Warning, the following episode contains adult language and screaming goats. Listener discretion is advised. Let's see how bad I'll piss off my wife by recording this morning. As long as you get done by Easter brunch. She was like, "You realize we have kids and we hide eggs and like this isn't just hide them really well so they have to like spend a couple hours trying to find the last egg." She's like that was yesterday, too. She's like this isn't President's Day. Like come on. This is like come on me. Poor Lincoln. Jeez, Zack. I'm like, well, this is what I do for the people. The people need me. It's about the people. The people need you, Dennis. I don't know about that. People need the Pinball Show. Ladies and gentlemen, this is the Pinball Show, episode 174, and the continuation of a special segment we've been doing from last episode titled Trough Jam 2025. We're moving into phase two jam. Well, look, I I felt good about it. We put it out there a couple weeks ago and the response has been overwhelmingly positive. Has it? I They love Is it Is it the trough part or the jam part that they're really latching on to? Um, who doesn't love jam? I don't know. Superior over jelly all day long in my I guess. Well, maybe if you don't like seeds, we can even segue into King Kong having a log jam. There is a physical log jam on the new Stern King Kong game. But before we do that, we do have another big log that's floating down the not the the proverbial toilet. And that is this. I think maybe our last pinball show on the Pinball Network. The Pinball Network's ending. Ah, that's right. I Does it have to do with money? It's got to do with money. Zack Mini bastard. Yeah. So, if if you want that update, go check penite. No. Uh if you and you'll be even more confused. The pinball network is ending. We discussed at length about it uh last episode on 173. We even went into a deep dive on the conception of and the timeline and and the and what happened throughout all of the Pinball Network, kind of the industry's biggest and and most successful media network conglomerate that is that we're closing the doors on. We're not chaining it up, I don't think. Maybe we will. We're we're no need to burn it down, but we are closing it down. But yeah, this may be the last Pinball Show episode. So you and I will So what new RSS do we have to tell people to subscribe to? Uh this one. So I guess I guess you I guess you were paying the bill on that one. That's the benefit of Yeah. paying the bill and doing all the work for the last couple years. That's the That's our consolation prize, Dennis. That we get to do more work getting rid of other podcasts that are on here and and Yeah. So, we still have a lot of work to do, but no fear. The pinball show here is uh it's is here to stay. So, and then go subscribe to all the other people for the for the details, the Patreon. We had a lot I mean a lot of people join. I was really shocked that people cared about the background that much. The official club of uh the Pinball Show via Patreon, patreon.com/thepinball show. Go sign in because you're gonna want to hear some exclusives. But people loved the uh exclusive content last week that we did cover the TPN. We Yeah, like you said, our biggest boom in in new members. So, they liked it. We need to close more things down and talk about it, I guess. All in due time, Dennis. Okay. All in due time. Uh, but I think we I we need to get to the pinball, right? Happy Easter. Happy spring, everybody. It has been very stressful on me as somebody that works in this industry because pity you because you've had to do so many sales. Supposed to pity you. Oh, man. It really it it did hell on me and we'll talk about that more. But first, we got to talk about the angel that is Stern Pinball. Keeping the lights on everywhere. Stern pinball production updates the last couple of weeks. They've been making Jaws Premium finally. And uh they still didn't make as many as dealers needed orders for. So, they're going to make more I believe like June, July, but they did uh squirt out some Jaws premium for us. Oh, what a word. Uh they also on the line was King Kong and we'll talk about that. Their no release Keith Ellen. Yeah. Speaking of Elwin and Jaws. So the weird thing is I believe Kong I don't know what Kong version is on the production line. I theoretically it should be the Ellie cuz they're they're releasing the Ellies first. But I thought I saw some non-ellies and there was a something with a decal on the Ellie. So I don't know. We should be getting Ellie soon. We'll talk about that when we talk about the release itself. April, I do believe they are going to run some more Metallica Remastered premiums this month as well uh over the next couple weeks. So, simultaneously with some of the Kong games and then in May, they're going to start running King Kong Pro and Premium models. So, we'll have them shortly in locations everywhere. Q3, I have some updates here for production of Stern Pinball. Q3. This would be July, August, September, summer months kind of thing. We're going to be seeing more James Bond Pro and Premiums, Jurassic Park Pro and Premiums, Metallica Remastered Premium, and Jaws Premium. So, you can see kind of uh listener, you'll see a pattern here where they make the most of what people want the most. And right now, it's Metallica and Jaws. A lot of people really clamoring for those two titles. So, they're making them kind of now and they're going to make them again this summer. Another update. Stern opened its vault to throw another game inside. Oh. To put it in, not to take something out of the vault. Yes. We don't It's a weird analogy, but we'll we'll keep using it. This time it's the Canadians. I I think it's this is more of a a US thing. Is this political? Is this punishment? That's right. You know what? You did nothing to us, Canada. So, we're really going to dig in deep and throw your precious rush into the stern vault. Let's see you live in the limelight in the closed vault. We ain't letting you out till 2049. Was pretty clever. Is that a thing? Is it 2049? Did I nail that? I'm glad this game is vaulted. Oh, poor I never could get I never could get into it. I never I'm sorry, Ray Day. It's not It's not you, it's me. I just I could never every time I have played it I the layout to me I you know what I I'll say I like the layout a little bit more than Turtles but oh it's I just can't I just can't get a feel for it right now on the side of the highway there's a Tom graph holding the time machine in his hand and a single tear trailing down his face. He just comes at it from a different place than I do. Tomy. So So that that is the production updates. Let's jump into trough Jam 2025 phase two. Dennis, get on the edge of your seat again. Even edgier edge. You don't even need it. Just hover. You don't have to buy a ticket. You just have to pre-order it, maybe. Oh boy. So, sorry. You're getting my dander up this episode now, Dennis. [ __ ] People did like that tariff talk, though. A bit one-sided that was, but that's okay. Oops. Oh, the hits keep coming. I'll take them. I'll take uh So, phase two, phase one was girthy. Phase two is our big one. This phase two is the steak. If phase one was more of the potatoes or the salad because cuz phase two is the is the big, you know, house the big the big licenses that people have known or highly suspected were coming and now they're seeing them. Are you saying phase three is the sweet dessert? It could be phase three. Uh may more of a like an appertif or something. I don't know what those words mean, but I'm a Midwesterner, but yuck. Oh, key lime. Uh, no, actually, it's a little tart for me. Um, my preferred pies are I thought you said peon. Oh, yeah. Pecan. Yeah, pecan. Whatever you want to say. However you want to caramel. But yeah, I've never I don't think I ever told you this story. My maternal grandmother one time was talking to me about about uh having like a having a pecan of And I was like, a pie? What did she talk about out in She's She lived in Alaska and Grandma camping a can. Pea can. That's No, that's what it was. Oh, it was for the cabins because it's Alaska in the winter. They wouldn't want to go to the outhouse and she literally had a pe can. I didn't say pean like a old folder and she but she'd say it just like the pecan like pecan. Yeah. She's like she's talking about this pecan and I'm like what? Why at night? What do you need to have a pecan by your bed? And I'm like, just like one, just like one little pecan just sitting there. And she's like, I finally realized, no, she's talking about like an old metal folders can that's being used as a as like a as a bed pan. That way you don't have to go out. I mean, I went out there once in the in the winter and at night, I mean, it was 20 below. Uh, so I understood the desire not to go outside, but I'm just doing because you had to walk to the outhouse. I hope she at least rounded the corners of that tin can. Oh, look. I I didn't ask any questions. Grandma's got some cuts. Oh, I can. So, what how we're going to do this is we are going to mention the timeline as we go cuz we could just sit here and talk about, you know, Dune Pinball by Barrels of Fun or King Kong. Not what we normally do. We could do that, but there was so much going on at such high stakes times. I mean, they were trying to tease here, tease there. It was like a bordello over or know what? They're always trying to promote the But that's what it was. I'm just People like to be let into the behind the curtains here a little bit, don't they? There were rumors that weren't true. There were like there's so much going on. So, we're going to kind of brief briefly mention the timeline as we're going along uh Trough Jam phase 2. Uh but also uh we're going to take a deeper look and I've got a lot of feelings, a lot of feelings about how all of this went down over the last week and a half. And we're going to put that uh for our official club members. They deserve the juice. And the juice was was gushing uh over the last week and a half. But let's jump into it. First off, we had I'm going to say let's start around the 1st of April. We had like April 3rd, we had barrels of fun jumping out and teasing #inccluded new infinity glass. They said, "Look, where other people are making you pay for this stuff, we're #inccluding it on our next game." So, that went over well. People like that. Oh, very cool. They also came back out on the 7th of April and they said they gave a a reaction to the tariff. Everybody was worried about tariffs and how's this going to affect us? uh really good PR move because it it got a a lot of positive publicity there. So, Barrels of Fun trying to jump jump out in phase two and and trying to position themselves well for their new release. And then uh on the 8th of April, 10:22 to be specific, they do another hashtag included their new lighting system, Dennis, the Horizon, I think atmospheric lighting system or HAL for short. And then they're rumblings. What are you doing, Dave? Yeah. Do they have uh what is it? Space Odyssey. What what do they have? And then Jersey Jack Pinball on the eighth. Jersey Jack Pinball jumps on stage and says, "Wait a minute." And they they pushed barrels off the stage. They're like, "No, that was a sound. I heard it." So this Jack back flipped him, did a flash kick and knocked him off the stage. He did a quasi cartwheel. Hey. And then I I thought I heard Barls do the Chung Lee scream. Okay. And then so Jack comes in and he emails dealers to basically say, "Hey, we got Harry Potter. Here's some of the game details." Uh, and start taking, he said, you know, pre-orders are open, but don't open up pre-orders to your cut. So, it's a pre-order, but don't call it a pre-order. It's not Don't call it a comeback either. There are so many things here. There are This is what's going into the Patreon. There are a lot of things. Yeah. Stick that in the Patreon cuz it's confusing. a lot of things here, but the end result was you can now message your dealer and you can pre-order Harry Potter sight unseen if you'd like. But whether you give money shouldn't matter, but it does matter with some. But I don't know what to tell you. I don't know. You can guarantee a spot if you go to flipping outpinball.com. That's all I'm saying. Just bye bye bye. They go to So there's a lot to just cut all that part out and put that in. No wonder you were like, "Hey, I really think we should go this direction." Not you do a bunch of like, "What are your top fives?" D. I Yeah, I lost some weight this last week and a half. A lot of sweating. Good sweats and bad sweats. Yeah. So, we'll discuss all that. So, Jersey Jack jumps in front and then a couple of days go by and then on the 11th of April, Jack gets back on stage and he wants to have a pep rally to discuss the theme of Harry Potter. Their next game being a pivotal moment not only in company history but in the hobbies history. Oh, expectations are through the roof. Don't spend your money, guys. He really pumps this thing up. And so he he's writing an open letter with the uh with the the the wax stamp on it for Harry Potter. He's really theming it all up style and people loved it. Hired an owl to fly it to us. People loved it. It was a good PR move. It worked. You don't know how these PR moves are going to work. Sometimes they fall flat on their face. Sometimes they work. So, the barrels tariff reaction, that was a that was a net gain. That was a big boost. Uh, this one this one from Jack worked. People really liked the tone of it and it and it worked. And then on the same day, the 11th of April, let me I'm going to pull up what day. Just a few hours later, if I recall. Just a few hours later on that Friday, two Fridays ago, Stern Pinball launches their teaser for King Kong Pinball at 11:00 a.m. They showed a gong. It sounds like Jersey Jack kind of knew this was coming. Stern does these teasers on Friday. So, so many spies. You think Steve Ritchie was the spy all along? Yeah, Jack said, "Go ape [ __ ] all you want." But never before have we seen a theme like Harry Potter come to this industry. That's right. and King Kong, you know, that's a that's one might argue while wellknown much like Godzilla, weaker theme, definitely weaker than Harry Potter. So Stern, are they behind the eightball? Are they weak here? Are they in a position of vulnerability? Well, Barrels of Fun starting getting a little skittish then. They were like, Barrels is like, don't forget about us. We made Labyrinth. We are world under glass. So behind the scenes, they're trying to figure out, I thought we were just battling Stern on this release. Now we got Jack entering stage, right? And what are we going to do? Should we should we start teasing more stuff? Should we have we teased enough? Should we unveil the game? Is licensing ready for us and to unveil the game? All of that. patreon.com/pinball show. But uh even barrels right now is like, "Oh [ __ ] I better go listen cuz he better not be better keep uh this is how we get subs. We make we make the industry subscribe." Jeez, I know the whole So then that following Monday, Barrels comes out teasing again. #inccluded ever gloss premium art decals. So glossy. Yeah, they were they were doing that around noon central time. And these are things are cool. We'll talk about that during the release. All of these things are pretty awesome they're adding on this game now. They're kind of leading up to the big climax. I see what they're doing. I mean, it seemed more like they were just trying to make sure they weren't forgotten about in the shuffle of discussion. Yes. Yeah. which is smart from a marketing standpoint. But then something happened I wasn't expecting even as one of their authorized probably one of their largest dealers. All right, at this point we're going to see King Kong tomorrow and then Barrels maybe later on this week. But then at 6:30 at night on Monday, 638 to be precise, Barrels of Fun ends up launching Dune Pinball out of nowhere. At this point, nobody even knew what the title was and they just were doing #inccluded, you know, uh upgrades and stuff. So, Dune Pinball is released on Monday at 6:30 at night. Not ideal, but uh but they launch it with the teaser and pics, but no trailer. And then, okay, so then we'll go into all the Dune thing. But then after Dune was announced, but kind of announced, Barrels of Fun hosts a media event on the morning of Tuesday. Mhm. during the Stern launch because they even watched the Stern launch at the the media watched the trailer of King Kong at barrels. And then yeah, King Kong Myth of Terror Island is released at 11:00 a.m. on Tuesday, uh, April 15th. And then Barrels of Fun then follows up with releasing the official Dune trailer at 2:53 the same day. So too much jammed trough. This was very jammed. Big log, big log. Then Stern Pinball, they still have their media event to happen. That happened on the 17th, two days later, but they even have a dealer event on the 16th, which was on Wednesday. So, let's jump into and like I said, if you want to hear behind the scenes details on all of that, it's super interesting. If you if you care about what's in the sausage, the pinball sausage that is, subscribe. Dennis, where are they? Subscribe at patreon.com/thepinball show. Let's talk about Barrels of Fun launching Dune. Yeah, we first received, like I said, a teaser, you know, mech mech. It did show a lot, but it my argument was it didn't show enough like all this cuz I knew what the game had. But King Kong just showed a gong. I think that we'll talk about that, but I don't think that was a big teaser trailer either. But it's a teaser. It's not supposed to be big. That's my point. So taste just a morsel. Just a little morsel. I didn't want them to put that much in it. No, I agree. I thought they put too many morsels in. Yeah, because then you you had launch and they had the pics. So we had all that. But most people when they see a game and they're putting their money down, they want to see a trailer. Like I want to see I don't know what any of this stuff does. Uh but there's one model of this game, Dune. Mhm. I do think it was a pleasant surprise by both Dune fans and non-fans of Dune or, you know, neutral fans of the franchise. You're a Dune fan. We'll go into and you spoke on the flipping out pinball stream. Uh you deep dove into this release with Joel and Jared and Tom designed by David Van Es and Travis Moseman. Travis also did mechanical engineering programming. Eric Pryky. People love Pryky's work. So that's a big old positive. Rules by Colin McCalpine and Bowen Karen's both prolific in this industry when it comes to competitive pinball. And at this point when it comes to uh rules rules creation in pinball. So people aren't worried about the the code that might be the current status of code but long-term people are not worried about that art by John Beron. Berseron Johnny Crap. For those familiar, when you seen this game, the pictures of it in the boom boom boom trailer teaser, what were your first thoughts? Pretty positive. You know, I I still wasn't totally sure if they were going to base it off of the new movie or not. I figured they would given their first game was Labyrinth. Um, and if they're going to do a movie, they're going to do the new one, not not going back to the David Lynch one. Uh, so overall with like the mechs and stuff again, it it played to where I thought they their strength lies, and that is that what we often call the world under glass. Um, oh, very much so. And so, but again, it was it was hard to get a good feel with just seeing the mechs. Um, well, let's throw it in there, though. The main worm mech the main worm mech was was pretty interesting. Yeah. So, then we'll throw in the whole trailer. Uh, and then you've got that nice two two and a half minute cut of what this game is all about. And that was I mean pretty captivating seeing the Dune franchise come to physical form in Pinball just in that trailer. They did a really good job in my opinion of portraying not only the theme and pinball but what you're getting with this game which was very exciting and uh sales have uh have spoken to that as well. It's doing very well saleswise. But the when I first seen the the trailer that's what hooked me. I'm like, "Ah, okay." Like, "This is pretty amazing." And in my opinion, Barrels has done what people did not know if they could do after their first release. Was it luck that they, you know, came out with Labyrinth and it was that well done, that environmental, that world under glassy, that loaded? Maybe that was just luck. Maybe they just kind of put all their resources into the last, you know, how many years making something their sophomore average is going to be like, "Okay, you guys suck." Nope. I think if anything it may have exceeded which I wasn't expecting. Uh the perception in the hobby was exceeded. So I think it was yeah it was overall a good good thing for jumping into our first impressions. The artwork. Did you like the artwork? Did you not like the artwork? This is coming from you as a fan of the do we call them novels? I guess novels. I mean I've I've read the novels. I'm not super fan of of the books. Once you get past the first book the read gets a lot harder. Okay. So, uh, just I mean it's one it's just one of those things like reading Lord of the Rings. Uh, the writing is more contemporary than how Lord of the Rings feels, but it's they're very philosophical, very slow books in a lot of ways once you get past the first one. Of course, this is based on the first one. Um, but yeah, no, actually I thought the art uh of the releases we have now seen, this one is my favorite art package. Oh, wow. I think you have a lot of people that would agree with you. I do. Uh, and it is it is pretty stunning. It's pretty stunning. It doesn't feel like a lot of what we see in pinball. So, that was a nice nice respit from all of that. I think a lot of companies would have been scared to use this much brown. Sure. But like I said in we did a straight down the middle first impressions video to accompany the trailer and I said like the smart thing that they did or Johnny did with with the pallet here. He leaned when it comes to sand you get browns and yellows he leaned more orange and then he complemented that with that iridescent blue uh with the darker blues. That's a nice palette orange and blue. People people tend to like that. So, I thought that was really smart. And I, you know, I I paid on I I gave myself credit here cuz nobody else [ __ ] noticed. I brought up the fact of the like the playfield art, some of the the apron art really was like a a tribute to some of the illustrations uh on not only not only the novels, uh the Frank Herbert stuff, but also just like the theming in general uh on on Dune. thought they did a really good job. So much so that I like pulled a picture of the novel. I think it was of the second novel or the third novel and then compared it to the Playfield character art and like if somebody were to see those next to they're like, "Oh shit." Yeah. I mean, there it is. Like that's Johnny Crap not creating his own thing. That's him like paying tribute and homage to the the classic artwork that people have loved. Um, and I said it on that show and I'll say it here, listener. I think that apron art is maybe my favorite apron art I've ever seen in pinball. It is very cool. It's just beautiful. Just beautifully done. And then we've heard from media people that in person this thing really is beautiful and gorgeous as well. And it shouldn't be. Dune should not be beautiful. It's sand. But it is Timothy Shalamé. I don't know. I am kind of crushing on him. I'm not going to lie. So the art checks for you. Uh it's good layout and design. This is where I think it shines. What are your thoughts on the layout and design? Is it a you know fan layout normal return to ramp? No. I mean the layout is Yeah, the layout the layout is unique. I like what the ball paths are doing. I am not convinced this shoots well. Okay. All right. So I'm I I'm not saying it shoots poorly. I'm saying because again and part of this was with the reveal after the reveal, the initial screen footage didn't make it look like it shot well. So, um, but what they've done with the diverters, the subway systems, the ball pathing. Um, I think it's, you know, it's interesting. I like that they've done they pulled a Blackwater 100, a lot of sculpted plastic over on that right hand side, which obuscates what's going on with the ball. I don't think that this is going to be a hard game to figure out how the pathing is going to work. I think there's sometimes with pinball, it feels like people look at this stuff and it's like all of a sudden they become 5-year-olds and they can't figure it out. And it's like after like six games, you're going to understand this is they're never that hard. Even like the most complicated pathing game ever I think was Godfather and I've never really heard people rant about I don't know where the ball's coming out next. Well, that's because of you diverters and chain states and all of that. But people like change state and this does have a lot of change state. What I like is it's not all just a bunch of diverters sitting on top of ramps that you clearly see. They have still respected the idea of I want you to feel like you're on a rackus and then you know they they've put it a lot of it under those plastics and stuff. So I like I like the way they've done and it it doesn't look like a layout that really mimics much of anything else that we've seen before. So it feels fresh. Absolutely. So I like that parts. I like those parts of it. I like designwise I think it looks very interesting. Um, it does, but looks I just don't my feel on how it plays is a little more nebulous. Yeah. And and that's one of the things that once we get our hands on it, we'll be able to see better how it does feel because people were mixed on labyrinth. Labyrinths tended to be uh pretty difficult. And uh what I would I was talking to Retro Ralph and he's got a labyrinth recently and he's like, "Dan, this thing is just freaking like brutal." And then I was like, "Oh yeah, like true." And I tend to like like really nasty games because I just I something hooks me about them. But yeah, and he was like, "But yeah, this is like on Labyrinth kind of unfair at points and I'm like I can't argue. I cannot argue." And it's the same thing with like Ghostbusters. I think Ghostbusters from a ge geometrical standpoint like is unfair from a design standpoint, it is unfair at times and I'm okay with some of that. some of that, you know, it gets to a point, but I think this will be a little bit more uh little bit more forgiving. However, I still think based on, you know, when that media when the media went there and was shooting this thing and that was whether it was on yam cam or nice cam, they didn't do it any service on uh shootability cuz they weren't hitting shots. Yes. This is where Barrels had had much like what Stern did a a video with gameplay. And you we've talked about this for years because even Stern used to not do this. We've been preaching like don't let the don't let the live stream be the first experience with the gameplay. Have have something pre-recorded where it doesn't look like it's impossible for anyone to play. I don't even think they really needed that if they didn't have media come. But the first time you somebody sees this game being shot, even if it's a really good play, like you just you want to give them a taste of the fun that it is to shoot without the initial frustrations that a lot of people are going to have whenever they step up to a new game. As I do, I think they're going to tend to be a more difficult shooter than some of the, you know, easy to shoot stern stuff that because some of the sterns, they have a range of difficulties, but some of the easier ones are pretty, you know, pretty approachable. I don't know if that's going to be the case here, but uh but we'll see on that. It I just love that the layout does what like what Jack Danger stuff did. Uh does what Elwin stuff does. Like as a pinball player, you've seen so many layouts and you've shot so many things. You just want something that's like just novel. You want something that you maybe haven't seen in a long time or haven't seen before or you see an area that you want to explore. Uh, that's what this game does in spades. It does a really good job of that and bringing back the stuff that I love. Like this is a selfish layout for me because this is like everything I think pinball players want. They want to explore new stuff and have new shots. Even if the end result is like, you know, some of the like the gotle stuff like some funky layouts and some of the shots are a little bit clankier, but man, it's kind of cool to see the ball do that or to see them take a risk there. like the the right-hand radical thing, but nobody's given it enough love. Some have given it a lot. They should have brought that back a long time ago. This group finally did it and they put a drop target in front of it so it can act as another staged opportunity. This is like the staging company and I love that when you when you're blocking balls in the labyrinth, you're locking them at different spots. This is going to be no different. If anything, it's going to be more so. They've got plenty of areas you can you can stop and lock balls including posts that are under those sand dunes in the back or magnets uh magnet holes or shooting it to the what's that? Uh oh, I think that's the harvester. Harvester. Thank you. But having it go over the worm and through the woods to grandma's harvester up there. You've got a post that can hold it back there and then feed the upper flipper. And then even like the the pain box popping out and then you're used to a kickback there on some of the like Jersey Jack games and such. No, it's like a hole that the ball can go through being staged and to use as like a another radical thing where it can throw a ball out there, kinetically hit another ball to save it. There's all kinds of stuff like that that I I just I think there there's a lot of thought that's going into this layout to be different and unique. And I respect it enough to, you know, to to speak on it to this extent on the podcast because I would rather have more of this and less safe stuff. I just even for pros and cons, the fork, the ball catching the fork and the the magnet area that throws it around. I think this is going to be, if coated properly, it's going to be a lot of fun to shoot. But to your point, uh, is it going to shoot like a sleek stern? I I don't know. And it's going to be tougher. So, what about like toys and stuff like that? It's got a lot of They Yeah, it it it looks good. I I thought I thought the toys are they're all pretty impressive. Obviously, you mentioned the pain box, which wasn't one I initially noticed because it's not always out, but I think that was a really clever deployment over there for the left outline. Obviously, the the center feature of the worm that can eat the ball or also let you ride the worm and rises up to the have a trail. That's going to be the showstopper. Yeah, it's um so that's the centerpiece toy. But even the little thumper, like my thing I loved ju just because I mean it reminds me the little top of it. Okay. Yes. It looks like they just went to um to AutoZone and picked up little tire stem caps to to make put on for the top of that. That's what it looks like to me. They weathered it and put it on there. Well, maybe they did. I don't know. But but it's so theme appropriate. And when you compare it to the stupid kung fu grip grip avatar knife mod from JJP, like this is something that's really just moving up and down, but it's so much more meaningful than that stupid knife. Especially when you pair it with like a shaker, the upgraded audio with amplifier now and the assets visually in the back. You see, you know, Shalom's blue eyes and boom boom, you know. And as I I noted earlier, I don't want to I don't want to uh underestimate the fact that they did some significant sculpted plastic work to represent the siech cave holes and stuff on the upper right. Like I again it's just it's a really nice touch. That's a touch I kind of expected because of what they did with Labyrinth, but uh again it gives it texture. You're not seeing like booty right all over the place. Booty right. So true. The moldings are second to none. And then I think that if they they need to lean talking about mechs and stuff, they need to lean on that backboard LCD because nobody else is doing that. And I just there's so much potential there, especially if they're branding themselves as the world under glass company. I think they've done it here. Dare I say that there is no other company that's batting this high of an average. Like they're they're batting 100% here. Uh and I think the LCD in the back helps with that. Everybody's like, "Oh, needs to have more. needs to have more look. Sure, but guess what it is by default on day one? Better than a [ __ ] decal. So, I don't It's It theming is uh quite wonderful in my opinion, but it's hard to find a flat plastic on this game. I love that they took the time to to do all the sand molding when sand all you got to do is a flat plastic, but they did molding to pull the world the world in. I wasn't a Dune guy. The theme did nothing for me, but it does now. Like, I'm going to own this game. This game looks freaking killer. And there's so much going on that I love that when you But you got to do it all right. You got to do everything to this degree in order to win some people over when it comes to a, you know, a B-level theme. Even maybe some argue a C- level theme. But yeah, it does it. It does it for me. Three spinners. Do you really need three spinners, Dennis? I mean, I like three spinner games. They all do stuff. Do you like can you not just have ramps? Do you have to have ramps that also have diverters and flaps that come down to lead to a different orbit shot? Like every damn shot seems like it could be diverted into a couple of different things. I love it. I love it. Oh, I forgot to talk about the beautiful back glass art. Every I've heard people say bad things about the back glass art. It's like one of my favorite things on this whole game. I for some reason everybody's like, "Oh, it feels like Lord of the Rings." [ __ ] yeah. Exactly. Like on Lord of the Rings, that is the only artwork on that entire game that is not worth the trash can. And I know people are like, "Yeah, but it's the times of the time." Yeah, I I agree. I'm just saying looking at that now, I want to cheese graater the entirety of that damn game, except for if they remade that game, I would urge and encourage Stern to keep the same translate. It's beautiful. That mo movie poster so iconic. I love it. It's like Jaws. All right. What else are we missing on the I didn't I don't love the back glasses on this. Oh my gosh. Oh, don't get me wrong. It's not like they're poorly balanced or anything, but it's it feels so Photoshop montage. It reminds me of the Star Trek back glass on the pro and just and Game of Thron it just it's just like what everyone does. Let's just stick everyone's favorite character on here. So hopefully you buy it. I think Yeah, I get like again I'm just saying it's not special. It's not special in any way. I don't hate it, but it's not special. The playfield is special. That is not I'm not. See, I'm seeing it more as it's not special. The coloring they're using uh the characters cuz if you pay close attention, it's the same color as the Playfield. No, no, it's it's because you'll see there are some characters missing. So, it's not like this photo because you can't put everything on there. Well, you playfield did what you love. They don't have let's have every single character as a shot. Instead, they did some like bigger like set piece, you know, let's have this vista and people on the dune. Yeah. Not a whole bunch of little windows. Mhm. Yeah. It's comic book style. Yeah. The back glass just screams the movie. That's true. What about I'm just saying it's looks fine. I wouldn't but I wouldn't write home about it. What's the worm's name? Doesn't the worm have a name? They probably named the worm like in the books the worm is called Shy Halude, but I think they like gave it I think they gave it a pet name. I think the barrels calls it the same name as the worm from Labyrinth. The willyworm rules and I don't care. To me that's like American pinball and the monkey like I that you want to do a thing like that. Is it completely irrelevant to anyone who's not like hardcore obsessing over the brand? Shyoot sounds like a badass name. Does it have like a personality and the Kachox and all sorts of fun words? Smoke cigars names. Oh, that would be a that would be a visual. Putting a cigar in that worm's mouth on the playfield. Okay. Rules and code we don't know enough about. Uh they've explained that it's going to be plenty deep. That's for damn sure. Different f light right now. Yes. Yep. That is the one complaint is like there even even during the media day it said like pending license or approval and stuff. So yes, I I I'm hoping they don't get way behind like what happened with Stern and James Bond where I mean, yeah, that game is like they're making more now because it it it got to a good place, but oh that was such a rough uh ramp up uh because I think by all accounts licensing licensing just it wasn't like the programmers were slow as the licensing just jeopardized things. And not to jump too far ahead of rules and code, but kind of like tied to audio and sound. One of the initial concerns I've heard from people is purportedly they've got like lots of callouts and stuff, but people aren't hearing it yet. Mhm. And yeah, because that score in and of itself is just oh epic. It's such a good uh film score. So yeah, I agree with you. Uh, the one thing that I like though about the whole rules and code department is that unlike I mean when people talked about Bond and is it going to get there, I have more confidence in like the team working on this really than Stern. Wow. Well, when it comes to like stylistic No, I'm talking about like Lonnie Rob kind, you know, like I like some of Lonnie stuff um and Vineor, you know, they did Stranger Things. I really like that. But Bond really did nothing for me. That older Bond, whereas this is is at least new cinematic, cinematic stuff, new filming stuff. And I have the people who have created some of the codes that I love more than like Rick and Morty. I still think that code set is so much fun. And it's almost like pinball level of perfection with, you know, your main objectives, but then sprinkling in these extra, I'll call them Star Trek Next Generation Artifact kind of stuff that just with the Mega Seeds. And then you've seen that again on Labyrinth that they just executed so wonderfully well that I just have legitimately zero concern about where this will this will end up as like one of the one of the better coded games ever. It just by the pedigree alone it just will. But to your point, how long will that take? That's whether or not people are up for that wait or waiting in general for it. Yeah. So, I have zero worry about that. But time, they said it'll take, you know, up to a year to get it fully coded where they want to call it pretty much complete, moving on kind of thing. And then a lot of people, they're like, that's that's pretty damn long. But that's what we're seeing from a lot of companies. Not to say it's right, but man, I don't know. Animation, we don't really know. audio and sound. Like you said, some of that the what we got from the media event is it seems like this is going to be awesome, but it may take some time. I did like the code thing, the pain box. That was clever where you have to hold your hand on that action button. Yeah. If you take it off, the ball dies and if the system detects that you're cheating and putting your fat gut on that thing and both flipper buttons are touched at the same time, it says you [ __ ] cheater and it kills you, too. Yes. That is good. That That was very smart. Very smart. So those little novel things I love. What else haven't we talked about pricing? So they came out. They're they're at 11,600. One model. Uh I think they're limiting it to a,000 units like they did Labyrinth kind of thing. That Yeah, that's my understanding. Now that price went up. Labyrinth was uh grand, right? Wasn't Labyrinth 106? Yep. Labyrinth was 106. Um, I know behind the scenes, just from what I know, that they they were worried about the whole they kind of had the price set and that's why they came out with the whole tariff thing cuz they're like, "Look, we're we understand all the tariff stuff. We've set a price and if we were going to consider the tariff stuff and like add that in right now, it would been higher. But we were going to come in at 116, it was going to be more expensive than the last one because there's more going on in here. also licensing and everything, but a lot more going on. Bill of materials is substantially higher. David Van Es told me even the tariff stuff that did hit that they didn't add into this equation. He's like, I just got this x mini pallet of parts and typically, you know, 6 months ago it would have cost this. Here's how much my bill was for this. And I was like, holy [ __ ] It was like three times, four times as much kind of stuff. Nuts. I thought tariffs don't make a difference. what they did on those couple pounds. Absolutely. But to my argument, the end result it didn't because they're still I mean they're eating it. Stern isn't increasing their prices yet. You know, I think all these companies will though at some point if these tariffs do continue to hit and they you know it isn't just bravado and stuff. It'll it will affect. That's true. production. They're wanting to get to about 20 games a week production goal. That way they can get through the majority if not all of these games Dune by the end of the year. What was their rate for Labyrinth? Oh, I think similar. They were about 15 20 games a week. It took them probably two months to get uh two and a half months to get to that point, but once they did, they were they were consistent with that, too. They were rocking and roll. That's all contingent upon parts and stuff, but I don't see 20 games a week being a problem. I just think 20 games a week will come uh in June. I think that's when they would get to 20 games per week. We do know that they are shipping now. They wanted to I mean that was a lot of why they held up uh releasing this game. They wanted to keep the branding similar. Um their etho is it ethos? Ethos. Is that what they call? Yeah, their ethos. Yeah. So, they were they were really big on that and they landed that I would say if I'm being critical to them and they know because I speak with them often is it's it was going to be hard because the resources and timing to nail everything you did with Labyrinth and I did think they slipped up when it came to the launch of this game. They didn't keep their is it pathos or etho? I don't know what is. They didn't keep their branding consistent when it came to the launch of this game because it was a bit of a mess in my opinion. So, I don't think it damaged the brand, but they have an area that they can do significantly better in in the future to uphold what they've worked so hardly uh to build up to this point. But they are shipping. I think two of them went out last week or this week going to I think a show. I think they're going to a show and then then they'll be going to different locations. They're they're preferencing locations, giving priority to that Dennis and listener to where they can get out uh on arc at arcades. I know that for flipping out pinball uh we're getting a showroom model uh so we can do some media on it as well as other dealers getting showroom models and uh they're going to location. So we have, you know, a list of locations that you're going to be seeing receiving those soon. All right, sales. Okay, how do you think this did? Oh, probably decent. As you said, market's down. Nobody wants games. Did I say that? Mhm. Yeah. Or that was the narrative that I was saying that you said. Okay. A lot of people say that though. Nobody's going to buy [ __ ] Nobody's buying anymore. The sales overall, here's the here's the real deal. I knew what this product was going to be. And if you gave if you told me to estimate the sales or or to project what I thought was going to happen to the sales whenever Monday hit and they showed the pictures and the teaser trailer sales were below what I would have estimated and I was a little like uhoh. But I knew that they weren't showing the product in its right in a rightful way like they weren't giving it. And maybe that may be behind the Patreon too but a lot of people were like oh it got leaked. There was a dealer that I I don't even know where this story came from. There was a dealer that leaked it and then they had to then launch. I don't know if Barrels cares if I tell this, but it's the truth. Like that's not even I don't know where that came from. That's not even close to being true. The reason they launched it was the reason they launched it. They had full control of that. I won't go into all of that, but there's other factors that make more sense and viably were actual truth. when the dealer le we didn't even have the damn We didn't have any of it to leak. So there was no Yeah. I I think I saw a link somewhere where someone had found that a a distributor had a page set up calling it Dune Pinball. That's me, Dennis. That's me. I have Oh, is it? Yes. Surprise, surprise. Like, so that's that's where some of this narrative came into like there was quote unquote media news that was reporting like, "Oh, a dealer has dunpinball.com." And then they were trying No, no, no, no. I thought I saw a thing where someone had a page set up on their actual like site where all of a sudden Dune was in the in the in the pinball list. Oh, okay. I got you. And then that person, whoever it was, I don't I thought I saw a screenshot. It didn't look like your website though. Okay. But that that supposedly they had posted like here was the link for the Dune P like it was in the drop down list and then they took it out like a you know in an hour or two or something. And we'll talk about the whole domain and stuff like that. I didn't look into it cuz I don't care. Everyone knew it was Dune. Well, everybody was saying like oh dunepinball.com. So this I think it was NAP. It might have been NAP. It was like, I think this dealer is trying to Well, I think after the Harry Potter after the Harry Potter pinball, people started like compiling lists of other, you know, known rumored games to see who owns the uh he's trying to get an advantage or something like it's like, well, absolutely not. Or he's leaking. No, absolutely not. Um I own a lot of domains, by the way, that I think might be pinball machines in the future, but it's just guesses. I mean, it's just that's a thing that um some of the people in the media just don't understand. And it's called it um it starts with a B. It's just it's called business. So you have to I'm running a business. I know it's hard to imagine business moves such as that. But that's what I'm trying to do. Trying to work hard. So overall I would say the before that the sales but then once that trailer hit and that was post King Kong I was like uh oh what are we going to do? No sales have been good. Good. And they were back up to what my estimation I almost to the tea of what my estimate was. Maybe a little bit better than even I estimated because I knew that Kong would take a bite out. I really knew that it would take a bite out and I was trying to be straight up with barrels whenever I was giving my assessment of what I thought was going to happen. I was kind of telling them, you know, as in this industry, with the timing that we've got right now for this product being launched, I think we all need to, whether you want to hear it or not, we need to temper some expectations of what this product is compared to the timing in which it's being released. I think that the Well, I mean, obviously, but like from a from a listener standpoint, OB, I get why it's important to your standpoint that, hey, you know what? I I stuck my estimate like it I I know how to read the market. From a listener standpoint, your estimate is irrelevant. What they want to know is over the 6 day period or whatever, how many more or less of these did you sell than Labyrinth? Oh, that's the number. That's a hard It's going to be less out. It's going to be less. Of course. Why? Why? Of course it's a multi Do I want to bore people with the multiffactored reasons why? I mean, I don't know. Do you? Oh, you probably do cuz you like to bore the people but meandering. We have spent we have spent like 50 minutes on dude. That's true. We can move on. But uh quickly if people do care uh let us know but # sky is falling different different time less than labyrinth sophomore effort in e effort inferior to freshman effort. That's not skying. That is not it. Sky it's timing. It's the market. It is uh it's so many different factors. It's um yeah, it's a lot of stuff, many variables. Well, not to not to even mention my sales are lower because whenever we were selling Labyrinth, I was one of three dealers whereas when we were selling Dune, I'm one of 20 plus dealers. So, that alone you're going to see sabotage. Yeah. But here's what I will say that I was very surprised upon. It may or may not be true. Well, it's true. This is true. Uh, flipping out pinball has sold more Dune pinball machines than King Kong Pros. How about that? Like that. Is that That's significant. Okay. Oh, yeah. Sure. A lot of factors. I get it. But what's your argument or what? I'm I'm feeling something there. I treating each model tier like its own thing beyond just being a I'm trying to find a data point that's interesting here. No, it's not. It's because it's devoid of context. It's devoid of context and not enough people have played King Kong yet. So, this is standard for like all the Sterns is the premiums and alleys out sell the Pro until people realize whether or not the Pro actually plays well. And the Pro looks super stripped down on King Kong. But you were asking me if they sold more or less or so I was giving compared to the same company, same thing. Like, oh, you're want to compare the same thing. I mean, we've got a lower LE count now, a lower run count on Dune than we did on Labyrinth. I I don't think they're going to make all thousand of them. Yeah. My only data point could be at this point because so early that it did not it has not sold as well as Labyrinth did a year and a half ago. And I think it looks overall I think this game looks really good. But you know uh unfortunately going up $1,000 when everyone else is holding their price was not a was not the ideal play here. I think that this game looks better than Labyrinth as a game. I agree. I absolutely agree. But I also like the uh license more. So I have to check my bias and make sure less. I love Labyrinth as a license. I know you do. But but yeah, going up $1,000 is significant, too. Absolutely. I mean, it's just compare when the fact that Stern held pricing and JJP's already indicated they hope they will hold pricing and JJP coming out with a a mech equivalent version of Harry Potter less than this game that and and we have to remember we told we're not allowed to spend our money. I thought I thought 99999 right for arcade. I'm saying do we know that it is just as mechenriched as I thought it was said like I'm not saying like the lighting and stuff but I thought like it was going to like gameplay was going to be identical. No identical when comparing to Dune here. Oh no no no. I meant just the wizard version versus the arcade version of like like you're not it's not like a Stern Pro where you're giving up mechs. Mhm. No. I given what they've done here and if they've really been as aggressive to hold the pricing. I'm very curious now if Harry Potter looks stripped compared to Dune given where Dune is priced or is JJP relying on their economies of scale and they're able to do more with less money because they buy more parts. Yeah, all very very good. I guess we'll have to wait till phase three to see. That's right. All right, let's uh talk about King Kong myth of Terror Island. What is the myth? I don't know. I mean, Terror Island Skull Island is pretty scary is the myth that it's not scary at all. What is the myth? I mean, maybe. Or maybe that he never was on Terror Island and so that's the myth is he's on this is the wrong island. [ __ ] It's like Shudder Island. Leo's really That is a weird movie and that movie would be a terrible pinball machine. The Hulk is really expect to do it at some point. I love Shudder Island. It's a great It's a very good movie, but like the so is The Godfather and it's not it's not meant to be a pinball machine. It's just that was my reference. But anyway, King Kong Stern Pinball Cornerstone Pro Premium. Can Can I please say I I mentioned this on that flipping out stream that Joel invited me on, but I am so proud of Stern for not going back up to a thousand LE units. I'm very This was This was the right play. I'm very disappointed. Keep them hungering. I thought make their tummy tummies rumble. I think that Keith Elwin should be known as the 1,00 unit LA man. I just I this is so good for the whales because it'll better position even though it's just a little bit under a thousand. It will better position for value retention in their Ellie. I heard you compare yourself to a little beluga. Cute little beluga. I might at best I would like in my scenario. I was walking through an example, but I can't assume myself to be a blue whale. I'm not. You're a little beluga. I would not. I'm more like a little beluga whale with a squishy forehead. They're cute. I love those with the bulbous Yeah. foreheads. Yes. Then you can push them and they squish in. Squish almost dolphins. I love it. They Yeah. 932 units. Why 932? Because King Kong was either written or the film or whatever it was was 1932. So the idea of tying these into like uh things is I I find uh quaintly ridiculous. Yeah. That part is not cool. Quit. Just make make round numbers. Quit. I was teasing I was teasing Stern. I said, "This game sold so well that if anybody I was telling the salesperson, I said, "Can you ask Gary or Seth? Um, let's just go back. Let's do a thousand and send the extra 68 units to me and I'll buy them right now, please." Because this this has been selling as everybody thought it would be selling. It's selling. I saw someone on a social media, probably on a flipping out social media posting saying it doesn't really matter cuz in a couple of years they'll have the black and white version come out and it'll be more valuable than the LE anyway. Couple years. I was hoping by Q4. I mean, maybe Q4 next year. Uh, you know, they're going to have to. I mean, if they're partnering this thing up so closely with Godzilla like they are, I mean, the people who have the black and white Godzilla are going to want the black and white King Kong. No, it's a fair point. I don't especially after all of this uh I won't even say rightfully so because I'll argue against it. The criticism of the color palette being used on this game. You know, they're going to lean into that and be like, "Fine, here's your black and white with red blood all over his hands." No, they got to go [ __ ] purple. I hope they go black and white and purple. I would love Come on, Yeti. Let's do it. You got he's the new studio art director, Jeremy Packer (Zombie Yeti). Yeah, congratulations to it. Congrats. Absolutely. So, no price increase. I think that shocked a lot of people. Super smart and Stern knows what they're doing. Sometimes smart isn't always helpful though in business. They're like, "Oh god." Yeah, that that was I again, if it was Spike 3, I think we'd have seen it. But maybe Spike 3 is a myth. Maybe it's like dry land in Water World. Oh, King Kong, the myth of the new operating system of Spike 3. Yeah. So, the design was Keith Elwin, the golden child. The golden man. He ain't no child. He's a man. Do no wrong. Shoots great. Best game he's done ever. Unequivocally game programming. Rick Nagel is back. Rick Nagel mechanical engineering. Harrison Drake. The whole team is back. That's right. Art. Well, no. Well, now I can't say that cuz art Greg Freres, Kevin O' Conor, and new studio art, our director Zombie Yeti. What in the hell happened here? Uh, collaboration. Uh, yes. Well, kind of kind of kind of some got to go got to dig back into the into the prototype vault of Data East. Or was it Sega? I forget. It was Data East. I thought it was I people have been kind of poo pooing like nobody even knew that game, so why would they do a throw? It's like, well, because it's their company and this is kind of cool. I liked it. I like the move. Uh, it was it was clever that they're right that nobody really cares, but I mean, I thought they integrated it fine into the beautiful down there. Yeah, it's beautiful. The only thing I don't like on We'll jump into the art, but uh because there's a couple things I don't like, but yeah, I thought it looked looked really cool. Let's see here. Who else worked on this? So, yeah, they came in. I think Greg Fra and Kevin O'Connor were doing the playfield and all this stuff and then Jeremy Packer (Zombie Yeti) stepped in after the fact and was helping them complete it. So he focused more on cabinet artwork, back glass probably kind of thing, but he probably lent him lended himself to is it lint or lint? Uh the lint lent themselves. It's Easter time. I know. That's what I'm saying. I won't eat. I promise. Sound design Jerry Thompson. You know, uh, TPS, the Pinball Show announcer, Jerry Thompson. Yes. Yeah. Jerry does good work. It's pinball with personality. Custom speech by Brian Q Quinn from Impractical Jokers. This is the guy that got drunk. It's like there's no remember that. To me, when I saw it, I thought, uh, I mean, I'm great. I'm glad you got custom. Honestly, they could have just used a coder in at Stern at this point. I'm like I But you're not going to get someone from a from a get someone from one of the King Kong movies like get one from Peter Jackson's. Get Jack Black to do it or something. Even though it's not themed on the movie, Tis Beauty killed the beast. I don't know. Just I mean, was the Brian have anything to do with anything? I would argue against it if he didn't do a great job. Like people are loving the work that he did in the sound. Okay, great. This is a weird It's a weird like you you sell one game because of this. That's all that did. That's all that you did. I agree. And if he did a bad job, people would be like, "Why is this a selling feature at all?" Like, come on. This is This is Well, they probably knew it wasn't a bad job though, the moment they heard it. But all right, so you seen this game. First thoughts when you see this game because this was revealed when you actually seen it all. Yeah. Looks good. It looks so good. Looks [ __ ] awesome. It does. It does. I mean, it's I hate you know what I I mean, I don't because I don't I don't inherently want to be negative, but I'm kind of at the point where I it might be nice to see something like a quasi miss from Elwin just to prove he's doing. [ __ ] no. Just to prove he's human. Oh, I'll I'll still say that's Avengers. That's what Avengers is. It Avengers is definitely the worst one. Good lord. Do you dare put that on anything? No. The gamewise, mechwise, shotwise. Again, he keeps making the layouts look like he has certain tropes he likes to do. Um, full, you know, credit to him here. I think he finally resisted doing a 180 ramp. Thank you. Cuz yeah, just it's like one of my least favorite things like like Gomez does a pretty good 180 ramp. I actually haven't really loved Elwins. We hate him that we talked about that. It's because it's it lets them squeeze an extra shot in is why they keep doing it. But I'm glad they didn't do it. It kills the good feeling of any shot. I don't like it. But I mean the gong the gong of cop I mean it was in the teaser. It caught my eye. The sound effects tied in with that. The biplane the little magnet spider. I love the magnet spider. Why are people hating on the magnet spider? They they hate it. I thought it's cool. People were hating on that thing. I think it's they're like it doesn't fit. Absolutely. I like how it's on a little metal plate and so it's a the magnetism of the electromagnets actually what's making it jiggle, not a coil. I thought it was awesome. That's neat. That's one of the biggest features you're missing in the Pro. I love that thing. Yeah. No, and that's the thing. I mean, my Again, I don't I don't have major criticisms of what I see here. It's It's hard to with the gameplay already being seen. Yeah, it shoots well. Yeah, the stream is awesome. I can see where some inspiration from some games is, but it it's it's a unique layout as it always. There's a reason that most of us media just gush over Keith Elwin games. Like it's I assure you guys it's not because Keith Elwin's up out here chatting it up and buddy buddies media cuz he's cold when it comes. I don't talk with he he helped me out with uh when I had an issue with my Godzilla game and like that's been the extent of our correspondence. We are not friends. I I do not talk to him. I do not hang out with him. I do not ask him to come on for interviews. I don't do anything with him. That's what I'm saying. So, when it comes to There's a reason why we all gush because they really set But we're not surprising anyone. Like, I haven't honestly heard anyone go, "You're wrong. All of his games suck." Like, no one thinks. Even the haters are like, "Yeah, I'll buy it. This game is awesome." That there it is the shining light in this industry and has been for the last five plus years. Uh, and keep them. It's been so severe, Zach, that some say this is why we heard out of JJP just like demands that we not spend our money on anything. Absolutely. They had to know this game would be good. Yes, they it's an expectation. Even without their spies, they had to know. But maybe he does get into a situation where people have so high expectations. They did this with Zombie Yeti. Then after so many art packages, people started poo pooing just for the sake of poo pooing. Ah, the big difference there and it to be fair, I think it's harder for an artist. I I'll always sympathize that it could be harder for an artist. Yeah. Is is doing, you know, working in a in a particular medium. Elwin has been able to keep and the I actually maybe it's not even that true because uh as I think about other pinball design well it's dependent on the designer but a lot of designers have layout it's I mean Steve Ritchie is a case in point. I love me some Steve Ritchie layouts but they look a lot alike. Elwin has done a very good job making his layouts look different. zombie yetis pinball art packages have started to look very sy that's why I like the I mean yeah same color palettes the micro comic again he's varied it up too but you start to see like there's a certain style that again he's an artist he's got his style how many of them are how how many of them are you know prolific in multiple styles of artwork and same with and and I was just going to say Ellen isn't the only design like like Balser has that reputation too of being pretty dramatically different with a lot of his layouts, but most of the active designers have have design tropes that constantly repeat. And I would I still argue and I'll argue this for the years that I have is that for whatever you know criticism that people give Zombie, his work changed an industry. It it truly changed the way our expectations of what art should be. So that in and of itself is the only trophy in my opinion that he will ever need to justify why he sticks to his artwork because it may not be for everyone, but selfishly I'm so freaking happy that it sings to me. Like everybody's like, "Oh, this color, all this color." I'm even because of Zombie Yeti. I'm going to give credit to Greg Fra and Kevin O' Conor. Kevin O' Conor who I'm usually mixed with on art. Take it or leave it. I just don't don't click with their his art. Even Greg Freris, like for whatever it's worth, Alvara artwork on the Playfield, like almost too much 90s for me. Uh, but on this, I love this package. I I might like the Playfield package, Dennis, more than I do the cabinet art. How about that, Jeremy? I may. I just And who was it? See, that's that's interesting to me cuz I actually like the the translate and the cabinet packages quite a bit. I think the color works fine there. It's the playfield that looks over. That's what most people are saying right now. They're just they're cramping all over that playfield and I had uh whenever this game was uh Greg and I, Greg works with Flipping Out Pinball, so we were at the dealer seminar together and he text me as soon as we seen this. He goes, "Yeah, you're going to love this art package, don't you?" And I'm like, "Does that mean Greg didn't like it?" No, he was mixed on it. He doesn't He doesn't need this much color. He's more like you. Like I I just don't Well, I mean it's it's not the colors like I mean they got the like the jungle theme going on on the playfield. Like I get the idea busy stuff. There's a lot of it's busy. That's and well and my big thing is that um you my impression is Jeremy really likes to dial that saturation level all the way to the right. And Greg Freres he he uh he packs things in. I mean think about Elvire. Think about some of the art packages he has done you know over the last several decades. where whereas I'm going to bring up another artist though where you know Franchie doesn't do high to me like he doesn't lean on saturation heavily. Now I know some people don't like his style because it's more photorealistic but he will throw in he'll throw in colors that people would argue don't belong. I'm fine with I'm fine with color. I don't want to be and I'm definitely don't agree with Greg who poo pooed all over Deadpool's art package because it was too what does Greg want cuz he's like no this has got too many colors and then Deadpool was too much of one color. What does he want? I love this art pack. Like I just love all the color. Is this his best art package ever for pinball? I can't I can't put this I can't compare this with the other zombie. For a while there you were always saying the latest like whatever one was on the line was Jeremy's best art. compare it because this isn't all of Jeremy Packer (Zombie Yeti)'s stuff. So, I don't You can You can compare it. Say it's not fair because he didn't have 100% universal control over it. Yeah, I don't like the cabinet package as much as I do his other work. No, I don't. I like the Ellie artwork the best though because it does give me one of each side, which typically I don't like the lack of symmetry there. Um, but the back glass I just think that Ellie backlass tennis is a winner. I just I love uh the heroine in front. I love I just love the composition of of Kong in the background. I love the art deco styling that Ellie is just now where they fell short for my opinion is hey Stern Zack here. Are we going to WWE this powder coat [ __ ] Like I'm I know John Wick wasn't a a great seller, but can we be done with the black? I need something to fill my plate or my game room with color. And that's why I'm buying the LE. Give me something besides I'm tired of all this black. Black is the standard you use. You use a textured black for your non-le. So whatever you do, try to stay away from black so you differentiate your top package from all the others. I'm just so tired of black. But Zach, it makes sense here thematically because you do have the art deco and you have, you know, that's a tuxedo black. I I know. I get it, but I just don't want it. I want color. Sorry, that was my rant. But yeah, the the Ellie, but I like the I just love how busy and colorful the playfield is. I don't know. I just do. Which one? What package do you like? You like the jungle package or do you like the city package? Um, overall I do favor the city package. Okay. So, premium. I'd have been perfectly happy to mix it like the sides being the dinosaur getting its mouth ripped open on the pro, but then going with like the the premium for the translate. Yeah. So, yeah, for whatever people want to say about the art, I just hope that they keep doing this. Like, just don't, please, just don't listen to people. I don't even know what the right answer is, but don't listen to them. I want this. This is what I want. Layout and design, A+. I mean, [ __ ] We even saw the stream, which I'm always deathly afraid of. I'm like, why are you streaming live new products? Please don't do it. And sometimes it works out. This time it worked out very, very well. it actually. Yeah, we've seen a bump in sales after the stream and that's that's usually a not a rarity, but that doesn't happen all the time. Uh so layout and design, it looks it's like Dune to me. Like that's that's what I was teasing before we went into phase 2 trough jam because like this is what pinball people want. And Star Trek is one of the greatest shooting pinball machines ever, but I don't want anything else like it afterwards. I'm I'm good. I'm good. I know what that feels like. I know what it looks like. Third flipper, side ramp, uh ramps that go straight up and they come straight back safely. I get it. I want new stuff to shoot at. Otherwise, I don't give a [ __ ] about new games except if they have like a theme that just screams to me. This is the perfect example, listener, that new pinball. Like I'm almost going back on my whole themes because I won't because of course themes sell better than anything else. But I don't care about King Kong or Dune as a theme. I just don't care. But I'm more excited to play and own these than I am even the themes that I just love more than these because they have cool stuff that interacts with you and different layouts. Ultimately, I think that's what as a group most pinball people want. Yeah, it'll do great. Looking at the like the mechs, the Kong Kong thing is cool. King Kong in itself. Like what a cool toy. That's like Jurassic Park level of toy there. How he's interacting, stopping balls. He's Kong Kong smashing the freaking the subway car thing and balls are flying. That's you. That level right there. We need something to that degree in every game to be a hit. And they loaded down like the biplane. Like you said, they've got this little upper flipper, the sweepable drop targets. I feel almost like that was his uh What Stern game do I not like that everybody loves that I think is overrated? Uh Batman quick. Quicksilver. Oh, Stern with the where they he Yeah. Quicksilver. Everybody's like, "Oh, that game's great." No, it's not. Sucks. The that that sweepable bank is way too close to the flipper and it feels clunky. But they feels like that ode to that. in the river. Dennis, the log that lifts up in the river, it comes down to the and he did like this little fathom like thing where the middle in lane is really the outline and the outline sweeps to the inlane thing. I'm usually kind of mixed on that though, but we'll see how it plays out here. Spider. Oh my god, my favorite thing on the whole thing. This sounds weird and I hope it feels good. I love the little kickback thing where you hit it the right orb and it swings around and hits that little got lead thing and it kicks it and it flips it right back to you and it feeds that upper flipper. Oh, baby. And you can do the little pass. You can do the little the ball passes from the upper flippers. You can hit the ramp and it feeds to the upper left flipper and then you go back and it feeds to the upper right flipper and you go back and forth and you play a little patty cake with yourself. Dennis rules and codes going to be [ __ ] awesome. We don't know enough about it yet. So, somebody said it this uh from day one though that does have quite a bit in it already. Uh animation, people are kind of down on this. What do you think about the animation? We got no footage. I actually liked it. I liked the cartoon approach they're taking though. I do too. Um but again, I think maybe that's cuz I don't love the theme and so you might as well make it original. Like I don't I don't care to see anything from the original movie. Uh, I think I have no I have no connection to the original movie and I don't care to. But I didn't have any connection with the Godzilla stuff, but it was a welcomed they were welcome assets for me because they were kind of campy and fun where I think I am kind of missing that here. I just don't think there's enough with King Kong. There's just Godzilla just became a thing like with King Kong like what are we going to do? Are we going to do the original movie only? Are we going to do the original movie and then all the other various movies that happened like in the 80s are like all disconnected and it doesn't there's not a unified theme to it. I other than that it's the same, you know, ape. I Yeah. No, I think this is fine. I think this was more like what they did with Deadpool. Um, obviously they've tried to make it not just be looking like a video game here. No, I thought I I need to see more of it to see how janky it might possibly be, but from what I've seen so far, I thought no, I think this works fine. Back up to really quick to just because people are everybody's giving the same [ __ ] out right now in the media, but Well, there's nothing to say. People Yeah. No, but people come to you and I for the true analysis. Yeah, they do. And our expertise [ __ ] We can be humble all we want, but that's why we get the listens. So, I'm going to ask you this. Is this technically his best layout? Where does it fall? Does it fall his best, middle of the pack, his worst? Gosh. And I haven't played I don't feel that's it's fair at all for me to say. I'll say I mean I I don't think from a technical standpoint this will be able to to shoot as well as Godzilla or maybe even Avengers. Okay. I I think that shoots better than Avengers, but I also think Avengers is his worst layout. Oh my. Avengers was oh so good. No, the banana ramp alone was annoying. the um No, I would say I think Jurassic Park was his worst layout. Really? Jurassic Park I would put as maybe his third best. Okay, we have very different tastes. Yeah, I just that 180 ramp doesn't I was going to put this at about Jurassic Park's I I think this is maybe his third or fourth best layout, but it's not as good as Jaws and it's not as good as Godzilla. I think this is better than this ends up being a better layout than Jaw. I wasn't high on Jaw's layout really. I thought I think once I I wasn't sure at first, but as I've now been able to play it more, just the way the various feeds into the that whole left side. Um, again, my least favorite part about Jaws is that 180 ramp and Godzilla's 180 ramp for the left ramp shop pisses me off, too. But for me, Jaws was that 180 ramp. I think he did have a significant compromise in his design because of a mech feature that that shark fin. say what you want how fun it is, but I think it really compromised the geometry of that game and the and the shot layout of it for better or worse. And then I think the little flipper shooting to drop targets or back up I I that's just not A+ stuff to me. Okay. Where I'm not seeing I'm not seeing any egregious layout geometry stuff here. I think this looks like maybe his most fun layout. I don't know. This has so many linking combo flowy shots that Yeah, but that's just a again we got that for years with fan layouts that you can pass between the two upper flippers is like no different than passing between two lower flippers. Like it doesn't mean anything to me to say anything. Doesn't mean anything to me inherently. I'm not saying it's not fun. I'm just saying like this actually looks like the least mechanically interesting game he's had. That's two Iron Maiden witches. What? See, I think this is like his most Nope. the the little the the subway ball block lock thing is inherently like we've seen tons of people do mechs like that. The monkey blocking the the the ball isn't as interesting as the fling eat the ball from from uh Jur Jurassic Park. The little kickback thing doesn't match the fascinating game state change and aesthetic integration of the Godzilla building. Again, I'm I'm comparing premium LE versions to premium. What he's done here is he this is mechanically more interesting than Jaws but yeah but it does so to a point that still pushes flow which I think is very difficult to do he hasn't had a single game that didn't push flow saying it's like maybe the James Bond 25th I I can't comment on that one but yeah it's more classic flow but it's still Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Well given the No game like he's not unless he wants to stop the ball his all of his games are are flow games. I they're not fan layouts but they're flow games. I Yeah. Is this flowier than the others? Maybe. But but mechanically, it's I It's less interesting to me. Like maybe it's cuz he's got multiple me like cool bouncy spider, cool uh subway ballock, cool uh ape block path or but compared to just like a a a huge centerpiece thing like the the building drop on on Godzilla. And again, that that captive ball with the magnet slinging around on Godzilla was so innovative. Everything here I've seen before. I've never seen an ape hit over a subway car that's locking balls. Let's not I'm I'm either I'm using a little hyperbole or being way too nuanced. It's like we've seen plenty of things where something like we just saw X-Men where they had the Sentinel hands block shots and stuff like that's cool, too. Yeah, but I saw it first. So, this one is interests me less inherently. Oh, okay. All right. Like, I've seen it already. I see your argument. I do. I do. Don't get Don't get me wrong. I'm I'm trying to nitpick here because the game looks great. I mean, what do you want me to say? That's right. What do you want me to What do you want me to do? Like, do I think I'm going to do I think I'm going to hate this game? No. Do I think I'm going to really enjoy this game? Yes. I I mean, I don't know what to tell you. At some point in your being in pinball, you'll own this game as will everybody else in pinball. Like, this is another one of those He's done it. This never sells as much as Godzilla though. No, no way. Again, time kind of thing. But I Godzilla Yeah, Godzilla is of its time. And there were things that worked in Godzilla's favor that are completely unfair. But even if this game is better than Godzilla will not outsell Godzilla. I think this game could sell more than Jaws. And I I don't know how, but I think it could. I I'm going to I'm going to say no. I'm going to say you're wrong, but it has a better shot than out selling Godzilla. The difference where I have to hedge is Jaws is such a better theme than this and you know games true and and I think you may be more down on Jaws than than where would you rate Jaws in his pantheon of don't have enough time but I okay I actually ended up liking it way more than I thought I would. People like it some people like it more than Godzilla. The rules too. the rule. I would even I would argue I enjoy the rules of Jaws better than I do Godzilla. That's such a bull. I just don't have enough time to because I have so much time on Godzilla. It's so hard. What helps this layout to me? It's it's Well, it's the layout, but it's it's the damn toy. That identifiable toy is like funhouseesque. It's like it's Jurassic Park. It's just so So, what's your favorite toy on this? Yeah. I It has to be the Kong. I No, it's the gong. No, I don't get You went gong when everyone else went gong. I don't know why people are going gong. Like, I hate to hate on that. Gongs are cool because the best thing people remember about AC/DC is the satisfaction of hearing the sound when you hit the bell. That is not close to a bell. You know what that reminds me of? It reminds me of the It is. It reminds me of the Mandalorian razor crest. dangler. Like I'm like, "Oh, don't don't make me think of that again." No, I don't. That doesn't I like five other toys more than I do the gong. Look, I'm here to say I'm kind of a gong hater. I don't get it. Maybe maybe the coils will surprise me, but I Yeah, give me the little godly kickback over that all day. Give me the log over that all day. You know, and don't don't get it. Give me the plane over that. It's the ape. The ape anytime. Anytime you can have a mech that has a personality and it like it characterizes the entirety of the product itself, that machine, him moving around, tapping the glass with his hands, catching a bowl. No, that that will go down more so than anything in that Joel's game ever could as identifiable. more so than even Godzilla. I would say that building because it is a personification of like I don't know that's just that's what T-Rex did. That's just what it all does. If it was small is not as interesting to me as Mecha Godzilla tummy grab. That Mecha Godzilla tummy grab is dumb. Like that doesn't do anything. You take that back. That just doesn't do anything. It's the Kong's got character. It's awesome. He sucks the ball up into his tummy. It's like the satellite from Golden Knife. You take that back. All right. Audio and sound people. This has been a highlight for people. I haven't listened enough to know, but people universally have said like Jerry Thompson's work here is pretty superb. And that's that's a nice compliment, especially initial sound stuff for games. Sometimes there's not enough code in it and gets poo pooed. So yeah, I think if it sounds good now to people's liking, then that's going to be in a good place. Gameplay stream worked well. pricing. They did not increase pricing. So, we're still $129.99 for LE's. $96.99 premiums and $69.99 pros. I think we do see an increase when they do Spike 3. I was surprised this wasn't a Spike 3 though. I don't think anything on the when they're going to release the Spike system stuff. Yeah, there's no rhyme or reason it feels to it. The production they are pretty much shipping this week. They plan on starting to ship out the LE. So, they are going out. That was a lot of talk, Dennis. I'm very tired. You know what's great is that everybody always talks about the battles of these games, like which one's going to hail supreme. And I know I said it months ago when I said, "Just wait, you guys. There's some stuff coming that it's going to be hard to pick between because they're all so well done." And I think these two exemplify exactly what I was teasing, uh, is that you're not going to go wrong with either. And what we've seen a lot of people sales-wise purchase both. And we've heard it in our Discord. People are going to buy every game that comes out this year. There's no reason to not. If they're that good, people will find a way to do it. That's hence why I'm getting a ton of trades uh for these games. Just a ton of trades. This is what pinball people want. So, please manufacturers continue with this because in the market that we're in and the times that we're in right now, as we talked about on episode 173, you you don't have a window of missing. You you It will crush you. It will crush you. You know what would crush a big ape like King Kong? A screaming goat. No, it would. I think a goat would uh We need a goat on this game somewhere. I want to I don't think so. We got to say thank you to Rodney. He's one of our big goats. Big goat. Rodney, I finally I finally watched the video of the bobcat attack. Oh, thank you. How great was that? The visual is just as good as the audio. That bobcat was rabid. And that guy's just freaking out. Yeah, his wife had like over 20 puncture rooms. Get in the house. Get in the house. Oh, shoot that [ __ ] He was just Billy badass. And there but the but the but the preceding part is he was like super mildmannered until it it hit his wife. How's it going? Have a great day. That's a bobcat attack my wife. Oh, shoot that [ __ ] Man, I'm going to have to watch that again. But thanks, Rodney. Steve, thank you. Bumble way a tuna. I want to see an ace Ventura. I just I so want It's a little dated. Maybe barrels will do that. Do that instead of Goonies. Yeah, I know. Everybody thinks they got Goonies. Do not go in there. Bumblebee tuna. I just want so bad. H Ventura. That's still my avatar on pin side. I still I still I still sometimes will just say Dan Marino should die of gorrhea and rotten hell and people are like why do you hate Dan Marino but that's not the point never mind about hating Dan I don't think anything of Dan oh man well I have kissed a man I just I love that movie both of them both of them oh even though the second one's just objectively worse than the first but just except for the rhino birthing scene that's making a comeback back is making a comeback. Uh the Panther, thank you so much, Rob, for the continued love and support. And I won't say to what Rob has purchased, but as a buddy of Rob's, I know to say congratulations on the new edition. He's got a new game coming his way. What do you think he purchased? And maybe it might not even be one of these new games, but if it was, which one did you think he went with? I would say King Kong. Okay. Interesting. Rob, you'll have to reach out. Let him know if it was in fact King Kong. Maybe it was both. What do you think the odds are that each of these guys Rodney, what do you think the odds are that Rodney went with both Dune and King Kong? Um, you think yes or no? Not Not Rodney. Maybe one. I don't think he do, too. What about Jabs? Neither. Okay. What about Rob? I think the B holds. Rob one. One. Okay. Falcon. My boy Frankie. God, I love Frank. What do you think, Frank? Frank with one. I think one of them. I want all of these guys to reach out and let us know because it's not like they're necessarily buying from flipping out. So, we don't know until they let us know. But, uh, we don't know. If not, then why? Uh, Joe, both. Both. [Music] Hear that? Fox, thank you Fox and Frank for the support. Thank you, Charlie, for the support. Uh, did uh either one of these uh dingle his bell? Uh, I'm going to say no. I think Charlie's going to wait a little bit, but that doesn't mean he's not going to come back and buy one. Wink wink, Charlie. What about William the dude? No, man. Come on. Who are you going to believe? Those guys are We dropped off the damn money. William probably bought all SKs of four. William got a big whale dick. We know. Like William It's like why not get the Pro Premium and Ellie of King Kong and Dune. So he is picky though. He I do know he is he is picky, but he does like new stuff. Yeah, he does like new stuff. He's not afraid to try. He can get rid of He can get rid of a game when he gets tired of it. So I I mean What about this four? I'm saying four. Sweet rooster. I'm going to rock out with my [ __ ] out. Josh. Um one. I think he gets one of these. Cockadoodle doo. And we know that John or Aqua Velva or sweet succulent scent of nastiness. There's something about an Aqua Velva man. You shouldn't. He I think he operates games, too. So, he's got to go Kong here, I would think. Yeah, I think one there. Oh, speaking of operators right now get preferential treatment on Dune releases, too. So, if any of you operators want one of the first in the country, yeah, I never get the first of anything anymore. Jump on that. I didn't even talk about the art thing I don't like on King Kong, which is I think it's totally Greg Fra. It feels like him at the bottom between the flippers. The little hands holding on the little Oh, like the they're holding the spears with the shield. I hate that. We didn't even talk about center post that has no need to even be there. Sorry, Keith. He doesn't like his games to play too hard. The first center post and I'm like, it's because you don't need one. I don't whatever. I won't care. It's Keith Owen. So, thank you all Screaming Goat Club members. Discord, we're talking about all the goodies and who's bought what and all of that. uh and what people think about what and oh the next uh happy hour hangout April 23rd this week is that this oh that is Wednesday yeah this Wednesday this Wednesday 8 to 9:00 p.m. Central Patreon folks have at the that are the Dennis Nordman level or above have a link uh on the Patreon to it. I think we might see some new faces in there, too. We might. We had a lot of new members. I didn't pay attention to what tiers they all picked, but guess I'll find out. This episode just would not be complete without the phase three cherry on the top of pinball market trends. Dennis Cel can't attack no more. I like your style, dude. Non-tariff edition. Oh, isn't that nice? I have to piss you off in this episode. I don't think I could I don't think I could sit through another one. Turning up this week is the pinball market trends tariff edition. What? People loved it and they hated it, but they they loved it. They loved the numbers don't lie, Dennis. I only report the facts. and anymore. Just that line in and of itself is trending up in this industry as media cannot help but to just look they take the uh the masterpiece that is the pinball show and they regurgitate it in any and every which way they can. It's the flattery thing, right? I im imitation the flattery. I mean, I guess when I was on the the flipping out stream with Joel and Tom and Jared, I I saw in the chat a lot of people kept bringing up or at least one person kept bringing up tariffs, which I refuse to address. I did too. You got a lot of bye-bye buys. You got a lot. I mean, it's time for us to level up, Dennis. That's I guess that's what I'm saying. But no, trending up this week has got to be the PMT tariff edition. We got a lot of messages. A lot of the the numbers were high on that episode. Uh, and it was very entertaining. For those of you who want a good good giggle uh or rage moment, go back and listen to it. It's good stuff. Also streaming up this week, coincidentally enough, pinball sales. How could they not be, right? Mhm. For everybody that wanted to say nobody's buying a damn thing, boy oh boy, this last couple of weeks, pinball sales are up. Dare I say, could this be listener the largest week of pinball sales for all of 2025? It's tough to say. I'm sure it's the largest sale so far. But we're not in phase three yet. I know what's coming in phase three. Oh, I don't know. A wizard. Oh my god, my wand is hard. I just can't wait. I can't wait to talk on Patreon about this whole thing. There's so much going on behind the scenes. All training up this week are tradeins. Wow. Just as I had predicted and everybody threw tomatoes at me last week. I said, "Look, a lot of us hobbies have reserves. We We've got a lot of games." So, push comes to shove. We're still going to want the good noob Keith Owen. We're still going to want the world under glass that is doomed with the most atmospheric experience I'm hearing uh in quite some time. We'll just find a way to move around things so that we can get them. And how people are doing that are by tradeins. So many dealers across the country that are that do tradeins have spent countless hours mocking up and crunching some numbers for what they can trade in for the newest King Kong or Dune or it. Look, I told somebody this recent week. They said, "I want to trade in this and this towards a Harry Potter." And I said, "The game hadn't even come out yet." And they said, "Well, but I know I'm going to want one." And I said, "Well, I would just wait. Just wait. You when it's released, you might not want it. And if you trade me in your games now, I can't really give them back to you. I mean, they're already going to be mine. They're going to be gone. They're going to be resold." And he just pushed. I just want it. And I said, "All right, as long as you know that this is a form of non-refundable, it's I can't get back a game that I resell." So, people are trading in in a frantic effort. But that guy's getting himself a Harry Potter, that's for damn sure. And I'm getting myself a What? Oh, I got it here. What am I getting? A a fun house. Getting a fun house. So, yeah, tradeins are man, they're hot right now. A lot of people trading in games. also training up this week. I'm going to give him credit, Dennis. I'm going to tip our veteran caps to the pinball media. Yep. Training up is pinball media because in pinball media now in 2025, it's quantity over. No, I'm not I'm not saying that. I'm not. I'm just saying that what I love is when I'm working, there's so much I can consume. Now, these media events are really priming us listeners and consumers of their media content. And I've always got something. I love it. It doesn't get better. Used to people are like, "Well, just by default, I might not like Canada, but there's a lot to listen to." Now he's got competition because all of these media events, people are podcasting weekly. They're podcasting sometimes multiple times a week. They're putting videos out there. They got their yan cams out there. Some of them have an actual professional tripod and some lighting. I respect to those people that uh put in a little editing work. So there's just between the Carrie Hardies of the world, the Triple Drains of the worlds, the Don Pinball podcasts of the world, even the streamers of the world, people still streaming pinball. There's so many people out there creating content. Um, and some of it I don't like, but guess what? I'm so addicted to pinball, I consume it anyway. So I have to give everybody in the pinball media our our brethren and sisterin is it sisterin sistern is a word but that's like a no sistern something else is that like a it's like a a waterway or something I don't know but all of our brothers and sisters out there that are creating content I love you please keep it up because Stern is even finally getting that they're understanding that a way to expand the pinball hobby is not just by making people drink beer. here at dirty old bars. That helps, but it's also in the community and the media that we have built, which is why we built TPN in the first place. We're always ahead of our time, aren't we, Dennis? You don't know. Stern's finally getting that. That's why they're doing these media events because this kind of stuff matters. Pinball media does matter. It does influence because otherwise people don't know what they're buying. They got to find it. They got to go out there and drive. And no, we bring that action, pinball action right to you. Hot pinball action. So, thank you to all of you pinball media creators cuz you're doing a you're doing a lot of job and I think that's fantastic. And some of you are doing exceptional work. Who did I disagree with this last week? It was my friend. Who was it? [ __ ] [ __ ] [ __ ] Hold up. Hold up. I'll give him a shout out. Triple. No, it wasn't Triple Drain. It was um Silver Chronicles. No, it was Ralph. It was Ralph and Ralph, Kale, and Jamie. So, they were doing What one was it? Cuz I saw the live stream with Ralph. Oh, he puts in some quality work. Some [ __ ] wonderful stuff. Shout out to Retro Ralph. But it was Burchil Jamie. Um, the new Oh, it was Wormhole, but now it's uh TB. Jamie, I'm [ __ ] up your name. TB. It's Jamie. JBS. The JBS pinball show. New pinball show, but old pinball show because it's still a carrier from Wenhole. They did a podcast and Kale, one of the people I love more than anybody in this whole hobby and industry, just love Kale Hernandez with Electric Bat Twiby award-winning Electric B. But I disagreed with him to a level that I have not disagreed with anybody in quite some time. Oh, totally. He totally botched it, Dennis. and everybody right now it's like the argument to make is he's like it's like when you when you argue against a Greg or a Dennis Creel the community loves these people so much that just by default they're going to disagree with me no matter what. So, you had some people support you on the tariff thing publicly. I saw like Where were those messages? Those me saw like three. I mean, it wasn't it was those messages come loud, but they're behind the scenes. They don't want to put that out there public. I saw one come behind. Oh, Kale, you were so wrong. I'll still trend you up, but man, you were wrong. He did this whole assessment with Harry Potter where it was almost as if he was finding out what the theme was for the first time ever. He was just so off base like, "What's this Harry Potter? Oh, yeah. I don't think this is a big theme at all. Uh, not even only for pinball, but at all. Like, nobody's going to care about Harry Potter. I haven't heard anybody talking about Harry Potter. And I was like, Kale, you're high. Like, I don't know what you're talking I know he doesn't like Jersey Jack pinball games as much. So, maybe there was a bias there, but it was to a degree that I was almost going to like pull off the road and call him be like, "Dude, what are you talking about?" But he does wonderful, terrific work. I need to go down to electric bat. Kale and Rachel, will you guys have me? Do you think they would? Not now. No. Just because he's wrong doesn't mean that I don't love him. I love you and you're wrong, old. What do you mean? That is a dentist statement. That's what you would say to me. No, you don't use words like love. No deal of the week this week. What? What? Don't you have a fun house to sell? Get yourself a fun house. Uh, look people, as always, I'm just here to report the facts because numbers don't lie, neither do my opinions on pinball markets. Dennis, where can people catch you? They can always email me eclectic Gamers Podcast@gmail.com. You can email us at the pinballshow@gmail.com. Make sure to sign up to patreon.com/thepinballshow. You guys loved last episode's dedicated Patreon exclusive club member episode. You're going to love this one. Maybe even more. I'll try to do what I can not to get myself in trouble, though. That's all I can promise. Very few of the dros, I think, are in our Patreon. So, Oh, you would be surprised just with this. Except now, now that they now that they've heard me, they're all going to subscribe. So, you know how many manufacturers message me even more so even this week than most of, oh, the dealers are pissed at you now. You got so many pissed off dealers. And it's nothing that I do directly. So these manufacturers, you go back and tell them like, "But you're mad at him because he's more creative and working harder." Like guys can't [ __ ] to us about that. Like we're good when our destro are working really hard. But yeah, I make them mad. Is what it is. There's a few of them out there that I love. Where was I going with that? You were going to say that it was time for your sponsorship plug. Oh yeah. Well, where uh But first, SDTM uh a video series we do on YouTube. Myself and Greg Bone. We did a Dune Pinball first impressions. Yeah, I haven't watched it, but I do like your thumbnail with his blue eyes. You know, I spent more time on that thumbnail than most people spend editing an entire podcast. That just shows my lack of sleep when it comes to editing. Oh, and so sad that like I'm not very efficient. I just there's a standard I like to set. But thank you for the because nobody usually cares about thumbnails, but that makes it all worthwhile. But yeah, you got to go check it out. I do think you in particular would like the first impressions cuz we do dive down deep into what we know about the Dune game and yeah we know a lot about that game so go check that out. Uh but yeah of course the sponsor of this show the pinball show is none other than flip in out pinball. When I buy my pinball I flip it out to figure it out. When I think of ball, I be flipping out. Zipping out. When I buy by I buy from flipping out my product showcase this week has got to be Dune and King Kong. They don't even need to fight amongst themselves. Bye bye bye. I think the holy matrimony of Kong hugging that big old worm uh and the worms wearing a veil. I don't know why. Just wearing like a bridal veil. Man, what a what a honeymoon that would be. Can you picture that? Think of the porn between those two. Buy, purchase, go play Dune and King Kong. That's the product showcase of flipping out pinball. Uh we can King Kong right now. I can get you if you're location first run pro. Maybe even a first run pro for non-loations, but certainly a first run premium. We can get you that. So, and if you want to trade in a game, we'll do that. Harry Potter pre-order because they're open. If you want to order one, you can order one right now. The easiest way. So, we had the domain harry potpinball.com. We have now since kind of funneled all of that through flippingoutpinball.com. So, you can go to flippingoutpinball.com. We're opening up the the website for pre-orders. And again, it's in there. It says, "Look, we don't want your money, per se, but since other dealers are taking money, and then you can't, Dennis, you can't convince a lot of customers that if I'm not taking money and somebody else is taking money, then they'll get in the line a cube quicker if they give money to somebody. It doesn't matter what I say. Some people just don't believe me." So, if you find yourself in that belief set, give me your money. I will take it. It is non-refundable just like it is everywhere else. But uh if you have to give me your money, it's not going to change your place in line, but if you want to give me money, it's open to it. All those details are in flipping ppinball.com. Uh for those of you who did pre-order already with us, and there are a lot of you, big super congratulations. You've got one not only in Q, but secured guaranteed model of your choice. So whenever that does come out, we'll be sending out information here shortly, too. uh to just reemphasize that you don't have to give us money. Uh but you do have a spot in line. You're not going anywhere. And as one of the largest dealers for Jersey Jack Pinball, I think you're going to be happy uh with your order and your support through Flipping Out Pinball pre-owned games right now. I've got a lot coming in. I'm about to I got a Lord of the Rings in Dennis that is so nice that I might replace the one I've got in my own collection. So regardless like a minty guy called it's in a basement. It's his only pinball machine. He bought it brand new back when it was released. So one of those things like oh [ __ ] so new that he didn't even know the magnet didn't work and the fuse looked so old and it was burned out and I just replaced it and it was just a fuse. Like that's how old that thing is. But it it's oh it's mint minty. But he did replace the flippers. So he was no he was not a noob. Now he did replace it to the high flippers rather than the medium ones that hobbyists now kind of flock to for Lord of the Rings. But regardless, there's going to be a Lord of the Rings up for sale here soon. Jaws Premium. I didn't get as many as I ordered, but I still have like one or two left. So nab those up. Free shipping. Dungeons and Dragons, Metallica, Uncanny X-Men's Avatars, Elton John's. You name it, we've got it over at Flipping Out Pinball. A lot of games are vaulted. So, make sure you get a rush before they go away forever. I did finally sell my GTF, so I think it's time for me to open up a signature for myself. GTF signature. You got screwed. Lost a lot of money. All right. Well, phase five included Cuphead. [Laughter] People are trading in Cuphead before it's even released. It's really weird. I'm telling you, people got it all backwards. All right. toppers, expression lighting kits, shaker motors, we've got it. Flipping out pinball media channel over at YouTube. Joel streams for us. He did a a chat stream breaking down all the first impressions from Dennis Creel. Tom Graph was on there. Thank you, Tom. Jared was on there from uh Joel's brother. So, that was a lot of fun. And yeah, I you guys entertained me. Thoroughly entertained me. I don't know what he's streaming this week. I think we may do Metallica cuz I don't think King Kong's going to be here yet. So maybe a Metallica to show off all that new code and stuff. Maybe Lord of the Rings or Funhouse. I don't know. Dennis teaches people something. It's easy. That's pretty simple. I'm just going to tell them do not be wrong when you look at King Kong. The best toy involved has to be the gong. And always practice safe pinball. And I love you even if you're wrong.