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Eric Meunier & JP de Win - Jersey Jack Pinball - Dutch Pinball Open Expo 2022

Pinball News (Dutch Pinball Open Expo 2022)·video·45m 43s·analyzed·Nov 14, 2022
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Analysis

claude-haiku-4-5-20251001 · $0.033

TL;DR

JJP designers detail Guns N' Roses and Pirates of the Caribbean development, covering design iteration, art direction, licensing, and audio production.

Summary

Eric Meunier and Jean-Paul de Win from Jersey Jack Pinball present their design and development process for Guns N' Roses and Pirates of the Caribbean pinball machines at the 2022 Dutch Pinball Open Expo. The presentation covers the iterative design methodology, mechanical engineering decisions, artwork development across three cabinet tiers, audio production with band participation, and screen animation/UI design. Key themes include collaboration with licensors, budget constraints forcing design cuts (like the subway system), and the integration of licensed content with pinball mechanics.

Key Claims

  • Guns N' Roses was the last game Eric Meunier designed in 2D; he now designs in 3D

    high confidence · Eric: 'This game, Guns and Roses, was the last game that I designed in 2D... I now design in 3D.'

  • The subway system in Guns N' Roses was removed during development to bring the bill of material down by approximately $400

    high confidence · Eric: 'the subway system, because it had five coils and two metal troughs and three plastics, troughs... brought the bill of material down by about $400, got me within budget'

  • Slash provided original music for the game and recorded small segments with Duff and Richard Fortis in the correct key, tempo, and pitch

    high confidence · Eric: 'Slash and Duff and Richard Fortis all got in studio and recorded small segments of music in the right key, at the right tempo, in the right pitch for every single song'

  • Guns N' Roses were originally not allowed to have their logo modified but Slash overrode band management to approve the custom logo design

    high confidence · Eric: 'the first reaction from band management was, no, you cannot mess with our logo. And then Slash replied... I like it and it should be in the game. So then band management said, okay, it's in the game.'

  • Jay Zielinski created artwork for Pirates of the Caribbean and was previously an animator for Dial In

    high confidence · Jean-Paul: 'Art was done by Jay Zielinski. He's not at Jersey Jack anymore... he was actually an animator for Dial In but he also created the artwork for this game.'

Notable Quotes

  • “Everything that you see, that you hear, that you feel in the game has to come out of my head or Jean-Paul's head or the programmers.”

    Eric Meunier@ 1:34 — Establishes the comprehensive creative responsibility required in modern pinball design

  • “The most important part about designing a game is making it, physically making the game and building it yourself, and then doing it again and again and again until the game feels perfect.”

    Eric Meunier@ 2:09 — Core philosophy emphasizing hands-on iteration over theoretical design

  • “Slash's only feedback was that he wanted to be pink. He didn't want to be blue. He didn't want to be purple. Slash wanted to be pink.”

    Eric Meunier@ 7:51 — Illustrates hands-on licensor involvement in character design details

  • “Bad audio definitely takes you out of the element. So one of the things that we focused on in the music... Slash was able to do original music for us for the game.”

    Eric Meunier@ 14:19 — Demonstrates commitment to professional audio production and exclusive band participation

  • “Because I'm a jerk, I make my extra balls really hard to get. So the line is, get the extra ball if you can.”

    Eric Meunier@ 19:14 — Informal designer insight into game difficulty philosophy affecting voice script content

  • “I build it for real. I don't program it in visual pinball first... I can physically build a machine really quickly and wire it faster than I could make it in Visual Pinball.”

    Eric Meunier — Explains preference for physical prototyping over digital simulation in design workflow

Entities

Eric MeunierpersonJean-Paul de WinpersonJersey Jack PinballcompanyGuns N' RosesgamePirates of the CaribbeangameSlash

Signals

  • ?

    business_signal: Budget constraints force mechanical design cuts: subway system removed despite being complete and functional, saving ~$400 BOM to stay within overall game budget

    high · Eric: 'the people with the purse strings say, well, you're over budget by about $400. So what has to come out of the game?... the subway system... brought the bill of material down by about $400'

  • ?

    design_philosophy: Screen UI and animation evolved iteratively alongside rules development; designers discovered that more gameplay rules required constant UI redesign and optimization to maintain visual clarity and player information hierarchy

    high · Jean-Paul: 'during development, more and more rules get added. And the place in the screen is starting to get limited... this is something that gets developed over time'

  • ?

    design_philosophy: Hidden Easter eggs intentional design feature: Jean-Paul embeds personal references (JP logo hidden in island shape, hidden family message in Star Book, hedgehog reference tied to next game) to be discovered by engaged players

    high · Jean-Paul: 'This used to be my old sort of logo. And I sort of shaped the JP into the island. I didn't want to make it too obvious, but I know it's there... there is a little hedgehog here in the truck, that's Eric's Easter egg. It's in Pirates and it will be in his next game'

  • ?

    design_philosophy: Multi-tier cabinet strategy: Guns N' Roses released in three art packages (Standard, Limited Edition, Collector's Edition) with different artwork and sculpture focus; all artwork packages visible during gameplay on screen regardless of tier

    high · Eric: 'on modern gaming, we made three different versions. We have the collective edition, the limited edition, and the standard edition... you still have all the art packages in the gameplay on the monitor'

Transcript

youtube_groq_whisper · $0.137

0:00
Mr. Jean Paul de Wynne, who is actually Dutch, is also working for Joseph J. Pinball as an art director and animator for anything you see on the screen, but also cabinet art and everything else. He's also involved in it. He will tell you all about that later on. I'll leave it to these two fine gentlemen to tell you all about what they are about to tell.
0:32
All right. Good afternoon, everyone. This presentation will be in English, so brush up on your skills. We're going to talk about mostly guns and roses, but Jean-Paul has some information on the development of pirates of the Caribbean as well. So we'll go through. This is a presentation that has a lot of information in it, but I'm going to go through it a bit quickly. We're going to talk about what it takes to design a game. So how do we do it? And for now, I'm going to walk to the computer and just push the button until you're ready. Do we have audio through the computer? OK. That'll be fine.
1:20
All right. So there's a lot of parts that go into making a game. Everything that you see, that you hear, that you feel in the game has to come out of my head or Jean-Paul's head or the programmers.
1:44
And there's a lot of people that take to making games. of seven people in the core group of a game. There's a game designer, the mechanical engineer, the animator, the artist, the programmer, the sound engineer, and I'm probably forgetting someone.
@ 42:52
person
Arjen Buehlerperson
Jesper Abelsperson
Matt Reiserperson
Jay Zielinskiperson
Melissa Reeseperson
Dane Henryperson
Disneycompany
Back Alley Creationscompany
Dial Ingame
Iron Maidengame
Medieval Madnessgame
Dutch Pinball Open Expo 2022event
Jerome DeWinperson
  • ?

    design_philosophy: Hands-on licensor collaboration: Slash actively contributed playfield sketches, mechanism ideas, costume preferences (pink coloring), and original music; band members recorded voice acting and performed for video content

    high · Eric: 'Slash had a lot of great ideas... he came to us with a Playfield sketch with mechanism designs that he drew himself'

  • ?

    design_philosophy: Eric Meunier emphasizes physical prototyping and iterative building over digital simulation (Visual Pinball); believes hands-on machine construction and repeated play-testing is essential to game quality

    high · Eric: 'I build it for real. I don't program it in visual pinball first... I can physically build a machine really quickly and wire it faster than I could make it in Visual Pinball.'

  • ?

    licensing_signal: Logo modification constraints universal across Disney licensed games; Disney required exact logo reproduction with no artistic reinterpretation allowed, unlike Guns N' Roses where Slash approved custom logo treatment

    high · Eric: 'for different brands, you cannot touch their logo. We could not mess with the Pirates of the Caribbean logo, for example. It had to be exactly the way Disney said it must be.'

  • ?

    licensing_signal: Disney exercises strict control over Pirates of the Caribbean branding, animations, and content (e.g., rejected alcohol imagery, prohibited logo modification, required approval of all screen assets)

    high · Jean-Paul: 'Disney didn't want... alcohol in the game... Eric, they also don't, didn't approve the integration of a pinball into their branding.'

  • ?

    personnel_signal: Jay Zielinski transitioned from animator role (Dial In) to artwork creation role (Pirates of the Caribbean); no longer at Jersey Jack at time of presentation

    medium · Jean-Paul: 'Art was done by Jay Zielinski. He's not at Jersey Jack anymore... he was actually an animator for Dial In but he also created the artwork for this game.'

  • ?

    product_strategy: Custom music production: Slash, Duff, and Richard Fortis recorded original short music segments in correct key, tempo, and pitch specifically for pinball sound effect integration; music composition done to ensure pitch-matched feedback on shot hits

    high · Eric: 'Slash and Duff and Richard Fortis all got in studio and recorded small segments of music in the right key, at the right tempo, in the right pitch for every single song'

    • 2:03
    We've got sculptors, and so on. So we'll go into the play field, and the most important part about designing a game is making it, physically making the game and building it yourself, and then doing it again and again and again until the game feels perfect. So you can see different iterations of the early Guns N' Roses game. There were a lot of ideas that changed over time, that developed over time as you worked on the game. As you work with the licensor, you come up with ideas. For Guns N' Roses specifically, Slash had a lot of great ideas. he came to us with a Playfield sketch with mechanism designs that he drew himself and that he wanted to see in the game. So as we go through, we see many of the different iterations and how over months and months the game keeps developing. So traditionally games were designed in a 2D design environment. That is not a way that I do things anymore. I now design in 3D. So this game, Guns and Roses, was the last game that I designed in 2D. And it is evolving.
    3:33
    So as you're playing, you're getting new information the more often you play. And you get to iterate and keep iterating and keep making the game feel better. So all of these parts are handled by me. I cut them in my machine shop, or I weld them in the welding area. Wire it all up myself. And then this game was actually running on Pirates of the Caribbean code, just because that's the code I had. So I would wire in the pop bumper to the same switch as it was on Pirates. And I'd wire in the flippers to the same drives as it was on Pirates, because the programmers were all working on other games at the time. So you do what you can to make the games work. There's other old components in this game that never made production, things like the catwalk, up there. I had ideas that there were going to be, the moving lights were mounted to those.
    4:29
    And the base ramp evolved a couple different ways. I had it coming out in different places. This is more of the final version of the play field. After I took the screen out of the middle. But there's again still iterations here. Some of the really, some of the things that did not make production, there was a subway system in this game that was comparable to Star Trek Next Generation. So there were exits to the subway here and here that would feed the ball directly to the in lanes. And there were always balls staged underneath the play field. The entrances to the subway system were here, here, here, and here. And so any time a ball would enter one of those, it would immediately kick out another ball into the left or the right flipper. But as we get further and get closer to production, that's when the people with the purse strings say, well, you're over budget by about $400. So what has to come out of the game? And that's the way it is for every game, for every company, for forever. And so the subway system, because it had five coils and two metal troughs and three plastics, troughs, bringing all that out, brought the bill of material down by about $400, got me within budget, and then we made the game that you guys see here behind me.
    6:01
    So again, this is Tut on my robot at the Jersey Jack factory, and then I pounded the inserts myself and clear-coated, and then I get playfields in, and I realize I still made mistakes, so So here is prototype games. I know people love seeing pictures like this. What's up?
    6:27
    So the question was, do we already have a little bit of code? And there is a little bit of code running so that games play well and we kind of get the feel for what's fun. And this shot isn't quite working the way we want it to. What if we added some more interesting code on that? So by this time, you have full-time programmers dedicated to the project. They're helping to develop rules and animations have been in progress for a while. So here you can see one of the first prototypes. You can see the balls that kicked out into the subway system, or from the subway system. It came out right there and right into the in lane. This is the game that Slash had played in the secret video that I can show later. This is the final product. So again, hundreds of small tweaks and iterations as the game gets developed.
    7:18
    So next we go into sculptures. So artwork really defines the game. And on modern gaming, we made three different versions. We have the collective edition, the limited edition, and the standard edition. And with that, we had three different art packages. And thankfully, I had someone who is very good at directing art, Mr. John Paul, that kept the whole show together and cohesive. So standard edition, we had an idea that we wanted to do these monster vehicles. And we showed the idea to Slash. And Slash's only feedback was that he wanted to be pink. He didn't want to be blue. He didn't want to be purple. Slash wanted to be pink. So that was the art that we had for Slash.
    8:07
    So the Wi-Fi is a bit spotty out here. So we're on Jean-Paul's phone. Hopefully things load up. There we go.
    8:25
    So there are different iterations here as well. Different art and things that went back and forth to the license org. Slash was very generous in every asset that he gave us. There was nothing that we couldn't do. And he provided the right kind of feedback for us. So some early concepts of the standard edition was a road case model. And then, thought about it. Well, wait a second. Pretty sure Metallica already did that. So OK, let's do something else. So then we have the monster vehicle.
    9:05
    And then the different characters and their mock-ups. And you see Slash there in yellow and jumped in blue. But Slash really wanted to be pink. Then we came up with the characters on the side of the back box. And none of these characters were quite loved by the licensors. So we went through and Slash was adamant that there must be a beautiful woman on the back box. We went through a couple different iterations of that. And we wound up with our girl there.
    9:35
    Then we moved on to the limited edition cabinet. So this artwork was put together by Arjen Buehler. Arjen is one of the masterminds behind their touring posters. So Arjen made, at the time we developed the game, Arjen had done 70 of their tour posters for countries and cities all over the world. We got together with him and collaborated and he helped create this art package. He has kind of the same mindset as we do, except focusing in the lithograph world. So there's lithograph side, where people talk and debate, and there's trolls about what the coolest posters are. Ari was very into that scene, so he made sure to put the highest rated posters, not just his posters, but posters from many different artists, and put the best ones in. So this is again one of our early concepts that we sent to Slash.
    10:32
    And Arian gave us really good feedback. There's a poster in this game that never actually made it to the show, to the concert where it was being performed. So that poster is like the unobtainium lithograph that never made it to production. And because of Arian's feedback, we were able to incorporate that into the limited edition cabinet artwork. So that poster, I think if we progress one more, there we go. So that one, which is from Dubai, never made it to the show. And so these collectors all over the world are trying to get this unobtainable lithograph. And we actually incorporated that into the side of the back box over here. All right and finally the collector edition We worked directly with Slash again again We came up some different concepts you know about the Guns N Roses ruling the world or Guns N Roses you know an iconic cabinet like that
    11:34
    Slash gave us the feedback that the Appetite for Destruction is the most collectible Guns N' Roses iconography there ever was. So we tried to focus on that for your collector's edition. And so we looked at that, we researched that, some of the concepts we had. But we went in the direction of Appetite for Destruction and themed it off of the characters from the Appetite album that was banned in the United States, that artwork package, because it is graphic in nature. It was not allowed in the U.S. It got pulled off of the shelves in the late 80s when it was released. So we used this artwork. And again, this is Arian. he developed this concept and brought it all the way through. The back glass was done by a different artist, Jesper Abels, who is Dutch. And there's different, so another part of developing the art packages is choosing the armor color. And I have a paint booth at the factory where I can create different colors and spray them and bake them and see how they look against the art packages. Sculptures. Sculptures are a big part of the game. So I worked with Matt Reiser from Back at Lake Creations on making some of the really cool artwork concepts that are in the game. And you see these on the collector edition on the outside of the game. And then Matt did the Axel Rose Screaming Sculpture. We had the bullet concept that we wanted to use. But our upper management, and this was a time in the U.S. where gun violence had been very extreme, and there were school shootings, and we decided not to have a bullet going into someone's head because it was kind of tasteless at the time. So we did not wind up shipping with a bullet, but the idea was there. So again, more feedback on different things, right? In order to ship the game, we couldn't have that little leaf hanging over the edge, So we had to modify this sculpture very slightly, bring it in a little bit. I mean, this is more of the iterative process, working with the sculptor to make sure that things are going to work correctly. We got our hat and painted it up. That was me with a chrome, so I 3D printed this hat at first, and then I painted the buckles with a chrome marker to get the prototype and mock-up and shown to Slash. Audio. So I don't know if this presentation part will work very well because we've got some actual audio clips in here. But the audio is a very important part of the game. Good audio is great, and you don't notice it. You're captured in the moment. Bad audio definitely takes you out of the element. So one of the things that we focused on in the music, for example, Slash was able to do original music for us for the game. So the album modes we showed Slash the concept artwork for different album modes and he created music for those modes. So that is music created by Slash that is only heard in the Jersey Jack pinball machines.
    14:49
    So there's all the original songs we wanted to have sound effects, we wanted to have things that worked well with those sound effects. I have a bit of a music history myself, so when you're playing the game and you're playing the song Chinese Democracy and you hit a shot, you don't want to hear songs that are out of tune or songs that are out of pitch when you're hearing these different sound effects. So Slash and Duff and Richard Fortis all got in studio and recorded small segments of music in the right key, at the right tempo, in the right pitch for every single song, so that when you hit a shot and you're playing that song, you actually hear feedback in the right pitch, in the right tone, and in the right key signature.
    15:39
    So this is the little presentation that we had shown Slash. And there is music that plays during this, but we can skip over that. But we showed him this, and he came up with this really cool tune.
    15:53
    So that guy can hear it. But it's a very cool tool that he came up with. Blues Inspired. Oh, Martin might be able to catch it with a microphone.
    16:16
    Maybe. If the microphone's on. There. He came up with really cool music. And it was really cool, you know, because he recorded himself not only audio, but video as well, so we get video clips of him performing the cool music for our game. All right. So we do want to hold on to the microphone there for just a minute because there's another pretty cool sound effect. a couple slides forward. So we did voice acting as well. And we got every member of the band to contribute their voice to the game. And there's one of the sessions of me and Melissa Reese recording.
    17:43
    So this is showing all the different files that were there for the sound effects for the different music. And then we've got the script that I wrote, 700 plus lines that were recorded for the game. And more and more and we keep going and we keep building. And so here is, there's Melissa Reese, she's a keyboardist for Guns N' Roses. And this is me in my office in a state recording that we recorded with her permission. This is kind of directing. These people are not pinball nuts like we are, except for Slash. He is a pinball nut like us. But I was explaining to Melissa how these things should sound.
    18:44
    I'm talking about extra ball and how important it is. And then I'm explaining because I'm a jerk, I make my extra balls really hard to get. So the line is, get the extra ball if you can. So she was very nice. She did pickup sessions on the road for us as we came up with new stuff. Then they were touring. And it was really great to have professional musicians who have recording studios and can do this stuff very well.
    20:01
    All right, so animations. Jean-Paul did most of this. But what was fun about this is we had a lot of concert footage. And Jerome DeWin is the guy who kind of edited it up for us so that we were able to take their live footage from their concerts and time it with the studio master recordings and then take more of their assets and animate them for the screen. So we've got these tour posters from them that we animated for use in the game.
    20:45
    And different instructional videos, things that Jean-Paul made in order to help explain rules in the attract mode.
    20:58
    So we've got this great big screen, 27-inch LCD screen. We want to fill it up with a lot of cool information, a lot of things that help you understand how to play the game. So we come up with these different videos and then a user interface that has to show the player everything they need to know about everything in the game with just a single glance. So understanding where you are with all of the different modes, all the different multiballs, all the different aspects of the game is kind of John Paul's job when it comes to animating the screen.
    21:32
    And then there's a couple of behind-the-scenes pictures. This was the first time that I got my tour poster artwork package. It just looked so incredible.
    21:43
    This is why I don't draw artwork. This is my sketch of what I really wanted to do with the Guns N' Roses logo. Something that is kind of the sacred cow that you do not touch is a logo, right? So for different brands, you cannot touch their logo. We could not mess with the Pirates of the Caribbean logo, for example. It had to be exactly the way Disney said it must be. And same with Willy Wonka and same with other games. But I wanted to do something really cool with Guns N' Roses because they have their iconic logo that they actually change for a lot of different concerts. So I thought it'd be really fun if we were able to do that as well. and the first reaction from band management was, no, you cannot mess with our logo. And then Slash replied to that email saying, I like it and it should be in the game. So then band management said, okay, it's in the game.
    22:39
    But this was the concept that I drew up and I sent to JP and I said, and it got the idea across. And then he was able to actually make it look like a five Didn draw it and it looks pretty good And so that down here I think on the apron We animated it and done some other cool stuff So this was you know during the pandemic was when we were still developing this game, so I brought my collector's edition home, and I was testing code, and I was looking at videos, and giving feedback to the team, and so my two young sons, the thing they liked most about the game was the lights underneath. So they would just lay underneath the game for a while and play with the lights and that sort of stuff.
    23:22
    So he's helping me test. Now that's when Slash came in. That's Matt Reesker, the sculptor. This is Slash's girlfriend. And then this is when we set up the green screen so that when you get your high score picture taken, it looks like you're standing next to Slash for a selfie.
    23:42
    All right, that is my part of the presentation. And I think JP's gonna come up here and talk more about the animation and digital design work.
    24:12
    Thank you. So I should be able to control this by telephone, not stand in the back. So I'm going to talk a bit about pirates as well.
    25:05
    Art was done by Jay Zielinski. He's not at Jurassic Jack anymore. before. He was actually an animator for Dial In but he also created the artwork for this game. And I got some early prototype pictures. You can see the three disks, spinning disks. There is a prototype Pirates of the Airway. We can see the original that was taken out but you can also see that we moved, inserts get moved around as well and then changes during the development. But it's always cool to see the white woods and play the white woods. Gives me an idea of what needs to go on the screen and what the timing is for certain shots. And I lost my connection to the telephone. So maybe you can see. Yeah.
    25:59
    Just touch the pad. There you go. So this is early sketches development of the UI. In this case, I used Illustrator. I put some things in place. And you mostly start the layout with the early rules that are there. The problem is, during development, more and more rules get added. And the place in the screen is starting to get limited. So the next iterations, you get more rules. And this was an idea. We didn't know exactly how to fill the entire screen. What are you going to show when you start a game when there's nothing going on? It needs to be interesting. So this is a game idea. And then we came up with the map idea, some early ideas, where for each movie, I have to follow a path. And then when you reach the goal, you start one of the five multiples. So in our iteration, this is an example where we came up with the highlighting, the spots you just collected. And you see the start of the chapter on the top.
    27:26
    So these are the sketches I did. and then later put in the material. And then you can see the map. I all drew that. It was nice to do something else than just sitting behind the computer and actually do some original drawings. I brought the original drawings. I'm going to give them to Gerard to put here in the museum. It's a donation for everybody to see who visits here. But he doesn't, is Gerard here? No, no, he doesn't know yet. So don't tell him.
    28:08
    The UI stuff, so I found a guy close to me who did this nice art and he took it. So it turned out that he was close to me and I asked him to do the artwork on the elements and he hand-drawn this in Photoshop. Later on he became an intern and helped out a lot of VR work in Guns and Roses. So this is the end result with the animated map. Animated some, yeah, you all know who played the game. Lining up the movies with the multigulls and chapters, it's something that, you know, it comes like over a month. Not just like, okay, rules, you can do UI. This is something that gets developed over time. So this is actually the final stuff. And as you can see, the stuff got, we had a mermaid here first, but then later on someone comes up with a rule, oh, we need a combo. And you have to start putting extra stuff in. Here is a little Easter egg I put in. This used to be my old sort of logo. And I sort of shaped the JP into the island. I didn't want to make it too obvious, but I know it's there. And now you all know it's there.
    29:40
    And then there is the book, the Star Book. And if you can see it. In one of the pages, there is a hidden message to my family and wife. but also a small Easter egg.
    29:57
    These are the different stages of the multiple intros. This is what we sent first to Disney to get it approved if they actually liked the idea. Then you build it out to another iteration until the final version with all the stuff in there. Again, a sketch concept and then the workout version. It's great to work with all the transparency channels so we can animate back to the UI by the dust cloud. That's all. It integrates really well instead of just starting a movie clip and then ending a movie clip.
    30:41
    This was a rejected animation because this is just the fifth movie skull and we were now, so they had a movie skull that covers the entire license and we had to use that. So, and Eric, they also don't, didn't approve the integration of a pinball into their branding. That's an example, like Eric just said, you cannot touch the lower or any branding or mix it up with your own stuff. These were rejected, rejected the booths. Disney didn't want, doesn't want any alcohol in the game. So we had to remove the labels, remove the alcohol and the empties, and then the bubbles ended up being empty in the game. This is an animation we first created for Match, but that transformed into the lighter guys animation and match became the character you selected from the start of your matching, the bigger match. So it's something different than just a number. Don't tell him. Don't tell him. No, after. So Guns N' Roses, Eric showed you quite a bit already what was in my presentation but we'll go through and we'll... So I was able to meet Slash in Namingen, just one kilometer from my house. I was able to bring a game backstage and talk to him for about 15 minutes about our upcoming project. And I got the kit pass and that was actually... We were able to go into the Golden Circle. I think we were actually be able to go on stage, at least inside of the stage, but we didn't try. That was, you know, a once-in-a-lifetime experience. And later on, we had, like, I had two or three Skype calls with him. I'm not sure if he remembered me, but he had a good contact with Eric, and we continued a contact by Eric, so it was just one channel. So we played the game. We the game back he played it he was there so that's pretty cool i did reset the game but i i saved the screenshot so these are uh yeah eric showed you early prototypes this was the first time i saw the white wood actually the only time i saw the game until it was finished because that was the year before go with i developed the game all in nijmegen i saw the art finished when the game shipped to Europe. So we have several artists, Dane Henry is a great artist. These were the
    33:39
    first sketches he delivered but it was rejected because they look more like zombies than skeletons and skeletons is more G&R and Guns N' Roses. And this one looks more like Eddie from Iron He looks more like Eddie from Iron Maiden. So we got into these figures, sketches.
    34:04
    And these are the first sketches for the Rocket Queen. And my Michelle, she is in one of the videos. And I thought it was a great image to use two girls in the slingshots just to make some girls into the man masculine world and it turned out really well So Dane started sketching ideas He sort of had So during the process, we found out that he had a hard time working around understanding the play field and working around the inserts and the lights. So I started helping out with moving stuff and placing stuff. And he would send me all his finished art. And I would count the entire file together for printing. So these are steps. And I make pictures of the whiteboards and project them so we can get a sense of perspective from the player. So these are just a few of the many stages you have until the final product. There are some Easter eggs in there as well. You got a dialed in building here in the city, but you cannot see it because it's underneath the upper play field. And there is a little hedgehog here in the truck, that's Eric's Easter egg. It's in Pirates and it will be in his next game, so you'll have to look for it.
    35:48
    So the other cabinet, Arjen Dürer, We just showed a lot of this rejected by Slash. He didn't really like the concept, so he continued into the infrastructure structure and monsters. So here you see more blown up. This is the reason why it got rejected. Actually, Slash wanted to have this on the cabinet. And we were like, eh, probably not going to happen. So, yeah, it didn't happen. But this is the end result of that game.
    36:30
    And then we have Jesper who worked on the pirates. I asked him, maybe within two weeks after we started, do you want to try to do a back glass? And so we did, and he started, and he took pictures from the websites we had, or the pictures, assets we had, He composed that whole position of different pictures and started painting over it. Then I took a 3D model and placed it into the position I thought was the best, and then he painted over it and got into the next slide, into the end result. And small little details like, okay, he shoots all these little guys, and one of them gets electrocuted. All these little details that I think is really fun in pinball art. That's what we want to see and what we did see in Medieval Madness and all that. So we also did the side plates and matched Arion's art style. We added the doctors in the area of the coma area. And he also is a great creative person. This cabinet we just also showed, different iterations by Mark. And so we ended up with three different cabinets, totally different cabinets in our style and very easy to differentiate. Mark also did all the patches and I just pruned this slide to show how much detail is in, actually put in all these patches and it was great to, integration of the theme. There you see the finished logo Eric just sketched up. And so Mark also animated all these posters for the, one of the album modes. This is a really, this is a really early sketch for me to do a layout for the game. We knew we wanted to have a stage and then you collect all the band members, et cetera, et cetera. So this is the first. And then you go into a sort of simple 3D modeling and you see that I wanted to do the actual stage but then you and do it, the actual measurements, if you show the next slide, you'll see it's too small. So the instruments get very small. So I scaled down, scaled up the pieces, so it will fill the screen better.
    39:11
    But take a look at the, I took a look at, they had all these stairs, those were monitors, and actually these amplifiers are fake, those are monitors as well. but on their actual stage.
    39:30
    So this is a concert I went to, and I hit this message in there. You can hardly read it, but the post is swapped during the game. But if you come across this one, that's where I went to.
    39:45
    And this is part of the song UI, where you go from sketch to 3D setup into final renderings. And one of the cool things, I think, about this game is that it doesn't matter which art package you have, you still have all the art packages in the gameplay on the monitor. So you see the collector's edition, and the standard edition, and the poster cabinet edition. And this is the center of the play field, the world map. And then we also have the final wizard mode, which is the center with the characters.
    40:28
    And there you go to their skeleton form performance. So I animated. So Jesper drew over the skeletons and made them more patriotic-like. And I animated those in After Effects. made them play to the music track we had. And I tried to mimic, to try to see if I can mimic the dance of Axl, which is quite iconic as well. So they battled the devil. I found the, one of the posters was about the devil, the Jersey devil. And I found out there was a New Jersey state line imprinted in his forehead. So it all came together in the end. It was pretty cool. So this is when you battle the band or the band battles the devil. You gotta make shots, your flip-flops are reversed, all kinds of weird stuff going on. I never reached it. Maybe someday.
    41:42
    But a lot of work goes into that. So that's what I wanted to show you. Hope you enjoy it. Thank you.
    42:04
    Sorry. Are there any questions? Because we can take questions and hopefully they have answers. If I can walk up to you with a mic, it would be best so everybody can hear the question. Anyway.
    42:28
    If you make a design of a game, you have it in your computer. Do you also program it in visual pinball or something like that to play it, or is it only on the whiteboards?
    42:40
    I build it for real. I don't program it in visual pinball first. I experimented with that early on and found that it can work for some people, but I can physically build a machine really quickly and wire it faster than I could make it in visual pinball. and I can iterate faster than the struggles I was having making a game work in Visual Big Ball.
    43:13
    Currently I'm running beta code on my G&R, and one of the light shows is getting altered. It's a reason. Very much high-end as you know. Are there plans to change more light shows in the near future? So, rule updates, or code updates are still coming for Gums and Roses. Mostly light shows and score balancing is what we're looking to do. After seeing the way players play the game, we want to make everything that we poured our heart and soul into something that the player cares about. Right now, I don't see a lot of people play Slash solo because it's not worth a lot of points, and it's a big risk without a lot of rewards. So score balancing is one of the things that's going to be coming to GNR future code.
    44:06
    What are you doing with your whitewoods? I have each of the first whitewoods I cut. But I disassembled the playfield itself, and the playfields are on my wall in my office, right beneath a final printed prototype of each playfield. So I have kind of the stages, and then you see the final game after it.
    44:42
    So we brought some goodies with us. We brought some translights and mini play fields and slash hats if people want to pick something up. I'm happy to sign and personalize them for you. And we'll be here. And, yeah, come get something.
    45:02
    Come get something over there. In the meantime, we're going to set up for Eric, who's going to do the next presentation about how we got Magic Girl working, which is quite an interesting project, so to speak. That will be in my 15 minutes, I believe, if I look correctly at the time. So please stick around for that. In the meantime, go plunder Eric.
    45:34
    you