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The Pinball Show Ep 74: Godzilla Revealed, Production Timelines, & Changes In Pinball Pricing

The Pinball Show·podcast_episode·1h 39m·analyzed·Sep 15, 2021
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claude-haiku-4-5-20251001 · $0.038

TL;DR

Stern announces Godzilla pinball with major price increases and rapid LE sell-out despite niche theme.

Summary

The Pinball Show hosts Dennis Creasel and Zach Minney discuss the official announcement of Stern Pinball's Godzilla machine, designed by Keith Elwin with art by Jeremy Packer (Zombie Yeti). The episode covers significant pricing increases across all Stern titles (Pro +$700, Premium +$1,200, LE +$1,300), attributed to connectivity parts, supply chain issues, freight scarcity, and labor costs. Production timelines show rapid domestic rollout starting in early October, with LE units sold out within hours. The hosts also discuss game features including an industry-first Magna-Grab magnetic catch system and motorized collapsing building toy exclusive to Premium/LE models.

Key Claims

  • Godzilla LE units (1,000 produced) sold out within hours of announcement

    high confidence · Zach confirms via direct conversation with dealers that LE allocations were completely gone within ~4 hours of pricing announcement

  • Pro model MSRP increased $700, Premium increased $1,200, LE increased $1,300 for Godzilla

    high confidence · Zach reports specific pricing: Pro $6,899, Premium $8,999, LE $10,499; attributes increases to connectivity parts, supply chain, freight scarcity, labor costs based on Gary Stern's dealer seminar

  • Factory personnel believe Godzilla is Stern's best art package and comparable to Stern's Addams Family

    medium confidence · Zach relays secondhand account: 'people on the team in the factory were saying that this is Stern's Addams Family'

  • Stern is ordering parts 1-2 years in advance to manage supply chain constraints

    high confidence · Gary Stern stated in dealer seminar that they're ordering chips and boards for two years in advance

  • Keith Elwin has designed or co-designed four consecutive major releases, putting him in contention for greatest modern pinball designer

    high confidence · Zach and Dennis discuss Elwin's portfolio relative to Gomez, Borg, Steve Ritchie, and Pat Lawlor; confirm he surpassed Dennis Nordman's output

  • Godzilla features industry-first Magna-Grab magnetic Newton ball system capable of catching from five shot paths

    high confidence · Zach describes feature as 'industry first' magnetic catch on all models; lists five potential shot paths to magnet

  • LE unit count increased from 750 (Mandalorian) to 1,000 (Godzilla) despite higher pricing

    high confidence · Zach reports historical production: typical ~500-600, Mandalorian 750, Godzilla 1,000

  • Stern is shifting away from $2,000 non-refundable LE deposits to full payment due at order

    high confidence · Zach notes policy change: previously customers paid $2k deposit, now payment in full required for LE units

Notable Quotes

  • “People on the team in the factory were saying that this is Stern's Addams Family.”

    Zach Minney @ ~26:00 — Indicates internal Stern assessment that Godzilla represents a benchmark-quality release comparable to one of Williams' most successful games

  • “Give me a Jeremy Packer monochrome over anything in the past. I don't care.”

    Zach Minney @ ~18:00 — Strong endorsement of Zombie Yeti/Jeremy Packer as the greatest working pinball artist; reflects community sentiment about contemporary art quality

  • “I will give you $100 right now if you can find an LE with a dealer.”

    Zach Minney @ ~58:00 — Emphatic claim of immediate LE sell-out; demonstrates extreme scarcity despite 1,000-unit run and Godzilla being niche theme

  • “The theme itself for me listener Godzilla, I'm trying to think of how to express how little this theme does anything for me.”

    Dennis Creasel @ ~11:00 — Articulates dismissive view of Godzilla IP despite acknowledging game quality; represents collector segment uninterested in theme licensing

  • “They're really really backlogged Dennis... the majority of like our Mandalorian premiums won't come until 2022”

    Zach Minney @ ~1:05:00 — Reveals significant production delays and cash flow constraints for dealers; Mandalorian premiums shipping 4+ months after initial release

  • “This is industry first, magnetic Newton ball that they're calling Magna Grab.”

    Zach Minney @ ~1:13:00 — Technical innovation claim; noteworthy that feature is inclusive across all three pricing tiers

  • “I think there's more in the kitty... I would speculate that's probably the bulk of the increase [from supply chain].”

    Dennis Creasel @ ~44:00 — Suggests skepticism about full supply chain explanation for price increases; implies additional profit margin extraction

  • “I think they're maximizing the marketplace right now.”

Entities

GodzillagameStern PinballcompanyKeith ElwinpersonJeremy Packer (Zombie Yeti)personDennis CreaselpersonZach Minneyperson

Signals

  • ?

    business_signal: Stern increasing LE production from 750 (Mando) to 1,000 (Godzilla) despite price increase; indicates sustained demand and profit maximization strategy

    high · Zach: 'They increased it in Mandalorian 750 units. And then this time around, price goes up and the allotment of LEs go up to 1,000'; Dennis: 'I think they're maximizing the marketplace right now'

  • ~

    sentiment_shift: Conflicted reception: strong enthusiasm for game mechanics/design (Magna-Grab, mech complexity) but pricing concerns and theme divisiveness (Dennis dismissive of Godzilla IP)

    high · Dennis: 'I don't care about this theme at all. What I do care about are the characters and creators'; Zach defends game quality despite niche theme

  • ?

    competitive_signal: Godzilla positioned as niche theme (lower expected sales than Mandalorian) but Keith Elwin design expected to drive strong adoption; potential test of designer cachet vs. IP strength

    high · Zach: 'Godzilla won't match Mandalorian...in terms of sales but hey theme sells more games than Elwynn does'; immediate LE sell-out despite niche positioning

  • ?

    design_innovation: Industry-first Magna-Grab magnetic catch system included across all Godzilla models; capable of catching from five shot paths to upper flipper

    high · Zach: 'industry first magnetic Newton ball that they're calling Magna Grab'; included on Pro, Premium, and LE models

  • ?

    design_philosophy: Keith Elwin confirmed as consecutive major release designer (4 in a row); establishes him as top-tier modern designer comparable to Gomez, Borg, Lawlor era figures

Transcript

groq_whisper · $0.298

0:00
Warning, the following episode contains adult language and screaming goats. Listener discretion is advised.
0:11
The Pinball Network is online. Launching, The Pinball Show. Wowee, this week is a big one, dare I say, huge. Dennis and I give our first impressions of Godzilla the new release from Stern Pinball we fill you in on Godzilla pricing changes upcoming production information and which model reigns supreme we also discuss the changing prices of all the other Stern titles how much, when, and so forth we chat about Stern Insider Connected how Stern has increased the value of your collection the upcoming board game Joe Kamigow truly bringing a kapow to his competitors Kerry Hardy deep-rooting the hell out of some deep-root. Twip shutting its doors, but then swinging right back on the return. Pinball market trends and much, much more. Oh, and the birth of a pinball icon. It's Nordman. I hope you've successfully mylar'd up because this shooter lane is about to get a little bumpy.
1:18
Pinball is a game of skill. For some, it's a passion and a lifestyle. It's time for the Pinball Show. It's pinball with personality.
1:35
Ladies and gentlemen, we are back a little bit later than one would have thought, but it's episode 74 of the Pinball Show. We are your hosts, Dennis Creasel and myself, Zach Minney. Dennis, a big day today. We've got a lot of news. I know. We're recording during my working hours. This is very stressful for me. I'm trying to monitor. the world whilst trying to monitor pinball. And it's been a big pinball news day, so I'm kind of stressed here. Really stressed, huh? You got anything to relax oneself in the evening? Kick up your feet? A little pedicure? What you got? No. I have a taco salad waiting once we're done. Ooh.

  • First run of Godzilla Pro units for locations shipping within 2 weeks, starting week of recording

    high confidence · Zach reports from dealer seminar: 'They started on the line this week. They're going to start shipping overseas this week'

  • Premium/LE Godzilla features motorized collapsing skyscraper with floor-based diverters and three-ball physical lock

    high confidence · Zach describes: 'motorized collapsing skyscraper bash toy' with 'diverters based on floor position'; physical ball lock on top

    • Dennis Creasel @ ~52:00 — Characterization of Stern's pricing strategy as profit-maximizing rather than cost-driven during supply constraints

    Gary Stern
    person
    The Mandaloriangame
    Rick Nagelperson
    Harrison Drakeperson
    Dennis Nordmanperson
    Flippin' Out Pinballcompany
    Tohocompany
    This Week in Pinball (TWIP)media
    Joe Kamikowperson
    Kerry Hardyperson
    Iron Maidengame
    Avengers: Infinity Wargame
    Jurassic Parkgame
    The Pinball Showmedia

    high · Hosts debate Elwin's ranking; Dennis: 'if it's another great and he's got four in a row, does that make him number one?'; consensus he surpassed Dennis Nordman output

  • $

    market_signal: LE policy shift from $2,000 non-refundable deposit to full payment at order; increases customer cash commitment friction and cashflow requirements

    high · Zach: 'Before...you'd have to put in a $2,000 non-refundable deposit...Now...payment is due in full. You're not going to see those deposits'; instructing customers to pay within 1-2 weeks

  • ?

    community_signal: Jeremy Packer (Zombie Yeti) continues as lead artist for Keith Elwin games; reinforces consistent design team and factory pride in output

    high · Zach emphasizes Zombie Yeti as consistent collaborator; factory personnel crediting Yeti's art as Stern's best

  • $

    market_signal: Significant MSRP increases across all Stern titles: Pro +$700, Premium +$1,200, LE +$1,300; attributed to supply chain, connectivity, freight, labor

    high · Gary Stern explained pricing rationale in dealer seminar; specific MSRP figures: Pro $6,899, Premium $8,999, LE $10,499

  • ?

    announcement: Stern Pinball officially announces Godzilla machine with three-tier pricing model; immediate LE sell-out reported

    high · Zach: 'I will give you $100 right now if you can find an LE with a dealer'; confirmations from multiple dealer channels within 4 hours

  • ?

    product_strategy: Mandalorian premium units delayed to 2022 (4+ months post-announcement); Godzilla premium similarly scheduled for early 2022; indicates sustained production backlog

    high · Zach: 'the majority of like our Mandalorian premiums won't come until 2022...Premium buyers are going to have to be patient everywhere'

  • ?

    product_strategy: Clear mechanical hierarchy between Pro (base) and Premium/LE (motorized skyscraper, bridge ramp, Mechagodzilla mech); $2,100-$3,600 price spread justifies features

    high · Zach identifies motorized building, animated ramp, rotating 3-bank, Mechagodzilla magnet as Premium/LE exclusives; suspects additional $100-200 in bill of materials

  • ?

    supply_chain_signal: Stern managing severe supply constraints by ordering parts 1-2 years in advance; freight scarcity forcing expensive air freight alternatives

    high · Gary Stern stated 'ordering parts in advance, like a year in advance...two years in advance for chips and boards'; Zach notes container shortage forcing air freight

    • 2:14
    Ground beef? I had the ground beef one for lunch. It'll be chicken for dinner. Mm. Any salsa? Yes. Salsa will be the dressing. I like to mix it up like that. Now, it seems like after last week, we've got a lot of messages, a lot of people reaching out. I didn't know what they say in media. And I feel like you're not going to eat alone. You have a new friend because last week, ladies and gentlemen, a star was born entering the ring. And stage left is Nordman. Holy shit. You really pulled out a new character that that is hit hard.
    2:48
    The response has been surprising. I suppose there really are no other pinball podcasts left. We're relaxing on to Nordman. You designed a logo for him. To be fair, you designed the logo. I simply cleaned it up for purposes of use on social media or T-shirts or whatever we might need it for. Do you think Dennis Nordman knows about his alter ego has been exposed? He will once we send him a T-shirt. What do you think, he's an XL tribal end? I don't. I do not know. He is the Silver Ball Knight, the caped canary in the coal mine. I love it. Did you think creating Nordman would have this big of a response? No, no. It was just I was, you know, we were having that discussion. I was riffing a little bit. It's so perfect. But people latched on to it. So whatever makes folks happy. I've got nothing really new this week. Today has been I've had a blazing headache for the best reasons because it was a new release day. Not just any new release, but a Stern pinball release, which is always huge in this industry. We'll talk in detail about that. We have a couple other big little nuggets here in the news because we weren't here last week. That's true. Where's my pro? Oh, God. Oh, no. They went to the operator. I even saw Stern announce it. These go to the operators. I haven't said no yet. I haven't said no. Let's jump in. We don't have any correspondents, I don't believe. We don't? No, they had their own show last week.
    4:16
    Fine. The big news this week, listener, is that Stern Pinball releases and announces Godzilla Pinball Machine with a Toho license. What do you think about the theme itself, Toho's Godzilla? Well, it's what I would consider a niche theme, but an interesting one. I'm not the biggest Godzilla fan. I'm well aware of it, but I haven't seen every single movie that they did. Toho did a lot of movies, though. but I mean it's iconic and I think it's fun it's campy in that kind of Elvira House of Wars way sure so especially given the the era that they went with so yeah I just I think it's neat it's not you know after Mandalorian which I don't think Godzilla matches Mandalorian at one goes in terms of sales but hey I'll have you know one of our TPN fellow podcasters I won't name which one contacted me saying that they thought this would outsell Mando and I laughed I laughed it may well uh no it won't because baby yoda is so cute does anything else sell a keith elwynn game sure a really hot license does and and that's and not to mention that you know mando is pretty respected as a shooter so that's true i think this will play good all of elwynn's stuff has before i'm you know it's i'm making the safe bet there but and and that was their argument was elwynn sells games and i agree but theme sells more games than elwynn does so i would tend to agree with that the theme itself for me listener godzilla i'm trying to think of how to express how little this theme does anything for me i figured that it's got to be something you you have never referenced godzilla never outside of like reviewing with your uh your show co-host greg bone the sega game based off of the u.s 90s movie sure like you never talk about godzilla so i just assume this is not this was not a part of your upbringing or anything it really isn't and if given a choice if i had to pick godzilla yeah this is sacrilege but i'm newer stuff for me like give me give me the matthew broadberg version well now okay now that would be sacrilege i mean you could go with a more modern i mean toho has four generations of godzilla sure sure even the uh the the stuff that's come out recently, the Legendary Pictures stuff, that's been pretty well received, especially Godzilla, King of the Monsters, the 2019 film. Sure, sure. I'm going to give this, it's going to flirt above the theme of an Iron Maiden for me personally. It's right around the Elvira theme, maybe a little bit higher than a Black Knight. Right there with a Munsters. Actually, Munsters is higher than Godzilla for me. I don't care about this theme at all. What I do care about are the characters and creators of this particular pinball machine, Dennis. We know that the designer and the lead rules is award-winning Keith Elwin, the greatest pinball player of all time. Now, arguably, maybe one of the greatest pinball designers of all time. I think a lot of people wouldn't even think it's an argument. Okay. All right. I guess we'll know after we play this one. I was hedging there a little bit because I knew you would retaliate. I think if it's another great and he's got four in a row, does that make him number one? Who would he be battling up against? Well, the typical modern era, the solid state era that people would normally throw up at the top of their lists would typically be Gomez, Borg, Steve Ritchie, and Pat Waller. I think you nailed that. He surpassed a Menier. Menier's only got two games. He's already surpassed that. He surpassed a Denise at this point. There's no argument there. Yeah, I think there could be arguments made. And a lot of Borg stuff is some retread feel to it. But you see, that's part of where Keith, like, he's not got enough games for us to really identify a lot of retread yet. Absolutely. And we even pick up flavors in this layout, as we will discuss. I think we've seen hints even in some of the prior things. And that's not a bad thing. People, you know, they know what works for them. Absolutely. That's why some of our favorite artists in general in life have the same tones or the same colors, the same forms. It's their style, their fingerprint Code Lead, who worked on Code Is always Rick Nagel when it comes to Keith Elwynn games Engineering lead on this particular machine Was Harrison Drake I believe he is back with this team This is a solid team that sticks together Artwork, in and out Different artists on Keith Elwynn team games This time, again It is the Zombie Yeti A.K.A. Jeremy Packer Who I would say definitively Is the greatest pinball artist of all time Hmm You can have your EMs. You can have all of it. I think he's done enough work now. Every single one of his pieces are A+. He is the god of pinball art, I'm going to say. Wow, that's quite a title. I know a lot of people do agree that he is, at least of the working artists, the greatest.
    9:18
    Triangle people, I guess. Don't you all think that's cool or something? They had more restrictive printing methods back then, less colors they were allowed to use. So in a way, it's not a fair comparison. Give me a Jeremy Packer monochrome over anything in the past. I don't care. That argument's nothing to me. So Jeremy Packer on artwork. Many inside the factory themselves, not that they're biased, have told me personally they think this is the greatest art package on a pinball machine that Stern has done. And many claim that this is the greatest game that Stern has done. This is their, I'm not going to say who told me this, but I was speaking on the phone with someone that said people on the team in the factory were saying that this is Stern's Addams Family. Wow. That's what I said. Well, it ain't going to sell that well. I said, holy shit. I hope they temper their expectations a little bit. But they said this one was special. We know that there are three models. This is a typical cornerstone title, so you get a pro model, a premium model, and a limited edition model. What was the first thing that you had seen regarding this game, Dennis? Was it a picture? Was it a video? It was the trailer that didn't show the game. Oh, yeah, the teaser last week. Yeah, the teaser. With the music. With Akira Ifukume's theme. I do like that music. It's very good. If you haven't, listen to Bear McCary's remix of it that he did for the modern movies. It's really good. A lot more bass and brass added. Okay, so that was the first thing. What was the first visual thing that you saw regarding the actual game itself? Well, I mean, I think it was in the order of the trailer. So in terms of what really stood out to me, the very first thing that truly caught my eye on the first playthrough was on the premium LE and the ramp that serves as the collapsing bridge. Yeah, super iconic. And people have been screaming, we need more mechs, we need more interaction, we need more unique features in these games. and I think they brought it. I wonder if the bomb is increased on this game. I suspect it is, but just judging from the gap between the... I don't know if the bomb's any higher on the Pro, but I get a feeling that the Premium LE had a higher bomb. It does certainly feel like that. First thing that stood out to me, I think was more conceptual. When I started seeing the layout of this game, that's what stood out to me. I mean, the artwork pops. You're like, okay, there's Yeti. It checks the box. That's awesome. But layout-wise, I thought, is this an Avenger? This feels like an Avengers. Oh, the twirly thing, that's like a Jurassic Park. I kept going, vacillating between an Avengers and a Jurassic Park. Avengers, Jurassic Park. It feels like the birth of them. That was my first instinct was, look at all those wire forms. This is Avengers and Jurassic Park, which makes sense. Keith Elwin designed those two games as well. Why don't we discuss, before we dive in deep with the different features, rules, etc., there were some pricing changes that we knew were coming. Yes. The enemy has many spies, they told us.
    12:25
    What do you mean? Birds. What do you mean? Do you think there was something to that? Employees. Were we warming up to this idea before we even knew it?
    12:35
    Warming up? Well, that's in the eye of the beholder. You know, it doesn't hurt to have it leak. I think it at least prepped expectations. Though I have to admit, the prices are higher than I even thought they'd be. So it softened the blow a little bit, but the blow still hurt. A little bit. I mean, it's close. It was close to, you know, I had heard secondhand that the pros were going up 600 and they went up seven. And I had thirdhand heard that the premium LEs were going up a thousand and they went up, what, 1,200 on the premium and 1,300 on the LE? Yeah. And they threw another 250 into the LE batch. So not that I don't care about that. So, yeah, it was a blow.
    13:18
    Maybe not a kick to the nuts, but certainly still a kick to the stomach. Takes your breath away. The MSRP on Pro model Godzilla is now $68.99. MSRP for premium level Stern Godzilla is $89.99, nearing that LE price of the last release. And the MSRP on a limited edition Godzilla is $10,499. That is substantial. Now, Gary Stern, as a dealer, I was in the meeting. Do I have to say that? Do I have to preface it, say, as a dealer? I never know. I'm not trying to flex. It never hurts. It never hurts to add the transparency. I never know. But in the dealer seminar this morning, Gary had told us some of the reasoning that pricing has increased. He said, first off, connectivity parts have been added to these games. You're going to see price increase on all games. Part of it is these parts that we're adding, the QR readers and whatnot, to get these things on the Internet. Number two, supply chain issues. They're still struggling immensely when it comes to getting the parts. Gary was talking about, Gary Stern, the CEO and partial owner of Stern Pinball, talking about ordering parts in advance, like a year in advance, just so they'll have stuff. And they've been doing that for the last year or so. So they said the other day, we're ordering stuff for two years in advance for chips and boards and stuff. So they're set better than a lot of other manufacturers, pinball or not, but still struggling to get those supply chain issues managed. Number three, freight availability scarcity. Throw them on a boat, that's fine. But if you have no containers to put on the water, you have to resort to things like air freight, which is much more costly.
    15:05
    And number four, labor shortages, one that I kind of forgot about. But having people come to the factory, being available to work, pandemic stuff going on, and with all other socioeconomical things in flux right now, labor shortages are a real thing, even if they have been providing some raises over the different titles here, he said. Do you think that aligns those reasons for the price increase, or do you think there's still more in the kitty there? uh yeah i think there's more in the kitty though i would speculate that's probably the bulk of the increase i agree i agree i think i mean you'd be you know we were talking about the bomb look on the you know as we start later to go through the features between the you know the difference between the pro and the premium but let's um so let's assume for a moment because this is what this is the game i play in my mind gary has repeatedly in interviews stressed that the pro while not a loss leader, their margins are a lot tighter on the pro units than they are on the premium LE. Correct. So let's assume that the $700 that the pro went up was entirely for these reasons that you've listed. And looking at the game, I don't see more bomb in the pro model. Okay. Now let's take the premium. And remember, we originally were hearing that it was going to be like $1,000 more, and now it's $1,200. Now, the pro we were hearing six and it's now seven. So maybe there's that $100 that just had to go in because costs have gone up even more since their first plans. But perhaps that extra $100 versus what we had originally heard as a prediction of the $1,000 is bill of materials. because normally with a premium, I expect two major mech differences, and I count three in play. And $100 more under the play field is a lot to work with. That's a lot of money, yeah. So I could see that. And if you're wondering like, okay, well, Dennis, you're going versus the $1,000 to the $1,100, and then the extra $100 to the $1,200. What about the difference from the pro to the premium, the $700 to the $1,000? I think that $300 is profit. I think that's just additional profit. I can definitely see that. I think they're maximizing the marketplace right now. Yes, right. Gary, he's pretty transparent when it comes to this stuff. He's encouraging. He's like, look, guys, sell these things. Your job is to sell these things. So do what you need to do to sell these things for maximum profit. Right now it's impossible to get games. I think they've added, even though Mandalorian is a more popular theme than Shoha-era Godzilla, moving the LE unit count from $750 to $1,000, even though there was also the price increase because they'll sell them. You can sell them. And what's the strategy that Stern has long advocated? It's pros are really designed for the operators. And not that they mind homeowners buying them, but they want people to get out on location because that's the best way to find new people to sell games to. So you get the operators to continue to buy these much easier to maintain pro models. And then hopefully those people look and are like, well, yeah, but as the homeowner, I want the spinning Target Bank and I want the skyscrapers ripped out of Doctor Who and I want the bridge ramp. And it's like that shit's cool. That shit is cool. I mean when I saw all of it, I was like, damn it. The premiums just look so much more exciting. It does. It looks more exciting to me. Substantially more so than usual too between a pro and a premium. Yeah, and that's where I suspect they added another, you know, I could see another $100 to $200 in the bomb here. Well, and Gary's even, when he was talking to us, he said pricing is fluctuating so much on bill of materials and different supply chain stuff. He said just as an example, since they confirmed the pricing for their Godzilla, just doing that, since then, their cost for bill of materials has gone up $50. So it is constantly fluctuating that they're having to manage. So we're seeing pricing. The interesting thing will be once that supply stuff should be temporary. Within a year, I am expecting that we will see stabilization. That we'll start and adjust accordingly at that point. It's a lot of money for a pinball machine. Sure, it is. But, again, we knew they were going to do adjustments because of the supply. And connected had to, you know, obviously the connected feature is more expensive than a plain apron. So that was going to get in there too. It's not free. Right. Now, my number one question that I've received through email, through text, through voicemail is, if I order today, when am I going to get my machine? And at the time of this recording, there's not a lot of information out there. The only information that we know, Zach, is you will get it before the Australians get their Mandalorians.
    19:53
    Poor Ryan. He's like, oh, fuck me. Production timeline is as followed for you wonderful pinball show listeners. The first run of pros, as we talked about, is for locations, and it's likely going to be. My basement's in a location, Zach. Well, technically it is. Two weeks, possibly even sooner, because they're on the line right now. They started on the line this week. They're going to start shipping overseas this week. So I'm assuming that next week will be the earliest that we'll see them starting to ship domestically, which is very, very fast. That is really, really quick. Then following that first run of pros for locations, you're going to see the full run of limited edition models. They're going to be the last week of September. This isn't a change, but it's one that I thought I'd consider letting everybody know. So before, Dennis, when you would order an LE, you'd have to put in a $2,000 non-refundable deposit. That's what Stern asked from dealers, so dealers then passed that to the customers. That was typical. Now, and Mando, payment is due in full. You're not going to see those deposits very likely from your dealer if you're in on an LE. Payment in full. Ooh, pre-order. I've been telling our customers, get it to us within one to two weeks here. Payment in full. That's a big bill. Oh, jeez. Mm-hmm. Especially with there being, as we said, 1,000 LE models. Typical for Stern is about 500 to 600. Most typically 500. They increased it in Mandalorian 750 units. And then this time around, price goes up and the allotment of LEs go up to 1,000. Mike cut down on the flipping. Have you looked at the market already on these things? Yeah, but I mean, another 250 units and Godzilla is a less attractive theme. They sold out immediately. No, only through you. I heard others say that they were very close to getting it through their distributors. Dennis, I will give you $100 right now if you can find an LE with a dealer. Well, it's a little late now.
    21:57
    That's pretty immediate. I was talking like four hours ago. That's pretty immediate. We were living in a very different world four hours ago.
    22:03
    I was younger then. Full of hope. The first run of premiums is going to be October. so very typical to how they usually run these things i'm guessing mid to late october they just say october but honestly i think it's probably mid to late october then you're going to get a second run of pros scheduled for november so all of you uh consumers that want these in your game rooms you'll start seeing those roll out in november and then the second run of premiums is slated for early 2022 they're really really backlogged dennis i know but they keep turning out new titles so i don't know what to say it's hard as a dealer at times i mean i'm blessed but it's tough because the majority of like our mandalorian premiums won't come until 2022 and you don't get paid until the player gets it absolutely nor do we most dealers aren't this way but flipping out doesn't take deposits we don't require that so you pay when it's ready to go do you need me to send you some soup a lot of people that that's a good reference a lot of people backing out saying hey i want to be on the godzilla stuff now but premium buyers are going to have to be patient everywhere i read on one of the discord someone dropped their halloween for godzilla looks like mecha godzilla is coming home clank clank oh where's fucking nordman when i need him nordman where where is that third flipper going i'll show you the difference between shooting a pro and then shooting a real version that has a kick-ass magnet oh my gosh I'm about to dump 4-inch Creasel Clone. I just love Nordman.
    23:42
    You can put me in your pocket, and I'll use the Nordarang to protect you. The Nordarang. That's got to be like a fucking Dr. Dude ramp or something.
    23:57
    Let's talk about this game. Game features. Three flippers. Oh, okay. three ellen loves his three flippers yeah you gotta have three flippers sometimes sometimes four yep we've get uh we only get one pop bumper and it's a ufo pop bumper interesting location as well bottom right a third of the game not protecting his least favorite feature poor you know did they make him do this because i was asked for those they wouldn't know i had just joked yesterday about how i wish stern would assign keith elwynn the kellogg's raisin brand theme because i want him to have to work with two scoops and here he is with one so now i'm i'm worried this is a slippery slope and two scoops would no longer be a barrier for him do you think this was a mandated scoop No No I don A requisite scoop Maybe I think given the decision to be able to select modes you want a stopping point So in this case, they figured a scoop made more sense than his other thing, which would be like sticking a post to track them all up over by the flipper. Yeah, he's like, give me my post. Yeah. I mean, maybe it's cheaper to do a scoop. and he already bombed himself out with that weird, fancy, cool Newton ball magnet. Industry first. I do like the look of it. I'm glad that is on all versions. Yeah, we'll talk about that. I think two main ramps, but I think I'm wrong. Maybe it's three. We've got a 180 ramp, a right ramp, and then I think we've got the Avengers wraparound ramp in the back as well. So I think there's three spinners. All models include what you're referring to, the industry first magnetic Newton ball that they were calling Magna Grab, which is capable of catching pinballs from five different shot paths and setting up that upper flipper for you. Five different shot paths. Yeah. It's a little loosey-goosey. I see four obvious ones. I'm not quite sure. I'm guessing it's left orbit, direct shot onto the magnet, the shot to the right of the magnet. The fourth one would be straight up to the skyscraper. I guess the shot five is the stand-up between that shot and the prior shot. Yeah. Because I don't. I mean, I only see arrows for three shots. To me, that's like saying the upper flipper on Led Zeppelin can hit that center ramp. Yeah, that's like dry land. That's a myth. Yeah, we'll see. We shall wait and see on that. It is a really cool feature. It makes a lot of sense. It's almost like, why haven't they done this before, especially feeding that upper flipper? I agree. I think it's cool that it's in all models. We also get, people aren't talking about it, I think it's damn cool, in-lane chase lights. Did you see those? I did not. So on the in-lane there, aligned with the flipper, there are windows within that in-lane plastic, and they have like a strobing flashing effect. I don't know if it's rocket artwork. Yeah, it's like rocket artwork, missiles, and they flash, showing the ball coming through, almost like a sensor. Almost like a sensor. It's chasing lights. I like that feature. It's really neat. That's on all models. We get that. It's becoming very typical to Stern, dual-color GI. We know John Borg and Dwight Sullivan love that. You can do a lot of effects with just two colored GIs. That's on all models. And then if you jump up to that premium LE model, you do get the kick-ass motorized collapsing skyscraper bash toy. And if that's not enough, they have diverters based on floor position. So this is like we don't need your manual hang glider TMNT diverter. Based on the floor that it's on, we will divert it from ramp to different ramp. What was there, like four floors on this collapsible building? I think four or five. It might be five. Are we counting the roof? I guess so because the balls rest. Because the balls go up there. The balls rest on the chin of the roof, I believe. So we get that collapsing skyscraper that I think is probably the central toy in this. You called it the Doctor Who. Hard to argue, but it's much cooler. Isn't it? Objectively, it's cooler. Yeah. Yeah, I think so. On the Premium LE, you also get that three-ball physical lock on top of that skyscraper. Everybody loves a physical ball lock. You also get the animated breakaway bridge ramp, that thing that really stood out to Dennis when he first seen it. It's essentially a ramp that breaks midway, and the ball can fall through, feeding the upper flipper or that magnet. I guess maybe that's one of the magnet shims. We also get on the Premium LE a Mechagodzilla-motorized rotating three-bank stand-ups revealing a spinner and a jump ramp. It's kind of like a mini carousel from Batman 66. A mini cell. Yeah.
    28:43
    Stand-up targets are kind of boring. But on the premium, it'll turn and say, hey, here's a spinner for you. I didn't catch that it turned originally. I was like, whoa, that's where I started wondering about the bomb stuff. Because I saw the magnet on the Mecha. Oh, yeah. And I was like, that was the standout to me. And then someone was like, I think that moves, Dennis. And I was like, oh. You do get Mecha Godzilla right behind that jump ramp with a magnet on his chest. So when it jumps off that ramp, bam, I guess that's the fourth ramp right there, technically. Clank clunk. Weak ramp. But get it sticking to his chest there. That's pretty awesome. You get a custom molded Godzilla sculpture right behind the collapsible bridge, which makes sense to me. If you're not pro people, you can add one of those really easily. So that's the big features. Of course, you know, your premiums, you get the metal apron and whatnot. For the LE, you get a high-gloss metallic silver Mechagodzilla armor. I can't help but to think this looks like the Mandalorian armor for the LE. Wah, wah, wah, wah, wah. Very wah, wah on that. Aw. Mm-hmm. You get a mirrored back glass, which I'm in love with. And they're doing what they did on Iron Maiden. You get a reflective foil cabinet. Think about Iron Man vault. You got that. Am I allowed to touch the foil or will it break? No, it's not gilded. Okay. You can touch it. You can lick it if you want to. Anti-reflective glass shaker, all the other LE stuff. Game rules, Dennis, and code. What are we doing in this game? I think we play as Godzilla. We play as Godzilla. Now, didn't Keith Elwin say that this game is not going to be as in-depth as a couple of the previous games? I thought he said it was more akin to like an Iron Maiden. I'm seeing a lot of shit to do. I mean, maybe the thought is that it's not like deep in the stacking sense. Oh, that could be. The multiplier senses. Do I combine the time gem with Mothra? Or is it better to save that for Rodan? I wish I had a reference that could pull in the gems, but I don't. I know on the center of this play field, you're going to see things like the King of Monsters. That's the big wizard mode. leading up to that. You've got five main multi-balls. They range from two to six ball multi-balls. But that right scoop, Dennis, like you said, that's where you're starting the cities. That's where you're getting your allies, different team-ups to help you out advancing towards Planet X. Again, to me, theme does nothing for me, so I have no clue what Planet X is, but that's where you're trying to advance toward by completing all those cities and the different allies. Yeah, I never saw it, but if you remember in the trailer, there are the aliens coming in the flying saucers. Yeah, yeah. I think they're from Planet X. Oh. They're from one film. I think there were two films, ultimately, but within the Showa era, they're from one film. I'm not going to lie. They kind of look like characters from Thunderbirds. Is it just me? No. No, they did look a little puppety. Yeah, they did. and it looks to me like that main bash toy that collapsible skyscraper you bash that enough it lowers the level you bash it you know other than that i don't i know that uh this week in pinball you might refer to them listener they had a deep dive on this and oftentimes jeff will have rules and pictures and everything or you can wait for the stream i believe is this friday speaking of a lot of stuff going on they went out and tried to get as many assets as they could as well we get that original theme song from the 1954 godzilla film and i think a very underappreciated song that we opened the show with godzilla by the blue oyster cult like a song den den i like the song okay i'm not looking forward to it being in this game and i hope it's minimally used it doesn't it doesn't fit the era it's campy colorful yeah look it's just it's just me but i would i'm really glad that they have the the akira ifakube theme i was hoping they would use more of his score throughout and maybe they do i gotta have more mothra come on i mean i think when the i think when the blue oyster colt i think when you when it's game over that's when they should just play that it's the attract mode song okay but yeah i mean i like the the song's fine it's fun it's just everything else about maybe it's just for multiple bowlers. I don't know. I was really glad to see Ifukube's work was in it. Akube Matata?
    33:20
    Akira Ifukube. He did the score for a long, long time. You're probably the kind of person that watches movies and reads subtitles.
    33:29
    You've got to read the subtitles. Is it worth a watch? I think not. I prefer dubbed so you don't have to focus so hard on reading. It's even worse. They get the worst voice actors for that. You either have it subbed or dubbed. You don't have a – I mean, your third option, Zach, is you learn the language, and you won't do that. Are you a subchaser or a dub maker? We don't need more shirts. People can't find crap on your website. I'm distancing myself from shirts at this moment. We'll talk about that. What about audio and video from 10 Toho Showa-era Godzilla films? Does that do anything for you? I mean, yeah, it's cool. Showa era is the first era, so that's the old, old stuff. That's like the mid-'50s to the mid-'70s. Okay, so you might as well just say a bunch of old shit. Yeah, no, if you like the stunt actors wearing rubber Godzilla outfit and doing campy combat and all that, that's this era. Yeah, the Power Rangers.
    34:22
    Yeah, sure. Okay. I did get a chuckle during the seminar. That's one of the cool things. During the seminar, we get to see some of the animation and stuff that you're not going to see because of license purposes. In the trailers, you'll see that during the stream. but they picked out super campy, super fun animations. Again, could care less about this theme, but those animations alone, I'm like, okay, checker, it's nicely done. These are funny. These are good. And poor Gary. Gary's what, 80, 90, 105? I don't know how old Gary is, but he had a coughing fit because he laughed at one of the cut sequences of Godzilla like flexing and pulling a metal bridge to his chest. I don't know. Or spinning around. That's because he was remembering back when he saw it when it was released in theaters. He was choking, coughing, apologizing. He was cracking up. No, it's, I mean, the modern stuff that they've done has really emphasized like this kaiju battles, big, epic, awesome CG fights and just, you know, epic fights. But you go back, especially to Showa era, and a lot of it's goofy and just fun. How many emails do you think Charlie Emery sends this week to Keith Elwin saying he's got some stuff wrong?
    35:43
    About the design? Zero. About the code? About the art? Art? Megalon didn't look like that. Finally, we would have got this license. Now, if people are upset, feel free to write in to Zach at thepinballnetwork at gmail.com. Not me. But I'll go ahead and I'm going to push back a little bit on this art package. What?
    36:08
    The decision to go full on cartoon comic, that is not in keeping at all with the show at all. And I feel like it looks like the same oversaturated color scheme we've been getting lately. I wondered when you would be wrong. Let's throw lots of reds, lots of oranges. I wondered. A la Avengers. I knew it was coming. Well, it's all well drawn. I don't think it, I wouldn't think it's fair to criticize like how any of the monsters are constructed, like how the artists constructed them. Go back and look at the advertisements. They're super colorful for these old films. I just, I personally wish that the art looked more like the films, which were much more, much more desaturated. No, you can't draw people in costumes. That'd look like shit. What? No. This is like comic book version. I think we could have gone with a color scheme that was a little more realistic. That's just me. Okay. Well, look, I've spoke with – It's well drawn. I'm not – I mean, Jeremy's art is a win, and doing it this way is probably smarter than doing it my way. I'm just saying. That's by default. I get that. It felt a little more like the film because this looks like some sort of comic book to me. And I agree. I agree with that. I'm happy it looks like this because it's fucking stellar.
    37:24
    Put a line in the middle, horizontal, on this play field and look down and try not to get aroused. Try, because that entire composition that he always does right between the flippers, that belongs in a portfolio of how to do pinball art. Color composition, form, function, everything is damn near perfection. Even between the flippers, you always get this iconic, if you want to have a flex piece, it's always between the flippers. Remember Deadpool, remember the shield of Captain America. We get it here. the cutest, most lovable creature. I think it's a Mothra there. I don't know. I could be wrong, but that little bug-eyed bastard, I love. He's holding a pinball. Oh, God. He says, shoot again in his eyeballs. Get out of town. And this is not overly red. This is not overly... You pick a blue, it's in there. You pick a purple, it's in there. Him pretending that he doesn't think Deadpool was overly red after he got criticized for saying what I've heard others say, that it was overly red. You guys will have to tune into that. I've already had a word with Greg Bone, and there are some parts on this game he's not sold on. Again, I can't criticize the composition. Like, it's well drawn. It's kind of like this is exactly what I expected when I heard he was doing the art. I have more issues. Like, if I'm going to nitpick, I have more issues with the art on the cabinet back glass than I do the play field. But it's functional, and you're right. As pinball art, it's very well executed. And, yes, you're right. It is a mothra between the flippers. Actually, what I really like about, and I don't know if Jeremy is a big Godzilla fan, but this suggests to me that he is. Because putting Shoot Again on Mothra with Mothra's ability to sacrifice herself and then respawn is very fitting. Very fitting.
    39:15
    Oh, the depth in this artwork. All you got to do is keep zooming in and you see more and more features. I think it's fantastic. There are some Easter eggs in the artwork as well. I think it was Joe Cervino commented that I saw on his post on Facebook, and he's right. The flooring of Drake Investments' skyscraper is a tribute to the carpeting in the Papa facility. Oh, that's neat. Yeah, I thought that was really nicely done. He's right, absolutely right. There was also a reference that Jeremy made to the Twippies. There was a Twippy trophy on one of the floors of that skyscraper. and I got to tell you Jeremy Packer thank you so much for putting that in there because that means a lot to me so that's really cool I love that Twippies are still near and dear to me so seeing something that I helped create on the play field yep that's flex worthy there Dennis I love how you always have to mention your involvement if you birthed a child would you call it a bastard I would disown it no you can't disown it no you throw the baby out with the bath water If the baby didn't stand in line like its job was. Some of us can have multiple children. I have enough love to spread. My other option would be, yeah, to have lots and lots of kids, and I'd put them all in identical outfits. Look, this Twippy Baby thing has grown up and made a lot of shitty decisions that I wasn't there to help. You know, I don't have custody of it. So it is what it is. I still love it. Still love it. Thank you, Jeremy. Really quick on the cabinet art. Is there one package that sticks out to you? Translite. Oh, you said cabinet art first. So cabinet art, I say LE. You're going LE? Yeah. Okay. So we have, it looks like the pro cabinet art is that iconic. How much stuff can we fit into an art package? Because this is going to be seen a lot on location. Yeah, I agree. It's going to be generalized to the entire audience as much as possible. Premium always gets a little bit more niche, and it's going to give you a more specified art package. They're focusing this one on, it looks like whatever the hell that dragon creature is and the flying creatures. You get Mothra in different things. Again, when we look at the Pro and Premium cabinet art, both left and right side of the Pro are the same. Both left and right side of the Premium are the same. We do get a different cabinet art left and right side of the LE. I'm only looking at the right side of the LE cabinet. Okay, right side of LE, you see Mothra and Mechagodzilla and Godzilla going at it. That's why I liked it. It's beautiful. That is nice. On the other side, it is just a close-up of Mechagodzilla. Oh, okay. And then the heads are different. That's okay.
    41:56
    Backglass? Backglass, I would probably go premium. Just because King Ghidorah is Godzilla's greatest foe, and I like that it's prominent. King Ghidorah? The dragons. Is that what it is, King Ghidorah? His name is King Ghidorah. Three heads or two? How many does he got? Three. Unless Godzilla's happened to sever one, which he does do. How original. You'd be nice if he uses electric power Nice try, Toho I'm looking at these art packages They all stand out They all look beautiful I can't say anything negative about any of them If I had to pick Again, give me the pro I like all of them Premium I like all of them as well Ellie's probably my least favorite back glass Pulls too much blue in that back glass He did that with TMNT where you try to have that dichotomy. I hate dichotomy. Yeah, but you love that oversaturated, warm color look is everywhere on pinball. That's like your weakness. Yeah, but I don't like dichotomy. I hate Transformers, Decepticons versus whatever edition where they split the powder. The asymmetry must be embraced. I hate that. I can't stand that. So when I see the front of this LE cabinet and see this dichotomy of this lightning bolt going down, you got Godzilla on one side and Mechagodzilla, I'm like, ugh, puke. Hate it. Keep it all in the form. Now, what I do like on the pro back glasses beneath Godzilla, I believe they've put in the characters Godzilla or Gorilla. Yes, in the – I'm missaying it. In Japanese? Yes. Yes, that is it. But in Japanese, it's not Godzilla. Yes, Gorgera. That's what Gary's told us. The premise of that name was Gorgera is a blend between gorilla and – Whale. And whale, yeah. Yeah. How did you know that? Because it's a portmanteau of two Japanese words. Yes, Godzilla. Oh, Godzilla. So I think sometimes people would hear Godzilla, and they thought people were making fun of how the Japanese said Godzilla. It's like, no, they're actually saying a different word. Like the dialect. Gojira. I got you. They should have added that Japanese on all of them, because I think that is really cool as well. Picture that pro or premium in a mirrored back glass. Oh, boy. Well, the pro people are just more cultured, I guess. Art package altogether. Give me the pro. All right, Dennis, we've got to talk about accessories. Where's the topper, baby? No one cares. I wonder if the topper will be over a grand now. We know that Elwynn toppers aren't usually known for being extravagant. I want it to actually blast me with atomic breath, and then I have to have a rad counter. But we do know that Elwynn toppers typically add a code feature in them. accessories we only seen accessories of the art blades and the shooter rods the shooter rod is awesome it's really cool it has the uh the egg like a godzilla egg do you see that little spotted egg uh no okay i did not once you see that you'll like that that looks cool art blades do not differ in my opinion very much from the le art blades le art blades come standard on the le version and they're more a red yellow color composition whereas you get a similar art piece Think Avengers, difference between premium and LE. You get orange and red for the LE. You get more blues and purples for the premium. Same way for the art blades. So I don't think you're losing too much there. We didn't see the topper. We have not seen the armor. We know that sometimes, like, Mandalorian came with a die-cut armor standard. This does not. This comes very much like Avengers, that straight.
    45:28
    I'm getting way too inside baseball here. I did notice one thing that I think is really cool. In all of these pictures, Dennis, if you zoom in and look, under the shooter rod, there's a decal now. It says here in pinball. That's good because I forgot who made these And if you look at The accessories video When you zoom in you see also Now an overlay decal When you get that accessory kit possibly And it's colored and it looks Really really nice So that's something I noticed I hope that is Not just for promotion here in the pictures And I also noticed something else That I think is going to be a connectivity thing Go ahead and look at the Premium and the LE apron. The Pro is not like this. The Pro, you still get these different decals on the Pro apron, but if you go to the premium and LE, you now get a full decal there and it looks phenomenal. There's no open space. You see what I'm saying? Right. Yeah. Yeah. That looks really, you get more real estate for art and it looks wonderful. Gary Stern showed us an example of the connected kit and he held up. If you don't want that QR code, a coder exposed, then there's like a decal or a magnet that goes right over it that continues that artwork. So you would never know it's even there. Let's wrap it up here when it comes to Godzilla. You think this game is going to be a winner? You said yes, but it will not yield the sales of a Mandalorian. Do you still feel that way? Oh, yeah.
    46:53
    But, I mean, it's like how can you bet against Mandalorian, one of the hottest licenses in the last five years? I can't, especially when the layout is seen as a winner. Even if this is a winner on all fronts, it will always be weaker on theme. So that would suggest that there are more non-die-hard pinball people in pinball than there are die-hard pinball people.
    47:14
    I'm not quite sure what you said, so maybe. I'm saying that there are more casual people in pinball than there are die-hard people listening to podcasts. Because that's basically what you're saying though, right? Kind of. It's, I mean, you have to factor in so many different, you know, there's so many people engaged in pinball beyond just collectors. There's only so much money people can put into the hobby.
    47:36
    They've got to think about their families and what they're interested in playing. Godzilla's super famous. One might say worldwide maybe more famous than Mandalorian, definitely older. But you're also, when you're going show era, you're focusing very much on people that have some sort of appreciation for the old school style.
    47:54
    This feels like an original theme to me, Dennis. I'm going to say it. I'm sorry. It feels like a generic original theme. Way too much from those films for me to give it. I mean, the whole plot of the game with Planet X and everything and the Zillions and all that is straight out of what Godzilla and the invasion of the Astro Monster. But in a similar fashion that Avengers pulls from comic books that nobody read. I think this is taking more plot beats than that. Sure. OK. I think you just don't know it because you haven't seen the film. And that's which I haven't either. But I read the summary and I'm like, OK, yeah, that's fair. I think this is a Keith Elwin zombie Yeti game for diehard pinball people. Well, obviously it is. They both worked on it. Yeah, but that's what I'm thinking it is. That's the draw to people. It's not Godzilla. I think the majority of diehard pinball players are buying this game not because of the theme at all. They're buying it because it's an Elwin-Yeti combo. Oh, yeah. Well, there's a whole group of – Well, I'm buying it. In Elwin we trust, and they'll buy anything Elwin. Sure. There's always a – but the same thing was true for Lime and Sheets, and that didn't mean Batman 66 outsold Led Zeppelin. I'm just saying. I think it's real easy for people to forget. I know competitive players that don't know the designers. They might know the coders, or they might not know that. They just know which games they like and which they don't. That's surprising. And they don't. Modern stuff, too? Sure. Older stuff. Yeah, I was talking to someone once, and I was going over how World Poker Tour is such a weird Steve Ritchie layout, and they're like, he did that? They knew who Steve Ritchie was, but beyond naming high speed and Black Knight, they couldn't have told you a game. I think for Western culture King Kong would have hit a lot harder I think us Westerners we appreciate King Kong more I think you right I glad they did Godzilla Like, I would rather have Godzilla than King Kong. I think it's a more interesting monster. Which model reigns supreme here?
    49:48
    Premium. Over the LE. No one can get it. A thousand people got it. Yep, but not me because I'm four hours too late. So you think all the cool stuff in the LE, that price doesn't justify? The artwork doesn't justify?
    50:06
    Oh, no, no, no. LEs are always this markup for the exclusivity of it. So for me, I'm never an LE person. I could love the thing. It could be my favorite theme in the world. I would never go LE. I always jump on the LEs. I think they offer the most. They're the most beautiful. On this one, I have a strong opinion.
    50:24
    I don't see how you buy the Pro. that's number one. There's just way too much stuff. Then again, this Pro probably has more in it than any other Stern Pro. You're getting a ton of games. And I think what happens to the Pros nowadays, especially nowadays, Dennis, is that the Pro appreciates more over time. It really does. People figure, I don't need that Captain Marvel ramp. I really don't. I don't really have to have that subway that slows the ball down. So I think over time, you're going to see the Pro really pick up speed. But right now, it is nothing but premium. So between a premium and an LE, I'm here to tell you, listener, it's all premium for me. I think it has a better art package. I think the choice of powder coat on the LE was a miss. You could have almost picked any other color. Give me a darker metallic blue. Don't give me a rehashed silver. I think the premium stands out better than anything. and for many of you, I would say buy this premium and make it more unique than an LE by getting custom powder coat, by getting things that the LE owners don't typically get. The premium is the winner here and I think it's pretty clear. I'm not even convinced I'm going to get the LE. I'm always impressed by the premiums when I first see the game and usually I start to get less excited as time goes by. So, I mean, by default, I would say yes on the premium because that's been my gut instinct every time I've seen a new release. Well, it's got more stuff. Premium, premium, premium. And then as I watch the gameplay, maybe the premium still holds up or maybe the pro wins out. But I usually don't love the premium as much over time just because the newness wears off. So I would agree with you. I'd say premium. Especially with this price increase, I sure wouldn't be telling people to powder coat it. Oh, absolutely. What I recently did to my Jurassic Park premium, I pulled in those speaker light kits. I upgraded them to the LE speakers and the LE speaker lights. and did some other stuff. I just say do that if you know the games. Get it, and then if you know the game's a keeper, you can start throwing that stuff in. Otherwise, if you're not sure, I wouldn't worry about that. This game deserves better than silver. I know they're trying to attribute it to MechaGodzilla. No, no, no, no, no. Okay, overall, let's talk about Stern General. We talked about price increases, right? Here's another update. Everybody's asking, so is this just Godzilla? What's going to happen to the other games? Are the other games going up as well? Here's the deal. It's like a two-phase thing, and it's kind of confusing. So bear with me. All games and titles being manufactured minus Godzilla are going to see an immediate $300 increase. Boom.
    52:58
    Godzilla's going to roll out. And anything after that on the production line, I don't care what title it is, it's plus $300. And this is mostly to reflect the addition of Insider Connected gear that's going to be added to every game, leaving that assembly line. $300. What about vaults? Are they running any vaults right now? They're not running any vaults. but I don't think... I wasn't sure they're still doing Iron Mans. I don't think they're going to. They're going to have another small run at Iron Man. Well, then there better only be 150 on that. Tell them. Yeah, I don't think you're going to see an increase in that. Okay. But I don't know for sure. All games and titles as of January 1, 2022 are going to go up again to match the Godzilla current pricing. That's pretty typical to what we saw last year with Avengers. The price increase hit, and then all the other games are going to catch up at January 1. Yep. So you're going to see... Right now you're going to see a $300 increase. Anything that's in a dealer inventory, no price markup.
    53:53
    Dealers have no inventories. I know. Have fun with that. I know. But no, you're not going to see any increase because it doesn't have that connected gear already in it. So if a dealer is trying to sell you stuff at the new price and it's been in inventory, doesn't have the connected, nope. Sell, sell, sell.
    54:07
    They don't know about Elvira, though. It's a studio title. It's kind of the only one they're going to be making in 2022 that we know of as of right now. So when asked about is Elvira getting another price increase after we've seen a $500 price increase for that in Batman, he replied with, we haven't determined that yet. Gary Stern did talk a little bit about the Insider Connected. Pricing and additional information is going to be revealed in a week or two. They're going all in on this. This is their big move. Based on what we're seeing in their decision making on this immediate $300 price increase, I think it's safe to say that you're going to see the Insider Connected kit come in anywhere from $200 to $300. If that's what they're adding immediately per the kit, I think that's what we're probably going to see for these retrofit kits as well. Do you think it's fair? Do you think it's high, low? I have no context to know. Okay. In the grand scheme of pinball stuff, it doesn't sound horrible. Overall, I have this opinion. I want to see what you think about it, listener, Dennis. a lot of people are going to view this price increase as bullshit. I'm out. We're going to get that. And I kind of feel the same way. Some of this is getting freaking ridiculous. But the market has become more expensive. So, too, is the value of these games now on the secondary market. In my opinion, Stern has now raised the value of your collection overnight. You have no evidence for that. I will in a couple hours once I check pricing. because a Deadpool yesterday is worth a hell of a lot less than a Deadpool in 2022. I would say you may be correct that CERN has raised the value of your collection if you have games that are still on the line. Anything older, like an Aerosmith, did not go up because of this. I think it will because of the internet connectivity. I think used games may still continue to go up because people are entering the market desperately trying to find things that are cheaper than this, but that's not directly driven by this increase. That's just a part and parcel of more people getting into the hobby and going, holy crap, $6,000? No. Maybe it's just my positive mentality. I think that every disadvantage has an advantage. I think your argument is stronger with the idea of when you buy these games, they retain their value very well, if not appreciate in the current climate. So the only issue is obviously you have to now tie up another $1,000-plus to get a game. But when you get out, it's not like you're going to lose more money than you were losing before, if you were losing at all, and you probably weren't. So that would be what I'd focus on. Those of you with a Jurassic Park, your machine's worth more now. But I'm afraid my Super Orbit did not go up in value because Godzilla's more expensive. Sorry.
    56:46
    As much as I wish it to be. My Super Orbit went up in value because of an auction in Banning, which now says it's a $2,900 game. Yeah, we're not even going to cover that this week. A lot of stuff we're going to leave for next week. Maybe we'll dive deeper into... Okay, screw Godzilla. We're done. So what's next, Dennis? What's next for Stern Pinball? That's all people care about. It's Borg's turn, isn't it? Yeah, John Borg was recently on the Super Awesome Pinball Show and said that his game is following Elwin's and it's going to be around December. Maybe he has James Bond. The rumor is rush. Okay, well, I guess it is time for another Has Been Band. No, two in a year? That's a lot of band. Tom Sawyer.
    57:25
    He's coming. it's coming enjoy i mean i like rush it's fine i do too but it's a band thing i wonder what the bash toy will be man godzilla is going to sell forever i think long-term godzilla may sell more than mandalorian but right now i think you're right no it will not no come on zach that's i'm telling you that's just recency bias it's not if you see what keith elwynn games do long-term sales wise every single one of them is still selling and it's selling the highest in its class I don't disagree with that, Zach, except other than Stranger Things, Mando is the return of Brian Eddy, one of the most popular designers from the 90s, and people love how that game plays. They love it. I do, too. So even if they love this, it's not like Mando becomes less loved. And Mando's theme is stronger.
    58:16
    I might personally prefer Godzilla. I don't know. I've played Mando, and I liked it a lot. So, you know, Stern doesn't do a lot of misses anymore, so it's hard to say. I mean, they don't have any real true – You rate everything a B-plus in your reviews. Well, yeah. Now, you do. So maybe you need to adjust your scale. Justify. Well, Led Zeppelin shouldn't be getting no B-plus. Our scale has more specificity than any other reviewer in the industry. The pro model, I don't think, is getting a B-plus. I will say the discrepancy between the pro and premium I don't know if any of you find this interesting from a dealer perspective there's not been a larger discrepancy thus far in our two and a half three year business with these new titles there's not been a bigger discrepancy in premium orders over pros it's not even close you thought Avengers was different you thought Mandalorian was different everyone is ordering Again, I'm not surprised given the – and I think my opinion has been – At least 10 to 1, Dennis. If not – 10 to 15 to 1. Sure. Well, especially on day one when it's all collectors all the time. But premiums are going to take longer to get. They're more expensive. It's still surprising to me. There's so much gain in that pro. Well, the hobby's changed somewhat, and I think my impression, why I suspect looking at it while I think that they've added more money into the bomb on – I don't agree with you on the pro. I don't think there's more in this pro than there was in a Mando pro. I do think there's more in the premium, though. And I think that makes sense for Stern if they're trying to get more people to do what you are experiencing as a distributor, purchasing premiums over pros, which gives Stern better profit margins. So drive that. Drive people into making more and more gameplay differences between the two models so that home collectors feel like they're getting ripped off if they get a pro. Look at the back panel. BOM-wise, that's vacuformed back panel. They don't do that. I think the bomb has gone up a little bit. Now, the one thing I would say for those that are uncomfortable with the premium is, despite all the cool toys that exist in the premium, I'm sure that Keith Elwin will give you a really fun-playing pro shooter. He's never disappointed before. Obviously, that's just my speculation based off his track record. But Keith has never made – I've played plenty of his pros. I think other than maybe Avengers, I've played all of them. and they are very fun games. So I think this will still play well. I would project that in six months, the ratio premium to pro will come back closer to a five to one. Sure. That's what I guess. But you still think that premiums will outsell it? Yeah, not even close. I mean, I could see it. There's going to be a couple of stories we're going to touch on more next week. One being Joe Kamenkao joining the Loser Kid Pinball Podcast. He had a lot to say. For one, he was name dropping some Bob Gale. For those of you who don't know, that's the writer of Back to the Future, one of the greatest films and franchises of all time. So, you know, chatting with his buddy Bob Gale, and Joe is an investor in the Back to the Future musical. Just throwing that out there, a little linkage, a correlation there. They also talked about original Denny's GNR selling for more than what GNR JJP is selling? Yeah, no, I've never seen that. I don't know what the hell he was smoking. I don't know if he misspoke. I don't know what he was talking about. He didn't misspeak. He probably thinks that's true, but it's not. It's so not. I mean, I don't go around looking for either GNRs, but I have seen DE, GNRs. They don't pop up a lot, but they pop up for less than the J.J. Pease. Yeah. He's hoping that Harry Potter is coming in the future. Hoping means that ain't ever happening because he, Mr. 100% always get whatever I want, saying hope. Do not trust a hope. It is forsaken, these lands. I thought if you shit hope in one and piss in the other. What's that saying? Shit. I think it's swear to me, Lord man. Swear to me you won't piss in your hand. Quit trying to take Harry Potter. I gotta get it and give it white water ramps so that Harry Potter will bump his head when he plays Quidditch.
    62:22
    I'm Nordman. You're not supposed to be better improv than me. Where is the golden snitch going? Golden snitches get golden stitches. What the golden snitches do?
    62:34
    I'm done. I can't. I'm way too close to Nordman. I like him way too much. I could hear you for a whole fucking episode. Do that. Cam and Cal said that if anyone was going to solidify that license, it's going to be Stern and Kapow. Damn it. Roger Sharp may have a thing or two to say about that. I just picture Roger Sharp, like, twinging his mustache.
    62:57
    I just imagine him opening his violin case, which is, like, equipped with his custom fencing sword that he assembles. Yes. Challenges Joe to a duel. They're going to make 200 B. Wait, huh? They still have 200 Beatles to make? What the hell? Oh my god What is this? That's a fun game But it was just way too expensive Well you heard it here If you guys are wanting Beatles Reach out to FlippinOutPinball.com Or wait wait wait It was apparently It was plenty of time Oh man If this wasn't expensive Before It's really expensive now Yeah Oh my god We're going to see that Maybe Q4 So that is confirmed I'll confirm that here Oh, Cam and Cal brought the Munsters license to Stern. Who gives a shit? Kevin O'Connor's working on art for the next Kapow title. That's surprising. French is the Kapow guy. Okay. And he's confirming there's another Kapow title coming. He was throwing some shade about Cactus Canyon. Did you hear that? Yeah, it was a little extreme, though I don't totally disagree with him. He said, quote, Cactus Canyon wasn't any good when Williams made it the first time and then went on to say, why would anybody want it now? uh outside of the fact that it's so rare i do find it somewhat odd that it was the fourth remake chosen by cgc no one's next to no one's played it i've played it a number of times and it's it's okay but it ain't no a-tier game it shoots really well i mean and you know how critical i am of j-pop honestly i think it would have made more financial sense to do like circus than to do cactus i agree even totem would even be better than yeah no yeah or anything but really world cup but i'll see what else the loser kids covered um came and cal called robert muller an ass clown he says quote i hope he goes to jail he gets what he deserves he talked about deep roots efforts with retro atomic zombie adventure land aka rosa and said quote i saw that piece of crap they tried to show a year ago and i just laughed damn yeah now now it's important to note that joe's really good friends with gary stern and and robert was pretty aggressive about stern so some of this is probably a little schadenfreude. Yeah, that's fine. He did shit on American Pinball, too, saying, quote, nobody bought Oktoberfest, end quote. He also said, quote, nobody bought, really, Black Knight.
    65:17
    Oh, is that like a quasi-burn because Steve's not with CERN anymore? And then mentioned that maybe he'll do a high-speed five next.
    65:25
    God! No, that's what people want. They do want another high-speed. Wow, Cam and Cal, look at you. It was fun. I enjoyed listening to this interview. It was fun. Yeah, that was... Even, did you enjoy the part where he talked about how, like, they designed Back to the Future in, like, three hours and how great of a game it is? I thought you would. Oh, God. Fix that game, Joe. No, they don't need to go back because the first one, according to Joe, was so good. All right, so we've got, he banged on Deep Root. He banged on American Pinball. CGC, is he missing anybody? He alludes to the current pinball manufacturers as being risky and mentioned the brand Hot Wheels, saying that, quote, probably not going to work. Quote, he talked about unsupported chips go bad. I think he's talking about American pinball in general, saying, be careful. These are risky to be buying these games. They're unsupported. Their chips are going to go bad. There's not going to be any replacement parts in the future. You're going to have a brick. That is a strong claim. Yeah, but in his defense, I do know operators that have been reluctant to embrace the new pinball companies for precisely those reasons. And a case in point was I knew someone who, when he was an operator in the area, he isn't anymore, but he was trying to decide between dialed in and Houdini. And he preferred Houdini more, but he was afraid that parts would be difficult to get, so he bought the dialed in. Oh, he went on to talk about the part shortages and the shipping issues that Gary was talking about today. You got to go listen to this interview over at Loser Kid Pinball Podcast. It was fantastic. Those guys maybe said 14, 17 words. Joe. It is a bit of the Joe show. And what a show it was. I don't even know if I agree with Joe a lot of times, but I still kind of dig the cut of his jib. So he was really good. I didn't know that he was a part of the board of directors of Arcade 1-Up. That could get interesting. Joe's everywhere. But the most important part of this entire damn interview came at the end. Host Josh and Scott attempted a very cute attempt at closing the show. Talking about me in particular. The host with the most Zach many here at the pinball show saying how wrong I was about Star Wars pinball being great.
    67:42
    Ask people that know pinball guys. Again, they're going to tell you how great that game is. Ron Hallett, I'm going to tag team you here. Jump in the ring. And they talked about how wrong I was about the Goonies theme. It was very cute. They had this nice, big, huge industry leading person on their show, and they tried closing out the show, shit-talking me, but Joe couldn't help himself. Joe Camencow chimes in asking about the Goonies for a little clarification there because the name The Goonies Alone caught his interest, loser kids. He even went on to groan, an audible groan, when you guys told him that you think the Goonies was a bad and is a bad theme. He groaned, and he was the special guest of your show. To close out your show, Joe Kamenkal, drop the mic by groaning and saying how sad and wrong you guys were.
    68:39
    How them apples. Yeah, if I were them, I would have edited out the groan. Yeah, it was. Can we put that to bed?
    68:48
    I've got Joe Kamenkal on my side. Can we put it to bed now? Well, I would say no, because Joe also thinks that Back to the Future was a great game. I think Joe knows themes. I think Joe knows licenses. I've made stuff that I know is bad, too. The argument was Goonies, damn it. The argument's not whether Back to the Future was good. Hey, wasn't that supposed to be a Barry Osler game? Oh, speaking of, nice transition there, Dennis. Talking about Deep Root. I saw on a recent Kerry Hardy video, a very strong video, by the way, Goonies was supposed to be a Barry Osler game. And featuring a coin-pushing mech. what are we doing deeper okay what to represent the treasure or what i don't even care don't know don't care i think that's the dumbest thing i've ever heard in my entire life that hurts me that hurts my soul and if they were going to bastardize goonies like that i still would bought it but thank god that they went under and they don't have their hands on goonies thank god i think the pinball gods every day for that i just i just find it fascinating that they could have made basically a pachinko machine and you'd have bought it anyway. Proving moral weakness of anything. I would have bought it. And speaking of stupid, Kerry Hardy doubled down and said, look, Octo Manufacturing, when he was there, you know what Octo Manufacturing was, Dennis and listener? I've never known what it was. It was simply eight fucking Harbor Freight workbenches and two employees building a game on one of those said workbenches. There's your Octo Manufacturing. Okay, so instead of assembly line, it's start to finish production two employees take one workbench and they build a game i i guess it takes up a lot less space but it doesn't sound very efficient but what do i know i'm not a manufacturer you want to feel the cringe go over to carrie hardy's youtube uh channel and check that out oh man and this is coming from the guy that was in the factory observing what was going on speaking of observing what was going on this week in pinball very close to deep root through over the last handful of years, shuts their doors for now, taking a hiatus Jeff Patterson from This Week in Pinball. What the hell?
    70:51
    You guys covered this over at Eclectic Gamers podcast quite nicely. Oh, yeah, his article on it. I got a lot of feedback on that. Good, bad, indifferent? Mostly good, yeah. You guys really deep-dived it. I appreciated it because I've been close to that story and to TWIP for many years, and a lot of what you guys said was true. is true.
    71:14
    And even your speculation and just kind of drawing conclusions here, a lot of that very much true. I felt bad when Jeff, he basically made an exit statement that said he's taking a step away. It's not, you're not getting paid for this. It's become too much work. I mean, I'm paraphrasing here. I think this is fair so far.
    71:37
    He was even suggesting, listener, that he was receiving threats and near blackmail. because of, I don't know why, because of something, because of a phone call, because of something. And that encouraged him to go on a hiatus. It was an exit statement, Dennis, but it was a little bit, and you guys talked about it, it was a little bit of everywhere. We had a heavy, deep emphasis on it. Yeah, I mean, if I remember, it's been a while since I read the article. I did read it a few times before we covered it on my other show. But, yeah, I mean, because at the end of it, he noted, yeah, there was this sort of harassment, if I were to nutshell it, regarding his something involving him in Deep Root. But he did also note that there were some other reasons behind wanting to go on hiatus. But I guess I haven't been there today, but someone told me there's a deep dive. So I guess he's back. So Twip is back. So now he's back. That was the one thing, your prediction, you said it would probably be best for him just not to. Well, I construed, obviously falsely, hiatus to mean a long-term thing. It was going to be just, I want to take two weeks off. That's what I would have said. I didn't think it was two weeks. I don't know how many. I mean, I don't go there regularly. I like the deep dives. I do too. I normally, but I didn't even think to go there today before our record because I assumed he was on hiatus. I don't just go every week. I would just usually, usually it gets linked somewhere. And this whole day has been weird because, I mean, I'm still working while we're recording this and everything. So it's all very – I didn't do as good of a job as I probably should have in checking up on the Godzilla. But, no, I mean I just kind of – I didn't quote-unquote unbookmark the page, but I sure haven't been going there because I thought it was on hiatus. Yeah, I generally go there for the deep dive stuff. But, yeah, we were going to cover it before, but then didn't know whether to cover it because by the time he quit, he already said, I'm back. I think this is I'm back. I don't know what this is. Unless it's an exception, kind of like the guest article he ran after the hiatus, which he didn't announce in the hiatus article. Well, yeah, but that one was already in the can. So he said in his exit thing, quote, monetizing Twip has always been a struggle in the optics of being sponsored by manufacturers or other pinball companies. And the small community has always been a concern. I cover my thoughts on it more in depth here on a post from 2019. He links said post earlier in this statement. And he talked about receiving monetary expenses from the pinball community solely saying, quote, our income has all been from folks in the pinball community. Thank you Exclamation twice And most of that income has been pumped back into the website and the brands in the Twippy Awards show to improve our products and content Which many people are thankful and grateful for. I know that seeing anybody give back is good. Unfortunately, our income has been all from folks in the pinball community.
    74:41
    It's an interpretation thing. If you include those that own and run a manufacturer, just still being in the pinball community, then yes, that is true. If not, then that is false. It's not a factual statement. For better or worse, it's just not. I would say that can be interpreted broadly.
    75:01
    I mean that would be how I would interpret it. That being said, back – and I'm not going to necessarily encourage people to listen to the EGP episode, but Tony spends a lot of time – we had a prior episode way back like in the 120s where he focused on FTC, Federal Trade Commission requirements in the US. And that's where a lot of our discussion went because a lot of that information that they've put out, this really came down primarily in 2017. And it's been mostly about people who were endorsing products and then not declaring that they were endorsing products. Yes, yes. Which isn't the case here. But the situation that is tied to all of that, that all of us who create content in a social atmosphere. atmosphere and that can be on facebook blogs podcasts youtube all of that as you know for doing straight down the middle is that in the ftc guidance they specify that you are even if you're not endorsing a product it's said that you are to make clear when you have a relationship with a brand so if say i was donating money to you zach and you were to talk about something you wouldn't have to name me but if i were dennis incorporated who produces uh the pin step i had to think of when that wasn't already trademarked by deeper the pin step and i'm making the pin step you and i was giving you money in a in my understanding as a non-lawyer is in the ideal proper world if i were giving you money and you knew i made the pin step if you were to podcast and cover me you should mention that oh by the way i received financial support from dennis and that is not influencing my my review here of that it didn't have to be a review of the pinstripe it would be just covering my business sure be like by the way we have a financial related you don't have to disclose like how much or what you're getting sure i will be the first to tell you dennis and listener i've slipped up on that uh a couple times on youtube you know it's really easy to make mistake it's really i have and that's where why we focused on it again isn't to like i have i've never gone and reported someone to the ftc it's just fyi because i know there's so many of us who create content who listen and consume each other's content be aware of this stuff it used to be a recommendation and then i think it was around 2017 when they found out that 28 of all brands like going to instagram influencers told them don't disclose this arrangement pretend it's a legit review that the FTC was like, oh, fuck that. Yeah. And to my knowledge, listener, I think Jeff has responded well to that. I know for a fact that he's gone back and he's trying to take every step that he can per his report that he is doing that just like I myself am as a content provider and so forth and so on. Yeah. And Jeff reached out to Tony and me after the episode and asked for information on the FTC stuff. So I sent him a guy because one of the things I was – like he has a disclaimer, and as a case in point, disclaimers are great. But the FTC doesn't want them at the bottom of pages. They want them where you have to see them before you read the piece. An easy enough thing to not think about though. Dennis, here's the brass tacks here. I'm only bringing this up because there's some murky stuff in here, and the only reason I know there's murky stuff because I've been associated with TWIP in the past doing a podcast. like we said the twippies we jeff and i were close best friends we were we worked hand in hand for many many years so you guys were very close when uh when i was asked to start doing some guest spots on twip podcast and then eventually to co-host absolutely i mostly communicated with you rather than jeff but jeff's always been really cordial with me yes yes and uh when when jeff and i were close he was a great friend great great friend we had a little breaking up towards the end many reasons, different podcasts that we would talk about that, but I have no doubt that Jeff, he has really good intentions for the most part. The problem is here in the past, recently, I'm going to be honest, there haven't been great intentions.
    79:07
    And what is hard for me, I'm having a tough time even discussing it, what's hard for me is reading an exit statement like this because Jeff has a good chance to clear up a lot of stuff for himself that I think us as a community, because he's made some pretty big mistakes in my opinion, and ones that he has not been transparent about. I have a hard time sleeping at night if I ever get faced with that. The truth of the matter is there's a lot of deep root stuff in here, listener, because there was an agreement. There was monetization that Jeff was receiving. I'm saying this from personal experience. I know this is a fact. He was receiving money, monthly donations, substantial, large donations, in my personal opinion, from Deep Root Pinball for an extended period of time. I would have loved to have heard Jeff just come out and say that because, like you were saying before, he didn't know that it was coming from – he was getting scammed to other people. No, that was me. I can't – again, not an attorney. Can't give legal advice. Sure. But I cannot see how any – there's no culpability tied to that any more than – for example, I am aware that when you were the host of the Twit Podcast, you were compensated to do the editing of that podcast. That's where I'm getting to. So you, for example, thus probably got some of that Deep Root money. Absolutely. But that's not your problem. No, no. And it's not your problem that Deep Root maybe got that from the little old ladies either. The problem is when I read this kind of exit thing, I'm like, damn it, Jeff, here's a chance, man. Just let people know what happened. You were receiving a substantial amount of money every month from DeepRu. I know that because I was receiving and negotiated a certain percentage. I'm going to be honest with you. It was 25%, which I'm actually pretty proud of, a good negotiation here on me. Anything that came into TWIP, Dennis and listener, 25% of those earnings came to me. You got 25% of my dollar I was given a month. Absolutely. That was 25% to me because there was a substantial amount of work that I was doing for TWIP as a representative of doing the podcast, doing the TWIPs, creating all of that. There was a lot of work that we were both doing. I negotiated 25%. I wouldn't have paid me 25%. That's why I'm proud. But I was receiving funds as well. So it just didn't sit well with me for people not knowing that that's really what was going on here. He didn't talk about that on his podcast. I had issues with that. And looking back, I should have been transparent. I'm telling you, I'm wrong in a lot of ways here. But continuing this without just continuing with the truth doesn't sit well with me. And I'm not blaming Jeff. I'm not blaming anybody. But I'm at least telling what was going on so that I can feel okay. Because, like I said, I happily and felt like I earned a good portion of what was coming in. I was proud of that. And looking back, it sucks now thinking that some of the deep root money was coming to me, just as it was with anybody that money was coming back from TWIP to the providers doing podcasts or all these little things going on. I feel like shit about it. Nothing I can do about it. Like you said, not my fault. I was just merely 25%. However, when I see this action, I'm like, man, just tell people. Tell people, Jeff. Get over it. It just doesn't feel good that this was. And God forbid, if people were really threatening, and I don't know what quasi-blackmail is or close to blackmail. I have no clue what that is. But if that was legit, that's pretty disgusting.
    82:40
    It's irrefutably gross that somebody would do that to the point that he was scared and he had to close down shop here. But that also gave him the opportunity just to be real with people. Just be real with people. That's all. So that's the truth. I'm not looking to wage any conflict here that is the truth whether or not why he didn't tell you I don't know maybe it's a moot point to many of you but I at least feel better discussing and talking about it because in this he also alludes to calling a friend you saw that Dennis he called a friend after talking to Robert we talked a little bit about it because I was a little confused about what the that whole section was strangely written absolutely and for me it wasn't strange because I was that person he called Okay. From an outside perspective, I was losing track of who was talking to whom about what. And I guess it didn't really matter. I'm telling you, I'm telling listeners right now, I was that person. He described me as a friend. I think objectively at that time, Jeff, I'm paraphrasing here, fucking hated my guts. If I'm being honest, whenever I stepped away from Twit Podcast, we had disagreements with Twit. He's kind of booed me from that. He did not like me. Why he called me? making one call after a Robert Mueller phone call and this wasn't immediately after why he's calling me I have my thoughts as to why I'm not going to speculate that because I don't have any proof as to why he called his one sworn enemy at that time Jeff and I have since then been much better and cordial and what not I don't know if this affects anything but he called me now he contacted me and said hey we need to talk I'd like to talk to you about something I thought what in the hell would Jeff want to talk to me about. He is irate with me with forming of the TPN and different things. So I said, I'd only feel comfortable if I had someone on the phone call with me. Hence, him saying in this exit statement that he asked a friend to join. I ran it by him prior to him agreeing to take that phone call. Took the phone call and he asked if I could keep something confidential. I told him I could not. And he was agreeable to continue telling me that with the desire for it to be confidential. It would have remained confidential because it was a non-point to me at that time, but here we are with an exit thing that technically involves me, and I just want to at least speak to it and how it involves me. He didn't tell me anything about any FCC or SEC, nothing like that. Didn't mention anything. He just said, hey, look, I just want to let you know that I've cut my ties or, quote-unquote, monetary ties that he was getting. uh, from deep root because I do not feel good about what's going on. I don't see this thing as working out and, I want to be done with it. I had nothing to do with it. So I said, okay, all the power to you, but essentially without being rude, like why are you calling me? Why me? What, why do you care? I think maybe it's because I'm a dealer and he thought maybe I was signing up to this. At that point, I had already told him now I'm out. I, I chose not to be a dealer, but he contacted me for what reason? I can only, guess the same things that you guys could guess. But he did contact me. Talked nothing about that. The other witness was Greg Bone. He was on the phone. So he can confirm all of this. Following that, I didn't really have any much conversation with it until here and there, just trying to work on a friendship and trying to come in good graces with one another. And then I've seen this recently, and I thought, well, shit, I was that phone call that he made. Why is he putting that in here? What's that have to do with anything? It doesn't. But the inference here is that after the phone call with myself and Greg Bone, there was then threats being made. I don't think necessarily he's inferring that directly we were threatening, but because of the information we may have allegedly told people, that was why people were harassing him. So you see now, listener, why I'm wanting to talk about this, because I don't feel good if that were the case. If somebody did do that, that's shitty, it's horrible. certainly wasn't me or Greg Bone but anybody did that I don't care who it was it's horrible but I think that's why he included it in the statement which then indirectly kind of includes me a lot more goes on to that as to why I wanted a witness in the first place and allegations legal allegations that you know were bestowed upon me from this week in pinball that out of the courtesy of decency and this conversation I'd like not to discuss further. I will, if need be, be happy to, but we'll just keep it at that. But I feel better, Dennis and listener, that I was able to at least talk about it. I don't think there needs to be anything brought forth out of this or as a result of this. It is what it is. Now we all are on the same page. It's all good. And I hope TWIP goes back to creating things I love, such as TWIPs and deep dives. Is that good? Sorry. I'm pretty shocked in the hell out of you, Dennis. Sorry about that, buddy. uh well i mean some of it's not not too surprised in the context of what was written and it does add some clarity in terms of some of the stuff i thought makes more sense now yeah yeah i mean i guess i thought you know if even if some mistakes are made everyone makes mistakes i don't see a big deal just start saying yeah this is what happened lesson learned yeah people are pretty cool with stuff like that yeah because nobody would know i just can't keep it's just we all We all want to do a better job producing content. The FTC stuff, for example, is something that I've had to review the guide, especially starting to do YouTube. I'm like, oh, gosh, there's just so much. It's not hard, but there's so much that you want to be sure you have to get right. It's easy to comply with if you know, but it's easy to not know because it's like, okay, well, you might see something and think, oh, this doesn't apply. Anyway, it's just interesting. It is what it is. A lot of other stories in the news we're going to keep until next week, such as little teasers here. Dr. John talks with Mike about this, a spinal tap. We get GNR toppers that are now shipping. There's a co-op mode now in American Pinball Games. Dead Flip streamed that a week or two ago. Kaneda threatening the leader of a manufacturer, American Pinball, Dave Fix, in efforts to get him on his podcast. Spoiler alert, it worked. Jesus Christ. And then merch update. Buy merch stuff if you want. whatever but shirts people be boop be boop i got my be boop ladies and gentlemen just like me this week it's feisty it's hot it's unscripted it's the pinball shows one and only pinball market trends trending up this week you guessed it it's godzilla by stern pinball have you seen the pictures The premium? Have you ordered yet? Bye, bye, bye, baby! Game of the year?
    89:41
    Hashtag too soon. Don't you trend up, Godzilla. It's only been up one day. I'll show you the difference between a trend and between an Elvira. House of Horrors, the real campy game. The real campy game.
    89:59
    She has a wig. Godzilla doesn't even have hair. he's ugly i want to still know what that little dinosaur is it's the ugliest little bastard ever i don't know uh milla god it's so stupid and carton the baby godzilla oh the fail jeremy packer for even illustrating him on the play don't you judge milla bad enough it was the best thing that ever happened to jeremy packer and godzilla disney's dinosaur sitcom dinosaurs good Oh, yeah, and then they all die.
    90:32
    The darkest ending ever to a single. Yeah, try climate change, motherfucker, and deal with it. Turning down dinosaurs. Turning down dark, warming dinosaur stories. Spoiler alert, they're all dead, like my parents.
    90:49
    Which one did you get? Did you go with the pro? Did you go with the premium? Reflexing those mecha pecs. Boom, boom, boom. with your LE. Which one did you get and why? Training up is Godzilla. It's going to be training up for a while. The only thing that's going to train that thing down is the weight of Stern rolling them out of the production line. Also training up this week while I'm at it, Stern Pinball. Is there a bigger company? Is there a company bringing you more? Still the gold standard in pinball.
    91:19
    You want code? You got it. You want assets? You got it. You want titles? You got it. You want designers? You got it. You want art? You've got it. What don't you have with Stern Pinball? Well, kind of have that in spades as well. Stern Pinball has been trending up for the last couple of years. And as Gary Stern said in his seminar, the inflation, he didn't see inflation stopping anytime soon. He didn't care what politicians say. He got on his old man pulpit a little bit there. I don't care what these politicians say. This inflation is going to continue going up. I was waiting for him to say, trending up this week.
    91:55
    He didn't, sadly. Also, training up this week is a little facetious, and it's pricing in general. Pricing is on the rise. As I said earlier, Stern Pinball has just rewarded you with a higher-valued collection. Thank you, Stern. I appreciate it. Psst, but if you ask Nicole how much any of these things are worth, all my collection averages about $5,000 a pin to $6,000 for the LEs. she doesn't listen at least she'll listen to like the first part of the podcast never this far so i think we're safe but like a missile on those in lanes what goes up must come down trending down this week are those poor dmd stern games oh dot matrix games walking dead sorry iron man oops metallica oh if only you were better those poor poor dmd stern games they've been left out in the outdated cold in the landfill next to the atari et games fern herm not about phones et it's connectivity baby while those lcd titles that stern makes are sticking up their smaller back glasses at the old dmds and they're cozying up all inside are all warm and connected they'll never see the light of the warm glow from the internet hmm hey perv clear your history i didn't know anybody was into that shit go also trending down this week is a bit of a rant so you might want to fast forward if you don't want to hear it but as i say numbers don't lie and neither does the truth does that make sense the truth doesn't lie because the truth in this turning down this week is those sad sad sad limited edition silver ball swag canada pinball podcast t-shirts viva la rosa there's your free plug there canada yeah i've got to trim these down because they're kind of toxic yeah surprise surprise right hey gear bear scooch over a bit off your pulpit here uh Is this thing on? So this damn community and industry, are we not done rewarding people making money off of the pain and agony of our fellow pinballer? This is our cohort. This is our peer group. People lost money with Raza. People that I know, friends of mine, lost money. And instead of supporting and being decent to those people, let's actually make fun of those people publicly by getting others to wear T-shirts as a constant reminder of them losing money. And in return, let's make money doing so. It's not cute. It's pretty damn despicable, if you ask me. Come on, mister. Ever since I came back, I'm no longer toxic or talk shit about you. Every single one of your episodes, you're throwing shit. but this is another low making money off people's tears. Ugh, geez. Dude must have the softest pillow and mattress ever. Come on, Chris. And look, I'm the furthest from being perfect. I've made mistakes, but at the end of the day, you just try to be decent, right? If you know something's shitty, just stop. Don't do that. Chris, make another t-shirt. Go sit in timeout, Chris. Your Power Wheel Civic will be fine. Just park it there. Go sit in timeout. You know what you did wrong. No omokase graham crackers for you, my friend. Snack time's over. This show is running long, so you guys don't get any deals of the week. You don't get any deals of the what? Honestly, this whole show should be an enlightening WTF to you guys. I'm gone for like a week and a half. A week and a half. Come on, pinball media.
    95:35
    All right, that's the end of our show. I think Nordman has left the building. He had to run, make another appearance somewhere else. Dennis Creasel is out as well Dennis had a prior obligation to attend to but he agreed to do the first half of the show so we are grateful for that and we'll hear him soon check him out next week on the Eclectic Gamers Podcast follow them on Facebook and on your favorite podcatcher you can reach me or Dennis at thepinballnetwork at gmail.com or me over at straight down the middle sdtmpinball at gmail.com and if you're ready to buy a brand new Godzilla pre-order it from Flippin' Out Pinball we continue to strive even if we have low inventory we continue to strive to bring you things that other people won't that's free shipping on all brand new sterns we're still holding out on that no requirement for pre-orders who else does that if you want a game message me i'll put you down you'll get the invoice you don't need to pay a penny until that game is ready to ship creating media keeping you updated we do everything we can at flipping out pinball because it is our life but we love it and we will continue to serve and appreciate all the support that we get. So pre-order your Godzilla and also specify if you're wanting some armor. Maybe a topper. We get on an interested list with us. Get yourself a Hot Wheels. Stern's cranking out games again now, so call us for updates for those titles that you love. We've got that Big Buck Hunter Reloaded Panorama online still. If you guys are looking for a Big Buck Hunter, throw that 55-inch or 70-inch behind it. Booyah! The damn fun game. We've got that CGC Ms. Pac-Man Galaga stand-up arcade. And pretty soon, Sounds like we're going to have a Cactus Canyon announcement. Our list is long, but we don't know how many LEs we're getting yet, how many SEs we're getting yet. Get on that list with flipping out. All kinds of accessories. Stranger Things art blades, Avengers die-cut armor, Jurassic Park topper, Amber shooter rod and art blades. Boom, the trifecta. TMNT art blades and shooter rods. Deadpool pop bumper ninja star kits. Do you not have those? They're cheap and awesome. Get them. Shooter rod, we got them back in stock. Art blades, we got them. Banners, we got them. Escalera, we don't have them. But order now in time for the fall. Eight to ten week turnaround on that. TPN last week, triple drain pinball podcast. That was a good one. Those guys are good. Also juicy with Silver Ball Chronicles. Steve Ritchie part three, The Return. It's getting a lot of listens, that one. A lot of listens. Consider them for some awards this year. And you can't leave out the final round pinball podcast. Three podcasts right there. All the other podcasts are going away. TPN continues to grow. I love my family over here. and I know you do as well. Final round was good. They had Dave Peck on, Mr. System 11 himself. I messed up his name and called him Roto Dave instead of Rotor Dave. Sorry, Dave. TPN this week, we do have an upcoming event on September 16th, Mystery Pinball Theater 3000 versus Don't Panic Flip in a Twitch battle. You've got to go check that out. I think it's over at DPF or Don't Panic Flip. Be on the lookout. Follow, like us on Facebook, the Pinball Network, Twitter, all of that stuff, and you'll be up to date with all the goods. And for Dennis Creasel, whether you like it or not, I'll always be Zach Benny. As I always say, that's my Godzilla cry. You put it at the end. It works. And always practice safe pinball and that mantra.
    98:53
    With the wing, don't touch him. Can't fly after. So long, everybody. Thank you for being a mute. That's right. Episode 74. Wow, we've made it that far? Godzilla!