And stop predicting to the shindig, chop chop it says I'm gonna win big, choose not to like the limitation, just get up and do the reservation. Sit up, sit up, sit up, sit up, sit up, sit up, sit up. Welcome everybody to Kaneda's Pinball Podcast. Dream Feed Kaneda is in the hizzow. The Olympics are going on. Is Stern Pinball getting ready to do another cornerstone in August? Are we going to get any money out of Damien and Marty for the people that lost money? What is happening in the pinball world? It feels good to put the mic back on. I'm not turning Facebook back on for a while, but I love doing this show and we're never going to stop doing this show. I do need a break every once in a while. So thank you everybody for sticking with me and thank you for all the words of encouragement. We're going to do this. We're going to get through this together. We're going to get through life together. We're going to get through this pinball hobby together. And we're going to have fun. And we're going to just have smiles on our faces as we all wait, wait, wait, and hopefully get in shape, shape, shape. So let's talk about what's happening right now. I've been looking at video of this black and white version of Godzilla. It appeared before Comic-Con at the Southern Fried Gaming Expo. And there were two machines there. and I've been watching video of it. I've been looking at photos and you know, I'm just trying to figure out like how this game is gonna do. Now I will be honest, when I see the game in person and I see video of the game and I really did like the sort of approach of this throwback Godzilla, there's just something missing though. It's just not popping. It's not like wowing me over and maybe I need to see it in person with the foil cabinet. But, you know, there's just something about black and white just doesn't jump out at you as much as the full color version. Because when I saw it juxtaposed to the older versions of Godzilla, I was expecting it to have more of a presence and it just doesn't. And the other thing is this. I really want to evaluate this game in the way it's going to look with everything black and white. The topper, the inner art decals, the game itself, you know, all the mod community is going to make everything black and white. And I'm not sure, but I thought that there's going to be like an update to the code where you can turn all of the stuff that's on the LCD screen so that it's black and white. Now, that's not happening in the game right now. I just hope and pray we can get to a pinball world when a manufacturer is ready to take your money, everything is complete. Like why isn't Stern ready with the black and white code? I mean, come on, you're going to like display this game for the first time to the world. You should show it off in a way that showcases everything buyers can expect. Because remember everybody, this is not a six, $7,000 premium. It's a $9,700 Godzilla. I mean, it's a lot of money, right? It's a lot of money. And I think we're all sort of feeling this right now, that when a pinball game is out, for this much money, I think everyone's over waiting for the sausage to be made when you're asked to pay for the item itself. So I think Stern missed a golden opportunity to showcase the game with all of the bells and whistles on it. And also, I just don't know how well this game is going to sell. And now that we're hearing from Naps Arcade that the next Cornerstone game is right around the corner, like sometime in August, that just goes to show you, ladies and gentlemen, that John Wick is not selling at all. And this Godzilla Premium, I bet the orders are not flying off the shelf. And the reason why the orders are not going to fly off the shelf for this Godzilla, they're going to make it for years. So there's like zero FOMO now associated with this game. This is not the marketplace that Stern is used to. They're so used to a world in which every time they have like new special version of a game, there's just like a plethora of sales right away. They are used to people beating down the door to get one. And now that they've had to do this, where this is not an LE, they're going to make it for years. It really does beg the question, why would you buy one right now for $9,600 or $9,700? Because we all know that if you just wait, all these dealers and all this inventory, there's going to be sales across the board on everything. And that's the thing. It's like, there's just no urgency. And I think that's going to create a really interesting pinball marketplace moving forward for all these manufacturers and obviously for us as consumers. And I think patience is a virtue. And I think if you do have patience, you're going to be able to get anything for a better price. But man, doesn't it feel like John Wick just came out and now we're hearing that Stern's next game is going to come out in August. And the rumor is that it's going to be Jack Danger's X-Men 97, which is a much more popular theme for pinball than John Wick. I mean, these poor John Wick owners and these poor distributors. I mean, imagine if you're like in on a John Wick LE for $13,000. You probably don't even have your game yet or you just got it. And in just a few weeks, the next Stern Cornerstone game is going to come out. It's going to come out by a better designer. It's going to have a better theme and it's definitely going to be received a lot better than John Wick. And now you've just lost like thousands of dollars. Like again, like I think the modern pinball world is going to be really interesting. And so what do I think about Jack Danger, X-Men 97 all the way in August? Doesn't it feel like almost too soon? And so do we think this X-Men 97 is going to be the first game with Spike 3 system? Or is Stern going to wait and do the John Borg Metallica 40th anniversary game, which I thought was going to come out in July, but they clearly switched it. It's a little interesting because if you look at when Godzilla came out 70 years ago, it was in the fall. and Ride the Lightning, Metallica's album, came out now. So it's really weird to me that Stern did not sync up those anniversary editions, but the writing is on the wall. Make no mistake, people. The writing is on the wall. Stern Pinball has the biggest pinball factory in the world. They need to make hundreds of games a week to keep their machine profitable and to keep it efficient. And those sales are not materializing right now. They are not used to this. And that means they got to get something new out sooner than later I don think this game if John Wick was a success I don think this game comes out right now I think this is them pivoting I think this is them calling in Audible. And I think they need another hit. And we all want them to have another hit. Now, the real question is this. Is the community ready to absorb another $13,000 LE? Here's my take on all of the things happening in the world right now. The whole concept of a limited edition game that is going to create crazy FOMO and having a thousand people trying to beat down a door to get one of these pinball machines for $13,000. I think it's almost over for good. I really do. I don't think there's many themes that will command that kind of like frenzy from the community. I think they just ruined it all. I think it's over. I don't think anyone cares anymore. I don't think there's that flex anymore. I don't think there's just that excitement or enthusiasm anywhere anymore. I just don't read it. I'm just noticing like what's the vibe of the community. And I just don't see people excited anymore to get their hands on the next LE or CE from any of these companies. I think they all ruined that. I also think the world is changing. I don't think people care much anymore to sort of flex with a plaque. I will tell you this right now. I've had Guns N' Roses in this house now for like a month. I have collector's edition number 500 of 500. Let me tell you, after playing this game for over a month, the plaque means nothing. The number means nothing. It's absolutely irrelevant. It just doesn't matter. It really doesn't matter. And look, and we both know when you're standing over an LE versus a premium, you're not having more fun with the LE. You're not having a greater experience. There's nothing different game-wise. Nobody playing a Guns N' Roses LE is having less fun than me as I play a Guns N' Roses CE. You don't really notice the sparkle on the playfield with the ink. you know, the gold sparkle or the silver sparkle with the ink. You don't notice that while you're playing. The coma ball lock does absolutely nothing. You are going to have just as much fun with that LE as the CE. Look, it's still not over the world of like people will go after some LEs, but it's only going to happen when it's a AAA theme and it's a bolt to your floor kind of theme that you never want to let go. Then you might want to have the nicest version. But man, it's like, how often is that going to happen? I don't think X-Men 97 is going to create that for most of you. I think the premium will be just fine. I do think Back to the Future might be one. I do think Harry Potter might be one because Jersey Jack does give you much more on the collector's edition than they do on the LE. But the world's changing, people. The world is changing. There's only so many years, like all these grown men who are in a state of arrested development will be excited to show off their LE collection. I think the world's changing. The other thing I saw that's interesting, just to use a cargument, did you see the new Chevrolet ZR1 Corvette? 1,064 horsepower. Unbelievable. The most powerful Corvette ever. Now, typically, Chevy would make a limited number of them and they would probably sell for like 200,000 over sticker. But did you see what Chevy did? They said they're going to make an unlimited number of them. If you want one, we'll build you one. And I like that because it takes away all of the stupidity around, I'm not going to drive this. The dealers can't be greedy and charge well over sticker for one. You know, you might have to wait to get one, but just wait. Who cares? Don't pay over for anything. Just wait. You know, the other thing I saw in the business world that was interesting, you know, when sales are down, when sales are down, companies start to act differently. Did you see Nike? Their sales are down 30%. And what are they doing now? They just launched a $60 million lawsuit against a guy who is known as the shoe surgeon. And what this guy does is he customizes Nike shoes and sells them. They are suing him for $60 million. Now, this has been a guy that's made Nike cool. That's put Nike on the cultural map in a really interesting way with his products. And I was just thinking about, is that going to happen in pinball? You know, Stern's been turning a blind's eye to all of these modders that have been making mods that are definitely infringing on IP. But as Stern's sales start to weaken and as their revenue starts to get smaller, do you think they're gonna go after the mod community and people selling fake banners and all these other things where people are making money on the IP that they own? We shall see. Again, when times are great and Stern is making so much money, I understand why they didn't go after any of the mod community, but as the revenue starts to decrease and sales are not where they used to be, will they do something more aggressive like that? All right, so I'm just excited because we're going to see a new Stern game in two weeks. John Wick is boring. Everybody's over it. Now, what does that mean for everybody else if Stern is going to release a new cornerstone in August, right early? That means they're going to get ahead of Mark Seiden's Jersey Jack game. Now, the rumor is it's going to be Avatar. And, you know, I thought it was going to be Stern versus Jersey Jack sometime in the fall. But now it looks like Stern is going to beat them to the punch. And whenever Stern puts a new game out in the world, a lot of money is going to go in that direction unless it's John Wick. But you know what I'm saying? There's only so much money to go around. And so I think this is bad news for Jersey Jack. And I think they were anticipating Stern's next cornerstone to be sometime more around Expo in October. So Jersey Jack's next game, you know, Elton John sales have to be kind of over. I know the collector's edition guys are saying it's going to sell out. It still seems like you can get one. You can still order one. This is what's crazy. You can still easily order an Elton John CE from Jersey Jack's website. So this just begs the question, do you really think they made 1,000 Elton John CEs? Now, if they did, if they did, I have to imagine there are about 200 of them or more at Jersey Jack in inventory. You just don't see enough unboxings of this game, right? I just don't see it. If there was a thousand Elton John CEO owners out there, there would be way more activity in the owners club. There would be way more people sharing photos A thousand is a lot And I not seeing it I just don see it I also don think they ever made a thousand Godfather CEs If they did there would just be so many more of them for sale. Like we know that Stern legitimately makes a thousand of all these LEs and you can see it. When you go to the marketplace, you can see there's always a bunch for sale. You can see the amount of energy in the owner's thread. You can see the amount of unboxings. You know, look, Elton John, you know how I feel. I think it's a great game. I think it's overpriced. And I think it's never going to be hard to get one. And I think everyone's waiting for Steve Ritchie's next game. I think he played it a little bit safe with this design. And yeah, I do think Elton John shoots great. But I think it's kind of empty. And I want to see more from Jersey Jack games moving forward. I think Toy Story, Godfather, and Elton John have been really empty games for the amount of money Jersey Jack charges for their machines. And I think we finally want to see the best of both worlds. I think we want a game that's loaded like Wizard of Oz, but shoots as good as Elton John. So Stern getting out in front of Jersey Jack is not going to help Jersey Jack. Also, like how many people out there are waiting on their Pulp Fiction Bad Mo Fo edition? And so now Stern's going to get out in front of that. I mean, it's just kind of embarrassing. Stern has released like six games since since Chicago Gaming Company has revealed Pulp Fiction I mean at what point does this whole thing just get so stupid like I don't even know who's gonna care by the time this Pulp Fiction LE comes out there's no reason why it would take two years to get this thing on the line like what are they waiting for it's the same game there's nothing unique mechanically in the game. I don't understand why they're making the people that spent the most amount of money wait this long to get the game. There's no way it would take this long to make the topper. You could send that topper over to China and they'd have like exact duplicates of it ready to go. They'd have a thousand of those things made in a week. So I don't understand why it's taking so long. If you're in on a Princess Bride, is Stern going to get out its next cornerstone game before you even get your Princess Bride machine? I hope those games start to ship sometime soon. The climate is changing. I don't think people want to pay for these things, leave these deposits, and then you're waiting forever to get your games. You just can't survive anymore like that. Stern coming out with this game now also means that we're going to see another game from them before the end of the year. And it's probably going to be John Borg's Metallica remake that we were talking about for so long. It's just going to be interesting. And another company impacted by this is going to be Dutch Pinball X. Alice in Wonderland was supposed to be out sometime in the summer. Now it's going to be out in the fall. And again, just think about it. X-Men 97 versus this game. Now look, completely different game. They're going for the high-end collector. Only 500. I don't know. I'm still so curious how this Alice's Adventures in Wonderland is going to do. Are there 500 people out there that want the remnants of a J-pop game, a zombie yeti, half done art package on the game, upper play field with magnetic flipping, a floating upper play field as we've been hearing. I'm not sure. Again, I think this is another idea that really seemed like a no brainer during the COVID feeding frenzy. And now here we are. And it's like so many years later. And again, I just think those days of I've got one of the rare versions of a J-pop game I just don't think anybody cares anymore so if I were Dutch Pinball X though I would be sort of getting people excited about this game and I think they need to start doing like weekly teasers and keeping this game on people's radar a little bit that's the other weird thing it's like and I keep telling this to Barry I need to do a phone call with Melvin but I give him all this advice for free. You can't launch a game like this the way they're doing it. Like they've already confirmed the title. We know exactly what the game is. And then you're doing nothing. Like every week goes by, you're doing absolutely nothing. And then people's attention will be grabbed by other things and other companies. And I think they need to realize this. You don't have something that anybody's really waiting for. What you have in Alice's Adventures in Wonderland is something in which you need to create all of the demand. There's no demand. And I know this is the hard part for these guys to realize because in Melvin's world, you know, he wanted it, right? He wanted it. And these guys over there, the guys that really value this J-pop stuff, and you got to remember, like they also signed up for the IP for Raza and Magic Girls. So he wants it. And that's really the only market research. And I'm just here to tell you, Melvin Barry, you guys need to make 500 other people feel the excitement you do for this game. And you've got to build that excitement over time. And I don't think this is the way to go about it. Now we know the game is not out until after a new cornerstone from Stern. And you're probably going to drop this game on the world right when the next Jersey Jack game comes out. And we know that this little boutique company does not have the resources to make something as spectacular as a Jersey Jack game. And so I think, again, timing does matter. See, if you think you've just got this inelastic demand because you made a rare, beautiful game. History has shown us that everyone who's tried to do that over the last 10 years of pinball has failed. And so I think you need to start getting people excited about this game on a weekly basis. And I would do stuff every week, just do stuff, like do a factory tour, talk to us about what went into this game. Maybe once a week, highlight a different thing you engineered in this game. Even if you don't show it, Just get people's curiosity going. Like Melvin could do a video where he's like, I want to explain to you what went into the floating upper play field that you're going to see in Alice. Just talk to us about it. You don't even have to show it, but just get us excited. Everyone just does the same thing. Let's show you underneath the play field. Let's reveal the title and then do nothing. And then you're just going to order one. And they've already told us the code's not going to be done. So great. Are you really going to run out of game that's not completed? another one of these things where we're going to build the ship in the ocean. I'm tired of it. If you're making just this game, it should be done. The day you reveal Alice in Wonderland to the world, why isn't the code completed? Why does someone have to buy this game and not know exactly what they're going to get? I think ironically that ship has sailed in the pinball space Let end this show real quickly by talking about Haggis I waiting for this Kerry Hardy video I think it going to be really eye all the stuff that been going on I seen a cease and desist letter that Damien has sent Wayne over there in Australia And it's interesting, you know, when a company sort of is at the end, all the finger pointing and then using legal threats to sort of keep people from saying things about what went down. Now, look, I don't know everything that went down. I do know this, that I've been saying something's been fishy over there for three years. And the moment they started to take money and give people dates by which they could expect their game and they blew by those dates for almost a year, that's where we all should have known that it's not working out. And here we are at the end. I'm not here to do a victory lap. I don't like to see people lose money. I don't like to see what's happening here. And from what I can just gather by what people are saying, This is what happens with these startups is that Damien and Marty probably have protected themselves and their personal assets from the company's failure. So you're not going to be able to go after them personally. And that's how all startups are. You sort of insulate yourself with an LLC. And so here we are at the end. I don't think we're going to hear from them in a lot of ways. Like we've seen this movie before. We've seen how this happens and we know that making pinball is hard. I think there were a lot of people that were championing this company, that were supporting this company well past, well past the date they should have. And I think the distributors got burned. I think content creators supported this company well past the expiration date. Imagine opening up a milk carton. The milk has expired and it doesn't taste good. And yet you're chugging it, telling people this is delicious milk. You should really get in on some. I mean, that was happening, people. That was happening when Centaur was released and how quickly now everybody is saying, oh, I told you so. I saw these red flags. And I just think it's easy to do that now. It was hard to do it when I was doing it. It was hard to take a contrarian point of view when I was doing it because then you're vulnerable, right? You are absolutely putting yourself out there and you're saying stuff that isn't popular, that is unkind, that these gentlemen would say is like slanderous and interfering with their business. And yet it all just comes down to this. If you have a pinball company, your future is in your hands. There's nothing that a podcaster, there's nothing that a YouTube personality, there's nothing that anyone who makes pinball content can do to hurt your company. The only one who's going to hurt your company is you. And I would really love it for people to start taking a little bit more responsibility and accountability for that. And I think when it comes to Haggis, there was a moment in which they needed to be transparent. It's how they said they were going to run the company. And then they were not transparent. They hid. And then you just get to that, like, what's the right word to use when you want to talk about, when they told people you'll have your game in eight weeks if you pay in full and eight months went by. Is it a lie? I don't know. I don't know what word to use. I don't know what word to use, but I do feel like they were saying stuff to their customers where they knew that stuff was not true. And I've been saying this recently, people, and I mean this with everything I've been through in my personal life over the last few weeks, over the last few months, over the 10 years of doing this show. You really do, as you get older, you will measure the success of your life by how many days you wake up and you're in a good mood. And for those looking for money from Damien and Marty, those looking for some justice, I will tell you this, those two gentlemen for the rest of their lives, and I mean They will be punished not by the court systems, not by the pinball community. They will be punished by themselves. They will not be able, I believe, to really wake up in a great mood for many, many years to come. They both love pinball. This pinball hobby has been a big part of their lives for a long time. In fact, pinball is their identity. I know this better than anybody. If you feel like you have to lose that part of who you are and your ability to wake up and enjoy the pinball hobby that you love so much because you did something stupid that put it in jeopardy, is it worth it, right? Is it worth it? And I will say this to almost all of you listening right now, stay where you're at. Just enjoy it. Enjoy your beautiful families. Enjoy the pinball podcast you enjoy. enjoy chatting on my patreon page enjoy every minute of it never do anything that would put any of that in jeopardy i think you'll wake up more days in a good mood if you enjoy the games you have and don't run at all of these new and box inflated prices you will wake up more days than not in a good mood. And that's part of growing up. It's part of maturing. We don't need more, more, more to feel good. Sometimes less is more. And if we just appreciate the people we have in this hobby and we hold these companies accountable in a fair way, right? I think that's an important point to make. I felt like I held Haggis accountable fairly. I think I hold every pinball company accountable for what they do in a fair and balanced way. There's stuff I like that they do. There's stuff I don't. And that's what makes discussing this hobby very interesting. Everybody, it feels good to put this show up. We're going to keep covering this hobby. We're going to make it entertaining and we're going to shine a light on what people are talking about each week in pinball. And I thank you all for the support. I think I'm going to lose like 50 subscribers because I asked to take a little bit of a personal break. I mean, that just goes to show you, ladies and gentlemen, how fickle some of these people are. I mean, I asked for just a little bit, right? And most of these guys, $5 a month and they run for the exits because I needed to take a little bit of personal time to take care of my family. I can't even imagine who would do that. How does that make you feel better that you went for the exits when a guy just asked you for a little bit of a pause so he could focus on his family. I guess some people are just a little bit more selfish than others, but you're not. If you're listening to this, you are not. And I'm very happy you're still here. And so is Ed Ed Robertson. Let's take it away, Chili Peppers. Wait a minute, I'm passing out, win or lose. Just like you.