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Ep 27: Dr. Zach

Final Round Pinball Podcast·podcast_episode·1h 44m·analyzed·Feb 16, 2021
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claude-haiku-4-5-20251001 · $0.032

TL;DR

Final Round Podcast discusses award shows and interviews dealer/media figure Zach Meny on industry politics.

Summary

Jeff Teolis and Marty Robbins discuss their Final Round Pinball Podcast second year, the Reach-Arounds awards show, and interview guest Zach Meny (Dr. Zach), a pinball dealer and media personality. Zach discusses the Pinball Industry Awards, his role as a dealer, the challenges of balancing commercial interests with credibility, and notable projects including the Hot Wheels pinball video controversy and the Guns N' Roses Jersey Jack production.

Key Claims

  • The Reach-Arounds special featured 30 different people contributing to the show, and the majority of content was produced by Marty Robbins.

    high confidence · Jeff Teolis and Marty Robbins discussing their recent episode

  • The Pinball Industry Awards received over 4,000-5,000 YouTube views within a week after airing live to 300-400 people.

    high confidence · Zach Meny reporting on first-year PIA metrics

  • Two-thirds of the Pinball Industry Awards voting committee came from outside The Pinball Network.

    high confidence · Zach Meny clarifying committee composition to address 'self-dealing' criticism

  • Zach Meny quit his day job as a psychologist and now works one day per week while focusing primarily on pinball dealing.

    high confidence · Zach Meny's direct statement about career transition

  • Stern's Batman 66 pinball machine is 'a fucking snooze fest' with boring jazz music and poor shot design.

    high confidence · Zach Meny offering critical opinion of Stern game

  • No manufacturer has ever reached out to Zach Meny publicly to complain about his critical comments.

    medium confidence · Zach Meny's claim, unverified by third parties

  • Stern told Zach and Greg (Straight Down the Middle) to pull their Hot Wheels pinball video after it went viral, citing conflict with agreements on gameplay reveal timing.

    high confidence · Zach Meny detailing the Hot Wheels video controversy

  • The Guns N' Roses Jersey Jack production video by Zach and Greg Bone is their most proud piece of work to date.

    high confidence · Zach Meny discussing recent Jersey Jack collaboration

Notable Quotes

  • “I can say without it coming across as conceited, that it was one of, if not the best podcast ever.”

    Jeff Teolis @ early in episode — Self-congratulation on the Reach-Arounds special; sets tone for episode quality

  • “I'm a dealer, right? Let's cut the bullshit. I'm a dealer. I make money. I make a livelihood in pinball, selling pinball machines. Period.”

    Zach Meny @ mid-episode — Direct acknowledgment of commercial interests; core source of community criticism he faces

  • “I think Stern's Batman 66 is a fucking snooze fest. It's boring. It's jazz music. None of the shots are great.”

    Zach Meny @ mid-episode — Critical opinion of major Stern release; demonstrates willingness to critique despite dealer status

  • “The problem is what if I really believe that toppers are cool or that Stranger Things is great because I do. That's the problem that I always face.”

    Zach Meny @ mid-episode — Core conflict Zach faces: genuine passion for products he sells vs. community skepticism of bias

  • “Not one manufacturer has ever reached out to me to say, hey, wait a minute. We're putting you in the icebox. No, not once because I think we have a mutual respect and understanding.”

    Zach Meny @ mid-episode — Claims manufacturing relationships are solid despite public criticism; unverified assertion

  • “You out of your mind? What are you doing? Why would you pull something that is doing so well helping you?”

    Zach Meny @ late-episode — Reaction to Stern's request to pull Hot Wheels video; illustrates tension with manufacturers

  • “I quit my day job as a psychologist because of it.”

    Zach Meny @ mid-episode — Major career revelation; demonstrates serious commitment to pinball dealing

  • “When people recognize the best is when people think that a really highly paid production company did it or the company themselves did it. And they just kind of blow over and they're like, oh, I love what Jersey Jack did there. And we're like, that was us.”

Entities

Final Round Pinball PodcastorganizationJeff TeolispersonMarty RobbinspersonZach MenypersonReach-AroundseventPinball Industry AwardseventThe Pinball Showorganization

Signals

  • ?

    content_signal: Reach-Arounds first-year awards show received overwhelmingly positive reception with 300-400 live viewers and 4,000-5,000+ YouTube views. Hosts indicate strong possibility of repeating next year after initial heavy workload burden resolves.

    high · Jeff and Marty discuss metrics and emotional investment; Marty hints at 'next year' repeat despite saying 'Fuck no' initially

  • ?

    community_signal: Zach Meny receives documented hate from community members, sources indicate criticism stems from his dual role as commercial dealer and media personality. Hosts directly address this tension as significant and ongoing issue.

    high · Marty mentions 'circles on Pinside' with haters; Zach acknowledges he has emails documented; discussion of inherent conflict in being both dealer and media voice

  • ?

    industry_signal: Pinball Industry Awards established formal governance committee to ensure objectivity in voting. Committee included members without decades of industry experience, focusing on checks-and-balances over domain expertise. Described as important for legitimacy.

    high · Marty and Zach discuss governance committee role; emphasis on 'objectivity to the best of our ability' and transparent criteria

  • ?

    personnel_signal: Zach Meny quit his primary job as psychologist to focus on pinball dealing; now maintains only one day per week of psychology practice. Indicates significant personal commitment/belief in pinball business viability.

    high · Direct statement from Zach: 'I quit my day job as a psychologist because of it' and 'I do one day a week now'

  • ?

Transcript

groq_whisper · $0.314

0:00
The Pinball Network is online. Launching final round pinball podcast. It's player versus player and player versus machine. Welcome to the final round.
0:38
Oh my goodness, it's Jeff Teolis. And now, ladies and gentlemen, Martin Robbins and Jeff Teolis. Look at this, our second year of the final round. My name is Jeff Teolis. My name is Martin Robbins. And I am as surprised as everybody that we've lasted a year. I think pacing was the key, don't you? I mean, if we went every week, we would have A, burned out, and B, probably killed each other. Oh, I think both of those things in equal amounts. So you spread it out every other week. Do I? And it seems to work. Well, listen, look what happened to the pinball show, all right? They couldn't last every week. In fact, Dennis Creasel loses his mind every time Zach starts to sing. He has to go every other week. I assume that was the only reason. They take February off. I mean, burnout, hello, way to lead TPN. Thanks a lot. Yeah.
1:38
We're fortunate, I guess, in that we do, besides the show, we do speak a lot even in between the show, and it's just carefree. So there's no pressure. We just turn the mics on, talk any old shit, and it just doesn't matter. When I did the compilation of all the sponsors, or at least two-thirds of the sponsors for our little bowl of super sponsors special that we did on Sunday, and I was listening back to some of the shows, which is the first time I have done so in quite some time, we've come a long way. And I just think of the structure we had when we first started. Absolute show notes, and here's where we're going to go, and here's the direction, and here's how we're going to talk about competition. I'm telling you right now, Martin and I are turning on the microphones with nothing in front of us. So whatever comes out, comes out.
2:30

Zach Meny @ late-episode — Comments on credit and recognition for high-quality content work; professional pride in production quality

Dennis Krieselperson
Straight Down the Middleorganization
Greg Boneperson
Guns N' Roses (Jersey Jack Pinball)game
Hot Wheels (Stern Pinball)game
Batman 66 (Stern Pinball)game
Jersey Jack Pinballcompany
Stern Pinballcompany
Ken Cromwellperson
Ed Robertsonperson
Glenn Wechterperson
John Lemonperson
Jack Dangerperson
Element Studiocompany
Flip N Out Pinballcompany
The Pinball Networkorganization
Motocross Harneyperson

regulatory_signal: Stern Pinball requested removal of Hot Wheels video by Zach/Greg after it went viral, citing agreement violations on gameplay reveal timing. Video was pulled but Zach expressed frustration with decision and indicated future reluctance to work with Stern under similar terms.

high · Zach details full Hot Wheels controversy; quote: 'I said I will pull it. But I'm not going to be very happy and this will not happen again.'

  • ?

    business_signal: Manufacturers begun dealing directly to consumers in 2020, creating tension with dealer channels. Zach acknowledges surprise and frustration when rules change mid-stream, though respects manufacturers' leverage and product control.

    medium · Zach discusses manufacturer direct sales in 2020 and notes manufacturers 'have the leverage' and 'have the product'

  • ?

    product_launch: Jersey Jack's Guns N' Roses pinball launch universally acclaimed as one of best game launches in pinball history. Success attributed to multi-media approach coordinated by Ken Cromwell, including partnerships with content creators like Zach/Greg and Element Studio.

    high · Jeff states 'universally everyone says that's probably one of the best launches we've ever seen'; Zach confirms strategic multi-angle media approach

  • ?

    design_philosophy: Zach Meny willing to critique major manufacturer releases (e.g., Stern Batman 66) despite commercial relationships. States he prioritizes truthfulness over protecting designer relationships, acknowledges 'tight rope' balance between credibility and dealer interests.

    high · Zach calls Batman 66 a 'snooze fest' and discusses his approach to critical commentary; acknowledges manufacturers told him he 'walks a tight rope'

  • ?

    content_signal: Zach Meny and Greg Bone (Straight Down the Middle) focus on 1-2 high-production pieces per year to challenge themselves as 'amateur filmmakers.' Guns N' Roses featurette described as their proudest work; viewers often attribute production quality to major studios rather than independent creators.

    high · Zach discusses strategy to produce complementary content beside Element Studio sizzle reel; notes people often attribute their work to larger production companies

  • ?

    community_signal: Final Round Pinball Podcast attributes longevity to bi-weekly rather than weekly schedule. Compare to The Pinball Show which publishes bi-weekly due to burnout concerns. Pattern suggests once-weekly podcast cadence unsustainable in pinball media.

    medium · Jeff mentions pacing as key to avoiding burnout; references The Pinball Show as cautionary example

  • $

    market_signal: Pinball dealing described by Zach as 'damn hard, stressful, overwhelming job' requiring extensive customer service and product knowledge. Many dealers lack service quality; Zach differentiates on customer support and hobbyist-first mentality despite commercial operations.

    high · Zach discusses poor dealer practices, high support burden, and his own approach to customer service as point of differentiation

    • You say that, except that because we talk so often, we just know that we've got things to talk about. Sometimes. I know this is an easy show to talk about what we did on our last main show, which was the reach-arounds. A lot of good feedback. We're glad you enjoyed it. It was a lot of fun putting that together. There's a lot of work for Marty and myself and all the wonderful guests. But I said to you, Marty, off air in almost five years of podcasting, it's probably my single favorite moment of podcasting. And I'll say it later, but I'll say it now as well. I listened to, I would say, probably a good 50, 60 percent of that show for the first time when the episode aired. So it felt great being a listener of the show. And because I can say that the majority of the show was you, the scripting, the recording. Yes, it was. Shut up. It was, I can say without it coming across as conceited, that it was one of, if not the best podcast ever. It just came out so well. So well done. A lot of sleepless nights going into that. Just because I would get ideas and I'd be like, oh, I've got to write this down and stuff. And contacting different people to present. Well, that's what I was going to say. That's what I was going to say in that you had a really good structure. But what actually made the show great was this. And I can say this with all humility. so many far more talented people than us contributed to that show and that's what elevated it to a whole new standard the accepted speeches were unscripted they were fantastic the songs were just mind-blowing amazing it just all came together to a great show yeah thanks to Ed, Glenn and our secret weapon who we're not allowed to reveal who sang Imagine but my goodness that was a lot of fun And yeah, you're right. Without all those people, I think there were 30 different people on that show. And everyone hit a home run. So thank you for everyone for making the reach-arounds a lot of fun. And really, you don't need any other award shows. Let's be honest. That's it. I know Pinball Industry Awards did the next night. They tried. It was cute. And I guess there's another one coming up in March. But you've got your fix. It should last you for a while. And we were glad to put that together. It was a lot of fun. And obviously, ultimately what we're saying is the real winners were announced. So everything else is just, you know, it's nice, but real people got recognized. So well done, and thanks for your money. You know what? We shouldn't totally shit on the Pinball Industry Awards. I know you, I think, were even part of the committee or something to do with that effect. I actually, the one thing I did, I showed up for 15 minutes at the end, and I said, I'd like to make a nomination. And I was glad to see that she won in Motoharney. So congratulations for your wonderful video work. That was my contribution. I didn't vote, didn't do the Hall of Fame awards and all that kind of stuff, but it came across great. And I hate admitting that because now he's going to gloat, but maybe, you know, he'll give us his take on it. It's our special guest, even though he's called it quits for the month of February, taking some time off. It's too much for him. He joins us right now on Final Round. We're going to put him to work, right? Oh, for sure. He's not going to get off easy. And here he is. It's Zach Menny. Wow. Wow, thank you guys so much for inviting me on this prestigious podcast, the Final Round Pinball Podcast. I'm not sure we invited you as opposed to you saying, guys, fuck, I've got to come on your show. I need to be on a good one on the TPN, I think is the exact wording.
    6:19
    Well, I've asked week after week after week, and finally I think you guys had a couple people drop out, so here I am. Yeah, it's funny. No one wants to record on Super Bowl weekend. Zach's like, hey, man, I'm in Indiana. Our football team sucks. That's right. That's absolutely right. Is it Super Bowl season? Oh, Marty. Is that a thing? Is that football? You guys kick the balls over there, don't you? We do. Do you? Okay. Well, you kind of kick them when you're going for a goal, don't you? Here's the difference between American football and Australian football, all right? A lot of equipment, four downs, and a lot of rugged men. And similar in Australia to the NFL, the only difference is they don't wear the equipment, and they grab more than just the football. They do things called gumming. Do you know what gumming is? And I'm not even making this up. I don't know, but I'm turned on. What is this, gumming? Do you know what gumming is? I'm strangely aroused. What is it? Ask any rugby player what gumming is. So you see a lot of the guys in the scrum and stuff like that, and to try to jolt the ball away or catch the person off guard, they will reach between the legs and pull down, thus called gumming. I'm not making this up this is a real thing and it's why I've never played rugby so I'm not sure which code of football it is in Australia but we have what's called the Hoppawattie named after a footballer where his trick was to stick his finger in where it shouldn't go just to put people off to get the ball there you go wow that's why I didn't wrestle in high school I think they get into that shit that's why Jeff was into it so the half fisting nelson i think they call that okay zach much like your shows uh we've gone off the rails almost immediately so uh first of all we did want to talk to you about you know we just are coming off the reach arounds and you are coming off the pinball industry awards and why did you make an award show when there already is one in the reach arounds i mean it would depend on who you asked if you asked pin side just because i wanted to win my own damn award um but some say ego honestly the no bullshit answer is because i enjoyed doing it with the twippies so much so and thought there's got to be a way that i can still create and find find a way to congratulate to commemorate all of the hard-working people in 2000 well 2020 last year and i wanted to do that but the twippies are so damn good that i We couldn't do the same thing, so we wanted to do something else that would partner up and that would sit right beside the Twippies, maybe even bring the Twippies on in March. So January, let's do something with the media. So the media votes on the best of of the year, as well as just giving a tip of the hat to some of the peers that we have in media, doing photography and podcasting, streaming, et cetera, et cetera, because we're all one big happy community, so why not celebrate more? That's pretty much the premise of it, nothing fancy. So Jeff and I, before the Pimple Industry Awards were announced, we were going to try and introduce a similar type of awards, mainly because you've got the popular vote. We wanted to do more of an industry, so I guess Oscars versus Golden Globes or Golden Gropes. Gropes is what Jeff called it. And then you came out with that, so we thought, Well, let's just go with reach-arounds because we like the joke. And the reach-arounds turned out so, so well. You guys have got to do it next year, right? Fuck no. Please, come on. Please.
    10:02
    I'm very pleased with the end result as well. And for those people that don't know, a lot of what was in that show, I listened to the same time as everybody else. So I hadn't heard the acceptance speeches. I hadn't heard the presenters. I'd heard the songs. Oh, my God, those songs. Yeah, when we got those songs, I was pretty excited. So I'm like, Marty, you've got to hear these. Well, it was some of the best talent that we have in the industry. Some of the people like Ed Robertson or who else was singing the original stuff? We had Glenn Wechter, I think it was, singing. And we had a secret singer, John Lemon. Yes. That one was just – it's one of those things where you cry and you smile at the same time because it's so beautiful and so talented, but it's hilarious as well. God, I love it. So I think that the summary is we probably will do it next year when the memory of all the work that we've had to do, including I've still got to do these freaking trophies. Once that's a distant memory, we might go it again, I think. Very nice. We've got trophies that are leaving next week. We had some go out this week, some going out next week, and then I'm going to drive up Jersey Jack and Stearns. It's too expensive to ship them heavy-ass things. So I'm going to go up to Chicago here in the next week or two and probably just drop them off then. But overall, we had a great response. We didn't know what we would get. It was the first year, and doing something the first time is always going to get, you would think, a small response. That partnered up with we were dropping it on essentially a nonexistent YouTube channel in the Pinball Network. We were focusing on that this year but not so much last year. So we didn't know what kind of response we would get, but, yeah, it has been overwhelmingly positive and pretty highly viewed for what we got with 300, 400 people live that night. And then YouTube, I think, a week after, we're at over 4,000 or 5,000 views, so not bad. Yeah, and I saw some comments, too, from some of the manufacturers that were very, very excited to win the awards. some of the designers, certainly the podcasters, streamers, and video makers, and all the content. I thought that was nice to see some feedback there in your first year, which was good. But what I really liked about the whole idea of this was, just as the Twippy is available for everyone, just as the reach-arounds are available for anyone with a checkbook, the Pinball Industry Awards kind of took a different angle, and it was a bunch of people that are, quote-unquote, media. And you had, as mentioned several times, two-thirds of those people outside of the pinball network. So the myth of you giving yourself an award is all bullshit because this was people from all over the globe coming in, and I imagine that will only grow next year. Yeah, that's the hope. And really, the idea and the vision that I had and reciprocated by the rest of the team after presenting it was the second year. That's where my heart's at. That's where my heart has been since we conceptualized the first year. The first year we knew it was going to be virtual, so dust the cobwebs off. Let's kind of get out there, give ourselves a presence so that we can hit it hard second year. Because second year, we have all plans and intentions on doing a live ceremony and a nice formal event in Chicago live in January, pending the whole pandemic thing, but that's the ultimate goal. So I'm glad we got through year one. We got a better response than I had anticipated. and if that's the type of response we're going to get in year one, shit. Year two is going to be bananas. It's going to be great. The other thing I just wanted to add to that as well, because I was part of the committee that did the Excellence Awards as well, and I guess for those people who are saying, well, it's all TPN and Martin, you're part of TPN, so whatever. What I'm going to say is this, being part of that experience, which went for a couple of hours, it's about the governance committee, because I know that people gave that a bit of flack saying, well, they really haven't been in the industry that long. The purpose of the government... Did DFX say that? Yeah, well, probably. But the point of the governance committee was to make sure that the rules and regulations of the nomination process and then awards was following a certain guideline. And that's what they did beautifully when I was in there. It's like people were getting quite emotional. Like, well, hang on. You've got to remember the criteria, Guy. You've got to remember what we're actually nominating here and how we're nominating and voting. So it actually became quite impartial and less emotional, and I think that's got more validity. Yeah, and our number one goal to set ourselves apart from any other awards is a different angle, and that's objectivity to the best of our ability. And sure, some people in the governance committee may not have been in pinball 20 years, and that's fine. We're not looking for that. We're looking for somebody with a good head on their shoulders, a wide variety of diversity within pinball. We wanted to hear from everybody that does media that can just do the checks and balances to make sure that everything is in line. And, again, it's a teamwork thing. It's not just one person. It's not me. It's not Dennis Creasel. It's everybody as a group trying to figure out how we commemorate those in pinball. So following rules and structure was really important, and it's going to be year after year if we want these things to be legitimate. So it did. And thank you, Martin, for being a part of that. It was good. It was fun, man. And it was a blast. It did get emotional though, didn't it? Woof! It was some heated discussion. It was heated discussion. I just remember this one point in time. I'm not going to say who it was. Someone said, wow, geez, you guys are harsh. And I said, well, it's not that we're being harsh, but if you are looking for the best of the best, you've got to be hypercritical and you've got to pick apart these things. It doesn't mean that they're not great and one's better than the other. It's just let's just talk about all the features of all these different media personalities and vehicles to determine which one's the best. Yeah. And I think the committee did a damn good job in that. I think the media itself, even outside of TPN, two-thirds outside of TPN, they did a phenomenal job picking the winners for the main game categories. And hell, even the public did just a wonderful job with the Pinball Machine Hall of Fame, inducting in that 2020 class of those six different pinball machines. I couldn't have thought of a better winner in each and every one of those categories. So my hat's off to everybody involved. Thank you. I like the transparency of the Pinball Industry Awards. That's something I thought was very important. If you're going to say it's a media ceremony in a way, let everybody know the criteria, who did what. And I like that about it. And I don't know if you've noticed this or not, Zach, but there are some circles on Pinside and in other places that might not be a big fan of you. And I don't know if you – I'm sorry if I'm bringing this up for the first time, but there are some haters. Yeah, this is odd. Really? There are some haters out there. Let me read this one email here. It's from a guy named Jack. It says, you piece of fucking – no, I'm not going to read that. That's terrible.
    17:07
    I've got that one documented already, so we're good there. This one from Jeff. You son of a bitch. I can't read that either. Anyway. You have a whole list. Can you explain why and where this all came from?
    17:20
    Yes, I can. It would have to be a docuseries. It would have to span across five episodes and it would bore the hell out of people. But yes, every single instance of somebody being upset with me, I think I'm cognizant enough to know where it's coming from, the validity behind it. But I think that I'm an easy target once you guys start. Because of your looks? Okay. I mean, the body shaming's got to stop. I mean, you can't help it. That's the face you were given. It's where I'm from. Hell, sorry. No, it's, I'm a dealer, right? Let's cut the bullshit. I'm a dealer. I make money. I make a livelihood in pinball, selling pinball machines. Period. You son of a bitch. Yes. So when you do that, you're going to have a bullseye on you because anything you then say publicly is going to, and I'm presenting it as an informational entertainment piece, But people are not going to believe that. They're going to believe that I'm trying to brainwash or subliminally make people purchase products through me. Toppers.
    18:22
    Well, toppers is a great example. Both of those things make me tick, and I love both of those things. So when people hear me trying to say how great a topper is, they're going to say, this is complete bullshit. You're trying to sell this. You know their shit. But this is you. Markup. Yeah.
    18:45
    The problem is what if I really believe that toppers are cool or that Stranger Things is great because I do. That's the problem that I always face. And I piss people off because they're like, no, there's no objective way you like Stranger Things. There's no objective way that you like toppers that much. Am I supposed to lie to people and say that I don't? So that's where I get mixed up. prior to me being a dealer, I didn't get nearly as much hate. I did get hate because I have strong taste. I have strong opinions. And I don't know the date. If you go back and listen to anything I've done, I've got a pretty strong track record of picking up the pinball market trends, if you will, and identifying what's going to be hot in the next month or a year and what's not. So I do it based on data and I'm swinging pretty good. They're pretty good average boys. So you, a couple of years ago, you decided I'm going to do flipping out pinball. There you go. There's the first part of your five days. Reach around. Oh, that was it? Yeah, that's all you get. Rip off. What I want to know is how easy is it being a dealer? Because it's surely it's just cash, cash, cash. That's it. You just put your name up and the money rolls in. Isn't that right? It depends on what type of dealer you are. See, this is why I get hated on because I'm going to say something. This is a bit strong. There are plenty of dealers out there. I know because I was a hobbyist before I was a dealer. that fucking suck. They're not any good. They will sell you a product, and then they'll ghost you. They're gone. You have something that breaks, better figure out 1-800-knockers because you're not going to get any help. 1-800-knockers, by the way, is a different phone number. Oh, sorry. Do they still have that? I think Stern still has that. So, yeah, if you're just selling games, it's pretty easy. These things kind of sell themselves because we're all addicted to them and we love the hell out of them. It is a damn hard, stressful, overwhelming job, So much so that I quit my day job as a psychologist because of it. What? Yes. Yeah. You heard it. Yeah. I thought you still had clients. I do one day a week now. Oh, wow. That's how much I'm in on this pinball thing. So when you're doing it correctly and you're answering every damn question a person can have and you're really trying to help people, I have people, guys, that will contact me telling me that they have a different dealer but asking me my opinion on this game or why I think this game is better than this game or the downsides of this game. And if you're doing it right, and I try to, I pride myself on customer service, I answer every one of those emails and I try to respond as quickly as I can, even if they're not coming to me. And I'll tell people that all the time. I picture myself, again, this is where it pisses people off because they think I'm lying. I'd like to picture myself as a hobbyist before I am a dealer. So if people don't buy from me, they don't buy from me. But I don't want people screwing them over. I want them being pointed in the right direction so that they do stay in pinball. So, yeah, it's damn tough. It is really, really tough. And believe it or not, some of these manufacturers aren't the best at communicating and aren't the best at just common business practices. So it's frustrating and it's tough and it keeps me up at night and I fucking love it. That being said, recently in 2020, we've seen some pinball companies deal direct and that had to be a bit of a shock. Well, I was surprised about that, too. Yeah. And again, it's how they go about doing it. If they go about doing it in an open, fair way and they don't change the rules midway, that's fine. If they change the rules, it gets a little frustrating. But then they have the leverage. They have the product. And sometimes I try not to tiptoe, but there are some things that I'm like, you know, people are like, oh, you're never going to say anything negative. Here you go, guys. You ready? I think Stern's Batman 66 is a fucking snooze fest. It's boring. It's jazz music. None of the shots are great. I love you, George Gomez. Deadpool's wonderful. So it's not that I don't say something negative, but I am not going to just tear down a creator. I've always been that way. I'm never going to tear down a creator because I know how much work it takes just to do a distribution or a business. I can only imagine how much work it takes coding a machine or doing music on a machine, design, layout. So I don't try to bash anybody, but I do try to tell the truth. And one day, it'll probably bite me in the ass from one of these major manufacturers. So it's tiptoeing. And the manufacturers tell me that all the time. They're like, there's a tight rope you walk. And customers tell me that. Everybody tells me that. But it's a rope that if anybody's going to do a tight rope walk, damn it, I have confidence in myself to do it. So I'd rather be in control of that walk than anybody else. Do you ever have some of these companies reach out to you and say, hey, we wish you hadn't said this about us? Nobody has actually asked me that publicly. People assume they do. I can honestly say that not one manufacturer has ever reached out to me to say, hey, wait a minute. We're putting you in the icebox. No, not once because I think we have a mutual respect and understanding, and that's never happened. Not yet. Knock on wood. Oh, God. I don't want that to happen. Please, Stern, don't. I thought American people might have with that whole Hot Wheels gate no the Hot Wheels gate thing is easy so what happened was I don't know if you guys are sweating more than me fucking hot seat here fellas final round the Hot Wheels thing is really simple they contacted us and said hey we'd love you guys to do a video because you were kind of here from the fucking beginning and we were with Houdini and Oktoberfest we did videos for that we had a lot of fun with it Third thing comes up, Hot Wheels, hey, you guys want to do a video? Sounds great. We'll do a video. Okay. We've got Jack Danger doing the stream as well. Here's the deal. We're going to send you as a dealer. You buy your own machine. It's not like I was given anything. Bought their own machine. It just came before, I think like a day or two before the other dealers. So in 24 hours, you unbox that thing, pull out some green screens, knock out as much as you can to showcase this product to the best of your ability. Greg loves the theme, so he was like, I'm in. so we painstakingly for 24 hours there's a great challenge to do all the video we could all the editing so that that next day when we were approved to release that thing and show it to the world and give everybody the greatest initial experience they could so that they can hashtag bye bye bye we did just that the thing was on fire blowing up then we got a call that said pull the video What? Pull a video? Are you guys not seeing what is going on? People are loving it. No, pull the video. You got too much gameplay. They told us initially no gameplay in it. Then I went back to them. I was like, I can't show off a game without showing the ball moving. That doesn't work. Coogler was like, well, just put a couple minutes in there. Their interpretation of a couple minutes, I suppose, was different than mine. I was just trying to showcase their product and fucking sell. I'm cursing. Sorry, guys. Trying to sell products for them. You're on final round. If you don't swear every five minutes, you get kicked off. It's late. I'm used to recording in the morning here. I love it. So, yeah, so we did what we thought was our free job.
    25:49
    And so, yeah, and if anybody – so I am very protective of things that I feel strongly about. So when they told me to pull it, I wasn't just going to be like, yes, sir, I'll pull it. No, I said I will pull it out of respect of what you're wanting me to do. But you out of your mind What are you doing Why would you pull something that is doing so well helping you Well we had an agreement with other people that you know gameplay was coming later I was like, oh, my God, this is ridiculous. OK, all right, I'll pull it. But I'm not going to be very happy and this will not happen again. And so that's the story real quick and easy. Yeah, it makes it tough. But on the other hand, you've done some great things recently with other companies. I'll give you Jersey Jack as an example, and not just recently Guns N' Roses, but before with the Willy Wonka production that you did. But this Jersey Jack release of Guns N' Roses, I think universally everyone says that's probably one of the best launches we've ever seen. I assume a lot of that has to do with Ken Cromwell, your good buddy, who's now kind of looking after that. But he used all kinds of different media, not just his own, to kind of, again, do the work for him and showcase this and build the hype. And I thought it was absolutely fantastic. We've got a small piece of that, too. We had Keith Johnson on. And, of course, you'd find all the other players here and there. And that video you did was just spectacular. Thank you. Thank you so much. Greg Bone and I, who does Straight Down the Middle with me, we've kind of focused more so recently. Once or twice a year, we'll try to do a high-production piece that we stretch and challenges us so we can grow as amateur filmmakers, if you will. That's weird. But we take it seriously. And whenever the opportunity came up with Jersey Jack to do that piece for Guns N' Roses, they had told us that they hired a production company, a cheese element studio, just a fantastic sizzle reel they did. But we knew that they were going to do that. So we tried to find what other angle could we come at this, kind of like the awards that we're doing. What other angle would not stymie the progress that that is making but will also sit very nicely with this? So we thought about doing a featurette because we knew the sizzle reel that Element was going to do wasn't going to have any heart, any behind the scenes, what it really went through to create something like Guns N' Roses pinball. So we focused on that, and I think we captured a really, really emotional tie that people have when they're playing this game. We were just able to do that for people's initial first impressions. And to date, that's probably the most proud piece that we have. So when people bring it up like yourselves, that means the world to Greg and I, because oftentimes people are like, eat the pizza real fast and unbox the thing. That was funny. Or talk about Greg's mom. That's hilarious. And that's it. Dick and fart jokes are hilarious. We love that. But, yeah, when people recognize the best is when people think that a really highly paid production company did it or the company themselves did it. And they just kind of blow over and they're like, oh, I love what Jersey Jack did there. And we're like, that was us. I honestly thought that you must have had the same production company that did their sizzle reel.
    29:25
    go to the haters and be like, come on, guys. Where's the love now if you're going to throw me some hate whenever you see a Flippin' Out logo?
    29:34
    I'm a nut about this thing. We're talking about pinball on a recreational podcast. It's the silliest, stupidest, funnest, most loving thing ever, and I love being a part of it. Doing media, Marty, don't you agree? I mean, we do it for the love of it. Bullshit. It's all sponsors. I see the cars. Obviously. Hold up. First up, I do want to know this a little bit inside baseball, but who was doing the promo with the tracking on the planes and the automobiles at the airport? Don't tell them. Okay. Don't tell them. Oh, Marty. What do you mean? What are you talking about? That was actually just off my iPhone. No. They're actually our cars and boats and homes. All I did was just, you know. It was my Lambo. Yeah, correct. My Aston Martin. I thought you used at least tracking software. It looked like you were using tracking software there, so that was awesome. And again, with the video that you made for Guns of Roses and any footage we've seen of that game, if you haven't been lucky enough to play it, there are a lot of fun modes. There's a lot of things to see and do in that game. Yeah, absolutely. And for me, when I'm editing, that's become a hobby of itself within pinball. It's strange. Pinball led me to some of my best friends that I think I'll have for the rest of my life. It also led me to other hobbies as well, such as filmography and just editing. And I'm so amateur, and I'm not very good at it. But when I'm able to sit by my computer for days, and the end product gives me goosebumps or gives me a feel like when live and let die knocks, you get that hook, live and let die, boom. And we showed the world what they're going to feel and see during that pinball moment. That's one of the greatest pinball moments in pinball history. And we could show that first. There's nothing, nothing that can top that. That feels so, so good. And sure, now when I go back and watch that featurette, it's cringeworthy because there's so many things. We had three hours to film. Boom, boom, boom. You just had to get what you could. But, oh, man, we would be so dangerous if we had a week with a machine or two weeks. That's my hope. That's my dream. is that one day we will get that recognition or the ability to really put our hands on something as part of a production crew. And we're working our way up there, so we'll earn our spot sooner or later. Well, in Australia, we are all just getting our Guns N' Roses this week. I think a couple of days ago they all arrived. And it's great because I'm just getting all these messages from people saying, I now know what you've been talking about. You actually have to experience that machine. And I keep saying to people, live and let die. I think for me right now, I would say one of the best gaming moments ever. Gaming moments, wow. It just looks and feels, and you just can't stop smiling because of the way it's just feeding you all the sounds on the light show. It's just great. And as I said, now everyone's reaching out saying, we now get it. It is a pretty special machine. Yeah, and it's all choreographed too. Every damn second of that song is choreographed because you can get to, what, third chorus or third verse where I always try to tell people and they get the bang of the liver to let die. I'm like, okay, but try to get to the red and white flashers because that's like the third, I think, the third verse or the third chorus. And then it just keeps going. It's not repetitive. It never gets old starting a song. And when we had Kate Johnson on, he said the thing that took the longest with the coding was the choreography of the light show. And you can see why. Oh, absolutely. Isn't it funny? You think about how many people were bitching and complaining. When are they going to release Guns and Roses? When are they going to release it? Or any game, for that matter, right? When's the next Stern game going to be out? When's next this, that? People complain, complain, complain. And then when it comes out, you forget it all because it doesn't matter. I mean, no one's talking about that now. Oh, it took them forever to get out there. Well, you see why it took so long for Guns and Roses to come out with everything that they put into it. Yeah, but the problem, here's the problem, guys. I don't know if you guys agree with me, but that kind of set a new little benchmark in pinball to me. Do you think that we see from these manufacturers them stepping up like they did when the Waz got that big 26-inch screen? It's going to be hard for them to follow something like that up. Not so much the theme, not so much even in Singularity the light show, just the integration all around. They got Slash doing co-creation and co-design. It's going to be tough. I mean, we've seen it with Led Zeppelin. Now, I got a Led Zeppelin. I love it to death. But everything is going to be compared to it now. That's my only worry. And it has been. Absolutely. People have had – I've seen photos of people side by side. It's a direct comparison and obviously poorly timed, but that's just one of those things. These manufacturers don't probably know each other's schedules or maybe they do. It's unfortunate. Led Zeppelin is still a great game. Have you got yours yet, Jeff? Not yet. It hasn't come in yet. So, yeah. Yeah, I've seen a few of them out in the wild, the LEs, but here in Canada, not yet. But fingers crossed, sometime this month. People are saying it's a great game. The feedback I'm getting from anybody that owns Led Zeppelin says that it is a fantastic game. It just does get that comparison, unfortunately. The cool thing about Led Zeppelin, I was able to unbox mine LE a couple days ago, and I've been playing a lot of it. It's just smooth. It shoots like if you want to feel like a pinball wizard, that's the game you play because it's nonstop. No, it's Elvira if you want to feel like a pinball wizard. I'm telling you, Jeff, this almost feels a little bit more. I know what you're talking about with Elvira. This feels even more so because it makes you feel like you are Keith Elwin making those shots or Jeff Tiel, Lister Martin, Ramos, whoever, besides Josh Sharp. But it makes you feel like you're just stinging them damn things on point. Even the third flipper to that ramp. It feels like you can't miss. So one of the things that Stern has that I just, no offense to Jersey Jack, I don't think they're ever going to get it is the feel of pinball. Stern pinball has the feel that pinball should have. And I can't put my finger on if it's the materials. I don't know what the hell it is. But there's nothing like shooting a Stern. There's nothing like it. I find Stern games very samey as far as how they shoot. And that's probably a great thing, right? because Bally Williams games, Marty, you and I played a lot of these in the 90s when we were just young, young children, and we liked the way they felt. And I remember the first time I played a Stern game, I'm like, this doesn't feel the same. And I'm not saying it's bad by any means, but it was different. And all Stern games kind of feel that way. A lot of Bally Williams games feel a certain way as well too. Zach, I don't know how much history you have with older games. I know you're certainly, if it doesn't have an LCD, get that out of my collection. If it doesn't have a topper, go fuck yourself. I didn't recently say that all EMs were the same game. You did too. That wasn't me.
    36:33
    Really? So what do you think about flippers, Marty? I like the talk, the flipper feel, like why a flipper feels good on one thing and not the other, or why people always think Bally Williams shoots so superior to everything else, or even Jersey Jack for that matter. Yeah, look, for me, I can bang on about the feel of a machine and how that feeds you. It gives you feedback. So flipper feel is really, really important. I'll give you a bit of a side note here. ACDC is a fantastic game. You know when they did the very last, they did a vault of it? Sure. For some reason, the flippers feel off. They feel sort of quite light and very sort of plasticky. And so what that means is you're not getting that feedback to your fingers when the ball is hitting the flipper. And I've played other ACDCs and I love it. And then the remake, I'm like, oh, I'm missing something here. Again, Attack from Mars remakes. We've talked about all the remakes from CGC. The flipper feel just feels slightly off. And for me, that kind of just stops the enjoyment factor a little bit. I do love Stern flipper feels. I think they absolutely, for all the recent machines, they nail it. Jersey Jack has a completely different feel. I think that's very sort of old school. More recent machines, you've really got to turn the power up. I think they come shipped a little bit spongy, which doesn't feel... A little limp. Yeah, a little bit limp. They make the shots, but you never feel like you've absolutely slammed the shot. So, yeah. I think with... I don't know why, because I remember getting into the hobby. Hey, Dayfix, I'm about five years, bud. Give me my chip. I think five years ago when I entered into the hobby, it wasn't as enthusiasty. It's not a word, but you know what I mean. It wasn't as enthusiasty. So people would love the Bally Williams, the Jersey Jack. Oh, I love it. It feels like a Bally Williams and all this stuff. Oh, Stearns feel cheap. They feel hollow. There's cheap parts. You're just hitting plastic. Man, I think there's an evolution that Stearns has been taking. Take Data East. Data East, what were they ridiculed for? It's Snow Valley Williams because they're too snappy. These things feel like you're breaking everything. Sega, even worse. You've got a stand-up target and a Sega. Every time you hit it, you think it's going to break. And then you transition into this Lord of the Rings, early White Star stuff where I think you do break things whenever those flippers are engaged, right? But then over time, they've softened up a little bit to perfection, in my opinion. So when you're shooting Deadpool, when you're shooting Star Wars, when you're shooting all of that, I don't think anything is close to the feel of a Stern right now. And five years ago, I think people would have called me crazy, but now I can't control a Jersey Jack or a spooky pinball, but I can drop catch like a mofo on a Stern. I can just barely give it a little tap to tap it over to the other flipper, and I think that's why you see a lot of tournament play and competition play utilize those Stern games too. It's because people get the feel down and you get so many titles where you just don't have that feel. Try playing between a Jersey Jack and a Stern back and forth. It's going to mess you up. It's really going to mess you up. I love hearing Zach talk about drop catching and what tournament players do because, I mean, when people think of Zach, they definitely think tournament player for sure. Does Zach drop catch me? Look, I'll put my drop catches up to most anybody. Well, you can because you haven't gone against anyone, so you can say all you want. People can see it.
    40:14
    Evidence is out there, T.O. List. The streams. That's like saying. Come on, T.T. I can drop catch. You know those YouTube videos where guys do a putt and it goes downstairs and it goes through a cup and it goes up a ramp and all that kind of stuff. They're like, I made the shot. I went through 16 different rooms. 17,000 different takes. And I could say the same about some of your videos, too. No. I've got those ill flipper skills. Why are you in tournaments? You would have so much more respect, especially when it comes to EMs, solid state games, games that don't have big LCDs or toppers, if you were to put your money where your mouth is and go up against. No, you want to know honestly why I don't play in tournaments? It's because I'm not good enough to win them. You don't have to win them all. I mean, I've been very – oh, I can't fucking say anything. You cannot say anything. Yeah. Yes. I'm going to pay for that one. What happened to you, Tate? Did you go to Australia or something? What happened there? I had a lovely time. It was there a year ago. See a koala? Good times. Okay. Zach, Zach, I'm going to give you a bit of a mixed message here. Go with me on this. I think if you... He's going to slap you in the face and give you a hug. Yeah, pretty much. I think if you are only going into a tournament to win, then you're missing the point. Sure. On saying that, I stopped playing tournaments because I got sick of not winning. Okay. That is a mixed message. That's a mixed message. But that's what I'm saying is I think there's actually a lot of fun in just coming together and talking to people and sharing the love of pinball. If you happen to get a win, that's great. But if you do better than you did last time, that should be a win enough. Hey, Zach, here's a little tip for you. It's also good networking. Yes. I get that. And I know I would get a little bit more respect. I'd have more people that I could interact with and relate to. But I struggle because I just know myself. And if I'm not competing to the best, then I don't know rules knowledge. Like, I just don't have it. And quite frankly, I don't give a shit about playing some of these games. But with your drop catch ability, do you need to worry about rules? Yes. I mean, come on. Yes. My shot accuracy is horrible. Is that of a four-year-old? My shot accuracy is horrid. Sure, I can keep the ball alive, but I can't hit anything I need to hit. But going in tournaments will make you play better, which will make you see more of the game that you've got at home. Yeah, but then you're going to want to, I'll get addicted to that, and then I want to be the best at that. I've sort of stopped trying to convince people to get into tournaments because it does change your perspective on pinball. And Ryan Seas is a prime example of it. It used to always be about wizard modes and certain things that happened. Now it's just a high score. It's very different. I hate that feel.
    43:01
    I don't want that feel. And I know that that's a cop-out, but if I'm playing Lord of the Rings and my job isn't to destroy the ring and it's something else, then I've failed as a pinball player. I just don't enjoy things like that. It's why Avengers hasn't really connected with me. Because once you're talking to me about putting gems on this one and then you stack it with this, I get lost and I don't give a shit. Give me Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles where I get to cowabunga mode and feel like I've ruled the universe. That's what I want. So Stranger Things was the best Stern machine last year for many reasons, and that is one of the main reasons why it was the best. I totally agree with you because I remember, and Jeff knows because we talked about this, I was streaming Guardians of the Galaxy, and everyone was saying, no, you've got to do this mode, then you've got to do that mode. And I'm like, no, I want to do the yellow mode because yellow is pretty. That's right. Can't I just do the yellow mode because that's what makes me feel good? and people were screaming in chat saying, you're doing it all wrong. No, I'm doing it my way, therefore it's right. I remember watching tournaments, because I still watch the hell out of tournaments and competition play. I love the sport of it. I would just rather be the commentator than I would the player. And I remember early on watching somebody drain out, or what were they doing? They were just burning the timer through something that I'm like, oh my, what is he doing? Get to that. Timing out of mode? like feels so good if you get to the mini wizard mode they're like no there's no points there and i'm like okay i'm missing something here that's what i want what you're missing is it why risk shots if the mode's not worth anything and you can time it out and you don't want to drain your ball on something it's all about the risk reward that's the one thing that casual players yeah i don't think realize that excitement that i think they're missing that in pinball when they when they have those risk-reward moments. I mean, Metallica, whether you're a tournament player or not, if you own that game, you know you don't like it. You know what the risk-reward is. How much can I build up, crank it up? How many times can I hit that snake before I fall asleep? That's what it does to me. It does nothing. I like Sparky Shaken. That's fucking cool. But now, oh, should I cash out? Who gives a shit? I want to see the light show. I want to see the screen stop. I want to see all the coils fire. I want to get to something that I only get to every 500 times I play this game. I don't care about the score. Give me the wizard mode. Well, with coronavirus, with this pandemic, I've done some of the things you're talking about because I've said it before, but I'll elaborate a little bit. A game like Simpsons Pinball Party, if you're playing that in a tournament, you hit the garage, you go up top, you do it over again. That's all you do. Those are the only shots you ever do. I don't do that at all, ever, ever, ever at home because I want to do all the different shots. I'm Zach Many. I want to see all the different modes. I want to see, I don't care what the proper order is. I want to see if I can get to that wizard mode, which is not a good strategy in a tournament. But it shows you the depth of a great game like that. Yeah, and I have all of the respect in the world for the upper echelon players. And I get shit on sometimes because that's just not my style of play. But then again, I'm not, and there's guys out there that do that. And I always think it's disgusting when they're making fun of people that want to chase points or want to win competitively. I have no issue with that. As long as I don't have to do that, I'll love watching them play competitively. So it's just not my bag, baby. Okay. We haven't won you over. Fair enough. Cool. Yeah, but Metallica, no. No, thanks. Oh, Metallica is the best Stern game that's ever been made. If you've got to read 20 pages of rules to understand, like Game of Thrones, no thanks. Oh, God. Game of Thrones. No. Not there. Oh, my God. Game of Thrones is an epic game. Ghostbusters is greatness. It's not because of the multipliers. Star Wars, one of my favorite games ever. I don't even touch the multipliers. I play the show for a while. Listen, Zach, you've still got a few more minutes. You keep talking about shitty games. We're going to throw you off here, but we want to give you the time here on this program. Sorry, you got me fired up. I'm talking about the feel of pinball. I love it. Listen, what I do want to mention is we're coming up to the one-year anniversary of not only, and I don't know if this is a coincidence or not, but of TPN, of the Pinball Network, and also the one-year anniversary of coronavirus. So I don't know if they're related. I don't know if this is the pandemic of pinball networks. That's all we need, Jeff. Shit.
    47:20
    Which one came first? Are you the reason we have the pandemic? I don't know. There's a new pin side thread now. Thank you. You're welcome. But congratulations after, I mean, I don't know what you envisioned, you and others envisioned of the pinball network, but the number of podcasts, the number of streamers, the award show, just a lot has been done in a year. And people we have never seen or heard before that are really big in the pinball community now, which I really get a kick of. I look at my Twitch stream and all the different people that I follow, and I enjoy every single one of them. There's a lot of content out there. And again, because of the pandemic, people are stuck at home, so they're streaming. But boy, we're getting to see some good personalities, and hear some good ones too. It's corny but heartwarming that somebody that I look up to, you guys, would say something like that. Thank you. Thank you so much. We had a tough go of it, as you guys know, at the beginning. And that's okay because new things create interest. And some people like these new things. Some people don't. But one thing is held true the entire time. It's just another way to celebrate and to come together as pinball people with the most diverse group that's representative for everybody in pinball. I've had a blast doing it, and it has not been easy at all. But final round is a reason why there's TPN. TPN wouldn't be here without final round. TPN's here because of Dennis Creasel. It's here because of Ken Cromwell, Greg Bone, Jason Fowler. It's here because of everybody that actually took the risk in saying, you know what, this seems like fun, let's do it. And the idea still holds true. It's open to nearly anyone who is positive that wants to be a part of just exposing pinball for the greatness that we all know it is. It's nothing competitive. We get people that tell us all the time, oh, this is just an in-group or a click. Man, if they could just be a part of it and realize how much fun we have, just the banter and the Discord stuff and the positivity, they couldn't be so far from the truth. So, yeah, celebrating a year is fantastic. It's overwhelming. And I needed a month break to figure out how we're going to blow it up in 2021. won. So thank you guys for the support and for believing that we were doing this for the right reason and sticking around this whole time. That's all I need to showcase who you two gentlemen are as people. So thank you. So if someone wants to join TPA and let's say they say, I've not done a podcast, I want to do a podcast, or I want to do a stream, what sort of support do they get from the Pinball Network to get those up and running? I'd like to think that they get the support that they would from a best friend if they asked that was into pinball. They would email the pinballnetwork at gmail.com, and we will help you with whatever you need. If you want to try to do a podcast, there's hosting fees and getting things up. We're going to try to help you with that. So we'll throw it off the record pinball podcast. You can do a one-off just to see how you like it and some of the feedback that you get from it. You don't have to pay anything. You don't have to do nothing. If you need help editing, we'll help edit. If you need help with any of the technical stuff, we've got Joshua Jacobs that's really good with all of that. He'll help with all of the mic setup, the programming, logo stuff. We can do all that. Streaming, we have 20-plus TPN affiliates, which is so cool to say. And you guys know them personally now. They're like best friends, all of them. So it's a lot of fun. It's nothing but trying to grow pinball and have fun doing it. So we're here to help any way we can. The streamers are very unique people, very diverse. It's all different types of days and times. So I keep weird hours. Marty's on the other side of the world. It's nice to be able to click Twitch and see that there's usually something there and, of course, the top ten videos that you have. Those are fun, yeah. Yeah, they are fun. The podcasts, you were talking about you can do a one-off podcast. Correct me if I'm wrong. Wasn't Just Another Pinball Podcast originally a one-off? Wasn't Jesse Jay's a one-off as well? But, yeah, like just another pinball podcast, it was Joel Engelberth. He's just a fantastic young ambassador that's having so much fun, and he's still giddy. So it's fun watching and listening to him. But, yeah, he just wanted to pick up a microphone and give his opinion on pinball, and he hasn't been in the hobby but a year or two. And now he's prolific at a lot of things, such as podcasting and streaming. And a lot of that's just inherently in him, but we tried just to help foster that progress that he was wanting to make. So he's having a blast, but yeah, off the record, you've started once and we got, um, Ryan Cravens was doing a podcast. I think he's, he's still doing it, but he's got some job stuff now, but same thing came in, did a couple of those off the records and was like, guys, I really think I'd like to do this. And you know, the committee was like yeah let put it to a vote Sounds good Let do it Yeah When we get uh we get get people and if any of you guys have questions or wonder you know is this this reach out to us You don't have to talk to me. Talk to Dennis Creasel. He's a lot more pleasant to talk to or anybody else. George Fisher, all of these individuals, David Dennis, Jesse Jay, she's been just a terrific, terrific, phenomenal help. The individuals, the Rogers over at What the Flip, Lindsey and Kevin, just a big, big old happy family. And you've now got a new website as well. Hot damn, the pinball.network. That's George Fisher's baby. I couldn't do any of that. Everybody, I hate when people are like, oh, this is Zach's idea. This is, no, no, no, no, no.
    52:55
    I'm not good at hardly anything. So George Fisher put that together, and he continues to build upon it. We even have Tommy over at Jedi McMuffin. He's creating, like, articles to help people when they're trying to start streaming or podcasting. He's putting together some videos. It's all going to be on that website, and people are going to have a nice reference point right there that they're interested in any of that stuff they can do. So we're trying to expand and grow pinball, and people will say, why are you doing that? You know why we're doing that? Because we love pinball, and we want more people that aren't even aware of it to experience the joy and the love that we have with this industry. So why not try to just get people more acknowledged about it? So I don't know what's so bad about the damn thing. It's funny that the three of us on this conversation are all part of the Pinball Network, but we all have our own individual side projects, in fact, all before the Pinball Network. Marty with Head to Head and, of course, Melbourne Silver Bowl, which is still going on stream. I've been doing Pinball Profile now for five years. That's right, Fix, five years, baby. And you've been doing Straight Down the Middle with Greg and, of course, Flippin' Out. But I bring that up because we do have side projects. So one of your little side projects was very interesting. In fact, Marty and I talked about it on a recent episode, and we're actually going to be turning it into our latest final round poll, and we want to talk about the most overrated games. Now, when you did yours, I was waiting and waiting. Can he possibly mention a game he sells? And you did, and you've already mentioned it in Batman 66, which I think, by the way, is a freaking fantastic game. I'd love to own one of those. Nope. Okay. I worry about the mech, but that's about it. I love the game. A lot of assets in there. You can't go wrong with the Lyman code, but that's just me. Anyway, Marty and I are going to do a list as well. We're going to do something a little bit different because we do not want to hurt any of the manufacturers or distributors like yourself that are currently selling new games being manufactured. We will not allow any of these games to be mentioned in our overrated list, but we're also going to get our listeners to give us feedback. They can email us. They can put it on our Facebook page. They can send us a note on Instagram, what they think of the overrated games. We're going to do a big bracket. We're going to have a lot of fun, and we'll let the listeners pick. I have to say, your list, there were a few on there that I went, whoa, really? Most of them I thought were pretty good. Really? I liked listening to Marty, you, and Jeff here. You all's banter about it a couple episodes ago, that was more entertaining than the damn episode was straight down the middle itself. So I love when you guys do these brackets and all of that. So I'm stoked for the most overrated that you're doing. And you sort of mentioned before that you're taking a break for a month. I'm kicking myself because, well, actually, maybe I'm not. That would have been a great reach around to have you be off the air for the month. And I think we probably could have sold that for a lot of money. I told Dennis he could run the ship, man, and he was like, nothing would give me more pleasure than not to have to speak with you two times next month. He said it just like that. So I'm still on the fence as to whether he's just always in character and funny or if he just genuinely dislikes me. And I think that's what makes the dynamic of the pinball show work so well. I don't know. I talked to you know how often I talk to Dennis every other Sunday from 30 in the morning to noon. That's when I talked to him. No, I'm being a bit facetious. But no, I do question whether that man likes me or secretly wants to hug me at all times. He's not a fan of the singing. I think that's quite obvious. That's the truth. He almost quit because of it once. And I was like, oh, shit. I thought it was a running gag that you understood and appreciated. Nope. He really hates it. I tell you what. Nothing would give me more joy if he does a podcast without you and sings on it. nothing would give me more joy. Oh my God. Nothing would give me more an arousal. No, I think he's taking the week. I think he's taking a month off as well. And he's just going to focus on EGP every other week. Cause that, that guy's been busting his ass, not only in pinball, but he's double dosing and all that. That's the one thing that started to take up the time here, but I really want to highlight how much that man has done for not only his area, But the expertise that he has in public health and with this coronavirus and pandemic, he has done so incredibly much work with that and helped thousands upon thousands of people in his area. And I think oftentimes we forget because we hear nurse, we hear doctor, and we give them a lot of credit. But damn, man, public health and him being an executive director over there and dealing with all the laws and stuff, I couldn't sing the praises of Dennis Creasel more with the seriousness and respect for. for his community. So thank you, Dennis. Yeah, thank you. And I can't imagine the stress level it has been for him during the past 12 months for sure. But he still keeps trotting on, yeah, with the pinball show, with Eclectic. So thanks, Dennis, for all you do. And also the science and technology reach-arounds. He was a wonderful host for that non-televised show. Oh my God, I love that man so much, you guys. It's unbelievable. I love him as much as he hates me. That's how much I love him. God, I love him.
    59:00
    Well, we appreciate you coming on the show. We appreciate you when you sing on your show. And I know it's only every other week that you get to do that. Well, you guys got to give me some songs then. Damn, I can't sing without songs. That's the rule now. We played a Greatest Hits of Zach Menny, and you thought we were making fun of you when we had that as a sponsor of the week. We loved that. We love your singing. Yeah. Oh, thank you. See? You've got to throw me some bones every now and then because if not, I've got nothing. And you sang when you accepted your reach around, which, again, another thing that just filled me with so much joy.
    59:37
    I love it. I love it so much. Thank you guys so much for even having the courtesy and inviting me on. I don't get invited on things a lot, so I appreciate you guys being friends. Thanks. It's a lot of fun. Congratulations on one-year anniversary for the Pinball Network. Where can people reach you at Flippin' Out? Oh, thank you so much. I'll do a quick plug. If you're ready to buy a brand new, fancy, beautiful pinball machine. And we're out of time. Sorry about that. Fuck.
    60:04
    FlippinOutPinball.com. Save it for the five days. All right. We'll let him do his plug. Go ahead. ZachZACH at FlippinOutPinball.com. You want a nice exclusive here? We're going to have a brand new episode coming up that is going to unbox one of the coolest damn toys that you can have in your game room. And guess what, guys? It's not a pinball machine. That's right. You've heard it. Flippin' Out Pinball is now an authorized dealer of Raw Thrills equipment, toys, games. Hell yeah. You want Jurassic Park sit-down? Hell yeah, I do. Yeah, you got it. Halo, you want that? You want Big Buck Hunter Reloaded? Going to Vegas and competing every year? We've got it for you. I'm really excited about that partnership we've got with Raw Thrills. So we are going to be bringing everything media over straight down the middle to both pinball and arcade. So that's coming soon in 2021. That's interesting because some of the distributors that I've talked to talk about how, you know, pinball is certainly very passionate, but it's heavy lifting compared to some of these other things. And they do better with non pinball things that they sell, whether it's parts, whether it's accessories, whether it's things like raw thrills. So glad to see you branching out. Thank you so much. Yeah, we're really excited about it because the only places generally you see these cool-ass machines is at FECs, is at barcades. But guess what? We're in a pandemic, so a lot of those places are gone. Our focus, Nicole and I, my wonderful, beautiful, intelligent wife and business partner, we are focusing on getting raw thrills into your home, the ultimate, ultimate trophy toy. Marty, do you have any buddies that have any kind of raw thrill games? I have a friend who has a big buck hunter at his place, and he also has, I don't know, 30 pinball machines. I played big buck hunter. Not that I'm a hunter. Not that I've ever even fired a real gun. I played that thing for two hours straight until I could barely lift my arms. It was so fun. Yeah, I love them too. I love rhythm action games. I love shooting games. I love those sit down where you get inside the machine. They're awesome. Oh, hell yeah. Yeah, cruising blast and all that. Yeah, if you're going to have 10 pinball machines, 20, 50 pinball machines, you've got to have a raw thrills. That's what I'm going with. It's like a working slogan kind of thing. I think it's okay. Cool. And what's the number people can reach you at at Flippin' Out? Thanks so much. It's 812-457-9711. Shoot me a message. Shoot me a text. Call me. I'll talk some pinball and arcade with you. Marty, does this count as one of his five days? Yes, it does. It fucking counts as two. Let's be honest, you fellow shit.
    62:37
    God, I feel like I'm plugging myself more than a bad porn. This is bad. I love it, though. Keep me on for another fucking hour. Oh, we're going to miss you for a month.
    62:49
    Said Pinside. Oh, man. Thank you very much, Zach. All the best. See you in March. I love you guys. Thanks again. So that was Zach Manny, the TPN overlord. What did we learn? Didn't he once say your show was trending down? And I thought I heard that once.
    63:09
    It is actually true. Yep. What show was that? That was This Week in Pinball podcast. And it was a trending up and trending down. And yeah, you know, he did say that. But I've forgiven him. Yeah. I haven't.
    63:26
    Well, I mean, I think Head to Head stood the test of time with you, with Ryan, with Joe, with your cavalcade of great guests, the occasional asshole inserts, all those things.
    63:38
    Still, you know my favorite show ever. Thank you. You know. You do two podcasts now. It's a lot of work to put him in, and sometimes the magic happens, sometimes it doesn't, and sometimes you find your mojo, it goes up and down. But what I was going to say, the good thing about Zach, and obviously we're joking about the fact that he did basically trash my podcast, he speaks his mind, and that makes him a target which he talked about, and he's just not going to back away from it. He's just going to still say what he thinks, and people like it or not. And I kind of like that. I really liked his honesty in this episode, and I look forward to more episodes of the Pinball Show, and of course, Straight Down the Middle, and again, great job on the Pinball Industry Awards and the entire committee for putting that together. I think it's a great first year and looking forward to future years as well. That brings us to our sponsor of the week. It is the one-year anniversary of the Pinball Network. Marty, what do you think? I think it's been a fantastic year, but I'm wondering what can you do to take it to the next level in 2021? The Pinball Network 2.0. Now, for legal reasons, every show will have to be called Flippin' Out Presents the Final Round Pinball Podcast or Jesse J's. We understand that. We get that. We do, and we are contractually obligated to talk about Flippin' Out every episode. Bye, bye, bye. I can let people in on a little secret here about bye, bye, bye, and I'm not talking B-U-Y. I'm talking B-Y-E, bye-bye, so long. Dennis Creasel will have to sing once a month on the pinball show. So that's something to look forward to here in 2021. Absolutely. Now, mind you, they might be sad songs after his Kansas City Chiefs shit the bed at the Super Bowl, but that's okay. That's probably why he took February off. Can I just say, what a great Super Bowl this year. Didn't watch a single second of the game But the weekend did a phenomenal performance And the ads this year were fantastic And that's really all I'm tuning into the Super Bowl for What did you say? Kansas, was it Kansas City Chiefs? Is that what you said? Yes Yeah, first time I've ever heard that team The other team was something like the Buccaneers I know of Buccaneer the pinball machine That's all I know And Tom Brady I kept thinking that Tom Bradley, the airport in LA, was named after Tom Brady, but it turns out I think there might be different people. The Sponsor of the Week has totally taken a whole shift here, but that's okay. We're trying to edumacate Marty here on the beauty that is the NFL. But this is the standard of content that you are going to expect on the Pinball Network 2.0. What could happen with Jesse Jay's pinball adventure? You know, I think the Bombs are going to run out. but they're probably going to switch it to something that, you know, maybe hooking Ryan up or something like that. Oh, that'd be good. Forget Bombs. Do Chomp. Maybe. Co-hosts, underlying masculine preferences. I don't know.
    66:31
    You know what? My prediction, TPN 2.0, Jesse Jay is going to get married, and it's going to be Homp, husband of motherfucking Pinball. Nice. That's my prediction 2.0. Now, the one thing that's going to be a little controversial on TPN 2.0 is, sadly Puppet Pals. And Puppet Pals, unfortunately, is going to have a little bit of competition with the new podcast Marionette Buddies.
    67:01
    No strings attached to this pinball podcast. Look out, Steve, Moppy, and Rory. Marionette Buddies. Oh my god.
    67:11
    You want to see that happen now, don't you? Marionette Buddies. I totally want Marionette Buddies. I got no strings to hold me back.
    67:24
    I totally want somebody to do marionette buddies. That's it for our sponsor of the week, TPN 2.1. I know we mailed it in, but we just gave you a whole fucking show of sponsors. Here's the point about bringing up the puppet pals. Marty, like last time we were on the show, it was my birthday during the re-challenge. Well, guess what? It's Marty's birthday. So we've got a special treat. And what did you unwrap, Marty? I arguably, so friends and family that are listening to this podcast, of which there are none, that have probably put a lot of thought into a present for me. It's actually probably not true. My friends, more than my family, notoriously have given me the shittest presents. In fact, every year after my birthday, my friends would ring me and say, what did your family get you? Because they were always terrible. But I'm just going to say, this year, I got the best present I have ever gotten in my life. Do tell. It is a special birthday message from my favorite pinball personalities. Would you like to listen to it? Can we play the message? Yeah, I'd love to. Well, here it is. Okay, so how old is he? Mr. Jeff told us he was 51 today. Fact, that's hard. Moppy, that's not old. And anywho, Mr. Marty looks great. I don't know. I bet his dick's about to fall off. No, his... Moppy. I bet Mr. Marty's as virile as a young Joey, hip-hopping all over the outback. That's right, Rory. Age is just a number, after all. So let's not say 51. Let's say 50 fun. And gosh, Mr. Marty, we sure hope your 50 fun is filled with all sorts of magical wonderment. From the States, a grand salute. Do some donuts in your ute. Our pal is 50 fun.
    69:21
    Guzzle gin, pet your cat. Moppy made you a birthday hat. Our pal is 50 fun. A day that's gotta be more than the old humdrum where you sit jerking your chain. Gotta be more than a pinball show where the hosts share half a brain. Clap your hands, what the heck, please go get your colon checked. Our palace, be, be fun.
    69:53
    A day that's gotta be more than the old humdrum where you cry yourself to sleep. Gotta be more, take the world by storm, where the riches are yours to reap. Send some love, continental, gosh we get so sentimental. Our palace fifty-five, oh Marty Puth. Our palace fifty, our palace fifty, our palace fifty-five. I hope you get some yummy cake. Well, that kicks the shit out of any gift idea I was going to do. Holy cow, that is very, very talented. I'm sorry, the gift of your friendship. I'm sorry. Five years in a row. No, it means nothing now. That is the new standard. If you want to be my friend, you've got to sing me a song. Actually, what I was going to do was set up an Amazon wish list for Marty. I might have thrown a few of my things on there, too. But I was looking on Amazon thinking, what could we should create? I mean, look, we had a bunch of suckers. I mean, we had a bunch of wonderful people buy reach-arounds. And I thought, well, why not do an Amazon wish list, too? And, of course, you know, keep us motivated to continue this wonderful podcast. Marty, have you ever gone deep on Amazon and thought, You know, I would never buy that for myself, but damn it all, I wouldn't say no if it showed up on my doorstep. No, not really. I've got to say, Amazon for me is, if I want something, I'll search and it's there. Wish. Wish is the one that really just blows my mind. I don't know that. Hold on, let me tape it up. What's Wish? I'm pretty sure it's wish.com. But they do a lot of Facebook ads where they try to look at your profile. They try to look at what you're looking at and your personality, and then they try to match gifts that you might want to purchase. And I'm talking about things like gimp masks and stuff like that, which I've seen on your Facebook page. So wait a second. No, no, no. Not on mine. Hold on. I did once go out as the gimp for Halloween. Oh, see? There you go. My buddy went out as Zed the cop, and I was the gimp. So I basically had to wear the leather mask the whole time. He walked me around on a chain. He had the eyeliner and the sheriff's badge. It was just kind of us being real assholes. It was funny.
    72:27
    Well, if you ever want Halloween ideas or costume party ideas, and I'm talking sexual, then Wish is where you will get everything you never thought existed but want. Okay, let's tone down the creep factor for a second here. I already posted the picture of you getting your nipples sucked up.
    72:48
    But the Amazon wish list, I've heard people talk about this. So I just thought, I wonder what Marty would like. And I looked. Marty, have you seen the number of Harry Potter wands that are available on Amazon? I don't know if they're legit. I don't know if they're knockoffs. I don't even know what a real wand would be. But, I mean, your collection could be huge, Marty.
    73:10
    This may not surprise you. I do have a wand from Harry Potter. I know that. You do know that. It's the Bellatrix Lestrange wand. It is just my pride and joy. But you're saying that there are other wands. All right, Marty, tell me if any of these tickle your fancy here. I don't even know what this is. Jack's Pacific Feature Wizard Wands? I don't even know what the hell that is. Do you? No. I see a bunch of different wands on here. And, Marty, not to knock the wand that you have purchased, every one of these ones have things that say three years and up okay not 51 and up 50 fun we know is the new way 50 fun uh yeah okay um i'm not sure what you're trying to say by bringing that up now i have boys in their teens and we do a lot of lego now they're getting a little old for lego but really it was just a chance for me to do legos with the boys so i kind of get that what's your wand excuse i do need to i do need to find out what the wand thing uh it was because i went to harry potter world that is not going to surprise anyone when i went to florida no it was uh universe studios in la okay and i love harry potter everybody knows it So I just wanted one bit of memorabilia to take back with me. And you go into this particular shop that's got wands for all the different characters. And because Bellatrix Lestrange is my favourite, I had to have her wand. It was ridiculously priced, but it was worth it. I had to wait in line, I think maybe 45, 50 minutes just to buy it. That's how many people were in that shop buying wands. So I'm not alone. being a good aside. Okay, I get, I'm not knocking you and millions of people that are Harry Potter fans. I'm wondering what you do with the wand. I don't get it in the sense of, I've been to your place, I didn't see it on display. Like, why not wear, like, a Gryffindor scarf or something that's a little more Harry Potter noticeable? I don't know. How dare you think that I have a Gryffindor scarf? Yep.
    75:25
    I didn't even know that, I just guessed. I did. And I, it was funny because, okay. Sorry. This is the whole... You know, we've talked about Trekkie versus Trekker. The fact that I say I'm a Trekker because I don't dress up. I did, however, go to the premiere of the seventh movie. And I did wear my Gryffindor scarf. And I was thinking, oh, my God, I'm such a nerd. It was actually going to IMAX with my Harry Potter scarf. You know what? should not have been concerned because I was the most underdressed Harry Potter fan there that night. So it was kind of okay. It's a nice looking scarf. It's kind of a maroon and yellow color, is it? Yeah, that's the one. See, I know my stuff. Yeah, you do. Yep. But the big question is, what house would you be in? I don't even... I know there's Slytherin and Gryffindor. I don't know. Hufflepuff or something like that? I don't even know their houses. Well, look at you. I've seen the movies, but it's been a while. Ravenclaw is the last one.
    76:32
    Nobody's a Ravenclaw person. Come on. That's right. They're pretty nothing. So there you go. I think we've said enough about Harry Potter. Okay, but the point I'm trying to get to is wish lists. And I was just thinking, you know, it's that kind of lull in pinball. We're waiting for the next machine to come out. And there's been a lot of talk about maybe someday a Harry Potter machine. But forget what the theme is. I want you to put together your dream pinball machine as far as the manufacturing of it. Who would you want making that machine? You'd know that Stern would mass produce it. Yes. You'd know JJP would throw everything but the kitchen sink in it. Yes. You'd know HomePin would make it with lead paint.
    77:15
    I have said this before, that I would like Jersey Jack to manufacture it, and let me tell you why. I think Stern would actually do a great job but I think Stern, if Stern would do it Stern would be like, you know, pick a house and then you've got to battle some of the beasts and eventually you've got to battle Voldemort and that's fine. I think if I had Jersey Jack with, let's say a Kiefer doing the code I would go through every single book every single event in every single book and I would feel like I'm in it It's kind of like, let's say Jurassic Park, where the Jurassic Park pinball machine, you are in the park and you're battling dinosaurs and you're getting to the visitor center and that's fine, but you're not sort of really taking a journey through the movie. Okay. Again, you're focusing on Harry Potter. I'm just talking about if you could make the perfect pinball machine. In this case, it happens to be the theme of Harry Potter. Forget that aside. I'm talking about the perfect pinball machine. You want Jersey Jack to make it because they going to throw all the assets in there You gave an example of Kiefer because of how deep something like Pirates is and all the different combinations and there a lot of different options there So Kiefer your coder Again doesn have to be a Jersey Jack designer It could be any designer. Who's designing the game?
    78:37
    John Borg. Borg, okay. Yeah, I think John Borg for me because I find he has got an interesting mix of stop, start and flow. I just wouldn't want it to be flow all day, stop start all day. Give me a choice to be able to do both whenever I want. Okay. So you've got your coder. You've got your company making the game. You've got your game designer. What about artwork? There's a lot of great artists. And you can go back and somebody in the past too, because there's some legends that are no longer doing art. But I just think of all-time greats. So I'm going to go a little bit left of centre here because I think that there is a pinball artist that really showed kind of what he could do but really didn't get the opportunity to go even further with a big selling game. And this is the guy that did the artwork for Capcom's machine. So Big Bang Bar, Break Shot, Kingpin. And that's Stan Fukuoka. I am not sure that I pronounced his name correctly, but I don't know. I just think that we saw the genesis of somebody that would evolve and just create really unique art. That's what I think. I saw him years ago at Freeplay Florida, and I think they were selling Kingpin Translates back when there was talk about making some Kingpin games. If I recall, it was like 75 bucks, you got a Translight signed by Stan, and you were in the queue if they ever made that game. Again, someone's going to correct me, but I think that was the genesis of that. And he had some other artwork there, and it was pretty impressive. So, yeah, I mean, I guess if we are thinking of Harry Potter, I think if that license ever does get made, I think the only possible way it gets made is by the books, not the movies. And again, so you're going to need more kind of cartoon work as opposed to something realistic. I would go the movies, but I would not put Photoshopped assets over the play field. But I think we just got so many visuals because you're going to go, you'd have to use video assets, right, from the movies. So you can't then just do cartoon art that's disjointed with that. But the pinball machine, I think, that does that quite well is probably The Hobbit, where the art looks hand-drawn but still has a photographic authenticity to it, if that makes any kind of sense. Well, art's really twofold, right? It's definitely the play field, the cabinet, and the back glass and all that kind of stuff. But when you look at the art of something like that LCD screen, that animation is something totally different. So, yeah, I was thinking the play field would be more cartoon art. But when you talk about the live action stuff on the LCD, yeah, I guess that would be a lot to do. But, you know, in what I've seen just early on, and hopefully this comes out soon, someday, is the Deep Root animators. Those guys are pretty creative as far as I can only wait to see what shows up on, whether it be the pin bar, the back glass, any kind of LCD screen. The animations there are pretty unique for something that is not using movie assets. so we'll see. I know there are some people that are concerned about things like Houdini, let's say, that kind of artwork. I was fine with it, the almost steampunk kind of look. I was okay with it. People, I hear crap on the Avengers animations. I think it's fine. Yeah, it's not really fully animated. It's a still picture that's moving around with stuff in the background. It works for me. Is it the best? No, but we'll see. I think for that game, it's appropriate and I think that's really what we've got to think about is what type of game are you going to make? I'll come back to Hobbit as well. The reason why it works for Hobbit is because there are some moments where it holds the ball, so you look up and you see this glorious bit of footage from the movie with the likes of Avengers. because it is such a fast-paced game, there really is no need to look what's happening on the back glass except to find out what your jackpot value is, whether you've got one, and what gems you've got placed or what you're progressing to. It's more of an informatic screen rather than having to use video assets. It kind of works for Avengers, I think. So those are some kind of dream ideas. I'm curious to hear what others think of what they would want as their dream designer, their dream company, their dream coder, programmer, their dream artist, send us an email. It's finalroundpinball at gmail.com, and there's other ways you can reach us as well. You can go to Facebook, just look up Final Round Pinball. You can go to Instagram, Final Round Pinball Podcast. Twitter is at Final Round Pin. But Jeff, the question everybody's been wanting me to ask is, what have you been up to the last two weeks? Quarantine fun here in Ontario. Things have been shut down for quite some time, and since December 26th, it looks like February 16th is the date of relaxation. so it really sucks for a lot of people working right now, but not a whole lot, except that in a couple of days, my Leds Up on LE shall be arriving. I just got a word today, so I'm a little excited about that, and also a little bit of ICR action too. It's the second season, if you will, of ICR, which takes place between January 1st and April 1st, so if you want to play some games, hit me up, and there's different ways of doing that now with Pindigo. It doesn't even matter if you have the same games. It's a lot of fun, but what about you for your two weeks? Look, really not that exciting, except that I've mentioned before, Guns N' Roses has finally arrived in Australia, so it's really good to see people enjoying that. Probably the highlight for me, though, was I played a game that's a little bit controversial between you and me, and that is Game of Thrones. Why is it controversial? Because I don't think you love it as much as I do. I fucking love that game. Really? Okay. I thought that was one of your ones that you were on the fence with. I don't like the premium. I can't stand the premium. I love playing the other game. Yeah, okay. In fact, it's Dwight's best code for me. I agree with you. And I've not really played the new code that much, obviously because of COVID, you know. I just really haven't been able to go somewhere that's got it besides Eric's, and we stream at Eric's, so I don't really get to play it. So this time I went to Greg from Haggis. I went to his place, and we streamed Game of Thrones Pro, which, you know, I had one for six months in my house. So this is the first time playing the new code. And I had a monster game. For me, probably for other people, not so much. But my final score was 24 billion and I got to Iron Throne twice. Yeah, that's pretty impressive. I think I saw the post on our final round page too. I don't really want to talk a lot about it because that Greg kind of stiffed me a little bit at the reach arounds too. I know he's a buddy of yours, and he's a good guy, and I love Haggis Pinball, but he's kind of muzzled me a little bit. So what's he muzzled? What can't you talk about? Well, it was January 27th last year. I was in Australia.
    85:52
    Yeah, it was your birthday. Yeah, that's all that happened. Yep. So the other thing that's happened in the last two weeks, I have sold my Jurassic Park. Oh, okay. Did you get what you asked for? Yes, I did. Wow. $30,000. Good for you. Yeah, that's 30,000 Australian dollars, so not a lot globally. No, but that's pretty impressive too. Hey, it's a great game, no question about it. So good for you. I know you're still in the process of moving, so I haven't asked you, how's that going? Great. Photographers come tomorrow, so the place is almost looking immaculate, and that's why the pinball machines have obviously gone. Wizard of Oz looks great in the front room. It's the only machine I've got. as an art piece it looks amazing so by the way i saw an old picture i think somebody posted it about your birthday and wizard of oz was there but beside it was jackpot i never knew you had jackpot i had jackpot on loan from stew thornton he that made the trophies for the reach arounds so yeah i had his machine for a couple of months and it was interesting because i don't know i guess it's probably par for the course for me these days i will hate a machine until i really sort of just get connected with it and I need to play it a lot. And I really started enjoying Jackpot after a while. And so when I saw that picture, I went, oh, that's right. I had that machine and I loved it. And his particular machine played perfectly. I can't remember if that was one of the games you listed as overrated, underrated, or maybe it was Zack. I think it's a fun game. No question about it. But I did avoid my top 10 underrated games. And again, you and I are going is set up a poll because we enjoy these kind of things on Final Round, on our Facebook page. Well, it'll be on Instagram as well. But we're going to let you pick the games. But you offered us your 10 games. Just quickly, what were those 10 games again that you thought were overrated? From 10 to 1, The Shadow, No Good Gophers, Cactus Canyon, Whirlwind, Spider-Man, Stern, Skate Stiff, Indiana Jones Pinball Adventure, Star Trek Next Generation, Medieval Madness, and Simpsons. Pinball Party was at the top. So, again, if you notice those games, none of those are being currently manufactured. And I'm not going to give any that are currently being sold because I don't want to hurt the sales of them. I know once we put our stamp on this, it's going to hurt resale values. I'm sorry, okay? Think of it as the anti-market trends here on the final round. There's no pinball show to save these games. Sorry. So this is our pinball market trends.
    88:28
    Do I have to do that? No. Okay, I didn't rank them 10 to 1. I've made a list of 10 of them here. Okay. And again, it's not necessarily games that I think are bad games. I just think they're overrated. And the biggest reason usually is because of the price or where they are on the pin side top 100 list. Okay. I love playing this game. I do have to admit it's probably overrated. TX Sector. It is about 150th on the list, and it goes for a lot of money. Let's face it. It's two shots. it's whatever spinner is lit that's the whole game fuck multi-ball and all that other stuff it's too risky just spinner rip the spinner rip the spinner that's the whole game it's god-awful art it's probably not worth what it is but those spinners are pretty juiced it's the audio package that's really great about that and sure there's probably a going to be a recurring theme and that is that tournament play ruins some games because if it's just spinner all day that's just to get points but if you want to play the game there's a bit of fun to be had i'll give you another one on my overrated list and sorry to bruce and ron who just rant and rave about all old stern electronic games not all of them are winners this is one of them i mean it's easy to say galaxy but no one thinks that's a great game so i'm not putting that in there but this is one that goes for 4500 US resale, and it's not really great pinball. It's a lot of bingo and plinko and shit. Ranked 132 the last time I looked on Pinside. Catacomb. Eh. You're relying a lot on the luck of that bagatelle? Eh, I'm not a big fan of it. Yeah, okay. I would agree with you. Oh, I would agree with you that it's not that great. Is it overrated? I don't really know that there's that many people that talk about it, but if you're talking about price, it's not worth that. Now we're talking about games in the top 100, okay? Okay. I don't understand how this makes the top 100, and I love John Borg, but Tommy's the Pinball Wizard is a shit fest. It's not only overrated, it's not a great game. Too many modes suck on that thing. Now, I'm sorry, Lyman. I had him on the show, and he was talking about it. He goes, well, you know, if you don't like the mode, do another one. Yeah, it's true, but what does that say about the mode you're overriding by doing another mode? Yeah, I kind of concur with you in that it is a game. It has got flippers, three of them, I believe. It's got cool toy with the mirror. It's got a very cool feature with the blinders that come out. No, no. I think it's a cool novelty. Sure, it's been done so many times since because it was so popular. I know. It's one of those games, if I see that in a collection, it'll be probably the last game that I'll go and play. Good point. Overrated at number 88. Okay, we're getting up there. Number 70 on the pin side list. I do not understand how it makes it this high. The game is Roadshow. Oh, you like the game? I think that... You want to talk about bad modes? Holy shit. There's a good one for you there. And just... I don't know. It's just never really done it for me. Okay. The sounds, the music, the talking heads. No, like... I don't know. I have a bit of a soft spot for Roadshow. It's one of very few super pins I like. In fact, it's probably the only super pin that I actually like. And I think it's a good utilization of a wide body. Yeah, rules-wise, yeah, the codes, the different modes aren't necessarily that kind of great. And because it's kind of in sequence with the old code, I know that there's new custom code that's come out where previously it was all just right to left, east to west. Yeah, I can kind of understand why people don't like it and people do like it. I don't know if there's a lot of games I like that have plungers on both sides. I'm thinking about it. Guns N' Roses, the original one, good. Yeah, it's okay. It's a good game. The ramps aren't exactly the smoothest. Funhouse? Well, Funhouse is the next one on my most overrated list. If I've got the one with two heads, I might as well put in the one with one head. Sorry, Lawler. I do not get that. Now, maybe it was a thing in the day, and again, I don't give a shit about the left plunger. There's just so much I don't like about it. Like, seriously, 45th on Pinside Top 100. I can easily name 50 better games. Maybe 100. Yep. Doesn't belong that high, and it goes for a lot of money. I'm sure it was pretty cool back in the day. I do like the callouts. I think Rudy's funny as hell, but just not enough there. I'm 100% with you on Funhaus. I don't get it. Another one on my most overrated games, and I think you mentioned it too. Actually, maybe it was Zach who mentioned it. So a little bit of a repeat here. Even though we both agree we love the artist, we just said it. Sorry, Stan. Big Bang Bar, not worth the price. And it's based only on the fact they only made 300 of them. It's an okay game. It shoots well. It's not ranked 52nd on Pinside. It's just if that came up for even a decent price, I'd pass. Wouldn't you? Yeah. I don't know. it's something that because I've played it my friend Lucas has got one because you play it and you know that you're playing something that's quite unique and special that gets factored into it but if you strip all that away it's a good game it's a fine game it's fine it's got good rules it's got deep rules it's got some the art looks great the ramps look great the toys look great the spinning little fish things look great it's and got good call outs it's great in Australia It's still $30,000. It's not $30,000. Give me a break.
    94:12
    And who did you say? Stuart has it? Lucas. On Lucas' game, does the ball get stuck a lot? Yes. Up by the tube? I think so, yes. Yeah. Happens a lot. Yeah. Okay. Number 67 on Pinside. I don't know why it's this high. Again, you want to talk about some modes that really suck. Just not a lot of fun for me every time I have to play Judge Dredd. I don't get that. I don't think it's a top 100 pin. Yeah, I don't know. Again, it was one of those ones where I've hated on Judge Dredd so long. And then probably about four or five months ago, I streamed it at Eric. So I got three hours on it. At the end of the night, I went, you know what? I don't love it, but I don't hate it anymore. I'm actually now starting to understand how to play it, but I still think it's a bit of a mess. getting through my top 10 most overrated games boy as i get closer to the top of the pin side top 100 i'm just pissing off so many people but again this is just an opinion show disagree with me all you want these are my opinions number 42 on the list i don't get that this game has been made not only once not only twice but thrice iron man there's not a lot there and i also love john board games. I like the flow of it. In fact, I bought Guardians of the Galaxy because I don't own Metallica or Iron Man. I thought, well, that's kind of the best of both. But I just don't get that this game has been vaulted over and over again for what's on that game. And yet it's ranked 42nd. I think the rankings are fooling me a little bit because a game that's been vaulted twice means it's sold a lot. So when you buy a game, you want to give it the higher ranking, right? Because you own it and you want to resell it someday. But really, 40 second, there are a lot better games than Iron Man. I'm going to disagree with you on that. I think that Iron Man is a spectacular game. And yes, of course it's not deep, but what is there is just snappy, brutal fun.
    96:18
    I really like Iron Man and I think it's not overrated, but there you go. I don't think it's a terrible game. I just think it's not 40 second. I do. I do. I think easy okay this one definitely does not belong in the top 40 you've had it at your place i don't get it the hobbit in fact it's the only game from jersey jack i don't ever want to play again everything else i'm fine with that game don't get it worst upper flipper in all of pinball let's be honest it does fuck all and it is just every time you play it unless you're playing it at pinberg you'd play forever and ever and ever?
    96:57
    I've said that of all the games that I have sold, there is only one game I would want back in my collection, and that is The Hobbit. On saying that, I have this strange feeling that if I had it back, I'd probably want to get rid of it for the same reason, and that is multiball all the time, modes sort of just don't pop, They don't give you that sort of sizzle that you want. But as far as an art package goes, sound package goes, the way it looks, it is a beautiful game. There's just something not quite right. Did you have Medieval Madness on your list? Yes, I did. Number two. Okay. The reason Medieval Madness is not as good as Attack from Mars is because of the stupid trolls. To me. Okay. You want to talk about timing things out. That's what you time out. Well, there are a few fucking trolls on The Hobbit. for creatures effectively. That's not fun. Sorry. If I want to play annoying things that pop up, I'll play Dragon.
    97:57
    Is that how it goes? I don't remember the sound. It's hilarious. Yeah, okay. You know, I think it's one of those games where without the creatures popping up, the trolls, inverted commas, it's a very open play field. It kind of really comes into its own when multi-ball's happening and they do pop up. It kind of is a bit of fun. The problem is it happens too often. The last game on my most overrated pinball machine list is actually not a good game. It's a great game. No question about it. But it is definitely overrated. Okay. Lord of the Rings. Oh, how? Lord of the Rings is not... I'm sorry. It's been as high as number two on Pinside. It currently is around 13. I'm sorry. It is not the all. It's one of the greatest codes. It's a great flowing shoot game. All those kind of things. There are a lot of games in those categories. It is a great game. Do I put it in my top 50? Easily. Top 25? It's around there. Yep. But it's not number two where it sat on pin side for a long time. It is not worth the money it gets in resale. How dare you? Except for the fact that I'm about to sell mine. So it is absolutely worth the money that it gets. In fact, probably more. Why didn't you tell me that before I gave the list? I've got to pick another game. I scratched that. Theater of Magic is the most rated.
    99:30
    But it's really interesting because Lord of the Rings, I hated for so long, and then I just played it once at Ryan's. He explained the rules to me, and I just had this fun game, and I went, okay, well, maybe I could have fun with it again. I then bought one, and I've had fun with it, but in a lineup that I have, only four games, but I would play all these other games and then go to Lord of the Rings and I'd go, it's a fun game. Oh, fuck, do I have half an hour? It was kind of a bit like that. It's like, okay, I get it, it's fine. It does everything that it needs to do, but it doesn't fill me with that much joy. It's a great game technically, but again, something missing. Listen, great code, perfect code, great shooting game, amazing layout. The call-outs, spectacular. The art is terrible. But again, it's just such a grind. And this is the competitor in me. I was watching a stream of Lord of the Rings the other day, and I made note that I think I have played that game maybe, I exaggerate and say 10 times, maybe 20 times in my life. It never shows up in a tournament. It never shows up in league nights because of how long it plays. Would I be happy to own it in my collection of 9 or 10 games? Of course, I'd play the shit out of it. But I think I would be tired of it. Yeah, I guess my question for you is then to see if I can sort of clarify it further. It seems to be the number one game that people want Stern to vault. Do you think that it's worthy of being vaulted? Yes. Okay. Yeah, I do. Again, so... But do you think it should be the one? The number one? I don't know about that. I just don't want people to be confused with, is Overrated a bad game? It's not. This is a great game. It's not the greatest game ever. It's not worth that freaking price people are playing. So in that sense, I'd like to see it vaulted so that the price does come to something a little more reasonable. Yeah. You put Attack from Mars with Lord of the Rings for me, it's not even a close comparison. It's Attack all day and by leaps and bounds. Yeah, look, I would say for me, the parallel, I said Medieval Madness is incredibly overrated. I get that it is a great game. I get that it shoots great. I just don't think it is as amazing and revered as everybody says it is. Same with Lord of the Rings. I'd rather play Metallica. Okay. I'd rather play Jurassic Park. Yep. So, anyway, those are my list. But it doesn't matter what I say. It doesn't matter what Marty says. It doesn't even matter what Zach said, and straight down the middle. It matters what you say. So what are we going to do, Marty? We are going to open this up to everybody. So please send us through via email, phonerampinball at gmail.com. What are your most overrated games? I think we will also put up a Facebook post, so then we can just put people's comments and see what it is. People are fucking lazy. They don't send emails. They just want to like their... I know, but see, we don't care. We've been podcasting for years, so we don't care whether people like or hate us and our opinion. But if you don't want your overrated pinball to be public, send us an email, finalroundpinball.gmail.com, but we will also put up a post, and you can tell us what you think. I look forward to that, and I look forward to seeing how this all plays out. If we get enough, Maybe we'll do 32 games and make a bracket, but I think 16 is the goal. But who knows? I mean, between yourself, mine, what Zach did on Straight Down the Middle, and, of course, our listeners, we might get to 32. So we'll see, and that'll be something we'll do over the next couple of weeks, and we'll report back to you on episode number 28. Marty, happy birthday. I know I've got to let you go because I think you've got some celebrating, a.k.a. drinking to do. By the way, nice job on Melbourne Silver Bowl. No stream tonight. sorry we'll be back you happen to do that during the month you're not allowed to drink on stream you're just cancelling the shows that's bullshit no no no jeff stop right there i know i don't think it's fair for me to have my month of no drinking when i don't have any pinball machines at home so i will have my month of no drinking on stream after i've moved and i've got my pinball machines back at home. Therefore, it will be something that I will miss. It's too easy for me to not drink now because, as you said, if I'm streaming at someone's house, I've got to drive and I haven't got people machines at home so I can't stream. So don't worry, you will get your pound of flesh.
    103:53
    So in one way, you sound really sincere and like, no, I'm going to make this count. But the other way of looking at it is I'm prolonging it. I'm procrastinating. I'm fucking drinking right now.
    104:05
    Not during my birthday month. I am going to be drinking this month. But in a couple of months, when I'm back, when I show you photos of my pinball room, that's when you can say, okay, your month starts now. You sure you don't want that on Amazon wish list? There's some decent wands on there. Yes. I've got all the wands I need. He doesn't. Send them. All right. Happy birthday, buddy. Thank you. Thanks, everybody, for listening. We will speak to you again in a couple of weeks. My name is Geoff Teolas. My name is Martin Robbins. Thanks, everyone.