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040 - What Kind of Player Are You?

Punk Rock Pinball Podcast·podcast_episode·52m 12s·analyzed·Mar 23, 2026
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claude-haiku-4-5-20251001 (batch) · $0.015

TL;DR

Turner Yeti buzz, American Pinball rebranding concerns, and pinball player taxonomy.

Summary

Stephanie and Mike from Punk Rock Pinball Podcast discuss Turner Pinball's new Yukon Yeti game (designed by Dennis Nordman) and American Pinball's rebranding under new ownership with plans to remake classic 90s titles like Circus Voltaire. They also cover playlist curation for tournaments and explore different player archetypes in the pinball community, from competitive to casual to lone wolf players, while encouraging newcomers to try multiple tournament venues.

Key Claims

  • Yukon Yeti is Turner Pinball's third game and represents their best layout work to date

    high confidence · Stephanie and Mike discussing Turner Pinball's announcement

  • The main criticism of Yukon Yeti at Texas Pinball Festival is the audio/music package

    high confidence · Mike discussing feedback from Texas Pinball Festival; they note code is not finished yet

  • American Pinball has new ownership and management and is planning to remake classic Williams/Bally games from the 90s

    high confidence · Direct announcement discussion; Circus Voltaire mentioned as first remake

  • American Pinball's new branding uses AI-generated logos, which the hosts view negatively

    high confidence · Stephanie and Mike discussing AI art use in American Pinball's marketing materials; they cite community backlash in their Facebook group

  • Dennis Nordman designed Pirates of the Caribbean for Stern and is known for wild ramp designs

    high confidence · Mike discussing Nordman's background when introducing Yukon Yeti

  • Spooky Pinball games sell out immediately and don't require traditional marketing

    medium confidence · Discussion comparing Spooky's marketing strategy to Stern and JJP; speculation that distributors may pre-claim production runs

  • Stern has the strongest marketing infrastructure among pinball manufacturers with a dedicated field marketing program led by Michael Grant

    high confidence · Stephanie discussing Stern's marketing capabilities

  • Pokemon pinball is out in the wild but still has app integration issues on Stern's insider platform

    high confidence · Mike noting Pokemon collection feature still doesn't work on Stern insider app despite game shipping

Notable Quotes

  • “I'm going to face you on this game in the tournament probably and I'm going to shoot 12 million in the tournament and you're going to kick my ass.”

    Mike @ early in episode — Personal anecdote about how teaching someone a game and then choking in tournament performance; illustrates competitive pinball dynamics

  • “The audio is a big deal...it's not even finished yet. But maybe Turner has a history of doing a show and getting feedback and changing things.”

    Stephanie @ mid-episode — Discusses iterative design process and how manufacturers use festivals for feedback

  • “They're basically rebranding American Pinball, and they've had two logos since this new rebrand, both of which are clearly AI generated. And I think that's like super lame.”

    Stephanie @ mid-episode — Critique of AI art use in corporate rebranding; signals community values around human artistry

  • “If you come posting like AI artwork in our Facebook group, like you get shredded...because it's gross.”

    Mike @ mid-episode — Indicates strong community sentiment against AI-generated art in pinball spaces

  • “Pinball companies suck at marketing. Yes. I mean, some of them do a great job at different levels of it, but I think Stern does a pretty good job.”

    Stephanie and Mike @ mid-episode — Industry observation about marketing competency variation across manufacturers

  • “Not every tournament, location, or scene is gonna be the same. Like, not at all...you would have a vastly different experience just based on the physical environment.”

    Mike @ late episode — Discussion of how venue affects tournament experience and community building; encourages newcomers to try multiple venues

  • “If you don't like the first one, try to do a different one. And even if you didn't like the first one, maybe just go back and try it one more time.”

    Stephanie @ late episode — Encouragement for newcomers to the competitive scene; addresses barrier to entry

Entities

Turner PinballcompanyDennis NordmanpersonYukon YetigameAmerican PinballcompanyCircus VoltairegameStern PinballcompanyMichael Grantperson

Signals

  • ?

    product_launch: Turner Pinball announces Yukon Yeti designed by legendary designer Dennis Nordman; game shown at Texas Pinball Festival

    high · Stephanie and Mike discussing announcement and gameplay reception at festival

  • ?

    design_innovation: Yukon Yeti represents Turner Pinball's best layout work to date; described as exciting and well-designed

    high · Mike: 'As far as layout goes, it looks to be easily the best Turner pinball machine.'

  • ?

    code_update: Yukon Yeti receiving feedback during festival playtest phase; code is not finished yet; Turner has history of incorporating feedback

    high · Stephanie noting code is unfinished and that Turner made changes to Ninja Eclipse based on feedback

  • ?

    product_concern: Main criticism of Yukon Yeti is the audio package (music and callouts); could be addressed before production

    high · Mike: 'one knock on it are...it's one knock, it's the audio package' and discussion of potentially hiring sound designer like one from Dirty Pool Pinball

  • ?

    business_signal: American Pinball acquired by new ownership (J.B. Vincent LP leadership); undergoing corporate rebranding

    high · Mike discussing American Pinball's new ownership and management team making rebrand decisions

  • ?

    product_strategy: American Pinball planning to remake classic Williams/Bally games from 1990s; Circus Voltaire announced as first title

Transcript

groq_whisper · $0.157

0:00
PUNK ARC PINBALL PODCAST Hi. Hello. Welcome to the Punk Arc Pinball Podcast. Is this episode 40? Maybe. I think it is. Well. I think it's number 40. I think the last one was 39. Stephanie K. I'm Stephanie. Mike K. I'm Mike. Stephanie K. This is the show. Mike K. We're the hosts of the show. Stephanie K. Yep. Mike K. Thank you for listening. Mike K. And the last one on the last episode on the Spotify and the Apple and all those podcast places, it was the biggest one yet again. Stephanie K. What? Mike K. Everyone, for like the release window, like the first 48 hours, every single one the last like five or six has been the biggest one. Stephanie K. That's cool. Yeah, so if you're listening on those podcasty things on the audio side, thank you very much. Yeah, thanks a lot. And if you like it, you could give it a rating like a five star or four star, I don't even know. Whatever you feel. Whatever you feel like. If you got a problem, send Mike an email. How many stars you think it's worth? If you don't like it, send Mike an email, Mike at livefromtherockroom.com and tell him what you don't like. Tell me what you want us to say instead of what we're saying. We've got a special guest here today. Yeah, I don't know if he's in the frame. I don't know. We've got two dogs. Cooper dog, my brother's dog, is with us today. He's a little beagle. He wants to be in on the show. So, our topics for today, we wanted to talk briefly about the latest announcements from Turner Pinball. Yes. And American Pinball. Yes. Bill T. Then we wanted to maybe talk a little bit about the playlist. Okay. Bill T. Making a playlist. Yeah. That's fun. Bill T. And then maybe we'll talk about like the different types of pinball or different types of pinball players. Okay. I love that. Bill T. What type of pinball player are you? You can think about that as we're talking. We'll get there in a little bit. Okay. So tell me about the news, Mike. What's happening in the world of pinball? Mark Leibman, Can I tell a personal story? Yeah, I'd love to. Do you mind as a listener? Do you? This is a story that happened to me yesterday. It's just a part of my, because I like to share personal stories about our competitive pinball journey. Okay, I know you have no idea what you're about to say here. It's happened to me yesterday. Has this ever happened to you? Was it about your shoes? No, it's not about my shoes. Has that ever happened to you? We'll say that at the end of it. So our friend Corey Grimm was there. Mm-hmm. And we're doing the warm-ups. We had a tournament yesterday. I'm not going to go on to the tournament, but like this is just a personal competitive pinball story. Okay. I'm not talking about just our place. Okay, I just want to hear it. Just tell me the story. So Corey's played John Wick and he had a pretty good game and I was talking to him about John Wick and he doesn't fully know the rules of the game. And I know the rules to John Wick really well. I'm not a better pinball player than Corey, but like I know John Wick better. So I'm like, let me show you. So I push start on the John Wick.

  • “Yeti in it. So does Yukon Yeti. Yeah. I know. I think the Whitewater Yeti looks a little cooler than the one in this one. Well, you know, I mean, cryptozoology right there.”

    Stephanie and Mike @ early-mid episode — Light discussion of game theming and previous reference to unfilled cryptozoology pinball concept

    • Stephanie Kperson
    Mike Kperson
    Corey Grimmperson
    John Wickgame
    Spooky Pinballcompany
    Jersey Jack Pinballcompany
    Texas Pinball Festivalevent
    Whitewatergame
    Joeperson
    Shellyperson
    CJperson
    Luke Pierowskiperson
    Tonyperson
    Jeffperson
    Mark the Knifeperson
    Katperson
    Pokemongame
    Punk Rock Pinball Podcastorganization

    high · Mike discussing American Pinball's new strategy to remake 90s classics; Circus Voltaire noted as top-requested remake

  • ~

    sentiment_shift: Community negative reaction to American Pinball's use of AI-generated logos in rebranding; strong backlash in Punk Rock Pinball Facebook group

    high · Stephanie: 'if you come posting like AI artwork in our Facebook group, like you get shredded...because it's gross.' Discussion of AI logos being 'super lame' from new ownership

  • ?

    community_signal: Discussion of different pinball player archetypes and barriers to entry for newcomers; hosts encouraging multiple tournament attempts

    high · Extended discussion of competitive, social, casual, lone wolf, and tinkerer player types; advice to try three different tournaments

  • $

    market_signal: Stern and Jersey Jack dominate marketing spend; most other manufacturers focus only on existing pinball community

    medium · Mike: 'I feel like outside of Stern and JJP, all of those other guys, they're just marketing right to current pinball players'

  • ?

    product_concern: Pokemon game shipping but Stern's insider app still cannot collect Pokemon, representing a failed launch feature

    high · Mike: 'Pokemon is out in the wild. It has been. I still can't collect Pokemon on my insider connected app. That's a fail. Period.'

  • ?

    venue_signal: Same tournaments and players in different venues create vastly different experiences for newcomers based on physical environment, lighting, and noise

    high · Extended discussion of three Bloomington venues (club, Poor Bros bar, Golden Ticket Cinema) having different vibes despite 75-80% same attendees

  • ?

    personnel_signal: American Pinball has new CEO/leadership making branding decisions; hosts suggest adding art/creative director role to company

    medium · Stephanie suggesting new leadership 'probably understands a lot of aspects of business but maybe not marketing so much' and recommending hiring creative director

    • 3:35
    And I'm walking them through what you do. And I'm doing everything I say to do. All right. Like you want to hit this and you know, ski pass it over there and then hit that. I'm walking them through and I shoot like 190 million or something. And I'm telling them everything to do. And I'm doing exactly like now you want to lock the ball and then I lock the ball. Solid game. I'm going to hit the car, hit the car, and I got to hit the spinner and I'm doing it. Got it. 190 million points. Bam. And I says to Corey, you know, I'm going to face you on this game in the tournament probably and I'm going to shoot 12 million in the tournament and you're going to kick my ass. And then the first round comes up and it's me and Corey, it's a four player game, but there's me and Corey Grimm on John Wick. And I shot 12 million. What'd he get? Like 60. Well. So I was fourth out of four. You put it out there. And so I spoke it into existence. But have you ever like taught someone a game in warmups and kind of like 200-ish million is not an amazing score, but it's pretty good on John Wick. Kat did that to me at the ladies night last week too. And she taught you a game? Well, on Champion Pub, she showed me how to do something and then I beat her and she didn't make it into the finals. And did you beat her by doing what she said? Yeah. So I guess, has that ever happened to you? It's happened to Kat. Yeah. Happened to me. Now, I don't know if Corey used everything I taught him against me, but it was more my failing to execute, my failure to execute. Like I'm warming up just talking the entire time I'm playing, shoot 190 and then I shoot 12 in the tournament. You know, that's pinball, baby. iknow addressed u
    5:27
    i like re utter i re nat satisfied if ne i ad l And now, with a new machine from Turner Pinball called... So Turner Pinball, they've made a couple machines, the Merlin's Magic. Merlin's Arcade. And then the Ninja Eclipse, both which we played at Expo. I think Ninja Eclipse is better of those two. I don't know. It depends on how you feel about them, I guess. But yeah, this is their third game. They're a newer, like a small company. I'm looking at their Facebook right now. 5,300 followers. But they have a new game that's very interesting called Yukon Yeti. Whaaat? Who's that designed by? Is that a Nordman? It's Dennis Nordman. He's the man who loves the wild ramps. Yeah, like the big wavy ramps. And this Yukon Yeti, it's sort of like a follow up to Whitewater. Beloved game from the 90s. You like Whitewater. Yeah, who doesn't? It's got a Yeti in it. So does Yukon Yeti. Yeah. I know. I think the Whitewater Yeti looks a little cooler than the one in this one. Well, you know, I mean, cryptozoology right there. Cryptozoology. We have talked about how there should be a cryptozoology pin. This game kind of hits that note. The layout looks really cool on this. It looks really cool. As far as layout goes, it looks to be easily the best Turner pinball machine. Yeah, the other night we were watching the Electric Batcast and Cale and Serge were going through, we didn't, we kind of watched towards the end of it, maybe the last quarter of the, of their live broadcast. How does Serge know how to play it? Like he walked through everything, like how you play the game. How does he know? I don't know. Is he getting that just from what's on the playfield? I have no idea, but it was like, is he like a magician psychic? I don't know. Because he's like, yeah, you want to do this one to qualify that. Those are here and here and here. And then you need to hit this shot and that will start your 2x multiplier. And it's like, all you've got is a playfield to look at. Yeah, I don't know. Maybe he got invited to like a cool walkthrough of it or something. Yeah, maybe. Who knows? Maybe. But I was impressed. It looks cool. There's like a dog yipping in the background. I don't know what he's up to. But the game looks cool. It's Dennis Nordman. He, Dennis Nordman also designed the Stern Pirates of the Caribbean, which we own and we like.
    8:19
    He's done a lot of good games. I think the art looks pretty nice. The layout looks fun. Yeah, I think the rules look fun. I'm like interested in this one. Cool. How about you? Yeah, I want to play it. Do you want to get it? No, I don't feel the need to get anything. What if you played it and you loved it? Well then, that's TBD, that's in the future. And what I'm hearing from... I've read a few things because Texas Pinball Festival is going on right now and it sounds like people are loving the gameplay on this game. And the one, kind of two knocks on it are... well it's one knock, it's the audio package. Alright, big whip. I don't like the music and the call-outs. I think the audio is a big deal. I know, but it's still like, it's not even finished yet. It's not finished. But maybe, so Turner has a history of doing a show and getting feedback and changing things. That's super cool. They did that with Ninja Eclipse. So maybe based on this feedback from Texas Pinball Festival, maybe they will revamp the audio package. Yep. We'll see. I forget, I feel bad, I forget the guy's name from Dirty Pool Pinball. What's his name? I'm not sure. He did the sound package for Winchester Mystery House, which is phenomenal. And I don't know if he's a free agent or what he charges, but maybe Turner Pinball wants to give that guy a jingle.
    9:51
    Maybe they were waiting for some feedback from Texas Pinball Festival and maybe that is part of the plan. Who knows? I think the audio package is hugely important. Because if I was designing a game, I would want to bring it to a really big audience like that. And I think that's the biggest pinball festival in the country. Get a bunch of consumer feedback and then go back and try to tweak it to hit on all of the things that were rubbing people the wrong way. I think that's really smart. Yeah, because I know some people commented online about like, oh, the code looks This or that. And it's like the code has got to be nowhere near done. The game's not made yet. Like they have prototypes of the game. So the code could go wherever it needs to go. We'll just have to wait and see. We'll have to wait and see. But I think it's an exciting title. It's cool that Turner has a game designed by Dennis Nordman. I think it gives them, not that they weren't legitimate before, but it gives them even more kind of legitimacy as like, Norbin games like shoot good, all the ones I've played, so it probably shoots good. So I'm excited about that. Me too. I can't wait to see it. The other piece of news, all in the same week, American Pinball. They're kind of back, and they've got like new ownership management and all kind of whole new team over there. This Coin hunting in progress. There will be some fire in the Deadman. We're doing something that people have been asking for for a long time of redo some of these older games from the 90s that people love. Yeah, I feel like when the 90s remakes come up, right, that game is always in the top three or four that people... it's like Theater of Magic, Tales of the Arabian Nights, Circus Voltaire are kind of like the three that everybody, every time that subject comes up, they want those. Yeah, so pretty smart choice there.
    12:14
    Rumor has it that our friends, John Shelley might have ordered one. I don't know. I don't know. Somebody told me that a little bird told you a little bird told me. I wonder what the timeline is on that when it's going to be made. I don't know. I think it's super cool. Super exciting.
    12:31
    I only have one thing about American pinball right now. Gives me reservations and somebody come. I shared the post in our Punk Rock Pinball Facebook group. I shared that they were doing this. And one person can't remember exactly what they said, but I agree. I did not reply to this comment. But they are apprehensive due to. American pinball use of A in their marketing materials Oh And I agree Yeah but if they doing like if they This is prince of all lads AC and PIP in snack for the month of may not go to trash orbit and running with some of lochlery gba runs of it's necserOL and this exact geek her some of he's an astro So this? Guy that made the PB Herman thing that we have. Oh yeah, Albright. I think it's Albright. That's cool. He did Winchester, like some of the pieces. So they're using human art for that. But I would just say I think I don't really have fears that they're using AI in the pinball, right? But I just think you've bought this company, you're basically rebranding American Pinball, And they've had two logos since this new rebrand, both of which are clearly AI generated. And I think that's like super lame. I mean, I agree. It's super lame. I agree. And I wonder if like, I don't know, I don't go in a lot of the other Facebook pinball groups very often because they're kind of crabby. What is that dog doing? I don't know. It's so weird. I wonder if people kind of like, is that, I wonder if the same reaction to AI art in those groups is the same as in our group. I'll tell you, if you come posting like AI artwork in our Facebook group, like you get shredded. You get shredded, which is totally fine because it's gross. Like there is certainly a place to maybe, you know, sometimes lean in on a little AI stuff. I know it's terrible for all like a list of reasons. I guess it just is real gross on the art because it all it has this look to it, which it just it makes the hair stand up on the back of your neck. I don't care for it. And it was really disappointing that, like, you buy and you're buying a pinball company, right? And you're going to rebrand it. And like the first thing you do is like, here's an AI logo for our company. And man, there are thousands of human artists that would do this logo. Some of them would probably charge you only a couple hundred bucks. Brandeis Pizza Birbенты All 4 The person who is the new CEO or president or whatever their title is probably understands a lot of aspects of business but maybe not marketing so much and that's a miss. It's a big miss. Maybe they should consider hiring, like if they don't have one, an art slash creative director at some level to make these decisions about this is what our branding looks like. So, if you're looking for a good pinball machine, you need to take that seriously and have a good logo designed by a good human artist. Well, I think that most of the pinball companies out there, quite honestly, do a terrible job at marketing. Pinball companies suck at marketing. Yes. I mean, some of them do a great job at different levels of it, but I think Stern does a pretty good job with what they're putting out to people. They've got a whole field marketing program that's led by Michael Grant. They certainly invest in marketing elements. They've got a really good social presence. All of that takes a lot of time and a lot of money to pull all of that off. It looks easy, but it isn't. It's very time consuming. Most of the other companies do a terrible job. Steven Shattuck Stern does do the best job, but they are far from flawless in their marketing. I'm not saying they're flawless, but like out of all of them, I think they do a pretty good job. I think they're like maybe the only ones that have a team for it. Yeah. I could be wrong. I mean, Spooky does, I think does like, they kind of like pop in and out, but I feel like I am just thinking about like marketing to your audience. Yeah. And I get served on like the connected TV when we're watching Hulu or whatever. Like I get, I'll see Jersey Jack ads, I'll see Stern ads that pop up. Like I feel like those two have the budget to do those kind of things. And Spooky doesn't need to do it because every game they make sells out immediately.
    18:02
    Yeah, they're like grassroots DIY, word of mouth. All of these are paid advertisements for anything because if you want to Beetlejuice your month's too late because it sold out. I think it was probably sold out on the distributor list before the game was even announced. Yeah, I think so too. And like the next spooky machine is probably close to being sold out and it's not going to be announced. By sold out I mean people have probably claimed those spots. I would not be shocked if Spooky's making a thousand of the next game if the distributors already have a list of a thousand spots already taken. Probably. I feel like outside of Stern and JJP, all of those other guys, they're just marketing right to current pinball players where I feel like Stern and Jersey Jack with the titles that they've done and some of the tactics that they've done because of the bigger title. I think Stern needs a lot of clean up. Tim Kitzrow, Barry Oursler,
    20:02
    It's multiple launches in a row now for Stern where it like the game is out. Pokemon is out in the wild. It has been. I still can't collect Pokemon on my insider connected app.
    20:15
    That's a fail. Period. That is a fail. This isn't this isn't pinball news. No, this isn't pinball news. But you went into pinball marketing. Well, because you're talking about the logo. Yeah. But yeah, so there's like maybe we could do a different episode about. Yeah, how they could do better marketing. Everybody can do better. Okay. So do you want to go to the playlist or do you want to go to the types of pinball players? Because that's pinball news. You got Yukon Yeti. Exciting. You got Circus Volterra. Exciting to many. Hopefully both those games get built in a timely fashion. And I would love to play both of them. Yeah, me too. Um, let's talk about your playlist. You spent a lot of time working on a playlist for our event yesterday, our tournament, our monthly tournament. Turnout
    21:32
    You want to make like a playlist for like a pinball tournament for your group or whatever. First, it helps if you have been around these people a lot. And I have a pretty good feel on, I don't know everyone's favorite band, but I've got a pretty good vibe on what certain people like. They mostly all like some type of rock, but different types and different eras. So what I did, I made this playlist and it kind of spans from like the late 60s up to like current. Because the newest song on it would be the newest song by the Menzingers, which came out like a week ago. So there is a one week old song on there and then there are songs, I think I have a Rolling Stone song on there, so it's like a 60s song. But I, and the playlist is like a hundred some, it's seven hours and 15 minutes long. Oh my God, that's how long it was? That's how long it was, but I knew I was going to go, I was going to open up the club at three. And you were going to hit play? And I was going to hit play, I hit play like close to four. So I, and the playlist was just about over by the time that I left. Wow. Last night. And I started off kind of mid tempo and kind of older where I had like some Tom Petty and then some Steve Miller band. And I would do like two or three song, like two songs to five song kind of rock block of different eras and different kind of vibes. So I go like, is this going to be in the 70s for a minute? And then now we're going to come forward into the 90s. Hmm. And then like if I'm doing like kind of like a like a harder rock vibe like I had like Def Leppard in there and I had the darkness in there which kind of both are kind of like butt rocky in a way. Yeah. And then so and then I want to get kind of more towards back to the punk. So I'm like how do I transition that like was a band that could take me from how do I get from Def Leppard to the Menzingers? How did you? Cheap trick. Oh, all right. I want you to want me. You pulled a cheap trick. I pulled a cheap trick. Okay. Yeah. And yeah, it kind of bobs and weaves. You had some Madonna in there last night. Madonna's in there. The Yeah Yeah Yeahs are in there. Hall & Oates are in there. Oh my gosh, Kat did not like that. Kat didn't like the Hall & Oates? No, she hates them. That song is great, dude. It's like her Genesis. Genesis Well, Kat is incorrect. That Hall & Oates song happens to be awesome. But we've got Soundgarden in there, we've got Green Day, Led Zeppelin. I'll share the link in the description if you want to check out this playlist or use it. We've got Queen, we've got some Talking Heads, we've got the Buzzcocks, all kinds of stuff. But I had a lot of fun making it where I'd just go into these little two songs, up to William demais's HappyVerb Petcheny David Van Es, 음악 ANHELO zobaczymes an Tim Kitzrow, Barry Oursler, The Valley Company, Subsidiary of Walter Kidde & Co., Inc., Mirco Playfields, Tim Kitzrow, Barry Oursler. I didn't get it. Woo! Okay. But yeah that that and then oh and also like I kind of ramped it up or I don know four or five hours into it kind of hits like the hardest rocking and then the last like hour to 40 minutes is kind of winds down and it like mellower What's your cool down? What'd you do in a cool down? What'd I do in the cool down? And at the end of the night it was just me and Joe and Shelly there and like we were uh The playlist is going on like, yeah, I put mellow music all like around this time on purpose because I knew we'd be standing there winding down. I've got some, where was it? I guess I do have like a poppy song very near the end, but I wound it down a little bit earlier. I guess we had a lot of music left there to go. We didn't use it all. But I had some of the Sundays, like Summertime. This is near the end, like Fade Into You by Mazzy Star. This is mellow. I had Shake It Out by Florence and the Machine there, which like kind of, it's got a nice beat but it's like pretty low key. Stryker is the leader of Heart até 12 that actually our scriptures clue. Jason Timko,
    28:11
    Yeah. But you want to talk about types of pinball players. Yeah, we were talking about this last week about like, feel like we, like, we're a certain type of pinball player. And a lot of the people we play with are a certain type of pinball player. And we want more people to come play with us, but not everybody engages with pinball the same way we do. Yeah. So I was thinking about like our core group of friends, like we're competitive pinball people. We like to, we like organized structured play. Yeah. And to see who is the best that day. Yeah. Like that we find enjoyment in that. But especially when we would play more on location, we would see other people that didn't participate in our structured tournaments. Yeah. On theBCap.t Reviewmission for today's event I took the following in question before I Marisa Lets also wrote a conclusion
    29:50
    Like a subset of that, like, I know you're more competitive than I am. I feel like Joe, CJ, I'm even gonna say Shelly, more competitive than I am. I like to play. I like to go to the organized events. I like to hang out with everybody. Yeah. And I like to play. And I want to win. But if I don't, I don't really get upset about it. Yeah, you don't care that much. No. But you're happy if you win. Super happy. You're not that bummed if you lose. No. Right. You get bummed. Sometime. Less so because it used to be way more stressful when we had fewer events around to play. Like now we have almost every other day we're playing like a league or a tournament. So if I do bad that day, then I'll just try better tomorrow. Mm hmm. So it's not as big of an event where it's like we used to have like one tournament a month you could play and if you like crept out that one it sucked. I don't know if I talked about this in the last episode but I don't think we did. But yeah so you have like the the organized pinball players within that and I would say most of the organized pinball players that are way in it are like hardcore players. Whether or not you're hardcore competitive Steven Eichmacher, and Darby Muss 가까w corpor always We're going to be talking about the competitive side that you could be competitive social to you or competitive like hardcore competitive and which is like me but doesn't mean that you're good. Oh gosh no. Like you know like we have like Joe and CJ and Luke Pierowski. I'd say KJ and Luke P and Luke Sheehan. And Luke Sheehan, like they're ultra competitive. They're also like, really good. My skills are emerging slightly, but I would say I'm just as competitive as those guys. I'm just not as good as them. And then yeah, and then there are the people that I think that a lot of people that and we do have some sometimes that they'll come and hang around the tournament, but not necessarily always play in it. So that's just like a social player. Yeah.
    32:31
    And then the lone wolves, we have some members of HQ that are kind of more lone wolfish, I feel like. That player intrigues me. Me too. That player intrigues me. If you're listening or watching, like, are you like a lone wolf pinballer? Like, do you get into pinball to just go like by yourself? And just to play by yourself and just like you and the machine? Which is cool. Like, it's super cool. Yeah, it is super cool. It's like, it's just strange to me because it's not, it's not how I am. So I don't fully understand it. But like, I feel I enjoy pinball more when there's other people. I think maybe a lot of people just don't know how to tip. And I know we've talked about this. But like we had a fellow come last night who lives in town. He's fairly new to living in town. He has a couple pinball machines where he used to live that he's Knapp Arcade, Bally Williams, Straight Down the Middle, Bally Williams, Straight Down the Middle, The Wally Winka Show, Knapp Arcade, Bally Williams, Straight Down the Middle, Bally Williams,
    34:16
    The Valley Company, Subsidiary of Walter Kidde & Co., Inc., Mirco Playfields, Tim Kitzrow, Barry Oursler. We're going to have pinball tournaments. So let's say you go to one and you don't like it. Go to a different one next time. You don't like that, go to a different one because every one of them is going to have a slightly different scene and crowd and vibe. So give it like three shots. Give it three shots. Because around here there's, you know, if you take it to our personal experience, like the tournaments in Bloomington and Peoria and Champaign are similar but all a little bit different. Yeah, they have their own vibe. And like, Champagne is way different. Bloomington and Peoria share a lot of the same people, but like, Champagne's way different vibe than Peoria. Yeah. I like both. Me too. But some may like one better than the other. Yeah, but that's a really good point. Like, not every tournament, location, or scene is gonna be the same. Right. Like, not at all. It's like sharing some common threads for sure. I feel like everybody's pretty nice. But yeah, there's just different vibes. Yeah, and even like the location has. So maybe it's maybe it's even like the same tournament director has tournaments at three different places. And I don't want the listener to think I'm just talking about just our I'm just using this as an example, our places because these are the places that I know but this could apply to anywhere in the country. We host tournaments at our club. We host them at a bar called Poor Bros. And then we sort of co-host them at the Golden Ticket Cinema with CJ. We help him. Mm-hmm. So those three are all like part of what we're doing. Yep. And they're all way different. Yeah. And then there's Joe and Shelly's house too. And then Joe and Shelly's, but like we don't run those. No, we don't run those. And CJ runs the Golden Ticket, but like we... We're a backup. You're kind of the backup TD there. We're a backup. But so for example in Bloomington there are three different monthly tournaments and they all just feel way different just because the physical space you're in is different.
    36:55
    Yeah, totally. Oh yeah, like the movie theater is like it's a movie theater. It's like a movie theater lobby. It's a movie theater lobby. It's a little odd. It's a little odd and but fun. And we all just kind of like take over the lobby. Yeah. And then we watch people come in to go to the movies and it's super awkward. But We're all happy to have that spot to go and play. Vet
    37:53
    apt You know, you get assigned to new ones and switching teammates and all that good stuff or players that you're playing. Yeah, very different. Yeah, and like the movie theater, because like I'm real sensitive about like lighting. Like lighting impacts like my mood a lot.
    38:25
    And like the movie theater is like bright. It's not like blinding bright, like it's not like you shouldn't go there bright, but it's brightly lit for like a pinball when you think about a pinball place. J It like an arcade thing attached to a bar and it very much like a bar vibe And there like loud music playing typically Sometimes I wish I could pause it when we're trying to do the announcements because it's like pretty loud. There's other machines, there's like pop-a-shot machines, there's skee-ball so you'll hear that stuff going. presenter
    39:57
    I'm going to go back to the first question. I know it's not perfect, but that feels more like a DIY collective, which it is, where it feels like a place where it's just pinball and it's a weird thing. Yeah. And the crowd between those three, it's probably 75, 80% of the same people. But if you're a newcomer and came to each one of those, you would have a vastly different experience just based on the physical environment. Yeah, totally. All that to say, yes, try more than one. Yeah. If you don't like the first one, try to do a different one. And even if you didn't like the first one, maybe just go back and try it one more time. Yeah, try it once again. And you do get a little bit different mix of people every time. But I guess we kind of took a big offshoot of like types of pinball players. Sorry, Kevin. But we're just trying to encourage, I guess that type of player would be like a fence rider or like they want to do the organized stuff that they're afraid. Don't be afraid. Get a buddy and go. Yeah, just make somebody, even if they don't want to play the pinball, make them just go with you. Mm-hmm. If you don't want to go alone. Yeah.
    41:04
    Yeah. Get a sponsor. Yeah, just have someone go with you or maybe even reach out to whoever's organizing it beforehand and ask a couple questions and they'll be excited and share information and they'll be excited to have someone new join too. Which will make it less awkward when you show up and you're like, hey, I'm Stephanie, I messaged you. Yeah. But yeah, give it a shot. And so what type of players have we talked about? The competitive, like the competitive social, hardcore competitive. Yeah. The straight up social player. Yeah. The lone wolf player. Yeah. And I've seen a few of those that are really good players. And then you have just kind of the purely the casual, right? Yeah. Just the casual player. Yeah. And I think there are like casual players that own pinball machines. Where they have a machine or two or three even in their house, because they like to look at them. And they're cool looking, they're pretty and they play them sometimes. Yeah. But they probably don't understand like how you'd shoot a good score on the game or well, I don't care. There are those people but then there's also the people who are into pinball that are players that like prefer to work on them. We forgot about that type of player. Like they like to play. But like our friend Tony. Tony and Jeff. Jeff likes... Like the tinkerer. The tinkerer. The fixer. It's an important part of the community. Yeah, those guys are great because they know how to fix your game usually. Or Mark the Knife. Like CJ kind of fits that. He's like a hardcore competitive guy but also... He likes to tinker. He likes to tinker and tech around with them. But I would say, like Jeff, I think this is safe to say, and I've met a handful like him, I think Mark Fitz is, they're probably just as content to work on them as they are to play them. It seems that way. It seems like they get joy out of it. Yeah. Like problem solving. And like identifying, like identifying that problem and then getting to the solution. Yeah, and like I think I feel like Jeff and a lot of these guys and Tony we know I think there are many in the kind of tinkerer category. The joy is finding a machine that's like kind of seen better days. And then they make it see better days again. Yeah, they take kind of a beat up machine and they clean it. They put all new lights in they put new plastics they put new rubbers. And now like this is a hunk of junk barely playable. And now look at it now it's beautiful. Zach Meny thus Restaurant beliefs about what a pinball six packer shoot will fire at innovation was military usemens control and all of its
    44:02
    women no i think i said that but they they're kind of like the Alaska hacking afraid and all might And I think they get a great joy of like just the process of taking something that is in a very poor state and bringing it into a great state of being and like it's a hunk of crap and now it's awesome.
    44:31
    And I like to then just pay the guy for the awesome one. You know? Yeah. Like buy it once it's once they make it awesome, then I would like to buy it. Yeah. Yes. Yes. want to use space but I want partake in that process of getting in today from émie take a good turn and go back to the original like it would be really fun until you I think there's a lot of work to do because I love to have a lot of уб вр take a grımp game is also very much leveled and I think the goal is. They serve a tremendous amount of patients. You know? Yeah. They're calm, steady. I don't know what that dog is eating. A dog is eating something. Oh, he's just got a little bowl. He's fine. They like calm, steady hand, just going with the flow, and they're very patient guys. All these guys that I know that do that stuff. That doesn't suit me, I would go nuts. I'd be swearing, kicking stuff. Yeah. That's not for us. Pinball machine would be worse off than it was. But thank goodness for those people because I think that they're really the reason why a lot of the older games we get to play are still around. Yeah.
    45:46
    Yeah, if not for them, like none of these old ones that are good would be junk. They were touched by somebody at some point. Uh-huh. In the best way. Are there any other kind of pinball players that we've forgotten?
    46:01
    I don't know. If you feel that you are a pinballer and you don't fit into any of these categories that we've discussed, what kind of pinballer are you? Let us know in the comments below. You can be multiple. Yeah, for sure. Like you can be like a pinball medic and a hardcore competitive pinballer. You can be both of those. Well, and I think the hardcore like isn't just like the competitive hardcore. You can be a hardcore player without being ultra competitive. Yeah. Mm hmm. Yeah, well, because you are like we talked about that. Yeah, yeah.
    46:37
    You're social. You're hardcore social player. Yeah, yeah. Yeah, I guess. Yeah. Yeah. There's probably others, but it's just interesting to see different personality types.
    46:54
    And it's I like to try to understand it because it is sometimes it can be frustrating when like, So, like, you'll see people around and you'll play with people and you'll invite them to some of your structured stuff and they don't ever come and you're like, why don't they ever come? They like pinball, but it's like, maybe they don't like pinball in that way. Yeah, and that's okay. I think maybe that like another category might just be like the people who are curious about it and they just don't know what path they're on yet. Like, um, and they just kind of are just total newbies. Yeah. And who knows where they're gonna go. Yeah. I mean, there's more of them because pinball is tiny. Yeah, but we need more of them. We need more of them. We got to get them in. Yeah. And maybe getting them in isn't always through like, organized play. Right. But I don't know how else to get them in because like, I don't know, everything we do is focused around organized play, like, in terms of in person events. Yeah. And are the people that we've been playing I've gotten really good.
    48:03
    Yeah. I almost feel like it's hard to come in if you aren't already a player. Yeah, like if we would have come in, like, it's been like almost two years now, or over two years since our first night shop tournaments. I think almost two years. So, like, if the night shop tournaments two years ago, if the people were as good as they are on average, as they are, like, the Bloomington Alehouse tournament, that would have been tough. Yeah. Because we would have, like, never, almost never beaten anybody. I mean, we didn't. We didn't very much anyway. We didn't. We were at the bottom a lot. But it was also smaller, smaller, like 10, 12 people. And I feel like these are the big ones had like 16. So it was a little, it's a little less intimidating when there's like 14 people versus, you know, we had 32 yesterday. And that would be a little intimidating if you're brand new. And it's like, those 32 people. Yeah, it's like a lot of people. Or that the house, they It was easy to get 20.
    49:29
    Yeah. And but there, there are, people are better now, like around here, they're better than they were then and it would have been more intimidating watching everybody kick your ass like that bad. I know, so like the people who keep coming back, they're getting better too, the new people, they're getting better, and I like that they keep coming back, because it's not easy. Yeah, it's hard, and I'm still near the bottom a lot. Oh, we did on yesterday's tournament, we did have the bottom four played off for a cash prize and a t-shirt. Cash prize, aka McChicken money. Yeah, McChicken money. Yeah, I was in one of those bottom four playoffs at Joan Shelley's just not very long ago, a few weeks ago. You got your McChicken money. I won the McChicken money. I won that bottom four. Yep. Yep. So it was fun.
    50:27
    Yeah, but that's all I got for today. It's 727. Sunday, March 22. Sundays are hard. Because tomorrow then you have to work like people. Like normals. Dumb. Uh huh. So jobs. This isn't our job. Dumb. Pinball is not our job. I mean, I don't have the Sunday night stomachache. But I do. Oh, Yeah, I'm sorry. I do every Sunday. You do? Yeah. That sucks. And there's dogs. There's some bumping and thumping. Yeah. I don't know what he's doing. It's just crazy with two dogs around here. I know Marshall loves it though. Yeah. Marshall's babysitter. Yeah, so we'll go mix this stuff. We'll edit it. Get it out there for Monday, tomorrow. Let us know what kind of pinball player you are. Let us know if you're excited about The Yeti game from Turner or the Circus Voltaire from American Pinball. I got to remember to put that playlist link in. But yeah, I'm excited that there's new, so a couple other companies putting more stuff out there. Me too. It's going to be good. It's good for pinball. It is. It's going to be fun at Expo this year when we get to see it all. Yeah, we'll play them at Expo. Hopefully the Circus Voltaire will be ready by Expo. It probably will be. Because it's, I mean, what is this, it's almost April. Mm-hmm. It takes a little while to, I don't know how far along they are in that process. We'll see, hopefully we can play both the expo and something else new. I would love it. Let's do it. All right, everybody have a great week. Yup. And that's it. All right, bye. Toodle-oo.