Yo, what's up, man? Hey, dude. How's it going? Good, good. Just, uh, I'm sorry. Just got in the car and leaving the grocery store. It's pretty crazy. Okay. Where you at? You at Trader Joe's? Man, I had to take a break from TJ's when it flooded for a while, so. Oh, man. Is it back open yet? Yeah, it's open now, but I kind of got used to using Harris Teeter now. but yeah i'll probably go back to tj's soon later well anyway um i was calling because you know i'm trying to like go back and get some bonus stuff off of some other sessions that we recorded uh-huh i was going back over the one where we got swords of fury and we like drove to that weird dude's house oh yeah yeah i get it and um i noticed at the end of that recording there was this weird distorted part that i like had to turn up because it was kind of quiet on there but it's kind of freaking me out it's like wait what is like what are you what are you talking about it's uh it's like a i can't really quite make it out but it sounds like a like a deep voice in maybe another language or something like someone talking hold on i'm gonna play it on my computer so you can hear it all right yeah so it was like what could you hear could you hear that Dude, what is that? I don't know, man. Play it again. What? It wasn't, I mean, it was that old, like, Casio tape recorder, so it's possible that it's just something left over from, like, some old, I literally had that recorder when I was in college. Oh, so you're saying, like, it could have been something already pre-recorded in there, from an old thing or just the tape. Well, anyway. Dude, that's weird. I mean, doing audio stuff, I've never heard anything like that. I mean, that sounds kind of deliberate to me. I was thinking we could post it on the show and see if anybody can figure it out or like an ancient languages expert or something. Yeah, maybe someone might be able to. It's kind of hard to make out. I'll tell you it's definitely not Spanish. It reminds me of those like Led Zeppelin, there's all these rumors that there's like, I don't know. Secret stuff in there. I don't know. That's kind of weird, man. It's kind of got me a little creeped out too because I definitely got weird vibes when we were there. You're not feeling weird right now, are you? I'm just like, I'm going to get this episode done. I mean, I feel kind of weird I have to listen to that, man I'm not going to lie to you I feel kind of nauseous Well, I mean, I guess it's probably nothing It's probably just the Taco Bell that I had earlier today But maybe somebody can help us Figure it out Yeah, I'd be curious I'd be curious to see Cool, dude Alright, well, I'll let you go Cool, alright, man If you feel weird or something, let me know Alright, later Alright, later, dude all right that was quite an experience just now yeah you had a little uh friend i had a yeah i was relieving myself outside of the shed cave and i had a little spider buddy trying to crawl back up my belt buckle. That was an interesting experience for sure. I gently swung my buckle towards a leaf and I eventually, as I was urinating, was able to land him safely on the little twig that was like sticking out of the ground. It was a whole thing, man. He was like swinging in midair. You can't stop midstream, it stings. I couldn't. Yeah, it does. Yeah, he's safe. I'm safe. we're safe well i'm glad you made a friend while you were using the uh designated latrine of the shed cade which is oh man wherever you don't think someone's yeah looking at you try to make sure yeah anyways besides that you know my arm still a little sore woke up this morning hasn't quite healed all the way wait what happened to your arm you don't remember you you twisted it up Oh, right. Got me to play my first tournament. Yeah. It's been twisting my arm for months. I know. It finally happened. Even longer. It finally happened. Yeah. So I pretty much started playing in tournaments within six months of starting to play pinball because I ran into a guy at... Boxcar? No, it was at Bull City, Solera. Oh, cool. So I was over there with Hacker J. They had three games there. Demolition Man, Johnny Mnemonic and World Cup Soccer. World Cup Soccer. Mainly there for the World Cup Soccer. And it was working good that day. And there was a guy there named Jason. Oh, wait, is it Jason? Different Jason. Oh, different Jason. He was like, you guys should come play in the Triangle Pinball Players Tournament. And they have a league and they have also just a lot of one-off tournaments. Yeah. And I think I went to maybe half a dozen of those and I was always like, hey, Don, going to this tournament. you're like i remember i remember i can't make it i went to one event and it was the non-tournament it was like the fun just hangout event oh right right just like the saturday hangout yeah yeah way back when i think it was right when you started going to those events i thoroughly enjoyed it i enjoyed hanging out with people like meeting other pinball players in the area and um i'm still pinball shy i don't know why yeah it's funny you're not at all shy with total strangers at the arcade man that's a whole separate episode this is like a work in progress it's me literally working on just being more comfortable with strangers and interacting with people because i've always been so anxiety driven like i used to not like honestly man i used to just like crumble talking to strangers i mean i think you're over that i'm getting better i think i would say i'm i'm pretty much on like the other side of it now like i think i'm pretty comfortable with strangers now yeah yeah i'm hit or miss you know it depends on the situation yeah yeah totally but yeah you i was always trying to get you to play in these things because it's just the most effective way of meeting other local pinball players like it's true if you just randomly go to the arcade there's usually not that many people there it's true most of them are just randos there's like one or two yeah like actual people that know what they're doing yeah and oftentimes you're the only one there or you know it's just not a good way to meet people in quantity right right and the tournaments i think are always they feel intimidating because it's a tournament but just the word itself the word is the problem tournament yeah i would say gathering yeah but but really that's what most of the events are i mean there is a league event where you know you're like playing multiple games over multiple weeks and they're tracking all the scores like a whole thing here but But there's also just a whole bunch of one-offs. Just for fun. Which are really just about hanging out and playing with people. And it's like, if you win, great. Sometimes you get a little prize or something. Those were the ones I was really trying to get you to go to because those were just about having fun. Just hanging out, having fun. Having fun and meeting people. Hanging out with pinball people. Well, it happened. It finally happened. It happened. Yes. And I enjoyed it. Yeah. 10 out of 10 would do it again. Nice. will do it again. Yeah. I mean, there are some people that are like, obviously competitive, but for the most part, yeah, just strangers that are also semi introverted, just hanging out. Yeah. Trying to talk to each other, but not really because you're too shy. And then when you finally say a word, it's like, oh, hey, we're actually very relatable. There are things that we can definitely talk about. I think pinball people tend to have a lot in common. It's true. I feel like this is a big step for you. I'm proud of you. Thanks, man. I'm proud of myself. So, just to set up how this happened, we have a new local spot that doesn't suck. I think we've come playing a lot. We've been waiting. We've been calling. We've been asking. The pinball gods have finally answered. Yes. It's actually the people who set up the tournaments, the Triangle Pinball players, the folks who largely run those tournaments put their minds and wallets together and started a new location. Which to me is interesting because this is probably one of the most real collectivy type places as opposed to an arcade. You can tell that the games are cared for. The people that have them and own them and maintenance them actually are about pinball. Yeah. It doesn't try hard to be an arcade. Even the bar, it's like not really a bar. It's more like a bottle shop. It's like a hangout spot. Yeah. Right? Anyways, I'm actually looking forward to digging in a little bit more and getting more information about how they got it set up and what they're going to do with it. I would say that for the purposes of this tournament, this experience, I was impressed. This was like the perfect first tournament location. Maybe this is what I was waiting for. yeah i mean they've only been open for a couple months now really this is the first time that you and i had both been over there since they got fully set up yeah they've filled up the space with games it's like the back rooms of a bar called slash bottle shop yeah flight deck yeah it's like i hate to call it a bar because it kind of paints this picture of like a like a bar yeah it's more like a neighborhood hangout bottle shop with a bar but they also have stand-up comedy events, little band events. Yeah. It's a small room. It can't be more than four or five hundred square feet like the main room. Then they have all these extra little rooms. Yeah. That's where all the pinball machines are and a ping pong table. But from the outside, you would never know. It doesn't look like an arcade. Yeah, yeah. It's not like a downtown, you know. You have to drive there. You're not going to get any walk in or walk by traffic or anything like that. Honestly, like for this purpose, it's kind of perfect. Well, it's not unlike the Richmond Pinball Collective where it's kind of in an out-of-the-way random strip mall. Right, like borderline industrial kind of looking vibe. Yeah, rent is probably on the lower end, which is always good. Right, right, right. But yeah, it seems like just in the last couple months since they started putting machines in there, there's been more and more people going over there and just becoming aware of it. Yeah. and so this tournament that we went to was technically the dune launch party launch party they had a prize of a dune playfield how in the hell which came from barrels of fun did they get that playfield barrels of fun donated it dude this place is legit yeah it's legit i don't know how many do launch parties there were across the country but we went to one of them it was like a sanctioned event by barrels of fun because they donated a freaking play field but yeah this it was like on a wednesday night 7 p.m dude it's happening over 60 people showed up to this thing which for this area is epic it's happening our area is finally getting good pinball to me this was like a turning point usually the local tournaments that i've been to the most people ever in any of this tournament i think was about 40 people yeah and that was like a lot i think having over 60 people at this yeah this was massive when we showed up it was low 50s or something and then by the time it started it got to like 62 or 64 something crazy it was like how do all these people even fit in here it was it was insane they have roughly 20 machines because they keep their games well maintained and set up they were basically all in the tournament yeah the only exception which made me oh no very sad was the branch smokers dracula i know uh had some issues at the last minute so they couldn't put that in the tournament it's a bummer i mean of the 20 machines we played like five rounds so we didn't get to play all the games or anything it's just how it works when you have that many people you know it was a good setup what was the um it was like a five strikes fair play or something? Yeah, five strikes. Set up. So I guess it's all position based, right? So there's no keeping track of the actual numeric points like score It more about placing like first second third or fourth place in a game Right so you get assigned to a machine in groups of four right so the 60 people got split up onto 15 different machines for round one yeah randomly allocation with the match play so it's all tracked via match play the event website you can just like see everything on your phone they also had screens on the wall they had a giant the same stuff the giant screen yep you have the four people per game and it's just how you ranked after everyone plays their designated randomly selected game. You basically rank them in order by score. You know, first, second, third, fourth place. First place, zero strikes. Second place, one strike. Second and third place was one strike. Okay. And then fourth place was two strikes. Yeah. So then when any given player gets five strikes, you don't continue to the next round. So in this setup, you got a minimum of three games because if you came in fourth three times in a row, that would be six strikes. Or if you came in fourth twice and third or second once, then that would be five strikes and you'd be out. So it's pretty fun. It kind of guarantees like enough play time to be in there, you know, be in the mix a little bit. Yeah. So if you got out after three games, you were probably in the tournament for about an hour. They were averaging, yeah, about 20 or 30 minutes per round. Yeah. And that's a lot of people on a lot of games going at once. Some games, you know, inevitably, some games kind of play. If Godzilla is in a tournament, everybody knows that game really well. So whoever gets a sign of Godzilla, that one tends to just like, everybody's waiting. Forever. Because you don't start round two until everybody's done with round one. It was cool, man. I had no idea that's how tournaments worked. Yeah. And at this tournament, there's no entry fee. The games were quarter drop. Yeah. And most of their games are set up like three games for two dollars or whatever. So if you had four players, it ended up being about 75 cents per game was your cost to participate in the tournament, which is not a lot. And you could play three rounds and only spend $2.25 or something. I made the mistake of putting a 20 in the change machine. And I went home, dude, with like a pound of like quarters in my pocket. Yeah. Well, at least you can still use those quarters. I know, right? Exactly. It was nice to have just a quarter drop location because our other spots are all token based. So yeah, it was interesting, man. Well, the first game, round one. Round one. Round one for me was none other than Swords of Fury. Right. They have a nice one. They have a really nice one. And I did terrible. How did you feel going into your first round of your first tournament? That was the problem. is, man, I had like, I had the jitters, man. I had like the, I don't know, just like first game, first tournament kind of jitters. Yeah. Well, and also I would suggest anybody playing in a tournament, don't show up right before the tournament starts. Get there like 30 minutes or an hour beforehand and get some play time in. You've got to warm up a little bit. I didn't even stretch, man. That was my first mistake. You got to do finger stretches, elbow bends, right deep knee bends right but um yeah we didn't really get a lot of warm-up time so that's part of it i think it helps to get rid of the jitters i know if you've been there and you're playing the games especially if like oh i just practiced on that game like you know 10 minutes ago you feel a little better i know i it's funny because i don't even care like i you know right i play for fun i don't care about the score somehow i still felt this weird pressure i mean it happens to me too especially on the first or second round i was on jurassic park the first round and yeah i felt a little jittery and like i think i came in second on that but ball three i just did like a really dumb thing i had a multiball setup but i just totally just whiffed you know just like really dumb thing that i would never normally do i know what you mean dude i did the same thing so swords of fury right i think i came in third so that was like my first strike right away like right off the bat first game a game that i'm familiar with right that we own right right i don't know if that's that should tell you something right i mean it is a tough game i'll just say that but a quick side note man so that was like an icebreaker i was talking to two other people that i played with one of the guys his name was john and he he brought his buddy jacob okay and they worked together john jacob jacob was telling me that john i guess like brought pinball to his workplace, which I thought was pretty cool. Oh, nice. I guess he got the other people that he works with into pinball. He started inviting them to pinball events and hosting tournaments for his co-workers. John or Jacob, if you're listening or whatever, remember me. You beat me. So it's a theory. Honestly, yeah, I would like to know more about that. Let me know. Hit us up, pod at bashpinball.com. But yeah, that was a pretty almost demoralizing experience. but i was like oh god this is the wrong way to start you know i had that happen when i owned mando and i played a tournament on mando and i got you like fourth or something yeah i was like wow i can't remember the word for it but if you look up Steven Bowden's pinball dictionary there is a term for playing badly on a game that you on your own game yeah yeah you know i think i've mentioned before but like Keith Elwin i saw him like totally couldn't hit the right scoop on godzilla yeah Yeah, I think you get so dialed in to the games that you own. Yeah, it's a foreign game now. Yeah. Anywhere else. Everywhere else. The pitch is going to be a little different. The flippers are going to feel a little different. The rubbers are going to be a little different. You just can't hit anything. That's a whole nother skill in pinball to be a tournament player, to be able to quickly adapt, just like shift from like an 80s game to like a 90s and then 2000s. Now it's like, oh, now we're playing Dune and now we're going back to 8-Ball Deluxe, which is what happened to me. Yeah, you see the really good players. You watch any of those, like, Bo and Karen's videos or something, and he's doing a tutorial. And, like, ball one, he's kind of missing shots a little bit. By ball two, he can hit every single shot. Yeah, yeah, yeah. That's crazy. So, nice. Nice. And now for a word from our sponsor. Mom, can I eat at Jimmy's? They're having chicken and stovetop stuffing. Sure, but so are we. What time? Eight. What time are you eating? Six. Hello, Mom. You can never get enough Stove Top stuffing instead of potatoes. Chicken's almost done, now it's time to make stuffing. Stove Top makes it easy, just push a little button. Stove Top microwave stuffing is easy to make. Just three minutes in its own tray, and it's delicious. Stove Top stuffing for your microwave oven. Yeah! And now, back to the show. Round two, what was yours? Round two. yeah so round two that was a bummer for me how was your round two pull fiction love that game fourth what was it just poor performance was it jitters was it that everyone else was amazing what happened so i couldn't hit anything like for some like the outlanes on that game are really hungry for one thing and i got house balled are you familiar with the term no idea my ball three didn't even get to flip no way came down bounced around straight into the drain and so you know i feel like i had some pretty bad luck that's pinball that's pinball anyway that was my my only fourth place finish wow so drum roll round two it was dune dune right away never even played the game dude oh is that your first time oh ever that's a hard first and actually did really well nice i don't remember what place it was either i think it was second but i think i was like right on the heels of first actually we kind of talked about the game a little bit you're not really the biggest fan right now so this goes back to the idea that i've kind of settled on that nobody likes a game until they're good at it i know what you mean and until i have a really fun game of Dune, I'm probably just going to be a little bit of a hater. I see people having fun with it. I know people like it. I've probably played it like 15 times now and I just can't like really find the shots and I don't know. I had a similar experience. I was still jittery and feeling the tournament pressure, but I mean, I was able to get multiball without even knowing. I don't even know what I was doing, right? I was just kind of following like basic pinball principles. Shoot what's blinking. Ramps are good. loops are good yeah i will say this man i enjoyed it i like the flow i could not find the shots man i had one ball i swear that thing was like i felt like it was forgiving me right like the outlanes were forgiving kept slap saving and it was working with me i could not hit a single shot dude it was just like post come back from the ramp come back from the left loop you know just literally missing every single shot it was crazy the layout of that game feels to me kind of like uh Keith Elwin light kind of thing like maybe Keith Elwin mixed with the john borg game or something it's got a little bit of both of those like Keith Elwin jr yeah which makes sense keith el lose if you know elwyn is a great guy to take inspiration from but it didn't feel as smooth it felt a little clunkier than if it were a Keith Elwin game. I know what you're saying. I can't make that judgment yet. Yeah. Yeah, I would say my first impression. It also feels like the ball save and stuff like that is not as forgiving as like a modern Stern game. The timers are pretty short. I like a hard game. So I think I probably will like this game a lot. Yeah, I think I'll like it. Once I get into it. I think I'll like it. I like the theme. Dune is cool. I don't really care about Timothee Chalamet's face. Like, I don't want to look at that guy's dumb face. Timothy Chalamet. What do you think about Dune? We've never talked about it before. What did you think about the artwork and the toys and that game in general? I think the big complaint was that it's very brown, which to me of course it's brown. That makes sense. It's a brown movie. You couldn't make a Dune game that wasn't brown. I do acknowledge also that it's gotta be tough to create art for a licensed theme like this where it's very binary in a way. It's like Timothée Chalamet's face. Javier Bardem. You can't really get away from the color palette or the characters and the way they look, which I think is part of the gripe. I kind of want to see if we can do a stream of it when maybe we're there and the lights are off and the sound is turned up. Because I do think it's going to be a little bit of a Bram Stoker's Dracula kind of thing where you've got to get into the vibe of the game. Obviously, if you're playing in a tournament, you can't hear anything because there's so many people there. But I do think it's a vibe-heavy game, and the music is very cinematic. I bet it's a much different experience playing it on your own time, in your own environment, like you said, with the lights down, the music, or the sounds up. I'll say this. The Brown, all that criticism, don't really mind it. It takes place in the desert. Yeah, I'm fine with that. So I thought like the powder coating, believe it or not, with the actual aesthetic of the metal on the side rails and stuff was cool. Yeah. It looks cool. It looks almost like a weird like artifact that you'd find like in another planet or something in the desert. The sandworm like mech thing. It's just cool to see people just doing stuff, you know, like maybe it could have looked a little bit better than like a soda can. But I did have higher hopes for the sandworm. But at least it eats the ball. You know what I mean? it could have been a shark that doesn't eat the ball yeah it eats the ball it's neat how the ball can cradle in the mouth of it and then it comes up out of the play field but yeah it's kind of like shiny and they're very like geometric like just like cylindrical with the round like we need more organic the way that it comes out of the play field it kind of almost has to be a cylinder shape it has to you know i don't want to dwell too much on that because they did put a sandworm and it does eat the ball. I think it's good. It gets the job done. The King Kong mech in the new King Kong game felt right. Most games don't get the big mechs right. I feel like that one got it right. It's true. I still think they should have figured out a way to put some actual sand in a box in the playfield and then have the ball roll across the sandbox and then an actual mini sandworm Maybe you know from They can go to Arrakis and like I sure they can find one baby one bring it over here Yeah like the mech has a mesh grate on the top and so there sand on top of it Yeah, and it filters through and then it grabs the ball, yeah. And then just sucks it down, you know? Yeah. I don't know, man. Yeah, I still think that's a game not unlike Labyrinth. I mean, I like the Dune movies a little more than Labyrinth. Labyrinth is cool, but it's not hugely nostalgic for me. yeah it's similar to that as far as i wouldn't mind having it and i'm sure i would really enjoy it and i'd probably play it for several months and sell it and be happy overall i will say it was a beautiful game and i did have fun i want to play it more so i think it's for me net positive one standout thing in that game that i did think was really cool and innovative was the pain box so if you remember in the movie he stuck his hand in this box and he like felt in crazy pain and it's like a test of will sort of and then he pulls his hand out and he's fine the game has the pain box but the way that it's implemented is you have to hold down the action button while you're playing so you have to be flipping on both sides while holding down the action button the whole time i see and so like do you hold it with one hand and then try to flip both flippers with the other hand or do you try to flip back and forth while holding the action button right i think i saw most people just trying to hold the button with one hand and flip with the other both hands i do feel like if you're a big fat so just put your gut on it just plant your gut over that thing and you're good oh man that's sorry that is a first unfair advantage to having a gigantic belly right your beer belly wins in that case that's funny but that was a kind cool thing. It's one of those innovative things that I think Barrels of Fun is doing some kind of cool, interesting things like that that I haven't seen before. That's cool. So kudos, kudos for some innovation. Yeah, I'm excited to see what else they come out with. But first, I got to play more Dune. Round three. Game of Thrones Yeah I did actually pretty good But unfortunately As a pro Yeah and you know who owned it? Who? Jared Oh you were playing against him Jared So I think Had I been playing with someone else I might have taken player one He got 107 I got 87 Not bad And the next closest was 15 Not bad. Now, that's a game you notoriously hate. I know, but you know what, dude? I actually really like the Pro. Oh, really? It was way more fun. That's what I was trying to tell you because I really don't like the Premium at all. I've never played a Pro until this one, and it's way more enjoyable. It actually plays like a good pinball game. Well, yeah. For one, I hate those giant upper playfields that cover the whole lower playfield. You just can't see what's going on. not being able to see where the ball's going yeah i don't know it takes away some of the satisfaction it's fun seeing the ball roll around well that upper play field is particularly egregious in terms of like how much real estate it takes up and then kind of what it adds like the value yeah you know like swords of fury also takes up a similar a little bit smaller but like small i mean that's like half this right maybe even a third of the size of the game of thrones one but the point is that swords of fury actually has more functionality like the game of thrones one it's like what am i doing up here like i'm hitting these little targets with like the dragon that's flapping its wings but like i well and according to jared it's also overpowered really like scoring wise it's really overpowered wow see so i i didn't even know that i hated it just because of the aesthetics and just the covering up everything i don't like that part of it similar to scooby-doo i don't like just shooting blindly into holes the one exception the the one is black night 2000 that game is fun but yeah the pro flows the pro flowed for sure yeah yeah i was actually pretty proud by then i think the jitters had subsided quite a bit yeah round three i started feeling good too that's actually where i had my first good game what was your round three iron maiden iron maiden and i was playing against one of the guys who runs the tournaments one of the really good players but fortunately he didn't have a great game so yeah i got first he got pinballed yeah i had around like 220 million or something on that nice dude and yeah after that pulp thing i was like okay i'm feeling a little looser now and like the game is obeying my commands that was fun i actually quite enjoyed game of thrones cool minus you're coming around on that game minus some aesthetic things you know the actual game itself i thought was really fun yeah i mean it's nothing special in terms of the art or play field layout nothing like again too amazing i think that game has pretty deep code and it's cool being able to choose the house yeah yeah there's there's a lot going on in that game there's multiple multi balls the dual alternate Return Ramps is like a Steve Ritchie Terminator 2 kind of thing. That's fun. For me, it's all aesthetic now. If you remove the upper playfield, give me a pro, my only gripe at this point is the fonts. Yeah, the fonts and the colors. Enough with the maps on the playfield. Jurassic Park has the maps. That game has the maps. D&D now. D&D has the maps. I particularly find fun if you play House Zac Stark and you do the first battle, like the mode, right? Like where Arya collects the names of everyone she's going to kill. Yep. And just keep hitting that center ramp. And every time it just builds up to value and then shoot the loop to collect. And there's the battering ramp. Is the battering ramp on the pro? Yeah, the battering ramp. It's terrifying. All that stuff. Like that one shot that rejects it quickly. It has the kicker shot. Yeah. All that stuff is fun. I mean, it makes it an exciting game to play, even if it's not revolutionary in any particular way. I still wish there would have been some kind of a physical representation of the wall. Yeah. You know what I mean? Like that was like something that could have been. Duh. Like some kind of like White Walkers bashing the wall. Like some kind of like. There should have been a wall bash toy. Yeah. Like just like destroy the wall. Whatever. I don't know, man. Like shave the wall and like you're getting bashed. Yeah. That seems like an obvious miss. But anyways. I wouldn't mind owning that game at some point. Like a pro. Yeah. Yeah. It was fun. It'd be fun to get really well acquainted with that game. I think it would be a fun one to have around and play with people. Yeah. And now for a word from our sponsor. What's the taste of good times together? It's easy to recall. Butterball turkeys are deep-basted, so they're always juicy, always tender. You can count on the holidays to be special, just like you can count on Butterball to be always juicy, always tender. Of all the tastes That make memories The best of all Is Butterball And now, back to the show. Round four! That was eight ball deluxe for me. I played five rounds. Oh my god, I thought I only played four, dude. I kind of got farther than I thought. This whole time I was like, I only played four rounds. No, we both played five rounds, actually. It's the jitters, man. It's all a blur. We could have been eliminated after three. I know. We did all right. We did all right. So yeah, round four, I was on bad cats. Meow, meow, meow, meow. Oh, man. I've played that game quite a bit and it still scares me for some reason. Something about that game. Maybe it's like Python's energy. But like every time I play that game, I do have fun, but it scares me. it has insane cat art which i love the cats are very creepy and weird looking but it's also got that center ramp that's very close yeah so it's not unlike the skull on hook if you don't hit that it's gonna come rocketing back to you pretty quick yeah yeah the game's it's kind of scary man i mean it's it's funny because it's kind of like simple and whatever but something about that it's fun i love it bad and the sounds are great it's a fun one man as far as like system 11 games go that's yeah in the top five yeah system 11 games very original very unique vibes i started off doing pretty poorly i think i was playing against three women and they were all pretty good and they were and i was doing pretty bad like there was actually a lot of women in this tournament which I was kind of like real happy about like I was kind of shocked at how many ladies turned up like all kinds of people dude you know Sarah was there and she was like wow I didn't realize there were so many trans people in the pinball community I didn't think about it but it's true it kind of goes to show what an accepting community that pinball is it's just like having fun together regardless of your background necessarily like where you come from who you are what you do it's just like we're just here together playing a game it feels like a judgment free zone 100% largely And we're all freaking weirdos, man. Yeah, yeah. But I thought I was going to get destroyed on Bad Cats after two balls. But then I found the shots on ball three. Nice. But then somebody barely etched me out. Oh, man. So I ended up getting second. I got absolutely destroyed by eight ball deluxe. Which is funny because if you look at the score, you would think otherwise. Right. I think I got third place. 90 of my score was on my last ball yeah that was me on bad cats too man that game yeah it's very unassuming kind of slow a little floaty like just hit the drop targets to get the balls and hit the a ball nope you're done yeah it's not the easiest game and like you and me we don't play a lot of early 80s late 70s era games yeah and the feel is just so dramatically different it's hard to shift gears it is and we all got rocked by that game i want to say the game i don't remember exactly the time but we said it was an average of about 30 minutes or so per like round 20 to 30 we were out at like 12 minutes man yeah like that game was it just like annihilated everyone i don't think any of you broke a million on it hell no it's tough if you're not i have the scores really dialed into the top score was 741 wait round five oh shit round five round five yeah round five was make or break because we were both this is it one strike one strike left of being eliminated what was yours do you want to go first my i had probably the worst possible game not to give too many excuses i mean that's what i'm mostly doing but it was stars stern oh man that's a tough one brutal i've heard it's just random everybody knows that game is random the flippers are super far apart there's no chance of saving it if it's anywhere near the middle it does have a center post but good luck getting help from that oh my god i was playing against joan mccool cool she is in her 70s she's a great player Her son is maybe one of the best players in the state, Tim McCool. I don't know what she did, but she did something right. Yeah. And a couple other guys. I mean, it was just instant drains. Just getting John Wick, dude, left and right. And the scoring seemed, we were trying to understand the scoring. It was like hit the drop targets, hit the spinner. But then Joan ended up winning because her bonus was so high, Which I think is just hitting a pop bumper in the center advances your bonus. That's so funny. Do you remember your score by chance? It was about 600,000. And I think the winner broke a million. Do you know who got a great game on Starz? Who was that? Jared. Oh, of course. Yeah. I came over and I was like trying to find him. I was going to ask him about something. I talked to him about this show, I think the podcast. And he looks at me and he goes, I actually got a pretty good game going on Starz right now. And he was so stoked. And I was like, geez. It's rare. Yeah, yeah, yeah. It was hilarious. man yeah that game is impossible it's cool look like I like the aesthetics of it I've never played it yeah I gotta play it round five round five oh my god dude Congo oh you had Congo I played Congo and I love that game yeah they got Congo right beside King Kong mother fuck Congo Congo I love that game dude I love Congo Really Yeah I wish I would have done a little better I think at that point, I think I was a little tired. I hadn't had dinner. It was just kind of like a long day for me. You know, like full day at work. I can't say I didn't give it my all, but I also can't say that I did. I did the best that I could. I'll say that. I actually did pretty well. I think I still got second place. I only had one strike left, so I was out. But that game was also pretty brutal. We all pretty much were done within 15 or 20 minutes. That game can be tough. It's got some really close shots and stuff. It's not super easy. Actually, I've heard it said that it's very similar to Iron Maiden's layout with the ramp through the pop bumpers. Iron Maiden may have taken a little bit of inspiration from that game. I don't find them to shoot that similarly. I didn't even put two and two together. I would not think one with the other. Congo, I always have to put in several games to feel like i'm doing anything that's one of those games like i said earlier that i just connected with right away like for whatever reason something about maybe it's the sub play field gorilla maybe it's the nostalgia of the film by the way the sub play field on that not that great i love it dude i think it's incredible what are you doing you're just hitting that ball to hit those i don't know i don't even care i just want to hit the ball with The gorilla hands. I mean, I'm glad it's got it, but I don't know how much value it adds. Man, it's got all the value. That's another... That's the magic, dude. That is the magic, you know? That was not the greatest movie. Like, did you see the movie? I freaking love that movie, dude. Oh, really? Yeah, I do. Maybe we need to re-watch that. That is a great movie to watch. I think I saw it in theaters, and I don't remember really liking it or disliking it that much. But I don't have any, like, nostalgia about Convict. I do, and I loved that movie when I was a kid. Oh, yeah? And watching it as an adult, not as good as I remember. But, you know, I think nostalgia for sure plays into how much I like the movie. It's not really a great movie, but it's fun. It's entertaining. It's kind of like we said earlier with Adam's Family, going back to a simpler time, just kind of linear, like semi-low stakes until those gorillas go fucking crazy and they start trying to kill everyone. For me, it has this similar thing of adventure, Legends of the Hidden Temple, in the jungle. I grew up in the jungle. Something about it, man. It was like, I'm going to find this old temple from before Jesus, and there's going to be monkeys living in it. That was real for me. As a kid, there were places in Panama that were like that, that were like islands. Okay, okay. I can see that being more relatable for you than it was for me, probably. There were monkey islands, dude, that were uninhabited. It was crazy. but anyways yeah i love that game i think for me the congo came after jurassic park yeah and they were both based on michael crichton novels right so i think there was a lot of comparing congo versus jurassic park and gorillas just can't compete with dinosaurs like it's just no comparison yeah for me it was the opposite i knew dinosaurs weren't real gorillas were 100 real so it was scarier and when you say dinosaurs aren't real well not today you know maybe in like a remote island and hidden in costa rica somewhere you know some people think dinosaurs didn't actually exist oh hell no of course they did i just mean today bones were planted yeah the fossils are fake 3d printed yeah no man yeah of course come on man yeah yeah we wouldn't have chickens today that's right in that regard to me congo was even scarier than jurassic park gotcha because it could really happen because you lived in the jungle are there native gorillas in panama no man there's there's other there are other monkeys like smaller like spider monkeys and other just like regular ones yeah there's actually an island that has legitimate spider monkeys i don't know if they're native i think it's called like the spider monkey island or something like that i used to want a monkey as a pet that was like my dream as a child what's funny is my mom dude my mom's friend now that you say that had a pet monkey oh really yeah for real oh man that's awesome and did you get to play with it i never got to do that back in the day man in panama it was pretty much like the wild west out there dude yeah you couldn't have pretty much any animal you wanted anytime in your yard um nowadays we know that's not okay to imprison anything. But yeah, man, people definitely had pet monkeys and stuff back in the day. It wasn't illegal. That's the point. I wanted one of those little cigarette-smoking, drum-playing capuchin monkeys. Dude, Panama has these tiny little capuchin-like monkeys that almost look like little warrior face paint. They have these little stripes on their faces and these little mohawk-looking hairs. And they're tiny, dude. They're smaller than a teacup chihuahua oh wow it's really cool you should look it up i'm gonna look it up we'll post a picture so we should get one to live in the shed cage wouldn't that be awesome if we just had a monkey living in here i gotta find it hang on this is oh my god game of thrones joffrey spider monkey aka joffrey's tamarin oh tamarin the panamanian also known these are all the same animal just by different name the panamanian white face capuchin that's pretty cool so this guy is It's probably about as big as my iPhone, dude. Yeah. It's crazy. Like it's smaller than your hand. They're so tiny. It's really crazy, dude. They look like these little fragile munchkin baby things. It's really wild. I want one. Yeah. I basically grew up in the Congo. Yeah. They move like freakishly fast. Yeah. Like how insects move faster than you, than like a human size can interpret. Yeah. They're little like head movements and like they're very jerky. Like, you know what I mean? Yeah. And like when they reach out to you, it's weird, man. It's like an alien, but it looks like you. So yeah, Congo was pretty much the perfect game for me to end my first tournament on. Yeah. Freaking love that game. Anytime I play that game, nothing but fun. I ended it on a fun note, even though I got my final strike. Yeah, Stars was... That was your final game? An abrupt ending to my tournament. That was kind of a bummer last game. That's a bummer. I actually had like a good ball. I was like hitting stuff and like kind of had a long playing ball. No points. Heard. But anyway, so we both, you know, my goal going into it, you were like, what's your, what do you want to do? And I was like, just want to be in the top 50%. Let's get in the top half of this thing. I'm not going to feel bad about myself. And we did that. We did it. We got through five rounds. We did it. We ended up with 12 other people tied for 24th. Yeah. With the strikes. There's no ranking other than just how many strikes you have. It's very rough. You're going to be tied because there are only so many places. Yeah. So it was like 10 people in 24th place and we were lumped into that group. Out of six or something. Six feels pretty good. Yeah, not bad. Could have been worse. If it weren't for that house ball on Pulp Fiction and for me getting stars, I feel like I would have advanced another round. If it wasn't for Jared playing his own game. Not fair. Oh man, no, I'm kidding, man. I feel like I did pretty good, all things considered, and I had a ton of fun. I feel like that was the perfect first tournament. Hopefully next time around, I'll be a little bit less jittery. I'll stretch, drink some water, warm up, and have more fun. Yeah. Hopefully. So, like, final thoughts on your first tournament and our first tournament at our new spot. So thanks to Triangle Pinball Collective, Flight Deck, Jared for making it happen and caring about pinball and making the community here better. And it's like I said earlier, it's happening. I thought it was the perfect experience for me. Perfect place to have my first tournament. Like local people that I'm probably going to see again and play with. Yeah, yeah. I'm just excited, man. I'm excited about the new spot. I'm excited about how many people showed up, you know? Yeah, 100%. Like you hear about the biggest tournaments in the world and you're talking about Electric Bat. Electric Bat, like 200 or something people. I mean, I think like 100 is kind of the... Seems like a lot. The number that they draw pretty regularly, maybe more. Yeah. But I feel like, geez, 60%, like that's more than halfway there to having like a huge tournament scene. I didn't even know there were 50 pinball players in the area. You know what I mean? That was pretty awesome. Yeah. That's really cool. That just gives me hope for pinball in this area. But like, you're going to keep playing. You're going to go back. This was like, you're in now. Yeah, I'm in. You know, I'm just not normally a competitive guy. That's not it for me. But maybe just for my own personal feeling of making progress or becoming better or just seeing where I am in the scope of things. I don't expect to be a champion at all. Right. And it's not really, it doesn't have to be about that. like as we talked about it you know the randomness of it like yeah the best players can end up yeah losing and getting eliminated early because they just have some bad luck and i think that's a good point to make shout out to eddie and caitlin yeah we talked a little bit it's their first time playing a tournament yeah i have been playing pinball for not very long yeah i think it i think it's true and it goes to show like anyone can play a tournament you don't have to be the greatest It's like I looked and Eddie wasn't even last place. He actually made that thing like pass like a round or two or something. And like he did have fun. We talked to them. Yeah, they seemed like they had a great time. We are going to have some video content coming out regarding this. Oh, yeah. So if it's not out already. We did a lot of filming and did some interviews while we were at this tournament. So check out the YouTube channel at some point. We'll have that on there. We actually not already kind of got their perspective on it. Yeah. So, yeah, that was pretty awesome. And I think that's it for me, man. I just want to give another shout out to Andrew's Arcade Services, man. Like that dude. He was the tech at the tournament. He was like the main tech for the event. Yeah. Like as soon as something were to go wrong, he's the guy. And we got to talk to him a little bit too. He's like basically like a one man operation, man. Like his business is literally called Andrew's Arcade Services. He's Andrew. Super cool guy, man. I can't wait to share that also. Yeah. A little interview that we did with him. And thanks for that, Andrew. Thanks for being cool. we'll have to continue to go to some tournaments there and i'm really curious to see how many people show up at the next tournament like was this some sort of a one-off like the news was there oh i forgot about that this was this was our local news our local wrl news station was there filming so i don't know was this indicative of the pinball scene here or was this more of a fluke Because it was really a lot of people. And I hope that many people show up at the next tournament. What do we do if that number just keeps going up and up and up? We'll have to have some updates in the future to kind of track how the scene is doing here. And just, I don't know. It's pretty cool. Yeah, it is cool. Thanks to everyone there for just being cool, having fun. Everyone that was open to me talking to you and sharing the podcast with you. Yeah. Dylan, I hope that you found Colin. Don't know what that is. Yeah, some dude was missing for a while. He was like player three. Oh, okay. And then Dylan was like, do you know Colin? And then they thought I was Colin, and then it was a whole thing. They were looking for people they didn't recognize. I said, Don, oh, Colin. Sounds kind of like Don, and then it was a whole thing. But I'm not Colin, I'm Don. Okay. Colin eventually appeared. And then, you know, also my long lost encounter with Logan. my pinball bff from like seven years ago or more or more the guy who taught you how to play lord of the rings one of the guys taught me how to play lord of the rings man like yeah organically met irl became friends would randomly hang out together before any kind of official group or yeah man and and logan man he's he's also a great player yeah he was he was up there and his fiance was there too and i guess she's also a great player yeah yeah shout out to those guys too Leave this territory now. Return to your home. evacuate all personnel