave, the first thing I thought was, I wonder if Marty's presenting. Did you not know? I did not know you're presenting. Right. And then when you came, I'm like, ah, that's why he disappeared. We're going to the Facebook page. Marty is trying to do the research here. I'm doing research on the fly. No. No. It's not there. It's not there. What's wrong, Martin? It's not there. So the best theme in Pitbull, the winner was Deadpool, which is kind of cool. I really do like the theme. I don't think you can be too critical of that. It is a great theme. I also think that it's not as polarizing as Iron Maiden is. Iron Maiden, people either love the theme or they hate the theme. that's true so and in pirates you have the whole like it's been done before and all that yeah yeah so that that's a hard one to know um the next one was uh favorite pimble location and the nominees were logan's arcade logan arcade and two other places we know that logan arcade one which was very cool and that was accepted by Crystal. So yes, Logan Arcade won. Yes. We don't know the others. We don't know the others too. I'm not meant to know the others as well because I don't know any of these places. It's not like someone was a presenter on the staff, if you will, and doesn't know any of this. Oh, don't be like that. Okay, so the next one was Favorite Pinball Convention. Which, what did we have? Texas Pinball Festival, Replay FX, and Pintastic Motorpin? Medivin? But Jack Guarnari, Jersey Jack, was the presenter. He was indeed. He did a cool thing. When he went to read the winner, as soon as he saw who it was, he's like, oh, and he just takes his shirt off, and underneath he had a Texas Pinball Festival shirt, and the winner was Texas Pinball Festival. Accepted by Ed Van Der Heen. yes it was Vendor Veen yes sorry Ed the next one we had was Best Light Show so we had Ken and Bill from Special Inlet hey boys I got to meet them they're actually really nice which is great again it probably would have been the same three I'm assuming it was it was the same three yep and the Best Light Show went to Pirates of the Caribbean Pirates of the Caribbean which again was one of those things I could tell you what was interesting is that When they showed the clips of them, I was kind of like, oh, pirates. But then when you see how much GI is there. Yeah, and the little lights they used in the rocking ship there, the lanterns and things like that, yeah. Yep, and, you know, like the star field at the back as well. It absolutely deserved it. So, and the next one was, favorite or best pinball publication, which was meant to be... Presented by Steve Ballard. Presented by Steve Ballard. He was busy in the tournament area until midnight because he made it all the way to the Final Four. Correct. It was presented by, I think it was just Reagan Zach. Reagan Zach, yeah. And, yeah, it was, what was it out of? It was, there was a magazine I wasn't aware of. Yeah, it looked really cool. It's a cool, like, art in it. Yeah. Yeah. And then there was, I don't remember the second one. There was the Todd Tucky book. Oh, the Todd Tucky book. and then it's got a bit of a yeah from the then there was the yeah because was that even yeah it was out it wasn't great it's an OB Collectors item yeah and then there was Pinball Magazine and it won yep and Jonathan Houston was there and he went up and accepted the award he ran up he ran up and vaulted up to the stage without taking the steps now do you know what do you know why I spoke to him after he he wasn't even there at the awards he walked in the door as they said and the winner is Pinball Magazine. Yeah, he said that in his speech. Yep. So he wasn't lying. Yep, he wasn't lying at all. So, there you go. Next one was favourite pinball website? Correct. So, what did we have? We had This Week in Pinball, we had Tilt Forums, and we had Pinside. And this was presented by the Emerys. Yes. mother and son team yep and who won this award I don't know who wins this award it was Pinside it was Pinside yay so who was it that came up it wasn't it wasn't Robin it was his brother or was it Robin and he was calling out for his brother yeah I didn't know but it was Pinside yeah Till Forms and what was the other one and this week in Pimble yeah so you know it's yeah if you're going to pick them on those three I mean you cannot you cannot deny it's influence as much as we make fun of it on our show. Exactly. And so the next award was Best Theme Integration presented by the tallest man in the world. I don't know about tallest man in the world but he's definitely the tallest guy in pinball probably. He really is. And the nominees are I can't remember. Can you? It's probably the same three. Basically Pirates Deadpool and Iron Maiden. Yes and the winner was Pirates of the Caribbean. Yes. Which I would get. You all know. It's just... I mean... I don't know. I guess it's the world under glass, if you will. But the Deadpool world, I don't know. Because for Deadpool, they have the actual guy who's been Deadpool forever. I know people are used to Ryan Reynolds as Deadpool, but the guy who actually does it in the game has been doing Deadpool forever. and like in the just the voice impersonator things always get me it's just like it's not johnny depp in there no i understand that but he was actually one of the actors from the movie yes that is true but here's here's why i i i said yep absolutely is that you know with deadpool you've got deadpool you've got art everywhere you've got rules and you've got code but what story are you going through right yeah with iron maiden you've got great songs you've got great art you've got amazing rules and layout but what's the story you're going through so if you think so the journey is not no it's more of the journey on pirates that's what i'm saying like a theme integration is you've taken those movies and you feel like you're in part of those movies i think that's they probably have better source material to work with to make you feel like you were integrated into it but that's why i think it won okay and so the next one was the favorite pinball youtube channel hosted hosted presented by dwight sullivan and this is when they were flickering the lights while he was talking and no one noticed this but me direct but it wasn't like like really flashing them but they were just going off and on this whole time he was up there it was subtle enough. And the nominees were, we had straight down the middle. Yep. You had again, we're kind of giving away who the winner is. Like, all suspense is not here at all. This is so bad. Everybody knows who's won it anyway. But yeah, so it was straight down the middle. They're awesome. Oh no, you know, Todd Tucky was another one as well. Yes, Todd Tucky. And who was the... I don't know, but we love you whoever you are. Third one. It might have been Buffalo Pinball. Maybe. Yeah, it could have been. They were in the Twitch one, though. Yeah, they were. So it wasn't, I don't know. I don't know. I'm so sorry. That's all right. Please don't hate me. We don't hate you. Thank you. So the next one was Best Artwork. Yes, this was Butch Patrick. Eddie Munster himself is giving the award. And this is where things got a little screwed up. Now, I can say some of this. I won't divulge sources, but basically the nominees were the usual three. Yep. You had Pirates, you had Deadpool, and then you had Iron Maiden. So two of them had the same artist. So I guess there was some miscommunication on who was supposed to accept the award. What was supposed to happen is, I believe, Iron Maiden. Iron Maiden War and Christopher Franchi was supposed to go up and accept the war and basically do an angle because something that he worked out with Zombie Eddie where they're supposed to be having this feud so he was going to be pissed that he didn't win and was going to destroy the trophy. That was you know that's pretty seems pretty funny. That would have been hilarious. That would have been hilarious. And they used a prop. It was like it looked like the other trippies but it was made to easily break. Yep. Yep. But what happened is there was some miscommunication, so Mike Vinikour of Stern went up to accept the award on behalf of Zombie Eddie. Yeah. And he was not in on it. He didn't know. Pretty much everyone else was in on it. He was not. So Chris decided, instead of just bailing on it, he decided to go through with this anyway. So he walks up on stage, and I'm like, what's going on? And I look over, and I see Zach, who is trying not to laugh. Right. So I know immediately it's some kind of angle. they're doing here. So he basically just takes the trophy from Mike and destroys it. Yep. Now, some people laughed and thought it was funny. Others were like, ooh. A lot of people thought it was serious. Like, ooh. Yeah, to the point where Chris actually had to post on his Facebook, like, it was a joke. It was a fake trophy. I know. But it was... It was a good idea. Best laid plans, I would say. But I think the problem was, because Mike's reaction was genuine. Genuine like what the hell? It made it look real. Yes. And so people weren't laughing. People were in shock. In that room, people were like, what the fuck just happened? Is he really pissed off or something? I was at the back because I was about to present an award. So I saw him come off stage laughing himself silly and then saying, I don't think Mike told him that No one told Mike that this was going to happen. That's the other clue, folks, is he walked off. There's a backstage area where he walked off. If this was for real, I would have done an angle where he just walked off the stage entirely and just left. Correct. That would have made more sense. I know. Anyway, it was hilarious. It was very funny. So the next one was favorite pinball Twitch streamer. And this was presented by... My man, Steve Ritchie. the greatest pinball designer of all time. And I've got to say, I was very disappointed that Melbourne Silver Bowl League was not nominated for this. No, you weren't even nominated. No, I wasn't even nominated. It was Buffalo Pinball. Buffalo Pinball. Jack Danger. Jack Danger. With Dead Flip. And the third one. Again, just stellar. We are fucking bizarre. And we're pissing someone off. I mean, I truly apologize. We really should be more prepared. but we're doing this in a hotel room. We had to turn the air conditioner off and it's like 90 degrees in here. No, not really. But, you know. But I'm sobering up. So that's really good. Speaking of sobering up, accepting the award, Deadflip won. Correct. Jack Danger accepting his award and really, when they showed all the clips, I mean, if you want to just go by pure entertainment, he's definitely, it was very, it's like, yeah, he's the guy who's going to win this. He's the guy. Yeah, absolutely. so then the next one was oh my favorite you know how I love rules, best rules best rules presented by presented by me so what was really funny about this and I was saying to everybody this is really ironic that I got given best rules the person that knows the least about any rules no, you are podcasting with the person who knows the least about rules. Really? I know less than you. Oh, I don't believe that for a second. Really? Is that true? I think so. Yeah, okay. If you talk to people who know me, they'll say, like, yeah, it's true, Ron doesn't know anything. Well, I was sort of wearing it as like a badge of honor, but now, God, if there's someone worse than me, well, then it's not so bad. Well, I'm trying. I'm trying. I got into Star Wars. Anyway. So, yes. So, the winner of Best Rules, well, I think it was the same three, wasn't it? Yes. Yeah. And the winner was Iron Maiden. Which sling code, the best sling code ever by Tim Sexton. I just want to put that out there. Thank you very much, Tim. Balls are amazing. So then we had Rookie of the Year. Oh, you know. It was Keith. Keith won. Well, this one, come on. One I actually know the nominees. Okay, go. It was Keith Owen, Eric, Mignet, and Tim Sexton. Oh there you go It was too Tim would actually be For rookie of the year Well done Awesome So and yes Keith Bond And that was That was really Not going to be a surprise With you know Iron Maiden And what it was So then we have Best animations And display By um The presenter was Robin from Pinside So it must have been Robin that accepted Who had been up earlier To accept the award For Pinside Yep And the nominees were I assume The same three Which again Would be Deadpool Yep Pirates of the Caribbean and Iron Maiden. And the winner was... Oh, it's not... Oh, my, it's not on the page that he was looking at with the results. It was Pirates of the Caribbean. Pirates of the Caribbean. Awesome. Well done. Which, again, I just want to put over, like, the video presentations were awesome on these. That was really good. They were really good. And a lot of times you would, like, you'd look at them, like, okay, that one, that one. Oh, yeah, that one looks like it's the best. And it would be the one that actually wins. Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah. You could tell just in isolation, but then together you could really have a good comparison. Yeah. So that's it. And then what was the next one? Do I have to? Yep. Okay. Oh, the next one was favorite pinball podcast. Oh, this is so such a great one. Oh, my. This went so swimmingly well. Oh. Oh. Nothing went wrong. No, nothing went wrong at all. Do you want to say who the nominees were? The nominees were Head to Head Pinball Podcast, Canada Pinball Podcast, and This Week in Pinball Podcast. And This Week in Pinball wasn't going to win. You knew that. I mean, come on. It would look really bad if you're winning your own award. Yeah, well, yeah, I guess so. So, I've got to address this. I know. So I've got to address this because what happened was when our segment came up and they went through all the different interviews that we'd done, which was great. Which was incredible. Yeah, folks, it was literally like, this is why I'm in. Hi, this is what this is like. It was ridiculous. Every person in the pinball industry, other than Gary Stern, pretty much, that you can interview, you guys did last year. That's correct. And so that was probably about a clip of about 30 seconds, which was kind of cool. and then they played like a 30 second clip from Kaneda and someone booed throughout the whole thing. Loudly. Loudly. And I've got to say, it was really uncomfortable. Yes. It was awkward. I thought people were looking at me like I had set this up, which just is not the case. Yeah, to the point where I'm sitting there, I never, the person who was booing was in the back, the standing room area, and I literally took my phone out and just pretended to not be paying attention just so no one would think it was me or something, because it's like, we didn't even get nominated. No, exactly. So, look, at the end of the day, Kaneda won, and I'd said, I've been saying to anybody that's like, oh, you're going to win. I said, no, no, no, Kaneda will win, and Kaneda will win, and Kaneda deserves it, because he knows his audience and his audience are really loyal fans and I absolutely get that. And good on you, Chris. Actually, genuinely good on you. I was expecting you to win. You did. You shouldn't have had to have gone through someone booing your nomination video or whatever it is, the audio, or your acceptance speech. So I tell you what you did, though. You really navigated that really well. Like to be able to incorporate that person into your acceptance speech. You weren't phased by it. I know you got a little bit sort of angry towards the end, but I think you handled that really well. So well done. And genuine congratulations. I just want to put a big note out to anybody that does a podcast. It is hard work. I was going to say it's a thankless job. It's not. We do get a lot of thanks, but it is a lot of hard work to put out this content. I was going to say, you know, we don't make money from it. We've got a Patreon. We get very little from it. It really is because we're passionate about pinball and we want to put out content there and whether you listen to us, whether you listen to Kaneda, This Week in Pinball, you know, Slam Tilt when they're on. Hey. You know, Buffalo Pinball, Mrs. Pin, I could just name them all. people profile blah blah blah blah um just keep listening just enjoy what these people are doing and let's not make the only category that is desperately not trying to be seen as being drama have the only drama of the night yeah can we do that next time i will say i know the person who was the the booer he was he was a new york city guy booing a new york city guy yeah and even afterwards these are like me you think did i go too far maybe yes no and and the thing is the i i know for a fact that there was heightened security because i mean certain people know who's going to win and i know they had a cop in the area specifically if anything were to happen I'm not making this up and the thing is when you go to Texas this is not like a lot of shows you got like the the rent-a-cop thing going on these are uniformed police officers with like guns and shit so uh yeah it was and and the thing that kind of sucked is it did it sucked the air out of the it sucked the rest of the of this because there's two more awards after that and it was just like I gotta tell you I gotta tell you what was really funny though was after, when they had like a 30 second clip of Kaneda's podcast and that guy was booing, then when it went to this week in Pinball's podcast clip, Zach started booing himself. That right there is a legend. He can just on the fly turn that around and make it light and everyone laughed. Well, he also said like, this is why us pinball people can't have nice things. That's exactly right. During the booing. So there you go. alright so the second last award was best playfield gameplay and layout it was presented by Antoinette she of the amazing hair which said I think it had monsters written on it oh my god I don't know how she does it and so the winner of that because you know what let's forget the bloody nominations we don't really know do we but it's going to be the same three yeah it's the same three and it was Iron Maiden and then we had Game of the Year it was the same three and it was Iron Maiden yes Mike Finacore had a lot of Twippies yeah what was it I think Stern ended up with like eight was it I'm trying to look at their they posted it on their Facebook page like just the bro of Twippy Awards yeah it seemed like eight and um yeah and Jersey Duck won four so there you go that was the Twippies that was the Twippies and that was pretty much Texas Pinball Festival yeah yeah or is it or is it well there's all the partying that takes place after correct which i'm usually not in but you know marty was and other people were and i'd love to know some of the conversations that go on there were a lot of conversations like as i said particularly when you're you know it's it's 4 30 in the morning and you're absolutely inebriated and you're having conversations with the designers i don't know what has been said i can't remember it but no Honestly, I was just saying to someone before, it's really, it's hard to wake up with a hangover. But it's even worse waking up drunk. That I can tell you now. First experience, first time I've ever had a sepacitemic. But that's because I had an hour and a half sleep before I streamed. But also, I do actually believe we have a man on the street, a reporter that you know and I know. I wouldn't say love, but we just know. So I'm going to say goodbye to Ron. Thank you very much for coming on. Goodbye. Love it. Awesome. Thanks, everybody, for listening. And we're now going to play some on-the-floor clips from our roving reporter. Oh, no. Is this who I think it is? This is Pinside Peter. Oh, shit. Here he is. Bye, guys. Here at Texas Pinball Festival with apparently the number one player in the world, he doesn't look that good to me, Raymond Davidson. How you doing? Hey, Petey. So what makes you so good? I finish higher than everyone else. You haven't played me yet. Ah, that's because you're too scared. Let's go do it right now. Yeah, let's do it. I'm busy. Beat it. Oh, look at this. I've talked to him before. Carl Dingalo. Oh, gosh. Hello, Carl. What's up? Nothing. Are you here to sabotage the show and make everyone think that this is way better than Texas? Sure. What about your never drains? I've seen you drain. You drain all the time. You're not that good. Let's see you never drain. Have you ever seen me lose? I've never seen you play. Therefore, I haven't lost. Think about it. Logic. Duh. Oh, my God. Hello. Hi, Petey. Mrs. Penn. Who's that beside you? Raymond Davidson. No, that other looking ginger guy. Carl D'Python Anghelo? That guy. That would be my husband, Dr. Penn. What? He's really great. Give me one thing that he's done. What's he got that I don't have? A medical degree? I'm working on mine right now. It's correspondence, so I'll have it soon. I'm sure you will, PD. He looks like an okay guy. I'm going to talk to him. You got a good woman there. I do, Petey. I'm a very lucky guy. Yeah? A little bit jealous, but does she have a sister? Listen, she does, actually. She's married too, unfortunately, but you're a great guy, Petey. We're happy to have you hang with us anytime you want. Well, I like half of that. Totally understand. All right. Live from Texas, it's Pinside Petey.

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*Exported from Journalist Tool on 2026-06-06 | Item ID: cf8a2978-e97b-4011-921d-311107d81ff0*