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Episode 168 - Check Back Soon

Eclectic Gamers Podcast·podcast_episode·1h 5m·analyzed·May 29, 2022
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claude-haiku-4-5-20251001 · $0.036

TL;DR

Eclectic Gamers covers pinball manufacturer updates and speculates on Turner Logic's Deep Root revival plans.

Summary

Eclectic Gamers podcast discusses recent video game experiences (Hardspace Shipbreaker, Celeste), then pivots to pinball news including Dutch Pinball stabilized Big Lebowski production, Multimorphic's Weird Al game updates with 2,500+ callouts, and significant speculation about Turner Logic's acquisition of Deep Root Pinball assets potentially leading to a Raza release. The hosts debate whether people will buy Raza despite poor prototype reception and discuss potential contract manufacturing partnerships.

Key Claims

  • Dutch Pinball has stabilized production and is shipping Big Lebowski games to early adopters at a steady clip

    high confidence · Dennis mentions factory tours and new cabinets with photos, with Tony noting continued shipments to early adopters

  • Multimorphic has 2,500+ Weird Al callouts in the game with mini wizard mode

    high confidence · Dennis cites Nap Arcade show notes covering code updates including mini wizard mode and UHF multiball improvements

  • Multimorphic is about two weeks behind on shipping schedule due to employment issues, not capacity

    high confidence · Dennis reports stockpiled parts but insufficient assembly staff, with company actively hiring

  • Turner Logic appears to have acquired Deep Root Pinball assets including potential Raza prototypes and intellectual property

    medium confidence · Dennis notes Turner Logic won auction bids, with website showing 'check back soon' message; speculation about software control and IP ownership

  • Turner Logic may possess Deep Root's software because Deep Root didn't pay them, making software Turner's property

    medium confidence · Dennis reports from Pinside thread that software was withheld by Turner Logic until payment; speculates Turner now owns it

  • George Gomez is working on James Bond pinball at Stern, discarding Steve Ritchie's previous whitewood design

    low confidence · Rumor Corner segment; Dennis states Ritchie completed whitewood before leaving for JJP, Gomez started over with new design

  • Legends of Valhalla (American Pinball) is not selling well, making standard edition run unlikely

    medium confidence · Dennis reports speculation from unattributed sources that deluxe edition struggles suggest standard won't launch

  • Joe Balser worked on Spinal Tap for Home Pin but left within a year

    high confidence · Dennis states as established fact during discussion of available designers

Notable Quotes

  • “This is pinball. They trust anybody. This is pinball. They don't care. You can punch them in the face and then tell them you're going to make a new pinball game. Steal their wallet and their wife. and they will still love you and buy pinball from you.”

    Dennis @ mid-show — Describes community tolerance for manufacturer failures, predicting people will buy Turner Logic/Deep Root products regardless of history

  • “I think that pinball people have this weird – to me, it's weird. Almost – they put designers on a pedestal in a way that I think is unreal.”

    Tony @ end segment — Critiques community's idealization of legendary designers like Borg and Ritchie

  • “Deep Root Pinball's website. It's up. There's a message there now. It's like, got a Deep Root logo, and then I saw a screenshot of this on Pinside, and someone on the page just lists a code. It's hex code. And someone on Pennside went in and translated the hex code, and the hex code says, check back soon for something interesting.”

    Dennis @ Deep Root segment — Key evidence of Turner Logic's Deep Root revival; vague teaser triggers speculation

  • “I still think they have quite a ways to go to catch up all the EAs, but hey, they could always do a game number two and start selling those, and then for every four game number twos, they send a big Lebowski on.”

    Tony @ Dutch Pinball discussion — Satirical comment on Dutch Pinball's slow fulfillment pace despite claimed progress

  • “Raza is kind of a turd. A lot of people who played the prototypes did not have highly favorable things to say about it.”

    Dennis @ Raza discussion — Acknowledges poor reception of Raza prototype, raising questions about market viability

  • “If the line's slow or they've got that spare line, which I think you're right. I think they indicated they had a line to do smaller runs.”

    Dennis @ American Pinball contract discussion — Identifies American Pinball as potential contract manufacturer for Turner Logic's Raza

Entities

Dutch PinballcompanyMultimorphiccompanyTurner LogiccompanyDeep Root PinballcompanyAmerican PinballcompanySpooky PinballcompanyStern Pinballcompany

Signals

  • ?

    business_signal: Secondary market pricing for Halloween and Ultraman declining below new prices, indicating market saturation and reduced desirability unusual for recent Spooky releases

    medium · Dennis: 'Halloweens and Ultraman's are selling for less use than they go for now' and 'that it's true when it's not happening for other games right now tells you how unpopular it is'

  • ?

    business_signal: Turner Logic's acquisition of Deep Root assets suggests potential revenue streams including software control, IP ownership, and life insurance policy holdings from bankruptcy liquidation

    medium · Dennis discusses Turner Logic winning auction bids, controlling software due to unpaid fees, and acquiring life insurance policies 'pennies on the dollar'

  • ?

    business_signal: American Pinball's Legends of Valhalla struggling to sell deluxe editions, making standard edition run unlikely; may have production capacity available for contract work

    medium · Dennis: 'Legends of Valhalla is not selling well... unlikely that Legends of Valhalla will end up having a standard edition run because they're struggling to sell the deluxes'

  • ?

    business_signal: Dutch Pinball appears to have stabilized production with factory tours ongoing and steady shipments to early adopters, suggesting recovery from multi-year delays

    high · Dennis: 'sounds like they're continuing at a pretty steady clip now to build big Lebowski's for new buyers' and reports of factory tours

  • ?

    community_signal: Nap Arcade established as primary source for pinball industry news and manufacturer coverage, eclipsing dedicated pinball podcasts like Pinball Market Trends in popularity

Transcript

groq_whisper · $0.198

0:00
Welcome to the Collective Gamers Podcast. Today is Sunday, May 29th. This is episode 168, and I am Tony. I'm Dennis. And, oh gosh, we have a number of things. We do. We can skip most of them if we want. We can just sit down and talk about movies, TV, hopes, dreams. I haven't seen anything recently other than The Doctor Strange. That's the only thing I've seen. And I've seen the Obi-Wan show, but you haven't seen it yet. I haven't seen it yet. I was watching Stranger Things. And I don't watch Stranger Things, so we really have nothing to talk about. So I guess we'll talk about pinball and video games. Well, what have you been playing lately? Actually, Hardspace Shipbreaker, which I've spoken about multiple times, has come out of early access. it is now at a 1.0 release they added a bunch of stuff for the final release I haven't actually played it since last year late last year because they announced they were on their final push to full release where they started adding the story the actual story events because before that when I was playing early access it was just the basic mechanics of the game so I stopped playing because I didn't want to play it again until the whole story and all of that stuff was added in. And now that that's all in, I've been replaying that pretty much all week. And I still have been playing Nova Drift off and on. That's that roguelike little shooter game that I've been enjoying. Other than that, I am deep into my – okay, deep's a lie. I have begun a complete re-go-through of the Tom Clancy Jack Ryan series of books. How many are those? How many books are there in that series? I don't know where it ended up before he died. I know they're still technically going on under another author. Kevin J. Anderson. It's not Kevin J. Anderson.
2:17
I'll never forgive Kevin J. Anderson for what he did to Dune. Yeah. No, that was rough. That was rough. But yeah, no, I'm on Patriot Games. I'm not doing them in. If I was reading them all in chronological order, I would have done Without Remorse first because it's set during Vietnam. And then Red Rabbit. And then Patriot Games. And then Hunt for Red October. I'm actually reading them in release order. So I did Hunt for Red October 1st. Now I'm on Patriot Games, and I'll follow that up with Cardinal of the Kremlin. And that's all I've put together so far. So it's been – it's fun. I haven't read them since early 2000s. I haven't read a Clancy book except for Red Storm Rising since Clancy died. And I haven't read the Jack Ryan series since long before that. so I remember the last couple ones I'd read was Rainbow Six and Without Remorse and I've re-read Red Storm Rising several times which is its own whole standalone thing but I haven't re-read any of the Jack Ryan series I'm in the middle of Patriot Games and I don't remember 90% of it because I haven't read Patriot Games since like the 90s hmm okay well that's quite a project yeah I have no project. I was playing a video game called A Ground, and it got too weird, so I think I'm done with A Ground. It got too weird. Well, it started as a resource management building a shipwreck-style thing, and then the aliens came.
George Gomez
person
Steve Ritchieperson
John Papadukeperson
John Norrisperson
Joe Balserperson
Dennis Nordmanperson
Chris Turnerperson
Tonyperson
Dennisperson
Barry Oslerperson
Glenn Weichterperson
Big Lebowskigame
Weird Algame
Razagame
James Bondgame
Halloweengame
Ultramangame

medium · Dennis references Nap Arcade multiple times as source; Glenn reports 'Rumor Corner is the most popular pinball segment in all of pinball podcasting, eclipsing pinball market trends'

  • ?

    community_signal: Pinball community demonstrates extreme tolerance for manufacturer failures and would purchase products from revived Deep Root under Turner Logic regardless of history

    high · Dennis and Tony agree: Tony states 'I am 100% convinced' people will buy Turner Logic products; Dennis: 'If Deep Root Pinball came back, people would buy machines, 100%'

  • ?

    leak_detection: Turner Logic's website displays hex code translated to 'check back soon for something interesting,' indicating planned announcement about Deep Root/Raza revival

    high · Dennis: 'Deep Root Pinball's website... someone on the page just lists a code. It's hex code... the hex code says, check back soon for something interesting'

  • ?

    personnel_signal: Joe Balser recently departed Home Pin after less than one year following Spinal Tap work; identified as available designer for potential projects

    medium · Dennis: 'Joe Balser is available now, too. He went over to Home Pin, and that didn't even last a year. Right. He worked on Spinal Tap, and then he's gone'

  • ?

    personnel_signal: Steve Ritchie's James Bond whitewood rejected by George Gomez, who started over with new design after Ritchie left for JJP

    low · Dennis (Rumor Corner): 'purportedly this was the game Steve Ritchie was assigned to work on after Led Zeppelin and the game he turned in his completed Whitewood for when he left for Jersey Jack Pinball however Gomez saw that design tossed it in the trash'

  • ?

    product_concern: Raza received poor reception from prototype players with only one media figure providing positive commentary; viability of commercial release questioned

    high · Dennis: 'Raza is kind of a turd... I can only think of one person I ever heard in quote-unquote pinball media who had positive things to say about it'

  • ?

    rumor_hype: George Gomez developing James Bond pinball at Stern with three-flipper layout, completing development within approximately one year of Ritchie's departure

    low · Dennis (Rumor Corner): 'George Gomez head of the design teams at Stern Pinball the reports are he is doing James Bond' with caveat 'I do not know for sure because it's rumor corner'

  • ?

    technology_signal: Multimorphic experiencing employment-related production delays despite adequate parts inventory; actively hiring to increase assembly capacity

    high · Dennis: 'they don't have enough people to put together all the games' and 'Multimorphic trying to hire people... about two weeks behind on the shipping schedule'

    • 4:06
    So it's gotten weird. It got weird. I did a whole – tried to do a whole bunch of stuff, and I didn't save in a long time, and I made mistakes, and I couldn't get back to my vehicle. And I was like, I don't think I want to go back and remine and play all of this. So now I'm playing something called Celeste, which is a platformer.
    4:26
    The rumors were it wasn't that bad of a platformer. I don't know where those rumors come from, but it's bad. All right, so I am now in Chapter 4. I started it yesterday. him uh chapter one was just a sort of introductory thing chapter two i died 100 times exactly 100 times chapter three i died i think 296 was the final count i may be too old to play platformer like this i'm not sure platformers i'm not sure a while ago i tell myself i give them up but i i inevitably this was something that was one of those games with gold that i just had in the system for a while and I'm at the point right now where I'm like, I think I just want to play something weird and different. What do I have downloaded from the free stuff? I was like, Celeste, that sounds gentle and kind. No. It was full of lies. I haven't really mentioned it because I haven't played a whole lot of it, but I played off and on a few weeks ago a game called Ascend.
    5:28
    I've heard of it. Which is a procedurally generated mountain climbing kind of Groundhog Day thing. It's interesting. You might like it.
    5:43
    Yeah. I don't know. I'm so hit or miss on procedurally generated items. Yeah. Well, this is just like the mountain that's procedurally generated. So the mountain that you're climbing is. It is otherwise, it's a, like as you're doing your climbing and stuff, it's very much kind of almost like an XCOM-y, like isometric, where you choose your path. But it's like first person, but you choose your path. And you, so it's like, oh, I want to go there. And you click it and it generates a path. And you actually set it like in an isometric and generate the path you want to go based upon how much energy you have, how cold you are, how badly your oxygen is depleted. But it's kind of a Groundhog's Day-esque thing where you go through it and you're like on a strange island and there's some weird stuff going on and you're basically trapped. Like you hit a certain point, and if you can't get to a certain place by a certain point, like time resets and you start over. Okay. Huh. Interesting. So you're trying to learn what's happening and what's going on and get to the exits and get to the right place so that when the time – and there's like an item and all that. If you're at the right place with this item when the time resets, everything resets, but you remember everything, and there's a safe place. There's like a safe base that's protected. Okay, wow. I've not played anything quite like that. Yeah, it's kind of cool. I was playing it just a little bit, and then hard space came out. And you love hard space. I love hard space. That's understandable. Well, you know what else you love? You love when we go into the pinball segment. I love pinball. Because that means the show is really underway. We're underway. We're out of the stuff that nobody actually cares about. We did play in a tournament last week. It was a sparsely attended tournament, and I still couldn't get my $5 back. It was a sparsely attended tournament. I was one win away from getting my money back. The month previous, I was the first person eliminated. And this month, I was the second person eliminated. You're improving. It's what you're saying. There's improvement going on. You adapted. You're like the Borg of pinball. I am. It did not go very well for me. It's one of those where I didn't feel like I was playing bad. I just was – several of them were very close. They're a bunch of killers is what happened. Everyone who showed up were killers. I was like just being just assassinated. Yes. Yeah. I mean, I don't know. Well, it's a strike tournament. Yeah. So you're like, okay, well, I want to try generally. Well, even in the – you've got three or four teams, so you're trying to get second place essentially or better.
    8:27
    I had a lot of ones where it was like, well, I was in second place until player three passed me by 500 points or player four passed me by 500 points. Or I was player four and it's like, oh, I'm 450 points out of second place. Again, just crap. Well, what isn't crap, Tony, is Dutch Pinball. We haven't talked about them in quite a while. No. We're going to have Nap Arcade referenced a couple times here, but actually most of these pinball items are covered in some capacity on Nap Arcade, so folks can go and check those out. In this case, I do have a show notes link, though, and that is apparently Dutch Pinball seems to have stabilized in the production of Big Lebowski's. They had a number of cabinets already put together and some photos. I've heard they've been giving factory tours so after years and years and years and years and years and then of course the pandemic and all the disruption with that it sounds like they're continuing at a pretty steady clip now to build big Lebowski's for new buyers and I have read that yes they are continuing to send early adopters their games I'm amazed I've said multiple times that I assumed they were DOA that they were dead and the best they could do was to fulfill their people and then walk. I haven't. I was pretty public about my thoughts that they should have declared bankruptcy and given people back portions of their money.
    10:02
    I'm not bending on that. No, I still think that's the right answer. I think at some point the value of dollar and how long you've waited to get this Anyway, it doesn't matter what I think. The point is, this is the way they've chosen to go about it. It seems to be going well. I don't... Do you think people ever trust them for a game number two? I do, 100%. This is pinball. They trust anybody. This is pinball. They don't care. You can punch them in the face and then tell them you're going to make a new pinball game. Steal their wallet and their wife. and they will still love you and buy pinball from you.
    10:47
    I think they shouldn't, but it's been proven to me time and time and time again that I have the wrong mentality when it comes to that kind of thing in pinball.
    10:58
    100%. They're all about it. I mean, there's no doubt in my mind. I can't really dispute it. I want to tell myself that they would be put off by the slow production speeds, but I do think that there's a lot of goldfish memory in this hobby, and they'll just look at this report where, hey, they're going in a decent clip now. Guess they figured everything out. Don't know how that translates to figuring everything out for a game number two, and they have not announced a game number two yet, but I will say it has been indicated they do have intentions of doing more than Big Lebowski. I still think they have quite a ways to go to catch up all the EAs, but hey, they could always do a game number two and start selling those, and then for every four game number twos, they send a big Lebowski on. I don't know. But, no, I am 100% convinced there is not. If Deep Root Pinball came back, people would buy machines, 100%. That's what I realize this hobby is. Well, speaking of positive for – I don't have a good transition with this stuff. So speaking of playing off of the Dutch pinball fact that their production seems stabilized and going well, let's talk about Multimorphic. So they've released some more news about their Weird Al pinball game, and part of that is more code updates. I got another show notes link also to Nap Arcade about this, but they've indicated they've got a mini wizard mode now. They've made some improvements to one of the multiballs, the UHF multiball. and also I've noted that at this point the game has over 2,500 Weird Al call-outs. That's a lot of call-outs. It seems like a lot to me.
    12:43
    Like Dutch Pinball, on the supply side at least, Multimorphic has indicated they've got stockpiled parts. They've got plenty of parts to build Weird Al's. They do have an issue though and that is they don't have enough people to put together all the games at the rate they want to produce games for the number of orders that they have. They have indicated that they're about two weeks behind on the shipping schedule versus what they initially had announced their goal would be because of the employment issues, which that's not particularly far behind given where we've been at with production broadly ever since 2020, really. So it sounds like they're overall in a pretty good place. I've never looked up exactly where they are in Texas to wonder if they have a – like do they have a logistical challenge with bringing in people or not? I've never gotten that impression. I bring it up because Spooky. Spooky is out like in the middle of nowhere. So when they mention having issues with staff, I always think, well, that's because you've located a factory not in the heart of any industrial capability whatsoever. So that's a challenge that they'll always have as long as they stay out in the middle of nowhere. Right. And I remember a few weeks ago seeing ads online from Multimorphic trying to hire people. So they're trying to fill the void to do all this. Right, but then you have training and quality control and all the other stuff that will take time to get settled. So that's all to be expected, though. None of this is anything unexpected. No, I don't think this is very surprising.
    14:18
    So let's move to a topic you mentioned back in Dutch pinball, deep root pinball. breaking news. It's breaking news. It's not exactly breaking news, but it's quasi-breaking news. All right. Deep Root Pinball's website. It's up. There's a message there now. It's like, got a Deep Root logo, and then I saw a screenshot of this on Pinside, and someone on the page just lists a code. It's hex code. And someone on Pennside went in and translated the hex code, and the hex code says, check back soon for something interesting.
    14:59
    Now, so you know, and for those that don't because we're not doing this on video, Tony is basically doing the facepalm almost of Captain Picard, basically. So the discussion has been Chris Turner of Turner Logic, which is the IT company that had been working with Deep Root during their attempt to launch Raza and everything else they were trying to produce, maybe planning to do something with the intellectual property. Turner Logic won a number of the auction bids on a lot of the stuff that relates. Like, I think, and again, I am not going back and confirming this, so bear in mind I may be incorrect on this. But I believe Turner Logic is who secured the Raza prototype cabinets. There's been a lot of talk that they have the software already because the games, when they were listed for auction, were noted as not having the software to run, I believe. and I believe they secured the IPs. So here's the discussion, Tony.
    16:03
    And you just came off of this discussion about people will buy whatever. People, they don't care about punches to the face.
    16:11
    Do you think Turner Logic is trying to basically resurrect Deep Root Pinball or just resurrect the Raza Project or just make functional Razzas from the prototypes they have and sell them And if it the former two options and not the last because the last would be just a couple one do you think people buy them
    16:40
    What are your thoughts, Tony? Share with the listeners. I think the only thing that makes sense, if they dumped a bunch of money into it, is that they are going to try and make at least a Raza run. of not trying to resurrect an entire or create a new company using what's already completed and whatever else they could get as basically seed to set up and get them rolling faster. Okay. So let's move forward. I agree with you. I think that they're trying to build games or have games built. That leads into my next question. Okay, so this is an IT company. Are they going to try and make a manufacturing line? Are they going to contract this out, the build? Because they wouldn't have the capabilities from the get-go to do it. I would think that they would try to contract it out. But it's possible that if they've already dumped money, that they could be dumping money into picking up a small manufacturing location to do that type of work.
    17:48
    But I would think it would be something you'd put out. you'd have built. I mean, if I were them and I were buying this stuff, I would definitely try and contract it. I don't know who you turn to. The right answer would be an existing pinball manufacturer, but they're all so busy. I just don't, like, who would pick it up? Who would do it? Spooky? They're still in the midst of Halloween Ultraman runs. Doesn't American have an open line currently? They might. That's a good point. Because they've indicated a desire to continue to do contract manufacturing. and I'm hearing reports, this is not a rumor corner report, but I'll throw it out here, that Legends of Valhalla is not selling well. So the likelihood, the speculation is it's very unlikely that Legends of Valhalla will end up having a standard edition run because they're struggling to sell the deluxes.
    18:38
    So if they're not ready to even launch Nordman's game, because Dennis Nordman, I believe, is next up, is the thought. I mean, they've got all sorts of stuff. But Dennis Norman's working on multiple games for American. They've indicated, they being American Pinball, that they're going to be producing a Barry Osler game at some point because he had basically finished a Whitewood for them before he passed away.
    19:00
    But if the line's slow or they've got that spare line, which I think you're right. I think they indicated they had a line to do smaller runs. Right. I believe they've got one that's in the process of doing final original editions of Oktoberfest, Houdini, and Hot Wheels. So that could always also do it too. So, okay, that would be a potential one. Because I would think, and this is just me thinking, I would think even if they wanted to start something else, their best bet would be to do a contract run of the Raza's,
    19:35
    get them out, get them sold because people buy it because this is pinball. Get the, get them out there, get them sold, get it basically a nest egg of money formed up to work on another game and look into putting their own lines together. but it's using contracts to keep things going. So they're actually actively making money while they're doing spin-up. I mean, that's interesting. I could see it one of a couple ways. I mean, if they've got multiple IPs from Deeproot, like if they bought them all, that would give them a few whitewoods they could – Right. The thing is, to my knowledge, Turner Logic has not brought on any designers. so any a lot of those stuff at least judging from the photos we saw most of those games aside from rosa weren't done so like no software at all i'm assuming on any of them basically and most of them even look like they got past the whitewood stage so could turner have looked at this and gone there's definitely money on the table all the developments done on rosa let's just turn that out and then i'll go back to being an it company afterwards well that brings up the thought how much money did Deep Root owe them? Is them spending a little bit more to get this, to push it out and finish it, just to make up the money that they were probably owed from Deep Root's failure? I mean, I could see that, but one of,
    21:09
    sort of related but unrelated, I believe, and again, I should go back and confirm, but we're recording, I'm not pausing. I believe Turner Logic got permission to buy Deep Root's life insurance policies the ones that hadn't lapsed, the ones they were supposed to be investing in. Because if I remember correctly from the Blueberry Johnson posts on Pinside and such, there was a lot of discussion about – there was something about stocking horses and stuff. But Turner put in a proposal to buy those policies pennies on the dollar, and there was some discussion in the court on that. did Turner have inside knowledge about,
    21:54
    like, did they know the value of those? And so they really low bid them so that they'll most likely make a lot of money on the life insurance policies. And the court still let them buy it because I believe the ultimate scenario that arose was there's no one else trying to buy them right now. And in the bankruptcy of all the Deep Root stuff or in the liquidation of all the Deep Root stuff, we need to get cash to pay creditors. So let's sell Turner this stuff because they're offering some significant money. But again, an IT company buying life insurance policies. It's weird. Like, I don't think Microsoft goes around doing that a lot. Maybe they do. I don't know. I haven't really looked at Microsoft. That's pure speculation. This is all alleged. So my point, just relating to what you brought up, is there seem to be simpler ways that Turner Logic has already employed to possibly make back the money they are owed from Deep Root Pinball assuming that they weren't kept up to date on all of their payments. I had heard through that Pennside thread, the reports were Turner Logic, the reason why there was no software on those games is the software was held by Turner Logic until they got paid.
    23:08
    Turner Logic might control the software without having to win. They don't have to buy it from Deep Root. Deep Root didn't pay them. It's ours now. Wouldn't that make sense? Again, it's getting beyond what I understand. I've not delved into this to that degree. What experienced developers are not currently on contract with somebody and not retired? Right, right. To my knowledge, and again, who knows for sure, out of the Deep Root stable, I don't believe John Norris has been picked up by anyone.
    23:40
    So he would be a possibility. John Papaduke hasn't been picked up by anyone, so he would be a possibility. And if you wanted to get outside of who Deep Root had, I've heard Joe Balser is available now, too. He went over to Home Pin, and that didn't even last a year. Right. He worked on Spinal Tap, and then he's gone. So if Balser's not retired, Balser could be an option. So those are three that come to mind. And they're all veterans. They all have significant pinball experience. And there's a slew of homebrewers who have put out high enough quality games that somebody could talk to them, potentially. I mean, if your focus is on Raza, Papa Duke, it's his game. Right. But there's also a sense that he doesn't know what he's doing when it comes to anything beyond whimsical design, like manufacturing and engineering and stuff. That's not his forte. So, if the layout is done... What would he bring to the table? In my personal opinion, he brings nothing. I don't see why John Papaduke should be employed in this industry anymore. I don't think he offers anything meaningful. yeah no I agree with you on that so if you wanted someone who like if your goal was in house but again if you're contract manufacturing how much do you like John Norris given his time with Premiere and all the stuff they had like their people wore so many hats he would understand in my view he would really understand production and manufacturing even though he's on paper a designer he worked on so much stuff but if you're not in housing the production why would you turn to him right So if they wanted to move on and start coming up with their own designs, he would be an obvious one to approach.
    25:30
    I think that my guess would be their decision on that, if they're contemplating it, will come down to how well does Raza end up selling. Because we have to remember, Raza is kind of a turd. A lot of people who played the prototypes did not have highly favorable things to say about it. I actually can only think of one person I ever heard in quote-unquote pinball media who had positive things to say about Raza. And so that's not that glowing. It's not. Yeah. So – and again, while pinball people may – there are pinball people who will buy just about anything.
    26:05
    It's like if they go to American Pinball, I'm assuming American Pinball will say, all right, how many do you want? You're going to prepay us and we're going to give you – how many does Turner Logic order? A hundred? how much money do they want to front and then try and push games out especially if they're not going to promise they won't make more like if you knew it was limited to 100 you can get a lot of decent money on that might be the smart way to do it yeah but if your plan is no i want to sell as many as possible you get 100 up front but you're going to say well there's no real limit uh you know i i don't know because because while pinball is still crazy in the words of dialed in about what's going on with the pricing. It's not like it was a year ago.
    26:47
    Halloween's and Ultraman's are selling for less use than they go for now. Sanity is coming up again, especially with games that don't play well.
    26:56
    I don't know. I've had discussions that Halloween is the greatest game ever built. Everyone's got their own stance. I'm not going to try and convince anyone otherwise. I'll be clear that I don't think it is. but my point is the market tells us it's not it doesn't matter what my thoughts are it sells for less use than it does new now in the normal order of things that should be true for everything but that it's true when it's not happening for other games right now tells you how unpopular it is if Raza though plays worse than Halloween and you've got an infinite supply or what? Halloween was 1,500 units. So let's say you had 1,000 Razzas. But it's a worse game in every way.
    27:41
    How many do you sell before word starts to get out? This game is a turd. You know, Carlo D'Angelo gets a Raza and then he sells it after 15 plays on it. Half the number he did for Halloween.
    27:56
    That stuff gets around and then people who are into playing aren't going to want that game. So I don't know. Anyway, it's interesting. But that's some of the news.
    28:07
    Speaking of spooky pinball, they have added wizard modes to Halloween and Ultraman. Yay. I put on my wizard hat.
    28:17
    I cast magic missile. Are there any girls there? I cast magic missile on the darkness. I attack the darkness. Okay. Well, it's that time. It's time for... It's time for Rumor Corner.
    28:54
    Dennis Creasel's got the news before Napa Caves. Is that right, Tony? Yeah. All right. Well, that's our new Rumor Corner song. So thanks to Glenn W. You know, I don't know how to say his last name. It looks like Weichter, but maybe it's German. Weichter? Glenn Weichter? Glenn. Glenn, we thank you. We say thank you from Germany. When I first heard the song, I quite enjoyed it. A little map arcade reference. Like Glenn only knew how much Jason and I exchange messages on what we're hearing and stuff. And all my links in the show notes to Nap Arcade. Nap Arcade is my go-to on like anything I don't follow is a Pennzite thread. It's like what does Nap Arcade have on these companies? But yes, Tony laughed quite a bit when he heard it. So thank you for the hit Rumor Corner song. And actually, when I was having an online conversation with Glenn after he sent that, he had noted that the reports are, the rumors are, that Rumor Corner is the most popular pinball segment in all of pinball podcasting, eclipsing pinball market trends on the pinball show. No, I didn't need somebody to tell me that it was better than pinball market trends. You don't even listen to that show. Well, that's true. To Zach's chagrin. We just did our episode 100 and we did it on video, which was very exhausting. You had to put the makeup on. You had to do your hair. I had to get out my lights. I had to shave.
    30:30
    I was just like, I normally record. You had to pull on the wig. I normally get up, plug in my stuff, read the show notes, and sit in total darkness and record. And now you have to have lights and get out your schoolgirl outfit and do all the proper stuff to make it a proper episode 100 to do. Thankfully, it's done now. But what isn't done is Rumor Corner. So we're in the Rumor Corner. So let me give the real rumor. That wasn't the rumor. The real rumor. Okay. That's truth. That was just unvarnished truth. There's no rumor there. You'll just have to tune in and see. So here's the rumor. George Gomez head of the design teams at Stern Pinball the reports are he is doing James Bond to enhance this rumor purportedly this was the game Steve Ritchie was assigned to work on after Led Zeppelin and the game he turned in his completed Whitewood for when he left for Jersey Jack Pinball however Gomez saw that design tossed it in the trash and is starting over But much like pretty much most Steve Ritchie's I think of, three flipper layout.
    31:46
    I do not know for sure. Well, I don't know any of this for sure because it's rumor corner. But this may very well be the final cornerstone of 2022. That seems fast.
    31:58
    Yeah, it does. But we have to bear in mind when I hear the rumor versus when Gomez actually was working on the game. True. Yeah, I don't know. It still seems fast. I mean, in a way, yeah, it does. But George hasn't had a game out, especially if he already had a design in mind, maybe. Right, but when did Richie leave? A year ago-ish, right? A year to go from clean sheet to completed?
    32:27
    I don't know what the real timings are. It seems like it runs longer between that per designer. It does vary a little bit. I can't remember. I think there was an interview with Gomez a few months ago and the, maybe it was an interview with Elwin. I'm blanking, but, and they were asked about like, how much time does Stern, it used to, I used to hear the development time for Stern pinball from conception to release was a year. That how long they had or maybe that was the Williams time And I heard someone else say that their time with Stern they usually got something like 14 to 16 months something like that So yeah in a way it seems fast But sometimes, as my guess, I know I've heard from Alwyn's interviews, like, he's got – he's like three whiteboards deep on stuff. The release schedule does not reflect the speed at which he can put out a whiteboard. Right. There's software and animation and stuff. That tends to slow things up, not coming up with a whitewood. Right. And again, you talked about pinball people buying, just buying stuff all the time and not really thinking long-term about stuff. I think pinball people have this weird – to me, it's weird. Almost – they put designers on a pedestal in a way that I think is unreal. I think they think that John Borg and Steve Ritchie go in and 40 hours a week they're staring at these play fields and moving posts by a millimeter. It's like that. It's pointillism. And they're painting each little dot, each little dot, hour upon hour, each little dot to create perfection. I'm like, you know, I'm not a designer, but I don't think it works the way you think it's working here. Well, I think it's like that in most things. I mean, basically, they treat designers like the big-name influencers and stuff like that, where they're very much considered greater than anybody else, and they're kind of a high standard, and their lives are always so exactly like people imagined. Well, and I do give a lot of credit. To me, the magic of the play field, by and large, I do credit to the designer. Now, the mechs go to the engineers. But my issue is just that this – I think they think there's a level of craftsmanship to it, artisanal to a degree that's goofy. Yeah. Like their hand forging every – you understand what I'm getting at. Right. Yeah. Like every little thing is – there's a reason why when we see designers by and large and have a – when they've been at it a long time, we start to go – like you grab a board and you go, oh, that looks kind of like this plus this plus this. It's like, well, because he knows those shots work. So he's gone back and he's moved some stuff around, but I don't think they – if it was the way some people fantasize it, there wouldn't be like three or five Whitewoods. It would be like 30,000 Whitewoods as we move. You walk into a room and it's like these are the Whitewoods. For Hello Kitty. And there's like 30 whitewoods around. I know. There have been times where, like Steve Ritchie in an interview said, oh, yeah, no, we are having some trouble with the shot, so I moved this post by half an inch. It's like the small degrees of modification does make a difference. But the thought that, like, every little thing is constant, like, they kind of know some stuff that works. And maybe you stick the demogorgon in the middle and it doesn't matter much. That ramp was too easy. So I did 13 different brand new whitewoods testing it with a different slope, and I decided that it needed to be 0.45 degrees steeper. Yes, yes, that's the thing. That's the part I'm just like, and that's where people start to think, oh, yeah, you need a year. You need a year. And I'm like, let's remember that, well, it was not the ideal model. Premiere, with their, I believe, reports of the average production time was three months a game. That was because they did parallel development. The layouts for a lot of Premiere games, I think, are good. It's the software that suffered for that speed. And even then, that would have been okay if they had been allowed to patch, but they weren't. Unless it was going to melt transistors, Gottlieb Premiere was not allowed to patch. And so you end up with unbalanced rules because that was the philosophy. Otherwise, remember, 90s Valley Williams games are unbalanced, too. They just weren't unbalanced the same way. And they were allowed to release patches.
    37:01
    So, I mean, anyway. Are you not rumor-tained? I are rumor-tained. Well, why don't you video game-tain us? We don't have a song for that. We don't have a video game song. That's okay. I will sing to you. You have. On multiple occasions People write in sometimes Because they know I don't like When Zach sings on the pinball show Because he's bad at it And I'm bad at it too So I don't blame him for that But he wants to incorporate the song And time it And I'm just like no I sing as a joke Because I know I'm terrible And occasionally I sing the things That make Dennis have to edit them out Because they're terrible Sometimes but not today okay video games there it is found it in my notes are important remember people write your notes keep your notes okay so Derek K wrote in asking us to share our thoughts on if we think Xbox's Game Pass could hurt the video game industry there's a link in the show notes to an article by former Xbox vice president worried that the Game Pass seats in the future game sales by having people stop buying games entirely and just rely on the service. And for the short answer, yeah, I think it's definitely a concern. For the long answer, I don't know if it'll actually hurt that bad as things shift because of how many independent games are out there now and how many independent studios are out there now and how much of the actual gaming is done in smaller amounts on smaller projects. I mean, yeah, you always hear about the big AAA projects, but the truth of the matter is most of the people that I talk to when we talk about games we're playing, most of us aren't playing the big AAA things. Now, that could just be the people I talk to and the people I interact with because I do know I have people that I work with who are like, I'm playing Call of Duty until the new Call of Duty comes out or I'm playing whatever the big AAA thing is. Those people do exist and there's a lot of them out there. But I think that it's a thing that isn't going away. It's well-liked. I think it's a really good deal and that's why it's not going away. and it might end up like video game streaming where the prices start climbing, start criming. It's a crime.
    39:49
    But, no, I think that there's a risk, but most of these companies are big enough and most of them are at the point of merging. I didn't include it in my notes, but there's stuff coming out second and third hand that EA is actively looking to merge or join another group. But it's not from – none of the stuff I saw was EA saying, yeah, we're doing this. It's from other people saying, yeah, EA is doing this. Right.
    40:18
    Yeah, it's – I'm not worried about this, though maybe there will be an impact. I did read the article. The Xbox vice president did note, like, consumers and himself as a consumer love Game Pass. It's great. And I have so much stuff to play that I've never done Game Pass because I don't need more choices. Again, like with Celeste, I've got plenty of stuff that was like Xbox Game with Gold I've never tried that I've downloaded.
    40:49
    Now, Game Pass does do indie games. So my thinking would be, all right, well, is it a bad deal for the game developer to get on Game Pass? because I've not heard any of them complain like we don't get paid well enough if we do Game Pass. I've not heard that either. They're bringing them in somehow, and it ain't all just first-party stuff. So conceptually, yes, this could have an impact. And I know the vice president guy did a lot of comparisons to music streaming, but music went through a whole lot of weird stuff. And I don't even like music streaming as a good example because even before then, Back in the CD era, for example, artists didn't get a lot of money out of album sales. That's why live concerts were so important. But anyway, I'm digressing.
    41:40
    In a way, some of the challenges that this maybe makes on the surface I think already existed. And by that, what I mean is I think his argument was sort of people are going to subscribe, so they're not going to buy stuff because they're just going to be like, I'm just going to play the stuff in the subscription. Okay. Possible. But how many of that audience was buying a whole bunch of – if his concern is small indie projects, how many of that type of person were buying those anyway? Let's say you spend – let's say your limit is – what's Game Pass's subscription? I don't know. It's like $14 a month. All right. Let's say you spend $15. You're willing to spend $15 a month equivalent on games. So was this person going out onto Steam and buying three $5 games a month, or were they going and buying once a quarter a $60 game or whatever? That's not even right because I need four months to make that work.
    42:39
    So my point is I'm not – really small games already have breakthrough challenges because they're so small. and anyone bigger I think would just try and get in on the pass and get paid via the pass so unless the income you derive from the pass is so much more I guess I should say so much less than what you would have made outside of the pass it would be a good deal so what scenario is that if you had a great game that ends up becoming like this huge hit like Among Us ended up having happen like that.
    43:22
    Okay. But most games don't have that. Most games you're worried about making enough money to pay your staff and move on to the next game. And I think a stable subscription service, to me, sounds like it solves more than it hurts. Yeah. And being on the pass doesn't preclude you from being purchased. I played Outer Limits on the pass, and I recently bought it because I dropped the pass, but I want to play Outer Limits again. it's one of those things because my problem with the Game Pass, it isn't a problem. I liked it, but I realized I wasn't utilizing it enough to keep a monthly payment. It's my same problem. Right, right. So I dropped it. That's why I have not done it. So I dropped it. I have trying to maintain all the necessary monthly stuffs for a house full of kids, eats enough that a game pass that was only being used a couple times a month wasn't worth continuing for me, especially because I'm one of those people that picks up a single game and locks in on that game for extended periods of time.
    44:34
    Yeah, so I mean, I guess my nutshell thought is, yeah, it could hurt the video game industry. I think it's way too early to jump to that conclusion. I think the analogy to the music industry is a dangerous analogy to make because gaming and music are very different realms. Well, yeah, and the music industry is in a really good place overall. Yeah, and some people, I think, in response to him because he brought up Spotify, had mentioned, like, it's really good right now for, like, producers and stuff. Yeah. It's not like it was. I mean, I honestly listen to more streamed music than I ever listened to music before or bought music because I rarely ever bought music. And I basically listened to the radio, and that was it. And now that music is streaming, I listen to a lot more stuff than I used to. Now I pay for a streaming service. So it's one of those things that – I think Game Pass just – I think a lot of people – I don't think it's going well. It's grown so much. I don't, unless, and I could be wrong, but I don't think it becomes the only thing. I think there are a lot of gamers out there that slow play, focus on single games a lot more, that are going to want to continue to buy. And bear in mind, we had our tricks too. I very rarely buy games on release. I buy them on sale. I have my methods to save money. And some people, when a Fallout game comes out, I don't save money. And when some other game like Shadows of Mordor does, I do. And I think Game Pass just gets certain people that maybe they would only buy the Call of Duty, but now they get four months of Game Pass, and they buy that to get Call of Duty, and they maybe play some other stuff. And those people make money because they're on Game Pass, too. Right. And I also think it's a big help for those people who don't have the kind of game access, like younger, non-working students. Yeah, that's who I think was originally probably targeting were people that had very limited, but it's easy to forget that for a lot of people, especially given so much of our audience is into pinball and a number of them buy pinball machines, it's easy for these people to forget. For some people, for some families, getting a console is a huge deal. It's a huge investment. And there are some people that only get two or three games a year, maybe. Yeah. And that's just how it is. So things like this give them more variety, and they can learn and appreciate more games. And those people are making money off of Game Pass, and they'd never have secured those sales otherwise. Right. That's the part that I think the vice president didn't factor in. Yeah. When I did have Game Pass, there were several games that I would have never spent a dime on that I tried. Yeah. And I would have been incorrect in not having spent a dime on several of them. I end up downloading and securing these games with gold games. I'd never have bought Celeste. I'm playing it because it was free to me. Right. Because I pay for a subscription to something that let me have it. Right. And I had the same thing when I had the PlayStation, my old PlayStation, when I had their thing where you got a free couple games every month. There was a bunch of games that I got that I would have never. And some games I hated and some turned out to be really cool. Yeah. Anyway, interesting. Thank you, Derek, for writing that in.
    47:54
    Moving on. I threw this one in. This is my fault. I read about this on Reddit yesterday, and I have a link in the show notes to an article about it. But it seems Stadia and the Ghost Recon Breakpoint series have had an issue where the saves disappeared for Ghost Recon, for Stadia players.
    48:17
    Last I saw, it's not clear whether the error was on Stadia's end or if it was an Ubisoft issue. and from what I had read, Google is looking into it. They've acknowledged, yes, there is a problem. The saves are gone. This is a game where people put in tons of hours the way the Ghost Recon game is.
    48:38
    But as of the writing of the article, I didn't see an updated one when I threw in the notes. But it had been several days and there is no fix to it yet. I checked and the latest update I saw anywhere is that it's still being researched and that was from like yesterday. There's still no fix. And from the top comment I saw on Reddit, all 12 people who were impacted are very upset. Yes, they are terribly upset.
    49:08
    But the fact that this only affects the Stadia version of the game. Yes, it is only the Stadia. That's confirmed. No one else means that there got to be something between where Ubisoft and Google stuff talks together And that where I think what people are wondering is you know did Stadia change something in the communication side? Google for Stadia or did Ubisoft make a change to the game? Like maybe how the saves work or how they communicate with the cloud and it didn't work right with the Stadia ones, but it worked okay with everyone else and they didn't initially catch it because no one plays on Stadia.
    49:48
    Let's be honest. This is Stadia. This change that caused this could have happened six or eight months ago and it just got noticed. It's entirely possible. It's Stadia. Poor Stadia. It did its best. I think that the whole concept of the streaming, I don't like the concept personally of that kind of thing. But I do think it's going to be something we see more of in the future. um just like well case in point the steam decks are doing very well in sales yeah the thing i never had a problem with the streaming with with stadia my issue was don't you you like don't you have a monthly subscription yes and you buy the games yes uh no yeah no and that's where steam decks different you buy the games it doesn't have a monthly subscription does it you just buy the You buy the deck, and then you can stream your Steam library, which, let's be honest, people who, if you're into Steam, even I have tons of Steam games, and I don't play PC much.
    50:53
    And I have tons of Steam games. That was where I felt Google blundered with Stadia, and I think the sales prove it. Yeah, no, it did not take off. I don't think it was the streaming that hobbled it. I think it was the way they approached the purchasing with the streaming. I was just like, there are a lot of barriers. You have to jump over a lot of hurdles. You've got to be a pretty solid Google fanboy to go all in on that. And I know people who did. Yeah, no, I do. I mean, I'm a huge Google fanboy. I freely admit it, but not enough to have gotten into Stadia. On the other hand, I could see myself getting a Steam Deck. there's several games that I play that I think would be fine for that kind of situation. Yeah. I mean, there are, I think anything that you're comfortable playing on controller. Yeah. Uh, and there's plenty of PC. Yeah. I think sometimes people think in shooters, yeah, you know, it's keyboard mouse, but there are lots of PC games where people want to plug in controllers. I, that's most of the ones I play. Yeah. Speaking of play my precious.
    52:00
    Yeah. No Lord of rings. Golem, uh, is scheduled for, uh, September 1st. Yay! Is it sneaky? It is very sneaky. I'm interested in the fact that, besides just, well, I'm terrible at sneaky stealth games. You just have to watch me play Hitman to understand. Give me my AK-47s, precious.
    52:22
    That's how I play Hitman. All the fan art. I already want to go in and make a golem with, like, the Rambo and give him an M16 or something. Oh, no. We need to give him the siphon filter night vision.
    52:37
    Oh, Splare Cell. Yeah, the Splare Cell. I want Michael Ironsides to do his best to go on the bus. That'd be great. But no, what's interesting to me is that in addition to just being the sneaky sneak and the fact that it has multiple branching paths of how you go through things, but it takes place during the actual, uh, you like fellowship of the ring and all of the Lord of the rings, uh, all of the endings into the same point point, the epilogues are all identical no matter what path you go, because it comes back to match what the written parts of the story. Right. So you can branch out and do stuff, but, but the game is designed where you're like the protagonist and the antagonist at the same time because of the golem Schmeagle split. Um, And there are like entire points where you are doing decision trees where Golem and Schmeagle are talking about it. And you are making decisions that go one way or another, supporting one personality or another. And it might be total trash or it could be really cool. It's just going to depend on how well the mechanic works. So I thought it sounded pretty interesting. It does sound interesting.
    53:51
    On to a quick update on everybody's favorite. Activision Blizzard. The QA testers at Raven Software did win their vote to unionize. Heard about that, yeah.
    54:03
    Heard Microsoft's going to recognize that, too. Yes. I saw someone say, how could they not? And someone said they could fire them all. Yeah.
    54:12
    There's only 28 employees affected because it's just the QA testers. From the vote, it was 19 voted to unionize, three voted against, and I guess the rest just didn't vote.
    54:29
    Yeah, that would be my guess. They were just like, whatevs. Activision Blizzard did release a comment that says, we believe that an important decision that will impact the entire Raven software studio of roughly 350 people should not be made by 19 of Raven employees. We're committed to doing what's best for the studio and our employees. They're going to find a way to fire those people. I guess. I don't know why they mentioned the 350 because it only applied to the QA testers.
    54:58
    I'm assuming the way they're saying it is they assume anything that's done there will have a trickle-down effect on everybody else.
    55:09
    We'll see what happens. Activision Blizzard has been union-busting hard since it was first talked about last year.
    55:17
    It will be interesting because Their annual shareholder meeting is on June 21st this year, and there are some groups that have put out letters urging for the board to be ousted at the shareholder meeting because of how they've handled the last year of upset and the way they've acted. Is there enough outside shares, outside of board control to achieve that? It is a pretty big company. It sounds from what I've read, nothing I've read has said yes, but it sounds like it's possible. Unlikely, but possible.
    56:02
    We'll just have to see how that goes next month. We'll see how that turns out. It's not quite a full month away at this point.
    56:11
    Jedi Fallen Order from EA. It is getting a sequel. We talked about it before that they're getting a sequel, and it is now officially out that it is called Jedi Survivor, and there's a teaser trailer released. I haven't watched the teaser yet, but I heard about it. The teaser, it's cool. I haven't played the first one. I heard it was very good. It's very good. I really enjoyed it. I enjoyed it enough that I now own it on two devices because I owned it on my PlayStation.
    56:45
    And now I picked it up very cheap on a sale on Steam. Okay. So I will probably go through and play it on Steam to finish. Right.
    56:58
    So we'll see. now there's a ton of video game to movie and TV news like I was surprised how much of it has come out people are ready to try it again they're ready to try it again are they ready to become shows and movies well judging from Halo no but there is a Horizon Zero Dawn project for a series at Netflix which means it'll get a couple seasons canceled no matter how good it does. I hear that's the Netflix way now. They have to invest all that money in tall grass. Yeah, basically, I mean, Stranger Things and one or two other things has made it past three seasons. They have to be really huge to make it past three seasons at Netflix.
    57:50
    God of War has a show in development at Amazon. Okay, that could be interesting. I wonder if they'll – so people can identify with him, he'll have to constantly wash off his makeup.
    58:04
    That's a Halo helmet off reference for people. Oh, my God. And then it'll be like, I must kill the gods because I'm so angry about my family. Now I'm going to go bone random people.
    58:22
    Gran Turismo is getting a movie? There we have it. It's called Fast and Furious. Right. I mean, maybe that's more like a need for speed or type thing. I don't know. Does Gran Turismo have a story? No, I didn't. I thought, I don't know. It's been so long since I've, I haven't played one since like the PS2 era. Yeah. The last time I played Gran Turismo, there was no story. You just raced cars. It was realistic racing. That was it. That was the big thing. I don't know. The Last of Us series is shooting on HBO. It's due out next year. I mean, they're into shooting. So it's definitely a done deal at this point. Are people ready for zombie-type stuff again? That was all the rage a decade ago. I think Last of Us is big enough. A lot of people thought the first game was Game of the Console for Sony. So it's happening. We'll see. There is a very early development Ghost of Tsushima movie being done. That could be interesting. That could be good. Yeah, I got no problems with that.
    59:27
    And NBC for their online Peacock channel. That's right. I see Peacock. I give it that cry. I'm very obnoxious. Is making a Twisted Metal series.
    59:43
    Oh, wow. Yeah. That's like right up there with that movie Battleship. Yeah. That's weird. It is not. That's weird. Of all of the stories and the universes and everything, let's make a thing about a clown in an ice cream truck wrecking people in races? I guess. I mean, I have been seeing lots of posts about how there is a Winnie the Pooh blood and honey coming out. I saw a post about that. A serial killer Winnie the Pooh or something. And, hey, okay, I guess in that world, in our world, in this alternate timeline we are in, I guess it's all possible. Maybe. Yeah, sure. Why not? Of all the things, whatever. I mean, I actually would be more interested in a gritty reboot of Winnie the Pooh than Twisted Metal. Now he needs to have the other machine gun next to Gollum. When he's done, he'll just go, oh, bother.
    60:50
    all this stuff I just had this mental image of Tigger laying there like bullet holes and he's bleeding out and he looks up and he goes you know revenge is what Tiggers do best and then he drops the grenades that he had already pulled the pins off for Matilda yeah and also There is a Final Fantasy IX animated series due out very soon. And by very soon is from what I've heard the initial release should be this week. I never played IX. IX, I don't know why. I think it's because of the art style. After how VIII had that very, very realistic art style and everything, IX kind of went to more of a chibi fun style. I loved 9. I liked 9 more than 8. 8 was... 8's one of my least favorite. I mean, 9 is one of my favorite Final Fantasies.
    62:02
    Like, I would say... Removing the MMOs from the list, I would say 7, 6, 9 for me, probably. Okay. As my top three. That's pretty high.
    62:16
    I really enjoyed 9 quite a lot. Well, as animated, that may work. Yeah, it could work. There was a Final Fantasy cartoon. It didn't get animated. It didn't get very far. Right.
    62:26
    Soil is my power. I'm pulling out all the references today. From what I've heard, the series sounds like it's aimed younger. Okay, that makes sense. Star Trek Prodigy is one of the best Star Treks out. Yeah, and it seemed young. I've not seen it. Oh, I think you'll like it. I haven't seen it. When it dropped there, it was in the middle of something else. I never got a chance to watch it. But then, I mean, we'll see.
    63:03
    And I thought we'd close with an update to a fan favorite game. Oh. A game beloved by all with zero technical flaws. Oh, perfection.
    63:15
    10 out of 10. Great IGN. Cyberpunk 2077. Gosh, I've almost forgotten about that game. It felt like it was 84 years ago. I know. It feels like it was so long ago. That was December of 20. Yes. So we are not even two years out. CD Projekt Red has put out stuff where they're talking about what they're working on. And currently, the Cyberpunk expansion has the majority of their effort. like they have more people and stuff put into that currently than all of their other game projects combined.
    63:56
    I don't care. I'm not planning to buy the expansions. I still have my disc down there somewhere, but I won the main game and I'm done. I didn't even go that far. I quit before that.
    64:08
    I didn't have as many issues. Yeah, you were PC, so you didn't have as many issues. I didn't have as many issues as you had. I was still playing on the original Xbox One, not the series. Right. So, yeah, I didn't have near as many issues as you had. Yeah, I had a lot.
    64:25
    I got to the point where it was just like, I don't care about this story at all. It was, I don't know. The world felt, surprisingly to me, unlived in. Yeah. And that's probably the biggest, like, it felt more barren than a Fallout game. Yeah, I didn't care about anybody or anything. I was just like, it just felt like I was chopping wood. And I was just like. Yeah, I can see where you get that vibe. And I'm a guy who plays games with zero story all the time. And I was just like, I just don't care. Well, the mechanics themselves weren't fun enough. Like, the combat wasn't fun enough to carry as a shooter. so without story what do you have? I quit. I don't blame you. I felt bad because that was one of my I spent launch prices. I got that as a gift I think actually but it was at launch so it was retail. I spent launch prices on it and I got saddened. Oh well. I think that's all we got today. Alright. Well folks you can always write into us at CollectedGamersPodcast.gmail.com or you can go to Facebook.com slash CollectedGamersPodcast to get a hold of us. We're occasionally available on Twitch, Twitter, and Instagram at Eclectic underscore Gamers Yep, and I don't know if we'll have as much news as we did this time in two weeks but we will plan to be back then Yeah, we'll be back in two weeks even if we don't have anything important to talk about We'll find something But until next time, I'm Dennis I'm Tony Goodbye everybody See ya