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The TRUTH Behind the Centaur Unboxing...

Cary Hardy·video·17m 12s·analyzed·Mar 19, 2024
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Analysis

claude-haiku-4-5-20251001 · $0.025

TL;DR

Carrie Hardy defends Centaur unboxing as damage verification, not promotional bias.

Summary

Carrie Hardy responds to podcast criticism alleging she promoted Haggis Pinball by unboxing a Centaur Revisited at Texas Pinball Festival. She clarifies that the unboxing was requested by Nitro Pinball (the machine's owner) for verification after it arrived damaged in shipping, and that she was simply documenting the craftsmanship and rare machine—a standard part of her content approach. Hardy criticizes the podcaster for spreading misinformation without reaching out to her directly, and calls out community members for uncritically regurgitating claims on forums.

Key Claims

  • The Centaur Revisited Oblivion Edition arrived at Texas Pinball Festival on its side on a pallet jack via DHL delivery

    high confidence · Carrie Hardy directly witnessed and recorded the delivery; described in detail with video evidence

  • Nitro Pinball ordered the Centaur from Haggis and specifically requested Hardy unbox it to verify for damage

    high confidence · Hardy states she called Paul (showrunner), who called Tommy (Nitro Pinball owner), who approved the unboxing and gave permission to stream/record

  • Only one or two Centaur Revisited Oblivion Edition machines currently exist in the United States

    medium confidence · Hardy states 'possibly two that are currently in the states right now' based on what she was told; refers to it as a 'unicorn' machine

  • The Centaur had minor shipping damage: small dent on back box corner and cabinet side, but art and internals intact

    high confidence · Hardy notes damage she discovered during unboxing; drop target issues were resolved by overnight code update

  • Haggis did not include a power cord with the machine

    high confidence · Hardy identifies this as 'probably the only oof on their end'

  • A podcast host spread claims that Hardy was promoting Haggis, which Hardy received as gossip at Texas Pinball Festival

    high confidence · Hardy was asked multiple times at the festival about what 'a particular podcaster said' about her and Haggis; she listened to the episode after returning home

  • Damien (Haggis owner/designer) was in Hardy's YouTube chat during the unboxing because he received a notification

    high confidence · Hardy explains his presence as natural viewer notification, then used him as a technical resource during unboxing

Notable Quotes

  • “if I gave two shits about what this podcaster says, I would be giving him five bucks a month towards his Patreon”

    Carrie Hardy@ 0:21 — Sets sarcastic, dismissive tone toward the podcast criticism; demonstrates Hardy's approach to online discourse

  • “it's just like, why is this person talking about this like this? Because it just doesn't make any sense because it's all lies or all just complete opinions that are not true”

    Carrie Hardy@ 1:45 — Core complaint: criticizes podcaster for spreading false claims without verification

  • “I got the approval from Nitro Pinball to unbox this thing for verification purposes”

    Carrie Hardy@ 2:58 — Key contextual detail establishing legitimate reason for unboxing; refutes allegation of bias

  • “so either one of two things is going to happen one this game is going to look amazing and i get to admire a work of art two this game is probably completely destroyed from shipping and that's just gonna be good content”

    Carrie Hardy@ 10:16 — Explains Hardy's content philosophy: documenting rare machines regardless of outcome, not promotion

  • “I do not lie because I don't want to have to remember what I say and it's a lot easier just to tell you how I feel and how it is”

    Carrie Hardy@ 15:26 — Hardy's personal integrity statement; addresses credibility concerns directly

  • “They can't back up what they say on social media or Pennside... they're like, oh, Kerry's a sellout to Haggis. And when I ask them directly... Silence. Nothing.”

    Carrie Hardy — Criticizes community for uncritically accepting and spreading unverified claims from podcast

Entities

Carrie HardypersonHaggis PinballcompanyNitro PinballpersonDamienpersonPaulpersonCentaur Revisited Oblivion EditiongameTexas Pinball FestivaleventUnnamed podcast hostperson

Signals

  • ?

    community_signal: Podcast host made public allegations that Carrie Hardy was promoting Haggis Pinball through the Centaur unboxing, causing community gossip and spreading of unverified claims on Pinside forum

    high · Hardy received multiple mentions of podcast criticism at Texas Pinball Festival; claims podcast spread 'total bullshit' without reaching out; community members repeated allegations on social media/Pinside without evidence

  • ~

    sentiment_shift: Pinball community members are uncritically spreading podcast allegations without verification and unable to substantiate claims when challenged directly

    high · Hardy reports people on social media/Pinside called her 'sellout to Haggis' but responded with 'Silence. Nothing' when asked to elaborate; criticizes community for regurgitating claims without thinking

  • ?

    leak_detection: Centaur Revisited Oblivion Edition delivery to Texas Pinball Festival was apparently not communicated to showrunners or Hardy, suggesting surprise shipment or incomplete pre-event coordination

    medium · Paul (showrunner) was unaware of delivery; Hardy had to notify him; suggests leak or coordination gap with Haggis/Nitro Pinball

  • ?

    community_signal: Carrie Hardy's content creation approach focuses on documenting craftsmanship and visual detail rather than promotional coverage, regardless of manufacturer or game performance

    high · Hardy explains unboxing was opportunity to show rare machine's build quality; states 'I'm looking at like look at all the hard work that someone did to make this game look visually appealing' and this is consistent across her content

  • ?

Transcript

youtube_groq_whisper · $0.052

0:00
I got asked a handful of times while at Texas Pinball Festival if I had heard what a particular podcaster said about me and Haggis. And my answer was, no, and I don't care.
0:15
And it's like, they're like trying to give me some tidbits about it and everything, and I'm like, I don't care. And it's like, honestly, if I gave two shits about what this podcaster says, I would be giving him five bucks a month towards his Patreon.
0:40
So I get home and I decide to go, you know what, I guess I'll listen to this latest episode since I'm guessing it's being mentioned. And of course, when you have certain people in this hobby, they say things and then it immediately gets regurgitated around, whether it be on Pennside or whatever. So I feel like I need to add context. So those of you out there, including the certain podcaster, can get a better idea of what's going on. So now instead of reaching out to me directly, it's just much better for them if they just basically pollute with lies, essentially. Because I was laughing the entire time on listening to this particular segment because it would be like the equivalent, just to simplify it, if someone started ranting about the color of your car and how it's red or whatever. and just going on about how you need to change the color of your car because it being red is blah, blah, blah, blah, blah. No one damn well your car isn't red. So the whole time you're listening, it's just like, why is this person talking about this like this? Because it just doesn't make any sense because it's all lies or all just complete opinions that are not true. And the whole thing could be completely botched if the said individual just would have reached out to me. But no, that doesn't make for good entertainment.
@ 16:27

product_concern: Centaur Revisited Oblivion Edition shipped with multiple issues: arrived on its side, had minor physical damage (dent on back box), drop target malfunctions, and missing power cord

high · Hardy observed damage upon arrival; drop targets had issues requiring overnight code update; power cord was absent from shipment

  • ?

    supply_chain_signal: Centaur Revisited Oblivion Edition is extremely rare with only one or two confirmed units in the United States, suggesting very limited production run

    medium · Hardy states 'possibly two that are currently in the states right now' and refers to it as a 'unicorn' machine; unknown if additional units will be produced

    • 2:09
    So here we are. So look, I unboxed a Centaur Revisited Oblivion Edition at Texas Pinball Festival before the show even started. Now, I thought I gave enough context at the very beginning of my unboxing that would explain the situation, why I'm doing it. but evidently some people don't listen to the first 60 seconds and they just skip through, and then they just kind of assume what's going on. The pallet jack was in it.
    2:47
    So it feels like it's going to be okay. But this is one of possibly two that are currently in the states right now. So, we got the approval from Nitro Pinball to unbox this thing for verification purposes. So, that's what we're going to do. So, what I'm going to do is, and I'm going to take the footage that I sent my patrons on my Patreon page and everything, because they're well aware of the context behind this. But, let's start out from the beginning. When I get there, I got there on Wednesday to drop off one of the games that I was bringing.
    3:25
    And after I get finished dropping it off, I decided to do like, I don't know, a 20-minute live session, just going and walking around the place, giving everyone an idea of what Texas Pinball Festival looks like when there's nothing going on. And I even end that session towards the end by stating this. All right, guys. I think I'm done, maybe.
    3:49
    I guess I'll head back to the house, get some stuff done. Still a lot of things to prep for. So I look forward to seeing a lot of you this weekend. I'll probably go live again tomorrow, of course. I'll be going live throughout the weekend. So I'll see you guys later. I state that I'm going home because I assumed I was done. I'm like, I dropped off a game. What the point of me hanging around here any longer There is no point So I going to go home and start working on the next game that i gonna be bringing tomorrow so as i get towards the dock and i saying my goodbyes you have a dhl driver walk up and he talks to the guy at the dock checking everyone in saying that he has a delivery they ask him how many games do you have he says i have one now immediately anybody that has been into Texas Pinball Festival and worked in the dock area and you're accepting people's games that are coming in if one comes on a delivery truck and they say it's just one game I don't want to say it's a red flag so much as it's just like well that's different that's interesting why would a manufacturer deliver just one game that doesn't make much sense Like, why one game? So my curiosity spiked, and I decided to stick around just for a little bit, just to see out of curiosity what game, in fact, this was. The DHL driver raises up his doors, and I see a pinball machine box pretty much on its side. Okay, so I'm going to show you, because I immediately was like, oh man, he's probably going to go up there and push the machine up, and then try to say that that's how it was when he picked it up. So I merely recorded this as evidence in case something was damaged or whatever that we can state that, no, this is how it arrived immediately after the doors rolled up. So anyways, this is my recording session right here whenever I saw the game for the first time.
    6:04
    yeah man you're probably gonna need some help with that one those things are not lightweight you want some help yeah okay so i get up there and i help this individual get the box upright still don't know what game it is i don't know what manufacturer it is it's just the the thing that you typically see on the side of a of a cabinet uh box i mean but nothing that screams what in fact this game is so when i get the game completely upright that's when i just i see haggis at the bottom of the box i'm like oh cool they shipped over a fathom that was my immediate assumption that it was going to be another fathom revisited kind of thing you know and then i see the game name says CROE. And I'm like, what the crow? What game is that? And I had to like work it out in my head. I'm like, holy shit. This is a Centaur revisited Oblivion edition. So immediately it's like, holy shit, we've got a freaking Centaur that's going to be here at Texas Pinball Festival. I didn't know it was going to be here, and evidently the showrunners didn't know either. So I hop off the truck, and I call Paul, who's one of the showrunners for Texas Pinball Festival, and I was like, you need to get over here because they have a centaur from Haggis, and the box was on its side, and he was unaware that this game was going to be there as well. So they get the game over. Eventually, Paul comes over there and examines the box, and they have a discussion with the shipping and stuff like that. I'm just kind of at a distance at this point because I'm curious of what's going to happen here. Are they going to reject the order? What? So Paul gets on the horn to Nitro Pinball because this is their machine that's going to be going into their particular area at Texas Pinball Festival.
    8:10
    Let me change cameras to help with retention here. So as I was saying, Nitro Pinball ordered this machine, I guess, from Haggis. I don't know the backstory of all that. All I know is that it belongs to Nitro Pinball. And he calls up Tommy and he's like, hey your centaur is here at the show And he like cool And he like well don be freaked out but it was on its side on top of the pallet jack and he like freaks out obviously like what the hell kind of thing and so he asked him like hey do you want us to like verify that it's okay and make sure it's not damaged like unbox it and he was like absolutely please because you know when you spend a bunch of money on a particular machine i think you kind of want to make sure that you're not getting something that's just completely destroyed so i was excited because i was like i might be able to unbox a centaur something that no one else has done yet and for all we know may never be able to do we don't know yet so it was one of those things where so i immediately asked after that i'm like can i stream this or record it and once again tommy had no problem with that i'm like okay we're gonna do a live stream then on this because I was like I know that this is something a lot of people would like to see I could have easily just been like yeah let's tear it open unbox it set it up and then just let everybody discover it at the show but evidently me unboxing this setting it up and then playing it supposedly I'm on Haggis's side and I'm promoting what they do and I'm just you know crawling up their butt whatever you want to say i'm gonna i mean it's it's absolutely ridiculous how it went from me trying to just show everyone how this game looks because you got to look at also from my perspective here on this on one hand i'm going to be unboxing essentially a fucking unicorn okay so either one of two things is going to happen one this game is going to look amazing and i get to admire a work of art two this game is probably completely destroyed from shipping and that's just gonna be good content right there entertainment for people to see what this unicorn looks like destroyed so it was in a way a win-win for that and I decided to go through everything to give those of you out there a better experience and just you know even listening to pulling off the wrapping and stuff like that I wanted those of you that probably won't be able to experience this for yourselves the ability to somewhat experience it but yet now I'm the asshole evidently now was the game damaged a little bit there was a little bit of thing on the back box on the corner and the side of the cabinet I didn't see it at the time but it was pushed in a little bit but the art and everything was still intact i mean it held up great as far as the workings of it i didn't want to play it because i knew that i was going to be horrible at it but at the time i was noticing that there were some drop target issues and it just so happens that damien was also in the youtube chat now why would damien be in the YouTube chat? Probably because whenever I go live, my subscribers get a notification that says, hey, Gary Hardy's live. All you have to do is click on it. So whenever you see someone that you subscribe to go live and all of a sudden it says, unboxing a Haggis Centaur, and you're like, wait a minute, I own the company Haggis and we built a Centaur. This is something I might want to see so sure enough yes he's in chat to watch and monitor and thankfully he was there because i've never unboxed one of these things before i don't know what to expect i didn't know where the lock was for the back box or anything like that so needless to say certain things i asked was towards damien because who better to ask than the person who built the damn game so getting the back glass off, setting it up here and there. There was a couple of questions I had. But overall, it was just me admiring the craftsmanship and the build quality for this game. And me doing that, for whatever reason, is me promoting them.
    12:48
    I promoting what the game looks like It like they never seen me admire a game before Like that just completely out of character or something Do you not watch my videos Did you not watch some of my streams that were at TPF?
    13:04
    A lot of the times, I'm giving you footage to show you the pure hard work that people put into building or restoring their games. I want you to see all that. I'm not so much on like look at the game as it gets played aspect I'm looking at like look at all the hard work that someone did to make this game look visually appealing so completely within my character I'm showing off all of that to everyone out there and it doesn't matter whose name or who made the game it was merely just like this was a rare machine to be in the states and for all we know this could be the only one that ever gets made i don't know it's yet to be determined but as of right now this is like one of maybe two that are in the states as what i was told so there you have it there so even after it's all said and done the most common thing that people are saying about centaur revisited is that it's beautiful that it looks amazing especially for those that were actually at the show and got to see it in person. Yes, the color play field is very subjective. I get it. So the orbs issue with like the drop targets and everything, something Damien mentioned in chat was update the code and that should be resolved. Sure enough, the code was updated, I'm guessing by Nitro overnight or whatever. And from what I experienced that everything they look to be working just fine. So there is that. They didn't ship it with a power cord, which a little bit of a fail right there, guys. But, you know, it is what it is. Luckily, you know, there's plenty that you can buy around there at the show. I happened to borrow one. But, yeah, so I think that was probably the only oof on their end was not supplying a power cord right there. So that's essentially what I wanted this video to be, was just trying to give you some context instead of listening to someone that has a microphone completely just spew out total bullshit okay so this is what actually happened this is what's actually going on there is no relationship or behind the scenes going on with me and haggis not they're not happening it just what you see is what you get guys I do not lie because I don't want to have to remember what I say and it's a lot easier just to tell you how I feel and how it is so that way I don't have to go wait did I say this was good or this was bad or this was no I just tell you how it is because I don't want to have to remember so there you go guys that's context for you uh more content is on the way you may or may not be able to hear that my voice is still on the on the mend so but I do We've got videos coming. I haven't decided if I want to do a live stream to talk about all the games that I got to experience or just do a quick video. I don't know. We'll see. And what proves my point even further about these certain individuals that just listen to this guy and then just, like, spew out what he stated is they can't back up what they say on social media or Pennside. They're like, oh, Kerry's a sellout to Haggis. And when I ask them directly, I'm like, out of curiosity, I mean, could you enlighten me on why you think that? I'm mainly just curious. Silence. Nothing. Because it's merely just spewing, regurgitating what someone else says. Instead of using your own brain, you're just going to go, oh, someone said this. It must be true. Let me just say it out there. And now I'm cool. No.
    16:56
    Use your head, guys. Please. please and by all means if you have questions about my integrity reach out to me directly I'm more than happy to set the record straight peace out