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050: Five Tips for First Tournament + Dream Theme Revisited!

Punk Rock Pinball Podcast·podcast_episode·46m 53s·analyzed·Jun 3, 2026
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claude-haiku-4-5-20251001 · $0.031

TL;DR

Tournament tips for beginners + dream theme discussion (Fantasy Island), HQ expansion update.

Summary

Punk Rock Pinball Podcast episode 50 covers five tips for first-time tournament players (sourced from competitive player Jill Grun's social media post): managing downtime, keeping your phone charged, knowing how to start multiplayer games, paying attention to player order, and looking up game rules. The hosts also discuss their expanded HQ location in Bloomington, Illinois (now 36-37 machines) and explore dream pinball themes, with Fantasy Island emerging as a current favorite.

Key Claims

  • Punk Rock Pinball HQ in Bloomington, Illinois now has 36-37 working machines on Pinball Map

    high confidence · Hosts discussing their recent HQ expansion; they mention refreshing the Pinball Map and confirming machine count

  • Jill Grun posted 'Five Things I Wish I'd Known Before My First Pinball Tournament' that the hosts found valuable

    high confidence · Hosts credit Jill Grun (identified as competitive pinball player from Ohio) and reference her specific post

  • In tournament play, downtime between turns can be significant, especially in 4-player matches with skilled players

    high confidence · First tip from Jill Grun's list, confirmed by hosts with personal experience

  • Playing out of turn in a tournament results in automatic DQ for that round

    high confidence · Hosts explaining rule #4 about player order; confirms this happens to everyone

  • LED Zeppelin Pro was acquired and moved to Punk Rock Pinball HQ (filling a vacancy)

    high confidence · Hosts mention they didn't sell it but 'took it over' and moved it to the club; Kevin topped leaderboard at 490+ million

  • The hosts own approximately 50% modern Stern machines and 50% older Williams/Bally/Gottlieb games

    high confidence · Direct statement about their machine mix when discussing why they focus Stern content

  • Spooky and Barrels of Fun machines are difficult to acquire at MSRP

    high confidence · Hosts explain they don't own Spooky or Barrels of Fun due to accessibility/pricing issues; specifically mention Evil Dead and Dune

  • They attempted to acquire Winchester Mystery House but were 'one day late'

    high confidence · Host explains contact attempt to secure Winchester Mystery House pinball; machine was already spoken for

Notable Quotes

  • “More pinball, more problems. That's what they say.”

    Host @ early in episode — Riff on 'more money, more problems'; reflects operational reality of running large machine collection

  • “We were the biggest pinball location in central Illinois for like a day.”

    Host @ HQ expansion discussion — Playful acknowledgment of brief competitive advantage before nearby location added machines

  • “Don't trust anything except for what the game says. Look at the game, what player is it on and what player are you, play that ball.”

    Host (citing Joe Sharp advice) @ tip #4 discussion — Core tournament advice to avoid out-of-turn DQ; emphasizes self-reliance over trusting other players

  • “It's kind of shocking there isn't one [Fantasy Island pinball]. From the 80s?”

    Host @ dream theme segment — Expresses surprise at licensing gap; drives main discussion of dream themes

  • “I want it to look like a late 80s, early 90s pinball. I want to hear Mr. Rourke say, 'Smile everyone, welcome to Fantasy Island.'”

    Host @ Fantasy Island dream theme discussion — Articulates specific aesthetic and content vision for hypothetical game

  • “A fool can dream. But in a perfect world, like if that was like free, or like not that much, and they didn't hold things out of the main game and gave you that like four years later, Peter, that would be great.”

    Host @ DLC discussion — Reflects on criticism of DLC idea; acknowledges the 'slippery slope' of microtransaction model

  • “If there was even a rumor of this, it would instantaneously get on the list and pay what [cut off]”

    Host @ end of episode (incomplete) — Suggests dream theme (Twin Peaks with Carl D'Python Anghelo design, Deadpool sound) would be instant purchase

Entities

Jill GrunpersonPunk Rock Pinball PodcastorganizationPunk Rock Pinball HQvenueShelly SharppersonJoe SharppersonKevinpersonJoeypersonJeffpersonCJpersonJDpersonRosieperson

Signals

  • ?

    venue_signal: Punk Rock Pinball HQ in Bloomington, Illinois expanded from unknown previous count to 36-37 working machines on Pinball Map; hosts note competitive dynamic with nearby museum (27 machines, then increased to 42) and larger operator about 20 minutes south

    high · Hosts discuss expansion happening last week, machines now on Pinball Map, and friendly competition with local venues

  • ?

    community_signal: Community effort to document and share tournament best practices; Jill Grun's social post about first tournament tips is being widely shared and appreciated by competitive community

    high · Hosts praise the tips, integrate them into their show, add supplementary advice, and note these are things 'most people would wish they would know'

  • ?

    operational_signal: Large pinball locations (37 machines) require dedicated team effort to keep machines operational; hosts acknowledge this is labor-intensive and praise teams managing larger collections

    high · Discussion of team members (JD, Rosie, Kevin, Joey, Jeff, CJ) 'working their butts off' on maintenance; comparison to Pinball Capital needing dedicated technician staff

  • $

    market_signal: New pinball machines from specialty manufacturers (Spooky, Barrels of Fun) selling out at MSRP; secondary market prices escalating significantly ($15,000+ mentioned for Evil Dead)

    high · Hosts unable to acquire Dune, Evil Dead, Beetlejuice, Winchester Mystery House at MSRP; express unwillingness to pay secondary market prices

  • ?

    collector_signal: Limited accessibility of new games from specialty manufacturers creating FOMO and pricing pressure; hosts note these games are 'not accessible' and cannot be obtained for MSRP

Transcript

groq_whisper · $0.141

0:00
Oh, hello. Hi. Hey, this is the Punk Rock Pinball Podcast episode number 50. 50. And we don't really have a real special topic for that, I guess. Well, I thought we'd come up with something special You didn't tell me it was 50 till just now. Well, last week was 49. I didn't remember.
0:34
I guess the special thing is that we're recording this on a Tuesday evening and we usually do a Sunday. It was busy. But the weekend was busy. I played a couple shows. And then yesterday I feel like you roofied me in the morning and I slept all day. I like did not feel well and I didn't work. I think my first sick day at work in four and a half years. Wow. I think. I think you've taken a sick day before. Maybe. Maybe it was more mental health, but yesterday it was like a sick day. Yeah, you did not feel well. No. Did you roofie me? No roofies were given. Man. I went to bed. I slept all Sunday night and then I woke up on Monday, got dressed, took a shower, went to I had to go sit at my work situation here at home and I couldn't do it. So I went back to bed like at 930 and I woke up at like 1. Wow. And all of like later last week we were busy. We made our Punk Rock Pinball HQ in Bloomington, Illinois. We made that bigger. Oh yeah. We'll have to do a video for people. I did a walk around. Oh, you did? I didn't say anything on it, but I walked through and like, it's like two minutes long. Really? Yeah. Maybe put that to some music and upload it. Oh, I thought you posted it and I just didn't see it. No, I didn't post it yet. Okay, cool. I know how to put it to music. JD and Rosie are in it. That's cool. Kevin's in it. Of course. Mm-hmm. Did that last night. What else? Yeah, we were busy doing that. Put a lot more games in there. We're on the Pinball Map app. If you look at Bloomington, Illinois and refresh that area, it will show us 3600 36 machines or 37? I don't know. I can't remember. 36 or 37. Almost all of them working. There's a couple in progress that are going to be working soon. It's also funny because there's a guy that has a pinball museum about 20 minutes south of here. And as soon as we had more than him, he added a bunch more. He did. I wonder if they're working. I don't know if that was a coincidence. We got 37. And there's a place not far from here that had 27 and a day after I've added the new ones to ours they went from 27 to 42. I don't know. Maybe there's a rivalry. I think he owns a lot more games so I don't think that's a battle we're gonna win. We'll never win that. He owns like the entire downtown of an abandoned town basically. He's like the only game in town literally. Him and the post office. And he has like four buildings. Yeah. We'll never win. I think he owns probably a couple hundred, so we're not going to win that battle. No, but it was fun when we had more than him for like a hot second. We were the biggest pinball location in central Illinois for like a day. That's pretty cool. I'm putting that on my resume. But our 37 versus those 42, I bet you more of ours work. Well, we don't know. That's my bet. We don't know that. Maybe he's been working my heart. Based on last time I was there, I know that when there were 27, there were about seven that worked. So I'm thinking we have more of that function. We know it's not easy to keep pinball machines running. It is not easy to keep pinball machines running. We have a lot of people working there all the time. Yeah, our friend Joey finally got his Black Knight working, the Ridge Black Knight, and man is that game so fun. Yeah, Joey's been working his butt off. Jeff's working his butt off, fixing stuff. CJ's working his butt off. I got it. Yes, they are all working their butts off. You're working your butt off. And it's funny. I was thinking about this last night. Like, man, to have that many machines in one place is super cool. But man, is it a lot of work. And ours is a collective. It's not just one person's machines. It's a whole bunch of people bringing machines together. And I just can't imagine like Pinball Capital, how many, I don't even know, does he have like a bunch of techs on staff? They've got to have some techs because they have like 140. Something crazy like that. Because we got it all kind of set up. I was talking to JD, some game had a problem. And then I can't remember what he said, but I'm like, every single one of these machines is going to break. Mm hmm. Every game in there is going to have something broken, probably before too long. Yeah. So kind of the more you add, like the more more pinball, more problems. That's what they say. Uh-huh. That's what they say. More money, more problems, more pinball, more problems. It's fun to have more, but then it's also stressful because it's like, oh, that one's broken and that one's broken and that one. Yeah. So kudos to all the people out there that have a lot of machines and you keep them running. That's a big, big job. It ain't easy. You know what we're going to talk about today? What are we going to talk about today? I saw this post. Who posted it? Her name is Jill Grun. Okay. I'm not sure exactly, but she's a pinball lady. Where is she from? Is she a pinfluencer? I don't know if she's a pinfluencer. She might be. But she is followed by a lot of people that we know. I think she's in Ohio, actually. Okay. I think she's an Ohio person. Because it looks like she's played in Cleveland and Columbus, so she's one of you. She's an Ohioan. Iowans. Yeah, I was born in Ohio. Anyways, she did this post a little while ago, and she's a competitive pinball player. Maybe the pinball, that same group that did the feature on John from the Dopamines, pinball people, people of pinball. They did a thing on her. I was like, who is this? Then I lurked on her page. So she's a high-level competitive pinballer, maybe? Yeah, I think she's like, you know, she competes. Competes? Yeah. Okay. So she did this post and I thought it was really interesting called Five Things I Wish I'd Known Before My First Pinball Tournament. Because we know a lot of people are a little like nervous about doing their first tournament. Mm-hmm. And I thought these were five interesting things. Okay. The first one is, Shelly Sharp told me this, be prepared for downtime.
Jack Danger
person
LED Zeppelin Progame
Black Knightgame
Fantasy Islandgame
Stranger Thingsgame
Transformersgame
Dunegame
Evil Deadgame
Winchester Mystery Housegame
Beetlejuicegame
King Konggame
Rescue 911game
Match Playorganization
Pinball Maporganization

high · Multiple attempts to acquire specific games unsuccessful; one Winchester Mystery House opportunity lost by 'one day'; clear preference expressed but pricing/availability barriers

  • ?

    product_concern: Operating large pinball collections involves constant maintenance issues; hosts note that 'every single one of these machines is going to break' and breakdown is inevitable with scale

    high · Discussion comparing machines in their 37-machine facility to operations like Pinball Capital; acknowledgment that larger collections mean proportionally more problems

  • ?

    rumor_hype: Community engages in speculative discussion about hypothetical future pinball themes; Fantasy Island emerges as strong candidate with detailed vision (early 90s aesthetic, Mr. Rourke voiceover, DMD display)

    medium · Hosts explore Fantasy Island as dream theme, discuss manufacturer fit (suggests Barrels of Fun or rethemed Rescue 911), express surprise no official version exists given show's popularity

  • ~

    sentiment_shift: Listener feedback indicates some fatigue with Stern-focused content coverage; listener explicitly expressed frustration about hosts' alleged Stern favoritism despite operational reasons

    high · Host references feedback: 'He liked our show, but we're starting to lose him because we talk about Stern all the time and favor Stern all the time.' Hosts explain 50/50 ownership ratio and accessibility issues with Spooky/Barrels of Fun

  • ?

    product_strategy: Specialty pinball manufacturers (Spooky, Barrels of Fun) appear to have limited retail distribution or secondary market accessibility; hosts cannot access machines at MSRP despite interest

    high · Hosts note they 'do not own a Barrels of Fawn and we don't own a Spooky and we don't own a Jersey Jack right now' with 'big reason' being 'they're not accessible' and 'you can't get one for MSRP'

  • ?

    content_signal: Punk Rock Pinball Podcast attracting new listeners from early episodes; listener feedback (negative and positive) indicates audience is engaged but selective about content preferences

    medium · Hosts mention multiple messages from 'a fella' who 'started watching and or listening' and is on 'early episodes'; audience members engaging with specific content preferences (Stern vs other manufacturers)

  • ?

    design_philosophy: Host articulates clear aesthetic preference for early-90s pinball design era when discussing hypothetical Fantasy Island game; values vintage look and audio quality over modern sleekness

    high · Quote: 'I don't want it to look new and slick... I want it to look like a late 80s, early 90s pinball. I want audio.' and 'I want to hear Mr. Rourke say, Smile everyone, welcome to Fantasy Island.'

  • ?

    licensing_signal: Fantasy Island (1980s TV series) appears to be unrepresented in pinball game market despite being successful show; hosts note this is surprising given Charlie's Angels and Gilligan's Island both have pinball adaptations

    medium · Host questions: 'It's kind of shocking there isn't one. From the 80s?... why isn't there a Fantasy Island pinball?' and compares to other licensed IP that have received pinball treatment

    • 7:01
    That's a big one. Mm-hmm. Now, especially at bigger tournaments, but at all tournaments, there's going to be downtime. Yeah. Because you're in a four-player, you're going to be in a four-player match most likely. And some people, the better the people are in the field, the longer the downtime is going to be. Yeah, it's like playing competitive pinball is different than just playing by yourself because when you're by yourself, you're going to play those three balls, bing, bang, boom. You play in a tournament, you're gonna bang, and you're gonna wait for everyone else to bang before you can bam. Yeah, and somebody might shoot a billion on the game. And you're just, yeah, you're just waiting. And Shelly Sharp said, any chance you get to sit down, just sit down, get off your feet. Yeah, me and Joe don't do that. No, Shelly's really good at it. Yeah, she's always, when she can, she's sitting. Mm-hmm. Because it kills your feet. Yeah, because most of the places you play are like, like concrete. Concrete? Concrete or some kind of hard floor. Real hard. It's not like carpet with padding usually. No. I'm usually too antsy to sit down in between. Me too. Like if I'm in a match, I just can't sit down in between the balls. No. Nor can I go play another game. I just like, ugh. I get all weird. Mm-hmm. But there will be downtime. So yeah, if you've not done pinball tournaments and you're going to go into one and it's like Match play. Expect for there to be several minutes between when you play ball one and when you play ball two. And then your round, if you're on like an older game, if you like come to RHQ for a tournament or somewhere like that that has modern games and old games, if your match is on firepower, it's quite likely your match is going to be over pretty quick, but then you're going to wait for somebody on like Fall of the Empire to finish.
    8:58
    That's a good point. So your match might be over for 15-20 minutes before your next one starts up. Yeah, go outside, have a seg. That's where smoking comes in handy. Kills time. Go outside, like, oh, I'm on firepower and it was only a three-player one and most matches are four-player. I've got time for a smoke now. There you go. So you could start smoking. Perfect. Uh-huh. We are sponsored by Philip Morris. Uh-huh. Okay, second one she said was to make sure your phone's charged. Good one. I thought this was interesting because a lot of places, a lot of the tournaments we go to, not all of them, but a lot of them use match play events. And keeping your phone charged is important because you can look at the standings on your phone of the tournament. You can look at who's playing what. You can, you know, figure out where your buddies are playing based on the games. Yeah, and you can see when the next round comes up. So when you're outside smoking, you know it's time to come back in. If you're outside smoking, or maybe you're going and going to sit down and have a sandwich. Yeah. Sandwich. Sandwiches. If you're having a sandwich, you can go have your sandwich and keep an eye on Match Play Watch for that next round to come up. Then the next round comes up, maybe you're player four, so you can have a little bit more of your sandwich. Yeah. Yes. That's really good advice. So yeah, you want your phone charged for the match play and if there's like modern Sterns you might want to scan in. I don't always scan in on the tournaments. I think on certain games they don't let, yeah, it's different every tournament. I don't always scan in on the tournaments. No, I don't. But sometimes I do just so I remember which player I am. Yeah, I like it for that so you go up and I'm a player too, but there's my name. Yeah. It's very helpful to not play out of turn. And if you like to take pictures at events, it's good to have your phone charged. Yep, have your phone charged. We're really bad at that. Number three, you need to know how to start a multiplayer game. That's a big one. A lot of people don't know. Yeah, that's a big one. And you need to start the game for the right amount of players. And that is the responsibility of everyone. It's everyone in the match. So if the wrong amount of players are started and a ball is played, the game is null. Even if three people have played ball one, it's wiped out. So you do need to know how to start a four player game or three player game How do you do it Mike You click the Start button the appropriate amount of times for how many players are in the game J.J. Now it's real easy on most of the modern ones because there will be a flashing button that says Start. J.J. And it will usually show you at the bottom of the screen when you add a new player. J.J. Some of the old ones can be a little trickier. J.J. Sometimes there's a little lag between... You hit start and you have to wait. And some of them, like maybe the lights on the back glass don't work to tell you how many players are in there. So it's good to familiarize yourself. If you show up early to a tournament, like go around, look at the games, figure out if you're real new, look at where the start buttons are. How do you start a game on this? It's always going to be if it's a four player game, you'll hit start four times. Because if there's a coin drop involved, everyone has to put in their money. That's true. If it's free play, you just go hit start four times, you're good.
    12:44
    If the games are on like pay to play with the coin drop, everyone has to coin up and then you do the start. Coin up, is that a real term or did you just make it up? That's a real term. You got to coin up? You got to coin up. I never heard that. Yeah.
    12:59
    It's a real term. Okay. Yeah. Coin up, bro. These days you dollar up. Mostly you don't coin up. You ready for number four? Let's hear number four. Okay, this is a big one.
    13:12
    Pay attention to the player order on a game. Huge. Everyone's done it. Huge. Played out of turn. Yes. It sucks. Because what happens when you play out of turn is you're DQ'd for that round, you lose that round regardless of what you've done. And you get embarrassed. And it's embarrassing. But it has happened to everyone. But it's still embarrassing. It sucks. It's way easier to do on the old games because there's no ball save. You might have, and a lot of the old games, like some of them, even if you don't hit a switch, your ball's done, it's over. So your ball might be a second long or two seconds long. And on some of the old games, if you don't hit anything, you don't score anything, you get to go again. It depends on the game. You get to go again and you walk away and then the poor next person plunges your ball. And they're DQ'd. And they're still DQ'd because it's their responsibility to make, it's your responsibility to look at the machine. If you're player two, make sure the game is on player two and three and four. I mean, it seems so easy, but you get caught up in the moment and you're so anxious to go play your ball, no matter if it's your first ball or your last ball. You're just a little anxious that sometimes you don't stop. But this is where advice from Joe Sharp comes into hand. Walk up with a plan. You gotta walk up with a plan. And sometimes people in the match might even call you over and say it's your turn. Don't trust them. When it's not your turn, don't trust them. And they're not trying to do it to trick you. Like sometimes they will genuinely think it's your turn. Because I've played out a turn that way. I've been told it was my turn and I played and it wasn't my turn. They got you. They got me. So don't trust anything except for what the game says. Look at the game, what player is it on and what player are you, play that ball. And I suppose if like you don't know and the people you're playing with don't know, then it's okay to raise a hand and have the tournament director come over and help figure it out. On like an old game, if the lights aren't up, like what player is up here? Because some of the EMs it's really hard. It can be very hard to know if like the lights aren't all working. Mm-hmm. Like, it seems stupid, but like on some of the old, those really old machines, it can be hard to know, like, whose ball is it? Yeah. So you could have a tournament director come and just say, like, we think it's me, and then they would probably let you plunge and then see which player the score is going to without getting a DQ. Yeah, they'll do something. Yeah. Yeah, so that was number four. Mm-hmm. Number five? Yeah. You can look up game rules in between turns. Yes, you can. And how can you look up those game rules? In Match Play, you can click on the game title, like in the matches if you have the Match Play up on your phone. I would say that's another thing you should know, number six, is be familiar with the Match Play events website And you can create a profile on there and be ready to be able to pull that up because it's very helpful if you're in a tournament to have that on your phone. And the matches you're in, everything will be white and yours will be like a yellowy color. Yep. So it'd be easy if there's a bunch of games, you just scroll the matches until you see the one that's highlighted and that will be you. That's true. And then you can click the game and then there's usually a, that will bring up the thing on the side and there's usually like some quick notes on it. I can't remember what it's called. Pintips? Something like that. Something. And it will tell you things like what's the skill shot. Sometimes it'll tell you how to get to a multiball, those kind of things. Yeah. You can also look at the rules on the game too. You can look at the rules on the game. And on the older games, those are sometimes sufficient on the real old ones because the rules are much simpler. On a modern game, it's not going to help a whole lot. Not really. But it'll tell you usually like a skill shot and how to get to a multi-ball. And if you don't know a game at all, that's better than knowing nothing.
    17:46
    Yeah. So those were Jill's five tips. Okay. I think that's a pretty good five. Do you have any other ones? Well, downloading or you don't know, Matchplay is not an app, but it's just a website. We'll put the link in the description. Mm-hmm. So you can at least familiarize yourself with that website and you'd be able to go to it and pull up your tournament that you're in. That's a huge one because if everybody always had that on their phone, it's easier to even run the tournament. Mm-hmm. Because also at the end of your match, you can suggest results and put them in there, which just kind of makes the whole process of getting to the next round quicker. Yeah. And it's easier than if everybody has to... We put ours up on a wall on a projector, so anybody that doesn't have it on their phone, they're kind of gathering around trying to look up there if they all had it on their phone. You get to your games faster. Mm-hmm. Yeah. So be familiar with match play. I'd say it's things you wish you knew. It's the title was five things I'd wish I'd known before my first pinball tournament. So it's like five things that most people would wish they would know. Mm-hmm. These are all good things. The downtime is huge. Comfortable shoes. I haven't discovered the perfect comfortable shoe yet for my feet. My feet get so sore. Always be sitting is something that somebody said in the comments of this. Always be sitting. I just can't do it. I'm too antsy. Me too. Too antsy to sit. I think...oh, I had another one and I forgot it. You've forgotten it? Somebody else said eat when you can, pee when you can. Yeah, if you have an opportunity to pee and you kind of have to, you should go do it. Although there was the post that Jack Danger had shared that said like, you might be better at pinball when you have to pee. And you're holding it really bad? I've tried it. I don't know if it's true. Like allegedly there's some science behind it, like certain activities, like you're better at them if you have to pee. I don't know that I agree. You always have to pee. I always have to pee a little bit.
    20:15
    I tell you what, it's not good if you think you have to poop. Not good. That doesn't help you play better. That does not help you play better. Like, no. It's terrible. No, it's awful. So on that note, if you have digestive issues, Taking an Imodium. Have some stuff handy because you're going to be there a while. So plan accordingly. It's not going to be any kind of regular format. It's not going to be real quick. It's going to be at least probably two and a half, three hours. So if you're prone to nausea, heartburn, indigestion, upset stomach, diarrhea, bring some Pepto, maybe bring some Imodium, bring some Tums. Just a little bag. Mm-hmm. Have your, like, digestive aids handy. That's why Mike brings a backpack when we go, like, when we go up to Chicago. When we go to the big ones, I have a backpack. I've got, like, Pepto and Imodium and Tums in there. I've got, like, Tylenol, Ibuprofen, a little med pack. Mm-hmm. Because you don't know. And those things are all day. Yeah. You know, that's like 8 to 12 hour day. A lot of times I have a couple cans of Coke in there. Mm-hmm. Maybe you might want a bottle of water in there. Snickers bar. Snickers. Yeah, we did have... It's good to have it like a candy bar, like a Snickers like that. Mm-hmm. Yeah, bring some snacks. Yep, snacks are important. Snacks, beverages. Mm-hmm. I know there are certain locations probably where they would frown upon like outside food and drink, but most places when there's a tournament you can. Because a lot of folks when we do our league nights they bring like a cooler. Mm-hmm. So you'd have like bring a sandwich. Bring a sandwich. Because you're gonna want snacks especially the longer ones. Yeah, definitely. Like if you're playing like the the papa tournament or the expo tournament or like that silver ball one that's coming up at the pinball capital those are gonna be long days. And you're not going to have a ton of time. You're not going to have time related to go get food between rounds. So you might want a little cooler with a couple sandwiches, Snickers, some drinks and some whatever kind of if you have any kind of chronic and routine ailments, bring whatever you use to treat that. You know? Yeah. Yep. That's a big one. It is a big one. Because you get there, you don't have your tums, what are you going to do? Then you've got heartburn and that's brutal.
    23:01
    Yeah. Like we went down to a big one at Atomic once and I forgot them. Shelly had some Pepto. Saved me.
    23:11
    She's got it all. She thinks of everything. If you haven't watched our last episode, you can see Shelly sitting right there and Joe. They were here They were here on the last episode Yeah we also have a hole here Yeah I don know if that in the shot It in the shot Okay there a vacancy which was Led Zeppelin Pro Mm-hmm. We didn't sell it. Nope. We took it over. Went to the club. Took it over to the HQ.
    23:43
    It's going to be a fun one to have in the tournaments and stuff. Yeah, I think people are enjoying it. Mm-hmm. And then not because the leaderboard is very low on it. Well, Kev just topped it yesterday. It's like 490 some million. He did? Yeah. He did. I didn't tell him anything about it. I mean, it's only been up there connected to the leaderboard for a handful of days. I know. It will grow. It was a matter of time. I think Joey was on top. Then Kevin beat him. I might be third still. I got to get back over there. Got to get back over there.
    24:17
    Was there anything else you wanted to say? I feel like there was a you wanted to comment. Oh, a couple things. A couple things. So we've had a couple of messages through the website from some fella the last couple days that started watching and or listening. I'm not sure. Really? He's on the early episodes. Oh, geez. And he wrote one, he's like, you lost me on Weezer as the dream theme, but then you had me back with like disliking Rush. And then he wrote again today and the subject was you fools. And he didn't like that I suggested, remember the episode where I talked about what if there was like DLC for pinball machines? What's a DLC? Download content. Oh, I mean. What if you could add the last handful of seasons to Stranger Things on your Stranger Things? That would be amazing. I do understand. He's like, that would be terrible. And I get it because it's a slippery slope. Yeah, I get it. If there was no such thing as like corporate greed and money, if that was all going to be free? Amazing. But it wouldn't be free. And then do they hold things out of the main game? Charge it for that later. It's a slippery slope. Kind of did ruin video gaming to a large degree. So you are a fool? So it's a foolish, to think it would be executed in a fair and equitable way is like a foolish thought. Well, a fool can dream. A fool can dream. But in a perfect world, like if that was like free, or like not that much, and they didn't hold things out of the main game and gave you that like four years later, Peter, that would be great.
    26:12
    I don't know where he is on his journey with our show. He's talking about the dream themes. You liked your Twin Peaks dream theme? I like them already. And I thought, do we need to bring that back, the dream themes? Does it need to make a comeback? I mean, I love the dream themes. We'll come back with the dream themes. I always have a dream. What's your dream theme right now? My dream theme in this moment is probably a Fantasy Island pinball machine. And not like the remake, but the original Fantasy Island, which I've been watching a lot on Tubi. It is insane. But like Mr. Rourke and Tattoo and the plane. Come on. It's kind of shocking there isn't one. Come on. From the 80s? Mm-hmm. You have a Gilligan's Island. Yeah, give me Fantasy Island. Okay, Fantasy Island Pinball, dream theme. Yeah. Who's going to make it? I mean, all I keep thinking of in my head right now is what's the one with that, the helicopter that just got to the club? Rescue 911. Somebody re-theme that for me. Put a plane in there. Retheme a Rescue 911 as a fantasy island. I don't know. Yeah, I want it to look like I want it to. I don't want it to look new in slick. Okay. I want it to look like a like 80s, late 80s, early 90s pinball. I think Rescue 911 is a 90s. I think that's a 90s pin. Gottlieb System 3. I want it to look like that era, not necessarily a 70s because I want audio. You want an early 90s. Yeah, because I want to hear Mr. Rourke say, smile everyone, welcome to Fantasy Island. Do you want that on video or do you want like a DMD like? A DMD. Like a little graphic of that. Yeah, I just want, yeah. Like sort of looks like him. Mm-hmm. Okay. That'd be a good one. It's kind of surprising that there isn't one. I mean, it is a terrible show. Yeah, but I mean, is it any worse than like Charlie's Angels? Or, which are great but terrible, like Charlie's Angels has a pin. That's true. Gilligan's has a pin. It's better than Gilligan's. I think so. Yeah, why isn't there a Fantasy Island pinball? I think it was a hit show. Now I'm pissed. It was. I think there's seven seasons. I'm on season two, episode four. Yeah, so it's a hit show. Maybe somebody should do one. I don't think it's going to be a big seller. No, probably not. These days. I think Marshall might be about to bark at something. He sees a critter. He sees a critter outside. That's a good dream theme. Thanks. Fantasy Island. I like it. Like, I would buy it. Yeah. I think also Barrels of Fun could do that. Probably pretty good. Probably. But it would be like modern and fancy. No, but I, you know, I just kind of like, I want it to be kind of a little banged up. I just emailed this guy back. I can't remember what his name is. I wonder how far into it before he's like, because we've almost lost him a couple times it sounds like. So I, maybe we've lost him by now. Maybe he'll never hear this. He may not hear, he might not make it to 50 because I think he's in like the tens. Well, you should tell him when he gets to 50, there's a surprise. But you have to watch them all in order. Otherwise none of it will make sense. He was like, you almost lost me. He did not like my download content idea. I get it. I get it. I get it, too. You're just living in a fantasy world. It would be so cool if, like, years later, Venom's got stuff from the movies now you can get. I mean, it would never happen because of licensing, but it's a dream of a dream. Licensing would cost money, and then they would have to charge you for it, and then people would be mad because they could pay for it. And then even if they weren't, you'd accuse them of like, that would have been in the game, except they knew they could charge you for it. So they held it out. People would be mad as hell. Charge you for it later. It is a very slippery slope, probably in general. It was just a dream. Best left alone. It was just a dream. We had another comment on, it was our last video that featured Joe and Shelley Sharp about Transformers. One fella, he liked our show, but we're starting to lose him because we talk about Stern all the time and favor Stern all the time. Well, it was a Transformer launch about the launch. It was about the Transformers launch. But... I guess I did say in that episode that I preferred King Kong to Dune. But we do talk about Stern a lot. We do. And there's a big reason why. It's because from somebody that, I guess we're kind of operators, we have an HQ where people play our games, a lot of people that are not us. So we have a pinball establishment. We have pinball machines in the house. And of the games we own now, it's probably like 50-50. Stern and then like older games. Some are the older Sterns, but probably about half modern Stern and then half like Bally and Williams and Gottlieb. But we do not own a Barrels of Fawn and we don't own a Spooky and we don't own a Jersey Jack right now. With Barrels and Spooky there's a big reason. The big reason with Barrels and Spooky is that they're not accessible. Yeah, I would love to have a dune sitting right here. I would love to have a dune sitting right there. Yes. You can't get one. Well, we can't. You can't get one for MSRP. No. I would love to have an Evil Dead fill that hole where Led Zeppelin went. I'm not going to pay $15,000 for an Evil Dead. Well, they'd have a Beetlejuice right there. But I also can't get that. So we do like those games. And if we did have a full episode on the Beetlejuice or we hosted a launch tournament for that and we spoke highly of the game. It was super fun. Great game. And Dune is a fantastic game.
    32:44
    And even better is maybe Winchester Mystery House, which I would super love to have. We tried to get one. I tried to get we did try to get one. I called the place that had the one. Uh huh. Hmm. And that one, it was spoken for at the time. It was spoken for. Uh, I was one day late, it was flipping out. That's a long time. Like one day, a lot happened in that day. Yeah. But yeah, we tried, we did try on that one, but we just weren't quick enough. Yeah. Man, what the, I was just thinking of a dream theme last night and I've forgotten it, but it It was going to be Carl D'Angelo doing something and it was going to be perfect. Oh, it was revisiting the Twin Peaks dream theme. Has to be Barrels of Fun with Carl D'Angelo doing the layout. Has to be. I think we might say at the time, Spooky, and this is not a diss on Spooky, but it's a testament to the Winchester Mystery House pinball machine. That just gave me chills. In the majesty of that game. I think I would be too creeped out. And Deadpool has to do the sound.
    34:00
    It's creeping me out. If that happened, I wouldn't be able to play it alone at night. If there was even a rumor of this, it would instantaneously get on the list and pay whatever the price was. Take my money. So I don't think anybody from Barrels of Fun watches this show. That's the other thing with Stern. We have a lot of friends at Stern and they watch the show and they comment on the show. So that always makes you feel good to then talk about them. And then they comment. So that's nice. Franchi, I think, has seen his comments sometimes. Yeah, he lied in his comment. What did he say? All about the Planet of the Apes? He said they're definitely not doing Planet of the Apes, which is a lie. We all know it. Yeah, it might be 10 years from now, but it's happening. It's happening. And they would do justice to Twin Peaks, but I think Twin Peaks, so barrels of fun if anyone knows them. A Twin Peaks pinball machine designed by Carl D with the dirty pool on the sound will sell out faster than Winchester Mystery House
    35:17
    Yeah. If you're doing 550. Holy shit. It would sell out. You're selling 550 of those instantaneously. That's one that would make you poop your pants. Yes. The way I'm envisioning it is like way scarier. So whoever did the art for this one too needs to do that art. I don't know who did the art package. Was it the guy? For Winchester. Was it? I think. He did the wood. We need like a similar vibe.
    35:46
    Oh my God. I would want that so bad, but I wouldn't want it in my house. I feel like I would be like too freaked out about it. I'd want it in the house. I would be scared. It'd be so great. This has to get made. How do we make it happen? I don't know. That's the best idea I've heard. Let's see. Brad Albright did the art. Oh, I was right. That's the guy. Carl on the game design. Sound Jeff Dodson. That's Dirty Pool. I always forget his real name. I just call him Dirty Pool Pinball. Yeah. That's his channel. Yeah. So Jeff needs to do the sound, Carl needs to do the layout, and let's get Luke and Paul back on the engineering and mechanics. Why not? I mean, they did a great job. Hell of a job with Winchester. Luke, Paul, you're on the team. And Brad on the art. Let's go. Let's make that thing. Oh, my God. I'd freak out. I can't think of a pinball machine I would want more than that with that team.
    36:49
    No. I mean, it beats Fantasy Island. It smokes Fantasy Island. And it rivals like a Keith Elwin fallout to me in my brain. I mean, it beats it for me, but... It might beat it, like, you just know... That's a dream theme. That is a dream theme, my friend. Mm-hmm. Yeah, so ultimate dream theme, revisited, Twin Peaks. That guy's never gonna hear this. He's gonna, we're gonna, like, have offended him on, like, episode 12, and he's never gonna make it to 50. Maybe. Hard to know. Maybe he'll just keep emailing and I'll just keep writing them back. You should write them back and just say... Hang in there until episode 50. Or just skip to episode 50 and we'll win you back. Don't leave us without episode 50. Maybe he won't be able to stomach the stern shilling between episode 12 and episode 50. I mean, I feel like we have a relationship with Stern people, the people of Stern, because a company is just the people. Yeah. And I feel like we have developed friendships with those folks, and I guess we just haven't really had an opportunity to create friendships with people from the other companies. And, excuse me, I mean Stern has made most of my favorite pinball machines to play. So like it's not just shilling for the sake of shilling. Like, I own of the modern machines, one due to accessibility, like I can buy a Pro, use Pro for $5,000. I can't find a used Dune for $5,000 or a used Beetlejuice for $5,000. But I also love the way that the Stern games shoot. Like, I'm not gonna, like, change that opinion. Like, I love the way that, I still think a modern Stern, like, shoots the best of any of them. But I do want Carl D'Angelo and Barrels to do that, Twin Peaks. Yes, they're gonna do it. Like, I do want Spooky to do Planet of the Apes. They're gonna do it. And Goonies. Not if it's a wide body, I'm out. I'm not. You're not out. You're getting it. Wide body or non-wide body. Anybody. Just give me the body. I think Spooky would kill Planet of the Apes. And I would probably choose Spooky over Stern for a Planet of the Apes type deal. Oh, totally. I would choose Barrels over Stern for a Twin Peaks type deal. Because they can make it so freaking creepy. Because they just set a whole mood. The mood they create is so immersive. Really? Yeah. But for Fallout, like I'm good with Keith Elwin and Stern doing that one. It's gonna be awesome. I'm good with Sterndom Pokemon, Jaws. Like, yeah, we could use some new code, but I still love that game and you can still experience something brand new every time you scan and play, you might catch a guy not caught. I did yesterday. Yeah. So I think that my dream would be that, like, Barrels and Spooky could put the games out at a pace. I would love to paste anywhere near what Stern could do so that more people could experience them, more people could buy them. Yeah, that'd be cool.
    40:28
    Like I would love there to be more Barrels and Spookies on locations for all the people that can't buy pinball machines so they could go play them. Yeah, because the closest ones to us on location are like two plus hours away. Yeah. And I know a lot of people are that way. Yeah. So that's my dream for the pinball future is like barrels of fun and spooky pinball are like they don't have to crank out as many as Stern but like in maybe even if they could find a way to do this would probably be controversial but like like a pro model something more comparable to a pro model so that operators would be more They're not equipped to buy their machines. Because that's what Stern has going is they have the Pro that's thousands less than a Premium or a Barrels does one model. Spooky does one model essentially. You can upgrade the cabinet and such. But if they had like a slightly more stripped down model that was more of a Pro so that, And if they had a greater capacity to build them, you'd see more on location. I'd love to see more Spookies and Barrels of Fun on location. Me too.
    41:53
    Because I want to play them. And if they had those lower tier models, I'd probably buy those. Hmm. You know, that's mostly we buy the lower tier model. We do. Like these two are a couple of the only ones that we didn't do that. But usually I'm good with like a Stern Pro. Yeah. Except for Jaws, you need your 50th. It's awesome. And then Pokemon, it was like the art package and the stuff on the LE just was so much better to me. It's what you dreamed about. And it's totally unnecessary. And like a pro is fine.
    42:36
    It's fine. You know what? But man, if you could get like a Beetlejuice Pro for $7,000 and it was readily available, we'd have one. Oh, yeah. If you could get a Dune Pro for $7,000 and it was readily available, we would have had one months ago. So we'd have gotten to the Pinball and Perry that day and played it. And then like the next week we'd have said, what can we trade out to get that Doom? Yeah. You know? Yeah. So. Marshall agrees. Yeah. So we do have equal love of their, we love their games. And I love a Jersey Jack here and there. Yeah, me too. Except for I don't like Guns N' Roses. You can keep it. Except Guns N' Roses. You can keep it. I know it's like a whole, I know it's a really good value right now for those who want a concert experience in their living room, but that's not me. I don't like that limp dick plunge. And the Jersey Jacks are more available. Yeah, you can get those. You can get those. And I keep trying to get, because we're kind of maxed out on our pinball spending budget, but we have a fellow who's a member of the club, a guy named Nick. And Flippin' Out has this dialed in for sale. And we love dialed in. We love dialed in. And they've reduced the price a couple times and I screenshot it and I send it to them every time that happens. I know. I would love to have that. It's a great game. I'm like, Nick, it's getting to the point where you can't afford not to buy it. Get it, Nick. Love a dialed in. I would love to have an Elton John. Yeah. Elton John, the same deal though, there's not like a pro, it's not a pro model of that, so you're not getting an Elton John. I think the LE is like 10 grand plus still, so you're not getting an Elton John for, you know, used for 6,000 bucks or 5,500. But they did do that with the Potter. They did. And I don't think that lower tier really sold as well. No, but I think you see some in locations. That's cool. But I bet you Jersey Jack is probably like 80 or 90% homebuyer, probably 90%. I bet. Whereas like Stern is 70% the homebuyer. I bet Jersey Jack in Barrels and Spooky is probably in the 90s. Probably.
    45:05
    And I bet the arcade edition of Harry Potter probably mostly sold to operators. I bet you're right. But yeah, that's all I have. Okay. How about you? I think that's all I have. It's a 45 minute episode. It's a nice, good number. Perfect. Marshall, I think, needs to go outside. He just wanted to come on the show.
    45:27
    He just barged right in here. And he's like wedged in there. I know. He's being squeezed on both sides. I think he likes it. He's a baby.
    45:37
    Okay, well, thanks for watching. He's got a cold tongue touching my legs. I'm touching my leg. Thanks for watching everybody. We'll see you next week. Oh, and we're going to start putting these out on Wednesday. Yeah, it's going to be a Wednesday show now. Yeah, it's just easier. There's a lot of Pintivities coming up that recording on Sunday night and getting it out on Monday is just not going to be possible. So we're just going to allow ourselves to change the date. Now it's a Wednesday show. Yes, now it's a Wednesday show. Mark your calendars for Wednesdays. Wednesday mornings will release. For the Punk Rock Pinball podcast. And also I haven't forgotten about the Funhaus thing. I just need the audio juiced up. Some of the videos are on my phone right here. I gotta give ya. Yeah. So there's logistics with this. Yeah, we got some. There's file management. This is not our strong suit. But the Funhaus tips will be coming to an episode near you. In the meantime, let us know in the comments below what your tips would be for someone playing their first tournament. Right? Yeah. All right. See you next time. Toodaloo. Bye.