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Pinball Down Under Part 2: Hankerin' For Some Hankin + Mr. Pinball

Silverball Chronicles·podcast_episode·1h 25m·analyzed·Jan 8, 2025
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TL;DR

Silverball Chronicles explores Hankin, Australia's first pinball manufacturer, with gameplay analysis and historical corrections.

Summary

Silverball Chronicles Part 2 examines Hankin & Co., Australia's first pinball manufacturer (1978-1980), discussing their seven machines including FJ, Orbit 1, and others. Hosts David Dennis and Ron Hallett review Hankin games played at Pinball Expo, provide historical context on Australian automotive culture (Holden FJ), and correct previous episode errors about D. Gottlieb & Company with input from Michael Gottlieb (grandson of founder David Gottlieb).

Key Claims

  • Hankin & Co. was the first Australian-based pinball manufacturer, making 7 pinball machines between 1978 and 1980, though IPDB only lists 5

    medium confidence · David Dennis cites discrepancies between Mr. Pinball list (7 machines) and IPDB (5 machines), noting some games may have been video or conversion kits

  • D. Gottlieb & Company was sold to Columbia Pictures because Alvin and Judd Gottlieb were aging, had no children interested in the business, and Columbia had tax-loss carryover forward that year

    high confidence · Michael Gottlieb (son of Alvin, grandson of David) directly confirmed this explanation via email to the show

  • Stern has a fix coming for X-Men pinball shooter lane issue

    high confidence · Ron Hallett mentions 'Stern has a fix coming out' regarding X-Men shooter problems, and workaround involves jamming plunger sideways

  • Silverball Chronicles' third-largest listening audience is Australia, followed by Sweden in fourth place; Canada is second by only ~90 listeners

    high confidence · David Dennis states 'The third largest is Australia. Wow. And oddly enough, Sweden after that' when reviewing podcast statistics

  • Hankin games at Pinball Expo received negative feedback from Australian players, who told Ron Hallett 'they kind of suck'

    medium confidence · Ron reports: 'At Expo, where there was lots of Aussies there, at least two of them said, Hey, did you play the Hanking games? They kind of suck'

  • Holden ceased trading in 2020 after 164 years of operation

    high confidence · David Dennis states: 'Holden became a division of General Motors in the 30s and in 2020 ceased trading after 164 years'

  • FJ Holden was an iconic youth car in 1960s-70s Australia, similar to 1957 Chevy or 1932 Ford coupe in North America

    high confidence · Dennis explains FJ Holden's cultural significance in Australia as equivalent to American classic cars

  • Orbit 1 pinball included automatic free game percentage calculation feature, which predates High Speed's similar feature by 7-8 years

Notable Quotes

  • “Dad and Uncle Judd sold D Gottlieb and Company because they were getting older and neither of them had children that were interested in taking over the business... it had nothing to do with the hospital.”

    Michael Gottlieb (via email) @ ~09:30 — Direct correction from family member providing primary source explanation for major pinball company sale previously misunderstood by hosts

  • “Well, you're representing. Mm-hmm. You're representing well. Now, Ron, we have seen a lot of people joining us over at Patreon.com slash Silverball Chronicles, most of them from Australia in the last little while.”

    David Dennis @ ~02:15 — Establishes Australian audience as significant new Patreon demographic, setting up episode focus

  • “They kind of suck. That's what they told me. And they're the Australians. So, you know, you've got to have some pride. You've got to start somewhere.”

    Ron Hallett @ ~48:00 — Community feedback on Hankin games from Australian players themselves; acknowledges quality limitations while defending early manufacturing attempts

  • “We are... a big deal. and not only are we a big deal, we are the source for all things history and pinball from here on out forever.”

    David Dennis @ ~15:45 — Self-aware meta-commentary about the show's responsibility for accurate pinball history documentation

  • “It uses the Motorola 6802 microprocessor. It has 4K of memory. All of the Ks? ... 25% less componentry... than most U.S.-made machines.”

    David Dennis (reading Orbit 1 flyer) @ ~55:00 — Technical specifications showing Hankin's early solid-state engineering approach and cost-efficiency strategies

Entities

Hankin & Co. Manufacturing LimitedcompanyDavid HankinpersonMichael GottliebpersonAlvin GottliebpersonD. Gottlieb and CompanycompanySilverball ChroniclesorganizationDavid DennispersonRon Hallettperson

Signals

  • ?

    community_signal: Significant growth in Australian Patreon supporters for Silverball Chronicles; Australia now third-largest listening audience after US and Canada

    high · David Dennis: 'We have seen a lot of people joining us over at Patreon.com slash Silverball Chronicles, most of them from Australia in the last little while... The third largest is Australia'

  • ~

    sentiment_shift: Pinball history documentation community recognizes value of primary source corrections; Michael Gottlieb actively engaged podcast to clarify family business history

    high · Michael Gottlieb reached out to correct podcast error about D. Gottlieb & Co. sale; provided direct family explanation contradicting previous speculation

  • ?

    licensing_signal: Hankin & Co. machines reference real-world IP (Holden FJ automobile) in game themes, indicating early licensing/inspiration patterns in regional pinball markets

    medium · FJ pinball machine based on iconic Holden FJ automobile model from 1950s Australia; game sold 1,200 units suggesting strong local market appeal

  • $

    market_signal: Australian pinball community large enough to sustain regional manufacturer (7 games, consistent 1,000+ unit sales per title in late 1970s)

    medium · FJ and Orbit 1 each sold approximately 1,000-1,200 units; Hankin sustained operations for 2+ years with multiple releases suggesting viable regional market

  • ?

    product_strategy: Stern Pinball has identified X-Men pinball shooter lane malfunction and is developing fix; workaround involves sideways plunger jam technique

Transcript

groq_whisper · $0.261

0:00
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0:12
On Amazon Music, we believe in keeping you in the moment. That's why we've got millions of ad-free podcast episodes, so you can stay completely immersed in every story, every reveal, every breath. Download the Amazon Music app and start listening to your favorite podcasts ad-free, included with Prime.
0:55
Launching Silver Ball Chronicles. All right. Ready to jump in? What is this episode on? This is going to be a surprise for you. We'll just jump in. Okay. Hello everyone, I'm David Dennis and this is Silverball Chronicles and with me is Ron... Hallett, that's my last name. H-A-L-L-E-T-T. I always give you like a funny middle name I guess you can think of one Vegemite Oh, is that going to be related to what we're talking about? It is, it is, what's up fella? You play X-Men yet? Yes Yeah, did the shooter lane work? No I did figure out a way to pull the plunger back And kind of jam it off to one side and release it And then it worked Ah, the old sideways, jam it, release it. It's a classic. Well, Stern has a fix coming out, so. That's good. It's really exciting. I'm really excited to play that. You know, Pintastic's coming up in April up here, which is up in the northeast. That's only five months away. It's only five months away. The countdown has started. Wow, the countdown has started already. Okay. They have the Silver Ball Rumble, which is a major tournament. Yes. Major tournament, which is our tournament, Silver Ball Chronicles and the Silver Ball Rumble. I don't know if anybody knew that. Oh, really? I didn't know that either. Cool. It is our tournament. Ah. Yes, and we always represent well. Well, you do. I drink too much and embarrass myself on a stream. Well, I haven't made finals for that one in a long time, so I'm not exactly representing well either. Well, you're representing. Mm-hmm. You're representing well. Now, Ron, we have seen a lot of people joining us over at Patreon.com slash Silverball Chronicles, most of them from Australia in the last little while. They popped in, which I think is very, very cool. They're coming in for, I think, the American barbecues, all the tips that the Americans have with barbecues.

medium confidence · Dennis notes the feature on Orbit 1 flyer and expresses surprise it appeared before High Speed; notes Williams/Gottlieb litigation over similar feature

Pinball Expo
event
Pintasticevent
Joe Cherovinoperson
Holdencompany
Columbia Picturescompany
X-Men (Stern)game
FJ (Hankin)game
Orbit 1 (Hankin)game
Slam Tilt Podcastorganization
Pasttimes Arcadeorganization

high · Ron Hallett: 'Stern has a fix coming out' regarding X-Men shooter problems; confirms personal workaround

  • ?

    product_concern: Hankin pinball machines received negative feedback from Australian community members at Pinball Expo; two Australian players stated games 'kind of suck'

    medium · Ron Hallett: 'At Expo, where there was lots of Aussies there, at least two of them said, Hey, did you play the Hanking games? They kind of suck'

  • ?

    technology_signal: Hankin's early solid-state era machines (1978) featured advanced innovations including automatic free game percentage calculation, Motorola 6802 microprocessor, 4K memory, simultaneous sound/score playback

    high · Orbit 1 flyer specifications documented in episode; Dennis notes feature predates Williams High Speed by 7-8 years

    • 3:25
    I think they call them Barbie. A strip on the Barbie, yes. Oh, don't, don't. At least I didn't do it with the accent. Well, okay. I thought we could go a whole episode without the stereotypical kind of Australian things that probably drive them insane. Like the Foster's beer. The Foster's beer. Yeah. The knifey spoonie. And remember, that's not a knife. That's a knife.
    3:54
    So, you know, we've had some people pop in for a couple months and leave just to say thanks. They've come in. If you're in our middle tier, which is $6 a month, you get early ad-free access to the show. You can jump into our private Discord chat room. You also get the barbecue tips, which, I mean, are a big deal.
    4:15
    Have you used any of these barbecue tips? No. I don't actually like barbecue. Oh, my God. I'm sorry. I thought I knew you. I'm sorry. Yeah, I thought you knew me. I don't like much. Oh, man. You like pizza. that's it uh pizza's good yeah you know what's also good our discord yeah so come on in there you get a free sticker after three months if you drop up to the elitist category there's where you're going to get after a three month period you're going to get all the same things but you're also after three months you're going to get a silver ball chronicles t-shirt so thank you very much for our new patrons and all of the shenanigans that have come from that now ron we're always on facebook as well that's another great place to chat with us so swing on over facebook.com slash silver ball chronicles and please leave us a five star review wherever you found us that way more people will see us we'll rise up in the algorithm are you familiar with the algorithm I would say four stars is the highest or six. Then give us those stars. Okay. But five is really the best.
    5:29
    Right. That's the way to do it. If you just want a T-shirt, just to say thanks. We've sold a lot of T-shirts. Some of them went to Australia, and we also sold a mug to, like, Michigan. So cheers to the guy who bought the mug. A Michigan mug. Yeah. Well, it's not a Michigan mug. I'm sure it's made in China. I thought it was made like in Canada of the finest Canadian maple. Yes, that's right. Just like the play fields of a barrels to fun machine. Barrels of fun machine. Maples? Wait a minute. They're made out of maple? I think it's made out of Canadian maple. No. Isn't that the other one?
    6:06
    The ones who did Pony Factory? We don't talk about that. They're the ones I believe that said that was made out of whatever. That's where I was getting that from. Pinball Adventures. That's what their name is. Yeah. That brings us to the corrections and concerns from our mailbag. That's over at silverballchronicles at gmail.com. The first one was you and I made some Simpsons jokes, and Joe Cherovino reached out, and he made some corrections. Did he reach out to you or just me?
    6:40
    What did we say wrong? So the first one is we were talking about Rainier Wolfcastle, the character that does the Austrian accent. Isn't it Wolfcastle? Right. Something like that. Rainier Wolfcastle. Yes. He's the Arnold Schwarzenegger of the show. Yes. Right. Well, we actually made reference to him and used the incorrect name. We used the name McBain, which is his character in the film that he plays in The Simpsons. What did I say? It's something like, not my job to read, but to lead, or to lead, not to read. But he does that when he's governor, which he's not McBain when he's governor. Exactly. That needed a correction. That needed the correction. The other thing was that I made the comment that, oh, my eyes burn.
    7:30
    Right? From the episode where he's playing Rainier Wolfcastle is playing, what was the character that he played?
    7:38
    Radioactive Man? Radioactive Man. so we we screwed that up so that was a big a big deal joe uh i think we've actually lost quite a few credit points with joe we're now down the list of respect when it comes to podcasters in the pinball industry i think we're we're down there with the loser kids now we didn't even talk about when he was commenting on his adult film career rainer wolf castle yes we left that on the table the other thing was we had a whole section a whole little like five minute conversation about why did d gottlieb and co get sold and i said that i was never able to find a primary source of david gottlieb or alvin gottlieb specifically saying kind of why it was sold off to columbia pictures. Well, the man himself, Michael Gottlieb, reached out and he gave us a piece of the missing link. But before I get into that, who is Michael Gottlieb? Michael Gottlieb is the son of Alvin Gottlieb. Yes. And the grandson of the D in D Gottlieb and Co, David Gottlieb. So he's in the know. He knows what's up. Well, Michael said, Dad and Uncle Judd sold D Gottlieb and Company because they were getting older and neither of them had children that were interested in taking over the business. Judd's boys were all doing their own thing, and my brother and I were too young. Further, Atari had been bought by Warner Communications, which sparked an interest in Columbia Pictures acquiring a game company. Dee Gottlieb had used Capital Gains, and Columbia Pictures had a tax-loss carryover forward that year, so it made sense from a tax perspective as well. It had nothing to do with the hospital. Dad and Uncle Judd were both on the board of the hospital, and it was doing great. So there you go. It comes down to timing, right? So Alvin was able to spend all that time working with David, kind of learning the ropes, manufacturing, doing a little sales, building relationships. But Alvin's children, Michael being one of them, were too young, and Judd's boys were off doing their own thing. So it was just timing. Perhaps if Michael and his siblings were born a little sooner, that transition would have taken place. And there you go. Once again, Atari screwing it up for everybody, right? Poor Atari. Right? Everybody following Atari thinking, oh, my God, if Atari is doing it, it must be smart. The thing is that kind of thing happens all the time with family-run businesses.
    10:18
    100%. I can name a bunch. We have in my area here, we had a jeweler, Finkel Jewelers. They've been around forever. I don't know how many generations they're in, but they just had their big going out of business sale because the current generation did not want to do it anymore. Yeah. Well, I think it was because their son, Howard Finkel, went to play football for the Dolphins. Isn't that correct? That's so bad.
    10:50
    You could have said Howard Finkel. He later went on to announce for WWE or something. Yeah. Now, the other thing that Michael had pointed out was actually a big error on my part. Yeah, you really blew this one. I really – this is like legitimately – usually we joke because we always get like a bunch of like silly corrections or we get corrections from Bruce Nightingale, the co-host of the Slam Tilt podcast. Yes, my other podcast. Check it out. And then we just ignore those. Or all the names we say wrong, which is most of them. Exactly. But this was actually like a legit error. So we've corrected our previous episode. So if you go back and listen to the D. Gottlieb episode, you'll like it's gone, the reference to an uncle who passed away and left an inheritance to David Gottlieb. That has been completely removed. So you will never hear that again unless it's this podcast. What had happened here was that during the listen back to this one, it was a bit difficult to hear because of a couple of accents and people talking over each other. And then the transcription software didn't write it out. So I had two issues. One is the software didn't write the words out. And the other one was that it was a bit crosstalky, so it was difficult to hear. So I sent that document, the audio file off to Michael, and he listened and confirmed, because he knows how his father speaks, that this was the joke about an uncle who died and left somebody a bunch of money in an inheritance was a joke that Alvin Gottlieb would often tell about a fictional self-made man who inherited a bunch of money where his father had worked for him. for every single penny and was – and that was the major reason he was so tight and was so risk adverse when it came to spending his money. Does that make sense? It makes perfect sense to me. Yeah, oops. Except the part where you said out. I don't know what that is. So anyway, I wanted to like personally apologize to the Gottliebs for throwing in kind of a comment or a thing in our – because we are, I don't know if you know this or not, Ron, a big deal. and not only are we a big deal, we are the source for all things history and pinball from here on out forever. Oh, really? We better not get anything else wrong. Yeah, that's right. So that's why I wanted to make that correction. Now, I didn't have to make that correction. I could just, you know, whatever. But I mean, I want to do the best job possible. So that's why we made that correction and nobody will ever hear of us making a mistake ever again. it's important that history is correct yes well i mean it's this is because of you oh really you should have you should have known that this was not correct and you should have stopped me okay because you usually do that is true that is true i've saved you many times but oh the stuff that has hit the editing floor but all those situations were stuff i was actually there for so i knew it was wrong yeah all right good stuff but you know what i wasn't there for our subject today. Oh.
    14:09
    Do you ever find yourself craving, Ron? Chocolate, yeah. Do you ever hanker for something special? Hanker? Hmm. We have had multiple people email and we have had inquiries when we are out in the public about a little known company called Hankin.
    14:32
    Some might say that all of these people had a craving for another australian based episode after our huge hit a couple of months ago let's go down under with part two hankering for hankin you had to say down under huh i did at least i didn't say shrimp on a barbie pinball's big in australia you know that oh yeah it's on it's unusually large for such a small country.
    15:04
    It's far away from where most pinball is created, but yet it's big. A lot of Australian podcasters are down there. As opposed to English podcasters from Australia. Exactly, or the German ones. Okay. Yeah, yeah. Now, it's usually the Greeks in Australia that the Australians don't like. Yes. Now, we're big in Australia. Did you know that? I did not know that. I don't look at the stats. We are a big deal. Oh. That's why I wanted to correct our previous episode, because the United States is clearly the number one listening group. And I would assume Canada's two. Canada is number two, but only by like 90 listeners. The third largest is Australia. Wow. And oddly enough, Sweden after that, which is weird. So hello, Sweden. Not really. It's pretty big there. Is it big in Sweden? Oh, yeah. I think that's pretty cool we've sold shirts to Australia I don't know why they wanted to because the shipping is a fortune but thank you and if you're Australian and you want any shirts silverballswag.com slash silverballchronicles you're going to be at Pintastic so if any of you are going to Pintastic you can just get a whole bunch of them yeah shoot me an email because I don't think anybody comes to like Boston when they come from Australia, right? It doesn't seem like an Australian destination. Los Angeles, Disney World, maybe Chicago Expo. They could stop on the way to New York City or something. Texas, yeah, that's true. There you go. But Boston's pretty cool.
    16:49
    But it's in Marlboro, which is not Boston. The first Aussie pinball company was Hankin & Co. Manufacturing Limited. And it's basically known as Hankin. Now, this is the Australian-based entertainment company that in 1978 decided to dip its toe into pinball manufacturing. So I went over to their website, and this is what it says. Well, it says A. Hankin & Company provides any venue with a vast array of entertainment and atmospheric solutions. Long established and highly regarded, we have been servicing the hotel and club industry since 1955. A. Hankin & Company maintains an edge on all competitors by managing to stay at the forefront of the music and pool table industry through continual investment into new research and development, and by subsequently improving existing products and ultimately meeting the ever-changing market demands when launching new products on a regular basis. So they do basically a lot of digital jukeboxes and stuff for venues like clubs and audiovisual equipment. And pool tables. I wonder what kind of new products come out in the pool table market. Different colors? I've heard there is so much change in the slate industry recently. Like do the pockets light up different colors? I'm just wondering. Yeah, exactly. How do you innovate on a pool table, basically? There's probably a way. But nailing down what the company actually has been is today and over the time has been kind of difficult. Like, for example, they made seven pinball machines between 1978 and 1980. However, IPDB only lists them as five.
    18:46
    So there's like, it's, the episode's a bit muddled. It's a little bit of a thing here. So I'm letting you know that when I looked for my sources, things did get weird. In 1978, they had Dark Rider. It sold 1,200 units. In 1978, they had Liquid Lightning.
    19:04
    That sounds wet. Yeah, that could be like the diarrhea game or something. Sounds shocking. Oh, God, we're on a roll here. This is great. Those games are listed in the Mr. Pinball list and price guide from 2018 when I looked that one up. But those two games are not listed on IPDB. So they were either video or they were conversion kits for existing machines. These games in loose release order are listed here. So usually we'll go through games in chronological order when they were released, but some of them kind of overlap or they were released at similar times or one was released and then actually manufactured after the other. So it's a bit of a muddled-ish here, but I'm going through as best as I can. So please, we're doing our best here.
    20:03
    The games are mostly uncredited designs as well. But I believe that they were most likely designed by David Hankin, who is the owner and founder of Hankin.
    20:17
    Ron, you have played all of these games recently. Yes, recently, yes. These were all at Pinball Expo. So we have first-hand account of the stunning events of this company and the machines that they produced. Oh, this is exciting. So first out of the gate, how are these games? Are they built well? Do they feel solid? They feel like a pinball machine. So are they stern electronics kind of wish, or are they more like modern Bally Williams built like a rock? It's tough to tell that just by playing it. I didn't take them apart or lift the play field up or look at any of the mechs. You didn't give them a jiggle?
    21:08
    I mean, they didn't fall apart. They didn't squeak? No. Backglasses looked good? As good as backglasses that old are going to look. Okay, so at first glance, good-looking pinball machine. Doesn't look weird, right? They look normal. Backbox, playfield. They're not Atari weird-looking, no. No, and they don't have odd-shaped backboxes or weird square pop bumpers like some of those European companies? No. Okay. So we're off to the races here. Literally. Their first machine was called FJ It a hot rods and car theme It from 1978 It sells 1 units and it has uncredited art but it believed that it was Michael Eggleston I hope I got that one right. What's an FJ? Ah, okay. So, an FJ. I had to look this up. Footjoy? It's a golf-related. No. Right. Here's the thing. When you throw in FJ into Google, you get some difficult returned results. Okay, so be careful if you're doing that around the family. But what I did do is I threw that in there, and I added the Australian kind of thing, and then it came up with what is an FJ. This is something that is, and everybody who's listening to this in Australia is like, well, of course I know what that is. Right? But we don't know what that is here in North America. I think it was a TJ, right? Wasn't that a Jeep? Jeep TJ. That was the thing up here. So, okay, we're in the closer area. FJ refers to the Australian automobile model, FJ, made in the 1950s by a company called Holden. reportedly these were an iconic youth car in the 60s and 70s much like in north america if you had a 57 chevy or a 32 ford coupe coupe no it's coupe no it's coupe why does it have an e at the end the 30 32 for deuce coupe i know you say coupe but it's coupe i say it the correct american way yes Holden became a division of General Motors in the 30s and in 2020 ceased trading after 164 years. Now, this I did know. I do know who Holden is because they popularized the Ute. Do you know what a Ute is?
    23:42
    That's what – what's his face called? Utes in My Cousin Vinny? Yeah. No, no, no. Ute are like utility vehicles down in Australia, but it's not like in North America where you have a sport utility vehicle. Those are the car trucks.
    24:04
    You know what I mean? That it's a car that has a truck bed on it, like an El Camino. Are you with me? Sure.
    24:13
    Look it up. Look up. Throw it into the Google. Here, I got to show you now because now I got to get your El Camino. Wasn't that a Clint Eastwood movie? No, that was Gran Torino. Oh, Gran Torino.
    24:27
    So there, that thing. You know what I mean? So it's like a car, but it's a truck. Yeah, I've seen those.
    24:34
    There was an era where I saw a lot of those, but yes. These are a big deal in Australia to the point of that they still made them for many, many years. I think they still make them today. But these are like a cool kind of car down there. And I'll tell you that Australians have some really, really sweet utes down there, these cars, like legitimately. There was like a Vauxhall, I think, at one time that had like a huge Corvette V8 in it or something. Well worth to throw that into the Google machine and look some of those up because there's some cool ones. But getting back to pinball. Come on, man. I love cars. Okay, so back to pinball. Let's click on the flyer because you're coming out of the gates here, right? You've got to have a flyer. We know we love our flyers. And you've got to smash it out of the park, to use a cliche, to ensure that we are launching a new company in Australia, the first manufacturer in Australia. So they're not manufactured elsewhere, brought in and manufactured. It is 100% made in Australia. What do we see here? It's exciting. It's fast. It looks good. It's reliable, easy to service, and under warranty. It's competitive. It's the right place, and it's Australian.
    25:53
    Yes. Top saucer bonus multiplier. That sounds like a bally. Shoot it up to the top into the saucer. That's what that sounds like. Return ball to the action area of the play field. Come on, Aussies. Come on. Light spinning targets and star rollovers. Wait a minute. It has a revolutionary new target system. Oh. Which I can't read because you're not zoomed in enough for me. I can't see it. I think if I get any further, it's going to be. Oh, that's better.
    26:22
    Automatically steps varying target value. Exciting skill shooting to obtain extra ball. Completing all through rows starts special sequence.
    26:35
    Adjustable stepping speed of spotted targets. optional memory recall on targets oh that's actually fancy right this is that kind of late 70s uh when we're moving from the em era into solid state right so now we can have some of these fancier little additional things like memory recall targets i like their little saying they got in there come on aussie come on yeah i wonder what that must be a thing be the first in your street in your street, not on your street. That's weird. Be the first in your street with an FJ. You and your customers deserve it. Yeah, okay. When we're looking at this, we've got like three pop bumpers in the middle of the play field, right? Which is pretty standard back in the day for those things. We've got your Italian bottom, right? Sling, flipper, flipper, sling. So then we've got an in lane and an out lane. so we're looking pretty good there. But above the outlanes, there's these, what do they call those?
    27:42
    Those holes? Captive holes? They're saucers, aren't they? Saucers, that's the word. Frig, I'm blanking. Wow. The saucers. Drop targets on the left with, like, flames. Looks like a drag strip. And it has two really awesomely placed spinners. What do you think? Spinners are awesome. Is this a wide body? I'm trying to remember. I just played these and I can't remember. You just played – it looks like a standard body to me in this picture. It would say if it's a wide body somewhere in the listing. It looks cool. And a lot of the posts very, very close to the flippers. Very dangerous-looking game. This one looks fun. What do you think?
    28:20
    Okay. Not so much, he says. Let's put it this way. At Expo, where there was lots of Aussies there, at least two of them said, Hey, did you play the Hanking games? They kind of suck. That's what they told me. They told me. And they're the Australians. They're the Australians. So, you know, you've got to have some pride. You've got to start somewhere. You've got to start somewhere, man. You've got to start somewhere. So that brings us to the second game, also made in 1978. That's Orbiter 1. No. It's Orbit 1. Orbiter 1 would be the start.
    29:00
    Oh, is this a prequel? Or maybe this is a sequel to Orbit, or maybe it's a sequel to Super Orbit. Science fiction fantasy theme, sells 1,020 units, the same amount, oddly enough, as the FJ game. So it's like they must have just ordered that amount of parts.
    29:21
    Uncredited design and art. But again, it's probably David Hankin that did it. The game is named after an arcade that Hankin opened in Newcastle, Australia in the late 70s. Around Newcastle, but yes. Whatever.
    29:38
    I'm just trying to be accurate. We're not into details here. We know that from the last episode. So this is an awesome flyer. But it also says First Australian Pinball. Yeah, so I don't... And the other one kind of said that, so... So this is where I'm getting into the like weird crossing over of when they were made and released. Because the other one kind of made it sound like it was the first. Now, this one is saying first. Now, they were also made in the same year. So it's possible that they were launched at the same time, like at the same show. It's one to four players, three or five balls. Space age electronic score sounds built in self-test system front. Wait a minute. Front end programming. I don't know what that means. that must be like uh keeping track of like money and stuff feature memory wait a minute automatic free game percentage calculation oh that's wait a minute we had a whole thing wait a minute that was done on high speed you mean to tell me orbit one had that first well here's the thing like seven or eight years into before that this was a whole a whole thing with williams and gottlieb right we talked about this where williams was suing gottlieb or they had to pay a bunch of fees for their automatic free game percentage calculation, it must be a different type of automatic free game percentage calculation. Yeah, that's got to be different than what I'm thinking.
    31:01
    It might be the same thing, but maybe the calculation itself, like the algorithm, is different. I mean, if they did it that far before high speed did it, that's impressive. Yeah, and it has a six-month warranty on its boards.
    31:16
    Huh? For those people moving from electromechanical into this whole solid-state era, I bet you that was a huge concern, was how reliable are these boards going to be? Because all I have to do is file and clean the stepper motor, the computer in the M system, right? Where this is a whole thing that I don't understand. Well, it has a six-month warranty. It uses the Motorola 6802 microprocessor. It has 4K of memory. All of the Ks?
    31:54
    Let's see. I like this. 25% less componentry, I didn't know that was a word, than most U.S.-made machines. Yeah, it's got less crap. Switches allow 11 different pricing levels. Cheat-proof income totalizer? Totalizer? total what does that say t-o-t-a-l total is the later total isolator sure automatic free game percentage calculator i really want to know how that works if you know what that is throw that into silverball chronicles at gmail.com that's something we'd like to i'd like to know what that means yeah um if anyone at past times arcade knows what that means because they have all these games there yeah there you go there you go has own on board quote unquote on board microprocessor enabling sound to be produced simultaneously with score prevents tedious and costly delays particularly particularly when a machine is counting off bonus points yeah sorry everybody this is a bit blurry that's why we're having a hard time oh you're having a hard time i i could read it i wonder if that means it can play the sounds simultaneously it was saying like i don't have to wait to play all the sounds sound system has the ability to create 16 different notes whoa which when combined with wave shape uh what i don't know what that says alterations literally enable it to produce a limitless limitless number of different sounds yes yes you're not having any trouble at all reading through this blurry text i just don't know what that word is it's amazing let's take a look at the play field let's look at this back glass this back glass is pretty awesome it's like a it's like a planets it's it's got the mirroring mirror gotta have the mirror man the mirroring it looks like i wish we did more planet silver ball it looks like yeah so cool so cool see i'm a sucker for these old like the cool thing about science fiction art. And this goes back to like pinball machines or films or movie posters or comic books. Science fiction art around different eras is so cool because you can distinctly look at it and be like, oh, that is totally like 70s science fiction art. And it's so distinctly different than science fiction art today. It's so cool. But this is another kind of unique play field. it has what looks to be a captive ball on the left side that bounces up to hit hits a target there's an orbit spinner that kind of has one of those loops in the middle so instead of going all the way around the orbit it's got like a horseshoe the captive ball on the left it's in a thing that looks i think it's supposed to look like a rocket but it actually looks just like the inline drop target area of future spa yeah and it looks like a boat it doesn't look like a rocket it looks like a boat just kind of the weird shape of it but it's a unique play field it's kind of neat right it's got that old stern kind of looking feel to it although it doesn't look weird enough to be an old star like it has a couple like you look at it you're like oh that's kind of cool and then i think when you play it you're gonna go that's kind of gross i'd say i played all five of them and there was nothing in any of them that was like offensive like oh my god what were they thinking Okay. So do you think they're stealing ideas from anybody? Well, we'll get to that. But no, I mean, these are very, very safe, simple playfield designs. There's nothing. Two pop bumpers, captive ball, spinner, three stand-ups. Yeah. Pretty straightforward. Very simple game. Looks like it's fun. Looks like a fun game. If you had this in your basement, you'd enjoy it. For sure. It's no stars. Well, nothing is stars, but yeah. snow stars how about this is the one this is the game i was like it confused me like who is this it literally says on dennis lily's how's that how's that h o w z a t i'm like that's got to be that means something in australia i have no idea what that is a h o w z it turns out dennis lily i guess is a cricket player yeah so how's that i would assume it would be like how is that which is like jammed together in australian way dennis what is dennis lily's how is that something like that so that's how i would sue so yeah it's cricket theme only 350 units uncredited all around and this one is in fact a wide body this brings me to who the hell is dennis lily so i googled dennis and this is like everybody in australia and if anybody listens to us in you know like Australian cricketing or the cricket world is going to think like, how do you not know who Dennis Lilly is? And, and to us in North America, cricket is not a thing unless you're from away and you play cricket here amongst your community. But like Canadians don't play cricket. I was actually hoping to be like an Australian football player. So I love that stuff. You see, that's cool. Cause then you can be like, or a rugby guy, right? All Australian rules football to me is very Australian because it's Australian rules football. Yeah, isn't that soccer? No, no. Australian rules football, they play with a football. It looks more like an American football. But they have to punch it to each other or kick it to each other. And if they kick it in the air and the guys all jump up, if the guy catches it, it's a mark. And they have to clear out of his way and then he gets like a free kick and stuff. And there's, what, four goal posts? You kick it between the middle two. I think it's like six points, just like in the U.S. And in the outer two or one or two points or something. And these guys just tackle each other and stuff. It's great. It's like Canadian football where we're like, ah, that field's not big enough. Let's make it a little bigger. And then all the players that aren't good enough in the NFL can come play here. You know, the Dennis Lilly, he was rated as the outstanding fast bowler of his generation. So, okay, this brings me to this thing. So I Google Dennis Lilly, and he's this Australian retired cricketer. And then, as you say, he's the outstanding fast bowler of his generation. So then I'm like, oh, God. Now I've got to look up a bunch of other words that I don't understand. So Lilly formed a new ball partnership with Jeff Thompson, which is recognized as one of the greatest bowling pairs of all time. So now I've got to look up bowling, which I think is throwing the ball.
    38:30
    And then I've got to look up this Jeff Thompson guy. Thompson. Without a P. Thompson. Now, by the time of his retirement, David Lilly's retirement, from international cricket in 1984, so this is five years after this game is made, or six years after this game is made, he had become the world record holder for the most test wickets at 355 and had firmly established himself as one of the most recognizable and renowned Australian sportspersons of all time. What was his name? David Lilly? No, it's Dennis Lilly. David Dennis. That's my name.
    39:11
    So now I've got to look up what the heck a test wicket is. No, you don't. He was part of the Australian squad, which finished as runners-up at the 1975 Cricket World Cup. And in 2009, Lilly was inducted into the ICC Cricket Hall of Fame. Yes. So that means when this game was made, he was still active. Yes, he was still a big deal. Cricket is the sport, not big in North America, much bigger in British colonies and in India. Bowling and bowler, that's the pitcher who throws the ball. So they do it all crazy-like, like their arm is made of jello, which is kind of neat.
    39:50
    A wicket, that's the posts that are up behind the cricket bat person who holds the bat. and the bowler has to hit the wickets down. And a test is apparently the longest format of the game, which is very historical and prestigious, and can end up being played over five days. That's right, yeah, because they can just keep going, yeah. You think watching a stream of pinball is boring. I think that would never work in this country, in the U.S. They would insist the game ends. they had to speed up baseball because it was too slow so let's take a look at the play field this one you played and this is the one that confused yeah the back glass was something it just got the dude's face like right in the center you know who that strikes me so it says Dennis Lillies how is that and then there's like cricketer he kind of looks like Yanni so he's got dark long hair and this super thick black mustache awesome mustache Hey, Pinheads. I just wanted to let you know that when I'm not doing this podcast and making bad jokes, I'm Dave, the financial guy. At Dennis Financial, our advisors strive to provide a return on life for our clients, not just a return on investment. The value of advice is something that we take very seriously. A valuable advisor doesn't just provide investment advice. They share wisdom. And this is where the true value of an advisor emerges. Don't take my word for it. Just listen to Ron Sterling, an average Canadian. Yeah, if you're in Canada, Dennis Financial is for you. If you're looking for a more human dimension to your financial advice, Dennis Financial Inc. has you covered with advisors licensed in most Canadian provinces. We're also doing secure online video meetings. Contact me via email at david at dennisfinancial.net for a free rate quote and a copy of our value of advice ebook or check out dennisfinancial.ca. Insurance Solutions provided by Dennis Financial Inc., Canadian residence only. He looks like in that episode of The Simpsons when they have the baseball team. Uh, that's... And Mr. Burns makes him shave his... Okay, you're really getting... Okay, it's a softball team, and he makes Don Mattingly shave off his... Yeah, because... get a haircut. Because there was an incident where they told him to get a haircut when he was with the Yankees, so they wanted to make fun of it. yeah so he looks like him because he's got that big friggin mustache the dark hair it's hilarious and on the flyer it just has how's that Dennis Lilly's how's that love it this game this is awesome it's the pinball with the speed and excitement that only dennis lilly or david lilly if you're david dennis can match hankin's new wide-bodied pinball see they're they're plugging that it's wide body featuring two sets of drop targets and dual flippers test the skills of every player yeah so so hankin is not immune from the late 70s early 80s freak out over wide bodies. Holy crap. I'm looking at this.
    43:19
    I've commented in the past how many times Arnold Schwarzenegger was on Terminator 3. Like he's on it so many times. This game beats him hands down I losing track of how many Dennis lilies are on this game one two three four five six seven all the pop bumpers all three pop bumpers are him it like if you had a kiss and gene simmons was just on all four pop bumpers like he probably would want to be but yeah so you can see that that apparently the bowler the the pitcher if you will they they like a like an actual baseball pitcher hold the ball a certain way and then it makes the ball spin in weird ways it's his hand is like all over and the ball being thrown and it's like it's the thing you know you need how's that like australia needs lily i love it you know oh i like this extra large cash box it comes with because you're gonna need it wait a minute each solenoid individually fused damn That's a lot of fuses, unless there's not a lot of solenoids. But it looks packed, right? It also has the automatic free game calculator. Yeah. There is a pop bumper in the bottom of the left of the lower play field, sort of like the – It's the paragon position. The dungeon or whatever? No. No, it's – Keep going.
    44:44
    It's like the cave? The beast's lair. The lair. There you go. A beast can have a lair in a cave. then you go up the play field you got drop targets right right in front of the four flippers yeah it's got the five targets in front so it kind of looks like what it's like those sucker targets well i'm trying to think what was the steve ritchie one that he did the white superman no the one after the white body he did after that one at williams oh yeah darn it but it reminds me of that with the targets in front but yeah superman i think has the same deal with the five targets in front yeah two spinners everybody loves a spinner nice captive uh uh you know spot on the right side a saucer it's got the flip so that so it's got a set of flippers right in front of those five drop targets on the left side which is just terrible if you ask me they don't really shoot at anything but then the one on the left side it's almost like uh genie right where it's got the drop targets at the top and it's got the flipper on the bottom left side a little bit of that into a and then there's a spinner up there it looks cool and you played this and it was not good why why was it not good i i honestly i can't remember i just remember one of the five i actually was like ah i kind of like this one and that was it i didn't hate any of them does it suffer does this one suffer from that kind of wide body like ah the ball kind of lumbers around and takes a while and you're like i wish it was no they all they all play pretty fast okay that's good God, he's all over the play field. He's everywhere. This has to be a record. Actually, I'm going to put it out there. If anyone wants to email us, if they can find any play field that has more instances of the same dude. Yes. Because I'm counting. It's literally the same guy. One, two, three, four, five, six, seven, eight. He's throwing the ball. So what it is is one picture with his hand up at the top, one of it coming down, one of it fully all the way down. I'm counting at least 15 instances of him. Yeah. So the three on the bottom are the batter. I don't know if that's actually. He's like on every plastic. One, two, three, four, five, six, seven. Insane. Eight, nine, 10, 11, 12, 13. Was there an issue with approvals? There's 13. And then on the back last 14. I was like, no, mate, I'm not on there enough. More. So what was that? 14. Yeah, that's right. He's on the back glass at least another five times. Oh, my God. Unbelievable. If you can find any other pinball machine that has the character. We challenge our listeners. It doesn't have to be. I'm not going to qualify it by saying it has to be the licensed person. No, no. It just has to be the same character this many times. Good on you, Australia. Good on you. Good for you.
    47:35
    Or ban on him if he had a huge ego and demanded that he be on the game that many times. You know, I bet you what it was is the Hankin team realized that they had like a huge star and they wanted to put them all over it so they could like fawn over him and talk to him and say like, look what we made for you and all. It's like if Wayne Gretzky came to a Canadian team, a Canadian manufacturer was like, can you make me a pinball machine? Everybody there would be like, oh my God, it's Wayne Gretzky. It'd be like they didn't get any permission to make the game from him. So they figured if they put him on it enough, he couldn't turn it down. Like, oh, my God.
    48:13
    I'm on this thing like 20 times. This is great. Okay. Do you have a favorite week of television? I don't watch television. You don't watch television. You don't have a favorite time of the year? Gee, I wonder if maybe Shark Week would be my favorite time of the year. There you go. The next game is Shark. This is the one I actually kind of liked. It's a futuristic underwater surfing shark attack theme. Yeah, it's Jaws, but they probably didn't have license, though. It's just shark. But in Jaws, they did not surf in spacesuits. This is like cosmic gunfight if it's about sharks somehow. So in Australia, like surfing is a thing. That's like a whole subculture. Going to the beach. It can't look as cool as these people surfing, though. It's it's so it where I'm from going to the beach is like that. But we don't have like Australian beaches where we're at. Right. Like we're we're in northern Atlantic province. It's freaking cold here. Even all the time. Like you get used to the cold water. We don't really like when we surf here, we wear like full wetsuits. Looking at the back glass, I like it even more now. Isn't that cool? It's got sharks. it's got people surfing on like futuristic surfboards wearing like spacesuits all the score displays have shark teeth around them and i just realized they're being eaten the whole border of the back glass is shark teeth four eyeballs four random eyeballs in the corner i don't know if those are the sharks eyeballs are those the eyeballs of the people that are left over because they've been eaten by a shark or those are the eyeballs that wesley snipes popped out of the guy's head in demolition man i think here's a real question okay are the sharks and the surfers are they are they fighting crime yeah or are the surfers fighting off the shark yeah it's kind of confusing they almost look like they're on the same team are the sharks in space no there's water there's water you can see the water are they under the water they don't look like they're uh they're jumping up maybe it's like sharknado hmm yeah it's before it's time is this a wide body too i think it is it is yes you know you can sink your teeth into big profits oh i love it i love it already good yep three three banks of drop targets for exciting skill shooting the extra ball wedge turns every 35 scores of 100 points or more for approximately eight seconds. Turns on every 35 scores of 100 points. Okay. Horseshoe. It has a horseshoe. Memory options for both bonus multipliers and bonus count. You can hold them over. The finish is top quality polyurethane paint for extra attraction and durability. Mmm. Polyurethane. My favorite kind of urethane. And don't forget that self-test system with that automatic free game calculation which I gotta find out what the hell that means. Someone needs to tell us what that means. Big time. But let's take a look at it. So the art on the side, okay, the side of the cabinet, since we're talking about art, is like a dude in a wetsuit scuba diving or a gal. He's looking for the Thunderball auditions. Yeah. But, man, that wetsuit is tight. Look at how tight it is around his butt. Yes, it is very tight. It looks uncomfortably tight. It's surprising that they were able to do that with, like, stencils and spraying it on. Actually, isn't the thing in his mouth like out? Yes. It's like hanging there. It looks like it's hanging behind him, but yet he has another one in his mouth. I'm confused. So he's got a backup?
    51:56
    Not a bad idea, I guess. Yeah, I mean, you are underwater. So this one has the two flippers on the bottom plus the mini flippers above them. Yeah. And this is a little bit like Space Invaders, right, where it's got kind of the two at the top and the two on the bottom? Mm-hmm. It's kind of cool. The playfield art is dark. It's very blackish. It's got lots of blacks. There's like a weird, like, I want to say he's like a wizard looking dude in the middle. I don't understand what he's doing. He's like mad at the shark. But it is busy. It is a busy playfield. There is art all over the place. this is like this is like if steve richie had a modern game and they had to fill up the middle of the play field so they just did a bunch of art it's the best part they've had so far my opinion it's cool this fish right here has glasses on oh he's not a wizard he's like a fish with like a face a human face with sideburns i man this is a this game this game is a trip dude i remember it's the one i really liked and this is the one you liked of all of them is it because of the art or because of the gameplay gameplay okay so describe a little bit of that would you i can't remember i just remember i just remember i liked it it was it was simple to figure out what to do and i just kept doing it over and over it's like it's kind of cool it's it is something else going on here and there's like a fish lady at the top without without a shirt on yes because we can do that because we because she's a fish lady well no because we're not in the u.s yeah i thought the water was warmer in australia though i like that there's a drain skirt yes it's not an apron it's a drain arch a drain skirt ron approved winner this one yeah if i if i was forced to take a Hankin game. This would be the one? This would be the one. Not the one you would think. Being the huge Star Wars fan I am, you would think a certain game.
    54:10
    So the last pinball machine made by Hankin was The Empire Strikes Back. This is the one that everybody's like, Everyone actually knows exists, yes. Yeah, nobody knows, nobody would know about Hankin if it wasn't for this game. There's tons of games that were made in Spain or in Italy or in a lot of those countries, and people don't really know about those companies. I mean, someone can correct me, but I believe this is the first Star Wars pinball machine. Yeah. It's not even built in the U.S. It's in Australia. It's the best Star Wars film theme. The Empire Strikes Back from June of 1980. Right when the movie came out, too. So this hit at the right time. And it is licensed. Yeah, this is not one of those sketchy ones. It's not one of those where they just did it. No, they actually licensed this. Yes, The Empire Storks Back. The Empire Strikes Back. Yeah, none of that. None of that. Change in some letters to make it sound faster. Released May of 1980. Yeah, what a great game. I'm sorry, what a great film. So this film was a $30 million budget, and it was the follow-up to the movie that started it all, Empire Strikes Back. I'm sorry. Star Wars. I just like the fact that it only cost $30 million. and it made $538 million.
    55:31
    $538 million back then. Of course, that is after the destruction of the Death Star. The Imperial fleet is trying to chase down all of the Rebel Alliance. The Empire is striking back. Yes, as the name would suggest. And this movie is really great for a couple of reasons. One of them is George Lucas didn't direct it or do any of the screenplay.
    55:53
    Well, it's also the first one I actually saw in a theater. When I was a kid, man, Empire Strikes Back. Still awesome. I think probably the next best one is The Last Jedi, which now people have crashed their cars because they're so angry, I say. Oh. But I think The Last Jedi is a frigging great- There's only three Star Wars movies, bro. Come on. That's true. Yep. That's because they're no longer for your age group after you see them when you're a child. It sucks. This is all from a secondary source, what I'm going to talk about here. So I wasn't able to find any primary sources of David Hankin talking on a podcast or any written documentation on any of this. So I'm getting this from a secondary source. Apparently, the licensing was arranged through Roadshow Licensing Corp. Limited, which was the Australian representative for Lucasfilm.
    56:43
    So it wasn't Lucasfilm directly. It was the Australian arm of Lucasfilm or the person that they delegated that to. So I guess in Australia, if you were going to make Star Wars toys, you probably had to go through this roadshow licensing corporation company. The game itself is pretty – The highlight is the back glass. Is pretty familiar. Because it's got Vader. So the back glass has the Vader. It's got the Empire Strikes Back. and it has the Infinity Glass look. I think it's a wide body too. From Xenon, yeah, it's a wide body. It's got that Xenon look. Oh, I love it. Remember, strike back and strike it rich.
    57:28
    Get in on it because, man, they were behind the ball with how Star Wars like exploded into the scene. They kind of had their ducks in a row when it came to licensing and toys and stuff with Empire Strikes Back. Where was the U.S. on this stuff? They failed so miserably with pinball. trying to yeah i mean there's doesn't make any sense yeah even the first like well the video game was huge you might be too you might be too young to remember the vector graphics classic star wars but yes well one of the greatest controllers ever and yeah if you can find the sit-down model awesome that's the way to go that's got like the what is a 25 inch monitor It's got the bigger monitor. Yeah. So, see, I didn't know about that game when it was younger. I knew about that game when I was, like, looking up arcade machines. And I'm like, ooh. Yeah, there's a picture somewhere of the one they gave to Lucas. They put an extra plaque on the side or something. This doesn't have just a flyer. This has a booklet. Yeah, it's got to have a booklet. It's Star Wars. May the Force be with you. Yes. With Hank. Yeah. Nice. They've really hammered it with that one. They put Vader everywhere, which is smart. Now look at this picture on the left. Who is that? Leaning over this pinball machine, leaning over it, checking it out. Oh, is that Mark Hamill? That is Mark Hamill. Wow. A young Mark Hamill before he got old and bitter.
    58:57
    Before they destroyed his character. It's Luke Skywalker. Or gave his character more depth. Yeah, okay. Luke Skywalker. The movie of the year is now the pinball of the year. And it was such a pinball of the year. How many units did it sell? Uh-huh. 350. Yikes. Okay. I think Mark Hamill was looking at it saying, hey, this looks like firepower.
    59:21
    He's like, wait a second. Isn't this game Space Invaders? I always thought more of firepower, especially the whole four-pop bumper nest with the six targets. just like firepower it's got two dead bumpers at the top so a total of like six bumpers two four active two inactive is that their first inactive bumpers i think so there's a spinner on the left side there's a spinner on the right on the orbits captive hole on the right very it looks like not a very target but a stand-up target some drop targets and in the middle it's got those like you said six stand-up targets like firepower now when it gets to the lower play field and the sort of the middle let me say middle of play field to lower play field because it's a wide body so it's really big and it's all the the arch or what did they call it the uh oh yeah we just said the drain cover cover yeah the drain cover it's really way down the play field but i just like that So this came out in 1980. So at the beginning of 1980, they saw Firepower, and they saw how much money that made. So it's like, we need to replicate this in our design. But let's make it better. I don't think this has multiball. So let's make more. Let's make more of it, because more is always better. So let's put four flippers at the bottom. Again, like Space Invaders, two small ones, and then two regular-sized ones below that. It's got six lanes, two out lanes. I'm sorry, one out lane on each side and then two in lanes on each side. So six in total. The middle, the art. So it's Star Wars. You look at it and it's.
    61:09
    It ain't no shark. But, yeah, it's got an AT-AT. It's got Vader. The AT-AT just doesn't look the same. It just looks. It's a bit. I don't know. It just looks off. You know, in the movie, they never call it that either. AT-AT was purely to sell the product as a kid, and it worked because I still call it that. What are they actually called? AT-AT? No, they're just called Imperial Walkers.
    61:33
    That's all they call them in the movie. They don't say, the AT-ATs are here. There's a Millennium Falcon, which did not fight the walker. At least the size is close. Yeah. It's got the little other ships that fly around it. They did everything with the artwork they should have. They put lots of Vader because the Empire Strikes Back, so it's very Empire heavy. Yeah, it's the darker of the films. And I think when you give people a choice between good guys and bad guy artwork, they almost go for bad guy's artwork every time. I mean, Stern did that with their Star Wars. They had the one that was more rebel side and then had the art package that was more imperial, more Vader. Yeah, it was like premium versus pro. Yeah. Super cool. Vader's on the pop bumpers because, of course, he is. He's on the side cabinet, which looks really cool.
    62:26
    He's using the Force, right? There's like waves coming over. Yes, there's waves coming from it. He's using the Force, which is an invisible wave.
    62:36
    So cool. That'd be cool if they made that sound. Yeah. I don't believe it even has multiball, though. I don't believe it does. But it is super cool. and you played it and thought it was awesome.
    62:49
    I played it and went back to play Shark instead. So according to Pinball Memories, which is a book, the game was first exhibited in November of 1980 at the National Amusement Machine Operators Convention held in Surfer's Paradise, Queensland, Australia. What an awesome name.
    63:09
    Surfer's Paradise. Imagine showing up for that and there's a freaking Empire Strikes Back and it's like, what? But why, with such an awesome, they're getting into the licensing. They're getting it, right? Why was this their final game, and why did they cut production so short? Because of video games. Killing everything, man. The Pinball Compendium, which is the 1970 to 1981 version, David Hankin tells the author that the pinball production stopped because of video games' popularity. right it was the video game sort of revolution because a video game you just put it on location you turn it on people put coins in it it just works and it makes money there's no pop bumpers there's no fuses there's no controllers really all you got to worry about yeah the board the ball doesn't get stuck right if the joystick stops working you unscrew it you screw a new one in you plug it in, done. I just bought a Missile Command. You love Missile Command, Ron. Wait, you bought a Missile Command? I bought a Missile Command. You bought a vector game? Good luck with that monitor. No, this is a regular monitor. Really? I thought it was a vector monitor. Oh, yeah, you're right. What am I thinking of? Yeah. Damn. You're thinking of Space Duel. I'm thinking Asteroids. Yeah, Asteroids, which I would love in Asteroids, too. Those are my two favorite games. So I bought a Missile Command. That's got, like, the large trackball. Yeah, the 4-inch. Yeah, the 4-inch instead of the 3-inch. Oh, my. So this thing just sits in my living room. I just turn it on and it works, right? There's no screwing around with it. Yeah, actually, with a CRT monitor, if it's been, like, recapped, rebuilt, it will, in a home use where you hardly ever turn it on, it'll outlast you. You'll be dead before that thing does it work. Yeah, so this game was refurbished by the one and the only Todd Tuckey. this is a Todd Tucky so it's been all redone on the inside the rollerball and all the stuff and the chips and the big blue and all that other crap inside has all been done and it signed on the back by the whole team I believe this is one of those machines that was sent to Mark from Canada
    65:25
    And he must not have liked it or wasn't very good at it, but now it's mine. So who got the next kick at the kangaroo, Ron? The next kick? Oh, you mean the next Australian to try to make a game? Yeah. I mean, you could say Wayne.
    65:39
    Yeah. And Wayne's last name is? Oh, it's Gillard? I think it's Gillard. Yeah, I think you're right. Wayne Gillard. Now, he was on the Aussie Pinball Podcast, which is hosted by Dr. John Cosson, who is a staple in pinball streaming and podcasting in the Australian scene. And you know him best for his great trivia that he plays with you and Bruce Nightingale, who is the co-host of Slam Tilt Podcast. Yeah, and he, Wayne, he's known in Australia as Mr. Pinball. Mr. Pinball Australia. I think he's the main distributor there still to this day, I believe. Since he was 15, Wayne has been into pinball. And he started Mr. Pinball in Oakley, South Victoria, Australia. So the company grew all through the 90s and in the 2000s to become the major distributor, I guess some people say, in Australia with Allied Leisure.
    66:47
    And, I mean, he started in, he purchased 20 of the Pinball 2000 machines, and Wayne saw an opportunity. So he sold 80 of them to boost his standings in the distributor network because he wanted to get further up the ordering chain. in 2005 wayne secured the rights for pinball manufacturing and replacement parts from who uh that was from gene cunningham yes illinois pinball illinois pinball yeah now they originally had the exclusive licensing to sell and remanufacture pinball and those were the parts were like five years they had the non-exclusive rights they still retained some rights because they were still making williams parts illinois pinball but yeah that you can make a whole podcast about just the the williams rights debacle and everything with that it was a big time so we have a whole episode on illinois pinball where we talked about gene cunningham the pinball enthusiast and collector where he purchased all the leftover williams stuff and then he tried to distribute all of those parts and ran into trouble and he makes new parts and replacement parts when he kind of wasn't supposed to but he only had the exclusivity for five years yeah then williams went out to find other people to license it and do some things but building those parts because we talked about how like building a game tooling the parts being able to build the parts like the pop bumpers or solenoids or plastics or things those all had different licensing requirements yeah but wayne he He got the license. If I remember, he got the license to the Bally name. Yeah, so that was a big deal. That was the trademark for Bally, so he could make Bally games. But he couldn't necessarily make the parts for Bally games. He had to have a license for that, too. And then you could buy the old parts that were left in a warehouse, but you couldn't manufacture those. It was all weird. And we talk about that in our Capcom episode. Yeah, but I think he still uses, on Pinside, he's like Bally Man or Bally something. He still uses the Bally. He still holds the trademark. Well, he had held the trademark. I believe – I'm sorry.
    69:02
    Wayne holds the – Yes. I believe I got my whodunit translate from him because that was the only place I could get a new one was from Australia. There. So he also – so this is interesting. So Wayne, when he was like the trademarking of Bally and Williams and using those trademarks in the gaming industry, for example, if we go into like Indiana Jones, the pinball adventure, that's a third party license. They could remake the game, but they couldn't put Williams on it. they could however name the game and put bally on it because bally was owned by caesar's entertainment well what does that mean that means that it won't be confused in gaming with bally because bally doesn't make gaming anymore it's it's a bit of a mess and i don't know how he manages to deal with it the the modern example is chicago gaming right chicago gaming when they build the Williams machines, you'll notice they don't have Williams written on the back box. They have CGC. But if you look at the Bally game, Attack from Mars, it has Bally written on it. It's outrageously confusing. So when did he get into thinking about building a game? Well, there's two that I remember. One was the Medieval Madness. He was going to do those. The remake, because everybody wanted a remake. Yeah, because, yeah. Even then, everyone wanted Medieval Madness was like the one everyone wanted, which Chicago Gaming would eventually do that one first, I believe, because it's the one everyone wanted. But he also was looking into doing the Crocodile Hunter game. Yes. So Wayne, like everybody, thought building and manufacturing pinball would be fun. And he looked at building a Steve Irwin Crocodile Hunter game, because Steve Irwin was a big deal in the early 2000s. the thing was that you have to learn kinetics right and what do i mean by kinetics when you talk about pinball how it shoots how it shoots in the ball movements and things like that but what the best part is the bally williams designs that he purchased came with a lot of the drawings or autocad files so he saw all of that stuff already he didn't have to learn by drilling into a thing, he could look at Steve Ritchie's designs and be like, oh, that's why Steve Ritchie bent the wire form that way. That's pretty slick. So who was Steve Irwin? He's a crocodile hunter. He was the Australian zookeeper. He was a conservationist, television personality, a wildlife educator, and a huge environmentalist. He was the guy that had the really short brown pants and the cargo boots and the Australian accent and everybody knows, had known. He was a huge deal. Now, he grew up around crocodiles, as we assume everybody in Australia does, and of course, other types of reptiles. And he was educated by his father, Bob Irwin. Steve achieved international fame in the late 1990s from the television series The Crocodile Hunter, an internationally broadcast wildlife documentary series that he co-hosted with his wife, Terry.
    72:24
    And the thing most people don't realize is he didn't own the name Crocodile Hunter. He was hired by the company that did Crocodile Hunter to be the Crocodile Hunter.
    72:34
    They could have replaced him with someone else and called them the Crocodile Hunter. In 2006, that's when tragedy struck and Irwin died from an injury that he was caused by a stingray while he was filming an underwater documentary by the Great Barrier Reef. His death became international news and hit a lot of young children quite hard, if I recall. But we were right along building this Crocodile Hunter game. If you go on IPDB, and the link is in the notes, you can see some of the proofs for the Crocodile Hunter. So what does it look like?
    73:13
    It's got a weird back box design. Yeah, so the back glass is at the top, and then it's got, like, speakers kind of in the middle. So the Translight almost looks like the size of the new modern LCD sterns, where it's a little smaller than the older back glasses. It's using a DMD. It's got speakers above the DMD, and then the DMD is kind of recessed underneath those. And the Bally logo. Because he owns the thing. But we don't have any play field pictures. Because I don't think they ever got that far. Yeah, or maybe they did, and it's just not out there. Because all of the play fields are all kind of blurred out on these promos. It's the crocodile hunter outback adventure. Isn't she a little ripper? In Canada, we say we're going for a rip. Do you guys say that? No.
    74:04
    Going for a rip, which basically means I'm going for a drive somewhere, going fast. Oh, I thought it meant something else. I'm going to have a bunch of drinks. If I'm going to let her rip, I'm going to go flat out. If they said that here, I would think a bog was involved or something. Yes. Yeah, full send. A lot of people call it full send.
    74:22
    No? No. All right. but if we zip on over to uh there's not a whole lot of information about that but if you go over to pin side it does have some of the information on um on this game itself so the software by a gentleman named mark alexander and wayne simmons the concept by wayne gallard gillard oh god i'm Sorry, Dr. John. I should have looked up your email how to pronounce that. Sound by Philip Stevens and music by Philip Steven.
    74:58
    So, you know, it's got some of the information as to who did this information, but why didn't it actually get made? Why was it only a concept?
    75:08
    Well, Wayne says, we spent about $250,000 Australian at the time on research and development, product development, artwork programming, circuit boards, cabinet design, all sorts of things. Then, unfortunately, Steve Irwin died, so it was paused for a little while. We found out that the Best Picture Show Company, who owns the rights for Crocodile Hunter, technically hired Steve Irwin to play that, so they own the rights of the Crocodile Hunter and just used Steve Irwin to be the face of that. We were stuck. We could proceed and build a pinball machine and call it Australia Zoo. We could use Steve Irwin's image on the machine, but we couldn't use anything to do with the Crocodile Hunter at all. Yeah, so it was the licensing that sunk this pinball machine. There were all these third-party companies involved. So there was like Animal Planet. There was the Discovery Channel. There was this licensing company. And apparently that this licensing company went bankrupt after coordinating the license for the Crocodile Hunter before Steve Irwin had passed. It was just a mess.
    76:15
    Well, Wayne says, we just ended up writing it off. We got various cabinets, playfields, and artwork, but the cost of bringing it to life was too much. I don't think the licensing is possible anymore.
    76:26
    Yeah. Then there was also manufacturing in Australia. So in our other previous Australia episode where we spoke about haggis pinball, we talked about a lot of the challenges trying to manufacture in Australia. And this is very much the same problem that Hankin had. That was just the cost of material. Yeah, Wayne says, I'll give you an example. I looked at getting pinball legs made in Australia. You needed a 200-ton press to make the legs out of cold roll steel. The tool is about 40,000 Australian. If you wanted to run the legs, you had to run a minimum of 10,000 of them. and they're going to be about $10 each. I said, it's Australian. They were going to cost about $10 Australian each to plate them. You're up for a heap of money. I could buy the legs from America from the original manufacturer for $6.50 already plated. It just isn't economically feasible. Everybody wants to build something close to home, right? Everybody wants to build Australian. We want to have great manufacturing. But here's the thing. it's going to be like triple the cost. So then the question becomes, well, is it really worth it at triple the cost? No, it's just cheaper to buy it from the U.S. and bring it over. Or, you know, this happens with buying things from China and bringing it to the U.S., right? It's just cheaper to do it elsewhere. So you can do it at home, but it's going to cost more, and you have to accept the fact that you're going to have to pay for inflation, and you're going to have to pay for, you know, all of that other stuff if you just want to have it made locally. now the WPC and the WPC 95 systems now those are the board sets in those sort of 90s Bally Williams games they needed the chips for those boards to be made but the worst bit is if they were going to build these boards if Wayne and his team were going to build these remanufacture these boards a lot of the chips in them were now obsolete and in fact a lot of these chips were made with hazardous materials that weren't even available back then this is much sooner than today's sort of revolution in uh manufacturing or remanufacturing a lot of these boards that are done overseas right where they're using new materials and new you know chips to do the same thing that those systems did back then they needed the the original ones right nobody was going to make a chip that was as good for a 90 something that was made in 1995 in 2005 Nobody's going to be like, I want to make a crappy chip. They all want to make the new chip. But enough time has passed now where we can sort of backdate them. So they went a different route in 2006 when it came to games, didn't they? Didn't it or they? Didn't they.
    79:25
    So in 2006, Chicago Gaming linked up with Wayne to make Medieval Madness. Now, they didn't just manufacture it. What happened was Wayne transferred the manufacturing license to Planetary Pinball. So he didn't just license the license. He just transferred it because he realized it was probably better to sell it and make some money than it was to keep it and hold on for maybe he could build it later on. Hold on, hold on, hold on. You know, when I said I correct things, that don't seem right because he made Medieval Madnesses, Wayne. yeah but when Chicago Gaming made the Medieval Madnesses locally yeah but that was like 10 years after this so wait a minute so he gave them the license but they sat on it for 10 years before they made anything I think so I don't remember I do not think that Rick at Planetary had these in 2006 that seems too early maybe it was 16 yeah that sounds more like it because six doesn't sound because i i me and bruce used to go to his place when it was bay area amusements when we would be there for uh the california extreme extreme that was probably after 2006 well he might have had the license i don't think he didn't do anything he had it yet no yeah okay maybe it was 16 if you know shoot us an email silverball chronicles gmail.com and i'll just freaking put it in the next there we go so we're just loaded with corrections here it It just didn't seem right. That's like way too early.
    81:04
    But Wayne says, the main reason we assigned the license to Planetary Pinball was that I had to make a decision. I did not want to leave Australia, move to America, set up the business in America because all the parts are made there. All the tooling is over there. All the designers, everything. Did I just want to hold on to the license and just plot along and just make replacement parts? I decided that it was in the best interest of pinball for somebody in the U.S., whoever that may be, to do more with the license in the U.S. Pinball tends to be filled with a lot of hoarders. It's like this collecting hoarding mentality where some people would buy up a license and to just sit on it and be like, ah, my precious. But Wayne, I think, was smart enough to know, you know what? This is for the community. Let's just I can't do anything with it here. Let's get it out, which is so great of him. They have everything. Pinball News and I'm trying to remember if it was called Planetary Pinball then.
    82:00
    Here we go. New company acquires rights. 2010. That sounds more like it. Yeah, there we go. Don't send me your correction email. Ron looked it up.
    82:14
    Thank you, Pinball News. You guys rule. Basically, yeah. These rights have been sold to a new company, Planetary Pinball Supply.
    82:22
    Yes, Rick. He had Bay Area Amusements, and for a while he ran them both as like Planetary Pinball was the Williams Parts offshoot, and he still kept Bay Area Amusements going, which was also Parts, but he eventually just combined them. They're just Planetary Pinball now.
    82:41
    But this was in 2010. Very good. Now, Mr. Pinball, still very much active in Australia as one of the distributors. throw him into your Google machine and look him up Australia and New Zealand Mr. Pinball is probably the spot to go down under and that's because CoinGiver in Australia has not opened yet which is Zach Manning's Australian arm I was about to look that up I never heard of that before any other last words on Hankin and Mr. Pinball um shark i like shark and they did the first licensed star wars pinball no one could take that away from them see the thing is 1980 pinball was still kind of there i mean you had a lot of innovation going on to like 80 going into 81 and then it starts to go downhill so you would think one of the american manufacturers would have been doing like bally of all people you think Bally would have done it because they were the licensing kings.
    83:47
    And, I mean, the biggest thing, though, was that they kind of got out before things got real bad. Oh, yeah. Yeah, 1980 was their last game, and yeah. It would have been a mess if they stuck around trying to go through that sort of 81, 82, 84. You know what I mean? I think it's interesting they started with regular size and then went to wide body for the last few. Well, you've got to follow Atari. Atari knew all of it. Do not follow Atari.
    84:22
    Oh, this again. Okay. As always, you can send your comments, questions, corrections, and concerns to CivilBullChronicles at gmail.com. We look forward to all your messages, and we read every one. I wonder if I could do this without actually reading at this point. I've done so many times. please subscribe to us on your favorite podcatcher turn on automatic download so you won't miss a single episode remember to leave us a five-star review that way more people can find us oh you're still plugging the patreon thing you still call them cronies seriously oh join us on patreon to support the show want to get early access to episodes before everyone else have a strange love for stickers? Do you know what a Discord is? Jump on as a $6 a month premium crony. Want all the other perks in a shirt after three months? Join us at $20 a month as an Elilitis crony. Maybe you just want a shirt. I understand. I don't really want a diaper. Swing on over to CivilWallSwag.com and pick up a CivilWall Chronicles t-shirt.
    85:33
    It's the Hankin episode. Oh. I can say I played every one of them. I know. You played them, like, recently. Yes. That's why I bumped it up the list. They kind of suck.
    85:56
    And I talked to a couple Aussies, and they said the same thing. The games kind of suck. The games kind of suck, aye? Yep. Yeah, aye. And he said the following.
    86:09
    Go ahead. Are you ready? Okay. I'm so ready. Well, Michael said, Dad and Uncle Judd sold Dave Copp. Wow, I couldn't get past the first sentence, but I f***ed up.
    86:25
    It says, a Hankin and Company. Wait a minute, a Hankin and Company? No, it would be A Hankin, I think. Oh, A, as in the name. Okay, let me try that again.
    86:35
    It feels good to tell people about your health. You see Dad's text about his problem gambling? I'm glad he's finally talking about it. Well, he's never been shy about his health issues. Remember the picture he sent of his foot? Yeah. Why did we need a before photo?
    86:49
    If you can talk about your health, you can talk about your gambling. Call the Massachusetts Problem Gambling Helpline at 800-327-5050.
    86:59
    And there's our weekly foot update. Thank you.