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Episode 56 - Taylor Talks Pinball

Eclectic Gamers Podcast·podcast_episode·2h 18m·analyzed·Feb 26, 2018
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claude-haiku-4-5-20251001 · $0.035

TL;DR

Taylor Reese discusses collection expertise, Deep Root's enigmatic plans, and pinball industry dynamics.

Summary

Taylor Reese, owner of Reese Rails and co-host of Flippin' Out Pinball podcast, discusses his pinball collection (11 machines including rare EMs), Deep Root Pinball mysterious manufacturing plans, designer acquisitions (Nordman, Norris, Osler), and community tournament results. The hosts debate pinball exposure via Supreme's branded machine, EM collecting trends, and potential future tournament formats.

Key Claims

  • Deep Root Pinball plans to announce multiple titles at once at a future marketing event

    medium confidence · Dennis notes: 'they are going to launch multiple titles, announce multiple titles at once, as near as I can tell'

  • Dennis Nordman's last design work was Wonelli, and he has designed Elvira 3 which is not yet out

    medium confidence · Taylor asks 'what's the last game that Dennis has done? Like, what's the last game that would be a Dennis Nordman game?' Dennis responds 'Wonelli, I guess' and mentions Elvira 3

  • Deep Root contacted Scott Denisey to try to secure him as a designer after Total Nuclear Annihilation's release

    medium confidence · Dennis states: 'Robert noted that he had approached Scott Denisey and tried to secure him, which makes a lot of sense'

  • Supreme's pinball machine promotional video garnered over one million views within a day

    high confidence · Dennis states: 'the noteworthy thing was the promotional video that Supreme put out had within a day over a million views'

  • Eclectic Gamers podcast conducted a recent interview with someone from Deep Root Pinball that received positive community feedback

    high confidence · Dennis: 'we had a lot of people that I'd never heard from before that reached out, and it was actually everyone who reached out was very positive'

Notable Quotes

  • “I don't collect games, I have games.”

    Steve Bowen (referenced by Dennis) @ early in episode — Frames the distinction between serious collecting (with intentional strategy) versus casual ownership

  • “once you see what we're doing, you're going to wonder why nobody else did this”

    Robert Mueller (Deep Root Pinball, from interview) @ middle of episode — Deep Root teasing mysterious manufacturing or design innovation without revealing details

  • “I hope they give him a chance to do a full design. I love Whitewater. I own one for a while.”

    Taylor Reese @ mid-episode — Expresses hope for Dennis Nordman to lead a full design at Deep Root, citing his legacy

  • “If you play this podcast backwards, it might say Nick is moving to Virginia.”

    Dennis @ near end of episode — Humorous hint about Nick's undisclosed relocation destination, referencing George Washington subliminal messaging

  • “They were looking at a Supreme video that happened to involve a pinball machine. And there is a difference because those are people who might never touch a pinball machine without it saying Supreme on it.”

    Tony @ final segment — Distinguishes between pinball exposure and Supreme brand exposure; questions if crossover appeal matters

Entities

Taylor ReesepersonDennis NordmanpersonJohn PapadukepersonRobert MuellerpersonScott DeniseypersonBarry OuslerpersonSteve BowenpersonTonyperson

Signals

  • ?

    community_signal: Eclectic Gamers received substantial positive community feedback following controversial Deep Root Pinball interview, validating research-driven approach to contentious topics

    high · Dennis: 'we had a lot of people that I'd never heard from before that reached out, and it was actually everyone who reached out was very positive'

  • ?

    event_signal: Eclectic Gamers conducting 'worst pinball game' tournament bracket series with community approval (destroy-everything format winning over positive-only in early poll)

    high · Tony: 'destroy everything was in double digits' vs 'keep it positive had five votes' on Facebook poll

  • ~

    sentiment_shift: Mixed reception to Supreme pinball crossover: debate whether 1M+ video views benefit pinball or merely expose Supreme brand audience with no conversion likelihood

    high · Tony frames tension: 'Does the exposure, no matter how you get it, is that worth it?' vs Dennis skepticism: 'They weren't looking at a pinball machine video. They were looking at a Supreme video'

  • ?

    design_philosophy: Deep Root pursuing undisclosed manufacturing or design innovation that Robert Mueller claims will make others wonder 'why nobody else did this'

    medium · Dennis summarizes Mueller's teaser: 'once you see what we're doing, you're going to wonder why nobody else did this'

  • ?

    licensing_signal: Spider-Man Home Edition layout licensed by Supreme for limited-run branded pinball machine

    high · Dennis: 'There is a brand... and they're getting a pinball machine. It's the layout from the Spider-Man Home Edition. I believe it's a very, very, very limited run.'

Transcript

groq_whisper · $0.414

0:00
Welcome to the Eclectic Gamers Podcast. Today is Sunday, February 25th. This is episode 56. I'm Tony. And I'm Dennis. And we're joined once again by a super special guest. He is the owner and operator of Reese Rails, which if you don't know what that is, I have a link in the show notes to the Pinside business page for it. He's also one of the hosts of this flippin' podcast, which covers all sorts of aspects of the pinball hobby. Again, if you aren't listening to it, you should be, and there's a link to the podcast within our show notes. Beyond this, he has an expertise and collecting side of the hobby, the hobby of pinball. he is a master builder and a trained artist also a sublime vocal impersonator with ranges from Elmo to Papa Duke so I want to say Taylor Reese welcome to the Eclectic Gamers podcast thank you guys so much I'm honored to be on your podcast that's awesome thank you for the intro as well I don't know what to say I could do an Elmo sure sure I because I cannot I used to try and do a lot of impersonations, but I have trouble with those. I can do high, but not quite like that. The thing about Elmo is that Elmo can hurt me. I found early on that if my throat is really dry, because I would do it for my kids, and I would just be in pain afterwards. Alright, let's see. Hello, boys and girls. This is Elmo. How are you doing today? Hey, baby.
1:46
Hi there, Elmo. You know, it's great for you to be on the show. I'm so excited to be on your show today. It's really exciting. I got you high right there. A little bit, but overall, that's really good. Yeah, that was solid. Okay, how about this one? Hey, guys, you know who this is? This is John John Papadu. I'm so excited to be here. That was a little too nasally, but those are my two go-tos. My kids enjoy it. Actually, my daughter, Ella, Pentech Ella, who's been on my podcast before, she, this morning, asked me to do the J-pop out of nowhere. She's like, Dad, can you do the J-pop, Dad? I was like, hey, Ella, this is John, John Papaduke. I'm going to reinvent the pinball. I'm going to make it square. And she started doing the Papaduke herself. So I don't know if I feel bad about that. I'm waiting for some, like, system disease to come from John, but nothing has come. I don't know that he wants to get in the legal system any more than he is right now. Yeah, that might be too much of a dance.
Dennisperson
Nickperson
Reese Railsproduct
Deep Root Pinballcompany
Flippin' Out Pinballproduct
Eclectic Gamers Podcastproduct
Supremecompany
Game Showgame
Big Buck Hunter Progame
Medieval Madnessgame
Campus Queengame
Cosmosgame
Pinside Top 100product
Whitewatergame
Tulsa auctionevent
  • $

    market_signal: Supreme's pinball machine promotional video achieved over 1M views within 24 hours, but views were driven by Supreme brand audience rather than pinball enthusiasts

    high · Dennis: 'the promotional video that Supreme put out had within a day over a million views' but Tony clarifies: 'They were looking at a Supreme video that happened to involve a pinball machine'

  • ?

    personnel_signal: Deep Root acquiring controversial designers (J-Pop/Papa Duke, Barry Ousler with 'shady past') while also securing respected legacy designer (Dennis Nordman) to offset reputation concerns

    medium · Taylor: 'J-Pop is obviously tainted because of his history and Barry Orsler has also had kind of a shady past' but Dennis notes Nordman acquisition 'is going to reassure people'

  • ?

    personnel_signal: Dennis Nordman joining Deep Root Pinball as designer alongside J-Pop, John Norris, and Barry Ousler

    high · Taylor states: 'So now he's down at Deep Root. So I hope they give him a chance to do a full design.' Nordman confirmed as part of Deep Root designer roster.

  • ?

    announcement: Deep Root Pinball planning simultaneous multi-title announcement at future marketing event

    medium · Dennis: 'they are going to launch multiple titles, announce multiple titles at once, as near as I can tell'

  • ?

    product_strategy: Dennis Nordman has committed Elvira 3 design at Deep Root (not yet released)

    medium · Taylor: 'he has the Elvira, Elvira 3, that I guess he designed that he's, it's not out yet, but he's committed to it'

  • ?

    rumor_hype: Nick (EM expert) relocating to undisclosed state; podcast hosts speculating Virginia, Washington, or California based on context clues

    low · Dennis accidentally revealed relocation fact, speculating states. Taylor hints: 'If you play this podcast backwards, it might say Nick is moving to Virginia' (George Washington reference)

  • ?

    technology_signal: Theory that Deep Root may employ flat-box/IKEA-style cabinet assembly (unconfirmed speculation)

    low · Dennis references friend Dan Farrell's theory: 'it'll be kind of like a flat box situation... you would get the cabinet kind of Ikea style and you would build it'

    • 2:54
    But thank you guys for having me on. I mean, if anybody's listened to my podcast, they know that I just like to ramble on about pinball. So it's kind of what I do. So somehow I lucked into that situation where I'm able to be at home during the day, and I make rails for people all over the world. And so that's awesome. Yeah, and we are going to let you ramble on through a whole lot of pinball topics today. Awesome. You know, we are mixed gaming, but we skew very heavily towards pinball and extra so for this episode because we knew you would be on. Awesome. I didn't know if, I guess just as part of the intro, you already talked a little bit about your construction of rails and such. I was wondering, I mainly, I asked for you to come on because you're a pinball collector, like what I consider a real one. I'm what you would call a fake one. Well, so, yeah, I think that's interesting because you call me an expert at collecting. Yeah. I don't, I am. You're pro, pro mode. I'm pro mode? Yeah. So what does that mean exactly? Because that's a little intimidating to be called an expert at anything. well I think that you go in with a mindset about alright this is you know like modifications here are the games here is I've started small build my way up I know which games have value which ones don't that's sort of how I view it whereas for me for example like I know you've worked your way up to having some of those what I consider A-list sort of titles and that would be a counter post to someone like me who my mix is, well, like the subject of the podcast is, it's very eclectic, but it's not top tier.
    4:37
    So I just sort of, what resonated with me is when we had Steve on, he at one point said, I don't collect games, I have games. And I'm kind of in between those two sort of realms. I have some games, I've gone at it with sort of a collection in mind of terms of what I want to see in my game room, but I don't pursue A-list titles or anything like that. I don't, I'm kind of outside of that world. I know about them. I envy them in some ways and care a little bit less about them in others. So that's just sort of what I meant by it. Well, I would say that I'm not an expert. Okay.
    5:13
    Well, you're more of an expert than I am. And so you get to have the title of expert on this episode. Awesome. Do you guys want to dive into that now or do you want to hit your list? Well, I was going to go ahead and say, if you want to just sort of mention at this point what games you do currently have in your collection, and then I'll wrap up my intro, and Tony will do his intro, and then we'll go in our list. All right, awesome. Okay, so right now, I recorded my game room, so I'm looking at my games, which makes it easy. I have 10 games currently. Actually, I have 11 games currently. One is not functioning, and it's on the chopping block. So games that are set up, I have a Meteor. Stars, Super Soccer, Electromechanical. I also have a World Cup Soccer, which is an electromechanical game. So it's not a pinball machine, but it's a game. 1968, I believe. Valley World Cup. I have a Game of Thrones, which is on a temporary trade for my Ghostbusters. Pro or premium, Ellie? It's a pro. Both of them are pros. So I own a Ghostbusters Pro, and I have a Game of Thrones Pro on trade.
    6:22
    I have a Wizard of Oz standard. I have a Medieval Madness MMR. Sorry. It's a Medieval Madness. I don't call it a remake. I call it a Medieval Madness. But I have a Medieval Madness remake. I have an Attack from Mars original. I have an Indy 500. I have a Doctor Who that I did a full restoration on. And I have a Willard Games. in the back I have a out of sight which is a two player EM that I picked up that was a freebie that's the one that's on the top and block just because I don't have room in my game room and I would rather pass it on to somebody who could get it working and play it alright makes sense thanks alright Tony any intro stuff before we move on I've been actually playing a lot of games I'm not really going to talk about most of them this week because I need to get more into it. But it's been a really good week we've had.
    7:24
    Monday, of course, was President's Day, so the kids weren't in school and I didn't have to work. And then on Tuesday there was an ice storm, so the kids weren't in school and my wife had to call into work. And then on Wednesday there was an ice storm, so I had to call into work because the kids weren't in school. And then on Thursday it was, I don't know, they felt like they didn't need to go to school because it was still kind of cold, so they canceled school again. So we had to get my parents to watch the kids. And then on Friday they decided, you know what, let's go ahead and let them go to school one day. So this week's been just insane.
    7:55
    Yeah, I did actually drive into Topeka, which for Taylor, that's about an hour west of where I live, for work on the first ice storm day. I actually left early enough that I missed the ice until I was almost to Topeka, and then it was down to 20 miles an hour because people were sliding off the road. But, yeah, it was this whole week. It's been interesting. We've had fairly mild weather up until this point, but, oh, well, it is February.
    8:29
    I have not, actually, I have not been playing a lot of games, so I don't have a lot of those to talk about at all again this week. I guess the only thing I'd note in the intro would be just to say thank you to all of the people who posted and wrote in regarding our last episode, which was the one where we ran the Deep Root Pinball interview. Oh, yeah. Oh, yeah, baby. Yeah, we had a lot of people that I'd never heard from before that reached out, and it was actually everyone who reached out was very positive, at least towards how the interview went. So I really appreciate that. You know, I was a little nervous to do it, not to do the interview part. I always prepare for interviews, so that's nothing. But in terms of taking what was known to be a controversial subject, we're a small podcast. We lay low. We like to do our research-driven topics and deep dives and stuff. We don't mind confronting controversial things. We just don't normally have something that has that many eyes on it. Yeah. But the response was really, really good, so I'm glad. As longtime listeners know, Tony and I aren't really huge fans of doing interviews. We like to do this where we have a, you know, we call it a guest host episode because we want all this input on topics. You know, we're bringing in things. I'm not trying to learn every little tidbit about the person who's on. I'm trying to get their opinion in on the show. So, but it was good. I think it went, well, the feedback was good, so I guess it was good. So, anyway, we appreciate the responses. You know, we'll always keep in mind doing things like that as time marches forward. But that's all I had to say. Let me just say something. I thought your questions were very on point. I enjoyed it immensely. I really think that you did a great job. Your research was commendable. And, yeah, the questions were great. I don't interview well. Like, when I interview people, it's just a big mess. I don't prepare. And so listening to a person like yourself doing that interview, I was like, I am glad you guys did it. We reached out to Deep Root a long time ago to see if somebody would come on. No response.
    10:40
    Oh. Yeah. Well, in terms of some, I'll give you a little bit of backstory on that. We were in the same boat. When they first came out on the scene, before they had done their first interview with This Week in Pinball, like the first week where their website was live and everyone was like, oh, John Papaduke is working with Deep Root. We sent him an email. I knew other podcasts had as well. I did get a reply back. It was very polite, but it was, we're not doing interviews. We're not coming on to any podcasts. And I was like, okay. So that was that. On this round, they actually came to us and wanted to talk about doing something. Yeah, you had mentioned that on your podcast. I can't remember. I can't remember anymore. Yeah, you mentioned that.
    11:19
    So, yeah. So I was a little surprised because it all depends on what you want. I mean, if you're wanting a larger audience, there are much bigger podcasts than what Tony and I are doing in terms of outreach. So, you know, in the world of podcasts, they're all free. So it's sort of like, you know, as soon as the word gets out, you go and listen to whoever has got the latest bit of info you want to hear. So because I subscribe to a number of podcasts, but I it's all balanced for me in terms of my commute. So I can't listen to them all. So there are some good ones I probably haven't honestly even tried.
    11:54
    And it's just it's all about balance in terms of what I can I can squeeze in. But if I hear someone's got something good, I'll go out and I'll listen to it, even if it's just a one-off sort of thing. But that's pretty much how I do pinball podcasts, and even a lot of podcasts anymore. I hit the highlights here and there, and the only ones I listen to real consistently are the slower-paced ones that aren't pinball related. Yeah. Did you guys get any blowback as far as questions you did not ask? No. Oh, nice. one thing that I'm interested in about Deep Root which I don't know I find their selection of designers very interesting and knowing that there's new blood in the water at JJP and at Stern I kind of would like to see some of that I think that J-Pop is obviously tainted because of his history and Barry Orsler has also had kind of a shady past with some stuff. So I don't know. It was interesting. The team they built loved certain ones, and other ones I'm like, yeah, that's weird.
    13:06
    I don't know. Yeah, and as I believe Robert noted in the interview, that new blood angle was the way they were going. I mean, I know he didn't name any names in our interview, but I know in one of the This Week in Pinball interviews, He noted that he had approached Scott Denisey and tried to secure him, which makes a lot of sense. I mean, given the feedback on Total Nuclear Annihilation, if you're wanting a young upstart who's already sort of proven themselves with one title, but still it's proof, that one makes a lot of sense. Did he approach Scott before Total Nuclear Annihilation was out, or was it prior to it? I assume it was after it was out, but I don't know. I'm not familiar with the timeline, so I'm speaking from a position of ignorance on that.
    13:54
    But, yeah, and as he did note in the interview with us, back when it was just J-Pop was the only name known, he didn't have any other names yet. So I wonder if some of these other acquisitions were a response to, okay, well, Papa Duke's very controversial, but, you know, I bring in Nordman, and that's going to reassure people. because people really respect him, and he's also a very seen-as-high-level designer where he's got a lot of that top 20 pin-side list is under his name, or at least some. You know, people still go gaga over Whitewater. He's kind of putting together a blade of designers to dig. Oh, yeah, we've got him, but, you know, we've got these guys, too, here. No, here, throw this in the way, too. No, look who we got. I think Nordman's a good choice. I mean, what's the last game that Dennis has done? Like, what's the last game that would be a Dennis Norbin game?
    14:50
    Wonelli, I guess. Wonelli? So you have Wonelli, and then he has the Elvira, Elvira 3, that I guess he designed that he's, it's not out yet, but he's committed to it, I guess.
    15:05
    But it's interesting. I think Dennis is an interesting player in the business because he kind of seems like a hitman. You know, it's like he worked on Wizard of Oz to a certain degree. He worked on, did he work on Alien? Yep. He worked on Alien initially.
    15:24
    So, yeah, it's interesting that he kind of is bouncing around. He worked with Skern, obviously, with Elvira. So now he's down at Deep Root. So I hope they give him a chance to do a full design. I love Whitewater. I own one for a while. I think that his games just have great humor, a lot of fun. He really uses the play field. The flow of his ramps are nice. He's a, yeah, I would love to see, like, a real Dennis Nordman title come out. I'm rooting for Dennis to get a chance to do something.
    15:55
    Yep. Well, we'll probably have to wait until that marketing event before we really learn much else in terms of what they're planning to do. It sounded like they are going to launch multiple titles, announce multiple titles at once, as near as I can tell. So what do you guys think is the quad manufacturing? I have no idea. I think that they got an alien device that just makes the machines in one thing. That's what they did. The aliens came down and visited them. A theory I've heard from a friend of mine, and this is just whatever, is that it'll be kind of like a flat box situation. Does that make any sense? Like you would get the cabinet kind of Ikea style and you would build it. Oh. I give credit to my friend Dan Farrell for coming up with that idea. But, yeah, he was just like, you know, do it. One of the things that was really interesting about the interview was that he kept talking about, like, once you see what we're doing, you're going to wonder why nobody else did this. And J-Pop, you know, when they started talking about back with Ben Heck, they were talking about coming to your house and building your game and stuff like that. Well, that would say to me, like, they're not going to come and, like, do a playfield build, but they're going to send you the playfield. They're going to send you a cabinet. You're going to build it. You know what I'm saying? Like, designers are there, but it's not like they're going to come in and solder the coils on. So what are they doing? So that seems like an idea that J-Pop has had.
    17:19
    And if you could do that with a cabinet, send a flat box. I mean, think of the money you would save in shipping, production. I don't know. It's an interesting theory, and I don't know what the quad means. Right. Well, that's probably better than my theory, which was, let's see. We have the announcements of, we have Papa Duke is a designer, Nordman is a designer, John Norris is a designer, and Barry Osler is a designer. That's four designers. They're the build team.
    17:48
    Yeah. Get out your screwdrivers, boys. It's quantum assembly. All four of you are helping me put this machine together. I remember when Jersey Jack first released pictures of their line, their assembly line, and it was always like the same one person, but he was like at different stages of the assembly line. I was just like, I don't know that this is going to work. That would be mono assembly. What is that? Not quad, mono.
    18:13
    Home brew assembly, yeah. Home brew, yeah. Boutique. Yeah, boutique. Oh, yeah, boutique. Don't ask me what the exact definition of boutique is. I don't think anyone knows. I don't know. Even the boutique. That's just when you're not home brewing anymore, you're boutique. Yeah, yeah. Okay, well, let's go ahead and formally transition into the pinball segment then. And the first thing I want to get out of the way before we jump to the more news-oriented items is we've been running a tournament for, well, since 2017, actually, on what is the best shame, quote-unquote, pinball machine. So listeners got to submit in any pinball machine, EM or solid state, that they wanted. and if it was not in the top 100 of Pennside's EM list and not in the top 200 on the solid state list, it was eligible. And we took all of those and we randomized the bracket and we were down to the final two as of the last episode. So we now have the results. But before I give those, I'll let you know, Taylor, that the two games that were fighting it out in the end were the Bally Game Show and Big Buck Hunter Pro. And I think Bally Game Show is a 1990 game from, well, Bally. and Ballard Williams. And then Big Buck Hunter, I think, is 2010 from Stern.
    19:30
    Which is better? Now, is it which is better or which is worse? It's which is better. Which is better? Yeah. Are you asking me? Yeah.
    19:39
    I had an experience with Game Show at Pinnberg a couple years ago that just killed me. This was the first year that Pinnberg was held at the convention center, and they had the cave section of Pinnberg, which was there was a dark area where the games were set up that if you were in there in the later part of the day, you basically could not see the games. I was put on game show, and I had three house balls. It was like plunge the ball. It would go up behind the main features on the game, and it would come straight down the middle.
    20:11
    So my experience with game show is not the most favorable. Big Buck Hunter, on the other hand, I did play that in a tournament that I won. I won the tournament. I don't love the game, but that freaking moving target, that's not my favorite.
    20:31
    So you're saying you love them both? Yeah. I'm saying if I had to give the vote to one of those, I think I would have to go with Game Show. Really? Yeah, I don't know. Despite the Pinberg wronging? Yeah, that still stings a little bit, but I did play it. I played it somewhere else where I actually, oh, I played it. Oh, where did I play it? I played it and it actually had no sound. Maybe it was Pimberg as well. They had an issue that there was no sound on the game, but I actually had a decent game on it, which sounds bizarre. But I think that there's more to do in that. You know, the Big Buck Hunters, the play field is just so stripped down. And that was when Stern was just kind of going through that rough stage of, are we surviving?
    21:24
    So I'll go with Game Show. You can't go wrong with the Bally Williams title. Okay. And Tony, was that, did you vote on this one? I voted for Game Show. Okay. And I've actually played Game Show. Yeah, we have one on location right now.
    21:41
    And I voted for Game Show also. So I didn't, I have not played Big Buck Hunter Pro, actually, but it took out Sharky Shootout, and I'm bitter. Oh. So, anyway, well, we're in luck because the community agrees with us. 61.1% voted for Game Show versus 38.9% for the buck. So the buck stops with the buck.
    22:06
    Now, just as a, we're not announcing a new tournament yet or anything, but we did put up a poll on Facebook because Tony had an idea. Tony, why don't you talk about your idea? All of our polls, including this one, even though this one is a shame poll, have been good polls. What's your favorite this? What's your best this? Who was the best designer?
    22:29
    Stuff like that. I want to run a poll that's literally just what is the worst game between this time period and this time period. And we thought about it, and we talked about it, and we went ahead and put up the poll on the Facebook to see if people were okay with doing a negative-style poll instead of just staying positive and happy.
    22:51
    And I think the poll formally ends tomorrow, but last I looked, the keep it positive had five votes, and the destroy everything was in double digits. So it looks like you get to be as negative as you want. I was wrong. I thought that the people were like, no, guys, keep it nice. Keep it chill. Have you been to Pinside? We are not Pinside. We are a mixed gaming podcast full of love and joy. Let the hate flow. I was going to say Darth Vader. Who said that, let the hate flow? The Emperor. Let the hate flow. No, that's not very good. I'll work on that one and come back. Yeah, let the hate flow, man. That's the competition name right there. Let the hate flow. I like it. Well, so anyway, I'm leaving this one for Tony to set up as he sees fit, picking what time. You know, we looked a little bit at some time ranges, and it comes down to just how many things you want to manage. For example, you go back for ten years, that's a lot of games.
    23:57
    You go back five years, that's still a lot. But you want it to be deep enough. You don't want it to be like, well, what was the worst game of 2017 either? Because that's not any fun. Sorry, Jetsons. Well, why don't you pick, like, do it a bracket, like a, you know, March Madness, so you have four 16-team brackets. You have EM, Solid State, like WPC 90 era, and then Modern, so you would have your starts and stuff like that. Oh, that's interesting. I hadn't thought about that. You know, because then you're going to have a, you'll have representation from each of those areas. And getting, like, games like EMs and stuff like that, I think, are interesting because I have an EM and I enjoy them, but I don't have a ton of experience. So it's always interesting for me to hear why people who know those games like or dislike those games. Yeah. Because I don't know the nuances enough to say, oh, yeah, that game is horrible because it has a gobble hole that does nothing. I'm like, okay, I don't know what, I know what a gobble hole is. But hearing people who consider themselves experts about that era game. It'll be interesting to see what kind of feedback they would have and say, this is why this game is horrible. Yeah, it was. Well, you guys just recently had Nick on. Yes. And we did back last year in November just to talk about EMs because he's an expert on EMs. And I have trouble. There were so many. There were so many of them. I had trouble keeping the names straight because then you got like, oh, well, here's the two-player version. Here's the four-player version. That's the same game sort of stuff. And the design philosophy was very different for a lot of those, like the use of bagatelle features, which is never done anymore. No. So. It's really cool. Like, there's a game for sale, and the guy may have sold it. But on Facebook, on one of the markets, there's like 5,000 markets now where you can buy any pinball thing in the world. But he was selling a game called an Op Pop Pop. Okay. I've heard of it. Yeah. Such a cool-looking game. It's a zipper flipper, and it has a Bagatelle feature up in the very top. And if he wasn't where he was, I would own that game.
    26:12
    Yeah, so it was really pretty. It was like a pop art. It was like an art theme. Pop art. Not pop art, but it was an art theme, which kind of is my background. So, yeah, it was a beautiful game. So, yeah, that's an idea. I'm not trying to take over your tournament. No, no. I actually, I was talking with Nick earlier in the week, because I said, you know, I currently don't own an EM. I've had three, but I don't have any at the moment. And I would like to have a zipper flipper, because I've never had one. But I want a multiplayer, because my problem with some of my EMs is they were single-player games, and it's just not as fun when people are over. So Nick's like, okay, well, here are the top three, in my opinion, zipper flipper games you might want to check, because I like 4 Million BC. That's my favorite one on the multiplayers that I've played. That's a great game. But he's like, you should try Cosmos, Dennis. Look for a Cosmos and see if you like that more because he thinks it's a better game.
    27:11
    Or Gator would be a good one in contention. He said, well, some people, you know, they don't like the zipper flippers as much on Gator. But Tony, for example, might really like Gator because it's the layout of Campus Queen. Which is one of my grails. But, you know, and a slight off topic here, There was one for auction, that big auction in Tulsa, which is only about four hours from here, had a campus queen listed. And I cannot tell you how close I was to loading up my big old blue van and heading down there just in case it went for a decent price. I ended up not doing it, but, man, I thought about it. And it has a total close the loop. Nick went to that auction, and he bought that game. Nice.
    27:57
    And he's going to be offering it to you for sale for like $5,000. Yes, I'm sure it's all part of his plan, Tony. Why are EMs so high? Why are the EM prices so high now? It's because people are going and snatching up other people's grails. Yeah, it's Nick's fault. That's probably what his big announcement is going to be. It's going to be the state that he purchases from all those EMs he's called to the grail seekers. So what state do you guys think he's going to live in? So I think it's down to California, Washington, and Virginia right now. Hmm.
    28:35
    I'd pitch Virginia, personally. I think that would probably be the way I'd lean as well. That or Washington. One of the two.
    28:45
    Washington's really nice. I cannot weigh in on this. You know? Yes. Oh, you do know? Yeah. See, he wouldn't give me the dirt. He wouldn't. I tried to pry it from him after we were done recording. Off the record? Well, we were talking about the Tulsa thing, and he forgot that I didn't know and accidentally told me. Oh. So I cannot tell, you know, I've got to be like George Washington. I cannot tell a lie. I was never going to, you know, I wouldn't normally bring it up at all because I don't like doing that, where it's like, I have information and I can't share it. Now, the fact that you mentioned George Washington, who lived in Virginia. Oh, interesting. Interesting.
    29:30
    You're thinking some subliminal stuff going on. I mean, I don't know. If you play this podcast backwards, it might say Nick is moving to Virginia.
    29:40
    I don't know. I mean, I pitched Virginia on our podcast when he was on. California is just so expensive. It's just the cost of living is so expensive out there. Washington, we were out there this summer. It's beautiful.
    29:56
    Washington is beautiful. I'm not going to lie. I thought the Seattle area was really amazing. My total experience in Washington was a five-hour layover in Sea-Tac Airport. And I've got to tell you, their airport floor is the most comfortable floor to take a nap on that I've ever taken a nap on in an airport. Yeah, I've only used Washington as a stopover for a few trips to Alaska. I have family in Alaska. Nice. So I've never been to California, and I think I have been to Virginia. It was once, and it was in the 90s. Oh, yeah, because I visited Mount Vernon. There you go. To the George.
    30:38
    It was a big D.C. trip thing that we were doing. So, yeah, it'll be interesting, I think, but I can't say anything else. So we're going to move on. We're going to move on. All right. Let's hit the news. Stern, Supreme Pinball. Okay. I think this might have been out in time for the last episode, but I was too busy with Deep Root stuff to look at it. So let's just hit it really quick. There is a brand, I guess, that's clothing. I guess at one point had to do with skaters, and now it has to do with expensive bricks.
    31:17
    And they're getting a pinball machine. It's the layout from the Spider-Man Home Edition. I believe it's a very, very, very limited run. But the noteworthy thing was the promotional video that Supreme put out had within a day over a million views. So I just sort of wondered, you guys, what are your thoughts on that? I mean, my read of our local area when it was sort of coming up for discussion is a lot of people sort of fell one of two ways. Either the theme is really stupid and or that's great for pinball if that many people looked at a pinball machine video. Yeah, but they weren't looking at a pinball machine video. They were looking at a Supreme video that happened to involve a pinball machine. And there is a difference because those are people who might never touch a pinball machine without it saying Supreme on it. Yeah, but does it matter? I mean, I don't know. Does it matter? Does the exposure, no matter how you get it, is that worth it? Well, it depends upon if they go on to play more pinball or buy more pinball machines or if their only interest is specifically in the Supreme Machine.
    32:27
    Yeah. I collect some collectible, they're not toys, but they're sculptures by a couple of artists, specifically one guy named Jason Freeney.
    32:40
    And getting into that whole vinyl, or there's vinyl toys, the whole vinyl toy collector scene. You guys know what I'm talking about? Yeah. Oh, yeah. I've got a whole bunch of them. I've got a rack of them behind my desk right now. Right. So I collect a certain guy, and he will release the same sculpture but in a different color. So there are collectors who will buy every one of his pieces in a different color way. It's a collecting thing.
    33:11
    There's a lot of famous vinyl artists out there. Kaws is one, K-A-W-S. He has all this whole series of figures. so I see the Supreme pinball machine kind of falling in that like hyper collector who collects Supreme stuff coming from that aspect of it the design of the actual game like the colors and stuff like that falls very in line with that whole thing there's Supreme final characters where it's like Kim Jong Un with a Supreme over his eyes so there's this whole like That type of collector aspect of it is where that game is coming from. So putting that into context, I get it. As a pinball person, it doesn't do a lot for me. As a person who collects not only, like, vinyl figures, but I collect original artwork by, like, graphic artists and graffiti people, I totally dig it. I absolutely dig it. Like, that's the kind of thing, like, a collector would put in their living room, and they may not play it, but it's, that's where that, that's what that game is. It not a it not a pinball machine It a it an art piece We got to we got to like as pinball people we just have to put it in the proper context That makes sense In my opinion Yeah, I straddle both. I guess I straddle both areas. I mean, looking at it from a pinball machine perspective, a reskin of a decent home edition game, but no, I don't think anything much of it, other than I have to say I do favor the minimalist color scheme that they went with. but in terms of what it does for pinball, yeah, I think overall I have to, it sort of falls into that any press is good press sort of thing. And if someone sees it or they actually have it at some of the Supreme stores, which sounds like what a lot of people thought the angle would be because there was some talk about it being on 25-cent play at Supreme clothing dealers, maybe someone goes, drops some of that in to get the full Supreme experience, and then maybe another day and another month they're at a bar and they see a pinball machine and go, oh, wait, I remember that. I remember playing something like that at Supreme. I'll go ahead and I'll try this one out. And, you know, maybe you get a few people that end up – I don't think it adds to the collector pool or anything, but maybe on the back end we see some positive impact on the location play side. That's sort of where I'm coming from on it. Well, I know there was one that was shipped, at least one. There's one that was shipped that was posted on Instagram. That's out in San Francisco. San Francisco Pinball, who's on Instagram, I think it's Sean, posted a picture of a Supreme pinball machine.
    36:03
    So they're out there. They're already shipping. I don't know. It would be interesting. Have we heard prices? I have no idea. I thought the price was really expensive. Well, yeah, based upon everything I know of Supreme, this should be the most expensive pinball machine of all time.
    36:19
    I don't know. I'm Googling. You guys talk amongst yourselves. Because I don't know. I know Supreme is, I mean, $200 for a brick or $100 for a T-shirt type place. Yeah, yeah.
    36:31
    That's true, but if it's Spider-Man Home Edition but with a real coin door slapped on it, the BOM is a lot less than a standard pro machine from Stearns. So they're starting the markup, even if the markup's more extreme, it's starting from a cheaper beginning point, if that makes sense. So that might have a – I mean, we have to remember, this is the company that put out a $15,000 Batman. Yes.
    36:58
    All right, I'm looking it up right now. What do you guys think the cost is? Have you already looked it up? No, I have no idea. I saw rumors that people were talking about something like $40,000 or something like that, but I haven't actually looked it up. I'll say $10,000. That would be my guess. I'd say $20,000. $20,000? Yeah. They just clap their name on anything. It's art, man.
    37:22
    Yeah. When are you getting one? When am I getting one? Yeah. My expertise tells me not to get one. As the expert, I would say if you enjoy playing pinball.
    37:38
    You know what I don't like? I don't like the size of the Supreme on the side of the cabinet. Like, I wish that was done differently. Like, it would have been cool if they, like, switched the lettering so that the Supreme was red and then it was on a white background. That's just my own opinion. I'm not playing art director, but I am.
    37:59
    I can't find a price on it. It's a mystery. We'll never know. Okay, all our guesses were for not. Yay. I think it's probably like $20,000. Wow. Well, maybe. In San Francisco, they can afford that because that's like one day's rent. A month's rent? Yeah. It's going to be a little crueler than that. Okay. Well, we'll move on to our next news topic.
    38:22
    And that would be Skit B, the purported attempted maker of the Predator pinball machine. I have legal news. It's been quite a while. We haven't had a legal update that I think we've provided on this show since October. Yeah, it's been a while. It has. But the snows are melting, the family members are coming back from their winter sojourn, and so now we can actually talk about some stuff. So there have been a couple of items, and this is regarding some of the bigger assets that the trustee, I guess I should probably do a quick recap. The trustee's office, which is, think of it, they're the people trying to pay back the creditors, and the main creditors are everyone who put money in on the predator machine. they have been pursuing purchases that Kevin Kulik who was the owner operator of Skid B to claw back what they can to pay the creditors off so there have been a couple of pending items one involved Kevin's mom her name's Kathy and she had an RV a recreational vehicle and they went after that the trustees office did because on Facebook Kathy had indicated she used language which suggested that Kevin had purchased the RV for her. So the thought was, well, it's a big RV. It might be $20,000 worth of money or something. So the trustee went after it. That has been dismissed. The trustee decided to dismiss the claim. Their research indicated that she only paid about $150 for it, and so it's just not worth trying to argue whether or not Kevin bought it or not because it has not got any value to it. So that's that. The second item that has had activity is involving Kevin's wife, and her name is Amanda. Now, as we talked about before, there was a house that she purchased. It's only in her name. However, the trustee's office had found that there was paperwork up until just before they signed where it was both Kevin and her name on the house. So they went after the house on the suspicion that Kevin was trying to shield that asset by putting it in his wife's name. And there was a clear paper trail showing that the Skit Bee Predator bank account had money transfers over into the bank account that bought the house. So they had a settlement agreement where they would let Amanda keep the house because she wanted to keep the house. but she agreed that she would pay $30,000 to the trustee to buy it because it's in a floodplain, so it's not worth anything. Well, it's worth $35,000, so they settled on $30,000. There are also other claims of monies that Amanda has, and those are unsettled. What that means is the trustee and Amanda are still in disagreement about whether or not she should be paying anything back on those. She says none of that stuff has to do with Kevin. This relates to her photography equipment and stuff. that people have suspected Kevin bought for her.
    41:27
    So, update. The updates are that the trustee has not received the money for the house yet. Amanda says she can't get a loan. That was her plan, was she was going to go to the bank and get a loan for that because she bought the house with cash. So there's no mortgage on it. But she can't get a loan to pay the settlement because after they agreed to the settlement, that floodplain, I know, shocker, flooded. And the house got 11 feet of water in it. So the house, from the bank's perspective, is too risky to put a loan out on it. So they're not willing to give her a loan to pay off the settlement. And she also indicated that the area of one of the local governments has been talking about using eminent domain authority and just taking the house away. Because there are only three houses in this part of the floodplain. And, I mean, we don't give legal advice here, but I'm just going to tell you it's really stupid to have a house in a floodplain from a financial perspective. and so governments don't like to have to save people. I mean, they had to rescue them with boats and stuff when it flooded because they were trapped. So, you know, they don't want houses to be in the floodplain anymore. So she might not be able to keep the house anyway if the government uses eminent domain. Though I believe she would get compensated in that instance under at least market value, so she'd probably get something like $35,000 from the government for the use of that power. But this is not the eminent domain podcast, so I won't go into that anymore. The only other thing I thought I should point out is that she also indicated that she has filed for divorce from Kevin, and that is supposed to take effect in mid-June. So what the court has done is, because the trustee's office hasn't gotten the money yet, and she has her excuses, but they're getting frustrated, they've scheduled pretrial work to start happening on April 19th, and tentatively they'll go to trial over at least the stuff that they haven't settled on June 1st, depending on what comes out of that April 19th meeting. All right. I know that was a lot of me talking, so it's been a while since we talked about Predator, though, so I guess Taylor or Tony, what are your thoughts on Predator and trustees? I don't know. I just don't know anymore. Where do you start, man? Wherever you want to start. first of all, so she pays for it in cash, $35,000, red flags all over the place.
    43:50
    What in the world were they thinking, first of all, buying it? And second of all, if somebody said, okay, you owe us money, give us the house, that's not worth anything because it's in a floodplain, why would you want to keep it? That doesn't make any sense to me. Well, and this gets back to past court hearings that I've listened to with her. and so I guess I'll tackle them in reverse order. In terms of why does she want to keep the house, it's because it's a home. It's their home. It's the home with her and the kids, and it's like an emotional thing. So that's why she wants to keep it.
    44:28
    So moving past that, the whole issue with the red flags and the cash on the purchase of house, her claim, she's agreed to the settlement, but she says that the trustee's office is wrong, that Kevin did not use prayer money to buy the house. She used money that her grandmother left her to buy the house. Okay, well, let's just go ahead and figure that out. Well, the problem is, the problem is in, I believe, written depositions, what they indicate is when the grandma, I think when she died and she left the money, they took the money and they stuck the money with cash deposits, which they don't have accurate records of, or they don't have source records of, with the bank, with the Predator account, because they needed to shield that money. They needed to hide that money away so that they would not lose their welfare benefits.
    45:18
    Oh, Jesus. So it was in order to commit fraud on the benefit system that they had to mask where that money was. So it got commingled with the Predator money, and because Kevin kept such, as she would say, They kept such shoddy records. She can't go back and prove what money was predator money and what money was grandma money. But they can figure out if the grandmother gave them the money to buy this house. There should be a record of the estate.
    45:53
    If it was done through an estate process and it wasn't just her giving them cash, and I'm wrong about that. I haven't read or heard about a death. I've made this assumption given the sum, but regardless, no documents have been produced. No paper trail. No paper trail whatsoever. Exactly. And Amanda has less to admit. She goes, this is my grandma's money. I understand. It looks really bad. This is all Kevin's fault. I'll agree to a settlement because there's no way I can prove that Kevin didn't buy it. She acknowledges she can't prove that it's her money. But she's admitting fraud. either she or Kevin did in a deposition yes they admitted fraud and the outcome of that was what were there charges from that nothing has moved forward on that yet wow the thought will be because that admission was made under the bankruptcy claim when they were doing the this is still all in bankruptcy so it's not a civil it's not a civil case in a in a traditional sense it's not a it's not a criminal case at all what happened was Kevin filed for bankruptcy after all of these predator buyers, filed a civil suit against him to get their money back.
    47:06
    He, then when the trustee's office, which was supposed to be processing the bankruptcy, was looking, they're like, this looks really suspicious. Where did all this money go? They got Kevin to voluntarily withdraw his application for bankruptcy because what the trustee was threatening was, this looks so bad, we probably could bring criminal charges on you for attempting a bankruptcy fraud. Or you can go forward and insist that you deserve bankruptcy protection. So he is no longer going for bankruptcy protection. And because of that, the trustee has the opportunity to say, oh, okay, well then that means it's time to get as much money as we can to pay all the creditors because that's not been forgiven under bankruptcy. But it's still operating under the bankruptcy rubric. So how much money is there? How much money is in the Kulik family fund that they can actually pull from? there's nothing on paper they are broke they have nothing Amanda said that the judge asked her how much is the child support supposed to be because she says Kevin's working and she said that it's $27 a month oh my god that is so sad I mean right when it comes down to it it's like look people who and this is kind of I almost cussed, so I apologize. This is a... It's a sad story that people invested in this company, even though they were obviously building games out of their basement. People put faith in these guys. I'm not sure how. I played the game, and I was blown away by how poorly it played. I was surprised how people had really latched onto it.
    48:55
    But at this point, if they have nothing, they should just drop it. Because now you just have to think about, and I mean, this is, I'm a dad. And I, you know, I mean, obviously the Kuliks have done some really horrible things.
    49:11
    But they have kids that are now, I mean, God, they're mired in this. And this is going to carry, they're going to carry this with them the rest of their lives. That their parents have basically, their lives are ruined because their parents made some horrible decisions. that's sad, man.
    49:29
    That's just sad. They should let it go. There's nothing. What do you want? You want a house on a floodplain? You want a $150 trailer? They have nothing. Why drag it to the courts? I think part of that, in terms of the valuations, is why the trustee, for example, has abandoned trying to do anything with the trailer. They're just letting it go. They're not going to go for that. They don't want the house because they can't sell it. That's why they did the settlement for the money. The problem I think that Amanda has is she signed the settlement already. So she's legally agreed to give $30,000 over. So now from the trustee's perspective, it's just time to shut up and pay us our money. But the trustees, don't they have a responsibility to know what they can actually get? Yeah, you're asking somebody. I mean, if you ask me, hey, here, you owe us $100,000. Give us $100,000. Sign this paper. Well, I don't have $100,000. So me signing a piece of paper is what? I mean, what does that lead to? The rest of my life, you can, I don't understand what the end game is. She has nothing. Right. Well, she has the house. She had the opportunity. I mean, from their perspective, it should be, well, she can always sell the house. That was the option was, I mean, the trustee's claim is that this house was bought with predator money. Give us the house. She counters and says, I don't want to give you my home. They say, fine, pay us the value of the home. And she said, okay, that sounds okay. Well, the trustee's messed up. That was stupid. You don't go to somebody who has nothing and say you keep your home and then you figure out where you're going to get $30,000. She obviously has nothing. All she has is the house. The only way for her to generate that type of income or money is by selling the house, but they're saying not to do that.
    51:10
    I mean, there's that. Right. I think the bulk of, and it's difficult for me to know, it seems that the bulk of the efforts in terms of where they think they can get the money are where Kevin has paid out ostensibly for predator-related activities. So this, you know, the house is a little bit weird. That was more of the he had money and he used it on things he shouldn't have used. The rest of it has been there have been a number of settlements. We never really cover them because they're all, I mean, it's like $1,000 here, $2,500 there. But there have been a number of people who were paid by Kevin, clearly paid, to do predator work. They, in many cases, didn't report it as income. So the trustee went to them and was like, we have a record on Kevin's end showing that he paid you this money. You didn't. Did you put it on your IRS forms? Did you file it and say you did this work? He said you did work for him. And a lot of them have gone ahead and settled and paid back a portion of the money or all of the money that they got paid for predator work. That's all pretty small potato dollars as a few thousand. And the other one, which is still pending, so we didn't have a legal update to talk about this time, is VirtuaPen. The VirtuaPen was the company that Kevin went to to have the cabinets made. Right. A sizable portion of money, and I don't remember the exact amount. I'll say it's approximately $100,000 was paid to VirtuaPen. The issue that the trustee's office has is they don't see a record of those cabinets being, other than 10, being sent to Kevin. So they're like, if you didn't send the product, don't you owe a refund? And VirtuaPen's been resisting this, saying that they delivered everything that they were contracted to deliver for the price that they paid. So that's probably the big one. I think that's the only thing that's going to be sizable at this point. Because I'm not aware of anything going on with Back Alley Creations and the amount for the Predator toys that were purchased.
    53:07
    There's been questions to Kevin about, well, where are all the toys? I mean, if they made you this many, they say they did and sent them to you. Where are they so we can liquidate them? You give us your asset, and we sell your predator assets, so we can pay pennies on the dollar to the creditors. So the virtual pen is the only large dollar sum where I think they've seen an amount that the trustee thinks it can get back, because that one's been really weird, because the virtual pen argued, if I'm remembering right, that they needed to buy a CNC machine to do this amount of cabinet work. So Kevin agreed to pay them this amount of money, and they bought this machine. The trustee's office said, you didn't deliver the product, though. You gave them 10 cabinets. That's not $100,000 worth of cabinets. They're not $10,000 a cabinet. So you were supposed to end up, for that amount, doing the full run of 300 Predator games. So you need to refund most of the money. And they, I think, said, well, we can't. We had to buy the CNC machine. And I think the trustee's office said, well, we'll take that. We'll take your CNC machine instead. And we'll sell it. And they're fighting over that, and VirtuaPen's attorney has leveled a countersuit against the attorney representing the trustee's office, saying that he deliberately was leaking the court documents to Pennside for defamation purposes. So there's a defamation countersuit going on. It's very complicated.
    54:34
    Wow. It's insane is what it is. Everything is just so up in the air. And the thing is, is all of these court documents, all this stuff, none of this stuff involves Kevin anymore. It's his mom and his wife and people who worked with him and this and that. I mean, I can't remember. I think it was, what, March of last year was the last time we heard Kevin in court? I can't recall anymore. And when the hearing was going on with Amanda, Kevin's soon-to-be ex-wife, she said she hasn't talked to Kevin in months, that they don't communicate at all anymore. She's assuming he'll show up on the day that the divorce is supposed to be finalized. But in the course of that hearing, the attorney for the trustee, his name's Nathanson, he noted that talking to Kevin does have a, they're not using a lawyer for the divorce, but Kevin does have an attorney representing him on all this bankruptcy stuff. That attorney has told Nathanson that he's not hearing from his client. So anytime Nathanson asks for anything, he's supposed to go to Kevin's counsel And Kevin's counsel says, okay, but he doesn't respond to me. He doesn't give me anything you want. And so the lawyer basically has to throw up his hands and say, I have an uncooperative client. But he has to say it, otherwise he could get blamed for being unprofessional. How is he not in jail? Like, how is Kevin not? Well, do you just mean, like, broadly speaking, like, just in theory? I mean, none of this is criminal. So, I mean, eventually the court could hold him in contempt. A lot of people think the judge is very, very soft. Yeah, I don't understand. This is a bankruptcy judge, though, so I think it's helpful to remember that he usually, I mean, most of the times, bankruptcies aren't controversial. These are people that are in desperate, desperate straits. But their crime is being committed. If you're putting money into a bank account to hide it and then you spend that money to buy a house, isn't that money laundering? I mean, isn't that, I don't understand how that's not a crime. Well, the issue could be, I mean, you're not obligated to keep a separate bank account for every single – this is where Kevin didn't set it up as a proper business. He did not shield his business assets from his personal assets. Skip B was not a DBA. It wasn't legally organized. There is no Skip B legally. He never legally formed it as a sole proprietorship or anything. So everything it did and every income that it made was under his name personally. so I mean didn't you say that he put money in like the money from Amanda's grandmother was put into an account with Sid B money to kind of hide it my understanding is yes but that was Amanda trying to hide her inheritance or whatever it was that's separate from Predator in and of itself if that makes sense it wasn't that it was put in with Predator money that was the issue. She was giving the money over to Kevin so that it didn't affect what was going on under her name. Right, but isn't that money laundering? It's fraud. And that's what I don't understand. If this came out during a bankruptcy hearing, which is done in a court of law, they're basically saying that they committed fraud.
    57:58
    There are people that think that once the trustee's work is done, they'll turn it over to the district attorney's office to evaluate if they want to go after criminal issues. So right now they're just trying to use it for anything they can. The trustee's job is to try and get as much money for the creditors as they can. Wow. What a mess. It's not to pursue criminal matters. And they're not going to get, I mean, will they get anything? I mean, the lawyer for the trustees has got to be, I mean, his bill has got to be outrageous. Or is he doing it pro bono? No. I mean, because that lawyer represents the trustee's office, which is sort of an official entity. He gets paid a set amount, and it's a lot of time that he's spending. I have no idea how much the carriers will get. I think fundamentally it comes down to whether or not virtual PIN has to settle. So really the big thing right now is virtual PIN? I think so. Wow. I think it's the only amount of money where there's a clear paper trail and there's an asset that could be acquired that could be easily enough sold to pay the lawyer fees and give people something. I think that's really about the only angle left, though. And it's going to be nothing compared to what they've put in. No, no. Oh, no. But that's not what it's about anymore. No, it's not about that anymore. It's revenge.
    59:17
    Revenge. I mean, you would think that you would be able to find the guy if he has a job. Right? Well, yeah, you would. And I don't know. I mean, they have an address for him. And Amanda said, I have an address for him. And off the air, off the hearing, she was going to give Nathan some of the latest contact information that they have. I mean, there are a lot of theories going around. Some people, there's a lot of suspicion in the collector community and the predator purchaser community that some of the money, they haven't seen where you tally up all this money, even with the house, and justify where the rest of it go. But no one's really entirely sure how much money he brought in. It's assumed to be somewhere in the order of $350,000 to $500,000, I think. So some people think he bought arcade machines because he's running a route. He's running a coin-op route, and he keeps it all off book, so he doesn't report his income. But he has money to live on because he actually has friends running a route for him or helping him or putting the games under their name or whatever.
    60:21
    Wow. That's an industry. That's a business side. That's an entrepreneurial aspect that he was involved with before. It's easy. It's cash-based, so it's easy to hide income on it. Yeah. So some people are like, find those gains and get those gains and sell those gains and then pay us our money. You know, there's a lot of that in there, too. Oh, man. Whether it's true or not, I have no idea.
    60:44
    I'm just a simple podcaster. Good times, man. This is why we don't get into this stuff, because it's so thick. It's so thick, and it's so layered. and it just gets so ugly. Because even saying like, hey guys, at this point just drop it because now you're just, I don't know, you're affecting people who had nothing to do with it. I mean, I feel bad saying that, but I feel that way. But at the same time, if I had skin in the game and at this point I'm just like, you know, screw him, I want to get him, you know. But then it just makes, there's just such a sour taste in your, I don't know. I try to avoid stuff that makes the hobby suck like that. Like waiting on games. I don't want to buy a game that I have to wait on. Yeah, I think everyone's tired of that. Yeah. I think the whole pre-ordering anything anymore has gotten to a point where most people are just dodging it. And it's because of, well, J-Pop. J-Pop and Skippy killed it. They really did. But, I mean, I don't know. I don't know. Until nuclear annihilation, you've got to sign up and you'll get your game in five or six months or something like that. That hurts. I don't want that. I want to be able to call up, order a game, and I want it at my house next week.
    62:07
    So say we all. Say we all. Well, we'll move from a negative topic to, oh look, another negative topic. But not as negative. Well, it's hard to be more negative than the legal system. That hurt. You almost need like a cleansing segment right now. Yes. Well, this one's going to be much more, I don't want to say shallow, because it's really going to upset people who really are offended by what's going on with this. I just saw this in the attack from Mars. Let's go ahead and go into that, which you noted you have an attack from Mars, but you have an original one. I have an original, yes sir This is about the Chicago Gaming remake which Tony and I played at Texas I liked it Attack from Mars is my favorite game of all time so I'm not going to not like Attack from Mars You're a good man there Great game I don't know if I would put it quite that high but I do think it's the best pinball machine of the 90's You're a bad man Yeah, well, you know, that's what it is. I'm the prickly one. Ah, okay.
    63:21
    So anyway, here's what's going on. I saw this in a – I saw that the thread on Pinside for AFMR was kind of blowing up top a lot. So I went ahead and looked in it, which I'm not normally looking in the owner thread because I don't own one. But all right, so what's going on is the part that I wanted to focus in on is there's been a little bit of controversy that's apparently come up. and most of the stuff, there's a few other little elements we'll touch on, but most of it had to do with coloring.
    63:48
    So what people have been reporting is that on some of the play field runs, the orange that borders like some of the inserts and such, there's sort of a light orange coloration to it. Instead, the wrong color is being used consistently all throughout. Instead of having the orange, Pinside's been referring to it as nude. I don't think that's a very helpful description. So I would describe it as it looks like a pale peach color. There are photos on Pinside if you want to know. But in all instances where there would be orange, it is that color instead. It's the same color, I believe, although I've not seen the side-by-side on this, is the nude color is the same color that the woman's skin at the bottom of the play field is supposed to be. That color is being used for the orange. So a lot of people look at it and they go, it looks like they forgot to mix a paint in or they forgot to put a layer in or something. The color is mixed wrong. The reason why this is controversial, besides people wanting a remake to look exactly identical to what they have in mind with an original, is Chicago Gaming has indicated that that's seen as a differentiation within shades of the orange color. And that's a part of the painting process. And it's an artistic difference. It's a stylistic difference. and they don't consider it covered by warranty for play field replacement. They don't think of that as a flaw. So given there have been other issues coming up about like shooter lane damage and some of the things we've seen with Stern before coming out on the AFMRs as well, this has rubbed people the wrong way because they're like, well, this should be, this isn't right. I would never have, if I had gotten to see this before the box was opened, I would never have taken peach color for my oranges. so that's not it's not like Creature from the Black Lagoon in three different colors because there are three different playfield manufacturers historically this was never a right color for those inserts it's not orange at all but you guys say well it's up to the individual artist who's mixing the paint is the excuse they're giving and that it's not a replaceable cause I don't know what I want to just get your guys' thoughts do you think it's a nothing burger that the color thing is Is this people whining too much, or is it something that does justify play field replacement? I think that compared to a lot of the issues that have been had in the past, this is nothing. It's not peeling. It's not popping up. It's the wrong shade of color. I could see it would be at most a little annoying, but I don't see where it would affect anything overall. But on the other hand, I also haven't spent $7,000 on a machine. All right. So I own a Medieval Madness remake, as I mentioned, and I have an original Attack from Mars. If I am expecting a remake and the way that these games are being sold, now AFM is, AFMR is a little bit different because they really did change a lot of things. Like they've changed the DMD size on some. like they have reinterpreted Attack from Mars, but they're still calling it a remake. They're remaking a game that already exists. So there's no artistic interpretation as to what the game is supposed to look like. You're supposed to remake it like it was. Now, on Medieval Madness, the big issue early on was that the inserts are not the same as the Williams inserts,
    67:28
    Valley Williams inserts. So it's not like a cloudy insert. It's clear. It's a clear insert. So through the insert, you can actually see the circuit board underneath the play field.
    67:42
    The lighting effect, because of that, it changes the way the lights are because they use LEDs, so it's more of a spot than it is like a diffused look. Now, my Medieval Madness has that issue. Like, I do have these non-clouded inserts, and it does affect the appearance.
    68:04
    So getting my game, it's not a deal-breaker for me, but I do not like the way that they did it. I wish they made it look like an original because that was what I thought I was getting. Now, certainly, like, I have an LE, so, like, my trim package is different than the original one. It's not the stainless. But I would assume that the play field is going to be made the same way that the original one was because that's how it sold. That this is a reproduction of this game, not an interpretation of this game. So I think that they have an issue. I really do. I don't think that you should, if they're calling an interpretation by the artist that this is, I mean, that opens you up for anything. Like, that's where, I mean, like, in Medieval Madness, they came out and they said, okay, they came out with a fix. So they came out with these like filters that you could put you basically mount it to the bottom of the play field so it diffuses the light It just like a clear opaque or it not clear opaque clear opaque It's like an opaque white filter that covers almost the entire bottom of the play field. So you put that on between the lights and the bottom of the play field so it diffuses the light. So it looks more like, or it looks like a original medieval madness.
    69:26
    Roger Sharp, you know, when he did his video and he was like, you know, these games are going to be made like the originals. If you say that, that's what people's expectations are. I mean, I understand CGC's, what they're arguing, but I just don't, as a buyer or as somebody, yeah, putting down $7,000, $8,000 for a game, I just, I think that they have an issue with that. And I don't blame them for having an issue. Yeah, I think that's a valid point that, I mean, if it is, that's how, if that is how they're selling it, which, of course, that's how they sold it, that does make a change. And the whole, well, it's an artistic difference would let you do conceivably anything you wanted and be able to say, well, it's just an artistic difference. And that, yeah, I could see where there's definitely, that's definitely a thin line and that they're skating on that could go either way. I don't know what the good how many how many play fields Are we looking at actually Done this way if it's just a handful Or is it the whole run Or I didn't notice that when I Played the AFMR In Texas or the AFMR that we have Up here I haven't Noticed it so I'm assuming it's On a limited number of the runs I and I don't Know I so far it sounds like most people have what is considered to be a reasonable color of orange. I don't know if they're all exact. Some people are pointing out that that doesn't match what they believe is the quote-unquote proper original attack from Mars, but that is indeed orange. There are only some that have had this sort of pale peach nude color used instead. For me, it's, I mean, if I would walk up to one, I don't know the color scheme of AFM enough that it would have caught my eye. I mean, all the lines and stuff, it's still painted well in the sense that it doesn't look like crayon or anything. So I would never really notice on that. The thing that confuses me, though, is this whole, I don't understand why artistic license or different people, whoever are handling the paint or the paint machine or the hand screening process, because I guess they do a lot of this by hand. I don't get it. I don't understand. We live in a world with PMS color codes. Why is this a problem?
    71:50
    I don't – I mean, you go, you take an original, you figure out what the numeric color value is for every single color you're going to use, and you do it. I mean, we did that with our – we have less than 10 people where I work. We had known PMS color codes for our logo. When we go to a printer, it doesn't matter if we go to Jim Bob down the street or we go to a national one, we give them the colors and we expect them to be exact, and they are. So I don't understand why pinball gets to be the super special different thing and not play by that. So I'm confused why Chicago Gaming allowed it to be an issue this way. They should just be using PMS color codes and that's that and always keep it exact. I mean, there's no logic to it. There's no thought of, hey, imagine how many more people would be happy if the colors weren't exactly the same on different runs. No one. There's no winning with this decision. This decision is, it says, Steve Bowden would say it is an objectively wrong decision. There's no reason why you wouldn't want to use the same color codes every single time. No, it makes no sense. Yeah, it makes no sense. So I think it's weird. And the issue kind of that's more concerning if I were an owner would be that if the warranty doesn't cover this, I mean, how much interpretation does this warranty get to be under? And I'm coming at it from this, you know, there was a lot of hate coming at Stern with all the ghosting, when the inserts were all ghosting, and that the warranty doesn't cover ghosting. The difference, though, has been that while Stern's warranty had never covered ghosting and still does not cover ghosting, they have been addressing it in cases that were seen as severe enough. And in this case, and one of the keyed posts on Pennside was that the response so far, at least from Chicago Gaming, has been, this is not a warranty item and we will not replace it for this. That's a tough one, man. I mean, if they're...
    73:53
    Could they be more hated than Stern? That's the question that arises, because a lot of people are pretty sick of some of the stuff Stern's been doing lately. And I think that other manufacturers have been given more of a pass than Stern has received, because Stern's the big dog, and you expect the big dog to get things right. I don't know. I'm shocked that they are having this issue after all they dealt with with Medieval Madness. And CBC is looking at doing like eight different games or something like that. Yeah. and they're coming out of the gate with two of the biggest, most collectible titles ever. You know, Monster Bash is supposed to be the next. I mean, I don't know. You know, Merco Playfield out of Germany. You know, when Merco started doing playfields, because I did a playfield swap on my AFM, and there were issues with the art to the point where people were pointing them out, And Merco started posting the art on Pinside and basically asking people to go over it and see if they saw anything that was wrong. People would point out color differences or like if a color wasn't like the whitewater that he did originally, like inside the hat of the guy on the raft, like there was a color missing on the AFM that I had, like under one of the inserts, and this was on the artwork, on one of the jackpot inserts, There's like a little keystone-looking detail. On the playfield that I had, that was missing. Like it wasn't there at all. It just wasn't part of the screen. But so he started reaching out and saying, hey, look, check out this whirlwind playfield art that I have. Do you see anything that needs to be changed? I think that TGC needs to start doing that. And they need to start doing that, and they need to start putting this out. I know that they like the whole surprise aspect of it. Like, hey, surprise, you can buy a Monster Bash. but if you're at that point and then somebody says hey these colors are all wrong because apparently they don't have the eye for that type of quality control then put it out there in the community and let the community say yeah that looks great you're missing this you know I don't know it just seems weird to surprise people with these kind of things I don't know no it's a good point I don't I guess the The excitement of the big reveal outweighs all still, or the thought that, the hype. And I mean, there was a lot of buzz at last TPF when it was like, here, look, here's the new Attack from Mars remix. Surprise. Oh, yeah, and you can buy them now. Yeah, there was. It was huge. But do you think that the Attack from Mars, everybody knew Attack from Mars was next, right? I think so. So the buzz was that you could buy them new, or was the buzz because of the changes that they had made? Like, the color DMD was larger. Like, they had really altered things on it.
    76:48
    I mean, if it's just, like, everybody knows that Monster Bash is next, right? So is the buzz going to be as great as it was for AFMR?
    76:58
    I mean, I'm expecting the same type of changes on Monster Bash. Like, you'll be able to get a bigger DMD, you know. So that's not going to be as surprising. Like, at some point, it seems like the buzz from the remakes is going to kind of die off. Other than, you know, people will start selling their games for, like, top dollar before they can buy a brand new one in the box. Right.
    77:19
    I agree with your, if I'm understanding where you're coming from on it, I will say I agree. I think there's diminishing returns.
    77:28
    Yeah. That it won't be as revolutionary. I don't think that they'll, I don't think that they can innovate enough every single release. I think AFMR had two things going for it. One was the bigger, high-depth screen setup that they went with was very eye-catching. A lot of people thought it looks leagues better than what color DMD does, and so that was just a big attention-catching thing, coupled with, like, oh, look at that really awesome topper, which, outside of the fan from Whirlwind, is, in my view, the coolest topper I've ever seen for a pinball machine. And, you know, the added little features of just, like, trying to make it more immersive. this. Don't forget the world under glass. People want that world.
    78:12
    I think CGC is missing the entire point of why people are excited about these games. People are excited about getting remakes of games that are not affordable for most collectors. Medieval Madness. You could buy a routed Medieval Madness before MMR came out was over $10,000. That's crazy. So they announced MMR, people didn't care. If they came out and said, look, we are going to make MMR, it's going to be just like the original. No color choices on the trim, nothing. But you get a medieval madness for $7,000 new in the box. And that is shut up, take my money. Right. Go on. So the problem they're having now is that now they're not giving people that. They're giving people interpretations of these games. Don't do that. Just figure out how to reproduce the games as they were, put them out there at an affordable price, and they will just make money. That's it. Keep it simple. Right. I think they think that they're doing both.
    79:27
    Standing aside this color gate, we'll call it color gate because everything has a gate, when the attack from Mars came out, I was at Texas, Tony was at Texas, and just hearing people waiting in line and seeing all that, it was the interpretation versions that were catching most of the attention. But Chicago was there saying, don't forget, we have the AFMR Classic. It's got the green screen. They didn't colorize it. They didn't add on the additional Martian effects and the weird strobing saucers or have a topper or anything like that. and I think the feedback gain there was also very positive because when you could look at that as the low-end version, so to speak, it was cheaper than Medieval Madness was. So I think that also helped them with their buzz, as they're like, hey, look, this one, I think it was $500 less than what Medieval Madness launched at. Yeah. Which, I mean, yeah, when you look at the mechs and the BOM, it makes sense, but the idea of, hey, look, they actually listed something less for once, I think that got them a lot of goodwill as well. even though everyone I spoke to that was the least popular model which one? the classic? the classic they want that color it's like every game should have a color dnd in it so what's better than a color dnd? something that actually ups the resolution that means you had to give up the classic and go to at least the middle model look it's bigger I can see it look at those colors pop don't forget the popping it does look nice But so on the classic, you cannot get the upgraded color package for the DMD? They might offer a piecemeal thing where you could pay more to get it upgraded. I would do that if I were them. I can't remember if they only made color ones in the larger size or not, though. That's why I have to hesitate on that. Yeah, because, I mean, on Medieval Matt, on the remake, like, you could upgrade. Like, you had to pay money. I can't remember how much it was. But you could upgrade to the full color DMD. And, I mean, the dots are great. I mean, they're great. They're higher definition than standard dots, and they actually redrew everything, so it looks really great.
    81:36
    I go back to the fact that I just think that, especially some of the titles that I'm expecting them to make, I'd rather them just create real, honest reproductions of the original at an affordable price. That's what I would want. So let me ask you this, then. we're in agreement that Monster Bash should be the one that they're announcing here in a few weeks. I'm guessing that the next one is Cactus Canyon. Is that your opinion?
    82:04
    I think Cactus Canyon, I don't know if Cactus Canyon is next. Cactus Canyon, it might be next. I'm surprised Cactus Canyon hasn't come out just because it's less complex than Monster Bash. Like, Monster Bash, I expect that one to be expensive because there's a lot of toys on that game. Right. You know, Cactus Canyon is pretty simple. I think the big thing is what are they going to do with the rules with Cactus Canyon? You know, Cactus Canyon continued, really took that game to the next level, and I hope that they do that. I don't know what the relationship is there to where that would work. And that's what I want. Actually, I shouldn't even ask for the prediction because that's what I wanted to get at. You had a big focus on original, or I should say, yeah, consistency with the original. Would that not mean that Cactus Canyon should be released with the code that the original has? I think that with Cactus Canyon, you should be able to toggle back and forth between a continued and the original code. Oh, that'd be nice. I mean, I have both codes, and I really do like the continued code. It's solid. I like Cactus Canyon. It's a good game. It just doesn't have the depth. I mean, not all games need to be deep, and I'm not going to go down that road because I'm more than happy to play an early Stern solid state for days on end. But I do think that the continued code, it just adds a level of fun to that game that I don't see with the original code. that just adds some great features to it. But I do think that you should be able to have it as a classic or not. So just have it toggle. It's easy enough. You go into test settings and you just go boom, boom, boom, boom, you know, game adjust. I want to play continue. I mean, make it as easy as that. Stuff doesn't need to be complicated. We don't need dip switches anymore.
    84:05
    Make it so that you can just do it on your phone. You have an app. You go into your app and you go, okay, now I want to play continue. Now I want to switch back. Boom, done.
    84:14
    I wanted to box you in with something here, and you escaped my box. Oh, no. I thought, oh, I've got him. I've set my trap. It's just like settings. Why not have both, as the girl asks with the cake? Going back just real quick, I do think that, going back to the play field, I think that they need to reproduce those play fields accurately. That's what you're looking at. and, you know, I don't know. I get that the ball, you know, the ball is going to roll across it no matter what the color is. But, you know, AFM is one of those art packages that the play field is very simple, and if it's not correctly done, you do notice it. Like, if those neons are not correct, you know it. You know, it's like, it has a real look to it. Like, Mirko's play field's the woman down at the middle. Like, she doesn't have the correct art. her legs don't have a I think two different colors in the legs on the Mirko one it's just plain it's just one color now that doesn't bother me but it's there if I was being sold that if you were selling that playfield to me and saying this is a there's no changes whatsoever but you don't get to inspect it if I didn't know what I was getting I would expect it to be exactly like the original because that's what you're selling So give people what you're telling them they're getting. I agree. Mic drop. Yep. I'm out of here. Yep. Bye, guys. Good job. Thanks, Taylor, for sending everyone straight.
    85:49
    All right. Well, I will say I like what they're doing, not with this specific issue, but just in general this whole, as we were talking about earlier, the inbox versions of the super expensive classic games is nice because they have right now of the probably four machines that I'm most interested in getting new in box, they've got two of them. Yeah. I mean, it's just the thing is, because Medieval Madness and AFM are two of my favorite games. AFM is my favorite game. I mean, if somebody turned around and dropped out, you know, High Speed 2, that I could get a High Speed 2 new in box, I mean, I'd be sold forever.
    86:38
    Except for I could actually afford to get those. Those aren't horribly priced. I will tell you that unboxing of Medieval Madness blew my mind.
    86:51
    Like that was, I've been in the hobby for 11 years, 12 years, and that's not a title that I ever thought I would own. and being able to unbox a Medieval Madness in my basement was really cool.
    87:09
    When I opened the top of the box and you see that coin door staring at you, you're just like, oh man, it's like the Archic of the Covenant. My face didn't melt, but it was like that grin, perma grin, perma smile. It was pretty amazing. I'm not going to lie. Trying to figure out what the high-pitched whine is and you realize it's you squeam. Oh, yeah, yeah, yeah. Yeah. It was awesome, man. It was awesome. But see, I'm the guy, like, the first thing I did was I had all the protectors and stuff like that, so I didn't play it. I protected it. So I spent my time and, like, got it all, you know, ready to be played. But, yeah, it was special. The game that I'm looking forward to is Funhaus.
    87:53
    I want to unbox a Funhaus. I do like playing it. I'll never own one. I don't want those creepy heads in my house. I think Funhouse will be made. I think Funhouse will be a remake.
    88:07
    You think it would be more likely or less likely than Adam's Family? I think more likely. You don't think that you would wake up someday and that head would just be sitting on the shelf in your bedroom staring at you? No. Oh, man.
    88:25
    You will? I'm thinking now. I had a dream last night. This is really strange, but I had a dream last night. Now I play pinball till 2.30 this morning and woke up at like six for some reason. But I had a dream right before I woke up. This is totally random. In the bottom of, I think it was an EM. I was cleaning out the bottom of an EM and there was like this really grimy, grimy coin. And I took it out and it was huge. It was like four inches or something like that for a coin. It was huge. It was really grimy. and I cleaned it off, and it was a, this makes no sense, it was a silver Baltimore dollar.
    89:07
    Don't ask me, I have no idea. That was my story about my dream last night. That was for Don. Oh, yeah, Don. Don from the formerly of the Pinball Podcast always talks about his dreams, and I'm always like, I usually don't remember my dreams, but I remember that right then, so I shared that. Thanks, Don.
    89:24
    If he hears this one, I'm sure he'll appreciate that. One last news item, actually, and then we're going to actually start talking about collecting. But I did want to touch on the news that Ben Heck has left Spooky Pinball. He noted that the reasoning was due to creative differences and a delay on the next game that he was expected to be lead on. Charlie, who owns Spooky Pinball, weighed in and said that there were problems securing the license for the game that Ben was supposed to make, and that's why it was delayed. But Ben said that, at least for the time being, he expects to be totally done with pinball.
    90:03
    He mentioned that his desire to do a Bible Adventures game, which was a genuine interest, that it dissipated with the announcement on the second interview with Deep Root that This Week in Pinball did, that they were planning to do a Bible-oriented one called Fire and Brimstone.
    90:19
    And I do have a link in the show notes to the interview that Ben Heck did with This Week in Pinball, if anyone wants to read because that gets discussed in that interview. But I just thought let's weigh in. What are your thoughts on Ben leaving Spooky? I mean, is it sad? Is it irrelevant?
    90:37
    Do we care? I don't know. Let's find out. I don't care. I think Ben is the kind of guy who has a plan and he's sticking to it. You know, I think that I hope that those guys keep their friendship going and there's not like some underlying bitterness that we're not really seeing. But it just sounded to me like Ben had a plan. You know, his show is his his like Internet show is ending and he wanted to drop this his next title when that ended. And that's not going to work out. So he's just like, OK, this isn't going to work. I got to keep doing what I'm doing. It sounds like he's going to Texas to work on a movie or something like that. Yes, correct. Yeah, so he has plans. So I think that the fact that he can do that and walk away from it, I think that's pretty commendable.
    91:32
    So, yeah, I mean, I think that, you know, he really gave Spooky a – he really gave Spooky the chance to be successful. You know, he did their code work, developed their boards. basically he created their first game I mean game that shipped that was popular that sold out that put them on the map so Ben you know has he will always have that fingerprint on Spooky Pinball so I hope that they yeah I don't know I hope that they work together sometime and that he has the passion that he wants to do another game but if he doesn't like he said it's like you have to eat and sleep pinball when you're doing it, and he just can't do that right now, so he's got to go do something else. It's pretty cut and dry.
    92:24
    Yeah, I think the same. I mean, it seems like Taylor said, he's got a plan, and he's going through with it, and it didn't work out, so he just cut off the section that didn't work out, and keep going ahead with whatever is next in his life. Yeah. And he designed the game. I mean, that's the thing, is like, he designed a Whitewood. So Spooky has that Whitewood. So he did his thing. So he's like, okay, well, I did my thing. I designed the game. They can't release it. Well, I'm moving on. It's not like he's like, I'm throwing my hands up in the air because I can't finish this game. It's like he designed. He's done with that part of the game. So if Spooky decides to use the license that he wanted, it might become that game that he wanted. but he did his thing. So it's not like he's abandoning ship. It's like, hey, I did my game, and, okay, I'm going to go do something else because I'm Ben Heck, and I can apparently do anything. Right. You know, I mean, it's like, yeah, why stay there?
    93:26
    Successful YouTube show, make a pinball machine, go film a movie. It's just, yeah. You know, I successfully cooked lunch the other day. So, you know, it's all the same. What did you make? What's successful? What's a successful meal?
    93:44
    The other day I did, what do you call it, dirty rice and jambalaya. Not like a jambalaya, but it's not jambalaya. It's like black beans and dirty rice and sausage and stuff. Nice. All right. I'll come to your house and eat.
    94:00
    Well, no, I don't have anything really to add on it. I actually did not find the news particularly compelling that everyone was talking about it, So I stuck it in because it's like, no, I don't see really any controversy here. I think it's just that Ben was there from the beginning, so a lot of people looking at Spooky maybe feel a little lost in a way. Not that it's really relevant how they feel. It's just that, you know, he did what he did.
    94:28
    I liked what he said was coming out with Alice Cooper and how the modes were going to be, and I thought that was neat. That was more interesting to me than whether he wants to be in pinball or not in pinball. And if he wants to come back, great. And if not, you know, I've only ever gotten to play at the America's Most Haunted at shows, but I've always found it entertaining. So, you know, he has that. It's better than Rob Zombie. Better than Rob Zombie. Rob Zombie might win your tournament you come up with, Tony. I'm just saying.
    94:58
    But, yeah, so I think, you know, he's got – if he wanted to leave a legacy in pinball, he's left a legacy. It will be viewed very positively. so there's really nothing I think to be for people to be sad about. I think the thing that took people back was just Ben. I mean Ben has always been really open and honest and when you hear him on interviews he just speaks his mind like he'll just say yeah that was stupid that was a stupid idea and so he tweeted out like I think that that's the way he announced it he just kind of tweeted out like this is what I'm doing I'm done with this and that's what floored people you know, it was just kind of this honest, like, hey, everything's cool. I'm just, this didn't work out, so I'm moving on. And spooky, you know, and then Charlie was just like, yeah, we're friends. It didn't work out, so he's moving on. It was like, okay. It was almost like there wasn't enough drama. So people were just like, you know, they wanted to stoke the fire, and Charlie and Ben wouldn't let it happen. I think that's why I did hear your latest episode on this flipping podcast, and your co-host Tommy brought up the, there's a thread on Pinside that was talking about the head of Paul and talking about the Ben Bible adventures and what he wanted to do with it. What I noted, though, that Tommy didn't mention was, according to those poll results, that theme is a terrible idea.
    96:18
    It's not going to – I don't know. Yeah, that's a weird one. I mean, I get it. I mean, I get what he's saying, but, yeah. I see why he thinks it would work really well from a rules perspective. That doesn't make it a good theme, though, in my view. Yeah. There are certain things. We don't talk politics, and we don't talk religion on this show. And there's a reason for both, and it's the same reason. All you will do is upset people. So you stay away from that stuff. But let's go into something that we won't stay away with, because you are the master expert collector. You may have thought you weren't, but you were going into the nuances of medieval madness and attack from Mars and explaining the squeejoy of opening a medieval madness up new in box, I think any chance of sort of dissipating that notion that you are the expert master collector went out the window. So let's talk about collecting. And here's one I think would really orient very well, especially since we have Tony on who he talks pinball with me every other week. Tony doesn't have any pinball machines. Oh, Tony, what's wrong with you, man? I know. I darned putting food on the table and putting new running shoes on the daughter like every... Oh, gosh, she's growing so fast. We get shoes so often, it's not even funny. And how old is your daughter?
    97:41
    10 and 6. I have a 7 and 11-year-old. Yeah, man, I'm right there with you. That's awesome. Good times, man.
    97:49
    So... You have two daughters? I'm sorry. This is what Tommy and I do. We just started talking about others. Yeah, yeah, no, it's two daughters. Yeah, that's awesome. Yeah, it is. I'm pretty happy. So, pivoting from the shoes. I'm going to reign you guys in. Pivoting from the shoes. That's fine. But now we're going to refocus because shoes are boring. We are not the shoe podcast. Okay, sorry. But tying into that, get that tying in. There you go. Yeah, beautiful. Yeah, you wouldn't have given me a compliment if I hadn't fished so hard for it. Well, you're right.
    98:23
    Oh, I hate you so much. So anyway, I thought maybe where to begin this segment would be where to begin for someone like Tony, for example. Like what should you get? Well, let's say you're going in. Let's say you're interested. You've been playing pinball. And let's say you want to start a collection. But you've got life. You've got other expenses. You want to do it on a budget. You don't want to go out. As much as you might love getting an attack from Mars New Inbox, you're not comfortable starting at that dollar point. You know, what's a good way? Because you mentioned that you started in pinball collection 10 to 12 years ago. The pricing was very different back then.
    99:04
    Pricing was a lot different. Yeah, absolutely. It was easier to get into collecting at that time, just money-wise.
    99:13
    Nowadays, I mean, you know, being called an expert as far as collecting goes is tough because I really built my collection over five years, ten years ago. So the bulk of my buying and, well, actually, let me see.
    99:34
    I have games. It's complicated because I approached it a lot differently than a lot of people because I have ten games, and it took me a long time to get to that point. You have a lot of collectors. And when I think about collectors are people who buy games to buy every game. You know, it's like I, you know, I bought every WPC like I collected them. I have a collection, but the way that I built my collection, I did it, I think, differently than a lot of people.
    100:06
    You know, my first game that I ever bought was Adam's Family because that was the game that I played in the early 90s when I was in college. That was the game that I had experience. That was the game that kind of sparked. I played pinball earlier than that, like at arcades in the 80s. But that was the game where I could say, like, I cut my teeth on understanding pinball, pinball rules, how to play. First game I remember getting my initials on was an Addams Family.
    100:33
    So that was the first game I bought. That was the game where I was like, if I could own one game, what would it be? It would be an Addams Family. And we were at a point in our lives where buying a pinball machine, at that time, it wasn't terribly unreasonable. It was still an expensive title. So when I bought my Addams Family, I think I paid $3,000 for it, which at the time was high, but I had no resources. Like at that time, there was RGP, but I didn't even know about it. So I had no idea. I was out in the world, and I had no idea that there was a bubble of pinball whatsoever. No idea.
    101:13
    So, Added to Family was my first game and I bought it because I loved it. I think that that's important. I think that if you could own one game, buy the game that you love.
    101:24
    Now, I know that, you know, financially that might be difficult, but there's ways to get to that endgame, I guess. You know, you can buy projects or something like that, fix them up and flip them and, you know, but you still have that endgame. I want to get to the game that I love. I think that's probably the way that a lot of people get into it. And then that's where it just grows kind of out of control because you buy a game to flip and then you flip and then you get another game and you're like, Oh, I kind of like this game. So I'll hold on to this one and I'll get another game to work on and flip or whatever. But collecting wise, I think it's important to, if you're buying your first game, you want to get one that works. I think it's worth going to a collector and buying a game, buying a game that works is the most important thing. My Addams Family, I had it for two days and it went down. I had issues with my flippers. I was missing parts on the game. Like, it was a container game that this guy sold. He was a basement dealer. So, you know, at that time, like, they would ship games over in containers filled with games. They would show up and you would get, you know, three Creatures from the Black Lagoon, four World Cup Soccer. Like, you would just get this massive games. Parts were missing. They didn't work. They were rusted. They were in bad shape. And that's where I got my Addams Family. So, like I said, it was missing parts. It didn't work well.
    102:45
    That was a bit of a bummer. Now, you know, I have a background, kind of a hands-on background, and so I just dove in. I was doing a teardown of my Addams Family within a month of owning it because I had to do that to get the game working.
    103:00
    I would not suggest that for most people. you want a game you want to get a game that works because you want to have fun playing it um and then that's kind of that's where to start you know find a game that you like love and it works and then just buy a lot more of them and then you have a collection and then you become an expert yeah i mean so when i when i was buying games i so i worked in the film industry And so I would travel to work And you guys I mean you guys travel to work so you would get per diem or whatever like that So I would take my per diem that I would get and I would squirrel it away So at the end of a job, I would come home with like a bunch of cash and that's how I basically built my collection. Um, so I wasn't, it wasn't like paycheck money cause I've never felt comfortable doing that because I've never wanted to have debt because of my hobby.
    104:01
    And that's one of the reasons why I gravitated towards, like, doing mods and stuff like that in the resales, because it does pay for my hobby. So it's like I'm not taking money from our paycheck to pay for this, you know, entertainment.
    104:15
    I think that that's something that's really, I mean, for me it's important. You know, like Tony's saying, like, I'm not going to take the shoes off my kids' feet or not buy them. I don't want to not be able to buy any food I want because I need to put a color DMD in a game. Like, that's not where my head's at.
    104:33
    I know that people, like, will put games on credit and stuff like that, and that's just, I just can't do that. So that's how I built my collection. Now, my Attack from Mars, I'll tell you a story. I bought my Attack from Mars. I think that's the game I've had the longest. I've had my Attack for maybe a decade now. and I bought it from a guy in California but I didn't have so I was working a movie and at the end of movies they do sales so we have a big sale where we sell all the assets that the production company has bought during the production of that specific film now this was on I think it was John Adams, it was actually a miniseries that we did for HBO and at the end of the miniseries, they wanted to sell all these assets. So it was John Adams and we had done these sets that were giant ships that were rigged out with all this rope and stuff like that. So we had bought all this really huge hemp rope. It was like three inch diameter rope on huge spools. These things were crazy huge. So we had them all left over at the end of the show. And so HBO is like, okay, we need to liquidate our assets. We have these giant spools of rope, which were worth like thousands of dollars. Well, nobody's going to buy that. I mean, the spools were like, you know, a thousand pounds or something like that. So we had to be out of the warehouse within a week. So we had the sale and then we had to get rid of everything out of the warehouse. We did not sell the rope. So I went to the production company. I said, look, can I have the rope?
    106:11
    Can I have it? I will get rid of it. And they're like, if you can get rid of it, you can have it. So I loaded up in a five ton truck. I drove it to a guy that we would rent props from and stuff like that. I went to him and I said, I have all this rope on the back of the truck. Do you want to buy it? And he was like, well, how much do you want for it? And I told him the amount I wanted for it. And he looked at me and he's like, who is ever going to buy this rope? I was like, don't worry, another movie will come to town. They'll want to buy the rope. So he gave me cash on the spot. I turned around and that's how I bought my Attack from Mars. And that's also how Reese Ropes started.
    106:48
    But that was like, that's how my AFM came to be. Like, I did not, there was not, I mean, yeah, there was like money I had, but it wasn't like, I don't know. It wasn't budgeted money. I've done the same thing with per diems when I've been sent on trips and stuff, and they're like, well, you're going to be gone for three days, and that's breakfast, lunch, and dinner. So here's $70 a day, and then I go to McDonald's and spend $4.
    107:22
    Now, so that was my thing, but I would be gone for six months, seven months. Yeah. So I would be getting in a little brown envelope cash, $420 a week.
    107:35
    And then I would go and I would eat ramen or I would go and eat catering. So I would go eat at the, you know, so they're filming down the street. I would go to where they're filming. I would eat at catering and I would just pocket my money. That's the way to do it. And that's how I bought, that's really like I bought a safe cracker like that. I bought my AFM like that. I bought my Whitewater. I mean, like I bought all the games that I bought at that time that are now allowing me to kind of like get into that A title realm were all bought that way. So like my Whitewater, I bought my Whitewater for $1,400. I can't remember when that was, but I bought my whitewater for $1,400. Did a full restoration on it. This was before playfields were available. So I did the, you know, I had the playfield sent out, had that restored and clear-coated because I don't feel comfortable doing that. I did a full restoration on it, blah, blah, blah. And then I sold, I traded that straight up for my Wizard of Oz. That's how I got a Wizard of Oz. So I was able to take $1,400. hundred bucks and I think that the I think that the playfield restoration I had done on it I think I traded rails for that work because I do um I do rails for Chris Hutchins who owns high-end pins in North Carolina and it's like a very high-end pinball restorer and so I'll trade work for with Chris so you know he might restore a playfield for me and then I'll give him a bunch of sets of rails and stuff like that so it's like you look at my collection and it's like yeah it's like there's a lot of value there now, but the amount of money that had to go into it to where it is now, I mean, it's like a quarter of, or less of what you would look, you see now. I also have like a meteor and stars that I paid 400 bucks a piece for. And those are two of my favorite games.
    109:27
    So, and those I picked up not that long ago, maybe in the last three years. So collecting, it's like,
    109:36
    you know, I don't have a ton of money that I can throw at my pinball machines, but I do love owning pinball machines. And so I found ways to buy them. Right. I mean, I'm kind of, I feel like I'm a, I feel like I'm a bit of a grinder as far as a collector goes. Like I'm like, okay, like right now I want a total nuclear annihilation. Right. Who doesn't? Well, I want one. And then when I, I'm like, okay, how am I going to get one? How many sets of rails do I have to make?
    110:05
    How many, so I mentioned this on my last podcast like I have a rule of work game it's not a favorite in the lineup and so I'm looking at selling that and then I'm like okay now I need to add money to that to buy a total nuclear annihilation what do I need to do and so I just start squirreling money away like I make rails and I make rails and rails or I sold an EM I had so and I had that money so now I can add you know it's like I just I can't just go out and like I see people who drop every new in-box game cash on that. I'm like, I don't know how you do that. That's not the type of collector I am.
    110:43
    I'm a grinder. It's like I grind away until I can get what I want. I enjoy it. It makes my games harder to get rid of because I have a history with each one of them. It's like my AFM.
    110:59
    I don't think I can get rid of that ever. My wife won't let me. She told me that if I die, she will keep that game. That's a one-name super secret. It's beautiful. I mean, I love it, but it's like the story of how I bought it and just my relationship with it as far as, like, doing a playful swap on it and stuff like that. Like, it's not just a pinball machine. You know, it's like it has – I have a history with it, and I have a history with all my games, which is another thing. It's like my Indy 500, that's a title, like, you just never saw. Like, I never saw it. It shows. I never played one, so one popped up like seven hours away, pretty decent price. And so I was just like, all right, I'm going to go get it. And, you know, drove down there, and I don't know. So I have that history, like the guy I bought it from, this guy Chad, who's right outside Boone, North Carolina. Like we became friends just over that. You know, it's like they all have history. Or, like, think about, you know, when you go down into your basement and you, like, have a great game on Wizard of Oz. You know, it's like that imprints itself on you. So now you have a history. I don't know. It's so hard for me to get rid of games. Like, it's just so tough. Like, I'm not a flipper. You know, I've had games. I usually have my games over five, six years. Yeah, my averaging has, I don't think I've so far had a game that didn't last at least four. Yeah. Yeah, but there are guys who will flip games. Like, I've seen guys who are in the hobby for three years, and they're like, yeah, I've had, like, 30 games, and I only have spot for three. And I'm like, I don't have – I think about that. I'm like, I don't have the energy to do moving games like that. I have a walkout basement. Like, I've designed my, like, backyard so I can get games into my game room easily, but I don't – like, I don't want to pack up a game. You know, it's like, yeah, what a pain in the – oh, leave that. That's fine. Those that don't know, Taylor's trying to comply with the – we're one of the few podcasts that covers pinball and is also clean lyrics. We do it for the children. For the kids. Yeah, you don't want to hear Tony and I when we're off air, though. Holy cow. Oh, yeah, no. We're – I'm a blue-collar worker, and I have a blue-collar vocabulary. So, yeah. Now, Dennis, what titles do you have? I have six games. So I have a Superman, Firepower, Silver Slugger, Jurassic Park. Now, Silver Slugger or Terminal Machine? Yes, it's a Gottlieb street level game. Okay, I got you. It's the only one of the street levels that Papa doesn't own in their facility, actually.
    113:42
    Have they tried to buy it from you? No. It's a Gottlieb. They don't care. So it's a Jurassic Park. Sharky Shootout. and Star Trek Pro. You've got a nice collection. I think that that's another thing is people, I mean,
    113:57
    I sound like a total hypocrite saying this because I have developed not a cookie cutter, not a really cookie cutter collection, but I do have those high-end games that people will look at or I will look at and go, oh, those are boring. Those are games that everybody has, but they're also games that I do have a history with them. I don't know. Woz isn't really a cookie cutter game, is it? It's just too new to be a cookie cutter. No, no. I mean, it's like, it's a question of, all right, if someone were to say, here are your collection, would they think that you're a Williams snob? That's really what you're asking. I think that I am. I am probably a Williams snob to a degree, but I do like, I'm probably a Williams snob. That's when I grew up. I mean, like I said, I grew up in the 90s, so I remember, like... But I don't like... There's some games, like Indiana Jones, the original one. Like, I just don't... The game doesn't do anything for me. I don't want that. Well, it's wide-body trash. Of course it doesn't. Oh. I had a Star Trek The Next Generation. I've had a Twilight Zone. Twilight Zone was my second game. I just found that one too... Wide.
    115:09
    No, it wasn't wide. It was pretty wide. It got to be too repetitive. It's left ramp, right ramp, shoot the piano. You can just grind it out to get lost in the zone. I'm a good enough player that a game that is repetitive like that can get kind of boring. That's why I like games like Attack from Mars, because even though Attack from Mars has a really simple rule set, there's still a lot of randomness to it.
    115:38
    Now, that said, I put up 40-plus billion points on it, and after that game, I was like, I don't know if I'm going to keep this game. And then the next time I got on it, it just handed me my lunch.
    115:51
    I don't know. But, like, I have a friend who has, like, a really eclectic collection. And I love going to his house because he always has, like, real oddball stuff.
    116:01
    And I think for me, I think, I don't know. I only have ten spots. You know, so kind of like, what do you do? You know, and I love my games. I don't want to get rid of them because of that history I told you about. So I'm in a bit of a pickle right now. Because I would like to have, I mean, everybody has that problem, or everybody wishes that they had that problem. Where it's like, I've run out of space. I have 10 games that I've run out of space. Boo-hoo. But, you know, I would like more solid states. I think if somebody was going to get into collecting right now, and you were on a limited budget, I would look at early scrims. Look at Meteor, Stars, Galaxy. those games you can still find them relatively cheap. I had a friend who just picked up a $400 Stars this week. You know, a lot of meteors were made. Tony looked at a meteor we had in the area, but it was by a car week. Yeah, it literally hit the sale about 20 minutes after I got home from just having bought a new car. And I was like, oh, come on. And it was a beautiful looking meteor. I had the same thing come up, a Spanish eyes got listed, and I had just spent my saved up money on something else we needed for the family, and I was just like, ah.
    117:23
    So that's just how my luck works out. I figure I have room for one game without angering the wife. I have room for three games with a little bit of anger from the wife, and I have room for all the games I want if I want a divorce. Yeah.
    117:40
    my wife is very patient with me when we bought this house we bought it specifically so I could have a place for my games I have a walkout basement which is really nice but yeah I mean collecting wise people can look at EMs I think EMs are great there's a huge variety of games that have a lot more features than people give them credit for there's some really amazing There's a game called Gay 90s, which I had, and I got it for $50.
    118:16
    And it did not work completely. But EMs are nice because they really are easy to work on. Like, when it comes down to it, it's really like looking at, as long as everything is there and nothing's, like, really fried out, then they are easy to work on because it's all about gapping switches. That's really all it is. If you have patience, you can make a game work, and EMs are still affordable. Game 90s, like I said, it was $50, and it had amazing features on it. Like, it was packed. You know, it had three pop bumpers. It had the left out lane kickback. It had a center up post. It had a swinging target in the middle.
    118:57
    That's a lot of game. You know, like, that's a lot of game, and if you love pinball and you just want to get a game, like, you can get one affordably and enjoy that. Enjoy that. Fix it up a little bit. Sell it for $200, $250, and get yourself another EM. Do the same thing, and now you have $500. Now get yourself a solid state. You know, fix that one up. A good, stern, solid state, if it's in nice working condition, can fetch $750 to $1,000. You know, now you're almost, now you're halfway there to like a System 11 or a WC. I mean, it's hard to find a DMV under $2,000, but it's not unheard of.
    119:44
    So it's easy. I mean, that's kind of the way I've built my collection. You know, like I said, it's like I had a BSD that I bought for $700.
    119:53
    Yeah, that was back in the day, but you can still find, you know, like I said, look at the early sterns because those games are packed. Like, there's a lot of, like, nice rule sets, but nice shots, but they're really fun. Like, they're fun, quick players, which is also nice, like, if you're playing with a group of people. Like, I was playing a critical hit tournament last night, which took forever, but one of the games that kept getting chosen was Medieval Madness. Well, it played forever, you know, but then you get on stars, and it's just like, you know, four people bang out five balls, like, really quick, having a really good time, and you're not waiting. I think that that's the big thing. It's like the more modern games, there's a lot of waiting because you can play them for a long time. So it's like it's not as socially as interesting as those early solid states. So that's where I would start.
    120:45
    Yeah, I recall playing the strikeout tournament on a Tron game where player one's ball lasted like 45 minutes or something like that. Player one's in that power 100. So I'm going to add a little context. That's true The other three of us on the thing If we added all of our scores up together After ball three We would have been about About three quarters of the way To his ball one score Yeah I remember that because I took second on that game And survived with like three million It was a good day For me I think another thing as far as collecting nowadays that's nice is that there are just so many parts available.
    121:35
    I know that with that Addams Family, I needed a new plastic set. And at that time, IPB, by Illinois Pinball, they had remade them so you could get reproductions.
    121:45
    But now, it's like there's so much stuff available. It's such a good time to be buying project games. You can find plastic sets, play fields. Like, you have numerous pinball manufacturers, so pricing on stuff is still, like, pretty cheap. You know, if you want to go in and do, like, a pop bumper rebuild, it's not insane.
    122:08
    So that's something that's really nice right now. Like, now is the time that there's not as many projects because so many have been swooped up, and Craigslist is the feeding frenzy, and there's, like, so many piranha-flipping pinballers. But, you know, now is a good time to find, like, a good fixer-upper. You know, especially if you're trying to build a collection. If you're on a limited budget and you want to build a collection, find a fixer-upper that has parts available and do, like, a really nice shop-out job on it. And you can sell that. People love that because a lot of people don't want to get hands-on anymore. They want games where it's, like, turnkey. So be that guy who will put the work in. You know, sweat equity will go far in building a collection. Yeah, that's been my general, what I've been Tending to look for is a fixer-upper Because I figure that's where I'm going to be my first step in And like I said earlier, I mean I've got a couple Older pens that are like my grail pens That are fine And I can get them for a decent price And work on them Like Campus Queen But it's one of those Things where I think that's how I'm going Where I'm more likely going to enter the hobby Because unless something amazing happens I'm not going to just go out and buy me an AFMR or an AFM. I'm going to start with one or two small games and probably need work and build my way into getting the collection I want. Yeah, it's a way to do it, man. It's a good way to do it. You know, that's a good sound way to do it. But, you know, people are going to be throwing out those AFMRs now with that playful defect. Yeah, you could probably get one of those quote-unquote nude ones for, oh, gosh, maybe $20. bucks. Who knows? Just get an orange Sharpie and you'll never think.
    123:53
    I want to talk a little bit about pinball conventional wisdom. I just thought this would be sort of a fun topic and I think what segues it well was that very brief discussion on the notion of William's snobbery.
    124:06
    By conventional wisdom, it's probably not the best way to describe it, but I'm just sort of curious about, you know, in pinball there are things, you know, we can say they're the quick joke, like you can make fun of a Gottlieb DMD era game real easily, and everyone's like, oh yeah, because Gottlieb was terrible, da da da. Things like that. And I was just sort of wondering about examples that you guys have of something that maybe is a sort of conventional piece of wisdom that it might be something better or worse but you disagree with. And I'll go ahead and lead it off, because I think an example would be helpful, and that is I don't like Williams mechs, flipper mechs. I think they feel inferior to Stern mechs, but most people seem to think that that WPC era flipper mech is the best mech. You're insane. Are you serious? I think they feel less snappy and almost luggage in there. And weak. I find them weak. And so if I could jump through my computer right now. You cannot. I will not allow this.
    125:08
    That is the most insane thing I've heard in a long time. Are you serious? You're joking. You're just like, no. I'm just like, and then I hear, look, Jersey Jack, they decided to go with WPC mechs. I'm like, why? I don't know why.
    125:22
    WPC mechs are so superior to Stern. Now, some of the, some of the, okay, so I own a Ghostbusters, and I have a game with Zones right now. Those flippers do not feel too bad. But, you know, one of the problems they have, like Lord of the Rings, is like those flippers would just get so mushy. I mean, those coils just overeat.
    125:45
    They get the bad buzzing, like I had a certain pinball party for a little bit, and, like, ah, man, it's like, eep, eep, eep.
    125:53
    I don't know, man. I would take my feel on my AFM over any other game. So you subscribe more to the conventional wisdom than I do. Yeah. I guess that's right. Yeah, man, you fired me. I know. That's what we do. We try and get our eyes out of people. because your Williams flippers sure won't. But the – Oh, sorry. I didn't mean to hurt myself. So do you have an instance where there's sort of a conventional, like, oh, yeah, this is the better whatever about pinball, and you're like, no, actually, I do disagree. And I won't jump through the screen because I'm nice. I don't know. That's a – I don't know, man. I'm trying to think.
    126:36
    I don't know what the conventional wisdom is. I don't know what people's opinions are Oh, it'd be something like Well, the other example I gave was The DMD era Gottlieb was the worst company Do you agree with that? Maybe you don't, maybe you think it was better than Sega That groan said no So, alright That one went off the list Let's see Oh, Bally games after 1982 Were they better than Williams games? You just went over my head with that one Okay, that means no. Sorry, Black Belt, you didn't make it.
    127:12
    Black Belt is a really interesting game, though. That upper right flipper that you have to hit that ramp backwards, like where you're shooting towards yourself, that's a really cool feature. Better than Space Shuttle?
    127:27
    I like Space Shuttle. Sorry, Black Belt, dead again. Yeah, Space Shuttle. I would like a Space Shuttle.
    127:35
    I would like a Space Shuttle. that's a good game. The phone ringing though is like one of the weirdest sounds in pinball right? When that phone, when the ring goes. You know what I'm talking about? And I'm not remembering a phone on it. So there's a sound it makes and I'm not sure what triggers the sound but it basically rings like a phone. Like an old time like You know what I'm talking about? I don't remember it in that game. Maybe I stayed up too late. I think that conventional thing. I would say, I think that playing tournaments for Whoppers is overrated. I don't know if that's conventional.
    128:18
    I've stopped doing that, except for unless it's in-state. I don't care about out-of-state points, because they don't matter to me. I thought that was interesting that you said that. I heard you say that on one of your episodes. What does that mean? Like you just don't care because you're not trying to qualify in that other state?
    128:39
    Right. So, like, specifically the way it's like Texas, because of everything going on in Texas, the first year we went to Texas, we took part in the tournament. It ate a ton of our time on the first two days. So I haven't done it because there's so much else going on. Now, if I went somewhere specifically for a tournament or if I, like, I've been debating one of these days if I can get the champ, want to get down to the Silver Bowl to one of their tournaments. Yeah. And I'm fine with that. If I'm going to something where I'm specifically, I'm going because of the tournament, I'm all for it. But like Texas, where it's got a whole bunch of everything and it's not just about the tournament, I just found that the tournament got in the way because I'm not a top 10 player. I'm not a top 50 player. So for me, the tournament just got in the way of everything else I could have done that was fun there. But then there's something like Pembroke, where from everything I've heard is amazing. It doesn't matter how good or poor of a player you are. You go to Pembroke for the tournament. I'd love to go to Pembroke for the tournament. It's on my one of these days list. So for me, it's just how you Aim it I mean, if I'm going specifically for the tournament, cool If I'm going to be there and there happens To be a tournament I probably won't do it unless it's like a fast One day tournament Yeah, I hear you I just thought it was interesting you said that That the You weren't interested in other Skate swappers Yeah, well, and that's the thing I don't even do good enough to qualify for Staving Kansas But for me, I do play in tournaments in Missouri, and I'll be honest, I've never once looked at the Missouri state standings. I don't know what they are. I'm sure they're somewhere in the low 5,000s. Yeah. Out of the 400 players, I'm definitely somewhere around 5,000 and all that. It's just not something that I ever look at or even think about. I honestly don't even look at my whopper points until, like, the end of the year. I don't even know what they tend to stand at. Yeah, I don't look until the end of the year. and then I see if I'm about to, if I'm close. I did get into Virginia this year, but I was not trying.
    130:53
    That doesn't make you sound like a poor player when you say it like that. I wasn't even trying, and, you know, well. It just kind of happens. Third seed, I'll just have to live with that. I think it was more a lot of people bailed out and went to other places because we have, we're in an area, Virginia, D.C., and Maryland, there's a lot of good players, but so people will go to D.C. or Maryland So I think I was like 30 or something down the line, so I was able to get in that way.
    131:21
    Yeah, last year I got into state at the 15th seed, and it was only because we had a lot of people qualify from Missouri who wanted to play in Missouri because I, placement-wise, was several spots below that. But this year, all of the top 16 in Kansas went to their state tournament, so that kept me out. Nice. Well, so you guys have a big scene. I guess Kansas does, right? You guys have a pretty solid thing going. Yeah, we've got a pretty solid, at least in the Kansas City area. There's a fair number of people in Wichita, but they don't really run very many tournaments. It's mainly Kansas City that's got a really solid core. You're right. Wichita is the largest city in Kansas, but it's in the south-central part of the state, whereas Kansas City is a metro area that's in the northeast part of the state. So it's about a two-and-a-half-hour drive. So there's not a lot of overlap on the player base. and so even though in theory you'd think, oh, Wichita could have a pretty vibrant scene, from what I understand, there are a lot of private collectors in Wichita, very little location play, whereas in Kansas City, we have probably a dozen locations that offer sizable location play and two to three of those locations run tournaments. Nice.
    132:38
    There's a lot of pinball out there, man. It's a good time. Mm-hmm. Yeah, I was hoping one of them would break down and get a total nuclear annihilation so I could finally play a production version. No, they're getting out there, man. They're getting out there. None of our people have ordered one.
    132:54
    It's been asked about, but none of them are going to go in on it, it sounds like, unless one changes their mind. So we'll just have to make do. Maybe I'll get a chance to see it again at Texas, I suppose. You could sell a couple things and buy one.
    133:09
    I mean, yeah, I could. but it's a lot. That's a lot. I'd probably have to, I'd have to sell probably more than two things to get enough. Probably. Because my stuff is, I can't say that I have, I always sometimes think of myself as owning oddball games but it's really, that's only half of the collection. The other half is very, I mean, Jurassic Park and Firepower and Star Trek. There are tons of those. So, it's sort of a 50-50 thing.
    133:35
    Though, I can only, I only have room for six games. Seven if I were to get rid of the virtual pen from the room. But that's a... I keep telling you, you need to knock out that wall and build another wall and just extend that room into the garage. It's not like you parked your car in there anyway.
    133:53
    Superman will go next. Because it's a wide body, so I never should have owned it anyway, but what can you do? They didn't want it. It was free, so I took it as an unworking thing and it's working, but it makes a shit around. And Steve Ritchie is my favorite designer, but that was in his early years.
    134:16
    Well, we went through my entire outline. Taylor, if there was anything else on pinball you wanted to talk about, or if you had – I don't know if you're a big video gamer or not. We can always do it. I don't do a lot of video game.
    134:31
    I'm good, man. I've got to say, like, yeah, it was good to talk to you guys, but I don't know what else to say.
    134:40
    I'm like, man, we've covered so much. I do video games every once in a while, but I own an Xbox, and so I play a couple games on there, but I'm more of a sports guy when it comes to that, like the FIFA stuff. And then I built my wife a Ms. Pac-Man cocktail for Christmas,
    135:01
    but I do pinball. I'm almost all pinball. I need to diversify maybe but I might give my kids a switch if they're nice my oldest daughter loves her switch so much that's all I hear yeah everybody loves them we're trying to make it an incentive thing for my youngest daughter she's a great student but we're trying to work on a little behavior stuff so we're like dangling a switch out in front of her see if that works that's a hard life right yeah I know exactly what you're talking about. We have to do the same thing, especially, and it's also with our youngest. Our youngest is the wild child. Yeah, yeah. It's pretty typical. Love them, though. Mm-hmm.
    135:47
    Well, I think... Well, thank you for coming on. Unfortunately, Jeff Teolis is going to be sad because we're an hour and 40 minutes short of what he wanted, but... This is what you do. You double it up. I'm telling you. So, look, so on our last... Because there are people... Your mini episode. Yeah, that was fun. My mini episode. So people have been chatting. I think somebody started a Facebook or a Pinside post about how podcasts were too long. Oh, yeah, I remember that part. Tommy and I, we always go super long on our podcast. And so the last one we did two hours and 40 minutes, and I titled it The Minisode. And so it was funny, though, on our Facebook page because there was just all this, like, who's saying your podcast is too short? That's ridiculous. We want more podcasts, longer podcasts. And, of course, I'm like, you obviously haven't listened to it because it's two hours and 40 minutes of us rambling.
    136:38
    Yeah, I saw that and I thought, oh, I saw your Facebook post. So I downloaded it to my phone then, as I would, and I looked at it and I'm like, oh, it's a joke. Okay.
    136:50
    No, this is the same size as all the episodes. That's my humor. It was very dry and it was very good. So I do approve. Apparently the people who follow you on Facebook do not, but they did not get it. Did not get it. Well, thanks again, Taylor, for coming on. Thanks for having me. Guys, if you want to listen to Tommy and Taylor's podcast, it's the This Flippin' Podcast, and there's a link in the show notes. So if you've downloaded this episode, you can just click on it, and it will take you to their home for their podcast, and you can listen to the latest mini-sode or go back further into the archive if you so desire. if you want to reach out to us Facebook is probably the best place Eclectic Gamers Podcast is well I totally botched how I was supposed to say that I should have said facebook.com slash eclecticgamerspodcast for that page you can also email the show eclecticgamerspodcast at gmail.com we have Twitter that's like never checked and Instagram which I actually work with anymore it's eclectic underscore gamers and we should be back in two weeks with a lot more on the video game side actually because we have some things in the works. So until then, see y'all. Bye-bye. Bye.