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Episode 16 - David Van Es (Barrels Of Fun Pinball) / Pokemon + Beetlejuice!

Nudgecast·podcast_episode·1h 33m·analyzed·Mar 3, 2026
7187ddf6-16c4-11f1-b278-bf7fe12ca918
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claude-haiku-4-5-20251001 · $0.033

TL;DR

Nudgecast explores 2026's major pinball releases and interviews David Van Ess on design, immersion, and Barrels of Fun's vision.

Summary

In this Nudgecast episode, hosts Ian Jacoby and Shane Toll discuss three recently released major pinball titles—Pokémon, Beetlejuice, and Winchester Mystery House—highlighting what they see as a historic moment for the hobby. Guest David Van Ess (CEO and Chief Mischief Maker of Barrels of Fun) shares his creative journey from Australian childhood through film and entertainment to pinball design, explaining how his love of immersive storytelling shapes Barrels of Fun's unique design philosophy.

Key Claims

  • Pokémon pinball just came out and is driving significant FOMO, with machines selling for $30,000+

    high confidence · Shane Toll discussing Pokemon and LE secondary market pricing

  • Beetlejuice features three scoops, is not a wide-body, has three flippers (with one in an unusual upper position), and includes a spinner mechanic that feeds into a scoop

    high confidence · Shane Toll describing gameplay details from hands-on play at Lit arcade

  • Beetlejuice includes a unique animation feature where flippers move to the beat during Deo multiball sequences

    high confidence · Shane Toll describing observed innovation in Beetlejuice code/mechanics

  • Winchester Mystery House has four flippers and includes a Pepper's Ghost display with a magnet behind it

    high confidence · Ian Jacoby describing Winchester Mystery House layout and features

  • Winchester Mystery House is more complex and similar in play style to Labyrinth than to Dune, both previous Barrels of Fun titles

    medium confidence · Ian and Shane comparing Winchester to other Barrels of Fun designs

  • David Van Ess is Australian-born but now based in Texas

    high confidence · Ian Jacoby introducing David Van Ess and subsequent conversation

  • David Van Ess is legally blind in his left eye, which prevented him from pursuing his childhood dream of being an Air Force pilot

    high confidence · David Van Ess recounting his personal history

  • 2026 could be a historic year for pinball with multiple major releases pushing the hobby toward mainstream

    medium confidence · Shane Toll opening commentary on the state of 2026 releases

Notable Quotes

  • “I think this could be a very historic year in pinball for all the new shit that's coming out”

    Shane Toll @ early episode — Sets the tone for viewing 2026 as a pivotal moment for pinball growth and mainstream potential

  • “when it does the deo multi ball it moves your flippers like to the beat... by the end it's going like bop like on your flippers it's like moving them for you to the beat as you're like playing”

    Shane Toll @ Beetlejuice discussion — Highlights Spooky's willingness to innovate with unusual mechanical/code features

  • “I think that's the innovation that I love about Spooky, though, they're not afraid to do absolutely wild stuff like that”

    Ian Jacoby @ post-Beetlejuice analysis — Frames Spooky's design philosophy as embracing unconventional, bold gameplay innovations

  • “we're just going to make shit happen, to be frank... we're just going to do it”

    David Van Ess @ Australia/Texas cultural comparison — Reveals Van Ess's personal design philosophy and entrepreneurial approach

  • “My very first dream was to be an Air Force pilot... they turned to me and said, oh, honey, like you can't do that. You're legally blind in one eye”

    David Van Ess @ biographical section — Explains a pivotal moment that redirected Van Ess toward creative/entertainment pursuits

  • “I walked through that front gate everything just melted away... from that point literally on the airplane... I started writing things what can I do at home to create worlds”

    David Van Ess @ Disneyland revelation discussion — Core origin story for Van Ess's philosophy of immersive, world-building entertainment design

  • “pretty much only Stern is doing fan layouts at this point”

    Ian Jacoby @ design trend analysis — Identifies Stern as an outlier in traditional flipper layout philosophy vs. boutique designers

  • “when you find the shots and you're going, yeah, it's really interesting. To me, that game is also doing a lot of the kind of Harry Potter stuff where... it's a spinning disc that has different ball paths depending on where it is”

Entities

David Van EsspersonIan JacobypersonShane TollpersonBarrels of FuncompanyStern PinballcompanyPokémon (Stern)gameBeetlejuice (Spooky)gameWinchester Mystery House (Barrels of Fun)game

Signals

  • ?

    product_launch: Three major pinball releases (Pokémon, Beetlejuice, Winchester Mystery House) are now in circulation with location placement and hands-on player availability

    high · Ian and Shane discuss playing all three games recently; Beetlejuice and Winchester at Lit arcade; Pokémon at Stern media event

  • $

    market_signal: Pokémon LE machines are selling in secondary market for $30,000+, indicating extreme collector demand and limited edition scarcity

    high · Shane Toll: 'people selling them for like $30,000 or whatever, it's like insane. I think that's all a really strong sign for what's to come'

  • ?

    design_innovation: Beetlejuice (Spooky) includes a novel feature where flippers move/sway to the beat during Deo multiball, representing unconventional code innovation

    high · Shane Toll detailed description of flipper movement during Deo multiball sequences synchronized to music

  • ?

    design_innovation: Winchester Mystery House uses a Pepper's Ghost display with integrated magnet behind it for ball control, combining visual spectacle with mechanical function

    high · Ian Jacoby: 'there's a Pepper's Ghost display in the back... there's like a little movie playing... and then also it can allow for free ranging... really fast... ball movement... you're almost never safe'

  • ?

    gameplay_signal: Winchester Mystery House initially perceived as very difficult by community, but experienced players find it flowy when shot placement is understood

    high · Ian Jacoby: 'all I'm hearing from people is, oh, the game is so hard... I actually found the game to be quite flowy'

Transcript

groq_whisper · $0.274

0:00
Need a pinball machine? Another pinball machine? Maybe some fat accessories like a topper or a shooter rod? Yes, you do. Hit up Jeff over at Mad Pinball for the best products and service, and use our promo code NudgeCast, and get a free exclusive t-shirt when you buy any game. And you also get free shipping on any new in-box stern. So many great games are out right now. Go pick one up. Hit up Jeff at MadPinball.com, and don't forget to tell them we sent you.
0:33
Holy shit! Guys, come and have a look at this. Holy shit! Let's go. A little bit more.
1:04
Hey, everybody. You're listening to NudgeCast, the official podcast of Nudge Magazine. That intro music you're listening to right now is the song Talking to Myself by Private Function. As always, I'm Ian Jacoby, the editor-in-chief and publisher of Nudge Magazine. With me is my co-host, Shane Toll of the band Silverstein and the Lead Singer Syndrome Podcast. Hey, Shane. Hey, man. How's it going? good very good for me i got to play a lot of new games uh in the last like three days so yeah man it's like you know the very beginning of 2026 and i'm not the first person to say this but i think this could be a very historic year in pinball for all the new shit that's coming out and we don't always talk about new games on here like that's not really the focus of what we do on this podcast but i do think it's important to bring up some of them because man there are some rippers like you know coming out and you know some games that have been out like we know about but are just kind of like arriving at arcades now you know totally no we don't break a lot of like new game stuff but this does feel sort of like a movement or moment in time for pinball where it's like the potential is there truly to kind of push the hobby if not like break it out but at least push it a little more into the mainstream than it is because um yeah just having pokemon Pokemon just came out. You and I and Ellie got to go play that at Stern. And then we have already talked about, but we'll talk about now, I got a chance to play Winchester Mystery House. And then I also got a chance to play Beetlejuice, which is making its way out there even onto locations.

Shane Toll @ Winchester Mystery House mechanics — Describes a key innovative mechanical feature in Winchester's design

Labyrinth (Barrels of Fun)game
Dune (Barrels of Fun)game
Spooky Pinballcompany
Litvenue
Carl D'Angeloperson
Retro Ralphperson
Tanya (Stern code designer)person
Nudge Magazineorganization
Mad Pinballcompany
Private Functionperson/artist
Silversteincompany/band
Electric Batvenue
D82venue
Jersey Jack Pinballcompany
  • ?

    design_philosophy: Stern continues to use traditional fan (two-flipper) layouts, while boutique manufacturers (JJP, Spooky, Barrels of Fun) have moved toward three and four-flipper designs

    high · Ian Jacoby: 'pretty much only Stern is doing fan layouts at this point... the only... Of those three games, the only... And Stern has done a couple fan layouts for sure'

  • ~

    sentiment_shift: Community sentiment reflects belief that 2026's release slate could push pinball into broader mainstream consciousness through iconic IP (Pokémon) and high-quality design

    high · Shane Toll: 'I think this could be a very historic year in pinball... the potential is there truly to kind of push the hobby if not like break it out but at least push it a little more into the mainstream'

  • ?

    design_philosophy: David Van Ess's philosophy centers on creating immersive, world-building experiences inspired by Disneyland and film; shapes Barrels of Fun's design ethos

    high · David Van Ess: 'how can I do at home to create worlds... when you walk into disneyland and it's a world like i'm in the world... from that point... I started writing things what can I do at home to create worlds'

  • ?

    product_strategy: Uncertainty about whether Barrels of Fun will continue with collaborative design (Labyrinth/Dune) or move to dedicated single designers (Carl D'Angelo for Winchester) moving forward

    medium · Ian Jacoby: 'I wonder what they're going to do in the future with design. Are they going to continue to do some of the team effort stuff, or are they going to have dedicated designers like Carl doing the games moving forward?'

  • ?

    venue_signal: Lit arcade in Minneapolis is exceptionally positioned to receive new games quickly due to proximity to Spooky Pinball; offers unique game combination unavailable elsewhere

    high · Shane Toll: 'I think Lit is like no place in the world... I think the games that they get at Lit, they both get the nicest games, and they also get them right away'

  • ?

    personnel_signal: David Van Ess moved from creative director role at Spooky Pinball to CEO/Chief Mischief Maker at Barrels of Fun, leading first three games

    high · Introduction: 'Before that, he was the creative director for Spooky Pinball'; David is now at Barrels of Fun

    • 2:43
    So, yeah, it was pretty crazy. But I did want to pick your brain because we went together. You watched me take my awkward pictures of Pokemon. What were your thoughts? You're more of a Pokemon guy than I am. So I love the game. I think it's perfect for what it is, for what it needs to be, and where pinball can go. I think that's the biggest thing. It's a very simple fan layout. It's nothing new, but it's got fun toys in it, and I think the code is going to put this thing over the top, especially for people that are just getting into it or people like me that are obviously very, very into pinball. I own a lot of machines. I've played a lot of games. I've played just about everything. But I'm excited for this game because I do love Pokemon. I do love playing Pokemon Go and catching Pokemon like that on my phone. And now this is kind of like an extension of that for me a little bit, being able to do it on a pinball machine and whatever else they're going to add. I'm still unclear about like, oh, are you going to have to go to other places to catch certain Pokemon? Or are they going to do like limited time Pokemon? Or is it just going to be random? And are there going to be shiny Pokemon? And like all these different kinds of things that are – There are still a lot of questions. A lot of questions. But I like the way that they're rolling this out. And I think the excitement you've seen people have, like the FOMO for El Ebes right now. For example, people selling them for like $30,000 or whatever, it's like insane. I think that's all a really strong sign for what's to come. Yeah, it's interesting. I mean for me, the layout, I did think there's some new stuff to it. It's fun because I think it shows the versatility of pinball in that like many of these ideas have been tried before in some capacity. But still, none of them have been put together exactly like this, right? Like I loved having a kind of the jet pack ramp return essentially on like the left orbit. Yeah, it's very Stranger Things too. Yep, exactly. And I've talked about – and it's a really satisfying shot. I mean just like genetically. I love those. And it felt like the flippers obviously were good, which is great. Even on days where they're getting hammered on those media days some days, like stern flippers always are nice and hold up. So I love that. And I think like kind of having the Meowth, I understand it's kind of like Junkyard. It is different, like how it behaves and in that area with like having the magnet and then having the – I've talked about this in our article about it. But I really dug that that return is essentially like up the middle. It comes back on a right orbit, you know, that shot. It's really like a pretty versatile shot. There's like some gated things happening there where I think it's holding the ball and stuff too. So it's just like there's a lot going on up there, and the way it's kind of being utilized is different, I think, than what we've seen. And ultimately this game, right, it's going to succeed, and it will succeed on theme. But in terms of like how it succeeds with pinball players, I think a lot of that is going to be up to the code. And I'm psyched on that. I think they have a really good team. I mean, Tanya has done a lot of cool shit with Foo Fighters and a bunch of other stuff. and the new guys they have on the team have already done some cool work and they're really into Pokemon. So I don't want to belabor it too much because we should talk about some of these other games as well. No, no, for sure, for sure. But just to add, I mean, I think the left ramp scoop, that is a pretty cool idea to have the scoop in the ramp. That's not something that you see all the time and for that to be the way you catch the Pokemon and really like the gigantic sculpts. Like I know most people have not seen this game in person yet. Right. But like, and the pictures don't really do it justice. Like when you walk up to this game. All right, fuck off. From across, well, not your pictures always do. But when you walk in and you see, like when you walk into the room and you see this game, the first thing you see is a gigantic Pikachu, a gigantic Pokeball and they're really glossy, really shiny. Totally. And they're just going to draw people in. And I think that that was such a smart choice because seeing it next to Star Wars Fall of the Empire and seeing how dinky the toys in that are comparatively to Pokemon, that was an intentional thing they did.
    7:18
    Across a crowded arcade, you will be able to tell a Pokemon obviously by the backlash, but just looking at the play field, it's very apparent walking up to it. There's a huge Pokeball. There's a huge Pikachu. There's a Meowth. I don't know that Meowth is necessarily bringing in anyone but total freak-a-leeks. Right. Yes.
    7:37
    If you're really into Meowth, goddammit, we got you too, you weirdos. First self-report to the authorities, but then after that, go play some Pokemon pinball. So then you had a chance this weekend, I guess you were in Minneapolis, and is it Lit? Lit got both Winchester and Beetlejuice. I am so lucky. I was just saying this to someone there because I think Lit is like no place in the world. Like all due respect everywhere else, like definitely like Electric Bat, you know, D82. There are all these places that have tons of awesome games. But I think the games that they get at Lit, they both get the nicest games, and they also get them right away. I'm so lucky. I texted Retro Ralph after I got a chance to play Beetlejuice, and I was like, this is the score you got to beat. Because, spoiler alert, I got $686 million, and I only played one game. I actually stopped after that. I was like, yo, I'm good, actually. um but but which was like a pretty high score but but ralph was like uh oh i don't even get mine you know for a couple weeks or something like that i'm like it's such a like a privilege that i like this is what i love about location play right is like it kind of evens the playing field so yeah they have so they have a they they have a winchester mystery house which i got a chance to play they got a beetle juice and there's a bond 60th like all within like 20 feet of each other You're just like, wow, like nowhere else in the world, you know, really? Could you find that combo probably? No, and yeah, I mean, that's a great spot. And I think I'm sure being, you know, in Minnesota too, they get stuff a little bit quicker from, you know, from Spooky being only a state over. So that's also terrific. But let me ask you a couple questions about the game. So Beetlejuice, I mean, I really was intrigued by the layout. It looked like a lot of fun to shoot. But you said you had one game on it and you moved on. Is it a really easy game? Was the game just set up kind of easy? Were the shots wide open? How did it feel? I was just on one for that. But, no, it's cool. The thing that was most notable to me, like, I watched a bunch of games on it. I only played the one because, honestly, it took a long time. Yeah. I felt good. Like, I was actually satisfied on it. But I think having three scoops in it was surprising to me. I didn't realize that there were three scoops, and maybe they don't want me to say, like – but also I also didn't realize it's not a wide body, which I like. It's like more of a – it's more of a traditional shooter. It has three flippers, but where the third flipper is placed is really interesting. It's not exactly an upper play field, but it sort of functions that way.
    10:22
    You know, like having the – it's basically the waiting area up there. And to get it up there, okay, here's the one really tight shot for me that I had trouble finding was on the left orbit.
    10:34
    To get up into that area from there, there's a couple different ways into that area. There's actually a really cool, like, you shoot it up and there's like a spinner, like a freestanding spinner that also kind of, it actually reminds me a bit of Avengers, the early Avengers that we had played. Oh, yeah, the wild, wild, wild layout. Exactly, but having kind of this freestanding spinner that goes – it's so cool because if you nail this spinner, it goes directly into the scoop also. Like you can snipe both, and sometimes the spinner will be to juice a point total for the scoop shot. You know what I mean? So if you rip it, you're like – you get a ton of stuff, and then it goes pop, and it like hits in there. But so this game has three scoops, so you're like, shit, is it going to play slow? Absolutely not. It plays fast as fuck. Like it's good. It's flowy. um the only jank to it honestly for me a bit uh and i didn't explore the code as much for this because it seemed like a dangerous area but the sandworm stuff like i did not explore that much but i'll tell you this like in terms of like you know it's so cheesy i actually kind of hate it when people are like magic moments in pinball and blah blah blah but like i think that's overrated i think a magic moment in pinball is like when i'm kicking ass at fucking pinball you know um so i don't care but i will say dude when it does the deo multi ball i it moves your flippers like to the beat did you know that like oh no no i didn't after so it starts like normal and just one thing's kind of like swaying and it sways to the beat and then everything is like swaying and then by the end it's going like bop bop bop bop bop like on your flippers it's like moving them for you to the beat as you're like playing and then it just like oh that's crazy that's the The innovation that I love about Spooky, though, they're not afraid to do absolutely wild stuff like that. And that can't be that hard to do. It's just that they're always so outside the box and so next level with some of the things they do. I love that about the company. I'm super stoked about that. I remember one of the first times I played Adam's Family and it like da-na-na-na-na, and the flippers just go click, click. And I was like, that was like a magical moment right there for me, too. And it's a tiny, tiny thing. So a hundred percent and they utilize. Yeah, you're right. They utilize everything in the game like they use. He utilized the knocker more than anyone by far. Oh, yeah. Like a trade. And that is definitely in this game as well. Obviously, like there's a lot of good kind of like Beetlejuice knock moments. But also, I'll just say this, like, dude, the the lighting in it is beautiful. like it's it's like stunningly beautiful like the um area up top where there's kind of like the deformed face lady like you know what i mean though like anima like she's like a it's like a muppet from the movie or whatever that like next to her that sign that is like golden and red it's just like yeah i want to take you sign yeah dude it's so like pretty like it it just um it's really just beautiful like and and and the the light show in the game is just really um yeah it was stunning for sure it's a it's a beautiful game it's definitely uh yeah it was really fun to play i had obviously a lot of fun on it but i was bragging to everyone obviously on that score so and then yeah got a chance speaking of in of speaking of innovation like fucking who else is innovating like this but winchester mystery house also was yeah and you've got a chance you've got a chance to play that a little bit i did yeah i mean this is this a perfect lead into our you know our guest this week with david vaness who is the the head the the he's got some funny title doesn't he uh ceo and i think chief mischief maker or something mischief maker yes chief mischief maker i did get a chance to play this game i played it actually kind of a while ago now because i played it at uh a skogi um out in in la and i guess games early because they do and i think i mean obviously that's carl uh d'angelo his you know the designer of the games like kind of home base so i think that's part of why they got the first one and yeah i mean i had a great game on that too when i played it nice um a couple great games i really enjoyed it and then And after I played it, because I feel like I was one of the first people to play it, really, being on the West Coast, all I'm hearing from people is, oh, the game is so hard. It's so hard. These shots are way too tight. And I actually found the game to be quite flowy and quite fun, and I thought it was beautiful like all barrels games. How did you find it? Well, it's funny. Probably somewhere in between those things because it did take me a second to find the shots. I got to play a bunch of games on this. I was actually so like, dude, the best part about Beetlejuice being on location is guess what? No one's like like not no one of still a bunch of people want to play. But like I got to play Winchester and take like tons of pictures of it. Like, yeah, yeah. You know what I mean? I was like, fuck. Yes. Like it was so fun. It is flowy when you find the show. I think it's kind of like we're entering this really great era with games where if you're a really good player, the game plays with you. You know what I mean? So when you find the shots and you're going, yeah, it's really interesting. To me, that game is also doing a lot of the kind of Harry Potter stuff where – sorry, excuse me. There's like a spinning disc that has different ball paths depending on where it is. Yeah. Super cool. And it just – it makes – yeah, I think the hardest part about that game for me is getting my eyes up because it's a four-flipper game. I guess I didn't realize it was a four-flipper game until I was playing it. But then I was like, oh, damn. There's one buried in the back left there kind of, right? It reminds me a little bit of – But it has some important shots up there. Yeah. It's cool. Yeah. Yeah, TCM is a game like that too. It has kind of a flipper that's easy to forget about in the top left. So, yeah, I totally get that. I mean I love the layout, and I think it's beautiful. and I think some of the features in that game were really, really awesome too. But the layout is really innovative in that. Like we should talk to Carl at some point because I think understanding how the ball paths go with a four flipper game is just like totally interesting to me because they can do so much. So like there's a Pepper's Ghost display in the back. We've talked about it before. Basically like if you guys want to think about it, it's like a little movie theater box almost. Yeah. Like inside that there's like a little movie playing and the movie is almost, it's 3D because it has this like transparent glass effect on it and so back there also is a magnet so any like kind of orbit shot that you're shooting on this thing like it can hold it or not hold it if it you know if you've if you've qualified a magnet thing it'll hold it and kind of like do stuff with the screen or whatever yeah but then also it can allow for free ranging like really fast you know ball ball movement as well so that you you're almost never safe uh when you're playing the game it plays fast uh which is cool but what i really liked about it code wise was you can relight that left out lane like very frequently which is important because it will drain left a lot but it will give you like the bounce back and the way that you do it is you hit a specific shot And once you've hit that shot, it immediately has that lane. You can relight it very quickly.
    18:11
    But yeah, it's a really interesting game. I had a lot of fun on it. Like I said, I think I learned about myself that four-flipper games are tough for me because I'm so trained to stay bottom third with my concentration. That's like really tracking the ball. you know like not um that that that is really that's when i'm playing my best so it's sometimes it's hard for me to get my eyes up but definitely it's worth it when you get your eyes up in that game because not only is there a lot of valuable shots but um yeah the the the locking mechanisms are cool and and all that too so yeah i think it's a great game it's a little bit more in my opinion you tell me on this like yeah so if i was if i was comparing if i'm like uh so there's the genre of labyrinth and there's the genre of dune at barrels of fun like those two different type of games yeah to me plays a little more like if we were thinking about a traditional like stern layout it has a little bit more of that and labyrinth is a little more complex and like labyrinth right like it kind of plays like a labyrinth um this is closer to labyrinth i would say okay than it is to um dune i think i would i think i would agree with that yeah i think dune has a little bit, maybe it's a little more wide open some of the shots, a little more easier, a little more flowy. Whereas when you're playing Labyrinth, a lot of times I've played it quite a bit now, so I do know kind of where the ball's going, but I remember the first couple times I played it, it was a bit confusing.
    19:42
    And some of the shots are pretty tight on that game, too. So I could see that. But in a way, I kind of feel like all three of those games are kind of their own thing, but they do sort of have something that's connecting them, which is cool because we didn't get too much into this with David Van Ness, and I think we're going to have to have him back on the show, honestly. But I wonder what they're going to do in the future with design. Are they going to continue to do some of the team effort stuff, or are they going to have dedicated designers like Carl doing the games moving forward? And that's something I'd be really interested to see how they're going to approach that, and if that's It's something that will, you know, if they want their games to be different and all over the place. And are they going to do a fan layout? Because that's the thing. Pretty much only Stern is doing fan layouts at this point. That's true, yeah. Yeah, that's actually really funny. Of those three games, the only... And Stern has done a couple fan layouts for sure. Yeah, that is interesting. I don't think Jersey Jack has ever done one. I don't think Spooky has done one. Maybe never. well tna a lot of people think tna is one but it's not it has the upper upper play field evil dead is almost one it is almost one because it's got the funny little the like many flip yeah the sling flipper so i would say that one because basically you can hit all the shots in that game with the bottom two flippers but true yeah that's true is alice cooper i think that's two flipper um it's been a long time since i played it they've they've done two flipper games but point taken like mostly these and that's interesting not recently they haven't no for sure and like boutique companies it does seem like they're really putting like three flippers is like there's a lot going on then for sure so yeah it was really interesting i mean dude yeah let's get into it with david because i think people are going to want to hear it's just it's fun to hear him talk because he's obviously really excited about not just pinball but like the creative process, like he's really smart guy. Um, and he's like just done a lot of different stuff. So, and he told us about it. He's a smart man. He's a Renaissance man. Here he is. Mr. David Vaness of barrels of fun. Pitbull.
    22:11
    Oh, yeah. Our next guest is the CEO and chief mischief maker at Barrels of Fun, whose first three games, Labyrinth, Dune, and now Winchester Mystery House, have made waves thanks to their non-traditional IP, interesting designs, and emphasis on immersion. Before that, he was the creative director for Spooky Pinball and has worked in film and the entertainment industry for decades. Please welcome to the show David Van S. Hey, David. Hey David Wow that a crazy introduction there Wow now you make me feel old No you just done a lot of stuff Like I gotta cram it in there as you know you gotta get your flowers. Like, this is the one place you're gonna get them, so. No, I've got more flowers to come. Let's hold off until I'm dead. Oh word, I love that actually. Wow. You are kind of the perfect, okay, we'll get past the Australian thing, but I do want to get into it because I'm actually low-key obsessed with Australia. Like, we don't get many Australians on here. So I wanted you to compare and contrast a little bit now because you're famously a Texan right now. Like, y'all are in Texas. I guess there is some similarity, I feel like, between Australians and Texans. Do you feel any similarities in culture? Well, I feel like the Australians and the Texans have kind of got, like, we're just going to make shit happen, to be frank. Yes. It's just like, we're just going to do it. Australians, they all like to wander. They just go and do their own thing.
    23:50
    So I feel like the Texans are kind of very similar to that. Very famous, if you're in Texas, you'll see at least one T-shirt at least once a week that says, I wasn't born in Texas, but I got here as soon as I can.
    24:03
    So it's like they are very, very proud people, just like Australians are. Yeah. But we like adventure. We want to go out. Like even my father, who is a Dutchman, he got on a boat right after World War II and went down to Australia. And then, you know, they settled down there. And then his son, you know, with 22, moves to the U.S. So we tend to like to wander. I didn't know that you moved so young. I did know you went to film school. So were you like writing scripts or were you in production? What was kind of your background there? Dude, my very first dream was to be an Air Force pilot. And I was, I don't know how old I was. And I'm actually legally blind in my left eye. And so I wrote down on my quiz, like because during school back in the 90s, you would have to go through and write down what you want. And we used to go for newspapers of like what courses you wanted to be down the road. So the first thing I put down was Air Force pilot. And like they turned to me and said, oh, honey, like you can't do that. You're legally blind in one eye. You got to have 20-20 vision. And that kind of spun me out because I was like, well, if I can't do that, I'm going to be a magician. Like I just went the opposite direction of like I'm just like – because at that time I was watching, you know, Tony Curtis, Houdini. I was getting into magic. I was like, well, that's what I want to do, just like a kid would say. So ever since then, I wanted to entertain people. I wasn't a very good student until I started. A very good teacher in high school realized my writing was bad. I'm left-handed.
    25:51
    I was very creative, but I just struggled in regular academics. And we had an assessment to put in, and he was like, David, why don't you shoot a video? Instead of writing your essay, make a video of it. That was the first time I got like an A, you know. What year was that? That was year 10. Okay. So like 19... No, I didn't. Years, like I mix up my 90s and 80s. I just, you know, I know what I love. Don't make him date himself, yeah. The reason that I ask, though, I feel like your age shooting a video for a project seems like kind of a very untraditional thing to do at the time. No, well, my dad bought a VHS when he had a big shoulder piece. We went to Disneyland for the first time. I think it was 1993. And I experienced – so this is when I was exploring movies and stuff like that. And I had a lot of just little family things going on. And then my first experience going to Disneyland when I was 12 years old, the movie came to life to me. I've been escaping into movies. My first memories of movies was Clash of the Titans, Gremlins, Ghostbusters. I love movies, and I've always wanted to escape into those worlds. I was the kid, every Friday night, I was in the VHS store. we would get six weekly videos for $12, would go and get a pizza or fish and chips, and that night, typically most of my friends would only watch two films. I would burn for those six films by Saturday morning. I would just go for it, right? And I was also the kid that would get... My parents would not let me watch certain things, but the best thing about the 80s and 90s, a lot of the filmmakers realized that they turned the horror covers into a cartoon, aka creep show uh meet the feebles uh all that stuff i could put that with say um uh the goonies in a stack of the and they'll just look at the cover and go okay we're good to go because they want to get out because they want to get home right so that's how i got into horror films because i was able to watch these really bad horror films like beverly hills vamp like just rabid grandmas like have you ever watched any of that it's just like i'll slip all that stuff in so i just went down this rabbit hole of really films and so forth so and i don't know how we got here but again i went to disneyland when i was 12 years old that was when it clicked the creative aspect of wow like movies are in this two-dimensional world now i walk into disneyland and it's a world like i'm in the world everything that was really i didn't realize how troubled i was until I walked into Disneyland and then I left because when I walked through that front gate everything just melted away melted away and then the realities of after spending my time there immersing myself into all these different stories and how you can tell stories in a physical world when I left that the sense of the real world came over me and then from that point literally on the airplane because I was going to Europe with my dad I started writing things what can I do at home to create worlds, you know, to the point where it's like, I can make a star trip, a star tour ride if I can strap on two CRT TVs, one on the front in front of me, two on the side, and I can put three VHS players in there. I could do the death trench run like I'm actually there. Like, I just like, that's where my mind went. It's like, how can I make that world happen for me at home wow so yeah so i gotta ask at that point were you playing pinball at all at that age was that something in your life at all so pinball i found pinball at the video store so there was always a street fighter to their a tmt uh foreplay because that was what got me into playing arcade because the turtles was a big thing for me in the simpsons but they had like a judge dread a terminator 2 that's when i got exposed to it so i would play it because there's always be a free credit on there so i would always because again i wasn't rich so like if i saw a free credit i'm taking i don't care what machine it's on you know it was even better do that yep um so it's like oh terminator 2 i love that film saw it in the theater i want to play the game i want to experience it so i guess the short end of this whole story it was that experience of experiencing a the film was a two two-dimensional world where i wanted to write a script for my friend then experiencing the ultimate immersion which was disneyland and then like how can i make those feelings happen again in my day-to-day life like i have so many sketches of what i could have designed my parents property into and stuff like that so um this is stuff i actually haven't never actually really talked about out loud but like i'd always would find ways of like how can i tell a story and i guess that bled over into my schoolwork and that's when the teacher realized well why don't you give that a go right so um yeah so i just you know that was a weird project because i was mismatching have you ever seen the movie west craven's shocker no all right so basically it's um a dude that gets electrocuted and he travels through electricity and he's a serial killer oh nice um okay so i mishmash clips from that into a new story of a article that was happening in our area so i was mishmashing is that type of weird stuff um so from that point very post-modern it's like very so from that point i got to hanging out with uh my friends we always talk about movies but we never really did anything and at that time how i got into pinball was i was working for my dad during the summer holidays and he is a kind of an entrepreneur himself he wants to inspire me to do stuff plus he also wanted free labor so he wanted to like hey if you come and work with me i will pay you money plus if you have an idea for a business you want to do i will match you 50 50 on it so i'm exposed to vhs's i'm exposed to arcade machines i'm going through the trade post of things that you can buy because dad was like what can you buy and what can you flip like what can you do with this what can you do with that and there was a whole section that was like arcade machines and pinball machines so my dad didn't care but he wanted to entertain me because he wanted the free labor again and so we eventually went to go and get a video tabletop machine and in the corner and the far side was a data east star wars being me being a star wars gig because i want to look at that i go over look at it and my dad's like well how much is it and that guy said it was like eight hundred nine hundred dollars and he goes well david you don't have that type of money because he's been counting my money as i'm working it and he didn't realize i was also working for my grandma picking fruit so i was like dad i've got four hundred dollars he's like no you don't and i pulled it out and he's like oh crap so that's how i ended up with a data a star wars machine wow Oh, man. That was your first game? That's such a vibe game. That's my first game that I put into a pizza shop. And that's where the locations started happening. But, again, I was only attracted to these machines because I fell in love with the movies. And it wasn't about how cool these games played. I just wanted to be Luke Skywalker. Like, when I shot that Death Star for the first time, I was Luke fucking Skywalker. And I wanted all my friends to experience that. So every machine after that was Talisman of the Crypt, Doctor Who, Twilight Zone. I wasn't buying games because they were going to earn well on location. It's like I wanted to own the games that I wanted, the movies I wanted to be in. So you didn't have a road show?
    33:59
    No. Honestly, though, you're entering into a great, like that was a great time for that, I think. Like those games, like sometimes the code isn't great, but always the immersion is super cool. Like, even Nightmare on Elm Street, like, all those games have just such crazy kind of – I mean, even that Star Wars, like, kind of takes some shit, but it's got the moving R2. It's got – I actually love – my favorite thing about that game is the, like, discified, like, Star Wars themes that they put in there. It's, like, so good, but, yeah, amazing. It's not a hot take to say that's the best Star Wars game ever made. It's not that hot a take. It's beautiful art. obviously i have an infinity for it because of what it did for me but i i just have a soft spot i actually have another soft spot for mandalorian so here's a hot take because i know a lot of people hate that game um i love it and the reason i love it is my kids got into star wars but they weren't like i was into star wars yeah right they would watch them they'd enjoy them but they weren't like me the day that we watched mandel moran together i saw my 12 year old self like going this this is the shit and that was like okay i need to get this game for the boys you know i'm glad that i wanted it too but it was like that moment of i don't care if the game's good or bad but if i get an emotional reaction to it now that i think about it it's kind of why the barrels exist i want to create worlds i want people to experience stuff and it may be the stuff that you don't like but when you taste it you may actually enjoy it like i used to go to the movie theaters um at the end of the summer in the u.s in australia and by the way i think i've almost been in the u.s longer than australia now which is going to be sad for my parents to hear but they would run a 25 ticket you could go to the movie theater from 9 a.m to the morning until closing i would not see movies for the whole summer because i would just live in the movie theater and i saw some of my favorite films i saw because i had no choice like i was wanting to see this film at four but i had to get a movie because i want to get the best value i had to go to the two o'clock of whatever michael so i can see the movie i want and then all of a sudden i was like holy shit michael's a really cool film you know like you've got to try stuff you know and that's kind of like my approach to the pinball licensing is like i want to be very diverse i want people to be able to have very different experiences you may not be a fan of the ip but you may be a fan of pinball so if the game plays good with a really cool immersive thing maybe we can get some synergy across those you know it's really um it's it's really like interesting to hear you talk about this because there is like there is such a through line with what you're talking about now and kind of where barrels has gone specifically is like like when you're talking even about you want to be a magician i'm like thinking in the back of my head that is pinball also right is like a repeatable like a repeatable process that is like rote that has to happen the exact same way every time but you're distracting the people and a magic moment like happens that takes them out where you're just like whoa like that is like at its best moments pinball is like yo where'd the ball go how'd it do that like you know we can talk about we'll talk about winchester but you know having Pepper's ghost in there, like all that kind of stuff is just, it's such a through line of, you're right. It's like the ultimate escapism. It's like, you're escaping, like you are in a movie, but you have some like interaction with it. If not control, then like you, it feels like control almost. It's, it's mimicking that stuff, which is, it's just like, I was the same kind of kid as you, where it's like, I, you know, I was working really hard also, but I also just wanted to um movies were an escape for me i feel like i grew up in rural wisconsin so like that feels as far away from la as australia you know what i mean like there's not really too much difference there so um do you i i want to know though because you're such a movie guy do you still get you're like also super busy like do you still like get a chance to go to movies or not too much anymore no so when i went to film school and by the way i grew up in lindswood south australia we had 70 kids in our school like it was a small town now we're only 40 minutes from the city but it was a small town um but when i went to film school so after i did all that and there was no real film schools in my town and i met with a guy that was working at a twilight zone which is basically an arcade in australia a very popular arcade back in the day and i was spending so much time they're playing i made friends with this guy called david code and he actually went to a makeup school now he went to makeup school for film because he wanted to make horror films but they don't make horror films really in australia i mean there was the boom of the expectations from the 70s and the 80s which was just one giant tax scam which honestly was the was one of the best thing for the most creative filmmakers out there in australia at the time but it literally was a scam of you give me a hundred percent we throw there are stories of uh lawyers taking suitcases of money thrown in sydney harbor and then they get 110 tax break on it so they were making 10 on that money right um but that's how you get all the exploitation films coming out you know mad mac all those films all came from uh razorback came from these uh exploitations of the tax system um but when i was growing up they were making historical australian dramas and there's some amazing ones there but as a kid i'm watching evil dead maniac you know monster squad like i like why are they making movies i want to see i want to see brain dead i want to see this stuff so i'm playing arcades in twilight zone and i get talking to him and he goes hi i'm doing a course in makeup oh really it's like man like and then we find out we love evil dead together and was like, well, we should make our own film. But there were no schooling that really led to that type of filmmaking. And we start this conversation and he rings me up on Saturday afternoon and he goes, David, in the newspaper, there's a stunt school opening up in Queensland near Warner Brothers Studios. You should go and do that because if you do that, we could get it in at Warner Brothers and we're going to have stunts in our films and we need someone to know how to do stunts so why don't you go and do that? And I was like, fuck yeah, I'll do that. can i just pause one second because you're really jogging something in my memory so i watch a ton of jackie chan movies was this started by a guy who was in jackie chan movies was that stunt school i actually trained yeah so it was that guy's crazy that guy's life was crazy he was like a he was a bodyguard for like rolling stones or like any of those people when they come through if you haven't seen it there's a great documentary about this guy i can't believe you went to that school that's wild to me so it was just like well we're gonna need a stunt person so let's go and figure it out and then we we can move on so i went up to the stunt academy uh so i've been hit by cars lit on fire shot four buildings um and i actually got offered to be a armorer for the warner brothers movie studio as a like an apprenticeship and as i was wrapping that up the australian film International Film School of Australia opened up in Adelaide. So at that point, it was like, okay, well, I know how to do some stunts now. So let me go back to Adelaide because that's obviously where my family was, and I'll go to film school. And that's when I went to film school and learned producing, directing. It was a very hands-on school with people from the industry. So that's actually where I learned the nitty-gritty of actually production itself. Crazy. All because we just want to make stupid crap. well that's how it happens I mean that's how nudge happened too you know it was like I want to connect with my friends and do fun stuff and do things that I'm not seeing um you know represented elsewhere and like that's cool I love pinball for like the all the different kind of views of it but I was like to me it was like you know arcades to me were kind of like gritty places where kids hung out and like kind of ne'er-do-wells hung out like people with like nothing better to do and it reminded me of like skate culture and so I want to do kind of you know when you look at nudge you're like oh that makes sense as it's like escape magazine but it's about pinball you know so those like seeds that are planted in those times like especially creative seeds i feel like they just they they really can manifest in certain people uh you know later in life so and i don't i know you've like kind of told your origin story a bit in pinball some but so how where does the connection with i guess it must be charlie from spooky or how how did you enter into pinball then And you're such a kind of licensing pro. That was like how you were known, I think, initially, right? It's like you were the guy. But how did you get hooked up there?
    43:12
    So actually, I want to go back to your point. You were talking about skate culture and like arcades being seedy. And it just brought me up like in Adelaide. There's a place called Hindley Street. It's still there today. And I just realized like there were basically three arcades down there, like the big famous ones that were down there. downtown uh meridian and twilight zone time zone sorry but there are at least four strip joints and bars in the same on the same street so you'd literally go from a strip joint to an arcade to a bar and repeat this over again so you're 100 right like it's like there were kids playing mortal combat right next to a strip joint right it's kind of this gritty and like i i get why pinball in general is like you know um especially certain manufacturers they really want to emphasize the kid like family-friendly part of it i get that i'm just saying there is a different you know like when you play kind of some of the like there are even games from that era they're a little grittier so it's it's fun it's really fun for me to see some of that like leaking in and i wouldn't say even barrels doesn't really have anything too suggestive or like crazy but at the same time you are kind of hitting like labyrinth is an interesting ip it's like something that is atypical it's not kind of um it's not just disney or it's not just like you know i i don't know so like you're pulling from some of those kind of even tangential sort of like esoteric i even dune which is a huge franchise i think it's not always like the first one that people are thinking when they're like pinball you know and then you see it exactly kind of what you said you're like you give them a taste and you're like oh i actually that taste really works for me so well no but this is good because you guys are bringing up things i don't even think about like i haven't thought about heinle street forever apart from there was a really seedy street street in the 80s and 90s and like kids were hanging out there because that was where the dodgem cars and the arcades were you know and The lock-in sessions. I mean, our parents used to take us to the arcade. They would pay $12 and lock us in there for three hours so they could go and do whatever they want. Totally. They had lives. It's huge.
    45:27
    Talking about licenses, it's like you've got to get what you can get. And when we choosing licenses we betting on three to four years out like what going to work and what going to resonate But what is the best stories Now I take the licensing back Yeah, majority of my pinball career was with Spooky Pinball, but it goes back even further than that because I actually started working with J-Pop back in 2012.
    45:59
    Oh, I didn't know that. Okay, word. were you working kind of working towards licensing with those projects as well or not at all so i've worked in the film industry the tv mainly more tv industry um and i've got myself to a position where i'm comfortable in life and i got back into pinball like my wife had no idea that i was into pinball not at all until literally when we were living in florida when I was doing infomercials down there. And I saw Tales from the Crypt for $600 on Craigslist. And I'm like, oh, I want to go and get that Tales from the Crypt pinball machine. And she goes, pinball machine? Tales from the Crypt? Oh, that sounds novel, but she didn't realize my history with it.
    46:44
    So after a period of time, I got to the point where I wanted to buy games again, to basically buy the stuff I had when I was younger, you know, I guess a midlife crisis kind of way. But because you're in post-production a lot, you're not doing anything physical. So pinball machines for me became an outlet to be able to control a product because a TV or film production is hundreds of people at a time. A pinball machine is just me working on a game, no one to bother me, no one to tell me what to do, and it was achievable at night without bothering the family.
    47:20
    So that got me back into fixing up pinball machines, restoring pinball machines and getting back into the hobby playing a couple of tournaments down here locally and i get on igp pin side comes out and wizard of oz there's rumors of wizard of oz coming out that's going to have an lcd on it yeah i work in post-production so i'm like well holy shit i have time so i just started cold calling pinball companies saying hey i'm not looking for a job i work in post-production i want to consult you don't have to pay me if i can get a game that'll be great and i just started cold calling that's what i've done in my whole life like the worst thing that happens they're going to say no to me so i just started throwing my stuff out there and of course on rgp i see john poppy pop up and i'm a huge fan of world cup soccer theater of magic talarobial nights and i just reach out to him hey if you ever need a hand let me know and of course he saw that as like grab onto you right um so he starts telling me about he wants to start his own pinball company and he's working on a title he didn't quite sure but it was going to be a successor to theater of magic which turned into magic girl right and like as soon as he says that i'm like dude i'm in like a successor to magic girl i'm all for that So, I started doing animations for Magic Girl, Ben Hex Adventures in Zombieland, and Alice in Wonderland. And I didn't know I was working with Jeremy Packer. I didn't realize Jack Danger was doing some animations. John was really good at siloing people away from each other. Wow. Right?
    49:08
    Because he was using all of our stuff. For obvious reasons. to help get people to buy more games. So that was actually my intro into pinballs.
    49:22
    And then because I was doing that and Ben was doing Adventureland with him, Spooky had come out at that point. You had Predator, Skip B come out with Predator, which I actually did a little bit of work for them because they were working on a second game called Adventures of Danger... What was it?
    49:41
    experts in dangerous or experts of dangerous right because they couldn't get the so mythbusters was owned by discovery so adam and that had their own traveling show which was called experts of dangerous so it's the same concept but they owned it outright so they had licensed that from they actually really did have the license for it i know they didn't have the license for predator which i lost money on just fyi because i was a sucker like 250 bucks for a predator i'm in um i so there they were doing that. I said, well, if you need help, I know you've already done Predator, but if you need help for actually, I did a teaser video for Predator. But if you need help with the next game, I'm in. Because again, my passion, I want to be involved in some way of telling stories.
    50:26
    So I started doing some of the test stuff for experts of Dangerous. At that time, they were playing with Funhaus 2.0. So I did some animations for Funhaus 2.0 back in 2013, 2014, back in the day.
    50:41
    So as I'm trying to help as many people as I can in the industry, sorry, hobby, because there weren't industry people yet,
    50:50
    I ran across Ben because Ben was working on Adventureland, Zombies Adventureland. And so Predator came out, America's Most Haunted came out, Ben was burnt out on America's Most Haunted. They were gearing up for their second game, and he did not want to do what he just did on America's Most Haunted because he wrote the code, he did all the animations, he's debugging it. Making a pinball is hard. So at TPF that year, the year that they sold out of America's Most Haunted, Ben came over to me. He's like, why don't you work for a real company? Why don't you work on a game that will see the light of day? If you can help me out, do the animations on the next spooky game, which was Rob Zombie. um i'm a big horror person i meet charlie i think i was wearing a haunted mansion t-shirt he saw me he's like dude we're friends like they're just straight up um and that's where it started like so i came on to start do the animations for rob zombie uh rob zombies game and i did all the animations right up to just before halloween so i started doing the animations then i got involved in the approval process because I'm doing the animations I ended up talking to you helping Charlie with their approvals and dealing with studios is a very different beast they have a very unique language and because I've worked in film and TV for a long time I'm not scared to talk to them so I eventually can of course Charlie was running the business I basically started helping him deal with the studios and stuff like that because I had a kind of a knack for it so So that went from animations to license negotiations to approvals and then eventually into development because it all kind of goes hand in hand. I did not realize you were that. Like, I didn't know that history of animation with you, so that's really cool to hear that it's like it started. I mean, that's such a, like, you're really getting into granular, like, understanding what pinball is and if you're fixing your games and stuff. That's just a very unique position, I think, even within some pinball companies to kind of have that background. It's stupid. Let's be honest. It's stupid because I'm doing animations. I'm not animated by trade, right? I just want to do it. I know how to use Photoshop and After Effects. So I'm doing these animations for Rob Zombie for tests because, of course, Charlie doesn't want to hire anyone that doesn't know what they're doing. So I start doing these animations, and I'm doing it 720p. and then like ben comes back no no no dude it's 128 pixels by 30 pixels and i'm like what like how's that even going to translate um so we did you know it was a learning curve for me because sure yeah we've never done this before um so it was a learning curve for me and how ben's hardware and software worked so i had to adapt my skills to do that and honestly because it's so low pixel we got a lot of weight we got away with murder um but like when you're working on Rob Zombie, I want to push the envelope. Like the ball save sequence in Rob Zombie, people love that. There was another sequence, which was in a track mode that did get canned, did not get put into the game. Essentially, it was just the coin getting pushed into someone's body.
    54:14
    But when it translated to dot matrix display, it didn't look like that. So that got mixed. Oh, got it, got it, got it. I remember presenting the ball save sequence and even charlie now yeah i don't know if that would work and they presented the game to rob at one of his shows and they're getting approvals like showing him all the stuff and i believe you can ask call when i don't remember the i i believe cheryl his wife saw the bowl save and i think charlie's like oh we could take that out if you want she goes no that's gonna fucking stay you know so yeah it's like damn that's awesome that is awesome no for sure And like, I mean, just a very like you can tell with your stuff, like whether it's your time at Spooky or like moving into barrels, like you just have such a like you have to have an affinity for the thing because you're going to be like you said, you're projecting out three years, four years that like you're looking. this actually kind of bridges into something that I did want to talk about which is like you talking about getting in at spooky and or even before that with Papa Duke makes so much sense now why you're working with people like Jeff from Dirty Pool Pinball and and um Carl I'm Carl exactly like first timers who are sort of outside the industry but have this like love and fire and are like are you looking for people like like what are you looking for how are you like building your team it seems like it's that kind of vibe but maybe you explain it to me at the end of the day and i'm not i've had such a blessed life right and i'm not saying it's easy i'm not saying it's hard but there's a been a point i'm here to help people i'm here to make the most amazing things in my life right and i'm here to give people opportunities if i if no one listened to me or gave me the opportunity, I wouldn't be where I am today. And where I am today is also scary. This industry, this is not the smartest industry to be in.
    56:20
    However, I... Sorry, Winchester sold out. You can hang up. Yeah, right. Winchester sold out. I want to... I've seen a lot of people get taken advantage of through my whole career, through the film industry, pinball, everywhere. okay and i thoroughly believe an experience i had on a film set with a horrible actor so very early in my film career i had to be the altar i wanted to be behind the camera i wanted to be the right i want to be the director i had to have every finger on the pulse i had a really really really difficult uh actor um and at that point i had to tell my heads of department i need you all to take care of what you need to do. I'm going to take care of this actor. Just do what you need to do to do the best job.
    57:13
    And every project before that never, ever looked like my vision. Every product I worked on, I look at it, it looks amateurish. I can't stomach it. I do not like watching my own stuff ever.
    57:25
    But when I empowered those people on that set that day, that became one of my best projects I've ever been on because I allowed them to be the best they could be. Right. And from that point onwards, I am here to empower people around me to be the best they can be. And I truly believe if we do it right, the money will follow. It's not easy. Trust me, it is not easy. But when I see talented people, I want to give them the tools to be successful. My accountant would disagree. but I'm again this is a long term play this is not a short term play you know we have a thing we say around here it's you start small and you start good and people will find it and that seems to be the case but it's hard no matter how well I plan stuff out there are things that trip us up every day like I have stopped saying in my life what else could happen because at the end of the day when I walk into this front doors, there's something going on. I will come in with work with 40 emails. By one, I'll be up to 130. By two, I'll be down to my last 30, and then this is the cycle happens over again. Trust me, I would not change this for the world. I freaking love it. I love the people I work with, but it is hard. It is very, very hard. Well, you touched on licensing and being three or four years out and having to almost kind to bet on what's going to be popular or what people are going to like or what's going to stick.
    58:59
    You know, that whole approach seems incredibly difficult. And a lot of times you hear about, oh, this license was supposed to be, we had it and then we didn't have it and then it was gone and then someone else had it or whatever. It sounds like a complete fucking mess, to be honest. Is that a constant issue? And also like when you go through this process, this is something I don't really understand. and I don't know if other people listening do or don't, what do you have to do to get a license? Do you have to show them a game? Do you have to design a game? How far along does it have to be to be like, here it is. Do you want it or not? Or can we do it or not? It comes down to meeting the right people. Like my relationship with licenses at this point is not about what I can do. It's that I have personal relationships with the studios because they now trust me. Like it's a matter of you've got to get past the gate so they know what you can do. Okay. If it wasn't for Henson believing in me, I mean, literally when I delivered that game to Henson on their lot, the guy turned to me and said, we didn't think you was going to pull this off. Like what you were doing, the scale that you were doing is like we, we, they're a company that would take a lot of risk with new filmmakers. They want new stuff. They're not looking to churn out. I mean, they want to make money, but they want to encourage new art. So when I came along and they saw what I was doing, I think they didn't anticipate me pulling it off. They just straight up told me that. Like, we can't believe you did this.
    60:37
    But from that, I have a deck. I show people the process of how I make pinball machines. I show them, which is very film-orientated. That's how I do it. That's how we landed Dune. The Whitewood wasn't even built for Labyrinth until we were pitching to Legendary. And we were talking about other IPs, and they saw the process, and they were like, what about this? Wow.
    61:06
    Again, I look for licenses that want to partner with us because they understand we make stuff for fans. Yeah, for sure. And like you're going to do you're going to represent their product like the way not just like in a good way, but the way that they also like kind of envision it. I think like you've matched up like labyrinth. It's good. Like you have good taste. Right. I mean, so it's like your taste is matching up like you like. But I'm saying you like those things. That's why you're doing it. And so guess what? Like the IP is going to understand that this is not just like a paycheck. It's not we're trying to bang out whatever IP because it's like, you know, like we're doing. I'm just trying to, like, who's the kid who does, like, the boom, like, reviews from Costco or something? Like, you're not doing something like that. You're doing something that you, like, deeply feel. And I think, like, licensors after they're, like, oh, got it. Like, this is going to work out. Yeah, but, again, like, we get passed on and vice versa. Licenses change. Like, one day I may will let some truths out. But, like, I've had contracts that had game licenses that people want. I had multiple licenses on one contract that would have blown people's minds and sat on the contract and that one of those IPs would walk or the studio wouldn't do it because an actor did something and guess what? The IP is no longer available. Yeah, right. Right. That's – yeah. It's like things completely like not even pinball or almost not even movie related, just like tangentially in the world things happening. Yeah, that's wild.
    62:47
    Yeah, go ahead, Shane. I think it's interesting too though. I mean it seems like you've got so many different people to please. Like you have to do something you want to do. You have to do something that the people that are going to buy your games are going to want, and that's maybe the most important. But then you've got the studios or the other licensors, the IP holders that have to like want to work with you and then they're going to want you to make a different game that you might not want to make as much as a different game or get one license to get a different license. Like that is so complicated. I would say out of the three things you brought up, what we want to do, what the studio wants to do, and what does the buying public we want to do. me and the studio we usually get on the same page very quickly because we're pretty detailed oriented of the direction we're going to go and we'll find out very quickly if we align on that right get in the pinball people to understand what we're doing like dune is a really good example like when half the media people turned up on the media day and half of them had not seen the movies right was like holy crap like this is a billion dollar franchise and i just had the best of the pinball media come here and they don't understand this that was your that was your fault for booking all the old guys if you would have booked someone like me uh i would have seen it so you got invited just now no i think you're right i was down there i had just been down there for for a different yes and so i think i could i couldn't make it back but yeah no absolutely you're right uh that's a good example of people experience that they did not understand it they got spooked by things that they saw that were not at the time it made sense for them but i was hoping that they saw how far labyrinth was that no matter what game we were releasing that we will put the same care and attention to detail in every title we do no matter what it is from care bears to uh the rocketeer okay go care bears next game dude please oh my god just like Dude, this is your second time mentioning Rocketeer. Like, we need it, dude. We need it. That would be so awesome. Like, that is like a – it sounds weird to say. That is like a dream theme for me. That was one of my favorite movies growing up. You haven't mentioned it before. I love the comics. Like, also, like, if you do a movie, it's like, I mean, there's like so much good Alan Arkin in there. There's so much – anyway, whatever. We don't have to get into it. But just stop teasing me with that because specifically that's one that very much triggers me. It would be like, damn, that would be so good. Well, moving into your last game, and congratulations on this just being an absolute, like, lightning in a bottle. Sell it immediately. The whole pinball world is excited about this. People are still trying to get one right now.
    65:38
    Winchester Mystery House. And you talk about the media people not seeing – half of them not seeing Dune. I can't even imagine what the old media people would say if they walked in and you told them what this game is because a lot of people do not know – when this was launched, a lot of people did not know what it was. So you – so okay. So let's go back to Winchester. So Winchester, you look at – so demographic-wise, it does not hit pinball at all. okay like it's it's a female demo it's slightly younger but i was betting on it because a i knew i'd make a good pinball machine b it was coldy enough but c all the men that were the demo were married to younger women and guess what demo they were they were elaborate so i kind of was factoring like we have an opportunity here because the male collector is addicted to buying if their wife says they would like a game nine out of ten times they're getting it all right so that's how i was hedging my bets on that one um dune on the other hand is perfect perfect pinball demographic this is a fandom that the people love the books love the old movie love the new tv series love the movies there's none of this star wars camps of oh i hate the new stuff i love the old stuff like there's there's synergy in the dune franchise that is it would be stupid for us to say no to their ip because it is massive okay yeah so we went into dune thinking it was going to be a home run okay we didn't plan to be coming out the same time as harry potter we didn't plan to come out the same time as keith ellen's game we were literally i think this was like a once in a lifetime scenario of like you know what we we got a roll with it okay yeah um but so we come out thinking this was a going to i don't want sellout day once just to be frank and clear to everyone day one sellout is bad because that means you totally underestimated the market and you probably shouldn't be in the industry to be frank because you my goal is to make enough games for everyone apart one person and that's the mad person that will get out there and go i want a game you know That's the whole point of the collectible market. So from that experience, we were shaken by it. We were like, wow, this did not connect. And then the media people were like, why do you want this? So do you remember, Dune was leaked at least a full month before it came out. And people were saying, no one wants Dune. No one wants Dune. And when you're a person being told constantly you don't want something, it starts to manifest. So people were already writing it off We came out against Harry Potter We came out against Elwynn So it was a tough market but what happened was we go to the show people start playing it they seeing because we got more code in it and like oh wow this is something this is something and every show we go to more games would sell more games would sell more people got to experience it so that game started to get its traction right so while this is all happening winchester a couple other projects are happening in the background.
    68:54
    Everyone in this company but myself was terrified of Winchester because again, not many people know what it is. If you're a kid of the 90s watching World's Mysteries, you know what Winchester is but if you're not in that world, you have no idea what it is. But I knew, A, pinball people have wanted a haunted house pinball machine forever including myself.
    69:16
    So when I was approached by the house itself because I was at a licensing show and they pitched it to me, I was like, holy shit, this is amazing. This is the house that inspired the Haunted Mansion. This is the OG house of the Haunted Mansion. But I told them, I can't sell this. This is going to be a hard sell because if you go look, original themes do not sell. And this is as close as an original thing because I'm going to have to educate every person, 60% of the pinball audience that have no idea what the hell this is. okay so they really really wanted it i told them the problems that i see with this ip but i do believe it will be a great game because of the story behind it but you need to give me time to develop it in the background so when it's ready to come out it will come out so people can get the full experience of it can i ask you when that conversation took place just because i'm wondering how long it takes for the development like this that license actually was signed before dune was whoa crazy so we're talking years ago labyrinth dune and winchester marks the uh season one of barrels before they became public that is that is phase one of barrels so everything moving forward is post barrels being out there and being a known entity okay that's cool this kind of plays into overall strategy and you know you're obviously not going to talk about whatever you don't want to talk about but i'm interested in like the future because i was working so from my perspective i'm working on a year in preview which is now we're entering into february so it's not going to be much but i was just looking at like the success of you guys and the success of spooky and kind of trying to forecast out what i think the pinball landscape is going to look like in the future and like for me maybe it is 500 to a thousand run maybe 750 of games that are just like really well done really um like i i see more of you guys and spookies in the future than i do of like sterns i don't know that anyone is necessarily going to be trying to do like multiple lines and like huge thousands and thousands of runs of games um what what is your kind of perspective on that i guess i i i don't want to get bigger than we are now like i've got to like starting the second line And so our goal this year, no matter, well, last year, 2025, our whole goal as a company, good or bad, was to launch two games a year for that year and also start a second line. Having a second line allows us a lot of flexibility. So our corporate goal was to set out to do that high, good or bad, okay, which we achieved. But I will tell you, setting up that second line has been a beast. I started it during the holiday season, bad idea. flew the through the winter season so everyone got sick another bad idea um that has been a huge learning curve for us but i do not want to get bigger than we are now we've moved into another facility we're at 33 000 square feet right now i don't want to get any bigger than we are what i need to do as a company over the next year is get this as efficient as possible because every ip that we drop you i want you guys like i don't this is not on my bingo card like this is not a game i expected you to guys but what i hope will happen is i'm gonna i don't care what it is but i'm gonna give it a go because it's a barrels game that's that's our overall goal right you know like you may not think that was a fun game but you know what barrels did it it's got to be interesting it's interesting though because you say you say that you know okay we don't want to get any bigger but then you also say well we want to sell we want to make one what was it you said one less game than people want correct right so it's like tough because then you made i think it was 515 winchesters those went immediately 525 sorry about that and i know you wanted to make 666 originally i heard that somewhere too but you were worried about the christians or whatever it is but uh but i mean it's a bad idea like he's just straight up and honestly i've had people call me afterwards they had they are big spenders they they've told me that would pay 30 000 for a unique game but they said they didn't buy it because of the planchette on the apron and i said you know that's just a printed piece of plastic right like it's not wow that's wow that's crazy i mean you are in texas so i mean that kind of checks out but yeah for sure but but but i mean it's kind of conflicting right because on one hand you're saying we don't want to get any bigger but i want on the other hand you're like we want we want to make we want to sell as many games as we can we have a company we have mouths to feed we you know that's a really tough thing to navigate oh dude like again like we so we come off dune which dune was weak okay so now we're going into winchester where a lot of people are company like man this is really cool but we have like if dune doesn't do it doesn't have strong sales what does a pinball machine about a haunted house that no one knows about going to sell so it was like well what numbers do we want to hit and like as we're throwing numbers around want to do 666 obviously got talked out of that and then like the street number was 525 winchester boulevard so it was like that made sense we fully anticipated the reason the second line was for winchester okay so line one will always run at 100 capacity so that's for our big one big hitters the second line is for these pet projects that we anticipate not to sell well so we can do five or ten down that line it's not meant to have a game that sells out like this whole point was we expected that game to have to last for nine months because people would have to get to experience it we again us selling out in 28 hours was insane like no one anticipated now we the plan behind it is a and you don't want the industry wanted a haunted house game be the story with sarah is so compelling and interesting you can believe it or not whatever it's a story yeah then in believing in carl like bringing a a a player that is so good and so nice and so willing to help me allowing him to be in power and like i didn't force anything on him i showed him what our roster was he instantly when he saw winchester he goes i want to do that because he knew it you know yeah and i didn't realize he was huge into haunted houses and amusement parks like i was we were running on the same uh internet channels back in the late 90s early 2000s we didn't even know it you know so but that's another example empowering people to do the best they can do for sure and just like when they're taking a natural inclination into something letting them run with that like i i have a thing and that you probably relate to this but you know Nudge is the first place for a lot of people who are either getting photos, like they're taking photos or they're doing their first writing. They're going to come to us. I love that. And I always tell people, like, if they're scared of writing, I'm like, I can edit your stuff. I can make you funny. I can make you look cool. I can't make you give a shit. You know, like if you give a shit and you're going to try hard, then, like, you get it. And the rest of it, like, will lock into place and all that. So, I mean, it's just, like, it's been really fun. having a chance to talk to you about this stuff. And, yeah, this is kind of, I don't know, Shane, we'll have to, like, have a repeat or something because there's still a lot we can dig deep on. There's definitely so many more. I mean, maybe we'll have you on for a quick one, David, when you release the next game. We can get into it a little bit more. That would be awesome. Well, that will happen this year. I know that for sure. Do you have a time window? Can you be a little more specific or not? 2026. Okay. I'll take it. That's sometime in the next nine months. so you know i don't want to hype it up because i want it to be its own thing but like labyrinth not that wasn't on everyone's bingo card dune was i thought was hugely recognizable winchester we didn't think it was going to be that recognizable but i will say the next ip that we have everyone has a connection to it everyone knows what the next ip is the question is will they come down support it.
    77:44
    Hell yeah. Well, dude, I think that quote alone is going to get us aggregated on NAP Arcade, so let's leave it there. That's like perfect. There you go. Hopefully it's not like the DMV, the pinball machine or something like that. Yeah, we all have a special connection to getting hang out at the DMV. The dental office. Pinball. McDonald's, the pinball machine coming soon with a broken clay fly everywhere. Yeah, the broken ice cream machine perpetually. Yeah, amazing. Well, hey, David, thank you so much for taking the time. Hey, thank you for listening to me rattle on. We loved it. so there it is with mr david vaness of barrels of fun pinball and uh a little bit of speculation there at the end about the next barrels game yeah hopefully not the dmv hopefully not yeah i mean there are no bad ideas but yeah i would like i would like to shoot i'll shoot it before reserving my judgment as they say yeah i don't know what do you what do you think what do you think yeah what could it be but dude when he says that it's something that's like touched all of us like something we've all related to right that sort of seems like it narrows it down in a weird way like i don't know do you have any possible thoughts i have a couple guesses yeah well one that comes to mind because and this might be like i hope it's not too good of a guess because i worry about this i don't know anything first of all he didn't he told us nothing this is all wild speculation on our part uh these the opinions expressed here are not the opinions of barrels of fun or david vaness or nudge magazine they're just ian jacoby being crazy uh but i think maybe a muppets pinball machine makes a lot of sense the muppets are like in the zeitgeist again like yeah i see miss piggy memes everywhere um i think like they just had that new special with sabrina carpenter and like everyone loved it and so i think like they already have a relation he talked about they had a relationship exactly the relationship with jim jim henson and and everything they did and how excited they were about it yeah and and the muppets are like something that has touched everyone for me okay and so this goes along with that i also thought maybe sesame street obviously like because that has touched really everyone and i that would be a favorite of a lot of people and it has a pinball connection because it has the song the one two three four five six seven eight oh yeah that right i love i love that when i was a kid man i don't I've never connected the dots that that's pinball until right now. That's true. I love that. 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7, 8, 9, 10, 11, 12. Yeah, it's sick. No, that's funny. And the thing about Sesame Street is, don't get me wrong, I love it.
    80:52
    We actually talked about some of the Sesame Street movies from the 80s when you were here in Vegas. So we are down with Sesame Street. And I would buy that shit in a heartbeat. However, I do think that that is too kid-centric, I think. You do. Unless there's a way. I do. Muppets, I agree with you, though. Muppets would work. Okay. I think it's, especially some of the more recent movies, like the movies they did with Jason Segel were really good, actually. Are you thinking the Muppets are a little more adult because it was obvious that the drummer of their band was on coke the entire time? or i don't know i don't know i think it's like the muppets i don't know what i don't know man i just it just no i kind of is there's something there's something more underlying like less brought to you by the letter and the number of you know and yes right like sesame street was always a learning thing more even though it's fucking hilarious and like yeah you know and they do a great job with kind of making things that secretly adult you know but um no muppets But I think the Muppets is more in that wheelhouse. And I love that guess. That's a great guess. I think – and like the Muppets too were like – yeah, they're like the SNL. They're like SNL for kids almost. You know what I mean? They were like sending up like doing parodies and having guests come on and like music. So that I guess is true. That has – not just that Animal was obviously on Coke. But wouldn't you say – wasn't it Animal? Animal was the drummer, right? Wasn't he? I'm pretty sure. Of the band? The only thing I can think of is – Rolf was the piano player. Yes, that's right. Yeah, Animal was definitely the drummer. No, I think of like – yeah, the only other stuff I think of is like, I don't know, like pizza, the pinball machine. Like we all fucking love pizza. No, I'm just – I don't know. Like Coca-Cola, McDonald's. Are we going like there? There's no way. No, but he could – that could be like hyperbole for sure, but I wonder if it's like – I mean Goonies is an obvious. one that everyone thinks it could be um and that is something that like kind of everyone has it would be weird to i just feel like that would be weird to phrase it like yes everyone everyone has a connection to it like it's like no it's like what if you just never saw the fucking movie you know and like and it is like classic like i do think like for especially like people of a certain age and stuff it is like obviously it would be weird if you hadn't like if you were our age and you hadn't seen it or weren't like at least familiar with like if it hadn't touched your life in some way like that might be weird but also like i don't know we just don't really describe movies that way like you wouldn't yeah um yeah i don't know it's really it's it is tough but but um but i'm excited i think they have done a really cool it's a really cool first three games um you know and i always think of like i always relate everything back to music because that's what I do and I think of you know bands that have put out three great albums you know in a row it's like kind of a short list you know um definitely yeah and like when you think of a pinball company starting out and how hard that is to do especially you know down in Texas like you're not in the pin you know you're not in Chicago you're not I mean Wisconsin adjacent whatever it's amazing that they've been able to pull off three awesome games like this and I cannot wait to see what's next and and yeah who knows oh for sure i think like i think back to the labyrinth like premiere and that was the best like viral marketing campaign i've ever seen because it was just three machines uh on the expo floor with 150 person line waiting for him the entire time like i don't remember even exactly what stern release was at the same time but it It was like – I remember writing about it. You could look back, whatever the Expo article is for that year. Did they debut at TPF? Because I played at TPF. I think it was Houston maybe actually because they're from Houston. It was either TPF or Houston. But then them being at Expo that year, like having that booth was like the best viral marketing for them was like – it was just a line the entire time, like people waiting. So, yeah, that was like and so to go from there to then Dune and it was interesting to hear him talk a bit about like acknowledging that the Dune launch was rough because we perceived it that way from the outside. But I don't know that it was ever really like acknowledged, but they talked about, you know, yeah. Yeah. And this is kind of funny where we know we don't really analyze the podcast of that we just did, but I kind of like this that we are a little bit. And I was really surprised that he was like, you know, really defending the Dune decision. Like everything about it is perfect for pinball. Like we did the research. Like we knew that Dune was like – and then when we launched it, people were like, Dune, yeah, never seen the fucking movie. That was really crazy that he – but they did their due diligence and that they were somehow like kind of missed. And that's – Yeah, or not missed, but just you can't foresee. I don't think it was the choice of theme that was like if we're litigating that release and I don't think he would think it was the choice of theme that did it it was more like like him talking about a leak happening a month in advance where they can't really do anything and they have to sit on it yeah having the lines be what they were and then it was Elwynn and like an Elwynn release and because it was King Kong maybe I think yeah it was and Harry Potter and and Harry Potter like That is tough. That's basically like – but we – yeah, so anyway. But it's really cool to see now is like – now think about it is like we have three releases and they're all bangers and they're all doing great for each company too, right? Like we have Winchester, Mystery House sell out instantly. Beetlejuice sell out instantly. And Pokemon now has just announced sold out the entire first run. Sold out. Yeah.
    87:06
    It's crazy. And not to mention Jersey Jack coming off of Harry Potter, which is just – they didn't even limit anything. They're that confident. And they're – I don't even know how many of those they're making. We don't have the numbers, but they're – It's doing really well. So it's a very, very exciting time right now. To end Shill Talk, do we want to kick it to a commercial for Jeff?
    87:31
    Absolutely. So there's all these great games coming out. You got to go get some. 100 percent, man. Jeff is my boy. Go get a pinball machine from Jeff. One of these games. Mad Pinball. Hit him up. Jeff at MadPinball.com or info at MadPinball.com. Let them know that we sent you. Get a free t-shirt from us. We are working on those, by the way. And you get free shipping on all Stern games. So, yep, hit up our boy Jeff at MadPinball. I did. I got a Pokemon coming. So I'm very excited. Yep. I'm excited for you. I got a Pokemon LE. I got the number associated with – I know they don't do plaques for the individual Pokemon, but I did think about it. So I've got Geodude, one of my favorite Pokemon. You do? Okay. Hell yeah. Yeah, the big rock guy. Oh, I'm familiar. I'm a rock guy. He's a rock guy. It makes sense. Oh, that dude. That actually does make sense. You're both buff. You both got great arms.
    88:33
    Lots of gray. But, yeah, dude, that's dope. No, definitely I know Geodude. If we're keeping it Gen 1, I know everything. But that's basically where my knowledge ends. Well, that's the thing. When I said, okay, because I've been on the list for this game for a minute, dude. Like, since the rumors first started, I was like, hey, you've got to get me on this list. And then once he knew his allotment and I was in, I said, okay, I've never tried to get a specific. le number before but that's what i said i was like i need i want like these numbers so i said like 25 151 like i i know and he's like oh i'm sure like i'm sure you can get one of these and i'm like i'm not so sure man and then of course like yeah i got i probably got like my 10th choice in the end you know because i'm like i want evie or i want you know but um but i yeah you don't have that pull yet right right yeah well i don't i don't know i'm no he didn't need is gonna do well I know he actually got, I think he, if I'm not telling any tales out of school here, but I'm pretty sure he got his charge already wanted. But he did a lot more wheeling and dealing on the black market than I think you're willing to do, which I have seen Jeff publicly does not like. I like that Jeff is a man of principle. If you want a Pokemon Ellie, he's sending it to your house. He's not sending it to somebody else. So you know what? Listen, go buy a game from our man Jeff. He's got principles, God damn it. he's selling pinball machines he does and that's the thing too it's like important when you're with a distributor like you you're on a list okay then you get your game you know what i mean like you you know fair and square because there there are definitely going to be some fly by night dealers out there that are going to get their pokemon allotment and they're going to like fuck over their customers and sell them their self for more money and that's not cool so yeah fair is fair even stevens hot cross buns you know all that so go buy a game mad pinball uh And yeah, dude, I want to say this. We're going to go a little Hollywood next week.
    90:38
    We're going Hollywood. Way Hollywood. So you guys are going to, yeah, you guys want to stick around for that one. It'll be up soon. Thanks for listening, everybody. Yeah, follow us on social media, all that bullshit, and we'll see you around. Bye.
    91:02
    Outro Music