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80s Cheese Done Right – Gottlieb 80b

Silverball Chronicles·podcast_episode·2h 26m·analyzed·Dec 2, 2021
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claude-haiku-4-5-20251001 · $0.037

TL;DR

Gottlieb System 80B sports pinball games showcased creative playfield design amid industry decline.

Summary

Silver Ball Chronicles hosts David Dennis and Ron discuss Gottlieb System 80B pinball machines from the mid-1980s, focusing on three sports-themed games designed by John Trudeau: Touchdown (1984), Ice Fever (1985), and Chicago Cubs Triple Play (1985). The episode explores how Gottlieb navigated industry turmoil through ownership changes (Columbia Pictures to Coca-Cola to Milestar to Premier Technology) while maintaining creative freedom to embrace 80s aesthetics and unconventional playfield designs that competitors like Williams and Bally avoided.

Key Claims

  • Gottlieb System 80 board sales dropped from 10,000-15,000 units at Columbia Pictures launch to 2,000 units by 1981, and Williams dropped to 700 units

    high confidence · David Dennis citing industry decline during pinball's struggles in early 1980s

  • John Trudeau was nicknamed 'Dr. Flash' because of how fast he could design playfields, producing three games in six months (Touchdown, Ice Fever, Chicago Cubs Triple Play)

    high confidence · David Dennis discussing Trudeau's design output and nickname

  • Ice Fever (February 1985) was the last System 80A game produced

    high confidence · David Dennis explicitly stating this in episode content

  • Chicago Cubs Triple Play was the first pinball game to debut with alphanumeric displays integrated into the backglass design

    medium confidence · David Dennis noting alphanumerics debuted in Aptor (1984) or Chicago Cubs (1985), with debate about which was first

  • Touchdown sold 711 units and was the first pin produced entirely in the new Premier facility

    high confidence · David Dennis citing production data and facility information

  • Ice Fever sold 1,585 units; Chicago Cubs Triple Play sold 1,365 units

    high confidence · David Dennis providing specific sales figures from period records

  • Gottlieb was sold to Coca-Cola in 1983, which created Milestar as a subsidiary and later sold to Premier Technology in October 1984

    high confidence · David Dennis detailing ownership changes citing Gottlieb website

  • Larry Day is an 'unsung hero' of pinball art who doesn't receive as much accolades as Greg Frieser or Paul Ferris

    medium confidence · David Dennis expressing opinion about art recognition in pinball history

Notable Quotes

  • “Gottlieb never regained the foothold and industry dominance that it once had. However, that did give them some creative freedom.”

    David Dennis @ ~8:30 — Sets up the core thesis of the episode—how adversity enabled Gottlieb's creative embrace of 80s aesthetics

  • “I have a weak part of my heart that just loves 80B games.”

    David Dennis @ ~12:00 — Personal investment in the topic; reveals host passion for System 80B era

  • “The strength of Gottlieb was they weren't afraid to make any play field, no matter how weird it may look.”

    Ron (via David Dennis setup) @ ~25:30 — Key characterization of Gottlieb design philosophy during this era

  • “Most creative people in the industry are not in a position to do anything... upper management never goes to the arcade and doesn't play the games in the street, yet they're dictating what goes out the door.”

    Steve Kirk (quoted from Playmeter magazine, May 1985) @ ~35:00 — Historical documentation of designer frustration with manufacturer management; David frames as recurring industry pattern

  • “It sounds like stuff Python Angela would say. It sounds like stuff a lot of the designers would say. It sounds like people said before Jersey Jack. It sounds like they say nowadays.”

    Ron @ ~37:30 — Meta-commentary on how creative vs. profit tensions are cyclical in pinball history

  • “This pin, although unusual to say the least, stands out because if you are a big football person and you got, you know, a bunch of fellas over for a football game, this is a must-have in your basement, if you ask me.”

    David Dennis (on Touchdown) @ ~20:00 — Personal endorsement of sports-themed games fitting bar/location appeal during era

  • “Not only that, but I am ready to catch the fever. Oh, what kind of fever? The ice fever, my friend.”

    Ron and David Dennis @ ~28:00 — Playful banter revealing Canadian host's enthusiasm for hockey-themed game; humorous moment

Entities

GottliebcompanyDavid DennispersonRonpersonJohn TrudeaupersonLarry DaypersonColumbia PicturescompanyCoca-ColacompanyMilestar (or Milstar)company

Signals

  • ?

    business_signal: Gottlieb experienced catastrophic industry decline under multiple ownership changes; from 10-15K units to 2K (1981) and 700 (Williams); ownership turmoil (4 entities in ~4 years) prevented recovery

    high · David Dennis citing sales data and ownership timeline: Columbia Pictures → Coca-Cola (1983) → Milestar → Premier Technology (October 1984)

  • ~

    sentiment_shift: Modern pinball community has nostalgia/appreciation for 80B era unconventional playfields; hosts frame as 'must-have in your basement' games, particularly for themed locations (sports bars)

    medium · David Dennis repeatedly: 'absolute must-have in your basement' for Touchdown and Ice Fever; Ron expresses enthusiasm for Ice Fever despite not owning one yet.

  • ?

    design_philosophy: Four flippers on Chicago Cubs Triple Play (two standard, two small at slings/in-lane) assessed as potentially 'useless' in competitive play; unconventional design prioritizes novelty over functionality

    medium · David Dennis: 'two at the bottom where they should be, and two at the top of the slings... they're smaller and kind of like in the in lane.' Ron: 'I'm guessing in a competitive situation, you would probably try to never use them.'

  • ?

    design_philosophy: Gottlieb embraced unconventional, weird playfield layouts while Williams/Bally avoided trendy 80s aesthetics; creative constraint (Dr. Flash Trudeau's rapid design) paradoxically enabled innovation

    high · David Dennis: 'The strength of Gottlieb was they weren't afraid to make any play field, no matter how weird it may look.' Contrasted with Williams/Bally passing on 80s cheese.

  • $

Transcript

groq_whisper · $0.442

0:00
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0:12
On Amazon Music, we believe in keeping you in the moment. That's why we've got millions of ad-free podcast episodes, so you can stay completely immersed in every story, every reveal, every breath. Download the Amazon Music app and start listening to your favorite podcasts ad-free, included with Prime.
0:37
The Pinball Network is online. Launching Silver Ball Chronicles. Do you see No Time to Die yet? No. You can rent it. I don't care. Watch all of them. Do it. No. Do it. No. Do it. No. Do it.
1:00
My dad can watch it. Do it. Hello everyone, I'm David Dennis. This is Silver Ball Chronicles. With me this month, like every month, is my co-host, Ron, Dominated Expo Hallet. What's up, fella?
1:44
Uh, hello. Yes, you just smashed all the competition at the Expo tournament, didn't you? the first major tournament and convention that we've had in a long time, huh? Did I? You're right up there in the top 100, right? I don't think so. I don't think they even posted any of the results. Then why do you even go to these things? I don't know. If you're not first, you're last, Ron. That's from a movie, right? Just ask Raymond Davidson. Ah. What movie is that from? Ricky Bobby. That's not the title of the movie. Yeah, it is. I thought it was Talladega Nights. Right. The Talladega Nights, The Ballad of Ricky Bobby. You're doing the subtitle. Yeah, well, it's okay. Yeah, you're doing the part underneath that's in quotes, so that doesn't count. First of all, that is a proper racing pinball machine. I still want my Team America pinball machine, but that's probably not going to happen. So you've been to Expo. You've met people. People exist. I haven't seen many people. Yeah, you weren't there. Some people have said actually that you and I are not actually different people because we've never been in the same place at the same time. That's true. You've never seen us together, so I could be doing your voice. And I got the Canadian accent down, if that's the case. You have been on your stream simultaneously with Stu McVicker, but we have never been in the same place at the same time, so I guess we'll have to do that. Anything exciting announced in the Hobby, Ron? Announced? There's all kinds of excitement. There's always new games. There's always excitement. You know, we're still waiting for those Godzillas to get out and about. I haven't played one. I haven't played a new Stern since Stranger Things Pro with .7 code, so I have no idea what pinball is like after a year. Where do you live again? I don't know what it's like to be connected. Are you, like, in Antarctica or something? No, I'm in New Brunswick. Do they not have pinball there? It's basically Maine. Every major pinball place is about an hour away. We do have a bar opening up, Shout Out 83 Barcade, opening in my hometown. However, all of their machines are vintage machines. There's no new ones. What would you consider vintage? I would say anything sort of like, you know, pre-2000. Wow. Okay. So all those classic 90s games are all vintage to you They are indeed, my friend Okay Do you know you can get an antique license plate for cars before 2000 now? I did not know that It's been 21 years, Ron, since the 2000s started Okay Well, then I guess our subject today is quite vintage Yes Is it like ancient? Ancient Well, this isn't an Ed Krinsky episode here, bud Oh, yeah. Well, check us out on Facebook.com slash Silverball Chronicles. Send us a message. Post on the wall there. Send us some of your shenanigans. That's where we'll post up from time to time a couple of things. Last month, what we did is we tossed up a little something something after the episode. You said you wanted to post up what is one of the favorite mechs that we covered. And I'll tell you what. We had a lot of engagement on that post over at facebook.com slash silverballchronicles. A lot of it was mostly, why didn't you talk about this mech? That's what I figured. Yeah, and I mean, really, the reason we didn't talk about some of those mechs, they were in other episodes. They did get an honorary mention, a lot of them, especially with Sean Ledgerwood saying, the Getaway Turbocharger, that was your favorite mech of all time back in the day. Was that in addition to the supercharger? What did I say? You said turbocharger. Oh, it's the supercharger. It's called the supercharger. That's right. I own it. It's downstairs right now. That's what it says. It's written on it. Very important. A lot of people, fun host, Rudy, right? Red and Ted from Roadshow, that kind of stuff. The one, of course, that I didn't mention that I think is actually a big miss on my point, even though we didn't cover it in the episode, it certainly did deserve an honorable mention. And that's the theater of Magic Trunk, which is awesome. Yeah, you failed. Yeah, of course, the Medieval Madness Castle mentioned by Jonathan Hall. Pat Pitt mentioning the jump rope on Champion Pub. Oh, yeah, there's a lot of cool stuff on Champion Pub. Yes. The speed bag, the jump rope. Mm-hmm. Very, very wonderful. So swing on over sometimes. We'll post up some stuff there. Also, if you want to leave us a review on your podcatcher of choice, please do that. Five stars or more. That feeds the ego for Ron there, and he can walk around the house pretending he's all important and stuff. And you can also leave us a review at thisweekinpinball.com in their promoter's database. So even if four stars is the highest, leave us a five star. Exactly. Okay. Yeah. You have to, like, if it's only a four star, leave four stars, and then in the description say, I would have given it five stars. Ah, so you always give 150%. It would be 125% if it were four stars plus another one. It would be 25%. Okay. So, another thing. We have a wonderful thing from Dan J. It says, I don't have a favorite toy. Just wanted to comment about how outstanding the podcast is. Love it. Outstanding, Ron. Did you think when you started podcasting you'd ever be on a podcast that was called Outstanding? No, but Outstanding. Outstanding, yes. Have to make a Canadian accent line every episode. That's the rule.

  • “The main purpose of these games is to make money... And be fun. But the first part is the more important part.”

    Ron @ ~38:30 — Cynical acknowledgment of business prioritization over creative goals—frames manufacturer constraints

    • Premier Technology
    company
    Gil Pollackperson
    Ed Krinskyperson
    Steve Kirkperson
    Monde International Corporationcompany
    System 80B (Gottlieb)product
    Touchdowngame
    Ice Fevergame
    Chicago Cubs Triple Playgame
    Michael Schallubperson
    Alien Stargame
    Playmeter magazinepublication
    Paul Ferrisperson
    Greg Frieserperson
    Mike Dimasperson
    Pinball Compendiumpublication

    market_signal: Mid-1980s pinball creative crisis: designers like Steve Kirk argued upper management didn't play games on location, stifled creativity for profit. Ron frames this as recurring 40-year pattern echoing through Jersey Jack era and modern complaints.

    high · Steve Kirk quoted from Playmeter May 1985: 'Most creative people in the industry are not in a position to do anything'; Ron: 'sounds like stuff Python Angela would say... they've literally heard it for 40 years.'

  • $

    market_signal: Sports-themed games (Touchdown, Ice Fever, Cubs Triple Play) timed for seasonal location play—fall football, winter hockey, spring baseball—suggesting location operator targeting strategy

    high · David Dennis: 'Timing available to your location for the season's kickoff.' Flyer: 'The baseball season can be profitable for you.'

  • ?

    personnel_signal: Larry Day (artist) remains underrecognized compared to peers (Frieser, Ferris) despite significant output on three major System 80B releases; suggests spotlight/credit disparity in pinball art history

    medium · David Dennis: 'Larry Day, who is, in my opinion, an absolute unsung hero when it comes to pinball art. He doesn't get any of the accolades as much as, you know, like a Greg Freris, you know, Paul Ferris, those guys.'

  • ?

    personnel_signal: John Trudeau's rapid design output (three games in six months, nickname 'Dr. Flash') driven by minimal bill-of-materials approach; many unfinished Whitewoods suggest overextension or aborted projects

    high · David Dennis: 'he could make some crazy stuff on a playfield with basically no bill of materials. Hence the reason so fast... three games in six months.'

  • ?

    product_concern: Gottlieb System 80B drop targets were historically rock-solid and less prone to breakage than competitors; technical design enabled robust gameplay

    medium · David Dennis: 'In the 1980s at Gottlieb, rock solid, and they felt amazing when they engaged and disengaged... they wouldn't break as often.'

  • ?

    technology_signal: Chicago Cubs Triple Play marked adoption of alphanumeric displays (two lines, numbers+letters), replacing score boxes; debate whether Aptor (1984) or Chicago Cubs (1985) was first debut

    medium · David Dennis and Ron discussing display debut; hosts note Aptor in 1984 had alphanumerics, but Chicago Cubs achieved integration into backglass marquee design.

    • 7:36
    In the early 1980s, there was a boon for pinball manufacturing. Bally and Williams had transitioned to solid state early and had evolved their platform over several years. Gottlieb, however, struggled with System 1, and as soon as they found their stride with the new System 80 board set, pinball was dying. By the mid-1980s, pinball was clawing its way back, but Gottlieb never regained the foothold and industry dominance that it once had. However, that did give them some creative freedom. The 80s was known for Don Johnson's jackets, big teased hair, trickle-down economics, Crappy synth music and neon lights While Williams and Bally passed on being too trendy or in the moment Gottlieb dove headfirst into pop culture and the 80s cheese we've now come to embrace Take note that he said crappy synth music That's not in his notes, it just said synth music So it's his fault I have no problems with synth music This month, our topic is 80s cheese done right. Gottlieb System 80B. Wait a minute. 80B? 80B. Wait a minute. We're skipping ahead. What about 80? What's going on? There's shenanigans. Got to do a little more research on System 80, and this one's more or less finished. And I have a weak part of my heart that just loves 80B games. So we're going to jump into it now. Cool. I figured I'd just bring it up before our listeners do. Okay, you went out of order. Yeah, so we're actually going to recap a little bit here of sort of the pre-System 80 era, just to sort of catch everybody up. They can listen to our System 3 episode if they want to get a little bit more knowledge on the end, and they can listen to our System 1 episode if they want to catch up on the other side of the bookend. So we're filling in some of the gaps here. We will be also doing a Gottlieb System 80 in another episode, sort of the precursor to 80B and 80A. And we'll call that Pinball is Dying in our Pinball is Dying series. One of your favorite series, Ron. I wasn't aware it was a whole series. It's a whole series. It's a series within a series. Wow. Let's recap a little bit with the constant ownership changes that Gottlieb suffered in the late 70s and early 80s. Sort of the turmoil around that time at Gottlieb, Ron, really put them on the back foot, didn't it? Yeah, they went from 30, 40 years being owned by the Gottliebs, then they sold it to Columbia Pictures. So Columbia Pictures wanted to get into coin op because, quite frankly, they are an entertainment company. Part of getting people into the theaters, in to see movies, was also to catch the dollars when they were there in pinball machines. Well, they discovered very quickly that when pinball started to trend downward and System 1 didn't go that great, at least for the beginning of System 1, they were selling like 10K a unit. So they were doing quite well at the very beginning before it started to go in the toilet. Well, eventually they would sell to Coca-Cola in 1983. And that was then operated as Milestar. Or is it Milestar? I have heard it both ways from multiple sources, so I'd like to know myself. If any Gottlieb employees listening, is it Milestar or Milstar? I've always called it Milestar, so I'll stick with that. In the 1980s, Ron, mergers and acquisitions, that was the buzzword, right? Building big, large, multinational, conglomerate corporations. Big deal, right? You're getting into all these other places. Instead of focusing on what made you great and what brought you to the dance. So Milstar was, of course, the short period of ownership where Coca-Cola tried to spin off the video game section. So they sort of looked at the books and they said, so then they spun off Gottlieb and they created Milestar. Potential buyers were approached in 1984 because of the downward cycle in coin-operated machines in general. Of course, when System 1 started with Columbia Pictures, they're selling 10, 12, 15,000 machines. By 1981, we're down to like 2,000 machines at best. And in some cases, if you remember from our Williams episode, where they're selling like 700 pinball machines. Ouch. Milestar basically made one good game, which was Alien Star. And most former Milestar employees refer to the company as Rat Slime, which is Milestar backwards. That was coined by Ed Krinsky in a very public meeting. I guess if you say it that way backwards, it has to be Milestar, right? It's an I Slime Milestar. Yeah, I think we have our answer. Ah, there we go. Now, of course, this led to a sale to Premier Technology. Coca-Cola kind of noticed this was not going very, very well. They would eventually sell to Premier Technology, who purchased all of the assets in October of 1984.
    13:11
    Premier Technology had two partners, Gottlieb Electronics Corporation and Embassy Electronics, Inc. this all comes from Gottlieb website which I'll include in our show notes so Gottlieb Electronics Corporation was a subsidiary of Mondial International Corporation which was the largest distributor of Gottlieb machines in the world these fellows at Mondial International Corporation wanted to make sure that Gottlieb continued to grow and continued to sell machines because they sold most of them around the world. That's a big deal. You don't want something to fail. Other partners, of course, who came in to help out with Embassy Electronics, that was a corporation controlled by somebody we've run into a few times, Gilbert G. Pollack, or Gil, a former member of the management team at Milestar. So we could see that in this sort of period, let's say the end of System 80, the beginning of 80A, 80B, you know, everything is in turmoil, right? Sales are in the crapper. People are escaping from pinball at a record rate and going to other things. It's not going really, really well.
    14:30
    And Gottlieb never recovered what they once had. During this time, they did, however, Ron, have some machines in the pipeline for what's called System 80A. These were all generally leftover games from Milestar, and they were just pushed out under the new Gottlieb name of Premiere. You're always a huge fan of Premiere games, right?
    14:53
    It's good ones, yes. You've got them in your basement? I don't have any Premiere games in my basement. I have a Milestar game in my basement. Oh, you have El Dorado City of Gold, the Ed Krinsky remake. I do not have that. No. You have Touchdown from October of 1984, which is an American football theme, standard body, 711 units sold, designed by John Trudeau, art by Larry Day and sound and software, which is uncredited. Designed by who? You said like John Trudeau. Oh, designed by John Trudeau. I don't have that one either. It was the first pin produced entirely in the new premier facility. The flyer was printed incorrectly, still had Milestar on it. Yeah. It actually looks pretty cool. It's got some neat in-lane saucers, two spinners. No? Not ringing a bell? No. I've seen it in a tournament. Is it the one that's got, like, a green play field? Yes. With the yardage lines and stuff on it? Yeah, it does. I'm right. Yes. Oh, man, the cabinet has the same thing. It's green with yardage lines on it. Yeah. It's got stuff. Hey, is Gottlieb, the strength of Gottlieb was they weren't afraid to make any play field, no matter how weird it may look. Yeah, so when you look at it, you got sort of the old EMs had those two spinners kind of at the top third, just at the bottom of the top third of the play field. It goes into four pop bumpers. Down on the bottom of the play field, it's got weird in-lane out lanes into a saucer. If the ball lands in the saucer, it'll go to the in-lane. If it goes out of the saucer, it'll go down the drain. It's unusual, to say the least. John Trudeau was known for very unusual games. We love our Flyers. What great catchphrases are in this one? Pinball, 1984. That's not the title. It's called Touchdown. Touchdown has all the right moves. Excitement, competitive football action on a pinball gridiron. I like that. Whoa. Quality and dependability in the classic Gottlieb tradition. Timing available to your location for the season's kickoff. Yeah, they are getting in. Getting in to make sure that you're getting the fall dollars in your bar because people are coming in to see the football season. And it kind of looks like a Green Bay Packers uniform. Yeah. It is literally the yellow and white. They just don't actually say Green Bay anywhere on it. But this, of course, the art done by Larry Day, who is, in my opinion, an absolute unsung hero when it comes to pinball art. He doesn't get any of the accolades as much as, you know, like a Greg Freris, you know, Paul Ferris, those guys. But, man, he had an awesome style when he did his art. Very, very cool. You can see on the helmet here on the flyer, the guy has Milestar on his helmet. Down here, there's some players. You got Zabriskie, which would be Dave Zabriskie, written on one of the back of the jerseys there, who was one of the programmers at the time. He, of course, would end up elsewhere in the industry as a big deal.
    18:16
    This pin, although unusual to say the least, stands out because if you are a big football person and you got, you know, a bunch of fellas over for a football game, this is a must-have in your basement, if you ask me. This is awesome. So put it right next to Monday Night Football and Stearns NFL Football. Yeah, see, I think this would be better than those two, not because the rules of the play field is better, but because it's got this vintage air to it. It's got this old excitement. It's got some really cool art. Right? I think this is a really cool little thing. The plastics, the art on the plastics is just gorgeous. The cabinet itself, not so much. Aw. Bright green. Yeah, it looks like a field. Yeah. How's that for theme integration? Yes. The world under glass.
    19:13
    Now, you had mentioned John Trudeau tends to be the major designer at the time here. There are many of his unfinished Whitewoods that are listed on IPDB, including Aces High, Nighthawk, Pinball Squared, which was a bi-level game, Subchase, Sevens, which was a flipperless game, Tyrannosaurus, and Snooker. He had a lot. He was just pumping out playfields left and right. His nickname was Dr. Flash, and that's the reason he had that nickname, because of how fast he could make playfields. This is another pinnacle, absolute must-have in your basement bar. It is Ice Fever, which is ice hockey themed from February of 85.
    20:03
    This one sells 1,585 units. Designed by John Trudeau. Art, again, by Larry Day. Sound and software by John Burris. This is the last System 80A game, and it is awesome. I like this. I've never seen you so into these games. This, oh, my God. I know there's one of these in London, Ontario. Shout out to Mike Dimas. He's got one of these for sale up there, and I'll tell you what, I want it. Is it because it's like hockey and you're Canadian? That's exactly why. Okay. Not only that, but I am ready to catch the fever. Oh, what kind of fever? The ice fever, my friend. Oh, do you know that scoring a goal activates the back glass animation feature? Exactly. So you know, everybody knows, World Cup soccer, you shoot the goalie, you know, he's in the net. But this has drop targets, which are the goaltender. Behind it, a captive ball, which then hits a target.
    21:14
    That is scoring a goal in this game. And then on the back box, the hockey player shoots the ball right into the net. The back glass, the hockey players look like they are on massive amounts of steroids. This was before they did a lot of the drug testing. I think so. They look huge. She looked bigger than the football players did on touchdown. Hey, Ron, you remember Hit the Ice from the 1990s, right? Uh, was it a video game? It was indeed, and it was a video game that was more arcade than simulator. You got into fights all the time. The characters were big and brutish and looked silly. It was the official video hockey league. Video hockey, okay. Don't know what that means, but anyway, that's what this art reminds me of, Because it's way over the top. They're really square. It's not taking itself too seriously. It has this serious spinner on it. That much I remember. Because I think if you light it, it stays lit, and you can just hit it repeatedly. You know I love a spinner. Orbit spinners, yeah! It's pinball on ice. Score a winning goal with Ice Fever, a fast-paced, high-earning pinball game that features an animated puck in the back glass. Goal for goal, Ice Fever has plenty of action. Clear the way for a slap shot. into the net after knocking down the rollover drop targets and score a goal. Three goals scores a hat trick, advancing the multiplier.
    22:39
    Nice. This game is awesome. This is Larry Day again doing the art. And he's got this. The way he does the art, it's got lots of lines in it. It's very cartoony. It's so much fun. There are four oddly placed pop bumpers on this. They are all over the place. Again, you want original play fields, Gottlieb is your company. This game is so cool. I would totally have one of these. Ron, why don't you have an ice fever? Ah, I haven't played one enough. But you're not shutting it down. Uh, no, it's got a spinner. It's got a juicy spinner. This has the new spinner from the old System 1s and early System 80 plastic crap spinners. This is the thick, heavy, metal, 1980s spinner. It's a sparkly spinner. This is the pinnacle of spinners. They use the same spinner from probably System 80, almost all through System 80. It's the same one. It's the one that is always never available at any of the part sites for some reason. Yeah, you've got to cannibalize a lot of these games. Or you can go to a show where the, I think, Mayfair Amusements always has them. There's no ramps. We're not into the ramps here. Nope, too early. So it's all single-level playfield. What was interesting about this era is rather than ramps creating kind of interesting bends in the playfield, it was the playfield ball guides that sort of created S-shapes or loops or hooks. But we still haven't got into kind of the flow-style era where it's returning to the pop bumpers, or it's returning from the pop bumpers down into the flippers. It's just kind of going everywhere, and it's all about kind of control. Some people call the style, what, like clunky? It doesn't have to be clunky. Just because a game doesn't have flow doesn't make it clunky. Give me a little extra on that. I mean, not every game is a flow fest. Clunky would mean the shots just don't seem to work right. You hit something, it clunks out. The shots don't seem to work like you think they should work. That's more of a clunky. Okay. Now, for John Trudeau's sports trifecta, by the time baseball season rolls around, okay, so we've got a football game in the fall, we've got a hockey game in the winter, and we've got Chicago Cubs triple play in 1965.
    25:14
    Yeah. So the lovable losers of baseball to the lovable losers of pinball at that time. Yes. also being made by the lovable loser of pinball manufacturers. This is May of 1985. It sells 1,365 units. This was a concept by Gil Pollack, who was a big Chicago Cubs fan, designed by John Trudeau, art by Larry Day, John Burris on sound and software. Now, pinball was really struggling, and many people had all but assumed they knew what the solution was to bring pinball back. How do we invigorate things again? Well, Steve Kirk, you remember him, of course, from Stars and Meteor, Ron? Oh, yes. He had been lobbying the manufacturers for some time to allow him to work on a new pinball concept, bringing back the creativity and higher bomb and excitement. Well, I'll tell you, this time at Gottlieb, there was no creativity like John Trudeau's creativity, because he could make some crazy stuff on a playfield with basically no bill of materials. Hence the reason so fast. What was that, three games in a year? Three games in six months. Not even a year. It's said that Steve Kirk, after lobbying all of these manufacturers, the one that he got furthest with was Gottlieb. And there's a Playmeter magazine from May of 1985, which I'll include in the show notes, where he speaks in vague terms of his new way to do pinball and the creative crisis that pinball was in during this era. And the thing about Steve Kirk, I'm not sure if it was that interview, but it was one of the PlayMeter interviews where he talks about things like games being connected to each other, being able to play across the country against other players and stuff like that. Sound familiar? Absolutely. Now, Kirk would say the main problem is most creative people in the industry are not in a position to do anything. I get very down on the premise that upper management never goes to the arcade and doesn't play the games in the street, yet they're dictating what goes out the door. They really have no idea what the needs of the playing public are or what the results of what they're doing is. And test results are meaningless because you really don't know how the games are being played on location. I would somewhat agree with Steve Kirk and his critique at this time, but when you look at a lot of these System 80, specifically System 80B John Trudeau playfields, there is a lot of creativity going into them, even though there may not be a lot of stuff on them. What do you think? Agree. Very good. Do you wish to expand on that more? So he would also say that manufacturers were scared to take risks, and it was all about making money and not being creative. Now, that certainly sounds familiar, does it not, Ron? It sounds like stuff Python Angela would say. It sounds like stuff a lot of the designers would say. It sounds like people said before Jersey Jack. It sounds like they say nowadays.
    28:45
    It's the inevitable struggle, which is why a lot of the designers and those in power at the manufacturers today basically ignore it because they've literally heard it for 40 years. Oh, you've got to make money. That's the thing. The main purpose of these games is to make money. Yeah, f***ing capitalism, man. And be fun. But the first part is the more important part. You know, when you look at something like this, when you look at this Chicago Cubs triple play game, it's kind of fun as well. And this is like another one of the I-gotta-have-it-in-my-basement-bar games, especially if you're a Chicago Cubs fan. Especially if you're a sports fan. What does the flyer say on this one? I love these. Sign up with the Cubs.
    29:33
    Oh, man, this is a long one. I don't think I'm going to do the whole one. But the baseball season can be profitable for you. Chicago Cubs triple play premieres timely new pinball game, transforms your location into Wrigley Field. Wow. And gives your customers a chance to play ball with the Cubs. So do they, what do they call them, the bleacher creatures? Are they there? They like spilling beer on you from the outfield? Well, one of the few baseball games that I've actually attended live, of course outside of the Toronto Blue Jays, is a Chicago Cubs game at Wrigley Field. And I'll tell you what, there is nothing like Wrigley Field in sports. It is something else. But you've got the Sky Dome. Yeah, but the Sky Dome has that 80s-ness to it. It doesn't have the charm and nostalgia and that smell of urine that the Chicago Cubs Wrigley Field has. Wow, I've got nothing to add to that. Now, the neat thing here about this play field is that it has four flippers, two at the bottom where they should be, and two at the top of the slings. But, like, they're smaller and kind of like in the in lane. Yeah, two-inch flippers. Really cool. I think they're probably useless.
    30:56
    Looking at the play field, I'm guessing in a competitive situation, you would probably try to never use them. Yeah. Beautiful. Beautiful line of six drop targets. These drop targets, Ron, in the 1980s at Gottlieb, rock solid, and they felt amazing when they engaged and disengaged. Oh. They tended not to break as much as the other manufacturers. And solid. They wouldn't break either. Eh, eh, eh. But they wouldn't break as often. If it's pinball, everything breaks. Totally. Now, this is another awesome art package by Larry Day. Just beautiful. The back glass is really the shining star here when it comes to that. You are looking at people rushing into the Wrigley Field Stadium. And the cool part is we're moving into the alphanumeric generation. So we're moving out of score boxes, and we're moving into two lines of digital displays that will have both numbers and letters that can spell things. Larry Day has integrated those alphanumeric displays into the Wrigley Field, home of the Chicago Cubs, sign on the stadium. Very cool. And the fact that it's a field means it's actually not a stadium. Yeah, whatever. The intimacy of Wrigley Field. Yeah, my favorite part is when you go to the boxes at Wrigley Field. You have to, like, walk through scaffolding. Salt Skull. Very cool. So there you go. Three games in six months. Banging them out. All sports themes. All of them ready for the sports season. What was the first game, Ron, that was ever produced with alphanumeric displays? Well, supposedly it was Aptor. Yes. Or you could say it was Hyperball, if you consider that a pinball machine, because that actually did have actual, it had alphanumerics and it would say things like condition critical because that's what I would see all the time when I would drain and fail because I never could understand that game at all. Aptor was the bizarre, and this was another one, is it Wico or Wico? I would always say Wico. I don't know how it's pronounced correctly, but they were no more for their parts, especially replacement parts. If you had a genuine, say, Gottlieb coil fail, you could replace it with a Wiko or a Williams coil, and it would be cheaper. Neat. So they had that. The Aftor had like a metal back box and like metal. It was interesting. It was their one pinball machine, I think they did. But it had alphanumeric displays on it, and that was in 84. So one of the references that I use, Ron, is the pinball compendium, which you can get on Amazon and a few other places. That's by Michael Schallub, an Aussie, I believe. You are correct. He is also a wonderful coffee table book. Wonderful. And he's got a lot of really cool stuff in here. I use this a lot for some of our references.
    34:05
    John Trudeau would say the alphanumeric display was a group effort to try to update the pinball game in general.
    34:12
    Chicago Cubs slash Wrigley Field Marquee was a natural place for it to debut. I don't think it actually did a whole lot immediately for the cash box, but it did receive very favorable reviews for those people who did get to see the test games, and anything that could help the PIN product was not frowned upon. Those were pretty slim times. I believe that the size of the tubes was determined by their availability. Nothing larger was readily available, so the cost of producing the displays was a determining factor. I really like the way they did the alphanumerics at Gottlieb, and it looks like they worked out really well, mostly because of their constraints as opposed to being unconstrained. You can also put in high-score names now. Put your initials in. That's a big deal. Although they had to put two extra buttons on the front of the cabinet for some reason in order to do so. Yeah, you didn't use your flipper buttons left and right. Hit a left and right button on the front of the cab. I'm guessing there was a technical reason for that. Someone's shouting at us right now. It was probably a board limitation or something. You couldn't do it with the flippers because they were separate. They were probably separate from the actual switch logic and all that, so it couldn't work to put initials in. That would be my guess. Yeah, I bet you if you listen very carefully right now, Ron, you can hear Bruce Nightingale's vein on the top of his forehead pulsating in anger because he knows the answer, and you don't. Yeah, Spruce is my podcasting co-host on my podcast. Actually, I'll plug that at the end. It doesn't sound right during the show. Now, of course, this is going to give you some serious bragging rights if you're walking through the arcade, right? You're able to put up your initials on the high score tables. Yeah, you can do what you have been able to do in a video game since probably the late 70s.
    36:08
    Congratulations, Pinball. Only five or six years behind. Always behind. Way behind on that one. Now, July of 85, we're chugging right along. So we're talking two months later. Yeah, we're getting to the things are starting to pick up or are going to be picking up soon because high speed is on its way era. Business is about to pick up, as they would say. But not on this game. This brings us into Bounty Hunter, which is a cowboy gunfighter theme. July of 1985. Sells 1,220 units. Designed by John Burris this time, not John Trudeau. Art by Larry Day again Software by John Burris Now this Oh he software and play field design Big deal yeah Now if you love yourself some cowboys this is probably the pin for you Now Larry Day would tell IPDB that Bounty Hunter was inspired by the 1980s Spanish graphic novel Torpedo, 1936, with the art by Jordy Burnett. Hmm. Super. It's a cool looking game. Now, Mr. Scoot, who is one of the streamers at the Pinball Network, he has, and this is his first game, a bounty hunter. I remember playing this once for a long time. That's what I remember. As in, it was really long playing. Let's talk about no drop targets here. No drop targets? Does it have a spinner?
    37:42
    No. Whoa, no spinner and no drop targets. Yeah, that's a hard pass. And it's brown. It's brown, like really brown. I think it does have one drop target, actually, now that I'm thinking about it. I think there's one that sort of blocks a left orbit shot. Well, there you go. But it's not a drop target bank. That's kind of a no-no, I think, when it comes to these System 80 games. You've got to have drop targets. You've got to have a spinner. But what it does have is awesome Larry Day art. It's like a guy, he's got a cigarette, he's loading his gun, there's a damsel in distress in the back with some seedy-looking fellas. And a Wanted Dead or Alive poster. Of course. You can't not have a Wanted Dead or Alive poster on a Cowboy game. And the side of the cabinet, there's a shootout happening. Yeah. How about the middle of the play field there with the pistol, with the bonus going up the barrel, and then the six multipliers down on the bottom where the chambers are? That's some cool friggin' design. Load them up for profits.
    38:51
    Yup. So this is, now I know these are funny, I know these are a bit cheesy, but these are nowhere near as cheesy as the Williams ones. The Williams one are groaners. These ones make you giggle. Well, you know, Bounty Hunter features our new alphanumeric top players display, trademark, that now lets players enter their initials. The new display also has easy-to-read scores with scrolling messages during gameplay.
    39:20
    Nice. Wow. And he has a name. Did you know that? Bounty Hunter has a name? Yes. Cactus Sam. Could have done a better job. Oh. But, man, Larry Day, the way he draws with these dark lines, he's very comic book, right? Does that, but it's not, it's not like zombie Yeti comic book. It's like, it's very cool. Do you like that? It's very brown. Yeah, it's a bit brown. It's kind of poop brown, yeah. Yeah. Did come with a comic book on the flyer. It did. Yes, do you want to read this? I was tracking down a new guttly pinball game from Premier Technology. It's called Bounty Hunter. When I was hot on its trail, I heard that's another one of them high-earning pin games from Premier that's built like a bank safe. There's like a guy and he's like shooting. It's like ping, ping, ping. He's like stealing this lady. I'll read the blue bits. But there's one more thing about Premier.
    40:24
    If it's like their other games, there's going to be plenty of action. You can load your gun, rotate your chamber and fire and pick off Cactus Sam. Oh, I guess Cactus Sam is the bad guy. Okay. I misread the synopsis there. It also has Premiere's new alphanumeric top player display, realistic shoot-em-up western sounds, and lots of graphics that make Bounty Hunter a great looking package.
    40:55
    See your local distributors This is a great one. If you can look this one up, this beats the Fathom comic book thing that they created to tell you whatever the hell is happening on Fathom. Actually, it looks better than the dialed-in one, too. It's so fun. Larry Day obviously enjoyed the heck out of doing that. Guaranteed loved it. Beauty. Go buy one of these. I'd rather buy the next game that came out. All right, Ron. This is a big one for me. This is the machine that started it all. Whoa. Okay. It's a game I like, too. Tag Team Pinball. This is wrestling lucha libre theme from September of 85. Sells 1,220 units. Designed by John Trudeau. Art by Larry Day. Music and sound by Ken Hale. And, of course, he's done a lot of work at today's Stern. The software, John Beerus. This was my first pinball machine. Ah, so you're biased. I am heavily biased, and this is a stunning, amazing game, which I wish I did not sell. Oh, how could you have sold it? It was so great. This game I pulled out of a basement in a man's home. This was the first machine, so you jump on it right away, and you pay whatever you can, and you drag it out of a basement. And it had been down there for many years because it, like most system ADBs, had a lot of technical issues and had a lot of small little fires. But as I continued to fix it up and basically got it to 95%, a lot of the other issues kept making me chase my tail. And we'll talk about a lot of the technical stuff in ADB and AD here in a little while, but there was a lot of moisture, I think, in the basement at the time. So there was like some rust and it caught fire a little bit in my garage. Caught fire a little bit. Just a little bit. But the game was awesome. It's beautiful. It's a lot of fun. The flyer, instead of going for the comic type art, It actually has a photograph of two big muscle-bound guys with lucha masks on. And these guys are big. They're big. They're too big to be luchadores. A pinball-first team competition. Players can now choose the excitement of challenging one team against the other. So the score will actually say Team 1, Team 2. Right. So Player 1 and Player 3 are on one tag team. Player 2 and Player 4 are on the other tag team. We've combined the appeal of professional tag team wrestling with multi-ball play field action, our alphanumeric display trademark. So does that mean if anyone else calls it alphanumeric display, Gottlieb gets a cut? They must. Adds up the team scores automatically while also displaying individual scoring. Put a wrist lock on high earnings with tag team pinball from Premier. Yeah, so you could play four player. You could play, you know, four on four. You could play, you know, your regular two-on-two. But you had the choice. It would say, would you like to play regular or tag? And you could use the buttons on the front of the cabinet to choose one or the other.
    44:24
    This has an absolutely amazing art package. I am an old-school wrestling fan, just like you, Ron. Mm-hmm. And this just is awesome, from top to bottom. The only thing that would make it better is if Bret Hart was in it. Oh, my God, Bret Hart. If he was on this machine. Maybe he was on the LE. Yeah, maybe. Or maybe they just removed him and put Hogan on it. Isn't that what they did for the Daddy East one? No, he's Daddy East. Oh, yeah. No, Bret Hart is in the Brawl Rumble. 100%. He's right on the plate field. Yeah, but wasn't he on the back last and then they replaced him with Hogan?
    45:05
    Well, they had a lot of people drop it out and stuff. They might have replaced. Hogan would have been. Oh, yeah, this is the sidebar. You can edit. But Hogan would have always been on there. I would have guessed more than likely they removed him for someone else other than Hogan. There's no way Hogan wouldn't have been on the backlist as the main character. This art package has got the two sort of luchadors who are, like, obviously the bad guys, the guys with the masks. Massively roided up luchadors. Yeah, and they are, like, they're sort of tag-teaming the one sort of, like, good guy or the baby face in one corner. And the other guy on the other side is trying to get in to, you know, save his friend. But, of course, the very dangerous referee is keeping him from getting in to save his friend. Oh, it's got the crowd in the front looking in. It's an awesome back glass. It is super, super good. But these had a lot of those heat issues, like a lot of those old back glasses, so they flake like crazy. Incandescent lighting. Heat generates peeling, or heat causes peeling. Now, when you look at this back glass, the gentleman or the wrestler in the background who's trying to get in to save his tag team partner from the bad guys, that looks like a very familiar wrestler. And I would say that it's clearly Magnum T.A. Now, he was a big deal wrestling personality at Jim Crockett Promotions, which is the predecessor to World Championship Wrestling. And he retired in 1986 because of a car accident where he lost control of his Porsche and he hit a tree. He wasn't supposed to ever walk again, but he did. But he had to retire from wrestling. And he was like this, he was this next big thing, they say. And he was like, this was a pretty devastating thing to happen at that time, which is kind of interesting that he sort of lived on as this legend, although he didn't really do much. But what he did do was so impactful. that he is clearly the sort of mustache, mullet guy, blonde, buff guy in the back. And, of course, this would be before his tragic situation. Very, very cool. Yeah, his name was Terry Allen, but since Magnum P.I. was popular and he kind of looked like Tom Selleck, that's how he got the Magnum T.A. name. Not only is the art really cool and it's kind of a theme that harkens back to my childhood, but, Ron, the gameplay rules are a lot of fun. And it has an orbit spinner. Yeah. Yes, it does. So you roll over the left in lane. It lights that spinner, and then you can just smash that spinner. And then it goes up into the lanes, down into the pops, and hopefully you can get it back down to that left in lane again and just smash it again. But it has two sets of drop targets, a set of three and a set of four. The top left has tag, and the bottom center drop targets have team. So if you spell tag, you light a capture hole in the top left. If you knock down team, it goes in the lock saucer at the bottom right. Now, you have to spell it in order, T-A-G, not just A-G-T, right? You've got to spell it in order. So if you spell it out of order, you know, you'll lock in the T, for example, and then it'll raise the targets again, and then you've got to do A-G in the correct order before you light that up. So it's kind of a little interesting. It's got a lot of really kind of neat shots for a single-level play field. Why do you like it, Ron? That's why. It shoots good. Yeah, it does. I mean, the right side doesn't have an outlane, if I remember. The right flipper is almost directly above the apron. There's no out lane on the right side, but on the left side, there's two out lanes. It is like a vacuum. It just sucks balls in there. But it does give you a little something called a last chance ball. So if you've got a ball that's locked, you go out the left out lane. If you go out the correct left out lane, it will be lit, and then you roll over it, and it will release the locked ball, and then you can start the process again. It has a three ball multi-ball. It does not have very good sound, however. It's almost like a drum beat that just sort of gets beating faster and faster. But it does also have one of the greatest pinball inventions of all time, the bell, which has been used since EM days. Exactly. But could it be any more thematically perfect? No.
    49:45
    Ding, ding. You got it. Ding, ding. Oh, when you match. Oh, this game is awesome. Way underrated. I've just driven up the price of this thing, and I'll never be able to afford it again. And the next game we have, also by John Trudeau, his 10th game in no less than a week.
    50:06
    This is Rock, which is a rock star music theme. October of 85, 1,875 units. So we're ticking up here a little bit in sales numbers. Art by Larry Day Music by Ken Hale and software by John Burris basically the same team as the last game now you want to talk Gottlieb Innovations we have the first pinball machine with a trans light rather than a back glass now we're not into the photo thing here that we're going to talk about in a couple of minutes but this is still a hand-drawn art Translite. Which more than likely was done as a cost savings. And it screams 1980s. It does. The pants, not as tight as I would expect, but they are leathery. There is a lot of teased hair. It's a rock band with a woman lead singer. Very progressive. But then for the flyers, we have the photographs. Which are bad. Very 80s. Just, you talk about hair. This guy's all business in the front, Perny in the back. But Premier says it's the new look. Now, because Gottlieb was not the industry dominator, they could take a lot more of these risks. You know, they could go all in on theme and odd playfield designs. And they could really dive into pop culture. And this is the first time they sort of dipped their toe into pop culture. What's interesting is on the flyer they actually have the Gottlieb employees on the flyer. All wearing some sweet sunglasses. Because it says, we're rocking at Premiere. Especially this lady who looks like she's in her 60s. Yes. Wearing like an apron of some sort. Looks like a winner. Part of Premiere's new look is our high-tech cabinet design. This new design utilizes single fluorescent tube back glass illumination. Combined with our new artwork, The result is a sharper, more vibrant image to attract the player's attention. So years before Stern started doing the fluorescent tube, Gottlieb was doing fluorescent tubing. Big time. Did you know that it sounds like a winner too? Because Premiere has completely redesigned its sound system to capture the interest of today's game player. Our new soundboard and extra speaker gives this game an extraordinary play appeal. Yeah, so we're talking a big-time innovation change here that itself didn't cause a revolution, but it certainly did make a huge impact at Premier Technology and Gottlieb. This System 80 era is dominated by amazing sound, and this is the beginning of that. So the code of this is pretty straightforward. you basically kind of have to collect various band members or instruments, and in so doing you add an extra layer of sound to the sound package.
    53:20
    You add the drums, you add the bass, you add the guitar, and then eventually you have this kind of rocking song, which itself is not actually that bad, is it, Ron? I'm trying to remember it off the top of my head. It does have the trend that John Trudeau liked his little mini playfields that are just part of the, you have a little section of the playfield, which will be like a little mini playfield in itself with a couple flippers. In this case, they're offset. You're trying to hit drop targets in the back of the playfield. Yeah, it's kind of like a single level, it's like a single level Swords of Fury. Drop targets in the back, flippers in the front. Two flippers. It's got two orbit spinners, one on the left and on the right, yeah, but it has this really kind of neat looping, swooping shot kind of that goes behind the drop targets. It's really kind of a neat thing that's going on there. Totally unusual. Off-the-wall design and some amazing sound. things are starting to change and they're they're they've seen some sort of way forward i think to differentiate themselves in the industry at this time so this is just prior to the system 11 transition now this is where we get into my second game raven the infamous raven this is an unlicensed action movie theme. It's October of 85. It sells 3,550 units. That is a big seller. Designed by John Trudeau. Art by Larry Day and Don Marshall. Sound by Ken Hale and software by John Burris. Raven gets a lot of crap, but it sold 3,550 units. The last time, Ron, that Gottlieb sold over 3,500 units was Devil's Dare in 1982 that sold 3,832 units. We are talking three years since the last time they sold more than 3,500 units. And Raven is basically the female Rambo. Exactly. And Raven is also Gottlieb's space shuttle, right? So it's the game that keeps the lights on before all the future huge hit games come out? Exactly. Okay. It's the one that started the trend back up, my friend. And this is what saved the company. Raven. Did you know Raven came from the code word used in the Hollywood movie Rambo? I did because I wrote the show notes. Now, Raven is the type of game that definitely creates a lot of strong emotional arguments. It's very polarizing, to say the least, because it's kind of crappy. and it's not really the play field per se that's crappy. It's not really the art that's crappy or the, it's just all of it together kind of creates a crappy game. But for people who aren't really pinball people or people who just like to shoot the ball around and have no idea what's going on, it's actually a pretty good game.
    56:34
    I guess we'll start with, with the flyer because it's a good one. Are your games missing in action? Oh, that's a great line. She's here, Raven to the rescue. The model on the back glass is on the front here, and she has like a, what is that, like an M4 or something? You're an American. You should know what kind of gun that is. I'm not a gun expert. Now, the flyer is funny in that it actually shows them taking the picture for the flyer on the flyer. Exactly. And it is something else because the actress or the model is kind of there with the back glass pose, but we're looking kind of from the other side, and there's, like, fireworks and smoke coming up. It's kind of over the top. I don't understand why this image is needed, but it's kind of fun. It's obviously got the art director of this game, Don Marshall, sitting there in his, like, turtleneck and suit. And I don't know if he's trying to, like, get himself on a flyer and make himself look fancier or something, but it worked, I guess. Did you know that Raven is offering a very uniquely designed play field? This game was created with the idea of offering entertainment to the novelty player and at the same time challenge the true pinball player. This is quite evident with the split rail ramp. Unlike some of the earlier games introduced, Raven's ramps give the player the option to continue playing the game, even when the ball is on the ramp. To add to the realism of the game, Raven has a moving helicopter located within the play field. Together, the novelty items, ramps, and artwork make Raven a game for today's player.
    58:15
    Did you know that Raven will set a new industry precedent with its photographic back glass? Oh, it'll do that all right. This is where it gets a lot of heat, but it's got some 80s cheesy charm to it as well for this photo back glass. I believe it was their first game they used the photo realistic back glass. It's a fun game. The code is far too shallow, and it basically ends up shooting it into the orbit spinner and getting into the top lanes to increase your multiplier. That's basically the game. I think it's another one where you go through the end lane, it lights the spinner, and then you hit the spinner. So you can just do that over and over. After, I would say, about a month of playing it, I was like, wait a second.
    58:56
    Are you telling me this is, you just shoot the thing and then around, that's it? And then sort of when I realized that, I was like, oh, well, that's no fun. As well as, I'm not so sure that I really like, as cheesy and funny as the back glass is, it's not like something I'd like to have in my game room or my living room. It's just a bit too much cheesiness for me. I think. There's other games that I think would kind of be more fun, but this one's just, I don't know, it just didn't do it for me. The playfield art is kind of cool. It's like a world under glass, right? It's like you're looking at a battlefield with the raven female Rambo character. The best part, though, of this game are the random single drop targets, the snipers that pop up in the play field at certain times. I just wish that the coding was better as to when you shot them, you got, I don't know, multipliers or you got more points or something, because it just ends up being, they pop up from the play field and they, like, block the orbit or they're really close to the flippers, but they don't really do anything besides just being annoying.
    60:10
    Right? John Trudeau would bring this back in Ghostbusters, basically being the Scolari brothers. Cactus Canyon also use them which is a bit topical at the moment kind of cool now it has this ramp on the left side it will open up and you can shoot under it to kind of go into the orbit and around the top of the play field into the top lanes they call that the Stargate ramp and this is a crutch at Gottlieb where it's like they had a bin of these things and they made too many of them in like 81 and they're trying to get rid of them. But it pops up all the time on these Gottlieb games. It is a cool mechanical device, but at the same time, it's like once you've sort of seen it, you've kind of seen it. I think John Trudeau also used it on Mustang, right? Uh, the rant does come up. Hey, Pinheads. I just wanted to let you know that when I'm not doing this podcast and making bad jokes, I'm Dave the Financial Guy. At Dennis Financial, our advisors strive to provide a return on life for our clients, not just a return on investment. The value of advice is something that we take very seriously. A valuable advisor doesn't just provide investment advice. They share wisdom, and this is where the true value of an advisor emerges. Don't take my word for it. Just listen to Ron Sterling, an average Canadian. Yay. If you're in Canada, Dennis Financial is for you. If you're looking for a more human dimension to your financial advice, Dennis Financial Inc. has you covered with advisors licensed in most Canadian provinces. We're also doing secure online video meetings. Contact me via email at david at dennisfinancial.net for a free rate quote and a copy of our value of advice e-book or check out dennisfinancial.ca. Insurance solutions provided by Dennis Financial Inc., Canadian residents only. What do you think of Raven? The only time I ever play it is in tournaments, and you just do left in lane, right spinner, over and over and over. Would you put this in your collection? Probably not, because it also has the ramp that is steep, and it's way at the end of the play field, so if the flippers are anything other than optimal, it takes a lot of effort, and it's a very narrow shot, so it's easy to have a high clunk factor trying to get up there. Gottlieb did all these steep metal ramps that are just sometimes nearly impossible to get up. Yeah, this is before they sort of get into those new flippers that John Norris would eventually work with at Gottlieb to sort of make them better. That really debuted at the end of 80 and more or less became into its own in System 3. Well, this still has, believe it or not, this still has the older flipper mechs in it, these older games. I don't know if they just didn't have enough power in the coils or something. But the other thing that's really weird, and I don't understand why they're there. I'm sure that the folk around you are much more technical than I am, but they've got these pop bumper boards. So all of the transistors and resistors and control pieces for the pop bumpers are not on the driver board as they were with Williams or Bally. they were actually a separate board that was mounted underneath the playfield. And the worst part about working on this game when I had it was that the pop bumper boards, there's four of them, one for each pop bumper, and they were mounted horizontally on the playfield. So there was an extra board that these boards were mounted to. And to get around in there to, like, unplug them or, you know, check the voltage, was really, really hard and super horrible. The pop bumper boards, a lot of it was due to limitations of the number of actual transistors they used on the main board. John Trudeau would say that this is his homage to Steve Ritchie's firepower. And I guess the reason for that is that it has six stand-ups in the middle of the play field and four pop bumpers? Yeah. Because that's about it. At the front, it's very reminiscent of firepower. There's a bit of a gimmick is that you shoot up that ramp, and it comes around and then it goes either left or right if you kind of nudge it. And then it goes down the ramp and it goes into a saucer and it holds the ball. And it's like the helicopter is dropping a bomb on the play field and then it pops it out. Perfect place to do a multi-ball capture. But there's no multi-ball in Raven. Multi-ball might have made this better. Helicopter's kind of cool. It's got the blades that move like a helicopter. on a track boat. It goes, every now and then, which is kind of neat. It's kind of a crap. Kind of a crap track. Wow. But, if you have no idea what you're doing, or you got family members that have no idea what they're doing, or you got buddies that are coming over for a pint, it's a good game. Just don't think too hard. How about we crack out the hits again for Rock Encore? Encore of 86. Is this the LE? It sells 250 units. So, I guess it sort of sells like an LE. Wow. This is the concept by Ken Hale, Don Marshall, and Jeff Walker,
    65:20
    designed by John Trudeau, Larry Day, John Marshall on art, John Burris and Ken Hale on sound and software, respectively. Premier had advertised this is a booster pack as a 15-minute art and sound conversion kit for your existing rock pinball game. It consisted of a replacement photo translate, because that's the future, and three new Pinball Sound ROMs.
    65:51
    It's also a few hundred dedicated Rock Encore games were made, but they basically sold it as a conversion kit. So this was an upgraded Translight. What do you think of that, Ron? Do you think that the other Rock needed a photo Translight? Not really. I'm trying to remember. I think it's the one with a dedicated version of the game as some, like, different side art. That's correct. So the conversion kit wouldn't have got you the new side art. Right, but the production game, which they only made a couple of them, had more of a splatter art that said rock on the side. It actually looked much cooler than the original cabinet, if you ask me. What do you think of this flyer? You know, Premiere is changing their tune. Keep a good thing going with Rock Encore. So this guy has the most puffy pop music 80s hair I have ever seen. Yeah, the guy is Ken Hale himself with the super poofy hair. I hope that's a wig. He didn't have his hair like that. God, he looks good, though. He does look like a rock star. And the funny thing is, in the picture, it shows him in front of a rock where they've taken the original Translight out and replaced it with the photorealistic Translight. I like the original one better. It says, keep a good thing going with Rock Encore. The Premier Booster Pack is a 15-minute art and sound conversion kit for any rock pinball game. You know, these new sound and photographic back glass, they produce prolonged earnings at a minimal investment. Yeah, it's a new game in 15 minutes. Now, we're not talking play field changes or anything. We're just talking different, more synthy tune music and a different back glass. And I don't know, I guess, this is kind of when Ken Hale and Don Marshall, who were kind of within the, let's call them the brain trust at the time. They're young, they're trendy, they're trying to make an impact. This is how they thought, hey, this is really cheap, let's do this and really get us into the future. But it was the next game that really brought them into the future. Hollywood Heat. this is a new wave Miami Vice theme. It's June of 86.
    68:13
    It sells 3,400 units. The concept was by Jeff Walker, who was another member of the Brain Trust of Young Folk. Designed by John Trudeau. Art by Larry Day, Don Marshall. Sound by Ken Hale and John Burris. When you look at this game, Ron, how do you see nothing but Miami Vice? Oh, 100% a Miami Vice ripoff. You were a big fan of Miami Vice, I assume. I saw it back in the day. I'm not that old. I would have been kind of young to watch that show. That was a more adult show. Yes, this was the crime, drug, drama, cop show. It ran from 1984 to 1990 on primetime NBC. Stripping in 80s music and cocaine. The 80s was the whole war on drugs, Colombians sneaking cocaine into the United States. That was the thing, right? That was the thing. And Don Johnson, the star of that show, he would be just the pinnacle of cool in this era. Well, who was the other? His tubs. Was it Philip Michael Thomas? He was like the only thing he was ever in. He disappeared after the show went off. They would say that this is a top 50 show of all time. And this show actually created the long pop music thing that all TV shows have, even to this day, where the characters are thinking or they're reflecting or they're driving, and there's some sort of pop song that's playing. Yeah, they used a ton of licensed music in the show. Big time. They kind of made it hard when it came out in video. to get the rights for all that stuff. Mm-hmm. Now, this had one heck of a photo trans light. The trans light scene shows Ocean Drive, which is at 13th Street in Miami Beach, Florida, and there are some serious, serious cool characters on the front of this. There's two ladies wearing 80s bathing suits with, what was the thing in the 80s was like pump high heel shoes with everything, right? That doesn't look very comfortable. That doesn't. He's got like a, what is that, a Ferrari? I think, if my memory serves me correctly, Don Marshall, he was at Pinball Expo, the banquet. He got inducted into the Pinball Hall of Fame, and he talked a lot in his speech. So I don't know if this probably isn't on film anywhere. He talked a lot about these photorealistic back glasses. And I believe this is the one he had a story that the car that's used in this, They actually procured that from some kind of actual, not mobster, but someone who was probably making their money in not the greatest way. Wow. It's a very interesting story. What's really cool is that it's shot kind of at dusk, and it's got these beautiful pink clouds in the background with the palm trees. And it has this old hotel with these vertical neon lights. It's very reminiscent of the air. It's very perfect. One of the interesting things is that the photo was actually retouched because one of those three vertical neon lights was actually burnt out. So they had to use, I don't know, computers? I don't know how they did that back then. Photoshopped the 80s version? Yeah, which was like a crayon on the film. I don't know. And, of course, the man on the flyer was Jeff Walker, who is the ideas guy. So Jeff Walker was the marketing department head. He was the person that came up with a lot of these concepts for the 80s games. He's like, hey, let's do a Miami Vice knockoff. He was the ideas license guy. That's got to be nice. Come up with the idea and put yourself on the backless. Yeah. Other interesting thing about Hollywood Heat, Steve Ritchie has said this was his favorite Gottlieb. Weird. Do you know Hollywood Heat? It's a vice worth having. That's literally what it says. Oh. On the flyer, they are leaning into it. And it even uses the same font as Miami Vice used. That's the other thing. The heat is new eight-digit scoring, three separate bonus levels, multi-ball play, two ramps, and the best music yet. The look is cool. The sound is hot. The action is awesome. It does have awesome music. That's the best part about System 80, is all of these games, especially when we get into this era, have amazing, amazing sound packages. It's like you took the right side from Tag Team.
    72:58
    There's no outlaying, and the flipper's almost directly off the apron again. The play field looks like this, like, 80s drug hotel thing, where it's like Art Deco styling, but with this, like, bright neon colors, dancing girls on the side of the cabinet. It also has this super annoying pop bumper board mounted vertically underneath. It's something else, this game. Also has the, has a little play field within a play field Yeah that sort of again that sort of John Trudeau little play field thing Two inch slippers Steep ramps that are tough to hit Looping shots It got a purple ramp What do you think of a purple ramp That's the theme. Yeah, I guess. It says it has two ramps, but I only see one. No, the one is a very short ramp that goes over. It's in the center. But, yeah, it's a little metal thing that says, hot shot on it. And that shoots it up into the mini little play field. Yeah, it's a cool little game. And I think this would be awesome in somebody's house because it's so funny. Right? How many did they sell? They sold 3,500 of them. We're getting better numbers. Yeah.
    74:11
    3,400. Very, very, very cool. Now, this is when we were getting to vacuum-formed ramps, the plastic ramps rather than the metal ramps, right? So they're able to sort of bend it a little bit better. what I think is the most fun about this is that it doesn't have that system 11 fancy fun code stuff but it is still pretty decent and when you think about the machines of your youth how just sort of simple it is to sort of shoot it around this is kind of a neat game it's very cheesy iconic but it's not as cheesy and iconic as Genesis Ah, one of my favorites. Everybody loves Genesis. Now, you got on your notes here, fantasy little person theme? Yes. It's from September of 1986. It sells 3,500 units. John Trudeau, Larry Day on art with Don Marshall, Ken Hale on sound, John Burris on software. This game was inspired by the 1927 German film called Metropolis. And the woman robot from it is underneath the play field. Yes. Of all the machines that kind of have a do-the-thing gimmick, this is probably the best one ever created. But let's start at the Translite. What's going on on the Translite? I never could figure out the Translite other than you've got an old guy that I assume is supposed to be the scientist. You've got a little guy that I'm assuming is supposed to be his henchman. Yeah, he's a little person. And the woman who is the creation. Yeah, so she's kind of got this puffy 80s hair, the red lips, but she's pale. Yeah. I mean, I think that's the story they're telling. And the game, it has these swirly pink ramps. And you kind of, so they don't go, it's not like Williams or it's not anything like a Steve Ritchie. It's not like they go up the ramp and it comes back to the flippers. It, like, goes up the ramp and then, like, goes around a weird curve and then, like, falls into a capture hole and then back out into the pop bumpers. Very anticlimactic. Oh, I think it feels good. What's the flyer say? Genesis, another great Gottlieb creation by Premiere. Genesis attributes its exciting gameplay to a number of challenging features. Genesis offers a multiplier capability of 49x for a single ball and up to 98x for multi-ball scoring. Dual ramps, very target, and the completion of the body part sequences build to a climax with a spectacular unveiling of the Genesis creation. Yeah. And the Genesis creation is cool. It is. Now, the best part about this flyer is not the writing. it's that they've cut out the creation model who's who's got like she's dressed i mean very you know sexy i guess or 80s sexy if that's your thing but they've like cut her out into all these weird situations and like dropped her in like really bad photoshop like she's sitting on it like presenting the game but she's shrunk down or she's sliding down the ramps like a like a slide at a child's, like, school. It's very weird. But I got to say, the Genesis creation, the spectacular climax, is it actually a spectacular climax? Can you explain how you get there, Ron, and then what it does? I believe the deal is you have to assemble body parts, which sounds weird. But, yes, there's four different sets of body parts. You have to spell four different things. Yeah, arms, the brain, the body, and the legs. And each one kind of has a corresponding shot, which is kind of innovative. You've got to spell them all, and then you've got to hit the very target or something. That's right. And then it reveals. And the thing is, I think when it reveals it, the ball is still in play as it's going on. It's not like that's where the fail is. It should have been like some kind of scoop or something to hold it so you can enjoy the regenerator, which is what they call it. And it's got, I think this was the, it has a window, like Creature from the Black Lagoon, another John Trudeau thing. He would reuse this type of, this window. And underneath the window, it has, you can barely see it. It's the regenerator, but you see the back of it. When you actually hit the very target, all the lights will come on, like really bright, like flashers. So it'll turn around, and then you see the robot, which is the Life Force robot. And it plays that music, which I'm trying to remember. Box, terracotta, and fugue. Is it the da-da-da, da-da-da, da-da-da, da-da-da, da-da-da, da-da-da? And, yeah, it rules. Not only that, just the regular music in the game when you're building stuff is really great. We're in the full awesome 80s sound package Gottlieb era, where almost every game sounds similar but awesome. If you want a really cool game that's both fun and interesting and unusual and screams 80s, this is the one you want. This is it. And if you hate the back, the Translight, there's alternate ones. And if you hate pink ramps, you can get clear versions now. Yeah, very cool. Because they're probably broken anyway. Probably. What do you think about the next one, Ron? Gold Wings. I kind of like it. I remember playing this. It's a Top Gun ripoff. just like Hollywood Heat was the Miami Vice ripoff. But this one, it has a feature that is invariably disconnected on almost every one I've ever played. Do you know what that is? Like it's unplugged? It's unplugged almost every one of these I've ever played. I have no idea. It has an air raid siren thing in it. Oh, my God. That would be annoying. It's almost always disconnected because it is incredibly loud. It's like, oh, my God. So this is September of 86. It sells 3,260 units. Designed by John Trudeau. Larry Day on art. Don Marshall. Larry Day does the play field. Don Marshall does the photo translate. Software by John Burris. So we're noticing a transition. Same team on every game. Everything's done by John Trudeau. So everything's done by Larry Day and Don Marshall, and everything's done by John Beerus. Non-stop here. Cranking him out, man. Top Gun, of course, from 1986. This was clearly a knockoff. Steve Ritchie's F-14 Tomcat. Better than this? Ah, yeah, probably. It's released in 1987. So Gottlieb, of course, the innovator here with the knockoff theme. Steve Ritchie, of course, did 10 Whitewoods with F-14 Tomcat. This did not have 10 nodes. It is this weird offset flipper thing. The flippers, the bottom regular flippers, are kind of offset to the right. But then there's like a wide open left out lane that you're totally going to die right away. But there's a flipper there to save it. It's different. It's a bit of a mess. It plays fine. I haven't played one, so I can't really say. But just looking at it, am I going to lose my ball right away? You will lose your ball eventually. Okay, well. Now, I mean, if it's a knockoff, it's got to be awesome. Yeah, and it's a knockoff. Again, we have gold wings, but it's in the Top Gun font. I love how they just completely rip off the font and make it the same. Buddy's got his, like, flight jacket with the thumbs up and the aviators. Does it say whether he's a Gottlieb employee or not? He probably is. It's got an insane topper. It looks like an aircraft carrier with the chase lights on it. Which is super cool, but it's huge. It's supposed to be like you're the pilot, and this is how it would look to you if you were taking off. I mean, it really rips off Top Gun to the point where it's got almost the same pose with, was it Tom Cruise and Kelly McGillis? Yeah, on the motorbike. Which has nothing to do with aviation, jet fighters. But, you know, from the first jet thrust, as the ball soars into play, Gold Wings peaks your senses with the thrill of the game. A total light and sound experience takes you through every stage of play. The ball maneuvers around the play field, up the ramp, and through the loop with the speed of a true jet fighter. With features like multi-ball play, eight-digit scoring, a real horribly loud siren. I don't think it actually says that. And a special light box attraction. Gold Wings flies circles around the competition. I have never seen one with the actual topper. One thing I do want to talk about here is this really awesome ramp, okay? This is a ramp way back in the back left. Now, there is a flipper kind of in the mid-play field to help you hit this shot, but it actually does a loop-de-loop. Like, if you've seen that homebrew Sonic Spinball, or if you've seen Hot Wheels and said, why didn't they do a loop-de-loop? It's because it was already done by Premier Technology. How do you make it any better? It goes vertical like a 360 ramp but then comes out the other side. How cool is that? Wait a minute. That would be a 180 ramp. Wouldn't a 360 ramp just be a full circle?
    83:59
    I'm going to turn this team around 360 degrees. No, but it does go 360 because it goes up in the same spot and comes down at the same spot it is on the right. That's true. How cool is that? We got more plastic ramps. And it's got, like, layered plastics, so it sort of looks like clouds. Give it a try if you see it. Yeah, it looks like it's interesting. I don't know if it shoots any fun. It's got a great spinner into the pops, which kind of looks like it sucks because I bet you the pops just smash it back into that spinner, though. But the air siren is so loud. Why would you do that? I don't know. All right. Monte Carlo. This is the gambling casino theme from February of 87. Sells 4,315 units. My goodness. John Trudeau on design. Art by Don Marshall. Software by John Burris. Broke a record. This is a photo trans light, of course, which was photographed at the Gaslight Club in Chicago. So Alvin Gottlieb is the older gentleman, and Gil Pollack is there in the bow tie, and they are all standing in the background. So it's fun because all of these translights and these flyers all have the people at Gottlieb in them, of course, with models. But it's nice that they have all these fun little Easter eggs in their flyers and stuff. It's nice that they have a Gottlieb in a Gottlieb. It's like Gottlieb Inception. Well, you know, when it comes to Monte Carlo, don't gamble on the competition. Place your money on a sure bet. Features, three-ball multiball, roulette wheel. We love the roulette wheel. Those always work. And a 10 million point shot. This is an interesting design. Again, they're just smashing the mouse. You know, it's okay, I guess. I haven't played it. Have you? Let me see that play field here. I mean, I'm sure I have. I don't know if I remember it. Yeah, we're getting into ramps again. that are more sort of orbit-based ramps, right on the left and right side. And my goodness, once again, we've got the Stargate rising ramp on the left side. At least this ramp does return the ball back to the flipper on the right side. So at least we're getting some movement back to the player here.
    86:19
    It also has a really cool Schatz shot on the left and right side. Can you explain what those are? No, I don't know what that means. Well, yeah, Schatz is the same as an alley pass when you pass from one flipper to another by letting the ball roll all the way to the very tip, and then you flip it the last possible second, and it actually goes up the other flipper's in lane. And you can actually go up and shoot a target in there. That was, of course, famously brought back at Iron Maiden by Keith Elwin.
    86:45
    This also, as you had mentioned as we were chatting, does not have in lane switches in the play field, but actually these kind of game-looking switches. Very unusual. I don't know if I've ever seen that. It's very unusual. Yeah. It's got a bunch of drop targets. It's got, what, six, ten drop targets, four different banks, two ramps. It's a great-looking little play field. It's different. That would be an LE today with that many drop targets. That would put it way over budget. It also has a plunge into a 180 scoop, just like Jurassic Park from Stern. Keith Elwin's stealing all the ideas. Did he steal it because it was on almost all the John Papadu games?
    87:27
    World Cup soccer, 180. There's no Larry Day on the play field here, and you can tell because it doesn't have that same sort of dark line, hand-drawn Larry Day design. It's got a roulette wheel. God, I hate roulette wheels in games. I don't get it. Should we talk about the peak of 80s cheese here when it comes to Gottlieb Braun? This one is unusual in that they go a little, usually Gottlieb was known more for the family friendliness, and the play field on this is not family friendly. This is Spring Break. It is a aquatic fun and happiness theme. That's what it says. That's what it says on IPDB. Aquatic fun. Okay. I had to take that directly. It's from April of 87. It's a standard body, sells 3,550 units. Concept by Jeff Walker, John Trudeau, Don Marshall, and John Burris. There's no manual ball shooter assembly. The ball is launched into play by pressing the right flipper button. Oh. That must be really annoying. This is the one where every ball starts with a multi-ball. This game is a bit risque, wouldn't you say? For Gottlieb, yes. The flyer's got a girl with no top covering it with her hands and a woman with a shell-top bikini and another one in a bikini. And then you got down here, laying in the sand is Jeff Walker buried in front of them. He's living the dream, this guy. Well, and the top of the woman who doesn't have a top is in front of him. Exactly. He's putting himself over pretty hard here on a lot of this stuff. It's very 80s, like coming-of-age party movie theme. I guess it's okay. Right? The art on the play field is pretty risque. The girl with her top taken off, and there's like a dog at the bottom who stole her bikini top. What do you think of this game, Ron? I'm pretty sure this is the game that starts with multiball. Actually, let's look at the flyer. I'm sure they would advertise that as something. Let's see. Premier brings the party to you. featuring new automatic percentaging. In other words, the thing that was first on high speed that will change the high score so it doesn't keep getting hit over and over. So you're not winning free games all the time. Yeah, it will adjust. Multi-image back glass. In other words, instead of one photograph, it has several. And automatic ball launcher. So, yeah, every ball starts with multi-ball. So it just fires all the balls out until you lose all of them. The top lane lights, the top lane rollovers are beach balls. That's kind of fun. It's the ultimate party. I guess. I haven't played it. Wouldn't know. It's not really one for my living. I think I definitely had to have played it once because I remembered the multi-ball thing. I mean, you still get three turns, but I believe it just fires out two or three balls. And once you lose the ball, that's considered your first ball, your first turn. Very cool. So then they did another conversion kit for Amazon Hunt 2, which was a conversion kit primarily made for the European market. Now, we had mentioned this before. What's with all these John Trudeau games? Why has he literally designed every game for the last, what, like four or three years? This is insane. We're into 87 and he's done every game. Well, at the time, John Trudeau was their only designer. You'll remember from our Williams Pinball is Dying episode that really the only designer that was left there was Barry Ousler.
    91:12
    So in a similar fashion, Daron Trudeau was holding down the fort and keeping the lights on. Gil Pollack would eventually hire Joe Kamenkow. Yes, that Joe Kamenkow, the one that's got a boatload of money, a James Bond car, and a Batmobile. Now, eventually, Gil Pollack would also hire John Norris, and he would promote Ray Tanzer from engineering into game designer. Of course, management at this time wanted to wean off being 100% dependent on John Trudeau. Now, this caused a lot of tension at Gottlieb when John Trudeau noticed that others were coming in. It's also said that John Trudeau felt very threatened by Joe Kamenkow, so he spent a lot of time politicking behind the scenes to eventually have Joe fired. Joe was incredibly enthusiastic about his current design, which would later be the Class of 1812, and suddenly Joe was no longer employed at Premier Gottlieb. Now, it took over a year before Ray Tanzer and John Norris would have their first games released. But once they did, the company had three full-time game designers who could keep the line going. Well, that brings us into Ray Tanzer's first design, which is Arena, a fantasy theme, June of 1987. It sells 3,099 units. Art by Constantino and Janine Mitchell. software by John Burris, but he's still doing everything. John Burris is still in on it. It does seem like they're settling into a nice 3,000 units per each game. Yeah, they're just moving on to the next, right? They don't want to do too much. They don't want to order too much. This is a Conan-ish theme, or like gladiators battling thing. Ray Tanzer, of course, the new blood. You'll hear a lot more about him in our episode two, Zombie Pinball, back from Gottlieb System 3. And who is Ray Tanzer? Well, after Gottlieb, he joined Sega Pinball in February 1996 to head up their mechanical engineering division, staying with the company as they became Stern Pinball in 1999, up until the end of 2008 when he left to join Namco. Wow, a lot of people seemed to leave Stern in around 2008. Yeah, because that's when they fired everyone, when they had the big downturn. But he's back at Stern. He managed the expansion of their latest facility, which is now too small. And he was also one of the guys responsible for all those metal ramps in the Elwynn games. Oh. I thought he was Avengers. Yeah, Avengers. He said, you can use the metal ramp right there. We used it on Stargate.
    94:00
    Shoot the pyramids. So the skill shot, this game is all built around the skill shot. Arena. How about that for a flyer? Yeah, it's Conan. I'm Conan. You do not have to pay the ice and sing. only for those who dare to enter the arena.
    94:20
    Wow, they're plugging this one. Enter the exciting world of arena. Gottlieb's newest hit. I love how they know it's going to be a hit. Like, it's not even, it's just out, but we know it's going to be a hit. Combines the challenge of battle with the power and speed of pinball. Okay. Premier introduces another new concept, combining photographic images and pinball art for a new, exciting back glass. The innovative music and pulsating sound add to the excitement of the challenge arena. Arena features also include a new flipper end of stroke switch and assembly, a lighted tube ramp, and new LED strip. Interesting, their flipper bats are still the same.
    95:08
    I haven't changed those yet. this game is all built around this skill shot, which is called the pit. Basically, plunge the ball, it goes up, and it goes, like, around this circle.
    95:21
    Yeah, it's like a circle. It's like one of those carnival games things where you're trying to get the thing just the right speed, and you're trying to come up around the circle and have it take the right path so it goes into the highest level. Yeah, like if you plunge all the way too hard, it goes all the way around and into the 25,000 hole.
    95:44
    And if you plunge just right, it goes right into the middle hole. And then if you plunge not quite right, it goes into the 50 or the 75,000 hole. It's really kind of neat, but I don't know if it looks fun because a lot of it has to do with that. That's the arena, right? Like that's the pit. and you're in there for like a second and then that's it. And then you're kind of struggling down on the bottom play field. I don't know. What do you think? I think I've only played it probably a couple of times. So the ramp is unique, right? Because the ramp goes up across the play field on these tubes with LED strips and then it goes back into the shooter lane. So you're always back into the shooter lane, into the pit. Back to the shooter lane, into the pit. And I love games that put you back in the shooter lane. That is something that just, I love that. I don't know what it is about getting back into the shooter lane. You know, The Walking Dead or Star Trek or Star Wars or any of those older sort of got leaves with the gate. Love that stuff. But here it just looks annoying. Well, it actually has a gate. It can go back to the flipper or go to the shooter lane, I believe. Oh. Yeah. At least that's what the flyer says. And the flyer surely wouldn't lie. It says back to the flipper or to the shooter lane and into the pit. The pit. You see the exact same sort of Connie Mitchell art that you see on a lot of the Williams of the era, where it's like these odd colors and he tries to make things look like rocks, but it looks too cartoony. Doesn't really do it for me. I miss Larry Day all the way. also mention is the pit, the arena, is actually, it's an upper playfield. Yes, yeah, it sits above the playfield. That's right. Yeah, it's kind of cool. It's different. You can tell that Ray Tanzer is trying something all new. He's in, you know, the young blood. But I don't know. I don't think it really works, but I would have to play a lot more than just look at it. How about the next one, though? This is the one that everybody loves to talk about. This is Victory. auto racing theme October of 87 3,315 units John Trudeau Connie and Janine Mitchell this is sound by Dave Zabriskie and software by John Burris is it Jeannie or Janine or Janine? you said Jeannie but it's spelled Jeannie this is certainly a playfield experiment wouldn't you say in what way? It's particularly unique. Now, Victory was the first game that uses a fully screened, photorealistic, Vitrograph, Vitrograph Mylar overlay for its play field, rather than the industry standard silk screening on the wood directly.
    98:46
    Basically, in a nutshell, what this is, is the art is printed on the Mylar, and then it's stuck onto the play field. Was it hardtop stuff that they have now? It's like hardtop stuff, but this was much thinner than a hardtop. And at this time, the major complaint amongst all of the operators were that these playfields were just disintegrating, and the art was just falling off of them really, really quickly. So they realized after doing this, they had a lot of significant adhesion problems, and the pieces, it was coming off the playfield. It looked horrible, and it was not working. Then Gottlieb went back to the standard silk screening on the wood rather than the Mylar. But they did it for a few games. They did it for Victory. They did it for Diamond Lady. They did it for TX Sector. Yes, and the art itself, you can see, is a lot less, like, hand-drawn-y look, and more, it has this different look to it, right? Like, it has this photorealistic look, but not necessarily like pictures. Like, it was drawn art, but it just looks different. It does look different. It's unusual. When you see it, you'll know. You have to look at it. Check it out on IPDB, which is in the show notes. The interesting thing, we're looking at the Victory play field here, and I've never noticed this before, but if you look at where the X's are, 1X, 2X, 4X, 8X, and the font they're using, Doesn't that look a lot like Hot Wheels? Oh, yeah. That's kind of neat. Yeah. It's like, damn, that looks just like Hot Wheels. But the victory game is all about the checkpoints. You've got to get through all the checkpoints, and they're all lit in order. You get one, and then two lights, and three lights, and four lights. It forces you to hit every single area of the play field. So you're kind of chasing the blinking light.
    100:41
    But in a fun way. I always liked it. And it has the light strips along the ramps. They look pretty cool. It also has an awesome spinner into, like, a kicker thing. So you shoot the spinner, and it goes into this spot where it rests, and then the ball gets kicked up to the upper play field into a four-drop target. Yep, it's got an upper play field. We should mention that. It's small. It's actually not small. It's the entire upper right-hand side. Lots of drop targets. Lots of ramps. Stand-ups, too. But you can see that the crutch at Gottlieb, Because those flippers aren't as powerful as the Williams flippers, that often the ramps are supplemented by really small flippers in front of them because it's like they're trying to get enough power so the flipper has to be really close to the ramp. In this one, you need the flippers to get up that ramp. You mean the upper play field? Yeah, because you can get on the upper play field from the left ramp, which is really far back, but then there's also the right ramp from the kicker. Yes. Right? So it's like if you can't make the other ramp, you've got the one on the other side where there's, instead of a flipper, there's a device that flicks it up the play field. Some people say this is John Trudeau's best Gottlieb game because it's got awesome rules. Originally, it had a little racetrack under the play field with a car that would move around the track, but that was determined to be too expensive and was cost cut. I could see that. So the flyer on this one says, a great pinball tradition continues with victory. And then it has a picture of the Gottlieb factory, which doesn't really scream.
    102:22
    Oh, I see. It's got a huge flyer. Load your weapons, check your equipment, and start your engines. You're about to start the race of your life. Set your weapon sites on high earnings as you speed to each checkpoint. Yeah, this is sort of like a death race theme as opposed to like a regular kind of car theme. It's like a four-page brochure. It's quite large. Reach around corners. Over and under three ramps, you are ventured to the finish line. Race to your distributor with the checkered flag and claim your victory. Yeah, it's kind of neat. It doesn't do it for me. Have you played it? No. Fail. I know. This is what happens. Yep. Judgmental. Can't be judgmental. The other thing is I never get to go to a show to play them anyway, right? There's never any. Certain shows I would go to, they'd have a whole row of all this era of Gottlieb, and no one would be playing them. So I got to play them all. I would be on this real quick. Now the next one out of the gate here is Diamond Lady. This is card game gambling theme. It's from February of 88, 2,700 units, designed by John Norris, a new name. We've got Connie and G. Mitchell, Dave Zabriskie, and John Norris on Sound Software. John Burris. John Burris? Or however... Have I been saying Burris? Yeah, however you've been saying it, say it the same way. I don't know how to say it. I've probably been saying it wrong. That's fine. That's our gimmick. John Norris, of course, you can read up about him on our Episode 2 Zombie Pinball, Gottlieb System 3, just like you did for Ray Tanzer. Now, of course, just in a nutshell, John Norris made some homebrews, and he was a big collector of wood rails back in the day. He first heard about Pinball Expo in the fall of 1985. He had made some resumes and some designs in a workbook. He gave those directly to a bunch of manufacturers at Chicago Pinball Expo, and he didn't think he'd hear back from any of those companies. About a month later, he heard from Gil Pollack, and he joined Gottlieb. Wow, so that was the first Xbox version. 1985, so. Yeah, so his first design was Diamond Lady. Diamond Lady introduced a new back box design with extended side panels and with scoring displays and speakers located at the top of the back box. That is a controversial design when it comes to having machines nowadays, isn't it? People often complain because it throws off the symmetry. Bally did it, so they weren't the only ones. The woman who modeled for the manufacturer's flyer and the back glass also appears on the International Concepts 1989 Night Moves. I did not know that. Yes. Wow. It's the same person. So if you look up IC's Night Moves, the little game. Yes. Little cocktail pinball machine. Yes, and you know who designed that. Yes, Mr. Trudeau. The second game with the vitrigraph playfield. Yes, Diamond Lady, and the art is completely different between the two. The vitrigraph and the silkscreen versions are completely different. And this, again, when you look at the playfield, the model that's on the playfield is photorealistic. So it's not hand-drawn art. It's not Photoshop. it's like this weird whatever whatever in the 80s and it all and she's everywhere she's in the in lane the out lane yeah she might be more places than arnold was in t3 look at this let's try to count a lot two three four five six seven eight she's like eight right off the top of my you know just looking at it pretty funny in front of every sort of major thing to shoot at she's in front of it what's interesting here is that it has a drop target between the flippers it's like a ball first I should do that, but probably the first in a while to do that. Yeah, super, super cool. And you can tell that there is a different designer in town because we have a lot of different sort of shots, tons of drop targets, two very cool flippers. It's a great-looking little game here. And this is one of Chuck Wirtz from TPN Streaming and SDTM. He loves this game, loves it. That plunge looks familiar, doesn't it? Another 180. Another 180 back to the flipper. Who would have thought that somebody like John Norris would steal ideas from a young, he's elderly guy. You know, I could argue, how about Black Knight, the original? It has the same 180 ramp. That's how it gets up the upper play field. That's how most of those get to the upper play field, those pie-level games. I guarantee you there's probably a wood rail made in the 40s that uses it. What I really like about this is the trans light. The photo translate, okay, is photo on the top. It's like a playing card. It's the Queen of Diamonds. But then on the other side, she's hand-drawn. It, like, changes from photo realistic into hand-drawn. It's actually a really cool effect. It looks really, really nice. Have you played a lot of Diamond Lady? Yes. What are your thoughts? It's a good game. It's different, but different in a good way. The shots are a lot of fun. Deal yourself a winning hand with Diamond Lady. Let's see what we got here. Is there any gold? Is there any gold on the second page here? Nah. Diamond Lady carries Gottlieb's part replacement limited warranty for one year on all basic and machine parts and 90 days on printed suit. Probably better than today's company's warranty. Then there's an asterisk. See the manufacturer's part replacement limited warranty for specific details, items, and conditions. Diamond Lady is built with the Vitrograph, easy maintenance, wear-resistant playfield surface. Patent pending. Boy, I wonder if they're still making money from that patent. No.
    108:24
    Yeah, so this is John Norris' first game, and I think, you know, for a first game out of the gate, I think it's a winner. You do, if you look at it, you do realize what it's an homage to. You may have said this, too. If you look at the drop target arrangement, I believe it's a volley. The EM volley. Yeah. Basically at the bankster in pretty much the same spot. Yeah. It's volley with a ramp. It's got kind of a neat ramp in the back left. Yeah. It's neat. Yep. It's very cool. Orbit spinner. Oh, yeah. He knows. It also has this really kind of neat spinner into a loop right next to the ramp. the way that it goes up there and hits the spinner and then kind of loops around the edge of the spinner is very cool. Very cool. He'd reuse that again in another really great design, but we'll get to that in a minute. This brings us to the darling of the tournament folks, which is TX sector. It's a sci-fi theme. It is March of 1988,
    109:28
    2,336 units. So not a big seller designed by John Trudeau, Constantino and Genie Mitchell software by John Burris, or Burris, whatever. Playfields. Now, there are three different playfields for TX Hector out there. So depending on when it was manufactured, yours may be different. There's, of course, the laminated VitryGraph playfield, a screen-printed playfield with light trapezoids, and a silkscreen playfield with darker trapezoids. Exciting. Yeah, which one's more desirable? Which one's the more rare? Which one's worth more? Which is the one that you got that you can flip for $7,500? So Dave can't afford pinball machines anymore. They decided to get rid of Vitrograph after this game. Yeah, it's probably not that one. Vitrograph's probably the one you don't want. Now this play field has a really cool plunge So the plunge goes up into a wire form around the left of the playfield in an arcing motion and then down to a third flipper where you never want to flip the ball from I pretty much want to hit the lit spinner. Yes, this game is two spinners, one on the left, kind of in the middle of the playfield, one on the right, kind of in the middle of the playfield. If you go in the left in lane or the right in lane, it will change which spinner is lit for 10,000 a spin. And all you do is shoot them spinners. It's kind of fun. However, there is multi-ball, and the balls will get transported from one area of the play field to another. Yes. So the Gottlieb invention here is that they invented transport technology, where the ball goes up a ramp into a saucer, and the game transports it from that side of the playfield to the other. Isn't that awesome? It is awesome. How did they have the money to do transport technology, but not the money to actually make decent code? Code is fine. It's more the experience of the game. It has an incredible sound package. It's probably what it's most known for. and just the completely bizarre artwork, including the back glass, the trans light, that is just, I don't even know what it's supposed to mean. It just looks. It's like a guy transporting, but he's like faded in and out. Terrible, out of focus, and what does it even mean? It sort of looks like the trans light has been, the bottom of it has been dipped in water. Or someone spilled beer on it or something. Yeah, it's all like peeling down or it's very odd. It doesn't make any sense. But this is where you'll often get the term power drain. A lot of people will talk about, oh, power drain out the left side. Power drain.
    112:17
    Somebody else in the background will say that. Yeah. It has speech kind of. That's one of the things it says. But even the speech is just weird. It makes all these weird sounds, and they're all good. It's a cool game. I have played a lot of TX Factor, actually. I had the opportunity to buy one, but just spinners all the time. I don't know if I can handle that. You don't have to play it that way. Yeah, but you do. If you want to, you know, get a score. But it's also, I mean, for a do-the-thing game, like spinners that change based on the in-lanes, that's a pretty good do-the-thing. TX, TX, TX, TX. Teleport yourself into a new dimension in Pinball, where reality ends and adventure begins. Don't miss it. TXTXTXTX. How about this 80s lady with the super crazy pointy eye makeup? It's cool. It's a cool game. I really like it. It's a tournament darling. The tournament folk just go A** for this game. Well, I think it was in a lot of tournament streams and people wanted it after that. Here's where things get a little bit kind of interesting. And I found this story and I think it's kind of cool. So there was an operator meeting at a trade show around this time. Now, it was likely with Gil Pollack and some of the designers. Some of the operators had a discussion around how great Sinbad, Countdown, and 8-Ball Deluxe were when it came to earnings a few years ago. They were simple to understand, easy to maintain, and they earned a lot of money.
    113:53
    Now, when it comes to Sinbad and Countdown, those are basically, what, the best System 1 games? and 8-Ball Deluxe, one of the greatest of all time in the class of Bally 1981.
    114:07
    The idea came up in this meeting to make new versions of those games with a modern look, theme, and feel. So this is where we get into some unique games. This one being really, really cool and one that I wish I could play, RoboWar. Sci-fi battle theme from April of 88, sells 2,130 units, designed by John Trudeau and John Norris, Connie and Jeannie on art, and John Burris on software. I would take RoboWar over TX Sector any day, because it is an updated version of Sinbad, and I love Sinbad. I also love sci-fi, so it fits pretty well within my wheelhouse. So this is an updated version of Sinbad. Yeah. Robo-War, where skill and fast action collide.
    115:05
    The back glass is like this moon-based planet thing with these saucer-looking imperial walkers shooting lasers. I assume they're robots, and they're in war. Very, very, very cool. So when you look at this play field, Ron, when you bring it up on IPDB, link is in the show notes as always, you can see Sinbad. There's a set of a single target on the orbit. There's a set of four targets. Oh, I'll be damned. There's two in the middle and the three on the right. Never really saw that, but, yeah, it is. It also has a frigging Stargate ramp on the left side. So it lifts up. You shoot under it. it goes to the top lanes. If you shoot up it, it goes across a wire form and into a capture. Is it called Stargate Ramp because it was on Stargate? Or is it called a Stargate Ramp because it was on the first, like, Mars God of War? Yeah. It's also in Spirit, and it's called Stargate on that, too. Right. Anyway, this is a really cool game. I really think this is cool. This is definitely one that would be in my collection, regardless of the silly-looking back box with the speakers on the top. Yeah, but they point right at your head. Or they should. Yeah, instead of at your, like, nipples. Mm-hmm. So have you played RoboWar?
    116:30
    Probably. It's another tournament darling. They're all about these in tournaments. I think you lock a ball and you hit a ramp, something like that. Yeah. The next one. This is the most perfect version of 8-Ball Deluxe that you can get. and that is oh no I'm sorry that is bad girls it's 8 ball deluxe with multi ball it is November 88 they sell 2500 units this is designed by John Trudeau no John Trudeau and John Norris it's got music by Dave Zabriskie and Craig Bjerre Waltz and software by Bob Wilson. And of course, art is always by Connie and Jeannie Mitchell. So what's up with this? Is Bob Wilson on software? Where's John Burris? He did everything for like five years.
    117:29
    Well, John Burris was the director of software. He programmed most of the ADB games. Bob Wilson was hired, and so was Alan Edwell. He was, of course, from the System 80 era and has been rehired. Now, towards the end here, John Burris was given a staff. Management wanted more than an eight-ball deluxe ripoff, and John had some great ideas. So he was able to work with somebody new while Burris was on a different project. Basically, what John Norris did is he flipped the play field, he added multi-ball, a very target, which makes every game better, and a translucent pool rack on the play field. Of course, in this area, you've got to add a couple of ramps, and there are some really cool shots. Do you love Bad Girls as much as I do? I don't know if I've played it more than once. I need to get more time on it. This game is criminally underrated, and the reason it's criminally underrated is because of the art. But let's talk a little bit about the play field itself. It's got drop targets all on the left side, which is awesome, right? It has two spinners. It's got one spinner on the left side, kind of in the middle of the play field. Squeeze it right by the pop bumper. And then it has another spinner on the left side in the far back. But when you hit that far right spinner, it loops around a ball guide and comes back down the spot, and that spinner just goes and goes and goes and goes. It is such an awesome shot. It's basically the mirror image of the Diamond Lady spinner loop, but for some reason it's done so much better on this game, and I can't explain why, but you can see it better. It spins faster. It's so cool. It has the John Trudeau window. It has the window in the middle of the playfield, but there's nothing below the playfield like a rotating sculptor toy. It basically just has lights that light up, and it makes it look like a fancy digital display, but it's just some lights on some glass. It's actually kind of a neat effect. I think the game would be better if it didn't have it, because then you could put in some kind of neat more art. But it also has three ladies on the playfield, and they are seriously hardcore 80s images. Like, it is 80s, 80s, 80s. They're bad girls. They play pool, apparently. Apparently good girls don't play pool. It's got a Vuck, which is awesome, into the pop bumpers. The drop bag has two sets of recoil, two sets of reset coils. That's exciting. Two reset coils.
    120:30
    Whatever. It's got those things. They do stuff. And it's got mirror blades, man. Yeah, but they're on the outside of the cabinet, not the inside. Yeah, that does. So you have mirrors you can look at yourself if you're standing next to the game. Yeah, it's so weird. So weird. Now, this is a pretty risque trans light, wouldn't you say? Again, for Gottlieb, this is a different risque than the spring break one. So the reason this backlash is very risque, the bad girls who are playing pool,
    121:11
    they have, like, stockings that stop just below their dresses, and they've got those garter belts hanging out, and they don't have shoulders on their dresses.
    121:30
    It's, I mean, it's iconic 80s and, you know, it's not particularly offensive, but it's, they're very sexualized. Let's put it that way.
    121:43
    This actually caused a lot of problems in Gottlieb at the time. Well, the models, they were friends of Gil Pollack. Of course they would be, because everybody has a bunch of models for friends. But John Norris says, I just suggested that they include a G-rated trans light, like the flyer photo, and include it inside a cardboard tube with each game. But management decided not to do that, probably due to the added expense. Yeah, they know that the target audience in pinball machines, and we talked about this a lot in our ballet art episodes, are teenage boys. And, you know, you're trying to get teenage boys to spend more time around your machine. And the best thing to do is to put ladies in suggestive clothing, 1980s high-heeled pumps, gloves, I guess, are sexy. I don't know. It's a bit much. But it is pretty cool. I'm not going to lie. In fact, this was the era when they started testing the waters for a new board set. John Norris would say that there were 10 bad girls that were released to test System 3 hardware. The games were shipped to a distributor called New Orleans Novelty, so you might have one of those fancy, super rare System 3 hardware bad girls. So we've done Sinbad.
    123:13
    We've made it pretty awesome. For the new era, we've done the new 8-Ball Deluxe, which I think is probably the best version of 8-Ball Deluxe. We only have one left, and that's Countdown, the new, age-updated, super-awesome Countdown, Countdown being the best System 1. Isn't that correct? I'll go with that. So we get Excalibur, which is a Fantasy Night theme from 1988 in November. sells 1,710 units. That's not good. It's designed by John Trudeau and John Norris, art by Connie and Jeannie Mitchell, and software by Rob Wilson, and I put probably on that because he's uncredited, but some people have mentioned it in other sources that I've had, so I put his name in there anyway. What I find funny is that these distributors had these conversations that they wanted these updated versions of these games because they sold well and they earned well and all that other stuff. But RoboWar sells 2,130 units. Bad Girls sells 2,500 units. Now we've got Excalibur sells 1,710. So these major distributors kind of put that out there and made the manufacturer do it, and then they didn't back it up. They didn't buy the units. So that's a pretty sleazy thing, if you ask me. So this is Countdown. and would you say that this is a new updated fun version of countdown let's see the play field let's see oh yeah again i never noticed that before now i'm looking at the play field yep it's countdown ladies and gentlemen david dennis has taught ron hallett a massive thing when it comes to pinball as let's drop targets at the top it looks like but it is it is countdown they added a ramp, wire form. This machine probably has one of the worst plunges in pinball history. So you plunge the ball, it goes around the orbit, it goes up a ramp, and then into a diverter to the left or right, which goes down into a capture saucer. And then it has a center ramp right in the middle of the playfield, and that center ramp goes right up, and then again into the diverter, which goes to the left or right capture hold. But you can't ever get up the ramp from the back again. You can only get up that way from the plunge. It seems a bit of a waste. But it is Countdown, and Countdown's a lot of fun. I think this game is fun, and that's what Chuck Wirt tells me. He has one of these, too. I don't know why he's got all these odd Gottliebs. But he says this game is a lot of fun, and he enjoys it. He's a connoisseur of fine play fields. Yes. He just wishes that center ramp was a little bit different. Like, for example, if you shoot up the ramp and the diverter is there, it goes to the left and to the right. And then it had a traditional plunge. He said other than putting the ramp in kind of gets it all in a weird situation. But he says he really likes this game, so I take his word on it. But what do you think about the theme? It's like knights and Dungeons and Dragons kind of thing. Medieval Madness, it works. Excalibur. Charge onto the battlefield of Excalibur as you choose your strategy with the plunger shot. Try to earn up to 250,000 points and select your shield targets for lockup. Battle your way through the shield targets to storm the castle and save the princess from the evil knight. Wow. Yeah, so the rules of this game were very much done by John Norris, who is very much engaged in the rules of his game. John Trudeau, for example, would often do the play field, pass it on to the next, do the play field, pass it on, and somebody else would do the rules. John Norris really takes a lot of pride, a lot of energy into designing all the rules on his play field. Chuck Wirt has told me that the rules here are actually very good and make this game actually shine, regardless of kind of how, you know, of a bit of a disappointment that center ramped. You know what I find interesting is they're using the term multiball, which was trademarked by Williams. So either Williams didn't feel like suing them because they made Tad East change it, or they were paying Williams to be able to use that. Mm-hmm. Yeah. Ten cents every time that a flyer was printed. Now, Connie and Jeannie, of course, Connie Mitchell, of course, was always the kind of artist that really went all in on the ladies, right? If you look at a lot of his Williams art, you can certainly see that. And this game had an original backlash, which was very sort of shiny, sexy robots. I don't understand how that's Excalibur, but that was mixed for the Backlash that they inevitably went with, which was more of a knight in armor leading the charge on a battlefield, which actually looks really cool. Yeah, they're going away from the photo Backlashes, too.
    128:42
    Yeah, you can see that they're moving in this now. the last three games, you know, TX Factor kind of had a mixture, you know, Diamond Lady had a mixture. Now they're moving back into those back glasses. I would probably say that the photo back glasses probably had much higher budgeting than just paying Connie Mitchell to design something along with the play field. You know what I mean?
    129:09
    Man, oh, man, that bad girl's translate. we are coming into the home stretch here Ron we're talking about Big House cops and robbers theme April of 1989 standard body sells 1,977 units designed by Ray Tanzer Connie and Jeannie Mitchell on the art software by Bob Wilson and Alan Edwell We're seeing the return of a name here, Alan Edwell, who is on the software. Alan, of course, was a gifted programmer who was very, very fast at his programming. All of the games at this time were programmed in assembly language, and the designer would often come to work early. They would play the prototype. They would create a bug or a change list by late morning, and they would pass it back to Alan. Alan would always have everything completed on the designer's list for the next morning, and the cycle would continue. This person was a machine. Now, they typically only had a couple of weeks to tweak game rules once the play field was complete, and to fix any bugs before production. I bet it was great to not have to worry about bugs when you were shipping a game, And since they worked so closely with somebody like Alan and so fast, they could often pull a lot of those bugs out of the game. Gottlieb's policy, of course, was to never release a software update unless there was a major bug. They were on to the next thing. This was often why the programming and code for these games was kind of ho-hum, because they were banging out games, and as long as it just didn't crash, it was good to go. Don't you think? Yeah, unless it was Alien Star. They actually did release an update for that one. Yeah, so Big House is kind of a neat little game, for sure. Now, the back glass is really kind of fun, because it's like a bunch of dogs who are breaking out of jail, but the dogs are drawn in a very distinctive format that look like some old-school actors of the time. Do you know who these actors are? One is Edward G. Robinson with a cigar in his mouth. But they're obviously not paying a license for these. No. Like, no. But they're those famous actors, those gangster actors in sort of the late 50s, right? Edward G. Robinson was like 30s. I have a question for you. Are your collections in solitary confinement?
    131:57
    Then break out with bigger earnings with Gottlieb's Big House. I like this game. This is a cool game. I'm not going to lie. The play field art is a bit worrisome. It doesn't look very nice because it's going for kind of that, again, that world under glass of a bunch of people breaking out. But it's very blue and green, and there's lots of inserts. It's just a bit muddled. Oh, they have a name for it. See, I always called it the corkscrew. There's a really cool, like, corkscrew thing that your ball goes in, and it goes up, it rises up. I didn't realize Gottlieb actually had a name for it. They called it the mechanical auger.
    132:39
    Yeah, it's like a snowblower auger. Or when you go ice fishing, you use an auger to cut into the ice. But you wouldn't know that. Yay.
    132:50
    It has a new improved Stargate ramp. Oh, God. But the best thing about this game is when you, in multi-ball starts, you're escaping from prison and all the lights go out and there's like a spotlight. And I think the spotlight moves around. So that's like when Guns N' Roses came out. Like, oh, moving spotlights, that's new. I was thinking, wait a minute, I'm pretty sure Big House did that. Yeah, it's kind of in the back. It's like in the back board. It moves left to right. And it makes silence as you're escaping from prison.
    133:21
    It also has like a ball and chain that hangs from the center. It's sort of like a bash toy thing. but if that thing breaks or is in like rusted or something it's basically impossible to replace because it's not like you could just take a regular pinball and drill a hole in it it's really hard to do something like that this is a very fun underrated game i played this twice on location one time and i really enjoyed it again playfield art is a bit busy and a bit muddled but it is fun and different. It's super neat. I really enjoyed it. Ray Tanzer did a lot of really fun things with this game. He included what you wanted, drop targets, a couple of cool ramps, and a fun kind of experience.
    134:06
    Hot Shots from April of 1989, 2,342 units. This thing was designed by John Norris and Art, once again, Connie, Jeannie, the software Bob Wilson and Alan Edwell. Again, this is carnival theme. Carnival's cool, Ron. I've never really had them out here where I am, honestly. Are sexy carnivals cool, Ron? Oh, is that what this is? This is a sexy carnival. Well, enjoy the carnival atmosphere with Gottlieb's Hot Shots. Shoot the blue elephants, red cuckoo clocks, yellow chickens, and green frogs. Yowza! Challenge the teddy bear targets to achieve extra ball and special. Hit the hot ramps for explosive action. Enjoy the calliope music and listen carefully for the bonus countdown freeze feature. Hot Shots is more fun than a monkey riding a blue elephant. That's pretty fun. Come one, come all. A kaleidoscope of fun. But on the back glass, this is where we're going to, this is where I get into it here. We've got, like, these 20-something girls, and they're all in skirts and high heels. One is bent over, spraying a water gun. The other girl has her shirt missing, and she's hugging a teddy bear. And there's, like, this creepy, like, 8-year-old kid, like, looking up from underneath the cabinet. It's very weird. Again, it's the hottest action in pinball. We've gone back to photo backlash, or translate, I should say. That's right. When it comes to bad girls in hot shots, when we want ladies to entice teenage boys to put money in the pins, we're going photo backlash. If we're going robots in space, we're just getting somebody to draw it.
    136:08
    Isn't that interesting? I have never played hot shots. I've never even seen one. But it's got a boatload of drop targets up the center of the play field.
    136:19
    Two massive, massive drop target bands. Tons of color. There are 16 drop targets in the shape of a V in the center of the play field. Almost reminds me of a cue ball wizard. Yep, that's a good observation. It's got a pop bumper in the middle that's got those things. It's got blue targets, red targets, yellow targets, red targets. and then it's got some ramps on the left and right sides. It's got lots of clowns before they were deemed to be evil. Yes, these were happy clowns in happy times.
    136:52
    Yeah, you can see that the play field has a different direction than the back glass. You can obviously tell the back glass was like, how do we get teenage boys to play this game? And the artistic quality of the actual play field is really fun. It's really, really good. You haven't played this? I never remember playing that. You got me on that one. If you've played this, you've got a little bit of extra insight. The return, of course, of the drop target between the flippers.
    137:17
    John Norris, of course, or one of his things. And then it also has a post behind it, so it gives you a little extra save. I don't know if I've ever seen one of those. Interesting. This brings us to the end of the 80B line, and that is Bone Busters. This is a spooky, haunted, skeleton, Ghostbusters theme. This is from August of 1989. 2,000 units designed by Ray Tanzer, Constantino and Jeannie Mitchell with Brian R. Johnson on art, music by Dave Zabriskie and Craig Bierwaltz, and software by Bob Wilson and Alan Edwin. You know what this has? The first game to have? What's that? The new Gottlieb Flipperbats. Ooh, the pointy ones. The crappy ones. This is a massive Ghostbusters ripoff. If you even look at the Bonebusters flyer for this, down in the bottom left, there's a guy in a gray jumpsuit with a backpack shooting skeletons. Proton Pack. But this isn't a Proton Pack. This looks like a little radio. And he has a logo. Imagine the Ghostbusters logo without the Ghostbusters. So it's just a circle with a cross through it. And that's exactly what it looks like. I don't know if this was supposed to be Ghostbusters and they just couldn't get the license or afford it. But they leaned pretty hard into the fact that this is a ghost-busting game, if you will. From the Flyer. Says, new flipper design. New shaped back. New lighter flipper assembly. Design with the same quality we used for this flyer. And reliability is our old flipper unit. Wrong. New, longer stroke on flipper coil. Yeah, way longer, as in you can trap everything. Tonskin, end of stroke, all new die-cast plunger assembly. It's funny to see the marketing for that when anyone would tell you it is far inferior flipper assembly. than what they used before. Yeah, when you change something, you've got to spend all your time convincing people. But when you read that, it's clearly better. Yeah, it's like when they change the arse on a cereal box. They just freak out, and they've got to put, you know, same cereal, different look. And do you know when they were plugging the new fluorescent tube and how great that was? That was in one of our previous flyers, right? What do they say now? They say, let the game talk for itself. New cabinet design, new lightbox hinging, new reinforced cabinets, a lightbox mounting, Lightbox mounting screws. New thumb screw design. No need to fumble with ratchets or wrenches. No more fluorescent tube. New insert with incandescent lamps for new, more exciting light shows. Yes, remember those really crappy fluorescent tubes we had in there? This is the better one, which is basically what we used to do. Nice. Sales. They're on the sales. It's hard. Let the game speak for itself. This game has one of the coolest toppers of all time. Nobody ever talks about the Bone Buster's topper. It's a skull that friggin' talks with, like, a do-rag and an eyeball that's missing. And he moves around and talks. So before, Black Knight Sword of Rage did it. It had a talking head topper. So cool. Now, Ray Tanzer is the guy who's very much a kitchen sink kind of fellow. the plunge goes up to an upper play field made of like vacuum formed plastic it goes up and then you go into uh you know another wire form which goes into a flipper uh you can shoot back up into that area into the flipper you open the flipper to go down the left side you leave the flipper closed to go back into the shooter lane it's it's all over the place it's got springs with these two things in the middle of the play field that just sort of spring around on the end, which make no sense. It's got a creepy, creepy skull in the middle of the play field. So creepy. Only one pop bumper on the left side. Two spinners, count of two. What do you think of this game, Ron? I haven't played it, but it must be something. It's something. It's interesting. Do you have any high points for this game? That you're like, wow, I wish Keith Ellman would steal that. I haven't played it enough, to be honest. Drop Targets, maybe? We all love Drop Targets. Yeah. It's a bit muddled. Eh, I don't mind it. It's very pink. Eh, it's got other colors. But yeah, it's very pink. It's like Class of 1812 on steroids. Now, Brian R. Johnson would say, I joined at the tail end of Bone Busters. Most of the art was already complete. I did, however, pencil and ink some small spot illustrations of skeletons doing various activities like riding a tandem bike or playing catch. They were used in several places throughout the game. And if you go into IPDB, you can see all of these skeletons doing all these really weird things. It's a lot of fun. You can tell the team that made this had a good laugh while they did it. Ron, that brings us to the end of our podcast today. We've spoke this month about one of the coolest and most trendy eras in pinball, which was the System ADB era. Which was the best game we talked about here, Ron? Best game out of all the ones? Hmm.
    143:12
    That's a good question. Well, we did mention Alien Star. Yeah. There are a lot of good games in there. I got to go Bad Girls. I think Bad Girls is probably the best shooter and has some really cool, fun, 8-ball deluxe style multi-ball rules. Heck of a game. Great designer. a cheesy and fun art package. A good close second. We've got to do a shout-out to Tag Team Pinball. Yeah, I like Tag Team. Heck of a game. I like Victory, too. Sue me. Yeah, what we're going to do is I'm going to throw up on our Facebook, what do you think was the best game that we spoke about in the System ADB era? Leave a comment. I'd love to hear from you. So would Ron. Ron, if you could have any one of these games in your collection, which would it be?
    144:10
    I like Victory, but I also like Tag Team. But I think overall, for the most longevity, it would probably be something like Bad Girls. There you go. We have now inflated the value of Bad Girls, and nobody can afford it anymore. And I would say, if you're at a pinball show, don't be a Valley Williams snob. You see these Gottliebs. Give them a try. You might actually like them. Your play fields are completely different than anything else you're going to play.
    144:43
    As always, we can send your comments, questions, corrections, and concerns to civilballchronicles at gmail.com. We look forward to all your messages, and we read every one. Please subscribe to us on Apple Podcasts, Google Play, or your favorite podcaster. Turn on automatic downloads so you don't miss a single episode. So, you know, you could just record me saying this so I didn't have to do it every time. You can't afford it? Okay. Remember to leave us a five-star review. That way more people can find us. Want to support the podcast and need a new shirt? Swing on over to silverballswag.com and pick up a Silverball Chronicles t-shirt.
    145:30
    Raven is a very decisive game. I enjoy owning this. Divisive. Raven is a very divisive game. What's divisive? Or is that a Canadian thing? I don't know. And don't forget my other podcast, which is much goofier than this one. Not nearly as professional. And that would be the Slam Tilt Podcast. Me and my co-host Bruce Nightingale, where we talk about pinball from beautiful upstate New York. I'm going to start charging you for that. Hey, we mentioned this show on my show. Cross-pollination. No, I didn't even use the right term there.
    146:38
    John Trudeau would say that this was his homage to firepower. And his homage. You're from Albany. You guys know all about hockey. I'm from Albany, and yes, we do know all about hockey. Is that right next to Albany? Genesis offers a multiplier. Genesis offers a multiple capability.
    147:01
    Yeah, go ahead. Find out who it is so we don't look like idiots. Because of our poll. Well, let me start that again.
    147:09
    Poll. I'm sorry. Sorry.