We, we, we're three guys who like to talk and ball. So we came up with the clever name. We're Joel and Travis Downer Talk and Ball. And we call ourselves Triple Drain, Triple Drain, Triple Drain. We're Triple, Triple Drain. We are here. We did not retire. We did not quit. we uh i don't know we excuse insert excuse here that's why we didn't that's why we didn't record in january was holding out for more money he is such a freaking diva behind the scenes so i had to take him on a sailboat and that convinced him he's like oh okay yep that was it often wash watching and he wants to uh he wants to podcast more now i would love to blame honestly okay so we're not gonna blame me no we recorded in december and then we recorded uh with loser kids in December as well, which was great. And then early January, we're like, let's wait. You know, there should be a reveal here soon. Let's wait. And obviously the Pokemon reveal just got keep pushback, pushback, pushback. And then people got busy. And then we're like, oh, we'll go to pinball at the beach. We'll record after that. And whatever. Long story short, we're here now. But here's the true story. Joel was on a darkness retreat for like a couple months. That's what it was. Yeah. He's like, it's like, guys, I don't have time for this anymore. I'm I'm going to take a few months off. And then Wednesday comes and he's like streaming. Complete isolation. That's what it was. Yeah, I really just needed to focus in. You needed to lock in. Is that what it was? That's what it was. I was too distracted. No, I just appreciate in the most loving way the people that came up to us at Pinball at the Beach going, where is Triple Drain? Where is, you know, I think one of the guys, was it Lee? Is that his name? He was like, look, I go to my podcast browser, nothing, nothing. And I'm like, I know, I know, I know, I know. But we're here now. Oh, I legit. I decided to keep count. I was asked no less than 22 times. It was in a three day time span. I'm like, I know, I know. I'm like, guys, we're just we're, you know, two idiots and me, you know, so it's just like, I don't know. Yeah. I'm just kidding. Tom quote. I'm just kidding. Tom's lovely. Oh, we've had all kinds of famous quotes lately. What what'd you say the other day? Eight. Hey, pal. Is that what I know? Well, yeah, there's hey, pal. there's eight spots shot it. That's what it was. I said it twice. I said it twice on the Foo Fighters tutorial. Shout out to Ray Day and pointing out all the things I missed on that tutorial. Apparently his combo lights were not as obvious as I thought they were. Or as obvious as he thinks they are. So, you know. There we go. We're going to shit on you for five minutes. When Ray sends me a Facebook message going, watching the tutorial now, and then the line, Oh, this is painful. And I'm like, oh, Ray, I'm trying to. I tried as best I can. Did you see Ray Edstern, Travis? I did not. I texted him. He's like, oh, he's like, yeah, I'm a couple of miles away. I'm like, oh, okay. Well, I, too, am a couple of miles away. And then we stopped talking to each other. That's smart. I do want to give a shout out to Martin. There was a guy named Martin at Pinball at the Beach that was wearing a Triple Drain shirt. It always makes me so happy when I see a Triple Drain shirt. And, yeah, he's from, what was it? It was either Sweden or Switzerland. One of those. I know those are very different countries. Sweden, I believe. Those are very different countries. But the fact that he flew all the way over and wore the shirt, awesome. So it was great talking to him and meeting him. So big shout out there. And then, Joel, then I'll let you go on. I have to also give a shout out to Mike and Teddy from Hangar Pinball. It's also Oklahoma. Great people. Yep. They're awesome. They helped out with the sailboat, although there was somebody else involved. I don't know if they want to be name dropped, but they helped out the sailboat. And then they did, what was it, karaoke on Saturday night. So they had up the karaoke and all that. And unfortunately, Joel and I did not get to sing, Tom, because we accidentally wandered over to the bar and I had a margarita. Travis put in work. There was a lot of old fashions that he was consuming. I was everywhere. It was great. It was a great time. Shout out to Mike. Mike admitted more than once that I think he falls asleep listening to this podcast. So good night, Mike. Tuck in. I hope you're warm. I hope you're cozy. Get some good rest. You're going to have a good day tomorrow. But just turn your brain off and go to bed. It's always a solid comment. Tom, have you noticed that? We take that as a positive. Well, I've had so many men come up to me and say, or even like wives, my husband falls asleep to your guys' voices. and i'm like well you should see how much they pay for tom's only fans well so i just real quick i know i know i'm not trying to bury the lead here but we're going to talk about pokemon we're absolutely going to talk about this is a pokemon expert it says it right on the screen oh my god you're not going to see so i've gone from i know we'll talk about this a little bit later i've gone from understanding like five percent of it just playing Pokemon Go, right? Because Monica makes me. And then I find out Monica's a huge Pokemon fan. And then I find out I've been pronouncing it wrong this entire time. It's Pokemon. But we talked about this yesterday. So I'll go with Pokemon. I think it's Pokemon. Well, you can go Pokemon, Poke-a-mon, Poke-e-mon. Right. It's one of those. Yeah, it's one of those. It's one of those. Yeah, I found out Monica is a huge fan. And now she's like, okay, we go from We're going to save money and really lock down this quarter one to, hey, is there going to be a new pinball machine when I get back home from work? And I'm like, yeah, the kids will talk to you again. Your daughters will love it. I think maybe my wife will talk to me again as long as I have a Pokemon pinball machine. She was at Pembroke Beach and she was great. Yeah, she's awesome. Monica's awesome. She doesn't listen to us. She admitted she doesn't listen to the show, but she's great. She hears me talk enough. She doesn't need to listen to me. True, true, true. Pokemon is pretty great. It came out when I was in fifth grade. My brother had Pokemon Blue. I had Pokemon Red. We both beat those games. And I remember distinctly Mrs. Carr's class. Shout out to Ms. Carr who took away – actually, no shout out to you because she took away my instruction manual. I had my Game Boy Red Pokemon instruction manual hidden behind my history book. And I was reading the instruction manual and she noticed and she took it. So I don't know where you're at, Mrs. Carr, but I hope you don't have a good day because I still remember. Mrs. Carr, I salute you. That is a good move. Joel was not paying attention in class and wasting your time. I'm just glad this didn't happen to Jared because if we would have been like, hey, this happened to Jared, there would have been like 50 people finding Ms. Carr like somewhere. She would have been dogged within a day. Took away my Pokemon manual. Anyways, we're going to talk about Pokemon, but I do want to wrap up real quick. Pinball at the Beach was awesome. Pinball at the Beach is a fantastic show. The summary of Pinball at the Beach is I've always done Pinball Expo in Chicago and TPF, both fantastic shows. And so if you're wondering, should I go to Pinball at the Beach? If your goal is to play as much Pinball as possible, then TPF or Expo are probably the better options. If your goal is to meet as many industry people as possible, probably go to Pinball Expo. It's in Chicago. That's where everybody is. But if your goal is to have fun, like just a fun time, it's so much more social. They only sell 1,000 tickets. They didn't sell out. So it's a smaller venue. It's more intimate, but yet it's not crowded. The longest line all day is like maybe three people deep. But most games don't even have a line. You can just walk up and play. and what's awesome is you can just play pinball for two, three hours and then you can step out of the tent or the pavilion and you're at the beach and there's amazing food all within walking distance, multiple restaurants, multiple bars. It's just such an enjoyable hangout. And I brought my wife this year and she is not a pinball person and she had a blast. So if you've ever thought about bringing kids or you've ever thought about bringing a significant other to a pinball event, this is the one to bring them to because worst case, they play pinball for an hour and then they go to the pool or they go to the beach or they go to the bar. And that's great. And that's the thing that you don't really have that type of option at a TPF or an expo. So I had an amazing time. It was awesome. Just no room with Neil McCray, that's all. Now the real question is, is Tom Graff going to show up next year? You never say never. Because the autograph session was only two and a half hours. But if you show up, holy shit, like eight hours at least? Yeah. I don't know. Kerry Hardy's going to have to sit on the sidelines of Tom Graf's show. I'm just saying. It was awesome. And really, I loved everybody that said hi and the conversations we were able to have and just be able to play and just hang out. And it was a really good time. But really, I mean, at the end, my wife genuinely had a great time. And I asked her, I said, what are the chances that we will come back next year? Because it was just my wife and I that went. And her answer was 65%. 65% chance. Wow. There you go. That's pretty good. That's better than 64%. Sure is. So pinball at the beach was awesome. Yeah, really, really good time. Tom, what's the percentage you show up? 64. 68. Tom, come to the dark. side see tom's going to end disc he wants to play for world championships see i that's the difference joel i chose disney world and sailboats and dolphin watching and hanging out with you over you know pinball tournament having fun at a pinball show or getting my butt kicked at a pinball tournament i choose choose fun uh travis honest question here do you think you drank more drinks than you played games of pinball oh oh yeah 100 yeah i pretty good but here's the thing no here's the thing though i was never i was never drunk no like the key is and i figured this out and this might be like so he says well this might be the native american in me too so for those scoring at home i'm actually a third or six whatever whatever 66 is two-thirds native american math like i said 64 is lower than 65 it is early okay i bet i've been having to deal with there i know anyway it's been a long week for you the point being is i realize certain alcohol will go through my system faster it's not a stereotype it's literally a biological fact and i've had to live with this biological fact after celebrating my 21st birthday 22 times so So knowing this, I space it out. I make sure I get a good breakfast in the morning. I don't do mimosas, at least at pinball. If I'm in Vegas, okay, it's mimosa time. But that's near here nor there. But I make sure to space it out properly, and, yeah, we just go from there. So it's like it's just fun, right, Joel? You go to the bar. You have a margarita. You go talk to some people. You might see a pinball designer or two or somebody in the industry. You're like, hey, we need to get a drink. And then you go get a drink. And do you talk about pinball at all? No. you don't and that's what's cool about it you talk about anything else but pinball so it's kind of like that's great yeah because you forget these people that are in this industry they have lives outside of pinball they have families they have other hobbies they you know so that's like that's truthfully the cool part and then of course if you do want to talk pinball you can go ahead and do that but plenty of people to talk pinball coming back around to it joel yes i drink more drinks then pinball game i might have played maybe 11 pinball games this year like total yeah games and probably like five of those or four of those are beetlejuice and two of those were winchester yep i was similar boat similar boat uh with the games i i don't drink a ton and i so you can absolutely go to you can buddy you can wow you can go to pinball at the beach without drinking a ton like if that's not so don't don't have that be a turn off no it's a great time Yeah, you're still allowed in the bar. You know, they have, I saw plenty of kids getting virgin daiquiris all weekend, Tom, and they looked fine. I mean, a couple of it was questionable, but still, I, you know, they were good. It was fine. Okay. So at, what I will say is at Pinball at the Beach, multiple games on Beetlejuice. I had a chance to play a few games on Evil Dead. Still a great game. Played some Dune. Still a great game. Winchester. Still a great game. seeing Keith Ellin play Winchester for the first time was a pretty amazing experience. When you see somebody like really good at pinball, just step up to a game for the first time and just start hitting shots like it's nothing. It just it's a gut punch. But at the same time, it's a magical thing to experience. Like, it's really cool to see somebody at that level play a game that well. And then also played Harry Potter, played Harry Potter a bunch. There was a bunch of Harry Potter games there. And what a great game. Like, really, what a great game. I will say my wife and I both had an entire game where neither of us started a lesson. So the scoop is still hard to hit. And that's all I got to say about that. Is your wife so mad at you for not having a Dune? Well, okay. I don't know. Maybe this isn't complete. I'm getting a Dune. Dune is coming. I told Zach, I was like, finally, I need to commit to this. Sign me up for Dune. so I'm in the final, the initial whatever, the late run, the March run so we are getting a Dune and that was really funny introducing my wife to people and so many people were like so how do you like Dune? They know Nicole likes Dune and she would light up every time because she likes Dune. So what's leaving? Nothing. Well, Godzilla is going to go to my parents. I'm going to give them a game that they can blow up and have a great time. So Godzilla is going to my parents and Dune will be right there. Let's talk about Beetlejuice real quick. Beetlejuice. Travis and I both had multiple games on Beetlejuice. I'm going to let you talk first, Travis. What were your initial impressions? What are your thoughts on Beetlejuice? So it's an interesting thing. The first game I played, we played one ball and we had to walk away. And it wasn't because the game was bad. It was just a super long player. The way that they had it set up, we tried to play a three-player game. I think it was I had a player you mentioned earlier that was on Winchester and he played freaking forever. And then that guy. Yeah. Then Monica came up and she played for like five minutes at least. She played for a little while and then I came up and I played for a while and then I just realized, OK, this this game is not going to drain. And I think it's mainly because if you looked at every game, Joel, it's like the left outlaying post. They had it nearly all the way down, I think so. And then there was some type of right gate, Tom, on the out lane that just stayed up the whole entire time. So it was near impossible to lose a ball. If you had a pulse, you were going to play forever. The gate was similar to the gate on Harry Potter. The Protecto. But it was always up. It was always up. So if that ball went out the out lane, it doesn't matter. That gate was up. It was coming back. You could not drain out the right side. Tom, it was like you were going bowling with like the safety bumpers up or the child bumpers up the whole time. Like you had the training wheels on. So, you know, I get why to do that. But at the same time, for me personally, I don't know about for Joel, but for me personally, it's hard to get a tell on like how a game is going to play if it has like endless ball saving has all that. But, you know, I will say I think the game is a real looker. The art freaking fantastic. It might be one of like the top five packages I've seen in pinball. So if people are into that, it'll be excellent. It'll be great. If you can, if you have one on order, I mean, as much as the art pops. Sell it now. I think if you could upgrade to the butter cabinet, I think you'd like that. I mean, the art pops so much. So I have no idea that the, I assume the butter cabinet would even just take it to another level. And I know it's an overused term. Like, you know, we talked about that before, like color pops and stuff like that. And, you know, I just, I take my C. I got in art back in high school. So I know art, obviously, but it just it just it looks great. No math. No, I don't know math. No, that's that's for a wife. I got I got to see a math also. So but, you know, the game looked fantastic in terms of how it played. You know, it's it's very tough. And I'll say this across the board for any game, any manufacturer that's at a show. it's so incredibly tough to get games set up properly and keep them playing proper all weekend long when they're being played nonstop so i'm mindful of that it's not like i'm setting up in a controlled environment where i'm the only one i can hear the sounds it's perfectly level so you know i always give grace for that and i try to look at it from the point of view of how will this game shoot based on my understanding of geometry and i have to pull that knowledge from previous eras, previous games played. So that's kind of where I'm at on it. Starting out with the good, I did like the left orbit when it worked. That left orbit, when it went all the way around and it looped back, I thought that was a cool shot. And when I say when it worked, if the game was leaning to the right, that shot was not going to work. It was too high of a pitch. It just didn't have enough power to go up there sometime. So again, I played four different models, so your mileage may vary just on setup, but when it cleared it, it was pretty cool. And I did like how, Joel, the upper flipper, you could hold it up and you actually hit the backside of the upper flipper when you go through the left orbit and then it feeds back down into the scoop. I think that's a pretty cool shot and a cool take on, you know, a classic like let's have an upper flipper and kind of like Star Trek or like Ninja whatever, you know, to where you hit it from behind or James Bond. So that was a little bit different. It's in a different spot. But other than that, one thing that stood out to me that I liked a lot more that I didn't think I would was the camera targets, the two stand-up targets. And I think it's just because – In the middle. Yeah. Like I will freely admit I'm not a fan of a bunch of stand-ups in the middle. So like that doesn't resonate with me with the Beetlejuice layout. But I can say the way that they implement it, those two targets with the camera and kind of everything going out on the play field. but that one target flashing and you knowing that you need to hit it, it was pretty clear on that point what you're supposed to do. And I think it actually led to a multiball because I know if I spammed it enough. There's a hurry up associated with it. Yeah, it felt like things were happening. So, but, you know, that's the things I really liked. You know, ramps are fine, orbits fine. The spinner shot into the scoop, I had a little bit harder time finding that shot. But it was cool when you could hit it. You know, I'm talking about the spinner that was connected to the left back. Yep. I mean, it was just, that was a tougher, tougher shot for me. And, you know, the, the sandworm was the one thing I was really curious about because I was thinking it was going to do a bunch of stuff. And I just, I think if I had the one critique over it that I wish, since that's the main mech to the game, that it was available closer to the start button, because it was taken four, five, six, seven hits sometimes to the targets to release it down. So the way that works is there's three targets. There's a main target. No, I'm familiar with how it works. But you have to hit it to hurry up. Like you have to hit all three in a short period. I understand that, which relies on skill of a player to unlock something that's your main mech. I think that should be so much closer to the start button for somebody. Like have it be open, let people hit it, and then you go to that second level. Oh, so you're saying start with it open. A hundred percent. Just to hit it once. Yeah because what you just described you gating your best mech behind doing a bunch of other stuff that people may not do because the game was set up super easy and it was still taking a while to get to that point I mean I got I got to it My wife got to it but I hear what you saying I mean I see what you saying though If you that that like my one critique. That's just my one critique. But I mean, overall, I, I don't know the sandworm. I was interested to see how like the lower play field would do, I guess below it. I don't know if you'd call it that. I'm not, I'm not even sure, but I found myself not generally noticing anything happening with that. And I don't know if that's because of just how it is or if they're just not code with that or I don't know. My expectations were a little bit different than what I saw there. But overall, I mean, the sandworm eats the ball. So if you're into that, like that happens. But generally, I just I don't know the sandworm itself. I thought the mech was going to do a lot more than what it did early on. And I kind of I even looked over at Joel and I said, you know what? I like the D&D Dragon more because I was thinking maybe it could be something where you're hitting it a lot and more things are happening. The way the jaw reacts on the D&D Dragon? Yeah, yeah. Maybe I just didn't notice it. Like I said, I need to play it more. It was at a show. I'm not going to write it off or anything like that. That's just my first impression. So don't fire off all your arrows at me yet. Send them to Joel. TripleDrain at gmail.com. I mean, overall, I kept playing it. Other people were playing it. There was lines the whole time. Oh, yeah. Yeah, 100%. That's a great first take. I would say, so on the Sanborn mech, what I like about it was, I mean, once I understood that, Bug was initially like, oh, yeah, if it was just hit the three targets, like, it would be the easiest mech in the world. But maybe they do that for the first multiball. A hundred percent, it needs to be. And then they have the hurry-up aspect for every multiball after that. What I did like is I think they already have three multiballs programmed in, so there is variety there. so every time I played I was getting different multi-balls one of them once it starts the dragon the worm is up and then you had to smash the action button a bunch and it would slowly lower it down and then it would bring it down and then you'd have chances to hit it that was a cool integration of the action button there was another one I think it was called gut punch where it was up and you had to hit below those below targets and once you hit enough of those like you're hitting it in the gut it would come down and then you could hit it that's the one I couldn't really tell what was happening. That's the one I had issues with. Well, maybe with audio or something, it would be more obvious what's going on. That's what I think, too. But I do like that, that if you're going to have that much of a mech, give us variety, especially if it's not like, oh yeah, the first one's always this, and the second one's always this. No, it's like I think it's random or whatever it is. And then there was a third one, I don't remember the exact rules of that. What I do say, the mech itself moves a lot. There's a lot of articulation with it. I did get to the DAO mode, the Deo mode, which was shown on the trailer, where you have to hit the different mechs to get them to either start dancing or stop dancing. Right, which I will say, Joel and Tom, I'll tell you this, too. I forgot to mention this on mine, so sorry for interrupting. But that is probably one of the coolest modes I've seen in pinball. It's awesome. It can't work for competition at all, and you may get bored of it if you play it like 30 times. But if you play it the first few times and you give it time in between, it's hilarious. Like, yeah, that mode was awesome. That's what stood out to me was I think they've really taken – they're trying to make every mode a unique moment or a unique experience. Like that, you know, just that multiball, the fact that you're smashing the action button to get that to come down. Or I played the Beetlejuice modes. There are white arrows. So by hitting an arrow, you get a Beetlejuice, so you have to get three. and then you can start a Beetlejuice mode. But like one of those, there's this as seen on TV mode. And to play that mode, you're supposed to hold the action button down. So it's a one-handed mode. What I don't understand is if you can beat the mode without doing it, because I watched a lot of people do that and almost everybody drained as, you know, eventually they're draining with a one-handed mode play. But I'm curious if that's a, you know, you can, you get more points if you do it one-handed or you have to finish the mode one-handed or something. I don't know. My guess is the way I understood it, because I watched somebody that will be not named, but they know who they are. They put their knee up on the action button, and apparently it just kept all the shots open, and it looked like the score stayed set. You could just blow through it. Oh, yeah. It was a lot of points. But me, I'm not that flexible, so I just trapped up and timed it out. I'm like, okay, I don't want to hold down an action button. I was having fun. I wanted to go to something else. It was fun. He wanted to drink. Leave him alone. Thank you, Tom Graff. You're welcome. Just every mode or everything I experienced. I mean, the Deo mode, extremely amazing mode. I mean, it's a moment. It's really cool. The left orbit I struggled with. Now, I only played two different copies, so I'm very curious when I go to stream it. I mean, I'll find it. I mean, I know I'll find that shot eventually, but I also have the habit of when it's a harder shot, I don't know why I'm pushing the button harder. You know, like, I just got to, like, push it. Like, I'm going to end now. And the problem is when I do that, then I leave the flipper up. So the problem is you're using the right flipper to hit the left orbit. But like Travis said, if you leave the right flipper up, it just hits the bottom of the upper flipper and goes into the scoop. It doesn't go around the couch. So I'm like I would hit the shot, but I'd be celebrating and still holding the flipper up like an idiot. And then it's back down. So the idea of locking a ball on the couch, you have to shoot the ball in this upper loop enough to then be able to. I never locked the ball on the couch because I couldn't. On the right-hand side, right? Yeah, on the right-hand side. So I saw people do it. It's a very cool mech. I mean, that's the one thing. There are mechs galore in this game. The theme integration is top tier. I mean, it's really good. Beautiful game. The pulsing lights, I know that's something on the initial stream. The colorful pulsing lights were really jarring to watch it. It's not as jarring in person. It's definitely noticeable, but it's not nearly as jarring in person. So I did ask, do you think it's super jarring? I thought it was more towards JJP than it is Stern, personally. Oh, I mean, it's a lot of light show. But I have old sensitive eyeballs, too, so that could be it. It's probably a me problem. Yeah, it's a me problem. Well, I did mention it to Bug, and they did say they were going to adjust, like, they were going to give the ability to adjust, you know, the brightness, obviously, like how much of a difference. Or I told him, I said, just from a streaming standpoint, if you have an option to turn it off or, like, a consistent GI. Oh, so it was too much for you, Joel. well i'm saying you went straight to bug and you tattletaled into he's thinking of his cameras exactly i said from a streaming standpoint and he he acknowledges he goes he knows that on camera it is it is way more drastic on camera than it is in person so he goes from a streaming standpoint he understands so i'm curious if they'll implement that um not not necessarily assuming everybody's gonna turn it on but um just have that ability would be nice but it was i mean my overall experience with Beetlejuice was I'm excited to play this game more. I'm excited to dive into these modes more. I do think if you're in on an order of a Beetlejuice, I think you're going to love it. I would already place, I think this game's right up there with that Evil Dead type mech experience, mode experience. Evil Dead is doing incredibly well and I have no doubt that Beetlejuice is going to be right there beside it. Overall, it's a great time to be a pinball fan. Really, when you look at it you have excellent machines coming out from pretty much everybody i mean you have i mean just just look at what we had a chance to play right you had evil dead you had winchester you had harry potter and of course you know stern's going to come out with multiple games a year so you have so many at bats to play so many games or games that are gonna be great so tom are you getting a beetlejuice yes you are oh i didn't know that oh yeah i was won dering cabinet now are you going to turn the lights down or are you just going to crank that shit up what are you going to do i gotta see it first oh okay well that's fair i mean that's a rational take joel and i are just you know we're on both sides of the fence on this one has the definitive view of of you know the right way to do things so i'll be really curious to hear uh what the right answer is just living his best life i have no idea what you guys are talking about for what Hey, you know what, Tom? I know this is early, Tom, but happy birthday. Happy birthday, bud. Tomorrow's his birthday. So when everybody just remembers. Travis has wished me a happy birthday every day this week. All you have to remember is Tom's birthday is Valentine's Day. So when you're celebrating. Joel doesn't even care that I've done that for you. When you're with your loved one, think of me. Tom. Yep, that's what matters. Tom. So Beetlejuice is great. Good on you for getting one. And I think it was interesting talking to people there at Pinball at the Beach because they're like, did you get one? Yes. Joel, can we ask Tom, why did you get a Beetlejuice? No, we're not going to ask him that. No. Okay. We don't have time. I'm curious, Tom. Why? Yeah. We haven't had this conversation. You pulled the trigger before you even saw it, I think. Yeah. I mean, I said I was interested, but once I saw it, I was like, this looks really cool. so i didn't want to miss out yeah did francie help push you over the over the edge you saw the art i mean like yes definitely the art on that game is spectacular and it wasn't evil dead too i mean and i think evil dead had something to do with it because i didn't want to get evil dead just because of like the horror theme yeah uh and beetle just a little different uh but uh like when I play Evil Dead, I'm like, wow, this is fun. There's a lot of mechs in it. I think you're going to like it a lot. The topper is really cool in person. The spooky speak they had off, so we did not get to experience any sort of spooky speak, which made sense. I mean, it's super loud in there. There's no way it's going to work well. Well, the best ringing endorsement I can give to Beetlejuice is I talked to multiple people that were having debates over what's better, Beetlejuice or Evil Dead. And if you know how people reacted to Evil Dead, Fist fights broke out. Well, yeah. I mean, I saw a couple of guys with a couple of beers. I mean, they were having a heated discussion about it. I'm like, okay, I have to sit down. I have to listen to this. You don't know what you're talking about. They made some great points, and that was one of the points that they made. So I was like, oh, yeah, that's a fair game. It's great. But the point being is people aren't writing it off immediately. If you're comparing it to something that was already considered a banger from your company and it's already getting that direct comparison and it's getting that debate back and forth, then your game's in a good spot. Yeah. Absolutely. Another game that's in a great spot, Winchester. Winchester had a very long line. It was really cool for a lot of people. This was their first opportunity to play the game. And so there were people coming back and just playing it and playing it and playing it. And it was similar, like I mentioned, you'd ask somebody, it's like, well, what game are you getting? They're like, I got lucky I got in on Winchester. I got lucky I got in on Beetlejuice. So it's like these people that hit the lottery on getting lucky to get some of these games. But Winchester, I mean, I heard nothing but positive reviews from people that had a chance to play it for the first time. And, yeah, I obviously played it some more. And once again, I love shooting that game. I'm really excited to see what they're doing with that. It's a shame that you can't hear it. You know, that's every pinball machine at a show, you know, that you're missing that audio. But I played Winchester a bunch. Still an amazing game. And then I had the opportunity to play Dune a few more times. Still loving Dune. And believe it or not, everybody, Tom Graff, Mr. Tom Graff over here, he bought himself a Dune. So you have a Dune now. It is in your basement. Let's hear your, what is it, your two-week, three-week ownership experience of Dune Pinball by Barrels of Fun. I haven't played it. No, just kidding. I'm just teasing. No, it's awesome. I really love, I mean, it's a tough game, but I really love the risk-reward of it. Like some of the I think they're called prophecy modes. Yep. You get into those and it's like, do you want to continue or you want to collect a jackpot? And you're like, I want to continue. And then you screw up and you're like, yeah. And then but yeah, no, I I'm really digging it. I think it's an excellent game. Like could be a top 10 game. Honestly. Let's go. Are you a fan of Dune in general, like Dune the franchise? Not to the point where I'm like an avid fan like Star Wars. Sure. But I've seen the new movies. I like them. I remember when I was a kid and I saw like the one from the 80s and I was like, I don't like this at all. like but yeah you know i i think that was because i was a kid and just how the movie was done but uh no i really like the uh the new movies so like i i think from when it first came out you know the code was really bare bones and now you know you can tell they've they've really tied the movie in to to the game and everything and it's it's super well done obviously the audio Jeff from Dirty Pool. It's awesome. It's really great. That's great. I'm glad that you're loving it. I just think it's funny that a player at your skill level with the way that your brain works with math and points and risk reward and everything you're saying possibly top 10 in a game with Dune. And then we got the other side of that, my wife, who doesn't care about any of that. And she's loving dune so it's just that that range is shows a lot um which which i'm pumped i'm pumped to get a dune and there's really like if i was gonna pick like the best mech of last year it would definitely be that worm that worm mech like it just does so many things yeah grabs a ball pulls it down under their play field the worm pops up it becomes a bash toy you know the magnet sinks in and goes up and drops it up on the play field. I mean, there's just so many things it does. And it's just really cool. The mode that I haven't played yet that I'm really excited for is the Fae. Once you spell Dune... No, it's not when you spell Dune. It's when you get, what is it, four Bessie Jezzeret awards? You get to that Fae multiball? Do you know what I'm talking about? Yeah. Oh, dude. Well, you report back because do you remember in the second movie? I have not played the new code yet. So like I just installed it recently. I've just I've been busy with media days and life. The in the second movie, do you remember the black and white kind of gladiator fight? Yes. No, I have. I have. Yes, I have played that. Yeah, that mode I've heard is an amazing moment in like an amazing mode. It is spectacular. Awesome. Like, everything turns white, and, like, it's just super cool. Yeah. Awesome. The modes, I assume Eric Prepke is, like, the main coder there. I mean, just freaking fantastic job with that game. Awesome. So, you know, I keep asking you this question because you look at last year. So now you have Dune. You're getting a Winchester, which is awesome. So we'll add this to the mix later. But right now you have Dune in your house. You have Harry Potter in your house. You have Star Wars, Fall of the Empire in your house. What else do you have? You have King Kong from last year as well. There's a lot of good games that came out last year. Yeah. So, I mean, anything standing out when you look at what you've played in the last month? Anything really standing out to you? You know, not necessarily. I mean, probably more Dune just because I just got it. Sure. But, you know, and that that. That happens a lot with me. It's like, yeah, you get your new game and you want to play it. Joel is asking you, Tom. Yeah. Is who is winning in your household? Which manufacturer is winning? That's what he really wants to know. Yeah, that's hard to say. I don't want to. They're all winning. I don't want to put pressure on anybody. You don't want to. You don't want to piss off anybody. Well, it'll be interesting. I get it. I just found leaking photos. true true i think it's great that you know there are there you know you have stern that's a big manufacturer but you have other manufacturers that are really yeah stepping up to the bar and then it just makes pinball that much better because the competition gets greater a hundred percent uh travis is holding his hand up yeah i don't want to rush you guys but i just gotten noticed that I have maybe like 25 minutes left. Okay. Time to pivot! If I have to leave early, you guys can still keep going. That's true. Just for the sake of editing, I'm just going to leave an empty... You can just leave your camera on. We're going to screenshot that. We're good. Joel, what did you think when you played it? Oh, funny boy. Funny. so I this is this is funny we're recording this at 10 30 10 30 a.m on Friday Pokemon's gonna be revealed in an hour and a half that's why Travis is having to leave early because you know he's gotta like sell the game I gotta do dealer stuff yeah so Travis went there he went to Stern for dealer day on Tuesday he's played the game and Tom went there on Wednesday for media day he's played the game I have not I have not played the game I've seen some grainy leaked photos and that's it so i am i'm on the outside looking in here um so yeah just initial impressions we let we let travis go first last time so tom initial pressures you were there for media day um what are your initial impressions with pokemon pinball by by stern pitbull i thought it was excellent uh it i'm not a pokemon guy i didn't play the video games i okay i may may have bought a pack or two of cards just to kind of check it out but i've never gotten into like playing the game or anything like that um i thought it was really cool uh the layout's really well done uh i i feel like it's a layout you know somebody like myself or travis who's maybe in the top 250 in the world might think it's an easy game at least at this point uh but i think this is going to really hopefully uh bring in people to pinball i mean it's just it's very approachable it's very easy to understand the rules like i i could understand what was going on like after two games like okay i know what's going on here like i don't need an encyclopedia to understand the rules um you have your bash toy up the middle which honestly was phenomenal like nice yeah that that is a very cool toy uh but overall i thought it shot well i mean there's there's plenty of opportunities for like combos and things like that it's you know if you like a fast game I like it's it's a fast flowy game, but it's not it's not like. Steve Ritchie fast or like Gomez is like Johnny Mnemonic fast but it hard to explain but it not overwhelming It not overwhelming Thank you Yes Yeah that what I want to say Nice The little bit that I heard I mean there was a lot of question of who designed this because this is Jack Danger and Gomez So it's like, is this a Gomez layout or is this a Jack Danger layout? There's people online that think this is a direct copy of Transformers, which is not the case. What I've learned is this was absolutely, this is like 95% Jack Danger. Jack Danger designed this entire layout, and then it was handed off to George. I think what I've heard is there was two shots that George had them switch. They basically, where the captive ball is and the Pikachu ramp are, initially those were switched, but then you couldn't see the captive balls. So Gomez was like, no, let's move those back so that you can see the captive ball mech. But besides that, this is almost entirely Jack Danger. And I know, selfishly, I love Jack Danger layouts. I had a blast streaming Foo the other day. I have X-Men behind me. Jack is known for super dynamic layouts, and it's clear that I think he started down that path and then was kind of encouraged to make it a little more simple, make it a little more approachable. And selfishly, it's like I want the crazy dynamic layout, but I understand with a theme like Pokemon, Pokemon, Pokemon, I don't know, with a theme like this, you want this to be as approachable and accessible to everybody as possible. And I think what I've heard, some people think this is his best layout because it shoots great and it shoots really fun. Travis, what were your initial impressions, experiences of the game? Yeah, so, I mean, like I said, everybody listening, keep in mind, I am a dealer, Stern, so you might hear me glazing a little bit. But this is like my honest thoughts on it, though. It harkens back to what we've discussed the past couple of podcasts to where I have this theory that I'm wondering what happens when a designer kind of does like the Chef Ramsay thing to where you're looking at a world-class chef and you're saying, make me the best scrambled egg you possibly can, right? Because there's elegance and simplicity. And I think that pinball in general, if you look at all the layouts that have shown up, and I think this has always been happening since the 80s and 90s, it's just kind of exploded the past 10 years or so to where everybody is going towards dynamic layouts, which what we mean by that, or what I specifically mean is having multiple flippers on a game, all kinds of crazy ball paths, horizontal ball paths and everything. But the issue with that is, is, you know, too much of something can be a bad thing. It's not always a good thing because you have to have shots dialed in. You have to have if your design has to have a certain setup. Yeah, that sometimes makes it a little bit more difficult, especially if you're manufacturing two, five, ten thousand plus games. Right. It's got to get out there to location, so on and so forth. So I think as soon as I saw what the layout was and I became aware of it, I knew immediately in my heart of hearts that this was going to be an absolute home run. But at the same time, I accepted that pinball enthusiasts that are hardcore about their dynamic layouts, whether it's on Pinside, Facebook, they're going to absolutely shit all over it. And I understand that. That's just the way it is. You can't please everybody. but I'm looking at it from the standpoint of you need something that's different than what's out there. You need something that pulls more people into pinball. And there are plenty of themes out there that, that does that, but let's face facts. You know, Pokemon is a massive, massive IP. It's like three or four X anything else. It is clearly the biggest IP. It's not, I know a lot of people think it's Harry Potter. It's, it's not. And Harry Potter is massive on its own. It just gives you an idea and we've talked about this before that jersey jack took a very big risk with how they designed harry potter and everything they did and i think it paid off i think they did get on the design right but that is an inherent risk whereas with pokemon imagine if they did something like that like imagine if it was the x-men layout there that's that's a big risk right so i mean you're swinging for the fences there and sometimes you're better off not necessarily i won't say play it safe, but you're better off making something that you know the majority of people can play and can feel good on and feel like they're hitting shots on. And that's what that's really what pinball is at the end of the day, because a lot of us, if we're playing like whether it's a Godzilla, an X-Men, a Dune or Harry Potter, and you feel like you're hitting all kinds of shots, we're really doing that from the standpoint that we've been playing pinball for a few years. We're not doing it from the standpoint that we're three weeks in and we're fumbling the ball all over the place just trying to stay alive. So that in itself, I'm glad to see that Stern went that direction. Overall with it, I think the thing that I enjoyed the most about it is that shots are accessible. Rules are accessible right now. I'm kind of glad that they went that way. I'm sure that there's plenty of depth coming with the various Pokemon and all that. But other than that, I'm really happy with what I've seen. And that doesn't mean the game's without fault or anything like that. I'll be up front. I'm not a big fan of their two-pop nest area, the nest of pops, because the ball doesn't come out over the middle of the play field at all. It just kind of hangs up and just goes to left orbit and comes back down. Obviously, probably intentional because you look at something like an ACDC, for instance. It's a great example of something that has like five major shots to the game instead of like Star Wars that has eight or nine. Yeah, it it basically and I'm talking about Fall of the Empire on that one. But the feed coming out of the pops there could be dangerous for people right down the middle. So I'm sure like something like that, maybe that's just a design choice. I'm personally not crazy about it, but I understand from the accessibility standpoint why they exist. um you know other than that i think the mech the middle mech the meowth that comes down i think that's great i think it's fantastic i call it junkyard on steroids and i absolutely hate junkyard how that mech works yeah it's way different than oh yeah oh yeah it works on this it's big it's huge you see it move you're clear on what to do you you get to it you know pretty quickly so all that i really like literally fun to hit i mean oh yeah yeah it's a it's a good mech i think that they did a great job on that um you know the pikachu that's on at the right ramp that yeah that moves back and forth you know for me i i don't really care either way just because i'm paying attention to the pinball and there wasn't i didn't notice anything in the code in which the ball would stop and it would guide my eyes toward pikachu towards moving or saying anything so it might as well have been like rogu a mandalorian i i didn't notice it moving there is a there is a post up there that stops there is um on the ones that i played though tom it's like the post came up and then immediately released the ball okay like i don't know if it was supposed to like hold it there for like a scene something over there yeah well it's not in the game yet well it came up it was in the game it came up quick when i started uh pikachu's mode which is on the right ramp and it's a two ball multiball but that post just came up real quick and then within like less than a second later the ball was already coming back to the right flipper so i don't know if it just didn't catch it or what exactly was happening there so yeah i i hope that they add in more for that let me ask this because i know a lot of a lot of people early on ellies are gone ellies are gone which props i mean those are getting ellie yeah ellies are gone but the difference between the premium and the pro as far as i can tell uh pikachu doesn't move the pokeball doesn't move there's no magnet under the upper area and then there's this weird side o'clock so i know you can lock a ball there's a little flap so under the pokeball you can you can um that's how you catch the pokemon i think is you go right under that and then it spits out the ball just like the coffin on um on elvira it's all over there and i know that entire mech isn't there on the pro and then also the whirlpool which apparently there are certain times where you use the little whirlpool on the left in lane yeah you like the whirlpool isn't like the whirlpool on creature wars or creature well i mean it doesn't stay in there very long okay so what's fascinating is designed it yeah and if you look at the uh you guys will see this here really soon like i i was taking a look at that whirlpool and I could tell like they had like little cutouts in it that appeared to be slowing down the ball. So my theory is those weren't there before. And that ball probably just went the whole entire time. And they're like, OK, we can't have this. We need to figure out a way to slow it down. I think that was their answer to slowing it down. Right. But I I personally wish it would keep going a little bit more because I was only getting like four or five around there at any one time. And when you're in the squirrel mode, well, I'm just saying, And, you know, for me personally, if I see a whirlpool up top, I don't want to watch it there. But if I see a whirlpool at my flippers, like, I don't mind if it spins a little bit. Well, there's a gate on it, right? Like, I've spun on Mustang and everything. There's a gate so that there are times where initially the ball will just drop down and avoid the whirlpool entirely. So if they have the whirlpool tied into a mech or, sorry, tied into, like, a specific mode, yeah, that's one thing. like on Star Wars, you hit that whirlpool sometimes when you're not trying to. And it's like, can I just give me my ball back? But this is if it's tied into a mode where it's like, okay, I'm going to enjoy this right now because it's the mode. But my question is pro or premium. Where are you at with that? Do you feel like it's an obvious answer here? Which ones do you think are going to sell more? What do you think, Tom? I think they're going to sell more premiums, but I personally am just going to get a pro. Okay. Because that's just me. Yeah. Okay. That's fair. But I've been getting pros now for a while. Yeah, and you can always upgrade if you fall in love with the game. Oh, yeah, absolutely. But I think if you're a diehard Pokemon fan, you're going to want to get a Premium or an LE. The LE was freaking sweet, like the expression lights. If I'm comparing it to the way they did Walking Dead and this one, this one blows it away. It's night and day, yeah. Yeah. Yeah, it blows it away. The lights on the outside look amazing, like in person. Yeah. Nice. And on the inside, personally. But with Spike 3, Spike 3 is designed in a way that all models could accept expression light. So I could get it for the Pro. Obviously, it won't have the same, you know, aesthetics and all that. Sure, yeah. And the purple pouting coating was... It was nice. Yeah, it looked nice on the cabinet, I thought. I assume, and this is the speculation side of this, which is I think people are already saying that the values of the LEs are probably going to go up. And that's just there's an entire Pokemon collecting community that drop crazy money for Pokemon collectibles. And I think there will be certain people in that community that once they hear, oh, there's a pinball machine, I got to get one. they're they're they're gonna want the best so i'm very curious i i would assume there are people the ellies are gone unfortunately but i i bet there are people that are that have some that are just gonna hold on to them to sell them later and it's a hundred percent there's gonna be a lag time between when like heavy duty pokemon collectors become aware of this and start understanding what it is yeah compared to like when they want to pull the trigger and get something so i think like this type of theme this is like a pure evergreen theme it's probably going to be manufactured for like six to 10 years at least like no joke. I mean, obviously star Wars was doing that until they shut it off to go to the next star Wars. So, I mean, this definitely has that high end potential. So the question really becomes, how are they going to implement home team and insider connect with it to, you know, get your Pokemon and everything. Draw people in. Yeah. Keep playing. Yeah. A thousand percent. I think they, there's a lot to do with that. Tanio Klyce was on code and Tanio Klyce, anytime that I would ask anybody at Stern, what's Tanio Klyce doing? You know, So Tanio Klyce's the lead. Andrew and Josh are also on it. Correct. But with Tanio Klyce, for years, like the last few years, it's, what is Tanio Klyce up to? Because after Foo, that was the last thing he did. And they always said he's on Insider Connect. So I think Tanio Klyce knows Insider Connect inside and out. So I would assume the Insider Connected integration into Pokemon is going to be big. So it'll be exciting to see what that's like, you know, who all you've collected or whether or not they do timed collections. Yeah, I can't remember what they said, but I think it was like you could collect 150 Pokemon right now and they're going to add more. That's awesome. Something like that. That's awesome, and I'm excited to learn more. Obviously, the game still isn't out yet. It's out in an hour. When this is released, this will be released within the next day. Good, because I have an NDA. Yeah, well, you guys will all see it. You guys will have all been able to see it after that. I'm excited about it, and I know selfishly I really like crazy dynamic layouts, but this is the theme that absolutely deserves something that's approachable. Everybody that I've heard that's played it says it shoots amazingly well. And maybe this is somewhat unfair, but Star Wars Fall of the Empire is a huge IP, and I think I assume there was a similar conversation of maybe we need to make this more approachable, not you know more of a fan layout if you were to compare the two i'm kind of getting a vibe that is a pretty drastic difference in how they shoot and which one's more a massive difference i mean and you can look at it once you see the play field yeah yeah i mean and it's simply because of geometry right yeah i mean there's only so many shots you could fit in right you know the There's definitely an area of forgiveness on the shots. But, I mean, it's not to say it's the easiest game that's ever been made. Sure. But, you know, you're going to lose your ball. It's not Beetlejuice. I mean, I think, yeah. I think for a stern. I'm kidding. For a stern, it might be. So it's kind of odd. It's like it might be one of the easier shooters, but there's still areas to where things could go sideways quick to where you could lose your ball. Like if that left ball guy doesn't come back to the left flipper and goes into a sling instead. Yeah, you're dead. If the, if you're not able to handle the scoop kick out from that little town scoop, because it was powerful on the games that I played. I don't know about you, Tom, but it wasn't like a dead bounce over. It would like bounce up into the sling or bounce like straight up. So it had like a lot of, a lot of velocity there. And then an area out of the junkyard area on the right hand side, or I say junkyard area, the Meowth area, the battle, it tend to, at least on the ones that I played, if you let it roll down the right side, it would go either into the left sling or even towards the left outling. So there are still danger zones because there needs to be in pinball. But, you know, whether that's all intentional, don't know, or whether that's going to be, you know, kind of changed around a little bit as the games get manufactured, I don't know. Either way, it's a fun game. It's a fun game. I'm excited. I'm excited to see it in an hour and I'm excited to play it, hopefully stream it soon. I think I had heard that the pros are going to go out first. Yes. Very quickly it sounded like. Yeah, that's exciting. I don't know. I'm excited for Stern. I'm excited for Pokemon and this theme and Pokemon enthusiasts. It's just interesting, like everything in pinball, to see some people already frustrated or upset. They're like, Stern's phoning in these simple layouts. Where's the fun? It's like, no. I own a Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles. And unfortunately, Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles, an amazing theme. An amazing theme for so many people. And so many people hate Turtles because of the games. It's hard, though. And it's like, you can just kill it. You can kill a theme with a bad layout. Turtles isn't bad with a challenging layout. I think what I wish some people in pinball would understand is not every machine that's made and not every theme has to be specifically for you. It's okay to have different things because there's so many games being manufactured already. We can't just keep doing the same thing over and over and over again. And that's kind of what I see all the manufacturers doing in a way that they are trying to do something a little bit different, like a sprinkle here and there. Like obviously Spooky's championing the theme integration, lots of mechs moving around. JJP is about the lights, the pomp and circumstance at the LCD, putting everything into it. Obviously, you know, Barrels of Fun is going with a cinematic version of pinball. And then you have Stern that's leaning heavily into the insider connected thing and into not necessarily tournament play, but into layouts that can be. Location play. Yeah, exactly. That can be put on location, take a beating, and be played. So there's different strokes for different folks. I mean, even Stern's taking chances on D&D with, you know, your story progress or Venom leveling up somebody. Like there's definitely risk being had across pinball. So I think if anything, what I would encourage everybody to do is try something out. Even if you think you're going to hate it, try it out. You might actually like it. And guess what? If you don't like it, you have like a thousand other options to go play and have fun with pinball. Yep. And a pinball show like Pinball at the Beach is great for that because you can see they had the whole skew of pinball. So it's just like you can be playing modern games or you can go play an old – just find your niche. my buddy Derek who's local he's he's becoming uh like a grumpy old man he just all of his uh all the modern stuff is like a turnoff to him he's just like I don't care about that thing and he's just like he's fully embraced the older alphanumeric like just that's the level of pinball that he loves and that's great that it's great that it's out there so find find your niche whether it's old Bally Williams days modern pinball EMs whatever that's what's awesome about this hobby um but I know Travis you gotta work you gotta go like do your job yeah my apologies I missed I misread my timing I thought I was gonna have till 10:30 but it was just till 10 so because I can't read yeah go ahead and do your plug uh yeah I'm Travis Murie and I gotta get the heck out of here I mean I'm on Triple Drain Pinball Company all that but love you guys you guys are awesome Joel even you you're fine you're fine Joel people think I hate Joel and they're right but right now I'm going to say he's awesome good luck thank you you guys take care and I'm going to leave all this on so you guys keep going for as long as you think you need to go all right later later guys um Tom this might be the best the best uh next whatever 20 minutes of Triple Drain we've ever had um so you know just to just to remind the listeners environment now Joel just to remind the listeners Triple Drain started because you Tom you wanted to start a podcast you were going to do a solo endeavor me Tom yeah why don't you start podcast all right well Tom there's only two other things that I can think of that I wanted to talk about unless you have another topic but um two games that I've had the opportunity to stream well I had I already mentioned Foo Fighters was awesome yeah Foo Fighters the completed Foo code do you still own a Foo Fighters oh yeah do you have pro or premium I have an LE. LE. Dude, I streamed an LE. What an awesome game. That game is so fleshed out. And FooBot is awesome. Like, to work towards FooBot, once you understand that, I love objective-based wizard modes where it's like, what do I want to work on? And it's just understanding. It's like, oh, all I have to do is beat one mode. It's not like I have to beat all the modes. I just have to beat one mode in one go. Boom. Do that. And then it's like, hit to this multiball. You have to get to Combatron. You have to play Area 51 multiball. You have to do the Sonic Radio. It like once you understand what you have to do get to what is it the bot frenzy mode. Once you understand your tasks it just you can totally shift how you play that game. Oh, man. I love the layout. I love the way it shoots. That center spinner never gets old. And Ray, believe it or not, he did a good job. He did a good job. The code is really good. The code is very, very good on that game. So, I just think it's crazy with Foo Fighters. That game came out and it was selling like hotcakes. Everybody owned it. And then for whatever reason, the value of the game just kind of plummeted because people started selling them. And I would tell you now, if you're a Foo Fighters fan, get in on one. Go get one. You can get a pro for under like $5,000 it seems like. It's insane. I know. And the premium or LE with the expression lights, like Jared had a blast. Like that game, and I understand band pins can be, you know, it's hard to own a band pin if you don't love the band like true because you're they're like oh I didn't know you were such a Kiss fan it's like well I'm not but I really like the pinball game you know it's like so I get it yeah you don't necessarily have to like the band to like the game yeah you know I get it oh you have Elton John too Elton John's one you know you know I but it's I don't know Foo Fighters awesome that was one of those like man that game was great and then um the other game I streamed Predator. I had the opportunity to stream Predator. Sorry, Joel. I know you played Predator at Expo, and a bunch of people played Predator at Expo. I wasn't a fan of it. I just, like, I don't know. Maybe it was the game I played or something. The flippers were pretty tired at the game at Expo. Yeah, and also, like, you know, I had a shot to lock a ball, and, like, I hit it like a couple times and it didn't work, and you figured like, eh. And I had to go anyways because I had to go stream. Yeah, it's my takeaway with Predator. Jared and I, we had a fun time. We had a fun time streaming it. From a technical standpoint, it was a challenge to get everything working with the video and the audio, but I got it. I got everything working. I had to do some tweaks. I understand this game's coming over on a boat. So mad respect for all the Australian listeners and European listeners that get all of their games off a boat because that thing, your game's beat up by the time it gets to you. So mad respect for you guys having to tweak your games and get them working because I had to tweak this one. There was an opto issue, but I got it all working, got it all working, had a good time, had a great time playing it that Friday night or, wow, Wednesday night. But I had a lot of people at Pinball at the Beach. What are your thoughts on Predator? What I will say is if you own an Alien and you like your Alien, then you will like Predator. It's just understanding that every manufacturer has different quirks. And so a Pinball Brothers game has its own unique quirks that are different than J.J.P., that are different than Spooky. So if you know what those quirks are and you like those quirks, you like how the game feels, how the flippers feel, how the build quality. like if you like all of that then yeah I would say you will like Predator between the two I preferred Alien I think Alien is the better game um but overall I would give I'd give Predator a solid B it's fine it's it's I mean I would even say it's good you know but it's just the modes there was nothing in the game that like blew me away the multiball with the that loads up over in the in the mech with the machine gun that that's a pretty cool multiball that's a pretty cool moment. Um, but overall, the layout's fine. The layout's fine. All the shots, you can hit all the shots are all accessible. Um, the modes, the code itself, I just filmed a tutorial. It's all good. Like it's a good game, but it's really hard as an American. That's a $12,000 game to get it over here. Plus shipping, plus this, plus that. And man, you look at games and pinball right now, there's a lot of good games you can buy for $12,000. And that's where it's just like, I just feel like that game, it's just not on the same level, in my opinion, as some of the other games. They said they were going to end production of it soon too, right? Yeah, it's going to be – that's one of those – and I understand in this hobby, there are collectors that they just like collecting more obscure games, more rare games. Absolutely, Predator will fit in your collection. Yeah, if you have a big collection. Go for it. But would I put Predator on location? No. In a small lineup, four or five games, it's just, I don't know, unless you're just a diehard Predator fan. But even if you are a diehard Predator fan, it's so obvious that Arnold Schwarzenegger is not in the game. It is comical how they've blurred his face or edited certain scenes to like, oh, you can't see him because he's running through the brush. Oh, that's the back of his head. Oh, that's his arm. I mean, it's creative what they did to get as much of him in the game as they can without him being in the game. But I don't know. You do miss him being in the game, and that's where I feel like Alien, the sound is better in Alien. Get to the chopper! Yeah, get out of here! Jared and I had a good time. So if you're on the fence, go back and watch our Predator stream. But, yeah, I bet there are people that will buy the game and own the game. Retro Ralph owns the game and loves the game. I'm happy for you, Ralph. I'm glad that you really love that game. But, man, it's just hard to me. I just hard personally to try to even put that in the same level as some of the games that came out last year. Not every pinball machine is going to be on the heartstrings of every person. True. I mean, you hate Rush. I love Rush. Rush just kicked me in the balls over and over and over. I need to stream it again, honestly. It was a tough game to get a grasp of when I first had it. But I love the game so much, and the theme, I just had to pound on it. So I had a shout-out to George Fisher with Don't Panic Flip. He had asked me, do I still love Turtles? Do I still love Turtles? And the reality is, I get it. I understand, in my world, Turtles, S-tier theme. It is one of my top three. I love Turtles. but if I'm gonna be honest is Turtles an S-tier pinball machine no it's not I understand I really like the code I've really learned to love that like I love the layout but I understand for most people it's a brutal layout it's a harder to find layout but if you own it you find the shots you play it enough you can really like it's not a bad it's far from a bad game I think it's a bad rap I think it's a good game yeah but I think that's that's something that like I understand Rush is Rush to you. So even if Rush was bad, you'd still love that game to death because it's Rush. So I get that. As a Rush fan, it's very well done. Oh, yeah. Yeah. The last game I streamed this this week, Kiss. This is a Kiss LE that Zach got in on trade. It's a game that I may have played one time before we streamed it. That's a great game. Yeah. I used to have one. That is a great game. Like some of these games, I don't know. I don't know if I'm just, uh, I'm just like naive or I just don't know. Or I, I just started a little late, uh, because that was a, that's 2015. That game was fun. And I don't, it's not, I don't love Kiss, but, um, there's a simplicity to it. There's a simplicity to it. Once you understand, fill the grid, here's how you fill the grid. Simple task-based, you know, objectives on the LE, the wizard mode. There's a magnet in the back with the Star Child multiball. I mean the scoop sucks the scoop is brutal yeah that's a tough shot yeah that scoop is right up there well I get it you know Rush got a lot of like grief for that scoop essentially in the same spot but there's a cliffy protector on this I think they all came with one that makes it worse it didn't come with it so they just added it even I watched the Bowen tutorial and Bowen was like get it off take the protector off because it makes it really hard but I just I don't know I think in pinball and I and you you're an incredibly good player but I like sometimes just having a more simplistic game maybe having in your lineup give yourself a Harry Potter which has eight movies worth of assets and crazy deep code and you know crazy stuff to experience you can enjoy that game but but make sure you have in your collection a game that you can just step up and play and step up and you don't have to overthink just play the game the center ramp on Kiss is honestly probably one of the best ramps in pinball yeah it feels yeah it's so good it's very I would say pretty easy to hit very easy to hit you could you could just loop it all day long yeah just so smooth it reminds me of the Led Zeppelin and then there's the right ramp oh the right ramp sucks the right ramp is brutal and of course you have to hit the right ramp to light your uh instruments and that's pretty important and uh that's that's the that's what holds holds you back from just blowing up the game but it's but honestly it's like it's very simple objectives but but the collecting instruments is the challenge and you only need one challenging objective to keep a game keep you coming back you know otherwise if that if that right ramp was just butter and you could just hit it all day you blow through the code on that game oh absolutely absolutely tough shot through the pop bumpers too on that game yes four four pop bumpers and yeah oh yeah yeah so it's it's you got some shots that you can hit all day and then you got a few others that are challenging and the way that the code is laid out sprinkled in where it's just that okay this is the challenge oh got through it okay let me do this and I don't know it was great so it's just I've I've had a blast streaming some of these games that I just didn't I like Monsters we've talked about it before Monsters was one that you know gets a bad rap and great game great game like so much fun yeah I could see Monsters being on the lines of actually like a Pokemon I think there's going to be a lot more to Pokemon than Monsters is so but yeah I could see people I could see like really high-end top tier players being like uh Pokemon's too easy I will be very curious to see how Pokemon fits into your tournament lifestyle. I think if you made it, you could make it hard. You could move the all-lane posts and put a tighter tilt on it and make the slings really sensitive. It could be a tough game. Okay. I'm curious to see. We'll have to wait and see on that one. Of your current collection, Tom, what's the easiest game? Let's stick with modern. What's the easiest game that you have? For me, probably Adams Family is probably my easiest one. Okay. I can walk up to that and just kind of tour the mansion. What about LCD game? That's a tougher one. I'd have to think about it. I'd say probably Rush, honestly. Oh, okay. All right. okay because I was my follow-up question was going to be you know when I just think some people if a game's too easy like Deadpool there's a lot of people that that sold Deadpool because they're like yeah I've beaten it many times I still have my Deadpool I mean it's uh it's a good game I did the thing with Deadpool is yeah you can get like a really good game going but then it can really and that's another game like I I made the sling super sensitive on it so like you made it harder yeah it makes the game way harder I asked um I asked Josh Sharp because I saw he had a Monster Bash in his collection I was like how do you have a Monster Bash at your level you know like I just thought that would be a game that people would be bored of so fast oh yeah Josh Josh knows how to set up a game hard and he goes make the slings tight yeah make the outlines big and the slings tight and it it's not a hard like it it becomes a totally different game yeah you you learn like you know I've gone to the IFPA Championship uh twice and that's like an invite only thing and you learn pretty quick like oh I'm I really gotta make my games harder you know like like they just they make they make those modern games usually the classic games are pretty playable but the modern games like yeah yeah your ball touches the sling it just grazes it and it's gonna fire boom you know yeah I'm well that's what's been interesting playing some of these games that Zach's gotten in on trade because these aren't brand new games so it's like some of these are are worn in a little bit or um they have mods on them I don't know if I talked about this on Triple Drain but I streamed a Bond um LE and the Bond had the mech where when you would hit the underwater mech that scoop instead of the scoop firing it back up at the rocket it it's a like a 180 horseshoe that just feeds the left in lane oh interesting yeah so it's a wire form that that it's just a small wire form that will feed the left in lane um did you like that I liked it I liked it I blew the game up one night but I watched in some of the Facebook comments people are like that mech makes the game way too easy and I get it because now you're feeding the left flipper in a very safe way and the ball feed in there. So it's like, okay, I get it. It is safer for sure. But I, I thought it added a lot more enjoyment to the game because the depth of code in that game. Now there is so much to do in that game. So, you know, if you're going to have a game that deep, you want it to be accessible. You want it to be, you know, I don't want to only be able to play two or three villains every single time. I want to see depth of code. So, um, I thought that was a cool mod. Um, I've had multiple games with precision flippers. I do like the extra power. I do. I don't think it's needed on every game, but, um, at the same time, I've, I've never had precision flippers on a game that I felt, ah, I need to take these off. Like, it's just, you can put them on and then you can always turn down your coil strength. Um, so I'll be, there's in the Dune thread, there are people putting precision flippers on their Dune. And I'm, I'm curious. I'm curious if I would want to do that. On my Dune. I did. I did I increased the power on the right flipper the left flipper was fine the right one just didn't seem to like make the the shot past the worm into the harvester um and then when I you know just certain things you got to do to dial in your game but um when I did that like then the get like I'm like oh this this is how it should play the the ramp behind the worm to to kill the harvester there are people on PinSide that are putting shims under the front flap of that ramp okay so you know the ramp is a very steep ramp very short and steep ramp so the idea is if you shim that front one it makes the ramp a little less steep okay they're saying they're getting way less rejects so I'm curious it's possible if anybody's done that I mean write in tripledrain@gmail.com or comment on the YouTube video I'm just curious if that's if that's worth doing I actually sent the the thread page to David Vaness and I was like what are your thoughts on this and he said oh we'll look into this I did have to dial in my worm my worm was like slightly higher than the play field yeah and their uh their software to do it is like phenomenal yeah I could just go in there boom and I'm pumped I'm pumped for Dune oh no Dune's great we are I mean sorry we apologize everybody that's still listening but it's uh they're like where's Travis we apologize for missing January but we were just we knew if we recorded Pokemon would be released you know two days later um I do think I know you guys are gonna have a chance Travis will obviously get one at the Pinball Company you'll probably get one at Lumberjack Johnny's or something close or your own personal one soon hopefully I'll be able to stream one soon um so we'll have a lot more pinball to play in the next few weeks um so hopefully we we can record again sometime soon um I really thought like code wise it was like kind of like Bally Williams meets Stern awesome yeah like the the ramps and the orbits had you know three shots start your mode and then uh you could also do like a battle in the scoop and there's there was a lot going on for early code that's awesome yeah well I can't wait to see it in 40 minutes it's gonna be the countdown has begun 41 minutes is when I will be are you gonna go live afterwards I'm not gonna go live I might I might record a uh talking to Zach he's like hey if you ever want to do like reaction type or uh you know initial impression stuff so we'll see I mean I got everything set up it might I know we've done that before where we've like, Oh, we did it that night. Yeah. We did it during the day. Like once. Oh, you're right. I forgot about that. Yeah. That was fun. Yeah. That was fun. Could do that. That is fun. All right. Well, um, was there anything else? Anything else that you want? I'm good. I think we're good. Travis, you know, I just think it's funny. He says he's got to like do stuff, but I just, I can't really imagine him like doing stuff. anything like he just like honestly as there's zero chance he's gonna listen to this zero chance so like realistically like if I had to give him a performance review as a co-host I mean is he meeting expectations Tom like I don't maybe we've just set the expectations I'm pretty sure he is I'm pretty he's meeting him but it's just I just set the I just set the expectations where I think he can yeah I think he can hit him but I just don't know I just I he says I maybe he's just he's probably taking a nap he's probably taking a nap in the room I don't know I just don't know what he's done before I gotta sell games but what's he doing Tom is he we've seen him with technology I mean I don't know I I know he I knew he made some videos so maybe he's releasing videos he's he's probably doing something I would maybe we should get uh is it Dominic one of it we should get no we should get Carrie we should get Carrie on Carrie would be good Carrie, his coworker, and we can get some truth out of her. You know, how is he? Is he is he OK? I could I could probably say that Carrie does 98 percent of the fixing of, you know, the work. Yeah. And Travis probably does 98 percent of the breaking of the game. You know, so it's just I think that's what it is, is Travis's has excelled in life because he surrounds himself with strong women. So he's got Carrie to build him up professionally. He's got Monica to build him up at home. Makes a lot of sense. That's the key. All right, Tom. Go ahead and plug it up, dude. Fox Cities Pinball and Triple Drain. You can find me either way. Fox Cities Pinball. I do mostly all my live streams on Twitch. So you can find me there. Yeah. And then Silver Ball Swag. Silver Ball Swag, if you want to buy some Fox Cities merch. You can also get some Flip N Out Pinball merch at Silver Ball Swag. and you can get Triple Drain merch at Silver Ball Swag. So check all that out. We have a Zazzle store for anybody that wants to buy a Triple Drain lunchbox. They're out there. My name is Joel, and I do the Flip N Out Pinball stream every Wednesday night with my brother Jared. Feel free to check out that. Just click on the Live tab on YouTube, and then also some tutorials there if you want to learn how to play some games. If you really want to learn how to play Foo Fighters, don't watch my tutorial because Ray said it's painful. I thought it was pretty good. I thought it was good. I'm sure it's fine. It's fine. But yeah, like always, Tom, you get the last words. Check out Pokemon.