Journalist Tool

Kineticist

  • HDashboard
  • IItems
  • ↓Ingest
  • SSources
  • KBeats
  • BBriefs
  • RIntel
  • QSearch
  • NName Review
  • +Health

v0.1.0

← Back to items

Steve Ritchie

Pintastic New England·video·46m 24s·analyzed·Jul 12, 2019
View original
Export .md

Analysis

claude-haiku-4-5-20251001 · $0.030

TL;DR

Steve Ritchie discusses Black Knight: Sword of Rage development, team, and design philosophy at Pintastic.

Summary

Steve Ritchie presents Black Knight: Sword of Rage at Pintastic New England, detailing the game's development team, design philosophy, manufacturing process, and his reflections on pinball design. He discusses the 20-person team including mechanical engineers, artists, programmers, and factory staff, shares anecdotes about the development process including the flail mechanism and music production with Anthrax, and addresses licensing challenges on Star Wars and Game of Thrones compared to the freedom of unlicensed games like Black Knight.

Key Claims

  • Stern Pinball's factory is very busy and loaded with employees; business is thriving due to influx of enthusiasts wanting to play and own pinball machines.

    high confidence · Steve Ritchie, speaking about current Stern operations

  • Stern makes three different models: street model (Pro), Premium Edition with most features but less cosmetic extras (no shaker, no glass), and Limited Edition with all features.

    high confidence · Steve Ritchie explaining Stern's three-tier product line, referencing AC/DC Pro Vault Edition and Black Knight as examples

  • The Black Knight: Sword of Rage team consisted of approximately 20 people at peak development.

    high confidence · Steve Ritchie describing team composition

  • The flail mechanism went through three generations/iterations and four material changes before achieving current durability; it could run faster but is intentionally slowed for safety.

    high confidence · Steve Ritchie discussing flail development challenges and safety considerations

  • Licensed games like Star Wars and Game of Thrones require extensive art approvals and changes that can be stressful, unlike unlicensed games like Black Knight.

    high confidence · Steve Ritchie discussing licensing constraints and creative freedom differences

  • Matt Cristiano and Rick Bartlett of Planetary Pinball (who own Harry Williams/Bally Midway IP) gave Stern creative freedom on Black Knight: Sword of Rage with minimal restrictions.

    high confidence · Steve Ritchie praising licensing partners and contrasting with other licensed game experiences

  • Steve Ritchie had hearing problems that prevented him from continuing to compose music for pinball games due to inability to hear pitch.

    high confidence · Steve Ritchie discussing why he could not produce music for Black Knight and how Dave Peterson enlisted Anthrax instead

  • Anthrax (Matt Scott Ian and Brendon Small) produced music for Black Knight: Sword of Rage that was well-received by the engineering team.

Notable Quotes

  • “Pinball will not stay alive if we don't make money. We have to make money... I feel somewhat responsible for their lives and their work.”

    Steve Ritchie@ 11:51 — Expresses manufacturer business imperatives and personal responsibility for Stern employees

  • “A Steve Ritchie game, guess what, isn't really a Steve Ritchie game. Well, it is. I steer the ship. I draw the game. I come up with stuff. But if somebody's going to lend their great talents to my game, come to me.”

    Steve Ritchie@ 9:08 — Reflects his collaborative design philosophy while maintaining creative leadership

  • “You're going to tell the King how to make a pinball? Are you?... they make the movies, and then they want to control what goes on the pinball machine also.”

    Steve Ritchie@ 27:25 — Expresses frustration with IP holder approval processes on licensed games

  • “When George came to Harry Williams, I showed him how to make pinhole machines... George is a very creative guy on his own.”

    Steve Ritchie@ 31:48 — Describes relationship with George Gomez and mentoring role

  • “I try to design and refine it. Almost everything has to be drawn two or three times or more, sometimes more, until I get a system that works all together.”

    Steve Ritchie@ 33:54 — Explains his iterative playfield design methodology

Entities

Steve RitchiepersonTim SextonpersonGeorge GomezpersonDave PetersonpersonGary SternpersonDenai KittivathanapersonKevin O'ConnorpersonJohn Rothermel

Signals

  • ?

    business_signal: Stern maintaining expensive three-tier model (Pro/Premium/LE) with significant differentiation in features (shaker, glass, upper playfield mechanics) as production volume increases

    medium · Ritchie explaining three models with different feature sets and price points; acknowledges necessity of profitability for company sustainability

  • ?

    community_signal: Stern demonstrating commitment to sharing design and manufacturing knowledge; Steve Ritchie mentors younger designers and engineers; collaborative culture between veteran and young talent (age gap noted: Ritchie 69, Sexton 26)

    medium · Ritchie describing mentoring of George Gomez and collaboration with young engineers from Purdue; emphasis on team effort and knowledge sharing within organization

  • ?

    design_philosophy: Steve Ritchie emphasizes collaborative design approach where team members contribute specialized talents while he steers creative vision; values iterative playfield design (2-3+ iterations) focusing on shot connectivity and flow

    high · Ritchie: 'A Steve Ritchie game isn't really a Steve Ritchie game...if somebody's going to lend their great talents to my game, come to me' and describing drawing games 'two or three times or more' until systems work together

  • ?

    licensing_signal: Licensed games (Star Wars, Game of Thrones) require extensive art approvals and IP holder control that create stress and creative constraints; unlicensed Black Knight offered significantly more creative freedom

    high · Ritchie: 'There were some things on Star Wars and Game of Thrones that required so many art approvals and changes...they make the movies and then they want to control what goes on the pinball machine also' vs Black Knight where Planetary Pinball said 'make a good game and we're happy'

Transcript

youtube_groq_whisper · $0.139

0:00
The latest in the continuing saga of Black Knight. Who knew there'd be another Black Knight and who knew that it would come from Stern. So here he is, the king of pinball, Steve Ritchie.
0:22
How you guys doing? How you doing? catch anybody knackman and i'm gonna catch you with my blade don't nap i'm serious anyway my name is steve ritchie i make pinball machines at stern pinball uh pinball is a wow i'm good at that pinball is a a very thriving business at stern right now We're building games every day. And the factory's busy, very loaded, lots and lots of employees. It's growing. It's mostly because of a huge influx of enthusiasts who want to play pinball, want to have them in their homes. And we're doing OK in the operating realm, though, too. We make three different models, for those of you who don't know. We make a street model, which is like, it's called a pro. It's not as expensive as our other models. It doesn't have as much in it, but it's also more reliable. And we saw that at a price point no one else can match. And then we saw a premium game with all the features of the limited edition, but less bling. You don't get a shaker motor, you don't get glass, but you get more. In the case of Black Knight, sort of rage. It's an upper play field and quite a few more interesting rules that were made possible by the upper play field. So this is the original artwork. This is the very beginning of the artwork from Kevin O'Connor. There's so many great people involved in this and I'm gonna try and nail them one at a time. It's hard because I had a list, but it's boring to read from lists anyway. So this is the work of Kevin O'Connor in the very beginning of the play field. I'm gonna move on here. Okay, oh, sorry. This is Lyman Sheets and Penny. Once in a while he says, oh, Penny's getting on my nerves. And I go, Penny is the best thing ever happened to you? And she is. Great people. This is a dog bite. I went to my dentist. He's a pinball head. It's cool. He's got like 20 machines in his basement. He's also got this inbred white golden retriever, but it's white. And there's two of them. I walk in their house and one dog is barking. His wife is holding that dog, barking every eight seconds. Woof! Woof! And I don't know what he's trying to say to me. The other dog is on my leg, humping me. I have to keep pulling him off, and I go, Paul, can you, like, fix that? And finally we went upstairs, and this guy has an incredible collection of autographs, including the Beatles, so many things, it's so cool. Anyway, and his dog got on my leg again and almost knocked me over. So, I kind of have a temper. I picked up the dog by the neck and the butt and I threw it across the room. It ran back and bit me right there.

high confidence · Steve Ritchie discussing music production for the game

  • George Gomez helped with the sculpt for Black Knight's toy, and Steve has assisted George on other games like Deadpool.

    high confidence · Steve Ritchie describing collaborative work between himself and George Gomez

    • person
    Tim Elliottperson
    Harrison Drakeperson
    Reyna Cortezperson
    Josh Clayperson
    Zach Sharpperson
    Alex Doryperson
    Matt Cristianoperson
    Rick Bartlettperson
    Dave Linkperson
    Corey Stuppperson
    Stern Pinballcompany
    Black Knight: Sword of Ragegame
    Anthraxorganization
    Harry Williamscompany
    Planetary Pinballcompany
    Pintastic New Englandevent
    Mortal Kombatgame
  • $

    market_signal: Stern Pinball operating at high capacity with large inventory of completed games ready for shipment; factory described as 'gigantic' with hundreds of games in various stages of production and testing

    high · Ritchie showing photos: 'This is a few hundred games there along the wall getting ready to be shipped out...Trucks pull in, we fill them up with games and they go all over the world'

  • ?

    personnel_signal: Tim Sexton (26) serving as key collaborator/co-designer with Steve Ritchie (69); represents generational bridge with digital/social media expertise complementing Ritchie's mechanical design knowledge

    high · Ritchie: 'Tim and I are the battery of the game, the pitcher and the catcher...He's much more in touch with social media and stuff like that...I like understanding what he thinks his generation likes'

  • ?

    announcement: Black Knight: Sword of Rage officially confirmed as released/shipping Stern title with detailed team credits and development timeline shared publicly

    high · Extended presentation with production photos, factory footage, and team acknowledgments indicates game is in manufacturing and distribution phase

  • ?

    product_concern: Shield/target assembly experienced screw loosening issues on some production units due to missing Loctite; Stern implementing mandatory Loctite education for all new employees

    high · Ritchie: 'There was one out here that came loosened up. So Loctite is my friend. I just have to convince everybody else that we'll use it' and plans for Loctite video training for new hires

  • ?

    technology_signal: Black Knight features upper playfield mechanical innovation with flail mechanism that required three material iterations and four generations of redesign to achieve reliability and safety

    high · Ritchie describing flail development: 'We made the thing and it had springs and balls on it...changed materials four times...three iterations...finally we have this one and it's good for millions of cycles'

    • 3:18
    Anyway, his wife was mortified. I just kind of shined it on. I don't know what's going on there. Okay, there it is. It's back. I have to stop stepping on cords. Anyway, I'm sorry. So his dog bit me. Next slide. We don't care. It's over. Look. Nearly healed. I said, I'm not going to sue you, Paul. He's a great guy and a great dentist, okay? His wife is a nurse, she patched me up, it's over. I don't know what these are doing here. Interesting pictures. These really don't have much to do with pinball, and I'm sorry. There are lots of them that have to do with pinball. They're coming up. About, I guess this team for Black Knight Sword of Rage was about 20 people at the peak. First it was just me. Then it was the mechanical engineer and me. Then it was, you know, a few other people got on board for hardware, things we wanted to do, like that flame panel on the top and a special drive for the flail. We were already beginning to work with the flail. That works good. I'm trying not to touch anything. This is – my wife is on the right. This is an old – this is a pinhead's wife. They live in Mexico. This is my favorite plant in the world. Why? Why? Yeah, they're cute. It's blue agave. Okay, now we're looking at toys on my desk. I think this might be a movie, I don't know. But anyway, I started messing with night toys and I had the flame panel. Somebody produced it and it was actually wrapped inside of a bulb and it looked like a fire, you know. We flattened it out and we started working with this company who originally made it and asked them to do a rigid circuit board so we could have our fire working like that. It doesn't look good here on my desk. It's just, it's a mess. This is a moose butt.
    5:06
    Okay, why is that there? I don't know, it's just, it's cool. It's in Minnesota, it's a moose butt. It's big. Moose butts are huge, actually.
    5:16
    Okay, oh wait, this is Al Capone's grave, which is in Chicagoland, out near where I live, and some friends. Now we're getting serious stuff. This is the original sculpt of the Black Knight toy.
    5:31
    He doesn't have, he's not holding anything right now, but this changed several times. This is a side view. This version was close, but not exactly correct. These are all the different views. This thing was actually produced by, the part was made by Dave Link, a sculptor we use often. He's a very talented guy. He's incredible. He got help this time from another huge contributor to this game. His name is Denai Kittivathana. He's a Thai man. He is such a great artist.
    6:07
    He's what you see when you look at The Black Knight, when you look at all those monsters. They're awesome.
    6:16
    And he set the flavor of the artwork in the game, not to the point of overlapping Kevin O'Connor with the cabinet and play field and back glass art, but they did affect each other. And so they came up with a very nice concept. Is this boring? I have to now.
    6:35
    Okay, good. Oh, that's my niece and my grandniece. Bye. There she is sitting in the window. She's cute. Oh, this is, you know what that is right there?
    6:47
    That's Jody Dangberg, our marketing, no, licensing guy. There, I said it. No, it's not really him. This is the guy that's supposed to be sitting here with me right now, but he's out there winning a tournament right now, Tim Sexton. Tim and I are the Mutt and Jeff of pinball now.
    7:06
    Tim came to Stern. this guy is so passionate about pinball I grabbed him up instantly he could have worked on someone else's game but I wanted to give him a try because he's wild and crazy like me even though we're years apart he's 26, I'm 69 we get along or else that's how it is that's what we say we believe that we do get along And I listen to him, he listens to me. I like, what do I like? I like the, you know, I like our idea interaction. He's much more in touch with, you know, social media and stuff like that. Not that I'm not, but he's way more connected. And I do like that. And I like being able to understand what he thinks his generation likes, as well as mine. I mean, you know, I get a handle on it just from being around young people. And I do like that. We've got quite a few at Stern. Then we've got the geezers like me. I feel like I'm being drummed out. No way! That ain't gonna happen. Okay. This is the guy I was telling you about. See the blonde guy on the right? That is Danai Kitivathana. He's awesome. They have this little kids table where they color. This is the art department. The guy on the left is Josh Clay and he was the lead artist for all the video work in the game. Both characters, both fun, both full of ideas, and part of a great collective where we worked together to make the best game we could. The guy on the left is Alex Dory. Also, he's like, Alex Dory is sort of like, he refined the Black Knight character in the video. Fire in the eyes and that kind of stuff and a lot of other things. He definitely stylized him and it's great. Zach Stark did a whole lot of different stuff, backgrounds and some characters. And this is boring. If it's getting boring, let me know. I like to praise the people that were on my team. A Steve Ritchie game, guess what, isn't really a Steve Ritchie game. Well, it is. I steer the ship. I draw the game. I come up with stuff. I definitely have a lot of opinions on the way. But if somebody's going to lend their great talents to my game, come to me. Come to me. All right. So this is Josh Clay and Tim Sexton playing together at the little table. This is the only room at Stern where you can do this. Oh, he made it. How about that? Got to tell you, folks, I never liked him.
    9:42
    Now, this is Tim Sexton. Steve, I have some bad news. Oh, too bad. But it's not so bad because you never promised me. Split the money with me. You should. We could split the money. But I have bad news. I made it to the next round of the tournament. Oh, OK. That's good. I'm sorry. That's good. Yeah, yeah. OK. This is another good friend of mine. Her and her husband, Rusty, have tons of pinball machines. She is just a piece of work. Her name is Shelly Nunley. OK, Danai and his girlfriend at the, where was this? This was at Milwaukee. This guy is the husband of Reyna Cortez, who laid out all her harness. She's this great engineer, an incredible wiring and electronic person, and she works really hard. This is her husband. Her husband runs the cabinet line in the factory. His name is Angel, and he is.
    10:48
    Okay, we've got Black Knight on the line here. I think there's an Iron Maiden back there. These are Black Knight LEs being built. More pictures of that. See the blue stuff on the side? That's so we don't scratch up anything inside the cabinet or outside of the cabinet. And these are all test pictures that you see. They have old games on them like, you know, I can't see any here. You know, they all have old back boxes that are, I don't know, old games. See, I took this picture because I like it. This is games going out the door. I know, you might not understand, okay, but pinball will not stay alive if we don't make money. We have to make money. I am a pinball designer I love making pinball But pinball has to sell I already been in two companies that totally crashed to the ground So pinball needs to make money. That is not my main motivation, but I want to sell as many games as possible.
    11:49
    There's a lot of people that work at Stern. I feel somewhat responsible for their lives and their work. I've seen a lot of people have to be laid off at whatever and it's terrible. So pinball, making money. This is a nice view of the factory. This is a few hundred games there along the wall getting ready to be shipped out. Just to the right is the shipping dock. Trucks pull in, we fill them up with games and they go all over the world. Another view from this balcony. place it is. Along there there's a bunch of flags too but I didn't take pictures of them. This is another view of the factory. The factory is gigantic. I try to get 10,000 steps a day with my Fitbit. I don't make it very often but we have this labyrinthine path we follow every day and do two or three laps, especially when it's really cold or really hot outside, I will do that. I like it there rather than going outside because if you go on the block It's a huge long distance. Wherever I am here in this labyrinth, I can stop and go to my office if I need to quickly. More games on test. This is the test line, the first test line. This is on break, that's why nobody's there. This is that same area where people go through and they look at every single switch, Every solenoid, every light, make it work, and every line of code is checked. No, that's not true. Tim lied in our video.
    13:32
    He checks everything. He didn't make a billion bugs. In fact, he made hardly any bugs. Somebody else on the team is the bug man.
    13:42
    He needs to be squashed. It's not far off. Another view of the factory. Don't want to get too boring here. This is where we, this is like a fence near the stock room. We put up play fields up there. Every one we make is up there. This is a play field as it comes to us in Iraq from the screener.
    14:06
    More play fields. These are some great people on the line. It's lunch time. We're gonna be featuring them in more videos soon. Just because they're really good people. A lot of them have been there for 30 years. working with Gary Stern, and it's like they're pretty special.
    14:24
    This is a game in a carrier as it moves up the line to have more parts assembled to it. This is also the inside of the QA area where we keep, we usually try to keep one of each Translight on the wall just to look at and remember and kind of groan at.
    14:43
    Okay, same thing with side armor here. This is a game we built a few, I think we built 100 Primus machines. It's okay, it's pretty fun. These two are a couple. Brad Sonia is on the right, Jose on the left. They're both jacks of all trades in the factory. If there's trouble, they can fix it, find it, find the right part, correct a problem. This is Ron. Ron came from Chicago Gaming. Great tester. I'm going to show you this. Someone stole it, I just know. This is our accessory plunger for the game. This is how it started out and this is how it turned out. This is available from Stern, an add-on. Okay, that's great. Thanks Dave. Anyway this this was the sketch that Kevin O'Connor did and
    15:59
    anyway I'd like to have it back you guys can can see it and touch it whatever I think I think it's a masterpiece plunger why because it feels good why because one of those skulls eyes is always looking at you when you look down there His belt buckle dragon is on the front side also with red eyes. It's a nice piece of work by Kevin O'Connor, Dave Link. That's it for that one. Dave Link was primary at getting the whole molded part together, shape and face, all that. Okay, apparently that's my last slide. Anyway, I would like to, I don't know if I'm going to have one of my clothes this day. Oh, sort of nothing. Anyway, we had a great team. I want to mention some of those people. Tim and I are the battery of the game, the pitcher and the catcher. We worked together to make Black Knight. A mechanical engineer by the name of John Rothermel, who was really second on the team. He was making this stuff as fast as I could draw it to get parts made. A great mechanical engineer. He's very European. He grew up in France, right on the border of France and Germany. He's a very smart guy, but he's also, I don't know, he's got that affinity for touching metal and plastic. He just has the intuition and familiarity with materials to pick the right thing to do the right kind of design for strength or durability or for beauty on to that the mechanical engineering team I would like to give a shout out to Elliot Iceman he's doing our topper right now and I think it's the best topper ever made okay I am biased but it is the best hopper ever made okay it's the best all right that's great to see you Tim nice to see everyone great talking to y'all thanks for the help we got we got a you know another young mechanical engineer and these guys are both from Purdue Elliott and Harrison. That's a hard name to remember if you're old. Harrison Drake. Young guy, they were both graduates of Purdue. He's a wise ass though, but we got along at the end of the project and he did a lot of nice stuff for us. He worked on the torso, the body, and just about anything we needed to have done. I want to give a big shout out to deny Kitty Pitana, once again, a magnificent video artist, and Kevin O'Connor, who's a legend, you know his work. Wow. In that room with the artists, Alex Borey, Zach Stark, Mark Galvez, Chuck Ernst, their boss, he did some work. Mostly he's like, you know, mostly he's negotiating what they're going to do for us or not. But it was cool. It worked out. On the software side, Tim worked closely with Corey Stupp, Waysan Chang, Mike Kisabat.
    19:19
    Brett, forgot his last name. UI, 20 years in the video game business. He's a very good programmer. What you see on the screen, a lot of the tutorial he put together and some wording and phrases. And in the test unit, you know, he converted a lot of stuff there from DOTS to regular text. Good job. I have to give a shout out to Raina Cortez, engineer on Wiring Harness, and the two ladies who run the BOM. They kind of tell me what I have to do. I will pay them $100 if they'll knock my BOM $100 down so I can add more stuff. It's totally cheating. They don't ever accept it. Okay, and that's Gabby Alvarez and Leticia Ramirez. Both, you know, ladies work harder than men. It's a fact. They're always busy. We're not. We're fooling around.
    20:22
    You know, not all of us. Not all of us, not all the time, but they do work hard. They stay on it, and we just kind of, I don't know. We work, but we fool around because we're boys. Every one of you are boys. You're just like me. I'm 28, really. Okay? We've got our toys. If you're sitting in this room, that's what you are, dudes. You've got some toys. They have different shapes and sizes. Some have got wheels, you know, and some have balls.
    20:49
    That's it. It's an awesome team, and I definitely want to shout out to George Gomez helped us out, too. We help each other. I've helped George. I think I did an adjustment to his sword on Deadpool. He did some work on the sculpt for our toy. And I don't know. We work together. We want every game to be a success. It is a team. It's a team.
    21:19
    And at Williams, there was really heavy-duty competition because there was a lot of designers. And there are only so many slots in that era that you would get where you got a good window of sales. Like right now in the summer, traditionally it's dead. Europe has bought everything they're going to buy. But that's still true for operators. But enthusiasts have no season, so it's a little different and better now. But you always had to buy for that good Christmas season. You didn't want to get out there in November or December.
    21:49
    January is not so good, but it's okay. It's better than June. Anyway, this is a different kind of competition. We still are competing, but we, what is it? I don't know, it's just more of a team thing where we want everyone to succeed. Maybe we all got mature, I don't know. I'm not mature, forget it. That didn't happen.
    22:11
    Wow, Black Knight, Sword of Rage was a lot of fun. Things that happened. I started trying to write music, and I have directed just about every game I've ever made. you know, if it involved music that had to be produced by us. I mean, you know, even then, I would direct the sound and music. Even on Star Trek The Next Generation, some of that was, you know, what I wanted until somebody brought up something, and, you know, it would just grow and whatever. But I'm not going to be able to do that anymore because my hearing is so bad now that I can't hear pitch. Here's the cool story, though. I was writing a song for Black Knight, And I got kind of frustrated and I just don't want to play my guitar anymore. It makes me sad. So I'm not. And – but Dave Peterson offered to – Dave Peterson's our – I guess he shares power with Gary Stern partner And he came up with you know enlisting anthrax Scott Ian and Brendan Small And when the music came to the lab and we actually were able to play it in the game,
    23:25
    everyone from engineering, 50 people gathered around it. It was so awesome. Just smoking. And it worked with Black Knight.
    23:33
    Rage! It was outrageous. I do love the music. It fires me up when I play it. It fires you guys up too. I hate to tell you this, but it also made you play. One more time. One more time. One more time. Anyway, I do the same thing I do. A lot of fun working with them. I never met them, never got to talk to them. They kind of isolate us from artists and stuff like that because we're scary. Scary, scary people. And they don't want us interfering with anything that might be normal. So we don't. Other things that happened. When we first made the flail, it was pretty dangerous, actually. We made the thing and it had springs and balls on it, and the spring would break and the ball would go flying. Can't have that anymore. We changed materials, I think, four times, modified the whole thing so many times. I would say it went through three iterations, three generations of operation. And finally, we have this one, and it's like, it's good for millions of cycles. And I'm really proud of that. I'm not the guy that really did the work. I just said, no, that's not it yet, John. You know, that's what I did. What he did was keep fixing it until it worked well. So it should run for a good long time. It can also run a lot faster than it does in the game, but it's kind of dangerous. I don't want anybody to stick their hands in there. We have an interlock now. It doesn't matter. You won't turn it, but don't stick your hands in it when it's running.
    25:10
    We have kind of a slower operation than we could have. It could be a lot faster, but there are modes in the game where don't take your glass off and run it up through where the flail is running backwards, trying to throw the ball the other direction because it's kind of dangerous. All right.
    25:29
    Other toys. The shield seems to be pretty bulletproof, too, but some games got out, you know, without Loctite on the screws, screws holding the target onto the bracket and the screw, the big set screw, holding the actual rotating device, the bracket and the target, on a shaft. There was one out here that got loosened up. So Loctite is my friend. I just have to convince everybody else that we'll use it. I'm sorry, Stern. Oh, slips at Williams almost. They're all mixed up in here. They are mixed up. It's a big window of time that crisscrosses like that, but just in my head. Okay, so anyway, yeah, we need to, you know, we need to get people, you know, integrated into the Loctite thing. As soon as they arrive at Stern, all new employees will study Loctite, the Loctite video, because we want it on all screws of things that move. Other things, I would say that, what do I want to say? I have to be careful.
    26:32
    I liked, what is it? I want to say that I like working on licensed games, but they can be stressful. I'll put it like that.
    26:43
    Okay? There were some things on Star Wars and Game of Thrones that required so many art approvals and changes. Whoever's doing that, quit it.
    27:00
    Anyway, it's like a nag. It's like somebody on your back. It really, okay, this sounds conceited, but I'm going to say it. You're going to tell the king how to make a pinball? Are you?
    27:16
    I love suggestions. You know, people have suggestions and ideas, and I like that. But, you know, who are these people? I don't make movies. I don't even try. But they make the movies, and then they want to control what goes on the pinball machine also. So in this game, there were no, you know, Matt Cristiano and Rick Bartlett, who own Planetary Pinball and the IP of Williams Valley Midway are my friends. Friends for life. And they said, make a good game and we're happy. That's it. And they do love it. They both have all these now. Matt says his wife likes it better than he does because the game just kicks his ass every time he looks at it. But he hasn't had much of a chance to play it. This guy has 200 machines set up and another 300 or 400 in a barn in California. He's an incredible guy. Anyway, that was the best thing about the game. Everybody could do what they wanted. It's not like you have to follow this script. That went for artists, that went for everything. That went for video art and things we could say. We could say anything we want, right? Pretty much. I tried to keep it clean. There's one thing I'm not in love with, but it's kind of cool.
    28:38
    Run home to mother maggot. It's mean. It's mean. It's nasty. I don't know if I want kids to hear that. Mom, what's a maggot?
    28:47
    You, kid. You're a maggot. Anyway, we like to have fun with that kind of stuff, and it's, I don't know, it makes the job better and easier when we can laugh about things. Like Lyman, every morning he'll come into my office, open the door and go, Ferber, Derber. Because I said that a couple of times. Now he says it to me every day. If you look really closely on the Star Trek play field, it's covered with parts probably, but there is the Ferber system and the Derber system. It's like a map of space. Anyway, it's a pretty fun place. I get to see these guys and work with them every day. Ferris and some of our new people like Stephen Martin I have to say give a shout out to that guy this guy's like super enthusiastic a great artist he sort of does all the mechanical stuff but he wants something done he just gets it done no matter what that's it it's a great crew and I'm happy to be there also be happy to be like say a billionaire in Australia that'd be fun all right I don't want to be that's a lie what else can I tell you about black night tell you what I'll take questions until we end it up you have a question you don't have a question yeah if you want to okay I think we should make it a tradition since you did it last time that you give us a sampling of some maybe Mortal Kombat voices? Oh, that would be easy. Sure. I'll do a few. I have to concentrate, though, really hard. It was a long time ago.
    30:37
    Fatality. Pop the mic there. Give me a suggestion. Get over here. That's good. Get over here. I'm trying to think of more. That was a long, long time ago.
    30:55
    That's a great one. Finish him. Sonia wins. Steve, you thank you for everything, by the way. Big fan. So I have a question. Is there anything like, all right, you're with George, and you guys have some differences of opinion via design. Can you go back in time a little bit? Is there something that, you know, you guys, hey, I would have loved to add this, but it got scratched. George and I are fine. We're friends. No, no, no, no, no. I'm not saying any differences. I'm saying that design-wise, what got scratched that you had that was a vision? I pee on everything he does. Come on. I know. I will tell you the truth, and George will tell you this. When George came to Williams, I showed him how to make pinhole machines. Really? Really. He'll tell you that. I know he has a rule of thumb of keeping it under the glass. No, not a rule of thumb. George is a very creative guy on his own, okay? I just showed him the nuts and bolts of making a pinball machine go together. What I'm saying is, is there a design that got scratched that you said, hey, I'd love to do XYZ on this title, and they all said, well, we can't because you keep, not keep it under the glass, or is there some design that you can think of that you? This is a lot of words for a deaf man to take in. spoken a little too quickly with very little enunciation.
    32:26
    Would you like to interpret that, Dave, please? I'm not sure. Okay, never mind. It was a question I can't answer. Is there an idea on a title? Quietly. We'll go down to ten words. Is there a specific idea on a title, pinball title that you came out with, that got scratched? Like, for instance, Black Knight, or I don't know, how many titles have you made? No, there's none of that. Nothing you came up with that you scratched. Once I made Stellar Wars, and it was a really bad layout, and I picked it up and threw it in the dumpster and started over. Thank you. That's how bad it was.
    33:04
    Yes, sir. Steve, love your titles like everyone else here. Thank you. Thanks for being a fan. Thank you, by the way.
    33:13
    I'd like to understand maybe some of the things you do to refine your play field layouts. You're the king of flow, and when you play your games, the positioning of stand-ups, where ramps are placed, they have such great feel. And I'm trying to understand, do you just understand those mentally that the scramp has to be just here? Okay, I can explain some of that. I try to design. And refine it. How do you get it right in the end where it's got to be exactly a millimeter to the left and a millimeter to the right? Sorry. Sorry, sorry. All right. No humiliation intended. I hear you. What I do is I end up drawing a game and then I'll blend new things. Almost everything has to be drawn two or three times or more, sometimes more, until I get a system that works all together. That's what I look for. Something that connects one shot to another. But sometimes I also get insecure about repeating that too much, so I try to break it up. I don't know. Should I ever make a game without an orbit, Lane? That's a question. It's like a rhetorical question. Should I ever? Right. People love them. So you have to have that. I don't know about lanes and jets. You probably don't have to have lanes, but Gary likes them. He will be suspicious of any game without lanes. That's how it works. That's, you know. Hey look, Gary's a smart guy. He like he also a survivor He knows what it takes to make a pinball machine and he knows what it takes to make a pinball company I not defending him We haven always gotten along Most of you know that Sometimes we don now but we getting along a lot better because we both geezers We don have the energy to argue and fight. We both want the company to be successful, of course.
    35:03
    But it's it anyway. That's how it is. I'll make it quick and easy. Thanks for being here. How long does it normally take from, okay, we're going to do a new game until it's ready to be produced? And how many days do we do it in? I think we're doing like 14 or 15 months between machines now. That's still pretty quick. Yeah, I took longer on Black Knight. I'm old and slow. Not even.
    35:30
    No, it's like some things take longer. I do like to set the goal high. I just do, and do what I can do within the corporate realm, limits that are there, exceed them when I can. Yes? Could you recount the tale at Texas Pinball Festival of the launch of Black Knight with the horse on stage? Okay. Oh, man, that's a long story.
    35:58
    I've got time. Everybody sit down. It's not that long. Here's the story. For Black Night 2000 at Williams, we were going to debut in Europe in Paris in a cafe on the Champs-Élysées by our huge French distributor PSD and a guy named Didier Salmon and his crew. They rented a very expensive cafe. When I say cafe, it's really a theater, okay, with seats on the outside, taking up like three-quarters of a block, big, huge rooms, stage, you name it, tons and tons of tables, waiters all over the place. And this guy, Didier, he invites every operator, every person that he sells games to, to this thing, and it's not cheap. It's a big, expensive party. So he makes special invitations, Chevalier Noir. And it's like, you know, everybody got one, even me. And then so Marty Glazeman, the vice president of sales at the time, and myself, went to France. And we went to this thing. We were excited as hell. It was like, it was going to be so cool. And they had three kiosks of three games in a triangle, three places in the room covered up with black gloves. So everybody's drinking and they're walking around with these delicious canapes and stuff. It was awesome. Then the lights go down a little bit and DDA, okay, there's nothing wrong with this at all, but DDA is gay. But he likes to, he borrows his first lieutenant's wife to sit by him so that no one will know. But everyone knows. It's okay. So he goes up on stage, lights go down, and he says a whole bunch of stuff in French, which I did not understand. But he ends up with, «Ana, chevalier noir.» Okay, so backstage, you heard this big rumbling, and then there's the, you know, here's this guy in full armor on a giant black war horse. real he turns to face the crowd and the horse rears up because the rider made him do it and everybody started applauding and when the horse came back down freaked him out and he let go of everything okay so it's a big so embarrassing a big stinky really steaming pile really steaming okay big and i'm telling you when he peed it was a it was a garden hose diameter stream And it was splashing off the stage. I don't know how people get it, but it was thoroughly aerated, and the whole room stunk so bad, and people were running out the door.
    38:57
    This is a true story. And then Didier started crying, and immediately his boyfriend shows up, and they're hugging and everything. It's okay, you know, get over it. So they get over it, and some guys come out with shovels. They're wearing white smocks, and they shovel and a broom, and disinfectant and everybody went outside. They were disgusted. Outside and you know out to the cafe area. It was cool that it was there. Anyway they opened the doors in the back and the windows in the front and everything. The air went through and then people started laughing which was a good thing. It was a good thing. When they came back in, it didn't smell bad. We unveiled the games and they loved it. That's the end of that story. I hope it never happens again. It's a true story.
    39:51
    Quick question. I just wanted to know if there's any plans to actually release the music from The Black Knight like they did for Deadpool? I didn't really hear that, Dave. Soundtrack album like they did for Deadpool? Yes, we're going to have one. We do have one. Okay. Physical or just digital? I don't understand you. I can't. Oh, sorry. Physical or? Yeah, it's vinyl. Okay. For sure. Cool.
    40:17
    I'll have them for $299.98 each. One quick one, Steve. What's your favorite game to play? Everybody always asks me that. It's Black Knight Sword of Rage. Watch me. I do have a good time playing it. I just do. I'm happy. It is my favorite right now. Just because it's such a battle. And, you know, it's kind of a throwback to old school. There's some old school that are definitely in some new stuff. It's a good mix. I'm very happy with it. Can I throw in a quick second one, then? Say it again. Can I throw in a quick second question, then? I need him. Second question. Oh, yes. Which of all your games that you've designed was the most enjoyable for you to design? Black Knight Sword of Rage. Didn't you hear me?
    41:02
    Thanks, Steve. Thank you. Hi, thanks for coming. Thank you for having me. I listened to a podcast while I was driving up with Chuck Ernst. Yeah. And he mentioned that when they were designing the animations, they said there were just a few rules. No fur, no feathers, no hair.
    41:26
    And then he said when you showed your designs, every single one had feathers, fur, and hair. And I don't know, did you do that just to piss them off, or were those really your designs that you wanted? The bad guys that they came up with are gorgeous. I didn't care if they have, you know, hair and fur. That was just to make their lives easier, you know, developing animations. That stuff takes more time, no doubt. And I'm not unhappy with any of it. I love stone, that skin on the hand, you know. I like how all of them look. I think most people do, and it's fun to battle them. This is the biggest lizard I could find. I don't know why we said that. Sir, do you have a question? No? Does anyone have any questions? I'd be happy to answer it. You have to, you come down here while I ask my question. Steve. It's good, but it's almost not as good as interpreting. I'm sorry. Are you working on your next title already? Yeah, but there's almost nothing on it. I can't really because I'm running back and forth. We haven't finished the topper. I'm still on that. We're still banging out code and some cool stuff to come out. You can't blame the company.
    42:40
    I guess we would, you know, a game designer and a programmer, a project and a team, we really don't want to. We want to make it as good as we can. And it's like they always want us to build sooner than we want to give it up. And it's okay. I understand it, but we continue to work and we're going to keep working on on black night for a while I can still draw I go at home. I can have a system
    43:07
    During the day though right now the folks on the topper and additional fun rules We've got a lot of new stuff with us. I think last chance is out there now It's a feature on black night and it wasn't anywhere before We released that I think on Friday or something anyway Steve, I have a getaway, and I've got to know, is the theme really you, like trying to escape from a speeding ticket maybe, from driving too fast? I'd love to understand if any of your personal life sort of rolled into it. Yeah, it's an extension of the high-speed story, which is a true story. I didn't run away from the cops. I didn't even know they were behind me or I was going really fast, like 146 miles an hour. 146? Yeah, but it was like, you've got a picture. I'm crazy, but I'm not stupid. I don't want to kill anybody. It was on I-5 in a section between Sacramento and Lodi, California. Nothing but tomato. Brand new freeway. Nobody was on it. Tomato trucks in the right lane. I would slow down when I went by them and then nothing for a long time. So I made my car go 146 miles an hour. And I didn't know the cop was behind me. And so a cop came this way and turned around. And then I knew it was for me and I pulled over.
    44:23
    What car was it, by the way? I'm sorry? What car? It was a Porsche 928. I think like a 1980 maybe. I don't know. Something like that. It was a great car, a fun car. I got in so much trouble.
    44:37
    What is the theme of Black? Say it again. What is the theme of Black? A guy who's wrapping a lady in a blanket.
    44:46
    I know. All right. It's Connie Mitchell. It's like, you know, I didn't have any real say about that. And also, I'm new at Williams. I don't know how far to push and everything else. And really, they don't like me. And after we made the game, it was a big success. They hated me.
    45:08
    And it's like, so. It's a fun game. I just don't get the art. I don't either. The art's horrible. Don't ever look at Stellar Wars either. That's another one. Firepower, I made him do like three times. He had to do it over three times. I think, yeah, but the drawing is like, the guy doesn't even, he didn't even know 3D, or it's just totally...
    45:38
    Is this autographed? We're not giving any to you, Dave. Yeah, I got it. No, you can have one. Yes, I'll give them away. Oh, we got questions or not? No, no, no. I'm going to sign them. These are for the autograph session. If you don't have anything to bring, you can have one of these. There's different decals.
    46:01
    You're never going to see them anywhere else. Any other questions? Are you sufficiently bored? All right, I've done my job. Thanks for having me.
    46:16
    you