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Episode 77 - Munsters in a Canvas Bag

Eclectic Gamers Podcast·podcast_episode·1h 36m·held·Dec 17, 2018
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Analysis

claude-haiku-4-5-20251001 · $0.038

TL;DR

Munsters leak, Deep Root delay, JJP roadmap rumors, and Twippies awards discussion.

Summary

Dennis and Tony discuss recent pinball industry news including leaked photos of the Munsters pinball machine in production at Stern, Deep Root's delayed reveal at Texas Pinball Festival 2019, Jersey Jack's rumored upcoming releases (Willy Wonka and Toy Story), and the newly announced Twippies awards format and categories from This Week in Pinball.

Key Claims

  • Munsters Pro is on the production line at Stern Pinball; photos from a European distributor presentation leak confirmed.

    high confidence · Dennis reports: 'This week in pinball, hi Jeff, has reported that Munsters Pro is on the production line at Stern Pinball... photos of the pins have also come out... there was a big leak of the photos it appeared to come from a european distributor'

  • Premium and LE versions of Munsters will have a lower playfield, but the Pro will not (similar to AC/DC model).

    high confidence · Dennis: 'the premium and LE version will have a lower play field, but the pro will not. That seems very ACDC style.'

  • Munsters formal reveal is imminent, likely before February 2019, possibly early January at latest.

    medium confidence · Dennis: 'if they're building, and supposedly those pros on the line are for the European marketplace, it has to be close... I think it has to be before February.'

  • Deep Root Pinball will not reveal their game at Texas Pinball Festival 2019; no revised reveal date committed to.

    high confidence · Dennis: 'Deep Root Pinball is not going to be doing their big reveal at Texas Pinball Festival 2019. Robert Mueller announced that they won't be ready in time.'

  • Jersey Jack's next releases are rumored to be Willy Wonka (standard-width, designed by Pat Lawler) followed by Toy Story (wide-body, designed by Eric Meunier).

    medium confidence · Dennis: 'The rumor mill, the spy network, whatever the source is, indicating Willy Wonka is Pat Lawler's. It will be a standard-width pin... Eric Meunier will be doing the Toy Story, and it will be a traditional wide-body style'

  • Jersey Jack's ideal production cycle is nine months per game, but the proposed Willy Wonka/Toy Story timeline is only three months apart.

    high confidence · Dennis: 'Jack of Jersey Jack Pinball said, ideally, he would like to be on a nine-month incubation cycle... This proposal is not that. This proposal is a three-month differential.'

  • The Twippies awards will be announced live at Texas Pinball Festival in late March 2019, with voting occurring at the start of the year.

Notable Quotes

  • “We don't make up drama. We don't need to in this hobby. It already exists.”

    Dennis @ ~12:30 — Reflects the hosts' philosophy on covering industry news with truthfulness rather than fabrication; sets tone for critical but fair analysis.

  • “I don't think Munster's is a good theme choice... the nostalgia factor for this isn't i think it's a minority of people making it seem bigger than it is”

    Tony @ ~27:00 — Key skepticism about Munsters theme appeal; suggests vocal minority vs. actual buyer sentiment.

  • “Nothing in Jersey Jack's history makes me think they're going to surprise me.”

    Tony @ ~41:00 — Expresses lack of confidence in Jersey Jack's ability to meet aggressive production timelines based on track record.

  • “I think given their production line and size of company, that makes a lot of sense to me. This proposal is not that.”

    Dennis @ ~44:30 — Critical analysis of Jersey Jack's proposed three-month gap between releases vs. their stated nine-month production cycle preference.

  • “Dialed In gave me hope, and then Pirates murdered the hope.”

    Tony @ ~49:00 — Summary of Jersey Jack's production trajectory and impact on community expectations.

Entities

Stern PinballcompanyMunstersgameDeep Root PinballcompanyJersey Jack PinballcompanyWilly WonkagameToy StorygameDennisperson

Signals

  • ?

    business_signal: Jersey Jack's production capacity concerns; history of delays (Pirates 18 months, Dialed In 6 months) raises skepticism about three-month release window feasibility.

    high · Tony: 'I don't think they've got the capacity and the capabilities to actually set on a game and walk out at something like Texas and say, here's this game. It's ready to go.' Dennis: 'Nothing in Jersey Jack's history makes me think they're going to surprise me.'

  • ?

    community_signal: Twippies awards format shift from write-in voting to live announcement at Texas Pinball Festival expected to increase engagement and legitimacy.

    high · Dennis: 'I think the only real negative to this approach... it is a bit late in the year, it's about a month later than the Oscars does their awards... I do think I agree with you. I think it's going to, it'll whip up more interest than how they did it the first time.'

  • ~

    sentiment_shift: Mixed reception to Munsters theme; vocal minority enthusiasts vs. broader collector indifference; theme perceived as secondary to game quality.

    medium · Tony: 'I don't think Munster's is a good theme choice... the nostalgia factor for this isn't i think it's a minority of people making it seem bigger than it is... these people are saying Munsters is a great theme are people who would have bought this if it was Jaws or would have bought this if it was Hudson Hawk'

  • ?

    design_philosophy: Lower playfield strategy for Munsters (Premium/LE only, following AC/DC model) raises concern about gameplay differentiation and Pro-tier appeal.

    medium · Dennis: 'If they do it like ACDC, then the lower play field's a joke, and they don't need to have a version with a lower play field. If they make the lower play field compelling, then people will be driven towards buying the premium models... I wonder if you lose sales because some people will say, well, I'm pro or nothing'

Transcript

groq_whisper · $0.288

0:00
Welcome to the Eclectic Gamers Podcast. Today is Sunday, December 16th. This is episode 77. I'm Tony. And I'm Dennis, and we're back. We've only got one more episode after this until the start of 2019, the year of the Eclectic Gamer, I've already called it. That works. But what has happened during this trail end of the year over the last two weeks, Tony? Anything? Oh, an amazingly large amount of stuff has happened. Case in point, though nobody can see it right now, my laptop arrived. It is. It's huge. It's much bigger than mine. Mine has laptop envy. Well, I'm pretty happy with it so far. It's going to let me do a lot, including obviously having a laptop here instead of having to use my phone for all the notes and looking everything up. He'll be much faster now. So it'll be a lot better and make me a lot happier.
1:10
It's going to let me stream. I wanted to this week, and life got in the way. I've got to stop letting life get in the way of that. Life finds a way. It does. That is what we learned from a mathematician long ago. Yes, it does. It finds a way. But, I mean, other than that, it's been, I've been playing a lot of Spider-Man.
1:32
That game is getting more and more enjoyable, actually, as I play through, which has been pretty surprising to me. But it's been a pretty good couple of weeks, all in all. I mean, we've dealt with some sickness in the family and this and that, but it's the time of year for that. So how have you been? Oh, fine. I went back to work. I had, after our KC Game Con, which was our last episode, I actually had most of that following week off up through Friday. Recovery time? Well, the first day, definitely. And then after that, I had a few other things that I had planned to take off and deal with. That was before my boss was put on paid leave. So everything, I probably shouldn't have taken that much time off because it just sort of felt overwhelming to go back on a Friday and try and catch up. But I did. And over this last week, I'm in a pretty comfortable place with all of that. And then more in the realm of what we talk about here on this show. This morning, I was on This Week in Pinball podcast. I won't have a link to it because it's not out yet. And I'll get this one out first because Zach has a lot of editing he has to do. Holy crap, were we not appropriate. But it's appropriate off target.

high confidence · Dennis: 'they're going to announce them live at Texas Pinball Festival... The votes will happen as of the start of the year.'

Tony
person
Zachperson
Brian Eddyperson
Pat Lawlerperson
Eric Meunierperson
Robert Muellerperson
This Week in Pinballorganization
Twippiesevent
Texas Pinball Festival 2019event
Special When Lit Pinball Podcastorganization
AC/DCgame
Deadpoolgame
Pirates of the Caribbeangame
Dialed Ingame
Ghostbustersgame
Head to Head Pinballorganization
Penn Stadiumproduct
Pinball Players Podcastorganization
  • ?

    event_signal: Texas Pinball Festival 2019 (late March) becoming major industry event for announcements (Twippies awards, rumored Jersey Jack Willy Wonka reveal).

    high · Dennis discussing multiple announcements planned for Texas Pinball Festival: Twippies live announcement, rumored Willy Wonka reveal, Deep Root's absence being notable.

  • ?

    leak_detection: Munsters Pro machine photos leaked from European distributor presentation; appears intentional given formal reveal timing is imminent.

    high · Dennis: 'there was a big leak of the photos it appeared to come from a european distributor uh based off of a presentation that Gary Stern had given' and 'With their official Primus line photos showing, you could question, did they mean to leak it?'

  • ?

    licensing_signal: Toy Story timing strategy linked to June 2019 movie release; unclear if licensing includes new movie content or restricts to original IP.

    medium · Dennis: 'Toy Story's got their new movie coming out at the end of June. 2019... The plan is actually that Jersey Jack will... Toy Story comes out early fall, a little bit after the Toy Story movie... I don't know what the license deal with disney's going to look like regarding toy story and is it going to have the fourth movie in the pit'

  • $

    market_signal: Pricing and release cadence strategy question: Can collector base support two $10K+ games released three months apart?

    medium · Dennis: 'I just don't think the percentage of the hobby that collects actually collects at that level... when I read forums, a lot of the people I see talk about JJP... acknowledge that it's a big deal for them to get one.'

  • ?

    announcement: Formal Munsters reveal expected imminently before February 2019, likely early January based on production line activity.

    high · Dennis: 'if they're building, and supposedly those pros on the line are for the European marketplace, it has to be close... I think it has to be before February. Before February, definitely... I think. I don't know how much preload stock they like to get built up and in place before they actually do their thing, but I would be amazed if it wasn't early January at the latest.'

  • ?

    product_strategy: Deep Root Pinball significantly delays game reveal from Texas Pinball Festival 2019; unclear if manufacturing or design issues.

    high · Dennis: 'Deep Root Pinball is not going to be doing their big reveal at Texas Pinball Festival 2019... there is no revised date for a reveal. He was asked if it would be 2019, and he wouldn't even commit to that specifically.'

  • ?

    rumor_hype: Jersey Jack planning aggressive two-game release strategy (Willy Wonka Q1 2019, Toy Story late summer 2019) inconsistent with stated nine-month production preference.

    medium · Dennis: 'The rumor mill, the spy network, whatever the source is, indicating Willy Wonka is Pat Lawler's... Eric Meunier will be doing the Toy Story... This proposal is a three-month differential.'

    • 2:47
    Yeah, there were a couple. I think. Well, we'll see what survives. We'll see what hits the cutting room floor and what he keeps in. Cause he has a, he has a odd sense of humor. It's first 12 minute episode. No, it wasn't that bad. But so I'll just name that here because then I don't have to remember to link it in the next two weeks show notes. And I also wanted to point out it hit yesterday. I'm only a few minutes into it so far because then we had to start recording. Cause I'm basically doing back-to-back podcasts today, but Special When Lit Pinball Podcast had an interview with Brian Eddy it is actually Brian confirmed the first podcast he's ever done so kudos to the gents over there at Special When Lit that's Bill and Ken and I have a link in our show notes so if anyone has happened to not subscribe to them already go ahead and go over and check it out because Brian Eddy is one of the greatest pinball designers in the history of the industry. And so it sounds like there'll be a lot of it. And Zach had already heard it. So when I was recording Twip, he put in a couple of pieces. He's like, oh, I don't want to spoil it. And I was like, everyone should go listen to it anyway. So who cares what you brought, what nuggets you drop in. Just tell me what you want. I already know everything and there is a no anyway. So just tell me what you want and we can talk about it. What you really, really want? Actually, and actually one of the things that was brought up had to do with Shadow and something that I did not know about it. So there's stuff to learn. But you already knew that it was better than the movie. I think even people who haven't seen the movie know that.
    4:24
    So that is what it is. And I guess just here in the intros, as a reminder, we are planning to live stream the next podcast, the last podcast of the year. Now, we're going to do that on our Twitch channel. And I imagine we'll actually do it on Sunday, probably. because that's the 30th. It won't be New Year's Day. It won't be weird or anything. So that would be fairly convenient. And what will happen is no one needs to feel obligated to try and tune into the live stream. If it goes like we normally do, and we sort of have to play this by ear a little bit because of scheduling and such, but normally, because we don't know if you'll have a snowplow or something. Right. There's always something, it seems like. We normally start recording around noon central, central time. but that'll be on Twitch and then we will still be recording Tony's got his fancy laptop he'll be able to run the stream and then I'll be running the regular podcast record and we'll still release the episode just like we always do it'll be edited just like it always is so if you want the unvarnished sloppy, confusing dirty, nasty that will be available on twitch.tv slash eclectic underscore gamers but it should be fun it should execute pretty well and spoiler alert just like all our final episodes of the year it will be our year end review where we talk about some of the major happenings in the hobbies of pinball and video games we tend to spend a lot of time on pinball in that one because usually there are a lot of mistakes that manufacturers have made and we just rehash all of it because it's what we do we smash them we crush them we only smash with truthiness with truth and love and justice. We don't make up drama. We don't need to in this hobby. It already exists. Yes. So let's move on to the new drama in this current iteration of pinball news. And let's start with Munsters.
    6:27
    Munsters. Yes. So this week in pinball, hi Jeff, has reported that Munsters Pro is on the production line at Stern Pinball. I do have a link in the show notes to the This Week in Pinball article for people who want to read it. photos of the pins have also come out and they'll also be in the upcoming this weekend pinball because there was some pictures of the line of primus where you can clearly see there are monsters in the background so so on top of all that since our last episode there was a big leak of the photos it appeared to come from a european distributor uh based off of a presentation that Gary Stern had given to, I'm assuming, a group of them. Yeah. So, I've seen those photos.
    7:11
    Still, obviously, there's not a formal announcement from Stern yet, though. With their official Primus line photos showing, you could question, did they mean to leak it? I think at this point, so much has come out, they're not really screening that carefully anymore. Right. Because I think it's imminent. We talked about this last time about when did we think the formal reveal of Munsters would be. I may be wrong about it being December, which was my call, but I still thought it would be December. But if they're building, and supposedly those pros on the line are for the European marketplace, it has to be close. I think it has to be before February. Before February, definitely. I think. I don't know how much preload stock they like to get built up and in place before they actually do their thing, but I would be amazed if it wasn't early January at the latest. Now, I'm not personally very keen on talking about game features before they actually do their reveal. I don't really see the point in speculating on gameplay. There's one element, though, I do think I'm comfortable enough thinking we can discuss, and that is the lower... There's been a lot of discussion about upper and lower play fields regarding Munsters. It seems the reports are all coalescing around that the premium and LE version will have a lower play field, but the pro will not. That seems very ACDC style. Do you think that that is a good idea? I think it's the obvious money-saving thing, and as long as they fill the spot in with something that looks better than what they did on ACDC, it'll be good. It'll be fine. I don't think it's going to be that huge of a deal.
    9:00
    Unless, I will put a caveat on that, unless there is just so much in that lower play field that it makes it a fundamentally different game. But I don't see it. Well, and that's the thing that I'm thinking is I don't see the point, actually. If they do it like ACDC, then the lower play field's a joke, and they don't need to have a version with a lower play field. If they make the lower play field compelling, then people will be driven towards buying the premium models, which could be good, except the price is so much higher. I wonder if you lose sales because some people will say, well, I'm pro or nothing, and I'm not buying some stupid version of the game that doesn't have the fun element. I don't know. I can see the argument. But, you know, I've been predicting that Deadpool actually ultimately moves more units than Munsters. I think so. And but a lot of that could come down to if Munster is a better player and Deadpool isn't the highest bar to pass, then I could be wrong. But I don't think Munster's is a good theme choice. I know some collectors, some hardcore collectors are adamant that it's an excellent choice. I think the analogies to Adam's Family are terrible. Adam's Family is not based on the TV show is based on a very popular movie. This show is like 18th best show of 1963. right that's like it was like three spots better than adams family but again adams family tv show was never a pinball machine i think that the nostalgia factor for this isn't i think it's a minority of people making it seem bigger than it is right and i i agree with you i think that this is another one of those situations where you have a very very vocal minority while the vast majority of people who buy don't actually care about the theme you're looking at people who are going to buy this machine because they buy every machine. Exactly. I think that these people are saying Munsters is a great theme are people who would have bought this if it was Jaws or would have bought this if it was Hudson Hawk or anything else. Oh, man. Hudson Hawk. We had this discussion at Pinball yesterday. There's old 80s movies that... That's the one. I didn't name it, but that's the one that came to my mind immediately. Yeah, I could see that. Hudson Hawk would have been interesting. A terrible movie that I loved as a kid. Right. And then I rewatched it and I was like, what was wrong with me? I was very not smart back then. Very not smart. Good bad. Bad on. Yep. Oh, man. Kung Pao Enter the Fist. That would be a great pinball machine. But that's not an 80s. I know it's not 80s. That's not an 90s either. No, it's the 2000s, but it would still be great. It would be fun. And if Steve Odekirk didn't want to do the voices, maybe I could still do a few of them. Probably not. It's getting harder.
    11:49
    Next topic. Deep Root. This came out just after. Everything comes out just after. No, the Munsters thing wasn't just after. That one was just a little bit ago. The photos of Primus showing it. So it's not everything. It just feels that way.
    12:04
    Deep Root Pinball is not going to be doing their big reveal at Texas Pinball Festival 2019. Robert Mueller announced that they won't be ready in time. When pressed by This Week in Pinball, which, again, this article also has a link. It's a separate article. In the show notes, there is no revised date for a reveal. He was asked if it would be 2019, and he wouldn't even commit to that specifically. What are your thoughts? What's going on down there in Texas, Tony? I am disappointed, but not surprised, because I always felt that with the way they were pushing things and the way they were talking about things, that they might have been assuming parts of the project and the buildup were going to be a lot easier than the reality of it. It seems to be an ongoing thing in pinball in general that most people seem to assume that the actual manufacturing is the easy part, the hard parts, the design, and all that stuff. But manufacturing is a very complicated thing, and I honestly think most of their issues are probably on that end of things. I'm leaning that way as well though the language was vague in the sense that there were some pieces that they were having trouble putting together I don't think they meant literally but there was some reference to making sure all of the features the innovations they were doing would work right I also wondered if there's a little bit of disc gate to reference Jersey Jack Pirates and something mechanically that they're struggling with longer but physics getting in the way of what they want Maybe, but in their case, rather than chucking it and saying, no, we're just going to change the mech to something common and basic and uninspired, they might be saying, still, at this point, let's double down and make it work. We need this. We need to show the amazing power that Deep Root brings to the table. The question, of course, becomes whether is this – does buying time get them to the solution if that's indeed the hang-up? It might. I mean, some things just require more time and more money thrown at the wall to get to where you're going. The question is, will they be able to throw enough time and throw enough money before they run out of either? It kind of reminds me of that whole time, quality, money, pick two. Right. And that's sort of the state that it finds. I'm a bit, I'm probably more surprised than you. I'm a bit surprised that they – because they hyped up the five days of – like, I don't even understand. Are the five days happening before TPF, or is it going to be four days of Deep Root and then the fifth day is delayed? Are they – is there still a plan to do this five-day spread out, or is it now just going to have to be one Uber day whenever they finally get around to it? Or are they – I mean, is the marketing plan changing? I would have leaned my expectation had always been more that they were going to possibly have to reduce the number of games they revealed that's what I thought they'd still be at Texas but if anything they'd just be like we're doing Fire and Brimstone and we're doing like two of the J-Pop games and that everything else instead of coming out with their initial they were talking about having like five games at launch or something like that I've never understood that strategy the strategy necessarily behind it because of the whole concern about you possibly, because I don't really know how exactly the economics work of it, but people are often worried about sabotage. Like the big talk right now is when will JJP announce Willy Wonka? Is that going to sabotage the sales of Pirates? Did the announcement of Pirates sabotage the sales of Dialed In? Those are the questions. Like the same thing about why isn't Munsters revealed yet? Was it because they did not want to undercut Deadpool? You know, those sort of things. And Deeper does not seem to express a concern with that. Now, that may have to do with their model. It may have to do with the ability to, that they're not planning to make a whole lot of any of those particular games. So we might as well have a half dozen. Right. Or there'll be like 200 of each. I don't know. I don't know what they're thinking.
    16:25
    They've been vague. And that's understandable. It's probably smart in comparison to like Jersey Jack, which I think comes out way too soon with everything. And then they just look like they're really slow. Yeah. And it makes them look like they're flailing as they try and maintain interest in their games as they release them a year and a half after they were supposed to release. Well, and if you want, we can as a mini transition. This isn't in our list of notes of talking about, but this will come up because of this week in pinball podcast. I'm aware of what's going to come up on the discussion, and that is regarding Jersey Jack's next plan. So to give you a little bit of background, Tony, the rumor mill, Jeff's spies are reporting to him that Willy Wonka is the next game from Jersey Jack, followed by Toy Story. Now, Toy Story's got their new movie coming out at the end of June. 2019. Like the release date's already known. Right. The plan is actually that Jersey Jack will reveal, I guess, ready to go Wonka at Texas. And then Toy Story comes out early fall, a little bit after the Toy Story movie. Here's the thing. What's the thing, Tony? Tell me about the thing. That sounds like a really good plan. Does it? I think it doesn't. You don't think so? I think it sounds like a really good plan because it sounds like something that Jersey Jack would really deeply hope to do is to come back and try and make up for their issues and their known issues by saying, look, we put two games out. We're awesome. I don't think the plan's going to happen because it's not going to work. Because I don't think they've got the capacity and the capabilities to actually set on a game and walk out at something like Texas and say, here's this game. It's ready to go. You want to buy one? Buy it here. It's ready. The best I see us having is getting an announcement maybe come late summer. The game might be available. Maybe. And then they'll make an announcement for Toy Story, and then we might see it maybe this year. Maybe. I would like it if they surprised me, but let's be honest. Nothing in Jersey Jack's history makes me think they're going to surprise me. I expect to find out an official release where they'll go and have, oh, look, here's playable versions of Willy Wonka. Cool. So when do I get this? Oh, two years from now. Okay. It wasn't two years for Pirates. It was a year and a half. And it wasn't two years for Dialed In. That was only about half a year. Yeah, Dialed In was impressive. Dialed In gave me hope, and then Pirates murdered the hope. Okay, well, let me give you a little more information. The rumor mill, the spy network, whatever the source is, indicating Willy Wonka is Pat Lawler's. It will be a standard-width pin.
    19:27
    No. Oh, my God. Oh, people didn't see the visual of you tearing your face mask off. Oh, God. And underneath that was Pat Lawler. And then Eric Meunier will be doing the Toy Story, and it will be a traditional wide-body style, traditional in the JJP sense.
    19:47
    Here's why I don't like the idea. On another interview, I think it was on Head to Head Pinball, Jack of Jersey Jack Pinball said, ideally, he would like to be on a nine-month incubation cycle. So basically, baby birth cycle. Right. I think given their production line and size of company, that makes a lot of sense to me. This proposal is not that. This proposal is a three-month differential. And I'm saying three because while I mentioned to you early fall for the Toy Story game, If they actually want it out with the movie, that means it's late summer.
    20:24
    Texas is late March. April, May, June, that's the release. That's three months. Right, and here's the thing.
    20:33
    It's something I could see that it could happen if Wonka was on the line and they were building supplies now. Except for all the issues with pirates means pirates is the only thing on the line right now. Well, in theory, all the past games are available on the line as needed as well. And I don't know functionally how that actually executes. But my issue is, if you were to follow the nine-month rule and they actually got Wonka ready, available for purchase and ship at Texas, that still means Toy Story should be a December pin. Right. By their own, I mean, by their owner's own planned schedule. So this seems very aggressive. I completely share all your concerns that I don't think that they can get production ready in time. I just don't think they've ever demonstrated much success at actually putting things on the line. Dialed In was their best success at that.
    21:26
    Pirates was a step backward, a fairly serious step backward, though not on the timeline to the degree that things like Hobbit were. Right. But I also wonder if, in their case, their pens are very expensive. We're talking, Neuron, $10,000 for these things. does it cause a problem for Pat Lawler, just like it did with his Dialed In, to have Willy Wonka, which I think for Jersey Jack is a good theme, and then have Toy Story come out so soon afterwards? Especially if you know both are coming. How many people out there are a, I buy two JJP pins in a year if I had the option? I mean, that's like 20 grand. I just don't think the percentage of the hobby that collects actually collects at that level, as much as, say, maybe Zach from This Week in Pinball podcast, when you get a chance to hear that. He seems to be much more on the line that the only reason they don't buy as many JJP pins is that JJP just doesn't produce enough pins. But if you actually released more than one a year, people would gobble them up. I'm a little more skeptical. There's obviously a percentage of this hobby that's equipped to do that. but when I read forums, a lot of the people I see talk about JJP, talk about the perceived quality, talk about the depth of the code, talk about the excitement of the themes, but they acknowledge that it's a big deal for them to get one. Right. And how many of them sell their old one to make up the vast majority of the money to buy a new one? I don't know. A lot of them don't have one period yet because they've been waiting for years for Toy Story. And they're going to keep waiting. Probably. here's what I feel should be done.
    23:08
    Wonka should not be the first pin. Toy Story should be announced at Texas. Hopefully it's ready by the time the movie's out. That would be the best idea. Because then at least you can do some tie-in stuff. Even if it was entirely themed around the first Toy Story. It doesn't matter. It's just like Ghostbusters. While the movie studio preferred Ghostbusters to have been themed around the new female Ghostbusters, it just having the same title was still advantageous from their perspective from a marketing perspective hey ghostbusters is on everyone's mind oh we should go see the movie look at that cool pin that makes us remember we love ghostbusters you know that was that was what it was what it was and i don't know what the license deal with disney's going to look like regarding toy story and is it going to have the fourth movie in the pit i don't know i don't care you don't need it you don't any of you have it doesn need to have spoilers or anything i mean i don know what assets getting Jersey Jack has not traditionally impressed me with which assets they acquired but I mostly thinking of Pirates because as a Back of the head! Yeah, as a we can't use any of the characters on a franchise that is past its prime. It's kind of like that wasn't a particularly great licensing deal in my view, but what do I know? I'm only a non-expert on licenses.
    24:22
    I was going to lie and say I was brilliant about licenses, And I was like, no, that's not true. Let's not do that. So let's actually move to the next and kind of final news topic that I have in the pinball section for us to banter about. And that actually is the Twippies.
    24:39
    That was Final Fantasy. Sorry. I was going to do more fanfare, and then I just shifted. It's just natural habit. It is. So, the Twippies are the This Week in Pinball awards that they give out for a whole host of things. The main awards are really to recognize the best pinball machines in various categories. Which makes sense. But they also have a number of sub-awards that they give out that have, last year they were done in a write-in fashion, like best podcast, best YouTube channel, best Twitch streamer. Best mod. Yep, exactly. So a lot of those categories are back, and they also have announced that there are going to be some new categories as well. And they've also announced that not everything yet is announced. So it's very, very confusing. I wanted to weigh in a little bit in terms of what these things are. So let me go ahead just quickly and run through the game specifics of the quote-unquote main awards. Best Animations and Display. Best Light Show. Best Theme. Best toys and gimmicks Best theme integration Best music and sound effects Best call outs I think that segregation may be new there Yeah I think so because I think that was part of the Sounds and stuff Best rules Best play field gameplay and layout Best artwork And game of the year They need a best buy Best buy Best value We're going to talk about what we think should be in actually And then let me do what they're calling The write-ins Favorite mod of 2018 Favorite pinball YouTube channel Favorite pinball Twitch streamer Favorite pinball podcast Favorite homebrew pinball machine Favorite pinball location Favorite location pinball That's new Favorite pinball convention Favorite pinball tournament Rookie of the year that's new so a lot of new kind of subcategories some of them i'm less than pleased about well end note they jeff has acknowledged that it's subject to change more categories may be added and descriptions uh may be added with voting options now first regarding the write-ins let me because this is our platform so let me start with what i think should change regarding the write-in process. Actually, because I was on with Zach, I spoke with him afterwards about this.
    27:10
    I'm very much not a fan of write-in votes. It's hard to count. It's hard to calculate. What I would recommend they consider doing is actually, if they plan to launch the final voting at the start of the year, it doesn't have to be long, a couple of weeks or whatever, here at the end of December and have write-in nominations for the write-in categories. Then they have a committee now that's doing the assessments. Tally those up and take your top six or eight or whatever threshold you set, arbitrary threshold, probably the same threshold for all of these, and then present those as radial drop-down vote options like you do the games when the big bulk voting happens. That way you thin the herd and you don't have to count up all the write-ins. Because there are going to be all sorts of weird misspellings and just crazy stuff going on for things like Best Podcast and Best Mod. And this way, you use your committee, you curate it. You'll probably have less volume during the pre-vote nomination period anyway. And it's just a good way so that people don't feel overwhelmed. Because I could see where Jeff and the team that's working on this won't want to take it upon themselves to generate a curated list. Because you could make accusations of bias factoring in. Like if they left us off because, I mean, if they had a rule, like I said, well, we just left off any mixed gaming podcast, that'd be perfectly fair in my view. Right. But that might make all of our fans mad. So you do a write-in. Torches and pitchforks. So you do a write-in for the nomination period. But then if we didn't get enough nomination votes, it's like, well, we didn't have a chance. So just have a list so I can drop down and choose head to head.
    28:52
    Right. That's my thinking. So if y'all are listening, I really recommend you do a write-in as a nomination period. You still let everyone have their say. It'll work great.
    29:03
    And you can do it before January. Just open it up for like 10 to 14 days or whatever. Almost all the votes are going to come in in the first week anyway.
    29:11
    And so that would be my recommendation on how they change the approach. They've already announced their approach change. It sounds like the votes will happen as of the start of the year. Normally, it'd already be going by now. and then they're going to announce them live at Texas Pinball Festival. Do you have any thoughts on the format change? I think it works. I think you'll get more of an interest by having a live event that people can attend than having just the video streamed YouTube thing. I agree with you. I think the only real negative to this approach, and they are planning to try and live stream it from Texas, it is a bit late in the year. it's about a month later than the Oscars does their awards. So it late March is a tad late for talking about the prior year stuff, but I don't think it's a big deal. I think people will be cool with it. And I do think I agree with you. I think it's going to, it'll whip up more interest than how they did it the first time. Of course, it's more known now. So, right. So let's talk about categories, either the game categories or the quote unquote, right in categories. Is there anything you don't like in these lists that you think is inappropriate? I don't really like Best Mod.
    30:23
    Why? Because, frankly, I think the vast majority of mod... It's because, honestly, I think the only mod with enough pull for it to even have a chance is going to be the Penn Stadium stuff. Okay. Well, that's a fair point. I mean, the other things would be Keller DMD. Right. That's pretty broad. I mean, there are only a few mods that actually go into lots of machines. Exactly. And I think they have a... It's the same way I feel about the Best Tournament. I feel like the Best Tournament is just a... It's a giveaway. I would be 100% shocked if Best Tournament is a Pembroke. Well, and I agree with that. That's a good... If Pembroke doesn't get like 90% of the vote, I'll be in shock. Well, mathematically, Pinnberg should automatically win. It's the most attended tournament, period. So it's got more people at it. And it's so popular that I know Jeff with the Pinball Players podcast, when he has guests on, he asks them what their favorite tournament is. He has a qualifier. Other than Pinnberg, what's your favorite? Right. Because everyone says Pinnberg. So, yeah, it's a gimme. There's no competition in that category. Shouldn't even be a write-in. It should be one radial option that says Pinnberg. Right. because that's what it's going to be. Whereas, pinball convention, I can definitely see there will be multiples fighting for that. It's not going to be a gimme that Texas will win that. Expo might win that.
    31:54
    I won't allow it, but it might try. Sure, it's a possibility. Free play Florida might win it. I don't know. Now, here's Indisc. Indisc, wait a minute.
    32:05
    Not Indisc, but what's the... No, Indisc could. I know there's some kind of tournament format things that I've watched in the past where they set it up so that once you win, you can never take part again. Hmm. Interesting. So that's something I could see as a format change, or at least putting anything that wins on a cooldown timer that you can't take part the next year at the very least. Do you think that as small as this hobby is, that that's ideal? No, I just think the best tournament shouldn't exist or Pinnberg should be excluded. But do you also think that maybe that it's nice to recognize a favorite pinball tournament? Because there's nothing inherently special about Pinnberg that couldn't be duplicated by another group if they so chose. I mean, Penberg works because they have a nonprofit that owns a bunch of machines that then organizes the event. But anyone in theory could organize a bunch of machines and try and do the same thing. They just don't. I think at this point, Penberg is so locked into the mentality of the hobby. It is such a major part of the hobby that I don't think another tournament could come in and take it. I don't think it could come in and take that top spot. I can't really fathom it. I mean, they'd literally have to have more machines and more space and more this and that, and somehow get all those people to come to it. And it's not going to happen because a lot of those people, they can only do one big major thing a year, and they go to Pembroke because it's Pembroke. Right, right. I mean, we could fill Bartle Hall here in Kansas City with pinball machines if we could somehow find them and throw to the hugest tournament ever, and we still wouldn't beat Pinnberg. It would be hard, but I could conceptually see it.
    34:15
    I'll tell you the recipe. Here's the recipe. You add it. It's one more day, so now it's a bigger Pinnberg. That's the strategy. I'm not saying that you can – there's not a better than Pinnberg formula. You just have to take Pinnberg to 11. That's the strategy right now. That's the low-hanging fruit. You're just like, we're Pinnberg 1.5. We multiply. Everything's 0.5 more. We have 0.5 more games. We have 0.5 more days. 0.5 more money.
    34:42
    I don't know how you do any of that. I'm just saying. On paper, I could tell you, here's how you beat Pinnberg. You do everything Pinnberg does, but more. You let more people win. I know exactly how you do that. It's money. If you've got enough money, you can just throw money at it until you win. Let's have Josh rededicate the dollar IFPA fees to make IFPAberg.
    35:06
    IFPAberg. Right, but then it's already a tie-in because you're stealing the name. Well, I am, but we could change that. The Grand Slam Masters match play format with strikes and spares and IFPA. And IFPA. I don't know. Tell me about it. Okay, so those are the ones that we think are kind of quite, yeah, I mean, it's a gimme. So that one was a little, I thought it was a little interesting choice. What about the categories that are missing? I mean, they've really broadened this up, especially in the write-in section. However, while you go about broadening things up, there are, and again, they've noted they've not picked everything yet. There, I think, are some interesting missing categories in this still. So I'm going to give you one that I'll start with that I thought was sort of interesting. We recognize moving pictures. why aren't we recognizing still photography? Is it too niche? I don't think so.
    36:03
    That's the argument I think would be made. I mean, I could see. I mean, so, but we're recognizing best tournament and there's only one that's going to win. I mean, like Gene X does a lot of photography at tournament, but you also have people that take, I mean, I'm just, again, If we're thinking about what are the arts that get applied to the various medias get applied to the medium of pinball, best photographer wouldn't, it would fit. I mean, it would fit, but I almost wonder if that wouldn't fit better. If you took not just, not, not just as best photographer, but maybe flipped it and went for something like best social media presence type thing. Hmm. Interesting. Because most people anymore, when they're looking at the photography stuff, this and that, they're looking at it. It's all on Instagram and Facebook and this and that.
    37:00
    Best social media influencer. Yeah, something like that. Yeah, that's a good point. Now, here's one that touches on me. So, of course, I saved it for second, so I didn't seem quite so biased. Why isn't their favorite author? because Tom Clancy's already dead. I know. It's sad. But favorite pinball author, which he never wrote in, to my knowledge, because the Ruskies weren't trying to undermine us.
    37:27
    This is the one, obviously, that I most associate with for those who are not long-time listeners. I've written a number of articles for the last couple of years, really.
    37:40
    It's not just articles. Later on, we're going to talk about pinball magazine number five so there's print there's print articles there's print interviews there's books like todd tucky's book okay there was a big backlash about how that turned out but conceptually shouldn't an effort stern's coffee table but it didn't come out but conceptually is it not a category you're recognizing people with you sorry zach you're recognizing people with youtube channels most of the information gathered in pinball that people consume is written at this point, not video. So why isn't it on this list? It seems glaring to me. The only thing, and again, because I've heard from some people that have been helping on this, that I understand why it's not yet been determined is that there's been a struggle with the phrasing because there's the concern about, well, do you do best book and then best article and then best interview and the best opinion piece. No. This isn't a bunch of literary awards. Here's what you do. You choose favorite author. That way no one's competing against themselves if they wrote multiple things. And if it's unfair that people who wrote articles are put up against people who wrote books, tough. I mean, it's just an award. Who cares? But the category is a glaring omission. I definitely think that it's a glaring omission. This Week in Pinball's site revolves around having – I mean, yeah, he's mostly summarizing the news, but it's still article. I mean, you could construe it as articles. He runs guest articles. Pinball News runs articles. Credit.pinball is an article site. Pinball Magazine is full of articles. It's really weird not to have anything for writing at this point. So I'm hoping that the committee, who I'm sure is listening intently to me right now, it should be in there. If you want to disqualify me because I pushed it, go ahead. But it should be in there. You should be recognizing people who take the time to write. Yeah. I definitely think that it definitely has a place in there, even more than, like I said, the photographer or social media presence. I think that has a bigger – I see the challenge on the photographer. I do. Now, here's another one, though, that I think is glaring. Website. There are a lot of – because it's a key resource. So I segregate it from writing because it depends on the website. But you have forum sites like Tilt Forums and Pinside. You have things like the IPDB, Massive Resource Site. You have things like the IFPA website, Massive Resource for Tournament Scheduling, Finding Tournaments. You've got things like Pinball Map. those are web-based tools let's i would just say favorite website to encapsulate them it seems weird not to have them now again my sources indicate that the struggle hasn't been that websites aren't worthy but rather do you if you just said favorite website is it not like the pinball tournament thing and then pin side just wins because everyone's on pin side would it be better to go with best resource?
    40:54
    I like the idea, but without a definition, like are we going to have like a three-sentence definition beside, are people going to know what that means? No, that's a valid point because I just, it's one of those things. Now that may be okay if they do what I suggested at the start of this and is they run like a nomination write-in period and then they just let people in the main voting choose based off of what the early adopters sort of sent in what are considered best resources. I like that idea because you could say in the write-in, I think you'd get away with having more specificity in these things like saying, well, you know, best social media influencer would be things like good Instagram posts, good use of photos, Facebook, Twitter, all that. And then on this, you can say things like web resources, apps like Pindigo, things like that could be included with that. IPDB. Sure. And then like on author, you could do things like books, articles, magazines, editorials.
    41:52
    You could explain a little better if it was sort of broken out like that. So in that case, yeah, I think the idea would be I would agree with you. Start with resources. See what you get out of it. And then if the hobby gets to the point where it feels like, well, phone apps are like their own thing and there are enough of them to be worthwhile. Right. Then in 2020, you could discuss if you need to make another modification towards that. Yeah, because like you said, I'm just – I'm in the concern that forums will dominate that type of – just your website. Yeah, I think – and again, I understand that they probably don't want to – it's not a bunch of awards for the web. So they probably don't want to end up with like five different awards recognizing different types of websites. Right. And I don't blame them. But I could see splitting forums and putting everything else under resources. I could. But if they only want one award, I think you still put something in, resources or websites or whatever, rather than be like not put anything in because it's too hard for you to carve it up. If it's too hard to carve up, don't carve it up. Trust your voters to carve it up. Makes sense. And then you can work with whatever. It doesn't matter if it's unfair. You guys already chose favorite pinball tournament, which doesn't make any sense. So you've just got to accept the fact that you've already done. You've already accepted unfair. What is Rookie of the Year? I don't even know how you would, how would you choose that? I asked someone what they thought Rookie of the Year was, and they told me that the intent, they believe, is Best New Designer. Well, that's not what it says. But if that's the case, then it's either Keith Elwin or Eric Meunier. Those are the only two that would, in theory, be eligible, because they're the only two that are brand new this year. Scott Denise was last year. Right. So, but it's not, why is that even a write-in? But would it be best for Rookie, would you consider a new person coming into the competitive scene? Because typically when you think Rookie, you'd think something like that. Based off of how it's described in this article, yes. I would have thought it was anyone who's new to the hobby and did something. Something enough that I would know to write their name in. Right.
    44:03
    It's a weird one. I'd probably shed it, honestly. Yeah, I think I would too, just because I feel like it doesn't settle in quite right. Right. If the intent is actually like rookie in the industry of the year, then I really think the committee should not open that up to write-ins. It should be like game specific and it should be a bunch of drop downs. And you should have gone through and looked at the recent employees that had something come out. And that means new artists and stuff. That's fine, but that is too nebulous to trust to a write-in situation. Again, if you want to go with like the nomination write-in period, that's probably a happy medium to kind of play it safe. But I've been in this hobby for years. I am having trouble interpreting what that means. Yeah, I don't know. I mean, that's – I don't see what it – it's so broad that it could – I could think of a bunch of things you could qualify in there. but that doesn't mean any of them will actually qualify in there.
    45:05
    But anyway, that's pretty much all I had to say on it. Now, once the actual like final voting period starts, we'll probably weigh in with what we think are our particular picks. Yeah. And probably include what we think will win. Yes, because I'm pretty sure our particular picks won't be what we, well, no, we have to show ourselves some support of course, but, but yeah, it'll be, so that'll be interesting. I always think it's neat. Awards are stuff. is neat because it's I think it's interesting to see who who wins what and I remember like and it's not just the twippies they but Jeff has done a really good job getting the the twippies a lot of exposure and there seemed to be quite a bit of more hype than I had expected when he did it last year yeah so that's pretty exciting and we'll actually be at Texas now I have to decide do I go and watch the twippies or do I take advantage of it being super popular and then maybe can get in some reduced lines for some of the new games that are coming out and take a back. Cause Hey, I never have like a little red band to stay after hours. Yeah. Nobody likes me. Nobody likes you.
    46:09
    This is me. You don't get all the, I'd watch that. I watched that this morning. It was hilarious. So we're done with pinball news. So we talked a little bit about writing and pinball. So I want to talk a little about Pinball Magazine number five because I have finally finished reading the entire thing.
    46:32
    And I remember Jonathan, the editor, had contacted me way back when it was first apparently being sent. My first copy, I think, got lost in the mail. He actually had several from that batch that didn't get to where they were supposed to go. But eventually I got my copy of the magazine. So let me start with just some general thoughts. and I've now loaned it to Tony. Tony hasn't had a chance to read any of it. Yeah, it's sitting right beside me. He's got it so he can take it with him because it is huge. It is, as they say, more like a book than a magazine. There are pros and cons to that, though, and I want to be fair with it, so let me stop. You know, it kind of looks like one of those, I don't know if you ever saw, the big wedding magazines that you'll see. Yeah, pick your gown, Tony. Yeah. I think that you'll look good in a traditional cream. No, I'm a red guy. Okay. So, it's massive. The quality is very, very good in terms of the paper, the covers, the look of the photos in it. The editing work is solid. You can tell in my view that it's a one-man show who's really doing all of the editing. there are a number of errors that stood out to me while I was going through it like lines that kind of repeated on themselves a bit nothing nothing substantive in a really distracting sense but but enough that I I wasn like going through with a red pen I noticed it while I was just casually reading it So I say present but not distracting I think the overall layout choices were good
    48:07
    So you could see the experience behind it. So bottom line is I thought it looked pretty professional.
    48:15
    My takeaway on the content of Pinball Magazine number five, this is the one with the cover dedicated primarily to Wayne Nyans, though. you see a few other people in the that have articles as well that are represented on the cover page it is in my view way too heavy on Wayne Nyans because this is a magazine and not a book I felt that it really did not need more than the interview that it had with Wayne and and here's why the magazine goes through an extensive, extensive interview with Wayne. It walks through every single game that he did with the company that got produced. It walks through a lot of the transitions in terms of when he first got into the industry before he was even with Gottlieb, up through when he was chief engineer, has some of his general thoughts on the current state of the hobby. It's, as I said now for the third time, extensive. Let me set aside any critique whatsoever to the interview in terms of how it flows, how long it is, how it was edited. Let me just set all that aside. That alone is such a huge part of the magazine that I feel it's unbalanced. It's unbalanced. It's too tilted towards talking about Wayne Nyhan. So you run into a situation where if you're not into Wayne Nyans, you're going to have a lot of trouble going through and digesting this magazine. So here's part of the challenge, though, because you have that big interview, which is the biggest piece about him. However, there is a sizable article that a historian wrote about Wayne Nyans that happens before the interview. The problem that I had is because it's like a book and I read it sequentially. I read the article from the historian and then I read the interview from Wayne and it's just duplicative. It's like Wayne touches on practically everything that the historian touched on. So it's just, I felt like I was reading the same stuff over and over again. And it was weird. I was like, why was there an article from the historian in at all? If you're doing a comprehensive interview with the primary subject, I thought it was an odd decision.
    50:30
    Also, and Tony and I actually talked a little bit about this because I mentioned it because as I noted, I write articles as well in pinball. I write a number of articles that have been historically oriented. I actually had someone once on social media criticize one of my articles. He felt he used more words than this. I'm going to describe it as he felt that I was cold. That's how I describe it. He felt that my writing was emotionless and that I was too fact oriented in how I present information. And those are fair criticisms. My problem with what this historian did was it was too emotional.
    51:11
    I've never seen so many exclamation points in an article. And Tony's chuckling a little bit because I pointed and I just turned to a random two pages and I pointed out all these sentences that were just like exclaiming things and being excited. And that's just the difference in style. I don't like articles, historic articles that are written with a preferential tone, like siding with the subject. You want to say something's impressive, you can say it's impressive, but you then present the data of why it's impressive. You don't just go, that's incredible! Exclamation points are like my least favorite form of punctuation, period. Least. I use semicolons more than exclamation points. No, it's just, no. But this is just me, so bear in mind, some of this is my particular opining. So I didn't care for, while the content was great, I didn't care for the structure of the art of the historical article. And then I definitely did not care for the interview following it. And then just duplicate the art. I felt the historical article could have been shed, even if it was written in my preferred style. It's just you had the interview. You didn't need it. After that are kind of some testimonials about Wayne Nyans. Not even everyone really knew him. So it was, again, we've already, by the time you get through the historical article and the interview with him, you're 250 pages in to a 360-page magazine, and it's just too much. Those should have been dropped. You didn't need them. I get it. It's really celebrating Wayne Nyhan's life, and there's maybe an extra complication here because Wayne is still alive and he received this, but it's a magazine. It's not something just for one person, and it was just way too heavy on him.
    53:00
    The rest of the magazine with the non-Nyans material is much more with what I associate with a traditional magazine. And I was always more of a person who would read like Time or Newsweek or things like that. So there were a lot more topical variety in the rest of the magazine, and the size of the pieces also varied quite a bit more. but it's very skewed to interviews. Almost every article in this magazine, really other than the first historical article and the testimonial pieces, are interviews. So my overall verdict, Tony, for you when you look through this is Pinball Magazine number five is an excellent choice if you want to know more about classic Gottlieb and Wayne Nines. It's also great if You love to read interviews. But if you really don't like the EM era or hate Gottlieb or hate Wayne for whatever reason, I don't know how you could. But if you did, this is not the magazine for you. It's got way too much on Wayne Nines to be considered, in my view, a true variety magazine. And it's so interview heavy that if you were hoping for things like opinion pieces and just like there's only one historical article and it's got the interview subject on it. So that's kind of moot. It's just, there's really not a lot of other stuff going on with it to fit what I consider a traditional magazine, but the production quality is excellent. So if you're interested in learning about Wayne and I learned a lot from it, then it's a good, it's a good choice to read, but just go in understanding that it's the Wayne show and everything else is just a tacked on interview. Which I mean, as long as you know, that's what you're going for. That's nothing wrong with that. Yeah. Well, I mean, I see with the size why it took him over a year since Pinball Magazine number four to come out with this. Holy crap, there is a lot of content. Yeah, it looks impressive just flipping through it. But that much Wayne-heavy stuff, honestly, at that stage, I feel that it might have been a better marketed, better use of the material to have actually compiled a book being a biography of Wayne. I mean, this is long enough to be a book. You might as well do it and then just do more of a variety thing on the magazine rather than push this page limit. But again, these are just personal choices I would have made. I'm no editor. You used to do layout and stuff with newspaper work. I did do layout and stuff. I did a lot of layout and stuff back in high school. It'll be interesting after you go through it just to hear what your thoughts are on it. Because really, there's not a lot of print material that covers pinball anymore. And I think this effort, Pinball Magazine, is really seen currently as the creme de la creme within our hobby. So it was neat. I'm glad I got a copy, though.
    55:44
    Yeah, I'm looking forward to going through it. But anyway, that's my personal opinion on that. And we only have one more thing in pinball, Tony. Yay! 20 questions. 20. For those that don't know, but everyone... No one can see your fingers, so no one cares.
    56:01
    We'll start with Tony getting to ask me a series of yes or no questions. It will be about a pinball machine. For the first 15 questions, it's closed book for Tony. But then after the 15th question, he can turn to his laptop and start doing searches at any resource that he wants to help him sleuth out the answer. So go ahead and ask your first question whenever you are ready. Is it an EM? Yes.
    56:27
    You had your run of easy sterns, so you're going to have to suffer for a little bit. You're going to have to suffer.
    56:36
    Is it a Gottlieb? No. Is it a Williams? Yes. Is it from 60 to 65? No. 65 to 70? No. That's question five. 70 to 75? Yes. Does it have two flippers? Yes. Let me rephrase. No, you don't get to rephrase. It has two flippers, Tony. Okay. Is it sci-fi themed? No. Is it card themed? No. Is it sports themed? No. That's question 10. Is it from 70? No. 71? No. 72? No. 73? No. 74 Yes, that's question 15 You may now search Wow, that was quick and brutal And Don't have nearly as much information as I normally have That's Going to be a little rough Nah, I don't know It should be too horrible I have the years So that's going to help So Looking at a Williams from 74.
    57:44
    Is it Skylab? Yes. It's the only game I've played that entire list. Yep. Woohoo! It's not sci-fi, though, because it was real. Yeah. No, I can see that argument. So, question 16, Skylab. For those that may not know, because it was quite a while ago, I used to own a Skylab, so Tony played it several times. Uh, yep. I said I pulled the whole list up, and it's like, I... And I knew you were nervous when you realized that. It's like two flippers. Unless I'm going back to some really weird single flipper Harry Williams game, they all have at least two flippers. I know. I said that and I'm like, oh, bugger. I misworded that. Because normally does it have more than two flippers is how I normally ask. It is. But it worked out. It does just have two flippers. Yeah, no. 1974 May game. Steve Kordek designed it. It was a good game. I didn't mind it. It's got like five captive balls are trapped in the middle, and that takes up so much space. There's really nothing else to do but go for them. That's my frustration with it. Right. But it let me work on my post passes and stuff, so it was a good game to learn on. I don't miss it, though. That was actually my very first pinball machine to ever own. My brother-in-law found it at a used video game store that was going out of business and sent me a message. And then I got it, and then I had to fix it. And then I, it was working, but I broke it by the time I got home. And then that's when I started to learn about things. And then I was like, oh, wait, they're also solid state games. So my second game was a solid state game. Okay. Do we want to do this on your side? If you wish. We haven't done that in a while. I don't know. I've typically been just not going. Well, let me minimize my window. Not that I imagine you're going to ask me Skylab, but it could happen. I've considered it in the past. not Skylab, but I've considered immediately following it up with the one you just asked. And it always seemed tacky. So I haven't done it yet. Yet. All right. Is it electromechanical? No. Is it a dot matrix display or more modern? So let me be fair. Is it a dot matrix display or, yeah, let me just say that. Is it a dot matrix display? No. Is it from 1980 to 1990? Yes. Is it a Gottlieb? No. Is it a Bally? No. Five. Is it a Stern? No. Is it a Williams? Yes. Is it from 1980 to 1985? No, it is not. 1986 to 1988? Yes. Is it 1986? No. That was question number 10. 87? Yes. Is it a Barry Osler design? Yes. Is it Space Shuttle? No. Yeah, I think that's earlier than that year anyway.
    60:32
    Is it Pinbot? No. Is it Comet? No. That was 15. You can now use resources. Yeah, this is a first. So I will use my resources. I ain't too proud to beg.
    60:45
    Let me get my Williams list up. Oops, not that one. Name changes makes it weird. We'll just do all years. And then we will pick our 1987.
    61:00
    Is it Fire? It is. What a turd. But it has an exclamation point. Yes. Good pick. I have played it. Yep.
    61:11
    We saw that really nice one at Texas two years ago. Was it two years ago? Yeah, I think so. I think I've played it another time as well.
    61:25
    Symmetrical play field. The theme is cool, but that's really all that's going for it. But that was a good one. I'm not a big, broadly speaking, I'm not a huge fan of Osler games anyway. Yeah. It's a mix, but let's see. That's one that had been in my mind to use for one in the past, but I didn't. But after the discussion we just had on the magazine, you're talking about exclamation points. I remembered Fire had an exclamation point in its title. And Pinbot was 86.
    61:54
    And Space Shuttle was 87. So Space Shuttle was the right year. I was wrong when I doubted myself, so I guess it was good that... No, that was Space Station. Excuse me. Space Station was 87. Shuttle was 84. 84, okay. Yeah. Interesting. I can't remember the last time I played Space Shuttle, actually. But Fire stuck with me a lot more. Yeah. Not in a good way, but... Okay, wow. So we both had to go to question 16. That's a first for you. The first we've ever tied. It is the furthest I've ever had to go down, yeah. I just I spent way too long on a well you know it just depends on where I go with which manufacturers right and if you get lucky if you get the year guess immediately that saves a bunch of questions that's why we have 20 questions the thing that I have to wonder is would I have gotten it if I didn't have the resource and I don't know that I would have because fire is not a top tier ostler that I think of So maybe, though, because if I had the years, that would have rolled out a lot of the stuff I know you did. Right. But still, it would have been. Yeah. Without the resource, I would never get anything.
    63:13
    Well, we're done with our pinball segment now. But before we go formally into the video game segment, I want to use a transitional segment. And this was suggested by a friend of the show and former guest host, Jason Knapp. and he thought we should be doing a holiday gift guide. So I figured we're before Christmas, probably too close to Christmas for you to successfully order any of this stuff. So let's do it now. This is the best time to do it. There are other times a year that you want to give gifts and not everyone gives gifts for Christmas. Some people are celebrating other holidays that happen later. So we can do this now. And it's going to be a mix of stuff related to video games and pinball. So I put it in sort of as a transition to talk about. And there's going to be links in the show notes to these particular items. And there are really only four things I wanted to note.
    64:02
    One of them, and this one was from Jason, and I'm sure it was a direct dig at me and my Premier Games, but there is a Gottlieb sort of storefront at Cafe Press. It has shirts, keychains, clocks, coasters, and mugs themed around famous Gottlieb pinball machines. Oh, a lot of them are true classics, not the stuff I have. Right. So it's something for you guys to consider if you happen to have an EM collector that you know, or perhaps there's someone who's fighting against the darkness with their lone Gottlieb flashlight. And Cafe Press is one of those nice sites because you can find a little bit of everything there, honestly, for anything if you search for it. There's always so much stuff to find there. Yeah, my sister keeps asking me why I don't put our shirt design up and let people order T-shirts through Cafe Press. And I've actually never sold a shirt for the podcast. They've always been given out to those who are worthy. Yeah. And going up with that, I want to also put out another place like Cafe Press, tpublic.com.
    65:11
    If you go to tpublic.com, they've got all sorts of pop culture T-shirts and stickers and this and that. But that includes, if you just search pinball, they've got a ton of pinball-related stuff.
    65:24
    We'll have a link in there. I've got it already. Then on the video game side, I want to talk a little bit about items we've talked about before, and that would be the NES Classic and the Super NES Classic. Those are the little, tiny, retro consoles of the Nintendo Entertainment System and the Super Nintendo Entertainment System that came out a while ago, especially the NES Classic. What I like about these is that I think they're really good for fans who remember those old historic classic consoles. They look like the consoles just shrunk, and they both got popular games that were out on those systems, but they integrate really easily with modern HDMI television. So, I mean, if you want to do it cheaper, you can always put together a RetroPie. If you want to go true old school, you can always actually get out those consoles and get things that will convert the signals and put them out on modern televisions. But this is the easy, branded way to get things that look and feel like the originals, but with a modern sort of twist on how they sync up and they're allowed to be played. Also, I just saw a couple days ago, Nintendo has indicated that after this holiday season, they are finally discontinuing both of these units, and they do not plan to come back and make them again. is at least the supposition. So 2018 holiday season is probably your last opportunity to not have to for sure worry about the scalper problem if you want to jump on with their regular retailing now. We ran into that problem with the NES Classic for quite a while until they rebranded it. And the NES Classic started to have that problem, but then they actually got the production counts out better. The NES Classic is a $60 console and it has 30 games. The Super Nintendo Classic is $80 and it has 20 games.
    67:14
    It's what it is. It's nice for the people who are looking for those specific things. Yes. And then the final item I had just to point out in the holiday gift guide is Tilt Cycle. This is back on the pinball side. That's Dan Burfield. He upcycles pinball parts into art. and so he's got a lot of stuff on his website in terms of things like nightlights to like sections of play fields that he turns into wall art and he does do custom jobs and I know I've talked before about I have a and that's sort of the biggest item I think a lot of people think of is getting a full play field populated with color changing LEDs those start at about $300 if you're just getting a simple wall hanging but he'll make coffee tables and stuff as well So you can actually commission him. You can send him a play field to use if you've got one in mind. But he also has a lot of old trashed play fields that aren't really good for anything other than art that are available. And he lists he tries to keep that update on his Web site. So, again, it's way too late in the year for a custom job. I don't know what his average runtime is. When I contacted him, it was a two month wait. But it's something to bear in mind if you happen to know someone who really would like to hang something like that up on the wall. but he's got things that are ready to go that are in his store that you can go and purchase. So those are just a few suggestions that we have. And there's the stuff that I think everyone probably already knows about who's into anything pop culture-y or geeky, like Jinx and ThinkGeek especially. They're places that have a fairly large number of video game-related and pop culture-related items that can be found for your geeky needs. I know I've ordered from ThinkGeek a fair amount of times just for fun, interesting little things. Yeah. Yeah, I've gone and looked at their stuff from time to time. I'm trying to remember the last time I bought from them. I'm not sure. I lose track. I know I bought from them several times. I lose track of this stuff. Yeah. So, yeah. So, Jinx and ThinkGeek are good options as well. So let's go and start talking about video games. Tony, you found there's been happenings. There has been happenings. You've been finding the happenings. And probably a good place to start is the one we sort of left off with last time, and that's Fallout 76.
    69:40
    Yeah. Baggate. Yeah, Baggate. They finally, Bethesda finally decided to admit that there was an issue. And they decided that they would put it out there and they would replace those nylon duffel bags with the correct canvas bags that they had initially said or shown were going to be part of it. Okay.
    70:04
    Problem solved. Let's move on. Yeah, it'd be great if that's how that had happened. Oh. Unfortunately, they set it up so that you had to put in a support ticket with a picture copy of your receipt and all that stuff. So that you could be sent, once the manufacturing is done, they would send you the replacement back. Okay. That seems cool. It's obvious. It seems pretty standard. Except for they messed up in their programming of their support ticket thing. So then when people started putting in their support tickets, they started receiving other people's support tickets in their getting access to them. So suddenly they could see other people's names and email addresses and partial credit card numbers and home addresses and everything else. So Bethesda fell on their face again They had to shut down their whole support system And do a quick patch But Well at least the full credit card numbers were properly stored And it wasn't compromised in that regard Yeah no they were only sending partials But they were sending full addresses And full names So we could do holiday hampers with all these people Yes we could We could send every one of them a hamper With a canvas bag in it We could solve this problem We could solve this problem. We could be the greatest podcast.
    71:33
    How much money would it cost for us to solve the problem for Bethesda, do you think? I would not be surprised if it cost you a Jersey Jack. We cannot solve the problem for Bethesda. It's unfortunate. We will have to remain in obscurity. And following up to Bethesda woes with Fallout 76 during the Game Awards that happened a couple of weeks ago Obsidian recently purchased by Microsoft Yeah But they released their official announcement trailer for their new game that is prior to the Microsoft setup, so it was still going to be available on multiple systems. Yep.
    72:14
    The Outer Worlds. Oh, wait, that's the Outer Limits. Outer Worlds. Now, the issue with this and how this hits Bethesda so hard is because The Outer Worlds is done, A, by Obsidian, who are very well known because they did Fallout New Vegas, probably, I would say most likely, the most liked overall of the new Fallout games. Okay. That hurts them a little bit. It also hurts them that the original creators of Fallout, period, are on board on the creation of this game. Maybe a bit. They're not as well known as, I think, maybe hardcore fans. right no I don't disagree with you but and you can tell from the trailer the game has the kind of feel that you would expect from the Fallout series of games the kind of campy jokes and this and that which Bethesda seem to be moving away from right they've been getting more serious now there are things it's not an open world from all the reports we've seen the Outer Worlds is not going to be a big huge open world game like Fallout New Vegas was. But it's still going to be a decent-sized game, and the trailer looks awesome. I was super interested. I didn't know anything. I wasn't following what Obsidian had been working on. I thought, wow, I actually want to play this. And I've been kind of... Fallout 4 didn't really click with me the way I wanted it to. I played a lot of it. I don't want to... The whole base-building thing just kind of pissed me off, and I was like, why is this tacked on here? and Preston pissed me off. But it still had the stories, which kept me relatively about it. Here's the thing with Fallout 4.
    73:57
    I'm pretty sure I've said it on the podcast before. I'll say it again. Probably. The changes Fallout 4 made from Fallout 3 New Vegas for how well it shoots, for its actual first-person shooting stuff, and the way it handles power armor, I enjoyed a lot. the fact that they decided to go full voiced and got rid of all of the good RPG elements and the, uh, trees that you could use for conversations and letting you have skills that would modify those conversations and give you extra abilities here and there. I thought that destruction of the RPG element hurt them very badly. I think they made great strides forward with the actual gameplay, and then they destroyed the RPG element that made it fun, and they tacked on that terrible, terrible, terrible base building mechanic, and they didn't let me kill Preston. Yeah. There were a mix of things. A mix of things. So it was not as good as it had any right to be. But the Outer Worlds may be as good as we hope it will be. I hope so. I've learned to temper my hopes on all things. Yes, good. Hopefully it will turn out to be the thing. You have learned well.
    75:21
    Now, Steam has been the main place to go for video games on the PC. Now, our listeners may not know that once upon a not that long ago, you were not a particularly positive person on Steam. No, I despised Steam when Steam first started. And for the first several years, Steam was in place. At one point when Steam first started, it required you to be online, and your games would not work if you were not online, which was deeply annoying to me because I didn't always have good connectivity at the time. Hey, that's what sunk Microsoft's Xbox One launch was their first day. And they didn't even implement that, and they still paid a hefty price for that. Yep, just for saying they were going to. For the arrogance to say they would do it. Yep. So that was then. And now I love Steam. I use Steam exclusively because I'm pretty much, well, I can't say I'm PC exclusive anymore. I mean, I've got a Switch and I've got a PS4 now. That's true. And you're also not Steam exclusive because for a number of years, big games like games like Overwatch aren't on Steam. Right. They tend to be on their own individual like Battle.net. Yep. And there's a couple. Origins. There have been a few. There's been a few. Big publishers can do it because it's like we don't need to kneel to you. we can make our own thing because we're so popular, people will turn to us. Right, and most of their systems have sucked. And in all honesty, I mean, there's also other small competitors. There's GOG, good old games, that start out with just old games is all they did, like really old games, and they'd actually bundle them and launch them with a DOS box launcher so that you could run it and it would work on your system.
    77:02
    The Humble Store for the Humble Bundle Store now sells games as well. but Epic Game Studios probably best known because they're the creators of the phenomenon that is Fortnite sure, some of us more old school people know them for their very coveted Unreal Engine that a lot of companies turn to it is incredibly popular Unreal Engine it's a good engine and they've decided that they're going to start their own store to counter Steam now the big thing here is they are going they are pushing their revenue sharing and how they take their cuts is the biggest difference they are going to be much more indie friendly according to their announcements and they're going to be more friendly to normal publishers because their revenue cut is 12% okay Okay, well, that seems like a decent chunk of money. Steam's is $30.
    78:06
    Well, $30 for the little guys. Now, it was $30 for everybody. It was, yeah. Up until three days before the Epic Store announcement, Steam actually made their own announcement where they changed their setting as they sell copies. So they will take 30% of the first $10 million in sales. Once you cross $10 million, they're only going to take 25% once you cross $10 million. Until you hit $50 million worth of sales, after that, they're only going to take 20%. That's it. Okay, so Steam's modifications impact hardly anyone selling in their store. Exactly. it impacts the largest of the large and the breakout insane indie games that blow up like firewatch and stardew valley and stuff like that so what does this mean for the pc gamer as a whole what does this mean for steam i think it's good in the long run i don't think that Epic has the ability or the backing, even though they were recently just valued at like $15 billion worth thanks to the Fortnite and everything else. But I don't think that Epic is going to have enough pull to destroy Steam. But I think that we're going to get a better overall network of game sales available because Steam is going to actually have competition. So they're not going to be able to just do the, what are you going to do? Go to somebody else? We've already got everything. So I think we'll probably see some changes coming that are going to be... I don't think it's going to be bad in the long run. No, I don't really see a downside to it. I think Epic's decision is really smart for a couple of reasons. From the Epic perspective, I think this is really the only way that they could have launched a true Steam competitor. They can't really sell the games for less. So the only thing they can really do is try and convince the creators that their platform is more friendly to them. So you need to come over and do it. Now, the main thing, though, is whether or not some of the larger distributors might look and say, well, Steam's got the bigger baked-in audience. We really need to stay with them. This seems like it's going to attract more of the indies. The problem there, that could be very good. I mean, ultimately, I think it's good for Epic, except I'm assuming Epic does not want to turn into some of the bad parts of Steam where it's like, I can't find anything anymore. It's all, it's so full of trash. It's not curated. Right. It just feels, I look at Steam and I constantly, anytime I turn on Steam, it's like, here's a bunch of announcements for games. And I'm looking at the homepage and I'm like, I've heard of three of these. Right. And everything else is indie trash. And everything else, yeah, isn't just as indie. it's probably trash. I don't know any of these names. In fact, people are so sensitive on the curator side. That's been one of the criticisms to the PS4 and the Xbox One is they liberalized since the last generation. They started letting a lot more indies on. They reduced a lot of barriers but people started to feel there's just a lot of stuff coming through that's not curated. They curate so much more than Steam. It's not even funny. so Steam puts I mean people use like RPG Maker and make something an RPG Maker and then put it up on Steam as a game and sell it for $15 but what this could also do is Steam is going to have to have as we used to call it come to Jesus meeting here and sit down and say Epic has been I've read the news one of the news releases on this where they were they were very blatant about oh yeah we've done our analysis we know we make plenty of money with 12% is no problem we're going to make so much money with 12%. I mean, that's practically what I came across. Well, and that's the thing. 12% is, we almost feel like we're still too greedy at 12%. That's kind of how the vibe I got from it was. And then you've got Steam, who's going to start, for all intents and purposes, is still at the 30%, more than twice as much. Right.
    82:32
    There's going to be issues rolling out. There's a lot to be said for lowest bidder. And Epic has worked in an extra deal because if you make a game and you release a game using the Unreal Engine, you owe Epic Games 5% of your sales. If you make a game with the Unreal Engine and you release it on the Epic Studio, you don't owe them that 5%. They'll just take the 12%. So you save on your licensing fee, basically. Exactly. Okay. There are a lot of really moderate tier indie games that are relying on the Unreal Engine. Not AAA. We're looking at this is going to be a home of AAA games. But the Unreal Engine is such that small teams can use it and make things look polished. That's why it's so popular is that it's a really polished looking engine. Because they made the engine. They did all the work. You skip that step. Right. So, okay. You know what? I think this is probably, in my view, the most significant challenge to Steam that Steam has ever faced. I agree. Since they basically monopolized the market. It is completely their biggest challenge. And it's going to get even harder for them because the Epic Store has already announced three exclusives. One of which is going to be hard. It is a full one-year exclusive, Super Meat Boy Forever.
    83:55
    Okay. Well, they're a darling indie studio. They are. And they will sell more than $10 million in sales. Oh, yeah, easily. They also have an exclusive on Ashen. Okay. And Supergiant Games' new game, Hades, went into early access only on the Epic Store. Okay. I don't know, from what I've heard, if it will be once it goes into full release, if it will only be on the Epic Store. But the early access is only on the Epic Store. because that's another thing is the Epic Store is set up specifically where Steam tacked on some stuff. So if you have early access, you can talk to the game producers and this and that. Oh, probably to help them with development. Epic Games designed their store so you have a direct conduit when you're in an early access game for that contact and moving back and forth. So, yeah, this is going to be one of those things that is going to make it put up or shut up time for Steam. Yeah. I mean, worst comes to worst, if both of the stores are successful, it's not a big deal. People will just have both clients installed on their computer. It's really not a big deal. Right. It's not. It's just like having – I mean, I have Battle.net on my computer now instead of just – I can still have a shortcut to any game on my desktop. Just double-click it and go to the game. Right. And that's what I do. I don't have to think about it. I do things the exact same way, and I'm not worried about it. I'll buy it wherever it's the better deal and whoever has what I want. That's why I've got Battle.net and everything. Sorry, Steam. You're going to have to make some bigger sacrifices than this. You guys might have to actually go Valve and start making some games again instead of just relying on your cash cow. Yes, they're going to have to. And our last bit of video game news. It's been a tough year for Blizzard. Not as tough as it's been for Bethesda, but yes.
    85:43
    Blizzard's year was going really good up until BlizzCon. Then they took a couple punches. I mean, they're not out of it. They're not down. They haven't been rocked nearly as bad as Bethesda, but it's been pretty rough. Yeah. And they just made a final announcement for the year that makes it even rougher. They are pulling large portions of the development team for their MOBA Heroes of the Storm and redeploying them to other projects. Well, as far as MOBAs go, my understanding is Heroes of the Storm is not a particularly popular one. No. It is definitely in the number three spot of the big three. If it's not in the number four spot, it's a distant three. League of Legends and Dota are the top dogs. And they have been for years. Right. And they're going to remain to be. But this change is big enough that there's going to be some serious issues, and there's already been a little backlash.
    86:45
    In their statement, they say, and I quote, Despite the change, Heroes of the Storm remains our love letter to Blizzard's worlds and characters. We'll continue actively supporting the game with new heroes, themed events, and other content that our community loves, though the cadence will change. Ultimately, we're setting the game up for long-term sustainability. We're so grateful for the support the community has shown from the beginning And the development team will continue to support heroes with the same passion, dedication, and creativity That has made the game such a unique experience End quote Okay, so they're not putting it on end of life In terms of that they're still going to plan to do some updates Obviously with a reduced team it's not going to be as aggressive Right And that's the thing is As of when this announcement made It had been six weeks since the last hero was released, and that's the longest there's ever been between heroes, and it's going to be a while. So the transition has probably already happened. Correct. But that all sounds happy. Like, well, we're not killing it, but we're going to. Right. We're just, this isn't our main concern. We're going to keep it going. They've always done this. And I'm sure they're going to keep it going. They always move teams around as they need to to the more upcoming projects. But in addition. It's normal, Tony. It's normal. they also announced that they're ending all eSports that has to do with Heroes of the Storm they've totally given up on Heroes of the Storm they've thrown in the towel that's the sign that made it clear that it doesn't matter if they're still going to occasionally plug in a hero this move means Heroes of the Storm is as again we say in the industry, lull casual yeah and that's exactly what they've done because MOBAs are about eSports
    88:28
    Now, maybe this is just a case that Blizzard has looked, they've run the numbers, they've seen that Heroes of the Storm has not successfully taken market share from Dota and or League of Legends, and they're probably seeing a lot more results on the esporting side for their Overwatch game. And they're just like, we would rather play, my hope as an Overwatch fan, as an Overwatch League fan is, they want to play harder on the team-based shooter side, which is a market they own. Yes, it is. and have recognized that they did not get the penetration that they needed for the MOBA side and that it's not worth the investment in the prize pool money and running these championship leagues and such. But this is an aggressive pullout. So they've given up on the esports side. And because of how MOBAs are, if it's not an esports competitive MOBA, I don't see people seriously playing it. Right. And here's the thing. And it was never a competitive esports thing. Their views, even their grand championship views for their Heroes Global Championship for the finals was pulling less than 50,000 viewers. I mean, we've seen just standard weekly Overwatches that can pull up over those numbers. Oh, yeah. And that was just not important games. That wasn't finals. That was just trash in the middle of the season. The Overwatch contenders out of North America can get 5,000 viewers on it. And that's the amateur. That's AAA. Right. So, no, this is, they've abandoned this game. This game, at this point, Heroes of the Storm is, it is on LifeSport. It's just like Diablo 3. It's not gone. They're not getting rid of it. They're not doing anything with it. Right. The thing is, since Diablo 3 isn't an eSport game, I think that's more, people are more accepting that that's just normal end of life for a game. whereas with this, well, no one was really playing it, so I think this will blow over. It just doesn't look the best because people, I think, are going to be hypersensitive to Blizzard ever since the Diablo mobile. Right, and we're going to see where do they move these people to. I think that's going to be the big thing that comes out. I think most of these production people, according to the statement, they have secret projects that are in the works. They're non-announced projects. Let's go with that. As opposed to secret projects. Blizzard's not afraid of creating a new IP. So they're doing that. I wouldn't be surprised if a lot of these people were moved to, A, I think almost my guess would be a huge chunk of the esports team, especially the back team, will probably be shifted into places for league and contenders. Sure. if they need more people because of the more aggressive schedule. Yeah, and they may.
    91:21
    Like I said, not on-air staff, but your backstage, your production people. Because with them pushing how much they're running, their production people are going to be going continuously anymore.
    91:35
    They could reinvest some of this prize money stuff into trying to do something a little more professional with contenders. Overwatch contenders is not. This is, all right. But everyone will tell you about how reflexes, youth, like by the age of 28, you're starting to decline on what your peak reflexes can be and all that. And how important that is in particular games varies on the game. I mean, look at the game of pinball. It's very reaction-based, but some of our very top people are people that are well over 40. So that said, the bigger challenge that esports has is unless you're winning championships, you can't often make a living at it. Overwatch League's big claim to fame was we're doing this like a professional sports league. Everyone gets at least $50,000, which is plenty to live on. But Contenders doesn't have that. And in contenders, if you're trying to get into Overwatch League and you're not good enough, you're in contenders. But contenders is not a cash cow. You can't make a living at contenders. So it's mostly kids living in the basements trying to become Overwatch League worthy, and then they could make their own living. That's not a great farm system. Baseball doesn't have that farm system. A AAA ball player makes a living playing AAA ball. Right. I think what we're more likely to see, and they've already shown some of that, and they showed some of it in Heroes of the Storm, because in addition to the big main Heroes of the Storm championship thing, they had what they called Heroes of the Dorm, which was specific for collegiate players. And we've already seen that there are specific collegiate teams in Overwatch because we've seen several times where there have been show matches between some of the league teams and on college campuses with the college teams there and this and that. And I think that that's something we're probably going to see as the most likely growth spot for that kind of thing, like contenders, is collegiate teams and the minor league teams from the Overwatch League teams, like the Hurricane and the, I don't remember, XL2 and... Yeah, Gladiator. I mean, a lot of them have them. A lot of them have their farm teams. Right, but I think those farm teams and then maybe a starting smattering of actual collegiate teams are something we're going to start seeing in the contenders level. And the straight, amateur, a bunch of guys spread all across the country in their mom's basements or in their apartments playing is going to start to slide to the wayside. Yeah, we'll have to see. Because that's kind of where football and basketball are in the professional sports league is the number of people who move up without going through the collegiate tryout, collegiate polishing stage is rare. Right. Well, I mean, it depends on the sport. Baseball very much still has their farm system and their lower tier games. Basketball and football use college as the recruiting ground. And basically, you're either a pro or you're nothing if you're no longer in college. And some of those might do. But there's arena football, man. Sure. And just like how hockey has, well, you can always go play for the, Canadians or whatever. I mean, they're all Canadians almost and Russians. But when you go in terms of some of the other leagues, easier leagues.
    95:06
    The Saskatoon suck-ups. Well, we reached the end of the show. There's a lot of content for people, but I'm sure they loved it because it's us. And we love you. Yeah, we do. You can always reach out to us, eclecticgamerspodcast.gmail.com. We're on facebook.com slash eclecticgamerspodcast. We are on Twitter and Instagram at eclectic underscore gamers. We're also on Twitch as Eclectic underscore Gamers.
    95:31
    And, in fact, that will be where we will probably be in two weeks, assuming everything gets hooked up right. And it will because we know what we're doing. Yeah. And you'll be able to watch the live stream. We'll put more information out on Facebook, definitely locking in times and stuff. We're not going to keep it vague like we are right now. Right, because we're still playing with everything right now. Yeah, we have to figure out everything exactly. But currently, just expect for it to be on the 30th of Sunday, 30th of December. So I'm Dennis. I'm Tony. Bye.