Warning, the following episode contains adult language and screaming goats. Listener discretion is advised. The Pinball Network is online. Launching the Pinball Show. Thanks again for the ongoing support as a Pinball Show Club member. Enjoy this exclusive TPS content and make sure to visit the Pinball Show Club Discord to chat about the bonus material. All right, Dennis, look, here's the deal. There's a lot of things available to buy right now. Oh, I know. They're all in the flipping out inventory. Well, some of them. Some of them. Yeah, some of them pre-order. A few of them. Some of them we don't sell for because the owner doesn't like it. Why? Why? So in this segment for our club members, we're calling what games are even worth owning? I'm going to read the games that are out right now that you pinball buyer could purchase new in box. Not limited to either, but Stern. Let's start with Stern. Jaws. Venom. Foo Fighters. James Bond 007. James Bond 007 60th Anniversary. Totally different game. Godzilla. Mandalorian. The Avengers Infinity Quest. Stranger Things. Elvira House of Horrors. Jurassic Park. Black Knight Sword of Rage. Deadpool. Iron Maiden Legacy of the Beast and Star Wars that's 15 right there Dennis and that's not even counting the ones they are not really going to make anymore like Turtles you can still buy new in box there are a couple titles that you there's a handful of Guardians Pros probably still out there so that's just the ones that they still they even still have like Rush they haven't archived it so technically maybe they may still so 15 to 20 there then we've got Jersey Jack's Elton John Guns N' Roses, Chicago Gaming Company and Play Mechanics Pulp Fiction, Chicago Gaming Company's Cactus Canyon, Barrels of Fun, Labyrinth, Spooky Pinball's Looney Tunes, Texas Chainsaw Massacre, and Scooby-Doo Where Are You, Pinball Brothers with their upcoming ABBA, their Alien Ripley Edition, Alien Regular Editions as well, Queen, and we got, we can't forget, American Pinball's Berrios Barbecue Challenge, GGF, Legends of Valhalla, Hot Wheels, Houdini, And I didn't put Oktoberfest in there. They have no plans to make Oktoberfest again. But believe me, they would if there's enough interest. Dutch Pinball, The Big Lebowski. P3's The Princess Bride. Final Resistance. Weird Al. P3's got a lot of other games you can buy new. But they're part of a platform series kind of thing. But those are the games, kind of the big three that they're selling right now. So that's over 35 titles that you can choose from with over nine plus manufacturers. Would you say that is too many products in this industry? I guess I wouldn't necessarily judge it on the – yes. Okay, sure. Okay. It's too many. It's a lot. It really is a lot. For new, for the size of the hobby, it's an awful lot of SKUs if I think about it. It's not fair for me to say like Pinball Brothers needs to factor in how many games Stern already makes, but I mean, this is just a pretty deep catalog. It makes me wonder though, if it doesn't mean that pinball manufacturing, if they can figure out how to do it, might be lucrative. Or is this something that manufacturers of pinballs are just obsessed with the hobby and they just want to create? Why would there be this? Never before in the history of pinball, I don't think, correct me if I'm wrong, Silver Ball Chronicles or whoever, have we ever had this much of a product offering in any given year? Well, remember back in the day, this style of model wasn't done. It was we build the game, and then we never go back. And we move on. Yes, and with very rare exceptions like Adam's Family Gold Edition and some of the stuff with 8-Ball Deluxe. It was, no, we build them, and then we get done, and then we move on, and there's no going back. But how many titles was Gottlieb cranking out in one given year, though? I mean, probably. I think maybe. I wanted to say closer to three, but I don't recall. Even in the redhead days and stuff? Well, all right. So in the EM era, because the games are so much simpler, I know people like to talk about how brilliant they all were and everything, but honestly, they were very derivative designs in many instances. A ton of carryover. Right. There was a lot of demand to keep the line busy and such, So you would see them like it wouldn't take them but a month maybe to come up and have a fully built game or something. Yeah, I would be hard pressed to think that there's not been more offering now than than ever. It's tough to say with the I mean, with the era and how far we would think you'd still be able to go like to a distributor and buy them, for example. But but looking at like, let me let's get into the flipper era. So let me take like 1957. I've gone ahead and looked here. And, oh, gosh, it's such a mess because some of them are things they designed and then they never produced them. But I'm seeing like, what, one, two, oh, my gosh, three, four, five, six, seven, eight, nine, ten, ten games that Gottlieb did alone in 57. Wow. And those are not the ones that were tagged at under ten units. Okay. So maybe it's close. But it's Apple's. But it was a different time. There was no competition for anything else, really. I mean, there were no video games. Yeah. So needless to say, this is, and we still have, I didn't name Haggis because we don't know what the hell's going on there. I didn't name Pinball Adventures. I didn't name even Progetti as they're going to be coming out with the remake. Oh, there were plenty of brands you didn't include. Yeah, a lot of stuff that I didn't include here. Hexa. Hex. That's right. So yeah, there's a lot of stuff A lot of stuff going on But I thought it would be fun for us to give the listener Our picks In some different categories So that they know, you know, if you're buying a new pinball machine What should you buy? What if you are a new pinball owner? Or an enthusiast? Diehard people Maybe you're looking to switch the collection up You got Sterns What's something, Zach and Dennis, that I should consider Taking a flyer on I want to get the feel of a different manufacturer game but I do not want to waste my money on the wrong one. Which one would you consider? Or what are some underrated games that I've never even considered that I could still buy a new box and should consider? What game should I not consider? So let's do that now. Okay, Dennis, so let's jump into it for the listener. Let's start with our top picks for a new pinball owner. So maybe somebody is listening right now, or maybe one of these listeners is into pinball, and they want to recommend a friend or a family member that says, I'd like to get a new pinball machine. What would be my best pick? So we'll go through our top three picks between you and I. These are for new pinball owners, and this is based on the list of what is currently you can buy new in box. So let's start with your third pick. What would be your third pick for a new pinball owner to consider? Okay, that's interesting. So you know, I didn't really rate them in priority order. Okay. I just sort of found what I sort of think of as three. Because in most of these instances, I'm just going to be like, I would normally throw out options. Got it. Okay. All right. So in terms of that, just so you know, I had Elvira's House of Horrors. Okay. All right. Stern Deadpool. Okay. And CGC Cactus Canyon. Oh, very interesting because I match you on two of the three. Do we differ on Deadpool? No, we do not. My third pick, my third pick recommending a new pinball owner into the new games, I would say is Chicago Gaming Company's Cactus Canyon. It's pure fun. It's not a hard shooter. There's plenty to do, but it drips charisma. And I think if somebody can get past the idea of a theme, which is not easy to do for a new pinball owner, you kind of want to cook them with themes. But if they want, they like Westerns and stuff, they want pure fun, it's hard to look away from that game. Two for me is Stern Godzilla. I think that irregardless of being new into pinball or seasoned into pinball, it crosses all barriers. And it's just objectively one of the greatest games ever made for a reason. And I don't think anybody, even from a management maintenance standpoint for new owners, the Godzilla, there's nothing that really goes wrong on a Godzilla game. so that and then honestly for me kind of surprising is stern's deadpool the pro in particular i think i'm like you i think for new pinball owners it's pure fun plus it gives you the ip is light-hearted it's still edgy it's beautiful and people can see things happening in odd weird ways it's mode based it's understandable plus you get to open up little side quests that make you feel like you're really doing something special in pinball um so without a doubt that yeah we're so you said which ones you say instead of so so i said cactus canyon for similar reasons to you it's an easy shooter also the one thing that unified all of my choices is i think the rule sets are fairly easy to comprehend so and cactus is the easiest of all of those so because it's basically just a 90s game so but it looks good it's got neat toys on it it's so i think it's pretty approachable Then I also said Deadpool, which is my hardest shooter that I've got on the list. But the rules, the way to get into and progress the rules from a basic standpoint is pretty easy to understand. And it's a very approachable theme. It's a fight game. So people know that platform already. So I just think it's a good demonstration of modern pinball. And if a new person said, I really want a hard player, I'd be like, okay, well, this one, you'll at least understand how to get into all the fights and stuff without having to do a bunch of research. Good point. And then Elvira House of Horrors was my other pick. I thought about that one. Again, forgiving layout, pretty approachable rule set. That one was my choice for, okay, you want something with a lot more depth than Cactus Canyon, and you want fancy toys. So if you're new and you're willing to pay the premium for it, this is the game I would steer you to. And I think the rules are very much more understandable than my pick in Godzilla, alternately. But where my mind went was for a new owner, Elvira has its quirks on maintenance and adjustments. So that's where I'm at. Because Godzilla rules are kind of confusing compared to Elvira. I'll give you that. And I'll give you a spoiler. Out of all these games for all these categories that we're going to do, I only repeated one game one time. I tried very hard to diversify the use of the games. I tried as well. Mine's pretty good. Mine's pretty good. Let's move to our next one, which would be what we'll call the enthusiast. So this is somebody that is in the hobby, whether it's an enthusiast for playing purposes or whether it's an enthusiast for collecting. Somebody that really, really likes pinball, so much so that they're listening to a podcast like this. So the top three picks, our top three picks for new and boxed pinball machines, what they should look for if you're an enthusiast. This is different than somebody new and somebody that we're going to call diehard competition players, just hardcore gamers, whether it's speed run, whether it's points, whether it's stacking, whether it's everything that makes you the greatest at pinball. This is for the enthusiasts, for just people who love it more than everybody else, besides the diehard people, of course. But, yeah, I think it speaks for itself. Enthusiasts. My third pick for an enthusiast is actually non-stern. I think right now, if I'm just my finger to the pulse of what is hot right now for an enthusiast, it is Jersey Jack's Elton John. Okay. I have that one as well. Okay. Yeah. It's the layout that is working so well, the rules that are working so well, and then everything else that you get in this package, especially the Platinum Edition. They've loaded it down with stuff that you oftentimes see on the CE. But it is something we know, the Steve Ritchie game, we know the feel of that. And it helped an entire company jump into the same pedigree of not worrying how something shoots. It's almost an afterthought. No, it's a jersey jacket. It's going to shoot awesome. No, no, no, no. That's not always the case. That is the case for Elton John. Yeah, I agree. I think I haven't heard a single person actually that really has had a negative reaction to Elton John in terms of its gameplay, its role approach, the toy integration, the light integration. But I have to categorize it as an enthusiast game because, again, considering a new purchase starting at $12,000, you have to be into this hobby to want to go into it. I don't think that's a starter game for people just because of the pricing. I didn't even think about that. But, yeah, that's very true. Well, I'll give you my second one then. Okay. Stranger Things. that's interesting i think the reason i went with that one the reason i went with it is because once you if you're getting into the hobby stranger things has a whole lot of other stuff that i think just integrates so well on top of the thing like someone's new into pinball my main concern is i want to have a lot of fun playing the game but with stranger things we're bringing in the whole uv thing you've got uh you might have to mess around a little bit possibly with some of the X, which of course kind of came up with Elvira too. It's a tough shooter. Yeah, it's harder to play. You know, the modes. There's a lot, but I feel like there's a lot of stuff you can experience in it. And so I think for an enthusiast, it's a pretty interesting game to go through. It got a lot of other aspects to it that I think enthusiasts would appreciate over new players And arguably where diehard competitors might be like no it fine It a fan layout It pretty basic rules There's no real strategy there. I think that lands solidly in there. I wish I would have picked that now. My number two was Stern's Jurassic Park, the premium LE version, to be specific. Not that we have to be. And that's just because for an enthusiast such as myself, it's the top three game of all time for me. and for a reason, which is exactly why I went number one, Godzilla Premium LE. I don't want to repeat here, but it's just so damn good for everybody and has stood the test of time thus far, even in its early handful of years being out. But they're just that good, so enthusiastic. And they have the toys. They check all the boxes kind of thing, the art, the toys, the rules, the layout. They're Keith Elwin, and they're the best sellers for a reason. So that's why I rounded it out there. Yeah, Godzilla as well. Okay. I mean, the weakest thing about Godzilla is the theme. And that's part of the reason I didn't put it in the new. I mean, there are Godzilla fans, but that's not the majority of people. But it's a unique layout. It's not the hardest shooter, but it's a longer player, but it's not as easy as like a Cactus Canyon or anything. and there's a lot of complexity to learn about the game so that's where I kind of grouped it as more of an enthusiast game so listeners out there if you're an enthusiast and you're looking to buy a brand new inbox pinball machine consider Elton John, Stranger Things Jurassic Park Godzilla I think it's a pretty solid group there for enthusiasts if they haven't already owned those alright let's talk about our top three picks for those in the die hard category competitive how do you categorize these individuals as competitive darlings okay and it's this is a hard category for us to recommend i think number one because i'm not a competitive player in general but also because new new games new titles tend to take a bit of a time to mature and they get code updates and for competitive players they want consistency and and no glitches They don't want any imbalance in rules or anything. So they don't want repeatable stuff that you can just exploit. So this is a tough category for me to pick, but I'm going to do my best. So if a diehard competitive pinball player and a gamer was interested in getting a brand-new game out of the box, what would be worth owning? Most of the time I'd say save your quarters and just go to local arcade and play there. But if you want to bring them home, what was one of your picks? One of them was Avengers. Me too. That was my second pick. I'm with you. Why is it Avengers? Well, it's an Elwynn. It's balanced. It plays a lot differently than his other games. You still have some themes, so it's not, you know, even if you get some people that aren't just diehard competitive players, you're going to have that. It's not the Yeti to look at. But I, in terms of playing locally, this one a lot of people really enjoy because it's – I feel it's his most challenging one that he's got in terms of trying to do what you need to do in the competitive environment. Yes. This is a Keith Elwin. A lot of these games have risk and reward, and that's what we see competitive players like because you're really managing your knowledge of the rule sets and stuff in competition. The problem is a lot of these may have risk and rewards. Am I going to cash out after I play all my Guns N' Roses songs? The problem is the balance portion, and I think Keith Elwin games do that in spades. So that's why I picked Avengers as well for my second pick because not only does it have great balance, but you're basically earning different power-ups, And you have to place those on specific strategic areas in order to have a bigger picture of expanding your score into the competitive scene. And it's a fucking head-scratcher. I still don't know. Each mode is really, really difficult. There's a reason why it's as lowest rated on the pin-side ratings. That game gets stuck in its own head, its own CPU. Which I've heard Elwin in interviews sort of pontificate on. I didn't think people would care this much about which Infinity Stones they should get when and all that. But they do. And again, that's why I think a competitive player can nerd out if they were to get the game. And this is when Ray Day figured out that his brain is not wired in the same way as the general population of the hobbyists in this industry. I think that was his first like – He should have known that when he did airport modes. well I think it was he's probably working on these before I don't know my third pick though if I'm going backwards my third pick I'm gonna get a lot of competitive people say you you have no clue what you're doing it's actually pulp fiction and the big reason here not so much the rules in the code even though I think there are some clever little competitive blocks that the code has that other more contemporary codes do not. Mine's more stylistically. It's Pulp Fiction. A lot of competitive players, they play the sterns, the sterns, the sterns, the stern. But this gives them a more classic layout. They call it single level. One could argue. But it's more of a classic retro game that they are known to play in competitions. 80s games, 70s games, even older games. So I wanted something on this list to reflect the gameplay variety that competitive players like to switch it up. I could have picked James Bond's 60th anniversary, but I'm going to go with Pulp Fiction here. My only concern with a game like Pulp Fiction is it's so newly out there in the field, I don't know if the rules are balanced or not yet. Yeah, that's where I was at. I disagree. I did the Iron Maiden. Oh, okay. Yeah, I was on my list. My second one. It's on my short list. It's the game that put Elwynn on the map as a designer because of how well-received it was competitively. In particular, how every shot advances you towards something, at least initially when you first push the start button. So all of your shots make progress. It's a balanced rule set. It was a unique layout compared to what else was being put out, in particular by Stern. And so all of that layered together just ended up, I think, being – it's hard to say because it's been so many years now. But to remind people, it was such a breath of fresh air on the competitive scene to see something that really out of the gate was so well balanced. Oh, yeah. And even let newer competitive players feel like they were accomplishing something. Because if they're only hitting like the left ramp, well, the left ramp is moving them towards something that they could sink their teeth into. So I think it's a good pick. And it makes sense that we're picking Keith Elwin games for this category, Dennis, because Keith Elwin is arguably the greatest competitive pinball player of all time. so it makes sense that that bleeds over into his design of some of these games. So much so that I promise I won't do this again, but my number one was Godzilla. It's a keep going game. I know I've picked every category, but hear me out. It's arguably the greatest game of all time. I would argue it's not my favorite game of all time, but objectively, it's the top three, no doubt. So that's why it's there for everybody, in my opinion. Plus, I've seen competitive players play this game in competition that still, to this day, have different strategies on how they approach this game. And these are the most highly ranked players have different strategies on how they play this game. In addition to, we've seen Pin Slash and some competitive side quest speed run type of things, even the Stern Shoopy and stuff, use Godzilla. And it's for a reason. And there are many different ways to play this and many different ways to compete, especially with Insider Connected. So Godzilla tops the list for me for the best pick for diehard competitive gamers looking for a new in-box game. Okay. I mean, it does make sense. I did not put Godzilla there, though. My number one was Jurassic Park. Another Elwynn game. Yeah. Hat trick out of Elwynn. How could I not? His games are the best balanced for competitive play of the current production, in my opinion. The reason why I went ahead, even though I prefer Godzilla, I like Jurassic Park quite a bit. It's my second favorite, Elwynn. I think it's a little bit better received by competitive players for a couple of reasons. One, some of the shots, some of the shot geometry, like the smart missile and all of that, is more challenging than the shots in Godzilla. So I think some people appreciate it for that. I also think for newer players, newer competitive players, and people who haven't memorized deep rule sets, it's more approachable on the rules than Godzilla is in order to even put up big scores. So because of those reasons, I think that Jurassic Park is a bit better. Plus, I feel it plays a little shorter, too. So for those reasons, I think it's just a stronger competitive game. It's actually, I think, the strongest in this entire list. We're making good arguments. I think we're doing pretty good here. I don't know if we're going to continue once we get down to the bottom half of these things. If you disagree, email us at thepinballshow at gmail.com, or even better, comment on our social media post about this episode, and we can discuss there. Or go into Pinside, a dedicated thread that TPN has, and we're within that for the Pinball Show. Or upgrade to the Nordman level, and then you can tell us on the live stream. Oh, yeah. That's true. It's coming. In the chat, in our happy hour. All right, so now we're getting a little tougher here. We've picked a lot of stirring games, and rightfully so. So they are kind of the best out there. I mean, it's also a big chunk of the list. Very true. What if we had to pick non-Stern games? So top three games that are not Stern pinball games. Maybe, I know a lot of enthusiasts that I talk to and hang out with, they have the majority of Stern. They don't have a lot of other manufacturers. They might have one or two, but a lot of people will reach out to me and be like, I know Jaws is good, but I just want something different. I've never tried a Jersey Jacker. I've never, I've never, what's this barrels about? I've never owned a, an American pinball game. If you had to pick one, which one would that kind of stuff? So out of this list, minus the sterns, what are our top three non-stern games? I'll start us off. If you're wanting to try something different, I'm going back to a JJP. So it's going to be Elton John for right now. That was my number one pick. Okay. Yeah. You got to feel, you got to feel out of J J J P because of all the little extras that you get with that manufacturer and what better than one that shoots uh wonderfully as well so that's that's why yeah yeah i all the all the same reasons for me and i'll note elton john is the only game that i picked for more than one category and this is the second time i've mentioned it and it will be the last time okay okay yeah you were uh you're a big fan of elton i can see you maybe owning one in the in the future and elton john yeah well you're on star trek so i don't yeah Yeah, I mean, it's different enough, I think. It's different. Possibly. Possibly. My number three was actually Ripley Alien. Alien Ripley Edition. That's a good pick. And this is not a game that I would get. Like, I don't like really how it shoots very well. It's a wide body. It doesn't appeal to a lot of my strengths. But it's a great theme. The rules, I think, are very good. The pricing has gotten a lot, especially with the Ripley Edition, has gotten a lot more competitive. Yes. And I think all combined as a package, you get a very different feel than a Stern. So we're thinking non-Stern in particular. I'm like, if someone's coming to me, I'm like, Dennis, I'm sick of Sterns. I'm like, you know what? I got the game for you. There's one wide body that's still out there in this space. And there's a reason why Pinball Brothers keeps revisiting the Alien well. It's selling. People like it. It's not my cup of tea, but some people like this tea. And so that's my number three. It's very immersive as well. And, yeah, they really nailed that theme integration. And the theme is awesome too. I can see that being in there. I wanted to pick a spooky game here. I'm going to be transparent. But I didn't in this top three non-stirring games. I didn't pick a spooky game. And that is because spooky's best is yet to come. That's what I'll say there. But number two, I went Elton John number three. Number two, I want to say Pulp Fiction because CGC makes such a damn great game that I want other people to realize that there are other really good manufacturers out there that are making really good products, ones that get the top licenses, they get the top assets, and ones that can be cool. It's not just edgy, stern titles like Deadpool and different things like that. There's other manufacturers that can do that. Pulp Fiction does that very, very well. And it not only offers a different manufacturer, but a different feel of a game because Stern doesn't make a whole lot of – well, nobody makes a whole lot of single-level games. But that one works really, really well and is built really, really well. So Pulp Fiction for me. And then number one for me, Dennis, was the newcomer. Barrels of Fun Pinball, absolutely. Labyrinth. This is one for me that it's not quite as big as the, oh, shit, what is this thing called Wizard of Oz pinball by Jersey Jack? But it is another significant step in a progression in our industry that we've seen, in my opinion, in the last 10 years. And it's a manufacturer that comes out of the gate doing everything correctly and still is flying really high and is on fire. even a half a year after the reveal and announcement and launch of a new product. Yeah, the Labyrinth was my number two pick. Okay. All right. So you agree as well. And then what was the number one you said was Elton John for you? Yeah for me it was Elton because it the one that going to have the least mechanical issues Yes In part So that the risk with the Alien and possibly with Labyrinth I haven heard too much criticism on the build quality of Labyrinth though I have heard some people note that on location it does seem to go down. So there you have it. First-time builder, so not surprised. Listener, if you're looking for something a little different to add to your collection, no other place than Dens and I are kind of on the same page here. Alien, Labyrinth, Elton John, and Pulp Fiction. What about the dark horses? Everybody likes rooting for the underdog here. What are the top three brand-new and boxed pinball machines that you can buy right now that are underrated, that just don't get the love that they deserve? You know, this one was tough for me because I have to kind of – you'll know better as a distributor, at least on some of the brands that you, through flipping out, deal in. My number three, since I'm trying to rank them now for you, would be I think P3's Final Resistance. I had that, but it was there. And I'm trying to get to you here. You'll see later. But, damn, it was there. I'm with you. And the reason is, in a way, it's like if you know, you know. Like if you know Scott Danesi, then you probably are aware of Final Resistance. As a layout, I think it's probably arguably better than Total Nuclear Annihilation's layout is. That's a strong take. And so I think it'll appeal. And it's friendlier at the very least. What? I think it's friendlier. here's my problem i don't have enough time to tell you if the rules are better or not as someone who used to own tna and then let it go the reason i let it go is it was a one trick i it's backhand the lock the inline locks and then try and destroy your reactor and then when you're out of multiball you inline them again and then you know rinse repeat so it was like it was hard it was cool music uh and you still get that with this but i think it's a little more i I think there's more variety to the gameplay on it. So I think it's a dark horse because... I agree, yeah. Plus, it avoids so much of my criticism of the P3 and this low-rent phone graphic nonsense they have to fill the screen with because he does it like a regular play field and just uses little clever things. So I just think it's far more approachable than most of the other P3 games because of how he handled the screen and everything else with it. But you have to know about it. And again, it's not a licensed theme. so who's going to know about it? You'll see here soon that Final Resistance was on my list in the position three for a reason. Yeah, I agree. It's super fun to shoot, too. It's the only game thus far that would make me consider a P3, but the reason I'll keep it off the list right now is I can't recommend it because I'm just pretty adamant about the feel of a P3 system and the operating system in general. And if I still want this game to be in a regular pinball format with wood play field and regular switches, then I can't really recommend it. So my third was going to be... Is this underrated, though? Stranger Things. It used to be. I thought about this, and then I thought, is it really still underrated? It was definitely when it came out. It's tough. because it didn't sell well when it came out. We were sitting on L.E. Well, because the Demogorgon shot was a mess, and the rules weren't in a great state when it started. There were a lot of placeholder things that were clearly from an older game that Lonnie had in there. Oh, yeah, and it's trended up over the last couple years a lot more so, but I still think that it's still kind of a dark, it's still underrated. People almost made up their mind. A lot of people made up their mind and don't want to change their mind and give it another chance. So I would say give Stranger Things another chance I'm not saying it's the greatest game ever It's got its issues still And it is on the code side More basic but in a great way So for me it was that My second though would be I got to man It's GTF This little dark horse It's not even a dark horse It's a space cow It's quirky I'm not saying that you're going to buy it and fall in love, but you would appreciate it a lot more. It gets shit on for the correct reasons and for the wrong reasons. I'm not going to say it doesn't get shit on for the wrong reasons, but it's fun, and it works for me, and it's beautiful, and there's so many things that I check, and there's so... Look, I go back to this game. It's one of my go-to games, and I might have a game that freezes up. I might have to reset it. But there's just something that I love about Galactic Tank Force. And I think it is a dark horse. I think it's underrated. And you should consider it if you're willing to live with its quirkiness. Okay. My number two was not GTA. I actually went with another American pinball game, Hot Wheels. Oh, really? Okay. Yes. the their one foray into license theming sadly sabotaged because the pandemic hit right after they revealed the game so it never got to be an operated game by and large i actually did play it on route um not perfect by any stretch of the imagination however there are a lot of assets from the youtube show so it actually has content on the screen it's not just juice squirting in on some um it's funny too it's it it's cool yeah it yeah again not not not the greatest in terms of not terrible build quality but if the flippers are working and stuff the shots it it has a different feeling layout and does i think it works well with the theme yes the rpm targets are are overly relied upon as a rules thing so you again you need to be an enthusiast looking for dark courses to want something like this shot but but but i think i actually enjoyed playing it uh it wouldn't be a game i would really be highly interested in buying but and when we had it on location it was actually it wasn't like the least favorite game there there are other games like guns and roses that got far more static from competitors than hot wheels biggest complaint was it wasn't very balanced but that's been true for all the american pinball games yeah yeah i think it's a good pick it's a solid game whether i like it or not it's a solid game my top most underrated dark horse this is the shill of me i'm sorry y'all i had a final resistance i bumped it off moved everything back stranger things gtf it's big buck hunter reloaded it's an arcade game because you know what i know but nothing is more underrated than having a just pinball collection you gotta throw something different in there nothing is more underrated than that you don't have it in the list so like i didn't even have the opportunity to pick it it's cheating i know it is cheating so once you not resistance i guess it's number three but big buck is awesome okay top three or did well my number one i didn't get to say my number one dark horse yeah what is the darkest one black knight sort of right just darkest of horses yep black knight sort of rage oh only pro only see this will get you there's your setting too dark horse that because the theme was only based off of a license that was known in pinball and as we talked about in the main show the just i'll say discrimination against the game for not the pro model not having an upper play field people didn't give the pro a chance it's actually a lot of fun damn i miss that i you know what i i did bad on this i failed you all because that that is actually the best pick i think and that they're doing a second bite at the apple and people get it you know what proof That's proof. It ain't a movie license, but it's a fun game. Yeah, the Magnus A being on the action button is stupid, but bashing the shield, the shots, it's in your face. It's the most brutal Steve Ritchie game of his last five, I would say. Here's my question. Do you think left ramp mod, I'll call it left ramp mod, sword mod, is good for this game? As a reminder to the listener, the left quasi-orbit is a saucer on Black Knight Pro, and it pops it, it vucks it up onto a wire form that comes back to your right flipper. A lot of people complain it's a right flipper game, but this mod actually, instead of vucking it up onto the right wire form, it's its own separate wire form back to the left flipper that I think works, but I didn't know if you had any thoughts on that. I think I've not played a version with that mod. I it is a right flipper heavy game but that's common with Steve because most people are right handed and that's why his third flippers are always on the right and he does that on purpose and you need the right flipper like I want the shots for locking the ball and stuff at the night I want to try and backhand those I want it on the right flipper so I wouldn't do the mod it's like the shots you want need the right flipper or they're better to take up from the right that stuff, the knight and everything, and the spinning flail thing, it's so in your face. The game's hard enough. It's supposed to be. It can be right flipper heavy. It's already a really short ball time game. And you can still back. It's a Steve Ritchie. So you can still backhand left orbit kind of stuff. So, no, I wouldn't do it. That's a good pick. We only have two more left here. The one is a top three to consider pre-owned. Maybe, you know, if you buy a new inbox, you're going to lose your ass. Or maybe you don't want to buy a new in-box because they need a lot of tweaking for this particular title or they need some break-in period. It might be better if you just buy a little bit down the line pre-owned instead of brand new in-box. I'll start it off here. Again, I'm cheating. I'm saying the P3 system as a whole because I think there are some good games in there with Weird Al, with Final Resistance. I have not played Princess Bride, but it looks fun. I just buying that whole damn bundle if you're wanting all three of those it's so expensive and I see it time after time week after week people going to sell it and they take such a hit on this thing not to mention that if you're buying a pre-owned one there's a good likelihood that it's coming from somebody that's like dove right into the p3 system and there's some twid don't I don't care you can't email in there are some damn adjustments on that system that you have to make, and I know that from experience because I've owned a handful of them as a distributor. That game needs some tweaking, needs some modification, needs some adjusting, similar to a spooky pinball game. I'll put it out there. But it needs some work a lot of times on that game. So why not have somebody obsessed with that kind of stuff, fix all that shit before they give it to you? So a P3 system in general is my third pick. Okay. Actually, my third pick was P3 Weird Al. Okay. And the reason was, you ain't going to find Princess Bride there. I'm making it yet. like it's there's not it's not available pre-owned and i'm not even sure final resistance is all that out there so in that regard weird al i know is we're seeing them come up and it's basically what you noted the p3 takes a bath on the second-hand market there's no reason in my mind that you should pay first uh first party pricing given how cheap they go for um and weird al does some creative stuff in terms of a rule set and using the screen and such so in terms of a different experience that's why i would say go ahead and look at it but look at it pre-owned because you're going to save thousands it makes sense my go ahead second pick oh i was gonna say my my second pick uh for on the pre-owned side of things is going to be now this one's this one i talked about how well you know princess bride not even really available yet this one's speculative but based off of prior performance out of spooky i'm gonna say texas chainsaw massacre oh that's an interesting pick and the reason i'm saying that one is i think looney tunes has got the they're gonna sell out of Looney Tunes. I think... Right now it's the more preferred title of the studio. Yes, but as we're hearing, and from my own experience, because I did play both at Texas Pinball Festival, the rule set of Texas Chainsaw is far more interesting. It's clever, yeah. Yeah, and they're the same layouts. So, given the theme, given the art, given the general dislike of horror in general, I think these will, much like other spooky titles, go for significantly less if you're willing to wait secondhand, and I think you're going to be able to get Texas Chainsaw cheaper than Looney Tunes secondhand, and I think you're going to get a better rule set out of it. I think you're right out of all of those. It might take some time for that rule set to get there, but yeah. So that's my number two. It's a pretty good pick there. I didn't go, I could see going with a spooky game there. I didn't. I went with a game that I think that could have fit in the underrated category, but one that, man, it is tanked from new in box pricing so much over the years, and it's a little quirky at times with power supply stuff. It's American Pinball's Houdini. It's one of my, if not my favorite American Pinball machine. You know what? GTF is really starting to fight. I used to always say Houdini is my favorite American Pinball game, but GTF's making that fight. But I loved Houdini. It's very difficult. It is quirky because it's their first game that they came out with. The early ones had power supply issues, so if you're looking for pre-owned, you're going to save thousands of dollars and maybe We tried to find one that somebody upgraded the power supply for consistent catapult launches. But overall, that game is so cheap at times. It jumps down to like mid-$5,000s, and there's a lot of game there in the low $5,000s range with a lot of charm and charisma too. So Houdini would be my pick because it's something that you open it up out of the box, you may hate it. so buy one pre-owned for a good price that's working and shooting well and I think you might have a winner there and then my top pick for the game to consider pre-owned rather than new in box I hate to say it but it's Venom that's my number one also and for me it's just because you guys heard it on pinball market trends it's losing substantial it doesn't matter what freaking model it's losing substantial amount of money I don know why it sold decent when it was first released It just not selling well now we close to 1 code and it still not grabbing people now there are some people out there a handful of people have told me that this is the Stranger Things effect people will realize later on I made that Stranger Things prediction when it came out I'm not making it for Venom but I've had a handful of people tell me Zach, this game is simply better than Jaws and nobody realizes it yet. And I'm in that group because I don't realize it yet. I don't. I mean, Jaws rules are less developed still. I will qualify my pick on it and say, and I do need to note, I still haven't played a Venom Pro, but I would say pre-owned Premium LE because I think it's the only way to truly experience the rules as Dwight has envisioned them. Yeah, yeah. And I have played that version, and I think it's extremely clever. But if you're looking at a game that doesn't do the change state of the layout, I think you lose half of the personality of it. It's another one like Avengers. It's kind of a game that's stuck in its own head. It's like, I know what you're trying to do. Damn. But the difference is I don't feel like you lose any meaningful gameplay experience doing the pro version of Avengers. I look at Venom Pro, and I'm like, why did you think it was okay to do the rules the way you did them and then strip everything cool out? That was the cool selling point. It was, and that's why I think Pros in particular are probably going to be some of the best buys you'll be able to find secondhand. But if you're trying to get a good experience, I think you've got to get the premium. And there's no prettier game than the LE version. But, damn, it's in the… It's a C-tier hero that no one really cares about. Yeah, but it's a $13,000 LE, Dennis, that has dropped like nine grand. That's like a $4,000 loss there. You can't justify that. There's just no way. And all the Venom LEs aren't going to have high plays on them anyway. They're going to be like new. Okay, to finish off this segment, I've had a lot of fun here. This was fun. What about if we're going to do the best of top threes, we've got to do a bottom three to get us in trouble. So this was harder than I thought it would be. It wasn't easy. But what are your bottom three picks of the new and bottom pinball machines on the market right now? And maybe even whenever you say, is there anything redeeming about your picks also? Sure. I mean, yeah. Well, maybe. I'll start with number three. This is the one I was most torn on, and this is probably the most redeeming one. And I apologize because you aren't going to like this, but it's GGF. GTF. Oh, Dennis, no. GTF. No. What's redeeming is I have heard a number of people that actually kind of enjoy how it plays. And you've noted that. Like, it's fun to shoot. You're not the only one I've heard say that, so I wanted to acknowledge it. However, it's such a miss on so many levels. Not only is it an unlicensed theme, the theme doesn't make any sense. This game is a poster child for why you should not engage in serious commercial product development while doing drugs. Because from the choice of mixing a 50s campy sci-fi aesthetic with dubstep, which don't go together, coupled with a one-ramp layout, coupled with an acting cast that nobody but knows except maybe one of the actresses, and they're all clearly reading their line. It's this mix of camp that I'm sure when people were stoned, sounded like it was all going to work, but it just really, to me, it doesn't. It just really doesn't. So if it played a little better than it does, I'd move it out of the bottom three, and I'd put in something like Scooby-Doo, which I think shoots pretty bad. But I just can't. I've got to say, I think out of this list, because if you get this game, you're probably going to take a pretty, even if you buy it used, I think you're going to take a bigger hit selling it than you bought it for. I just can't recommend it. I have to say. I think it's one of the worst games to come out recently. Oh, man. Ouch. Okay. All right. Is it in your bottom three, even though you mentioned it earlier? Is it a positive game? Question mark. Now I feel even worse because my third pick is an American pinball game. It's Legends of Valhalla. I did think about that one, too, but I just don't have enough experience with it. I appreciate what they were trying to do, and it's a good story to tell, but that game just sucks. It just sucks. The mechanics of it suck. The layout's not horrible. I don't like the theme. I don't like the artwork. There's so much that I don't like, and there's so much that you can buy with your money right now. The only way, the only way that I could recommend Legends of Valhalla to purchase is if you own the other 34 games. It just, it's bad. It's so bad. There's a couple other ones that I wouldn't recommend, but Legends of Valhalla, maybe if you like, see, I don't think it's done well enough with like the Greek mythology stuff. Maybe if you're a Jeff Teolis fan, I don't, even Jeff Teolis doesn't own this game probably. I don't know. It's bad. So that's another American pinball. I've got to get out of this. I'm going to get more complaints here. Let's switch over and piss off Pinball Brothers. My second pick would be Queen. Mine as well as my number two. It just not only did it not sell well, it was a swing and a miss on the layout department. I find some redeeming qualities in this game, but it's not for the best reasons. I like the band Queen. I'm not mad at shooting it, but there's nothing really fun, fun to shoot at. There's no real mechs or toys in this game. People hate the artwork. I'm okay with it. People hate the artwork. It's just principle alone. They've done Queen dirty here, and I don't forget about that. It's a bottom three for me. Yeah, for me, putting it as a second worst was a lot of the similar. The layout, I mean, it's not the worst layout out there, but it's not great. It's not great. The problem I mostly feel, don't forget, was it the horrific trans light that they went with, like a weird art decision versus everything else. But the problem is you took such an iconic band that never had a pinball machine, and you made no one want it. Yeah. You made no one want it so badly, you had to spin out the Ripley edition of Alien so that your company could make money. And remember, this was the first game I remember seeing where they did a price cut. Before the game came out, they did a price cut on one of the lines, knowing how difficult it was going to be. So it's not a great experience. I know. And I'm going to be... Because we're here with the Patreon, So I'm going to be a little saltier and say it's borderline insulting what they did to Queen with it. I know, right? It wasn't respectful to the license. They did them dirty. Yeah, did them dirty. That's a good way to express it. So, yeah, I agree with you. You know it's a bad game when I've heard people argue like, no, guys, but the code is solved. The code is fun. And I can agree with you, but I'm like, who gives a shit? Everything else is just bad. You wasted your time then. even if this code is good and the rules i don't care because man it's just bad on so many levels come on well our number ones have to be the same i mean they have to be right i just feel like it is oh is it american pinball game bbq all right squirt those beats squirt on very old barbecue challenge all right while i've been thinking about this here's what i wanted to do um where do you think it ends up falling in the pin side top 100 list because not all right they're currently 200 and no i think all right maybe it doesn't get ranked and obviously there are so i'll say 100 100 no no i mean all right yeah it's because they call it the pin side top pinball top 100 but actually it's the top 292 currently so here's what i think boy i don't think it ends up falling below thunderbirds because there are some rules things to thunderbirds that are inferior to the rules of barbecue. This game has me thinking, eh, on Thunderbirds. Like, this game is horrible. Some people might be saying that, but here's where I think it falls. I think it ends up coming in at 288. I think that Spy Hunter, Raven, Bugs Bunny's Birthday Ball, Hercules, and Thunderbirds all rank under it, but Harley Davidson by Stern is better. I'd rather have three of those games at least over this barbecue game. I mean, I would rather have Raven and Harley Davidson for sure. Spy Hunter is such a turd of a layout with a weird flipper thing. Bugs Bunny's rules are awful. I'll take Bugs Bunny. It's iconic. It looks good. Bugs Bunny looks great. Hercules is a novelty. No one cares about it. But, so, I mean, all right. So I played this. I played multiple copies. I played it several times at TPF. other than the space shuttle ball locks, I can't say anything positive about the whole screen as a waste of space. Why is there a screen in the play field? There's nothing special going on. It doesn't shoot well. I mentioned Hot Wheels earlier as one of my games that I thought was kind of interesting, a Dark Horse pick. It's a better version of the same layout. Same-ish layout. It's not identical. And what kills me on this is everything on face value is horrible, like the art, the theme, all of that. But then you dive into it, and reports are coming back that it's not like this game is built well. People say it feels like shit. It feels cheap for some reason compared to other American pinball games even. So it's like they didn't even get that right. No, it was. No, there were times where on certain copies at TPF, I couldn't. Like the shots wouldn't go clear. They put the spinners so far up on the ramps that they can brick the shots. The very first game I played at TPF was barbecue because when I went into the place on Friday, there was no one at one of them. I walked up to it. I finished my ball one, which I played about five minutes on it. The ball drained. The game crashed. It crashed. I had to reboot it. I get that people don't say things because they want, you know, their job is important and stuff like that. I get not saying something, but this kind of stuff, when products come out like this, I get in trouble because I'm honest with it. But, like, if I'm part of that American Pinball team, guys, like, at some point, somebody had to at least put their job on the line for just reminding people that this is a bad idea. Like, I would have had to have compromised my job. I know I'm probably going to get fired, but can you guys say publicly that I didn't want any part of this? How does it get to this point? This is a horrible game. The only thing that comes to my mind is, and we heard this after the crash and burn of Deep Root with Robert Mueller, but that you couldn't tell him no. No one was willing to tell him no. He didn't listen to the loose suggestions of things. And that's what it feels as an outsider, because I don't work with American Pinball. As an outsider, that's what it feels like to me, is that there is leadership at American Pinball, and everyone is either too scared to correct them or the person doesn't listen to corrections. They're always right, because this is very much a no one ever said no. And so all this stuff gets thrown in, all these legacy components from, hey, we're paying honor. We're homaging all these greats of Barry Osler's designs. And then you end up with a turd burger. with juices squirting on it. No, I don't even care if the rules were to get to a good state. You look at this display and I'm like, this display with the meats is on par with what Scott Danesi did with TNA, where there's just a spinning spaceship, because he's not using the display for anything other than menu stuff. But we all bought Total Nuclear Annihilation knowing that. Here it's just a waste. There's not numeric displays to otherwise occupy our eyes. I would recommend them not continue with any unfinished code. There's no reason to. Don't finish with it. And part of me was like, well, maybe people didn't want to get canceled because they were like, well, this is a tribute to an individual who has passed away that was important to this industry. Me speaking up was going to make me look like a dick. Here's the deal, guys. We're past that. Everybody understands that we can love Barry O and love his contributions to this industry. He's an awesome guy. Who cares? This sucks. This sucks. Even if this is a nice tribute, God bless them, that's fine. But as a product in 2024 to sell with the competition that you have in these other products, this is unacceptable. It's just my take. No, there is a big gap between my pick of queen at two and this at one, a big gap. When this product comes out and has you questioning the entire company that's producing it, that's a problem. That is a problem. Prior to GTF, American Pinball was known for the little engine that could, that makes really high-quality games. It's a little different than Stern, but one that you can get behind. The last two releases here, they've really compromised their brand. With this last release, their overall decision-making in this industry. We'll see what happens with their next game. We hear rumors of it was supposed to be a whitewater return, but now it's not because Nordman's gone. It's a licensed cuphead. They can only go up from here, I think. I think. I don't know. All right. Is this time to tell? Yes. You can push stop now. Thanks for listening. Oh, that's good. I'll listen to this one.