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Tucson Pinball Podcast – Episode 73 – Oh For Two On Two Point Oh

Tuscon Pinball Podcast·podcast_episode·analyzed·Jun 6, 2024
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Analysis

claude-haiku-4-5-20251001 · $0.032

TL;DR

Funhouse 2.0 kit analysis reveals design issues; Pedretti remakes signal market shift toward factory-built alternatives.

Summary

The host discusses the Funhouse 2.0 kit by Pedretti Gaming and the newly announced Funhouse and Whirlwind remakes, examining the evolution from retrofit kits to complete factory-built games. He analyzes technical and design issues discovered during the kit's deployment, evaluates how the 2.0 versions compare to originals, and explores broader market dynamics including post-COVID sales softening and the emergence of multiple remake manufacturers competing in the classic game revival space.

Key Claims

  • The Funhouse 2.0 kit costs $2,000 and includes FAST MPU, PinSound board, LCD display, new speaker panel, side blades, and mirror display replacement

    high confidence · Host describing kit contents explicitly at start of discussion

  • Funhouse 2.0 kit users discovered a factory miswiring in original machines that only manifested with the 2.0 kit installed

    high confidence · Host referencing forum discussion on Pinside about discovered factory flaw after decades

  • Early code versions of Funhouse 2.0 required separate MPU firmware updates independent of game code, creating confusion for users

    high confidence · Host explaining the dual-update issue that emerged during kit rollout

  • The Funhouse 2.0 kit shipped incomplete and required USB code updates post-delivery

    high confidence · Host stating 'it didn't ship complete' and discussing ongoing code development

  • Funhouse 2.0 uses Mark Silk as the new voice of Rudy instead of original actor Ed Boon

    high confidence · Host explicitly identifying voice actor change and his reaction to it

  • Funhouse 2.0 has a ball save feature, which is atypical for pre-ball-save era game remakes

    high confidence · Host discussing how ball save differs from original restart mechanic

  • Pedretti Gaming's Funhouse remake has Classic ($7,500) and LE ($10,000) versions with auto-launch

    high confidence · Host citing pricing and feature details from Nap Arcade article

  • The Funhouse remake LE is limited to 750 units and features new playfield art, not just touch-ups

    high confidence · Host stating LE has 'new, new' art and 750-unit limit

  • Post-COVID FOMO is tapering down and used pinball prices are declining

    medium confidence · Host observing market trend and citing distributor commentary about sales softening

Notable Quotes

  • “There's not very many instances I can even think of right now in pinball that have a shot that you don't use as an entrance. It's only used as an exit to return the ball.”

    Host @ ~25min — Identifying unusual playfield design quirk in original Funhouse that is never utilized in gameplay

  • “The fact that it isn't Ed Boon's voice, that that's kind of the most recognizable aspect of the audio on this game, it definitely was different. And I'm sure maybe I could get used to it. I just... that might be enough for me to just not even be interested.”

    Host @ ~35min — Core criticism of Funhouse 2.0's design choice to replace iconic voice actor

  • “The choreography of that was very weird... That would have been one of the first things that I noticed as soon as the multi-ball is implemented.”

    Host @ ~50min — Critiquing the multiball/ball-save interaction and questioning playtesting depth

  • “For me, I'd be comfortable putting in a kit, but only after many, many other people have been the guinea pig and the code is developed enough to the point that it's basically a drop-in kit at that point.”

    Host @ ~62min — Risk-averse stance on kit adoption due to immaturity of code and installation complexity

  • “This might be the first remake that actually also has a new Playfield art package done to it, which is like this is original, original.”

    Host @ ~68min — Highlighting innovation in the Funhouse LE remake with completely new playfield artwork

  • “The fact that we can get a new clear-coded reproduction play field from CPR... that is one of the more exciting aspects about this particular remake.”

    Host @ ~72min — Personal interest in playfield reproduction as benefit of remake ecosystem

  • “There's two different companies that are both working in conjunction with the license owner... they're going to be able to focus on their specialties and refine their process a little bit more.”

    Host @ ~74min — Analyzing competitive dynamics and benefits of multiple manufacturers in remake space

Entities

Pedretti GamingcompanyChicago GamingcompanyMark SilkpersonEd BoonpersonPat LawlerpersonChris GrammerpersonFunhousegameFunhouse 2.0productWhirlwindgame

Signals

  • ?

    product_concern: Funhouse 2.0 kit shipped without complete code, requiring post-delivery USB updates; caused confusion and delayed user satisfaction

    high · Host states 'it didn't ship complete' and describes forum posts about users unable to update code after installation

  • ?

    product_concern: Dual update system (MPU firmware separate from game code) created significant user confusion and support burden

    high · Host explains separate SD card firmware updates caused 'pretty big thing on the thread' and users reporting non-functioning games after updates

  • ?

    product_concern: Factory miswiring discovered in original Funhouse machines manifested only when 2.0 kit installed, decades after manufacture

    high · Host states users 'discovered that their funhouse had a factory miswiring' that caused 'weird switch registers' with 2.0 kit

  • ?

    design_philosophy: Funhouse 2.0 took complete reimagining approach (new characters, themes, modes) rather than homage-based modernization of original

    high · Host criticizes 'totally different world and totally different thought process' vs original; contrasts with preference for modernization approach

  • ?

    design_innovation: Funhouse remake LE features completely new playfield artwork rather than restoration/refresh of original

    high · Host: 'This might be the first remake that actually also has a new Playfield art package done to it, which is like this is original, original'

Transcript

groq_whisper · $0.103

0:00
Wayne's World! Wayne's World! Party time! Excellent! part of a little bit of a journey. So there was a kit that came out a little bit ago for Funhaus. It was called Rudy's Nightmare. And it was not cheap. It wasn't ridiculously expensive, but at $2,000, it certainly was not cheap. But I think from the hardware side, you're getting your money's worth on that pretty much. So inside that kit, you had a fast MPU, and you had a pin sound sound board you had a new speaker panel and a new larger display there's an lcd display it's replacing the alphanumeric display that's on there and there's a new trans light and the the mirror is no longer just having light bulbs showing you what your next award is and what you've completed it was going to get replaced with a smaller display to kind of show you not only your progress, but also animations and just kind of status updates and more than just what blinking and solid lights can show you. There's also some side blades and pretty sure that's it. Which, you know, all in all, considering there's multiple vendors on that and that sounds like, I mean, that's a pretty good value in my opinion, as far as pinball goes, as far as hardware goes, kind of in the hobby. that's not outrageous Funhouse was not the only kit that had come out and this was done by Pedretti which is the company that's behind the new remakes coming out but there was also Whirlwind Total Chaos was another kit that they had put out after Funhouse had been out for a little bit and that was at this point anyways that's the totality of that effort on the kits who knows if there's going to be remakes Funhouse is now the oldest of the Bally Williams era remakes like if you're kind of looking at it from a DMD side I mean I know that Haggis has been doing the Class of 81 they've done Fathom and are working on Centaur and I know Fathom's not finished I don't think but still, so I know that this is not the oldest remake done but from the concept of what Chicago Gaming was putting out, this is certainly the oldest title that's been done.
2:55
So the progression from kit to complete game is probably a wise one, because when you have the kits, it's a kit. So it's being put together at a factory potentially, but it's not being assembled into the game as a kit or as a complete game. So it's got to get sent out to a customer and they have to do the conversion. And the biggest question is, is it done right? Because you have a pretty broad technical range probably from all your different customers. And that's going to come with a variety of, I don't want to say quality or not to question anybody's competence, but, you know, but there's, there's different comfort levels. And so there's going to be different results. And, uh, some people had different technical skill sets and, and there was a pretty big forum post on this, uh, on pin side. I'm sure it's still around, but I have since stopped following it, but early on, I did want to follow it to kind of just see how things were going and kind of what the perspective was because, um, you know, I have a fun house and this is certainly on my radar and through the the kind of the life so far of that thread early on it was very very heavy on installation questions and issues with that and then later it kind of turned into code status code updates because it doesn't it didn't ship complete which in the modern era that's not i mean at a certain level it needs to have certain functionality but it doesn't have to be totally complete because you can just do like a USB update and life is good. So, and some people are fine with that. Some people are annoyed with that, but that just kind of is the way it is with the internet being a thing. So one of the interesting things that came up in that thread was some of the users discovered that their funhouse had a factory miswiring, whether it the wiring or the diode. I can't remember. Something was reversed, and with the regular Funhaus, everything was fine, but with the 2.0 kit, it was not. They were either getting weird switch registers, or I don't remember the exact issue, but it's not often that you discover a factory flaw decades after the game was out. You know, there's a couple schematic errors that I think people have discovered on some System 11 games over the years and have corrected, or at least like there's information out there that if you run into this and you don't know it's a thing there's at least a method to to kind of track that down and figure it all out so it's not very often that you you run into a brand new factory flaw which i mean if they didn't find it in play testing and it's fine on the 1.0 code or the the pre-kit you know version of funhouse and they only find it when this kit gets installed i think that's kind of a pretty interesting discovery Another issue that was coming up on the thread was the MPU has its own SD card that's running firmware. So that's not the game code. That is the firmware that tells the MPU how to do its thing. Pretty much every electronic thing has firmware. If it doesn't have a full-blown operating system, it just kind of tells you how to do stuff or tells the device how to do stuff. I think most commonly if you've got a modern router in your home with an app, it might actually say, hey, it's time to update the firmware. And that's kind of basically on the MPU what was going on. So early code, early game code recognized and expected early MPU code. and as they were doing the updates at some point there was something that that happened and now the mpu had to be updated and that was a different process than updating the game code and if it sounds confusing it was confusing more than just you because um it that was that was a pretty big thing on the thread for a while and then every now and then you'd have somebody pop in that said hey, I've had this kit sitting for six months and I finally installed it and I went to update the code because I saw there was a code update and now I don't know what to do because my game isn't doing anything. So every single one of these issues is a potential point of failure or not necessarily miscommunication, just an issue that you really as a company, you don't want the end user to have to go through. Like you kind of want to not hide all that stuff, but avoid all that stuff. And by having a complete game coming out of the factory, you kind of are able to bypass all of these issues as compared to when you're shipping out a kit that then needs to get installed. So another observation that I was trying to figure out was, is the kit any good? Not the kit itself, But like, is the game, is the 2.0 version of Funhaus, is it any good? Funhaus is kind of in a, in my mind, like I've always seen Funhaus is kind of in a weird spot. Because like the collector community has always kept the prices fairly high on that compared to other games in that same age range. Keeping in mind, it is a WPC 89 board set. So it not a System 11 but it is a pre So it kind of right in that transition spot and some people don even recognize that it not a System 11 because it got an alphanumeric and Bride of Pinbot is the same way

  • Whirlwind is the best System 11 game, making it questionable as a candidate for a 2.0 kit

    low confidence · Host opinion on game quality and strategic remake selection

    • Whirlwind 2.0
    product
    Bride of Pinbotgame
    Tales of the Arabian Nights / Totangame
    FAST Pinballcompany
    PinSoundcompany
    Classic Playfield Reproductions (CPR)company
    Nap Arcadecompany
    Dutch Pinballcompany
    Haggisperson|company
    Pinsideorganization
    IFPAorganization
    $

    market_signal: Post-COVID FOMO declining; used pinball prices softening; new game sales reported down by distributors though magnitude unclear

    medium · Host states 'post-COVID FOMO, fear of missing out, that's kind of tapering down quite a bit' and 'used prices are starting to come down'

  • ?

    manufacturing_signal: Kit-based distribution creates quality variance risk; shift to complete factory assembly reduces end-user technical burden

    high · Host explains kit installation requires broad technical range from customers, leading to 'different results' and support issues; justifies move to complete games

  • ?

    industry_signal: Multiple manufacturers now competing in classic remake space; Pedretti Gaming complementing Chicago Gaming rather than replacing

    high · Host: 'The fact that there's two different companies that are both working in conjunction with the license owner... they're not working from the same era necessarily either'

  • ~

    sentiment_shift: Community member (host) expresses strong personal resistance to Mark Silk replacing Ed Boon as Rudy voice; considers it potential dealbreaker

    high · Host: 'that might be enough for me to just not even be interested' in Funhouse 2.0 due to voice change

  • ?

    restoration_signal: CPR playfield reproductions enabling owners of worn original machines to restore/upgrade without full remake purchase

    medium · Host planning playfield swap using CPR reproduction for own worn Funhouse; identifies as 'one of the more exciting aspects'

  • ?

    operational_signal: Ball save implementation with single-ball multiball creates tournament rule ambiguity and unfair advantages

    medium · Host notes concern about 'tournament legal scenario' and IFPA rules prohibiting stall-ball manipulation in multiball

  • ?

    gameplay_signal: Totan 2.0 observed with excessive ball save mechanics making games unendable; playtest feedback ignored or deprioritized

    medium · Host played Totan 2.0 long enough that players waiting disappeared; 'everything was a ball save'

    • 8:45
    And so, funny enough, Bride of Pinbot 2.0 was the very first 2.0 kit that I ever heard of. That was put out by Dutch Pinball early on. I had a chance to play that. A local friend has a Bride of Pinbot that had that kit on it. And it's been several years. So I don't remember the exact specifics, but it did introduce like a DMD style display. So you no longer had the alphanumeric. But Bride for alphanumeric, Bride has some pretty cool animations. They were at the very end of that technology. They were doing it really, really well. But it had new animations. It had new code. in my opinion Bride of Pinbot is a game with a pretty fun layout and pretty interesting mech like that rotating head is that's pretty awesome right like in the world of pinball that's a pretty awesome mech but the rules are very very boring it's basically shoot the left ramp all day and then keep shooting the left ramp because eventually your goal is to get into the billionaire club and And the only way you can do that is with the left ramp, getting the bride all the way to the final stage and then shooting the billion shot. And that's the entire game. As far as I remember, the bride 2.0 kit attempted to make you play the rest of the play field because the rest of the shots, those are pretty good as well. I mean, it's a pretty fun thing. And, like, the heartbeat ramp was my favorite shot on the game. and in a tournament scenario, if you're head-to-head at a local thing or if you're in a four-player group and it's a local tournament,
    10:31
    if you played the game and shot the heartbeat ramp and got a couple million out of that, that was potentially a pretty good strategy. There's no need to go for the billion in that scenario, but again, that's reducing it down to a one-shot game. Anyways, this is not about Bride. This is about Funhaus. But in the context of 2.0 kits, I think the Bride 2.0 kit was a good kit.
    10:55
    My opinion on Funhaus and Whirlwind as a kit, it's a little different. And also, at TPF a couple years ago, there was a Totan 2.0 that was very much a work in progress. I'm not really going to ding it for that, but I played that game for a very, very, very long time. and all my brain kept going after a while. I was like, this is Tales of the Arabian Ball Save. Like everything was a ball save. And I just kind of lost interest in what the new stuff was because I'm just like, oh, look, I hit this shot. And oh, look, that turned on my ball save as well. So like this game, this game kind of won't ever end. We had some people show up behind us and I played long enough that in that single ball, they disappeared behind us.
    11:42
    So whatever. Let's see. So I didn't really, I have a lot less experience and research done on the Whirlwind 2.0. And I think that's just kind of a little, it kind of plays on what Funhaus did a little bit. So Funhaus 1.0, just quick overview. The voice of Rudy is iconic. Ed Boon, that's very – it's very iconic and it's a very memorable performance.
    12:17
    The temperament that Rudy goes through, Pat Lawler, who's the designer, he talked about this on his interview on TopCast 15 years ago, whatever it was. And he kind of talked about the revelation that they had of – because they kept saying early on it was, oh, when Rudy starts getting angry at you, like he starts screaming at you and raising his tone and pitch for both. I don't know. I'm not an audio person, but he gets higher. and uh and pat was eventually started talking about how they they changed that because when you talk to a child that is angry with you they they and they're not yelling at you they actually get deeper and lower and kind of it's it's definitely a lot more sinister you know the effect that they they want and that they got out of it you know so rudy in in the original fun house is very memorable and some people you know you you watch Goosebumps or you watch Toy Story was it Toy Story 4 and they have like the dummy in it and and some people are just totally freaked out by that and that's fair you know so some people are just totally freaked out by Funhouse but when you play it you you have to acknowledge at least that it is a very remarkable presentation of a game and also Chris Granner did the music on it if you sit there and you listen to to the music on Funhaus in a quiet environment, the multiple different stages, and, you know, just the different modes, like, what they're doing with basically sound effects to create these, these songs, these backing tracks of songs, it's really, really good stuff. Like, it's really good stuff. And, you know, so the, and then also they talked about, you know, there's, these are the earliest versions of modes, right? Like the hot dog or the super dog mode, you know, like that, that is a mode that was kind of like the transition stage from objectives to getting into a mode and then having different objectives outside of just the regular gameplay of shoot the blinky lights, get into multi-ball, you know, do whatever. Admittedly, it's not very deep. There is no ball save and it took me a very long time to realize the kickout scoop you don't actually have any reason to shoot the ball into that which is it's such a weird thing and it's it you know it's it's a shot on the game it's not like it takes up half the play field but it it it's a dedicated shot and it's as big as a pinball has to be in order to go into it and it it's essentially a scoop but it it's not because there's no point in shooting it into that um so i thought that was kind of weird. There's not very many instances I can even think of right now in pinball that have a shot that you don't use as an entrance. It's only used as an exit to return the ball, which I mean, there's subways and there's all sorts of cool stuff in it. So I wonder if there was actually a plan for that shot and they just didn't get to it or they couldn't hold it on the ROM or, you know, whatever. But it's a shot that's not used and that's kind of weird. All right, so on Funhaus 2.0, there is a new voice. Well, it's not new in the pinball world. It's Mark Silk. It's new to the world of Rudy, though. And Mark Silk does an amazing job. He has done several games at this point with multiple different call-outs where he plays multiple different characters, and that's like he's a professional voice actor. He's great at what he does, but he's not the original Rudy voice. And I am in the camp of that's kind of off-putting for me.
    16:04
    You know, there's understandably in Funhouse 2.0, like they call it Rudy's nightmare. You know, so it's a different world. Like you're not actually, you are Rudy and you're having to combat these different instances and things that he's going through during his dreaming phase of, you know, there's toy soldiers and there's the monkey with the symbols. And just like there's a couple of tropes that are kind of familiar, but then there's a couple of unique things that, you know, are kind of newer in this world. But, you know, so maybe it's a totally different, you know, like in the Marvel world, maybe it's a totally different universe. But the fact that it isn't Ed Boon's voice, that that's kind of the most recognizable aspect of the audio on this game, it definitely was different. And I'm sure maybe I could get used to it. I just and there's nothing against mark I think he does an amazing job in all of the stuff but the fact that it literally is not Rudy from the original code it really kind of does it for me enough that it's like that that might be enough for me to just not even be interested so again the modes there they a little weird um it it a very kind of it it's it's interesting you know like it's definitely creative it's definitely unique but it's it's just kind of like when you're used to the original funhouse it it's not expanding on what that game was it's it's a totally different world and totally different thought process, you know, that they're going to take you on. And that's, that's fine. But it just, it's different. And just because it's, it's fine and that's what they want doesn't mean that everybody has to be interested in that. So I would have preferred if it was a little bit more of a, of an homage to what the original Funhouse was as far as, you know, the different scenarios and the things that you can take out of the art on the back glass and the cabinet and the playfield and just kind of translate that into a modernization of it as opposed to a total rethink and introducing all these new and different characters. However, on the display, the animations and all the different things that they show,
    18:21
    whether it's the fonts or the animations and just some of the static imagery and the backgrounds, all that stuff is beautiful. It is amazingly done. that was I've seen this at several different shows and it's it's very well done so that is definitely a positive side of it and if this is you know if your thing is kind of taking a chance on on a newer reimagining of something that maybe you love the layout but you know admittedly the code is very shallow and if you play this game I don't know a hundred times a thousand times in a single game collection, it probably would get old. And so this would breathe new life into it, and that would be very exciting.
    19:07
    And so that would definitely be a positive aspect, is at least the presentation that you're looking at is very, very well done. There is also a ball save, which Funhaus's 1990 pre-ball save era, except for very, very few weird exceptions, You know, with like Silver Ball Mania having a essentially a physical ball save that kicks it back out between the flippers, you know, stuff like that. Like that's those are more of a gimmick as opposed to of like, oh, ball save is a part of pinball now, just like slingshots and flippers.
    19:38
    So there is a ball save. There's also a multi ball save, which is that's a little weird because, you know, you play a DMD era game that or, you know, System 11 or, you know, stuff like that. But like pre-ball save era, what they do instead of giving you a ball save is they give you a restart, right? Creature from the Black Lagoon has a restart. Totan has a restart.
    20:05
    Funhouse has a restart. Just all these different games, they have ways of restarting the multiball, not continuing on through. So that definitely is a little weird.
    20:17
    It's weird because there's no auto kicker. And if the ball is going to give you the ball back, but it doesn't have a way of serving the ball back out into the play field, that's a little weird. So instead, early code, and this is where things get kind of weird and maybe a little less uniform of a decision as far as like how the kit was supposed to go out or like what the future options are for the kit. is the kit didn't come with an auto-launch mechanism or anything, right? You still have to pull the plunger and shoot the ball. Well, in the code versions that I've played, and I haven't followed it in a little while, and it almost doesn't matter going forward, but at least on the production side of the full games, but on the kit side of things, it would sit there. You could be sitting there in a multiball. You're in single ball play, and there's a ball in the shooter lane, and the game is saying, hey, plunge the ball. hey plunge the ball hey plunge the ball like i heard that so many times if you're at a game nearby and somebody gets into multi-ball and and i'm sitting there going who decided this was the best path because um you know like the my first response was like this is not a tournament legal scenario to be in you know like you're not allowed to be in a single ball multi-ball and like there's rules be you know obviously because that's that's a benefit and advantage But there's rules in the IFPA rules specifically stating that you can't like if you're in a two ball multi ball, you can't sit there and like just bop the plunger to keep the ball like bouncing in the shooter lane and avoid an auto plunger. Right. You just have to let it do its thing.
    22:02
    So like that was that was kind of weird that that was the first thought in my head. But the second thought was like, why isn't the game just like, hey, shoot the ball. and then oh by the way like you've put it in any one of these ball stops that you would play like stall ball you know whether it it was in the mirror or in the lock shot or in rudy's mouth or in the scoop or you know if it goes in the left shooter lane you know it's sitting there that one might be a little harder to do because then it's like hey plunge both balls at the same time you know like in a scenario that it's taking the ball off of the play field it's it's basically out of play and holding on to it, and it has to fire a coil in order to give it back, how about it says, you can have this back once you plunge that other ball, and then you force the game to now be in a two-ball scenario. Like, it just, the choreography of that was very weird, and again, like, it's probably a, hey, it's on the list, but we just, we gotta get rid of all of these, you know, line items, and we gotta fix all these bugs, and then we'll get on to some of the more choreography minded line items. I, I, it just, it was always really weird to me though. Like how that was, that was a thing, you know, like that was, that would have been in play testing. That would have been one of the first things that I noticed as soon as the multi-ball is implemented. And it's like, Oh, we're, we're doing ball save, not a restart. Okay, cool. Um, why is it letting me do this as a one ball multi-ball? Like this needs to just like stop it and hold it and just be like, this is mine until you, you launch the other ball. So that was, that was another, you know, just like the, the whole audio call out thing. Like that was another thing that was just kind of like, this is really weird and more of a less refined decision-making process. So, um,
    23:53
    so the 2.0, like I don't, I don't hate it. Um, it's not really, it's not really my thing. Um, but it doesn't have to be everybody's thing. That's fine. I don't think they had any issue selling these kits. Um, I think there was plenty of interest in people that do enjoy Funhaus and love that layout and love that concept. And they were very excited to, to get into it with another kit and that's fine. That's cool. Um, on the whirlwind side of things, I'm not going to go into that too deep because it's kind of a lot of more of the same. one of my biggest kind of like huh moments was why Whirlwind you know like it's to me okay so there's there's two ways to approach this and it's almost the same exact sentence so Whirlwind in my opinion is the best system 11 right so Williams from 1986 high speed to 1990 and was it Whirlwind as the last system 11 or was there one after I don't remember it was really close to the end. It doesn't matter. Whirlwind, in my opinion, is the best System 11. So why would you start with that as a 2.0 kit? Why wouldn't you start with another game that maybe wasn't...
    25:04
    See, if you say if it wasn't as well liked, then it's like, well, why would you want to do a kit on anything but the best, you know? So that's where it's almost the same statement making two different points, you know? So it's like, I wouldn't have started with Whirlwind because that one's already really well loved like start with something else and and go from there and then but the flip side is well we want to do this on on a game that's really well loved and so why wouldn't we want to start with the best so you know it's it's basically the same statement making making two different points um and i'm in the camp of like don't start with whirlwind like you you don't have to like start with something else whirlwind is already a very very good game as it is there there no real real need right now in my opinion to put so many man hours into it But anyways, whatever. It's out there. It exists.
    26:00
    Again, the modes are a little weird. Animation's really good. I'm sure the music is good. I've only ever seen it on a couple streams. Haven't really listened to it too much, you know, through headphones or whatever. but I'd expect it presents very similarly to the way Funhaus 2.0 does. So on the kit side of things, you know, there's enough factors in there for me to just kind of say, you know, for me, I'd be comfortable putting in a kit, but only after, you know, many, many other people have been the guinea pig and the code is developed enough to the point that it's basically a drop-in kit at that point. Because it is plug-and-play, kind of, but the code's not done,
    26:50
    or it wasn't done when it first came out, and that would be a factor. You know, like, I wouldn't want to take, even though there is a 1.0 version on this kit that was not very fully developed, there's some audio balancing issues, There's some other stuff going on, but for the most part, it's basically exactly what you want.
    27:10
    But I wouldn't do that right off the gate. However, the remake itself, again, Pedretti Gaming, Nap Arcade, they did a really good job with an article on that. It breaks it down quite a bit. Lots of different details, plenty of pictures on it. So the classic is $7,500. The limited edition is $10,000. both games have the fast MPU I don't think there was the pin soundboard I don't remember what the trade out of that was maybe there's a fast soundboard in there the displays are there there's an auto plunger so we'll get back to that in one second so the Classic is 2.0 capable but it doesn't have the kit in it you know quote unquote kit it's code at that point the LE has new art both on the playfield which was really interesting to see I think this might be the first remake that actually also has a new Playfield art package done to it, which is like this is original, original. This isn't like inspired by, you know, and we cleaned up the sharpness of some of the spots or we, you know, we made the color a little bit more saturated, but it's still the same black lines everywhere. Like this is new, new. So that's pretty cool. but also the cab the head the back glass like everything has new art that's limited to 750 units um there's there's quite a bit of other details i think the the inserts are all clear on that one uh because they have rgb lighting underneath in the play field which which that's pretty cool it's definitely different than the original um the auto plunger is is i think this is where they they kind of close that loop right so um the original kit there wasn't an auto plunger but they were able to program in that if you wanted to disconnect your knocker and rig up a way to have an auto launch kit and there's a couple different people that were were working on that effort inside the thread um you know there there was ways of having that happen right so they did end up getting that done. And on these new remakes, it's just going to come with an auto launch, which that's cool. I think that's definitely needed in any game that you're going to have a ball save on that also has multi-ball. You need to have that auto launch. And so now it's just a factory aspect of it, and that's pretty cool. I'm willing to bet that There's more remakes in the pipeline, and we'll kind of see how that all kind of shapes up because pinball as a market is kind of evolving a little bit right now. I think the post-COVID FOMO, fear of missing out, that's kind of tapering down quite a bit. And so used prices are starting to come down. overall sales of new games. Like it's not quite as high of a volume as distributors have seen in the last couple of years. And there are distributors that have podcasts and media aspects that have talked about this, that sales are down a little bit. But if they wanted to quantify that, which they haven't, but it's like, okay, well, how much are they actually down? Like if you're selling, just make up numbers, if you're selling 100 games a month and now you're selling 99 games a month, like, yeah, that's not really that big of a deal. But if you're selling 100 games a month and now you're selling 50, like, that's a pretty big noticeable change, right? And probably not a temporary thing, you know, to get back up to 100, you know, oh, like, let's just wait a year and it'll be back. Like, who knows how much of a change that's actually going to be. So remakes are probably, you know, there's more coming from Pedretti. As an original Funhaus owner, the thing that I am maybe not most excited about but one of the biggest aspects for this is Classic Playfield Reproductions or CPR is the one that's doing all these playfields and I have been very adamant about not buying a reproduction playfield from another company based in Europe for various reasons and now CPR has these original playfields because the classic version of this remake is not going to have the new artwork, and I don't think it's going to have the clear inserts either. So I think the classic version of the remake is going to be using basically the exact same play field as what I have, except mine is super worn out. So it's down to the wood in front of the slingshots and in front of the kick-out from that scoop that you don't use for anything. I've put mylar on it so we're going to slow the damage or we're going to pause the damage at this point but there's been a lot of damage already done and so the fact that we can get I can get a new clear-coded reproduction play field from CPR and I've done a couple play field swaps so I mean it's not scary it's just very time consuming that is one of the more exciting aspects about this particular remake, but also the fact that there's, you know, another company doing remakes. It's not going to be, um, Chicago Gaming has done the all-star lineup so far. Um, they're going to still do more stuff. The fact that there's two different companies that are both working in conjunction with the license owner, it's not, you know, it's not like the license owner dropped Chicago Gaming and now they're picking up with another one. There's two different companies and they're going to be able to focus on their their specialties and you know refine their process a little bit more and you know they're not they're not working from the same era necessarily either so um that might change um or we could expect to see some system 11 remakes but at this price point that might be a little bit of a challenge but um either way it doesn't matter uh there's more pinball coming out and that's always a good thing there's more funhouse playfields coming out which is a great thing because a lot of those are trashed and I'm excited to have access to one for mine so um yeah I'm not getting a remake but I'm certainly getting a remake playfield and that's you know what this time around that's good enough for me because I've got an original funhouse and that's not really a you know holier-than-thou statement That's just, you know, I have what I want, and I'm able to enhance and make mine a little bit more durable. And it's already been out for 30 years, and I'm happy that it's probably got 30 more years to go. So with that, we'll see what other remakes are kind of coming out in the next several months or years. And party on. Party on, Wayne. Party on, Garth. It's Wayne's World. Party time. Excellent.
    34:19
    And we're clear.