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Star Wars Pinball VR analysis

BlahCade Pinball Podcast·podcast_episode·1h 31m·analyzed·May 14, 2021
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Analysis

claude-haiku-4-5-20251001 · $0.035

TL;DR

BlahCade reviews Star Wars Pinball VR while discussing The Mandalorian (Pro) machine and arcade cabinet innovations.

Summary

BlahCade A A Pinball Podcast hosts Chris Friebus and Jared Morgan discuss Star Wars Pinball VR, analyzing Zen's latest VR implementation with detailed technical breakdowns of hardware setup, locomotion systems, lobby design, and menu accessibility. They also cover announcements regarding Stern's upcoming Mandalorian pinball machine, Arcuda's new gaming cabinets with pinball integration potential, and Haggis Pinball's Fathom remake.

Key Claims

  • Stern is making a Mandalorian pinball table

    high confidence · Chris Friebus announces this as confirmed news: 'so we're going to find out real quick who the better designer is what's going on who exactly yeah because we've kind of had a of who the designer is on this.'

  • This will be the first direct one-to-one comparison between Stern and Zen on the same theme (Mandalorian)

    high confidence · Jared Morgan: 'This is the first time we're going to get like a one-to-one relatively close. Like one-to-one theme.' The hosts note Zen has 21 Star Wars versions vs Stern's 1, and Wonder Woman was developed simultaneously without copying ability.

  • Lucasfilm controls artwork and approvals for both Zen and Star Wars pinball machines

    high confidence · Chris: 'you know lucasfilm had to approve all the artwork and everything that's going to be on the table so i'm i'm dying to know what this thing looks like'

  • Zen's Star Wars Pinball VR uses an explorable lobby environment rather than the static lobby used in FX2 VR

    high confidence · Jared: 'In this instance, you're actually able to move about the room' and 'they've gone away from the model where they've got that sort of like static view in the room in fx2'

  • Stern's pinball toppers (plexiglass and colored lights) are overpriced compared to the value offered

    medium confidence · Chris discusses community criticism: 'There's apparently a lot of fuss over the sheer balls that Stern has charging what they're charging for their pinball toppers, considering they're basically just plexiglass and colored lights.'

  • Haggis Pinball (Australia-based) is working with Chicago Gaming Company to remake early 1980s Valley pinball machines

    high confidence · Jared: 'Chicago Coin is the one doing the AFM and all the remakes they've gone and talked to them and said hey do you mind if we remake some early 80s ballet machines and they went yeah sure go for it so they put out that they're going to be making Fathom.'

  • Fathom pricing is comparable to Stern Premium machines

    high confidence · Jared: 'It's about the same price as the Stern Premium' and discusses the value relative to original Fathom condition and hardware age.

Notable Quotes

  • “I cut a cord. I'm joining the modern era here. I've been a Dish Network subscriber for 19 years.”

    Chris Friebus @ early segment — Personal anecdote about cord-cutting that opens the show; demonstrates streaming as cost-effective alternative to cable.

  • “Turtles is just hot garbage. It really is hot garbage... I hate having to play it in tournaments. It's like my least favorite game on the floor.”

    Jared Morgan @ mid-segment discussion — Strong community sentiment criticism of Stern's TMNT pinball machine; used as contrast to praise Infinity Quest.

  • “if somebody can produce that for that price... come on... you know.”

    Chris Friebus @ Stargate toy topper discussion — Critique of Stern topper pricing relative to competitor offerings; hints at community perception of value.

  • “This is the first time we're going to get like a one-to-one relatively close. Like one-to-one theme. Wonder Woman theme, and they were being developed at the same time, which means there's not going to be the ability to copy what the other guy was doing.”

    Jared Morgan @ Mandalorian discussion — Key insight that Mandalorian Stern vs. Zen comparison will be unique; designer quality directly comparable.

  • “I want them to go all in on this and use the same sort of technology that they used in Stranger Things and that projection system and all the other stuff and just throw the whole kit and caboodle at this thing. Because if they do, it's going to be an amazing experience.”

    Jared Morgan @ Mandalorian designer speculation — Expresses hope for innovation in Mandalorian; references successful Stern design techniques and implies standards expectation.

  • “if you could find a Fathom in that condition... It'd be that much. It's going to be that much, and it's going to be running on 30-year-old, 30, 40-year-old hardware, whereas this is going to be running on brand new hardware that's not going to fail on you.”

    Jared Morgan @ Fathom Revisited pricing context — Justifies premium pricing for remakes vs. vintage originals; emphasizes reliability and condition value.

Entities

Chris FriebuspersonJared MorganpersonStern PinballcompanyZen Pinball / Zen StudioscompanyChicago Gaming CompanycompanyHaggis PinballcompanyArcudacompanyStar Wars Pinball VRproduct

Signals

  • ?

    announcement: Stern Pinball announces Mandalorian pinball machine; first direct theme competition with Zen Studios on same IP.

    high · Chris Frebus states: 'so we're going to find out real quick who the better designer is... so it turns out stern is making a mandalorian pinball table it's like okay this is interesting this is going to be really interesting'

  • ?

    product_launch: Zen Studios releases Star Wars Pinball VR with new explorable 3D lobby and dual locomotion systems.

    high · Chris and Jared provide detailed technical review of Star Wars Pinball VR gameplay, lobby design, and control options.

  • ?

    design_innovation: Star Wars Pinball VR implements dual locomotion systems (free movement and teleport) to address VR motion sickness concerns.

    high · Jared explains: 'There are two ways that you can implement locomotion in a VR game... because some people get discomfort when they're using vr particularly new people to vr and it makes them feel motion sick.'

  • ?

    product_strategy: Community backlash against Stern's pinball topper pricing relative to perceived value (plexiglass and lights).

    medium · Chris discusses: 'There's apparently a lot of fuss over the sheer balls that Stern has charging what they're charging for their pinball toppers, considering they're basically just plexiglass and colored lights.'

  • ?

    competitive_signal: Mandalorian pinball represents first direct one-to-one theme comparison between Stern and Zen with simultaneous development preventing design copying.

    high · Jared: 'This is the first time we're going to get like a one-to-one relatively close... Wonder Woman theme, and they were being developed at the same time, which means there's not going to be the ability to copy what the other guy was doing.'

Transcript

groq_whisper · $0.274

0:00
blockade pinball podcast this is the blockade pinball podcast i am your host chris frebus aka shut your trap joining me as always halfway across the world jordan morgan hello how are you going I go.
0:29
You go. And then I come back, and then I go again. Yeah, that sounds like about me. Right? Yeah. Yes. Howdy, folks. So I hope everybody has been enjoying the last two weeks, specifically the old Star Wars pinball VR that has come out. We are going to be talking about that today. Yes. But we got some other things we're going to just kind of meander about in prior to that.
1:01
The first one being, Jared, I did a thing. Oh, what thing did you do? I cut a cord. Oh, you did? Oh, are you talking about cable? I finally cut the cord. I'm joining the modern era here. Oh, wow. I've been a Dish Network subscriber for 19 years. Wow. Wow, okay. And they decided to raise the price on me and not honor what they had previously said they would do, which was keep my price going the same. And so I was like, well, if you're going to be that way, I guess I'm going to have to look for alternatives. So in the meantime, I found alternatives and realized, hey, this whole streaming thing and cutting the cord, it's not as expensive as I thought. It's actually cheaper.
1:48
Oh, really? Because a lot of people say it's not, depending on what services you go for. It depends on, well, here's the thing. It depends on what you actually watch. And that was where the key factor came in. I started doing a hard look at what it is that I actually watch, how many channels I actually watch, and realized I don't watch that many channels anymore. All my viewing is kind of on Netflix these days.

  • Arcuda is planning to announce pinball design capabilities by end of month

    high confidence · Chris: 'they've been teasing also that they're basically doing like a month of announcements, I think is their whole idea. And by the end of the month, they're going to get into their designs for pinball, what that's going to be.'

  • Star Wars Pinball VR lobbies are difficult to navigate menu-wise without reading onboarding instructions

    high confidence · Chris: 'unless you carefully read the onboarding things you won't know they're there' regarding locomotion options and 'the options seem a little bit hidden. I'm a little bit disappointed that it's not just a simple matter of hitting one button and options pop.'

  • Zen's VR pinball features two locomotion methods: free movement and teleport, to accommodate VR motion sickness concerns

    high confidence · Jared explains: 'There are two ways that you can implement locomotion in a VR game... the other way is what they call teleport where you have this little recticle that goes out and it jumps down into a position... the reason why they introduce these two methods of locomotion in games is because some people get discomfort when they're using vr.'

  • “unless you carefully read the onboarding things you won't know they're there isn't that right chris that would be a hundred percent correct”

    Chris Friebus @ VR locomotion discussion — Identifies UX problem: hidden features require tutorial reading; design issue with game accessibility.

  • “so your your actual view position is what actually highlights things and then you basically tap a or click the trigger and you'll go directly to it but when the difference between the the i guess the that let's call it the lobby area the lounge area in fx2 versus the the lounge area in um uh star wars is that the options is almost like a hidden secret menu”

    Jared Morgan @ FX2 vs. Star Wars VR comparison — Direct comparison of menu accessibility between Zen VR implementations; Star Wars criticisms versus FX2 predecessor.

  • “They're down in Newcastle... Fathom. God, it's gorgeous. It's expensive, but it's gorgeous.”

    Chris Friebus @ Haggis Pinball discussion — Enthusiastic reception to Fathom remake aesthetics; acknowledges premium pricing tradeoff.

  • “It's pretty cool. It's just, like I said, it took me a little while to even find the leaderboards, because that's on a whole other TV screen elsewhere... and i was like it's in the kitchen”

    Chris Friebus @ Lobby exploration — Illustrates hidden UI elements scattered throughout VR environment; both design intent and usability friction.

    • Mandalorian
    game
    Fathomproduct
    FX2 VRproduct
    Deadpoolgame
    TMNT (Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles)game
    Avengers Infinity Questgame
    Galaxy Extremeproduct
    Mercuryproduct
    Pinsim Controllerproduct
    Meta Quest 2product
    Oculus Riftproduct
    Lucasfilmcompany
    Valley Pinballcompany
    Attack from Marsgame
    Stranger Thingsgame
  • ?

    product_launch: Haggis Pinball announces Fathom Revisited remake of 1980s Valley machine with new rule sets; planning series of early-80s remakes.

    high · Jared: 'they've gone and talked to them and said hey do you mind if we remake some early 80s ballet machines and they went yeah sure go for it so they put out that they're going to be making Fathom.'

  • ?

    product_strategy: Fathom Revisited premium pricing justified by new hardware reliability and condition versus vintage originals.

    medium · Jared compares cost-benefit: 'it's going to be running on brand new hardware that's not going to fail on you' versus 30-40 year old original hardware.

  • ?

    product_concern: Star Wars Pinball VR lobby navigation and menu access criticized as non-intuitive; features hidden in onboarding documentation.

    high · Chris: 'unless you carefully read the onboarding things you won't know they're there' and 'the options seem a little bit hidden. I'm a little bit disappointed that it's not just a simple matter of hitting one button.'

  • ?

    technology_signal: Arcuda gaming cabinet featuring USB-C DisplayPort compatibility for VR headset integration as part of all-in-one entertainment system.

    medium · Chris discusses: 'If they've made that USB-C port DisplayPort compatible, then your Oculus could plug into that... you got your pc plugged in there your consoles and then you have vr.'

  • ?

    manufacturing_signal: Arcuda ramping up marketing and announcements after Australian floods; planning month of product reveals including pinball design details.

    high · Chris: 'they've been teasing also that they're basically doing like a month of announcements, I think is their whole idea. And by the end of the month, they're going to get into their designs for pinball.'

  • $

    market_signal: Haggis Pinball and Arcuda pricing in USD creates disadvantage for Australian customers due to currency exchange rates.

    medium · Jared: 'they're pricing everything in US dollars because they're smart... So we're screwed in Australia' noting US dollar at 76 cents vs 61 cents pre-pandemic.

  • ~

    sentiment_shift: Community sentiment highlights extreme variance in Stern designer quality (TMNT negatively vs. Infinity Quest positively).

    high · Jared expresses strong criticism of TMNT as 'hot garbage' and 'my least favorite game on the floor' while praising Infinity Quest released concurrently.

    • 2:14
    Yeah. It's like, whenever I hear it, it's like it's always Netflix or Disney+. They're the two that people flip between. Well, here's the thing with Disney+. Disney+, if you just want movies or their custom shows, right? Same thing with Netflix, although Netflix has a bazillion TV shows. And they're pulling also shows from networks in. Oh, so they're essentially syndicating them on Netflix. More or less, yeah.
    2:44
    Using an old TV analogy. You're right. uh as for the like my local stations uh so for us in the states that's your abc nbc cbs fox the big four i don't watch any of their programs and that's kind of a big factor for cable also i don't watch any of the news networks i don't tend to watch live sports those are all the factors that when you want to have while cutting the cord that's what jacks the price up so okay instead i'm going to be perfectly fine with things that like if i buy a hulu basic package well the shows are going to be on the air the next day i'm fine with that's what i currently do anyway you know if i'm there's anything i'm going to watch it tends to be the following day that i watch it and uh this will actually allow me to have the money to buy into hbo max and disney plus and hey if i need you know amazon prime i can pay into that also and it'll all come down in price so yeah today i literally called them up and said that's it here's my final day uh see you later when the billing period is and then all of a sudden it was like well no no no we can do the price that you had been paid too late guys yeah sorry no because i gave you a chance oh i'm not only did i give him a chance i talked to three different people on that same day and i was heavily saying well if this doesn't work i'm going to find alternative things and they just went yeah okay okay no worries mate so clearly well okay then clearly the right person wasn't talking to me on that day but you know well the three right people were talking to you on that day yeah too bad for you oh well see you later dish okay other thing that uh we heard uh this past week hey it turns out stern is making a mandalorian pinball table it's like okay this is interesting this is going to be really interesting yeah so we're going to find out real quick who the better designer is what's going on who exactly yeah because we've kind of had a of who the designer is on this. I don't either, but we kind of have a small taste of it in terms of there's a Deadpool table in Xen, and then there's Stern's Deadpool. We have obviously 19, well, 21 now, 21 versions of Star Wars that Xen has done, and then the one version of Star Wars that Stern has done. But this is the first time we're going to get like a one-to-one relatively close. Like one-to-one theme. Wonder Woman theme, and they were being developed at the same time, which means there's not going to be the ability to copy what the other guy was doing.
    5:40
    No, there's no way that, I mean, pinball design goes back months. So there's no way that either of them could have known that this was in the works. And given that it's Mandalorian and Disney, there's no way. There was rumors floating around that this was a thing, but there was no leaks at all of it and we know through welcome to lucasfilm exactly right like they don't let you do that but it should be interesting because you gotta figure lucasfilm is giving stern the same access i would imagine that they've been giving zen yeah which you know it's uh and you know it's gonna be interesting for the rumor mill right and you know lucasfilm had to approve all the artwork and everything that's going to be on the table so i'm i'm dying to know what this thing looks like um as you as you commented to me let's hope it's not led zeppelin oh oh man that was a that was that table was phoned in real hard like i don't see any innovation on that at all. Like, you look at Led Zeppelin and you just go, meh. And then you look at something like, you know, Avengers Infinity Quest and you go, oh, okay, now there's an innovative table.
    7:04
    The one that Stern's released. Yeah. Like, the Middleworld's got it. We've been playing it heaps. It's a great table. Like, you put the ironic thing is, like, Turtles and Infinity Quest. They're around the same time. And the tables are like chalk and cheese. Turtles is just hot garbage.
    7:23
    It really is hot garbage. That's the phrase that pays today, folks. It sure is. It's the hot garbage. Yeah, so it is hot garbage. I hate having to play it in tournaments. It's like my least favorite game on the floor. Wow. And there's things like The Walking Dead on the floor, which I'm not really hot on either. But, man, Turtles is just hot garbage. I hate it. But you think about the same time they have this Infinity Quest game releasing around the same time as well, and it's like night and day.
    7:57
    So I'm going to be really interested. I hope they haven't got the TMNT designer to do this table. I hope they've got the Infinity Quest designer to do the table because if they have, there's real promise in this title. It could be pretty amazing. I want them to go all in on this and use the same sort of technology that they used in Stranger Things and that projection system and all the other stuff and just throw the whole kit and caboodle at this thing. Because if they do, it's going to be an amazing experience.
    8:30
    Other areas that we want to... It brought up something. I don't have the video of it. Did you see... In the real pinball world, There's apparently a lot of fuss over the sheer balls that Stern has charging what they're charging for their pinball toppers, considering they're basically just plexiglass and colored lights.
    8:57
    They're not anything amazing. but there was a somebody made a toy um and it's literally a toy of the stargate uh disc right combination disc it's all motorized makes all these awesome sounds and a lot of people are going i think we can adapt that oh really to to a pinball machine and the beautiful thing the thing that does amazing oh yeah so the star day skirt try it Again, the Stargate ring, right? For those that have not seen the TV show or the movie a long time ago, it was, you know, this ancient Egyptian-like design. When the combination dialed in, all of a sudden a portal opened up to transfer to another world. A big pool. Yeah. And you saw the ring. So when, and the ring is vertical.
    9:48
    So on this toy, it's got a mirror on the front of it, right? Mm-hmm. When all the combination locks align, bam, infinity lights appear, making it look like the thing has depth. And I just went, oh, that's beautiful. That is beautiful. I just have that. I had that sitting on the shelf just doing its thing. Right, right. And the thing is, I think what they were saying for the price, it's about what Stern is charging for their pinball toppers. And so people are like, come on, if somebody can produce that for that price.
    10:24
    Yeah. You know. Anyway. Oh, I see it. Yeah. Oh, yeah. Right. You're seeing it. Oh, man, I wish I could have you share my screen. Hold on.
    10:33
    So you push this button, and then all these, you push this little button here, and then on these lights. The chevrons light up. Well, they light up one at a time as this inner ring actually spins. And it hits the things. and then the locks engage, they go chink, they will slip down. They actually slip down? Yes. Oh, man. They actually move and they make all these nice loud noises.
    10:57
    It was a real spectacle in the show to see this thing engage. Oh, wait a second. Look what we can do.
    11:06
    Let's just enjoy. Although this is probably going to... I'm going to leave it on mute because I don't know if this music is licensed music or not. It probably would be. Yeah, you know. Well, that was generic enough. I don't think we'll get to that tag. But so you can see that the locks aren't engaged right there. No. At the moment. Right. And it is that you can see the mirror when you see it up close, but you wouldn't even know, like, looking at it, that it was there. It's so seamless. Wow. So that's just a nice little bit of modeling right there. Yeah, the actual, like, if that was just a static display, that would look great on the top of a people machine, right? Right. So that was just a question of when they fired this thing up. Wow, even the, like, the stonework and everything is, like, it's not. painting on it. That's all good stuff right there. That's incredible. Wow. There it is lit up. This one apparently isn't showing us how the gates work. Oh, here we go. There it is. Oh, look at that. So you actually can light the ship and they encode. Wow.
    12:15
    Look at it. That's so awesome. And each of the individual chevrons are... Oh, one more. One more. Whoa.
    12:34
    Look at that. That's just magic. Oh, yeah. I like it. I like it a lot. How much do they charge them for that? Because I want one. you're like i don't even care that if i don't have a pinball machine to put i'll find i'll find something to put it on i don't i don't necessarily need anything to put that on it like apart from my desk because i'll just play with for hours it's amazing want it what need wants and needs right oh exactly right um okay one more bit before we get into our uh star wars pinball vr review and that is as you know throughout uh guy for some time now um we've been in communication with Arcuda.
    13:16
    Arcuda keeps on mentioning product and then delaying and then mentioning product and then delaying and never having anything out. They were supposed to have an announcement at the beginning of April and then they were flooding. And then they got flooded out in Australia. Yeah. So finally, there's been suddenly a stream of tweets, Jared. A flurry of activity. A flurry of activity on the old Twitter. So if you have not followed Arcuda and you are interested in a gaming cabinet, now might be the time to go ahead and subscribe to their Twitter feed. But I want to kind of point out they're kind of giving their history where they came from and their pedigree essentially. Yeah, because they basically said they've been in the gaming for 23 years or something like that and you might be like, well, I've never heard of Arcuda though. Yeah, that's right. And one of the things that I just kind of found this picture fascinating doing their whiteboards. Look at all these toggles for PC, console, joystick, trackballs, trackball on and off, mouse on and off.
    14:20
    I mean, they're kind of really thinking about everything, right? Yeah. This is an insane amount of buttons, plus having trackballs. Now, those are thumb trackballs, in case anybody's wondering. So not the whole palm spin. It would still be a thumb trackball. um that's just kind of everything that they were doing to get into uh this their wizard extreme cabinet which um looks a little bit dated if these are you got to realize that arcuda the cabinets they sell are commercial that's what this is it's a commercial design for commercial use, and they send their stuff to Japan.
    15:08
    That's who their major partners are, are the Asian market, which is why their manufacturing is over in that region. That's what they've been kind of doing, but they've been wanting to do home market, get into the home market. So they just basically showed this. This is their home cabinet, the Galaxy Extreme, I guess. the Mercury.
    15:36
    But if you notice, it's got buttons here on the side, or ports for future buttons, which could only be for one thing. Pinball. That's right. Unfortunately, it'd be landscape pinball, but if you're looking for an all-in-one cabinet, it'd be kind of that action. Plenty of buttons going on there. That would be... The way that Arcuda Market sees it is that they're plug-and-play for consoles. and you chuck your console into the back of it.
    16:05
    There's all got the wires and everything in there for you to connect your console up to. You select it on that nice little front panel. Which I'm going to highlight in one second. And then you literally play. So consoles being a landscape orientation, it's perfectly suited for that market and that sort of, I guess, demographic who wants to connect their consoles up to a hardware. This is basically for anybody that's been, you know, is a fan of AtGames' Legends Arcade. This is what is... This is like the big daddy of this. Yeah.
    16:36
    It's like these are pretty hardcore machines. I was going to say, these are built industrial strength is what we're being told. I mean, look at this massive door on the front because inside is shelving. That's where you put your console. It's shelving. Where you put all your consoles, not just one. And a PC, anything you want to run. That brings us to something that we can plant. So remember, at games, they threw their little control panel thing up at the top so that your cables can droop all over the front of your playing, right?
    17:09
    Whereas Arcuda is putting this beast on the front. Just look at this thing. Look at this thing. We've got headphone jack, microphone jack for whatever reason. Oh, probably for streaming. No, for streaming purposes. And for karaoke. Probably for karaoke as well. Maybe. I think these things have pretty decent sound systems in them too. It's a 2.1 surround or with subwoofer. 2.1. Stereo with sub. Big old volume knob on the front. Look at this. Four USB 3 ports. HDMI on the front. USB-C on the front. And then all these over here are the power buttons to fire up your PC consoles. So that USB-C port is interesting. If they've made that USB-C port DisplayPort compatible, then your Oculus could plug into that. um that's you see that's pretty awesome to have if you can have a an all-in-one machine that can play also you know you got your pc plugged in there your consoles and then you have vr and you can just plug right in it's just neatly all captured in one little box rather than having cables all over the place yeah that's that could be the center point of your games room and then everything else hangs off that um that's pretty cool we haven't heard official pricing yet i know they're going to be a little bit pricey. It's going to be a four-figure, low four-figures from what I understand.
    18:35
    But you look at it, though, and you realize, well, yeah, probably. It should be probably four figures. Yeah, and like I said, they were designing these things for commercial use,
    18:48
    and they're not cheaping the product down to have it be for home use. They're basically using the same things. They actually have... Their bill of materials, in other words, haven't really changed. They're using the same... Just so you know, it says here, touchscreen, console controller, Sanwa Arcade, VR headset, gun shooter, and much, much more. Cabinet support to JAMA Arcade and all current consoles and includes 2.1 subwoofer sound system. So you can plug your Neo Geo NBS boards into this thing, and they will work. and I think my understanding with the the Arcuda board systems they've got in there it basically it takes all the rough edges about off of actually connecting these boards up because typically what you'd need to do if you had a typical jammer arcade cabinet where you would run the arcade is that you have to worry about things like button maps and things like that when you're swapping over your jammer boards and stuff inside because each jammer board while it's a standard like the jammer standard is a thing the way that some of these video game um companies have interfaced with the jammer connector is subtly different so it's sort of like it the connector is jammer but that's about where the standard ends sort of thing but there's there's some variances about how you actually connect up the controllers so the the arcuda software helps you with that and makes it a lot easier. Okay.
    20:21
    So what we're going to try and do, they've been teasing also that they're basically doing like a month of announcements, I think is their whole idea. And by the end of the month, they're going to get into their designs for pinball, what that's going to be. So we're going to reach out to Arcuda, say, hey, is it time for us to talk with you again? And hopefully bring you guys some more. Sounds like it is. Yeah, hopefully bring you guys some more detailed information and maybe we can convince them to send us a unit.
    20:52
    I don't know. I'm in Australia. I know, you're in Australia. I probably have more chance of getting one. Oh, that reminds me. They're down in Newcastle.
    21:02
    That reminds me, Jared. What? Well, this whole Haggis pinball, which is Australia based. I'm not sure where in Australia they are. Oh, down south. that's very generic but I think they're down in New South Wales but anyway they have gone and basically where Chicago Coin is the one doing the AFM and all the remakes they've gone and talked to them and said hey do you mind if we remake some early 80s ballet machines and they went yeah sure go for it so they put out that they're going to be making Fathom. Fathom Revisited. God, it's gorgeous.
    21:48
    It's expensive, but it's gorgeous. Yeah, it's about the same price as the Stern Premium. But considering, you know, as I saw a few pinball commentators talk about, if you could find a Fathom in that condition... It'd be that much. It's going to be that much, and it's going to be running on 30-year-old, 30, 40-year-old hardware, whereas this is going to be running on brand new hardware that's not going to fail on you. So, dang. But, the important news, the important news, they want to do five Valleys. Yeah. This is just the first. Which makes me think, what do you think, Jared?
    22:29
    Centaur? A-Ball Deluxe? Yep. So, Fathom, what would be the other two of that era, Valley, early 80s? we're talking about narrow bodies here not wide bodies there some obvious choices there like Paragon these are going to be the narrow bodies bodies i trying to think what are the other classic valleys from that maybe medusa maybe uh flash gordon wait is it is it flash gordon or the flash the flash one of those i know is wildly popular um curious to know what the what the what they're what the other two basically what are the other two options of that era. We're talking 1980 to 1982 basically. Pretty much all the era of Squawk and Talk. Fathom's a Squawk and Talk and 8 Balls is a Squawk and Talk. Centaur is too. Like Centaur redone with because the thing is with these revisited ones, when you buy the premium, you get a brand new rule set as well and you can switch between the two.
    23:40
    And Centaur is ripe for a brand new rule set. It's got such depth. You guys have heard me talk about when I was playing the VP8, I think, at the time, and how much I loved the alternate ROM set that was being used for Centaur. Yeah, lots of potential. But anyway, I just thought, wow, Jared's got a pinball company. It's probably going to be a lot less shipping, isn't it, Jared?
    24:12
    Well, the problem is they're pricing everything in US dollars because they're smart. Yeah. So we're screwed in Australia. Although at the time of recording, I think the US dollar was sitting around 76 cents. So it's not that bad. It's not the 61 cents that it was before the pandemic hit. Right. So, you know, there's better news, I guess. Yeah.
    24:35
    Okay. I think it's time. Yeah, we can do it. We're going to do a little, just for you that watch this on YouTube the entire episode, you're about to see what a mini-episode formed purely is going to be. We're going to do an actual review of Star Wars Pinball VR. So, in a way, this is going to be a little bit of a restart. It's going to go a little something like this.
    25:02
    Hey, folks. We are the Blockade Pinball Podcast. I'm Shed Your Trap, a.k.a. Chris Frebus. That guy over there, that's Jared Morgan.
    25:12
    If you've been following us at all, for some time we've been touting the aspect of Zen, and then most recently we got into VR a little bit, and why would we be doing something like that? Well, because, yeah, the good old Star Wars VR pinball was coming down the pipe. We wanted to get our hands on this, See what Zen has done since the last time they entered into the pinball VR market. That being said, I want to get down a couple of points before we even start talking about the game itself, and that is what hardware we are using when we are taking a look at this. I myself am using an Oculus Rift, plugged in with two sensors aiming at me, all the wires plugging into my PC. Because I'm on PC, I'm using the Steam version of Star Wars Pinball VR with Rift not available in the Oculus store. Jared, on the other hand. So what I'm using is I've got the Steam VR version. I'm running that on the Oculus Link cable. So directly tethered to my Quest 2 without going wirelessly, which is probably the most reliable way, albeit a little bit sort of clumsy, to connect your Quest 2 to a PC. My PC build is a gaming PC running RTX 2060 NVIDIA card with around 16 gig of RAM and an i7 processor. And then you're using the touch controllers. Correct. I'm using the touch controls that come with the Quest 2, and obviously on the Quest side of things, it's a Quest 2 headset with standard Quest 2 headset, which I'm also using as my head-mounted device, head-mounted screen for the PC. I myself, I'm using the thing behind me there, which is the Pinsim controller.
    27:14
    It has accelerometer, has plunger, has rumble motors in it. and it basically is a 360 controller board, more or less. That's what the computer thinks it is, is a 360 controller. Yes, I did try hooking up with the touch controls, but when you got that thing, ditch those.
    27:38
    So that is my review, is basically how it functions using the Pinsome controller, not using the touch controls.
    27:46
    All that being said, we want to get that out of the way because it's important to understand what it is that we're looking at when we give our thoughts on the game and i think too often people just assume that it's in this case using lace grace hardware which is quest 2 which indeed jared does have but people using it not tethered into the pc um you know just using it purely as a freeform thing and i I think mileage varies because of that.
    28:19
    Yeah. So let's get into this then. First things first. Loading up the game, you're immediately greeted with the lovely, lovely lobby. If you're familiar at all with FX2 VR, your lobby was basically you standing in a static spot, being able to look around the room, go, hey, hey, this room looks nice, and then highlighting a table, pushing go to the table, and you're into the table. In this instance, you're actually able to move about the room. However, as some people haven't discovered, there's multiple ways of moving around that room. I'm going to let Jared describe that. So when we're talking about VR, we're going to go into a technical term here, and the term is locomotion. So there are two ways that you can implement locomotion in a VR game. You can actually have people walk around freely with like essentially three axes of movement um and you usually use your left and your right controls to do that um so you control your essentially you can strafe and you can move around the place you can literally do like circles around things if you want like with a tracking camera so that's one way of doing it the other way is what they call teleport where you have this little recticle that goes out and it jumps down into a position in front of you and you teleport to there the reason why they introduce these two methods of locomotion in games is because some people um get discomfort when they're using vr particularly new people to vr and it makes them feel motion sick if they're moving around and their body is not moving around so zen has actually made two ways of locomoting but unless you carefully read the onboarding things you won't know they're there isn't that right chris that would be a hundred percent correct um as a matter of fact when i first hooked up the pin sim i couldn't move around at all and i was like ah crap they broke my system it's not going to work for me because as far as i knew there was no analog control on the pin sim later found out that there is so i'm not we're not going to go into that in the review portion here just yet but just so you know yes i can locomote around using the pin sim. It's not... Unfortunately, you're basically a stiff robot moving on four axis, and you have to move your head in order to see around the room. So it's not the smoothest, wonderful thing, but damn it, I don't care, because I'm able to make it work. But yeah, you definitely have to go... Like, I'll just say this right now. Finding the options menu in the game, the fact that you have to maneuver yourself over to a TV screen, push A, that will bring up your options. If you read down at the bottom that, oh hey, you hit this button, then the options screen, the options seem a little bit hidden. I'm a little bit disappointed that it's not just a simple matter of hitting one button and options pop, and then you get to go through it.
    31:13
    It's sort of what they gave you, if you compare that experience to FX2 and the fact that you land in front of that screen when you first start the game up, and if you want to go and adjust the options there even if you move like because in fx2 you essentially you look around and that's what selects the things in the room so your your actual view position is what actually highlights things and then you basically tap a or click the trigger and you'll go directly to it but when the difference between the i guess the that let's call it the lobby area the lounge area in fx2 versus the lounge area in um uh star wars is that the options is almost like a hidden secret menu as you say chris but you got to know you got to basically got to hit the right grip or the rg button which is like this one that you activate with your thing down there and that will open up the the settings menu so it's not easy to find and the locomotion settings uh in the controller settings controller settings that's right yeah so and see this might be a case again where me using it on the pins in the only way i can get into the options is to maneuver around to the tv screen enter the tv screen and then down the bottom it lists oh if i hit my right button that's going to let me pop up the auctions menu but if i'm actually at a table playing the table i cannot bring up any of these options no so the only way you can do it is to use the pause function in game so if you're in in a game and you want to pause the game you get a screen that allows you to do some basic things but you don't get to actually change the global options in there you can change things like volume and stuff like that but control the scheme and control the map and everything has to be done through that tv interface um which is a little bit restrictive i guess once you get it set up you could argue that you don't need to see it again but if you're sort of experimenting with stuff you kind of do and this is what i was going to say the lobby itself once you're used to it is pretty cool and now it becomes hey this is an interesting vr environment to walk around take a look and i can actually share a little bit of what some of this looks like so this is your lobby so you got posters that you can change um trinkets around the room that you can change. It's very themable. Yeah, it's very themable.
    33:44
    All this stuff is things that you can earn while you're playing the game. Full-size costume statues, if you want models, things like that.
    33:57
    So that all is pretty cool. It's just, like I said, it took me a little while to even find the leaderboards, because that's on a whole other TV screen elsewhere. and it is and i was like it's in the kitchen yeah and i'm walking around that's where you look for leaderboards where there's leaderboards somewhere and then you find it but once you know where it is well then it becomes kind of cool that you're you know it's your environment you're moving around you're functioning in this environment i think though if you think about it like this is the first time that zen's done vr like this like they they've gone away from the model where they've got that sort of like static view in the room in fx2 so you're like a fully explorable environment so i think the intention behind putting things in weird places around the plate is to get you to look around and experience the environment and that's fair enough you know yeah yeah um so aside from the lobby which is a nice experience then it becomes a matter of going in and actually playing the games um the tables that you play There's eight currently that are in there. We're hoping that they're going to eventually add more. But what you get, you get the brand new table, the Mandalorian. You also get the brand new table, Star Wars Classic Collectibles. There is also Rogue One.
    35:24
    There's Masters of the Force. Which I'm going to say, my God, does 3D help that. I may not like the table still, but it certainly helps you understand where the hell you're supposed to be shooting the ball. Yeah, Masters of the Force sucks less in VR. Yeah, I also realized for the first time, hey, there's actual prequel characters in that. Oh, there is? Yeah, Darth Maul is one of the cardboard characters. Oh, yeah, yeah. Nail and stuff, and I was like, oh, okay, so I guess they did eventually touch upon the prequels. They just never did a dedicated prequel movie, Pinball Machine. And then the remaining four, Star Wars Rebels, New Hope, Empire and Jedi. So you basically got your original trilogy plus Rogue One, which fed directly into the original trilogy, your prequel in Master of the Force and Star Wars Rebels, and then your collectibles, which has, you know, it's just a mishmash of, again, original trilogy, and obviously the Mandalorian, which takes place pretty much right after the original trilogy. So we're kind of in a whole little era right there.
    36:41
    Hey, I wanted to say something at this point about the... We're talking about the tables. There's eight of them there. But there's a really nice feature, which is just essentially... It's not like a big game feature, but it's a quality of life thing that brings you into the illusion when you're in VR. And that is, when you select each of these tables, the image of the playfield changes. But not only that, the scale of the cabinet changes to fit the playfield. Have you noticed that? Yes. Now, that is really interesting. I can actually show this. And one second. Let me bring up.
    37:14
    It's really interesting because by far. Here we go. Watch the width of the table change as the table changes. Oh, it got narrower. Much narrower.
    37:29
    That's a little bit wider, but not too terribly bit. If they show Jedi, Jedi is a freaking square. It's like playing an old Stern Electronics machine. No, it's basically playing Star Race is what it is. It's a super wide body. It is a massive wide body. It's the biggest in all of them because the environment goes so far outside of the play field itself. It's a really immersive table. There's your table selection menu, and you'll notice that there probably should be a sliding bar over here. About there. But there isn't. But yet there's this black box there. So I think that's a pretty good indicator that, yes, we're going to be getting some more tables. Yeah.
    38:17
    The detail on these things is really great. and they did a good job of incorporating artwork on the sides of all the cabinets.
    38:26
    Yes, you get your characters floating around on the sides of the cabs. That right there is an immersive mode on Mandalorian, and I really like it. I didn't like it because it's that table view, and they let you have this, hey, you can give down a ball-label table view, which is kind of an interesting novelty, but I would not recommend playing pinball in that. No. I tried. It's really hard. But this particular mode, it's fun because it's designed for that view. Yeah.
    39:01
    And I'm playing these at half speed, folks, just so you know. I'm playing this at half speed. Yeah. This is not lagging. This is so we can talk to it. The collectibles table has some really cool stuff floating around it. I think you could buy that. All these things you could buy. Yes. That's a drone I could buy. I did feel that drone before. No doubt about it. Okay, now I'm going to pause. I'm going to let it go one more second. Right there. So our DMD. This is going to be a quick note. I want you guys to look at that DMD and notice something. It ain't got no dots. Where's the dots? It's just an MD.
    39:36
    Yeah. It's not even a matrix. It's just a D. Right. It's a D. It's a display. It's a D. That's all you got. We're going to go into that in a little bit, but this is one of the things that some people have been pointing out about the DMD. Why does the DMD not look good?
    39:54
    I've got some suggestions which we'll bring up soon. We'll get there, yeah. But I'm just going to say it's a feature that is available on Color DMD also, and I've never liked it on that either.
    40:06
    Let's play a little bit more here, just get a little taste of what all they're there. Star Wars Rebels, I believe. That's Rebels, yeah. That's Rebels. uh there's new hope kaboom rogue one rogue one benefits also from being 3d oh hugely this one really look at jedi look at how freaking wide jedi is yeah the reason why it has to be that wide is because of this ramp right over here that's it because that ramp right over there exceeds the width of a table well outside the playfield have you ever tried because we we do play on flat screen yeah we play this in vertical mode and so much is gone when you play this thing in vertical mode it chops off so much of either side of the play field it is amazing how much and i'll note that it's something that for people that have been playing the arcade one up star wars cabs have complained they were like how come jedi has so far away and has so much dead space this is why because it's a square this is the reason and you can't it's basically the virtual cab it's it really is like this the whole thing is the epitome of world on the glass yes like this thing here it's a whole theme environment yeah there you go the view that you'll never use um and then of course you've got these uh moments these little uh mini game moments where you're completely in that virtual being able to battle vader and such yeah you can look up at any time and select your side as well when you're in front of the play field um or front of the table. Now these mini modes are amazing. I don't know if you've experienced this one yet. No. I've only experienced the lightsaber training ball on the Falcon. So that's pretty good. This one's pretty immersive too. Like the Darth Vader one where you're in there smashing around with a lightsaber is really good. But that speeder mode one it's so cool in VR. And then just all the decorations that are in there. You can change carpeting also. Literally everything in there pretty much. when it comes to the actual gameplay now again I'm using the Rift I'm not experiencing any lag I've not experienced any crashes of the game I don't play with ball trails because I don't personally like them so I've turned those off I don't know if that affects performance at all or anything else like that but as far as I'm concerned my gameplay and I was popping between this and FX2 VR I'm not noticing any differences per se.
    42:43
    I do feel that this is an evolution up from FX2 VR by minuscule margins. Just, again, when I say that, to me the actual pinball gameplay is virtually identical. But in terms of the VR environment and doing all that action, I think that that's where this is obviously an improvement of such. But we're not talking about a night and day difference at all. It's subtle between these two programs on the Rift. Now, Jared, I don't know how it is for you with the Quest 2. Okay, so with the Quest 2, and this is in both Quest 2, you know, the Oculus Quest, Quest 2 experience and the SteamVR experience played through the Quest 2.
    43:39
    I've definitely noticed a problem with aliasing in this game. the you know aliasing for those people who aren't aware of what that is it's the shimmery lines you get on very thin lines uh in in video games that because of the way that the computer renders a straight line on an angle it sort of like essentially steps the line and aliasing sort of smooths out that line a bit by sort of piecing in the information between um but I don't know what's going on in both builds of this. The PC version is less affected by this. It still has a few aliasing issues.
    44:19
    But the Quest 2, the whole thing is really heavily aliased. Like you see on, for example, the Mandalorian table on the left-hand side of the table where the buildings are, and you see these vents on top of the buildings, they're just shimmering and strobing, and as you move, even if you move your head left to right, the whole thing like the whole shimmer rotates like this so it's heavily alias at the moment um there's definitely some problems with depth of field clarity as well um in both the steam version and the quest 2 version so if you compare it to fx2 vr on both steam and on oculus Oculus Quest 2 the back of the playfield is still clear and visible whereas on all of the Star Wars tables the back of the playfield is out of focus and aliased like all the textures in the back are actually also aliased as well and there's just not as much clarity like when you're looking down at the playfield from a play level view most of the inserts in FX2 you can make out clear enough that you know what they are But when you looking at the inserts at the back of the playfield on Star Wars they're illegible. You have to actually go all the way up to them. And as you start to zoom into the playfield surface, it instantly starts to become beautifully rendered. Like it's clear as anything. When you actually get nice and close to the playfield, you can clearly see everything. but as you start to move out the depth of field just disintegrates and you're back to blurry mess and see there's where playing on the rift everything is kind of a blurry mess already so it's fine yeah I mean yes the same thing where if I lean in everything does become resolves because I'm making it big again the resolution on a rift is not the same as the resolution on a quest the faces of the 3D characters I did notice just kind of looked like blobs they were very much not defined and again you really had to lean in order to get that these are issues that I'm hoping can be improved upon these are all solvable issues and I think that's where we kind of go with where we're going to go with this review is the game fun? yes it is it worth buying right now personally i don't have a problem with it i mean i find it very playable and i find it very fun still uh that it's not there's been a lot of vitriol that i've seen elsewhere and i think a lot of that is just hyperbole and people trying to just you know make a standout point but the game plays i'm not having personal issues with it crashing again i don't know what it's like on psvr we don't neither of us have another review that um and if there were issues on on that front but on the pc front uh it's completely playable right now is it going to be the best vr experience no but again there's definitely room for improvement i think that's where we're going to go with right now um i'm going to take i know jared has a lot more thoughts because of the quest, but my thoughts are all related to that bad boy, the Pinsim.
    47:55
    Something that we highlighted with FX2 VR, when I load up that game and I push go for a table, bam, it is the perfect height. I'm dead centered. It feels exactly correct. where my hands are resting on the Pinsim virtually, that is exactly where my hands are resting, like should be resting on the cabinet. I mean, I can even kind of squint underneath my headset. And so with one eye, I'm kind of getting the overlay of where the virtual table is. And with my other eye, I'm seeing where my hand physically is and they're dead lined up. It's wonderful. It is fantastic how that is.
    48:40
    In Star Wars VR, when you approach the table, the table seems pretty low down then you start the table bam the table is all of a sudden really high and to the point that it almost seems like i am six inches shorter than i actually am so i wind up having to reset the view by squatting down six inches then resetting the view which by the way resetting the view is difficult on the pin send we'll go into that that's not purpose of the review. But I do think the approach to the table, when you fire it up, it all of a sudden is much higher than I feel necessary. And I don't know if that's Zen's way of dealing with this resolution if you, like you said, trying to lean in or not. But I don't like it because then the second you exit the game, the table's back down to another visual level. And I think they should be consistent. When you walk up to that table and you press go, it should just still be there at that same height um now spoil me this with regard to fx2 um the tables in fx2 they were all a mixed size weren't they like there was some wides some narrows it was a variety yeah zen tends to make wider bodied machines but yes they were they all i think they all fit within the constraints of the pinsim where my hands were yeah i'm just trying to remember if like if what you're experiencing with the pin sim and the sort of positional experience you get there is because of the great disparity in widths in Star Wars titles. That should not affect the height. That's true.
    50:19
    So, if they were scaling the size of the hand positions to your pin sim, so the width was the same, that would affect the height. So, if it was like, if they were going right, this is like, for example episodes six or seven it's super wide um so therefore you'd have to zoom out so the the actual position of your hands was relative to the cabinet at that height so i wonder if that's what you're experiencing there with that i don't think it is um again we'll go into this uh after the review because this might be just you know quirk of pensam and i'm not going to knock a game for a very, very, very niche product. Your product there is a niche of an already niche market. Exactly.
    51:10
    My only other complaint, though, and the funny thing is this is a complaint that we had with Stern Pimblor. Stern.
    51:19
    But my other complaint is just the fact that I want to be able to access the options with the push of a button and not have to go over to the TV screen to get those options. I want to be able to, while I'm playing a game, go into options, make an adjustment, and go right back into the game. And currently, it's a no, nope, you've got to exit the game, walk over, go do it over there, walk back to the game, try it out, are you happy with it? No, okay, got to go back up. The other big issue that I'm having right now is button mapping.
    51:51
    There's only two options on any of the buttons. That's true. And you're stuck with whatever Zen is issuing you. and I don't like that and I know that some of the VR people don't like it either because for them, the A button apparently is not your usual select button. No, it's not. It's a trigger. It drives me nuts. It really does. It's such a jarring experience. Now, for me, I want it on my A button because I'm using what's essentially a 360 controller. Yes. Then, let us map our own buttons.
    52:25
    Yeah. Yep. Particularly if If you have a, because you can connect an Xbox 3, an Xbox One, Xbone controller to the Oculus Quest 2 as an input device.
    52:39
    And if you do that, you should also be able to map the buttons the way you want as well. You are able to do it in FX2. You should be able to do it here. So, yeah, my biggest gripes with the game are all controller related. Jared, I'll let you take your biggest gripes. I think the biggest problems I've had at the moment is just the sharpness of the graphics on the game. I also noticed that, I think, when Mel was describing the state of play with pinball effects and physics and stuff, the legacy tables are everything, you know, basically, legacy tables included all the ones that are in this VR experience. but the idea was that they were apparently going to receive Williams physics on them as part of the remap the only table that has it is Mandalorian and it is obvious really obvious and collectibles and I'm really shocked that collectibles doesn't have it except for the fact of who designed it may not have been a fan of that physics level I don't think that is a consideration anymore. The Williams physics is the new model, and it's not there. Which is like, I was trying to do flipper tricks, and I was going, why can't I tap pass? And I'll say this too.
    54:06
    One of the dead giveaways that people look for to go, hey, is it using Williams physics or not, is if you got your flipper down, and a ball comes, and you do a dead pass, the flipper will now give a little twitch. A little twitch.
    54:18
    Mandalorian, it does not give a twitch. That flipper stay is rock solid. but the bounce of the ball is very much Williams. I've had ball spin where the ball will hit the rubber and kind of stop in its tracks and kind of change direction. I've had that happen. That's completely a Williams physics thing. Just how, yeah, the flipper tricks that you can do, they're there for the Williams. They do not feel that way on any of the other tables. All the other tables feel like standard that we've been playing for forever now. Yeah. Yeah, that's really weird that they would mix physics models in the game. I just don't understand that. That would be something I would think would be fixed. I hope it's something that comes down the pipeline, that maybe it's just they still are working on it. I think they've got bigger fish to fry at the moment. They do, they do. I think the resolution issues, everyone... It's in every second review on the Oculus store that the graphics aren't sharp, that everything is seething and aliasing. so I know they're working on it too like they're actually trying to solve this problem and you know there's lots of discord around about you know what they might do to fix it I'm sure that they've already read I'm sure they've already googled things and they've probably read all those same articles that everyone else is boarding them to so I can only assume that this is a solvable problem because the aliasing isn't as bad on PC I can say that so on SteamVR I'm not seeing the aliasing at all and if they could just get the Quest 2 version to that level I'd probably be okay with it then they can start working on the depth of field clarity issues that are in the game but just get rid of that aliasing, it's so hard in my eyes I can't stay in VR for long with it at the moment it actually really hurts after a while, so it would be great if they could fix that up real quick but like you said, do we think it's a, you can purchase it now? absolutely yeah you'll be hurting yourself by waiting a little while no because patched patches are happening as we speak and i've been they did like a almost like a patch a week after it was released to solve some big problems big bugs which we'll go into after this review um so patches are happening and they're happening pretty frequently so you can expect the issues that you're seeing now on launch to be resolved pretty quickly i think when i say quickly over the next two months potentially right um i would think is this a game that will make you through controller gown and uh spit at the virtual screen and be like this is utter crap i can't believe this got released it's like shovelware no no no i can't really say that like it's got problems but they're all solvable like it's fun to play even like you can look past the aliasing issues and just spend less time in vr i will say this time if you have been able to enjoy the other vr pinball games that are out there if you found enjoyment with those there's no reason why you shouldn't find enjoyment with this yeah they've all got their issues but they're all still completely playable so yeah and that this game is no exception you can have a lot of fun with it and you know i will highlight this the mini games in it and the career progression so much fun right yep those those challenge modes that you get in this game they really add a huge dimension to this game and if you haven't actually delved into them if you're just playing the games by themselves you've got to give them a go they're really cool like you're chasing parsecs like number of parsecs that you've actually done in some of them there's a distance based goal so it's so cool like they really put some thought into way these things work and those modes are really important because they'll give you access to force powers and you can upgrade your force powers by completing those modes so make sure you don't ignore that part of the game. It's really important. So anyway, there you go.
    58:10
    It's a review, analysis, one of these things. A bit of everything. A little bit of everything. If you want to know more about what we have to really say, more in depth and kind of us going off on tangents, then certainly circle back to the full episode of the Blockade Pinball Podcast. This will be episode 222 that you'd be wanting to hunt down. Anyway, thanks for giving us a watch. and keep on flipping.
    58:37
    Keep on flipping? Where the hell did that come from? Right. Jared's like, wait, I need a tagline. Keep on flipping. Okay. So now let's get into some nitty-gritty here. Yeah, right.
    58:53
    I'm going to start mine with the Pinsim cab. Some of the issues that I have been... Okay, first off, for anybody that has one of these, let me tell you how to activate I did not know this Jeremy Williams, dude I have the utmost respect for you because you built this into this prior to this game and I had no clue he's apparently done some hot button combos on it and the hot button combos so when I built this I went a little bit overboard on all the buttons that I put in and it turns out I went the right amount of overboard right So, apart from my ABXY buttons up on top, apart from having my joystick up top, apart from having my plunger, my launch button, my two sets of flippers, and I've even got on here the third Y button down here to activate force powers with, I also have my start button and my back button. this back button turns out very very important because in order to navigate around in vr i need to push this back button and at the same time push up on the joystick if i do that suddenly my joystick is like the left analog stick and i can move around the room which is fantastic it let me play the game with the pin sim and i was worried that i was not going to be able to. Obviously, there is no right joystick. So you're pretty much strafing around the room like this basically. Yep, strafing, and if I want to see anything, I've got to move my head in order to see it. But it lets you do it. It lets me do it. It's a little awkward. I'll take awkward.
    60:38
    You know, believe me, I'll take awkward. That's great. Here's where the issues come in. Like I said, in order to change in order to re-center my table view of where I'm at and everything in Pinball FX VR 2 that button right there, my X button I press that, bam, it would re-center me. It's what worked in Stern VR worked in Pinball FX 2 VR did not work in Zacharia.
    61:16
    Because Zacharia's centering is a whole different Boloax. So I was expecting the same thing. Unfortunately, the only buttons that are mapped for recentering that Zen has set up is R3, which is a pushdown, or L3. That's it. So both on your analog parts basically you've got to push the analog in. Which I don't have.
    61:40
    So no recentering. So the only way I can recenter, so there's this immersive mode that puts you down into the table, and I'm able to access the immersive mode by, I believe, I'm trying to think which button. It's a Y button. Is it the Y button? Yeah. It might be the Y button. I'm not sure. Anyway. By default it is. I think I have mine on the B button. But anyway, on the back button. Anyway, that will put me into the immersive. Then I need to center myself up and squat so that I can adjust the height. and then I tap it and then it'll center me according to what my new height is.
    62:20
    Again, if they would just use whatever was being used in FX2 VR, where that table was always dead center where I needed it at the correct height, I wouldn't have to worry about this. But I am constantly having to change that up. Now, Jared, to your question, is it a case of because of the cabinet width? It has nothing to do with the cabinet width because the... the table, like I said, is staying at the same height, regardless of what table I switch it to.
    62:51
    So, yes, in the case of Jedi, suddenly it's much wider than what my pin sim is. Which, at first I was like, well, this is kind of weird, but then you quickly forgive it. That's not an issue. And it doesn't matter if I reset my height so that the table is much lower, it's still much wider than what the pen stem is. So that's not a factor.
    63:17
    That's not playing into this at all. It's just a matter of why it thinks I'm six inches shorter. And again, when we walk up to the table, the table's pretty low on the walk-up. But then as soon as you select, wham, the table jumps up in height, which is just bizarre. Something that Zen fortunately has fixed with the patch note was when you went into immersive, it was always sending you to either the left or the right. I think it was sending you to the left of the table. They've now had it so that you're now sent to the middle of the table, which helps with the jarring transition, as opposed to you going, whoa, wait, wait, where the hell am I?
    63:57
    Why am I sitting over the left flip-up? Yeah, exactly. If we could just map our own buttons, that button that I'm used to for re-centering would work. would work i just i don't know why they locked us in to two sets and that's it that is a very bizarre choice that i think because they expect because of the the limited scope of the the supported headsets they all support touch control um the rift has its touch controllers so you know and they're expecting people to use those that's was their design i think is which okay but so in In which case, why didn't they do it with the standard button that all the VR people are used to than for Select? I don't know. I can't answer that question. But it's an interesting one. You know, I can't believe that it would take up massive resources to allow button remapping. But I'm not a designer, so I don't know. I'm pretty sure that's a solved problem. Because literally every game lets you do it.
    65:04
    And I don't think it's a big problem. I don't know, maybe there is a limitation in button remaps on touch controllers in Oculus. Maybe they deliberately don't let you remap that much because they want to keep the experience relatively consistent. But I'm not sure if that is even a thing. I hope it's not because that seems very limiting if you have to, as a developer, only offer a certain set of buttons. I mean, flipper buttons, I can understand you would probably only want those on the trigger and those probably don't need to be remapped. but all the other interface buttons those should be selectable my other issue some people have mentioned they think the lighting has taken a hit on this game as opposed to FX2VR here's where I think the difference is in FX2VR your ambient room light dims
    65:58
    it does it dims big time which makes the table look much better gee how many times we've been saying that yep in star wars the room never changes ambient light it's bright as it always is and it's you're in you're basically playing the pinball in a fully lit room like uh they need to dim the lights when you're in pinball they absolutely do because it would really highlight because in both builds now given that the Oculus 2 the Quest 2 is running a mobile chipset it's a pretty powerful one it's got a dedicated GPU but it's not a PC it doesn't have 16GB of RAM and a really high end video card but what I've noticed is the effects that you get in the Quest 2 aren't that much different to the PC. So there's a little bit of fidelity lost in some of the effects, but for the most part, you're kind of getting a similar experience across the two. I'll give you an example. In Mando, when you launch the ball and it goes up to the Razorcrest mini playfield,
    67:13
    in Steam, there is a scan line that goes up that playfield. Now, that's nice and smooth, and it looks like a radar line in Steam, steam but in quest 2 it's almost like a block that transitions up a thing like that so that's one graphical difference the thing that's interesting though is when you shoot the cauldron to start a mission um the ball starts spinning and there's like sort of like almost like a um what would you call it not a miss but there's yeah it heats up and there's like sort of like a blobs in it that are floating in there now i thought for sure i played steam first and i thought for sure that's not going to be in the quest version but they managed to do it so it's probably a little less fidelity but it's still there it's not like it's cut from release so that was interesting as well um when you when you have a um uh on the upper right flipper in mandalorian there's like this sort of like stuff floating above the flipper yes to indicate that There an actual shot underneath that upper flipper It a hole and it only accessible by the opposite side mid to flip into it Just blow the cauldron basically Right So instead of having an insert lighting up saying hey, this hole is active, no, instead now it sparkles. There's sparkles. Yeah, there's sparkles. So the sparkles are there in Quest 2, but they don't quite have the texture and light that the Steam VR version does. so the like in the case of mando and indeed in the case of collectors as well there's there's not a lot of disparity between the two like you're not in and this was sort of the case in um fx2 vr as well like you we did a video on this actually yeah where we had side by side the two things you get a little bit of extra flare and maybe a little bit of extra lighting on the pc version versus the Quest 2 version, but it wasn't jarring enough to make you go, I'm really missing out here on Quest 2. So do you feel that... Do you feel that basically we're all playing a Quest 2 build of this game, or even a Quest 1 build of this game, even those that are on SteamVR, as opposed to there being a dedicated PC build to utilize, not just for me on a Rift, but for you using your link cable to utilize full fidelity of graphics? I think it's not so much that they're using a mobile build.
    69:54
    And for the record, the way you can do things in Quest is you can target, you can actually have completely separate build profiles for the different headsets that are supported in Quest. So you could have a Quest 2 build profile that has more graphics, better aliasing and stuff like that. Quest 1, you can downscale things because the processor isn't as powerful, nor is the screen resolution. So you have to back off some things and make some sacrifices in Quest 1.
    70:21
    And on Rift, through SteamVR, of course, you can throw the whole book at it. But I'm just wondering here, is rather than trying to go, hey, we've got a PC VR experience, we've got a Quest experience. I wonder if they're just going, we've got an experience and rather than actually going let's like throw the full gamut of effects and everything at pc and limit the quest let's actually try and make the experience kind of similar across all the platforms so that people don't feel like they're missing out so that's my only thought about that it's almost like they're going in maybe a situation of let's for now do that while we're sorting out some of the performance And then hopefully build up to it. That's what I'm thinking. Throw the book at it later. I mean, I've said that there are definite similarities between the two. You're getting a minor graphical quality of life improvement on the SteamVR version. Yeah. But I don't know. Having both, this is my thoughts on the matter. At the moment, with the current build, this is as of the 9th of May 2021. I would be leaning towards the Quest 2 version aliasing issues aside purely because it's just so much more convenient like you throw the headset on start the game, you're in, bang you don't have to start your PC up oh great, I've got a Steam update I've got to install oh great, now the thing's updated I've got to plug the cable in I've got to route it in such a way they're not tripping over it Which is the biggest problem with VR, in my opinion. It removes all those barriers with the Quest 2 version because you're not sacrificing that much graphical fidelity in it.
    72:12
    For me, it's like, if you've got both, and you have an option to buy Steam or the Quest 2 version, I'm going with the Quest 2 all the time because it doesn't really offer that much difference in graphical quality. If down the line, that changes and they really start to open up the floodgates with the SteamVR version and really start to utilize the power of the PC. Like, my PC build is... I'm running an RTX 2060. In VR land, that's a mid-range experience. Yeah. Like, you really need to be running an RTX 30 series card now to actually get really high-end visuals. And this laptop is essentially behind the curve now. It used to be quite good, but now it's actually not considered a top-end hardware profile. So even with that at the moment, I'm getting an okay experience in there. I think I'm losing some resolution, though. I think I might be losing a bit of screen refresh. So I think I'm on 72 hertz instead of 90 hertz for the screen refresh. So that will be affecting clarity as well, to a little extent.
    73:23
    Whereas I think the Quest 2 is running on 90 hertz natively. I think. Not sure, but I presume that's pretty much the standard now for all Quest 2 games.
    73:32
    I still think for me it will be the Quest 2 version over the Steam version. It'll be interesting to see if they then therefore do any ramping up. I do believe that I think Deep is the one that designed Mando and Deep is obviously the champion of Williams physics whereas star wars collectibles i think was uh developed by uh zoltan and i'm i'm shocked that that one's not available with williams physics the other tables i'm not quite surprised because i do think that they're probably still in the process of optimizing them for when they eventually come out in in effects pinball later on effects yeah yeah so i would hope that those become an option later on but i think it's kind of inexcusable for collectibles not to have it right out the gate yeah i don't understand that decision at all i don't know why that is missing the williams physics those two tables being brand new yeah they're not part of the legacy no right they are they're essentially the two tables that will be featuring in pimple effects later on the year so they should be having those physics as of now like there's no reason why mission uh let's talk about those two tables real quick um yeah okay real quick mando i really dig it i've barely cracked the surface on it i mean it's so hard to get it is but i want to crack the surface it's it's engaging i like it it's easy to follow it's the it tells you where to shoot for the most part i still wish they would do call outs to tell you where to shoot it's One aspect that Xan then does not ever do, I want them to, be like, you know, call out the ramp. Call out the ramp that you're supposed to be hitting. Don't make me look at the DMD unless you hold the ball and give me time to read the DMD. Yes. Especially in VR where it's hard to read the text. Yeah. Or, you know, call out the ramp. But Mando does a really good job of blinking the insert light so that you know where it is. Collectibles?
    75:46
    No clue what is going on. No clue. I have put quite a bit of time into this table purely because it was interesting enough for me to go, okay, what do I need to do to make this thing blow up? and the the biggest frustration for me on this particular table is actually starting the collectibles mode now when i say the collectibles mode that's where all the figures pop out of the play field go to their plinths that are on the play field where you collect them so to do that what you have to do is you have to shoot up to the death star loop so the ball has to go around actually it goes yeah this way and then back down and then you got a little flipper that you've got to shoot it and make it do the whole loop again and go back up to the top now i can count like i've had probably about 30 plays of this table over the last like since it was released probably more and i can probably count on my hands on both hands how many times i've been able to successfully get that mode started with what looks like a clean shot from that flipper.
    77:00
    I just cannot... It literally just goes around the loop, just up, and then dribbles back down again. Every single time. It drives me nuts. But the thing is, too, is that there's no... There's nothing that tells you that that's what you need to do. There's nothing that tells you that. Because, honestly, if you're hitting a combo shot, you don't have time to hit the shot and go, oh, where's the blinking light? Yeah. Especially if it's off a flipper, off a flipper, and in. Mode starts should never be that difficult. Difficult, that's right. One of the things that I don't understand is it'll be like, oh, you've clicked, select the character.
    77:38
    Okay, I select the character. But why? What is my point? Am I locking in one character and then moving on to the next character and then moving on to the third character? Once I've got all three of them locked, then they go? I don't know. It's not telling me anything. Yeah, that's the biggest problem. It's like, why am I selecting a character? Like, what is the purpose of it? Do they unlock different features in the game? I mean, I literally feel like how I feel when I play Tesla.
    78:05
    Yeah, that's not a great compliment. No, it looks interesting, and I would like to figure it out, but you have made it really difficult to figure out. so anyway of those two tables I think that we can both agree Mando yay Star Wars Collectibles not easy no not an easy nut to crack that one as I've said well again same nut hard to crack it's for me that's Masters of the Force it's just a table that I don't understand what it wants you to do and part of that is this whole light side dark side you know if you hit so many shots on this side well that opens up the dark side modes but if you hit so many shots on this side, that opens up the light side modes, and it just becomes a mishmash of confusion.
    78:51
    But at least visually I can understand where a lane of shooting the ball is now. I'm much more happier with that table now. I tried to put my preconceptions aside with that table and actually put some time into playing this particular table. and I will say it benefits greatly from VR. Yeah. Like it really starts to make a lot of sense now. The layers and the depths and everything are really useful and I think that now I can actually see what's going on. I have a better idea what I need to shoot for and you're right, it is very much separated right down the middle with light and dark. But, you know, using the dark side and shooting it up to where the Holocron mini play field is, like that is now a lot easier to understand and i'd argue actually easy to shoot now as well because you can see how things need to go off the holocron to get up there um so that's easy to understand the light side though that that holocron that spinning holocron drives me insane it's so hard to line the shot up so you can knock the multi ball out of the holocron like there's a ball stuck in the holocron where you shoot it it pops it out you start multi ball that's so inconsistent for me. Maybe I just suck and I can't do it, but it's just so frustrating. That particular shot. And like I mentioned, Rogue One definitely benefited from three dimensions. Yep. It looks really good. Looks really good.
    80:23
    Empire? I have to laugh. On the back of the playfield, there's a Death Star, right? They didn't bother making... and it then goes deep. inside the back glass, you might say, to a star field. But the Death Star is just a cardboard cutout. They didn't bother making it 3D. They didn't make it 3D. That could have been the sacrifice. It could have been. But it's also a table that I don't think the 3D helps or hurts. It is just as easily playable in 2D as not. Yeah. I think Jedi benefits a little bit from it because the upper play field can get a little bit confusing in 2D. So I think that benefits a little bit. I think that New Hope, I went, I didn't know it had a lower play field.
    81:12
    Yeah, exactly. Which was kind of like, huh, okay. Rebels, I think... It looks good. It benefits a little, but it was not detracted from in 2D either. In flat screen, yeah. The one that I really want to see in 3D is Might of the First Order, I believe. Oh, the one where the flames come up and you've got to shoot the thing? That's the one that is on the deck of the Star Destroyer. And it has the lower playfield on it. Oh, yeah, and you've got to pass the balls over? That one I really hope that they bring over, because I like the table, but it is a visual confusing table. because they didn't do depth of field on the lower play field. And so you think, oh, you think the ball's coming towards your flipper and then you flip and nothing happens. You realize, oh, that's in the lower play field.
    82:14
    So that's one that I really hope they bring over. The other one I'd like to see as well is the Starfighter. That would be amazing also.
    82:26
    Imagine, because it almost looks really good in flat screen now. The fact that the table is floating and there's all this stuff happening around it. Imagine that expanded. Well, imagine this. That's one that has a mini-game that is basically you playing Asteroids. Or not Asteroids, you're playing Galaga.
    82:45
    I haven't got to that yet, I don't think. Oh, it's great. You've got three ships. And depending on what you're doing, you either have TIE Fighters flying around and you're trying to blast them. And they're swirling and stuff doing the Galaga action. or you've got meteors falling and you're trying to shoot the meteors and and dodging imagine that as a virtual reality minigame that'd be amazing that'd be fantastic so uh i think there's a couple of tables that i would really love to see uh come over and i hope that there's plenty more that they can bring in like i think there's nothing stopping them bringing in every single one no into the collection over time but there are some ones they could bring in as a priority like a if you are having to rank the ones to bring in yeah the ones that we're talking about would be very very good additions up front yeah and then gradually bring the rest over that you know would look nice in vr but wouldn't that that essentially don't have any graphical problems in them that would make them so much more understandable in vr honestly my preference would be for those two and uh boba fett yeah boba fett is one that's fun to play once you get into it but it's again it needs depth doesn't it like it absolutely yeah it does it really does so that would be my top three that i would love to see come over first um i really enjoy uh force awakens the table but i don't feel that it suffers in 2d at all so i'm fine with waiting on that like i said i'm working i'm more wanting tables that will i think will visually benefit from the immersive uh vr aspect of things yeah yeah i agree i think there's there's definitely lots of uh room for some excellent content to be brought into that that product yeah um any other thoughts that we have on on vr i do i do okay i have a thought and this is again regarding the vitriol of reviews out there people oh the hot garbage yes oh yeah um i think a lot of that is everybody taking a chance this is the first release that zen has had since they've announced pin effects and it being epic exclusive for a year i think people are taking an opportunity to uh heat piles of dung over at zen for this um this is an unreal base game this is their first unreal engine base release completely playable and you know how i know that so there's a guy on youtube uh by the name of carrie hardy he does a ton of real world pinball content.
    85:44
    He's decisive on his own in the pinball community, apparently. Some people love him, some people hate him. But he's in it big time. Not quite deadflip level, but close. Very close. Right. And Oculus called him up and said, hey, we want to sponsor your show. And he went, hey, why? Yeah, why would I want to do this? And so then they contacted him again and he said, well, I guess if they're contacting me a second time, they've got a good reason so okay so they sent him over quest 2 and make you a whole oculus care package you know shirt and water ball and all that jazz yeah but it was quest 2 and they sent him star wars pinball vr and he basically said i've never played vr i've never played a digital pinball game ever because i only play fresh brand new yep he had a blast yeah absolutely was shocked at how much fun he was having one of the things that he again looking at it from purely a physical pinball machine player he was like i love all the mechanics that are on these things because it would drive the price of a real machine through the roof absolutely it would and he goes but he was like i love how it's modeled it's very realistic the sounds are there he basically didn't as a real world pinball exclusive player didn't feel like there was anything lacking um and that's a big call that's a big call and what he was saying he goes i'm going to have to take and he was talking about with portability with quest 2 he was like i'm glad it's portable the way it is because he goes i know that if i invite friends over that are just like me they ain't gonna play this thing because but if i take it over to them and be like throw this on give it a shot then they're going to come to the same conclusion that he has and because he's like i've found myself and he does his show with a row of pinball machines behind him and he goes i keep on just in this past week just grabbing the headset and throwing it on and playing so with a big row of pinball machines behind him he's going like i'm going vr So, I mean, I think for VR enthusiasts and people that are really, really, really into VR and how good the graphics can be in VR and what they expect, I understand there being a disappointment in this.
    88:14
    But calling it an absolute piece of trash that's unplayable, that's way out of line. Yes, there's room for improvement. Absolutely room for improvement. but I truly believe that the improvements will come. We just need to keep our foot on the gas a little bit but overall it's a good product that does exactly what Lucasfilm would want it to do. Yeah, well, exactly right. Promote Star Wars in a positive light and make the whole Star Wars experience like a feature of the game which is, you can't argue that it doesn't do that. And again, look back at our review of the other, you know, Zachary Pinball and Stern Pinball.
    89:01
    They both had their issues, too, that if you're willing to overlook them, then you can still have a good time playing the things.
    89:13
    When it comes down to the core of playing a pinball machine in VR, they're all fun. it's all the gravy aspects that can bog down you're like well it needs to fix this it needs to fix that yeah uh oh can you hear me? I can hear you but I had a white screen of death wow I totally white screened of death that was interesting I think my computer is telling us it's time for us to wrap this up it's time to wrap it up I think it is well hey look folks I hope you enjoy that in-depth dive.
    89:53
    Get the game. Yeah, just buy it. You're not going to be regretting it terribly much. Or wait for a sale. I don't know when a sale will come, but if you want to do that too,
    90:06
    if you feel like you need to give it a month for all the patches to be done and make the game playable and wonderful, wait. Do that. Wait. But it's definitely going to be something that's eventually going to be in your library if you are a VR owner. Yeah, you'd be mad not to, in other words. Like, even now, you're going to get your value out of your $34, and that's Australian dollars. Yeah, $24 here. Yeah, so you're going to have fun with that. And, like, just for the mini-games alone, and for the career progression stuff, that's a really fun aspect of the game that you really do need to experience, because it's a lot of fun.
    90:45
    So get it. get it alright let's wrap this thing up as usual we don't know what we're going to talk about next time but it'll be something typically Jared's favorite stuff and things there'll be something until then hey go visit the website blockadepinball.com and hit us up on Twitter let us know what your thoughts are and until then buh-bye