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The Pinball Show Ep 115: For Just The Cost Of 400 Cups Of Coffee + Tax, Shipping, & Electricity

The Pinball Show·podcast_episode·1h 48m·analyzed·Oct 25, 2022
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Analysis

claude-haiku-4-5-20251001 · $0.038

TL;DR

Stern's $2k Mandalorian holographic topper steals Expo spotlight despite vendor friction and pricing controversy.

Summary

Dennis Kriesel and host discuss the 2022 Chicago Pinball Expo, with primary focus on Stern's surprise announcement of the $1,999 Mandalorian topper featuring 3D holographic display, embedded mini-wizard modes, and deep Insider Connected integration. The episode covers vendor experience challenges (electricity charges, lack of advance notice), Expo logistics improvements, and strong topper pre-order reception despite high price point.

Key Claims

  • Mandalorian topper announcement came with zero advance notice to dealers; Stern released promotional video before contacting distributors

    high confidence · Dennis describes real-time experience: 'no dealers didn't get a heads up on this one' and 'They just... we've waited a couple years. I saw the video, I guess, after a lot of people saw the video.'

  • Initial allotment for Mandalorian toppers is approximately one-third of typical dealer order volume

    high confidence · Dennis states: 'the allotment that we're receiving for our first run, quote, unquote, we're going to receive a lot more than maybe somebody that doesn't buy as many toppers, but it's one-third of what our overall order would be'

  • Mandalorian topper includes holographic/3D display effect, multiple game modes, and integration with Insider Connected for stat tracking

    high confidence · Detailed technical breakdown: 'using a 3D holographic display in vivid color' with 'Mandalorian Madness, which is an embedded mini-wizard mode' and 'player's username and icon will be up there' when Insider Connected

  • Chicago Expo charged vendors $300+ for electricity, with no advance notification; vendors were told internet would cost $1,500/day for 5 Mbps

    high confidence · Dennis recounts: 'they're charging us for electricity here... that bill was about three hundred dollars' and 'Internet was going to cost $1,500 a day for five megabytes'

  • 2022 Chicago Expo was reformatted similar to Texas Pinball Festival model, improving vendor and attendee experience compared to 2021

    high confidence · Host notes: 'I would call the year 2022 for Chicago Pinball Expo, Texas Light... It was formatted in a very similar Texas Pinball Festival manner'

  • Mandalorian topper pre-sales have exceeded other manufacturer toppers sold by dealer; sales volume higher than Black Knight topper historical sales

    medium confidence · Dennis: 'I've sold, I've probably sold more Mando toppers than I did Black Knight toppers... I've sold so many of these damn toppers'

  • Mandalorian topper is designed as an unlimited run (not limited edition), contrasting with R2-D2 Star Wars topper which was limited

Notable Quotes

  • “I'm the topper king. I got 100 people. You can't give me an allotment. I am the allotment. Yeah. I'm driving this damn market.”

    Zach (Dennis's dealer partner) @ ~14:30 — Illustrates dealer frustration with Stern's surprise topper announcement and allocation strategy; reveals scale of pre-existing demand

  • “This topper is $1,999 plus shipping... Shut your fucking mind. I'm going to spend $2,000 on a topper. They're crazy. They've lost it.”

    Zach (paraphrasing customer reaction) @ ~16:00 — Captures community shock at topper pricing; indicates substantial sticker-shock despite strong sales

  • “If I owned a Mandalorian, I would not be in the market for it, this topper, even though I think it's extremely cool... $2,000 for an add-on. I mean, I've never even considered $1,000 for an add-on.”

    Dennis Kriesel @ ~36:00 — Even as Stern advocate, Dennis expresses personal rejection of price point despite acknowledging product quality

  • “It has more RGB lighting than the actual game itself, which was pretty cool... it's a fucking beauty it really is a gorgeous beautiful beautiful topper”

    Zach @ ~20:15 — Establishes topper technical sophistication and visual appeal as justification for price premium

  • “I'm not surprised they went $2,000 here because if they are struggling to get parts for accessories such as this, it makes sense that they're going this high up because they see secondary prices on like Beatles toppers or things that are substantially less complex as this product.”

    Zach @ ~37:30 — Suggests Stern using high pricing to address supply chain constraints and capitalize on secondary market pricing

  • “The holographic effect in person they had four to six of these at expo it works superbly it is a beautiful beautiful topper and it's a functional what i'd call an interactive functional topper”

    Zach @ ~18:45 — Eyewitness account of topper functionality at Expo; emphasizes interactive nature beyond visual spectacle

  • “I'm beyond... I'm happy, of course, but I am very shocked [at topper sales volume]. I'm not too surprised. It is very – I mean, to a lot of people looking at it... it does seem to be the most advanced of any manufacturer-related topper that I'm aware of.”

Entities

Stern PinballcompanyMandalorian topperproductDwight SullivanpersonDennis KrieselpersonZachpersonChicago Pinball Expo 2022eventBlack Knight topperproduct

Signals

  • ?

    business_signal: Chicago Pinball Expo charging vendors $300+ for electricity with ambiguous advance notice (fine print: 'electricity not provided'); represents significant vendor cost increase and industry friction

    high · Zach recounts $300 electricity bill; notes line item was in contract but easily missed; describes as 'most expensive place to be a vendor in the pinball industry' when factoring booth rental + electricity

  • ?

    business_signal: Stern failing to provide advance dealer notification of topper announcement; dealers learning via public YouTube video during product launch; no pre-announcement coordination with distribution network

    high · Zach describes discovering announcement via video while driving to Expo; phone 'ding ding ding' notifications from customers; Nicole watching video and reading email about allocation in real-time; Zach makes emergency calls to Stern during drive

  • ~

    sentiment_shift: Despite $1,999 price point and lack of FOMO-driven scarcity messaging, Mandalorian topper achieving strong pre-order volume; customers expressing willingness to purchase without game ownership

    high · Zach reports 'I'm beyond... I'm happy, of course, but I am very shocked' at sales volume; messages from customers wanting topper pre-purchase without owning Mandalorian game; topper pre-sales exceed Black Knight historical volumes

  • ?

    competitive_signal: Mandalorian topper positioned as potential Black Knight topper successor; holographic display and Insider Connected integration represent category-leading technical features

    medium · Hosts discuss whether topper will 'displace' Black Knight as benchmark; note holographic effect and stat integration as differentiators; Zach: 'this will probably displace that' regarding historical topper regard

Transcript

groq_whisper · $0.325

0:00
Warning, the following episode contains adult language and screaming goats. Listener discretion is advised.
0:12
The Pinball Network is online. Launching the Pinball Show. This week Dennis and I bring you the goods as we talk the most anticipated accessory release of the year. The 2022 Chicago Pinball Expo, getting my hands on James Bond 007, Magic Girl, and Queen, as well as discussing homebrews, how the script was flipped on autism, Dennis' trending popularity, the 2022 Twippies, pinball market trends, and gaining new friends. There's also a bit about applesauce for those into that kind of stuff, but welcome to episode 115 of the Pinball Show. Even electricity can't compare to what I feel when I'm with you.
1:06
Pinball is a game of skill. For some, it's a passion and a lifestyle. It's time for the Pinball Show.
1:21
It's pinball with personality. it to you and even if i could i wouldn't know you hey what's going on everybody this is the pinball show sorry for the voice little horse the pony thing is it's dennis kriesel and i here on the pinball show episode 115 post expo dennis where in hell were you at i was not there i was at peace i actually had a work conference up right up against this is not why i didn't go to expo but I'm using it as a nice, convenient shield. Okay. Because I had, yeah, last week, Monday, Tuesday, Wednesday, I had my annual meeting, and I was at another organization's annual conference, which we kind of piggyback on. And so I was just like, you know what? I'm glad I'm not going to two conferences in a week. Expo is notoriously – I was like – now I'm doing the – allow myself to introduce myself. Expo is notoriously known. I don't like saying it like that, but Expo is notoriously known as like the worst of the big shows. Oh, yeah. And I went last year and I hated it. Oh. Hated it. Zach, there's nothing to do. It was a lot different. I heard that there were a lot of changes coming in, and I did receive feedback from people about, sounds like the, maybe not for the vendors, but for a lot of the attendees, the change in the hours so that you weren't just cut off into the free play area for vast portions of the show did make a big difference. People did like that. I did hear that. I heard the vendors weren't big fans of the fact that now they're charging for electricity. Oh, that's a thing that we'll talk about. My spies tell me about that. Man, you've got good spies. And my sources indicate that the tournament area was moved. I don't think anyone really had a problem with where the tournament area was, like, logistically. Yeah, it looked nice. It was in a big conference room where, you know, all the competitive people hung out and stayed. I seen them here and there. Tom Graff or Travis Murie would come out into the vendor hall before going back in, but most of the turtles stayed in that shell over there. I guess you survived it, so congratulations. I survived. My back survived. My voice, somewhat shaky. But overall, it was a very successful expo. A lot better. It was what I'm... I don't think it's derogatory, but I would call the year 2022 for Chicago Pinball Expo, Texas Light. Okay. So it was formatted in a very similar Texas Pinball Festival manner, not as hosed elbows, as people say, as Texas is. Texas is crowded, overly crowded. Yeah, you're almost waiting in line just to get to different parts of the vendor areas. So it was spread out. It was nice. I think even more can go in in the following years. They're honing in on what needs to be done for future years. I don't know if having the show open until 2 a.m. into Sunday morning makes sense, because most of us vendors were breaking down at 11, 30, 12 o'clock. We're like, no. We've been on our feet since 10 a.m. I think we're good. And the electricity thing was a smack in the face after being told that the Internet was going to cost $1,500 a day for five megabytes. Oh, gosh. Everyone laughed at that and said, piss off. So I was like, okay, no internet. We got a hotspot. That's fine. We set it all up. And damned if somebody didn't say, I mean, this is my big downside of Expo. Everything else was great. They said, hey, you want to go check in over there, the electricity? And I was like, okay, I guess they just want to know what we're running for their data, maybe. So Nicole went over there and she came back. She was like, sweetie, they're charging us for electricity here. And I'm like, what? What do you mean? they're charging for electricity yeah every booth has to pay for electricity and there's watts and there's there's and i giggled and i said okay um tell them that at the pinball electronic show we will actually need electricity so sign us up and that bill was about three hundred dollars jeez i mean conferences gouge left and right yeah i'm just a little given the you know given the general need, almost universal need for tables to go ahead and have electricity for phone charging at the low end to running pinball machines at the high end. I'm just a little surprised that wasn't embedded into the initial vendor price package. I did go back and look, and it should have been, because Expo is almost like the internet thing where you ask about it and they're like, oh, that's a secondary company. You need to talk to them. We have nothing to do with that. And I'm like, well, you kind of do, though. So I went back and looked, and you can see there is a line. And, of course, I didn't pay attention to it because it says electricity not provided. So I didn't think that – I didn't think I'd have to run my own line. So they did declare it. Okay. Yeah, it was in there. It was in there. The lesson learned. Lesson learned. And Expo in Texas, just for those who actually care, booth-wise for vendors, they are the priciest of the booths because of the large metropolitan areas and the size of the shows, I would anticipate. So we're used to paying a little bit more per booth rental in those arenas. But, yeah, wasn't expecting electricity. So with electricity, it makes it the most expensive place to be a vendor in the pinball industry for a dedicated pinball show, pinball arcade show. uh by by a long shot interesting are those 10 by 10 booths or what's the size the standard is a 10 by 10 flipping out to the 30 by 10 including tpn so oh we're back though dennis yeah and there was a craig bobby sighting at the chicago pinball really first time i've met him in person felt like a brother he was truly one of the highlights of the entire show for me because he's fucking Craig Ball, he was great. He truly is a great soul and a great human being. I enjoyed spending time with him, but I think he's probably, he had a lot of fun. So he's probably recovering. I don't think we have a top stories from him right now. I don't, I don't anticipate that happening. And thank you, Dennis, for doing this wild off the cuff late recording session with me during your work time period breaks. Thank you for doing that. You lucked out this week. I usually am driving at this time. Yeah, and usually you're a man of principle, and you don't like changing those times if you don't have to. I like consistency. Yeah, once the train leaves the depot, I'm shit out of luck. What do you want to talk about, Dennis? What are we going to jump into? Well, you know, let's wait a little bit in terms of going over Pinball Expo, because There's obviously a lot of, well, I don't know if I'd consider it strong news, but there's a lot of news that sort of is related to Pinball Expo. But I think the big announcement that's happened since the last time we recorded is actually a topper of all things. You know how many people ask me about this? It would pain me to say that.

high confidence · Zach: 'This is not a limited topper... I think an open-ended, you know, run what they want'

  • Mandalorian topper requires approximately 200-300 games to unlock Beskar Bonanza progressive reward that grants all Foundry items

    high confidence · Zach on designer Dwight Sullivan's comments: 'it's going to take maybe two, 300 games in order to achieve this Beskar, the progressive mode'

    • Dennis and Zach (dialogue) @ ~42:00 — Consensus on topper market positioning; establishes as category-leading product despite price

  • “Expo is notoriously known as like the worst of the big shows... I went last year and I hated it... There's nothing to do.”

    Dennis Kriesel @ ~3:45 — Establishes baseline poor perception of Chicago Expo logistics; provides context for 2022 improvements

  • “I honestly thought that Mandalorian was going to be Game of the Year until Godzilla came out. Yeah. And then it was like, oh, okay, well, that's not going to happen.”

    Zach @ ~57:00 — Indicates Mandalorian game sales impact and competitive positioning; Godzilla displacement signals market dynamics

  • “If I had to guess, the second run production of these toppers for Mandalorian will probably fall into 2023, Q1 of 2023... I'm going to guess Q2... April 2023.”

    Zach and Dennis (prediction dialogue) @ ~59:00 — Industry projection on production timeline; indicates extended wait for second allocation

    • R2-D2 Star Wars topper
    product
    Craig Ballperson
    Insider Connectedproduct
    Flippin' Out Expo tailgate partyevent
    Bill Webb, Steve Beattie, Courtney Bowmanperson
    Texas Pinball Festivalevent
    Godzilla Rush (pinball)product
    James Bond pinballproduct
    Nicoleperson
    Chuck Ernstperson
    Brian Eddyperson
    Pinball Junk Drawermedia
    ?

    event_signal: 2022 Chicago Pinball Expo reformatted with extended hours, improved vendor/attendee flow, and tournament area relocation; represents logistics improvement over 2021 event

    high · Host describes 2022 as 'Texas Light' format; notes 'change in the hours so that you weren't just cut off into the free play area'; vendors praised improvements; extended show until 2 AM (vendor complaint about timing)

  • $

    market_signal: Mandalorian game sales have softened over time; Godzilla displaced Mandalorian from GOTY consideration; topper announcement suggests effort to re-engage market interest in aging title

    medium · Zach: 'The game itself has kind of softened interest-wise' and 'I honestly thought that Mandalorian was going to be Game of the Year until Godzilla came out'

  • ?

    personnel_signal: Dwight Sullivan designed/programmed Mandalorian topper as major personal project with deep code integration and new animation work

    medium · Zach describes hanging out with 'my buddy, Dwight Sullivan, who designed, programmed' and notes his significant investment in topper quality; mentions Chuck Ernst animation team involvement

  • $

    market_signal: Stern setting $1,999 price point for Mandalorian topper; represents pricing increase relative to historical topper accessories despite parts supply constraints

    high · Dennis speculates Stern raising price due to supply constraints and secondary market pricing validation ('they see secondary prices on like Beatles toppers... substantially less complex as this product')

  • ?

    announcement: Stern announces Mandalorian topper with holographic display, mini-wizard mode (Mandalorian Madness), Beskar Bonanza progressive reward, and Insider Connected integration at 2022 Chicago Expo

    high · Topper officially announced via promotional video; dealers received allocation notifications; 4-6 units displayed at Expo with functional demonstrations; priced at $1,999

  • ?

    product_strategy: Stern releasing Godzilla and Rush code updates (V1.01) concurrent with Mandalorian topper announcement; Rush and James Bond toppers status unknown/unannounced

    high · Zach: 'there's been code updates for Godzilla and Rush, both now at V1.01' and 'We still haven't seen a Rush topper... still haven't seen a James Bond topper'

  • ?

    business_signal: Stern executing unlimited production run (no quantity limits) on Mandalorian topper to avoid secondary market pricing pressure and FOMO-driven pre-purchases, contrasting with R2-D2 limited edition approach

    high · Zach confirms 'This is not a limited topper' and 'open-ended run'; Dennis notes Stern 'threatening to continue to build these forever' and avoiding FOMO-based justification for high pricing

  • ?

    technology_signal: Mandalorian topper represents significant platform advancement: 3D holographic/Pepper's Ghost display effect, RGB lighting exceeding main game, Insider Connected stat integration as first manufacturer topper feature

    high · Zach describes 'using a 3D holographic display in vivid color' and 'It has more RGB lighting than the actual game itself'; notes Insider Connected integration as 'probably a first with Sturm Pinball'

    • 8:37
    So many people ask me about this. Of course they did, because you're the topper king, trademark pending. All rights reserved. Yeah, this last week, the timing of Stern is so impeccable. I'm not saying that sarcastically. You know what?
    8:53
    Yeah, I'm going to interrupt here. As the listeners know, I'm often fond of interrupting. So what is going on with Stern right now, Zach? It's so weird. Like everything, you know, the impeccability, as you've noted. I have never seen such precision out of them in my entire time in this hobby. This is just like two years we've waited for toddlers have taken over the market. I don't get it. It's weird. They're there. There's like the tripping over each other's feet and they're fighting over their milk. Who's going to get the milk? And I'm just like, this is what's going on.
    9:33
    So, Zach, what's going on? Explain the impeccability. Timeline for me was we have been taking not pre-orders, but an interested list, a very interested, interested list of people for the last merely two years, spanning over 100 different customers wanting a Mandalorian topper. If it comes out, we didn't know pricing. We didn't know. We sure as hell didn't know timeline. We know that licensing was a hang up for a substantial portion of time. We also know that Stern Pinball has announced and has been struggling getting parts for the dedicated toppers, whether it be an Iron Maiden rerun, a Mandalorian, a Godzilla rush, whatever it may be. So I thought to myself, right before going to Expo, I'll take my paperwork with me, because I'm a physical paperwork kind of guy, it's just how I work, and I have a big stack of those interested parties for a Mandalorian topper, and it was cramping my style in my Stern backpack, so I pulled those all out and I put them on my desk. I don't need those. It's a Mandalorian topper. 30 minutes into our drive, my phone starts going ding, ding, ding, ding, ding, ding. Now, were you driving or was Nicole driving? At this point, I was driving. Okay. I'm just trying to have a visual picture. I'm driving, and I'm like, okay. I'm like fucking Kermit the Frog here. Moving right along, and I'm going to the fucking expo, right? Moving right along in search of good times and good days. And I get these dings, and I'm like, oh, shit. What did Kaneda do to threaten me this week? That's the first thing you thought of. That's usually what I do. Oh, God. How did he try to take out my business? So I look at my phone, and I see the video preview of this. Hey, did you check out this topper? I want one. And it was the video promotion by Stern Pinball for Star Wars, the Mandalorian topper. I thought, great. Oh, shit. That's wonderful, Stern. So, no, dealers didn't get a heads up on this one. They just, we've waited a couple years. I saw the video, I guess, after a lot of people saw the video. Nicole was watching it as I was driving. And then we got an email saying, hey, here's what we're selling. We're going to start making these in November. You're going to get an initial allotment run of them, which, again, I was driving. She was reading. I freaked out because I'm like, what do you mean I'm going to get an allotment? I'm the topper king. I got 100 people. You can't give me an allotment. I am the allotment. Yeah. I'm driving this damn market. What do you mean? And so I make calls to Stern and all of that. And they're like, chill out. No, it's just the first run. We're going to make more. In April? We don't know. That was the other thing. That's a callback. We don't know. It also came with a, so we were not prepared, to say the least. Stern didn't have official photos. So I was like, Nicole, sweetie, I'm sorry. we're going to have to pull off. You're going to have to drive. I have to now find a way to get this on the website, start marketing it, stuff that I would probably do prior to. They have no official photos, so I'm snapshotting pictures from the video so that I have something for the website and cropping it and cleaning it. This is my life. My fucking life. Yes.
    12:46
    All the while. This topper is $1,999 plus shipping. And I'm balancing those messages as well. Shut your fucking mind. I'm going to spend $2,000 on a topper. They're crazy. They've lost it.
    13:05
    And I'm responding to these customers, I can understand your frustration. This is a lot of money on the topper. I want to fill the wizard mode. I got to get this for a wizard mode.
    13:15
    So I'm doing that, taking orders, cropping pictures from a YouTube video. I will say shortly after, within half an hour, an hour, we did get official pictures, so I was able to update those. So the story is, we get a Mandalorian topper, and we get one hell of a topper. Is it the Black Knight topper killer? We'll have to wait and see. There are a lot of things to discuss on this topper, one being the price. That's the one that's big. I'm a stern dealer, but even I'm like, okay that's a lot of money for a pinball topper an accessory right uh yes okay even though we know that some of these toppers which are not even close to being this fucking cool are selling on the secondary market way over 2000 so they're finding their they're finding the price and trying to figure it out this is not a limited topper listener this is a uh i think an open-ended, you know, run what they want. So we're not looking at the Star Wars R2-D2 limited edition topper. Beep, boop, beep, boop. Visually, the topper itself spans the entirety of the back box, or the majority of that. And it looks as if you're in the cockpit of that Razor Crest vehicle. Is it a vehicle if it flies? Yeah, ship. Okay, ship. So ships fly, but vehicles don't. So weird. Well, no, it's a vessel. I think vehicle's okay, too, if you want to call it that. You can't call it an airplane, though, right? Does it? It's a spaceship. What's the difference between a spaceship and an airplane? One goes into space.
    14:50
    Oh, spaceship. They didn't call it a space plane, Zach. Spaceship. So it's the Rage Express. That's a Lego movie quote. The big thing here is it's using a 3D holographic display in vivid color. And then also, so we get that Pepper's Ghost or whatever, the Ghostbusters Octogoggles, the Pinball 2000. The hologram thing. The reflective thing. Looks like the image is floating. So we get that. So the rumors over the last, I don't know, year or so were true. We get a holographic effect here. I also get new gameplay features, including Mandalorian Madness, which is an embedded mini-wizard mode. Uh-oh. DLC-ish? Yeah. I mean, kind of like the Jurassic Park topper. Mm-hmm. Until later, they ran it on Insider Connected forever. Yeah, well, we don't talk about that because it has no point to the argument we're making. And then they also have Beskar Bonanza, a progressive mode that awards all upgrades in the Foundry. Okay. Well, you're going to need a lot of Beskar to get this topper, so that's fitting. We're going to need a bigger Beskar wallet. I was able to hang out with my buddy, Dwight Sullivan, who designed, programmed. This was a big project for him that he'd been working on, which I appreciate, because there are some titles that come out, listener, that the toppers are not designed by any of the creators. They're just, you know, if there's a coder around or somebody codes it, somebody does the light show integration, et cetera. He was very well invested into this topper and wanted it to be one of the greatest ever, so much so that that's why you see that code integration so deep. I think I looked at this thing. It has more RGB lighting than the actual game itself, which was pretty cool. It has spatial objects within the topper that makes it look 3D, even the physical items within that cockpit. it's it's it's a fucking beauty it really is a gorgeous beautiful beautiful topper there's no one that can that can argue that the holographic 3d effect in person they had four to six of these at expo it works superbly it is a beautiful beautiful topper and it's a functional what i'd call an interactive functional topper it is doing something it is giving you information that may be readily available within the menu system or the screen of the main LCD, but things come up there that are helpful. Not to the player per se, because you're not going to look up there unless you trap up, but to bystanders and such. It even has a competition mode that will display all four scores, I think Dwight said, at the same time. So if this game is being used in competition, it has its topper, or even loosely competition. If you're playing with buddies or something, you can more easily see maybe the scores and stuff up there. So he was giddy, hung out with him at the Flippin' Out Expo tailgate party. We'll talk about that. And then he gave me a personal walkthrough at Expo of this topper and all of its features. It's badass. But wait, there's more, Dennis. Not only if you buy this topper, But if you then integrate it with the Insider connected on your Mandalorian machine, there's more features that open up, which is probably a first with Sturm Pinball. The player's username and icon will be up there. They'll display the player's lifetime encounter. Many play field accuracy percentage pops up there whenever you're Insider connected. That's pretty cool. Lifetime Beskar collected for all games played while you're logged into that. Just stuff like that information up there. If we go back to the progressive Beskar Bonanza, Dwight was like a kid in a candy store on this one. So it displays your Beskar that you're gaining throughout the game. And this is progressive across all players. And this is set almost like a slot machine progressive where you see it at all times, but it's going to take maybe two, 300 games in order to achieve this. Beskar, the progressive mode that's going to give you all the foundry items. I found that really clever. It's a novelty. Again, the stopper enables then the user something else to kind of look forward to. What do you think about a progressive mode that's, or a progressive achievement or reward that spans that far out? Yeah, it seems awfully far to me. Okay. given that I think part of, I don't know. It is a large achievement, though. You're getting every foundry item immediately. Right, right, right. You know, I get it. I get why the decision was to pace it out that far. And, I mean, so homeowners are the ones that are going to invest in this sort of thing. So, yeah, it's just, I mean, 200 plus plays is a lot of plays. I don't know. I mean, it wouldn't have been my decision to do, but. What do you think about the topper enabling a mini wizard mode that can only be reached with the purchase of this topper? It's a great way to sell toppers. That's true. Visually, did you see the promo video of this? Yes. Yeah, it looks cool. I don't think there are going to be very many people that will look at this and go, you know what? This looks terrible. Yeah, yeah. What do you think about the price? It's high, obviously. It is high. If I owned a Mandalorian, I would not be in the market for it, this topper, even though I think it's extremely cool. Even though you have a ceiling that can handle it. Let's just assume I did. Let's assume I had the space and had the game and had the premium or an LE already, even so I'm a total Mando. And it's just like, no, $2,000 for an add-on. I mean, I've never even considered $1,000 for an add-on. I just wouldn't do it. I'm not surprised they went $2,000 here because if they are struggling to get parts for accessories such as this, it makes sense that they're going this high up because they see secondary prices on like Beatles toppers or things that are substantially less complex as this product. And what happens if you can't build products fast enough? We've seen it from manufacturers. You increase that price. You've called it more than anyone I've heard, Dennis, saying, hey, if you can't make them fast enough and you're pissing off people, raise that price so that you can slow down some of that production and catch up. Do you think that's what they may be doing here? Or do you think just with the licensing and everything like that, $2,000 is what it's going to have to be regardless if they sold one or 10,000? Right. Well, I do think part of it's probably trying to deflate a little bit of the air out of the secondary market. I don't think this is necessarily to try and deal with the issue that we've discussed about difficulty in getting parts, even though they've been transparent about that aspect. Given that they – the other way they could deal with that is something that they've done before, R2-D2 topper as a case in point, and actually put a firm limit on the topper, which would have helped, quote-unquote, justify the pricing. And they've chosen not to do that. So that's another thing that undermines the secondary pricing is they're basically threatening to continue to build these forever. So given that, and I don't think once the supply chain issues are resolved that this price goes down, it would upset the initial buyers anyway, even though we know in other industries it is not unusual for an older product to start to see price cuts as time goes by. But saying all that aside, I just think that a lot of it's probably driven by the complexity behind it, the depth of the code, the time investment that you mentioned Dwight has done, coupled with the visual spectacle of it. I think those two things combined are where they're deriving the price from. I don't think they're doing it based off of the supply issue. Yeah, because these are new animations. You've got to get Chuck Ernst and the team to be doing that as well. And you make a lot of really great points. I'll also say that when Stern released the Star Wars R2-D2 topper, and they did put the LE on that, and they did have, at that time, an elevated price compared to their other products. I think that price was somewhat reflective of licensing and the limited nature of that product, which is why they did limit it. Hey, if we limit this, then we can push the price up to this point. It's a limited product. So I think they learned from that and said, oh, people are going to pay this regardless of its limited nature. They kind of shot themselves in the foot limiting that product because if you asked Stern Pinball and they were being completely honest with you, they would love to make more R2-D2 toppers, but they can't. So I think they learned their lesson there, and they were like, you know what? We're going to put a price tag on it that we need to that makes sense for us and our distribution network, and we don't need to limit it because they're selling and they're going to sell. The non-limit also could help with the supply issue. So rather than them necessarily adjusting the price to try and combat getting a whole surge of orders because they're putting the price really high, I could see more so that they would take the strategy of saying, okay, well, we're going to really stress that this isn't limited because we know instances, you and I know, Zach, of instances where people have gone and bought the Black Knight topper and they don't have a Black Knight, but they're so worried they won't be able to find the topper that they're buying it preemptively in the hopes of eventually getting a game used down the line. This avoids the need for that. Stern's basically saying, if you want to get a Mandalorian topper, don't fret. We're going to be doing these for a long time. So there's not this – people that don't have the Mando right now don't need to feel like, oh, I've got to buy the topper right away because I'll never get it. The first run's the only run. That's been the Stern topper way. Logically, you're right. But for some reason, people are still kind of doing that. I'm getting so many messages, man. They're like, hey, do you have any of the toppers left? I don't want to miss out on this. And I think they are a little bit gun-shy because Stern has, when it comes to toppers, all of a sudden they're like, no, we're not making those anymore. And you're like, what? There was no last call. There was no – what do you mean? You're not – no, we're just not making those anymore. Now, do you think those messages you're getting are from people that don't own Mandalorian or do you – Yes. I mean, Mandalorian was a big seller. Yeah, they are people, the majority is people, hey, I'm kind of interested in that game, but I don't want to miss out on this topper.
    25:24
    Do you think I need to buy it? Like, what's the deal there? Well, in which case, then, if it was what I thought, which was Stern saying all this to try and prevent a run on them, then it's not working. The other thing that Stern is doing, and I don't know if this is out of necessity or if this is a marketing thing, but they're giving allotments for a first run in November. Now, these allotments, and this is a personal number based on my business, but I can say that the allotment that we're receiving for our first run, quote, unquote, we're going to receive a lot more than maybe somebody that doesn't buy as many toppers, but it's one-third of what our overall order would be. So percentage-wise, not bad, but still, I'm spending a lot of time answering people, am I in the first run? If not, I need to find it elsewhere. Oh, yeah, it's the first run, because then they've got to, as you noted, they've got to hunt. They've got to call every distro. Yeah, yeah. So that's tough, because those toppers are long gone. The thing that surprised me, I saw this, and I was like, oh, fuck, this is badass. All the topper nuts out there are going to go nuts like me, even with a $2,000 price tag. It is what it is. It'll be a moderate seller. You know, the game itself has kind of softened interest-wise. Those games are not flying off the shelves like they were, and it's a pretty normal thing. Whenever a game comes out, it softens over the course of time, just like any other title will mostly any other title will So that didn surprise me if i didn get as many dennis this topper has sold better than other manufacturers games i sold so many of these damn toppers or pre-sold so many of these damn toppers that i'm left kind of in awe of the response of a two thousand dollar topper from a game that was released over a year ago i'm beyond And I'm happy, of course, but I am very shocked.
    27:35
    I'm not too surprised. It is very – I mean, to a lot of people looking at it, and again, visually, and the quote-unquote DLC that's coming along with it, it does seem to be the most advanced of any manufacturer-related topper that I'm aware of. So it's just a step up is what I'm saying. It's a step – obviously, it's a step up in price, but it's a step up visually because we all know the case in point, Like the pinball manufacturer's best regarded topper in the history of toppers is the Black Knight sort of rage topper. Arguably.
    28:07
    Yes, that's what I'm arguing. Okay. But now, I think this will probably displace that. and because of the integration, the holographic effect, just visually is more interesting in and of itself, coupled with the expanded code, the Beskar Madness, which you've also got the score stuff and all the other displays, the lifetime stats. It's doing a lot more than telling you you don't know how to play. That's a fantastic point. It may not be the visual animatronics that people always long for, but yes, it's, man, it's battling. It's apples and oranges almost, the style of these two toppers we're discussing, but it was made to be the Black Knight topper killer. And whether it succeeded, we'll see, but I've sold, I've probably sold more Mando toppers than I did Black Knight toppers. Maybe that's a title thing. I also was told that Mandalorian have sold a lot of units. The game itself have sold a lot. I'm saying a lot of units. Yeah, no. Well, that is a super hot license. And I think, you know, as unfair as it was, a lot of people, I think, were more receptive to the layout and how different it looked from Brian Eddy than his Stranger Things layout. So I think there's some people that were kind of like, oh, I don't want to see, you know, the same thing we've been seeing. I don't want to see the Attack from Mars Brian Eddy. I want to see something like the Shadow Brian. Of course, Mando isn't that, but it's also not like Medieval Madness and Attack from Mars. There were just a lot of things. I honestly thought that Mandalorian was going to be Game of the Year until Godzilla came out. Yeah. And then it was like, oh, okay, well, that's not going to happen. We still haven't seen that topper. We still haven't seen a Rush topper. We still haven't seen a James Bond topper. I don't know what to make of all of it. We've sold a shitload of them. We continue to sell a lot of these. I don't know when the second run is going to be. If I had to guess, the second run production of these toppers for Mandalorian will probably fall into 2023, Q1 of 2023. That's what I would guess. I'm going to guess Q2. Oh.
    30:19
    Start of Q2. April. Aren't you a Q? April 2023. Aren't you a QT? April. Fucking April again. Just saying. When those Bond pros are gone. I'm just, hey, look, I only report the facts when I report the opinion. And this is in the opinion realm. Also from Stern Pinball, there's been code updates for Godzilla and Rush, both now at V1.01. I need to turn my Godzilla on and install it then. That's right. I haven't played it in two weeks. Oh. Busy, busy. I'm a busy little bee. So you said, Zach, that the Mando topper was at Expo. What else happened at Expo? So that was kind of one of the big releases at the Chicago Pinball Expo. We rolled into Wednesday kind of setting up the booth, and we jumped over to the Flippin' Out Expo tailgate party, hosted by Bill Webb and Steve Beattie and Courtney Bowman. They're the stream team for us every Monday-ish night on Flippin' Out Twitch stream. I can't thank them enough for setting this all up. They always have pinball creators, designers, coders there. They bring, BD has a nice, you know, a nice collection of 20 plus pinball machines and a heated garage. They got the big trailer full of the TVs and the music and the bratwurst and the hot dogs and cheeseburger. It was a damn great time. And they did that, they did that all for the pinball people. It was a blast. And I get to hang out with Dwight. I get to hang out with Jerry, like some of my favorite Stern people, Jerry Thompson.
    31:53
    Eric Menyer from JJP. Peter Dorn. Kiefer. Some Keith Johnson. Did you get to hang out with anyone you hate? Anyone I hate?
    32:02
    No. You know what? No. I didn't hate anyone there. That was, so it was nice. Can't say thank you enough. And then we rolled into the show and the big, you know, everybody wanted to know about James Bond, 007. Got my hands on that. The pro and the premium.
    32:20
    How's the code looking? Well, so I will say that the highlight was the shots. It shot really good. You see what I'm doing there? Yeah, well, the shots look – I did catch the tail end of the Dead Flip gameplay reveal stream. And the shots, yeah, they looked kind of like we thought from the photos. They looked fun. Oh, yeah, they did have that stern stream. And this is my opinion and the opinion, though, of others that saw more of the game than me were kind of like a, why are they showing it in this code state? And there was some speculation that, well, maybe the code would be updated by Expo. That was, yeah, that's interesting. You know how it is when you go to the shows. You can't hear. You're not really going to get into the game much. So, yeah, I'm not savvy enough to be able to pick up on that code. So it's hard for me to say. But I did go back and watch that reveal Stern Stream, and the code did seem very bare. It seemed very bare. and so that's probably the same way at the at the expo i was starting multi-ball starting modes they didn't have the one ball no they didn't have like that that was what we call what we call european rules baby's first multi-ball where we let you do one ball walk and that's right so i know i so that was that seemed very normal uh there was plenty of animations there's plenty video clips animations that kind of stuck out to me i was like oh this that looks really good i like the style they're going with there it was just a clean game so yeah i think it's going to be a big hit for them uh in person the cabinets looked really good the art looked really good there was no complaints there maybe not as beautiful as we would like but yeah they look cool and it shot fun it shot really really damn good especially the right side of the play field that missile one area it's fine especially on the premium it's nice because you at least have some ball locking going up there but feeding that third flipper was done so on multiple shots so i can appreciate that so anytime you hit that missile it is feeding that upper flipper for an additional shot the only thing i didn't really like about the layout i thought it was going to be that side ramp shot that thing was fine it was smooth as hell is the little creature pit. So you know what I'm talking about? The left side under the third flipper? Oh, where the diver thing is? Yes. That was just kind of weird because you hit it in there and I guess maybe code's not... When it kicks it out, it kicks it out to the same spot, which is the stand-up target in front of that tank, but then you're really out of control. It's like, I don't even want to go in there unless points are there, unless progress is there.
    35:04
    The code did seem like it's going to lend itself to multiple stacking opportunities. That's one thing that stood out to me, whether they were coded in there, in there or not. I thought, damn, okay, you're going to be having three or four things going on at the same time on this game, which a lot of people, a lot of hobbyists love. Okay. Interesting. Diamond, diamond spinner shot was awesome. Left orbit was fricking awesome. It flows really good. We'll have to say I, I dude, I, until I get there. And that's what I told, I tell George Gomez, who was I telling that to? I need to get it at home. Same thing with all these other games I play. Queen, Magic Girl, I won't get that at home. But I can't tell anything on these games until I sit down by myself and actually get some good play on them. See, I'm not a very good reporter, are I? No, but you used a lot of words to get us to the same place of nothingness that we started at. It's stern. It shoots phenomenally. If you like James Bond, it's a no-brainer. Well, you mentioned Magic Girl, so did you get an opportunity to play the working Magic Girl? That was another big highlight of this pinball expo. Whoa, some say it was the only reason to go to expo. Who in the hell said that?
    36:13
    Rumors are, this is rumors, so they may be totally untrue. Rumors are that Magic Girl was the highlight of the show. It was a highlight for a lot of people because that kept a line. Granted, it was only one machine, but it kept a line the entire show. It was kind of roped off to by itself, isolated as much as you can isolate within that show floor. But it always had a line on it. I did step in a line to play with some buddies and with my other buddy, Bug, from Spooky Pinball. He and I kicked around some Magic Girl, and it worked. Well, yeah, but they said it was working. I don't know. That's why it's there. Well, but I wasn't expecting it. It worked. It was real. They weren't lying. Yeah, but, okay, so I told people, they were like, oh, it works. I'm like, it works-ish. I don't know if it's working in the intended design fashion that it was created.
    37:11
    They did some workarounds because John Papaduke's design and engineering was incomplete. So they filled in the blanks and it didn't crash per se or it didn't get hung up in spots where there was just no engineering or design capable of doing what it was supposed to be. They fixed all those issues. The animated code and stuff when I watched on stream looked bare. Those were cleaned up a little bit. It was a John Papadu game. That's what it was. It played like Totem and Circus Voltaire, for better or worse. Okay. A lot of plastic. so would you have been more comfortable if they had said instead of calling it a a working magic girl that it was a functional magic girl i think that would be more accurate okay well they did their best i would say that uh the perception or the feedback that i received talking to people that played magic girl all of them said whether true or not all of them said the same thing first they all said probably the most beautiful pinball machine ever made they all said that then they went into okay well how does it play how does it in rules wise 90s bally williams rules probably a little less than that because of the holes that were left in the code initially and them trying to fix that it plays just like a john papaduke game so my fucking idiot ass liked it of course because you're a huge j-pop fan and i feel horrible You still think he, yep, I still, and I may be wrong, and you can correct me because you're on the show, obviously. But I've often suspected you still would like a manufacturer to give him another chance. That I can publicly say they would be ignorant and stupid to ever give that man another chance to design a pinball machine. Even as much as I like his designs or his team's designs when he was on them, no. Unequivocally, no. If you want to have an unsuccessful business that goes into the fucking hole, go ahead and hire him.
    39:16
    I did, and the reason I'm strong on that, Dennis, and I will not say the manufacturer, but there was a manufacturer that was trying to pitch me. I don't know if they were playing devil's advocate. They were trying to pitch me the idea that maybe they could make it work. John Poppins, that is.
    39:34
    And that was my response. I said, if you want to fucking go bankrupt, then yeah, you should do it, Because you're actually doing good right now. So, yeah. Oh, so this is an established manufacturer. This is a manufacturer that has made at least one machine. Okay. And I said, no, what the fuck are you, like, maybe they were just trying to get me fired up. Yeah, I mean, yeah, it's, well, I don't want to read too much into it. But pinball is full of, let's say, confident, very confident individuals, especially a lot of the manufacturers. And I would say to a fault because I think that pinball is essentially a – and I mean this in the most optimistic, fun way – almost a barren wasteland of manufacturing failures. So that they would all think that they could do it doesn't surprise me, but we've seen people trip over less large boulders than this. So it strategically doesn't seem like it's worth the risk. And there were some shots in there that, I mean, I just, I really liked the style and the design of that game. I did. And I didn't get to enable the mid-level Twilight Zone magnets. What do they call that in Twilight Zone? The power? The power. So he has designed something very reminiscent to that mid-play field where you get it in a buck and it goes up to the top. I didn't get to see that work because I just simply didn't get that far into it. But it locked balls physically. It released them upon multi-ball. I played it. I thought it shot like a John Papaduke, which I enjoy. I like it. It was a fucking specter to look at. It was beautiful. Even that stupid, goofy-ass cabinet that John Papaduke did with the whole Zidware thing, that was a good design concept. It really works and still looks like very much a pinball machine. I hate sitting here talking positive about it, but I'm just being honest. it no honesty is all we can ask it works in a lot of ways that's all the listeners want it worked but the reason i've lost all faith and hope in anything john papaduke moving forward is because of that shit that was retro atomic zombie adventure land that was all him dennis and that was fucking atrocious i could have designed a better a better pinball machine and i I have no experience designing anything. That was trash, and I never played it. Some people liked it. There's no way. No, I knew one person liked it. I remember hearing them because they were a pinball media person. There was nothing in there to shoot. I lost all my faith in John Papaduke on that release.
    42:14
    Well, that's sort of sad. It makes me sad. Let's get fired up. It doesn't. I'm not sad. I don't care. Pinball Brothers made a big show. Yeah, so they had Queen there, you said. They had a number of Aliens LVs. That's a pretty machine. Damn. You know, I so wish I liked how Alien played because it's one of my favorite themes, but I just don't. That's a good point we'll discuss right now. They did have two Queen machines. The Queen machines are a standard body, not a wide body. And Pinball Brothers, damn it.
    42:43
    And I've talked to them for a long extended period of time. The two actual Pinball Brothers were there. Oh, they were there. They were there. And they're very nice people, and they seem normal-ish. What does this mean? I thought they were going to be like aliens, man. I meet some weird people in pinball, especially some of the manufacturers that make bad decisions at times. So I'm always anticipating. Like when I see a lot of bad decisions coming from a company, I anticipate the person making those bad decisions are off a bit. So they were normal-ish. And I say ish because I didn't spend enough time with them to – Well, then you don't know. Maybe they're really weird and you just didn't get to experience it. I'm pretty good at picking up some red flags early on. No, maybe they've learned to wear those masks. If they can mask me, then I'll give them credit. I mean, okay. You're a bit rusty. I mean, you've been – No, no. You've become a pinball salesperson. No, this was going to a pinball expo. That was a good refresher course right there. Very good refresher course. But no, they were nice. I think one of their sons was there. His name was Simon. He was, I give Simon some credit. He was so into the company that he was a good spokesperson. He was very well versed into the code, into the mechanisms. So he was explaining things. Okay, so I'm assuming he's older then. Yeah, he was, I would guess, probably in his 20s. Okay, I'm sorry. I have no context. So when you said it, I just imagined a five-year-old going around telling you maybe you could go and fix your Deadpool in your boot. Freddie Mercury rocks.
    44:32
    Play another one bites the dust. I remember hearing all these songs on Teen Bop, Kid Bop, whatever it's called. Kid Bop. here's the issue with pinball brothers being at the show and this is the ish part of it what's the ish? they're normal they brought to the show these queen games that were physically fully functional every mech worked every shot worked everything worked like magic girl but the code was problematic and they even said that they even told people the code is buggy the code is glitchy so they were honest But they were like, hey, to let you know, you know, this thing has crashed a couple times. We're having to reset it. Or, hey, we don't have that enabled because it caused a crash earlier, so we disabled the kickback, the ball cap. So they were honest, but the code was a bit messy. So why, I don't know, why even bring it? If you're going to give the first impression, a hands-on experience for people potentially buying this product, That was the only issue I had, not only as an enthusiast, but one that carries and sells these products. I'm like, why are we doing this? It was set on two ball, which, again, I don't know if that was a decision to get people moving because it was kind of a hard. Probably. That's pretty typical from other manufacturers that I've heard as well as shows.
    45:56
    JJP has done that. So that was weird. That was really weird. Well, but I mean, Stern's out showing James Bond and its codes pretty, I mean, not needing recess, but basic. It was, I would probably guess that it made that code set look complete. And didn't this happen at that Ozzy show with the Spinal Tap game? Like, it was crashing. Oh, I don't know because I do not follow that. Was that there? Was Spinal Tap there? No, I didn't see it. Oh, okay. I didn't see it. so queen overall that code was messy as shit that's too bad here's the thing that again damn it of course people are going to call me a shill it was still fun man it's still fun i went look i went back i played this more than bond dude that's because it was online because it kept crashing man i went back in line four or five times to play this i don't know if it's because that was a two ball thing and it left me hungry but it shot really well really really well it shot better than alien and maybe that's just the wide body standard body thing the wide body is going to hurt alien yeah it shot phenomenally well especially given the design elements in it a lot of stand-up targets a lot of drop targets drop targets blocking shots which i'm okay with but when that's kind of all you have an upper play field that was more stand-up targets. Like, I don't know. It just shot really well. Very smooth. That's the number one thing, the feedback I gave them. I said the one big surprising thing to me is how smooth this game shoots. Like that little faux vuck that pops it up through the, you know what I'm talking about? Not really. It pops it up through the ramp flap, and then it comes back down. It looks really odd. That worked phenomenally. the orbits were freaking buttery. The right shot that then turns into a wire form, maybe the best feeling of any shot similar to that with other games. The music was awesome. Even if it was the live stuff, it was phenomenal. It got me toe-tapping. It got me playing. I wanted to come back for more. I didn't play much of the upper play field, though, and that's okay because there's not really much up there. the physical magnet diverter in the back for multi-ball it all freaking worked that was kind of my take away of that of the expo was like Queen's actually kind of good I'm okay with it I don't know what the code's going to do but I would own one I'd definitely own one but my caveat to that listener would be keep in mind I'm not a big music pen guy at all I fucking love Queen music I love love love love Queen music so that helped out immensely it's not a i don't think it's going to fly off the shelves the design's not cool enough but yeah that was my little dirty little secret was queen but now the secret's out yeah and i'll get fucking flamed for it whatever yeah chill chill chill whatever but i don't own an alien and i will own a queen so i thought you had an alien i did it didn't last long. So you owned an alien? I owned an alien. I don't know. Like, LV is just gorgeous, but the theme's awesome. It just, it was funky shooting. I wish they could have made that into a standard body somehow. So was JGP there? JGP was there. They had a phenomenal booth. Really, really beautiful, spectacular booth. Stern had a phenomenal booth as well. The big guys were, you know, they held their own. Technologically, one of the prettiest booths in there, if not the best booth. They were smart. Let me give a shout-out to Cam Cromwell. They were really smart with what they did. So they had Guns N' Roses. They had the Toy Stories. But they also had, like, the crane game or the claw that you could, like, they had an interactive booth more so than other people. So you can win the little aliens if you qualified something to play the alien game. They had influencer Gavin Free in. Oh, the slow-mo guy? Slow-mo guy was there playing and had a show appearance there and signing autographs and playing with people. So that was really smart. I've heard rave reviews about the tour. People really were talking about that tour a lot. So people loved, loved, loved that damn tour, especially with the, I guess, the luxury buses and stuff. So J.J.P. had a really good showing. And a lot of people, I did get a lot of people come up. This is, I don't know, good or bad. but a lot of people didn't came up and was like hey dude you weren't wrong about toy story like it's it's actually a really good game and i'm like well yeah so i think a lot more people were able to play it they're still not gonna buy it zach well that's what i mean like i don't know if it's a good thing because they came up like yeah it's not a total piece of shit like so i was gonna sell it but people i don't know why they came up to me feeling like i'm the Well, that's because I do like the game. I opened up a Toy Story 4 CE that was my own for the show. Didn't even get to play it yet. I haven't even played my own damn game. So JJP had a good showing. CGC had a normal showing. They had Cactus Canyons. They did have some production LEs there, but they still haven't shipped out a production LE. There were rumors that they might have, but it was only a might, and of course it was a rumor, so who knows, that they might have had a new game there, an original game. but they didn't i did hear that rumor they did not well you know rumors they're often not true i tried to poke around i'm like two things when are we going to see the le's come from the factory they told me maybe as early as this week they may start getting some out um don't hold them to that because freaking cgc and i did hear some rumblings about a new game rumble rumble i did hear some rumbling. So I think it's pretty safe to say that we may see something from CGC before the end of the year. Okay. Well, that was another rumor I heard was that the Expo was very up in the air, but that there was a lot more confidence that they may reveal at the end of the year. Yeah. So that was cool. American Pinball was there. They had a booth, a bunch of their games. Now, was Magic Girl in their booth? It was not. It was within the vicinity, but no, it was not magic girls by itself american pinball nothing new no tanks no lunchboxes no lunchboxes i mean there was a there was an opportunity to strike that iron well whilst hot and i fear that it may have passed i told dave fix uh i said simply you're welcome uh ttf it's like shit dude i don't know we're lobbing you up here some alley oops the old media i still don't think we're gonna see it this year, I guess. Based off of some statements, I recall reading it. It sounded like they were positioned to not, and I really doubt it, especially given they decided to announce that third iteration of Legends of Valhalla, the classic, to replace the old classic, which is the deluxe, which has replaced the deluxe, which is now the limited deluxe. I'm sure you recall that discussion. What a mess. Oh yeah, we got some feedback. Oh really? People like that.
    53:22
    I talked to Dave Fix, He was excited. He was Dave Fixey. He always smiles, always a happy guy. Told me, you know, stuff's a-coming, stuff's a-coming. We did hear about they did get Scorebit integration, or at least a partnership with Scorebit moving forward for American Pinball Games. Yeah, I heard about that. I heard about Nordman, I guess, at the seminar. They said Nordman, two original titles coming from him. So we got GTF, rumored. rumored right GTF and one of them is going to have a new redesigned cabinet I think that was probably just because the next one's going to have a new redesigned cabinet so ideally maybe both of them will but I guess Nordman still there I talk to Josh Kugler a lot ex Josh Kugler Oh is he with anyone or is he just at the show I didn ask him I didn't know. Is that tacky to ask? I guess that would have been appropriate. You know what? I don't – I guess it depends if you know someone or not. But professionally, I don't – with what I work with, we have people who move jobs all the time but usually stay in the field. so it's not unusual to say hey are you are you with the state still no no i i'm i'm working for a city now it's okay he was he was really transparent with me we had good good chat he is very very much into pinball loves it loves it's his his passion he even told me about uh a really cool little easter egg and houdini he was like nobody really caught on to it and sorry coogler but i gotta tell people because it's fucking brilliant like little details so you You know the start button that flashes? Yes. He said nobody noticed or never said anything. But if you look at the – I'll give this. If you look at the start button flashing for Houdini, it's irregular. It's because it's flashing in Morse code. Morse code, yeah, yeah. And he said there's a thing with Houdini and his wife and just – yeah, the guy's passionate. A lot of good stuff from him. Now, I think just before the show, the AP lost someone else. They did. Thank you for bringing that up. It was announced that their, I don't know if he's lead tech, but Dave Brennan was their, man, he's so freaking good too. That's the thing is I had a couple people actually message me like directly and saying, oh, Dave is leaving AP.
    55:53
    You know, he's really helpful and he knows his stuff. Yeah. He would always make me feel good when a customer is having issues. Like, that's no problem. I'll contact him. We'll walk through everything until we figure out what's going on. And if we need a part, I'll walk them through installation of the entire part. Like that's the kind of tech he was. And I don't know how they lost him because it was his decision to leave. And I think he's going back into an industry familiar to him. And I don't want to even talk about why he left because I don't know. But that's a big loss in my opinion. And I know that they got Barry Engler that came over from JJP, who was originally with American Pinball.
    56:33
    And he's good, but you don't lose Dave Brennan. That dude was freaking – anybody that's got a collection of their own machines of some of the rarest games, and he can restore and work on them himself, he can figure out an AP game. He can figure out a modern game. I would have snatched him up. Maybe he's too pricey. I don't know. I would have snatched him up if I'm a manufacturer. Maybe he's old and – yeah, I haven't heard any motivation. or anything. Maybe his old industry just was able to offer him significantly more money. It could be that simple. Possibly. I'd hate to see him go, but he said he'll still be streaming and stuff. I think he was streaming for part of Buffalo Pitbull. Yeah, I thought so. Didn't he used to sometimes be on the TurboGrafx stream? Yep. That's where I think I know him from. Fantastic guy. I got to chat with him. There was a Fathom revisited in the past. You own that, though. I haven't unboxed it yet. Still? I still haven't. It's been like over a month. I want to so bad. Apparently not because it's in the box. I'm too busy. No, you're not. Make Nicole do it. I know. Don't you have like five kids? Have them do it. Oh, that could be a good straight down the middle of it. Blur their faces because we don't want child exploitation. That's okay. I'll exploit my child. Okay. Well, blurring off some of that. Yeah, have them say, give them all like each of their own ratchet wrench and say, all right, you guys, I'm going to time you. I'll give them all mermaid fins. See if they can do it hopping around.
    58:00
    I want your two sons to hop into the frame and go, merman, and then hop out, and that's it. Don't drop the game on your torso there, Fletcher.
    58:11
    Daddy's got a bad back. You can't lift it off yet. Have it look like the back box is like Pindy or Youngest, and just have him go, beauty is the essence of wetness.
    58:22
    I'm telling you, this could be a lot of fun. I got the salt lung. Oh, man. Help, help, help. A whole herd of flipping mermaids. It's cool. See? We got to work out this stuff before we unbox things. But, man, this pinball machine was gorgeous. It gave me a bony from across the room. I'm like, look at that shit. It's a pretty game. I didn't get to play it, though. Didn't play it. Didn't want to wait in line. But, whew, she was a looker. It looks just like it does in the videos, but the cabinet is what got me. It's like a different, it's weird. It's like a Metallica, but it's different than the other manufacturer's Metallica stuff. That's going to be a winner. You're going to see that game, Dennis, mark my word. You're going to see that game, even if it is expensive as it is, like $10,000 plus shipping, which is fucking crazy. It's going to go even higher than that. That's always going to be a hot, hot game, which gives me faith that other of these little remakes, older games, can work.
    59:24
    And speaking of whether a game can work or not, the homebrew section, I visited that. Okay. Yeah, I remember last year they had a pretty substantial homebrew section.
    59:34
    Okay. So like eight games or so, I think, last year. There wasn't really a big tout for the American Dream. I was going to ask you about that. So was there any? Who was the winner? I don't know. I don't know who won. I didn't see a banner that said, you know, be the next top model. I don't know.
    59:54
    Here's what happens when you're in media, Dennis, and you know this all too well. You get in a position where there's an olive branch, and you get in a position where things are easy, right? Prices are too much money. Homebrewers are great. There's like these little things that if you get behind them, whether you believe them or not, you'll get support from people, right? Do you know what I'm talking about? I think I know where you're coming from. There are easy arguments in Pimple. The tougher thing is to tell the truth. Uh-oh. I could come in and say – Uh-oh. Yeah. Uh-oh. I know. Are you telling me I shouldn't do this? No, go ahead and do it because they'll blame you and not me. Oh, shit.
    60:37
    Go ahead. I could come in here and say – Let me – I'm sorry to cut in. I know what's going to happen here. Let me position it in a way that's going to get less blowback. Thank you. How many, roughly, do you recall, how many homebrews were there in the homebrew row or whatever? At least 12. Okay. Out of those, what percentage were good? I didn't play them all. Out of those, what percentage do you think were good? I looked them all in a different lens because of my own upcoming projects. So I was looking very much at details and design and operating systems, and I was looking in a different lens specifically. I'll say that. Okay. And which one of them looked good? Which one of them? Which one? How many looked good? What are we going for is good, though.
    61:37
    My point being, Dennis, is that… I don't know what your point is. You wouldn't even answer my easy question. My point being that I could say that these homebrew people are fantastic. They are the future, all being true. I'm supportive of them. I think it's fucking awesome, and I do. I believe all of this stuff. I'm just saying that a lot of them, like, I don't get it. I guess I don't get the design, some of it. I don't get the rush. I mean, some of these things were just so fucking sloppy. Oh, that's where I'm going to get in trouble.
    62:19
    Slop. I don't. When you make a homebrew and you work that diligently and you plunge the ball and you shoot a couple shots, if that already sucks, then why are you spending time on anything else until you get that figured out? That's what I'm saying, I guess. If you can't figure out the plunge or the flippers or just basic places to put a ball, I don't know.
    62:46
    Well, maybe they don't. This is coming from someone ignorant that's never designed a pinball machine. Well, we'll be fair, as we like to be. So they might not be aware, and part of that could be a lot of people.
    63:01
    Well, all right. Have they never played pinball? Well, they play it badly. Okay, that's fine. I mean, there are people out there that like Champions Pub, Zach. And all it is is theme. All it is is the best world under glass that we've ever seen. But it's a clunk monster, and it's not fun. And that's obviously just my opinion. But there are badly, however we might think pinball should play, there are badly existing manufactured versions out there. Here's what I think. I think what happens is, with homebrew especially, with anything small, we see this even with small manufacturers, but homebrew even more so. People don't want to hurt anyone's feelings, so they don't actually give honest feedback about what is or isn't working. And in the designer's head, they might not even be honestly all that focused about the shots. I think a lot of homebrew people get caught on the idea of the theme and how much of the theme they can cram into the game, and that's what excites them. It's cramming in every little reference that they can get, and then if it means the game doesn't play very well, that's not the focus. The focus was, oh, you love this movie. I'm trying to think of a movie. I'll use Event Horizons. All right, let's say I was doing an Event Horizon Humber because I don't think there's an Event Horizon Humber that exists. Now I'm like, I'm going to put in where we're going. We don't need eyes to see. I'm going to have the folding space drive, and I'm going to have the weird green light circuit board tunnels, and I'm going to have the airlock with Mama Bear Baby Bear, and I'm going to have the surgery table, and I'm going to have the explosive linked bridge between the two ships. and the Nebuchadnezzar. You like to play too much this game or that movie. So my point is, by the time I've put in just those elements, I've just rambled off. I've already put in too much into the game. Okay. But you could see where if I'm like, Event Horizon needs to have a game, that that's what you're going to get. I'm just going to vomit movie all over this thing, and I'm going to fit things in where I can to make it playable. But the goal isn't to make it fun. The goal is every time you do something, You get that dopamine injection of remembering the movie. That's what I think a lot of it is.
    65:07
    And bear in mind, a lot of these people have no desire to be professional designers. I remind myself that too. It's just a project. It's just a fun project. Because they can. They figured it out. And that I'm jealous of because there's a lot more expertise and skill and craft than I'll ever have probably.
    65:25
    I'll point out, I think I saw this on Pinside once. It wasn't directed at me or anyone specific. But I remember someone just sort of – I think they were talking about podcasts, and they just sort of lamented how there wasn't coverage of the homebrew scene. And again, I don't listen to all that many people on podcasts. I've heard that before too, yeah. Well, because it's not news. I mean that's why I don't cover it. Okay. Because the only time you get to experience a homebrew is like at a show, and almost none of them are ever going to be made in production capabilities. So there are groups like on Facebook and stuff. I'm a member of some of them where you can go and relish the homebrew scene. But the home purchasing is not – let's not overly elevate it into something that it's not. I'm a flat channel. Yeah, I'm with you. It's an amateur area of people, and there are a few within it that might be using that to develop some bona fides to land a job. Perfectly said. It would be really cool to see a company like American Pinball or Stern go and see – like what we saw with Scott with Total Nuclear Annihilation and be like, that game is so good. It deserves to be made. But remember, Scott didn't want to be a permanent designer. He's done one other game on contract. He works for Pinball Life, and he loves what he does. He wasn't trying to become a designer. He wasn't shooting for it. And a lot of them, I think, are just doing it for fun. And so that's why I don't feel the desire to judge them one way or another. And I've never been overly harsh with any particular homebrew I've played because it's an amateur doing an amateur project for the passion of it. And I have no interest in judging it because I'm not trying to take someone's money. You articulated it better than I ever could. Thank you. Well, that's what I'm here for. Thank you for doing that. Yeah, I was just, I don't know, just wasn't that impressed. No, I honestly. Maybe my lens was different than it was supposed to be. Everyone that I think, I played a few last year, and I was like, they had a lot of them, and I didn't get to play Sonic Spinball, which was like the one everyone was loving on. And once I played, like all of them had really cool concept that I liked. Oh, yeah. But I didn't have enough time to like take the whole layout and be like, and if I did, I'd probably be like, you know what? I'd rather you have the one cool shot, and then everything else is kind of built around it. Yeah, what I thought would be cool is to pick one, because there's always one feature on each of these machines. I'm like, oh, shit, that is super, super clever. But to take at least one element from all of those 12 or 15 or however many were there, and then to put them in a game. Like, let's work as a team. All of you guys work as a team to create one. But that's a more interesting idea to me, because there's some great creative minds there. But individually, that's a tall task to create a pinball machine. I was more impressed with, there was like this original design maybe pinball machine in the fast booth that was right by, sorry, listener, I don't know what the name of it was, but it was right by Fathom. That was impressive to me. I'm like, this could actually, that layout could do something. Very classic, single level. That was a cool game. It wasn't the Norse one, was it? No, I did see the, what was it, like Norse gods, Greek gods or something like that. Well, he has that. I don't know if anyone's built it yet, but that, and I'll mispronounce it because it's a French thing. It's like Champs-Élysées, the cycling one that he did as a true street level, a true premier style street level. The Norse one. Yeah. Yeah, yeah, yeah. No, that's not. Yeah, okay. I didn't think anyone had built it yet. I think he's been working on actually making one, but he's released all the plans and stuff. But, of course, he's a professional designer. I really wanted to highlight that Fast booth because they have come a long way. And if I was jumping into homebrew stuff, I think I'd focus there. They had a whole lineup of games that were running off of the Fast board, even games that we know well, the manufactured games that were still running off of Fast software. And I was thoroughly impressed with that booth and with what they are doing in pinball. I think that's an up-and-coming riser. It's already big in our industry, but that's one to look out for there, that company. Yeah, it was. I mean, historically, like, because without taking old boards and doing something with an existing older board set, I've only really been aware of two major options. Multimorphic, of course, has their P-Rock, P3-Rock boards, which is what a lot of homebrewers turn to. And then I'd also heard – this was years ago – that some people were using Fast and doing the Fast Board stuff. And I think Fast is starting to get more general public attention now that they have that arrangement with Planetary. And so, so many of the – like Rudy's Nightmare kits and stuff are using Fast. So I think more and more people are seeing that, and Fathom revisited using Fast. And so I think a lot of people are now seeing, oh, yeah, you can do stuff with it. modern stuff with it. I don't know if people ever really thought about it much because again, and maybe it was just the circles I run in. I know more people that had worked with P-Rock stuff.
    70:25
    Just very interesting. I thought also interesting and oddly, a lot of the expo had a video game section or an arcade section bigger than I thought it ever would be even with vendors selling used video games and stuff. They had a fairly big in the free play area last year console game setup. I wonder if they were doing tournaments or something.
    70:52
    And that was here again this year, but because everything was blended within one another, maybe that was surprising because it was sectioned off more so in a corner. I mean, strategically, it could make sense if they were trying to up the foot traffic to put more of a video game focus because the broader public is more familiar with video games, especially home video games, not arcade. Also, maybe trying to get more stuff on the floor. You can bring this stuff in and earn a pass or whatever. Again, I don't know. This is all speculation. It was odd because I'm like, this isn't MGC. This is Pinball Expo. This isn't a gaming classic. This isn't a... But interesting. I'm a little surprised that they would do much on the home video game. Arcade makes a little more sense because they were often in tandem. Operators usually routed both, arcade and pinball together. Distributors sell both. Yeah, yeah. And they did have that. Chris Menier at Kingpin had all the Royal Thrill stuff. So that was different and fun too. They had the flip-out tournament. I don't know much about it. I don't know who won because I was traveling, and everybody seemed to be having fun in the flip-out tournament. Good job, winners. Sorry, guys. No, we phrased them. Flipping the script on autism happened. Oh, yeah. That was a big event. That was a lot to talk about there. A lot of people donated. Thank you to all of those people who donated and took time to donate items such as yourself, Dennis. Thank you. Your Creso clone shirt went for, then that got bid on and won and went for good money. Did it go for more than that sheet music? The sheet music really did. Did you see how much that damn thing went for? Not ultimately, no. Wow. I never thought it would go in the 2000s, I think, if not more. Oh, wow. It really went for a lot of money. We had a friend of the show, Steve Jablonski, who's the composer. Has he written in yet and said which of us he likes more? I don't want to do that because I'm afraid of the answer. This is a Steve, if you're listening. Same with Greg Bone. I don't want to know. No. Go ahead and say Zach, Steve. It won't hurt my feelings. I'm just assuming maybe he's a fan of mine. But no, he was phenomenal. He donated that. And then he donated a Transformers album or CD or something to put on top of that. That was the biggest item of the entire thing. So thank you. Oh, more than that attack from Mars? Yeah, it flew past that. Flew past it. So thank you, Steve. And thank you, Michael Bay, for signing that and doing custom messages and stuff. Steve, can you give me the Event Horizon score?
    73:35
    I don't know if you worked on that or not. I wonder who did the Event Horizon score. But he showed up huge, and he's a fellow pinhead. So we have him to thank for the flip in the script. I heard that they did reach that very, I felt, very ambitious goal of $25,000. They sure did, with a special thank you. You know who you are out there for coming in and making a very, very large and generous anonymous donation.
    74:04
    Oh, so there was a – Well, how do you know who they were, Zach, if they're anonymous? Well, they – Yeah, Zach, how do you know? They reached out to get some help with how to go about doing it. Ah, interesting. Okay. Well, yes, thank you. That's very generous. An anonymous whale. Yeah.
    74:21
    It's a lone cry. We can't identify what type of whale it is. from its cry. That whale was awesome. Thank you. Did you see, it was kind of surreal seeing all of the different, the Keith Elwins, the Roger Sharps, just a slew of creators and historical figures in pinball coming in and helping that cause coming together. It was awesome. Unfortunately, I could not watch a lot of it. So I'll say what I did see. I saw a part where Scott and Josh with Loser Kids Pinball Podcast that were really, you know, Josh was really trying to organize this event together. They were on with Steve Bowden from American Pinball. Okay. And spent a lot of time actually talking about the Pinball Dictionary that Steve Bowden has hosted for years. So I thought that was a really fun discussion. That's a clever idea. Really, really deep, you know, deep in the weeds pinheads would like. And then I also caught the tail end of when you and Mark Silk were talking. Oh, yeah, yeah. And he was trying to get you to do your Scooby-Doo voice and you're all like, aw, shucks, I'm just so bashful. He was training me and, yeah. That was a good little shtick we had. So those are the parts I saw. And I did not realize I saw the commercial for the Learning Solutions Center. Yeah, in between the – I didn't realize George Fisher did that with Don't Panic Flip. Freaking humble. That whole event could not have happened without George Fisher. Well, I mean I was going to switch away because they stopped and I'm like, oh, wow, wait. this commercial was like what I see with the Prevent Cancer Society and Doctors Without Borders when Games Done Quick. And Games Done Quick is a super professional thing. But the whole stream setup was incredible. It really was. So I'm going to give a special Dennis shout-out to George Fisher. I was extremely impressed with how well it looked and how well it was managed from what parts I did see. Is it a gold star that you're giving? What would you give? Well, I don't have any physical gold stars to send.
    76:22
    Because, you know, I wrap them in 24-karat gold foil, and you can't touch them. You can't touch them. They're really just for toppers. Gilded. Gilded foil.
    76:32
    Yeah, it was a wonderful event, and he did. He filmed, directed, and produced that entire thing, and I was giving him credit just as a friend. I was like, dude, oh, my God. Like, you did that, and he focused on the stuff. He's like, well, the audio levels weren't that great because the children were loud, but that's part of the production. It's wonderful, but it was hard to really isolate that audio. I'm like, dude, no. What are you worried about? This is fantastic. Do you think Steve could get me George's score from the commercial? Jablonski can do anything. Okay. Have you not heard his work? I mean, it will bring tears to your eyes. I have seen Transformers, so I'm sure I've heard his work. Everybody go listen to the piece called Tessa. And that was, I mean, overall, that was Chicago Pinball Expo. My own selfish shout outs. I wanted to give a shout out to Haley and Dan Rosenstein. Boy, oh boy, making my heart flutter. Did you hear the story of the dad and his daughter who came to Expo with a picture book? Did you hear about this? No, I think I saw a photo of a picture book that you posted, but I didn't know if that's related to this or if it was something else. Yeah, so Dan brought his daughter Haley to this event. I think they're from the west, northwest. And he created a picture book of all the people that he's accustomed to watching or listening to, the creators, the George Gomez, the designers of the world, the coders of the world, the personalities, the Zach Minnies and Greg Bones and Amanda Hamiltons, streamers, podcasters, video creators, such and such. So he created this little book like you do at Disney World, and you go get the little autograph. So it gave Haley something to do throughout the show, like find this person here, and let's have them sign. And she was a big pinball fan too, so he did this. And darned if they just didn't make my day because Haley came over and wanted me to sign the book where I was. And she even put Nicole in, which was awesome. So it was just a fun interaction with little Haley, and Greg Bone wasn't there. So I was like, oh, did you like... No, that Greg, he never does anything. I asked because she had a spread of Greg and I, and I said, are you probably like Greg more than me? And she gave me the look, the little shit. She gave me the look as if she did. So you know what I did, Dennis? What? I said, well, sweetheart, he's not going to be able to sign your book because he's not here. Does that mean... You broke her little heart, Haley. And then I proceeded to make her giggle and snicker as I then took Greg Bone's picture drawing a mustache and black eyes and black tears. No. Yeah, missing teeth. No, not his teeth. His teeth.
    79:21
    Yeah, I was appropriate though. Didn't want to mess up Loyola's book, but so she got a kick out of that. And then Amanda Hamilton kept, boy, look at the first picture in the book. I was like, look, young gun. you got a quarter of a picture and I got a full two page spread so sit down was it the picture of you in your Jurassic Park Ian pose that would have been awesome me and Greg got the centerfold it was awesome and also want to shout out to the Sharp family singers I met new friends Dennis and they came up and uh sharp family singers are a group on on the tiktoks and the facebooks and the youtubes and they're viral like they're they're huge they make tons of gobs of money because they're uber talented they've been america's got talent and all that crap but uh they're big pinball people the whole family even mom's a big pinball person there's just dad and son that were there and they're awesome beautiful looking people he played in like lay ms on broadway and stuff phenomenal talented people but shout out to the mom who's apparently a huge fan so they came up and they're into pinball they're fresh into pinball but they have a ton of machines and we had fun and my family now watches their family's videos and stuff so you got to go check out sharp family singers we got something planned that we're going to be doing some video stuff with them in the future and wow i just lovely lovely people that's me That's really neat. Sharp Family Mom, write into the pinballnetwork at gmail.com and say if you prefer Dennis or Zach. Oh, no, no.
    81:07
    You can say Zach. It won't hurt my feelings. We going to keep mining for war here though until we find something We going to find well ask for him Dwight Sullivan invested so much in time into our friendship and he still prefers you what no i don dwight right into he does come on that work and tell zach that you actually like zach better because he needs that i do need it because he told he told me at the expo thing i'm like you're still a dentist thing over me right and he was like zach you don't i'm not gonna lie to you i'm your friend but why why I can imagine him saying this. There's no reason to lie. Like, Dennis is just something special. And I'm like, flipping out booth helpers, thank you so much, each and every one of you guys that helped set up and break down because I felt like a schmuck. I couldn't lift anything because of the back thing. So I tried, and then people would be like, stop it. Can't do that. And the biggest shout out to Nicole for, well, she's like a thing with the flipping out. She sends everything out. She's a huge part of flipping out. I think sometimes people think that you say this like she's only like, oh, yeah, I'm, you know, we own it. Like a token part of it. Yeah, yeah. But no, like everything, because Zach sends me stuff sometimes. Like everything from Flippin' Out is sent by Nicole. It goes through her. Every product that we're excited, it goes through her. Nicole is the only reason why I have my T-shirt money. You did, yes. Yes, I did get it. T-shirt money. I did get it. Woo-hoo. So, yeah. Be-boo, be-boo, thank you. Big shout out to her because I couldn't do anything, but she could do things, and she was directing people and helping people. And a lot of people would come up to her and talk to her over me, which is new, and I'm good with that, I guess. Well, she is very pleasant. She was. It was the cutest thing in the world. I look over, and I see her and Craig Bobby playing Big Buck Hunter together and, like, laughing and having the best old time. And I had to go take a picture of them, too, because I'm like, these two are so precious. but yeah she was having a lot of fun and she was like into it which is weird for me Nicole write into gmail.com and say who prefers Zach or Craig she probably prefers both of you guys because she's frustrated with me a lot I've probably worn it a little thin oh really? she was bummed I'm great in small doses is how I would generally describe myself I think that's fair. I'm good in small doses. Though, she says this, and if she hears it, which is fine, it is a little odd because she's like the last time. She's like, Dennis, you just remind me so much of my son. Yes. And I'm like, I don't know how to take that. That's odd to me. Well, it's one of the most important people in her life, and she likes that person better than me.
    83:58
    I'd take it positively, my friend, but I couldn't do anything about it. Well, if it makes her feel any better, I'm my mom's favorite, too. Oh, you're both sisters. I'm just kidding. My sisters will say, I'm just kidding. Don't be mad. Don't blame mom. She can't take it right now. There's too much stress. Let's think about it. I mean, dad's got to have a favorite, so maybe by default.
    84:25
    All right, so that was my thank you. Oh, thank you to the medical staff at our booth who embarrassed the hell out of me. Of course, Amanda Hamilton's a freaking behind-the-profile nurse, and then we got Scott Larson's a freaking anesthesiologist. And Nicole, she had to freaking tell him that my sight wound was swollen a little bit from the drive, and it was getting a little weird looking. So, of course, she told Amanda, and then Amanda asked for a consult with Scott. My back was being shown in the center of a public play. I'm like, guys, this is bad. I don't want you guys looking at my wound, please. I didn't tell them to fuck off, but it's like time and place. And they were like, shut up. We got to make sure you're okay. They don't, they don't, they, they hear that whole, I'm fine too much. They, there's no, those medical people have zero tolerance. So she took a Sharpie and put it around my swelling area. We're going to check with you tomorrow. And if this is, and then Scott Larson's sending pictures to random stranger neurosurgency he knows and I'm like I love you guys but this is embarrassing and when I looked in the mirror because she circled around the wound it looked like a big old butthole so I had a butthole on my back all week but thank you guys I think that's about it I mean the Dutch Pinball has got some new big Lebowski code we can talk about yeah they finished the wizard mode yeah version 1.00 it's done the dude abides now and of course this dude already sold his machine so that sucks. Spooky Pimble, a lot of chatter about Spooky releasing a game possibly this year. Other than the TNA 2.0? Other than the TNA 2.0. Okay, because I hadn't heard any rumors on this. Interesting. Yeah, I had a couple people coming up to me, hey, man, I've been talking to people, and I think we might see another game this year. They're about done with all the other stuff, so awesome. Same with CGC. Same with, oh, last one. This is a big old nugget here before we drop the bomb. Oh, I love chicky nuggies. 2022 Twippies are coming right and I saw a post Jeff Teolis was saying that he was asked to host which he was grateful for but he turned him down and stuff but because it's my baby it's my child I won't do it I fucking can't let it go I'm still bitter and sad so I reached out and I wanted more info about this because I'm like what is going on here so come to find out Jeff Patterson one of the original co-creators off the twippies is out he's he's he will not be a part of this year's twippies for the first time in the show's existence hmm that is i hadn't heard okay well interesting yeah so and uh jeff and i are good speaking terms and i spoke with him a little bit about it and it's not like he was like oh don't tell him anything he's just he's like yeah lately he's kind of been out of pinball and a lot of work responsibilities and he just said he doesn't even, he's not even on the committee. He's not, doesn't have any part of any of it. Again, and for those that didn't know, because again, it's like the sausage making, you know, with the Pinball Industry Awards, you didn't do the committee this last year. You were willing to host and we had you and Greg host, but you weren't a part of the planning. So, I mean, it's not unheard of is what I'm saying. So, okay.
    87:48
    Interesting. He's not going to be any part He didn't go to Expo. He said, I don't think he's going to TPF. He doesn't run This Week in Pinball anymore. I heard Will was doing the posts now for This Week in Pinball. So I suppose that Will O'Wedding is going to be running this year's Twippies, and I'm assuming that they are still having a show. Well, they have a committee, so that probably – I mean, if you didn't know, Zach, when you didn't participate on the committee, well, it sucked because I had to do a ton more work. But we did have a team. so we had a team and yeah you guys kicked ass doing that uh doing that and i just i think the only reason you hosted that though was you heard all of our ideas that we were talking about and you were like oh my god this is gonna be like a third grade i should have just turned it all over to george fisher yeah because he was on the committee and after seeing what he did with flipping the script i felt like it would have been fine yes but no zach came in he's like you guys want me and Greg. We can do it, but it's on our terms. We construct the entire show. You know what? Absolutely. Full creative control signed. We'll sign all the disclaimers. We're going to do webcam stuff.
    88:58
    I could feel his blood pressure rising. I hope that these changes have helped lower Jeff's blood pressure. I'm not going to homebrew you. I was terrified of what you were about to do to that thing.
    89:13
    I jumped in, and this terrifies me as well with Jeff Patterson being out. I'm not going to lie because although I am not by my choice, but I'm not part of the Twippies, it's still part of me and terrifies me each and every year, especially after whatever the hell that was last year. Oh, they got to be doing something. Well, obviously, that's why I'm sure Jeff Teolis was contacted. Did you know this? I think they said last year that they weren't going to do the same hosts. I come to that. We were talking about it. Greg and I were talking about it. And cause he was a co-creators. Well, I, I don't think he ever reported this publicly. They reached out to Greg bone to co-host with a moto, I believe two years ago. Hmm. Okay. And he, he turned it down. Well, everyone does like Greg more. So I know. So yeah, it does fit. Okay. Well, interesting. He just said he couldn't do it without me. So it was nice. It was nice. I was like, Oh, that was nice of fucking Greg bone. I'd have just done it.
    90:13
    Man, oh man, woman, oh woman, and girl, oh girl, and boy, oh boy! My voice is gone. Pinball Expo took it out on me. Pinball Expo's big this year. The Mando Topper of Stern brought some heat this year. Other manufacturers, newcomers, they were huge. But they all pale in comparison. At least 20, 30 people at this expo had to come up and sing their praises for one podcast segment and one podcast segment alone. Ladies and gentlemen, with a shit voice, it's Pinball Market Trends.
    90:50
    How many of you came up and said, Bye, bye, bye! Or, you know what, I was able to replicate the screaming goat once, and I think that's why my voice is now jacked up.
    91:01
    A lot of you patted me on the back and said, You're right, numbers. don't lie. Many of you said it's true. You only report the facts. Hell, even I was able to hang out with Chris Franchi and while he didn't admit that pinball market trends is superior than any segment he's ever done on his most super awesome pinball show, even he would probably say that he loves him some GTF, but also some Zach. Side note, like I saw him and I came up to his backside, gave him a little tickle random tickle. Giddy, giddy, giddy, giddy.
    91:37
    I don't know how amused he was. Later, we were bullshitting and hanging out and having fun. And I was like, what did you think about that random tickle? He was like, would have probably been the weirdest damn thing ever if it wasn't from you.
    91:51
    He and I brainstormed some ideas for an Exorcist pinball machine that would be fantastic. Wouldn't it be awesome? But we've got a lot to get to trending up this week. I've got to do it. It's Stern Pinball's Mandalorian Topper, Dwight Sullivan, you did it big man Mando Topper is a certified hit in the last three days I've received just as many emails about the availability of the first run Mando Topper as I have emails about Godzilla Premium and that should tell you a lot wait more than a year to release a Topper, prevent it from being a limited run, price it at $2,000 and many of you want so bad for this to be trending down but listener I'm not going to homebrew you. Numbers don't lie. I only report the facts. And the facts is that the Mando topper just flew past the galactic tanks. GTF hype was so September, the season of Pepper's Ghost begins. Pull out that Beskar and buy yourself a cardigan. Because as the pumpkin spice flows, so too do, so too do, so too do the extra features that come from this topper. holograms and dedicated mini wizard modes and progressive foundry overload this topper's got it even if you don't have a mando game i know you won't also training up this week again i've got to do it game recognizes game in this week's pinball market trends and that's george fisher the guy's a saint without george fisher that flipping the script i'm just gonna say it that the fundraiser event wouldn't have happened he made the in between feature at promo video at learning solutions he ran the entirety of the stream he and a special shout out to his partner slash girlfriend danelle but those two were incredible incredibly important. He produced the stream. He directed the stream. He organized the interview segments, and he did so with no need for recognition. He did so with not one complaint. I did not hear one complaint. I did not see one eye roll. He was humble. He is not only one of the largest streaming assets in our industry, he is one of the most critical and needed members of this industry. He reached another level with me, and I'm forever grateful for his time, his eye, and his dedication. Also trending up this week is my Deadpool LE pinball machine. I put a price tag on that thing at Expo, y'all, and by the end of the show, I wasn't going to sell it. I'm not really, like, I don't get really starstruck over celebrities and stuff, especially like pinball celebrities. Like, you design a machine, you code a machine. I'd rather be a great friend of yours and collaborate and talk about our love than fanboying out over you. I just really don't care that much. But it was surreal seeing some of the most respected people in this industry do that flipping the script interview and then proceed to walk around into the flipping out booth to play my Deadpool Ellie that held up like a tank, you know, training up because of that damn thing. My homie, Gomi George. Gomez. this dude game held up like a tank. Talk about galactic. That is the galactic tank that I think is one hell of a force to be reckoned with. And then pull the glass on that damn thing once. It was a beast. But back to the story. It was freaking surreal looking over and seeing Keith Elfman playing that game and just seeing it all in the most haphazard, like, aw shucks, whatever, casual way possible. to see Roger Sharp jamming out on Deadpool in his most iconic stance and ferocity. Eric Menier playing that guy. I don't think I can get rid of this game. So that Deadpool Ellie, she was the belle of the ball. And based on the note description on the head of that game, she was Greg Bone's mom approved.
    96:05
    But everything can't be applesauce and brand new kicks. it it's you know what that means who doesn't love applesauce though right i eat oh my gosh best combo ever not necessarily mixed together but in a tandem as a two little mini courses there applesauce preferably one all natural organic no sugar i don't need any of that you can add a dash of cinnamon if you want to but applesauce and macaroni and cheese i i don't know why but It works so well. It's like a little meal. Don't mix it. You get a really cold and a really hot. But applesauce and new kicks. Who doesn't love new kicks? But anyway, trending down this week is not applesauce. No, sure as hell isn't new kicks. It's electricity.
    96:54
    You heard us talking about it. Rob Burke, Day Fix. Come on. We got to figure out something with. You're going to charge me for electricity where no other pinball conventions charge for electricity? as a sub charge to me a solid and at least integrate that cost into the booth so i just think it's a crazy booth price more so than electricity what's next you're gonna charge me for the concrete that i'm walking on maybe the air that surrounds the area no last year was the internet this year it's the electricity we're getting close guys but damn that was a punch in the stomach. All streaming down this week is one of you son of a bitches out there with sticky fingers. You know who you are. Sadly, there was some one or some ones that may have picked up some of the autism charity auction items for themselves. Flippin' Script booth was breaking down. Flippin' Hat was breaking down. A couple items went missing. We had Brian Cosner. I think He had a hat or something else. He had a couple things of his own personal items. Those are gone too. Turning down this week, who's going to steal shit from a pinball convention? It happened at Expo a handful of years ago. I remember Franchi had some shit jacked. Come on, people. You know what sticky fingers are? They're tacky. Let's end PMT on a brighter note. For those of you who attended the Expo, special shout out to the Poor Man. Poor Man's Pinball Podcast. They get a tribe that's weird and cultish and they carry around coins because they're also part of a local AA chapter. So they get their coins. You get a lot of weird people in that group. But what they did for their booth was maybe the best brand integration of that whole show. It was a flea market. It was a highway vegetable stand. It was dirty. It was strange, but it was poor men's, and I loved it so much. Let's be honest. I can't trend it up. No, no. There's no way to trend that damn thing up, that booth, whatever the hell that was.
    99:21
    I drew sort of a canopy, like those pop-up tent things. It was a 10x10, so he set up the canopy. it was just so fucking poor man so i asked him i said uh it didn't he didn't put the uh the top on it yeah it was just a like a an accordion you know the pop-up tent metal canopy but he didn't have the cover on and i said do you need help like getting the cover on it or like he's like looked at me with a straight face and he was like i didn't i didn't plan on putting it on there because it's not rainy he was just using it to hang like a couple banners from it was like the banners like sprinkled with zip ties it just looked like shit oh my god they were selling shit that people wouldn't, that people couldn't give away. There were some real treasures in there, though. They had a whole table full of booze that they were drinking on. Lord knows, I have no clue how they didn't get in trouble for, but it truly was a highlight. And they were, of all Expo, they were the funnest to party with. I've partied with so many of the poor men's tribe, and their fearless leader, Drew, with a cameo by Ian. They don't need any more promotion, but damn it, they nailed their booth and brought a lot of fun to the expo. But there wasn't a more fun, proud, beautiful group of people than the tribesmen and women that were hanging out and partying. I shared more laughs and laughing tears in that area than probably any other expo experience. So I'll never be part of the tribe, thank God, but that doesn't mean I won't support the hell out of everything that they're doing. What a group. No deals of the week this week, no WTFs, and we're closing out the pinball bounty on Dolly Parton. At the moment, I tentatively have a, ooh, ooh, ooh, gives me the downstairs tingles, how nicely restored. I have a lead on one that's coming my way, so we're in the shipping process. once heading here, so no need for a Dolly Parton. Thank all of you for looking out for me for that one. I think next week we may be announcing a new pinball bounty. Amy like bounty. And as always, peoples, I'm just here reporting the facts because numbers don't lie on the largest pinball podcast in the world and its sexy little bastard child segment, Pinball Market Trends. Dennis where can people catch you man they can always reach out to eclecticgamerspodcast.gmail.com or go to facebook.com slash eclecticgamerspodcast use the messenger tool and those I check regularly Patreon people sign up well we don't have a Patreon you can sign up for the EGP Patreon I have new ones I always thank them by first name or handle at the start of the episodes and Tony and I are trying to generate more stuff for just the Patreon folks No promises. There's going to be a new Baby's First Hair at the start of April. I'm a Patreon follower and a subscriber, and I got a nice little nugget that you sent this weekend to your Patreons. Yeah, some of the stuff I think, you know, it's like, I'll just drop my cheeky nuggies on the Patreon. It's just easier. Oh, it's good stuff. I'm glad I'm a Patreon. So definitely go become a Patreon because not only are you getting cool stuff exclusive from EGP, but you're supporting them and all the work that they've put in for year after year after year. So definitely do that. Dennis and I are still talking about whether or not we're going to dip our TPS toe into the above ground pool of Patreon. So we'll see. We'll see. You can reach out to me at the pinball network at gmail.com. Please go over. You guys showed so much love in person at the expo for straight down the middle of video series on YouTube covering pinball and all things fun. Please make sure you're following, liking, subscribing to social media. We are entering another phase on flipping out and straight down the middle on social media. We're getting ready to start launching that in the coming months. So be following now on the social medias, even the TikToks and the Instas. Speaking of flipping out, Pinball Product Showcase this week is the Mandalorian Topper. Order yours and buy, buy, buy now. Buy, buy, buy! James Bond 007 Pro and Premium Pre-Order still taking a list for that, as well as a list for the limited edition 60th anniversary James Bond by Keith Elwin. No info came from Expo about that, to my knowledge. And George Gomez still hyping it up. I still think we were talking with some buddies. I'm still guessing about 25K is what these things are going to come in at. But we'll have to wait and see. Remember that flipping out pinball vault? Pending sale. Elvira, number 40, 40th anniversary. Tentatively leaving this week. It's gone. About a week or so ago, we did add the Black Knight Sword of Rage limited edition vinyl record. So go check that out. Also, just then, this week, we got a Halloween pre-owned that we're going to sell cheap. We got a Rick and Morty with a butter cap. Uh-oh, that one's going to go quick. People are going to want that. We also got in an Ultraman Nguyen box that we're going to sell cheap. And what else did we, oh, Toy Story 4 LE in stock. Cactus Canyon Remake SE in stock. Rush Pro Premium in stock. Star Wars Pro Premium in stock. Oktoberfest in stock. Mandalorian Pro and Premium in stock. Talk about a game that's going to start selling more. Mandalorian right now because of that topper. TMNT Pro and Premium coming this month with the last run. We've got spots available. G&R LE, both new and used at Flippin' Out Pinball. We're taking queen pre-orders still. It's a dark horse there, people. A lot of accessories, a lot of toppers, CGC shakers, banners, escaleras. We've got a lot of stuff. We've got a lot of inventory. Help us help you get what you're looking for next at flip the letter in out pinball.com or email me at zach z-a-c-h at flipping out pinball.com or you can text me at 812-457-9711 tpn last week just another pinball podcast episode 34 what's expected expo uh with josh rupe that one's not gonna age well silver ball chronicles episode 26 the architect george gomez part two that one will age nicely pinball party podcast episode eight Years ago, Jason's still on vacation, but he got a lot of compliments this last week about adding the pinball party. Last week also was that Flip in the Script charity stream. You guys can find that on YouTube, the video on demand. That was a ton of fun. Mark Silk and I, just bring in the gold. Go watch that as well as Roger Sharp, Keith Elwin, Eric. Man, there's so many people on that. So much fun. Go tune into that. Also, this week at TPN, everyone's recovering. I don't know what we're going to bring you. But we'll keep it coming each and every day on the industry-leading media provider, the Pinball Network. Before we fade out, I do want to give my dedicated thoughts, prayers, to Kerry Hardy, who lost his younger brother a week or so ago. He still found the strength to come to Expo and hang out and provide a smile for all of his followers. I know that was probably damn near impossible to do. I couldn't imagine losing my brother. So, Gary, we're thinking about you, bud. And no words can help or anything, but just know a lot of people love you, and we're here if you, no bullshit, if you ever need. For Dennis Creasel, I'm Zach Manning. And, folks, because so many of you try, if you want me to go to Expo, there are certain rules that have to be met, okay? Because, oh, my gosh, people were messaging me. So, first of all, I have to have a hotel room on site, and I don't jump through hoops for it, okay? Easy enough, okay. It needs to be arranged. All right, so that's rule number one. Rule number two of this year, I need to see that the actual free play area was respectably populated. Okay. And I don't want official photos. I need this Stern style. You need to go in, 720p video, take screen grabs, and send them to me. We call that the Mando effect. And then I might still say no because I don't want to drop. and always practice safe pinball and homebrew up everybody's raving about that piece of shit game oh it was so bad i'm like no couldn't pay me to play this turd uh i played it but it was bad I feel electric, baby. So electric, baby. Wanna let you know, let you know.