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Episode 146 - A Blizzard of Bad News

Eclectic Gamers Podcast·podcast_episode·55m 45s·held·Jul 25, 2021
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Analysis

claude-haiku-4-5-20251001 · $0.028

TL;DR

Pinball news dominated by Stern Sept announcement mystery and Museum closure; serious Blizzard harassment allegations discussed.

Summary

Eclectic Gamers Podcast episode discussing pinball and gaming news. Primary pinball coverage includes Stern's September announcement (likely internet connectivity), the permanent closure of the Pinball Museum in Banning with collection going to auction, continued silence on Dutch Pinball's Rasa/Deep Root project, and community speculation about affected games. Episode concludes with serious discussion of Activision Blizzard's sexual harassment lawsuit from California.

Key Claims

  • Stern has a big announcement coming in September that will impact multiple games

    high confidence · Cited from Gary Stern statement via This Week in Pinball; also mentioned in Joel Engelberth's Just Another Pinball interview with George Gomez and Tanya Klyce

  • George Gomez told Joel Engelberth 'don't sell your Deadpool' in connection with the September announcement

    medium confidence · Just Another Pinball interview; suggests older machines may be impacted by connectivity feature

  • The most likely explanation for the September announcement is internet connectivity for pinball machines

    medium confidence · Host speculation based on what could impact 'lots of games all at once'; no official confirmation

  • The Pinball Museum in Banning is permanently closing and the entire collection will go to auction

    high confidence · Official museum announcement; collection could not be relocated or sponsored

  • InDisc tournament will continue despite museum closure, finding a new venue

    high confidence · InDisc made official announcement; tournament relied more on outside games than museum collection

  • Dutch Pinball's Rasa/Deep Root project has had no news since the 4th of July promise of an announcement

    high confidence · Forum monitoring on Pinside; nearly a month has passed with no announcement as of late July

  • Ben Hex claims to have knowledge of Robert (Deep Root principal) attempting to acquire or get ownership stake in Spooky Pinball

    low confidence · Ben Hex forum post on Deep Root thread; described as behind-the-scenes information; details unconfirmed

Notable Quotes

  • “Stern has been teasing that they've got some sort of big announcement in September...indications are that it's going to impact a number of games”

    Tony @ ~29:30 — Key pinball industry news indicating major feature update coming to multiple machines

  • “George actually told Joel, don't sell your Deadpool”

    Tony @ ~32:15 — Suggests older Spike systems may receive connectivity upgrade, implying value preservation or feature enhancement

  • “I am still on Pinside monitoring the deep root thread. And there were a lot of people that were hoping slash expecting an announcement to have hit by Friday and it didn't happen”

    Dennis @ ~46:45 — Documents ongoing community anticipation and disappointment regarding Dutch Pinball's mystery project

  • “Ben said at some point he would explain...the story about when Robert, the principal behind Deep Root, attempted to acquire Spooky”

    Dennis @ ~50:30 — Teases potentially significant acquisition gossip; indicates industry M&A activity and speculation

  • “The Pinball Museum in Banning...they are permanently closing...those are all going to go for auction”

    Tony @ ~38:00 — Major community event: historic collection dispersal via auction rather than preservation

Entities

Stern PinballcompanyGary SternpersonGeorge GomezpersonTanya KlycepersonJoel EngelberthpersonJeffpersonPinball Museum in BanningorganizationInDisceventCarl D'Angeloperson

Signals

  • ?

    business_signal: Pinball Museum in Banning permanent closure; major collection breaking apart via auction

    high · Official museum announcement; unable to relocate, find sponsor, or identify single collector buyer

  • ?

    event_signal: InDisc tournament continuing despite museum closure; finding new venue; collection reliance model shift

    high · InDisc official announcement; tournament relied more on outside machines than museum collection

  • ~

    sentiment_shift: Deep Root thread experiencing increased trolling and speculation as announcement delays continue; community frustrated by silence

    high · Dennis monitoring Pinside; thread 'exploding with messages...mostly trolling'; people expected Friday announcement; no news as of late July

  • ?

    personnel_signal: Tanya Klyce (Stern code designer) working on unrelated project; expected to return to code lead role after September when project completes

    medium · Interview with Joel Engelberth; hasn't led code since Deadpool; implied September project completion

  • ?

    announcement: Stern Pinball teasing major September announcement impacting multiple games; strong speculation points to internet connectivity/leaderboard infrastructure

    high · Gary Stern statement via This Week in Pinball; George Gomez told Joel Engelberth not to sell Deadpool; Tanya Klyce expected to finish other work by September

  • ?

Transcript

groq_whisper · $0.167

0:00
Welcome to the Eclectic Gamers Podcast. Today is Sunday, the 25th of July, because I forgot to write that down in my notes. It's episode 146. I'm Tony. I'm Dennis. We're getting close to the big 150. I didn't think about that. I didn't think about it either. But I'm thinking about it now. And I'm thinking, oh, good. It's four episodes away. We don't have to think about it anymore right now. Yeah. So what's been going on? Final Fantasy 14. I know. That's it. I mean, I didn't know that that was it, but I knew that it would be something. There would be something. I mean, I can complain about work more and being tired and coming home and falling asleep at 6 o'clock. No, don't complain. I don't need to do that.
1:01
I've been playing Final Fantasy XIV still. I finally finished the main story quest for A Realm Reborn, which is the first initial thing. And then I've started the Heavensward content.
1:17
It's still fun. I'm still enjoying it. The big thing that I've done lately is I started as a Lala, which is basically if you ever played Final Fantasy XI, it's a Taro. It's the little short, tiny little adorable thing. And I hit a point where I decided I hated all of my clothing options for how they made my character look. It's reminding me of, have you ever seen the Angelina Jolie Tomb Raider movie where she gets attacked. I'm sorry, this is a weird sidetrack. She gets attacked in her mansion And they shoot the whole place up And like UPS or FedEx comes the next day To deliver her package And he's just looking around at all the damage And she just says I just woke up and hated everything And that's what I'm imagining You just waited until Final Fantasy 14 Just looked at your wardrobe and you're just like I hate everything That's basically what it amounted to It's like no matter what I wear It makes me look like the little kid trying to wear daddy's clothes And it was starting to annoy me So at the end of one of the big main quest lines, you get a potion called a Phantasia and it basically lets you drink it and it tells you, hey, take off all your gear and then log out and then log back in and it lets you go back through the character creator and just remake your character into whatever changes you make, whatever changes you want to make.
Dutch Pinball
company
Robertperson
Ben Hexperson
Spooky Pinballcompany
Tonyperson
Dennisperson

product_strategy: Dutch Pinball Rasa/Deep Root project: nearly one month past promised 'after July 4th' announcement with no news

high · Hosts monitoring Pinside forum; no announcement as of late July; community expected Friday announcement that didn't materialize

  • ?

    rumor_hype: Ben Hex claims Robert (Deep Root principal) attempted to acquire or gain ownership stake in Spooky Pinball

    low · Forum post by Ben Hex; described as behind-the-scenes knowledge; promises future detailed explanation; no corroboration

  • ?

    technology_signal: Uncertainty about scope of internet connectivity feature: which systems eligible (Spike 1/2/SAM/earlier), implementation method (built-in vs USB adapter), backward compatibility

    medium · Host speculation on whether feature requires hardware changes; uncertainty about which legacy systems could receive updates; George Gomez's 'don't sell Deadpool' cryptic

    • 2:41
    So I did that. So now instead of the cute little adorkable little childlike thing, now I'm a Catboy.
    2:52
    Well, that's very Japanese. It's very anime. Yeah, kind of. I made pretty much one of everything, and then picked the one I liked the most. If only you could find the right hot spring to turn you back.
    3:08
    Yeah, I just need to buy another Fantasia. They're like $10 in the real money store. And the game has all the stuff saved, so literally I could just load my old character.
    3:19
    Because that's what I did is I created new characters and just created looks and saved them. I created a new look and saved it and created a new look and saved it. And did that for like eight or nine different looks. And then picked the one I liked the best. So it actually was pretty easy that way.
    3:35
    And now I just go and I play around all my solo stuff as a red mage. And group stuff I am a heal boy.
    3:45
    Which translates to doing as little healing as possible. Yeah, it's tedious. It's not really tedious. It's just annoying. I've got a good damage rotation going in. I hate to interrupt my damage rotation because you can't get out of the glowy box on the floor. That means you're going to take damage in three seconds if you don't move. That's always been a risk with people in MMOs. They don't understand telegraphed attacks. Yeah, I know. It's like, oh, there's mechanics, and this game tells you the exact mechanic for most of it, and all I have to do is take one step back? Nah, I'm too awesome. being my ninja dude.
    4:24
    Blank tank. So, with that being the totality of my excitement lately, what do you got going? Well, I have made a little bit of Gears of War. I guess it's just called Gears at this point. Gears 5 Progress. I played that yesterday. War is evil, so we can't name it Wars. No, we couldn't. I got past a boss that I had died to a few times so because I had not figured out that it had three different like cycles like they weren't they were not like phases kinda kinda the thing was I was always dying at the start of the last phase so I did not realize that he was always doing that like I didn't know there was a pattern so there's a big monster and it would And in the third, I think it was the third phase, whatever the final phase was, it shifted from when it would be mad at you, run at you, to jump. And if it lands on you, you instantly die. I thought it was being a proximity trigger. So I was trying to stay further away from it so it couldn't leap and not realize it will leap no matter what. So when I finally dodged one of the leaps, it did it again and I wasn't ready for it because I thought, oh, I'm way far back this time. So I'd be okay. I just wasn't thinking right so I've made some more progress than that and then because of you and your video links I sent you a cool video if you do everything if you make every choice in your life based off the cool videos I sent you I'm glad you didn't send me a video jumping off a bridge what would have happened just because I sent you a cool video doesn't mean you need to be out there I mean let me I think you're not building a boat in the backyard now, are you? No, but if it keeps raining, I might.
    6:19
    Yeah, no, so I got some stuff to start doing some hobby watch repair. So as I was telling Tony before we started, I screwed up the first one, which, to be fair, is not a design that was meant to be taken apart. And so that was an interesting learning experience. And now I'm working on a very, very, very small ladies' watch. So, again, not the best one to start with, and I lost a screw. So, basically, you went straight to the dark souls of watch repair. Well, I mean. I guess, technically, this would be also gears. I guess. Except, I mean, they're not like the most totally trashed. I mean, okay, maybe I should have started with one that was working and seen if I could get it, take it apart and put it back together and it still worked. Yeah, because, I don't know. Anyway, I just thought it would be something different. Maybe eventually it might be something to record. Though without macro lenses, I don't know how well you could record that stuff. Oh, yeah. No, you'd have to have. I tried to shoot some stuff with the camcorder. I screwed up the footage, though. But even thinking about it, I was just like, this is all so zoomed out comparatively. I mean, it's really zoomed in for a poor little camcorder. Yeah, because I've seen some of the videos that people like. The video I sent you of the guy working on stuff. And then they go and it's like, okay, well, now I need to change to my microscope camera feed. Yeah, microscope. No, no, no, no. See, because as is often the case with me, you know, it's like, I really would like to go in and give this a try, but I don't want to spend a lot of money. So it's a weird hodgepodge of, you know, getting the right, you know, not skimping on things like the tweezers and the screwdrivers and the oil equipment and all of that. And then being like, okay, well, let's use some Rubbermaid tubs and some basic cleaners to clean the stuff. Yeah. Because why buy stuff if I'm not going to stick with it? Tools are always useful, though. That's the thing. That's my logic. That's what all my toolbox is full of. Other tools tell me. Tools are always useful. There's always a good time where you go, I'm glad I had that. And then it'll really go bad. Well, if they do, there are guys on YouTube who can fix them. Yes, there are. Or rebuild them for you. Yes. Or both. So anyway, so that's been kind of interesting.
    8:36
    It's just different. I can really, I don't know yet, but my thought, I'm just not used to working with things that small. So that's really, it's just like getting used to working with a loop and stuff at that level is really weird. But everything goes together in a very logical manner other than the Timex stuff. So in that regard, it's kind of neat to see it, you know, be able to pull it apart and then try and see it come together. I mean, I assume it will feel better if it actually works. We'll find out once I get my screw replacements, which I'm hoping are the right size. Because there was an assortment of 18 different sizes that were supposed to be for most of the common things in mechanical movements. I have no idea what I lost as common or not. But I knew I would eventually lose screws because I do on big projects. Right. Well, that's what happens. I lose screws in pinball. I can't ever find them. So I was like, how am I supposed to find something that's the size of a grain of sand? And I don't know. I found a lot of them that I've dropped. But if they leave the table, that's kind of it. It's kind of too far. It's too far. Maybe you need a table with a little ridge edge thing to work on. Maybe. I did order one of the work mat that's supposed to, I'm hoping, minimize the bounces and stuff. Like I've been using like a plastic tablecloth, something easy. I need something I can see on. I've got one of those self-repairing mats with the measurements on it that you use for model making and stuff on my desk. I went ahead when I ordered the screws and ordered the $20 Bergeron Swiss mat. That's green. Supposedly the color that's easiest on the eyes and extended duration, close-up viewing, and good contrast against watch pieces. That's what they actually said. I was like, are you sure you're really that much better than blue? Really? Probably. I don't know. See, mine's reversible. It's green on one side, black on the other. Very fancy. Well, you know what else is fancy? Pinball We don't have any new game announcements though We actually, you know Other than our intros This might be a bit of a downer episode As I'm looking over our notes I don't feel That we have a lot of Positivity here Anything positive or upbeat? At all?
    10:55
    I'll open with one So, Stern is teasing Oh, sorry about that. Ooh, my pen cap. Stern has been teasing that they've got some sort of big announcement in September. Now, as that would indicate, they aren't saying what it is. However, indications are that it's going to impact a number of games. so I've heard this and I've seen this noted in two different places now first time I heard about it was uh Joel Engelberth who hosts the Just Another Pinball podcast he did an interview actually it was about Deadpool's the pinball machine specifically with uh George Gomez and Tanya Klyce during that interview when asking about like when's Tanya going to be taking lead on code again because he hasn't since Deadpool, the discussion was about what he's been working on something else lately. And I believe September was what was indicated that that was going to be expected to be finished and then he would be able to start working on his next game.
    12:03
    Then Gary Stern, according to This Week in Pinball, didn't ask me anything. And from the highlights that Jeff with This Week in Pinball pointed out, there Gary said that there's something big impacting multiple games coming in September the rumor mill is internet connectivity finally because what else is going to impact lots of games all at once what are your thoughts though internet connectivity with systems that don't have built in networking capability or built in networking cards or built in wireless capability seems rough because you're going to have to order parts. It'll be something extra that you'll have to put into the machine yourself if it's for older systems. Now, if it's for the newer stuff coming forward, okay, that makes sense, which means it's a change to their, it'll involve at least a minor change to their standard board set. Well, the older stuff is going to be impacted because in the Just Another Pinball interview, I believe George actually told Joel, don't sell your Deadpool.
    13:10
    Interesting. Because as far as I know, there's no built-in networking capability in any of these systems. I do not believe, though I do not know for sure, because I don't own a Spike 2 system much. I don't own a Spike 1 system, for that matter. I do not believe that they have, say, a Wi-Fi card already in them. But it is a node-based system, so they may have it integrated in such a way that it's an easy, like it's not hard to add on. It could be an easy just a plug-and-play type thing. Like how the toppers run down and you just plug them in and they work. It could be. But I do think you right that people will by and large other than perhaps it will be by default on the going forward games that they have to get something to make it work if it is connectivity But if it affecting games that have already come out i don know what else it would be unless it was just it a weird way to describe it like if they were just sitting on a big bunch of code like there was that time where they did the big code update where all of a sudden it's like um games i mean star trek had a code update and metallic had a code update but that was just like all up you know right could be a firmware update what would be the feature?
    14:21
    I don't know. But that would affect everything. Yeah, but who would you be excited for? I'm trying to get, like, why would I be, like, so you can have the joys of updating BIOS. Right, for whatever special thing they have. I don't know. I mean, it's just, I'm trying to figure out what would they expect. And when they say, how old the machines are we talking about? Will it only affect the machines since they started putting out the LCD? or will it affect older machines? That's, I mean... Is it only the new system? Is it... I mean, who knows? Now, it is known that they have, because they have said before that they have been working on internet connectivity for quite a while. So that's part of the reason why I think there's a lot of thought there. And that's what I would guess at this stage. Oh, I think it makes the most sense. I can't come up with anything else that you would tease in this way.
    15:14
    Like, it's all going to be in September. It's affecting multiple games. Keep your old stuff. And I agree with you. I'm at a loss to know where the old stuff comes. It can't go all the way back.
    15:28
    My guess will be that it will be only spike systems. I would even go further to say my guess will be it will only be spike two systems, LCD systems. Right. But maybe all of them. It could – there are network adapters that you just plug into USB ports. How far back in the systems did they use USB ports for updating? SAM, I believe. So they're basically World Poker Tour, I think, on. So they could be doing something like that using that as the network adapter because then you just have to reach in and go plug.
    16:06
    They have it set up correctly. That's a good point, yeah. So basically, I don't believe they could go back to their – yeah, because White Star didn't have USB updates. But as of Sam, so they could go – I mean, if that was the case, yeah, they could go back into the DMD era and hit, I think, World Poker Tour on. Pretty much all the important stuff. Yeah, yeah, all the popular ones, ACDC, Metallica, Star Trek, where they had all their hits. I mean, the only white star games of any note are Simpsons and Lord of the Rings, anyway. Right. But, of course, it's a question of what does this connectivity bring and whether the rest of the software, because that's the other aspect. Getting it online is one thing.
    16:49
    Why would I want Star Trek online? Easier code updates is the biggest thing to me. Why would there be any more code updates?
    16:57
    And the only other thing I could see is leaderboards. which are very important to some people and other people don't care. If they update the systems of those Sam games to allow for leaderboard communication, I could possibly see that.
    17:16
    They might have that backbone in on the Spike stuff already, though. That's where it seems like it would be more realistic. Here's the truth of it. Here's what it's going to end up being. They're going to sell ad space on your LCDs and your D&D monitors and stuff, where you'll just occasionally get, you know, have a Filet-O-Fish. It's March up here on your thing while you're... But wouldn't that mean P3 has the best ad space? It does have the best ad space.
    17:45
    I mean, if they want to just utterly alienate the customers they already have. No, do it the Kindle style. If we buy the ad-based version, we save money.
    17:55
    You know what? If they made you save enough money, it could help. I've not bought a Kindle that wasn't ad enabled because the ads are completely unobtrusive so because the only times you see the ads are when you're like unlocking it from the lock screen it's like oh I'm so hurt by this ad the only thing I wonder about is what makes it choose what ads I'm going to see because I see a lot of ads and it's like I don't own a book that would fall into the category of this but okay unless it's because me and my wife have shared our libraries, so I'm getting ads based upon her library. So I don't know.
    18:34
    So we'll have to see, but probably won't have to wait all that long. Yeah, September's not very far away. About another month. Which at the rate this year is going means two or three minutes.
    18:46
    Yes, indeed. So one other piece of pinball news, and this is where we start our descent into the unhappy topics. so the pinball museum in banning we touched on that a couple episodes ago i believe maybe it was one episode ago uh they are permanently closing so they had put out an announcement they obviously did not relocate in time they did not find a a sponsor to fund any storage needs or whatever that they they would need to buy some time with and they were unable to find a single collector that was willing to buy the entire museum collection. So those are all going to go for auction. They made an announcement that that like that auctions all set up. You can't contact them early and try and buy a game out from under the auction or whatever. You need to just go through the auction process.
    19:40
    The now the big thing besides obviously that this was a major collection that's going to be broken apart, is Indisc, which is the Never Drains in Southern California, big pinball tournament that Carl D'Angelo is associated with, I believe. That will still be moving forward. Indisc has already made an announcement that they're going to find a new venue and they're still going to hold Indisc. So the competitive tournament that people love, because that's a very popular tournament, that should still proceed, but obviously they're going to have to hammer out some new solutions. But that being said, I believe I read on one of the pinball forums that InDisc for the tournament was already relying on a lot of it wasn't relying on the museum's games as much as it was outsiders bringing games. So that model isn't going to be wholly different for them.
    20:34
    Anyway, we'll just have to find, yeah. So it's not, I would say if I was to nutshell I would say this is not as devastating as ReplayFX's decision to quit owning games and ending Pinberg and all of that because the tournament is what people really care about. The Pinball Museum, the Museum of Pinball in Banning had horrible access.
    21:02
    Like it was open four times a year. Yeah. So in some ways, I'm not going to take this episode to criticize nonprofits doing things I don't understand. I think I do that enough as it is. I don't get why they were where they were for the number of years that they were with that limited of access. It doesn't feel like much of a museum for the public when you're open once a quarter.
    21:25
    I'm just saying. So in a lot of ways, it's hard for me to care what happens to an entity that didn't feel like it was really for the public anyway. but a lot of people were upset. So here, we're covering it.
    21:38
    And that's understandable, being upset over the loss of something like that. Sure. We'll just have to see what happens. Speaking of upset. Nope. No? No. I have a pinball question for you. Dang it. I didn't want to answer any questions today. So I was going back in our notes, looking when you said it a couple episodes ago, and as I caught one of our older notes, I realized something. it's after the 4th of July weekend. Have we heard anything else about Rasa?
    22:07
    No. And I almost put that in the notes and then I, because there was no news, I didn't. So I think the news that the fact that their last thing said it'd be after the 4th of July weekend before they said anything else. And now we're coming up on almost a month after the 4th of July. I am still on Penn side monitoring the deep root thread. And there were a lot of people that were hoping slash expecting an announcement to have hit by Friday and it didn't happen. Or if it did, no one reported it. And everything's been getting reported. So, yeah, there's absolutely no new news on Raza. There's no new news on Deep Root. The thread has been exploding with messages. It's mostly trolling. Just people going off on weird tangents. Discussions about how J-Pop has seduced yet another person into falling for his godhood of Pinball design.
    23:01
    You know, Ben Hex in there a lot saying stuff about, you know, knowing things about behind the scenes, stuff coming out. Oh, here's a kind of a I guess this will whet your appetite. Then you can remember it in a few more episodes, as he said. Ben said at some point he would explain the tell the story about when Robert, the principal behind Deep Root, attempted to acquire Spooky.
    23:27
    Really? interesting acquire or get a share in it or some ownership thing so I don't again I don't know any of the details but so yeah no there's been a lot of talk it's been a lot of nothing a whole lot of nothing well it's a forum that's what I expect anyway so no there's still no good news there I didn't know I didn't think I would ever think anything to do with Raza would be good news at this point so now we can move to video games do you want to open with what you plan to open with or do you want to open with that that poor individual who emailed us about how you ruined their life by getting them addicted to final fantasy 14 sure i'm just playing out that i i'm not you you are all like dennis you can't hold me responsible for you taking apart watches and i'm like what about the poor final fantasy guy you know what this is what you do to people you suck them into these things i i talk about stuff that's all i do there's nothing wrong with I just talk about stuff that I'm doing and that I enjoy. It's not my fault. I'm glad people enjoy things that I also enjoy. It makes me feel happy. You're sucking them down the rabbit hole. It makes me feel joy. That's a sound. But, yes.
    24:47
    It's an addictive game. I enjoy it quite a lot. That's how MMOs are designed. And this one does a very good job because it really gets away of the worst MMO things and the fact that it doesn't require me to spend a whole lot of time constantly interacting with other people.
    25:04
    I was just thinking, you know, if you ever wanted to do a career change, a heroin dealer would probably be a strong one for you. I would make a lot more money. You know. You would make so much more money. You could, you chase the white dragon and you don't really have to deal a lot with people.
    25:22
    It's pretty easy. You just need a corner in an abandoned building somewhere. Have you ever seen The Wire? Have you seen an antique spoon? Just remember the good parts from The Wire.
    25:36
    We use these nice antique spoons. They're very... They're sterling silver. You do have to polish them or else they'll tarnish. but I know a guy on YouTube will show you how to replate that stuff just get some batteries, some nickel alloy some solutions next thing you know good as new I saw someone he was trying to figure out how to gold plate, he took his wife's Honda logo off of her car but he put the polarity on the wrong end so it turned black so he took the cover him, blow him off and dip the trunk.
    26:16
    That one turned to gold. Okay, well, he got one of them right. He got one of them right. I think he put a bump back on the car. He just said, she never noticed. Or she noticed and she knew him well enough she just shook her head. So one of the two. It was funny.
    26:33
    Speaking of funny, though, now we've got to move into not funny. Yeah, there was the happiness. The joy's gone. It's all dead now. So we're going to open with Blizzard. and I'm going to give a flat out say this is a content warning and a trigger warning and it once again ties into those issues that we talked about last year with sexual harassment and everything the state of California has actively sued Activision Blizzard over what it alleges to be a frat boy culture that created a and I quote breeding ground for harassment and discrimination against women end quote the lawsuit describes a culture of constant sexual harassment at blizzard entertainment and i'm pulling the rest of this pretty much just as a big clip from the euro gamer article because it's almost nothing but information straight from the suit okay so uh it's basically female employees quote almost universally confirmed that working for defendants was akin to working in a frat house which invariably involved male employees drinking and subjecting female employees to sexual harassment with no repercussions. The suit mentions cube crawls where male employees probably came into work hungover Similarly male employees would play video games during work engage in banter about their sexual encounters talk openly about female bodies and make numerous jokes about rape As a product of this frat boy culture, women were subjugated to numerous sexual comments and advances, groping and unwanted physical touching, and other forms of harassment. A female employee noted that random male employees would approach her on defendant's work site and comment on her breasts. Female employees working for the World of Warcraft team noted that male employees and supervisors would hit on them, make derogatory comments about rape, and otherwise engage in demeaning behavior. This behavior was known to supervisors and indeed encouraged by them, including a male supervisor openly encouraging a male subordinate to buy a prostitute to cure his bad mood.
    28:34
    Employees were further discouraged from complaining as human resource personnel were known to be close to the alleged harassers. An unnamed former Blizzard CTO Was observed by employees Groping inebriated female employees At company events The lawsuit alleged Alex Afrizabi The former senior creative director for World of Warcraft Was permitted to engage in blatant sexual harassment With little to no repercussions During BlizzCon He was alleged to hit on female employees Telling them he wanted to marry them Attempting to kiss them and putting his arms around them This was in plain view of other male employees including supervisors who had to intervene and pull him off of female employees.
    29:15
    And this is just some of the stuff that's in the suit. And I'll put a link to the Eurogamer article in the show notes for folks that want to read up on it. And of course, with allegations this bad, much like Ubisoft last year and the all of the other issues that came out last summer the company responded oh unlike Ubisoft the response was really bad like really bad I'm going to go ahead and read the response in full it's a little long but not terribly so but I think it's important for the context. It's important, yeah.
    30:03
    So their response is, and I quote, we value diversity and strive to foster a workplace that offers inclusivity for everyone. There is no place in our company or industry or any industry for sexual misconduct or harassment of any kind. We take every allegation seriously and investigate all claims. In cases related to misconduct, action was taken to address the issue. Nice start. Sure. Very boilerplate response to something like this. Right. That's exactly what you would expect. Now we go to the next one. The DFEH, which is the Department of – it's basically the health and – or employee stuff for the state.
    30:44
    Oh, it's – okay. Yeah, the employment people for the state. So it's their labor department. It's their labor department. Okay. Includes distorted and in many cases false descriptions of Blizzard's past. We have been extremely cooperative with the DFEH throughout their investigation, including providing them with extensive data and ample documentation, but they refused to inform us what issues they perceived. They were required by law to adequately investigate, to have good faith discussions with us, to better understand and to resolve any claims or concerns before going to litigation, but they failed to do so. Instead, they rushed to file an inaccurate complaint, as we will demonstrate in court. we are sickened by the rehensible conduct of the DFEH to drag into the complaint, the tragic suicide of an employee who's passing has no bearing whatsoever on this case. And with no regard for her grieving family, while we find this behavior to be disgraceful, non-professional, it is unfortunately an example of how we have conducted them or how they have conducted themselves throughout the course of their investigation.
    31:39
    It is this type of irresponsible behavior from unaccountable state bureaucrats that are driving many of the state's best businesses out of California. The picture of the DFEH paints is not the Blizzard workplace of today. Over the past several years and continuing since the initial investigation started, we've made significant changes to address company culture and reflect more diversity within our leadership teams. We've amplified internal programs and channels for employees to report violations, including the ask list with a confidential integrity hotline, and introduced an employee relations team dedicated to investigating employee concerns. We have strengthened our commitment to diversity, equity, and inclusion and combined our employees' networks at a global level to provide additional support. Employees must also undergo regular anti-harassment training and have done so for many years. We put tremendous effort in creating fair and rewarding compensation packages and policies that reflect our culture and business. And we strive to pay all employees fairly for equal or substantially similar work. We take a variety of proactive steps to ensure the pay is driven by non-discriminatory factors. For example, we reward and compensate employees based upon their performance, and we conduct extensive anti-discrimination trainings, including those who are part of the compensation process. We are confident in our ability to demonstrate our practices as equal opportunity employers that foster a supportive, diverse, and inclusive workplace for our people, and we are committed to continuing this effort in the years to come. It is a shame that the DFEH did not want to engage with us on what they thought they were seeing in their investigation. So, this will be interesting once it comes to the actual court. Yeah, some of these paragraphs are something that I wouldn't have been too surprised to have seen in a response to the court.
    33:31
    Right. You know, maybe, you know, in terms of, you know, I'm thinking like in a civil case, if you're submitting what reasons why you think the allegations aren't accurate, I could see some of this sort of phrasing, some of it possibly showing up there.
    33:50
    I don't know. In a way, this is sort of all over the place. But like bringing up businesses leaving California and suggesting that that's somehow.
    34:00
    It's weird. It's like that's like a that's like a petty political attack. And I'm not even sure it's very accurate in the sense that my I couldn't very well be wrong. But my understanding is most of the businesses that leave California leave California because of the high prices on property and people can't find places to live. And it becomes very challenging compared to a state like Texas, where it's much more affordable. Right. That doesn't have anything to do with California being too hard on people over sexual harassment as a business. But you see, it's a totally different topic. So you could say there are things in California that make the business climate. I guess that's what they were going for. But again, it's like this. That's not. That would not be the tone I would have ever advised. Be like, hey, you know what would look really good for you would be when you're accused of having a culture of harassment to instead complain about government. Yeah. And say that the government is just trying to be mean to you.
    35:03
    There's things in this that is very correct. The kind of thing I would expect with talking about the moves they've made, the changes they've made.
    35:15
    Obviously, at the state level, they've felt that there's enough issues that the moves and stuff they've done either hasn't been enough or has just been painting over the problem without actually attempting to repair the problem. And what's interesting about this is that many of the developers for Blizzard have come out on their own and spoken up about this, and there have been pretty much openly saying, we disagree with our company's response to this because this is an actual problem. I know several of these cases people talk about. I know, I know the people and I've been involved and I've seen them. And when their actual people working for them are coming out and saying, yeah, this is crap. This isn't fixed yet.
    36:07
    Then it feels like a major disconnect between the communications team and the reality of the day to day work. Yeah, I mean, my and I just I don't know enough about this stuff to be sure. My read of it is it feels to me like they decided that their public statement needed to align with what their court strategy is going to be. And some of this language, some of this phrasing, like because they have the parts like the first paragraph and some of the later paragraphs where they were emphasizing that they value diversity. And they talk about some of those aspects like are again, I don't know everything in the suit. We've been focused on the harassment side. Right. Because they are bringing up a whole thing about compensation and stuff.
    36:56
    And that unfair pay practices wasn't, I thought, the point of the discussion. Maybe that's part of the lawsuit. It could be part of the, yeah, because I didn't go through the entire lawsuit. Because I'm just like, okay, so you've got the, it just seems like you're sort of outlining your court strategy. The biggest blunder, in my view, the biggest blunder in their response was the suicide. Yeah. Because now you look like, in my view, you as a company look like you're trying to use someone's suicide as a shield. Yeah, because the suicide is in the lawsuit. It's mentioned as being caused because of the ongoing situation. I mean, I'm saying, you know, referring to the reference of it as reprehensible, that they're sickened, that there was no regard for the grieving family. basically uh this is one of those blank in my view you know if i were to distill it in a more calm common parlance this is a this is that standard oh we're just going to call you unprofessional because we don't like what you did so the state was unprofessional for referencing that even though they're not presenting anything here that indicates that there was no regard for the grieving family or that the grieving family doesn't support the state in its position we don't know in a lot of ways we don't and in some ways it may not matter i mean if the if the company did wrong the stance of the family is i'm sorry to say it's kind of moot it's not right a place to control that's not their choice it's sort of like asking the you know the survivors of a victim of a crime what do you want to have happen to the defendant i mean yes you definitely are entitled to an opinion but there's a reason why we don't let those people make those decisions it's because They're too close to it. So anyway, I just thought that was really tone deaf to try and use that because it comes across like people that use charity stuff for shielding. This is trying to – it's like the opposite of victim blaming. It is, yeah. I'm going to bring up these victims' aspects and I'm going to use them as a corporate shield to try and make it look like you're the bad guy because you didn't – because you brought up something sensitive. And that's pretty much how this whole thing comes off. I just don't – this is not a – I mean, my opinion is this is not a good response overall. There's a lot of aspects to this that are pretty neutral, but there are some pieces here that were just, I think, pretty big mistakes. And this looks overly defensive.
    39:21
    Yeah, and it comes off that way to me, that it's overly defensive and that it definitely has – it feels like they were working with the state, and the state's like, you're not doing good enough, so we're going to have to elevate this. And they're like – And the phrasing makes it sound like they were surprised that I elevated. But it also, in a way, because of this approach, makes me feel like one person wrote this and didn't screen it. It's so... Which is entirely possible if the response comes from a high enough level. Just to go through and do it this way, I just think the whole statement is really weird to run. I mean, they're on the defensive and it in a way it's phrase, especially that second paragraph, it's phrased like they think they can take the initiative. You can't take the initiative. And even if you even if they were in the right, they can't take the initiative in this as things are laid out. They are in a position of weakness and you can't just bulldoze. It's not going to it looks like you're trying to be diversionary instead of that. you actually don't have it like you if you really didn't do anything wrong that would be what you would be stressing not this oh it's distorted and all that it'd be more like here are the complaints here are the here's where kind of like a compensation thing here's where we're okay uh they just didn't do i'm anyway it's just it's not it's not a good statement poor blizzard they can't do nothing right they've had nothing but problems for the last several years at this point.
    40:59
    So we will see how this turns out. Knowing the way courts go, it won't actually hit courts for two years. Maybe they settle. That's probably how most of this stuff tends to end up being. I mean, the state may have done this to increase pressure. And they felt they weren't getting enough feedback. Most things don't actually go to trial. So, again, I don't know because we're, you know, we're too much we're too much on the outside to know exactly what the aspects of the investigation are. But but given that there are developers within Blizzard that have disagreed so strongly with Blizzard's own public statement, it just again, that's why a statement like this is such a bad idea. It because it easily undermined by by other people that aren associated with the state government So he says like you chose to walk into a spinning prop for no good reason other than you wanted to convey strength. But with your face missing, what strength do you have? You have faceless strength.
    42:03
    Let's see. One little thing, I had to look it up again because they put out, they had a couple internal emails that went out. I didn't have it included in the notes here but from two different members from there one from the Blizzard president J. Allen Brack which sounds like exactly what I expected to hear the very understanding and you know here are the steps we're taking this is what we're we hear you yeah very much the we hear you kind of a thing that you expected And then another one that came from their chief compliance officer that had some of that, but also included a lot of the kind of comments that were seen in their public release. but it was mainly just hitting the high points of the stuff that they've changed and then that this was a wrong suit that shouldn't have happened because it does the whole, oh, this is all from stuff that happened before and we're different now because that makes everything okay if you've instituted a couple changes even if some of the people who were involved in it are still in high level executive positions because most of those people have been in high-level executive positions there for years and years and years and years.
    43:35
    We'll see how it turns out. The big thing was that, like they said, I mean, stuff was reported. It's not that stuff wasn't being reported to HR. HR just didn't do anything. They didn't take measures, so now there are issues. We'll see how things turn out The ex-boss for Blizzard Mike Moriheim Who left in Like 18 To go found another company Put out a thing That just said he was ashamed Over Everything And that he's sorry that he failed people Which because he would have been there During the core of a lot of this Because this stuff is going back a decade But that's the thing. He doesn't even work there anymore. He owns a whole new company, and he made a better apology than Blizzard did.
    44:34
    Yeah, I wonder if Blizzard feels like they can't because they think an apology would be an admission of guilt and undermine them in the suit. That's the most generous I can give them. Yeah, I don't know. For why that seems sort of tone deaf in some of the paragraphs in particular. So, well We'll move on to Happier news Not for poor Nintendo That's now on its last legs Yeah, right Valve has announced their Steam Deck For those who haven't heard it This is Valve's supposed Switch killer It's a B It's a hand I'm not the best anymore Oh no Your game is in another console Well that's the thing It's not going to be Nintendo has some of the best first party Franchises in the world It doesn't matter how good this piece of equipment Turns out to be But Steam has visual novels They do have visual novels Here's the thing It's going to be just like... Okay, let's back up. For those who haven't heard, the Steam Deck is a handheld PC that Valve is putting out that looks just like the Switch. It's got two analog sticks, two touchpads, analog triggers, ABXY face buttons, four rear buttons, gyro controls, and a 7-inch touchscreen, which makes it identical in form factor to the Switch.
    46:17
    On the other hand, it has a very good processor in it. It is a high-end system. It's got a custom Zen 2 processor with all sorts of data and information that doesn't matter, 16 gig of RAM. The base model comes with 64 gig of storage. the display is 7 inches, which matches the new OLED screen. It's got Bluetooth. It's got an SD expansion port. It is basically a super switch. I will freely admit that it's basically a super switch. At a decent price point, shipping starts in December. It's $399 for the 64-gig version, $529 for the 250-gig version, which switches to a solid-state drive, and $649 for the 512 gigabyte version, plus the SD card port for expansions.
    47:17
    And it comes with SteamOS, and it's automatically, not automatically, but you connect it to your Steam account. So you can play all your Steam games on your Steam Deck. And that sounds amazing, because who doesn't want to play Civilization VI while they're sitting in their chair somewhere for one more turn. I mean, let's face it. It's going to be just like the Switch. Everyone's just going to be playing Stardew Valley. It's a giant, expensive Stardew Valley game player. But we come up with a problem. And the problem is Valve's history with hardware.
    48:01
    They have put out a whole bunch of stuff. They put out the Steam controller That was a pretty respected controller After it was discontinued And it had a fire sale Yeah, when everybody could buy it for a dollar Yeah Because they were just trying to get rid of them Because they wouldn't even work with most games through Steam You had to go through special setup stuff That took like 20 minutes to set it up every time Well, they had the Steam machine Which was the desktop Gaming system That they just never really sold very many of and had none. But they've got the Steam link so you can throw it from your computer to your TV which you could pretty much do with anything nowadays.
    48:47
    But you could control it with your Steam controller if you had one before they had to sell them all off for a dollar because nobody wanted them and they were crap. They had the HTC Vive, the worst of the big VR sets that is the one that everyone says not to buy, even the new version of, because it's way too expensive. It doesn't work as well as the... But you know, they've got a... It's Valve.
    49:16
    It could be what they say it is. It could be a Switch killer. I don't see it. Because of the lack of first party stuff that Nintendo has, it's not going to kill Switch, period. People say that because it looks like a Switch. Yeah, I think the big thing for me is that, obviously, because it plays the Steam library, I see where the logic of the attraction to it is. But given that all those games were designed not with this form factor in mind, I don't know how many of those games actually are going to be enjoyable in that capacity. And there are already portable ways to enjoy your Steam library, like with laptops and stuff. So, given all that, I just, I mean, it might be okay. I think they did a really good job with the pricing to, you know, they got at a very compelling competitive price point. Yes. So, that's a strong thing for it. I just, I don't know if it really brings enough new to the table to motivate most people.
    50:24
    I don't know. I think it's one of those things that there is going to be a segment of hardcore gamer type people, the guys who've been crying and crying for Nintendo to put out PS4, PS5 level hardware in that form factor that might really like it if they've got the games. I mean, I've got a huge Steam library. But the truth of the matter is that's not really a gaming factor that I like. Well, one of the things I wonder is, and I don't know, and maybe it's been posted, I've not obviously done any research on it, is like on the analytics, how many people play the Switch docked versus play in the handheld mode? because the Steam Deck, in the docked perspective, doesn't bring... You can dock... It's what your PC does. So that doesn't... That market isn't there for this. You already have a Steam library. You already have a computer that lets you play docked. So it would only be for the portability aspect. I don't even know if Switch is... I mean, Switch obviously is like a 3DS replacement, but it's also their Wii and Wii U replacement. It's their plug to the TV console and they're portable. That's part of why it's so popular. I mean, I know people that do primarily use the Switch in its portable format, and I know others that keep it almost entirely docked to the TV. So I just, I'm not, it's not, this isn't going to be as broadly appealing because all the Steam library stuff for a docked experience, pretty much everyone already had. I mean, that's how they already enjoy their Steam games. So that side of the market's already been met by Steam. They can't penetrate that very well, I don't feel. Well, and the thing is, not only is it already marketed, the biggest thing you could talk about would be like, oh, but I want to sit on my couch and play on my TV. Well, they already made a device for that that didn't sell real great called the Steam Link. because, you know, I could just hook my computer up to the TV. Yeah. Which takes the same amount of time as a game. And if that's really the big thing, then doesn't that mean this becomes the Stadia killer?
    52:43
    Because that's what Stadia needs is another knife in its back. I'm just saying, is that what the Stadia's big thing is? You can stream it to, like, any device that you want?
    52:55
    I don't know. I don't care. So you can hook your phone and you can hold the controller that's three times the size of your phone while it's hooked to your phone and you can stare at it while you're playing right there holding it in your hands. Through the power of broadband. That's the exciting part. Until you hit your points and you're throttled. Well, there's always a price. There's always a price. We'll finish up with more news. Nintendo came out And to clarify Their position It has nothing to do with the Steam Deck at all But does have to do with all the rumors And leaks that came out around The announcement of the Switch OLED And they wanted to clarify Because there were still some people out there thinking That the OLED was just part of it That there was going to be this Super Switch Coming out from Nintendo also Oh, kind of like when Microsoft has done their lighter, smaller versions of the console, and then they would have a more powerful one in the last generation. Exactly. Okay, I see that. So they still think it's Switch Pro. Right. Well, they reached out to clarify that other than the Switch OLED, they have no plans for any other models of the Switch at this time. Curbstop fatality.
    54:12
    So they wanted to make it very clear that there's no Switch Pro. Y'all quit buying these OLEDs. Buy our OLEDs. Quit holding out.
    54:24
    Good for them to clarify. I think that rumor is going to live on forever. I don't even think that that's good enough to kill that rumor. It won't. Not in today's world, it won't. They're lying. They're trying to trick us. They're tricksy-pracys. So twixy.
    54:41
    Well, that's where we are. Well, great, exciting, happy, joyful episode. That is a lot of stuff. Well, we had some fun talking about the Steam Deck. Yeah.
    54:53
    And maybe internet for, you know, pinball might finally get internet. Yeah, that's definitely what pinball needs the most. We're literally on the edge of the knife. Woo-hoo. All this money pouring into pinball.
    55:10
    It's still so slow to change anything. But we're not too slow when it comes to responding to people. So if you want to reach out to us, you can always email us at eclecticgamerspodcast at gmail.com. Or you can visit us over at facebook.com slash eclecticgamerspodcast. We're on Twitch, Twitter, and Instagram as eclectic underscore gamers. And, well, we probably won't know more about Stern's plans in the next couple weeks. But, hey, we might have some other announcements. There are other companies. There are other rumors I'm hearing about. There could be something interesting and good.
    55:40
    But until then, I am Dennis. I'm Tony. Goodbye, everybody. See you.