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We Are Pinball #26 "New game explosion!!"

We Are Pinball (WAP)·podcast_episode·1h 16m·analyzed·Mar 20, 2025
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claude-haiku-4-5-20251001 · $0.038

TL;DR

Portal and Merlin's Arcade announced; Portal pricing and Multimorphic distribution model questioned by WAP hosts.

Summary

Don and Genghis discuss the explosive new game announcements emerging just before Texas Pinball Festival 2025, focusing on Portal (Multimorphic P3 module) and Merlin's Arcade (Turner Pinball). They analyze Portal's premium pricing ($5,500+ for enhanced version, $12,500+ for complete setup), limited distribution (one U.S. distributor), storage challenges, and niche appeal to collectors with large existing collections. Discussion reveals industry concerns about Multimorphic's modular design practicality versus traditional pinball cabinet accessibility and affordability.

Key Claims

  • Portal's premium module version costs $5,500, with topper additional $750, totaling ~$12,500 for complete setup

    high confidence · Don and Genghis discussing Portal pricing structure; confirmed via NAP distro reference

  • Multimorphic has only one official U.S. distributor

    medium confidence · Don states 'there's like one distributor in the U.S. and he's this guy that sells trailers and storage lockers'; Genghis confirms uncertainty but notes difficulty finding official distribution info

  • Approximately 10 Weird Al Multimorphic machines exist on location in entire U.S.

    medium confidence · Don: 'We added it up the other day. I think there was like 10 Weird Als in the entire country of the U.S. that are on location'

  • Portal's enhanced version adds plastic ramps and diverter but no new art or layout changes

    high confidence · Genghis: 'The play field is the same size, but you get these extra plastic ramps that you can plug into the sides... It's basically like buying a topper and put it in the middle of your play field'

  • Multimorphic flippers have noticeable lag compared to Stern/Spooky due to remote coil linkage design

    high confidence · Genghis: 'It's almost like they took the lag that you have with virtual pinball and brought it over to real pinball' due to coil placement under screen requiring arm linkages

  • Merlin's Arcade is a Deep Root design being released by Turner Pinball as his sophomore release

    medium confidence · Don explaining Turner Pinball 'was able to scoop in on the auction and pick up a lot of licenses and things' after Deep Root issues; 'this is a deep root design game from what i heard'

  • Turner Pinball previously released Ninja Eclipse with 100 units sold out, currently halfway through production of second game

    medium confidence · Don: 'launched an original design, not a Deep Root design, Ninja Eclipse, came out with 100 versions, sold them out. He's over halfway through the build'

  • Portal's topper not included in $5,500 price due to MSRP psychology competitive with Stern at $6,000+

Notable Quotes

  • “If I was Jerry and I had this kind of technology and I had this assembly line and everything, I would directly copy Stern Pro and just make this game as a Stern Pro. That's it?”

    Don @ ~15:45 — Expresses frustration with Multimorphic's high-complexity, expensive approach vs. simpler traditional cabinet design

  • “you could have what i'm talking about listen i don't care if it's ferraris or blondes you know if they cost too much i don't care how attractive it is i just I'm not interested at that point”

    Genghis @ ~17:30 — Strong opinion rejecting Portal's $13,500+ pricing despite acknowledging game design quality

  • “I have not seen one person. They may be out there. but one person that has space for one machine and this is the one that they have.”

    Don @ ~12:15 — Key market insight: Portal buyers are wealthy collectors with 15+ existing machines, not solo-machine households

  • “I don't see thousands of these games being sold I don't see that so like listen all the guys that got really nice collections and fancy homes and have one of these”

    Genghis @ ~18:45 — Expresses skepticism about Multimorphic's addressable market size and volume projections

  • “if it's true with one distro in the U.S. and nothing over here, maybe aiming on stealing some hundreds of this game. I don't know.”

    Genghis @ ~27:15 — European perspective highlighting distribution gap and questioning viability of limited distro model

  • “You've got the screen. You have all of these servos running the plastic shields that come up, the plastic scoops that come up. There's a ball trough all the way in the back of the cabinet with, like, 16 balls in it”

    Don @ ~24:00 — Explains maintenance complexity and capital intensity of Multimorphic platform for operators

  • “And he works with a lot of caravan parks, a lot of RV parks, you know, campgrounds. And he sells some of these to campgrounds and they're like, look, you can have one machine but then every couple days you can switch out the game”

Entities

PortalgameMultimorphiccompanyMerlin's ArcadegameTurner PinballcompanyDeep RootcompanyTexas Pinball Festivalevent

Signals

  • ?

    content_signal: We Are Pinball (WAP) planning Patreon-exclusive real-time coverage from Texas Pinball Festival with hands-on Portal/Merlin's Arcade impressions

    high · Don: 'when Donnie is at TPF while he's there... We're going to hook up, and we're going to make a Patreon-only show... I'm going to interview Donnie while he's there'

  • ?

    business_signal: Multimorphic has severely limited distribution: one U.S. distributor, no European distribution, primarily selling direct

    high · Don: 'there's like one distributor in the U.S.' and Genghis: 'I know no distros in Europe that sell these games. I have never seen a Multimorphic game anywhere'

  • ?

    venue_signal: Only ~10 Weird Al Multimorphic machines on location in entire U.S.; used unit difficult to sell; maintenance complexity and alignment issues (ball pickup risk) make operator ROI questionable

    high · Don: 'We added it up the other day. I think there was like 10 Weird Als in the entire country' and 'if you were looking at this is my business, I need to make money... I don't think that's bringing a ton of people in'

  • $

    market_signal: Portal targets only wealthy collectors with 15+ existing machines; no identified buyers with Portal as sole machine

    high · Don: 'I have not seen one person... that has space for one machine and this is the one that they have' and 'This is going to people that have, you know, 15 games'

  • $

    market_signal: Turner Pinball acquiring Deep Root licenses/designs post-bankruptcy; Merlin's Arcade represents salvaged Deep Root project

Transcript

groq_whisper · $0.230

0:00
with so much drama in the pinball world is wop number 26 back did you heard that rhymed i think don here what's up i'm here with jeng is we're meeting on the eve of the texas pinball festival friends from other borders friends from different mothers but a common love for some solid silver balls man what are you doing buddy oh yeah daddy i'm having so much fun man this is show number 26 can you believe it a wop is back sir yeah we're wop stoppable i mean the last show was like 10 days or something i go usually we take you know three weeks between the show but we needed to do this because you're right on your way to cheese of the people. Frisco, Texas. Yeah. The, the, one of the seminal pinball events of the American calendar is the three day long Texas pinball festival. New games, new people, new perspectives, nude women. It's, it's incredible. I'm assuming I've never, never partaken in that of course, but we'll see what's going on. We're getting finally at long last some new games to play revealed just this week. like normally there's like six new games to go play or something. And it's like, we were like, what's even going to be a TPF this year. And then we got it. We got it. We can talk about portal and talk about Merlin's arcade. Talk about venom accessories, tickling the tendrils. I can't wait.
1:33
And also, also when we're doing this show, but when Donnie is at TPF while he's there, while he's seeing all the new stuff, while he's trying all the new stuff, We're going to hook up, and we're going to make a Patreon-only show and tell all the news what's going on. I'm going to interview Donnie while he's there, hands-on experience. So we're going to make a show for you, Patreon people only. So if you're not a member, jump in and see what's going on. It's on there in a couple of days from now. It's going to be cool. Yeah, dude, the mobile studio is going to be hooked up, and so when I play stuff, when I get into some madness and mayhem, You're going to get an uncensored sneak peek right away, like that day, over on the page of the Patreon, man. Where else would you want to be? Plus, we've got the coolest people over there. Oh, my sweet mother of candy fudge. And we have to thank our guys, Donnie. We have to thank Enzo Ferrari at premium level. Enzo, Enzo, we love you, man. Sweet mother of candy fudge? What the hell? I mean, premium level, man. $50 support is so good. Thank you, Enzo. Love you, buddy. We got Jeremy Ford. I get you. Another $50 supporter at premium level, the Ford Mustang. Oh, Antonio Banderas. Oh, yeah. Give it to him. What a freaking solid run of people. Oh, my goodness. We got Josh Koch, the real velvet. We love you, Josh. Josh, hey, buddy. Josh, I'm going to brush up on that brushed velvet. The velvety smooth voice. What a cool guy. Josh, Joshy. He is the collector edition $150 supporter. We love you, Josh, man. We love you, buddy.

medium confidence · Don: 'If it was included... the price will jump from $5,500 to $6,000 something... stern MSRP right now is $6,000 something. You cannot do that... it will just destroy it, man'

Don @ ~25:30 — Describes niche use case (RV parks/campgrounds) as primary location market for Multimorphic

  • “It's frustrating for me because I really like a lot of what they're doing. A lot of really cool people are doing a lot of good work here, and there's just not a way for me to enjoy it.”

    Genghis @ ~33:00 — Summarizes European frustration: admires technology/design but cannot access product due to lack of distribution and high pricing

    • Ninja Eclipse
    game
    Donperson
    Genghisperson
    Jerryperson
    Ace Gogecompany
    We Are Pinball (WAP)organization
    Weird Al (Multimorphic module)game
    Princess Bridegame
    Final Resistancegame
    Dungeon Door Defendergame
    Sterncompany
    Spooky Pinballcompany
    Flippin' Out Pinballcompany
    Mark Silkperson

    medium · Don: Turner 'was able to scoop in on the auction and pick up a lot of licenses and things' and 'this is a deep root design game from what i heard'

  • $

    market_signal: Portal's premium pricing ($5,500-$6,250 module + $750 topper = $12,500+ complete) creates psychological barrier vs. Stern Pro at $6,000 MSRP

    high · Don: 'If it was included and you said it cost some hundreds more, then the price will jump from $5,500 to $6,000 something... stern MSRP right now is $6,000 something. You cannot do that'

  • ?

    announcement: Merlin's Arcade announced as Turner Pinball's sophomore release after Ninja Eclipse success

    high · Don: 'the day after we got another game... we got Merlin's Arcade... this is a deep root design game from what i heard'

  • ?

    announcement: Portal officially announced as Multimorphic P3 module, available at Texas Pinball Festival

    high · Don: 'under two days ago, we got a brand new game, Portal, from Morty Morphic, P3'

  • ?

    product_strategy: Portal's enhanced version ($5,500) adds only plastic ramps/diverter with same art and layout; ramp mounting on screen creates jiggle/instability issues

    high · Genghis: 'It's basically like buying a topper and put it in the middle of your play field... it's going to jiggle all over the place, and it's going to be kind of wonky'

  • ?

    product_strategy: Portal module storage problem: swapped modules require dedicated plywood storage containers to protect from damage, foot traffic, pet damage; negates 'minimalistic' single-machine value proposition

    high · Genghis: 'doesn't that just destroy the whole idea of minimalistic, not that much space in a home? Because then all those other play fields are taking more storage, more space in your house'

  • ?

    technology_signal: Multimorphic flipper design introduces measurable lag (2-3ms) due to remote coil linkage under screen; flippers described as 'feeling like puppet show on sticks'

    high · Genghis: 'It's almost like they took the lag that you have with virtual pinball and brought it over to real pinball' and 'just an extra little couple of milliseconds it feels like'

    • 3:24
    I think it's the top Euro shout-out, the $150 one. Oh, yeah, Josh. Oh, the collector's edition gets the extra, extra one. I love it. Oh, wait. We have another collector's edition supporter, man. We got Charles Angels, man. Now, what other pinball show has a rogues gallery as awesome as this, man?
    3:49
    It's so, oh, we have a new supporter also. We have to thank him also, Donnie. Let's go. Oh, my sweet mother. Look at this. We got Robert Gagnon.
    4:01
    Get in here, sir. Get in here. Take a bow. Yeah, Robert, welcome to the team, buddy. We really appreciate it. Nice to have you on the WAP team. W-A-P, buddy. Yeah. So cool. Welcome, welcome, welcome. Tony, it's going well? I would say, dude. Show number 26. More and more listeners. And as far as... More support on Patreon. What more could we ask for? Even more. Now, I will tell you this. It feels like Pinball 2025 is starting, like, right now, especially with this week. I know we got the Avatar CEs that we're finally playing with. We got the D&Ds out there. The Dragon Fires have been put out. But we're getting fire drops coming. Oh, March Madness. I love it. Yeah, let's go. The weather's just going to keep heating up. And, yeah, we're kicking off the show season. You know, between now and Expo, we're going to see a ton of fun stuff. And, like, all brand new stuff. I can't wait. So many new companies. So many games. Bring it. Let's jump into it. So, like, under two days ago, we got a brand new game, Portal, from Morty Morphic, P3. Yeah, I still don't know what the company is and what the product is. I don't know if it's the multimorphic P3 system or it's P3's multimorphic system or P3's transgenic whatever is going on. What I know is I don't have one. I know they're really heavy. I know that I have fun playing their games, and I don't see them a ton on location. Dude, you have played their games? Every single one of them. Consider yourself lucky. I know no distros in Europe that sell these games. I have never seen a Multimorphic game anywhere. So I have, I mean, last time on Patreon, you and I talked about our listeners' feedback. They loved when we talked about pinball. We had hands-on experience. I unbox all the new games for the last many, many years on my YouTube channel. So I have hands-on experience with all these games I review. You get invited to the different factories. You have hands-on experience. So when we do a review, we have played it. It's not just from a YouTube video. So this time with Multimorphic, I haven't got the hands-on experience, so my review will be pretty limited. But yours will be better. Mine will be better. This is a factory I have not been invited to.
    6:28
    But you have tried their games, right? I've tried every one of them, yeah. Yeah, so let me cover the basics here of what the multimorphic system is. Okay, so you walk up to this thing, and two-thirds of the play field, the lower two-thirds, are like a virtual pinball machine. There's a high-fidelity screen there with plexiglass over it. And then just beyond that, you've got these six scoop cups that come up. They look like Altoid containers. They're made out of plexiglass. They function as a glass wall for certain battles you can have on the screen. And they pop up and drop. They can move different ways. every game has the ability to use them they're not really used in every single game but generally for the main modules they come into play beyond that you've got the back third of the cabinet and this is the replaceable part where you have a mini play field usually tiered with upper play fields and stuff and you drop this thing in and it contains the software to run that game so the idea behind this is you have one cabinet that you can buy which is i don't know like eight or nine grand and then the games are anywhere between like $2,700 up to $5,500, and then you can swap them in. They're not the easiest thing to swap in. It's kind of heavy. It's all the way in the back of the cabinet. If the game's in a lineup, you've got to pull it out. But the idea is there that you can invest in one cabinet and swap out the play fields, right? They also have this infrared grid system over the screen that can track the ball in an XY coordinate. So you can theoretically have graphics that interact with the ball as it's rolling around, which is kind of neat. I haven't seen it implemented in a great way because it's still the interface is not truly like one-to-one, like right there. It feels a little bit laggy, smashing virtual spiders on the screen. But I mean, it's there if you're creative enough to find a cool way to use it.
    8:15
    So you're saying that if a guy only has room for one pinball machine in his house, this should be a good example, right? That's what you're saying. It will be an example. All right, good. That's up to the beholder. Now, I've been in homes. The people that have owned this machine, they all seem to like it. Okay. So how many games can you buy for this multimorphic system right now? So they'll advertise that there's like 25 or 27 games. Now, you've got the modules, and besides that, you can also download titles to play on there, like digitally add them to the different modules. The best one I played was Dungeon Door Defender. And this is like a tower defense kind of role-playing-ish game. It takes place mainly on the screen but uses the interactive bits, the stand-up targets, the ramps, and the flippers and slings and things for points. So just because you have that one game, whatever it is, Heist, Weird Al, Princess Bride, now Portal, or Final Resistance being the top titles that they have. um you can also play like those games or you can play these downloaded titles on that module to give yourself a different kind of gameplay system right and these things can be like 100 bucks 200 bucks or something so for pinball a nominal fee like the price of a testicle shooter rod you can get yourself a downloadable title right so so you live in a small apartment in new york very expensive and you have room for one game or you're like us here in europe we were we us in europe we We're very minimalistic, so only plays for one game. Okay, so I bought this game, and I bought 11 one-third play fields. So I want to change from one game to another. Okay, I check out the weird L, and I put in this new portal. So what do I do with the one I just took out? Because it has got coils beneath. Does it have a big box, security box you put it in? What do you do with the old play field now? You can put it in the shipping container that it came to you in, like that box. I've seen other people get cabinets that have been custom built that they can store these things in. Most people, if they have one or two of these modules, they'll probably just stick it under the machine. It's got some legs on it so it can stand and not damage the coils too much, but it's going to be out and exposed to the elements. Your dog is going to come by and pee on it. So, like, you really should have some kind of plywood container to put this thing in so it's secured. No one's going to step on it or drop it, kick it over, or stub your freaking toe, man. You ever kick a coil?
    10:55
    Don't get me wrong, but doesn't that just destroy the whole idea of minimalistic, not that much space in a home? Because then all those other play fields are taking more storage, more space in your house. So the idea? The idea is good, but if you start kind of looking into it, that's when things kind of fall apart a bit, right? Because the whole idea was, yes, you make this huge investment of like $13,000 for like a complete machine, all top end with the topper and everything. But then after that huge investment, then you only pay $2,500, $3,500, and you have a brand new pinball machine. I did that $5,500 a minute ago. That's what I'm saying. And once you start looking into it, if you want the good version of Portal, because why would you not, $5,500 now for a one-third playfield module. And we didn't even talk about the flippers. Have you looked at the playfield, like how this thing actually works? Yeah, it looks different. But wait, so they got a huge price increase now. Yes, absolutely. Yeah, I think you're at the mid-$3,000s for just the main module of Portal. But what they did, people complained, like, look, yeah, it's a new game, but it's only one-third of a new game. The rest of it's just the same screen that every game has, the same bottom. Nothing's different. You know, no up posts, none of that. And they're like, well, we're going to bring some ramps down closer to the mid-play field, closer to the player, right? So there's now an add-on module to the module to make it more like a regular pinball machine. And they're bringing the price more like a regular pinball machine. and you already have to deal with the space that these things are going to take up. So kind of like where are we? Where are we? Okay, so get a bit bigger play field for $5,500? The play field is the same size, but you get these extra plastic ramps that you can plug into the sides of the middle part over the screen. Okay. The art and everything, is that the same on the $2,000 more expensive one? Yeah, it's plastics. It's plastics. It's basically like buying a topper and put it in the middle of your play field and you get a couple of extra ramps and I think a diverter or a ball lock or something. Okay. But – I mean, we are up there. We are at Sturm Pro level prices, man. Yeah, I know. I understand $2,500, but $5,500?
    13:11
    And how much does this cost? If I buy this with Weird Al, what did you say, $10,000 or what? That limited version was $13,000 if you want the accordion topper, which is pretty cool. Otherwise, it's around $11,000, $12,000 to get the full thing. Although used market, I've seen them for like seven, eight for the whole thing. Oh, okay. So there's a lot of angles to this thing. Now, the games are fun to play. Okay. They do play a little bit different. Part of that's because they've got very unique flippers, right? Because you've got the screen, and that's one of the main benefits of this thing is you can change the layout of all this graphics on the bottom two-thirds of the play field. But you have an LCD screen down there, an LED screen, and so you can't put flipper coils through that. So you have to put the coils in the apron, and then you have to build these arms that go out to the actual flippers. And so the whole thing is like playing a puppet show on sticks with the slings and the flippers.
    14:12
    Oh, God. How powerful is the flippers? Because all the shots are at the back one-third, at the backside. Are they powerful? They're powerful enough. They're okay. You know, they're not as responsive as, you know, Stern being kind of the gold standard. Spooky's getting close to there. JJP took a huge leap forward. But they feel like, I don't know, you know, American pinball flippers feel okay. They feel okay. Okay. But it's just the linkage is kind of weird, you know, because it's just an extra little couple of milliseconds it feels like, you know. It's almost like they took the lag that you have with virtual pinball and brought it over to real pinball. Oh, no. Don't talk about virtual pinball lag. It just, oh, my goodness. I don't like that.
    14:54
    Yeah. So who in our pinball, you know, 40 to 60-year-old men, who is interested in portal? Who's going to buy this? Here's the thing. I don't know anybody that has one of these in their home where this is the only game that they have. This is going to people that have, you know, 15 games. You know, they've got everything. You know, they have a Fathom Mermaid edition at one end. Okay, then they have one of these, right? Those are the kind of people I've seen that have these in their home, like people that really have kind of top-end collections where they really do have everything. Then they get one of these too. So people with money and space are the ones that have these. And, yeah, I mean, if I've got 25 games and this is one of them, I'm going to like it just fine. I'm never going to get to play it because I've got 25 other things to play. But when I do, I have fun with it, right? I have not seen one person. They may be out there. but one person that has space for one machine and this is the one that they have.
    15:54
    I mean, listen, if you had a New York apartment, wouldn't you get like a top-end Jersey Jack machine and just have a showpiece for like – I have one machine at home and it's this thing that's – this spectacle, right? I would buy a theme that I just love. Yeah, yeah, yeah. I mean either you get a diner and trick it out like a museum restoration quality Valley Williams game. It's like your aesthetic, you know, or you're just going to fill your house with tons of games, right? So, you know, I don't know. Marketing-wise, if you've got space for one, you've got tons of games with this variety. It's great. But then in actuality, does it really happen?
    16:34
    So are they limited in numbers? Oh, you know, let me pop over to NAP. I didn't even see that because they do have this $5,500 top edition. No, no. That's the other thing, man. It doesn't even come with the topper. The topper is $750 on top of the $5,500 if you want to get the good game that's got everything. So you're really like $6,700? Is that right? That can't be right. Donnie, do you know why the topper is not included?
    17:04
    Because if it was included and you said it cost some hundreds more, then the price will jump from $5,500 to $6,000 something. And you know what? stern MSRP right now is $6,000 something. So here. You cannot do that. That's just psychologically, it will just destroy it, man. So here. If you're the guy with the apartment, you want one game, you want the good version, $12,500 not limited, plus $750 for a stacked plastic topper that looks exactly like what Spooky is including for free with their $10,000 games. What is going on here oh no how did this how did this go sideways we haven't even talked about the game itself yet this is just like the concept we're gonna get into that i ask you who's gonna buy this who do you know that plays portal today i mean or is interested in portal i mean i i i'd like portal i just downloaded it again i haven't played it since 2007 i played through half of it the other night and it's fun like i dig it um it's a cool game and having a ball disappear on one side of the play field and show up somewhere else like that's cool that's fun and when we get into the layout this looks really fun um i love the way you're saying it's a 20 year old game it's cool it's fun but you can hear it in your voice would you pay 13 500 for this absolutely absolutely not what are you are you crazy you could have what i'm talking about listen i don't care if it's ferraris or blondes you know if they cost too much i don't care how attractive it is i just I'm not interested at that point, you know. And so I haven't seen my level of enthusiasm match the asking price for something like this. I thought all of these games cost like $2,000, $2,500. And the base pinball, I don't know. Again, as I said, I know no distros over here in Europe, and I have never seen these games. I have no knowledge and no interest to be honest Everything virtual pinball I don care for it For I would expect to have this game with a regular play field get rid of the screen and the pill boxes and just put it in a cabinet let me buy $99 art blades, and let me buy the topper, and let me have a whole machine with flippers that directly connect to the coils one-to-one.
    19:25
    But that doesn't exist. They don't make that. There's no arcade edition of Portal. You've got to spend the price of a Stern Pro and cram it at the back third of your play field. I don't see thousands of these games being sold I don't see that so like listen all the guys that got really nice collections and fancy homes and have one of these and have all the modules and don't have problems with storing the modules in space they've already put their deposit and they're getting portal because of course they are you know yeah is that in thousands how many people is that hmm is it even 500 I don't know Yeah, yeah. I mean, that's who's going to get it. Do you know the name of the owner of this company? Yeah, his name's Jerry. I've talked to him before. He probably doesn't even know who I am, and that's probably a good thing. If I was Jerry and I had this kind of technology and I had this assembly line and everything, I would directly copy Stern Pro and just make this game as a Stern Pro. That's it? These games have a lot of technology and innovation in them. You know, you've got the screen. You have all of these servos running the plastic shields that come up, the plastic scoops that come up. There's a ball trough all the way in the back of the cabinet with, like, 16 balls in it because some games have, like, crazy multi-balls. So you have to have all that stuff. So, like, there's a lot in there, but there's a lot in there that requires maintenance, right? I mean, every pinball machine needs maintenance. This thing has a lot of kind of maintenance-heavy things. You know, servos, the plastic screen or the plexiglass that's over the screen itself that can get scratched that may need to be replaced. They're not the easiest. They're very heavy. I don't have a lot of experience maintaining these things. But, like, I would be, you know, given the market and if I'm an operator, I don't know that this is what I would choose to put out on location and just hope it runs well and doesn't need much more than servicing every week, you know. You have visited many locations. Yes. Have you seen one of them out there earning $1 each game? Have you seen this on location? I've seen it at two locations, okay, and Ace Goge in Van Nuys, California. They're in Los Angeles, like a legendary place with top-end machines. You know, I've seen one there. There's a mall arcade in Madison, Wisconsin that had a Weird Al on location. You know, so I've seen them at like a couple of places like that. We added it up the other day. I think there was like 10 Weird Als in the entire country of the U.S. that are on location, and there's like five or six of some other ones. There's a distributor that like they have like one distributor in the U.S. and he's this guy that sells trailers and storage lockers and stuff. And he works with a lot of caravan parks, a lot of RV parks, you know, campgrounds. And he sells some of these to campgrounds and they're like, look, you can have one machine but then every couple days you can switch out the game and your campers can have something different to play. And like that seems to kind of work, you know, if it's like a dusty campground and, you know, just something else to go play.
    22:28
    But I don't know that, you know, this would be – if you were looking at this is my business, I need to make money, you know, an $11,000 investment for the cheap version of Portal just to be able to say, hey, we also have Princess Bride occasionally when I get there to swap it out. I don't think that's bringing a ton of people in. Does your distro sell this game? No, no. As far as I know, there's only like – well, so I think that they may be able to work out kind of deals, But as far as official distributors, I only know of the one guy. Like he's the guy that shows up at shows. Oh, I thought you just meant there was this guy doing this. But you meant there is one U.S. distro? Yeah, I think so. Otherwise, everything is direct. But I've seen flipping out post ads, I think, if you want the – actually, I don't know. I don't know if he's officially a distributor or not. Oh, Zach doesn't sell these. No, no, no. I know he had a Weird Al, and it may have just been that one machine. Yeah, he take in used games, you know. Yeah, but I guess he had a hard time moving that weird owl. And the frustrating thing is, you know, you've got the plexiglass over the screen. You have all those plastic boxes that jump up and down. And, like, there's an interface. There's a line for every part of that. And if it gets misaligned, the ball is not going to track right, and that's going to need to be fine-tuned and adjusted. You know, if one of the plexiglass walls is a little out of alignment, then there's going to be a ball pickup right there, you know. And that plastic is at the end of the screen, right? So it's on all the games. Well, it's at the end of the screen. It's at the end of the plastic flap. It's at the end of the plastic box where the module comes in. So there's like three areas where, you know. And we had a lot of problems with air balls just on Jaws' lower play – or the fin, you know. Just that alone was causing problems for people if it wasn't fine-tuned. So, like, and it seems like this costs a lot more to do this when if you just had a regular play field and you're like, look, we have the P3 version right here. you can also buy the arcade version that's just like a stern pro and throw it in your location and then because because this game this game looks really fun princess bride is really fun to play i love weird al although the game came off a little like cringy even for al um final resistance is fantastic i'd love to just play i'd love to play a final resistance cabinet uh next to a total nuclear annihilation next to a rick and morty and just have the denise trio you know look look final resistance looked cool sounded awesome and this game if you just dissect the game the back one third of the of the play field the ball is flying in the air okay it gets it's getting the portal from one area to the next area ram shots look cool it flies up and shoots the back side of the play field, the game actually looks awesome. When I saw the video, I was like, I want to try this. I really, really want to try this. So there's nothing wrong there. It looks good. But there's just so much else. On top of that, I tried this game, the PC game, for like 20 years ago. Usually you play Halo. You have Cortana, this beautiful, sexy lady's voice that you love to listen to her. but this game had this male-functioning female robot that was so irritating voice in the game. Is that the call-out of the game, of this Pinball Machines game? Do you think so? So that's the other thing. They got Mark Silk to do voices. I haven't played Portal 2, and I think this little robotic assistant guy might be from Portal 2, but they hired Mark Silk, who's like a great voice actor. They got the lady that did Gladys' voice. Now, Portal, when it came out, felt very much like an indie kind of game. Like, it was word of mouth. Like, hey, this is, like, something totally different than all the zombie shooters we have right now. You know, it's like it's a puzzle game with action, and it's unsettling, you know, and it took off, right? And it was popular. And so, like, I dig that. It was different. Yeah, but, like, this isn't Call of Duty, right, you know? Oh, no, no. It's not a theme I would – I mean, I think it's a cheap theme to buy today, but it's not something I could choose. I mean, I would choose. It's probably the best way to use Portal in a pinball machine. Now, you might say maybe you shouldn't even do that to begin with, and you can have an argument for that. I think it's cool, and it looks like a really great Portal game. I just wish it was in a regular cabinet. Yeah, there is nothing wrong with the design. Shots and layout looks so fun, so cool. I enjoyed all the shots. I love those air balls when it's meant to be air balls. Looks so awesome. But, yeah, I mean, if it's true with one distro in the U.S. and nothing over here, maybe aiming on stealing some hundreds of this game. I don't know. They got the jump ramp to the Iron Maiden target, but then the balls fall, and that's the physical ball lock. And when you knock the weighted companion cube into the portal, it activates the other one as the ball diverter to lock those balls there. Like, that's really cool, man. Awesome. Yeah, yeah. So let's see. Do you know anything about – we don't know if it's only one distro. It's hard to get info that way. Yeah, and I think with this company, they can sell everything direct and not have that distro margin. So that's probably working for them. But you've got to get the game with the extra ramps. Why would you not want them? But then the problem is this mid-ramp on the right that's on a diverter that pops up and down. When it comes down, it's resting on the screen, so there's nothing to fix that in place. So when you hit this plastic ramp, it's going to jiggle all over the place, and it's going to be kind of wonky. You know, like when I play Mandalorian Pro on location, and the screws need to be tightened on that plastic ramp, and it just kind of janks around. Like that's what this was looking like in the video. So I really can't wait to play it. It's just I wish I could play it in my home in a regular cabinet.
    28:25
    Yeah, yeah. But, again, we think it will be a TPF, right? Yeah, I guess they're going to have three of these. Yeah. You will play this in a couple of days, and we will make a Patreon-only show, and you're going to tell your experience with this. It's going to be awesome. Absolutely. I can't wait to play it, man.
    28:47
    It's frustrating for me because I really like a lot of what they're doing. A lot of really cool people are doing a lot of good work here, and there's just not a way for me to enjoy it.
    28:57
    So P3, congratulations. the design shots on layout looks awesome and yeah donnie cannot wait to play it and we're gonna talk more about your game yes sir yes so the day after we got another game yeah this was awesome it was rumored to be like another company dropping a game and everybody's thinking barrels of fun's got to be the one it's got to be dune maybe fifth element who knows but probably dune um is it going to be old dune new dune we don't know is it going to be goonies and they're going to surprise us and then like no it wasn't them i was hearing whispers that turner pinball right the guy behind ninja eclipse the the i forget like he's like a he's an awesome like i don't know if he's like a software engineer a pcb builder electrical he's told me nine times and i keep i just look at him and he's just like a wizard boy but he was doing work for for deep root and then kind of got out of there but was able to scoop in on the auction and pick up a lot of licenses and things. And so he put his own company together, launched an original design, not a Deep Root design, Ninja Eclipse, came out with 100 versions, sold them out. He's over halfway through the build and so ready for the next game. And this is something that apparently was in development back with Deep Root and he knows the people associated with it, created it, and said, you know, I really want to have this game see the light of day. And so for the sophomore release, we got Merlin's Arcade. so this is a deep root design game from what i heard this is probably like one of the things that was in development and i don't i don't know how how far it ever got along but when it was revealed i was like this does seem familiar i've heard i think whispers of this but it may have just been like this is a rumored title for the future i don't know if it was ever a you know maybe they got to whitewood phase maybe it got to art i don't know actually when you're saying like that i think years back i saw this list was with like 15 18 games and i actually saw something with medieval i remember now yeah yeah but it's like is that just a throwaway placeholder or is an actual concept there was no way to know yeah yeah no no so as you said they made these ninja eclipse and sold all hundred of them awesome and the price was just under stern pro and i just loved it. I don't remember how much, but $6,000 something, something, right? Under $7,000. Awesome stuff. So this game looks like it has got, I haven't watched almost nothing about this, but it feels like it has got more stuff on the play field than the Ninja game. And is the price still under $7,000? That's just pure awesomeness. So, yeah, there's two price points. There's the $7,000 price, and then there's just under $9,000 for, I think it's called the Legendary Edition. Oh, okay. So there's an extra limited edition version? Yeah, so he's doing what he calls the Arcade version, which is just kind of a base one, and then for $2,000 more, $7,000, $8,000, yeah. Yeah, so under $7,000 for the Arcade, under $9,000 for the Legendary. Oh, under $9,000. He's doing 500 Legendaries. He's going to start shipping them summer, so soon, which is amazing. Oh, so he took the jump from, 100 total to 500 LEs plus the arcade versions. Unlimited, yeah, yeah. Whoa, what a jump! That's a jump. Did we expand the factory? Probably not, but I think it's a situation where it's like there will be no more than 500 of these ever, you know. But 100 to 500 games is a huge jump, Donnie. Yeah, so he was probably thinking, you know, 200, I don't want to limit myself too much, you know. because he could build legendary editions for a couple of years here based on demand.
    32:50
    But what do you pick, 300? Do you pick 250? He settled on 500. Now, are we going to see 500 of them made in the next year and a half? And then probably, I don't think so, but he'll build to demand.
    33:02
    But yeah, I'm not— Do you think it will sell for under—I mean, I feel a bit sad about this, because I was like, this is aimed just under Storm Pro, which is awesome pricing, you know, because when us in Europe, when we buy a Stern Pro, we pay the Stern premium price. Oh, yeah. Yeah, that's our issue. So, yeah, it's a $10,000 game for us. Now you're saying there is another version, much more expensive, and it jumps from $100,000 limited to $500,000. Yeah, and this is coming right at the Stern premium price is where the top-end one is labeled. So the difference is, though, there's a physical ball lock mechanism that's not going to be in the arcade version that is in the LE. It comes with Invisiglass, which is kind of nice to have. That's nice, yeah. It'll be yellow powder-coated on the hinges, the armor, and the legs.
    33:54
    And there's RGB lights and I think maybe an upgraded sound system. And a launch button. But they both come with a launch button. But there's no fancy shooter rod. And that costs $2,000 more. $2,000 more, yeah. Oh, and a topper. You get a topper, too. Layered plastics.
    34:11
    Yeah, so not a bad value taking all that into consideration, I think. Okay. It's going to come down to does the gameplay seem to be compelling or not.
    34:21
    Do we know any coders? I mean, do we know anything about this? Good question. I think Brad Albright is doing the art. He's done a lot of other art for other machines, too. He did Ninja Eclipse, I believe. Correct me if I'm wrong, Internet and Chat. He didn't do the art for Looney Tunes. Wait, am I thinking – which Brad am I thinking of here? Because there's a Brad that did, like, the Motorhead art, and then there's the Brad that did Ninja Eclipse, and I think that's the Brad that also did Looney Tunes, and that might be the same guy.
    34:52
    I'm going to know here pretty soon. Okay, so follow-up episode. I'll have this confirmed because, like, I haven't had time to – this just dropped yesterday, and so I haven't had time to go through every single thing. I did listen to Kerry Hardy's interview last night, the live stream, with Chris Turner where they went over everything. I listened to the last hour or so of it. I had to run and pick up another game, so I was listening in the car.
    35:14
    But, yeah, so there's a new game out. It's called Merlin's Arcade. That's what the price is for it. Want to go over the layout? My knowledge of this game is an hour ago I actually recorded a video on my YouTube channel, Retro Jango, and I saw Carol Harder's video, and I just fast-forwarded to where they show the game. So I, you know, saw five minutes of this game. That's it. I didn't listen to anything, what they said. But I'm pretty sad about the game launch, Donnie. I have a lot of questions. A couple of days ago, listen to this part. It's on my video, so check out my video. It will be out in a couple of hours. I have to edit it. But, you know, a couple of days ago, we get portal release. Look at that video, that three-minute clip. Awesome video, right? Because you use at least a year of your life. You use a lot of money, research, build it. You do all of this and release it with an interview on a live YouTube show. That's a fail. I'm sorry. I mean, so the portal video, all the infos there, bam, bam, bam, in your face in two, three minutes.
    36:27
    Turner, you need to do the same. As soon as this dropped, I had a lot of questions, and just seeing the photos and the write-up wasn't answering them. And I couldn't even find an actual picture of the whole play field itself so I can see what the layout was. And so I managed to reach out to Chris. I knew he was super busy yesterday, but he managed to text me a photo that he had of the whole play field. I shared that around, and it's on App Arcade now. It's everywhere. But, like, that's what I needed. Like, here's our game. The first thing I want to see is what's the layout, and I couldn't find it. Chris, that's his name? Turner? Chris Turner, yeah. Yeah. Chris Turner, dear friend, if you're listening, contact Zach. Pay him. Two-minute video clip, just like JJP, just like Spooky. I mean, make an awesome, kick-ass intro video. Show with the camera what's going on on the play field, what's going on with the ball traces. Zach knows everything. He does the best edit in the world in the pinball industry. do that and this is not to be an a-hole. This is not criticism or what's it called. This is just for helping you out. Yeah, call anybody that's local would come down and at least shoot some photos and play some game and then could drop something right then like, hey, here's a first-person perspective of what this game is like. We've seen anybody can have a bad launch. John Wick was awful.
    37:54
    I like that they got the influencers, but the first time I was seeing gameplay of John Wick, it was like from a 45 degree angle of somebody's iPhone standing there to the side. It's like, game's released, I'm trying to make decisions on if I want to put down a deposit or not. If I'm getting it, I want to get it soon, so I want to be early in the list. I need to make a decision right now, but you not giving me enough information I don feel good Exactly I mean I always rooting for the new small companies So this Turner pinball I rooting for them But this launch was as bad as that Alice launch It was also on – this has nothing to do with Kerry Hardy. Leave him out of it. But it was the same kind of amateur launch. It just doesn't work. We need you to directly copy Stern. When Stern releases, two-minute clip, bam. And at the end of the video, this many limited, this many shots, bam, bam, bam, bam, bam. That's what we need. That's how you sell games. Not all that all live interview. Do that afterwards. That's what we need, but that's also what the distributor needs because people are going to call them, And they need to be able to respond with like, oh, here's – there's five main shots off of both flippers. Here's the mechanisms that are going to require maintenance. And it's like if they don't even know, how are they going to be able to help those customers?
    39:19
    I saw earlier today – I saw Zach from Flippin' Out. He put out these pictures. He's a distro for Turner Pinball. So he put up a couple of pictures, and I saw it first there, and I was like, Zach, where's the kick-ass video? And he was like, well, I know about this same time as you guys, and this is the info that I got. I was like, no, this is not happening.
    39:48
    I mean, you know what I mean. Yeah, you have to be secretive with your product and pinball, I guess. You don't want stuff coming out. You don't want to kill the hype.
    39:56
    But he hired Zach to make Guns N' Roses. When you're a couple weeks out from launch, man, it's time to start bringing people in, get some NDAs signed, and get some media generated so you can just punch the market with your launch and get those day one sales, man. Like, do what Stern does. That's it. Nothing negativity. Just for helping you out, Turner. Helping, what are they called, the Ellis guys? Dutch Pinball Experience. Dutch Pinball Extreme. Yeah. Just for helping out. Just make awesome videos, and that's it. So, are we going to buy this game? So I'm going to play this game this weekend. Oh, nice. It's going to be a TPF also? It's going to be a TPF, I heard, yeah. I'm going to interview you again and ask about this game also on our Patreon show. I'm not running to turn in a deposit yet. I don't have all the information yet. It would be irresponsible of me to do that. I think the presentation of this looks fine. I like the Invisiglass. Bold choice with yellow powder coat. It doesn't get pulled off very well very often. Simpsons Pinball Party. They tried it on the LE version of Avengers. Maybe it works, maybe it doesn't. But you don't see it a whole lot. And this one, I'll have to see it in person. Do we know about, are the games in boxes ready to ship out? Good question. I'll find out.
    41:21
    That's important. The only thing I've seen officially is Summer 2025. He's going to be shipping the Legendary Editions first, maybe like 100 of those, and the arcade will come later. Oh, no. Oh, another fail. You never launch games like that. Never. Again, copy stuff. Have games in boxes ready to ship out. This would wait, wait, wait. It just doesn't. You just got your avatar. The next game is right around the corner. I know. You just got your D&D. The next game, it doesn't work. It doesn't work like that anymore. Not in this climate, man. Chris has a young company, and the boy needs to buy parts. and so the boys need some funds to get some parts going. I will say, you know, now, I don't think it's – I'm listening.
    42:09
    Haggis, right? Holy shit. Yeah, don't do that. But I know at least Mad Pinball, this guy does have distributors. Mad Pinball will guarantee your deposit if the game ends up never coming out. So that's kind of – it's a $1,000 deposit. Oh, don't get me wrong. It has got nothing to do with that. It's not like you can – you don't get – I'm only – I don't want to get locked into a game and see something better come out in two months and my money's tied up in this and I don't have my game yet. By the time I get it, I don't care. Cough, cough, Pulp Fiction Limited Edition.
    42:41
    Exactly. That's not two months. That's over a year of waiting time. It just doesn't work anymore, man. We need to do like, you know, JJP, they have games in boxes now.
    42:56
    Bam, they release just like Stern. showed the game, released the game, built like 15, built 20 of these games. Look at Spooky. Spooky is not a small company anymore, but, you know, December, here is our game. Who will ship it January? What happened January? Bam, here are your games. Bam, Johnny got his game. Everybody showed it online. That's how we do it. Remember Labyrinth? They unveiled it at Chicago's Pinball Expo. They had 10 of them, and they were already pre-sold, But at least they were like games were going out to locations. Berrios Barbecue Challenge did that. And I think this is why we're not seeing another Barrels of Fun game right now because they're not quite ready. And so otherwise they'd have a new game out soliciting deposits for a game that's three months away from being built. Barrels did it the right way. From the get-go, it feels like, okay, I think you were the one that said these guys were at Spooky. I don't remember now. But it just felt like this company has got some pinball experience. You know what I mean? So it was so good. Okay, the game that launched had nothing to do with my theme interest. But the next game, Dune, I love it.
    44:11
    Rumored Dune, I'm so sorry. Yeah. I love it because if it's the new ones, it's cool. If it's the old ones, it's cool. If it's the PC games, it's cool. Also, I love that Bennett-Jeseret will, so I cannot wait, man. I just hope there's no U-turn Rams. Oh, my God, I hate U-turn Rams. Our friends at Loser Kids just ears perked up when you said Deseret, so that's funny. All right, if you know, you know. Deseret. Should we go over this Merlin game here, layout? This looks like a very much back third game, back third of the play field game. And, like, I have questions. The concept, right, Merlin's Arcade, is this in the Middle Ages? in Camelot and they decided to have an arcade with basketballs and stuff? Or is this a 1980s arcade with a Camelot theme and the teenage employees are dressed up like Lancelot and playing skee-ball with everybody? I have no idea. Both ideas sound awesome. Right? If it's running on an arcade machine, it's cool. Yeah, because there's an arcade machine in here. So if this is like a 1980s arcade, let's go in there and play these games with this really kind of campy kind of crappy cringy uh medieval theme left over like that could be fun man and there's like a there's like a foosball guy that's an actual spinner like that's fun there's only one ramp in the whole game that's not fun where's the other ramp at there's four pop bumpers up the middle there's two spinners uh there's a physical ball lock on the legendary which is a diverter that pops up on the ramp that knocks balls into a subway. Eh.
    45:45
    Eh. Yeah. It's got the upper left flipper just like an 8-ball deluxe that shoots the stand-up targets. Yeah. On 8-ball deluxe, it's drop-downs. It's much more fun. But it's placed like that. It's okay. Do we need eight stand-up targets in a row? Like, that's Pony Factory level. Come on. I want drop targets and then something behind there I can access. On 8-Ball Deluxe, those drop targets, they're really fun to shoot, Donnie. But stand-up targets, I don't know, they re-accelerate the ball, and it's almost the whole right side of the play field.
    46:20
    I'm thinking ACDC Pro when I see stuff like that. What if it was like a shooting gallery, and when you hit it, the drop target has a little monkey on it that drops out of the way, and then there's something behind there to interact with? I think that would be fun. We have got Evil Dead that has got – okay, it's on the left side, But, you know, you shoot there, it opens up, goes into the hand. I mean, the price is about the same when you say they have got the swimming edition for what was it, just under, yeah, about $9,000. Imagine if there was another wire ramp that would go to a sling flipper situation where the ball could sit on top of that flipper, and then when you're ready, drop it, go right into the drop targets. Oh, that would be fun.
    47:00
    But to be honest, it's their second game. When I saw this design, I was like, I want to play this game. It wasn't like, ew, what's going on? I want to play this. When I saw all that meat on Berrio's barbecue, I was like, I don't want to see this game. Right? That's how I felt. But this Merlin game, I was like, I want to try it out. I want to test this game. For sure. Okay. Right? That spinner guy looks cool. Merlin is moving. There is this knight on top of the pop bumper. I think he will shake. So, yeah, it feels like it has got some toys in it. Now, I don't know if the cheaper version removes those toys. Yes, there will be flat plastics on the cheaper version. See, again, make a video, pro version and early version. Bam, bam, bam, bam, bam, bam. Thank you, ma'am. That's what we need. Not two-hour talk on a live video. That doesn't work. I don't have two hours to sit and watch. I can listen to a podcast, but I cannot sit down and watch a live stream for two hours. I just don't have the time for it. I'm sorry. I need a video to go to my wife so when I blow the kids' college money on a toy, I can say, look what I got. And if I'm just showing her a two-hour live stream with a podcast or a couple of knuckleheads, she's going to be even more mad at me, right? You got to help me help myself here to get your game.
    48:32
    Yes. Oh, people are writing that I'm laughing too much. That's because you guys are not seeing what I'm seeing when Donnie makes these beautiful face expressions, laughs, and makes some crazy stuff. That's why I'm laughing, guys. Donnie, stop that.
    48:50
    This guy is crazy. This guy. Donnie, when Stern released the video for Venom, It had awesome rock music. And it said, like, do something and change the game. When I saw that intro, I was like, we're going to buy this game. Oh, my sweet mother of candleflies. It was such a powerful expression. What did it say? Change the character, change the game or something like that. Yeah, that was it. And something was moving. It was so cool. And I unboxed the first pro in the world. And now? Your flipper button wasn't attached.
    49:29
    Check out the video. Oh, man, oh, man, oh, man, oh, man. How could that get through the quality control? I have no idea. Well, I'm a solo guy too. Like I try to run a little media empire here, and I miss deadlines left and right. Things are never as cool as I envision them. And so I get it that he's probably running at 110%, and it's just that's a lot of work to try to get all these things together. And then the guy's got TPF coming up. He wants to launch this game. There's a deadline. It's rushing towards him. And it's like, I've got to get this out. But, yeah, it all comes down to those little details with launches. It happens. So the Venom. The Venom game. Let's jump over to Venom. First, say congratulations to Chris Turner. We hope you sell all these games this weekend. Truly from my heart, I hope so. So, yeah, cool. Venom. We got the accessories. We got accessory kits. We got topper. We got everything. Do you know what we got? We got one-minute video clip showing, explaining everything. Everything. Thank you, man. Yes. So I just listened to Don's Pinball Podcast latest show. Guys, you need to check out this guy's podcast show because here is Donnie. On Patreon, he's Donnie 2.0. But on his own personal pinball podcast show, he talks about this Venom accessory kit, the Shooter Rod. He talks for 10 minutes how much it reminds me of male genitalia.
    51:06
    Balls, balls, balls, Donnie. Donnie's so excited for 10 minutes, Donnie. Let's talk about these Venom balls. Do you like them so much? Okay, you want to skip right to the Shooter Rod? Because I've got a lot to say about it. I want to start with the shooter up first. What do you think about that ball? $199. And what they did was they took the Venom symbiote goo with its tendrils coming out, and it looks veiny. Very much they borrow a lot from biology with the world of Venom and things. So the plate, the housing that goes over the body part. Wait, wait, wait. Stop doing this with your hands, touching a ball all the time. It's disturbing. I was a little bit itchy. So I swear, they borrowed a lot from the blood vessels of a placenta going out, and I love it. It's like alien. It's gross. It's human but applied in a weird way. And then you have that round orb. It looks to be the same size as the Jurassic Park mosquito amber, which feels great in the hand with the extra textural bits that feel like engorged veins around a testicle. I love it. And I was inspired, right? They just released this yesterday. Why do you love it? I released this yesterday, and I'm like, I got to do more. I got to make a companion to this shooter rod because you have the shooter rod in the game, the testicle aesthetic. We're going to go with that. So I made a symbiote cocoon tendril mod that you can also add to your game. I'm going to show it to Jenga. It's the first time now on camera. So just imagine this hanging off the front of your game. You can have this.
    52:42
    No, Donnie. No, no, no, no. Between the legs, right between the legs, the symbiote encapsulation egg containment system. Have it on your truck, man. Guys, it's truck mode. You're playing the game, but we're nudging. We're nudging.
    53:01
    So for the listeners, if you're familiar with what the Venom shooter rod looks like, imagine two of those black orbs hanging there with the blue tendrils coming down, and it will hang as if it's dripping from the machine between the legs, and it'll have some nudge action. And so you will see this on a game. I want that on my Mandalorian, on that crest. What's it called, that plane you shoot? Oh, yeah, the Razor Crest, the little dangly bit. Yeah, the dangles. You want Venom symbiote sacks hanging from there.
    53:36
    Oh, Donnie, you're going to sell those, man. I'm bringing this concept to TPF. I'm hoping I can mock it up on an actual game and we can see how it plays on the Venom.
    53:48
    Just go over to the Venom game where George Gomez is standing. Just put them down there and just walk away.
    54:00
    Dangling. They're going to sell, Donnie. What do you think? What is this worth, the dangling sack of symbiote eggs? I would definitely pay $75 for those dangling balls. I'm going to take a picture of this and post it on our Patreon. right now. So if you're listening and you want to see this in all the glory, there it is, man. There it is. Come to Patreon.
    54:25
    Tangling balls, Tony, man. So did you really buy this? You don't have the game. Did you buy it? I have 100%. I bought that shooter rod.
    54:35
    Word is going to get back to them and they're going to be like, guys, we can't. Just delisted from the market. We can't put this out there. And so I had to get one because every game that comes in, it gets the Godfather legs on it. Now every game is going to get a set of pinball truck nuts and this Venom shooter rod temporarily. This rod, you could use it on X-Men, you know? It's the same universe. I'm going to use it on there. Merlin's Arcade is getting it. It's going to be on everything.
    55:02
    To be honest, you know, when they usually release these rods, dangling rods, they only have the rod, and the front part is just normal for yeah you know normal metal right but on this one the metal you mount to the cabinet is so cool perfect it's you know yeah yeah i love that really well done really well done i like it so how about the armor yeah so the armor all right so hundred dollar armor it's it's lollipop armor there's no change in the shape and it's painted with like some some cool graphics um it's $400 yeah what am I missing here can I just take can I get graphics from my wife's cricket and put it on some lollipop rails and have kind of the same thing Donnie can I be honest when I saw it on that video I was like oh this looks cool that's just how I felt I'm sorry I felt like I like the look of it I cannot make graphics like that myself But I liked it, man. Usually I like the cut in the metal armor, you know. But it just completed the artwork, man. I liked it from the video. I don't know how it looks in the real deal, but $400, that's like $700. It looks cool, right? You know, the 35-year-old divorced redhead at the end of the bar looks cool. But $400?
    56:29
    Yeah, that's what I mean. Isn't that cool? you know and i love venom when venom le came out and had the laser cut armor and it looked so good and it was such a such a big jump up from like the james bond le just had plain armor godzilla le just had really plain armor venom the game was garbage but the armor looked really great and so like you wouldn't remove that le armor and put this on and i'm like you could just go get le armor i made and that's what i did for my premium and it looked phenomenal and it was like less than half the cost of that so i i think it's i don't know maybe the licensing fee may be really high maybe they're not making that many of these so they have to kind of just have them for a high price they're definitely cool as far as like just the product itself it's fine but it's very expensive and and you know artists art doesn't cannot cost that much money anymore because if you go into an AI generator and just write Venom art it will paint you kick Venom art in a split second Zombie Yeti did the art for Venom He employed by Stern So he probably did this the same time the game was released. It's just been sitting around.
    57:42
    Do you think he did the armor also? I think Zombie Yeti is doing much more important work than the armor man for this game. Do you think that? This was probably done like 18 months ago. Yeah, the game is old. Yeah, you're right. So if I had a Venom Premium still, I would buy the shooter rod, I would get the topper, and the Art Blades. The Art Blades are fine. They're $99. They look great. Fine. Yeah. I also think they look great. And for $100, it's okay. So the topper, it's the Mandalorian topper, right? No.
    58:17
    It's flat plastic. It's shaped like the Mandalorian topper. It is. It's shaped like the Mandalorian topper. It's got an LCD screen in it, which Mandalorian does as well. but it doesn't have that holographic effect going on. So it's just a vertical, um, you know, team who's on screen, uh, showing like the symbiote stuff moving around. Cool. I dig it. It's cool. Um, you know, we're not going to see a $600 topper from Stern ever again. So it's 1299. It's not $2,000. I would be writing it hard if it was $2,000, you know, it's overpriced at 1299. I'd probably still get it if I still had the game.
    58:53
    That's it. Yeah. so and no matter what this is stern topper man it's gonna sell out in an instant it's gonna sell out this weekend anyway it's gonna it's gonna look better in person than it does in images so when you see it hopefully at tpf um you'll be like you know that does look good i mean the the foo fighters topper looked good it was two thousand dollars which was insane and so like i would i just i was happy i didn't have the game anymore sitting there to think about it i bought the rush topper but it had a lot of movement on it looked like there was some at least some engineering going on. It added some extra modes. This adds Ghost Rider to the game. Yeah, but isn't it like you don't need the topper, right? So, for three months, it's available for everybody. They're doing that somehow with code. Now, if you don't update your code after three months, can you still play it? I don't know. Maybe it's got to be online to do a check. If you've got some knowledge, there's ways to unlock this stuff without purchasing a topper. Ask around. Hopefully they don't remove that ability. So they don't have topper exclusive only that they had on previous games? It is, but there's ways around it. But for three months it will be available, I guess, for everybody. And probably that's because if you buy a topper, there might be a little bit of delay in getting it, so at least you get the content.
    60:11
    So I don't know. I think it's fine. How is it doing in the U.S. market, this game, for premium, for example? Do you know that? Yeah, Madge has sold an LE for $8,500.
    60:26
    Matt Pimble, you're – oh, I want to give a shout-out to Matt Pimble. Yeah. Because I really love when distros do a great job. I really love that. So I know you buy from Matt Pimble, right? Mm-hmm. Yeah. And our dear friend Jason from Jason's Nap, he actually – he posted a picture on his page, and he said that I just got my Dungeons & Dragons from Mad Pinball, which was cool. Yeah, cool. And I was just reading there. The first line said, the first comment by a guy I don't remember now, he just wrote there, Mad Pinball, best distro ever, love their service, something like that. And I was like, whoa, Don is talking good about them, Jason is buying from them, and look at the first comment. They're writing, this is the best distro in the world. And I was like, cool. So Mad Pinball, what's the owner's name? Well, Jeff at Mad Pinball is the main contact. Jeff from Mad Pinball, shout out. A guy from Denmark hears about your great service. So great. Well done, buddy. Yeah, Corbin and the Angele Stark brothers. And they have another pinball podcast they started called Fresh Pinball Podcast. So check that out. They put out – so they have a lot of perspective as being distributors and local arcade operators. so it's nice to have that perspective. And these guys are kind of crazy like I am. They bought themselves a punny factory just to take it around to local arcades in Ohio so people could play it. They let me come and stream the damn thing. They were one of the first people to get a Ninja Eclipse, and not only do they promote and sell and service the game, they also put in effort to make sure it got around, drop it off at different arcades for periods of time so everybody can play the damn thing. And, you know, so we've been talking about trying to find other obscure games that aren't in the U.S. that we can import and, you know, find ways to ship these things around just so we can, just for fun so we can play these damn things, you know, and other people can get to them. So, yeah, they do a lot of good for the pinball community in that upper Midwest. So, yeah, shout out to Jason. Yeah, shout out. Keep up the good work. And shout out to Jason Knapp, also a great, great guy. He is really enjoying his Dungeons & Dragons. and you're sitting in front of me with a Dungeons & Dragons t-shirt. And at the background, I see a Dungeons & Dragons Premium. And in the background, I see a Dungeons & Dragons Limited Edition. What's going on with the Dungeons & Dragons, Tony? Are you enjoying it? Do you need to play it in stereo? What's going on? So I do like the game. I went and I ordered from Mad and I got my Dungeons & Dragons LE. I loved Venom for the gameplay of leveling in and unlocking things. I love that. And so when I played D&D and saw what was in it, I was like, I want the good version. I want the Worf Dragon. He had an LE left that wasn't spoken for. I snapped it up. And so I've been having fun. I'm at the end of the code for it, so I'm waiting for code updates. And the 1UP Lounge in Bellingham, Washington, they've been buying games of mine that I've made over, powder-coated, added all the mods to it, added to the purse. And so they're like – the guy owns – one of the guys that operates there, Hugh, shout-out, buddy. He's got a card shop right next door selling all manner of nerd culture stuff and dice and card games and all that business. So he's like, I need to put a D&D in there, and I want the Dawn version. I want a Dawn Customs. So I'm like, all right, Jeff, grab me a premium. And he had one ready to go. It got here in a couple of days. I just picked it up last night. And so while I'm making this over, I got another friend in town who's going to rent it for the month so we can get some plays on it, get it broken in. And, yeah, so I'm all of a sudden in the custom cabinet business and the rental business. So you bought this. You're renting it out. You're making money. You're muddying it out. You're selling it. Oh, nice Dungeons & Dragons mud over there also. 3D-printed apron cards. Yeah, we're doing those. Dom's Customs is making money. I'm loving this. Great, Tony. I'm so happy for you, man. And what you're doing is awesome. I see everything you do. It's so cool, man. so have they bought from you before yeah yeah so uh they have jaws that i made over which was an incredible build they just got their delivery their metallica um which that man metallica premium make it look like an le get it all powder coated up man cab maybe you should buy a an extra kong uh so yeah that my kong is coming it's already sold to them so they'll be getting that when i'm done with it i know who's the buyer same place or same place yeah yeah they got they got my banner up on the wall yeah so you're gonna mod it out and sell it also the one congratulations due to popular demand i can't say no to these guys man they're like hey what's going on next they're getting in on it early so uh yeah if you're interested in having you know like a custom-made machine um get at me because we can make it happen uh what you're doing is beautiful man i love it i'm getting better yeah absolutely and like i'm doing it anyway so you know if you want a game that that plays well it's already modded uh it's already powder coated you don't have to lift a finger you don't have to disassemble a coin door i do all that and you want it for like an awesome price like i'm not talking about triple markup like you know you want to get a black and white uh twilight zone made people are charging thirty thousand dollars for that like and you have to donate a game that's craziness that's craziness plus i didn't think of it first so i'm making over games and getting them moving um and i'm having fun in pinball come be part of it yeah and you're also making some different custom mods yeah dangling balls again you're making these custom and our collectors edition uh supporters on patreon are gonna getting these uh get these your very limited edition custom mods and we talked with josh and josh got josh started making his own awesome mods. I saw that, yeah. Yeah, this is so awesome. But yeah, he gets it. And Charles, man, hit us up. You're going to get your own mod because all Collectors Edition supporters are going to get these awesome Don's custom mods. So that's so cool, man. Congratulations. You're doing business with pinball, Donnie. Yeah, it's happening. The dream.
    66:38
    And Jeff had mad pinball. He must be happy you're buying more. You got the Ellie and you're ordering some premiums also. It was the same with X-Men, right? You bought two or three X-Men. Two X-Men, yeah. They both went out to buyers. Yeah, it's been fun. They're going to locations. They're going to homes. And I get good feedback, man, so I'm going to keep doing it. Yeah, it's beautiful, man. Cool. Cool, Donnie. And more games are on the way. So in a couple of days, we're going to make a Patreon show. Yeah. And after that, we'll make another show because more games are on the way. Rumored games. We said Dune, right? Rumored. Only rumored.
    67:17
    J.J.P.'s, what was it? Oh, Harry Potter, that little thing. Harry Potter, yeah, that little thing. Here's the other thing, man. Here's the other thing. TPF is coming, right? This is huge. And not only are there new games to play, but there's also alcohol for people to drink. And when pinball people get to drinking and they know stuff, things tend to come out. Rumors tend to get confirmed. Like, hey, don't share this, but take a look at this. So there will be a nice Patreon portal here for a lot of new information coming soon. We share more stuff on Patreon than usual. It is what it is.
    67:53
    We're getting great support in there. I mean, it's just natural that we loosen up and share some more stuff. So, yeah, it is what it is, man. Absolutely. I can't wait. But, yeah, that's coming. Rumored King Kong is coming. I hope King Kong is from the movie I had on my VHS. What was it called on VHS tape when they turned at slow motion so you could have four hours of recording on a two-hour VHS tape? Oh, there was SP, EP, and slow play. Slow motion something. What was it, man? It was like slow play or like long play. Long play. That was it. Yeah, it was if your VHS recorder had the long play function. So I had the 1976 King Kong that started 29 minutes in the movie. I never saw the beginning of that movie, but 29 minutes in the movie, King Kong, 1976.
    68:55
    What an amazing movie. And after that, I had Rainbow Three. It was such a cool VHS tape. So if it's the 76 movie, I would love it much more than – Oh, this is late break. I just got a text from the Electric Playground. They're the guys that make those awesome aftermarket toppers. They're Pulp Fiction toppers coming. They just put up the final teaser ahead of the release tomorrow at TPF. So that's awesome. I've already ordered. I've seen it. I can't wait to get it. Holy crap. I love – these guys are elevating their topper game, man. And so my SE is actually going to be like competition for the LE Pulp Fiction that people still don't have yet. They still don't have it. Is the price out for the topper? No, not quite yet. Not quite yet. But they're only making 300 of these. There's going to be some kinetic motion in there. There's going to be sound. I don't think I can talk about that. And so, yeah, like if you've seen their Twilight Zone topper with the gumball that had the wire form the ball rolled along it, And, you know, you can see what these guys are capable of. And so now it'll be interactive with the game. It'll have kinetic function. Go check out the teaser. The full trailer's dropping tomorrow when the order bank's open. And only 300 of them. And they have released this. There's going to be an apron badge as well that'll have the numbered edition of your topper that you can put down on the apron where that bad mother flipper wallet is on the LE. So you're getting that too. So you're going to have the double tap edition. There's only 300 of them that will be available. So the original Ellie Topper, when the production came out, I mean, they looked a bit weird.
    70:36
    Did that get fixed? Do you know that? I don't know for certain, but I've seen them now, and from the perspective of the player, they look okay. Okay. Yeah, so I think the first batch they got in were, like, hideous, man, like Nosferatu looking. So I think they had those redone. That was part of the delay. So now at least the ones that have come out, they look okay from the player's perspective. Okay. So this Aftermarket Topper, you said the trailer is out. The final teaser trailer. Yeah, they've been releasing little teaser bits of it. And how much does that teaser show? The new one, I haven't seen it yet. I'll pull it up there. I'll play it.
    71:20
    Because I have watched a video of it. I don't know what I can share here. Probably not much. No, okay.
    71:30
    But, I mean, it's coming out. Can you show it here? Let me see the teaser on your phone. The whole thing is coming out tomorrow.
    71:38
    Let me see the show. No, your phone says battery low. Wait, let me see. Limited to 300, it says. Yeah. 10 a.m. Oh, okay. It didn't show nothing. So all they were showing here was, like, what the game looks like from a distance.
    71:55
    Let me see here. Double tap edition. It doesn't show the chopper, man. Oh, okay, okay. You see some gun flashes there. All right. So official confirmation. But you don't see the main thing, Donnie. 10 a.m. Pacific time tomorrow, 1 p.m. Eastern time in the U.S. is when the full release is happening. That's when the trailer will probably hit. And so, yeah, yeah, so it's going to be out there. So they've confirmed that there's sound, there's motion, there's lights, there's a badge for your apron, a badge for your vag. Get it on. That doesn't make any sense. I'm really looking forward to the price of this. Yeah, me too. I mean, that's going to be the thing. If this is $4,000, it could be great and ain't nobody buying any of them. You know, if this is $600, they're selling out first day. So I think the price will be somewhere between there. I just feel like Evil Dead Topper for $1,400, that just set the standard, right? Yeah. Look at what you're getting for $1,400. It's just – that Spooky Topper just – we need to go after that measurement, if you know what I mean. Yeah. I mean look at the Venom Topper's $1,300. It's $100 less than the Spooky Topper, and it does a hell of a lot less than Spooky's doing.
    73:09
    Yeah. So just saying, just saying, just saying, just saying $750 for a portal topper that is just stacked plastics and it's not even $5,500 for the portal module. Doesn't even come with the topper. That's a departure. Every other bitch, this big of a price. Is it because of tariff? Why? I have no idea. I don't know where, where'd all this money. Maybe he's, I don't know. that's too much money for just a module to put in there and not even include the topper. Like, normally if you buy the good multi-morphic module, you get magnetic decals for the cabinet so you can change the design if you want. You don't get that? I think you – well, I don't know if it says or not. What? I think you still get that. But it used to be you got the topper, you got the graphics, you got the magnet for the front of the game so you can make it all look like the new module, and, like, now they're starting to say, well, you have to pay extra for that. It's like – Oh, Donnie, so it costs like a STEM pro game? I know. Do you want this module, or do you want to buy a Godzilla pro? Oh, come on. Yeah, so that's where we are. Now, look, if you buy one of these things and you have multiple modules, you're not pulling the topper off and putting a new topper on every time you change the game around. So I don't know. That's weird. But the side argue will change them, Donnie. Unless it's in a lineup. Are you really going to waste time doing that, though? You'll probably just have it rolled up in the back of a closet. The idea is you don't buy this game if it's in a lineup. You buy this game if you live in a small apartment. You don't have room for one game. I mean, the whole purpose of this is just, yeah.
    74:52
    The purpose would make sense if you buy the cabinet, and then you could rent the module from them, and then send it back and get a new module like Gamefly back in the day, or like Netflix. Like, okay, let me give you $500 to have this for three months, and then I'll send it back to you. Then every time they come out with a new game, it just goes. But then for that matter, why not just get a virtual pinball machine and just get software updates and play 1,400 different games?
    75:17
    Oh, Matt, that's why I told you earlier I don't think this will sell. The more you think about it, the more it falls apart. And Jerry just did an interview where he mentioned that he knows people that didn't like to swatch out the modules all the time, so they just bought a separate cabinet so they have two multimorphics so they can always have Weird Al and always have some other game. And it's like, well, what are we even doing at this point? What's the point of this then? If you're somebody and you own one machine and it's a P3 Multimorphic, please email me and let me know that you exist because I'm not certain that you do.
    75:50
    We are pinball69gmail.com. That's a good one to go out on, all right? Yeah, tell us about it. All right. Make sure to join our Patreon club, guys, because we will come up with an exclusive video for you people. and just share the fun and happiness. Right, Donnie? Absolutely. Speaking of fun and happiness, we're going to make Genghis do his happy dance right now. Oh, yeah, baby! Trigger the Euro trash. We are pinball69 at gmail.com or patreon.com backslash wearepinball to get at us. More info to come this week from Texas Pinball Festival, direct from Frisco, Texas. My mouth to your ears to your girlfriend's rears, man, if you're not careful. Be careful in the hot tub. All right, Genghis, buddy. Thank you. More volume, more music. Woo!
    76:38
    I love it.