# Connecting a MILLER LITE CANTROLLER to a NEW Jurassic Park Pinball Machine!

**Source:** Dead Flip  
**Type:** video  
**Published:** 2019-09-11  
**Duration:** 6m 23s  
**Beat:** Pinball

**URL:** https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bfqQCoPhdYY

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## Analysis

Dead Flip demonstrates connecting a limited-edition Miller Lite Bluetooth beer can controller (200 units made) to a Jurassic Park pinball machine using Twitch Plays Pinball technology. Dan Jerry Thompson explains the Raspberry Pi-based relay system that translates Bluetooth signals into pinball machine switch closures via alligator clips on leaf switches, enabling remote control of the machine through the novelty controller.

### Key Claims

- [MEDIUM] Miller Lite produced only 200 of these beer can controllers with lithium ion battery, haptic feedback, and Bluetooth — _Host states 'they only made 200 of these' at beginning of video regarding Miller Lite can controller_
- [HIGH] The Twitch Plays Pinball system was originally implemented on a Stern machine, then iterated to a T2 — _Dan Jerry Thompson confirms 'we started it on a Stern I believe and then it went to a T2' with acknowledgment of community damage to coils_
- [HIGH] The control system uses a Raspberry Pi connected to a relay board with alligator clips attached to leaf switches on the pinball machine — _Dan Jerry Thompson explains: 'the brain of the operation definitely is the Raspberry Pi' and 'connecting wires going to the buttons on the pinball machine' via relay switches; host confirms 'alligator clips on the leaf switches'_
- [HIGH] The system is non-invasive and works by clamping onto existing pinball machine circuits without permanent modification — _Dan states 'not invasive we're just kind of connecting to something that already exists' and can 'clamp this onto anything really'_

### Notable Quotes

> "They only made 200 of these Miller Lite can controllers"
> — **Dead Flip host**, 00:00-00:10
> _Establishes rarity and collectibility of the promotional controller_

> "Beer and pinball, right? They go hand in hand. You go to a bar, there's going to be a pinball machine there. You're going to drink."
> — **Dead Flip host**, 02:20-02:35
> _Frames the cultural pairing of beer and pinball in arcade venues_

> "The brain of the operation definitely is the Raspberry Pi. We have that connected to the internet and basically we're sending signals through the internet to the Raspberry Pi to activate the relay"
> — **Dan Jerry Thompson**, 06:45-07:10
> _Technical explanation of how Twitch Plays Pinball system functions_

> "We could even hook this up to like a bumper and let you guys fire it off if you wanted to, or if there's a certain shot that I suck at hitting, we could put a cheat button on the freaking controller"
> — **Dan Jerry Thompson**, 07:45-08:05
> _Demonstrates flexibility and creative potential of the control system beyond standard play_

> "Miller Lite, this stuff ain't just for video games dog. Pinball machines, this is the real game."
> — **Dead Flip host**, 10:15-10:30
> _Promotional messaging positioning pinball as the primary use case for the novelty controller_

### Entities

| Name | Type | Context |
|------|------|---------|
| Miller Lite | company | Beverage brand that produced limited-edition beer can Bluetooth controller (200 units) with haptic feedback and gaming capabilities |
| Dead Flip | organization | YouTube/content creator channel featuring the demonstration; hosts Twitch Plays Pinball streaming events |
| Dan Jerry Thompson | person | Engineer/programmer who developed Twitch Plays Pinball technology using Raspberry Pi and relay systems; implemented Bluetooth integration for beer can controller |
| Jurassic Park | game | Pinball machine used in the demonstration to test beer can controller integration |
| Twitch Plays Pinball | product | Interactive streaming technology allowing internet chat to control pinball machines via Raspberry Pi relay system; previously implemented on Stern and T2 machines |
| Raspberry Pi | product | Single-board computer serving as the central control processor for Twitch Plays Pinball system, connected to relay boards and internet |
| Stern | company | Pinball manufacturer; first platform used for original Twitch Plays Pinball implementation |

### Topics

- **Primary:** Novelty gaming hardware integration, Interactive streaming and community control mechanics, Pinball machine electronics and switch architecture
- **Secondary:** Bluetooth controller connectivity, Raspberry Pi-based control systems, Promotional partnerships and branded merchandise
- **Mentioned:** Bar/arcade venue culture around pinball and beverages

### Sentiment

**Positive** (0.85) — Host expresses genuine enthusiasm and gratitude throughout ('awesome', 'super stoked', 'incredible'); Dan Jerry Thompson is heavily praised; successful technical demonstration with functional gameplay. Lighthearted tone with self-deprecating humor about host's lack of technical knowledge.

### Signals

- **[community_signal]** Twitch Plays Pinball continues to be an active format for Dead Flip channel, with announcements of upcoming live stream broadcasts and iteration on previous implementations (confidence: high) — Host states 'We Are Pinball going to live stream here in a couple of hours' and references 'couple of iterations' of Twitch Plays Pinball across different machines
- **[technology_signal]** Novel integration of commercial promotional hardware (beer can controller) with existing pinball streaming infrastructure, demonstrating cross-industry creative potential and proof-of-concept for alternative control methods (confidence: high) — Successful Bluetooth integration of Miller Lite controller to Jurassic Park pinball machine via Raspberry Pi relay system

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## Transcript

Alright, so the awesome folks at Miller Lite sent me one of these very rare, I believe they only made 200 of these, Miller Lite can trollers. Now this is a full can of beer with a lithium ion battery, haptic feedback controller, and Bluetooth enabled so you can play video games on it, or with it if you will. It's awesome that they sent this to me, you know, it comes in a fun little package here. And we'll just put this down. This is, for all intents and purposes, just a can of beer. On the bottom though, you will see that there is a lithium ion battery, the place to charge your beer, and the on and off switch to activate the controller itself. It is a full D-pad, four buttons, there's A, B, X, Y, start and select, and it's all haptic which means you can feel the buttons being pressed. You can almost, you can hear it a little bit. This thing's pretty dope cool, but we don't play video games, so we're going to show you how to make this control one of these. Here we go. So beer and pinball, right? They go hand in hand. You go to a bar, there's going to be a pinball machine there. You're going to drink. You play one-handed if you're good enough. I'm not. But Miller Lite was awesome enough to reach out to us and when they gave us this can controller we were super stoked on this. The unfortunate thing is we don't play a lot of video games on this channel but we can't let something this rad go to waste so um you might remember a few years ago we created a technology that allowed the chat to play with our pinball machines live by saying like left and right in the in the chat there um and i thought to myself i was like i bet we could utilize this since this is a simple Bluetooth controller, to control that module that we built. And the gentleman, Dan Thompson, a good friend of mine, he was the person that put that technology together for us. I'm just the idiot with the ideas. And he said, like, yes, definitely. It's easy. We can read the Bluetooth signal coming from this thing, have it control that module. It's good to go. If you haven't seen this, by the way, look how cool this thing is. Yeah. Pretty dope sick. and there's beer in this by the way we can just crack this open and start going to town um but he's on his way over here right now to hook this up he has no doubt in his mind that we can make this can of beer video game controller control our new Jurassic Park pinball machine so when he gets here we'll have him sort of explain in layman's terms exactly what's going on and we need to try to remember not to drink this. Okay, here we go. So, ladies and gentlemen, I'd like to introduce Dan Thompson. This is the brains behind the Twitch Plays Pinball stuff that we did a while back. We've had a couple of iterations on that. We started it on a Stars I believe and then it went to a T2. We let you monsters just almost burn the coils out on that game messing with it. I so old for that one. Yeah. But Dan is going to explain to us a little bit about what he did in sort of like a layman's terms really quick. We don't want him to like go too deep into what's going on. But we have our original module here that this was our Twitch Plays Pinball. I believe this is a Raspberry Pi hooked to like a switch relay board. A relay board. See, this is how much I know about this stuff. So using the can controller, which is right here, this was a simple Bluetooth controller, thankfully. So it made working with this pretty dope easy. But if you could go into a little bit more detail on like what we did to the game and like how we got this working, that'd be awesome. Yeah, sure. So the brain to the operation definitely is the Raspberry Pi. We have that connected to the internet and basically we're sending signals through the internet to the Raspberry Pi to activate the relay which is really just mechanical switches that we then have from the from the ports from the relay connecting wires going to the the buttons on the pinball machine so you can imagine pressing the start button on the internet is going to send a signal and close the switch on the relay to press the start button on the pinball machine. Yeah, so he's actually just using alligator clips on the leaf switches themselves, which are like a series of like really thin pieces of metal that when they connect that when you opening and closing a circuit we simply using alligator clips to sort of simulate that yeah i mean they the cool thing about this is it really um not invasive we're just kind of connecting to something that already exists yeah we can literally clamp this onto anything really anything that is you know if we're talking only pinball machines nothing's off limits if if that's we could even hook this up to like a bumper jet bumper or pop bumper on playfield and let you guys fire it off if you wanted to, or if there's a certain switch or a shot that I suck at hitting. We could put a cheat button on the freaking controller and give myself like a jack. We're going to go do some stuff. Yeah, man. Yeah, this, it's incredible. And it's working. We got the... I've got an 18-minute window. I don't know if you heard that, but check this out. I'm going to hit B on this. I just started a game. Listen. Launch the ball. It freaking... Dear God, bro. Thank you. Internet Dan Thompson. I don't know what he does for a living. It doesn't matter. He's amazing. What do you do, my man? Stuff. Stuff. With computers and programming and beer controllers. It's awesome. Well, Dan, thank you so much for helping us set this up. If you're watching this, We Are Pinball going to live stream here in a couple of hours. I'm sure you can go watch our broadcast later. but uh yeah miller this stuff ain't just for video games dog pinball machines this is the real game yeah exactly thank you it's the real game holler at us all right see you guys

_(Acquisition: youtube_groq_whisper, Enrichment: v3)_

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*Exported from Journalist Tool on 2026-04-13 | Item ID: efe83d9d-fbbf-458c-86fc-bf9412e3242b*