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Life - and pinball - happens

BlahCade Pinball Podcast·podcast_episode·58m 1s·analyzed·Apr 10, 2018
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claude-haiku-4-5-20251001 · $0.030

TL;DR

BlahCade hosts return after family crisis; discuss restoration projects and digital pinball platform issues.

Summary

Chris and Jared return to the BlahCade A A Pinball Podcast after a multi-week absence due to Chris's son's serious medical emergency requiring hospitalization and brain surgery. The hosts discuss their personal restoration projects (playfield art touch-ups on Firepower and Star Wars machines), digital pinball developments including new Zen Star Wars tables and the Bethesda pack coming to Switch, and frustrations with the Pinball Tournaments app's matchmaking system that limits competitive play.

Key Claims

  • Zen announced two new Star Wars tables coming April 17th for Steam and mobile (not Switch)

    high confidence · Chris discussing Zen announcements

  • Zen Bethesda pack (Doom, Fallout, Skyrim) is coming to Switch this month

    high confidence · Chris announcing Zen release schedule

  • Black Panther is now Marvel's number one movie surpassing Avengers

    medium confidence · Jared discussing potential Zen table opportunities; statement may reflect opening-date performance rather than final worldwide box office

  • Zen's post-Alien Pack tables represent a 'third generation' of improved design quality with better physics, rules clarity, and artwork balance

    high confidence · Chris and Jared's collaborative assessment of Zen's design evolution

  • Pinball Tournaments app (Farsighted reskin of Fireball) has insufficient player base and matchmaking problems preventing competitive play

    high confidence · Chris describing personal experience with the app's limitations

  • Switch does not yet have Star Wars or Marvel table packs, only Zen Originals and Universal pack

    medium confidence · Chris clarifying Switch platform availability

  • 1990s-era Williams playfield design intentionally minimizes artwork in high-action areas to allow ball tracking

    high confidence · Chris and Jared discussing pinball design principles based on observation of stripped playfields

  • Chris made an artistic modification to Firepower's laser design, making it uniform instead of the original widening pattern

    high confidence · Chris detailing his restoration choices and purist concerns

Notable Quotes

  • “my son had bleeding on the brain so non-trivial... we spent six days in the hospital... finally came to the conclusion of what's going on”

    Chris Friebus @ early in episode — Explains the podcast's multi-week hiatus and personal crisis context; establishes vulnerability and real-world stakes

  • “I would have just put a big flat sheet of frisket over and just done it all in one hit”

    Jared Morgan @ playfield discussion — Reflects on restoration learning curve; relatable mistakes in DIY playfield touch-up work

  • “I prefer the freehand... you could make the corrections immediately and it was just a matter of going exceedingly slow. No fast movements.”

    Chris Friebus @ restoration technique discussion — Technical insight into precision hand-painting technique for pinball playfield restoration

  • “everything that's been post-Alien has been really top-notch... They've really focused better on the rules... they've gotten much more adept at making the tables feel like real pinball”

    Chris Friebus @ Zen analysis — Identifies inflection point in Zen's design quality and design philosophy shift

  • “we're digital. We can do whatever we want. We want to make ourselves seem different... no, we don't want different. We want creative feel.”

    Jared Morgan @ Zen design philosophy discussion — Articulates the design tension between novelty and player expectation in digital pinball

  • “It feels like you're in jail... you've got me playing daily... But the fun is not there because of the matchmaking.”

    Chris Friebus @ Pinball Tournaments criticism — Captures frustration with app's structural limitations despite engagement hooks

  • “if you don't have the numbers of people playing, it's not going to be the least bit of fun... the game was so confusing in terms of that scoring issue... I think you lost a lot of people”

    Chris Friebus @ Pinball Tournaments post-mortem — Analysis of app's failure to reach critical mass due to confusing design and information clarity

Entities

Chris FriebuspersonJared MorganpersonBlahCade Pinball PodcastorganizationZen PinballcompanyFarsighted GamescompanyFirepowergameStar WarsgameWhirlwindgame

Signals

  • ?

    community_signal: BlahCade Pinball Podcast returns after multi-week hiatus caused by Chris's family medical emergency; establishes vulnerability and real-world impact on content schedules

    high · Chris detailed explanation of son's hospitalization, brain surgery scheduled, and Easter weekend scheduling conflicts

  • ?

    restoration_signal: Chris and Jared share detailed playfield restoration methodologies for Firepower and Star Wars machines, discussing frisket masking, hand-painting techniques, and design choices

    high · Extended technical discussion of masking strategies, sharp knife requirements, pinstripe work, and artistic corrections to original designs

  • ?

    product_launch: Zen Pinball announces two new Star Wars tables releasing April 17 for Steam and mobile; one follows movie plot, other focuses on Luke's Ahto island with porgs on slingshot plastics

    high · Chris confirmed announcement with specific release date and thematic details

  • ?

    product_launch: Zen Pinball Bethesda pack (Doom, Fallout, Skyrim) launching on Nintendo Switch this month

    high · Chris and Jared discussing Bethesda pack availability and table quality on Switch platform

  • ~

    sentiment_shift: Chris identifies clear generational shift in Zen's design quality, with post-Alien pack representing 'third generation' of superior rules, physics, and artwork balance compared to earlier tables

    high · Detailed comparison of design eras: generation 1 (pre-Alien including early Marvel/Star Wars), generation 2 (transitional mid-Marvel era), generation 3 (post-Alien onward including Pinball Effects 3)

Transcript

groq_whisper · $0.174

0:00
this is the blockade podcast with your hosts chris and jared well looky here you are listening to the blockade podcast make that the blockade pinball podcast i am your host chris freebus aka shut your trap joining me as always halfway across the world Jared Morgan. Howdy ho!
0:32
I don't know, for some reason the drop target noise from Whirlwind was just sticking in my head as we've been absent for a little while here, folks. I think you've... We haven't been doing very much stuff.
0:46
It's kind of been a little bit quiet. Yeah, it wasn't intentional, but in the meantime, there wasn't much going on in pinball, so it didn't feel like there was this dire urgency to get back to it. But I'll just give you the quick synopsis of what transpired here.
1:06
Initially, we were going to be recording in the sense of, what, three weeks back, I believe. And here in the States, it's a Saturday for me. There in Australia, it's a Sunday for Jared. And that particular Saturday, my boy was going and getting his first-degree black belt. And there was a big ceremony regarding it. So there was no way I was going to make it in time for podcast. So we were like, oh, that's no biggie. We've skipped weeks before. We'll just come back the following week. No one's going to care. Nobody's going to care. It's so easy for us to pick this stuff up. Well, two days later, my son had medical issues that then we spent the week trying to resolve, and it wound up landing us in the children's hospital here in Orange County, at which point we found out that my son had bleeding on the brain so non-trivial yeah so we spent six days in the hospital with them running scans and tests trying to figure out exactly what was going on and finally came to the conclusion of what's going on so we've had this now gap Oh, and then last week was Easter weekend Sunday, and so that didn't bode well for recording on either. No. And that brings us up to this week. So this week, it was a fairly normal week, and able to kind of restart things. Like, I had even abandoned doing the Table of the Week tournament on Xen.

  • “there's only little tiny gaps in between... I just installed a whole bunch of headaches instead”

    Chris Friebus @ frisket masking discussion — Self-aware humor about restoration workflow mistakes and planning errors

    • Medieval Madness
    game
    Attack from Marsgame
    Pinball Tournamentsproduct
    Bethesda Packproduct
    Alien Packproduct
    Norm Wurzperson
    Black Panthergame
    Deadpoolgame
    Ant-Mangame
    Sith versus Jedigame
    Infinity Wargame
    The Avengersgame
    Pinball Effects 3product
    JAWSgame
    Herculesgame
    Switchproduct
  • ?

    product_concern: Farsighted Games' Pinball Tournaments app suffers from critical matchmaking issues preventing competitive play due to insufficient player base and algorithmic pairing problems

    high · Chris describing being paired with single opponent who avoids rematches; leaderboard rarely filled; high-Z value matches inaccessible due to lack of opponents at skill level

  • ?

    product_concern: Pinball Tournaments app lost casual players due to confusing and poorly explained scoring system at launch, reducing player base below critical mass

    high · Chris recalling feedback to Norman about scoring confusion; assessment that unclear rules drove away casual players early in lifecycle

  • ?

    design_philosophy: Zen Pinball's design philosophy shift toward authenticity: earlier tables over-experimented with digital-only mechanics (reverse flippers, excessive flipper placement), newer tables balance Zen identity with traditional pinball fundamentals

    high · Jared's articulation of balance between 'creative feel' vs. 'different for different's sake'; Chris noting Zen's movement toward traditional flipper placement and ramp layouts

  • ?

    design_innovation: 1990s Williams pinball intentionally minimizes artwork in high-action playfield zones to enable proper ball tracking; modern Zen tables rediscovering this principle for clarity

    high · Chris and Jared discussing stripped 1990s Williams playfields showing minimal art; correlation to Zen's recent move toward color restraint while maintaining visual presence

  • ?

    content_signal: BlahCade Podcast operates on variable schedule with multi-week gaps; hosts acknowledge low industry activity during quiet periods as factor in publishing frequency

    medium · Chris noting 'there wasn't much going on in pinball' during absence period; reference to Table of the Week tournament on Zen as regular content driver

  • ?

    rumor_hype: Community speculation about potential Zen Black Panther table given its status as top-performing Marvel film; licensing and pairing strategy uncertain

    medium · Chris and Jared discussing Black Panther's box office performance and wondering how Zen would pair it with another title; no official announcement or leak

  • ?

    licensing_signal: Zen Pinball has built substantial Marvel and Star Wars portfolio; licensing strategy involves pairing new tables and focusing on comic book source material while incorporating film aesthetic cues

    high · Jared noting Zen's approach: still revolving around comics but taking visual/voice cues from films; existing tables include Avengers, Infinity War, Ant-Man, Deadpool, multiple Star Wars iterations

    • 2:41
    I just completely had no desire to play it myself and no desire to load it up. Yeah, so I started that up again this week. Started doing some of these regular Facebook posts that I've been doing, which is favorite all-time albums that are still in your rotation,
    3:01
    active rotation of albums that you actually listen to. It's just kind of a fun thing to think about and figure out what you actively listen to of your albums. and yeah so everything is going normal until this Tuesday when we go back into the hospital my kid has brain surgery to fix his issue so you know it's these little things nothing major what happens yeah but that's where we've been so life kind of got in the way yeah it's kind of did um and you know what in that whole off period of time you'd think it would have made a lot more progress with the pinball but i haven't really but what i have done is i've frisket masked areas of the playfield so i'm sort of really gearing up for it right i just got to spray the bloody thing out yeah yeah yeah i saw that uh you you laid it down and I saw you did something that I never thought to do, which was the areas that you were going to leave down on the table, you took a black Sharpie and kind of drew squiggly lines over it. I didn't do that. And I'm realizing that that was rather smart of you and kind of silly of me.
    4:26
    Well, it took me ages to work out that when you're actually measuring out the area you want to frisket mask, you do it on the frisket side and not the paper side because of course mirror image. When you flip it over, I did that a couple of times. I went, oh, I have to do it on the frisket side because otherwise it's back to front and I just waste this bit of frisket. But no, you don't really waste it. You just use it on the bit of the play field. So it's not a big deal, but it's still like annoying, right? Well, you know, the other thing that I did that if worried to do it again, I would do completely different how I frisk it. I was trying to be conservative with my frisk it. And so just, I cut out a section that was just a bit larger than what I actually needed. And then, so that would be down. Not realizing that once you've done all the frisketed, all the areas, there's only little tiny gaps in between. And now I'm going to have to cover that up anyway with butcher paper or something like that to deal with the overspray, it would have been so much easier to just do two long sheets of Frisket all the way down the front of the playfield with a seam in the middle and then just cut away and be done with it. I just didn't even think about that because I really didn't save that much Frisket by doing it the way I did. Instead, I just installed a whole bunch of headaches instead so yeah i did exactly the same thing fell into exactly the same trap like i thought there's some areas on this on the play field where there's uh like a whole lot of return lanes and stuff and there's just enough white area in in that sort of zone that needed to be like retouched and i sort of tried to zone it off a little bit and i should have just put a big flat sheet of frisket over and just done it all in one hit um i'm finding it really hard to do the white rings around the lights because I can't find an object that's just the right size to be able to cut around it with the scalpel. So I'm kind of having to freehand it, which is tricky. That's what I wound up doing on Firepower, where I initially was trying to use, I have a clear ruler, and I was trying to do all the straight lines with the ruler, and I was guiding the X-Acto knife along that. and as my buddy pointed out he goes the most important thing is to make sure you have an exceedingly sharp knife and the reason for that is straight lines no problem when you start doing curves oh a sharp knife makes all the difference in the world well so i did a lot of the straight lines that way and then when i had to go do the flames around the pop bumpers well there was nothing that i mean i was gonna have to freehand it anyway well i got quite good at freehanding that. And that gave me the confidence that then when it came time to do the numbers and the lettering, I just went, you know what? Screw it. Why am I... Because everything had a rounded tip. There was no flat lines.
    7:29
    And it was harder to try and then make your lines parallel to each other because the ruler is unforgiving in that way. As opposed to if I was going freehand, I could make the corrections immediately and it was just a matter of going exceedingly slow. No fast movements. And so it took time, but in the end it wound up looking better because I could compare the lettering from when I did it with the ruler versus the other side of the table where I did a freehand. And I prefer the freehand. Yeah, right. So I've got some challenges on Star Wars where there's white text on black background. and I know I'm going to get into the situation where when I spray the other white areas, some of which are actually visible, like they're not underneath the plastics zones where the GI is. So they're going to be visible on the playfield and I just know that they're going to stick out like dog's balls once I've done them compared to the other white zones. but the thing is I have to touch them up because they are worn down to the wood so I don't have a choice so the other problem is the lettering and the zones that I need to touch mostly are lettering so white lettering on black background so I think what I'm going to do is for those lettering zones that are going to be retouched on black I'm just going to cut as close around them as possible and leave them the way they are and just spray very closely around it with the other black and just let it be i think i'm just going to make the call it's going to be too hard to actually cut those out with frisket yeah so i'm just going to let it ride and i mean you'd be surprised remember i did pin striping with the frisket oh yeah i cut the literal pinstripes, you know, out and sprayed, you know, to spray those white. And, I mean, it was, we're talking about a sixteenth of an inch wide. Wow, that's narrow. It's very narrow. And, again, sharp knife because otherwise it would pull the frisket off. Yeah. But the sharp knife left the frisket stay and allowed me to do a nice straight cut.
    9:45
    But, yeah, that first pinstripe line that I was like, I'm going to try it. Oh, man, I was sweating bullets. But it worked. And, you know, there is you realize with how these tables were painted with the silk screening that the silk screening was far from perfect. No, it wasn't like all the lettering on Star Wars. It's got it looks like bubble writing. It's not sharp. Yeah, it's actually quite, quite rough, actually. So I wound up, there was a couple of pinstripes that they went so narrow that they almost disappeared into the black and then would reemerge. And when I got done with it, it was all one uniform pinstripe. So I was actually able to make a few corrections to the initial look that the silkscreen didn't do a good job of. I did do one correction that I realized purists are probably going to hate me for. But you know the big red lasers on firepower that shoot into the planet? Yeah. So if you look at it, there's this weird thing that they do where they widen out, and then all of a sudden it's a straight line in, and then they widen out again. And it drove me bonkers that it wasn't just one uniform straight laser.
    11:08
    And initially, whoever had done their touch-up paint job had kind of butchered one of them. And so I said with this, I went, you know what, screw it. I'm going to make it the way that I think it should be. So I made it one uniform laser so it doesn't do this weird, you know, goes wide and then narrows again and then goes wide once more. It's now just wide at the top and goes all the way to a narrow pinpoint.
    11:32
    And so obviously anybody that looks at mine after I'm done is going to go, hey, that's not original. But you know what, it makes me happier because it was driving me bonkers. It's the same thing that drives me bonkers if you look at Firepower 2.
    11:46
    It looks like the lower portion of the playfield has gotten worn off. It has massive tableware. The paint job just kind of crumbles almost, and there's black, and it's weird. That's how Williams designed it. And I hate it because it looks like it's been worn. Yeah, let's pack this. Yeah. so yeah i think it's it's tricky sometimes like you want to you want to try and do the best restoration you can on the playfield but at the same time like you could just go crazy with this and it would take you months to do it right i don't really have the interest to do a like a full-on restoration quality i'm going to fix the really bad bits on it that like stick out terribly yep and there's going to be some bits that because of the area of the play field they're in i probably won't even attempt to touch up um because they're just really bad yeah the things i want to the things i want to do is at least get the the numbers i think because they've quite worn off the lettering in some places is also worn off i don't know if i'll be able to actually like they're that bad that i don't even have something to go by um in the area so i can't even like trace over it and then have a go um so there's some parts that are just like unrecoverable and i might try my hand at doing it um but i don't think i'm gonna have much success yeah and then there's you know there's big areas of green but unfortunately if i if i go and spray just a bit of the area that's affected it's gonna be mismatched so i'm gonna have to do the whole lot of the green and unfortunately they've also put some some dotty pattern over the green so i'd somehow have to mask around that and it's there's so many bits there's so many baby dragon moments from this play field that you know it's it's not a simple like you see people touching up ems that are just like bold colors with very right fine zones it's like yeah that'd be nice you realize that that's what we should have started on something simple no now i did the same i did the same thing when i wanted to make an electronic kit i went well what do i want to make well i want to make a subwoofer amplifier so i'm just going to go for a level four kit um where i had to like work out how to wire up a toroidal transformer and i was you know well i truly not something i could do myself but yeah i just bit off and chewed like hell I guess I going to do that with this as well
    14:37
    Let's talk a little digital pinball. Yeah, let's do. There is some news in that front, mainly coming from Zen.
    14:45
    Zen came out and announced they have two new Star Wars tables coming out on April 17th for Steam and mobile. I don't believe it's for Switch.
    14:58
    I could be wrong, though. I'm not sure. No, they wouldn't be, because Switch doesn't have any of the Star Wars or Marvel tables yet, I don't believe.
    15:05
    Okay, that's interesting. So only the Zen Originals they have on there, is it? Yes. Zen Originals, I believe they do have the Universal pack. They do have...
    15:22
    I don't know if they have... I don't know if they have Portal or Walking Dead either. I just know they don't have the Star Wars and the Marvel packs yet for Switch.
    15:36
    But anyway, so for everything but maybe Switch, it's a new Star Wars table. One of them is basically their typical, hey, let's follow the movie plot kind of games. And the other one takes place on Luke's island of Akto. and all I know is immediately I looked and I was like there better be a porg somewhere on this table and sure enough there's a porg on each of the slingshot plastics so I was like okay job done and unfortunately I will have this whole conversation saying that I've not seen that movie yet so I know nothing but I did notice that it's actually out to buy on Google Play so that means in a month's time it will be out to rent which means I'll go and just rent it and then I'll catch up and then I'll be able to understand what the hell I'm doing on the pinball table. Right. Yeah.
    16:30
    So, so there's that bit of news from Zen. And then the other news from them is they are coming out on the switch with the Bethesda pack. And that is also happening this month. Yeah. And that's a good pack. The Bethesda pack. Like it's,
    16:48
    there's some pretty interesting tables in there. I've been mucking around with Zen. I've got a, through Workday, a new tablet, and it's a Galaxy Tab S3, which is like a big 9.7-inch 4x3 orientation Android tablet. And I've managed to find a controller, a Bluetooth controller, that would work with it. So I've got not-touch controls for pinball, and it's quite pleasurable to play because the display is an OLED display. So all the colors are really nicely saturated and really nicely presented and crisp and fast. And it actually looks better than the Shield tablet.
    17:30
    The tablet itself doesn't quite have the performance of the Shield tablet, but it still does a good job. So I'm kind of happy to be playing it on it.
    17:42
    That Bethesda pack, I've never played any of the games that are in it. So Doom, Fallout, and Skyrim.
    17:52
    So I'm a little bit lost regarding when they do a callout. I'm like, but I don't know what that object is that you're calling out.
    18:03
    Yeah. So there's a little bit of a learning curve there for me. But we did Fallout, I think, in one of our Table of the Weeks. And so I was able to learn a few things about that. It's a pretty interesting table. And also the same thing with Doom. It's rather interesting also.
    18:25
    Really good lighting packages on all those. Basically, if you look at Xen, all the packs that they've put out since the Alien pack, to me that's been kind of a new starting point for them, you might say. There's all the tables that were pre-Alien, and then there's all the tables that have been post-Alien. And everything that's been post-Alien has been really top-notch. They've really focused better on the rules. They seem to have listened to people's, like ours, complaints about the DMD displays and giving you information you can't possibly read because there's a pinball bouncing around.
    19:02
    Yes. They've gotten much more adept at making the tables feel like real pinball in terms of the bounciness of the rubber.
    19:12
    Yes. And just basically your shot selection flow of the tables. A lot of them really do feel so nice to shoot. You're flipping around going, this is just really quite like pinball. Yeah. It just feels great. You would call this, to me, it's the third generation of their tables.
    19:37
    First generation being not only all those, but we're talking through V12, Tesla, Shaman. Epic Quest.
    19:49
    Yeah, probably up to Epic Quest. A lot of the early Marvel tables and the first generation of Star Wars tables. And then all of a sudden they flipped switch, and I think it was with a lot of their Marvel tables, and it was probably somewhere around the time of Infinity Gauntlet or Fear Itself that also was like, hey, you guys are getting on to something. And there was kind of a hit and miss still going on where one of the table packs would be one of the tables in there would be kind of like dodgy still, but the other one would be like, no, no, but I really like this one going forward. I remember us having this discussion with all the Star Wars tables. Oh yeah, old designer doing this one and new designer doing this one.
    20:37
    Yeah. The Graffle. I think the Graffle, Mr. Graffle, is one of the guys who was slow to go with the bouncy physics. Yeah. And, you know, they really started hitting their stride with, you know, like the South Park table and stuff like that. And, you know, they were kind of on a roll of a certain baseline of quality. It was better than that original stuff that they were doing. So that was kind of the second generation. Like I said, third generation of what they've been doing and how they understand pinball, I say, starts with the Alien Pack and moves forward. And obviously everything they've been putting out for Pinball Effects 3 has been really, really well thought out and good. I've really rather enjoyed them. I mean, you know, even though the JAWS table is a little hard for me to get into, there's still some quality good stuff on there. And at least the lighting is cool. Yeah, the lighting is actually really cool. Even on mobile, it looks really good.
    21:36
    I was surprised actually playing, what was it? It was Hercules or whatever it is. Yeah, that was a really good one.
    21:46
    That's got some lighting on it that really surprises me on mobile. It's fun. It's a lot of nice flow on that table. It's just a good one to shoot.
    21:57
    I'm really quite a big fan of it. I like it. You know, Zen used to do these bizarre flipper placements and ramps that you had no clue where the ball was being diverted to. And they've kind of gotten away from that and gone a little more traditional with where you expect to see things. And I think that's also part of why I've latched on to these later tables more. They just feel that you still want the Zen feel of the tables, but you also want some... you want the reality of pinball in the simulation as well. It's not even a simulation, but in the storytelling that they're trying to do. Yeah. And, you know, I think in a lot of cases, some of the earlier tables were a little bit like the EM days with pinball designs where they, you know, they put pinball flippers backwards and they, you know, they, they put like heaps of flippers everywhere and crazy. It was, it was, it was almost like, well, we're digital. We can do whatever we want. We want to make ourselves seem different. and it's like, no, we don't want different. We want what we want. We want creative feel. We don't want different. We want creative. There's a difference. Yeah, exactly. They've even gotten better about their artwork on the tables because I remember trying to play, I believe it was Ninja Gaiden and the entire table is red and red to begin with is a very difficult color for your eyes to resolve.
    23:30
    Yes, it is. Even in reality, it's difficult. But it was so much a wash of red that the whole table just kind of looked flat, and it just looked nasty. But then they went the other direction when they started doing, if you look at Shaman or El Dorado, it's so busy that you can't tell what the hell is going on either. you can't tell what is three dimensional you know raised from the play field and what is flat to the play field because they would purposely make the plastic that was on the raised portion blend in perfectly with the background of the table itself so if you look at though back to the future it's like ah you nailed it you understand what is you don't need so much artwork and if you've ever seen a stripped play field of a 90s era Williams table, you'll see just how little actual artwork is on these things.
    24:32
    It's quite shocking. They're designed to be paired back so your eye can process it. If you take a look at those 90s designs, you'll see that the areas where a lot of fastball action happens is very low on art. So the loops and all the fast-moving areas of the play field, there's really not a lot going on because of that reason. Your eye actually needs to track the ball and not the art. Yeah. So it's very interesting when you look into this sort of thing, and you can see it in the way the tables are actually designed. It's there now that they've really dialed the colours back but still made the art present. Yeah. And it's just much better balanced now. So, yeah, they really do have how to represent an original theme digital pinball product in the games that they offer.
    25:33
    We were discussing, just me and you texting back and forth, about whether they would do a Black Panther table.
    25:42
    Yeah. And it's one of those things where they've yet to do Black Panther on any of their tables. obviously the movie has is now marvel's number one movie that they've ever made um and surpass even avengers and so i mean it's huge it would make perfect sense for them to to do this the question is are they really going to do just one standalone table they don't usually do that they You usually pair it with another table.
    26:15
    Well, if you look at the slate of movies that are coming out, a lot of times then has kind of paired somewhat with either something that's coming out or has just recently come out. But they've already got an Avengers table. They've already got an Infinity War table. So that's two tables in one movie that they don't need to redo. They've already got an Ant-Man table, and that's the other movie that's coming out this summer.
    26:45
    I'm trying to think of what other things that... Oh, Deadpool's the other movie that's coming out this summer. They've already got a Deadpool table. So it's kind of like, oh, well, what would be the next thing that you would pair it and kind of put out? because Zen has been writing this weird line where they're still very much following the comic books, but if you look at the artwork on the Ant-Man table, it's clearly modeled after the movie. And the voice work, they clearly tried to get somebody that sounded like Michael Douglas.
    27:25
    So they're taking cues from the movies, but not revolving around the movie. They're revolving still around the comic world. so I don't know. It's one of those things where it's like, I can't believe that they don't have a black Panther table, but what would they put with it? Yeah. It's sort of, it'd be hard to get, they have to do like a, a star Wars, um, my own creation table, you know, like they've done with the, um, the last Jedi pack. Um, you know, a spinoff one, like a focus on, uh, an area of the pinball or area of the movie that perhaps is maybe the best bit and then focus on stuff around that.
    28:13
    Right. So they'd have to make a game within a game, essentially, if you know what I mean. They'd focus on... There's one more table where it was Sith versus Jedi, which wasn't on any table whatsoever,
    28:29
    any movie whatsoever, but hey, we've got these properties, let's blend them together and create a room. Yeah, it'd have to be a theme. So a theme from Black Panther.
    28:41
    Like maybe, I don't know, they'd be able to work something out. But it would have to be like essentially a subtext table.
    28:50
    What they had to do. They could do it though. Yeah. Be interesting to see where they go with that Other digital pinball So I been playing this app that Farsighted put out called Pinball Tournaments
    29:06
    And this is the one where they basically, it's the reskin of Fireball. Oh, yeah, that's right. We talked about that last time, right? Yes.
    29:15
    And it took me a long while to figure out the scoring. I think we've talked about that before now. I've got that figured out. and I've actually been playing it daily, so they've got me hooked on that front. Where they're still losing me is getting paired in tournaments.
    29:39
    Right. So the matchmaking is still a problem, is it? It's still an issue because, A, you've got to have people playing. And based off of what I'm seeing, there ain't people playing. these tournaments usually have at least 10 I don't know if it's 10 or 15 placement positions to pop up on the daily leaderboard because that's what it is, it's a daily leaderboard and rarely do I see it filled I don't think I've even seen it filled all the way once so clearly there's not enough people playing it but then also there's the issue that I've probably played too well and I've put myself into a category where there's literally one other person that I get paired with to play against. And that person is being a jerk because if you lose a match to a person, you can challenge them to a rematch.
    30:41
    Also, if you can play tables where you're not playing against anybody and basically banks your score. And then the next person that comes in and wants to play at that particular they call it Z. That's kind of their virtual currency that you earn.
    31:01
    And so there's the 2Z level, the 10Z level, and the 50Z level. So if I have a couple of 2Z levels waiting for a player, the first person that comes in that is matched at my level, well, they're going to be having to play against the scores that I've already posted.
    31:18
    well, I've got a laundry list of scores posted in all three areas, and I'm not getting paired with anybody. Meanwhile, I look at the leaderboard, and people are above me.
    31:29
    It's weird. It's very weird, because they've been playing against other players, and they're scoring Z based off their scores with that. So I've only got this one person that I'm playing against, and basically what he'll do is we'll play like a 50-Z match, and if he wins he will not play anymore that day and I now have no way of catching up to him because that's the only person that I'm paired with that's really crap that's not fun at all no I've tried to there was one time where he lost a couple of matches to me so I was way up on the point goal and he challenged me to rematches and I went sure let's do it And so I played the rematches, and fortunately I won, so I still schooled him.
    32:23
    And so I figured that, okay, now when the coin is flipped, he'll do the same. He'll just be like, yeah, sure, it's fun to play. Now, he's just purely going for the absolute win. And the thing is, some days the leaderboard win total is worth a whopping 4Z, maybe 2Z. I mean, it'll be a stupid, dumb number that is so inconsequential it doesn't even matter. But then, now and then, like today and yesterday, top score is worth 250Z. That's huge. Yeah, that's a nice windfall. And this person's not playing against me. And for the scoring today, they're not playing against me at all, and so I'm not even on the leaderboard.
    33:11
    Because there's nobody to play against. It feels like you're in jail. Yeah, yeah. And it's just one of those things where it's like, guys, you've got me playing daily. I'm checking it daily. I want to play. I really do. But the fun is not there because of the matchmaking. Yeah, the matchmaking is just too limited.
    33:34
    Yeah. And then this is actually what my fear was when we were in beta and when I initially talked to Norman, he is the one that told me about this thing going in, and he was asking what issues I think, would people be wanting to play or whatever, and I told him, I said, if you don't have the numbers of people playing, it's not going to be the least bit of fun. He's like, I think people will show, I think people will show.
    33:58
    But the problem was, right off the bat, the game was so confusing in terms of that scoring issue, because it was nowhere plainly clearly explained that I think you lost a lot of people that were casually trying to even play this thing. And now you've got the matchmaking issue that just makes it not fun either.
    34:23
    Yep. What are you going to do? There's nothing you can do. Nothing you can do. All I can do is highlight the issues that are there.
    34:34
    Yeah. And it would also be nice, It would be also nice because this is the only table. I've pretty much mastered this table. Yeah. It's kind of a bit old now, right? Well, it would be nice if there was another table to rotate between, or three tables to rotate between, so that, yeah, it's like, oh, what are we playing today? Oh, okay, cool. But I'm sure to a lot of people, they're like, oh, my God, I hate this table. Why would I want to continue? I'm done. I'm done with this. I don't want to play it anymore. So therefore, maybe that's what Old Maid's problem is, that you're going, I'm done with this. I don't want to play it anymore. Could be. So it may not be he's avoiding you. I'm just really not interested in doing this anymore. Oh, no, he's clearly avoiding me because he's still playing. He's still actively playing. All right. I think it's just whenever I ask for a rematch that that's when he's avoiding me.
    35:30
    Yeah, he goes, no, you're too good. So my counter to that has been to just make sure that there's enough of my games in the queue so that he has to get through my scores. Yeah. Eventually he has to hit one of your scores. Yes. Yeah. But again, that's where you come into the issue of once you hit 50,000 points in this, you're done. You can't play anymore. And it just does a quick total of how many balls did you have left and what was the time left on your counter. That creates your bonus score. Boom, here's your score. So most of my scores are between 82,000 and 94,000 points.
    36:11
    Well, so I can finish with an 88,000 point and be like, okay, that's cool. But then all of a sudden this other guy scores 92,000 and I've lost. Yeah. But I had plenty more time to play. I had plenty more balls to play with. So the capping issue also is what kind of sucks.
    36:32
    Yeah, that's really... It's a bit of a coin toss as to what's going to happen in the end. You know, you're like, I have really rocking scores, but if that person happens to have a better rocking score, what are you going to do? So really it all comes down to the bonus that you get at the end, it seems. It entirely comes down to the bonus. Ah, see, that's rubbish. The only clue that you have regarding what you're up against, so if a score has already been posted, right at the beginning of the game, before you even plunge the ball, If you look at the score, it'll show, it'll say like one ball, 48 seconds.
    37:11
    And so what you realize is this person only lost or was still playing on their first ball. And when they hit their 50,000 point cap, there was, you know, 72 seconds left on the table. so you have kind of a goal to go for but you don't know what their actual score was and again the goal itself is really abstract like it doesn't the fact you have to work it out it's just another layer it's not inviting really no and the fact that I haven't heard peep one out of Farsight since they put this out.
    37:58
    I mean, zero. And I've made comments on the message board about it, and the only thing that I got a comment of was,
    38:07
    oh, yeah, we know about the score cap being an issue. That's it. That's all I've heard. All right. It feels, I hate to say it, it's shovelware. It's vaporware. It's just there, something unsupported.
    38:24
    Another experiment that's deemed not to be something they want to continue, but unfortunately they don't take it down after they've experimented. Yeah. And the problem with these experiments is that's what betas are for. When you go live with this, you've got to nurture your baby. If you don't nurture it, of course it's going to die. You can't throw it out there. No. You've got to expect it to do things. You've got to market the crap out of it, basically. Yeah. Like, it's got to be every second tweet, you know, or, you know, you've got to get people interested in it so that you can then start getting your dollar-y-dos from it, right? And you think about something even, you know, look at Candy Crush.
    39:09
    They didn't just put it out and then stop. They continually evolved that thing. I haven't played that in quite a few years, and I would be probably shocked to load it up and see what it has become. because I'd probably be like, what the heck is this? It's evolved so much. And how many levels, thousands of levels do I now have to go through in this game? Right. It's thousands, thousands of levels now. You know, I play this other mobile game called Clash Royale, and they just recently did a tournament where they went, okay, you get to play with all the cards that were, only the cards that were original to the launch, and you have to follow the set of rules that was there at launch. The game only launched like a year and a half ago, I think, maybe two years ago, and it was just like, whoa, what the heck? I don't even remember playing this way. So, yeah, you've got to nurture the crap out of it. You've got to evolve, stay with your players, listen to their feedback, and make adjustments, and make them aware that you are there listening and making those adjustments instead of just throwing it out there and being like, hey, if you like it, yeah, cool.
    40:29
    And unfortunately, this is classic product management 101. You release it, you measure, you iterate, you release, you measure, you iterate, and you keep on doing that until no one cares anymore. And then you kill it off and you start again with something fresh. And this is the thing that I don't understand with Fast Die, because this isn't their first rodeo. No. They have been releasing games for years now, like a decade. So this pattern should be ingrained, and it should be something they can just do without even thinking. But they don't. And they just don't really seem to do it. Well, it seems like they're still operating on an old model.
    41:16
    Yes. of game design rather than realizing that if you're going to enter the mobile market, you've got to be at the forefront. Otherwise you're just going to be washed in the tide.
    41:28
    So, yeah. Uh, speaking of changes, the pinball league that I've neglected to be in because of my knee for at least six months, I think it's been actually some seven or eight months since I last played. Um, they are restarting their season tomorrow and they've got a whole new set of rules. And I'm actually going to go, uh, go check it out for the first time. Uh, cause it's really local to me. So I won't be gone from the house for very long, but, I'm very curious to see what the rule changes because basically what they've done with these rule changes, no longer will they be earning points for, uh, international pinball, uh, scoring. Yeah. Waffle point. Yeah. Those are gone completely. And this is going to be more each tournament is going to be its own individual tournament. There will be a winner crowned at the end of it, and there's not going to be league points carried over month to month. So basically, it's embracing the casual nature of this, making it fun so that you don't feel this need to have to attend every single meeting. Instead, whatever you attend, it can still be equally fun. but it's there there's only going to be four tables to play you're only going to have three tables of those four to play and you there's a preliminary round of which the top three players of all the players that play that table will advance to the next round and then the number four player is this weird thing where whoever has the top number in the 100,000 column. So if you earned 648,520, your number is 648.
    43:23
    Okay. So whoever has the top number in that gets the fourth spot of all the players So it kind of a random thing Once the preliminary round is done and they go to the next round
    43:39
    you only will be playing one table. So you could have scored top three in all three of the tables that you play, but you're only going to get placed on one of those tables for the next round. and then the top one player, so whoever places first on each of those three tables, then those people will all go head-to-head for the championship. Wow, that sounds complex. Yeah, I'm really trying to wrap my head around how this is going to work, and obviously this is going to be the first time that they've ever done it, so I think they're also trying to wrap it. I looked at the rule sheet that was posted, and a lot of it was TBD.
    44:27
    We're still trying to figure out exactly how this is going to work. And then there was another thing, and I'm hoping this is going to make the tournament go faster because one of the issues that we always had was, great, everybody plays their first round. You get done with your first round, you go to do your second round. Oh, but there's still a player playing in the first round and now you're standing around waiting for that person and finally the person gets done and you go, and by the time you got to the third or fourth round, you would just be sitting there waiting on players. And so that dragged the whole thing to a screeching halt. So this time what it is, they said that there's these, and again, I don't know what this is, but there's these little clip-on things that'll go on a lanyard that you wear. And it's basically, this person is playing and this person is waiting. As soon as the person that's done playing is done, they have to go find a person next on the list and hand it off to that person. My only problem with that is if you don't know people, you're going to be going, so who is this and who do I hand it off to? I don't know. Yeah, hopefully they have name tags on. Yeah, I hope that. Oh, that'd be nice if we did name tags. The other thing is when this will be really cool, all the other machines that are in the house, what used to happen is during the tournament, if it wasn't a tournament machine, it got turned off. and you weren't allowed to play anything that was there.
    45:56
    Now, all the machines will be turned on and if it's a non-tournament machine, it's free play. Go have at it. Good. Why wouldn't you want to do that? Believe me, it's hard when you... The idea when you go into a pinball tournament is to kind of play pinball? I don't know. What you would have to do is go early before the tournament and then all the tables would be on but you didn't know what was in the tournament so you didn't know what you were practicing on and what you were just playing for the fun of it. Then they always said that after the tournament was over it was open house. Well, most people bailed after the tournament. Yeah, because it took so bloody long. Right. And pre-tournament you would be so intent on trying to get your hands on every single thing because you didn't know what was going to be in the tournament.
    46:43
    This way, yeah, you're right. Now you can just have fun. You can be there. You're not sitting – while you're sitting around waiting for your next table to play, you can actually be playing a table. Yeah, and actually the most important thing is that while you're waiting for your next tournament game, you can still be keeping your hand in. Right. And actually getting – like not forgetting how to play pinball between your rounds, right? Yes. It's what happens to me. When I'm at the Brisbane Pinball Club,
    47:09
    we have the, like, every tournament is its own competition. So, yeah, someone gets crowned winner at the end. It's a really good format. Like, it's much better than having points carry over.
    47:21
    And, yes, when you are waiting for, there's normally six tables chosen for the tournament. I think the venue has about nine or ten. So it means that the other four tables are available for the general public to play while the other tables are reserved for the BPC. Yeah. And it means that if in between rounds, like I usually get there at five o'clock, I'm done with my tournament games by 5.30 or 6. Right. And I have to wait around for three hours. So I'll go and have some dinner and probably do coin drop and a couple of other tables just to have a bit of fun. and yeah it would be really boring having to sit there for three hours waiting um to to do it so having tables to play and having something else to do while you're there it's it really would make for a much better tournament environment yeah um for everyone so i think you're gonna sound like you're gonna enjoy yourself tomorrow i think it's gonna be good well and the other thing i'm gonna enjoy myself with is uh this guy just bought dialed in so he's got dialed in um last time i was there last year. He had just gotten Game of Thrones.
    48:32
    He also has a Wizard of Oz. So he's constantly getting new tables in. So I'll be very curious to see what else is in his collection, if he's got any other brand new... I wonder if he's making a slot for the new Iron Maiden table that's coming out.
    48:52
    You know what? That looks really good. Doesn't it? Oh, well, A, the artwork is phenomenal. I mean, you wouldn't expect Photoshop with, because it's all hand-drawn art anyway, to begin with. It's all based on Eddie.
    49:08
    But even the table layout, I love that there's a ramp shot that the only way to get through it is to shoot through pop bumpers. That is such a Waller style design.
    49:19
    And I think that's phenomenal. What's that? I think about that roadshow ramp that you have to shoot through the pop bumpers for. It's risky as anything. It's great. yeah, your strength is a pops in danger. Instant peril. It's great. Yeah. It's going to be a very, I think this would be one that I think you would absolutely spring the extra money for the, the premium for. Well, but here's the thing. When I looked at the difference between the premium and the pro there, like, Hey, look, the pro has spinners. the only thing that seems to be I guess there's one ball lock mechanism and I don't know if it's I haven't seen a picture of it yet to compare so I don't know if it's kind of like on the Metallica table where you have the hammer that slams down but everything else just seemed to be decorative in terms of what the added price is it has no effect on the actual gameplay or scoring. So that excites me too, where it's like, hey, maybe the pro version was better. That being said, they raised the price on the pro.
    50:34
    Yeah. Well, the pro actually has things like spinners, and it has drop targets as well, which is up until quite recently on Stearns was like, yeah, you get stand-up targets and you'd be thankful for it. You even get those shots to make in the game on pro. But I think with this one, I think the way Keith Ellman designers table was such that they really couldn't remove much stuff off it because it would just change too much of the gameplay. So that's, that's what you get when you have a pinball designer. Oh, sorry. A pinball player designing a pinball table. Yeah. As opposed to a game designer designing a pinball table. And same with Scott Denise's work on, on TNA. Like, that game, there's not much stuff you can strip off it.
    51:28
    Well, and maybe they're also feeling the pressure from Jersey Jack, where the difference between their, you know, I don't know what they call their two models, but gameplay-wise are identical. It just happens to be build quality that's the difference. Yeah, shiny of cyber hails and physical arts and all sorts of stuff. Right, right. And that's the way it should be. Like that is exactly, you look at, like if you hark back to the days of the Addams Family when they did the gold run, like the only thing that was different there, I think, was some changes in the ROM. Yeah, the code was slightly different. There were scoring differences, but it wasn't. The table was identical in mechanical design. Right. So you've got the same gameplay experience, you've just got a slightly different rule experience. So, you know, that's fine. That is the pattern they should be going with with these tables anyhow. I agree.
    52:24
    All right. Well, I think that's all the pinball talk that we have time for. Hey, folks, why don't you go ahead and check out our website. It is blockadepinball.com slash article. No, episodes. Episodes. Almost at it. But you want to check out the articles. Yeah, so blockadepinball.com slash episodes. There you will find all of our past podcasts, as well as my plethora of movie reviews, of which I just dropped three of them this week. I did a review for Pacific Rim Uprising, which if you saw the trailer, you saw the entire movie. I loved that review. Yeah, that really does look like that. I just saw Blockers which was quite funny and essentially if you enjoyed back in the day American Pie it's the sort of thing but with girls trying to get laid instead and what I like about this style of comedy is that they treat the kids with dignity and their choices and they make the parents the idiots that's really good that's actually the right way to go right yeah it is so that was good and then I just saw yesterday A Quiet Place which was every bit what the trailer promised and more so that I've watched the trailer right based on the fact that you did the review oh that does look really good as a thriller Because it's horror and thriller. It's more thriller, isn't it? It's more thriller.
    54:13
    It's that slow burn thriller, too. It takes its time. And the thing is, is that sound is every bit as much a character as the actual people. This is one that you're going to want to go to a movie theater that has the sound system. Quality. It has a good quality sound system. because if you saw the... It's directional as anything. Exactly, exactly. But it's also if you remember the vault scene from Mission Impossible and the absolute utter quiet of that other than the atmospheric noises of that room and you could hear a pin drop in the movie theater during that sequence, right? Well, now amplify that to 90 minutes because there are moments where There are moments where all you're hearing is just like you're in the middle of the forest and just whatever sounds you would hear in the forest because everybody's trying to be absolutely deadly quiet. So that when a noise happens, it's truly jarring. You're truly just cringe and tense up and be like, oh, crap. Here comes the hurt. Here comes the things. Yeah. Oh, man. That sounds so good. I have to go and see this in the movies. I can't not.
    55:33
    Yeah. Kim will never go and see this. This is one that's all on me. There's no way she would even be remotely interested in seeing this. So I need to go and just do it. My son expressed interest and I'm like, that would be really kind of a fun experiment because he... I'm too jaded of a movie goer or even a TV viewer. When I say slow burn, a lot of this is, if you're a regular watcher of The Walking Dead, The Walking Dead is not the least bit scary to you. It makes you cringe and it makes you go, oh man. But you're not being like, oh my god, zombie. And so that's kind of the same. There's that overwhelming sense of dread and everything, but I know how to handle that. I'm not going to be watching through fingers, whereas if I took my boy, who's never experienced anything like that, he very well might be watching through fingers. I probably will be for weeks.
    56:25
    Believe me, it would be a lot more fun for me than it would be for him. Yeah. Yes. Yeah. that being said he's not going to be going anytime soon because yeah folks we're going back to the hospital yes so hopefully we'll be out of the hospital and we'll be able to do another podcast next week yeah hopefully but if not well you guys get to wait another week ration this one out and yeah we'll see you when we see you absolutely and as always once you check out our Twitter feeds the show is at Blockade. Jared is at JaredMorgz, and I am at ShutYourTrap. And if you follow those, then you'll be aware of when our podcasts drop, as well as when tournaments in Xen are posted, as well as whenever we post anything onto the website.
    57:15
    Alright, well, with that, thanks for putting up with the gaps in weeks between podcasts, and thanks for continuing to listen. Yes. Bye-bye. wizard amusement.com the site to visit for custom pinball shooter mods easy to install totally unique mention blockade podcast for 10 off your order wizard amusement.com sales restoration customization don't forget to leave a review on itunes or your favorite podcast hosting service that blockade is delivered to we can't improve unless you tell us how now stop listening and play some pinball you