Good evening and welcome to the fifth episode of the Spinner is Lit Pinball Podcast. Tonight's episode, Batting the Ball Around. As usual, I'm your host, Spencer Klingin, recording from the Kitchen Table Studios. And tonight I have a special guest, my good friend and fellow pinhead, Seth Holder. Seth, welcome to the show. Hey, Spence. Thanks for having me on. This should be a hoot. Oh, it's going to be good. And tonight's episode, I basically put some basic outline show notes together like five minutes ago and texted them over to you. It's kind of like working without a net, man. It's just the rush and the fun of doing it. So if you're ready, let's jump right in. You know, you and I, let's talk about Steve Sharlin for a minute. You and I attended his memorial service yesterday. pretty somber occasion but you know at the same time there was a lot of joy in it in that everyone there was celebrating steve's life you know and and all the accomplishments of his life and just you know beyond pinball what a just a wonderful human being that he was yeah absolutely i think one of my remarks on the way home was uh uh given the somber nature of the event that was probably the most enjoyable, if that's a poor choice of words, memorial I've attended to where it was really about celebrating somebody and honoring them in a casual environment where it felt like a family reunion getting together and honoring one of the fallen. It was really neat for me. I'm really plugged into Steve the pinball guy but just to see all the other facets of his life walking around looking at all the photographs and memories and seeing all the different folks that are in all the other hobbies that he had a vested interest in so it was pretty neat and just being able to the family asked that we wear the different shirts or maybe our favorite pinball shirt So it was just kind of neat to see such a large crowd wearing kind of their tip-of-the-cap type hats to Steve. It was a pretty neat event. Yeah, yeah, because it was, of course, us Timball people. There was car people. There were coworkers and employees and, of course, obviously his family and just other close friends. Yeah, it was just, I mean, overall, you know, I took away from it is, you know, I want to tell everybody that if you knew Steve at all, or even if you didn't know him, but you might have known him just from the pinball forum, is try to take something away positive. Be who he was, just a good man. Yeah, absolutely. It's like the overwhelming response to anybody that's interacted with Steve was just that he was all in. And he was plugged into what you were doing, helping you, almost being that servant kind of guy. It's like, oh, what are you working on? Let me help you with that. And he would stop what he was doing and make that deep personal connection with everybody in his life. A truly unique individual. Yeah, he's going to be missed. I don't buy everybody. But especially the System 80 crew. I mean, how do you fill that void? As our System 80s begin to break down over the next couple of years, which they will do, it's like, who do you turn to now? I was thinking about that very thing today, and I was talking about it a little bit at the tournament. It's like we've all got to jump in and do what we can to kind of figure this out and learn it and share what he shared with us. And if we have new knowledge, share that too. Pay it forward, yeah. Exactly, exactly. So what's new in pinball, man? Everything. It's 2017, and the market's gone bananas for new pins, I guess, most of them way too rich for my blood without having to sell off my meager collection just to get into one. But it's crazy when you look at the couple new sterns, the dial-in's beginning production soon. You've got American Pinball starting to make a strong showing. Real excited to see what they're calling a factory-level machine that's going to be showing up at shows here real soon. Pinnagogo is the next show that I know that it's going to be there. And then you've got Spooky's making a strong showing. They've got, what, how many titles running through their line at this point? They've got three, I think, four, five. I don't know. That's another one. and then you got Higway with their latest offering beginning to ship soon, right? I think another quarter is when we'll start seeing the Alien propagating out there. Unfortunately, you have some like your Bride of Pinbot 2.0 redo that's coming out, and you kind of scratch your head and go, okay, I guess maybe there's somebody out there once that art package is at that price point. But, yeah, there's a lot to pick and choose from. Yeah, you know, like Alien, you know, I'm real excited about. I still haven't been downtown to play Aerosmith yet. Maybe next Sunday, or I'll just catch it at Pinagogo. Same with Batman 66. You know, everybody's talking about Star Wars. That's going to be a game changer. Obviously, Steve Ritchie, you know, and with the new LCD screen and then hopefully well, allegedly Star Wars. Allegedly Star Wars. I mean, you know. Worst kept secret. No doubt. Could end up being like all of the family for all we know, right? Right. That would turn some heads. Yeah. I got a chance to go down to the Arcade Expo 3.0 in Banning. It was last month and super neat show. Really fun. Great, great setup. and Marco was there with some great sterns, so I got a chance to play Aerosmith Pro for the first time and got to log some time on, I guess it's a Batman Premium. I get kind of fuzzy all the different levels that they got with the Batman 66, but I think it was somewhere in the middle. So I got to log time with both of those titles, and kind of, not that I was hungering for the themes, but it's always kind of interesting to see what's coming out. Aerosmith played well, shot well. The trunk worked a good 60%, 70% of the time on the model that I was playing on. It was a pro, so it didn't have the upper play field up there on the right. It scratched some itches, but it wasn't like, oh, I need to own this. This is better than Metallica, which is kind of my gold standard for rock, stern pinball machines. So it didn't kind of shift what I do there. Batman, you know, I like the theme. I'm not like, it's not like, oh, I have to have a Batman 66. But, you know, I thought it was well executed. It was nice seeing the screen with all the images and the tie-in to the program. It flipped fine. I liked it. But once again, I wasn't like, oh, I've got to own this. This is a needle mover for me. I've got to figure out how to get this in my house. But I'm sure, you know, obviously the market's responding and people are buying. So I am probably more of a minority than a majority, I guess. Yeah, well, I'm right there with you. And for me, theme is good. But, I mean, theme is so much less important for me if it shoots well or if, you know, I like the shots. I mean, if the themes integrated well, I'm probably most excited still about Dialed In. So if it was a Barbie theme that shot amazing and had zero sound and zero light show, you'd be – Well, there's got to be a little more than that. But a game I actually won, it matters a little bit, but it's not the most important part. Okay, I'll grant you that. I won a Dolly Parton pinball. By the way, not that there's anything wrong with the Barbie thing. Right. There you go. You know, I really want a Dolly Parton pin. I don't know why. Just the kitsch value. And it looks like it's a fun shooter, you know? Right. Well, you know, for somebody of your age group, right, that's probably right. You love to just dunk on the age, huh? So, yeah. So, yeah, I mean, you know, look, it's not like, oh, I got to have it. I'm going to, you know, order one off eBay or something. But if one came up locally cheap, I'd pick it up. I'm with you on Dolly. That's a fun shooter. I've played it over at the museum, and it definitely has a price point. I think I did play that last time we were there. I try to keep track, but Dialed In, and we were talking about this in the car. When I'm watching some more recent video footage of Dialed In, and you and I talked about with the theme. Okay, it's an original unlicensed theme, obviously, and it captures the essence of pop culture of what's going on today. Like, for more machines, especially unlicensed themes, and licensed ones too, I suppose. But, you know, back in the day, when machines, you know, the EM days, early solid state, when machines were much simpler, you know, the themes often captured the essence of what was going on in pop culture at that moment. Kind of like a window into 1981 or whatever. No, exactly. I mean, it's the exact reason why Diner is such a great pen. Sorry, Practical Steve, but yes, Diner is a great pen. It's got that, that captures that certain era and nostalgia. And I think Dialed In will be exactly that 20 years from now. Now it's kind of current, maybe two years past its prime. So it kind of, your initial impression is like, well, but as somebody who likes JJP, likes Jersey Jack and what he brings to the table, likes what they're striving to do, I'm interested in it. I'm looking forward to playing it at Pinnagogo. It could be a needle mover for me. I might have to find a way to get a Jersey Jack machine at some point. but I actually to be honest haven't seen any videos of it I haven't had time to check it out I was saw all the photos when they first got came out and saw the shots and it was intriguing but ultimately I'm just going to have to play it I've seen way too many videos and fall in love with machines only to play them and go well the geometry wasn't quite what I was expecting so dialed in I'm putting a pin in it keeping myself optimistic then again at some time part of me hopes I don't like it because at it's price point I would have to get rid of most of my machines to own it so it's not a good value proposition for me but so we'll see yeah that's where I'm at with it too obviously you know me pretty well and it's like I'm just not in the market for a new machine man i'm like let's find that 800 machine oh absolutely but i you know hopefully they'll get them on route locally and i'll put lots of money in them and uh and our friends with with more money than us will buy one so we can play it a lot yeah exactly so uh mr bannister if you're listening get dialed in sir please oh spooky man i just root for these guys so much I absolutely love the layout and the shots on Rob Zombie. I love playing that game because it has the elements of a modern game, but it has also the elements and the feel of a System 80 with glass holes. I haven't been over to Adams to play it yet, but I've played America's Most Haunted, which is fine, but it definitely has more of a home-built feel to it. And maybe I'm – yeah, I'm probably a little bit of a Williams snob, but I'm just curious. Does it – have they progressed in how the overall quality as you're playing the machine feels? You know, I think it has, but I've only played like three games on America's Most Haunted, and that was last year at Pinnagogo because Gene – Thank you, Gene. Thank you, Gene. He's bringing it back again this year. Thank you, Gene. I think – well, we're going to have a Domino's, so I'm excited about that. Yeah, actually, I am too. I'd love to see a Jetson show up, but I don't know if that's going to happen. Yeah, I don't think so either, but Domino's looks like a really good shooter. I have watched some videos on that, and the theme doesn't do anything for me, but I don't hate it either. The art itself Subtracting away with it It's dominoes looks fine It looks like good theme integration So I'm curious to see how it plays So really appreciate Shane bringing it up From SoCal to bring it up to the show For us to try out Oh definitely You know with Rob Zombie The biggest drawback for me is I mean I like the theme well enough I don't hate it I think Rob Zombie is cool But you know I got little kids man And you know even on a family theme I'm like, because I haven't seen it on Family Theme. But, you know, at Adam's house, it's on adult mode. And I'm like, I can't put that in my game room, man. Because they got cursed. Now, Mickey, when the machine says blank, blank, blank, that means. That means don't tell mom. Yes. For the love of God, don't tell mom. Yeah. But, you know, so, I mean, I get it. You know, it's cool he's doing, you know, science fiction horses. I'm very excited about Alice Cooper. I mean, I just report because they do everything, you know, as best they can. And they really, you know, they really care about the community. Not that the other guys don't. But, you know, like Star Wars. You know, because I'm a huge Star Wars fan. But I don't know, man. I just, it's kind of one of those things like ACDC. I'm an ACDC fan. But until I actually saw the game up front and played it, I was just like, eh, okay, cool, ACDC. You know? But then when I saw the game in person and played it, I went, oh, man, this is awesome. So that's kind of where I'm at with Star Wars. Alien, I'm really excited about it. It looks really cool. I really want to play it. It's just they've got to get them out in the people's hands. Yeah, exactly. Time to market. Knowing what the theme is and what the art package looks like and what the game looks like six, nine months in advance, it's what people want. They want information as soon as they can, but then it's like the market gets saturated, and then you get – it's kind of hard to deal with what are your choices and when are things going to be released. Right, right. It's tough, but I agree with you. I really like what Spooky represents. They're not trying to be the next Stern. They are, at least from my perspective, and maybe Charlie's going to tell me I'm an idiot, and I probably am. But to me, it's like they have a niche of being a boutique. They knew who they are, and they just stick within that niche, and they do things. They focus on quality, and they focus on customer, and they're not worried about, okay, what's our next 5,000-unit hit? They're perfectly fine. I think like what they're doing with Total Nuclear Annihilation, which that could be a big head-turner for me because I love early 80s single deck fast player type machines. The fact they're like, yeah, we're going to run it. We're going to run 50 at a time and we'll just keep running 50 at a time. We're not going to do any of this nonsense about 500 and we sell out. We'll just, once we get 50 orders, we'll put 50 out. And if we get another 50 orders, we'll put 50 out. So they could conceivably have three or more titles being run through their assembly line in any given year. So I think that's a great model for them. But on the other side of the spectrum, those that maybe not going after Stern, but are gearing themselves up for success, I think, I've been really closely following HomePin, who as most of us know that are kind of watching the inside baseball stuff is the gentleman from Australia that set up a really world factory in China and is really focused on quality and delivering to the customer's expectation. He's taking no money up front. He's working to build the first 500 units before he even reveals them and ships them. So he's been teasing us for quite a while, He's had his own roller coaster getting to where he's at. But if he can get off the ground and if he can get his bill of materials considerably lower, given where he's working out of, and if his quality is there, he has the capability of really making a dent in this escalated price wars that we're seeing and in the capability of churning out new titles. So I'm really excited to see what he does with Thunderbirds. what other licensing agreements he's got, or if he's going to be doing some original themes. What kind of designers is he going to work on? I think over the next 18 months, it's going to be really neat to watch how they unfold. Yeah, I haven't. We talked about that on the drive down to Stu's Memorial. I haven't followed the Home Pin thing at all. So it was all news to me yesterday when we were talking about that. I was like, oh, cool. So it's cool that you brought it up because probably some or maybe all of our listeners May not know about this or may know very little like I did. I was aware of it. I heard about Thunderbirds, and that was about it. There's a great – if you go look, there's a key thread somewhere on Penn's side that's all about HomePin, and it's – you just start at the beginning, and it goes back a couple years. But you can just focus on HomePin account postings. You can ignore everybody else, and he's showing photos. He's showing detail like this is how I designed my screw and why I did it. This is why I'm wrapping my own coils this way. I mean it's just a real detailed level of attention because he's really focused on quality. He doesn't want to have quality issues. He wants to have a good product that stands the test of time, at least from what we can tell. The proof will be in the pudding when he starts shipping and we start getting our hands on it. Originally, he wasn't even targeting U.S. I mean, that's why the theme Thunderbirds, most of us in the USA are like, really? Okay, Thunderbirds? But that's just got a huge worldwide market. There's been tons of shows and movies over the years. And so it's got a global reach. And so he's got all the licensing all lined up. And so he's really targeting everybody. And if the U.S. wants it, great. And if the U.S. doesn't care about it, he's not really worried about it. But I think once he's got everything established, then we could start seeing some titles that are much more focused on things that the U.S. audience would be interested in because I think that's really where the bulk of home buyers are. Yeah, I think so. Well, especially since most of the companies are in America, and I know international shipping really jacks up the prices. Okay, you brought up, of course, Dutch pinball. You know, I'm so impressed with what they did with Bride of Pinbot 2.0, you know, playing Ericsson and a couple other collectors. They did a really bang-up job on that, and I wish they would have continued doing more titles of that 2.0 kit, because there's quite a few that they could do. You know, Weatherquist, Funhouse, and then some of the System 11s. I don't know, man. I just, you know, I'm a harsh critic because, you know, the way they behaved at Expo when they first revealed. And then just all the stuff going on, I just look at it and it's like, and now with the Rotted Pinbot 2.125 or 3.0 or whatever it is. I mean, you know, there's one sitting in my game room right now. And it's a fun game, but it's not the end all be all of human existence, you know. And it's like – I mean I'm no art critic, man, but that new art to me is just frightening. I just – I'm looking at it going, this is an improvement? Come on, man. Python was the man. Yeah, it's confusing. I mean that's all I've seen. I mean full disclosure, what do I know about pinball? Oh, I guess I've read some stuff on this online forum and I've talked to some buddies. So I'm by no means an expert. But yeah, the artwork that I've seen coming when it was first released, I was pretty darn disappointed. And they could have done so much more with it. But I'm like you. Python is semi-sacred to me. I would rather keep honoring him and his art than try to introduce something new. I think they could have picked other titles to do something with this. Or ship their first game and get all their customers made whole. That would be probably a good start. Well, yeah. You talk about how much of a success from your standpoint playing 2.0 is, and I think it's a subjective thing. 2.0 doesn't do that much for me, especially at that price point. It doesn't interest me. But I get it. I get why people would really, really like it, and I don't begrudge them that. But in terms of how they executed it and how long it took to get into hands of people and then how everything else is running on the Dutch side of things, yeah, it just doesn't bode well. I'm always going to hope for the best. I want them to succeed. I think having multiple players in the market isn't a bad thing, so hopefully they can find a way to make it work. Right, yeah, me too, man I don't want anybody to see anybody fail Especially, you know, being so passionate as we are about this Not even J-Pop? You don't want J-Pop to fail? No, no, I don't Okay, I'm just kidding, we'll get there later No, no, we'll get into that No, I want him to be held accountable There's a subtle difference Okay, let's jump on The classic games we have played and liked lately Every single one I'm right there with you But, you know, for me, a couple of real high points lately. Devil's Dare, man. System 80 Gottlieb. Wow, I don't know. There's something about that game. I'm not that crazy about the theme or the artwork, but, I mean, it's okay. But I just like the shots, you know? I just like the shots. Yeah, you're probably going to hear me, especially if we start talking about classics, talk about geometry a little too much. For whatever reason, that's one of my hot buttons. if a game has good geometry, if things flow. A, the designer needs to put the geometry in place, and then B, the owner needs to have the table set up correctly, tweak where the posts are, tweak the lane guides, all those little things that make a big difference, get their cliffies installed. If that's set up right and you can just shoot like butter, I mean, it's an amazing thing, and Devil's Dare has that in spades. Now, I haven't played it in, oh, 18-plus months, so I'm not recalling the exact layout. I remember there was something neat about the center playfield area, but I just remember having a really good experience on it. Yeah, yeah, I just really enjoy it. Well, you were talking about going to Banning, which I had to cancel out because I was going to go to you guys. I had to cancel out. Yeah, you were missed, dude, big time. I missed you guys, you know, and, you know, working and paying the mortgage has to come first. I guess. I know, I guess. It's like this whole work thing keeps getting into my pinball pie, man, and it's killing me. But, yeah, you know, I remember there's a couple of real high points for you and, you know, Eric and Adam and, you know. Jim. Jim, thank you. and, of course, Practical Steve. So what were some of the high points for you on games? So as a show organizer on Pinagogo, that's A, my favorite show, and it's the show I spend a lot of time not playing pinball in. So anytime I can go to another show and play pinball, it's a great show from that perspective where I can just kind of relax and play. so and I haven't I'm not the guy that's traveled around and been to all these different shows I've I've been to PPE and I've been to California Extreme and I've now been to Banning so these are all local California shows but Banning was definitely special you can just the fact that they're able to have a fixed facility is is awesome they have a this large sprawling complex and so you get all these pinball machines I think there's five six hundred on set up in one room wide aisles comfortable benches um it's just a really good environment to play in they've even got ac piping in in certain spots so it's like um you know sometimes the room can get warm but you find good spots in that room that are cold so it's a it's a great experience um but just the title selection was was um almost overwhelming at times we we came in and we actually ended up um there was five of us that came down from from norcal and um together and so we we ended up volunteering to help tech um because we love the classics all of us do and um they had a lot of classics like a lot of the early early williams and got leaves were down for the count when we got there on friday morning so we pitched in and kind of helped um there was a ton of other people that have been putting their heart and soul into it so we we just scratched the surface but it was fun being able to come in and work on the pins that we were passionate about playing anyways and it was self-serving because you know it's like we all really wanted to play Knight Rider EM and they had one there and so uh and it was down so guess what machine got worked on a lot it was Knight Rider EM oh no doubt um Skateball right which was in the tournament area that was the heartbreaker we all wanted to play Knight um Skateball but it was in the tournament area and the boys got permission to go play one game on it um after hours one night and um we had been rotating through a five man there's five of us and so last man out had to sit out and it was just my luck that i had lost the prior game came came in last so that meant i had to sit out and and watch uh my four buddies play skateball so i still haven't had a chance to actually shoot a skateball but man oh man that that is a title that i'd like to get my hands on at one point the the theme the art the sound the shots it's all there on that machine um and so it's no wonder that it's a highly desired title yeah now you did get a chance to play a lot of the early ballets i remember you guys played a hot dog and did you get a chance to play a future spa yeah yeah we played both. Practical Steve killed it on hotdogging, so now he wants one. To me, that era of early wide-bodied ballet, this is where I show my bias because I own one, but Umbreon still is the pick of the litter. But definitely I think all of those machines, even Space Invaders and Paragon, they all have really cool bits and pieces to them, and if they're set up right, They're just wicked fun. So there's really no complaints there from me. But it was neat seeing all the early solid states. There was one stern that I had never seen before. I think it was like Freefall or something. I got to play Quicksilver, play a Viper. So some of these early solid state sterns that I've never played before, I finally got to kind of scratch those itch. I'm a huge, huge, huge big game fan. fan, so Stern, big game. All my friends are tired of me talking about what a great pin it is. It was kind of neat to play the other Sterns of that era and see how they compared to big game. I'm actually not tired of hearing about it. I love that game. It's fantastic. It's one of my favorite designers. I'm going to get his name wrong. It's Harvey Williams, Henry Williams. Harry Williams yeah Harry Williams and so he designed Big Game and he also did Split Second which is another great game that you got sitting in my game room yeah both great games Future Spa I used to play that one it's a brand new game at a local arcade when I was a kid I absolutely love that game and I'd love to find one you know I've never played a hot dog and so I played I think all the other wide body early valley solid state wide bodies yeah because he's played space invaders on location a lot paragon and then I really never played an embryon or saw one until you know I started pinnago fellow collectors you and another you know fellow collector so this is the first time I really had any experience with them, but I agree it is a fantastic game. And for the listeners that may be really experienced in pinball, or even new people that are just getting into it, look for some of those older games, man, because there's some real gems and just some phenomenally fun and inexpensive games. Oh, absolutely. Polly, if you looked at my don't look at my pin side ratings because they're a mess, but if I was to sit down and try to rate my top 10 favorite games. Seven of them would be early solid state, and they would all probably be under $1,000 easily in the right conditions. And definitely the ones that I own of that group, I paid around $1,000, if not less, depending on the deal. So that's the best thing to me is like, man, these are my favorite machines, and it cost me $600, $800,000. That's such a great bang for your buck as opposed to risking $8,500 on a new inbox that you may or may not like, that may or may not have the right code for two years. So I'm always going to be really attracted to the secondary market and specifically to the 80s games. I've owned a handful of quality EMs. I say quality in terms of what people view them on rating-wise. um you know jumping jack and quick draw and grand prix etc i really do like um ems i have a surf champ right here that is yours and i love them but there's just not quite deep enough like i'll play them for three months and then i stop playing them um so it's like i gotta rotate my ems through where i think it's just the speed and the rule set just isn't quite where my satisfaction is and But by the time you get into the early 80s, that's when it's like, okay, there's just enough play it one more time factor in the game, enough, oh, man, that ball drained so fast. Let me try this again. Then it keeps bringing me back. Yeah, yeah. Well, you know, one of the problems with us all, especially early solid states, is the ones I keep gravitating to that I really enjoy playing seem to be all for rare. The two latest in that line. I know, right? Why is that? I don't know. Why can't we love Flash more? I actually do love Flash, and I don't care about B-Pool. I know. I like Flash. But Barracora. My God, because you're talking about B-Pool ruleset for the time. Pretty good ruleset. Spencer, I'm going to stop you right there. That is my number one grail pin right now, and I don't want to talk about it because everybody's going to go out and buy it. Yeah, can you say TX sector? Too late. There you go. Too late. No, you're absolutely right. Barracora is a game I want so bad. I mean I don't know what I would if one popped I mean I would have to sell plasma yeah exactly I'm like okay 401k yeah I can make more money later I have to own this I can get another credit card only 24% interest I mean that's just you know there's pins that just play awesome like big game top five pin for me all time I love the theme and everything but I mean it could be a little bit sound and a little bit better graphic package. Barracora hits it on every single level. Rules, theme, I mean, it's got it all. It's one of those ones that just knocks it out of the park for me. They're just so stinking hard to find. It's like, you know, we're the ones we're always talking about. TX Sector, RoboWar, those kind of pins. It's like, they're so hard to find. And yet Raven shows up every second Tuesday locally on Craigslist. we happen to have two friends that have this game locally Cosmic Gunfight Oh man I love that game I love that game. Really love that game. Yeah, that's one of those games. They only made, what, I don't know, $400 or $500. I don't know. It's some ridiculously low number of them. And I got to play one of them, and it was just – it blew me away, the simplicity, but yet the complexity of it. Just in terms of trying to sit there and shoot a set of shots and how brutally hard it was to hit. It kind of scratched the same itch that Sorcerer does for me where you're trying to build up something. I really, really like that game. Yeah, that's another one of my grills is Sorcerer. But, I mean, my God, we know. Well, you have one. We know one, two, three, four, what, five, four, five. We have four or five friends pretty locally that have one. Yeah, it's one of those things where I think at least our core group of friends here in NorCal, we all like early solid states, and that's just in everybody's top ten. So we've all been actively seeking them, and it's just such an amazing-looking game that you almost want it just for the art package sitting in your game room. Yeah, yeah, and it's a fun shooter. Another one that you picked up recently Is Blackout And my wife really likes that game too Yeah Blackout has been Super fun A local collector here in town Todd gave me an opportunity to buy his And It Has really grown on me In terms of Sound And replayability The Backglass It's okay. It's 6, 7 out of 10, but I think one of our buddies has talked about this before. I just love the fact that there's a red insert, a blue insert, and a green insert, and an orange insert next to each other. I like that it's talking to me and orbit and all this different nomenclature. Three spinners. Yeah, exactly. And the sound of a good spinner rip on that game is just cool. Totally agree For me, I'm a sucker for any game that has spinners and then you throw in drops which, you know, okay, there's big game, there's blackout you throw in spinners, drops and a horseshoe and I'm just squealing because it's just like the perfect machine And yet you sold your Sword of the Fury I did but really, I look at it as a benevolent thing I allowed Adam to get a machine that the Lodi League could enjoy and love for years to come. And he agreed never to sell it, which is the only reason why I felt comfortable selling it, because I didn't want to leave our group. I wanted to be able to play it any time I had that itch. Yeah. It's a fun game. I enjoy it. And the music's awesome. So we cover games we like. What is it you don't like at all? Like, just like, God, I've got to play this tonight? So I think you and I are kind of on the same page just philosophy-wise. I don't hate pinball games. Pinball, you throw a flipper and a silver ball and something to shoot at, I'm fine. So you put me on a wood rail, I'm going to be happy. But you're right. There are certain games where it's like, okay, how are we going to get through this? A lot of times for me, it's not knowing the rules. so any game that I don't know anything about and I walk up to I usually have a couple games where I'm like I don't really enjoy this and I've really got to force myself to try to read the rule card which inevitably is not the greatest list of instructions and then you go out and try to find some sort of pop-up tutorial video or the like to try to figure out the gist of it and then things start clicking and then you start liking the game but I don't know if I've had a game that I've played that I've been like oh god i gotta play this game again um they're all pretty good i don't know what i mean what what comes to mind for you games you hate maybe what you know for me it's only only really when i'm i'm i'm in playing in league or a tournament like tonight you know i were today we played in a tournament and i had to go i had to go up on um f14 and i hate that game i mean i love it you know yeah if i'm just playing it for fun i i'm fine with it um but it's like because it just It's so brutal. The funny thing is, it's the only game because it was a pin bowling tournament. It's the only game I got a strike on tonight. My god, that game is just savagely brutal. I love that game because it mocks you. You've got to like any game that's mocking you. Yeah, you kind of do. The next game on my sort of halfway list is because it came up in conversation again tonight. is South Park. Oh, please. Well, no, because we played it right after, actually, when I was still recuperating last year. We went and had lunch, you and me and Eric, and played it. Look, and it's a great location game, and it still earns crazy good from every route operator I've ever talked to because it's simple. And the casual person that goes, oh, cool, South Park pinball, let's play. And they can kill Kenny, make the ramp shot, get a multiball. But I mean there's just not enough there to really interest me for a long term at all. Yeah, I mean I don't disagree with some of your points. I think to me it's a solid $2,000 DMD machine. I would rather own it than Hurricane or some of the other DMDs that are kind of at that price point. You're not going to put South Park above Lethal Weapon 3, are you? Ooh, that's a good one. So full disclosure, I've owned Lethal Weapon 3. It was my very first DMD. I think it's a great shooter. I've had long arguments how it's a poor man's T2. Some people think I'm smoking crack, but I think the shot layout is eerily similar. I agree it's a poor man's T2. I think if I had to own one, I would probably lean on South Park. Wow. You know, it's a simple game, like you said. I mean, it's not as simple as an EM. It's not as simple as some of the early solid states I love. So depth isn't really a factor for me. It would get old. I wouldn't play it much after a month. But, you know, it's got decent call-outs. It's got bright colors. There's stuff to do. so I don't hate it. Yeah, that's a good comparison. I'm trying to think of a game that I've... Okay, I know. Jurassic Park is a game I am supposed to like and just did nothing for me. So I guess maybe I'll phrase it that way. There's certain games out there that people tell me I should like and they just do nothing. I got a Jurassic Park, an opportunity to get a nice one, got the latest ROM that finally unlocked the starting mode so it wasn't always the exact same starting mode or randomized it which was supposed to really help that game. It just did nothing for me. And most people would think that's kind of crazy talk. Well, World Cup Soccer is the same thing for me. I had it for a couple months and within two weeks I was bored of it. So just something about those games just didn't do it for me. admittedly I'm a little bit of a Data East snob I've owned I don't know three or four Data Easts now so I'm willing to try them but none of them have really stuck with me I think my favorite Data East game I've ever played is Tales from the Crypt and that theme does nothing for me but the shots were really really fun on that game yeah that's kind of the way I feel about it well since you brought up World Cup Soccer doors open doors open now because we had this conversation in the car uh that's why that's why you did oh that's why i love our car ride okay because we're talking about jay poppin and i just to this day i am just baffled by the cult following this guy has because i think he's like i i just i i look i i just don't i i i i mean like okay world cup soccer if there's one on location or at a friend's house or a show, I'll play a couple games and enjoy playing it. I have no real desire to own one other than it's a good family thing. Theater of Magic, I think it's a fun game, but again, if I had it in the house, I'd probably get pretty quick. I actually, for some crazy reason, really like playing well, I like Totem too, but I mean, it's just, but again, not real deep ruleset. I don't think it's going to be all pinball, but Circus Voltaire. I don't know. The game's quirky, and I kind of like it. And again, where the fellow collectors have to have one or a pinnacle or something, I'll play a few games and enjoy it. But again, if I had it in the house, I'd be probably moving it in about a month. I just don't... And then episode one, which is... Why'd they even bother? Well, because Jar Jar needed to live in homes across America. Well, it's beyond – not even the jar jar. It's just there's no shots on that game, man. They shoot up the middle, and if you get lucky, you might hit a ramp once in a while. Well, that's your classic pinball 2000 problem in my mind. But yeah, I'm with you. You say Cole to J-Pop, and maybe it's simply the threads that we read. I don't necessarily have seen people blindly pledging allegiance to J-Pop outside of the fact that, okay, he's designed one of my favorite pins. Therefore, the next pin he does I think is going to be amazing. I don't know if I call that a cult. I get that people love Tails. I get that people love Circus Voltaire, and I get that people love Theater of Magic. So that's – I mean he's got – I'm looking right now at IPDB, and he's got a total of nine records in the database in his name. Two of them are Zizzles. So his body of work is pretty small, and in that small body of work, he's got three incredibly well-respected high-end titles. And then obviously World Cup Soccer is in there at number four, although it doesn't hold the same sway as those first three. so he's got a good track record in terms of the home market and and what people desire or deem collectible now circus voltaire does nothing for me um my um my dearest cousin uh will kill me if i don't say tales of arabian nights is the greatest machine of all time but it's not um and theater magic I would like to own for a month, but I think like a lot of people, I'd get bored of it and be ready to move it. Tails, I would want to own purely for the art factor, which is a bad reason to own a pinball machine unless you just got unlimited money. So I disagree that there's a cult out there from my perspective. Now, we can definitely talk about the whole debacle with Magic Girl and Zidware and all that kind of stuff. Well, that's been pretty much beaten to the bone. Yeah, but that's been hashed. Well, since you're bringing up Magic Girl, okay, it's like people are willing to pay over $20,000 for a game that doesn't even work. It's like what's got nice art? And buy the art, man. Well, they did for $20,000. Did that finally sell? I just – I think there's just a small segment of speculators in the market, and there's people that want to own – they're the collectors. so it's not just speculation for future monies. They want to own something really rare, and Magicko represents that. Yeah, if you want to invest in something, invest in gold, man. Pinball is not a hobby. Yeah, and speculators, man. I'm going to dig way deep here. An old movie called Trick or Treat, I don't know if you ever saw it. No, no. Sammy Kerr, this rock star dude. It's a cheesy, bad 80s B rock and roll horror, but it's like no wimps, no false metal. man. No fault pinball. You know what? Go out, buy yourself a flash, man. Go out and buy yourself a flash, Gordon. Go out and buy a System 80. Go out and buy a, you know, go out and buy a System 11, man. Clean it up, fix it up, have fun and just enjoy it. I think you kind of opened the gateway to prices, if you don't mind me jumping, because you mentioned the Magic Girls price point and then you mentioned about having fun with the affordable pins. A, I mean, Obviously, this is America. And so anybody can do anything they want with their money provided they don't break any laws. So I don't have a visceral reaction to somebody spending $20,000 on a magic girl. I'm not the guy that's saying, hey, I'm going to go buy up all the magic girls if I had $100 million and I would light them on fire. That's not my approach to things. But as I look at Spencer. But I do get – That was a nicotine withdrawal, man. It's just all the nicotine withdrawal problems. But I do understand it seems like such a waste of money. But really the market has spoken, and if you look at prices, every day there's like, oh my gosh, look at that. There's a new price complaint thread on Pinside. What a shock. I get it. You can complain about prices, and then you can complain about how it correlates to quality. But as long as they're buying, the prices are going to be there. And really, I think Moff did a cool thread a couple years back where he started collating new in-box prices, and then he price adjusted them for inflation. And it's interesting. When you go look at those prices, Family Guy, I think, ended up being the most affordable of all new in-box purchases in the last 10 years or something like that. and the Adams family was the most expensive. But they're all in the $4,000 range. So if you can get a brand new Stern in 2017 for $5,000, well, when you adjust for cost of inflation, you're not that much over what they were selling for 10 years ago. So I get the Batman and the Magic Girls, and it does seem like there's price gouging going on. But by and large, the market is dictating it, and the prices really aren't that much out of line with what they were selling for 10 years ago. Yeah, yeah. Well, you know, I don't know if you listen to the show. Chris Kouros, Teneda, his last podcast was an interview with Roger Sharp. Excellent show. Great interview show. Yeah, I haven't caught that one yet. Well, Roger, you know, that was brought up. And Roger, you know, he's always really, really diplomatic about things, but he kind of called all the manufacturers on the carpet in a very respectful and polite way. and that's actually been brought up I have hardly looked at pin side at all lately other than to continually get the date wrong on the pinnagogo thread I don't know what the heck man it's just been a busy last couple months it's been crazy in my world between juggling work and family and pinball well your priority order is wrong that's the problem that's the problem so if I can just get that fixed we'll all be good but yeah I mean look I'm not in the market for a new game anyway and I'm just as happy to find a $500, $800, $1,000 game. And I wish everybody well that does. The people that bought an SLE, bless their heart, man. I hope they're enjoying it. But it shoots. So I'm just not getting why. What is the deal, man? The game doesn't even shoot. Right. But, I mean, there's certain people like, well, okay, Kaneda, man. At least he's up front about it. He's like, look, I knew it wasn't going to shoot. I just want one. Okay, cool, dude. Yeah. You know, at least you're on, and you know what you're paying for. Right, there's no disillusionment. Yeah, you know, so, but, you know, that's just kind of where I'm at with the whole thing. And I just don't want to discourage any new people thinking, oh, my God, I can never get the game I want. Yeah, you can get a lot of great games you want. You talked about, you know, a newer box turn pro around five grand, pretty good deal for, like, an Aerosmith or a Kiss or Metallica or Star Trek or something like that, Walking Dead. but at the same time man like you know you bought all these games and sold by for you know around a thousand a piece it's like hey for the cost of a new Smyrna I can have five games in a game room and have a pretty cool collection yeah and that really good my collection has grown and shrunk and grown as I try to find that balancing act of bang for your buck I found that when I went up to 13 pins, that was okay. Besides maintenance, I can't play all of them all the time, so why am I sitting on this many? So then you shrink down and go, oh, this is not enough. I need a couple more. And so you kind of fluctuate. But, yeah, in my price range where I'm trying to keep my game room at a certain level and add a little bit to it each year, I can't buy new in box. That's not my lifestyle. Right, right. And, you know, other than having, you know, one new in box or maybe two or real recent, I'd rather have four or five older games and just have fun with them. Absolutely. Yeah. So you came up with a great topic tonight. Actually, you came up with two great topics tonight. First one being dream theme of the month. That's awesome. Right. You want to go first or you want me to? Sure, I'll lead things off because I'm going to be able to drop the mic when I'm done and walk away. I'll be able to sleep tonight knowing that because I'm positive Gary and Jack listen to this show, that they'll be out there fighting for the licensing for it if they don't already own it. No, my dream theme would be a Disneyland theme. So I'm a Disney fanatic. It's funny how many Disney fanatics there are amongst the pinball community. There's definitely a cross-section there. But to have a Disneyland theme where you have the different lands represented in different areas of the play field and bringing in a lot of the intellectual property from Disney. if you can grab animations and sound bites, that would be just a showstopper for me and for my family. I mean, my wife would be like, yep, where do I sign up for a new inbox? S-E-P-N, you know, I'll take it. So that's the ultimate, you know, and barring that, it would be some sort of, you know, Disney property, a Pixar toy story or something along those lines. That would be ideal. Cool. You know, for me it's so weird because I don't have like – I have a couple that I'd really like to see, but I have a non-licensed one I'd really like to see. A couple I'd really like to see, and for some reason somebody was talking about today at the tournament, and we were talking about it for a minute. Well, Fifth Element. Okay. I think it would be a great, great pinball machine. You know, love the movie. Chris Tucker into the studio to do some custom call-outs. Oh, it would be great, man. You know, it would just be great. you know, Lilo Dallas multiball, you know, or multi-pass multiball. I mean, I think it would lend itself very well. Somebody on Pinside or somebody uses Blade Runner a few times, classic film, loves the movie, loves the music from the movie. That would be a good one. And I know you and me and Eric have talked endlessly about Firefly. Firefly. Yes. Firefly, Janestown multiball. I mean, you know, and I think that's a game that would sell very well just to Firefly fans, you know, that may not be into pinball at all. I secretly hope Ben Heck is working on that theme. I don't know why. Yeah. I think he would do it justice. Maybe he needs to put Bible Adventures, which I also think would be a great theme, put that down and try a little Firefly serenity. Before Bible Adventures ever even was talked about, my wife and I were talking, you know, Rusty and I were talking about Noah and the Ark pinball, right? Two by two multiball. I mean, you could start out with two balls and four and six and eight, you know. It lends itself well. I would love a Bible Adventures game. The non-licensed, one of the other non-licensed themed idea, trains. Oh, now you're talking my language. I come from multi-generation train folk, and it's the reason why I want a Zack locomotive so bad is that I just would love to have something integrated, a good train theme. Think about it, man. I mean you could do the lane change like in Shadow and just have tracks going everywhere and balls going everywhere on those tracks and changes the lanes. I mean it could be really cool. And, hey, who doesn't love trains? Right. Right. Well, and you know, you could – I mean here's – I'm just speculating here, but you could – if you could do something like dialed in where you've got the technology, where you make almost like a modern-day transportation Sid Meier's railroad type, and obviously you can't get super complex on a pinball machine. But you could have some really interesting rules where you're trying to ship things, territory, products, and your actions are taking place due to the shot selection and ability to do combinations. That would be super fun. I think that's a great idea. I'm on board. Where do I sign up? We've got to start building it, man, or somebody does. And you brought up earlier Total Nuclear Annihilation. I just want to play the darn thing. It looks so freaking awesome. I know. It's so awesome. So I hope we're going to actually continue to see a few more original unlicensed themes drop in on us. Yeah, I think so. I'm sure some of the designers really crave that creative freedom. So I think we'll see it. But at the end of the day, we all know the ugly truth is that original themes just don't appear to sell as well as licensed properties. Right. Right. But hopefully we can see some sneak in. Well, that's what's exciting about the whole spooky concept is with him, if other people are able to come up with other awesome Total Nuclear Annihilation-esque type projects and can get a bill of materials that makes sense for him to run it, he can have, yeah, give me 50 orders, I can run it. Give me 50 more orders, I can run it. So I think those possibilities are there for even a smaller scale. Yeah, and that's filling a really great niche market And that's another thing I'm really happy about And your second topic tonight Mount Rushmore of designers Everybody needs to have one And they need to be vetted constantly Okay, who's yours? I don't know I'm just kidding I love pinball And so every designer is pretty amazing. So what I usually end up finding out is I don't really look at the designer when I'm playing the game. And after I've got to know the game and I really like it, I go, oh, so-and-so did this game. Okay. And so after a couple of years, you start adding up and you're like, oh, I must really like the way so-and-so does the shots. And so over time, your tastes evolve. Maybe you get more sophisticated. I don't know, but I know surely for me, four years into the hobby, my tastes have definitely evolved. Right now, for me, the number one go-to guy is Barry. Mr. B.O. is – he just – everything he does for me is magic. So Grand Lizard and Barracora. I mean it just – if he came out as a – he's one of those guys. Because if he came out and announced, yeah, I'm doing a pin with so-and-so, that's when I go, okay. Forget cult of J-pop. Cult of Barry Osler is real, and I'm its founding member. There you go. I love his games too. In fact, I'm going to go back to his first game he designed at Williams. I believe it was his first game. Phoenix. Early solid state, man. Used to play. But, man, I'd love to have one. They just don't come up for sale around here. but I just have so many fond memories of playing that game the few times they've shown up at Pinagogo I enjoyed a few games on, in fact I think there's one on the list for this year so I'm excited so we will have to get a game, we have to play at least one game that could be it you know for me it's so tough because like you and my tastes are constantly evolving and changing you know when I first got into the hobby of buying games and put in the house, it was Pat Waller, man. And I still love him, you know, and I'm not downgrading him. But then there's something about Steve Ritchie's games that are just, you know, that fist like Star Trek, man, just fist in your face, just, you know, just riding like a roller coaster ride, the adrenaline rush of Ritchie's games. But then, you know, more and more I'm looking at, you know, like Barry Orsor and John Trudeau because everything I play of John Trudeau's, you know, it's like it's not that he never does the same thing twice but he always, you know, every game has got some really cool, it can be something really minor you know, just the way he puts a ramp return or something up, it just he always, you know, he's never really just, you know, happy, just saying, you know, I'll do this again, you know, and I love that about him, you know and, you know, Barry Worsh's games, I'm going to dig way deep here, well We brought up Harry Williams. Wow, he designed some amazing games later in his career. And then I'm going to go another deep one. Wayne Nance. That man designed more Piv-Mall machines, I think, single-handedly than probably five or six other designers put together. And you've got to go way back for his games, early Gottliebs, 50s and 60s mostly, I think. So these are the ones you grew up on. Well, yeah, I mean more 70s EM Gottliebs. Because, you know, when I was a kid, I mean, you'd see a Valley game. and then occasionally Williams or even less occasionally like a Chicago coin or a Sonic, you know, in a local, you know, mom and pop grocery or whatever. But Gottliebs were probably 75%, 80% of every game I played as a kid, you know. Well, you just rattled off a whole bunch of awesome designers, but I want you to name the top four. Top four. Unfortunately. Go. Pat Lawler, Steve Ritchie, John Trudeau, and now the guy's name escapes me. He did Early Sterns, Nineball, Steve Kirk. So that's your top four? Yeah, probably. If I had a table near me, I'd start flipping it right now. Really? No. Okay. Who did I miss? Who did I miss? I love them all, like you. I know. Well, so for me, like John Trudeau, A, is a really good guy. He is. And he has come up with really, really cool shots, cool gimmicks. Spirit is an amazing, amazing machine once you get to play it and kind of get to know it. He didn't make my top four, but I get why he'd be there. for me after Barry I've got to go Mark Ritchie between Taxi Diner yes sorry Practical Steve but Diner Fishtails Dorser those are some of my favorite games so for me when I started in the hobby it was all about Steve Ritchie and for now I switched to his brother Mark and um so he's my number two Steve Ritchie he's still on my top four he's still on my mount rushmore i love good flow my first game was high speed that's a game that i wish i still had if i had unlimited room and funds i would always own a high speed for nostalgia and because it's such a well done game um and then number four as we talked about earlier is uh harry williams which kind of covers more of the older games. But honorable mention for me would be Claude Fernandez. Have you recognized his name at all? Vaguely. Give me a game. What if I told you it included blackout, embryon, and skateball? Wow. Exactly. Wow. Flash Gordon. Well, I absolutely love Flash Gordon. I mean, I just – every time – He didn't do a lot, but he did those four. And so I'm like, my hat is off to him for those really, really well done games. Yeah, I love Flash Gordon. I often get stares and little faces because I always say I think Flash Gordon is a better game than Black Knight. So it's like. Take that back right now. Hey, I stick it for you on Diner. Okay, all right. All right, I'll let you have this one. I just enjoy playing it more. Well, you know, I'll tell you why. Because on Black Knight, there's a fatal flaw in that game. And there also is for really good players in league or tournament play. And that same thing holds true on Swords of Fury. When you're in the upper play field, if you can get control of the ball, you can keep that ball up there and just keep locking the ball. Well, on Black Knight, you can just drop the second ball. No, there's a setting. There's a setting for that. Adam needs to fix that. Yes, he does because I put up a really high score one night when I figured that out and just had good ball control that night and just kept getting multiball over and over again. No, you can force them to go to the lower play field in order to enable that lockup there. Yeah. And so I heard there was a setting, but yeah. And then I haven't been able to do it, but Stephen, he's putting up scores consecutively of like 7, 8 million every single league night that we play Swords of Fury. And he just stays in that darn upper play field. I had to play him in league finals two seasons ago. And it killed me because he just – no, it was two seasons ago. Because, I mean, like one ball, I mean our first ball, and he went first. And it's like – You went and made a sandwich. No, I sat there and watched him for literally 25 minutes on his first ball. And, I mean, he just killed it, you know. Well, I think Adam just needs to crank down on that machine even more. He does an amazing job getting his machines as hard as he can for league so that the game times aren't too long. But, I mean, just take all the rubber off the machine. Put two-inch flippers down on the bottom. Put it at an 8% angle. I don't know. There's got to be some way to mitigate that. But yeah, in a league, sometimes the league gets really comfortable on a particular machine, and then you've just got to figure out, all right, how can we tweak this to really make it fresh? Wire that upper flipper to only activate on the other flipper button so that it's like a whole new game, something like that. There you go. There you go. Well, Seth, we're at over an hour. This is my longest show yet. Usually I keep it around 30 minutes. I know. I know. because I don't want it to be like a three-hour tour or anything. You got anything else to throw in the pod tonight before we sign off? No, it was fun chewing the fat with you. I think this is something you and I get to do quite often as we go and take trips out to the city to visit our buddies. We get quality one-on-one time in the car. So this kind of just reminds me of many of our long conversations in the world of pinball. Yeah, exactly. See, and you were worried. I told you it would be fun. I put notes together in like under five minutes. We didn't need no stinking net. We don't, man. It's just two buddies talking, and people can listen in and feel like they're part of the conversation. Absolutely. They'll see that I'm right most of the time and that you still have a ways to go. Yeah, there we go. That's it. I think we're closely aligned on most points. So we're a little bit of an echo chamber where we hear each other and agree with each other on most things. Yeah, I think so. So it's all good. Well, thanks again for being on the show tonight. Hey, you bet. It was fun. Yeah, it was a blast. So that's our show tonight, folks. Thank you for tuning in. And to the people I've met lately at different pinball gatherings that just come up and give me feedback on the show, thank you. I really appreciate that. Of course, you can reach me at thespinnerislit at gmail.com. if you want to come on the show or just if there's a topic you'd like me to talk about. Pinnagogo is coming up, so if you want to attend that or just check it out, check out the website. That's pinnagogo.org. If you're looking for places to play pinball, pinballmath.com. Again, this has been Episode 5 of the Spinner is Lit Pinball Podcast. We'll see everybody real soon. Play pinball. Keep America strong. Thank you.