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Episode 108 - Hammer Time Reforged

Eclectic Gamers Podcast·podcast_episode·1h 6m·held·Feb 10, 2020
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Analysis

claude-haiku-4-5-20251001 · $0.029

TL;DR

Haggis Pinball durable playfield innovation moves them into serious manufacturer conversation; Rick and Morty shows promising design but flipper concerns.

Summary

Eclectic Gamers discusses Haggis Pinball innovative hybrid playfield technology (birch plywood + acrylic + digitally printed substrate) demonstrated in durability testing with 750,000+ plays, positioning the manufacturer as a credible innovator. The hosts debate whether acrylic vs. wood surface materials meaningfully affect ball physics, concluding that material differences are negligible for most players. Rick and Morty pinball gameplay footage reveals solid shot design with concerns about upper flipper execution and difficulty.

Key Claims

  • Haggis Pinball's hybrid playfield has endured 750,000+ plays with no visible wear in testing

    high confidence · Press release quoted directly: 'as of today, it has over 750,000 plays with no signs of wear'

  • Haggis beating Deep Root Pinball to market with playfield innovation has stolen Deep Root's thunder

    high confidence · Tony: 'Oh, for sure. Because Deep Root's solution might not be the same solution... But it doesn't matter. This was first.'

  • Modern pinball players have been rolling balls on polyurethane/acrylic clear coats rather than wood for years, not directly on wood

    high confidence · Dennis: 'have you really been playing on wood ever since you've been playing on such thick polyurethanes... your ball hasn't touched wood for quite a while now on most of these games'

  • Loser Kid Pinball Podcast expressed skepticism about acrylic playfield surfaces affecting ball physics

    medium confidence · Dennis referenced episode: 'they were very... leery, skeptical, because they are used to playing on a wood surface'

  • Rick and Morty pinball has upper flipper shot execution concerns due to ball momentum/speed issues

    medium confidence · Dennis: 'there were a lot of struggles to hit those two upper flipper shots... trickled back out a lot due to a lack of momentum'

  • Knight Rider had some plastic playfield versions, tested as a cost experiment but abandoned due to expense

    medium confidence · Dennis: 'the issue that came up... had nothing to do with the play. It was the costs were not conducive to actually going and switching the process'

Notable Quotes

  • “The result of that is a new hybrid playfield comprised of a layer of birch plywood, a layer of specially coated acrylic, and a digitally printed cast substrate that is chemically and mechanically bonded to create a pinball playfield that will not dimple and not pool.”

    Haggis Pinball press release (quoted by Dennis) @ ~08:00 — Official technical specification of Haggis's patent-pending playfield innovation

  • “For Haggis to come out and drop this and drop this video before Deep Root's been able to do anything is huge.”

    Tony @ ~11:30 — Assessment of competitive advantage and market timing for playfield innovation

  • “The only people who can tell you that they can tell the difference are lying. There is a difference. But we're not playing on sandpaper.”

    Dennis @ ~21:45 — Philosophical position on acrylic vs. polyurethane surface physics and player perception

  • “You all listening right now you're not good enough to know the difference. That's what we're saying.”

    Tony @ ~23:00 — Direct statement on skill levels required to perceive material differences

  • “The only way Deep Root could get something back is if they can do a full power slam and there's nothing... They could hope, but it doesn't matter. This was still first.”

    Tony @ ~13:00 — Analysis of Deep Root's limited options to recover market perception advantage

  • “I think this puts them on the radar as being innovative in a hobby that is desperately looking for innovation while also expressing constant concerns about all innovation.”

    Dennis @ ~35:45 — Meta-commentary on pinball community's contradictory attitudes toward innovation

  • “The left bumper is even more awesome than... [paused]. Overall, it looks fairly challenging. The middle shots seem to be the safe shots. And it's the pop bumper that seems to put you in a lot of danger.”

    Dennis @ ~48:30 — Early gameplay assessment of Rick and Morty's shot layout and danger zones

Entities

Haggis PinballcompanyDeep Root PinballcompanyLoser Kid Pinball PodcastmediaDennispersonTonypersonKeltsgameRick and MortygameSpace Gamblergame

Signals

  • ?

    competitive_signal: Haggis Pinball moves ahead of Deep Root Pinball in playfield innovation race through public demonstration before competitor market launch

    high · Tony: 'For Haggis to come out and drop this and drop this video before Deep Root's been able to do anything is huge'

  • ?

    design_philosophy: Rick and Morty upper flipper shot execution problems: balls lack momentum to reach targets or trickling back out from orbit

    medium · Dennis: 'there were a lot of struggles to hit those two upper flipper shots... trickled back out a lot due to a lack of momentum'

  • $

    market_signal: Playfield material science becoming central to manufacturer differentiation and innovation narrative in pinball industry

    medium · Extended debate about acrylic vs wood; historical references to plastic playfields (Knight Rider, Premiere); Haggis's hybrid approach as significant innovation

  • $

    market_signal: Boutique manufacturers (Haggis) establishing credibility through transparent operations and technical innovation rather than marketing hype

    medium · Dennis notes Haggis's daily video logs and lack of speculative industry coverage compared to respectable perception in community

  • ?

    product_strategy: Haggis Pinball's hybrid playfield (birch + acrylic + digitally printed substrate) addresses durability concerns with 750,000+ play endurance testing

    high · Press release quantifying durability tests; video demonstration of hammer impact resistance; comparison to Deep Root's previous claims

Transcript

groq_whisper · $0.199

0:00
This episode of the Eclectic Gamers Podcast is brought to you by The Empire and the Roanoke Pinball Museum in Roanoke, Virginia. The Roanoke Pinball Museum. It is an interactive museum more powerful than the Death Star itself. It is powered by science and history of pinball. Its mission is to cultivate curiosity in science, art, and imperial design. The museum is open every day except during Order 66 and Mondays. It houses over 65 machines with models ranging from 1932 to 2018. If you only knew the power of the Roanoke Pinball Museum, join me and together we will explore the entire universe of pinball.
0:58
Welcome to the Eclectic Gamers Podcast. Today is Sunday, February 9th? Yeah. And this is episode 108, not episode 107, as I'm looking at the wrong set of notes. Oh, that would explain why you stalled on the date a little bit. Because I knew you wrote in the date already. I did. I was looking at the wrong notes on my laptop, and I'm like, it's not January anymore. No, we're free of that. We're in the good month now. Actually, we're in, like, the worst weather month normally for Kansas. Yeah, I mean, is it really? Here's the happy thing.
1:47
Happy. We're finally at the tail end of all of the federal holidays. Yes. So we get a break for a while because it feels like that I just keep falling behind. Yeah. So do you get President's Day? Yes.
2:08
Okay. I don't think I do. See, because we get eight holidays. Five of them are between November and February. Yes. Because we get Veterans Day, Thanksgiving, which is two days, Christmas, which is a day and a half, New Year's Day, Martin Luther King, oh, and President's Day. So there's – and then we just get – the rest of the year is Memorial Day, Labor Day, and Fourth of July.
Knight Rider
game
Roanoke Pinball Museumorganization
Eric Prepkeyperson
Charlieperson
Pinball Newsmedia
This Week in Pinballmedia
  • ?

    product_concern: Manufacturing viability questions for Haggis's thin wood layer in hybrid playfield: will it support modern mech weight without bowing?

    low · Dennis: 'a fairer complaint... was mechs. And since this is such a thinner piece of wood now, how much weight can it support before it would start to bow?'

  • ?

    business_signal: Haggis Pinball's press release and public durability testing video positioned as market timing strategy to establish manufacturer credibility

    high · Dennis: 'I think this was an excellent strategy. I think it was smart for Haggis to send out press releases. I think this puts them on the radar as being innovative'

  • ?

    technology_signal: Community skepticism about acrylic playfield surface physics and whether it maintains authentic pinball feel

    medium · Dennis references Loser Kid Pinball Podcast concerns; extended discussion of material physics; hosts acknowledge valid questions despite reaching skeptical conclusions

    • 2:46
    Okay. Yeah, well, at least according to the calendar I updated online for people to know when I was closed. I'm not off again for holiday until Memorial Day. So I didn't think we took presidents. My last employer, we did not. We also did not take veterans, which I do here with my new employer. That was because where I was, we took Christmas Eve and New Year's Eve. And we gave up two other holidays for it. And one was Veterans Day. And I think the other, we did take Martin Luther King Day, so it might have been Presidents. Yeah. And I'm guessing, I'll recheck my notes, but I'm guessing we just don't do that one here. Presidents is always kind of an iffy one for people. My only annoyance is because at work we fall behind, and it takes us, because there's a certain amount of stuff we have to do every week to stay caught up. And when you get the extra days off and a bunch of them build up, you fall behind and fall behind and fall behind. We just this Friday caught up finally for what we've been behind since Thanksgiving. Mm hmm. So, yeah, for me, it's it's not so much if everyone's taking the holiday like Christmas. But if it's not the case, then I have other entities that are working on the day that I wasn't working. and then there's a catch up with that or I have to plan around it. So because so much of my life is meetings like last week, I think now my Office 365 gives me an analysis based off of my calendar. And it's like you were in meetings for 25 percent of your work week. And I was like, yes, it felt like it. And then another 25 percent was me driving to meetings. So. Wow. So in reality, I had 20 hours to do everything else. That's interesting because I get the exact same analytics and mine's not quite as bad. Mine's like... Most of my weeks don't read that aggressively. Mine's like 10% in meetings, but I also have very high, like continuously busy in conversation with people. Right, right. Well, a lot of what I have at our meetings are responding to the emails for information that I can handle outside, Which I prefer because I can do that at whatever time period I can slot it in. Speaking of slotting items in, we had a game night last night. We played games. We played some games. I played Coup. I've played Coup in the past. Yes, you already know all about Coups. I liked that. That was pretty easy to understand. Then there was that pun game. That was terrible. It was pretty awful. It wasn't hard enough. yeah it was like it seemed like it'd be a really good game for like children like toddlers yeah i mean i mean when i thought back on it i think maybe out of the hall we didn't even get all the way around the table before we had scored someone had scored 30 points and i think there were only like three or four missed questions and these cards that each had six and that was across all the cards yeah just too just too easy but it was and all The missed questions were picked up by the other team. Yeah. So. But it was still fun. It was. In terms of playing games. Yeah, it was fun in terms of playing games. Yeah, I like to play games. It's not a game that I will play. And otherwise, update-wise, not a lot. I streamed Space Gambler online. Obviously, because I said I streamed it on Twitch. Which, because that's still at my house. Broke the mushroom bumper. One of them. The stem part broke. Really? Yeah. From a ball strike right at the end. So it just cracked so I could see the spring under it. So got to get that replaced. They use, Playmatic Games use the same mushrooms that Valley Games did. Oh, so that's... It's not a problem. There are a lot of used ones online and you can buy new ones from the parts dealer. So that's not going to be hard to do. And other than that, I have not really played a lot of video games this week. I did a little bit of the beta for Phantasy Star Online 2. Last week I continued to put in several more hours into Assassin's Creed Origins, though. I think I'm towards the quote-unquote endgame-ish. I think I know who the final bosses are now, but I'm still probably a few hours away from being able to fight them because I'm too low level. Right.
    7:11
    See, I've played Creeper World 3 some. Creeper. Which is basically kind of a tower defense-y type game. Oh, okay. But otherwise, I spend most of my time reading and watching movies and stuff. Yeah, I mentioned working on a competitive pinball article, which I'm now – oh, gosh, it's taking forever. No, I mean, it was a mistake to agree. I have finally finished putting in the relevant manufacturer, year, or build for all the games. I finished that yesterday. I have over 700.
    7:53
    And so, yeah, some of them are repeats, so I could drag and drop the answers. But I had to look up a lot because a lot of these people have to be unique. So we've got... Unique butterflies. Well, you've got location play, like Kansas hosts the SCS at the 403 Club, but in a number of states, private collectors host. So there's that. I think it'll end up being interesting. I think I'm going to launch that over, actually, to Pinball News. I think it will fit their learn section. I mean, that would be up to Martin, but I haven't published with them in over a year. So that's kind of where I'm leaning, where I think they'll find a good home.
    8:27
    But I had a lot of feedback from people, which I really appreciate. So anyway, I'm not committing to a deadline other than I do hope to actually get it submitted to an editor for review before the end of February.
    8:41
    People were thinking. So the deadline is the end of February. Thank you for giving us a hard deadline. I don't know. Most of the time when I give it to This Week in Pinball or Pinball News, it's usually over a week before it'll be published minimum. Just because they have their own release schedules and they need to do their review and everything. But since this is so public, people know I'm working on it. So I don't want to feel like I didn't make any progress. But February is very busy for me work-wise, and I can only put in a few hours at a time in a week to working on it. So I probably bit off more than I can chew on retrospect. I wouldn't have wanted to do an article that required this much background research. But I am finally at the point that I can start writing it. But remember, research once done, you still have all that information for other articles. I do, but I don't know what I could do with it. I mean, unless I build up on it or something along those lines. So, yeah. But I figured that would be an okay lead in into our pinball segment, which we only have a couple of pinball news items to go through. and the first one I want to start with is Haggis Pinball. You know them. They've made kelts. We've not tried kelts yet. No, we haven't found it yet. We've seen images of it. We've seen some video of it. We've discussed it a few episodes ago, many few episodes ago. I mean, I think it more like – Let's go with several. Several episodes ago, before episode 100. Yes. And we received, as I'm sure many did, a press release. I'm not going to read the entire press release, But I will quote the relevant portion to lead us into this segment. We set about designing a new method for playfield manufacture. The result of that is a new hybrid playfield comprised of a layer of birch plywood, a layer of specially coated acrylic, and a digitally printed cast substrate that is chemically and mechanically bonded to create a pinball playfield that will not dimple and not pool. We have also run a physical pinball endurance test on our new play field, and as of today, it has over 750,000 plays with no signs of wear.
    10:47
    In the show notes, there is a link to a video that they have, which will be the now, I suppose, infamous hammer test. Hammer. That was often spoken of by Deep Root Pinball with Robert out of Deep Root. And so they hit this acrylic combined substrate mix birch play field with a toy hammer, a smaller normal hammer, a regular normal hammer, normal hammer meaning claw hammer, and a sledgehammer. Now, they did not bash it like you were trying to break apart a sidewalk. They didn't full power swing it. But they hit it harder than a ball will hit it. Yes. and it looked good to me. It did. What were your thoughts? Because I know you saw the video. Yeah, it was, I was pretty surprised. I thought it looked really good. I was sure, I wasn't sure, I haven't been sure from when Deep Root was talking about it that how well something would pull off. And for Haggis to come out and A, drop this and drop this video before Deep Root's been able to do anything is huge. But it looked good. I mean, there was a decent drop from a large hammer, and there was nothing noticeable on that play field. And the way this approach looks as a play field looks attractive to me. Yeah. I'm not a huge fan of the Celts' artwork. Right. And I think I noted that back when we talked about the— It's fine. It's not my style. Right. But the way that the play field looked before and after, and just the way it looks assembled, it looks like a play field to me. hit. And so, I mean, the main thing I think to talk about at this point is, so is this the game changer? Because here's the thing. We've not spoken a whole lot about Haggis before. I imagine most of the other commentators in pinball haven't, at least the ones I listened to have not. They mentioned it from time to time. There's a lot of respect for what Haggis is doing. I hear that it's seen as the people behind it are reputable. They've been really transparent. They were doing daily video logs of what was going on until recently. There was a lull about three weeks where they weren't. But so they've been it's been a different approach. Does this move them this play field, this solution, if it is as good as it appears to be into the conference? Are they like now a spooky? Are they a boutique that we need to talk about in the same breath with the quote-unquote real manufacturers and not keep them confined to the realm of Great Lakes Pinball, our Pinball Brothers, people that are essentially all talk and have no real proof of progress? No. Or minimal proof of progress? No. They have a process. It seems awesome. It looks good. They need another machine. Oh, you mean something besides Kelts? Yeah. Okay. So you want to see game number two? I want to see game number two. I want to see proof of a little bit of saying power. Okay. I think that's a fair ask. Because if they have, I mean, in all honesty, if their method, whatever their method is, they've got everything set up right and they're ducks in a row, they could turn around and license out their playfield method to any of the big playfield manufacturing setups and just call it good. They would never have to make a machine again. Assuming they patented it. Which I don't know if they did or did not. I think they should have. Well, let me ask you this. Do you think this, what's already come out, has stolen the thunder from Deep Root? Oh, for sure. Because Deep Root's solution might not be the same solution. It might not be the same solution. But it doesn't matter. This was first.
    14:38
    The only way Deep Root could get something back is if they can do a full power slam. And there's nothing? They could hope, but it doesn't matter. This was still first. I mostly agree with your perspective on that. I think the one thing that I want to talk about is the use of the material. If Deep Root has a method where you're still playing on a surface of wood, that might make some people feel more comfortable than the notion of the top surface here is acrylic. So what are your thoughts? Because I want to credit. It was Loser Kid Pinball Podcast. I was listening to just a few days ago. And one of them was talking about that they were very, I'm not going to use the right words, but essentially that they were leery, skeptical, because they are used to playing on a wood surface. And while you still have a wood play field,
    15:31
    what will the balls, geometry, the physics, the spin, all of that, how will that be when you're essentially on an acrylic surface? Will it not be pinball anymore? was sort of the angle of, not saying that it wouldn't be, but that was his question. For my part, I don't care.
    15:51
    Maybe I shouldn't say it quite so flippantly, but I don't think it's an issue. Because, and they also discussed this on their podcast, but we have gone through decades of flipper pinball now. And what we've been actually rolling the ball on as a surface has varied quite a bit over that time. I mean, the ball does not. In fact, that's one of the things where we get a Nick Schell versus a Nick Baldridge arguing over whether or not it's okay to clear coat with polyurethane EM games because how the ball spins is different on polyurethane than it is on a simple lacquer.
    16:28
    And the types of lacquer was not the same across all the pinball manufacturers Look at like I mentioned streaming the Space Gambler from Playmatic Whatever their lacquering coding approach was was very different from the Americans which is why the art looks so good on that game Because they did a different approach. There have been all sorts of surfaces that were used that were different. We've had plastic playfields before. The biggest complaint about the plastic playfields that I've seen wasn't that the ball didn't play right on them. It was too expensive to keep doing it. so I don't think this is any different than I mean have you really been playing on wood ever since you've been playing on such thick polyurethanes the polyurethanes that have become so thick and thus why you see all this cratering and such now because you're punching in on the clear which used to not be a thick coat one of the arguments I've heard I don't know enough about clear coats to tell you one way or the other but I think it's safe to say your ball hasn't touched wood for quite a while now on most of these games not really you're on a you're on a rubbery surface you're on a clear right and that's completely valid and i think that's the truth i don't think it there are people in this hobby who will decry it who will say that it's not pitbull but but there's people in this hobby who say that about everything but i mean we've had i don't i don't know they're all acrylic but i mean like the lower playfield on monsters they're it's not wood that's letting us look under that we're playing on some sort of plasticky window right and oh but but trust me they'll find an excuse oh but that's just the window the main playfield is still blah blah blah blah blah because that's the way a certain type of person is no matter how valid the fact that we're playing on clear and you're playing on plastic there and uh how many of the upper play fields on games are normal play fields versus just having plastic and how much it's not gonna matter i'm to the average player that's the average normal player to joe pinball and jane pinball it's not gonna matter let's tell even the people listening who are fans of pinball let's let's be more direct you all listening right now you're not good enough to know the difference that's what we're saying that's not what i'm saying that's what we're saying that's what tony and i are saying dennis is saying that yes i'm not going to notice the difference because i'm terrible you're a highly experienced that's what you're saying you're a highly experienced i'm not going to notice the difference i'm saying no i'm willing to go out far enough to say that a ball rolling on acrylic versus rolling on polyurethane and like how exactly the ball spin will be and the ability to either control it or not control it is going to be, well, it exists. I completely agree it exists on any different material. We are talking such subtleties that people are not going to be able to properly describe to you the difference. This difference, I think, is going to be less than whether or not you're playing on Super Bands versus Titans. Oh, for sure. This is definitely going to be one of those things where the only people who can tell you that they can tell the difference are lying. See? And that's the thing. There is a difference.
    19:57
    But we're not playing on sandpaper. So it shouldn't be that. We played on so many similar things to this before is why I'm saying it. Like Electra. It had the whole middle play field. I don't know if it was acrylic, but it's something acrylic-esque. Is it smooth? Does it hold up? Okay. There will be some subtlety. Yeah, there will be some differences. Is it going to redefine pinball? it's not like you're all of a sudden playing on Mars and the gravity is different. This isn't the expanse.
    20:29
    You're right. You're exactly right. And that's the element. It's fair to be concerned, but I think we've already seen enough things like this in pinball that I am in no way worried. The biggest risk would have been things like the screen on Munsters or how the covers were on Premier's Genesis or Bad Girls where there might be a seam. But if this is the entire play field, then that's not an issue. Right, so there's not going to be anything to catch it. It's not going to be noticeable.
    20:59
    Here's the thing. We've been dealing with this. People aren't even thinking about how much, especially on older games, and how many different spots have mylar, which actually changes the level.
    21:12
    But if mylar is flat, it doesn't really make that notable of a difference. And this isn't going to be even less because it's all even. so that people are there's still gonna be people who do not accept sure sure just like people who are bad about the pinball protectors and they're like well it's not the same as playing well no it's not going to be identical to the but other than where the seams are at most of the people i've seen play on pinball protectors say it feels like playing pinball yeah on the only difference there is they have another game without a protector they can compare it to but you won't have that here that's why you won't know you're not going to know it's not that you're stupid is that this is how physics is. You're just not going to notice. When was the last time you talked to somebody who they're like, I can't stand this specific machine. It's been refinished. I can tell. Or, oh, this is a late batch machine. This is after they changed the clear type. This is a new style clear. Compare later to the early generation. The first 500 machines were on an old style clear and the last 1,000 were on this new style clear. I can tell this is a new style. Only in regards to quality. That's it. Yeah. Because that's been discussed a lot about, oh, well, oh, look, here's this cool System 11 game. Oh, well, is it a diamond plate game or is it not? Which meant, did it have polyurethane or did it not? Right. But I've never, it's been like, that's all about where. It's not been, oh, well, I don't, if it's not diamond plate, the ball doesn't spin right. Come on, guys. I mean. Come on.
    22:40
    I'm not 100%. If I remember right, Knight Rider was a game with plastic playfield. If I remember right. I have no idea.
    22:52
    At least I remember somebody telling me that. But I've played a fair amount of that game, and if that is a game with plastic playfield,
    23:00
    it didn't shoot any different or seem any different than any other game. Let's see. Let's IPDB this. Yeah, I'm already there. They had an EM and a solid state version, but the summary on the solid state version does not say that that was the case. But I know that Premiere did a few, like Victory, I think, was one of the Vitrograph. That's what it was. So, Victory, which is an 1887 game that Premiere made. A lot of people may know it from the Pinball Arcade. I think it's a fun game. It was the first game where they used a vitrograph. So it was a fully screened photorealistic Mylar overlay that they put on top of the playfield rather than silk screening the wood. So you played on plastic Mylar. And I've heard some people complain about like dealing with posts and stuff and fixing some of the things on on such games, but not about how the ball played on the game. so they did that they did the same process on a diamond lady which i have played and it played like any other premiere we played it at texas pinball festival uh tx sector they used the same approach yeah again i don't hear people complain that the ball doesn't play right on that sort of plastic so anyway it's fair to it's fair to ask i you know we took a little bit of a strong take for emphasis, but I think it's fair to wonder, but they're testing all of this. You saw the ball rolling in the little sample machine where it was doing that, he had the 750,000, you know, that little box. It's like, is the ball rolling back and forth like it rolls on a wood playfield? As near as I could tell, it seemed to roll like it. I mean, the thing is, we've done things like this before just on parts of the playfield. So that's why I am not worried. And I don't think you'll really notice. I don't think anybody will know. Especially if all the games are that way. Then it would be more like, well, does Kelts just not play anymore? And again, unless you're using a rough surface or something, I think you can get away with a lot of different materials. And they will have an impact on how things like ball spin and such happen. But you have to remember that pinball often is moving at a pretty high speed. Yeah, there were some plastic play fields in Knight Rider. Do you know if you played one? I don't know if I played one. I know somebody was telling me about them at TPM while I was playing a Knight Rider. I don't know if that was the one I played. Some of them have it. And apparently there were some speakeasies that had it. Okay. I think I played one speakeasy. But not all of them. It seems like it was apparently a test thing. Yes. And that, I do, if I recall, the issue that came up, again, had nothing to do with the play. It was the costs were not conducive to actually going and switching the process and doing plastic. Right. It was just too expensive. So now, nowadays, maybe it wouldn't be. I don't know. But I mean, I'd say, I mean, my normal answer would be play it and find out for yourself whether or not you like how it plays or not. And whether or not you can identify, is it the material or is it you just don't like the layout of kelts? because that's the thing. But I think that they will, by their own testing of it, have a pretty good sense as to whether or not it still plays like, quote unquote, real pinball. So I would give material differences a pretty... Well, let's... I mean, my reaction is let's give some experimentation on materials, as long as they're smooth, the benefit of the doubt, and not just immediately go full snob on this and be like, oh, it's not... You didn't use the right type of... I mean, I've heard people debate about the right types of plywood that you use with the layering and stuff for pinball. I'm like, I'm not sure it really matters as much as you all think it matters. Right. Now, a fairer complaint that our concern that I believe I read somewhere was mechs. And since this is such a thinner piece of wood now, how much weight can it support before it would start to bow? And would that influence how many things they could do on a future game? That's an interesting question. I don't know, because I have no idea if you needed the full thickness of plywood to support what modern mechs are, because I don't think they're very heavy. Is the acrylic that much weaker than wood? Well, in their case, it was less of the concern of the acrylic layer and how thick it was, but rather that the wood layer underneath is so much thinner as well. But what I'm saying is, is acrylic weaker than wood? Is it more apt to collapse under weight than wood?
    27:45
    And I don't know. I wouldn't think so normally. The bigger issue, which some people have asked about, and then these, I think, are the fair points to bring up, would be like, well, but what about you have to drill through acrylic? Will you crack the acrylic? But that's all part of the manufacturing process. Right. So once a thing is in there, I don't think you should have any problem unthreading a post and re-threading it back in any more than I have when I've put screws in through acrylic on toys or whatever. It's not been an issue. So, yeah, I don't know. But anyway, I think it's neat. I think it's awesome. And I'm not worried about how it's going to play. So I think this was an excellent strategy. I think it was smart for Haggis to send out press releases. I think this puts them on the radar as being innovative in a hobby that is desperately looking for innovation while also expressing constant concerns about all innovation. See the projector for Stranger Things. See putting screens in the play field. See everything else. But nonetheless, pretty exciting. So next item that we have for pinball is Rick and Morty. so I see my notes that I typed on the other computer didn't fully populate over here I fixed the link though we do have a link in the show notes for people to see the sneak preview of gameplay it's about 15 minutes long as I recall over on YouTube so that's what I wanted to note about it is we finally have seen some gameplay video I don't know if you've had a chance Tony to see any of the gameplay video I haven't okay if the link's there I can pull it up while wearing the background with no sound and watch. Yes, the link is there. In terms of my overall thoughts,
    29:27
    I really like that they went with the pop bumper for the left slingshot. I liked the concept from the beginning. It makes it very unique. It is clearly more dangerous over by that pop as it should be than the sling, which, well, somewhat randomizing is not nearly as unpredictable. So it seemed to get a lot of good play. The horseshoe shot seems pretty good in terms of, I didn't think it's, doesn't look like it's a hard shot. That didn't seem silver ball mania easy. It also fires back pretty quick when it's not functioning as a ball lock, which I like. The scoop seemed like another relatively simple shot. I think it's placed well. It fires out fairly quick. So I thought that was pretty good. The only geometric concerns that I have, and again, this is a short video, there were a lot of struggles to hit those two upper flipper shots. Right. The inner, more top part of the flipper orbit around seems like it trickled back out a lot due to a lack of momentum. So even when it was cleanly hit, it wasn't hit with enough force, which, again, I worry about if it was on location, if the flipper's a little mushy, does that become an impossible shot sort of thing? And I can see that. And the second orbit, I can't even recall. I watched the whole video, but I don't remember if anyone hit that lower upper flipper orbit at all. Not that I've seen yet. But, oh, man, is that left bumper is even more awesome than. So overall, it looks fairly challenging. The middle shots seem to be the safe shots, actually. And it's the pop bumper that seems to put you in a lot of danger. Also, if you end up bricking on your ramp shots and such. Yeah. The ramps themselves seem fine. They seemed like they were decent. Not overly hard, not overly easy shots.
    31:31
    I think there's an instance in the video where trying to lock in the garage, they fired through the right orbit to feed up in that. And the ball had either it didn't have enough momentum or it had too much and didn't go into the garage. I think Charlie said that it didn't have enough momentum, which makes sense. Most of the time, they hit that shot, though, so I don't think that orbit was a problem. So really, other than the use of the upper flipper, I liked what I saw. I didn't see enough to judge the upper flipper, but I guess if I were to say if I have concerns, it would be that flipper is my concern currently. the modes they showed a little bit of the modes and i think that the way eric prepkey has programmed it makes it pretty clear for you to know what you're supposed to be shooting for so he was explaining it to uh he's like oh you need to go for the purple shots now where what what i think it was charlie playing he's like what what are those what should i be shooting and i just uh one of the other people there was like shoot the purple stuff and it was actually the pop and the sling were purple so he was probably looking at inserts and instead they were glowing right because that was the goal right then, was to actually shoot into that pop bumper. Just kind of again, like how TNA would occasionally have you shoot into the pop bumper, which was always very scary. Yeah. But you know what we say, no risk, no reward. I really like this whole single dangerous pop. Yeah. Is that going to be this Denise calling card? I hope so. One pop games, and the pops will be dangerous. Yeah. I think it was good. I'm glad that it looks as fun as it was. We've talked many times on here. How about not liking the, the super safe triple pop standard drop in It such a deviation from what they were historically Right I mean to someone like Harry Williams he always wanted the ball is wild It can't be wild if it's safe. I don't care how much action you get. So, for example, Stern Star Trek. Those pop bumpers see a lot of play, but there's no danger from them. Not at all. It's a super safe pop nest. So while I appreciate that you get a lot of action out of them versus like Stern Star Wars where I feel like asking why did you even put them in because it doesn't seem like you're in them ever, there's no danger. Now, I don't want cheese danger either like Avatar or Daddy East Jurassic Park where the ball kind of just falls out or Walking Dead even where the ball, if you don't have it, it just sort of falls right down the middle. Right. in a glide because that's the feed. It wasn't like a TNA where the ball, where the pop-up is like going down the middle because I'm making you go down the middle. Right. No, that's just because it feeds out poorly. It's just because of how the ball departs from the nest, which I don't care for that. But yeah, it's just... So anyway, I thought we should note it now that... Give the link out because there's finally some gameplay. And I guess they were on the... It's really weird to watch it at two times speed because that's what I've got us flying over here is at two times speed. It's not that dangerous. It's not that aggressive. But at two times speed, when the ball hits that left pop bumper, it just vanishes from the screen at two times speed. Yes. It's just gone. I don't even see it. It's gone. And they do have it set, so at least as long as it's activated. I don't know if it's always active or not, but they had it happen a few times. If the pop bumper sends the ball straight down the middle, immediately into the trough, it gives you the ball back.
    35:01
    But if there's even a little bit of a delay, it does not. So they've tried to, they didn't want it, or at least there are certain instances where you can set it up so that it does not cheat you with a straight down the middle. Because a sling won't sling straight down the middle. Right. That pop bumper can. So, but still, I think, I think it was smart. I like that deviation from the standardized lower layout. Right. It's a welcome breath of fresh air to me. I know other people that don't like that. They want it standardized. I mean, this is still Italian, but they want an Italian bottom. They want a standardized lower layout. They want that all predictable. In fact, Steve Ritchie relies upon that. That's why he always keeps the same exact lower structure. Right. Because he wants it to be comfortable for people. Scott doesn't want you to be comfortable. Scott wants you to be afraid. Fear. Yes, right. Fear is the mind killer. It's a little deaf.
    35:57
    So that would be a good pinball machine. And, hey, with the new movie coming eventually, it might happen. Maybe we can finally have Shy Hulud multiball. Shy Hulud. Of course, we almost have it already in sort of rage. Yes, I do always call it the Sandworm Shy Hulud when it comes out. It's Shy Hulud. So that's really all I had for news and pinball. So as such, since I knew it would be fairly light, I actually have loaded up 20 questions. No! Yeah, you didn't see it in the notes. It's a surprise. You have not played 20 questions since episode 101. Gosh. We last did it with Nick on episode 103. But you've had a lull. You've had a lull. You've had an LOL lull. So we're going to end your lull. So for those that don't know how this works, because it has been quite a while, Tony will ask me a series of yes or no questions. It will be about a flipper pinball machine that I know he has played at least one ball on. I have to be very specific now.
    37:01
    And after question 15, if he still does not have it, he may turn to online resources to help ask the remaining five questions. And that's pretty much it. Those are the rules.
    37:15
    No, you monster. Don't fear, Tony. Let me close out my video and move around and get my notes ready. If you want, there's a notepad right behind you if you want to do it on paper. So you don't have to reach around your microphone cord. Because for those you can't see, I've got pens and paper right there. For those that can't see, which would be all of you because you're listening online, Tony has to have a booster seat for his microphone. so his microphone is way up high and it's kind of interfering with his access to the computer because he has to make enough space for the booster seat plus keeping the computer away from the microphone this little pro tip helps with uh preventing picking up the sounds of the fan from the computer into the background of the your audio which is stinky we don't like there were complaints because i sounded like i was in the bathroom yeah it's a little echoey because i had the gain so high so that you didn't have to have the microphone in your face that the sound was bouncing off of the door behind you. Yeah, because there's a glass door right behind me. Because we're in my kitchen, so that's where we record. This is a kitchen table talk. Yep.
    38:19
    Oh, welcome to kitchen talk. Yep, yep, yep, yep. I'm thinking I'm going to make a nice tikka masala.
    38:27
    Not actually. Yeah. I mean, I've got most of the stuff to do it. I just haven't had a chance to do it yet. But someday you'll be able to. Soon. All right, you can start whenever you're ready. I'm trying to remember. I had a pattern of questions that was working real well for me, and I'm trying to remember them because it's been months and I've been free. I mean, let's go with, is it from 1980 to 1989, including 1989? No. Is it 90 from 1990 or newer? Yes. Is it from 90 to 97? Yes. Thank you. Because I could play this the safe route, which is just getting dates until I get it down to about the right date. But I don't have the date memorization as solid as you. So, I'm trying to think if it would be better to go with... Is it a premiere? No. Is it a licensed theme? Yes. That's question five. Is it Adam's Family? No. That game was just sticking in my head from like question three. It falls under everything you asked, so it was a very legitimate guess. Is it from 95 to 97? No. Is it T2? No. Swinging wide. I need to narrow the gap down more before I... Is it a Data East? No. Is it a Sega? No. That's question 10. Is it going to piss me off when I...
    39:57
    Who knows? Is it The Shadow? Yes. it is The Shadow. It's question 11. Thanks for the hint. What hint?
    40:08
    Who knows what hint? It lurks in the hearts of men. I was hoping you didn't pick up on that, but there's always a risk, I suppose. The Shadow. November of 94 was when it came out. It's a Bally-branded WMS game. Obviously based off of the not-so-hit movie with Alec Baldwin. Yeah. It was one of the movies that had crossed my mind. And you don't get to play it a ton, but you have played it several times. Several times. It's an enjoyable game. You know what? I'm not a fan of that whole upper playfield thing. Oh, yeah.
    40:47
    It's like Breakout. Breakout, batter ball, arcanoid type thing. The ball breaker, yeah. It's okay. It's better than some upper playfields that I've played on games, but it ain't great. Yeah. Well, it was Brian Eddy's first layout design. I like the diverters. I like the little shadowy ball lock. All good stuff. It's an enjoyable game.
    41:18
    It would fit well in the Brian Eddy corner. It would. A corner that has four games. Unless you're counting games you programmed, and then you can get more in, like Black Rose. Right. As of now, the Brian Eddy Corner has Nothing And it probably won't ever have anything but nothing I don't know But it's a humorous idea Who knows, maybe Chicago Gaming will remake Shadow They've remade all the other Brian Eddy stuff I think that one might be a little harder I think it doesn't sell for enough For it to be worth it Because I think that game Maybe it's crept up to the $4,000 I don't price Shadows out much It used to be around $3,500 it's probably closer to four nowadays would be my guess without looking I wouldn't pay four for it no and even there putting those games in of the games you just listed I'd rather have a Black Rose personally because that's a rather fun game I've lost on Black Rose when I was in SCS after I was eliminated from being able to move on but when I was fighting for the ability to be 9th through 16th. Right. That was my one loss was against Gordon on Black Rose. A game he loves.
    42:37
    A man of good taste. Yes. So I ended up taking... What did I get that year? 11th or something, I think. That wasn't bad for me. Especially when I went in in the 15th seed. But still.
    42:50
    Curse that Black Rose. Speaking of curses, I think you have some not so optimistic stuff to cover in the video game segment. So we can get going with that. We're going to jump over to video games. I'm going to do this in a slightly different order than it's in the notes. Okay.
    43:07
    Just because I want to do the follow-up stuff from our last episode. Remember, last episode we talked about the coronavirus and the Overwatch League having so many games in China. Yep. And a few days after our last episode came out, they did announce that all of the in China games in February and March have been canceled.
    43:32
    They have not announced when they are going to be moved to or when they're going to be played. That's to be announced in the future. But for now, they've all been canceled. So that's going to reduce the number of Overwatch to be watched for the next several weeks. like five of the first seven weeks, if I remember right. I mean, so are they not, their hope is to try and do those later in the year is the thinking? That's what it sounds like. Saying, okay, well, you don't get to have your home games. We're going to host them remote. They might host them remote later in the year, but right now it sounds like their hope is to host them in China later in the year. Well, I mean, there's a huge audience in China that's really into Overwatch. They're some of the most passionate teams. team fans, so I can see why they definitely want to do it when they can. Because all of the Chinese home stands sold out quickly when they went active. Now, two of the Chinese teams for sure, the Dragons and the Charge, are not currently in China. They have moved to South Korea for safety reasons. the hunters are specifically staying in China but they're working under very specific protective things and they're in Chengdu and I haven't heard about the Spark I couldn't find anything I think I saw about Spark giving refunds to those that had bought their homestand tickets that's all I've seen yeah but I haven't seen anything from the team Okay. Yeah, I haven't died. So, we'll see. But Overwatch League has started. Yep, yesterday. We watched most of it, most but not all of it yesterday. Yep, the New York homestand. Yep, the New York homestand and the Dallas. It looked well attended.
    45:39
    New York looked well attended. Dallas seemed pretty well attended. It was harder to tell. Dallas, I think, was a bigger facility. That could be it. Because it seemed like Dallas had a lot more areas that were far enough back from the crowd shots on the camera. I couldn't tell if there was a lot of people back there or a few people because it was kind of dark. Yes. But, yeah, they seemed well attended, which isn't a surprise.
    46:03
    The production? The production. I almost sent you a video this morning of one where they superimposed and it was showing, I don't know what movie it was from, but basically a woman like in a uh in a habit a nun uh but her face was the london spitfire logo and then behind her was another woman in like a black habit with the nyxl logo and the one in the white is holding up a lantern and she's like hello hello and then i guess it's from a horror movie and but a jesus groove box that's how it gets her oh yeah it's just oh man their production i don't know i don't know if they're rusty because the league's been gone for months and months six seven months yeah or if they you know they're letting all of the other people they've they've released everybody else maybe they relieved all released all the production staff and they're training all new production staff but yeah the production was terrible yeah and that my cheese Cheez-Its, for those that most of you won't know, what happened was Cheez-Its is a big sponsor currently, and that's fine. But they actually were running the ads with the games going, and you could hear the game audio, but you can't see anything because it's showing you a box of Cheez-Its. There was an instance on the King's Row map between London and New York, which was the highlight game of the NYXL Homestead. Right. Because London is a former, well, not with the current players, but is a former world champion team. New York is seen as being in the top four every year. And there's a solid rivalry between the two. Yes. And there was a minute where you couldn't see anything because the Cheez-Its box was on the screen, full screen. couldn't see anything. And they did the same thing during between match commentaries at one point when they were talking when the desk was talking and showing clips. It was just the Cheez-It box on the screen the whole time while they're talking. So there's that. There were there was some more to me more understandable but sluggish bad swapping from viewpoints where all of a sudden you'd be looking like out of Symmetra turret or there'd be a delay and they'd switch to someone coming back from spawn instead of someone who was in the fight. You would have instances. Oh, apparently the commentator desk is now just in LA. Yes. And the green screen is not that good. Here's the thing. What do they need a green screen for?
    48:44
    I think they're trying to still look like the Blizzard Arena. They could just put normal stuff up and just have a normal desk. A set. They could do a little set. They could just have a set and leave it up and they'd be fine. Nope, green screen. That's how we, NA production. It did not look good. NA is for North American because in the world of Overwatch, the North American stuff is always the worst. It is. It makes us look bad. I do not understand some of the choices that have been made.
    49:13
    Not just the Cheez-It Groove, also the Coca-Cola victory moment that as soon as a match ended, they just would cover the screen with Coca-Cola victory moments so you don't see a moment they don't show a moment it's just a giant thing that says here's the Coca-Cola victory moment and then the commentators are talking about other stuff they're not talking about a gameplay you're not showing you a clip of gameplay it's just like oh we didn't get to watch the players shake hands because it's the victory moment I mean it was horrible the only thing I will say that I have appreciated and I don know if this I assume this is because they shifted over to YouTube but I not inundated with ads at every single break And that's been nice. That's been very nice. I'd rather just have the timer up and not have to constantly hear, because, yeah, they've got their Overwatch ads, but then we were always getting hit with the regular Twitch ads. here get the Terminator 2 skin well yeah you were in the command center because I paid for the command center but I didn't so I always had to get the Terminator 2 skin for Gears of War 5 no I don't have Gears of War 5 Gears 5 excuse me I do now but I didn't then I didn't need no Terminator skin if you'd gotten it you'd have it they probably made more money off those Terminator skins than they did off of that new Terminator movie probably that's what they say worst performing Terminator movie ever Even though I've heard that it is not the worst Terminator movie. That's what I've heard. I've heard it is much better than Genesis. I could not get through 15 minutes of Genesis. I looked away and then became confused. And then I read about it and it was like, yes, apparently you can't ever look away on Genesis because you'll miss all the hops of what's going on. And I was like, okay, well, I don't want to think on a Terminator movie. What do you think this is, The Godfather? You've got to be kidding me. Yeah, it's bad. But it's interesting you brought up Wow I probably blew that out with that really loud But that was Maybe it is pretty strong As I wait for Real strong spike right there It's funny that you brought up Gears Because the announcement was made that Rod Ferguson studio head For the Gears War Franchise Has left He has joined Blizzard to take over the Diablo franchise. Wow. He probably should have taken over the Warcraft 3 Reforged franchise. Probably should have.
    51:50
    He's only known as a fixer. You hit a certain point, even a fixer can't make it better. So do you construe his involvement with Diablo as a good sign or a bad sign?
    52:01
    I see it as a good sign. He's been well regarded for the work he's done in the past because he was known as the person who brought Bioshock Infinite out of its development hell and got it released. Okay, and yeah, that ended up pretty good. I enjoyed that game. He was deeply involved with Gears and all good games.
    52:25
    Gears 5, he was the head guy for Gears 5, and I think it's a good thing. I think it shows that Activision Blizzard has concerns. So they don't want to screw it up. I don't think they can afford to screw it up. They've burned decades worth of Blizzard goodwill. It's gone. Well, but you know, a lot of people felt this was going to be inevitable once Activision got them. And they were right. Once Activision got them and enough of the old cadre was gone. It has felt to me, perhaps I'm wrong. I'm off on him. But it has felt to me like Activision, over the last year really, looked at EA and said, we're the number one publisher in the world of video games. Why are we losing to EA on the hate wagon? We should be the most hated, not them. So what can we do? They're really screwing up Star Wars, so we got to go big or go home. And they went big. Yeah. And meanwhile, EA, very successful on that latest Star Wars. It beat their expectations. Yeah. But over 2 million copies sold. It's very popular. It's well-reviewed. It almost will now assuredly get a sequel, given the success that it had. And it was a case of, hey, look, you gave people a single-player story. What they wanted in Star Wars was a single-player story. I mean, Battlefront's fun, but other than that, most of their projects have been disasters. And I'm sure there are execs at EA who are sitting there like, but how did that game make money? How did people like that game? How did we do it without a loot crate? It doesn't have loot crates. It's not multiplayer. Why would people play that game? Loot crate. Nope.
    54:10
    I mean, see, they just... That's not our... Their model is loot crates and then find a reason for people to buy loot crates. Yes. Yeah. I mean, that's literally what their model has become. That is what they have relied upon for years now. And... I guess they kind of lost their way. That's why people were looking to people like Bethesda for single-player experiences, and then Bethesda Fallout 76 is us, because they want to get on the same bandwagon of having a living game.
    54:37
    And there's a place for living games like Overwatch, but not every game should be that. Right. I can understand them wanting to have a game like that, just have continuous funding rolling in. Right. Makes sense. Yeah. every game doesn't have to be bad. You need one game that can do it. Fallout 76 is not that game. Yeah. So, but back to Blizzard. I know, I took us on a little tangent, but it was all related to the hate that Activision Blizzard now feels. So tell us about some more of the hate, Tony, because as you crack your knuckles with glee, because you may hate pinball drama almost as much as I do, but you relish this video game stuff. Warcraft 3 Reforged was announced at BlizzCon 2018. Yes. They had that beautifully done cinematic. Yep, I remember. It was really epic looking. I've not played Warcraft 3, by the way. You've never played Warcraft 3? No. Oh, wow. Only one and two. Well, they had this beautiful cinematic. It looked lovely. It was one of their big announcements. It was the same time they announced WoW Classic that they were going to put out Warcraft 3 Reforged, taking the most popular of the Warcraft games and modernizing it and making it look better and doing some UI fixes and just making it this whole new visual appeal while keeping the story and everything that people love about that. But since it's Activision Blizzard as opposed to Blizzard, they had this grandiose idea, and then they put a stake in its heart. No, no. Vampiric. And buried it at the crossroads. It is an enormous embarrassment. It crashed and burned so hard. the big things that people were talking about UI improvements just better graphics the new cinematics well the UI is not improved and a lot of people think it's worse the cinematics aren't there at all that should have been the easy stuff the cinematics they have are basically lightly upgraded versions of the original cinematics because according to them, they didn't want to change the feel of the game. So the cinematic, the huge cinematic upgrade, which is what lots of people were looking forward to and thought would be cool, they got rid of. It's just, it's not happening. It's just gone.
    57:27
    Okay. They created a whole new back end to connect for the internet play. All right. Makes sense. That back end also applies to people who own the original Warcraft 3. Makes less sense. That back end doesn't work. Makes no sense. A lot of the stuff that has been available for Warcraft 3 for years, stuff for running tournaments, stuff for clans, stuff for allowing you to do custom campaigns, it's either gone or not working.
    58:11
    But we can still play at a LAN party. No. because there is no offline play now. There's no LAN play. There's no offline play. You have to be able to contact the server.
    58:27
    And Warcraft 3, one of the big things people loved about Warcraft 3 is it had a very robust game editor that lets you do a lot to it. That's where Dota came from. Dota was a mod that was created using that engine. Back in the day when I mentioned I played the first two Warcrafts, I used to use Warcraft 2's game editor and make custom campaign games for us to play against hardest tuned AI systems. That was my thing. Yeah.
    58:59
    So how's that work now? Well, it's still there. Oh, good. But anything you do on it is owned by Blizzard. And they can delete it or keep it or sell it or make money off of it or do whatever they want to. This is their response to the Dota problem. That's right. Because Dota isn't theirs. Dota's not theirs. Because the people who did Dota in the game engine for Warcraft 3 were hired by Valve. And they made Dota 2 completely separate. Right.
    59:32
    That's why... And Blizzard has their own knockoff version that they had to come out with later. Right. Which is Heroes of the Storm. Yeah. Yeah, which, guess what, isn't as popular as Dota 2 or League of Legends. Right. Nope. It's the distant third. Yeah. So, it has just turned into this giant mess. They have said that they are releasing patches, and there are patches on the way. The first patch coming out is over 2 gig.
    60:13
    that's supposed to repair some of the stuff. It's supposed to give back clan support. And some of those things that have been in for years and is gone. But a lot of the other stuff is still, it's, who knows. Why'd it come out like this?
    60:29
    Because, honestly, they rushed it out. That they needed to? Or what? I mean, I don't know. I think the fact that it was an 18- I mean, it's like a remaster, so that's what confuses me. I don't understand how you screw up a remaster. I mean, the game is buggy. It's got video hitches. It crashes.
    60:50
    You cannot load into custom campaigns from any of the normal loading screens. There's a way to do it, but you have to do some really wonky, go into the game editor and launch into it type stuff. It wasn't play tested enough. That's what most of this is, is it wasn't play tested enough, and I don't think they know what the people wanted. And the problem is, is they destroyed people who were playing Warcraft 3 still, which was still a fairly popular game, because they destroyed Warcraft 3's back end and put it on top of this. Right.
    61:26
    So they stepped in it. They stepped in it and they fell in the mud. It is one of those things that has been an issue.
    61:36
    They have, we've talked in the past multiple times, about this new thing that's apparently so popular of review bombing games. Yes. On Metacritic, Warcraft III Reforged is the lowest ranked game of all time. Its current ranking is .5. But in this case, do you think that this sort of review bombing is fair? Because it is about the game. Whereas a lot of times when we've talked about review bombing, it was, oh, I don't like that you put it on the Epic Store, so I'm going to say your game is bad. Right. Whereas it does, to me, from what you've summarized, sound like Warcraft 3 Reforged is just bad. It is bad. It is just bad. And you don't want to give it a good review if it's bad. Right. And I think in this case, the review bombing would be considered fair. Okay. I'm not against it. Because, again, it's not like, oh, I'm review bombing you because you're on the Epic Game Store, or I'm review bombing you because I don't like your politics, or I'm review bombing you because... Because that's disingenuous. Right. You're saying that the game, the review is about the game and you disagree with its person or how it was released. But that's not about the game to me. Right. But this, all of the stuff you've highlighted is about the oven. You didn't say anything here about like how it was launched and complained about how, oh, well, they put it out on Battle.net. And I didn't like that. You didn't mention that. Right. No, and in their defense, I have a hard time saying it. I think it's because it's the only good way to do it is that they have announced that they are changing their normal requirements for getting refunds. Yes, I read that as well. because normally within requirements for getting a refund is it's time locked based upon how much time you've played the game and when your first time on the game was, if you put too much time on the game, they won't issue a refund. If you've done, you know, if it's been too long since you installed the game, you don't get a refund, stuff like that. Uh, they have changed that and they are making it official that you can get refunds for this game just period.
    64:02
    A lot of people pre-ordered because how could they screw up a remaster of what was already a great game? But it's back again to a conversation we've had many a time. Don't pre-order games. Yep. I mean, don't pre-order video games. Really do not pre-order a pinball machine. I mean It's gonna happen That's the only way to get a new machine From Spooky But It's just a bad idea Because you don't know what you're getting It's tough But it shouldn't be tough on the video game side It shouldn't be Because there's no false scarcity And you can get what it wants When it comes out And the reviews on the game And the player copies and reviewers tend to be out a couple of days before the game. So you should be able to still get the game on launch day if you want. But I don't know. Well, we'll keep an eye on this and feed off of this drama like little baby sharks.
    65:09
    No. I was thinking of it, but no. No. You will die. Baby shark. I am the ocean. I am Daddy Shark.
    65:28
    Oh, Daddy Shark. Daddy Shark, you're breaking my heart. Once more, the Finns will rule the ocean. That's a good spot I think we're good there Well, if you need to reach out To know the continuation Of the Baby Shark Saga You can email us to EclecticGamersPodcast at gmail.com Or you can contact us Facebook.com slash EclecticGamersPodcast We're available on Instagram Twitter and Twitch As Eclectic underscore Gamer And we should be back in a couple of weeks Two weeks Until then My name is Dennis I am Tony And we will say goodbye for now Peace