Into the great wide open, under the skies of blue. You know, I was walking to work, I was all ready to talk to you about Godfather, which I'm going to talk to you about, and then someone literally just sent me a link to Multimorphics, Final Resistance, Join the Fight. Pre-orders open March 9th at 9 a.m. Central Standard Time. $3,400 for the Final Resistance game kit. The P3 platform with the game, $11,700 for this new game from Multimorphic. Okay, so look everybody, it's just stupid now. The entire pinball industry is dropping all of their games at the same exact time. This is idiotic. We're going to talk about this. Foo Fighters, Godfather, Queen Pinball. We got Galactic Tank Force. We got Final Resistance. There's not enough money to go around in this hobby for all of these games to find homes, to get orders. There's not enough space in everybody's households for all of this stuff. But I'm not going to get too derailed by this multi-morphic news. We're going to talk about this game on Canada's Pinball Podcast. and look, it looks pretty interesting. There's this major mechanism in the upper right that like you shoot the ball underneath it and then it fires balls back at you like a cannon, like a tank shot. And it's got this really cool Scott Denise vibe going on. It's got the Scott Denise countdown clock. It's got cool music. And we know it's gonna be a great light show and music show by Scott Denise. But look, do you have $11,700 burning a hole in your pocket after you just bought Scooby-Doo? After you just bought Foo Fighters? after you're going to see freaking Godfather tomorrow, after you're going to see Galactic Tank Force the following weekend. It's just too much, people. If you add up all of the pinball machines that are getting released right now, it's close to $80,000 to $90,000, almost $100,000 if you buy every single game in its finest trim, and it's just too much. Okay, so I want to talk first about Godfather because I've been thinking a lot about this game over the weekend, and now that it's been confirmed that it's Godfather. We hear Slash's guitar solo in the trailer. I fully expect for Slash to be in this game. He always plays the Godfather theme song at Guns N' Roses concerts for the last like 30 years as his guitar solo. But here's my thing about Godfather. On paper, it should never work. We've been making fun of this theme for so long. And I just started watching the Paramount Plus TV show The Offer, which is about the making of the Godfather. And I had no idea that it was so hard to make this movie, that the mafia was trying to shut down the production. And I've seen the movie The Godfather, and it's an incredible movie. I've never read the book. The movie's 50 years old, and all of us have been saying that this is the worst theme ever for pinball. And on the surface, we've been right. It is one of the worst themes ever that you could possibly select for pinball. But I'm just going to say this right now. I'm going to play devil's advocate. Just maybe, just maybe in a sea of sameness in which everything in pinball is sort of bright and colorful. Everything in pinball is like either rock and roll or like Marvel or like major motion pictures in which everything in pinball is always like fast paced and energetic. Maybe, just maybe this pinball machine makes total sense because it's going to be different. And maybe if you have a lineup of pinball machines, you don't want another Skittles catch the rainbow, bright, colorful game like Foo Fighters. Maybe you don't want another rock and roll game. Maybe you don't want another corny and campy family fun adventure like Galactic Tank Force or Scooby Doo. Maybe you're a grown man who enjoys whiskey and cigars. And when your grown men friends come to your man cave, you want them to say, wow, the godfather. You want something a little bit more mature, a little bit more adult. And yes, I hope this game is R-rated. I hope it captures the violence of the movie itself. I hope there are not muted clips. But now all of a sudden, I'm glad that we actually have a theme that is radically different than everything else we've been getting in pinball because it has been a sea of sameness for so long. There's a formula that works and Stern keeps doing the same exact formula over and over and over again. I would argue Stern doesn't put a lot more into their games and yet they've been charging us 40% more than these games used to be. I think a lot of people are loving the Foo Fighter package. I'm loving the Foo Fighter package but there's no escaping the fact that $13,000 is a lot of money for in LE and there's not a ton of new mechanisms in the game it doesn't mean the game's not amazing and super fun and super colorful and the animations are the best Stern's ever done it just means that's a lot of money that's a lot of money and now that we're seeing Eric stare at the underside of that godfather machine in which there is like it looks like a spaghetti bowl of cables going every way I think that's the pre-production version of the game, and that makes it look a lot more loaded. That's not how the game's going to be wired when it goes to consumers. So I think it was a little misleading to use that image, but it's an Eric Minier game. And Eric Minier, as we know, always takes a really unique angle with his machines. And that's the other reason why I'm excited tomorrow, is I do have faith that Eric Minier is going to do something interesting, at least. He not going to do just a traditional fan layout I think he likes to put interesting mechs into his games We all know they need to have a lot of interesting mechs in this game We all know that Christopher Franchi is going to crush the art package on this game. It's going to look incredible. And I think right now I'm feeling excited about this launch by Jersey Jack Pinball tomorrow. The other thing is this, there is no way in a million years I would buy this game right away. Like if you are interested in a Jersey Jack machine, there is no way on day one I would ever order a game again from this company. And the reason why is we've seen the way the marketplace has gone with this company, and we need to see that the play fields are going to be good quality. And I mean this. Just because they're good on Toy Story doesn't mean they're going to be good on Godfather. So I want to wait and see what the quality is. I also want to wait and see what the market is on this game, because we're starting to see now in the pinball world, if you buy something right away and you rush to buy it, you're going to lose a lot of money now. Have you seen this guy trying to sell his James Bond LE for $11,000 and he doesn't like the game at all? And think about it. If you had just waited and didn't buy your James Bond right away, you all of a sudden could have saved yourself $2,500. And the James Bond price is going to keep going down and down and down. We're seeing Scooby-Doo spots are now selling for 500 off sticker. You could have saved yourself 500 bucks if you just waited to see what the market would be on the game. And Jersey Jack Pinball, don't forget everybody, is the most expensive pinball machine right now. 15,000 for a CE, 1,000 CEs, 12,500 for NLE. And here's the other lesson I hope Jersey Jack implements with the Godfather machine. I hope they had a marketing meeting and they don't do the idiotic thing again and announce a thousand CEs. They need to cut that number in half. They also need to stop with the idiotic business practice of saying they're going to make 5,000 LEs of this game. If they want to sell these games at these prices, they need to strategically think about what kind of company do we want to be. And I think moving forward at these prices, If Jersey Jack wants to drive any FOMO and bake in any exclusivity and any secondhand value into these games for their customers, which I think they need to do because I think they've lost their way. I think they need to cap how many games they will make in total of this game and games moving forward. So I think they need to say, we are going to make in total no more than 2,500 Godfather pinball machines. We are going to make 500 collector's editions and only 2,000 LEs. And that's it for all time. And then move on to the next title. Then you secure a level of rareness and exclusivity for everybody who buys it. And then all of a sudden, it doesn't feel like a ripoff if we buy a collector's edition or an LE of the product. But they can't do what they've been doing. It's not working. They are trying to act like they are a stern pinball. It will never work. But I just want to get back to this theme. I think a dark, slow, Italian family mobster drama, all of a sudden, it's going to stand out because it's different. Do I think they're going to sell out on day one? No. I heard they have a hundred LEs ready to go. They're in a box. Do I think they're going to sell those games? Absolutely, they will. Whenever you have a product in a box and you bring it to shows and you let people know you can have it in just a day or two, they will absolutely sell these games. There are a lot of people out there that are feeling one simple thing, and I said this on my Saturday morning show, The most powerful human emotion that gets people to act, the most powerful human emotion that gets engagement from consumers is curiosity. And everybody is curious about this pin. Everyone is curious how are they going to translate Godfather into pinball. We are curious what the code is going to be, what the mechs are going to be, how the game is going to play. All of these things are driving our curiosity. And my gosh, is everybody curious about what is going to happen in the month of March in pinball? But Jersey Jack Pinball, I'm just here to tell you right now, I'm going into tomorrow with an open mind. I'm going in tomorrow as an Eric Minier fan. I'm going into tomorrow hoping that you guys have thought about the launch of this machine a little bit more strategically. if you come out and launch this game exactly the same way you launched Toy Story 4, trust me when I say it, this game is going to have lukewarm sales if they do it that way. And as a customer, and I've been telling all of my friends this, I just would not buy this game tomorrow. I wouldn't buy any of these games in March. I would absolutely wait until every single pinball manufacturer releases their game in the month of March. And don't forget, people, we are also getting most likely Pulp Fiction revealed to the world at TPF. We are going to have seven new pinball machines available to buy. And guess what's going to happen when that happens? None of them are going to sell out. Distributors are going to be sitting on product for a long time. And you're going to be able to buy any of these machines for less money than they are MSRP. There is no room in one month for seven brand new pinball machines that are all costing north of $10,000. Are you excited to see this marketplace I am I have never seen anything like this before It also shows me one thing None of these companies really understand marketing very well They really don They're all living in a vacuum. They all think their baby is beautiful. They all think if they get their game out, buyers are going to show up. And I'm here to tell you right now, it's a different world. The economy isn't where it was three years ago. It's a different world. We all are looking at these games with a lot more discerning eyes. It's a different world. We're not stupid. We know that these games don't have 40% more into them, but the prices are 40% higher. It's a different world. There's just too much. And I think a lot of you out there are feeling this. How can we absorb this game, Foo Fighters, Galactic Tank Force, this multi-morphic game, what's the name of it again? I already forgot the name. Let's see what it is again. Final Resistance, join the fight. All right. How can we absorb all this? And let's talk about this Final Resistance game. It's got this major, major mech in the upper right corner. It's definitely a Scott Denise game. But here's my question about Jerry's timing around this game. He hasn't even made all the Weird Al's yet. What is this guy doing revealing a new game before all of the Weird Al's were made? He revealed Weird Al to the world a year ago. And you're telling me in one year, P3 Multimorphic can't make 250 games Jerry what are you doing? You can't stay in business If your manufacturing is this slow This is comical Stern can make 250 games in 3 freaking days Jerry What are you doing? He's got to figure something out Because are you going to really order this game And then wait a year to get it? And also what makes no sense is How are you going to start making final resistance If you haven't made all the weird owls yet? And I just don't get this business model And trust me when I say this, and I'm not rooting against pinball companies, people, but I'm here to tell you right now, 2023 is going to be the year in which we see some of these smaller companies that don't really know what they're doing. We're going to see some of them collapse. There's just too many games. There's too much product. It's all too expensive. No pinball is worth more than $10,000. Everybody knows it deep down inside. We used to get fully loaded games for like $4,000 to $5,000. Now we're paying three times as much. It's because all of the pinball media is controlled now by people that are selling you games that want to be friends with the designers and the manufacturers. You've all been misled for all of these years. The hype, hype, hype, buy, buy, buy. You guys know what I'm talking about. And you guys are all going to wake up. The coma is going to be over. and you're going to realize we're all getting kind of hoodwinked by all of these companies now charging us in arm and a leg for pinball. And it doesn't mean I don't love pinball, but this can't be pinball now for the rest of pinball's existence. Are we really going to live in a world now in which every single pinball machine is now going to be north of $10,000 for the most part, unless you buy a pro machine? And then we have all of these boutique companies that are going to take forever to get games out, and they want to lock in your order. We have now more pinball companies making games than we did in the 1990s. There's like three times as many companies making pinball machines right now. And are you making three times as much money? Are you telling me the audience for pinball is three times as large as it used to be? And here's the scary part. No, it's not. Because Adam's family sold 22,000 units in one year or two years. So think about it. Pinball will never be as popular as it used to be. Sure, it's more popular in a home environment, but everybody else in the world looks at us like we're a bunch of morons spending $15,000 on amusement devices that are not supposed to be inside our homes. There's a reason why there's a coin slot on every single game, ladies and gentlemen. It's so that these games can make money for operators. It's not so you can spend $16,500 on a Jersey Jack game. and in just a few months you're going to lose $4,000. Like why are we doing this? Just wait and buy a Godfather used. And nobody else wants to tell you this because I don't get any kickbacks. I don't get any money. And if you knew what I knew, people, pinball media people, are making money selling these games for these manufacturers. It's getting scary, people. The church and state lines have been crossed. And it's only Canada that's got no agenda. And look, I tell you this right now, it's hurting my livelihood. The more money these games cost, the more you're going to be hesitant to give me your five bucks every month. No, this is still the best bang for buck in pinball. It's going to be crazy, everybody. And here's the other part. Like, where the heck is American Pinball? In all of this madness, we now got to see this multi-morphic game before we've even seen David Fix's Galactic Tank Force. And I'm going to tell you this right now. American Pinball is going to be the big loser in March. They're going to be the big loser. They waited too long. David Fix's strategy, his marketing strategy, he set it in place before Foo Fighters happened. He set it in place before Scooby-Doo took all this money. He set it in place before Jersey Jack dropped its new trailer. He set it in place before freaking Multimorphic just showed us their new game. And so this is the problem with marketing when you set it in place. If you're not able to pivot and move with the market and move with the culture of what's happening, you will lose out. And David Fix all of a sudden now is realizing and he's waking up to the harsh reality. We waited too long. We don't have a game that's going to override everything people have seen. And now it going to be impossible for people to get excited about Galactic freaking Tank Force at the end of seeing these four new games from everybody else And now he going to come out with his original IP It not going to have artwork that as good as Godfather And it's the same damn artist in Franchi. It's not going to have an emotional connection to anybody. You know, who wakes up and wants to save the ice cream in a galactic tank battle in outer space? Yes, that's the theme of the game, ladies and gentlemen. Save the ice cream. And David Fix, nobody needs four trim levels of this game. And I'm telling you, these tank treads, when they get shown to everybody, everyone's going to be like, what are you doing, American Pinball? And again, it's just going to be a day late and a dollar short on this game. And he got it out too late. Galactic Tank Force was supposed to come out in December. And he waited. And he delayed it to TPF. And now he's screwed. And I mean it. American Pinball is going to be the big loser. How is Haggis Pinball going to move on to their next game? There's too much pinball, everybody. It's almost like crazy to say it. There's too much pinball landing on top of itself. And I love it because as a customer and a pinball content creator, this is the greatest thing ever to happen to all of us. Because now all of us collectively as a community, we can all just wait and see. Trust me, you're going to be able to buy every single one of these games that's over $10,000, if you just wait a few months, all of these games are going to be for sale for 20% less than they are in March. I guarantee you, ladies and gentlemen, all of them, because there's too much coming out. And how do you move cars off the lot when people aren't buying it right away? You discount it, and that's going to happen at pinball. I'm so excited. I booked my flights to TPF, everybody. I'm flying in Friday morning. I fly out Sunday. I'm going to set up my happy hour at Perry's Steakhouse. So if you're going there, look for details on that. And don't forget to vote for what shorts I wear at the Twippies. Right now, it's looking like the Brazilians are in the lead. And the Brazilian shorts are not even cargo shorts. So that might be breaking the rule a little bit. But I think it would be hysterical to get up there and maybe win for the sixth year in a row after all of the controversy that my votes in Brazil that people say I paid for are the reason why Canadian Spinball Podcast is number one. No, this show is number one. And this show is the only show that can do what we do because of shows like this. And I mean it when I say it. I'm looking out for each and every one of you. I'm excited about all of these games. I'm excited to see the creativity from all of these companies. But as an industry, it's become a bit delusional. All of these companies are delusional if they think they can launch all of their products in the same month and they're delusional if they think we're going to buy pinball machines from now until the end of time for north of $10,000 and I'm talking much more than 10 grand. Like most of these machines now if you fully deck them out are closer to $13,000 to $14,000. Jersey Jack is almost $17,000 with shipping and tax. You want to spend $17,000 almost on a game that's not even rare, on a game that's not even exclusive. I mean, that's on you, ladies and gentlemen. I don't know how wealthy you are, but it's just not fun. And I think that's where we're all out. You know what is fun? Waiting and then buying a James Bond LE for thousands off the sticker price, getting a basically brand new game. That's fun to me. It's fun watching people lose money on Scooby-Doo and I'll just end this show by saying right now I'm in the Scooby-Doo thread and for you spooky apologists and I'm seeing some of these quality control issues pop up once again and my thing is this why did you think spooky pinballs quality would all of a sudden be better they haven't really changed their like staff they haven't really changed their process and I think these young kids are rushing games out the door and they're not going over them the way they need for a game that is now over $10,000. And I'm saying this right now, and I mean this, that is on all of you. Anyone who bought a Scooby-Doo knows what Spooky's quality has been. It hasn't been the best quality. And if you listen to Kaneda, I told you, you need to wait and see. And if you would have just waited, I'm telling you right now, you're gonna be able to get a Scooby-Doo in just a few months for $2,000 less than what you committed to buying the game for. And if you locked in a non-refundable deposit, congratulations, you just lost $2,000 if you don't want the game. I love seeing people be like, I'm going to get out of my Scooby-Doo now that I've seen Foo Fighter. Well, you can't. You're locked in. So trust me when I say it. Do not lock in your money tomorrow or this month with any manufacturer. Don't. Unless you know you really want the game, unless you know you're going to love the game and you want it for a really long time, it makes absolutely no sense to run to this stuff right now. It's just gotten out of hand. Everybody, Kaneda out. Lots more shows coming. I'm going to have a new show tomorrow. We're also going to watch the release of Godfather tomorrow live on my Facebook Live. So I would love for you guys to come join that. And let's see my reaction in real time as we get to see Eric Menier's Godfather. Our curiosity is through the roof. I can't wait to see what they do, how much they price it at, and how many they're going to make. It's going to be a great day for pinball tomorrow. Later, everybody. Under the skies of blue Out in the great wide open A rebel without a crew