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Are We There Yet?

BlahCade Pinball Podcast·podcast_episode·48m 7s·analyzed·Sep 11, 2019
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Analysis

claude-haiku-4-5-20251001 · $0.032

TL;DR

Zachary Pinball Android app launches; Zen Williams app improves; Jared acquires three Gottlieb tables for restoration.

Summary

Chris and Jared discuss recent pinball developments including Zachary Pinball's new Android app release with 27 retro and 14 EM tables, improvements to the Zen Williams app that have made it feel less predatory, Jared's Star Race restoration project including MPU board replacement, and his acquisition of three more Gottlieb System 80 machines (Pink Panther, Timeline, Force 2) for restoration.

Key Claims

  • Zachary Pinball released a new Android version with 27 retro and 14 EM tables available in an in-app pack for $3.29 AUD

    high confidence · Chris and Jared demonstrate the app directly on stream, showing the purchase screen and confirming the price and table count

  • Zen Williams app has been substantially improved in terms of monetization balance and player rewards compared to earlier seasons

    high confidence · Jared reports downloading 180MB update and playing the app after months of avoidance; describes feeling rewarded rather than nickel-and-dimed; notes easier part collection

  • Zachary Pinball is working on an iOS version with a target release of September

    medium confidence · Chris states 'they're now currently working on the iOS version. They're hoping to have that out fairly soon, possibly by September, I think was what the goal is'

  • Star Wars and Marvel Pinball tables may come to Switch in a pack similar to the Star Wars package already available

    medium confidence · Chris asked Geno on Thursday stream about odds of Marvel Pinball on Switch; Geno responded 'probably I would come in a pack that way'

  • Jared's Star Race board replacement cost $35 AUD for the rebuild kit, saving labor costs compared to $45/hour shop labor

    high confidence · Jared describes ordering Rotten Dog MPU replacement and rebuild kit from Kays Arcade; details the work and cost savings

  • Jared acquired three Gottlieb System 80 machines (Pink Panther, Timeline, Force 2) from a seller who merged the best components from multiple copies of each table

    high confidence · Jared describes the acquisition in detail, explaining the Frankenstein assembly process and specific mechanical features of each machine

  • There are licensing complications with Nintendo, Star Wars, and Marvel that may affect Switch port availability

    medium confidence · Chris speculates 'I think there's something licensing-wise that happened with Nintendo and Star Wars and Marvel specifically'

Notable Quotes

  • “Are we there yet? Are we there yet? Because not much has been happening.”

    Chris Freebus @ Early in episode — Sets the episode theme of limited new developments in the pinball industry during the period covered

  • “I was banned from the Zachary Pinball Twitch chat... for violating the chat terms because I promoted our show. I didn't post a link. I didn't even say the name.”

    Chris Freebus @ Mid-episode — Illustrates moderation tension in pinball streaming communities; anecdotal but shows community friction

  • “It feels like you're being rewarded now as opposed to them grinding. Really, it really does feel a lot fairer and a lot more balanced now.”

    Jared Morgan @ During Williams app discussion — Indicates measurable sentiment shift about Zen's monetization approach after recent updates

  • “27 retro tables—shut up and take my money—for $3.29.”

    Chris Freebus @ Zachary Pinball app section — Expresses strong positive reception to Zachary Pinball's pricing and value proposition

  • “You do something dodgy and your name gets out there real quick. So you don't want to do that... pinball is a very small, very tight-knit community.”

    Jared Morgan @ During Star Race restoration discussion — Reflects core community value of reputation and trust in the tight-knit pinball collector ecosystem

  • “I wouldn't feel right handing over the game in an unworking state and then having the new owner spend money on it to actually get it working.”

    Jared Morgan @ Star Race restoration section — Demonstrates ethical restoration standards and community norms for machine resale

  • “There's zero delay on any of the mechanical effects. I can hear, and it's brutal as it always is.”

    Jared Morgan @ Zachary Pinball Android gameplay section — Technical confirmation of low-latency implementation on Android port; positive technical assessment

Entities

Chris FreebuspersonJared MorganpersonZachary PinballcompanyZen StudioscompanyGenopersonBlockade Pinball PodcastorganizationStar RacegameKays ArcadecompanyPink Panthergame

Signals

  • ?

    business_signal: Zachary Pinball pricing strategy emphasizes value: 27 retro tables for $3.29 AUD (~$2 USD), 27 remake tables at <$1 per table, Award Pack $7.99

    high · Chris demonstrates all pricing tiers in app; describes as 'probably... one of the best [packages]... at the moment' on Google Play

  • ?

    community_signal: Moderation tension on Zachary Pinball Twitch chat; Chris banned for subtle show promotion then unbanned after creator intervention

    high · Chris describes being banned for saying 'pop over and say hi' to his show without posting link or name; Mart unbanned him after discussion with moderators

  • ?

    community_signal: Zachary Pinball maintaining existing player base through cross-buy feature for previously purchased tables on new Android app

    high · Chris confirms users logging in with same Google ID get access to previously purchased tables; described as 'generous' community support

  • ?

    licensing_signal: Licensing complications between Nintendo, Marvel, and Star Wars IP may be constraining digital pinball port strategy for Switch platform

    low · Chris speculates 'there's something licensing-wise that happened with Nintendo and Star Wars and Marvel specifically' based on pack bundling discussion

  • ?

    announcement: Zachary Pinball officially released new Android app with 27 retro and 14 EM tables in unified interface

    high · Chris and Jared demonstrate app directly, showing purchase screens, table counts, and gameplay on Android device

Transcript

groq_whisper · $0.144

0:00
blockade pinball podcast hey you are watching the blockade pinball podcast i'm your host chris freebus aka shut your trap joining me as always halfway across the world jordan morgan well hi there everybody welcome to this fine sunday or saturday um and i think yeah depending on where you are jared you're the rare person that's on a sunday i am from the future and so far so good now so interestingly enough here in the states holiday weekend it's uh labor day weekend and And yet over in Aussie land, it's Father's Day.
0:52
Yeah, it is. It is Father's Day over here. I've just been lavished with gifts that you kids pick up from school. They have like a Father's Day stand. I don't know if this is a thing in America too, but they have like this stand where you can go and get like $2, $3 gifts, and you get lavished with those. And those gifts include a stick of, What you can hear in the background is Zachary at Pinball Lab going up, but more on that later.
1:20
That is very shiny. So what you get is, I think I've got a stick of M&Ms in a little tube, and I can eat those. I've got a truckload of mints, i.e. it's a little plastic truck dispenser with mints in it. and I got a... What else did I get? I got a biscuit with Dad on it, so a cookie with Dad on it, and I got some handmade gifts, which of course are the best for Father's Day.
1:57
Well, they're the best, except for that you have to lie about how much you think they're wonderfully crafted.
2:03
That is true, yes. So they're very thoughtful. and that's the beauty of those gifts because you can see the effort that's gone into making them. So you have to look past what they are and look at the effort. Yeah, see here things are a little bit different because of the timing.

Zachary Pinball has 4,000+ quests/achievements in the game, with 1,600 required to unlock Caveman

high confidence · Chris states 'There's probably an option there... there's four thousand achievements that are actually in Zachary Pinball. And I'm not kidding either... To unlock Caveman... it's 1,600 quests'

Timeline
game
Force 2game
Buffalo Pinballperson
Martperson
Edperson
Magic Castlegame
Nintendocompany
Magic Pixelcompany
Netherworldlocation
  • ?

    product_concern: Zachary Pinball Android implementation shows technical quality with zero input latency and feature parity to Steam version

    high · Jared tests gameplay on Android and confirms 'zero delay on any of the mechanical effects'; praises interface and visual quality

  • ~

    sentiment_shift: Zen Studios' Williams Pinball app perceived to have significantly improved monetization balance after updates, reversing earlier negative community sentiment

    medium · Jared reports returning to app after months of avoidance and feeling 'rewarded' rather than 'nickel-and-dimed'; notes easier parts collection and positive community feedback

  • ?

    technology_signal: Digital pinball developers expanding platform reach; Zachary Pinball Android launch complements Steam version; iOS version targeted for September

    high · Chris states iOS version in development with September target; Android app is direct port from Steam product with consistent interface

    • 2:23
    Father's Day for us isn't until June 20th, I think, something of that nature. So it's after the kids are out of school and it used to be right at graduation so they used to always do promotions in the store that would say grads and dads but uh no it's the it's the moms that get all the handcrafted uh goodies from school the the macaroni necklaces if you will oh the macaroni necklaces yes yes yes i'm aware of those we haven't actually got any those that's more of a uh like a preschool thing i think they they up their game a little bit when it's um when it's uh like elementary school or you know primary school as we call it here in Australia. Okay. Yeah. I can't say that I don't know what age they stopped doing those kind of gifts or art projects. Not now, no. Now he would draw me a card that would probably feature some really violent character that he's created with blood spewing all over the place.
    3:28
    Happy Father's Day, Dad. Pretty much, yeah. Yeah, right. So, I wish we could say things have ramped up and accelerated, but we're very much sitting in the back of the car right now, screaming and saying, Are we there yet? Are we there yet? Because not much has been happening. It sounds as if.
    3:53
    Well, I mean, they've been busy, because I know that they were just at, what was it, Gamescom or something like that, and now they're at PAX. I think it's PAX West. So they're doing these conferences. They're doing the rounds. Yeah. They're doing the rounds. Yeah. And, of course, what are they advertising? Well, they're advertising, right now, I think they're doing Castle Storm 2 and then the Star Wars on Switch.
    4:19
    Yes. Getting those out and about. We'll say we, I was watching the new guy, Geno, as opposed to Ekosh. I'm trying to figure out instead of... I always wanted to be like Echos and Gino. Akosh. Yeah, so you're probably with the Prague accent. Right. Czech accent, yeah. Anyway, he was doing a stream on Thursday, like he does every Thursday, and we posted the question whether... Because he was playing Marvel Table, and somebody was like, oh, it'd be nice if us Switch players could play that. And so then I asked, what are the odds of that being in a pack very similar to Star Wars. And he kind of was like, oh, well, you know, probably I probably would come in a pack that way. So I'm like, yeah, that conversation's been had.
    5:16
    Again, I mean, it makes sense too, because those are so old that it would make sense to package them as a one thing. But the suck part is that it's not part of FX3.
    5:27
    No. So you wouldn't get the ecosystem, would you? No. Unless they took the effort to actually put them into FX3. But that's another challenge altogether, because there's a whole lot more infrastructure they'd need to tack onto those tables.
    5:40
    Yeah, except for, I mean, they tacked on their own infrastructure to the Star Wars tables. Yeah, that's true. True, true. So it's not out of the woods. They can retrofit this. Well, not only that, but they've already done that with FX3 on all the other platforms. I mean, all the other platforms have those tables, so it's not like, it's a straight port over.
    6:03
    Yeah, you would think that they already worked out on Steam there. Right, I think there's something licensing-wise that happened with Nintendo and Star Wars and Marvel, specifically. So, who knows what that is. Yeah, who knows. It's getting out of the realm of me being able to guess these things, so I'm just kind of not. Because licensing is hard. Let's go to the mall.
    6:35
    Let's go to the mall? What? That's a Barbie meme. You should look it up. Okay. I won't explain it here. Go and look it up.
    6:47
    Yeah, that's different. It is. That's my trademark. Different. Different, shiny, new. What else has been going on? Well, why don't we talk about this right now. Let's go into a little bit of Zachariah stuff. Yeah, that's right. So you may have heard before that my phone started to blink and flash and make noise before because Zachariah Pinball have released their brand new shiny version of essentially the Steam product on Android. And I don't know if you can see it, but it's probably not going to work. Focus, focus. You're too close. Back off, back off. Back it towards your face, back it towards your face, back it towards your face. You know why? Oh, there it is. There we go. That looks shiny. It's very shiny. It's the same logo. Yeah, you know what it is? It's blurring. I think it's your background blur. Yeah, it is a background blur. So here it is. It looks exactly like the version on Steam. And when I tap the logo, it logs me in automatically to Google Play Games so I can track my progress.
    8:03
    Okay, hold on. Here's the $64 question. Why is that beeping at me every single time I push a button?
    8:10
    This is a very good question. I'm like, what is going on? Tables, do you have them? I am going and doing a check now. So, wow, okay. So I get asked first, I say, for $3.29, and that's $3.29 Australian pesos,
    8:32
    here is a unique opportunity to get an in-app pack with 27 retro tables for a $3.29 special price. That's pretty good. 27 tables for $4. bucks that's almost like i just buy that now i've got google play credit i'm just gonna buy that um because yeah why not 27 retro tables shut up and take my money for 3.29 um so yeah so that was the first thing you get when you um set up the app um it's just processing the payment now um and i need to change my payment source Okay, well, you work on payment source. I'm going to tell a story. Yeah, yeah, tell a story. So I had logged in to watch a second Twitch broadcast, only to find out that I had been banned from the Twitch chat. Banned? Banned from the Zachariah Pinball Twitch chat,
    9:37
    to which I was like, why? What is Mart not like me anymore? What's going on? Yeah. Well, so I inquired, and he said that his moderators, I didn't know he had any moderators, his moderators had banned me for violating the chat terms because I promoted our show.
    9:59
    Oh. To which. Naughty boy. Right, but to which I was like, I promoted our show? I'm sitting there thinking, I'm like, okay, So I was chatting and commenting on gameplay and everything that was going on. It was during Buffalo Pinball visiting and playing. And it was time to get ready for our podcast.
    10:21
    And so I just said, you know, I like it when people say, hey, I'm leaving now. Goodbye. Thanks for, you know, doing whatever. And so that's exactly what it was. I was like, hey, this is great. Got to run. Got to go prep my show that's happening in 90 minutes. if you get done here because I knew they weren't going to be going on 90 minutes I was like when you get done here pop over and say hi that was it I didn't post a link I didn't even say the name I didn't say get ready for the blockade pinball podcast I didn't even do that but that was enough that got me banned wow that's a very twitchy bot isn't it I don't know if it was a twitchy bot or if it was a twitchy moderator I think it was a twitchy moderator a human moderator Yes. And thankfully, Mart went in and talked to them and unbanned me, but now I feel like I've got to walk on eggshells. Talk them off the cliff, yeah. Okay, so I'm in the game now. I've purchased the remake pack.
    11:20
    Not the remake pack, the retro pack. Yeah, so that gives you basically the 27 retro tables, all the ones they've done. So all the ones that are EMs, basically. so I can tell you for sure that the gold pack that I previously purchased for it is owned nice, very good so that gives you removes one ball limitation from all the 27 solid state and 14 EM tables, you also remove advertisements from story mode you can play without an internet connection on all the tables and story mode and unlock 4 player local multiplayer on all 27 solid state and 14 EM tables wait what that foreplay local so you be passing the phone around Yeah hot seat basically on your phone Okay okay So yeah there you go So the options you have are the Gold Pack, the Remake Pack, which in Australian pesos is $32.99. Ooh, that one's a little pricey. That's probably, if you take 40% off that, It's probably around the, let's call it, $25, if my math does it right, US dollars. Okay. Maybe a bit more. Okay. My math is a bit shady when it goes to 40% off. Feel free in the comments to help me do the calculations because math is hard. Let's go to the mall.
    12:39
    Retro Pack is owned. campaign pack is if you want to do the campaign mode um uh which is sort of the rpg style um version of uh the table so you go through and do challenges and goals and chris has covered that once or twice before i have done twitch streams of that in fact that's right go and check out twitch streams so that is $4.89 um and then the last one is the award pack so ah the award pack that is the ones you unlock yeah I'm trying to think what they call them but it was the tables that they'd made prior to Zacharia that they put out on iOS so these tables include the mummy aliens, hippie firefighter, speed kings beast master, voyager wizard, zombie and caveman they're the ones you get And yes, they actually have little previews of the art in the top. Look, the interface is very slick.
    13:47
    I really do quite like them. So at the moment, when I go into SS, everything is unlocked and it all is happy. There's sort filters at the bottom, so you can sort by release. You can sort alphabetically. You can sort by the year it was released. You can also just use a random table button to load just a random table. and start playing it. You can also hit on the... Whoops.
    14:20
    I don't know how to get back from here. They don't like having you go back. That's not a Zachary feature. I know there is back. I just couldn't see it because I'm blind. So bottom right-hand corner of the info screen is your back button. It just doesn't look that pronounced. So yeah, that's all the solid-state tables. just go into the em tables and um there's four eight twelve fourteen fourteen tables same options in there so the interface is really consistent um all the remake tables because i haven't purchased the pack they're all on free play so you get one ball play on those which we now have an update those replay it would be basically 20 bucks uh and there's 27 remake tables so less than a buck table that's very cheap and look those remake tables are like worth a crack because they're really nicely done um like really nicely done particularly fire mountain is is excellent um so it doesn't compare to stars phoenix but you know uh yes uh and yeah all the retro tables uh gee you got a lot of retro tables there's like 4 8 12 16 20 24 27 all on the grid nice and easy to select really nice um and then now with the award tables when you go to that tab um they're all there but um they tell you exactly how much you need to unlock them so they're all quest related right yeah you have to do achievements but there's probably an option there to purchase them outright i think for us on steam it was all of two dollars yeah and that's exactly right if you go to the store you can go award pack and you purchase it for seven dollars ninety nine yeah so you just unlock them straight away and and you've got them um so yeah that that's great look rather than grinding through the four thousand achievements that are actually in Zacharia Pinball. And I'm not kidding either.
    16:23
    No, no, no. To unlock Caveman, which is the last one there, it's 1,600 quests. So that's a lot of quests. Just a few.
    16:35
    Yeah. So, yeah, I think that's probably worth the $7. So now it comes down to... So I'm in the solid-state tables. I'm going to go to one that I know and love, which is Magic Castle. Magic Castle is one of the tables that's in Netherworld, and it's a regular favorite in tournaments because it's rather brutal.
    16:58
    So the menu comes up. If you get this little box out, again, I'll try and show you. Yeah, we're seeing it. Yeah, so it's got the really typical sort of style that the Steam map has. It has a lovely flyover where it zooms in on table features. The table's really crisp.
    17:18
    and looks great on the Android devices. It's even got things like glass reflection and dirty glass mode and stuff like that, which is activated at the moment. It looks really, really slick. I think some of the buttons are a little bit hexagonal rather than being round like they are on the Steam app, but that would just be to reduce the poly count a bit.
    17:40
    So you've got, in your table menu, you've got the following options. You've got play, rules, options, fly cam. it also tells you your quests and your leaderboard score and then allows you to jump back out to the main menu so let's have a little go so when you bring up um play it brings you up with the menu where you select how many players you want and um and all that and yes it's not focusing well yeah it was good and then it fuzzed out just go and turn off the blur mode there you go yeah turn blur there we go there we go it's a bit better so you've got all your options there And so you've got mode. So if you go into mode, you can select from arcade, simulation, or user. So when you select the mode, it actually brings up a little submenu there. So it keeps it all really neat. You're not going screen to screen, and that's really quite slick.
    18:31
    So you've got everything from mode, players, ball size, so all the stuff that you kind of have in the Steam version, which is very, very nice. so uh well they said that they were going to try and do a more or less a direct port over so yeah yeah so um you can choose the game modes from classic challenge checkpoint survivor lamp hunter target eliminator 90 second challenge i'm just going to go for classic and uh see how it goes so i'll uh turn up the volume so you can hear it um all right let's give it a plunge give it a flip plunge plunge flip flip oh yeah so i could say that there's absolutely zero delay in the um oh your bikey gang's up and running again i hear my what your bikey gang just yes yeah yeah the bike gang of one it sounds like a Harley no it's just a lawnmower engine that has no exhaust on it yeah right so yeah it's it shows you in the bottom right hand corner the your next leaderboard score so it's quite nice you get an instant view of that all the time and sounds really good there's zero delay on any of the mechanical effects I can hear and it's brutal as it always is so it comes up with the game time bonus alert which I believe you can actually switch off in the game, it's one of those things you can select but yeah it feels strong I just wish the one at Netherworld played like this that's a big ask you know and quest completed global multiplier global domination, so there you go it's very nice, it's slick definitely an improvement over the original android one, but the original android one now is pretty old, so it stands to reason that it's looking a bit tired but this is very shiny so the trick is, I'm sure that if you had purchased tables with the original app you've got to make sure you log on with the same Google ID. So that will then give you access to the tables that you purchased in the original pack. So you get a lot unlocked for free if you actually use the same Google ID. So that's pretty generous of them. And I think the remakes and stuff,
    21:17
    getting those, all jokes aside, even though Chris and I did Voices for a couple of them, they're really well thought out and really good remakes of the original theme. So it's worth having a go, Adam. For like $32, there's a lot of table action there for $32 Australian. Yeah, absolutely. I would strongly suggest getting on it if you're on Android.
    21:43
    Yeah, I know that they're now currently working on the iOS version. They're hoping to have that out fairly soon, possibly by September, I think was what the goal is. So we'll see where that goes. Yeah, well, look, good work, Magic Pixel dudes. It's a lovely release, very nice and crisp, and look, top work. It's been worth the wait, and thanks also for supporting your existing fan base with the cross-buy. Yeah, no, it's good to know that that actually went through, because that was always the big question. Oh, absolutely, yeah.
    22:21
    Based on the quality, though, like, even if that wasn't included, included i'd almost you know just go and buy them again anyhow because they're probably out of all the the the packages on um google play at the moment that's one of the best ones that isn't you know like zen or something like that with the modern tables it's a really nice um early 80s um package of tables and you know who who wouldn't want more early 80s and um ems in their pinball repertoire on android more more more um now you also said that you for the first time in a very long time uh cracked open the zen williams app on your phone yeah i did you know i was i was just on the way home um from work and i was just you know the train the train trip was taking a bit longer there were some delays and i thought you know what i don't really want to listen to music which is typically what i always do i catch up with podcasts and stuff on the train i went you know what the the wind the the wind balls wind balls app wind wind balls okay we can go with that you know the wind balls the williams pinball app is uh on my phone still it i have literally never not opened it since probably volume two because i just got jack at the all the um smurf berries and all that sort of action and i thought you know what i'm going to suspend my disbelief and i'm going to open it again and um and just see what they've done because you know chris has been covering all the work they've been doing iteratively over the releases.
    23:53
    Yes, in an effort to get people to stop whining like Jared. So I thought right cool I open it up and I got to download 180 meg of data Cool I update all the tables and then I in And look, it's a lot better. It's a lot better from a balance perspective.
    24:17
    I don't feel like I'm getting nickel and dimed as much in the app anymore. It feels like you're still getting some value. you can go and like um just watch a quick video and play one of the uh extra basic challenges you seem to get more parts it feels a bit easier getting more parts you're getting like i got a couple of coins when i was playing rather than just like like um graphical enhancements you know right so honestly so in general it feels like you're being rewarded now as opposed to them grinding right yeah yeah really it really does feel a lot fairer and a lot more balanced now um so look i'd recommend that if you if like me you didn't bother um playing it after season two because you just it just felt yuck go back in there and give it another shot um and and just see what you think because for me look you know i wouldn't totally ignore it now you know i really I played the game on Steam more than what we would Android because it is a bit easier. But definitely give it a go if you're on Android. They've done a lot of work on it, and you should at least see what you think about it.
    25:35
    So I got a notification in the thread that I had been doing about data collection for this, which I've long since stopped collecting data on the app because there was no point anymore because they have fun changing things. But, no, I got somebody that just posted. They were like, I just got my final part. They go, it's so much easier, so much better changed.
    26:00
    So they're all ready for doing their final upgrades and stuff, and it was just by doing the basic playing of it. And, yeah, so that's why I feel like they definitely must have made an improvement enough with how the parts collection goes, because I haven't been collecting parts in a very long time,
    26:18
    that it got much better. It feels like that you could just play your three daily challenges and your three video challenges and not reset, and you'd probably actually progress relatively fairly in the game now. That's the feeling that I get now, so that's not backed up with data. That's the feeling that I get now. That's an important thing, though, is that if you're feeling positive... I mean, that was the whole point of me doing the data collection, because everybody was feeling negative, and I was like, well let's throw some fact behind it but if you're feeling positive then you're like who cares about what the data says that's right like if you actually want to open the app and play it now then that's actually the better thing than you know what it was before which you really didn't feel motivated to do it because you just didn't feel like you were getting value for your time spent right okay well so there we go we we got that to uh encourage people to go back into Now let's talk about your Star Race.
    27:15
    Yes, so last time we spoke, Star Race had a slight problem in that it would not boot. And to resolve the problem, I put in an order with Kays Arcade and got a Rotten Dog MPU replacement board for Star Race. And based on the condition of the board interconnect, the cable that connects the driver board to the logic board I decided to get a rebuild kit for that and do it myself and save the labor and I rebuilt that the other day it's really easy to do hey like they give you this little tool that allows you to pop out each of the contacts from the existing plug you don't need to buy another plug unless your plugs completely scorched or something which there's no reason why it should be because there's no high voltage running through that it's just logic logic voltage um and i just repinned it took me about an hour i think but it got easier towards the end um the only thing i would advise people if they have to do it themselves is just remember that the the the two there's one end of the connector that has the heavier gauge wire in it and that's to carry the the ground and the power um all the other wires in this particular repin kit were white and you get two black and two red so the two black and two red go on one end only so just make sure when you're repinning you do that right because i i did it incorrectly and i thought no i because my ocd kicked in i thought no i'll unpin the ones i plugged in and then put them in the right hole i ended up um in my um jiggling of the wire i pulled the connector off the tip of the wire so i had to re-crimp it um it wasn't that hard nothing like making work for yourself right yeah i was like ah i should have just left it where it was anyhow um so yeah 35 bucks well spent for that because it would have saved me even though that worked out to be i think 50 55 no for 53 australian that's still cheaper than the 45 an hour labor that I have to pay to do it. And then the cool-down fee. $45 an hour labor. It is what it is. The tech that they use is a good tech. So you pay the man the money.
    29:33
    So yeah, I did that. And so what I did is I went over to Ed's on Saturday to drop off the board. He also ordered some of those really nice LED displays for a high speed that he's doing up. and they're the, what do they call the, I forget the name of the displays, but there's this particular, like, they come with a driver board of their own because they're LED and they don't need the 60 volts to actually power them. And it's a really nice little package. They're not cheap. I think they were about, to get them into the country, they were about $300 Australian.
    30:11
    But, you know, the displays themselves, if you can find them, aren't that cheap anyhow. So you might as well just go with the low voltage LEDs and save yourself a whole bit of trouble
    30:21
    um, so you got those and um got a A board a pair of board side cutters so you can cut off connectors and stuff And um, yeah, I think it ended up being something ridiculous like six or seven hundred dollars australian to get it in but um all up, but yeah, you know, it's one of those things that you've got to do because I would I just wouldn't feel right handing over the game in an unworking state and then having the new owner spend money on it to actually get it working. It's just not the right thing to do. Especially since then they're like, never buy anything from Jared. And that's right. And, you know, everyone knows that pinball is a very small, very tight-knit community. So you do something dodgy and your name gets out there real quick. So, you know, you don't want to do that. And also, it's not only that. It's not only the reputation thing, but it's more just the fact that I wouldn't feel right doing it.
    31:14
    So, yeah, give the guy a nice new board, give him a nice new interconnect, and that should really make sure the game's quite solid. This particular customer, he doesn't have a problem at all with spending the money to get the game working really solidly and really, really well. So with that, with godly tables, that means repinning everything. So, you know, basically just swapping all the connectors out, making sure they're brand new contacts and starting essentially having the tables start from a new state, essentially. Right, right. So, yeah, it's the right way to go. There you go.
    31:55
    Yeah. So that's the Star Race news. And so I got the payment for the table the other day that came through. so I have lined up three more.
    32:11
    Three more? Three more, yeah. You told me you were just going to do one more. Was there a bulk sale or something? I got a good price for them. Sorry, a good Australian price. Yeah, there is a difference, right? There is definitely a difference when you're looking at project pins. So I got a good Australian price for them.
    32:37
    I've still got change from the sale of the machine. Well, you have change until you need parts, which I'm assuming you need parts. Oh, yes, I will need parts for these. These are all African pins.
    32:52
    Are they water damaged like Star Race was? No. So this was part of the deal. I got this particular person has more than one of each table that I got. so he has been very kind and has merged tables together for me so I get best cabinet best head box and best play field out of all of them ok so it's a bit of a Frankenstein of three tables into one kind of table kind of deal yeah that's right so it's going to be the best sort of specimen out of the ones he had so the tables that I've got are Pink Panther they're all System 80 God Leaps so I've got a Pink Panther which is a three ball multi ball which is the reason why I was eyeing that one off first and I've got one called Timeline which has a neat little mini playfield a little bit like Circus's mini playfield, a little bit like Sir Not Sinbad's a little bit like Genie's mini playfield so it's got two flippers up there that you're using to play and then we've got another one which is called Force 2, and Force 2 is a two-ball multiple game, but it's just got drop targets everywhere. I think it's got like a total of 15 drop targets in it. That is a lot of drop targets. So the thing I look for, the thing I really enjoy in a table is drop targets.
    34:20
    All of these tables actually have a fair few. I think Pink Panther is the one that has the least amount, but Timeline, you've got six drop targets in the upper play field. and then smattering a drop target around the table. So there's a lot of stuff to shoot for on that table. And these ones aren't super wide. They're just regular wide bodies, Gottlieb wides. And I think one of them's a regular size. So, yeah, it's a mixture of sizes in this one.
    34:50
    So it's going to be fun. What kind of playfield damage do they have? Oh, look, they all got the original mylars on them. So some of the tables have got a few chips out of them here and there, like just regular hole wear and stuff like that. But from what I can see of the pictures that I've got of them, they're all reasonable condition. We'll put it this way. They were no worse than Star Race. Right. So, you know, you've got your little wear points in Star Race that are always going to be there. But, you know, my approach with this one is going to be a little bit different, I think. what I'm going to do is if there are any big gouges in the playfield, I'm going to actually sort of polyfill them first and then do a little bit of touch-up on them. But I need to get that flat surface right first. So I've learned so much from doing Star Race. I know the things that I need to do now on the playfield to make it, like, just really good. And so the clear coat will actually stand up. I'll definitely get protectors for around the pop bumpers because they did actually cause a little bit of damage to the original clear coat. I would certainly use the Colorspec clear coat again on the table That worked That seemed to hold up pretty well providing that you fix up any of the divots so on the flat surfaces on star race it was it still good so you don't need to go out and like do a automotive clear you can use the um the super cheap autos clear coat system to do it pretty well um but yeah i'll spend a bit more time leveling things out this time i think when i'm doing the play fields and the the cabinets are original too and there's a lot more paint on them than the Star Race one had. So I've got a little bit more to work with there. I can actually probably retouch them quite nicely without having to re-stencil the whole thing. So I think these ones are going to have less work in them than Star Race. So I should. My goal is to have at least two ready for next year's BPAC. So I want two bulletproofed and ready for BPAC next year. Well, the nice thing too is since they're all the same, like what do you say system 80 yeah yeah so since they're all the same thing there you can now buy parts if you will in bulk that will apply to all three of them and you know that your tools are going to work across the board on all three of them and you know you just knock it out that way much easier than having to change up your your your mode of of function uh for each time that's right so i'm going to leave basically i'm going to get the play fields that the first order will be play field parts and if i can find them plastics because that makes a big difference if you can find plastics for these tables um it makes them look just brand new if you can get them done right um i did see a set of plastics for um uh pink panther around but i'm going to go and hunt them down again because they were on ebay so i had the the dudes thing listed but they were They were rather expensive. They were like $150 US. So it's a bit of a sting.
    38:01
    I think Star Races plastics. People definitely charge a bit for the plastics. Yeah. Well, they're unobtainium now. Like these ones are new old stock too. So they have been used on a pinball machine. They've still got the wrappers on and everything. So they're nice. But, you know, I may not need to. Like I think from all the plastics that I saw on the photos, they're actually not in bad condition. and I think he'll be swapping out the plastics for me to get the best ones. So I'm pretty confident that, look, they won't be damaged to the point that the Star Race ones were. The Star Race ones were being held together by wire. They were that bad. Wow. They were terrible.
    38:43
    They were smashed beyond recognition. So, yeah, I was lucky to find the ones for Star Race, and it's lucky it's a low-production game because it meant there were sets available through PBR.
    38:56
    But these other two games, I think they're more common. They're like about 2,000 table runs, I think. So they're a higher production run.
    39:07
    And that's kind of good because there usually are more parts available for them around. So we'll see what happens. It's going to be fun to do them up. And I know where to spend the money now. You spend it on the boards, you spend it on the connectors, and really, if you can just get the playfield looking pretty nice, you don't really need to do as much stuff on the cabinet as you think you need to. Right.
    39:34
    And so my goal will be to redo the playfields, get them all new components, and then, when I'm ready to, get the boards all in one hit and get them from Pascal, because all these games are compatible with the Pascal system. so that's going to be great I'll just get an all-in-one driver board and I'll probably even get new pop-up boards as well and power supply and there'll just be fresh components in there they'll all be brand new and that should mean that when they go on the floor at the show next year there will be no breakdowns because they're brand new boards So when are you taking the delivery of these?
    40:11
    Over the next month or so there might be a chance I get one on Monday but the other ones will actually be stored off-site because I don't really have the room for them.
    40:24
    So, yeah, they'll be stored off-site and I'll just grab them when I need them. Very good. Interesting stuff. All right. Well, I think that's about as much pinball news as we can squeeze out of this particular episode.
    40:41
    There is a fair bit of pinball news in this one, actually. It's been kind of nice. Yeah, you know, go figure. This is why sometimes we take a week off.
    40:50
    I have not been taking a week off, though, in terms of doing the Twitch broadcast. So, folks, I encourage you to go over to twitch.tv slash blockade underscore pinball and follow.
    41:05
    If you missed it on Friday, you missed me failing miserably at the $5 challenges twice. Shaked under pressure. Yeah.
    41:14
    It wasn't kind. Monday we'll be doing another mobile edition video and maybe more mobile play in general. Wednesday is always Steam-based play.
    41:30
    And then Friday is the Skills Challenge and then kind of a free-for-all for whatever you want to do. All of those times typically start at 3.30 p.m. Pacific Daylight Time, but they're subject to change. because sometimes life happens, and it's amazing how often it does.
    41:51
    Life does tend to happen. Yes. Other things, if you want to comment to us on the show, well, you could do so at that particular Twitter handle, this one that's also there on Jared's, or watch this, folks. Watch it. Oh, it just grew. Oh, yeah. Then you can go to Blockade and also check us out there. make sure you drop us comments and let us know what you think, let us know what you want to talk about be sure to always friend me on Steam so that you can try and beat my scores or I can try and beat your scores because they tend to then pop up a lot on the Twitch stream because I always check out the leaderboard and go damn that bastard's in front of me so you know yes there's one last thing before we go I remember that after I dropped the stuff off at Ed's yesterday we went to Pincadia and they've got a brand new Monster Bash remake there. Oh, very nice. It is shiny. I bet. Wow. They have put in like Attack from Mars didn't have a lot of extra animations on it but they have really cleaned up the animations on the Monster Bash. It looks amazing. So if you've played a remake before you'll know that the score display and everything uses the more traditional dot style um uh display it looks like an old dot matrix display but it's really big like a really wide display right there's more dots way more dots so when you um go and play this particular monster bash now because this is the premium edition that's the one with the big display when the animation and stuff comes on like you know when um eagle finds body parts and stuff the dots basically go to high definition and you get this amazing like it's still dot art but it's super crisp and colored and everything like it's they've spent a lot of time working on these dots it looks amazing and the lighting effects in it um they've got multi-zone leds in it now so it'll actually change color like when the mummy gets lit everything turns orange right because the Oh, across the entire playfield. Yeah, across the entire playfield. Most of the playfield, it turns orange. And when you get Drac, everything goes red. And when you get Frankenstein, I think everything's purple. So it's really nicely done, the way they've integrated the light shows into there now. And of course, being LEDs, it's vibrant as anything. When Ed was playing it, he was saying, I don't think I ever would have thought that I'd find a game that was more bright than Ghostbusters. I found one today because here it is crazy, it's a beautiful game so yeah if you are in the Brisbane area or you know of somewhere in your town that actually has a Monster Bash go and check it out because it plays very differently to the ones you might have been playing that were from the 90s it plays much better cool, I know that Zen put on location here in Southern California the championship edition table at a Dave & Buster's. Unfortunately, the location that they chose is in the city of Torrance, and that is nowhere in any direction I normally drive.
    45:25
    Really? It's a bit out of the way. It's a bit out of the way, and worse, It is basically about an hour drive to it with friendly L.A. traffic. As soon as you get into ugly L.A. traffic, it's now going to be about an hour and a half. That's just one way.
    45:43
    That's a long... That's like going... To put that in perspective for Aussies, that's driving from my place to the Gold Coast in the car. Right. Mileage-wise, it's not that far. I think it's 20, 28 miles or something like that. Oh, okay. But time spent, that's a whole other story. And it's like, oh, why couldn't you guys have put it in the Dave and Buster's that's closer to me in the city of Orange? Because then I would have actually gone and checked it out without hesitation. Because there's plenty for me to do in that particular area. Like, where there's things that I drive purposely to that area for.
    46:18
    Ah, right. So what distance is that away from you? that is I think as the crow flies maybe 16 miles but it would basically take me about 20 minutes 20-25 minutes and there's not I don't have to worry about traffic right that would be lovely that's the key difference so anywhere in LA it's traffic yeah so we'll see hopefully that's not the permanent location and maybe they move it to one of the other locations closer to me it'd be nice if it was on if you're listening please do that orange um all right then i'll go check and uh have a chance to uh see what this thing is uh feels like but um until then i don't think that i'm gonna make that trip that's a long trip yeah long trip long lot of gas yeah so yeah um but that's the only other thing that uh that uh was of note that it what's happening on their Twitters.
    47:21
    Like we say, that's why we say, sign up for Twitter, even if you don't feel like tweeting. There's good information that Zen puts out in that, and we try and forward that information also, spread it around.
    47:33
    Alright, well, that's it for us today, and we thank you for stopping by and watching, and or listening, if you do that too, still.
    47:45
    And, uh, until next time, well I think this is now the thing Jared what are we doing next time I think that we're going to be talking about stuff and things I like it alright folks bye bye