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Pinball Industry News: April 2018 Re-cap

Pinball News & Pinball Magazine Pincast·podcast_episode·1h 11m·analyzed·May 2, 2018
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claude-haiku-4-5-20251001 · $0.032

TL;DR

Heighway Pinball liquidated; Thunderbirds in production; Iron Maiden LE revealed

Summary

A Pinball News podcast recap of April 2018 industry developments, focusing on Heighway Pinball's liquidation after Andrew Highway's departure, Homepin's Thunderbirds Are Go entering production, and Stern's Iron Maiden Limited Edition reveal. The episode discusses creditor hierarchies in liquidation, asset transfers to Pinball Brothers, and planned exclusive interviews with Andrew Highway addressing community accusations.

Key Claims

  • Heighway Pinball is undergoing voluntary liquidation after investor group took over from Andrew Highway in June 2017

    high confidence · Martin explains the liquidation process and timeline of ownership changes

  • Assets and completed machines from Heighway have been shipped to Sweden where two of the four investors are located

    high confidence · Martin states 'all the stock and all the completed machines have been shipped out of the company and moved to...Sweden'

  • Pinball Brothers was established by the same directors/investors of Heighway and has shifted purchasing, sales, and potentially game licenses away from Heighway

    high confidence · Martin describes the corporate structure shift and asset movement to Pinball Brothers

  • Most liquidation creditors will receive nothing because Heighway's remaining factory assets are minimal and unlikely to cover liquidator fees

    high confidence · Martin explains the asset situation: 'the actual value of what's left inside that factory is pretty minimal and is unlikely to cover the fees of the liquidator'

  • The Alien license expired at the end of 2017 with a 90-day sell-off period, forcing remaining stock to be sold as demo/secondhand rather than new

    medium confidence · Jonathan mentions hearing rumors about this licensing constraint but notes 'I have no confirmation of any of that'

  • Thunderbirds Are Go was announced at least four years prior and took an extended development cycle before entering production at Homepin

    high confidence · Discussion of the game's long development history and announcement before the TV series aired

  • Stern showcased Batman, Star Wars, and Aerosmith at a China AAA trade show while Gary Stern and Dave Peterson were present

    high confidence · Martin describes the trade show presence and game selection

  • Cassandra Peterson confirmed she was one week away from voice recording sessions for her Elvira pinball game at the time of a comic-con appearance

Notable Quotes

  • “they have decided that they are going to liquidate the company which means basically that any of the assets that remain in the company will be sold off and the funds used to reimburse those people who are owed money by the company”

    Martin @ ~7:00 — Clear explanation of liquidation mechanics and creditor repayment hierarchy

  • “all the stock and all the completed machines have been shipped out of the company and moved to...Sweden”

    Martin @ ~12:00 — Reveals asset removal strategy during liquidation process

  • “I need to be able to have editorial control over what we publish. So I said, okay, well, all we can do then is we can do a written version”

    Martin @ ~23:00 — Documents the negotiation over Andrew Highway interview format and editorial independence

  • “the whole artwork package and the fact that we're back to a proper back glass that's really cool to see rather than just having a regular trans light which has become something of a cut down version, looks like Stern are actually putting some serious money into this”

    Jonathan @ ~48:00 — Indicates Stern responding to feedback about LE differentiation and quality

  • “he turned it into a great game. I absolutely agree, yes. It was almost, you know, it was a great game waiting for an accessible theme, I suppose.”

    Jonathan @ ~55:00 — Validates Keith Elwin's design work and theme selection for Iron Maiden

  • “the two upper flippers are positioned in such a way that you have a sort of a loop within a loop, if that makes sense. But once you have a multiple going and you get balls in front of those flippers at the top, if you see how you can shoot two balls at the same time going in opposite directions and then crossing, it's just simply beautiful.”

    Martin @ ~58:00 — Technical appreciation for innovative playfield layout mechanics in Archer/Iron Maiden design

Entities

Andrew HighwaypersonHeighway PinballcompanyPinball BrotherscompanyJonathan HoustonpersonMartinpersonDave SanderspersonHomepincompanyMike Kalinowski

Signals

  • ?

    business_signal: Heighway Pinball voluntary liquidation after investor group takeover; asset transfer to Pinball Brothers in Sweden

    high · Clear timeline: Andrew Highway departed June 2017, investor group took over, now liquidating April 2018. Assets moved to Sweden location of two investors.

  • ?

    community_signal: Andrew Highway's post-departure statement received 250+ downvotes on Pinside; community blames him for Heighway's failures despite investor group takeover

    high · Martin notes Highway's statement was 'the most downvoted post ever on Pinside with over 250 downvotes already' and discusses why he's receiving blame

  • ?

    design_philosophy: Keith Elwin's Archer layout praised for innovative four-flipper design with crossing ball mechanics and loop-within-loop structure

    high · Martin describes 'two upper flippers are positioned in such a way that you have a sort of a loop within a loop' enabling 'two balls at the same time going in opposite directions and then crossing'

  • ?

    licensing_signal: Alien license expired end of 2017 with 90-day sell-off period; completed stock being sold as demo/secondhand to circumvent licensing restrictions

    medium · Jonathan reports hearing rumors: 'the Alien license expired at the end of the year...there was only kind of like a 90-day sell-off period' but acknowledges 'I have no confirmation of any of that'

  • $

    market_signal: Stern expanding China market presence; challenging local market awareness of Western IP themes

    high · Gary Stern and Dave Peterson showed Batman, Star Wars, Aerosmith at China AAA trade show; Jonathan notes 'apparently those are themes that nobody knows in China'

Transcript

groq_whisper · $0.214

0:00
highway pinball is liquidated thunderbirds are go is in production iron maiden limited edition revealed hi and welcome to uh this month's summary or last month's summary uh by pinball news and pinball magazine my name is jonathan houston and martin from pinball news welcome martin Thank you Jonathan, it's good to be back Right, so in case people missed it we had a sort of in-between podcast earlier this month in which we had an interview with Jersey Jack Guarnieri so straight off the top we're not going to cover Pirates of the Caribbean and that whole situation which sort of seems to be resolving right now. I think most people are accepting the fact that there are discs removed, but in the end this will still be a great game. But for all the details on that, please listen to podcast number two, because there we have Jack Guarnieri himself explaining the whole situation. Yes, we were fortunate enough, all three of us, to be at the Flip Expo show in France a couple of weeks back, and we took the opportunity to have a chat with Jack and to get the word from the horse's mouth. And Jack was very kind to do that interview with us in somewhat trying circumstances around the back of the hall in a lovely weekend, though, at the Treport in Normandy. And, yeah, I think we got a good result out of that, and hopefully those who listened to it will agree with that. So thanks to Jack for that. And that kind of covers the Jersey Jack situation at the moment. I don't think there's any particular news from Jersey Jack that we're going to be reporting on this particular podcast. Is there, Jonathan? No, I don't think there was any news after that. Okay, so that was all very good.
2:07
So moving on to this podcast's headlines, and I guess the first one of those that we probably want to look at is the situation with Highway Pinball, Right. A UK-based company, so that probably automatically means it's something which I'm going to talk about. I was going to say so. Yeah.
2:29
Now, it's been a tortuous time for the company over the past few weeks. About, I guess about three weeks ago, the staff were informed that the company was going to be shut down and they were all going to lose their jobs, which is obviously not a very nice situation for anybody involved the company closed it's worth actually going back a little bit and looking at who the company now is because Andrew Highway who obviously ran the company for the best part of six years six plus years actually and after whom it's named left in June last year so he hasn't actually been running the company since then in the past nine months it's been looked after by a group of investors who took over from andrew in june of 2017 and at this point they have decided that they are going to liquidate the company which means basically that any of the assets that remain in the company will be sold off and the funds used to reimburse those people who are owed money by the company now that's different from sort of shutting it down and i think this is a voluntary liquidation it's not enforced i don't think any creditors have actually pushed for the company to be liquidated the the directors in charge of the company have decided to go down the liquidation route, which means that the company shuts any asset, any equipment, any parts, anything that could be sold is sold, and the money is then used to repay people who are owed money in a very strict order, and there are preferred creditors and there are unpreferred creditors. I was about to ask, because obviously there's people who have prepaid for either a full throttle or an alien game, but there's also the investors who are apparently, I assume, entitled to something because they put money in as well. Well, they actually are relatively low down on the list of people who get their money back.

high confidence · Jonathan reports 'she was...a week away from doing the voice call recordings for the game'

person
Keith Elwinperson
Jeremy Packerperson
Cassandra Petersonperson
Jersey Jack Pinballcompany
Stern Pinballcompany
Gary Sternperson
Iron Maidengame
Thunderbirds Are Gogame
Aliengame
Elviragame
UK Pinfestevent
Pinball Expoevent
  • ?

    personnel_signal: Stern had not assigned software programmer to Elvira game as of Texas show (early 2018); game in dormant state despite hardware/artwork progress

    high · Jonathan references George Gomez statement at Texas show: 'they were definitely going to be doing it, but they hadn't assigned a software programmer to the game yet'

  • ?

    announcement: Cassandra Peterson confirms Elvira voice recording underway, scheduled late 2018 or early 2019

    high · Jonathan reports Cassandra Peterson 'confirmed...at a comic-con type of thing that the game is uh her pinball game is happening and...a week away from doing the voice call recordings'

  • ?

    product_strategy: Thunderbirds Are Go announced 4+ years prior to production entry; extended development cycle

    high · Jonathan states 'the game was announced like four years ago at least' and announced before TV series aired; now finally in production at Homepin

  • ?

    product_concern: Stern investing in LE differentiation: upgraded JBL speakers, proper backglass instead of trans light, exclusive red trim, additional playfield shots

    high · Jonathan notes 'Stern are actually putting some serious money into this now and making the LE version really worthwhile having' with 'upgraded speakers, the JBL speakers in the back box for the limited edition'

  • ~

    sentiment_shift: Community feedback on premium tier quality appears to have influenced Stern's investment in LE differentiation

    medium · Jonathan observes 'it appears that Stern is sort of listening to feedback because in previous occasions where it looked like they were cheapening out on games people were vocal about that and apparently they paid attention'

    • 4:49
    First and foremost is the tax authority, which is, in this case, Her Majesty's Revenue and Customs. So if they are owed any tax money, they have first call on anything. but before that let's go and look at what those assets actually are because there's been some movement in that shall we say let's not um prejudge it but it seems that from the point when andrew left highway pinball another company was established called pinball brothers right and And the directors of that were the directors of Highway Pinball, the same directors. And since Andrew left – sorry, carry on. But you were also basically the four main investors in the company, if I'm not mistaken. That's correct, yeah. Yes, they were the ones who put the money in originally to keep the company going.
    5:50
    But they are also the directors of this company called Pinball Brothers. and Pinball Brothers seems, and this is just how it looks, seems they have shifted all the purchasing of parts and the sales and machines through this Pinball Brothers company rather than Highway Pinball.
    6:13
    And probably it also looks as though they've moved the license for future games to Pinball Brothers as well. Right, right. Which means if Highway Pinball is liquidated, it doesn't actually kind of have any assets anymore because everything is now owed to Pinball Brothers. And over the past few weeks, from what I've been told, all the stock and all the completed machines have been shipped out of the company and moved to, I think, Sweden. Right, right. Which is where two of the four investors are located, if I'm not mistaken. That's right. so what is left in the company now to be liquidated well not all in fact very little as i understand of the major equipment in the factory was owned by highway pinball some of it was leased some of it was was rented from from other individuals what about all those machines that andrew bought well there's a number of them um things like the cnc router for instance i understand i've been told was not owned by the company it was actually owned by somebody else and they were able to go in there and recover that before the doors were closed on the factory um the printer i believe was was bought on a finance deal so strictly speaking it belongs to the finance company um and other bits of equipment well they were bought um in various way some of them were bought from sort of business auctions where other companies that have failed or
    7:53
    where the equipment's been recovered from another company after others they've not paid you know they've sold off relatively cheaply so i think the actual value of what's left inside that factory is pretty minimal and is unlikely to cover the fees of the liquidator right so In essence, I think the result from that is that anybody who's owed any money from highway pinball isn't going to get anything out of it. Right. But then since games were moved to Sweden, apparently, then the question is, what's going to happen with these games?
    8:32
    Yes, I guess we're talking about alien games at this point. That's a good question. And I've heard various rumors about that. I've heard that games are being offered to people for sale.
    8:46
    I've also heard that because supposedly the Alien license expired at the end of the year, end of last year, and there was only kind of like a 90-day sell-off period where you can get rid of existing stock, but you can't make any new or sell any new stock, that these games are not being sold as new. They're being sold as demo games. Or second hand or whatever. Yeah, they're effectively new in box, but they're not brand new under the terms of the license with Fox for selling of alien games. That's what I've heard. I have no confirmation of any of that. But it certainly seems like a bit of a murky situation and what's going on there.
    9:35
    I'm sorry to carry on with future licenses, but do you want to talk about Alien a little more? Well, I figured, actually what I was about to say ties in with what you're saying very well. Apparently they are looking into continuing with the Queen license that they have, because apparently that was not available for Deep Root Pimble, who inquired about that.
    10:02
    So that makes me wonder, well, since they are already making Alien games, and they already got an extension once, they might as well get a new extension.
    10:11
    yeah although I guess it would be in the name of a different company this time if Highway Pinball doesn't exist so maybe it's not that simple but maybe they think that Alien has enough issues with it that it's not worth pursuing that any further and they're better off starting with a new license and a new game and they think we'll maybe have a wider appeal but I don't know that's a guess on my part But I guess also the important news is that Pinball News has an exclusive interview with Andrew Highway. Right, and I have to, let me jump in here. No, no, please do. Because since Andrew was no longer involved, it's actually quite odd that he basically stuck up his head and interfered and came with a statement which turns out to be the most downvoted post ever on Pinside with over 250 downvotes already.
    11:18
    But one could wonder, why would he say anything? I mean, he left the ship. Why go back to it? Well, I think the reason is because he's getting a lot of the blame for the situation and probably rightfully so because what he what he left yeah i think i think that's true and he'll stick his hand up and and and admit to his failings in various areas in the interview well no well you have to read it and find out exactly what it is he says um but um there's also an awful lot of stuff that's coming out and he's getting the blame for you know for what happened with people who pre-ordered games. And he believed, he says, that as part of the takeover by the investor group, that all those pre-orders and part payments were going to be either fully fulfilled or refunded as required. As people ask for refunds, they get refunds. If people wanted machines, they'd get machines. Right. So everybody asked for a refund. Well, no, not everybody asks for a refund, believe it or not. No, because a lot of people read the post by the investor group on Pinside when they took over, saying we are going to, you know, we're going to fulfill all the orders, we're going to go ahead with this game, those people want refunds, they get refunds. But, you know, Alien is a really nice game. So those people who bought it early got it or would have got it for a very reasonable price. Some people did. Right. and part of that initial pitch by the investor group was, oh, by the way, we're putting up the price of Alien. So if you get out now and want to get back in, it's going to cost you a lot more money. So there was an incentive to not get out. So those people who had prepaid, either in part or in full, were encouraged to stay in and get their orders. Now, in a number of cases, they never got either. They didn't get their money back and they didn't get their game. so you know is that Andrew's fault no that's not Andrew's fault but um you can you have to look at the company that Andrew left when he left it and the state it was in and up to that point it's Andrew's fault and then the I get the feeling that the uh and this is just a feeling but the investor groups basically were left with a crippled company trying to make it work, and in the end, it didn't. So then you can wonder, is that the fault of the new investors or the investor group, or is that the fault of the person who ran the company into the ground in the first place? Well, absolutely. That is one of the key questions I've asked Andrea as part of this interview, and he's got a very comprehensive answer to that, which I don't want to go into now, because he can He can say in his own words exactly what the situation was at the time he left and what the promises made by the investors were, I should say. So wait for the interview, which probably by the time you hear this, it will probably be on the Pinball News site. At the moment, I'm still working on it. I've got a few more answers to questions to put in there and make it into a fully rounded package. but it will hopefully be on the website by the next 24 hours and probably by the time you hear this podcast so speaking of that interview you announced that you were going to interview Andrew Highway on Pinsight which I find very brave not everybody was happy with that and a lot of people came up with really well not that interesting questions but on the other hand your intent was to do like a skype call record that and put that verbatim online and and we'll refuse to do that um it's yes well first of all i went to pin's eye because that's where a large amount of the the accusations and um the claims about what happened is the company were taking place so i thought well if anybody's got any questions about what happens, that's the place to ask them. Totally aware that, you know, you're walking into the lion's den, it's liable to get your head bitten off, but what the heck? What's to lose? You know, that was actually my first ever post on Pinside, so I thought I'd give it a go, all or nothing. And, yeah, okay, I will get criticised straight away for even attempting to do this, but, you know, what the heck? I've done interviews with Kevin Kulik in the past about the whole Prelator situation. I'm not afraid of asking difficult questions. A lot of people assume they're all going to be softball questions because Andrew's, they say, Andrew's a big friend of yours. You're big buddies together. And, yeah, I don't deny that Andrew and I have a good friendship or have had a good friendship over the years.
    16:24
    We've got along well together. We shared hotel rooms at pinball shows. he's always paid me back every penny that he's owed me so I've no beef with him so yeah some people read into that that I'm going to give him a softball interview well you will see that I'm asking the hard questions and getting some difficult answers and Andrew's admitting to a significant number of failings on his part as well but yeah so I went to Pinside to do that the original intention as you say was to do a Skype interview and that's how I would have preferred to do it because I like these things you're hearing people talking in their own voice without having pre-prepared questions, pre-prepared answers you ask them a question you get their instant reaction to it it's not something they've had a chance to think about too much in depth sometimes they'll be able to guess people will be able to guess what kind of questions you're going to ask but to be able to hear the intonation in people's voices is important, I think. So that's what I wanted to capture as part of that. But Andrew was afraid that in addressing some of the questions and actions of other people he might lead himself into a situation where he caused legal problems he might libel or slander himself in saying something which maybe it true maybe it his interpretation maybe it's something that is his understanding but he has no means of backing it up if it ever went to court. So he didn't want to do that. what he asked for was that I give him the questions in advance so he could work out what he was going to say to make sure that didn't happen now I'm not happy about doing that I want people to answer questions as they're given to them so they, I ask a question they think about it and they give a reply not they spend an hour working out what they're going to say and I don't want to go into an interview with a person who knows exactly what all the questions are going to be in advance so I said no, I'm not doing that I said what I will do is we'll record it and if there's anything in there which you think is libelous or slanderous we'll either beef it or take that bit out but the rest of it needs to be verbatim and then he said well I want to have final editorial control over this and if it's if I'm not happy with the way it's gone I don't want it to go out I said okay well that's in that case we're not doing it That's a red line I can't cross.
    19:13
    I need to be able to have editorial control over what we publish. So I said, okay, well, all we can do then is we can do a written version, which you could argue very easily that, well, you're giving him the questions in advance, and he's giving you the answers, which is true. Right, so I don't have to say that anymore. No, exactly. No, that's fair. But it's not an audio interview. It's not a fake interview, which it would be. If I gave him all the questions in advance, it would be a fake interview because he'd know what I'm going to ask. At least this way, everybody knows I've given him the questions in advance and his response is, I don't like doing it that way because it doesn't give me much of an opportunity to dive in in the middle of a question or a middle of an answer if he's saying something. And I go, well, hang on, what about, or, but you said, and then, no, interrupt him and put him back on points. But I can do that to an extent retrospectively. He gives a reply and I can go back to him via email and say, you said this, but what about that? And he can give me a reply to that by email. It's a lot more stilted. It's not so free-flowing, but I think it's important that this interview is done. And if that's the way that we do it, that's the way we do it. Right. Okay. Well, I guess thanks on behalf of all the people waiting to hear from Andrew for doing this interview.
    20:38
    And it will be available on pinballnews.com probably by the time this podcast is available. Yes, hopefully. Yes. Right. There's one last thing in the whole highway pinball matter that I would like to briefly mention. um andrew or andrew highway pinballs a main designer dave sanders apparently had a very bad deal with the company and um sean harvey was kind enough to start a go fund me campaign uh online where people can basically donate money to the dave sanders fund so that he at least gets a little bit of compensation uh because he wasn't really in a very good uh situation if i if you read the uh the stories online absolutely yeah if people want to uh uh donate whatever uh ten dollars or fifteen dollars twenty fifty one hundred whatever go to www.gofundme.com slash dave-sanders-fund and there they can donate and hopefully make the situation a little bit more pleasant for Dave Sanders.
    21:59
    Yes, I think that's absolutely a good situation. The situation Dave finds himself in is a difficult one and it's, I don't want to pre-empt the interview too much, but it is certainly addressed in that interview.
    22:19
    And I won't say any more. I'll just say, read the interview, you'll see it's maybe not as clear-cut as you might think it is. Right.
    22:33
    But the end result is that Dave is in a bad situation, and I'm sure any contributions anybody can make will be gratefully received. Right. So please go to that page if you want to sympathize with Dave Sanders. I think that's the best way to put it. Yeah. So then, in other news.
    22:58
    Yes, so Thunderbirds. Thunderbirds are go, to give it its full title, or tag for the short. Right. being made by Home Pin, which is an Australian company, but they actually have a factory in China. They do, and they've been making a lot of other games, mostly video games, I think. They've been doing some Hankin games, and Thunderbirds Ago is their first production pinball game. Right. They also have been doing a lot of reproduction parts of PCB boards for certain games or boards that are not easily available or like Italian Zaccaria boards, that kind of stuff, I think, if I'm not mistaken. But, okay, so they are no stranger to pinball, let's put it like that. Absolutely, and they were showing their Thunderbirds Argo game at a trade show in China, is that correct? Yes, it was the AAA trade show.
    24:05
    I saw photos of their booth, which was actually a very tiny booth, but at least there was a lot of interest.
    24:15
    Stern was also present at the same show, in person by Gary Stern and Dave Peterson, with three games.
    24:25
    From the top of my head I say, Batman, Star Wars and Aerosmith were at the show which is interesting because apparently those are themes that nobody knows in China yes it's a surprise but I guess probably all recent Stern games are probably titles that nobody in China knows either right so I can see why Stern is trying but you might want to consider re-theming a current design and make it more interesting for the Chinese market if that's the market that you want to get into. But obviously there's a price tag attached to that as well.
    25:10
    Yes, a price tag and new assets. It's quite a large job really, I'm sure, to completely re-theme a game and to get all the necessary sound clips and video clips, because obviously with a large-scale LCD game, you can't just simply reuse existing assets on the display now. You have to use a complete custom display and clips. But we're supposed to be talking about Thunderbirds, Argo, and while we give all credit for Stern for trying to break into China, So let's talk Thunderbirds Are Go being in production. And it took a long time. I think the game was announced like four years ago at least, if I'm not mistaken. Yeah, I think so at least, yes. And I think it was announced before the actual Thunderbirds Are Go TV series was aired. But since then it's been aired and it's probably its second or third even season by now. And so it's, you know, I'm not sure exactly how hot a license Thunderbirds are go is. Certainly it varies considerably by region. It was never a really big license in the intended market, which was the US.
    26:39
    It did very, very well in Australia and New Zealand and in the UK. but I think even Homepin themselves, Mike, would accept that the US is probably not the primary market for that game. Right, now he said that on multiple occasions and I think he's even well he's currently busy fulfilling pre-orders that are going to ship to Australia and New Zealand I suppose what I understood was that there was a request to have one of the games one of the Thunderbird games at Pinball Expo and apparently there's no time to get a game ready that's not already spoken for to go to Expo so that's unlikely to happen unless somebody in the US like a distributor has a game and brings that to the show that might that could happen. That's interesting because Thunderbirds will be at UK Pinfest in August the UK presumably being a larger market or a larger expected market than the US so games are going to shows but not Pinball Expo I know a little bit about the background of why that game is going to be there apparently that game is going to be to the is going to the licensor but before heading or sending it to the licensor as their game of proof I suppose you could call it will be at the show You would have thought the licensor would have got one before they actually went into production, wouldn't you? Well, I think they got the gaming parts ahead, so they could approve all the parts up front, but now they get one completed and assembled. Right, okay. Well, if you want to play the game, I don't know what other shows it's going to be at, but UK Pinfest is at the Daventry Mercure in August, I think. I believe. I need to get my room booked for that one.
    28:48
    So do I. Yeah. But, so, well, it's interesting, and what I understood is that Mike Kalinowski, the owner of Homepin, is going to be present at that show as well. So that could be fun.
    29:05
    I think it's going to be a good show. It's a return of a national UK show, which is on August 25th and 26th, at the Mercure Hotel in Daventry. And, yeah, we'll certainly be there. And it should be a fun weekend. We didn't have a UK show last year. And with there not being a Belgian Open this year, the UK show could fill a little bit of that gap. Right, okay. I guess that's for now that's all there is to say about Thunderbirds Are Go being in production yes I think so let's move on to our third headline which was the recent reveal of the limited edition version of Stern's Iron Maiden game so what's your take on that Jonathan actually I didn't look into it that much in the sense that all the limited edition games were already spoken for. And to me, it was sort of like, it was basically an announcement to all the distributors that ordered games like, this is what you ordered.
    30:22
    Yeah, true. And showing the art package for those buyers who signed up for the game, which is a different art package to that previously shown on the Pro version.
    30:36
    Personally, I think it looks beautiful. I think you've done a really good job on it. No argument on the artwork. I mean, Jeremy Packer, Zombie Eddie, the artist on the game, did a tremendous job, at least from not being an Iron Maiden fan, from what I can see. It will be interesting to see how actual Iron Maiden fans respond to it, because the artwork of Iron Maiden has always been one of the unique selling points, I'd say, of the group and the way they present themselves. So that will be interesting. But from a pinball enthusiast perspective, I'd say the game looks absolutely gorgeous, although I really have nothing with Iron Maiden whatsoever.
    31:23
    Yeah, I take your point. I do like their music, and it's part of my regular playlist of music when I'm traveling to and from work. but I'm not a fan in the sense that I haven't followed their progress and the band line-up changes and the various albums they produce over the years other than the obvious ones. So looking at this particular game, I think they've done a really wonderful, generally done a wonderful job with the artwork. There's some nice features there that are early exclusive. the whole artwork package and the fact that we're back to a proper back glass that's really cool to see rather than just having a regular trans light which has become something of a cut down version, looks like Stern are actually putting some serious money into this now and making the LE version really worthwhile having, not to say the premium is not going to be good as well because the playfields are going to be the same but But the whole package that's put together with the upgraded speakers, the JBL speakers in the back box for the limited edition, exclusive, the red trim on the side armor, really matches the rest of the game. So I think they've done a good job with that. And some additional shots on the playfield as well. And you have to give absolute kudos to designer Keith Elwin. I mean, his archer layout, which eventually turned out to be used on this game,
    33:01
    as a wife, it was already incredible fun to flip. And he turned it into a great game. I absolutely agree, yes. It was almost, you know, it was a great game waiting for an accessible theme, I suppose. I mean, Archer was fun, was great fun to play, but how many people actually knew what Archer was internationally? You know, outside the US, I don't think it really got much of an airing. That is an interesting point, because I had never heard of Archer, but I found it easier to get into than say any given superhero Marvel theme because with the Marvel themes well you need to know sort of like who is who and who has which powers or whatever all those kind of and I'm completely not into any of those superhero type of movies so I have no clue who Captain America is for example and with those games I'm just flipping it and I'm like I have no clue what I'm doing when I was playing the Archer Whitewood I could instantly see like we got a great layout here it's very innovative we got four flippers and what I love about that the two upper flippers are positioned in such a way that you have a sort of a loop within a loop, if that makes sense. But once you have a multiple going and you get balls in front of those flippers at the top, if you see how you can shoot two balls at the same time going in opposite directions and then crossing, it's just simply beautiful. That's the only way. Yeah, it is. And so that's very innovative, I'd say, from Keith Elwin. And as far as the theme, I was not familiar with Archer whatsoever, but for some reason it was easier for me to get into that, and I got the sort of black humor that the show contains. So for me it was easier to get into than, like I said, the superhero themes. Oh yeah I understand that yes I mean I didn know Archer at all either but yeah you can get the jokes straight away in the funny one from Archer But Iron Maiden I think is a good fit It seems to work well It nice to see the return of the Shaker motor as well on the LE It seems like the anti-reflective glass, it looks like they're not cheaping out on the higher end models anymore and reproducing something which is worthy of an LE title. Right, so it appears that Stern is sort of listening to feedback because in previous occasions where it looked like they were cheapening out on games people were vocal about that and apparently they paid attention. Yeah they're either listening to feedback or they're looking at what their competitors are doing, were their top end games and looking to try and match will beat that right so um and while we're on the topic of stern pinball um cassandra peterson elvira um sort of confirmed to a group of pinsiders that were at a some sort of comic-con type of thing where she also was that the game is uh her pinball game is happening and In fact, she was, at the time of that interview, a week away from doing the voice call recordings for the game. Yes, at the Texas show, George Gomez said that they were definitely going to be doing it, but they hadn't assigned a software programmer to the game yet, so it was kind of in a sort of dormant state. So it's good to hear from that that steps are being taken to move the game forward the recording of quotes from Cassandra. Right. And apparently the artwork is gorgeous. She obviously has seen that because she has to approve it. And the game is scheduled, according to her, either for late 2018 or early 2019. My pick would be early 2019. Yeah, it sounds like we've got enough games coming out at the end of 2018 with potentially a Kapow game or two even, being released around about Expo time. So yes, 2019 would be a good fit for Stern. And it gives them plenty of time to get the code to up to a decent level of code before releasing the game. And talking of code, I understand that American Pinball have also been bringing out an updated code version for the Houdini title. Right. Stern also published, I think, a code update for, from the top of my head, I'm saying Batman and Guardians of the Galaxy. Yeah, certainly Guardians of the Galaxy. I think Batman 2, but it's not yet version 1, I don't think, for Batman. That's still to come. It's not the final release version, if you want, but obviously it's been out a while now, so it's been released. but it's not everything that George and Lyman and everybody wants it to be just yet but it's on the way and in conclusion before wrapping over or going over to American Pinball Stern Pinball also apparently have made special Iron Maiden coasters which were shown on their Facebook so it will be interesting to see where these will show up and what they will do with them but I love to see this kind of creative marketing. Well, it takes us back to the old Williams days. They used to produce coasters from the cutouts from the speaker panels. I don't know where they actually come from, whether they're actually dedicated products that they're producing. You would think it would probably need to be licensed separately if Stern was selling them. But coasters... Sorry, carry on. The approval for those coasters was apparently... not a big deal. It was done like on the first go, yes, go ahead. Excellent. Okay. It must be good if Biden-Baden's licensing company is happy with them straight away. Right. So the interesting thing will be, will these be like coasters like what you mentioned, the previous speaker cutouts that we used to know from the Williams days or are they actual coasters that you have on bars? you know, like the cardboard paper ones. What's the material? I'm not sure how to call that. Well, I think you're right. It's just cardboard in most cases. But I doubt there'll be that. I think there'll probably be either at least plastic or felt-back plastic, so they're a little higher quality than just, you know, regular cutouts from the sheet of butyrate that they make the rest of the game out of. Well, even if they are cardboard, I think it would be it's an interesting way to promote your game and it makes them also kind of collectible because they are disposable True and of course there are iron maiden beers out there, which would be a perfect match for that There's trooper and there's another one which I can't quite remember the name of but trooper both grew by Robinson beer in the UK and It's a lovely beer. I recommend anybody who's into into their ales to try trooper as a beer and I'm sure their follow-up beer is also very good. So getting these coasters would be an ideal match for that. Right. So now you were already discussing American Pinball, a code update for Houdini. Yeah, absolutely.
    41:15
    That's about all the news I got from American Pinball for this month. Yeah, I don't think there's anything, they don't seem to be close to announcing their second game at this point. Well, we know what it's going to be, but... Yeah.
    41:32
    Well, remind us. Well, I think at the Texas Pinball Festival, Joe Bolzer confirmed that they are going for Oktoberfest. Yeah, which I think everybody thought was a bit of a strange title and is one which Python had been pitching for a long time over at Williams. That's right, isn't it? Yes, and Joe as well to Gary Stern back in the day when he was still working for Stern. so it's definitely a theme that he seems to believe in interesting though isn't it because it's certainly going to I don't know maybe narrow the market at who would be interested in it, it's obviously not a license I mean they did really well with Houdini and it's a license, it's not a license it could be a good thing that it's not a license because that will allow them to put in a lot more humor if they want to like in the old days of uh belly williams i'd say true but um need to see some kind of evidence that they're up to doing humorous games if that's the way they want to go with it right so it will also be interesting to see where they are going to sell them because obviously they do have um i assume they have distribution for example for uh germany which in this case would be a key territory, but from the way I understand it, Germany is no longer a key territory like it was in the 80s and the 90s. Well, I don't know. If you look at the scale of the operation from Pinball Universe, for instance, that would indicate they're a massive target, because they have multiple warehouses across the country, They're distributors for JDP now, as well as Stern, and you look in their warehouses, they've got dozens and dozens of Stern games on the shelves, which they, if you ask them, how come you have this much stock, they say, because we sell this much stock. Oh, I absolutely agree, but they sell mostly to collectors. Back in the day, in the 80s, all these belly games that were going into Germany, they were even making belly games in Germany because it was cheaper instead of shipping them just to manufacture them in Germany. But those games were all going on location, and those days are sort of gone. That's what I'm trying to say. So the huge operators market that Germany once was is no longer there. That's true, although Germany is a market in flux. It always is because laws keep changing in that country as to what's allowed as far as slot machines go.
    44:21
    So for a while they were – in fact, I think they still are. They cancelled their annual trade show, the IMA show, because of all the changes in legislation. Nobody quite knew what they were allowed to sell and what they weren't allowed to sell anymore.
    44:35
    I think pinball has been a constant through all that. It's always been legal and it's always been available.
    44:43
    So every downturn in gaming or gambling machines has always been an opportunity for pinball to make inroads on that market. Right, but let's see how they do, what they come out with eventually.
    44:59
    But for now, as far as American Pimble goes, I guess this is all the news there is this month. But it's good to see that they are still updating Houdini, and I assume that they are still building games and sending them out. Obviously, we don't get daily updates on that, but neither do other companies. so nothing odd going on there as far as I can see and if Oktoberfest is going to be their second game then I assume that Joe Balser is currently working on the design of that and we just have to wait and see when they are ready to show something well you would hope it would be ready in time for October wouldn't you?
    45:44
    yes but given the especially after the current highway pinball situation American pinball probably will have to try to get to a situation where when they start showing the game that they also have games ready to immediately ship I think one of the I think Jack mentioned it already in the podcast that we did the interview that we did two weeks ago, that the days of showing a game and then going into production months and months later, those are over. Now you have to be in production, show the game and have games ready to sell when you start promoting them, so to speak. Yeah, I think that's true. Well, Stern have always done that, pretty much. That's something that Chicago Gaming were very big on, to be able to sell games the moment they release or announce their next title. That's why they say they weren't showing their latest title in Texas, because they weren't ready to actually sell it yet. Right, and they didn't show it at the Midwest Gaming Classic either. But it's a nice bridge, actually, if you don't mind. No, no, go for it. Then, speaking of Chicago Gaming, no news regarding the third remake title has been announced, as far as I know. But what is interesting, and it could just be another teaser, I would say, for which DocScore said they love doing these. the Northwest Pinball and Arcade show posted I think it was either on their website or social media platform whatever they do have a raffle going on or something there is something going on that people can win a pinball machine and it was announced that would be a new in box Monster Bash remake it was only there for like a few seconds they took it down and then they replaced it with a brand new in box pinball machine but someone caught it and put it on pin side so take from that what you want Monster Bash obviously has been rumored to be probably the most anticipated or at least the title most people are expecting it to be yes I think that's right to be honest looking forward now with the Northwest Pinball show being in June so we're looking at that next month the only other show between now and then would a major show it's probably worth saying but the next major show and US show is going to be the Golden State Pinball Festival. Well, and they're in Salontown, isn't that this weekend?
    49:03
    But it's not there. At the time we were recording this, we know that nothing's there. Right. That show from Chicago Gaming. Right. So we're looking at mid-May into early June. If they were going to announce something, maybe early June at the Northwest Pinball and Arcade Show in Tacoma would be a good point at which to do it. otherwise great show to go to by the way I highly recommend it absolutely I should be there myself but also worth pointing out that that same weekend there are two other shows taking place there's the Rocky Mountain Pinball Showdown which is also a wonderful show and the Southern Pride Gaming Expo another wonderful event down in Atlanta so unfortunately all three on the same weekend this year I'm told there won't be all on the same weekend next year so a little more choice there but yeah I would recommend going to one of those so bless you thank you there's me diving for the button to mute my microphone and obviously missed it right that's ok so spooky pinball yes what do you want to talk about with spooky this time I guess there's not much news other than that they are very busy showing both Total Nuclear Annihilation and Alice Cooper's Nightmare Castle at pinball shows.
    50:39
    Scott D'Anesi did release a code update for Total Nuclear Annihilation. and personally I'm curious to see at what point in time they will start taking Alice Cooper's game into production, but I have no news on that.
    51:00
    No, it's quite a nice situation to be in though, isn't it? Having more pre-orders than they are able to fulfill at the current time. They've got a good sort of production line is capable for the next few months without any issues at all. Well, they have like 800 games to make. So, yeah. And from what I understood from the Spooky Pinball podcast, they have their podcast of their own. Visit their website and check those out as well. it looks like sales of Total Nuclear Annihilation and Alice Cooper are currently sort of tied so I guess Alice Cooper is in the 400s as well as Total Nuclear Annihilation but as Alice Cooper is limited to 500 the expectation is that since Total Nuclear Annihilation keeps selling and selling and selling that's likely to be their best-selling game in the end because Alice Cooper's run is limited.
    52:05
    Yeah, that's right. Once it goes over 500, then it automatically gains that slot for the next year, probably, until they sell 500 of whatever comes after Alice Cooper. Right.
    52:19
    And then there is... That's sort of the last topic on my list, and I have to be very careful with this. Dutch Pinball.
    52:29
    There is a rumor, and I can't precisely pinpoint where it's coming from, but there's a rumor that there is apparently either new investors or new money pumped into the company.
    52:44
    Right. Do we know what's actually stopping Zytec from making Big Lebowski's? Is it simply that they haven't got them? No, Dutch people don't have the money to pay for them at the moment? I have no idea whether they are stopped right now. As far as I know, they are in the process of ordering parts and importing them into China. And that might be something that you have to be really good with the Chinese import system because it's very difficult to import parts into China.
    53:18
    But they done that for other manufacturers as well So they didn expect any issues there I don want to assume that there any issues there other than it taking them a little longer to get production started So aside from that, the rumor about new money being available or whatever you want to call it, new investors, I tried to contact Dutch Pinball. I texted with Jaap and basically his answer was we don't comment on any rumors.
    53:55
    Right, so they've got nothing to announce officially then at this point. Right, so I don't know whether it's true. I can just call it a rumor and that's it. If they have extra money, good for them. If they don't, then I'm still pretty confident that they might get production going with Zytec.
    54:21
    We certainly hope so. It's been a bit of a torturous journey with a couple of false starts so far. So let's hope that Zytec are the way forward and they can produce that game, which there's a lot of people waiting for them, both existing buyers and new buyers. and the game does keep showing up at various pinball shows although normally not from the distributor right, no actually I might as well mention this the game was present at the Leipzig 4 show Flip Expo that we had our previous podcast from actually I brought it myself and that was because I knew that the organizers of the show have been requesting for that game for years and years.
    55:10
    So I called Barry and he was kind enough to give me a game to take to the show. And foolishly, I gave it back to Barry as well. Even though you're actually owed a game. Is that right? That is correct, yes. Right.
    55:26
    But the interesting thing was that in France, the game was very popular. lots of people played it everybody loved it and people were really asking questions like when can I buy it, where can I buy it how much is it so that does give Dutch Pinball at least a good perspective in the sense that once they get production going and let's hope that will happen soon there is a market for these games, absolutely yeah I agree with that when I was at the show in De Trapo at Flip Expo taking pictures in the vendor hall that was the game that always had the longest queue of people I don't know whether it's simply because all the games lasted longer on that than they did on any of the others but all the latest games were there but the Big Lebowski was the one that had the longest queue of people waiting to play it so yeah it certainly was attracting a lot of attention and I didn't get to play it, but on behalf of all the people who did, thank you for bringing it, and thank you to Barry and Yap and everybody at Dutch Pinball for letting you bring it. Right.
    56:41
    And I completely agree. I did get to play it, and it was playing very snappy, as always. Very good. Okay, so moving on to from games that hopefully will be to games that might have been, There was some action in the Zidware slash John Papaduke situation this past week. Right.
    57:12
    What do we know about what took place over in Chicago? Well, that's the interesting thing. We don't know much. I'm just going to call it like it is.
    57:22
    On Pinside, it was sort of, I'd say, celebrated that apparently John Papaduke lost. let's just recap a little and say that he was being sued by a group of 26 people who were in on Magic Girl if I'm correctly informed I think that's right I think it's just the Magic Girl case I don't know if it's all the buyers for that game or a subset of the buyers for that game who clubbed together in order to fund this case against John to basically, I think, want to get their money back for the amount they spent, although they have received, or at least some of them have received a gain, be it non-functioning or a box of lights or whatever you want to call it. Right. So they have something, but they were still continuing with the case. Right. And so what I understood is that the court ruled that they are entitled to a refund of some sort, but I have no idea of how much and whether that was worth all the effort. I don't think the trial indicated that John was intentionally fraudulous or that it was a Ponzi scheme or anything like that so it wasn't like a criminal set up where he was deliberately trying to sell people a product that he was had no intention of making no it's my understanding too that it was esteem that he was, if you like, incapable of delivering the final game but didn't go into the whole scheme with that intention. He went in with the best of intentions to make the game but was ultimately unable to deliver it and therefore needed to refund some of the money that people had paid. And the other thing we don't know about, which is probably the biggest part of any settlement, would be whether legal costs are settled. Does John have to pay the plaintiff's legal costs or the people who were suing him? Right. So what's also interesting is what's the outcome of this case going to mean for the people that ordered either a retro-atomic zombie adventure land or Alice in Wonderland game because obviously those games never got produced but then there is that's also tying in with the Deep Root situation who are currently employing John Papaduic and have sort of shown interest of making those people whole and starting to producing these games. We'll still have to see how that works out. Yeah, it's a bit of a torture situation with the whole Magic Girl, Razza, and Alice in Wonderland trio because, obviously, the first game,
    61:00
    the Magic Girl game, which was John's first game, as far as I did aware, was then moved over to American Pinball to produce, which they did produce in a way. And now it's gone over to Deep Root, who also want to produce that game.
    61:24
    So it's kind of, I don't want to call it a bad penny, which keeps cropping up, but it's a title which seems to live on through various companies and various failures and various court cases. So it's almost a cursed game in a way, but in the end it's also a great game. The actual game itself, if it was ever completed the way it was intended to be, would be wonderful. If it would flow like it's intended to be, yes. Whether anybody will ever be able to make it in that form for a reasonable price or need a tool on a reasonable time scale, we'll have to wait and see. I think the time scale issue is probably already gone, but it may yet come back in a form which is more marketable and at a reasonable price.
    62:14
    Right. So, well, since that, we just have to wait and see how things develop on that front. As far as DeepRoot goes, my take on that is basically they said, like, we'll be showing games when we're ready and my take on that was like great then I won't ask any questions until you're ready to show games yeah I think they said they're going to show their first game at Texas next year yes they're planning their five days of Deep Root and the last day should be the opening of the Texas Pinball Festival which okay I'm curious Yeah. Well, they certainly seem to be a well-funded company. They seem to have a good number of employees there and some capable ones.
    63:09
    Who knows what's going on down in San Antonio? Well, the only thing that I'm going to say about this is if you look at the people that he hired, then that sort of tells me that if they are willing to work for him that must give them the impression that he's serious about what he wants to do and that they like the way he showed them how he's going to do it and other than that I'd say okay fine, design your games and show them and then we'll see yeah I think that's true. We give people the benefit of the doubt unless they prove themselves unworthy of that. So, yeah, they seem to have a good team working down there. Let's see what they come up with. Exactly. So, I guess this concludes our podcast. Yeah, I think so. Yeah, there was one thing I forgot to mention when we were discussing Iron Maiden, and that was that you have to give kudos to Stern Pinball for showing up at the Midwest Gaming Classic with 30 Iron Maiden games. That was very impressive, and it was about 15 machines in total, I think. 15 machines in total. That was absolutely very, very impressive. So, again, it seems that Stern is on a sort of, I'm not sure whether you can call it a marketing strategy, but they are definitely trying to show the rest of the world, like, who they are and what they are capable of. Yeah, and also let's not forget that at the weekend of the Texas show, they had, what, 25 machines in Texas, and another 25 machines or so over at Pinball Arcade Expo. Arcade Expo, yes. Yeah, so same kind of scale, but split across two sites. Let's work with Marco.
    65:16
    Marco, of course, being Stern's show partners, I guess you'd say. Is that a good description? Yes, no, absolutely. So kudos for Stern for doing that. And actually, unfortunately, neither both of us have been to the Midwest Gaming Show this year.
    65:40
    Gary did. I was actually expecting him to call. Yeah, I thought he was going to call. We know we get a call from Gary, and the one time we actually want to hear from him, there's nothing. Yeah, so maybe more news about that on future episodes. although it might be too late to discuss that show by then but yeah it's a pity that he didn't call but yeah I'm sure there will be plenty of news coming up from events that happened there and just a little shout out I don't think you're going to the Golden State show are you in this month later this month are you Jonathan no I will be there in Lodi looking forward to that and I will be hosting a seminar, recording seminars as well on the Pinball News website and hosting a fireside chat with Jack and Butch from Jersey Jack Pinball. That's very interesting. I do have on a personal note, if I may be so blunt,
    66:45
    I do have news regarding Pinball Magazine No. 5. Ah, yes, I was going to ask you about that. Good. Go ahead. What's happening with Pinball Magazine No. 5, The good news is I finished editing all the copy of the cover story and side articles.
    67:05
    So from now on, all I have to do, and it sounds easier than it probably is, but basically I'm now starting on the layout of the magazine to basically make every page look like they should be looking.
    67:24
    This was quite a task. People might not understand, but the cover story in itself is like probably over 200 pages in plain text.
    67:37
    And I had great help with this cover story from Gordon Hesse, who is an award-winning copy editor in the world of advertising and a well-known pinball historian. He is. He's a very, very knowledgeable guy and will also be at the Golden State Pinball Festival doing a seminar, by the way, but carry on. Right. Thank you for that.
    68:00
    So what happened was first I proofread and edited all the entire cover story and that took time. Then I sent everything to Gordon, who went over it and he came with a lot of changes and comments and suggestions, which meant that I had to go over it again to make sure that
    68:28
    to approve either his corrections or do something with the comments that he left, which I did. And well, obviously, there was a show in between and my DJ activities, I also spin as a DJ,
    68:50
    took we had quite some festivities here in Holland so I was busy with that but so I'm finally happy to say like everything now is ready to go into the magazine and so I'll be so come on when is it going to be ready just tell us when it's going to be ready well I seriously hope to go to print by the end of this month right so that should be due so my focus will be do the layout of these pages all the photos that will be in the magazine or at least the majority is already prepared to go into the magazine so from now on it's just like ok we need to insert here's a bit of text here's a photo going there ok it doesn't look good, ok move on to the next page but it's going to be like a 300 plus page magazine this time wow, sounds like it will almost be like a book I'm afraid it is yes wow you ought to use that as a marketing slogan yeah it could be my tagline more like a book so anyway speaking of pinball magazine if there's people listening to this great podcast if I may say so if there's any issues of pinball magazine that you don't have yet go to the pinball magazine website and feel free to order bravo well done well and that's all the plug i'm gonna do because i don't want to be shamelessly plugging myself the entire time oh no no of course not no no so heaven forbid right right totally good okay well as you say that sounds like uh we've we've covered everything in this particular podcast don't forget to check out the the interview with andrew highway on pinball news right and if you missed it also check out episode number two of our podcast for the interview with Jack Borneri. Oh, wow, yeah. That was extra special to be able to do that. Just unexpected, but a really good opportunity and it was too good to miss. Okay, so let's round it up for now and I hope to hear or see everybody back for our next episode early next month. Thank you. Yeah. Take care, everyone. Bye-bye.