Journalist Tool

Kineticist

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

v0.1.0

← Back to items

Recap of Mel Interview and More

BlahCade Pinball Podcast·podcast_episode·1h 36m·analyzed·Jan 20, 2022
View original
Export .md

Analysis

claude-haiku-4-5-20251001 · $0.032

TL;DR

Blockade hosts recap Mel Kirk interview on Indy licensing, Zen's tech roadmap, and pipeline constraints.

Summary

Chris Freebus and Jared Morgan recap their recent interview with Mel Kirk of Zen Studios, discussing the licensing challenges behind Indiana Jones in Pinball FX, the studio's transition to Unreal Engine 5, and their development pipeline constraints. They also discuss Jared's pinball restoration projects in Australia, including his completed Force 2 and ongoing Pink Panther restoration.

Key Claims

  • Williams and Disney wanted Zen to make Indiana Jones for Pinball FX as part of the licensing deal terms

    high confidence · Chris directly states Mel said 'Williams and Disney wanted them to do Indiana Jones' and that 'This was the driving factor'

  • Indiana Jones licensing required payment for John Williams' likeness, actor likenesses, and new 3D model animation licenses

    high confidence · Mel explained to hosts that they 'had to pay for voice. They had to pay for John Williams' likeness. They had to pay for art likenesses.'

  • Zen has transitioned to Unreal Engine and achieved good workflow optimization with it

    high confidence · Mel said 'they've pretty much gotten up to speed now. Um, that they know—they've got a good handle on it. And that, of course, is making things go much better.'

  • The P3 engine cannot support HD video, 120 fps, or ray tracing capabilities

    high confidence · Hosts state Mel said P3 'couldn't do HD video' and 'couldn't do, you know, 120 frames per second. Couldn't do ray tracing.'

  • Zen will transition to Unreal Engine 5 in the future as a framework bump

    high confidence · Mel stated 'once Unreal 5 comes out, they'll be making the transition to that. But that'll be an easy transition.'

  • License holders are now approaching Zen proactively asking to be included rather than Zen requesting licenses

    high confidence · Mel said 'They're not really going to places going, "Oh, could we please?" They're actually coming to Zen going, "Could you please?"'

  • Zen's primary constraint is developer capacity, not license availability

    high confidence · Hosts note Mel indicated 'It's a development pipeline. It's the choke point at the moment for them. Like, they would obviously want to go and do all the things that all the license holders want, but they just can't, because they don't have the warm developer bodies'

  • Indiana Jones will release simultaneously across Pinball FX Early Access, Steam, consoles, and Williams Pinball app

Notable Quotes

  • “Williams and Disney wanted them to do Indiana Jones. Really? This was the driving factor, was it?”

    Chris Freebus @ mid-content — Reveals surprising fact that major IP holders pushed for Indiana Jones inclusion rather than Zen initiating request

  • “You still gotta pay people. You still gotta pay people. And they're not gonna help you on that front.”

    Chris Freebus (reporting Mel) @ mid-content — Characterizes core licensing challenge: IP holders accept fees but don't subsidize production

  • “Nobody's really telling us no now...everybody wants a retail presence. They do.”

    Chris Freebus (reporting Mel Kirk) @ mid-content — Indicates massive shift in Zen's negotiating position post-Indiana Jones success

  • “It's a development pipeline. It's the choke point at the moment for them.”

    Jared Morgan (interpreting Mel) @ late-content — Identifies developer capacity as Zen's limiting factor, not licensing

  • “The next Pinball Show will be showing off some of those things exactly. Which is going to be really interesting to see.”

    Jared Morgan (reporting Mel) @ late-content — Signals upcoming tech demonstrations at Pinball Show event

  • “I think it's going to be pretty exhausted by the end of it, actually.”

    Jared Morgan @ early-content — Indicates prediction of very high volume of pinball releases in coming year

  • “You've got to think of it like beta.”

    Jared Morgan @ late-content — Clarifies that Pinball FX Early Access on Epic serves beta function before console release

  • “It's been worth every cent doing it because...I don't think there's any Force 2 games in Australia that are operational.”

    Jared Morgan @ early-content — Justifies restoration investment by rarity value of machine in market

Entities

Mel KirkpersonChris FreebuspersonJared MorganpersonZen StudioscompanyPinball FXproductPinball FX3productIndiana JonesgameWilliams PinballproductUnreal Engine 5productP3 Engineproduct

Signals

  • ?

    business_signal: Zen Studios' primary constraint is developer capacity rather than licensing; pipeline bottleneck prevents simultaneous development of all requested titles despite availability of licenses

    high · Hosts note Mel indicated 'It's the choke point at the moment for them. Like, they would obviously want to go and do all the things that all the license holders want, but they just can't, because they don't have the warm developer bodies'

  • ?

    business_signal: Zen Studios no longer pursuing licenses; major IP holders now proactively approaching Zen requesting table development, indicating significant market position shift and licensing demand inversion

    high · Mel said 'Nobody's really telling us no now' and 'They're not really going to places going "Oh, could we please?" They're actually coming to Zen going "Could you please?"'

  • ~

    sentiment_shift: Hosts expressed relief at finally being able to publicly discuss Indiana Jones after extended NDA period; indicates strong community interest in behind-scenes licensing dynamics

    medium · Chris states 'me and Jared have known about that for a long time' and 'we've been sitting on that info for way longer than any info that we've ever had before' and that Indiana Jones silence was 'severe case of us covering our butts'

  • ?

    event_signal: Pinball Show upcoming event will feature Zen Studios demonstrations of new technologies, likely Unreal Engine 5 capabilities and visual improvements

    medium · Mel told hosts 'the next Pinball Show will be showing off some of those things exactly. Which is going to be really interesting to see.'

  • ?

Transcript

groq_whisper · $0.290

0:00
blockade pinball podcast this is the blockade pinball podcast i'm your host chris freebus aka shut your trap joining me as always halfway across the world it's jared morgan oh hi everyone how going happy new year and stuff and things wow get the stuff and things out of the way right off the bat look at that that's right yep so yeah uh it is the uh the new year we we we had the idea that maybe we would come back sooner like maybe the week or two after we had mel on last time and then we didn't no we didn't because we're too busy eating food and not doing the podcast yeah and not thinking about pinball at the moment but that's all going to kind of change oh I have been oh you've been thinking about pinball yeah we're going to get into that in a moment here Jared's been all consumed but this year according to Mel should be a jam-packed year.
1:18
Yeah, it's going to be, geez, I wish we didn't have so much pinball coming out this year. I think we're going to be pretty exhausted by the end of it, actually.
1:28
It's a good problem to have. It is. We're going to recap what, kind of highlight the things that Mel said, kind of maybe point arrows at things and kind of like going, here's what you really need to be reading the tea leaves about. Um, but yeah, it's, it seems like we're not going to be starving for anything to talk about in this coming year. Once, basically once March hits.
1:58
So yeah. Yeah. For sure. It's going to be, oh boy, it's going to be, we're going to be busy this year talking about stuff. which will be nice for a change because it's been a bit of a challenge finding stuff to talk about, sort of scraping around for news that we can actually talk about on the show. So we won't have that problem this year after March, I don't think. Hooray. Yeah. Let's kick things off, though. Jared, you have been working on your various pinball machines that you rescued from an African container. From the plains down of Africa. That was waterlogged. Not directly. Yeah, that's right. So tell us where you are with your machines, which machines you've completed or working on, etc. Okay. Well, the last time we spoke, I said that Force 2 was at the brain doctor getting its electrics and its guts worked on. That's right, yes. Well, that is now back home, and we have been playing it to death. I think it's got about 200 or 300 plays on it at the moment.

medium confidence · Hosts discuss Mel saying Indiana Jones should be 'on absolutely everything that we can' and 'all going to be coming out at the same time' with qualifier that Epic Early Access may launch separately from console versions

  • Jared spent approximately $5,000 AUD (total) restoring Force 2 to operational condition

    high confidence · Jared itemizes: game $1,250, parts ~$1,000, displays $500, Pascal board $800, service $800, plus paint ~$200

  • Force 2 is extremely rare in Australia with operational examples countable on one hand

    medium confidence · Jared notes 'there might be a few scattered around, but they would—you can count them on one hand basically' and cites technician John Grist as never seeing one in his career servicing Data East machines

    • Force 2
    game
    Pink Panthergame
    Star Racegame
    John Gristperson
    Farsight Studioscompany
    Magic Pixelcompany
    Disneycompany
    Scientific Gamescompany
    The Pinball Showevent
    Blockade Pinball Podcastorganization

    licensing_signal: Indiana Jones required separate licensing agreements for 3D animation models, John Williams likeness, and actor likenesses beyond base IP license; indicates complex multi-layer licensing structure becoming standard for modern table development

    high · Mel Kirk stated they 'had to pay for voice. They had to pay for John Williams' likeness. They had to pay for art likenesses' and required 'sign all brand-new licenses for the 3D models of the animation'

  • ?

    licensing_signal: Indiana Jones licensing required Williams and Disney approval as part of licensing deal terms; suggests major IP holders have significant influence on Zen's development priorities

    medium · Chris states Mel said 'Williams and Disney wanted them to do Indiana Jones' and 'This was the driving factor' for inclusion in platform

  • $

    market_signal: 2024 expected to be high-volume release year for pinball starting post-March; hosts predict content overflow requiring careful release scheduling and consumer spending management

    medium · Jared states 'I wish we didn't have so much pinball coming out this year' and predicts exhaustion by year end; Chris says 'this year, according to Mel, should be a jam-packed year'

  • ?

    product_strategy: US Postal Service restrictions on international mail to Australia causing shipping cost inflation (150 AUD per order); delays restoration parts availability and forces strategic ordering to avoid customs GST classification

    high · Jared states 'The U.S. has halted all domestic general parcels out of the country to Australia' and 'the last time I did an order, it was 150 Australian dollars in shipping' and must order with gaps 'so it doesn't look like I'm a commercial importer'

  • ?

    product_strategy: Zen Studios planning multiple simultaneous releases of Indiana Jones across Pinball FX Early Access (Epic), Steam, console versions (FX3), and Williams Pinball app with staggered launch timing (Early Access first, then console simultaneous)

    high · Hosts discuss Mel's statement that Indiana Jones 'will be in Pinball FX and in FX3' and 'should be on absolutely everything' with discussion of Early Access timing separate from console launch

  • ~

    sentiment_shift: Hosts describe excitement about Indiana Jones announcement after months of sitting on NDA information; community reception expected positive given licensing difficulty and perceived 'impossible table' status

    medium · Chris states 'I'm so excited for this' and 'I mention in the interview that this seemed like the impossible table, there's a very good reason for that'

  • ?

    technology_signal: Zen Studios transitioning from P3 engine to Unreal Engine 5; P3 lacks capabilities for HD video, 120fps, or ray tracing; Unreal 5 transition planned as framework bump with major patch

    high · Mel stated P3 'couldn't do HD video...couldn't do 120 frames per second. Couldn't do ray tracing' and 'once Unreal 5 comes out, they'll be making the transition to that'

    • 3:10
    But, you know, this is a system of 80 games, so the games don't last long. But the thing is wild. It's got so many powered rubber surfaces that the ball, you'll often actually, the ball will come down, hit the little slingshot that's on the left-hand side, and then bounce, dunk, dunk, dunk, and back up to the top of the play field and rattle around in the pop bumpers. and it's a really fast game. I've got it set with a fairly steep pitch on it and even with that, it's still flying around the playfield, the ball is. And it's a lot of fun, lots of drop targets to hit and it just plays really well. Although the new, I wish that when Star Race was around that I had access to Pascal's board system because this one has a Pascal board in it and LED displays.
    4:08
    And it's trouble-free. I have not had to... I had to do minor adjustments the other day just to some switches, which is just pinball. That's how it works. Yeah. But nothing like the problems I had with Star Race. And unfortunately, Star Race... Well, fortunately for some, not for me, Star Race actually has a passable solution now. He actually managed to get a hold of a game and code the software for it. So I'm sort of going, oh, I kind of regret that I sold it, but I kind of don't. I was going to say, it's now not your problem. It's not my problem anymore.
    4:46
    But it would have been nice to actually be able to play the game. It would have been nice to have that board in it when it was at the exhibition. Right. And not have the thing go down halfway through the stupid tournament. So that's Force 2. So how much would you say it cost you to get Force 2 to this point? Okay, well, let's use averages. So I've done, I'd say about, this is in Australian dollars. So the game was $1,250, unserviced as is.
    5:17
    Then add on top of that, you know, with shipping, of course, the parts which were just a smidge under $1,000 Australian dollars because that's the limit for how much you can get to the country without paying GST then the displays were about $500 then the Pascal board was about $800 with the pop bumper boards as well and the sound board because I just want everything new you know right um and so uh and the service to and to install the displays and the stuff that john gristed was you know around 800 so you know it's well and truly around five grand i was gonna say so you you you definitely spent way more fixing it than you did uh buying it. Oh, yeah. But that's always the case with pinball, particularly these ones, which are always in rough shape when you get them. Right.
    6:24
    So, yeah, you always spend more. And then there's probably incidentals as well, like paint and stuff like that, which I haven't fully accounted for. So we could add probably $200 on for that as well. Okay. So, you know, and people will wonder why when you try and sell one of these old machines that you've restored that you're charging around five or six for it's like that's just to make even yeah on it yeah um that's not to make any real profit so um yeah it was look i i had no regrets on spending the money on it like it's it's been worth every cent doing it because it's a like i don't think there's any to my knowledge i don't think there's any force to games in australia that are operational okay there might be a few scattered around but they they would be you can count them on one hand basically like john grist was saying he's never seen one in the entire time that he's been servicing got leave machines which has been a long time now so for him not to have seen one come through his door suggests to me that they are not very common here in australia so that's kind of cool to uh to know that you got something special there Oh, yeah, that's right. I mean, you know, the clear coat is still real nice on it again. So it plays really fast, probably faster than it did when it was stocked with the Mylar on it. Oh, I'm sure. And it presents well with the brand-new plastic set. The thing looks brand-new. It looks fresh out of the box. So, you know, it was worth spending that money on it as well.
    8:04
    Though that one's working. We're having fun with it. I need to get a new glass for it because the glass at the moment is what they call shop glass. It's very, very scratched. But it keeps the noise down, so we're getting used to just looking through the scratches at the playfield.
    8:20
    So, you know, it's fine. We'll get the glass. And when I get the glass, I'm, again, not going to be scrimping. I'll be getting, like, you know, the proper glass because I think at the moment it could even be plate glass in there. Like, they just put whatever they wanted in there because it feels really heavy. not not like tempered glass does which is a little bit lighter um so i'll be getting new glass and i'll be probably getting um like a anti-reflection coating put on it which when you're getting glass done it's only about 10 or 20 dollars more so why wouldn't you do it you know it's not like hundreds of dollars more so you just get it done um so the next one is pink panther um and I've done all the cabinet work on Pink Panther.
    9:04
    I did the usual playfield stripping on it, and as always happens when you do that, a bit of bark comes off, a bit of paint comes off. So that's inevitable. But the problem with Pink Panther is it's got a really odd... Oh, yeah, there's like an aqua green colour in this playfield. It's a really odd paint scheme on it. I think they really missed a trick here. They could have gone with Pink Panther Pink everywhere on this playfield, and they didn't. They went for this sort of moody nighttime feel to the playfield, like you're going through a dark house, trying to explore it and nick the Pink Panther Diamond. So it's missing a lot of that Pink Panther bright appeal to it. So anyhow, this green, blue, whatever you call it, is basically impossible to match. so I've had to make some, there's been some really bad wear around the pop bumpers, so I've just done that area in black and just mastered it all off and sprayed it. And that's come up pretty good.
    10:06
    So, you know, it'll do the job. And I was going to just leave it blank and not touch it up, but, you know, the internet suggested that was a bad idea. So I was just going to leave it play as condition, you know, and just go, whatever, this is it. But no, I'm glad I did the extra effort and sprayed it and mastered it and everything. It does look a lot better. so um yeah that's where i'm at at the moment with that and then the the only thing really holding that up is parts availability so at the moment i need to go through the pinball resource to get these parts yeah reasonably because they're the only place that has reliable supply and the u.s uh have halted all domestic or sorry general parcels out of the country to australia so So if you want to get anything from the US, you can't, unless potentially if you use one of those freight forwarding services and then bundle it all up and get a courier to deliver it. So that may be what I need to do because the last time I did an order, it was 150 Australian shipping to get it over here because they can only use premium, super fast USPS service. That's the only thing that's coming out of the country. Wow. So, and again, that's the cost of doing business at the moment. Yeah. It's sort of like if you want parts and it's holding up a restoration, you kind of just need to pay the man and you need to suck it up. Yeah.
    11:31
    It's brutal though. I hate it because I could spend that money on parts and other stuff, you know? Yeah. And actually get more. In fact, I had to sacrifice some parts in the last order because I had to factor in the shipping to actually get it out here as well. so it's really frustrating but you know that'll be next I also need to order things with enough gap between them that it doesn't look like I'm a commercial importer as well so it's really, it's a real pain like if the customs department said hey, they'll just go no, you're ordering too much stuff from overseas you have to pay GST but this is my hobby, I'm not doing this commercially I'm restoring three machines I've got to buy the parts from overseas it's the only place I can get them from. But, you know, you don't want to have that discussion, do you, Chris? No, I wouldn't think you do want to have that discussion. Not at all. No. So, you know, I will slowly and surely get stuff in. I think the first order, which I may as well just get sorted this week because, you know, I'm home, I can't do anything else. Yeah, folks, I've got COVID. So that's been fun with two kids at home, one of which has also got COVID. so I mean Omicron it's just like a cold if that because I'm triple vaxxed and it's barely anything it just feels like a mild cold which is I guess good compared to some of the other strains that were floating around Zachary's come down a little bit harder because of course vaccinations aren't yet available for his age group well they're just becoming available here in Australia and he was booked in this week Of course, he can't get one now because he's got the Rona.
    13:16
    And he's going to have to wait the next period of time afterwards. Yeah, he's going to have to wait a month before he can get it. And, of course, Sienna hasn't got it yet. So that will probably mean that right at the end of the seven-day quarantine period, she will get it, and then we'll all have to re-enter quarantine again. So, you know, fun times.
    13:38
    But at least you've got a machine that's working. We do have a machine that's working. And behind me, as you can see, I've got the drum kit all set up, and I can play Drum Mania at home. So, you know, there's plenty of stuff to do here, you know. So that's good. We've got the internet, so I can order things. So it's not terrible.
    13:58
    Yay. I'm just looking for the silver lining. Right, that's what you've got to do. That's what you've got to do. Yeah.
    14:07
    All right. Well, let's move on then forward to, yeah, our interview with Mel there. So in case you were living under a rock and yet somehow you still watch this channel, last time we interviewed Mel Kirk.
    14:27
    Again, we were just, we hadn't talked to him in a while. We were just like, let's just have a conversation because we knew that he wasn't ready to promote FX, Pinball FX yet. and we were now done with releases, at least from what we could tell, based off the 11 count.
    14:45
    And so we were like, yeah, let's just have Mel on for a talk, just to have a chat. And then the Indiana Junes, man, I cannot talk today, Pajard.
    14:56
    Words are hard. The Indiana Jones news came down that that will be in Pinball FX. and in FX3, which is a nice little bonus there. Awesome. Yeah. And then it was just like, well, now we really have to talk to Mel.
    15:14
    So fortunately, we had actually already lined up the interview when that news dropped. Yeah, because this was, we were trying to get times right for a couple of months, weren't we? Yeah. It was really hard. Like, he's a busy man, and our schedules were tight as well with work and stuff. So, yeah, it was pretty hard. But we did it. We did it. It came. so a little we're gonna we're gonna unveil a curtain here a little bit it was very nice that indiana jones has finally talked about because yeah me and jared have known about that for a long time yeah uh then we we've uh we've been sitting on that info for way longer than any info that we've ever had before about the game um so if you were watching our show and wondering how come we never really talked much about indiana jones that was why because we didn't want to get into any nda in trouble yep it was a severe case of us covering our butts um yeah so yeah when when we're sitting there pointing out hey look at the wall behind zen and all the cool things and And then I'm getting messages going, well, you didn't mention there was an Indiana Jones figure up there. And I'm like, doop-a-doo.
    16:30
    Nothing to see here. These are not the droids you're looking for. That being said, I'm so excited for this.
    16:43
    Because of the effort. Me too. Right? The effort that has gone into securing this. and I don't know how much we'll ever be able to reveal about the behind the scenes of getting this thing. But when I mentioned in the interview that this seemed like the impossible table, there's a very good reason for that. I mean, Mel touched upon it.
    17:07
    As much as he could touch upon it. Yeah, just some of the things he said. I don't know if something we didn't know, Jared or I, was he was saying that part of getting the Williams license was Williams and Disney wanting them to do Indiana Jones. Really? This was the driving factor, was it? I mean, that's what he said. He said that Williams and Disney wanted this to happen.
    17:36
    Right. So, I mean, that's like, talk about a push. And, you know, hey, great, you've got our support. And this is, and I have a feeling, so maybe this came back to, back with the idea of when Scientific yanked the Williams license out from under Farsight and then gave it to Zenn, maybe that was part of a factor where Scientific just went, there's no way, no how they're ever going to put Indiana Jones into this, and we want this out there. I mean, I don't know. that's me just kind of putting my own two words into it. And you're probably right, along with a whole lot of other factors, which is covered before in the show. Yeah, exactly.
    18:27
    I would say you probably won the money there. It seems like Scientific Games, while they're the license holders, they've also got skin in the game here. Oh, sure.
    18:39
    It's their name also in the copyright information on all the games you know it raises their portfolio if you if you can prove that 35 year old content is once again relevant and saleable and yeah you know that only raises the value of your portfolio among other people so um but some of the things that then you know yeah you would think oh well if williamson disney wanted them to have that then it should have been just a no-brainer easy peasy well no this goes back to the whole thing of you still gotta pay people you still gotta pay people and they're not gonna help you on that front so they'll help you by accepting your money well in a lot of cases they will um yeah but you know in some cases they won't yeah so what what mel was talking about though was that they had to pay for voice they had to pay for john williams likeness they had to pay for art likenesses and then i didn't even think about this one but they had to sign all brand new licenses for the 3d models of the animation that zen does because it adds a completely different layer of integration which which is really interesting because all the other license properties they've had probably have a similar clause in them as well um like think about all the um you know animated heroes tables and stuff like that sure they're not actual actor licenses and a lot of these tables right but there's still a different reimagining of the copyright art aren't they so yeah it's just one more piece of the puzzle of licensing that we never think about we always just think about oh you got the license to this great that means you can do anything with the license yeah that's right just do anything with it you have to license it specifically to what you're what you're doing i think mel was mentioning this when he was talking about the whole star wars vr which incidentally i saw has been nominated for an award um yeah new york games expo or something like that you know so congrats to jen on uh to zen on that um but he was saying that's the same with um with star wars as well like you essentially have to renegotiate licenses when you're doing vr because it's a new new experience right and a new thing and it's the same with with these 3d models it seems as well so you're right it is an interesting aspect of licensing because licensing is hard and then it i kind of found it interesting because after he mentioned all those things he was like and then we could start on production yeah it's like well yeah i guess you don't want to put money you know money forward and only be told no you can't have it and then you're like well why do we spend the money developing um yeah yeah you guys what happened with aliens didn't we uh not seen aliens but the other aliens pinball so yeah we saw what happened there yeah so that was uh that was interesting to see and then and then this where he said uh that that they're currently dealing with another game that has a big license that everybody thought would be difficult and they said and mel was saying it's not even close to what indie was that it's like downright easy compared to indie um and i have a feeling like with the problem with these older licenses is in a lot of cases it's actually really hard to track down people oh yeah who owns what and that's the hard bit but with these modern licenses well that's that's like i mean say stranger things right yeah i'd imagine if if them was producing stranger things they go oh okay well we just go to netflix or whoever the copyright they'll put us in contact with all the people because we still know everyone yeah and well and they're still all under a contract so that kind of eases things along because they're all part of this collective already just put in extra clauses or whatever and job's done essentially starting from scratch is hard we told the story long ago and this is back when we were talking to Norman at Farsay with regards to roller games that they were going to do roller games. They had every intention of doing roller games. They couldn't track down the rights holders.
    23:01
    Because there was two different entities. One of the entities pretty much just wasn't interested in talking. But the go-around was if they could get the other entity to agree upon it, then it would be a go. And they couldn't track down the other entity. Period. Like, just... there was no forwarding address, if you will. Yeah. And he said that they were, this kind of gives you a little insight into Farsight,
    23:33
    that they thought about, well, you know what? Why don't we just make it and put it out, and then somebody will come knocking.
    23:41
    Well. If they don't come knocking, we're fine. And if they do come knocking, well, then we have the contact. And we can go, oh, yeah, so hello. You're fine returning our calls, are you? How nice of you. Right. Yeah, let's talk. But the problem is then that, you know, I don't know. Well, then you get the cease and desist. But as far as they're concerned, well, we already front-loaded and sold everything.
    24:03
    That right Yeah So it like well if you got the entitlements well you know you just have to be quick to get the game Right And honestly they probably could have done that for a couple of titles
    24:18
    Oh, sure. If you think about it. They could have done that for a few of them and just gone out there and just put them out there and just said, oh, by the way, you should probably buy this pretty fast. Yeah. Just sort of put that caveat on it. and it would have been fine but of course that's short-term solution uh ignoring what the long-term problems is which is then the word gets out among licensors that you're a bad faith operator yeah and i i think that they actually came to that same conclusion which is probably why they didn't do it probably unfortunately but yeah yeah so uh the other thing was is that uh when questioned about just with putting Indy out also on FX3,
    25:09
    Mel was just basically saying, hey, for the love of pinball, we've got to get Indy on absolutely everything that we can.
    25:17
    And it's all going to be coming out at the same time, apparently. So, if that is the case, that sounds to me like, come March, we'll get indie in epic indie on steam indie on the consoles for fx3 indie on williams pinball app um it'll be dr jones i wonder if they'll actually do indie i don't know if they're going to release indie on in march because that's technically early access i think they will release indie when epic early access finishes and they release the product the final product you might be yeah Yeah, you're right, because early access is not going to be on the PlayStation or Xbox. No, it's not. It's just going to be epic. And they need to do early access to iron out the bugs. So they will iron out the bugs, they'll roll the fixes into the game, and then they'll release. That's how they'll do it. Oh, man. For sure. You just poured water on the whole thing. Yeah.
    26:22
    It's like beta. Yeah. So you've just got to think of it like beta. Yeah. so um which i'll just say this folks we've gotten word beta's coming up pretty fast not we don't know beta of what but now that jared's mentioning i'm like oh yeah it sounds like it's just gonna be beta of early access not not beta of indie damn uh yeah yeah yeah i think so um moving on to things that mel uh talked about we're just kind of going to go in order of of what the interview went there but he he was telling us that the the workflow for the unreal engine unreal engine not unreal engine unreal engine i'm not having a good day jared um we haven't done this for a while we gotta like limber up the limber up the tongue in the mouth and stuff first show back of 2022 too fallen on the face um saying that the workflow for unreal engine um that they're they've pretty much gotten up to speed now um that they know if they're they've got a good handle on it and that of course is making things go much better um in terms of there was a in terms of why the need to switch over to Unreal Engine when the PX engine was working perfectly fine, you know, by all accounts, with FX3 being relatively still new. I mean, in the span of things, how long we had FX2 for compared to FX3. FX3 was a pretty short little tenure there. Window. Right, but he was just saying that the... There was a question about the technology and the future and whether or not the PX engine could keep up with it, and they didn't think that it could. They just said, no, it can't. and you clearly couldn't do hd video no and all that sort of like advanced stuff we couldn't do hd video you couldn't do you know 120 frames per second couldn't do ray tracing yeah you know apparently the other thing that was interesting in that interview i think it was that he said that the next pinball show will be showing off some of those things exactly which is going to be really interesting to see yeah so you know and and this is where we again, we've had this history with Farsight and the Pinball Arcade, where they reached a point where I was like, guys, you really need to re-up, do a new engine, because it's lagging, it's clunking along, and you're not going to be able to give the best experience going forward. And they got cold feet regarding doing that, because they toyed with moving to Unreal Engine. They toyed with it, and they didn't. Yeah.
    29:12
    That was basically probably the first nail in the coffin for them, really. Yeah. And Mel did say... That engine they were using was complex to develop in. Yeah. And Mel did say that once Unreal 5 comes out, they'll be making the transition to that. But that'll be an easy transition. That doesn't require pinball effects, too. No, it doesn't. Just a simple transition. It's a framework bump. I shouldn't say simple, but yeah. It's a framework bump with the relative software updates that need to happen. I mean, I'm sure it'll be a big patch, but... It'll be a big patch, all right. Yeah. Be like a re-download. Just having that Matrix Revolutions demo that you shared a while back, that thing is just incredible. like real it's like as far as unreal engine 5 goes it's like look at that and go wow okay yeah it's this big of the possibilities with pinball when you look at that thing exactly um we asked whether or not uh indie kind of paves the way for doing getting more licenses easier and Mel was just kind of like well nobody's really telling us no now which is kind of interesting they're not really going to places going oh could we please they're actually coming to Zen going could you please yeah because like he said everybody wants a retail presence they do yeah so and it's just a matter of and this is what I found interesting though what he was saying was It's a matter of priorities.
    30:58
    Yeah, because it's a development pipeline. It's the choke point at the moment for them. Like, they would obviously want to go and do all the things that all the license holders want, but they just can't because they don't have the warm developer bodies sitting there actually being able to do the coding. Well, and even if they did, you still also have to be concerned with, you don't want to flood the market and have your consumers go like there's too much and then not I can't afford all this. Right and then not be able to purchase it so you know I'm sure that part of the licensing is hey we'll dedicate time to your license promoting it properly and giving it the proper attention so that we can maximize how many eyeballs actually wind up downloading this thing and you know that so when he says priorities I kind of feel that that's it we've been saying this with regards to the Williams license and it's something that again Farsight kind of stumbled on you want to maximize your time that you have with a license that you're paying for the license fee in order to be developing it during but then if you bring in more it dilutes the waters and you're not getting as much bang for your buck as possible. So I kind of felt that that just hinted to me that other than them going out and doing first-party licenses for Xen Originals, we're not seeing a hookup with Stern or Jersey Jack or Spooky necessarily anytime soon just because it's cutting everybody short. yeah absolutely um i i think that we're going to be probably waiting at least until next year probably after um to see that i mean we'll see you know if if if mel actually gets his request of doing 20 tables a year i mean they can rip through some williams tables really fast yeah they they can it's gonna be interesting though because a lot of the tables they have left over now are all licensed it's all licensed i mean other than what we got whodunit cactus canyon and jackpot those were the only three unlicensed dmds everything else carries a license that's right if you're looking at dmds only yeah then system 11s yeah yeah um so i mean which oh please look at system 11s oh yeah yeah i mean look they're not the deepest of games but they're fun So get them in. Yeah, absolutely. And the themes are really good as well. And the sound. Yep. All good. Mel said they were looking to separate themselves from the other pinball developers that are out there, which I also kind of found interesting. I was like, ooh, shots fired at Zachariah and whoever's, or not Zachariah, Magic Pixel, and then probably the visual pinball developers may be doing for AtGames Legends Pinball. I don't know. Maybe. Literally, it's only Magic Pixel is the only other company out there that's doing anything worthwhile.
    34:18
    Yeah, exactly right. And for the size of the studio they are, they're doing a pretty very good job. God, I really wish that they would have a conversation well I mean although Zen's probably sucking up the talent pool but have a conversation with Zell on Zell dude what's gonna happen I'm gonna have to do a lot of editing in the audio I'm not editing I see I'm not no we're just leaving that in but how to grow a studio yeah I mean come on Archie Pixel grow just grow the thing is though as an aside with Magic Pixel how much more can they do?
    35:05
    They've really milked the Zachariah license. Just give them the Gottlieb license. Please. I'd buy it. I'd buy their stuff if it was Gottlieb. Good quality Gottliebs. Because they did a lot of their work initially with all the Zachariah pinballs without any physical machines. They just were getting playfield uploads from fans out there. So as far as operating costs go, their model is very lean.
    35:40
    So I don't know. I hit something accidentally. I need to mute. Mute. Jeez Louise. Sorry. I was about to bring up something because of the point that got raised next. I was quickly trying to look for it because I was like, oh, yeah, people were asking for the link to that. Um, so I'm, I'm just going to, okay, now I'm prepared. Okay, folks. Hey, isn't it, isn't it good that this show is null, nice and prepped? Oh yeah, it's good. We, we do, we do things live here, live and in front of a not live studio audience. Yeah. Um, um, it's fine. So first episode,
    36:23
    it's fine. Mel had mentioned, uh, that video, uh, uh that had gotten to him by way of ekosh who got the video from me because of a link that i'd sent him um let's clear this up everybody so that you know what we're talking about here if you go over to youtube there is a channel here called ponisher ponisher okay he is a visual effects artist he works with well he used to be part of the corridor crew if you've ever seen any of their videos they They do visual effects, artists react, and he's done it. They have a very good channel. Yeah, it's a very good channel. Anyway, he was part of them, and then he separated off to go do his own thing. It is this here on his channel, the community, Master 3D Community Render Challenge with Prize. That is the one you want to click on. All right. You click on that bad boy. What's up, everybody? My name is Tony. Shush.
    37:19
    And I'll just show you. Wait. Where is it going? There. Oh, this is how to do it. But this is the whole pinball, I guess what you want to call the pinball machine thing. It was just a continuous loop of stuff.
    37:37
    And that's what I was looking for. Yeah, so just to give you a quick. So it's this whole thing of watching the balls just drop down into various different environments. Right, I don't even have the right thing. A couple of these environments, look at that, somebody built the inside of a computer and the ball was going to be rolling through there. A couple of these environments actually are pinball machines. Like people built pinball machines in them. So it's totally worth... They took it literally. Yeah.
    38:11
    But what Mel was talking about that he was so impressed with was the physics of the ball. How it felt and how it was sticky and had interaction with the environment. and some of those ones and absolutely take Chris's advice and watch that video if you're having because it's incredible you can watch it countless number of times if I'm good about this I'll remember to put it in the link down below but hopefully I'm good about it I'll hunt it down for the show notes so read them please I need to put a link in there because you've got to give credit where credit's due and that one absolutely deserves credit it needs all the credit What got me excited about that, though, is that Mel got excited and saw that as vision board material for what he wants pinball effects to be.
    39:03
    Have that weight, have that look, have that fidelity, have the lighting, and just have it interacting perfectly so that it looks and feels like actual pinball, even though it's video pinball. That's right.
    39:19
    Some other things. Let's see. Oh, asked him about basically the physics. And we were talking about with Indiana Jones,
    39:34
    was there going to be a difference between figuring out the sensitivity of the physics of the ball? Was there going to be different collision detection? Or was that even going to be an issue because of developing in two different engines? and frame rates, and we've already seen it with, if you've played Zen Pinball Party, that some of the collisions are a little bit different with the Williams tables than they were in the Williams app.
    40:04
    That's right. A lot of that can be attested to switching engines. Even though your physics might be the same,
    40:13
    the collision detection and everything else is way different. so absolutely um and mel was kind of basically saying that that was one of the things that takes a lot of time and it's been taking the time um finding the balance and yeah like how much do you need to do to make it playable and fun but not too much that it's going to bog down your development pipeline yeah i'm trying to get this thing across the line because like every single table has to have the treatment. That's the cost.
    40:49
    He mentioned that I didn't even realize this until I re-watched. He said that once they're up and running, that every two weeks a submission to a first party is going to be happening.
    41:04
    It's like every few weeks it's like, okay. I mean, if you think about it, he said every two weeks. yeah it was like what it's been 26 weeks it's a release like that but right right this just means submitting it to the first parties probably for approval um more or less and getting it into approval through the you know the various stores and stuff like that but uh that's ambitious that's a lot of releases a year oh my god and you just kind of go is there a pipeline really that ready for it that flush yeah that's right but i think too it's like it could be there'll be a submission and it might be every two weeks but then they will batch that release and put it out in one lot maybe um well and it's also you think about it also might be you know submit and then get return you know a lot of time to return if there's going to be you know hey you need to fix this you need to correct this and yeah it's not going to be like don't expect with that comment it's not gonna be like a release every two weeks but yeah it's gonna be frequent releases yeah yeah i think you can pretty much expect that um he also mentioned that uh there's gonna be new options for purchasing which is yeah exactly um so it sounds to me like they're if i had to guess i think it's going to be that whole mixture of what Apple with the Apple Arcade subscription is right now.
    42:44
    That being a possible option, the yes, you can just outright purchase your tables kind of option. Maybe, maybe they'll be introducing the season pass kind of way of doing things rather than, rather than, right. Better than a subscription kind of do what like Farsight used to do where it's pay the season pass up front. You'll get a discount, but you're going to get everything and own everything legit. Yeah. Yeah, yeah. I think it's a great idea. It works really well for Farsight. Yeah, it'll be interesting to see where they go with that, with what those purchasing options are. And I'm just curious to know, is it going to be across the board, like eventually when they do the mobile app, if they do a mobile app, God, I hope they do a mobile app,
    43:29
    that that'll be the case too. An unreal one. Yeah. Yeah, that'd be pretty good. Yeah. I mean, FX2 is the last time they've really done an all-encompassing mobile app. They've had the brand apps, which are fine. They work. But having like... I mean, FX is an ecosystem and it will be out on all platforms. So you can say, yeah, it will be there. In terms of the DMD, we'd asked if there was thoughts of either colorizing or going to just straight LCD style video for retrofitting of machines. And the response from Mel was, and I didn't even think about this, was that because it's all so hard-coded into everything that they do, they essentially have to remake the table yet again. Yeah, which really surprised me. I thought they would actually have the assets separated and they would just throw them in, but it sounds like they're really deeply integrated into the PX engine. Yeah.
    44:30
    And unfortunately, it sounds like they also probably weren't going to bother licensing with Color DMD, you know, adding yet another fee, and just taking whatever work that they had already done to colorize Williams DMDs, so would have been having to have in-house somebody do all the colorization.
    44:48
    Yeah. You know, kind of like what Chicago Coin is doing with the remake tables. Yeah, with their wide aspect DMDs. Yeah, because they're not paying Color DMD. They're just doing it themselves. They are, yeah. Yeah.
    45:03
    And then we kind of were just like, hey, Mel, what's your take on the pinball landscape right now? And he kind of thinks we're in a new golden era. A golden era that, sorry, what was that? I was going to say, I don't think he's wrong. Yeah, I think he's right, for sure, we are. And his point about a cyclic industry, that is a true observation. In the past, there have been essentially a decade where pinball's been strong, and then there's a decade where it's receded. We saw that with Stern in 2000, after an amazing 1990s era across the industry. But what we're seeing now in the industry is very different. It's like it's been at least a decade now of strong growth, and it doesn't seem to be stopping. well especially since it's not dependent on arcades no it's not because there's a home market now and we can thank stern for that but they they have actually the smart marketing there has actually made it that pinball is no longer linked to an arcade cycle um it's there's a home market well established now there's a there's a resale market for it now as well like that's just as big um So there's an entire ecosystem supporting and bolstering pinball as a thing now that it's sustainable in a way. And that's the reason why the cycle hasn't actually stopped yet. So it's really interesting. Doesn't it just kill you that you don't have a time machine and you can just go back to, you know, like 2005 and be like, all right, I'm going to scoop up some machines.
    46:49
    Yeah. Yes. I'd just like to get all the top 20, please. Yes. And I could probably achieve that, getting all top 20, for probably like 25 grand.
    47:01
    Probably, yeah. That's right. Whereas now that's like two tables. Yeah, if you're lucky. Yeah, exactly.
    47:13
    Jeez, some of the prices are wrong. moving over to the uh pinball royale side of things uh where he was saying that that's going to yes it's sort of like what we're seeing i was trying to get him to commit to is it going to what is it exactly yeah what's it going to look like or is it going to be like what's in zen pinball party where it is just a made-up table a very basic table and you're batting around or are we gonna be playing on actual tables real tables he wouldn't go there he wouldn't drop that little nugget makes you think that yeah that's probably what's going to be happening yeah if you read into the tea leaves yeah which is great like you know being able to play something like the getaway with royale style rules sounds awesome yeah but I did like that they were thinking that it was they're going to scale up so it's start with four player then eight sixteen thirty two and eventually if the need be 64 players Which is a lot It is a lot I definitely had trouble finding matches in my time zone on Pinball Royale the Funko one So, you know, small steps. I think, yeah, rather than just going, hey, 64 before you can start playing a game, that would be bad, bad, bad, bad. And that kind of led us into the cabinet world with what Arcade 1UP is doing, because, you know, we haven't heard anything. Yeah, and they haven't released any news about Pinball Product this year. No. Which, again, probably shouldn't be surprising. So the points in this kind of got picked up by this section of our podcast wound up getting picked up by Unqualified Gamer and him posting.
    49:05
    It was one of those things where it was like, I'm scrolling through YouTube and I see my face, but it isn't our channel. So I'm like, wait, and I click on it, and it immediately just starts with me and Jared talking, and then Mel, and I'm like, what the heck? Did he just straight up pull this off and is doing his own little mini blockhead without it being a mini blockhead? And then he actually started talking and going into, because... It was cold open, essentially. It was cold open, yeah. because he follows the arcade one-up world side of things yeah yeah side of things and so it was like this is the first bit of news that he was getting also regarding this um although he had his own sources and so that was kind of collaborating and and uh you know making things more concrete for what they can expect um but by the sounds of it the mel was saying that he wants to increase the value of the cabs that are out there and there was a lot of him talking about and the multiplayer aspect and you know being able to put in the wi-fi and the wi-fi um and that there's a new announcement coming soon from arcade one up so keep your eyes peeled yeah i think that um that new software board that i think it was me who predicted would come out in 2021 could be a 2022 thing yeah yeah which would be good it'll be interesting to see where they uh where they go with that um you know see if us it will well it wasn't necessarily by choice that i waited but those of us that might go for wave two that's right how much we might be going glad i waited um i think look you know you can't dispute being a wave one owner the enjoyment you would have got from having one yeah but i don't know i think wave two owners will be just as happy but it sounds like wave one owners aren't going to be left in the dark i mean what does everybody say about buying a new car never buy the first generation of it by the first generation no you don't want to be the beta tester for a new first generation of a car and so it's less so with something like okay why not but still yeah it's still holds true doesn't it yep uh We talked about the new designers, and then Mel mentioned that there are six active designers at Zen right now, and they're looking to add six more. They want to have 12, and if you do the math there, you're thinking, oh, maybe it's one person working on a table per month kind of thing. Well, it could be if they spin up and get that capability. That would allow them to do that. Yeah. I mean, he even said that they had just, in the span of one year, doubled the size of the company.
    51:57
    He also said on that as well, it's like, you know, that COVID is still at play as well. Yeah, they're not even in the studio, which I didn't realize. No, they're not. So, yeah, which was really surprising. So they're doing all this remote and still getting the job done. Yeah, which makes you go, you know, if you can do it remote, other than the language barrier, which, I mean, most, I shouldn't say most of the guys, but Europe in general, a lot of people know how to speak English. They do. So it makes you wonder if the very nature of proving that Zen can operate purely online and doing submissions online of all their work, if that opens up the talent pool. You're not now just seeking people that have to move to Budapest, but instead you can make it a worldwide search and get the best programs. Honestly, there's no reason why. Developers are doing it every day. they're following the sun developing and there's well established methods of them doing this so that can only be good news for Zen being able to access people outside of the Czech Republic we then sticking with Zen Pinball Party we were kind of curious to know whether or not there'll be additional code added to these basic versions of tables, to which Mel clammed up a really nice and tight So tight. Yeah.
    53:37
    That's a yes. I mean, it would really be a shame if they didn't. It would be really a shame if they didn't. They're great designs. They are.
    53:47
    I know a lot of people are also curious about how long is the exclusivity and are these only going to be Apple? Obviously, Jared being an Android user makes it very difficult for Jared to play Zen Pimple Party. Yeah, it does. It's not easy. No. And you don't want to leave that much of a market out. And then there's me who these, I want to, if I had Apple Arcade on my TV, then I'd be able to see these designs nice and big. But I don't have that. I only have it on my phone. So I'm looking at these things really tiny. and I think it'll be nice to have it in a proper setting for us all to really marvel and look at. Yeah, well, it'll be FX for sure. Eventually. It's got to be eventually. Yeah, they will be coming over to FX for sure. Yeah. Probably with advanced rule sets. So there you go. That's our prediction. Yep. We weren't getting much info about VR other than Mel says that he can see a day when pinball effects will support vr i mean so you know you could probably read into that and say yeah go and buy hits it i mean it it it truly makes sense that you would be developing this almost simultaneously knowing that you have it in your back pocket knowing that you know you're going to throw it out there because the framework's there Yeah, it's just they're not going to turn on immediately with all the other stuff that's going on because it's just too much noise. Yeah.
    55:23
    And, you know, Zen Mel said in the past that, you know, when they do VR, it needs to be an experience, not just a bolt-on. So, you know, they need to do that right. But, you know, it's interesting. You did make a comment in the show about the whole lobby that you saw in the Epic Games Store. It looks quite similar to the Star Wars VR lobby. and I would definitely agree with that. It does look very much the same.
    55:51
    Well, he said that the man cave aspect got a lot of positive feedback. It got a positive feedback. And how about, you know, it's such a good idea. Like, you want a garage or a room that has all your pinball machines in it and stuff. Like, it's just obvious, right? Yeah, you know, I mean, would you rather have that or would you have it, you know, set in some retro 50s diner? No.
    56:19
    Do not want. Give me a really nice, classy man cave, garage, custom room. You know, that's what you want. That's how you want to, like, interact with your things. Yep. Will we be getting... Oh, God, I hope so. Will we be getting ROM set carryover from game to game and a track mode sounds, and Mel was just like, you're going to like what you see. What's coming. what's coming yeah so thank you safecracker with the vault carryover jeez you know end well thank you any system 11 game because yeah we all have carryover stuff involved with them they do taxi everything um world cup is all but confirmed yep just because we were mentioning super league football and yes melville just kind of said well there's a certain event coming up in this coming year.
    57:20
    I was like, so why is he avoiding saying the words World Cup? Yeah. So, I will be, honestly, I would be happy with either. Either having World Cup 94, or having Super League. I'll be stoked if we get both. I'll be missing it. It's such a good table. Super League is fun. Literally,
    57:42
    if I go back and play FX2, that's what I'm going back and playing it. And then I go, oh, well, okay, sure, I'll have a game of South Park. Or I'll have a game of Portal. Or not Portal.
    57:58
    Misplosion Man. Okay. Or Plants vs. I mean, I'll just like, well, okay, I'm here. I might as well play those two. But the first thing I'm always playing is Super League. I just love Super League. It's great. It's an awesome game. It is. And it would be so much better with better physics. Yeah. Its physics are not good. Get those Williams pinball physics right in there. Yeah, it's got the lead ball problem. It really does. Yeah. It really does. It would be so great with live physics. Oh, yeah.
    58:29
    I'd be in that game all the time, I reckon, if that was in there. Yep. We brought up the whole, why did you do the beer? But what was interesting was he said that the beer sets the stage for something that's upcoming. so I doubt that means more beer. I think it means more merch.
    58:51
    And not just your slippers and your t-shirts. Right. Which, for the record, I still haven't received. It took a long time for me to get mine, man. And look, I know why. It's that shipping thing. Because it's for shipping. We were talking before the show all the problems with getting parts and stuff in the opening. Yeah. And it'll be the same. That's why I haven't got my merch yet. Because the net would pay $150 to send this stuff over to me. Exactly.
    59:15
    Yeah. But anyway, that was kind of the summation of what was said in that entire episode, in case you... I don't know. We always like to kind of go back and give our take on what... Try and read between the lines and kind of highlight what piqued our interest. That's what you want when you listen to us after an interview. People expect this coverage. They like to hear our ramblings about what was said in interviews because there's often stuff in there that, unless you're really soaking in it, if you're just a casual observer, you may not pick it up.
    59:56
    And it's fun. We're getting into a really fun part of Zen Studios again, and it's only getting more and more interesting from here. Yeah. I mean, we might have been given a little bit of insight to what's coming.
    60:14
    Maybe. Yeah. We'll just leave it at that. It's going to be a big year. It's going to be big. Yeah. Very big. The fun thing is that sometimes we'll be clued into a thing or two. And that'll get us excited. And then that gets surrounded by the things that we didn't know. And we're like, wait. Wait, so you told us this, but you didn't tell us that? What? You know. Yeah. Yeah, it's... There's definitely some good times ahead for everybody. Yeah, it's going to be an awesome year. Yeah, everybody's going to be really happy about that. I'm going to be dusting off my Xbox controller and getting this computer that I'm on at the moment set up for gaming again. Because I haven't played pinball for a year, digitally. Oh, wow. That long? well because you were doing you were doing the vr once you got the headset you were doing the vr for a while yeah but i haven't even i haven't even put my headset on for months either like i've been doing like between pinball and drums behind like i'd just be playing that to death it's just you know my interest my uh i've kind of gone through the same thing it hasn't been that i haven't had that kind of a drought um but it has been i've kind of wanted to put a separation between me, between FX3 and Pinball FX, so that when Pinball FX comes out, I'm truly excited for it. Yeah, it doesn't just feel like a wow factor. Yeah, I totally agree. I think that's kind of why I'm doing it as well. You know, we played a lot of these games when they were out in FX2 and FX3. And Pinball Arcade. And Pinball Arcade, yeah. I mean, let's face it, we've been doing this podcast since 2012. Yeah, that's right. So this is now our 10-year anniversary. It will be our 10-year anniversary when we circle around to October, I think. October 2022. It was October. Yeah. So, you know.
    62:11
    There's been a lot of... Oh, there. Jeez Louise. What's that? I don't know. It was like this giant rumbling going down my street. Okay. Anyway.
    62:21
    Probably the Hells Angels going down, riding a convoy. Yeah, exactly. But yeah, no, we've been... we've been playing these games day in day out for a very long time so there's only so many times you can see a pinball table and go oh yeah that's fine yeah i mean it's why people sell them yeah you know so yeah i think i i've been deliberately abstaining um so that i can really get excited really see everything with fresh eyes again yeah and one how i wonder if that's like for those people who are tuning in, is that what you do as well? Are you not playing the game or are you just playing it as you would normally and still enjoying it? How's that working for you?
    63:09
    Let us know. And how would they let us know there, Jared? Well, they could go to our very – they could tweet us. So they could go and do at Blackhade and that will get you for the show account. Or you can shout at us individually. I'm Jared Morgz and Chris is ShutYourTraps you can also send us an email at blahblahblahcade at gmail.com and ramble there because we like rambles so yeah get in touch and tell us or even leave comments come and join us for the live premiere and leave comments there or comments in the YouTube anywhere you've got a number of ways of doing it folks and we'll get back to you eventually we do we will yeah mostly chris on youtube he's very good with that yeah i try on on the blockade yeah all right so here's the deal folks that's it for the pinball talk we're gonna take the next probably 10 minutes oh well i say that lightly probably 15 but um as usual it was the end of the year i always do this i always make my list of uh best, good, worst, disappointing movies of the year. We're going to run through this list really quick because it's kind of a tradition, whether you like it or not.
    64:29
    So, Jared, I don't know how you were able to actually watch a few movies this year, it seems. Yeah, yes. I'm not living under a rock at the moment.
    64:39
    So maybe you'll have things to say. I may actually have some contributions to make here, or at least agree or disagree. Show me what you've got. All right, so here we go. Here is my best, in no particular order necessarily, Zack Snyder's Justice League, which for as much as I hated the theatrical version of Justice League, I loved this version, and I'm not even a DC fan. I haven't seen the cut of that. Yeah, it's worth seeking out in some manner.
    65:10
    Sound of Metal, which is a drama about a guy, a musician, that loses his hearing. Oh, right. And the kind of him being thrust into the deaf community and learning to deal with that. It has amazing sound design. It puts you in his head. It makes you experience. So you can hear what he's hearing as a person who's experiencing deafness. Yes. Wow. That's really cool. It's a very cool movie. and again, you may not think that this is something that you'd want to check out. I guarantee within the first 10 to 15 minutes, you're going to get hooked and want to continue just watching to the end. So yeah, it's very good.
    66:01
    Oh, I should qualify before we go further. These were, of course, all the movies that were new to me in 2021 because Sound of Metal came out in 2020.
    66:11
    Quiet Place Part 2. Yeah, Quiet Place Part 2, which literally you could watch a quiet place take out the credits and then start up a quiet place too and you'd never notice the two movies were different really they just flow right into each other and wow you get one giant long movie and the quality is just as good just as good yeah yeah i have to go and check that one out because i love the first one i didn't see it in the cinemas um but i've got a decent enough soundbar at the moment that will it will sound great. Yeah, it's definitely a movie you crank up loud or wear headphones and crank up loud. Because again, just as much as Sound of Metal is with sound design, Quiet Place is all about sound design.
    66:57
    Similar to Zack Dyer's Justice League, Suicide Squad, which was James Gunn's version. Oh, the new one? Yeah. I enjoyed it. Much better than that pile of crap that we dealt with before. So much better. It was great. It had, like, it was just enough humor in there that it was like, you sort of just like, oh, yeah.
    67:22
    Yeah. It's, you know, it's really good. It was a very well-balanced day. Yeah. It's also just, it's so much better storytelling than what they did with the first Suicide Squad movie. I'm not going to get into the reasons why I hated that one, except for the fact that I'll just point out that it was like, the first 45 minutes were nothing but flashbacks. whereas this one still told flashbacks but it was in a nice progressive order it you were still and it closely reminded me to Deadpool to the first Deadpool yeah that's right that's what it reminded me of yeah it was great yeah I really enjoyed it Shang-Chi and the Legend of the Ten Rings very good Marvel movie I was just about to watch that the other day actually and I can't wait to watch it I reckon it's going to be awesome no it's very good Marvel movie if you saw it in the theaters in 3D very good 3D unfortunately the only place that's carrying it on disc now is Japan and they're charging like $90 it's stupid expensive so unfortunately my days of collecting Marvel 3D movies are gone because they did that with Black Widow they're doing it with the Eternals it's all just like pain in the butts for that but proper martial arts for a change. Like, a good martial art. Filmed properly. Really? Martial arts. Chop-socky stuff that you see. It's not, it's not those tight close-ups with shaky cams that's like five billion edits. No, it's back to, you know, think of like John Wick. It's wide shots where you can see everything happening.
    68:57
    And they do a couple of different, and there's different styles of martial arts. Like, when I say different styles of martial arts, like,
    69:04
    how martial arts are portrayed in the movies. Whether you're doing wushu or doing just regular kung fu or, you know, it's, you got your wire work, you got your regular just, you know, kick, kick, punch, punch, you know, all that jazz. Yeah.
    69:19
    The Harder They Fall. This is a movie that was on Netflix. It's a western. It's an almost entirely black cast.
    69:31
    All right. It is hilarious. Oh, yeah? It is what would happen if you mixed Baz Luhrmann with Quentin Tarantino.
    69:39
    I'm just getting my book. I'm writing some of these down. So, because Baz Luhrmann does that very over-the-top theatrical, like, you're very aware of the camera, you're very aware of the humor. It's almost breaking the fourth wall, but isn't, you know, with his. And Tarantino, it's all about the writing, the humor, and the violence.
    70:02
    So marry those two together, you've got The Heart of They Fall. I thoroughly enjoyed it. and then last on the best list uh spider-man no way home it's just really good phenomenal phenomenal they i've really enjoyed this trilogy um whereas i always say my my favorite marvel movie pretty much is iron man uh spider-man homecoming was probably my not necessarily my second favorite but it gave me the same feeling that i I really enjoyed that movie too. And they just didn't stumble, and this was how you close out a trilogy. It didn't suffer that problem that some trilogies have where the third movie is just like, oh, we went back to the well one time too many. That would have been the fourth one.
    70:57
    Anyway, those were my best. Moving on to The Good. a lot of these were Netflix movies go figure really hitting some hard runs, eh? Netflix, they're doing a great job The White Tiger which is it's a tale from India it's about somebody basically trying to bust out of their cast system and become better than who they're supposed to be according to that but it's kind of a gangster story almost. So it's surprising.
    71:36
    Similar to that is a movie called Skater Girl, which is, again, takes place in India. It's a little tiny, I don't know what their towns are called, because it's not a town, it's like a village. It's called a village.
    71:54
    Somebody brings a skateboard, a tourist brings a skateboard, and blows everybody's minds away with this thing, and all of a All of a sudden, all the kids are on skateboards, and the community is having a problem with it because it's not traditional Indian values.
    72:11
    Yeah, it's American values. And then on top of that, you've got a lot of girls that are skateboarding, and that is ruining marriage prospects, you might say. So it kind of similar Oh really I honestly would recommend watching The White Tiger and Skater Girl back to back Oh right Because it two different sides of the same coin.
    72:36
    Hmm. So it's a societal change. Yeah. Pretty interesting. Cool. A movie called Bliss, which is a very unassuming sci-fi movie with Salah Hayek and Owen Wilson.
    72:49
    Oh, that's an odd. It is a head trip oh yeah it's one of those that you finish watching the movie and you go wait what did i uh crap i gotta watch this again don't i so it's an inception basically yeah yeah yeah um i love those promising young woman which is a female revenge movie uh kind of john wickish in terms of what's, you know, like minor event, or not necessarily minor, but what some people would think is, why are you not getting over this, and yet this person becomes an assassin because of it. You know, it's like, that's not the normal route that most people would have taken. Most people have just gone to therapy.
    73:41
    Why go to therapy when you can kick ass? Exactly. Now, back-to-back that with a movie called Nobody, which stars Bob Odenkirk getting his John Wick on. See, I love John Wick, so anytime anybody's tapping, it's this whole genre that I love that's kicking up.
    73:58
    I saw this fly past the other day as well. I went, oh, Odenkirk doing this? This will be interesting. Think John Wick, but funny.
    74:06
    Oh, yeah. That'd be really good. But it's not funny for the sake of bad action. No, it's still really, really good action. It's just there's a lot of one-liners. Oh, that's very good. I don't care what anybody says. I enjoyed Mortal Kombat.
    74:26
    I haven't seen it. Look, I really liked the original Mortal Kombat. It has not dated well at all, but I've got a soft spot for it. And so the fact that this is better than that movie means I liked it. Yeah. And all I had to do, look, are there gross fatalities? Yes. Does it have the Mortal Kombat theme song? Yes. When? So.
    74:53
    And is that the OG Mortal Kombat theme song? Yeah. Mortal Kombat! Yeah. Yeah, right. It's in there. That's great. Movie called King Richard, which is a Will Smith movie about the Williams sisters. yeah really good it's really good i mean it's pretty good sports movie yeah that's right sports movies uh i often shy away from them but yeah usually when i watch them i go that was worth it yep uh no time to die which is the latest bond film um yeah enjoyed that it's again ties up Daniel Craig's Bond time very well. It's... The funny thing is it's just like the least Bond films Bond film of a Bond film. Like, there's not even a casino scene. No, there's not. It's not gadget heavy in the least. No, it's actually just classic spy. Yeah, and I think I would have enjoyed it a lot more except for it seems to me that the Bond films, and this is with his whole run,
    76:08
    if it wasn't for the fact that the Jason Bourne movies and the Mission Impossible movies are out there,
    76:16
    because it seems like it cribs too much from those. Rather than being original, it's doing really good imitations.
    76:27
    And they should be the ones that are imitating Bond. But all the same, that's why it didn't make my best. It's just good. It's really good. it is pretty good go and check it out and then there's two that view on your own discretion I enjoyed them but I can certainly see why people would hate them The Green Knight which is Arthurian tale telling about Gawain and I know it's based on a poem it is visually just out there rich yeah and it's not remotely how you would think the tale would normally have been told but it was one of those that I couldn't stop thinking about it I had to immediately go onto my computer and look up more information after I watched it so to me that if a movie can get you needing to google not because you're trying to go well what happened but to go no tell me more I think that's a good sign same thing there's a movie called Annette. So this is, there's a band that's been around since the 60s called Sparks. It's two brothers, Ron and Russell Mayle. They, if you watch their documentary called The Sparks Brothers,
    77:44
    you'll know that, which is on Netflix right now, you'll hear them tell that they've been writing a screenplay and nobody would buy it. They just couldn't sell it. They kept on having false starts and stuff. Well, guess what? Somebody bought it. And this is it. And it's a musical, part musical, part drama. Adam Driver is the main star of this.
    78:06
    And I'm telling you, it's wackadoodle. Okay. It is out there. Most people, like, I wouldn't doubt if people, like, turned it off within 20 minutes. Oh, right. So it could be quite polarizing. Yeah, going, I'm not sticking around for this. But here's the thing. It has two monologues that I know if I was still in, you know, back in my days of being a theater student at Cal State Fullerton, we would have been doing those monologues. Oh, yeah? Because they're fantastic monologues.
    78:44
    And they're both from Adam Driver, and he just knocks them out of the park. And then there is this little girl who completely kills you with the scene that she is in. Just wrecks you. And it's one of those things where you're just like, I know you're a child actor.
    79:05
    You're still retaining that childlike quality. You're not the annoying kid kind of actor. and you are holding your own perfectly with your fellow castmate. Wow.
    79:20
    That alone is what I recommend the movie for. It just sits for the first 20 minutes and just go along with the ride. Just go with it. Yeah.
    79:31
    And then I have, look, I put Matrix Redirections on here as good. I enjoyed the story. The action is pretty subpar, but the story I really enjoyed. concept was good it's essentially a two-hour epilogue to the trilogy yeah it is that's what it is um and then the french dispatch which is the latest wes anderson movie um and it's just like a greatest hits of wes okay if you know wes anderson stuff then you'll know what i'm talking about um but rather enjoyable uh and then i'm just gonna go skip i'm gonna skip my disappointings. Who wants to know about those? Well, I'll just rattle through them. Boss level, freaky, without remorse, Army of the Dead, Wrath of Man, No Sudden Move, Black Widow, Free Guy, Many Saints of Newark, and Last Night in Soho. It's not that they were bad movies. It's just that I was disappointed. What did you enjoy? I loved... What is it? Free Guy? Free Guy. Yeah, I really enjoyed it. Anything with... I mean, it was enjoyable, but it was also just kind of like, yeah, been here, done that, hey, it's Wreck-It Ralph.
    80:42
    You know, it's... Oh, yeah, I guess. And if you've seen... I'll just switch your brain off and go along with the ride for that one. Check it out.
    80:50
    That's what I said. None of these were terrible. Rotten Tomatoes bad. Right, right. It's just, I was disappointed. Like, for instance, boss level is essentially Free Guy.
    81:01
    Yeah. Great the entire way. it completely craps the bed in the last five minutes yeah like just you go no what what no stop why are you oh man what was the other one that was eight bits eight bits something it's only just been recently a bit christmas i didn't watch that yeah that that was hallmark level crap oh really yeah unfortunately wow like it just like you got to the end of it and it really it had that almost rammed down your throat message yeah at the end yeah and it was like you know it had its parts to it but it was just like oh yeah you didn't need that you didn't need the uh the psa at the end i really didn't need the psa like if you're like a bit of 80s aesthetic and you grew up in the 80s, you'll laugh at some of the things in it. Like, it's got some... But it was like... It really did feel a bit Hallmark-y at some points, you know?
    82:02
    So, this brings us to our worst. Oh, dear. This was a stinker of a year. Like, for a big bunch of stuff. Because usually I have to fill it with, like, you know, just things that necessarily shouldn't have been good anyway. But, no. Wonder Woman 84.
    82:17
    Crap. All right. Well, I'm striking that from the list. It's... everything that you loved about Wonder Woman is bad in this movie. Oh, okay. That's not good.
    82:30
    Just like I was saying how Justice League theatrical was terrible compared and everything was great with Zack Snyder, it's like the same, just like. Wow. It's the case of they said, okay, we won't cut anything that you do, and they desperately needed an editor. You could have taken 20 minutes out of this movie and never batted an eye. Right. Monster Hunter, which, based on a video game, Paul Thomas Anderson movie with Mila Jovovich. And, yeah, it's terrible. It's bad. Even with Mila Jovovich in it. It's bad.
    83:07
    It's not worth checking out. It's, I mean, think of what he did with Resident Evil. That's what he did with Monster Hunter.
    83:18
    It's, you know. Godzilla vs. Kong sorry folks didn't care for it the stupid was overwhelming it was somebody doing cool paintings and not figuring out how that actually would function in the world so yeah if you just want to see ape and lizard punching each other well yay it did a good job you'll get that but i was bored um i have this movie vanquish on here which is a movie that i shot off after literally the eight minute long credits opening credits eight minute long opening credits and they are like skinamax bad just like it looks like somebody did it on an old PC bad opening credits. And I was like, you're padding your run time.
    84:19
    And the poster has it's with Ruby Rose. Has her standing there. She's got like all these guns behind her. And you're thinking, oh yeah it's going to be a big old action gun movie shootout. There's not a single gun shootout in the movie.
    84:35
    What? I mean like a gun is fired but it's not a proper gun shootout. it's not all those guns that were behind her and the only reason why I know this was because after those opening credits and I watched one scene after that oh and Morgan Freeman said it and talk about like you could see him counting the money from his paycheck oh really I went okay I can't take it no I'm going to turn this off but I'm curious I need to know when the gun shoot out so I just started fast forwarding through it 30 seconds just like running through and I made it through the entire movie and got to the end and went, yep, no action scene. Great. Glad I didn't spend my time on that. Yes. Now a movie that I did spend my time on that I should have done the exact same thing with was Gunpowder Milkshake.
    85:22
    Okay. I never even heard of that. It's, what's her name? Karen Gillian is the star of this one. She plays what's Gamora's sister in Guardians of the Galaxy? Nebula. She plays Nebula. this movie is what happens when a production designer gets a hold of something and it's just production designed to death but there's no content it's all style over substance the scene that really killed me was there was a raid happening on this building and there was a big brick wall with a warehouse door size opening.
    86:09
    So they're going to use that as a choke point. She's got a vehicle with a 50 caliber machine gun coming out the top of a vehicle, right? Here comes all the bad guys.
    86:22
    And she's spraying like this and hitting like half the bullets are just going into the brick wall. I'm like, it's a choke point. You only have to go very little. Like that. But it doesn't look cool. And that's the movie. That's the movie in its entirety. They do things because it looks cool, but it doesn't make a lick of sense. Right. I see.
    86:49
    Jungle Cruise. That sounds terrible just by the title. Well, you see, you've never been to Disneyland. You've never ridden the Jungle Cruise. No, I have not. Exactly. That's what it's doing. It's based off of the Jungle Cruise ride. it's Dwayne Johnson. I was going to say, is it Dwayne Johnson? Yes, it's Dwayne Johnson. It sounds like a Dwayne Johnson movie.
    87:11
    This is a movie where, hey, it's a boat on a river, right? But I guarantee you that the actors never once stepped foot on a river or on a boat on a river. It was entirely green screen. Oh, yes. And the characters were ripped wholeheartedly straight out of the Mummy movies.
    87:32
    Oh, really? Oh, like, you're going, wait, I, so, okay, so she's playing the girl, he's playing, yeah, oh, there's the brother, mm-hmm, yeah, okay, and, oh, hey, look, there's the library scene with her balancing on a ladder, mm-kay, uh-huh, yeah, like, part and parcel taken straight off the Mummy movies. Well, with a little dash of Pirates of the Caribbean thrown in for visual effects. Yeah, terrible. Geez. Not as terrible as Space Jam A New Legacy. Oh, that was... Look, I watched it with the kids.
    88:06
    It was okay. But if you're watching it with an adult lens on... Here's the thing. They have all these fans lining the basketball court.
    88:18
    They are so obviously filmed individually and then comped in, and they aren't paying a lick of attention to what's actually happening on the court. No. that they lit they are so composited aren't they like yeah it is it's comical yeah oh hold on something happened here oh wow i froze there yeah we both froze i know i think i left it on the camera for too long uh i heard the thing um two more here we go yeah fast and furious nine the Fast Saga. I gave up on Fast and Furious ages ago. Ages ago. Well, 8 completely disappointed me. Hobbs and Shaw confirmed what my disappointment was and 9 just proved that it was never going to get better. What you're saying is you're a sucker for punishment. You don't learn your lesson when it comes to Fast and Furious. Well, when you've already watched 7 movies, you figure well, okay, I'll just take it to the end. So now it's a hate watch. Because there's going to be one more. Yeah, it's grudge watching it. But here's the thing. Really? Why are they doing Am I paying to go see it in the theater? Oh, hell no. Nope.
    89:26
    And I didn't see this one in the theater. I didn't see Hobbs and Shaw in the theater. So I learned my lesson at least that much. You made the right decision. Right.
    89:34
    And last, I have Cry Macho, which is a Clint Eastwood movie. Oh, it's terrible. Oh, is it? Oh, it's beyond terrible. it's like you question why anybody thought this was a good idea terrible in the hands of somebody else with a completely different cast and better actors that are more age appropriate sure but Clint's 90 or 91 and yet still can somehow attract the senioritas and there's this troubled kid who's supposed to be really a bad kid like a 12 year old from hell that's because he has a chicken and coccyx that that's the only reason why he's bad yeah yeah um oh i didn't finish the movie i i literally doing it's all a community service with these light reports yes just like really honestly i these lists now i can actually go yep yep yep yep i know that i have access to those movies in some way and I will watch them and that will be fun. Um, but yeah, those ones that are horrible. Um, I have actually been getting into a lot of probably new to me TV. Um, one of them at the recommendation of you actually Ozark. Yeah. Um, cause I was off breaking bad and off better call Saul waiting for the new series coming out in Ozark. What a spectacular, such a good story. Yep. Um, in that such a very different take on cartel life. Um, it, the whole thing is just like a constant battle not to die. Yeah. And that's what makes us, it's really, this is what I would sum up the whole series is let's basically do all we can not to be killed by the cartel. And it's the story that evolves. It's, it's very creative. The things that come up with the, like keep ahead. Um, and it's been a long time since, uh, the season you just finished, aired. I think it's been almost a year and a half. I've forgotten a lot of it, so I'm going to have to re-watch it before the new season comes out. I'm kind of looking forward to that.
    91:48
    Yeah. I love watching back-to-back. You really got the context of it, but that was fantastic. I did Better Call Saul, and I did Breaking Bad. I've got my genre of television. It's like hateful television.
    92:07
    It's the anti-hero anti-hero that's the one yeah and i was really getting into that stuff yeah so now i'm watching good omens oh that was good um yeah so i'm getting into that i mean i again i'm not particularly religious so i'm sure there's a lot of in jokes in there the like kind of religious related um but i'm still enjoying it and um the other one i've also gone into is the second series of ted lasso oh that was great well you can't not like ted lasso he's like just the writing in that And the punchlines that Ted's character, that Ted comes out with, are just like, oh, so good. It's just so subtle. Yeah, I just finished, and I would highly recommend you check this out too, Jared, The Expanse.
    92:50
    Oh, yeah, I've seen that. It's six seasons. It just wrapped up. It's now done, although it could easily be brought back. Yeah, yeah, right. But it didn't disappoint. Oh, right. It's exceptional sci-fi.
    93:08
    When I say sci-fi, I like hard sci-fi. Oh, right. Like, well-thought-out universe of science fiction. Oh, good. You only have to get beyond the first three episodes. First three episodes are very cliche.
    93:24
    Oh, okay. But once you get past that, then it's like, ooh, hey, where'd this show come from? Awesome. All right, well, I'll be into that. And what's the other one that I've watched as well? it was uh the other thing i have been watching because i have access to them is all of the how it's made um episodes because like watching how things are made on big machinery is incredibly satisfying to watch and you know it it's it's cool you get to learn how all these things you see just around you are made and now because i've watched enough of the episodes now i can kind of predict all right, so they give you the rundown at the beginning about what they're going to make in the show. I reckon it's going to be extruded plastic. That's going to be like casting. That's going to be this. And you try and guess how they're going to make it before they actually do it. And there's an element of fun in doing that if you're a nerd like me. Cool.
    94:18
    Yeah, so it's fun. All right. Well, there you go, folks. That was our, I know, I said 10 minutes. Yeah, I lied. It's never going to be 10 minutes. Come on.
    94:28
    We don't apologize for that. it's been good that I've been actually able to have something to say about this year it's been good so it'll be curious to see if you guys have any thoughts or comments about this list that I have feel free hit me up in the comments I'll argue our old day about these things where was June Dune oh I didn't even put that what the hell I read right past it Dune is on the very good list That's at the very tip top, pretty much. The very top of the very good list. It did not disappoint me one iota, and I'm a Jane Norris Dune fan. It's my favorite book. How are you finding Wheel of Time?
    95:12
    I found it enjoyable, but I'm not blown away like some people are. There are some other fantasies on Netflix that I actually kind of enjoy better.
    95:20
    See, I haven't read the books in that series. I'm coming in just... I've never read Shadow of the... Cry of Knowledge. I've never read The Wheel of Time either. Yeah. But honestly, I'd almost think Shadow and Bone on Netflix, I think I actually kind of like better than Wheel of Time. Oh, wow. Put that on one of those too. Yeah.
    95:41
    And they're about to have a second season. Well, I mean, I know it's being made, I should say. But anyway, you'll see it very much is a similar.
    95:54
    It's the fantasy genre. No, not the premise, but it's that fantasy genre. where you just like, you see the typical archetypes and the costuming and the magic and, you know. All that. Yeah, all that. So. Oh, cool. All right, folks. Well, thanks for sticking with us on this back half. This is why we save this for the back because we know some of you are just like, nope, I'm out. Yep, thank you very much. Next.
    96:17
    However, like we said, we're looking forward to this year. We should have a lot of content to talk about. So we will do just that next time when we talk about, Jared? Stuff and things again. Until then, buh-bye. Bye.