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Episode 76_Pinville with Marcus Petersen (1)

The Spinner Is Lit Pinball Podcast·podcast_episode·1h 15m·analyzed·Jun 18, 2025
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claude-haiku-4-5-20251001 · $0.033

TL;DR

Marcus Petersen built a pinball community in rural Northern California through leagues and tournaments.

Summary

Marcus Petersen of Pinville shares his journey from childhood pinball discovery through competitive play to building a thriving pinball community in Susanville, California. He details how he created multiple pinball leagues, an annual Pinville tournament modeled after Pinberg, and established pinball locations that now support 27 machines across the county. The episode emphasizes community building, operator challenges, and the social fabric that pinball creates.

Key Claims

  • Marcus first played Sorcerer at age 9-10 in a bowling alley at 50 cents per play and found it too expensive to learn on.

    high confidence · Marcus Petersen, opening autobiography segment

  • Marcus played Roadshow in the 90s and decided to buy that machine someday, which he did later.

    high confidence · Marcus Petersen, personal history

  • Marcus attended Pinberg in 2012 after losing his job and using severance to travel to tournaments via free flights from his girlfriend who was a flight attendant.

    high confidence · Marcus Petersen, tournament history

  • Marcus moved to Susanville 10 years ago (roughly 2014-2015) and thought his pinball days were over due to the small town population.

    high confidence · Marcus Petersen, relocation narrative

  • Marcus placed a beat-up Earth Shaker in a dive bar on Main Street in Susanville, and it shook the entire building when the machine shook.

    high confidence · Marcus Petersen, venue placement story

  • Brad Grant won the Charland Award in the same year he bought three additional machines after saying he would reduce his collection.

    medium confidence · Spencer (host), anecdote about Brad Grant

  • Marcus started a high school pinball league during COVID (around 2020-2021) with about a dozen kids, then started an adult league after a parent requested it.

    high confidence · Marcus Petersen, COVID-era community building

  • Marcus now has 27 pinball machines on location across multiple locations in the county and operates Highway to Gaming Zone with 18 machines.

    high confidence · Marcus Petersen, current operational scale

  • The first Pinville tournament had 24 players (split roughly 50/50 between Susanville and Reno), and the second year had increased attendance with travelers from California.

    high confidence · Marcus Petersen, tournament attendance

Notable Quotes

  • “I timed it. Try less than 30 seconds.”

    Marcus Petersen @ Early in episode — Humorous anecdote about how difficult Sorcerer is to learn on, emphasizing the challenge of learning pinball on expensive machines

  • “I was like, man, this is awesome. You play two player games, you know, it's way more interactive, you know?”

    Marcus Petersen @ Mid-episode, discussing pinball with his son — Explains why pinball appeals as a bonding and interactive experience

  • “There's two things you run into two constraints to collecting pinball and it's money and it's space.”

    Marcus Petersen @ Mid-episode, collecting discussion — Core insight about the practical barriers to pinball collecting

  • “You just didn't make it as long as what it is in Pinberg. You play 10 rounds and then you play another 10 rounds the next day and then you play for the finals. So you shorten it to five on a Saturday and then four on a Sunday.”

    Mark (co-host) @ Late episode, Pinville tournament format discussion — Explains how Pinville tournament successfully adapted the Pinberg format for a smaller community

  • “I don't mean to spoil the surprise. Yeah, that's what all those splatters are. It probably covers up other things, too. Who knows?”

    Spencer (host) @ Mid-episode bathroom discussion — Humorous commentary about the Highway to Gaming Zone bathroom's black-light decor

  • “Start in a league, man. If you can find just a few people, start advertising, getting the word out. It's like a bowling league.”

    Marcus Petersen @ Late episode, advice to Spencer about building community — Practical community-building advice applicable to underserved markets

  • “It's amazing the people it's drawn in. I mean, I've had up to 45 players in a league, in a league night up here.”

    Spencer (host) @ Late episode, Casper, Wyoming community discussion — Demonstrates the scale of community that can develop from grassroots league initiatives

Entities

Marcus PetersenpersonSpencerpersonDanpersonMarkpersonBrad GrantpersonTed McGintypersonThe Spinner Is Lit Pinball PodcastorganizationPinvilleeventLassen PinballorganizationReno Pinball Leagueorganization

Signals

  • ?

    community_signal: Marcus Petersen built a pinball league community in rural Susanville from scratch, growing from initial 8 players to 45+ players in league nights, creating sustainable weekly engagement and spreading to adjacent markets

    high · Marcus stated he started with 8 players, grew to league nights with up to 45 players, and the Reno community (1.5 hours away) also grew from Mark's initiatives, with many players now traveling to Susanville events

  • ?

    event_signal: Pinville tournament launched as annual event modeled on Pinberg format; first year had 24 players (50/50 Susanville/Reno split), second year saw increased out-of-state travel; now established as recurring event

    high · Marcus described first year Pinville with 24 players, second year with increased travel from California regions, and goal to grow to 60+ players; tournament format explicitly mirrors Pinberg's tiered bracket structure

  • ?

    venue_signal: Highway to Gaming Zone in Susanville expanded to accommodate pinball; developed 80s arcade aesthetic with black-light bathroom, neon, and vintage carpet; now features 18 pinball machines and hosts tournaments

    high · Marcus and hosts described venue opening back arcade area with black light, neon, classic carpet aesthetic; expanded from initial 5-6 machines to 18; hosts Pinville tournament with 8 banks of 4 machines

  • ?

    operational_signal: Marcus Petersen operates 27 pinball machines across multiple locations in Lassen County; manages league play, tournaments, and public access; demonstrates successful operator model in rural market

    high · Marcus stated 'I got 27 games on location here in this county' and 18 machines at Highway to Gaming Zone; operates Lassen Pinball league website and manages multiple venues

Transcript

groq_whisper · $0.227

0:00
It's M. Bill, we're playing, lights flashing bright Crowds are cheering loudly, pinballs in the night Bells and whistles sounding, as we take our aim Hands on the flippers, we're winning this game Pinville, Pinville, shoot to thrill Pinville, Pinville, shoot to kill Who's gonna win the ultimate prize Deep in the heart of Susanville We're racking up the scores Digits turning fast Every move is perfect That victory will last Fans are on the edge Watching with delight High scores on the board Here on this night Pinville, Pinville Shoot to thrill Pinville, Pinville Shoot to kill Who's gonna win the ultimate prize Deep in the heart of Susanville
1:21
We're racking up the scores Digits turning fast Every move is perfect That victory will last Fans are on the edge Watching with delight High scores on the boards Here on this night Pindle, Pindle, shoot to drill Pindle, Pindle, shoot to kill Who's gonna win the ultimate prize Deep in the heart of Susanville Welcome to the Spinner's Lit Pinball Podcast Tonight's episode is episode 76. We have Marcus Peterson of Pinbill. With me tonight, as always, are my co-hosts and good pals, Dan. Hey, what's going on, guys?
2:35
Mark. Hey, everyone. And our guest host, Marcus Peterson of Pinbill. Welcome. Thank you much. Honored to be here.
2:44
Yeah, it's good to have you. So before we actually get into pinball, I like to go back to the beginning, jump in the way back machine, take us back before pinball and where you got started, your beginning, your discovery of pinball, if you will. Oh, yeah. Well, I was like nine or ten probably in the bowling alley trying to learn pinball playing sorcerer. And it cost 50 cents a play. And that was two candy bars back in that day. and I realized real quick I was not going to learn how to play pinball at this cost. And so I kind of gave up. It was something that I always wanted to learn, but I really couldn't afford it as a kid. Well, Sorcerer's a real ball breaker to learn on too, right?

  • Mark (co-host) started the Reno Pinball League, which grew the Reno community significantly and now includes team-based tournaments organized by Ted McGinty.

    high confidence · Mark (co-host), Reno league history

  • “Pinball brings us all together and it's really cool to create friendships with with people from all different you know the whole scope, you know?”

    Marcus Petersen @ Late episode, community reflection — Core theme about pinball as a social connector across diverse populations

    • Highway to Gaming Zonevenue
    Pinbergevent
    Pinball Museumvenue
    Roadshowgame
    Sorcerergame
    Earth Shakergame
    Monday Night Footballgame
    Susanvillevenue
    Renovenue
    Casper, Wyomingvenue
    Charland Awardevent
    ?

    community_signal: COVID-era high school pinball league created stable youth engagement in Susanville; served as mental health alternative to cancelled extracurriculars; sustained for 2+ seasons with ~12 participants

    high · Marcus described wife's concern about high schoolers seeking antidepressants due to cancelled activities; responded with high school pinball league that ran 2 seasons with dozen participants and then parent-requested adult league

  • $

    market_signal: Pinball infrastructure limited in rural areas; Susanville (9,000 people) and Casper, Wyoming (59,000 people) lack native pinball scenes; successful models depend on individual operator initiative and community building

    high · Marcus moved to Susanville 10 years ago and thought pinball days were over due to small town; Spencer relocated to Casper and described limited scene (6-7 machines total, operator apathetic); both now building communities from scratch

  • ?

    community_signal: Reno and Susanville pinball communities connected through shared tournaments and events; Reno league growth (Mark's initiative) spilled over with players traveling to Pinville; demonstrates regional network effects

    high · Mark stated Reno Pinball League started to build consistency and grew community 'leaps and bounds'; first Pinville tournament split 50/50 Susanville/Reno; second year expanded with out-of-state travel; now interdependent event calendar

  • ?

    competitive_signal: Pinville tournament successfully adapted Pinberg's tiered bracket structure to smaller player base; reduced from 20 rounds (Pinberg) to 9 rounds (Pinville: 5 Sat + 4 Sun); maintained competitive depth with era-based machine banks

    high · Mark explained Pinville format mirrors Pinberg (multiple eras, tiered brackets based on points/skill) but compressed to 5 Saturday + 4 Sunday rounds; creates matched skill-level competition while reducing logistical burden

  • ?

    restoration_signal: Marcus used beat-up Earth Shaker in Susanville dive bar as entry point to location-based pinball; machine's shaking mechanics became venue attraction; demonstrates value of worn machines in bootstrap operations

    medium · Marcus placed 'old routed beat it up Earth Shaker' in dive bar; noted 'when it shook, man, the whole bar would shake like the whole building was fantastic'; led to game shop owner's interest in pinball

  • ?

    collector_signal: Marcus bought 5 machines from Phoenix via Craigslist in 2008 for $5,200 total; borrowed money from bank; immediately flipped some to pay off debt; demonstrates acquisition strategy for bootstrapping collection

    high · Marcus described buying 5 DMD games for $5,200 via Craigslist Phoenix run; took bank loan; sold couple right away to pay it off; noted timing was right before 2010 pinball market heating up

  • ?

    historical_signal: 1980s-90s pinball cost barriers (50 cents per play) prevented youth participation; Sorcerer's short ball times (30 seconds) made learning expensive and frustrating; theme licensing and production quality improved by 90s Roadshow era

    high · Marcus played Sorcerer at 50 cents per play (~2 candy bars in value), had <30 second ball times, gave up on learning; returned to pinball via Roadshow in 90s with more complex theme and longer gameplay; noted Roadshow was 'really stacked' with features

  • ?

    industry_signal: Pinball scenes in underserved regions (Susanville, Casper, Reno pre-2020) require individual operator/champion effort to establish; once initiated, leagues create self-sustaining communities with 15-45+ committed participants and event calendars

    high · Marcus single-handedly built Susanville community from zero; Mark did same for Reno; Spencer now replicating model in Casper with early traction; all described league as viral mechanism for community growth and retention

    • 3:32
    Very true. 50 cents a play in Sorcerer, that's like 90 seconds of fun. Try less than 30. I timed it.
    3:41
    I timed it. yeah yeah thanks for all that power i'm trying to learn how to flip one flipper at a time and uh i was like man i could have had you know a kit kat and a whatchamacallit for that you know so so i kind of gave up on pinball i got older in the 90s i went out and played uh at the arcade they had a road show and uh i played it for the first time and uh i was like wow, I really do want to learn pinball. And so, and says, man, if I ever have a chance, I'm going to buy this machine.
    4:21
    And that's kind of the opposite effect roadshow usually has on people. I loved it. I thought it was amazing. It's a cool game. I'm just being a dick. Two talking heads. I mean, are you kidding me? And construction and all kinds of construction, construction, country music, innuendos.
    4:39
    Yeah. And destruction. so anyway outdated racial stereotypes that's right it was really cutting edge back in the 90s you know it was it really was like it was Lawler's like what second or third game after the whole Adams family Twilight Zone and yeah you could tell that he didn't have much of a limit on to what they were letting them spend because Roadshow really is a stacked game there's a lot in that thing there's a lot going on but, um, fast forward another like 10 years though. And I had, uh, had my son Jesse and he was like six and we were doing lots of Xbox and he was doing Xbox. But I was like, man, I want to do something that's more, you know, relational. I was like, I wonder if there's any pinball. So I Googled it and found the pinball museum in Alameda and, and I was in San Rafael at the time and went out there to check it out myself first and just absolutely fell head over heels immediately.
    5:46
    And I was like, man, I got to get my boy out here. So we went out there and sure enough, I didn't know what he was going to think, but he was like six, seven years old, something like that. And I was like, okay, one flipper at a time, starting there. And it turned out that he really took to it and really started liking it. I was like, man, this is awesome. You play two player games, you, you know, it's, it's way more interactive, you know? So, um, I started playing that, started hearing about leagues, found out you could be in a league and started playing in a league out in Fairfield at Brad Grant's house and was absolutely jaw dropped, amazed at his collection. And, um, Um, so it's one of those times that you realize that there's, that there's crazy and then there's absolutely insane. Yeah. That is beautifully insane. I'll tell you real quick. Brad story about three years ago, three or four years ago at golden state. And he says, I'm selling three games. I mean, I'm still, you know, reading the collection way down. Don't let me buy any more games. I'm like, okay.
    7:00
    Mark, how that turned out. So at the end of the weekend, I'm like, well, what happened? He goes, I sold those for you. I'm like, great. I'm like, what the hell are those? He goes, well, I bought four more. Or he bought three. I'm like, wait a minute. You told me you were buying more games. What the hell happened? He goes, well, you were there to stop me.
    7:21
    It's obviously your fault, Spencer. It's obviously my fault. Look what you've done. That was the same year that he won the Charland Award, along with Steve Face and Greg Ong. He had to celebrate. He could not buy any games that year. I mean, come on, man. What would he have to remember that by? Exactly. Some kind of baloney award? No. Machines. I call everybody that are the winners and let them know they won. They're getting the award to be at the dinner. I'm the one who makes the phone call. So I called Brad and said, hey, we're giving the award to Steve. I think it was Steve. I was like, we really need you to be there. say a few nice words about Steve. He's like, oh, okay, no problem. So he gets to the dinner and finds out it's Steve and Greg and him. And he's like, why did you tell me this before? I'm like, because you wouldn't have come. Yeah, because we needed you to show up. We needed you to show up, and he wanted to show up because he's a very humble guy. Anyway, didn't want to take away from you, but, no, I didn't know that you got all this through Brad. So that's awesome that you know Brad. So please continue, sir. Yeah, no, yeah. League is so inviting. I love League.
    8:37
    So by the time you were playing in League, did you have games already? I did not, no. Okay, so how quick after meeting Brad did you start buying games? Man, as soon as possible. I can tell you that. It's a disease, right? Like you get next game, you just catch it. Yeah, and so it was probably right around there, 08, I think. I had a Craigslist search nationwide, you know, looking for looking for trouble, looking for pinball lots. I wanted to get the only way I could have pulled it off is if I bought more than one and then, you know, got a deal and then sold some. And then I was able to, you know, that was my that was my strategy. Well, it paid off. I bought five machines in Phoenix. I got my brother-in-law and my dad's big cargo truck, and we tag-teamed driving down Phoenix nonstop and showed up and picked up five games, one of them, of course, Roadshow.
    9:41
    And took a loan out of the bank and bought all five games, came home, sold a couple right away, tried to pay it off. But anyway, that's how I started collecting was with five DMD games for fifty two hundred dollars. Well, that was a good era to be buying games. Yeah, because, you know, right before 2010, pinball hadn't really heated back up. So, you know, what a great moment to start building your collection.
    10:10
    I felt like I won the lottery and was was super happy to to have them in the in the in the house. yeah, I had a neighbor just a few months before had Bugs Bunny's birthday bash. And he says, I'm moving. Can you keep this machine for a little while? I'm like, dude, you like pinball? I'm like, yeah, I love it. Anyway, so we had that. My son and I would play that every morning before school. And we was like, man, we've got to have one of these in the house because there's nothing like waking up and just hit and start. So how did you go from pinball aficionado to pinball player to now pinball collector to where you are now? Yeah. So 20, a few years later, I lost my job and I got a decent severance. And so I had my girlfriend, I was a flight attendant, so I could fly anywhere for free. And I started going around to competitions. So I flew anywhere where I knew I could stay for free somewhere and play in a competition. So I had a relative in Pittsburgh. So I went to Pinberg. That was 2012. And then and went back for the Papa Championships and, and, um, but, um, Northwest show, you know, just went around to different, uh, tournaments that I could get to. And, uh, I was like, wow, this is a whole nother world, but really loved, uh, the tournament challenge, you know, a totally different way to play. And, uh, but more than anything, I was just like amazed at how much fun pinberg was that you would qualify it would it didn't sell out back then i think there was like 130 some players in the tournament and um yeah like right on the cusp before it got like you know the 30 second sellouts exactly exactly um but like the coast to coast pinball days i remember hearing about pinberg on uh like coast to coast pinball and just being like oh my god that sounds amazing you have a bank of four machines from you know uh well back then it was three eras because there was no uh lcd screens and so it was em and then solid state and then dmd quote unquote modern modern right and uh and they so they'd always have two of one of the eras in the bank of four, but man, you, you play for what a whole day. And then the next day you play only in your group. So you're, it's way more competitive. It's really more to your level that you play against. And I just thought that was so fun because I didn't have to go up against the Elwins and the linemen's and the, you know, all these guys that were absolutely incredible. like the glass was off when they played compared to me.
    13:09
    It was just so much fun because you played so much pinball, and then it got competitive, and then you're competing against people who are in your same skill bracket. So I was just like, man, it doesn't get any better than this. This is by far and away my favorite tournament format. And so you got back and just sort of decided to bring that home? Well, no. Actually, I got married and moved to Susanville from the Bay Area 10 years ago. And I thought my pinball days were over because there was, you know, it's a town of 9,000 people.
    13:52
    The sign going into town says 17,000, but that's because there was two prisons when they put that sign up and they counted all the prison population.
    14:00
    and well they get mail so yeah so for tax purposes we're 17 000 but really there's only 9 000 that are free so uh but uh yeah susanville for the folks not in the know is this really uh little town not like tiny not like 35 people town but a small a small city up in uh up in remote northern California. Yeah. Northeastern California. The next thing you get to is, is Oregon in about three hours. And, uh, so people travel through, but that's about it. Um, but yeah, there's, you know, no pinball scene, nothing going on. And, uh, but I actually had room now instead of living in the Bay area, I have a bigger place. So I started filling up my garage with pinball and um you know friends would come over people play you know it was okay but you know you know pinball is just so much more fun playing with friends than it is uh solo but uh the uh a game shop opened up in town after i had a pinball i put a i talked the bar we had one dive bar on main street and i talked him into putting in a pinball machine and i put an old routed beat it up earth shaker and, um, and it, and it had a cellar and it had this wood floor. And when it shook, man, the whole bar would shake like the whole building. It was fantastic. And, uh, but, uh, the bartender was friends with this guy who was opening up a game shop. And so the game shop, uh, the guy was talking to him. He says, Hey man, you ought to have pinball machine in your game shop. Cause he's like, you know, buys and sells video games, you know, like a used video game shop primarily. Yeah, like a Funkoland kind of place. Kind of like that. Kind of like a GameStop kind of used games. And then also, you know, other, you know, those board games where they set them up and they paint all their figurines and stuff, whatever that's called. You know, I don't know. Hammer. Yeah, stuff like that. Yeah. So, yeah, he came over, the owner, and I said, yeah, you want to check out these pinballs? And so I showed him my garage, and it has like 15 games in it, and they're all, you know, beautiful and on and working.
    16:27
    He just, his eyes got so wide and his jaw dropped. He goes, what? And he said, I was expecting somebody with, you know, a couple of dirty old dusty machines with boxes all over them in a corner. And I go, no, no, everything works here. I go, he goes, oh man, can you make my shop look like your garage? And I said, uh, I, the Brad Grant in me said, uh, are you kidding? Absolutely. once you're a collector of the level of like a brad you know the biggest thing that you want is just like somebody to walk up to you and go like hey can you put your games into my space and you're like where where have you been all my life yeah there's are you enabling me to buy more games and have more space i'm in there's two things you run into two uh constraints to collecting pinball and it's money and it's space. And if you, either of those, you know, usually you can get around money though. You can find deals. Because money is insurmountable. Space is where it gets really awkward. Space is really tough to overcome. So, so, uh, so I was real happy to hear that. And so I put one in and I had a couple more in, I think I got it up to six, five, five machines in there. And then COVID hit. And then my wife is a doctor in town. And all the high schoolers were coming to her for antidepressants because they had canceled all the extracurriculars. So the kids had nothing to do and they were all getting depressed. And so my wife's like, man, you got to do something. And I'm like, I know, pinball league. So there you go. So I had a high school pinball league at the game shop. And, uh, and so they, they came, I had, I don't know, about a dozen kids, which was great. I had a, had friends who were teachers and they were advertising for me. So, so they came and, um, had fun. And, uh, after like the, I did two seasons with them of kind of like a little league. And then, uh, one of the parents came up and said, well, when do the parents get their league? And I'm like, really? Would you come to a pinball league? And so one person said they wanted it So I said okay let start it So that was what 21 I guess About 20, 21, 2020, right in there. And so we started a league, and that was what I always wanted, is just to play pinball with people who like playing pinball.
    19:13
    Yeah, that's absolutely perfect. Yeah. So have a community, a community is just, I mean, you basically took adversity and, you know, it was an opportunity to create your own pinball community. So that's so that's basically the genesis of of your your organization. What's its last last and pinball? Yeah. Yeah. Last and pinball dot com. The the Web site name was not taken. So I was able to get it. all the people up there like hotly you know it's mine no it's mine there was no bartering for that one so i got it for free so but uh but yeah so we started a league and you know i had eight people about the first season you know it would go it was really good if we had 10 and um then we had a finals and i didn't feel right playing in it uh for the league and then um so uh i sat out the first season the finals but then the second season came around i was like okay now i'm playing it's just too much fun your free ride is over yeah yeah yeah but uh so ever since then it's the last so what for that we did that for a couple years uh two or three seasons a year. And, um, I think we're, we do, we're going to start season 13 next month, you know, a couple of years ago. Well, I was like, well, let's do a tournament, you know, they, okay, let's do a tournament. So we do like a one, you know, afternoon tournament, or we did a tournament for Halloween, like, man, this is fun. And so I'm like, you want to know what's really fun? Pinberg. And so, uh, I was like, man, I want that. I haven't, I have the games now. I built it up. I have 18 games at the location now and opened up a couple other locations. We have, what, 20? I guess I got 27 games on location here in this county. I think we – I don't know who has more pinball per capita, but I got to be in the running on location.
    21:30
    But so we ran it. The first year was a couple years ago, and we had 24 players play for Pinville. And so a bunch of people from Reno. The Reno scene started really taking off thanks to Mark in a major way. Mark started the first league in Reno. Isn't that right, Mark? That is correct. Yep, we had tournaments, and people were not showing up to the tournaments as much. And we're thinking, well, how can we build this community a lot better? by getting more consistency and more buy-in instead of just a one-and-done type of thing. And it ended up that people were committed and came weekly, and the pinball league, the Reno Pinball League, was born. And from there on, the community just kept growing and growing and growing. And now we have tournaments again, and we have leagues that Ted McGinty put together where we're actually playing against other teams. as I've mentioned before in earlier podcasts. But it's just awesome to see the community grow leaps and bounds here in Reno and how it spills over to Lassen in Susanville, too. It's really awesome. Yeah, because that's when I first moved up here. The only chance to really go hang out with pinheads was at Adfago to Reno. So it was like an hour and a half I would drive. And I played in what, your second season, Mark, in league? That's correct. And you won that season, if I'm not mistaken. Oh, that's right. I think I did. You did. Yeah. Oh, yeah. I went to that. I just happened to show up and win. Yep. He did. He came home with a trophy, with a plaque. Yep. But it's fun to be part of something that's growing and building and, you know, getting momentum like that. And the pinball scene in Reno now is just amazing. It's fantastic. and um but uh anyway so yeah we made made lots of connections in reno and figured and so we had 24 people the first year a couple years ago and that was like half half of the players were from susanville and like half were from reno and then last year we tried getting the word out even more and uh johnny o came over from the bay area um who else traveled a little bit we had a couple Few people travel, people from the other parts of California and had a great, great turnout a year ago. And then this now it's become an annual thing. We just got to do this Pinberg tournament every year. It's just too much fun. And the format is great because you really did do a great job in emulating what it's like to play in the pinball or in the Pinberg tournament in Pittsburgh. You just didn't make it as long as what it is in Pinberg. You play 10 rounds and then you play another 10 rounds the next day and then you play for the finals. So you shorten it to five on a Saturday and then four on a Sunday, which would be qualifying. And of course, you did the same thing where you had a upper bracket and you had a lower bracket so that you had people play each other in the same level. It was awesome to see everybody how they were evenly matched when you could see how they were set up based on their record of their number of points that they got. Yeah. Yeah, it's it's it's a lot of work moving all the machines around. And I brought them out of my house, and we had eight banks of four all set up in the game zone and just took over the whole shop, plus an extra for backup. So it was a lot of moving machines around and setting up, but, man, it's so worth it, so much fun. Such a great time. Where is the tournament actually held at in Susanville? So for the first couple of years, we did the first day at the game zone. And then the second day we did at my house. And so people would just camp at my house or whatever. And I, you know, take over my house a little bit and move some machines inside the house out of the garage. And but man, with 40 people in my house, it was just getting a little tight. I was like, man, we got to figure out a way to grow because I want to get, you know, I want to get over 60 is my goal. and um so this year we did it all at the game zone so i brought my collection from the house down to the shop and spread out and it worked out a lot better don't you think mark wasn't there enough space to move around i thought the way that it was laid out and how you had that extra room it was really nicely organized and i did not feel claustrophobic at all uh it was plenty of room the games are very visible easy to find for each of the banks it was such a treat to play four different games from four different eras some of them i've never played unless i go to like a show when i see those rare ones but like monday night football was one of them which was a great one to play really enjoyed that and there were a lot of eums that i've never played before which was cool uh yeah just super fun but yeah the uh the place that you're mentioning, the full name is Highway to Gaming Zone. Is that correct? Off of Main Street? That's right. Yep. Highway to Gaming Zone. Yeah. So you can't miss it if you just keep going. If you get close to the downtown area, you'll see it on the left-hand side if you're driving into Susanville. Yeah. If you can't find something in Susanville, you're not looking very hard. Exactly. You can't fly past it, but it's really nice because if you see before you get to the building, there's a nice open dirt lot where you can park your car, which is really nice. And it's awesome in there. I mean, it's got the neon going. It's got the great classic 80s arcade carpet. It's really awesome. And the bathroom is an attraction in itself.
    27:45
    I'm going to go ahead and tell another weird things to say by Mark. He's like, look, I don't know about this whole tournament thing, but have you seen the bathroom in this place? The bathroom is awesome. Awesome.
    27:58
    Mark is saying to me. Mind-blowing. Yes. Mark says to Mark, you know, previous episodes, hold my beer. I got another one.
    28:07
    Exactly. He's like, look, guys, I don't know how else to sell this guy's event besides to tell everybody, you got to get up to Susanville to check out this toilet, bro.
    28:19
    It is primo. Oh, you got to head to the guys, though, because they had this shop and they had this kind of whole front half of it. And I had my games, you know, five or six games in there. But then they're like, hey, we're going to open up the back half of this building and we're going to make it like a true 80s arcade. And so I'm like, can you can you bring in another 10 machines? I'm like, 10. I'll start working on it. So they totally opened up this back arcade area with, you know, the black light and, you know, the cool carpet. And they did the same thing to their bathroom. They made it all black with neon paint everywhere and black light. So that's what Mark's talking about. I don't mean to spoil the surprise. Yeah, that's what all those splatters are.
    29:06
    It probably covers up other things, too. Who knows? I don't know. I shouldn't have said that out loud. I have poor impulse control.
    29:14
    let's just say you can't tell when the bathroom is dirty when it, when the black lights are on. So yeah, it's cool. Dual purpose. Yeah. Dual purpose. Yeah. It looks like something out of saw.
    29:29
    But yeah, they made it real nice. They decorate the place. Great. They got, you know, posters and things up and they matched the pinball machines. I mean, they, I can't, I can't thank them enough. They really have provided us space. the guy that owns it really is more community minded. And he's like, man, wouldn't it be great to have a place for kids to go, you know, and not do crack, you know, or so.
    29:53
    And I'm like, yeah, I'm all in. Let's let's make this place a little bit better with some pinball. So, yeah, it's been it's been a fun. It's not like I'm not raking in money hand over fist, but it's enough to to keep me going, you know, as far as a hobbyist operator. Well, you're also giving a real public service. You know, those kids, especially during the time of COVID, they're going to be 50, 60 years old, and they're going to own a couple of games. Or they're going to go, hey, remember, you know, when we were in high school, and, you know, that pretty much saved us from losing our minds. And the parents, too, they have something to do other than drink. You know, I'm going through that here and now because, you know, I moved four years ago from, you know, Sacramento area where I was in league with Dan. And I moved to Casper, Wyoming, which is a beautiful, wonderful little town.
    30:47
    Great place to raise a family and live. But there's not a pinball scene here. I'm starting to meet a couple of the collectors and we're starting to make some stuff happen. But it's slow going because, you know, we're the second largest city in the state. It's 59,000 people.
    31:04
    So there's just, you know, so for us, it's like you want to get, you know, see a lot of pinball. You got to drive over to Denver or you got to drive over to Colorado or at least Cheyenne. Cheyenne has a couple of real good locations. We've got six, seven pinball machines in the entire town by one operator. And he doesn't care about pinball at all. He doesn't make any money at it. So he didn't take care of them. He makes his money with billiards and darts. So we're kind of in a similar boat. I'm way behind you on this, but you're giving me real inspiration. So thank you for that, Marcus. Yeah, start in a league, man. If you can find just a few people, start advertising, getting the word out.
    31:49
    It's like a bowling league. Our bowling alley has been shut down since I moved here 10 years ago. There's no bowling. You know, there's, you know, the skating rinks are all gone nowadays for the most part.
    32:07
    But, you know, what about entertainment? What about getting together with other people and, like, seeing people face-to-face and actually interacting and having some fun, you know? So it's amazing the people it's drawn in. I mean, I've had up to 45 players in a league, in a league night up here, you know, because it's like, hey, what are you going to do? Let's just go play some pinball, you know, whatever. And people start playing and start liking it. And then the ones, a certain number of them get hooked. And there's a community here now that's really, really strong and it's really cool. There's, you know, there's at least 20 of us that are real committed now. and we're just we're a bunch of friends and there's just no way we ever would have met any other way you know we're all in different worlds little different tribes you know doing different things but pinball brings us all together and uh it's really cool to create uh friendships uh with with people from all different you know the whole scope you know who just all you do is you like oh you like pinball oh i like pinball okay let's talk about some pinball and before you know it, you've made a friend, you know? I see you like pinball. I like pinball too.
    33:27
    Come here often. Let's be pals. That's literally why we're doing this podcast because we all met, like Dan and I met through League. Wait a minute, I thought we were doing this for the money. We're making a bundle. I can afford domestic here.
    33:48
    And then Mark's on that. At least when it's on sale. There you go. I'm getting some of that Michelob.
    34:01
    You got that beer with the skittles in it? Skittlebrow? Yeah. I don't think that exists. All right, well then give me a pack of Michelob and some skittles. Skittles.
    34:13
    Yeah, but then Mark, I don't know if you know the story, as Mark sort of told you, we met because my wife and I were at Pinnagogo some years ago, probably close to 10 years ago now. And we were waiting in line to play Hobbit, which was a new game that year. And Mark was behind us and said, you want to play with us? And we've been friends ever since. Yep. Yeah, it's really cool. And I was a guest on the show. And then all of a sudden I ended up co-hosting. And now we're best friends beyond just podcast buddies. So it's really cool. Mark you had us at I'll edit it Your show sucks Spence First I'm going to make you a theme Then I'm going to be a guest Then I'm going to edit it Step 4 Tomorrow me and Spencer Are going to be gone And he's going to be like Welcome to Mark is lit This is the greatest podcast on the internet Spencer's going to be an AI bot Yeah, but he's happy he has beer and tortilla chips, so we're good, you know.
    35:22
    Something crunchy while he's at the mic. Hey, see, that was the problem. Before Mark, we thought that was acceptable. We're like, hold on, do we got crunchy snacks and barking dogs? Let's go. But it's not acceptable?
    35:37
    It was just, but you know what it comes down to is it was an excuse to hang out, right? It is. And just like, you know, just like league and just like just like events, you know, which I'm trying to get back on track here. You know, you're you're coming up with a reason to bring people together. And that was one of the things that before we started, you know, before we all moved apart and before you moved away and we started Zen casting, you know, we pretty much did the podcast on location. Yeah, and we have this live from somebody's house. Yep. Around a kitchen table. Somewhere on my coffee table or the kitchen table. Me, Dan, Will, and Brian. Whoever we could get in. And whoever else we could get in. Kendra would come over. Kendra, yep. Kendra's on it. Bud the dog. Alex, a lot of Alex. There was a lot of Alex in those days. Alex showed up an hour and a half late with pizza. Yep. You know.
    36:33
    But yeah, no, and you're building a community. a real community. And that's so much more than just pinball. You're bringing people in the community together that would normally never talk to each other beyond a casual hello, and they're becoming friends through pinball. And that's a beautiful thing. And what's cool is you're doing it in a place that you wouldn't think that would happen.
    36:58
    Yeah, pretty small pickings, you know, only 90,000 people. Yeah, small town USA. and it turns out that what you've created is probably the pinball hotbed of northern California.
    37:15
    At least to Sacramento, between here and Sac and the Oregon coast, that's for sure, or the Oregon border. Even in Oregon, it starts getting ridiculous. Those guys take their pinball very, very seriously. Yeah, we had a guy come down from Eugene for Pinville this year, and he plays competitive up there. But he he was really impressed and that something he's like, man, you should be proud of this scene because people are so the competition was good, but it was friendly. It was just such a encouraging environment He like man this is this is a great scene And I coming back next year and I going to bring some friends And I like that awesome man Thanks for that That yeah He really had a good time. He had a really good time and, and it was a cool vibe and that's what I feel. It was kind of like, you know, we have, we've had all the episodes with golden state and it was kind of like a, a post golden state experience with the tournament. But we weren't there. I didn't get to go. Spencer didn't go. Mark obviously went and we'll hear about that story. But like, let's talk about this year's event. So take us through, take us through this year's event and how it went.
    38:25
    Well, it went great. Shoot, first day, the five rounds, which you figure out is all just to determine whether you're in the top half or bottom half for the next day. And I was playing well. I was it's kind of hard being the TD and doing the playing because you're always getting stuck balls or, you know, checking out machines that might have a malfunction. But I was running around like a chicken with my head cut off. But apparently it was good for my competition, my competitive play, because I didn't get to think about it too much. You know, just like, wait, hold on. I got to go fix this machine. I'll be back. And so, oh, it's my turn. OK, just walk up, start playing. And it took away some of the anxiety of tournament play, you know. And so I played really well the first day. I think I did I get the most points in the first day, Mark? You did. Yeah, I think you were. I think you were first. Yeah, I got I ended up first at the first day. But then the second day, you know, it doesn't matter because it all gets erased and then you get cut in your own half. And so then we played the second day and I did pretty well. And then Ben, though, he – Ben Hillman was part of getting the league going here in a big way, and he went and played in Nevada. Played in Nevada so much, he got to go to the Nevada State Championship last year and went down to Vegas to play. But he edged me out, I think, in the last game on the second day. But he was one and I was two on the second day. So I was feeling pretty good going into the playoffs.
    40:02
    and got through first round of playoffs. We whittled it from eight down to four. And then I met Mark in the finals. And that's trouble. That's the problem. Because now I'm sitting here staring at my Pinville three trophy and it says second place on it. And I think Mark is staring at one that says grand champion, which I'm a little bitter about.
    40:32
    Look, you can't be upset about losing to Mark because you'll just be upset all the time. I knew Mark had it because he texted me and said, I'm feeling really good. I'm doing well. And I don't have to worry about school because school's out. So I'm worried about work. And I'm like, he's got this. And then we talked later and he'd won. And I'm like, I knew as soon as I got that text from him, you have this. Because when Mark gets in the zone, it's pretty tough to knock him down. Yeah. Yeah, well, we were going into the last game on our bank, and it was fishtails. And Mark had six points. Another guy, Steve, had six points, and I had five. So I had to win the thing. On every game, if you get first place, you get three points. If you get second place, you get two. Third place, one. Fourth place, zero, right? So I had to definitely get first place just to force a tie break. to have a chance at winning the thing. And, um, so I, I played ball one and I got, uh, you know, I got the, uh, the monster fish pretty good ball one. I'm like, okay, that's feeling good. I was player two. And then, um, Mark was after me player three. He did. Okay. Um, I think he got his monster fish too. If I remember, did you get your monster fish first ball, Mark? I got monster fish my first ball. Yeah, I did. So we were kind of close. And then ball three came around and I lit up my second monster fish and we were still about the same score. And I lit up my second monster fish, went to hit it, rattled straight down the drain. Yeah. Didn't collect my second. And that would have been very helpful. and then uh so i was only like i was like i don't know three or four hundred thousand over mark so i'm like oh there it goes mark's got it all he's got to do is hit two shots of anything and um he walks up to that thing on ball three and dude leaves no doubt he not only does he get another monster fish then he starts the multi-ball i think he did you get a jackpot multi-ball i did get a jackpot multi-ball yeah jerk yeah yeah and i did hit no you don't have to show off mark yeah well i know well he i was like at 51 million and he was like like at 50 million you know going to last ball after my third ball is at 51 and he was just under me he throws up 161 yeah it was like 160 something yep yeah yeah with the last ball he throws up another 110 million he's like yeah just in case you were wondering. It's like, dude, you're okay, man. Let it drain. Just walk away. You're fine.
    43:26
    But I was a third player, so I had to make sure I was good. That's true. You had to build that buffer. You don't take your foot off the gas. That's true. That's very true. I did not take my foot off the gas. Nothing's worse than being player one, two, or three and running up a good score and you're like, okay, I think I got this, and then watching that dude behind you get in the zone and reel you in, which, I mean, on that game is thematically appropriate. it you're just like oh you bastard just just and i'm the kind of guy who like i hate to root for my opponent to have bad luck right so i hate to sit there and just be like just drain just yeah come on come on outlaying come on gravity come on gravity get him you feel like such a small person when you do that don't you You're just like, I'm such a bastard, but please just die.
    44:17
    It's way better to walk away, Dan. Just don't watch. It's way healthier for your soul. Yep, exactly. Just, I'm going to be in the other room. Yes, have fun. Drinking beer, petting the dog, anything. Anything but watching this happen. Yeah. Come back and tell me if I won later. and then the next game was it toy story that we play was that the last one or was it fish tales was the last one right right yeah the bank was fun land harlem globetrotters fish trails and then toy story that's right and toy story is your game that game you can blow up and i just got very fortunate to keep it alive and get a couple of multiballs. I did start the, uh, what is that called? Travel, travel multiball or what is it called? Road trip. Road trip multiball. Yeah. I got that started. Um, and then I stacked it with some other stuff and, and, uh, did pretty well on that. But, um, that was, it was really a competitive atmosphere in those last four. It was intense, but a lot of fun at the same time because I didn't realize it when I did the math. I played 40. Let's see. 30. We had 32 games, right? And we had four rounds. So nine times four, 36 plus top eight, 40 plus another top four. So 44 games I played in two days. Yeah. That's just pure awesomeness. awesomeness to be able to play that much pinball. Yeah, and across 32 games, different machines. So you get to play a real nice wide variety of machines over two days. It's no better tournament on earth, if you ask me.
    46:14
    I'm not biased, but it's the best because I put it on. Well, not necessarily just because it's mine. It's the best tournament of the year. More like the format. It is. How many players were there? We had 34 this year. It was graduation weekend, so we kind of missed some. So we're going to go back to what we did the last two years. Next year, it'll be the weekend after Father's Day.
    46:40
    Oh, that's good. Okay. That'll be a better weekend for people. Yeah. Yeah, for sure. But, yeah, it was still good. A little more separation from Golden State. Yeah, that's going to help, too. That'll help. that'll help some of us because i know that some of us you know uh shannon went uh and david went he took the the b trophy yeah he's the guy who plays in in our uh folsom league okay so how did it turn out for shannon what happened to him he was riding high and then just the games got the better of him you know i it might have been the laser tag game we played until midnight the night before. I have a pretty cool laser tag system at the house and, you know, I got four acres. And so it was, uh, you know, 11 o'clock and it's like, Hey, what are these? Oh, it's a laser tag. You want to play? It's like, yeah, I want to play. So about, I think, uh, I think six of us. Yeah, six of us strapped it on and went hog wild, run around the fields. Yeah, that might have tuckered him out. At one point, he was climbing the back of a trailer and trying to hide, but he got lit up.
    47:57
    And he did go venture into the shrubbery, let's just put it that way. Yeah, I'm not sure he recovered so well for Sunday. He did not recover so well from that.
    48:10
    I love Shannon. Yeah, Shizzy's a baller. He ain't going to go into the night quietly. Nope. Yeah, and that's the other thing. You know, Saturday night after we play, it's like anybody wants to come over, I still got some games in the garage. Let's play stall ball. Let's hoop it up. Let's play some more pinball. Let's go.
    48:36
    Yeah, the tournament wasn't enough. We had to play more pinball. As usual. Oh, yeah. But it's always fun. Yeah. No, yeah, it definitely sounds like you're building yourself a mini festival. Yeah, it's a little bit of a line there. But then you also have the camping and the hanging out.
    49:00
    And, yeah, that's, I think, honestly, more than anything, I think that when people hear about that, because they were like, hey, do you want to go to Susanville to play in a tournament? you know, what, a week or two weeks after the show. It's like, no, I'm good. I'm good without pinball. But then everybody came back and they're just like, oh, man, we were camping and, you know, we were doing this, we're doing that, we're hanging out. I didn't even hear about laser tag until now. I'm just like, dude, that sounds amazing. Like, I gots to go to this. Yeah. I mean, if you make the effort to get all the way here, I mean, you can, we got a, you know, a little Creek that borders the property and, you know, I mow everything down. So it's like, you want to just bring a tent and camp out, you know, up in the mountains because that's where we're at. So it's like, uh, if anybody, you make the effort to come up here, you can stay at, stay at our place and, and camp. Bobcats and bears, baby, bobcats and bears. That's it. Yeah. That's it. And not only does he have laser tag, but he also has a really cool zip line that goes right across his property. So yeah, it's a summer camp is really what it is. Yeah. It's a destination. It's definitely a destination. Yep. Yep. It's awesome. So what is the future hold for Pinville? Yeah. Well, the goal is to grow it. I mean, I had a, I had a player cap at 64 this year and, and, uh, I'm the real goal is to grow it. Just the more players, the better, the bigger the tournament is, the more fun, you know, more people, more fun. So it, the test went really good this year, having the whole thing down at the highway to the gaming zone. And, um, so we can handle, you know, we can handle another 25 players without much problem at all, I think next year. So, uh, that's the real goal is a circle your calendar for next year, the weekend after Father's Day and come to Susanville. Perfect.
    50:58
    Pinville 4. Oh, yes. Mark it down. Get out the Sharpie marker. No pencils. Yes. Pinville IV. That's it, baby.
    51:08
    Pinville IV. That's it. You can still do it, but I think you kind of missed out on a thing where glass and pinball cures depression. Yeah.
    51:22
    I like that. We'll get a motto. We'll get a motto in there next year for Pinville 4. Yeah, IV. Yeah, no, we could put that all together. We could get an IV graphic together. Yeah, I like it. What's a motto? Mepha, what's a motto with you? Hello.
    51:39
    You set that up so beautifully for me. Thank you. We're here all week. Try the wheel. Don't forget to tip your waitress. There you go. Yeah, you know, we talk with a lot of, you know, the folks. And they're like, well, where are you from? Oh, we're from Susanville, you know. Oh, okay. It's like, oh, Lassen Pinball. Cool. I keep hearing about you guys. You know, it's harder for me now because, you know, there's no short way to get from my house back to California. It's either a 17-, 18-hour drive or a whole day of flying. I got to fly out of Casper, catch a connector in Denver, and then fly out to Sacramento. So anyway, but yeah, man, I'd love to get out next year. It's just talking to other people. This sounds like a lot of fun and very grassroots, very organic, like how Pinnagogo started and Golden State Pinball Festival took off from there. All very grassroots and organic, just, hey, let's get together and bring our games together and have people over and have a good time. And that's always the way the best things start is very organically, just some family and friends getting together and having a lot of fun. Yeah, Golden State has been helpful in building the community up here. Golden State is, what, a four-hour drive maybe to get to from here? And I was able to talk a few to go down with me a couple years ago. and they were like blown away at seeing how many machines are set up and then the nightlife and the camp scene and um it just it it even fueled the fire coming back here to play more pinball and and they're like oh everybody we're going next year and you all have to go like i didn't have to say it like they were saying it and then um so last year i think we had eight people go down to Golden State and loved it. That was the first year of the fire.
    53:39
    And then this year, we had over a dozen, we had over 12 people go to Golden State for the weekend, and all from Susanville. I was just like, not only do we have a scene, we've got a dozen people coming down to the festival. You got to empty the phone out. Yeah, I love it. I was like, wow. Susanville represented big time at Golden State, big time. You know why everybody from Susanville goes to Lodi, right?
    54:04
    Just to remind themselves how great Susanville is. No, I'm just kidding. Lodi is a great town. Thank you, Lodi. We love you. There is a reason why somebody sang a song about being trapped in Lodi.
    54:19
    You know, it's a small town. You get used to it. You get used to the speed of life and you go, there's a lot of positive things about it. But, you know, a ton of entertainment and a lot of activities to do isn't always it unless outdoor stuff. I mean, we got we're right here on the base of the mountains on the eastern side of the Sierra Nevadas. And there's all kind of outdoor stuff to do fishing and hunting and boating and lakes and you name it. But mountain biking. I mean, they got there's all kind of stuff to do here. But like a normal like city type of, you know, night entertainment. No, the town shut down at nine. You know, there's nothing to go out and do at night, you know, for like city entertainment. But but pinball is there now. Cool.
    55:10
    Yeah. Well, that energizes people to go, OK, we're a lot smaller and a lot smaller population, but we can build on this. yeah and a small town is cool too because um just by nature of being in a small town like for example like when you drive in the in the parking lot at safeway like if if anybody's even coming close to trying to cross in front of you you stop your car why because they probably know who you are like there's a high level of accountability in public. So you can't clip the neighbors and be like, Oh yeah, no, I know whose car that was. Let's just go on over there and find out what's up. Yeah, exactly. So everybody knows somebody, you like everybody, somebody is going to know who you are in any, any given situation, right? Doesn't matter where you are. And so, um, that carries over into league too, though. And so I've got, we got a great mix of people and people, you have to learn how to get along with people who are different than you in small town. Otherwise you won't make it. You know, if you, if you only hang out with people who are just like you, you might have one friend in 15 years, you know, because it's just such a small population. You go to a big city. Well, you could find a dozen people who are very similar to you have similar, you know, what outlooks on life and stuff and just have your little tribe. But, uh, in a small town, you got to figure out how to get along with people who are very different.
    56:39
    And so that carries over into league I mean we got I think 30 to 40 of I think it somewhere in there of the league is women for example
    56:53
    Right? A lot of leagues and a lot of places, you have a hard time drawing women. It's mostly like a dude hangout. but you know that you don't have that we don't have those those issues so much right of of having to expand to other marginalized people it's like if you live in Susanville you are marginalized we're all marginalized we're all just hanging out together man you're like look it's like join pinball league you gotta do something exactly that that might be our motto. Yeah. We've got to do something.
    57:33
    She doesn't know pinball league. It's nothing. Yeah, it's nothing. I actually, as a teenager, I lived in a small town up in eastern Washington. No, what you're saying is exactly right.
    57:48
    It's funny because the smallest things are big news. So, yeah, you can win pinball league there and people are going to know about it because, you know, you're probably about two people removed from, you know, everybody knowing, oh yeah, you know, there's a, there's a league that they play at the, at the game shop in town and everybody's involved. So it's, it's probably, like I said, when you said that you're building this community up in, up in Susanville, I was just like, man, that's gotta be awesome because, you know, there is there, it's a, it's a small community. And so you're going to be a big part or you are a big part probably of the entertainment of this small community. I was shocked when he said the bowling alley was gone. Bowling alleys in small towns usually kill.
    58:34
    Yeah. Somehow it shut down and the owner hasn't ever. It's been boarded up 10 years since I've been here. Nobody's ever opened it back up. And you got to find out how much that sucker costs. Yeah. He's asking too much. That's the problem. it's all like hey how much does a small town bowling alley cost four million dollars well have fun just looking at a closed bowling alley yeah i know it's it's you know there's there's things like that that are that can be depressing kind of little symbols in town or you know a boarded up a boarded up business on main street that's been there for years or you know or that bowling alley that hasn't been open for 10 years it's like man you know people if you just drive through you go man is this place depressed or what depressing or what and it's and uh but it just takes people you know who to figure out a way to make it what you want you know where did we go spencer what town was that again that we went to play russian oh um pollock pines yeah we went to the bowling alley in pollock pines man it was hopping wow jumping yeah that was what four years ago yeah that was like right after i'm whatever rush was brand new we made a special trip just to go play rush and i was just like this is like a small tank like a small town there's really nothing else to do let's go to the bowling alley and it was just killing and so like i'm kind of hearing your story about like yeah the bowling alley is closed down and i'm just like you know we're playing at a game store and you know we have a building community and i'm just like man we should open a bowling alley in Susanville. There you go. We have two bowling alleys. It's down to 59,000.
    60:19
    Wow, that's pretty cool. Yeah, investors can hit me up at LassenPinball.com. Anybody who's got a couple million wants to get the bowling alley going, I'll put the pinballs in. There you go. I'll be in the store real quick, Mark, because the other guys know, and I haven't been yet. across the state over near Cody is another little town called Powell. And they've got a little community there, a film ball community. There's local operators got two, like, bar restaurants that have about eight, ten machines each. And they have leagues, you know, tournaments. So I want to go in there and check that out. But what else they have is the only still operating drive-in in the state. You know, when I used to live in Sacramento, I lived in Rancho Cordova, which had the last drive-in in the area, the sixth screen. So I missed that because I lived literally one freeway exit from the drive-in. So me and my family and my wife and kids used to go all the time to the drive-in. And I missed the drive-in. I grew up going to them. And so Powell has a single-screen drive-in. Discovered it last year. I'm going to get over – I'm making plans to get over there at least once this year and check it out. Well, what caught my eye, my attention is they were thanking somebody who come in with a whole box and donated a whole box of the old speakers. They're still using the old speaker boxes. They're not using. Yeah, they're not using the FM transmitters.
    61:48
    Yeah. So because my boys, you know, I've been to the drive in dozens and hundreds of times, but it's always built the FM transmitter. I said, boys, we got to go. Yeah. Because you have experience to drive in movie with the old speaker boxes. You got to hang it on your window, baby. Yeah, I got to hang it on your window. They always still do that. Yeah, bring a towel. We got the paint chipper here for you. When I go over there, I'm going to listen for that episode. It'll be sometime later this summer, but I'm going to do a trip report on that. because it's not directly pinball, but it's related to that whole wonderful small town Americana that's largely gone away in America. You know, like a lot of bowling houses are closed up, movie theaters, drive-ins. You know, the arcades, they're starting to slowly make a comeback,
    62:40
    but by and large, not like, you know, they were when you and I sound like we're pretty close. Yeah, they're not arcades. Right. You know, they have arcade games, but they're a different kind of arcade. Yeah, exactly.
    62:56
    But I wanted to share that with you. I knew you'd get a kick out of that. Yeah, that's cool. Speaking of arcades, did Joe open? I believe Joe did.
    63:07
    So, yeah, just to give you a little information about that, he had a soft opening just recently, and it was great. We just had a little small tournament just to play on the games and check out the place. But his grand opening is this Friday, June 20th. It's going to be a really fun time. He's going to have his stuff all set up. His games, obviously, are going to be all fixed up because we were playing games that were from Playfield 76 and he didn't even get to work on them since he shut down and moved to the new location. So he has some rare ones, too. He has a Lost in Space, which is a really fun one to shoot. He's got a Godzilla Sega version. And he's getting a couple other games in there, too. And it's going to be a really fun place to feel that 80s nostalgia, which Joe loves and mostly everybody in my group loves, too. And it's a great time. So if anyone can make it June 20th, I don't know exactly the time it starts, but I'm assuming probably when it opens, which is 4 o'clock. So Playfield Sports and Games on Lake Street in downtown Reno, real close to the Aces ballpark.
    64:26
    Nice. But it's a cool place. It's a cool place. It's going to do really well. And the bar itself is a sight to behold, what he did to that. Really cool.
    64:40
    And I'm not going to give it away. come and check it out yourself definitely check it out and support Joe he's a friend of the show and a righteous dude absolutely so yeah looking forward to that and uh Cody's Place I have not gone to yet but that's really cool at Comic Kingdom another great place to visit if you come to Reno and Highway to Gaming Zone is awesome for a small town that arcade is amazing and thanks to Marcus for providing all those games. There's a lot of variety to play there. I think I bought a shirt, or Rusty got me a shirt. It's like a muscle shirt from Highway to Game Zone. I just picked up that that's a Top Gun reference. That's correct.
    65:27
    I'm like, Highway to the Gaming Zone, what an awkward... Oh, yeah, that's a Kenny Loggins song. I like it.
    65:33
    The owner gets accused of looking a little bit like Tom Cruise, and so he likes it. So what a problem to have. Yeah. Hey, what's Tom Cruise doing here? You're like, I don't know. Maverick.
    65:50
    What a rough problem to have. So, Marcus, in conclusion for the night, what do you want our listeners to know? Oh, man, I say invest in your community, put pinball out on location, and build a scene. It takes a little legwork, but the dividends are phenomenal on the global note. But specifically, if you want to make a pinball trip next year, circle the date, the weekend after Father's Day, to come to Susanville for Pinville 4, I guarantee you'll have fun. Even if you don't like playing tournaments very much, it's the funnest tournament you can play as a novice or intermediate player. If you just love pinball, come play a Pinberg tournament because you'll see the fun that you can have even though you're playing a little more competitively. but uh yeah swing whenever you're driving through town don't forget to check your pinball map and swing by the gaming zone or lassen ale works is another spot we got and then a spot down in just 10 minutes south of us in janesville called the firehouse grill we got five games down there and but um swing on by and play some pinball say hi it's something you don't want to miss It's the only thing that makes me want to go to Susanville.
    67:29
    Maybe we'll put that as the motto. Having been in that area many years ago for working and just fun, growing up a little south of there, it's in the heart of the Sierra Nevada Mountains. And it's going to be in June. It's a beautiful time to go there. and not only is there good pinball but there's a damn good chinese restaurant there and there's also an amazing pizza place there so uh food's really good there too just so you know there's something crazy about mountaintown pizza places they're always amazing yep oh this one was amazing and it had pinball there too all right well let's wrap it up mark you got any shout outs and thank you i got shout out marcus thank you so much for pinville three uh looking forward to pinball four and uh i know you have a really cool song we're definitely going to have that as part of the podcast and uh just thanks for organizing it yeah thanks for organizing it thanks for uh getting everybody involved thanks for having the machines out there with all the different varieties that you had there. Thanks to the barbecue. It was just a wonderful time and I can't wait to go. And that's much better, especially when I get out of school and having that two week break that week after Father's Day really is a great time to have it. So thank you, Marcus, for everything. Appreciate it. Yeah. And thanks to all my league members too, stepped up and are helping with organization and making everything happen. It's so nice to be able to do that takes a lot of work, but to have the support around you is just invaluable. So a big shout out to all my league members who, who chip in, man, we all, we all chip in and just try to make it a, quite a destination experience when you come up here. And the trophies were awesome, by the way, who made those? I want to give credit to that because those are awesome trophies. Yeah. One of the guys in the league found it on Etsy and had that. And then we, and then his girlfriend too, I said, hey, can you make me a trophy? Because if you win all four games on one bank, you get first place on all four machines. You get a Golden Sweep award. So they got these little mini Oscars, like little plastic Oscars and labeled them like Pinville 3 Golden Sweep. And they're gold, and then they got a little broom that they're holding. It's phenomenal. So cool. And that comes from the people. That comes from the league, right? I'm more proud of my Golden Sweep trophy than I am my own trophy I bought on Etsy because it came from the pinball community that's been built here. So thank you so much, Steve and Tessa, by the way.
    70:19
    Yeah, thanks, Steve and Tessa. They also did the song. Steve also got that song put together through AI.
    70:29
    So cool. Spencer you got any shout outs and thank yous tonight yeah thank you to Marcus for coming on the show and for all you do for building community building pinball and inspiring others like myself to continue to work to do it where I'm at to my wonderful co-host Dan and Mark for coming on and having fun with us every month and or more lately and to all the wonderful listeners who tune into the show and give us feedback and give us a reason to do this once a month.
    71:08
    All right, for myself, I want to just go ahead and say congratulations to the Capital Corridor Pinball League Season 40 champions for Folsom.
    71:18
    Alex, who I think this is like his sixth league championship for Folsom. Wow. Jack and Thomas, as well as the B champion, Darren.
    71:29
    I want to throw big thanks to Marcus for coming and hanging out with us tonight and telling us about this awesome event, making me really sorry I missed it and making me determined not to miss it next year.
    71:41
    And, of course, to, you know, the whole Northern California and actually everybody who's into pinball, the listeners, you guys, you know, the community makes it worth doing. Pinball machines are great, but it'll only get you so far. It's the people of pinball that make it special. And, Spencer, where can you find us? Where can you find us, Spencer? We're all the best. Nice segue, Mark. Thank you. Yes, you can find us for all the best pinball podcasters sold or given away, and that's our home flagship at soundcloud.com and on iTunes.
    72:16
    And you can email us at thespinnerislit at gmail.com, and you can visit our Facebook page, thespinnerislit on Facebook. Anybody else got anything else before we take it out? Take us home, Spencer Play pinball Keep America Strong Lights are blazing, hands are raised The crowd is roaring, the boards ablaze Score is climbing, numbers scream Susanville's fire, pinnacle dream Tilt a warning, sweat on the brow Flippers flying, don't stop now Every tilt, every twist, every shot Nerves like iron Give it all you've got Eye of the Penville neon gleam Flashing glory, chasing dreams Eye of the Penville thunder roars Rise as legends crowd and pours Roller action, steel ball flies Tears erupt like sky high One last move, one last call Victory rides on one pinball
    74:30
    Under the pressure Under the lights Heartbeats pounding Fight the fight Legends born Where the cool kids thrill Pinball kings crowned in Susan Bell Eye of the Penville neon gleam flashing glory chasing dreams Eye of the Penville thunder roars rise as legends crowd in plows We'll see you next time.