[Music] What's going on everybody? Welcome to the wrong freaking screen. We Let's try that again. Uh, welcome everybody. This is not really like an official episode of the Dirty Pool podcast, but uh something else that I thought might be a little neat to do. Uh we're doing kind of like a meet the team and uh as many of you may know Pinball Expo has ended. Uh 90% of the people that went to it are now sick and will be suffering for the next week. Uh somehow Joshua and I have dodged that bullet. Um so today's little episode is to say hello, to say thank you to everybody that went there. It was an overwhelming experience for me. This was not a position I was expecting to be in. all the people that came up to me that threw up love for the Great Pyramid. Just everybody was super positive and it just it couldn't have been a better experience meeting everybody. But today we're not only talking about Expo, we're here to talk about something else extremely important about our game, The Winchester. I'm joined by none other Joshua Clay, who you may know from plenty of other Stern titles, his illustration artwork and whatnot. You are responsible for the 3D modeling the Winchester house itself on the screen. Hello, Joshua. Hello. Thanks for having me. Hello. Thanks for having me. So today's kind of like a hybrid episode. We're here to chitchat about Expo and our experience with it. Uh we're here to answer questions if you guys have guys and girls have any questions about uh the game itself, what we can answer in the capacity that we can. Um just in general like the team's hyped like this is uh universally uh not what we expected to have happen with the game. And I think I speak for everybody that we couldn't be happier about it. And uh it's important that everybody watching this uh know that we cannot wait to make this game the best it can possibly be and to continue this momentum to make a really special pinball machine. Um so yeah, without further ado, throw your questions and Josh, can you talk a little bit about what got you involved in the project and you know your your work? Let's talk about Winchester. Um yeah, I guess what got me involved in the project was I was working at I was working at Warner Brother games um on a Mortal Kombat title and they cut the they had cut the mobile games division which I was a senior user interface artist for that and I had talked to David before. Um so after I got laid off I was sort of um sort of took some time to decide what I wanted to do. I thought about trying to go back into um AAA video games, but I wasn't really happy. I was kind of burned out on that. So, I'd hit up David about um Barrels of Fun to kind of see where they were at with their games and to see what where they where at with the company and he invited me onto the team. I got working on Dune and did all the user interface stuff for Dune. And then as that was going, he was talking to me about Winchester. Um, so yeah, it just sort of naturally led from Dune into Winchester. Um, and I had a bigger role on Winchester because we needed we didn't have any license or assets really. So I needed to come up with a plan to create everything to tell the story that Carl had designed. Um, let's touch base on that too cuz I think let's touch base on that too cuz I think a lot of people had mentioned like man oh man like well you got such a small license you don't have to acquire all these licenser assets like what an easier pin to make. And I can't imagine the amount of eye rolling that occurred as soon as you heard that. And it's like instead of instead of crutching on like video assets that kind of like automatically fill a certain like role in the pin, now all of a sudden we're having to like make all of this stuff from scratch. I do find it hilarious. Somebody had said a rumor that the that we went in and scanned the whole house with LAR or something. No. No. There was a tour. There were tons of reference photos and then you modeled every room that is in the game. like all these real rooms that exist in the house are modeled by you. Uh and then with character animation by Julian, right? She she contributed on that. Yep. Yep. So you talk about a little bit So you talk about a little bit did that. did that. Can you can you give a little bit of the Can you can you give a little bit of the process of going from photos to 3D model? Yeah, it was uh Yeah, you you know, even Yeah, it was uh Yeah, you you know, even if you don't have license or assets, you pay for it. You know, you pay either way. And honestly, like we I mean, so many so many countless hours into modeling these rooms, you know, and it's not until you really start looking at the photos of the rooms that you realize just how detailed they are. Um, the amount of like amazing woodwork in every room, all of the super ornate objects and items, chandeliers, um, just woodwork in general, uh, doors, trim, there's just some incredible like aspects to each room. And because of the way that she built this house, you can't reuse every everything from one room to the next. It's like every room you're almost starting from scratch cuz she was constantly uh Sarah Winchester was constantly building onto this house and just in this weird hodgepodge sort of way like so yeah every single room was just a new adventure and it was just a new like it was a new like it was a new like you can't cut corners with like pre-made you can't cut corners with like pre-made assets cuz this house is so unique like I remember so like we had let's talk about the organ like this organ is amazing this they have this ornate organ in it. I'm so glad it got used as kind of like a front and center thing for the bonus screen. You see it in the background when uh when you finish a ball after you've been brutally destroyed by the left out lane and uh you've got this big big organ and there was no way to find an asset that was even close to it and you just dove in and was just like I'm going to make it. Yeah. Yeah. cuz I a lot of times when Yeah. Yeah. cuz I a lot of times when you're working on a 3D project, you can there's like 3D asset websites where you can, you know, purchase items and download them to use them in scenes. Um, and I looked all over the internet to try and find something close to that um to that organ because, you know, it's a timesaver. You can spend you can spend 20 hours modeling something from scratch or more, hundreds 100 hours sometimes. Um, and then if but if you're able to find it on like a a store, you could save yourself 40 hours or something by modifying it. But in this case, throw that time into But in this case, throw that time into something else in the room that's absolutely exactly. But in this case, this this exactly. But in this case, this this organ is just one of a kind, you know. So I just instead of continuing to to think about what am I going to do, what am I going to do, I just sat down and started working on it. Um, and it was a it was an awesome challenge, honestly. like there was just and when you start getting into it, you notice all of these extra little items that even looking at it, I was like, "Oh, this thing is crazy." And then once I start modeling it, I'm like, "Oh, man. This thing is there's so much more to it than I even realized from the first glance." Uh there's so many great questions Uh there's so many great questions rolling in. I want to just again reiterate like this is a live thing. That's kind of how I do my podcast. So, if you have questions, throw them out and we will do our best to get to them. Uh certainly as many of the things that we can't answer we absolutely will and the things that we don't know we cannot answer. Remember my role is is sound and music and uh call out direction as well as just kind of being like a kind of media face for my portion of it just because I have this platform and Joshua obviously we talked about does all the 3D modeling. So try to keep the questions to that. If there's stuff outside of that we'll do our best. Um first off there's a few people in here that we spent a lot of time talking to. I want to send out a few shoutouts individually. Joshua and I were talking a little bit earlier. Pinballs, thank you so much for both being like just a amazing genuine advocate for the game. You had legitimate straight criticism about certain things and just a whole lot of love for everything. And uh your legitimate enthusiasm for pinball and for our game is like just thoroughly heartwarming and it was it was a pleasure to meet you in person and I cannot wait for you to get your game specifically and everybody's of course. But uh yeah, it was it was great talking to you. Um, Sanji, everyone that I actually met in person. It was it was really great. Uh, thank you to all the shout outs that are saying how great the pin is and that you're looking forward to it. Uh, we got YouTube going on right now too. Hopping hot. Uh, Cameron saying, "Congrats on the pin. The music is very unique." It definitely is. Uh, Sonic signature for the tour guide. What was your process in landing on the voice actor? Sure. So, the voice actor is a friend of mine. He's an actor in Los Angeles. He does uh audio books and some other stuff. And uh, we had a meeting. We talked about it. We needed to find somebody and there was a few people's names that we really wanted to. Some of them are not alive, which is hard to cast a voice actor who is not living. Um, and so we like wanted to have a tour guide that was very in theme with like the haunted mansion, Disney mansion or right is it haunted mansion? I forget what the exact name is. Um, but just somebody who had a lot of personality and we wanted every single person in the game to have a character, be a character, have a character, and really kind of like call out to the '9s. A lot of this game has a lot of references to the '90s. Something that I want to talk about with Joshua is you'll notice that a lot of the animation in the game is very very much an homage to the seventh guest. If you guys didn't pick up on that, that's that's a lot of what our reference was. How the cameras move between rooms with the whole room going dark as the door opens, traveling down the hallway. If you haven't played that game, it's a it's a CD CDROM title from the '90s and a game that I absolutely loved as a kid. Um, so yeah, like just just know that many of the decisions that went into this game were insanely thought out. they come from this insane document the Carl put together. It's not like we didn't ho the, you know, yolo this situation. It was here's our plan. Here's our direction. We're going to go with it whole hog. And uh hopefully people resonate with it. And I think a lot of people did. Um so yeah, hopefully that answers that question. Uh Splicky Lit is asking, "Are the rooms all pre-rendered video assets?" Take it away, Josh. Yeah. Yeah, the rooms, well, they're Yeah. Yeah, the rooms, well, they're pre-rendered with uh with PNG sequences overlaying certain areas. Um like if there's things we want to trigger to turn off and on that need to be interactable, then we render those separate things out with like alpha channel data around them and then overlay those um in that area so that they're interactable. There you go. Um I'm getting some There you go. Um I'm getting some questions about when the games are coming. I understand you're super excited. You know, David said manufacturing is going to start in a couple of weeks and they're going to start shipping out units. That is literally all we know. So, trust me that barrels wants you to have your game and they're making it happen. So, that's all we could say to that. Uh Dan Ryan, it was great to meet you. Uh are do you think there's going to be more well-known IPs for manufacturers in the future? I don't know. I just I think this was a great experiment and I think a lot of things align to make this game a success. I don't think that means a IP that is not wellnown will always be a success, but I think that we will always aim to make the greatest possible pinball machine we can as a team at Barrels. I know that sounds like kind of a copout answer, but it's true. I don't care what the IP is. We're going to make a great game. Most of the team or Let me not say that. I didn't know what the Winchester was. Did you? I did. Yeah. Yeah. Actually, yeah. I' I did. Yeah. Yeah. Actually, yeah. I' I'd heard of it when I was a kid and stuff and then when I mentioned it to my wife, she was like super excited. Yeah. Uh, Miss Led has a good question. He's Uh, Miss Led has a good question. He's like, "I really like all the instrument target sounds. I can't place what is going on with the bass and treble clefts. Anything you can talk about there?" So, all of the instrument targets are So, there's four or five. There's gong, drum, uh, bell, horn. Uh, I'm forgetting one, Josh. What am I forgetting? Gong, drum, bell, horn. Gong, drum, bell, horn. Man, I I modeled all those, too. I know, right? Anyways, so but point is I know, right? Anyways, so but point is every single one of those is actually recorded. So Sydney played the drum. Uh Carl played trumpet on it. I demanded that he do it. Carl plays musical instruments. You'll notice that tambourine. Thank you. Of course. And I played the tambourine. I have it over there. Uh so everything that could be recorded legit is done legit. This game has almost no stock sound effects from [ __ ] dumb libraries. I just I don't roll like that. I like recording authentic fully from different sources. Um a neat little story. So like the turntable mech. The turntable when it goes click click click and locks into place is actually an antique uh uh typewriter and it was recorded with a sanken co 100k microphone. It's a microphone that records up to 192 kHz and it allows you to record in ultrasonic land. It's used for recording bird calls and bugs and all this different [ __ ] And uh so when you record stuff that's like really tiny and clicky like that, you can pitch it down octave after octave after octave. So, all of the turntable clicky mechanics are actually the internal little uh spring mechanisms on this old typewriter pitched down like 10 octaves. And uh you know, it just gives it so much character and these are unique sounds that you just can't pull out of, you know, a library. So, uh hopefully that answers some of that. Um yeah, but but also let's let's get back. So, Joshua, we had to transition these elements from one element to another, right? And can you talk a little bit about like what it's like seaming elements together and making sure that like the elements are able to transition both between scenes to rooms and also between like the upper and lower display. Yeah. I mean, I guess the hardest part Yeah. I mean, I guess the hardest part with that kind of thing is like you never know what's going to happen during a person's game of, you know, during the person's game of pinball. like if they if they're going to be in that room for a decent amount of time, if they're going to terrain out of it fast, if they're going to if something else going to get called up on the screen. So, yeah, I mean, fading to black is a is a safe bet, honestly, because like we would, you know, it'd be nice to have some sort of interesting camera outro animation or something, but realistically, it's going to end up getting stomped on when while someone's playing the game. So, it's, you know, we kind of have to go for something safe. It also fits with the haunted house It also fits with the haunted house theme, though. I mean, you're entering into a dark room and then the lights turn on. And it also is like kind of an homage to the whole like seventh guest thing cuz, you know, a lot of the same reason that they would have that render to a black room is because you can't render what is the next room without infinitely having multiple versions of it. It's just from a pipeline perspective, it doesn't work. So, it helped like kind of locked in on that style. Yeah, 100%. Yep. Gecko says, he's like, Yeah, 100%. Yep. Gecko says, he's like, "Regarding the voice acting, was he new to voice acting for pinball?" "Yes." "Did you lend him a pin or something?" "No, I had him come over to the studio. He's local in Los Angeles." And we talked about Attack from Mars. We talked about Medieval Madness. We talked about a lot of amazing '90s games that just have these like over-the-top callouts. Uh you know, we talked about a lot of people have been saying Vincent Price. Like there was a number of characters and a number of real world actors that we wanted to like dial in the narrator to be this kind of like kooky off-the-wall like just like eccentric thing cuz you know some of the call outs are like goofy and some of them are like pretty intense when he's like screaming at you. Then there's some other modes later on that are coming up with the rooms that are going to be uh the intensity is definitely different because the the scenario in the room is scarier in general as opposed to just like walking around being a tour guide. Um, so yeah, in Indie Arcade Wave says, "Great game. I really enjoyed playing Expo. Dune was great, too." That's right, man. Dune is awesome. And I'm so glad so many people got to experience Dune in a like, I don't know, better setting. Like, people were coming. Like, the line for Dune was not as big as Winchester in the in the experience room, but the line for Dune was consistent the whole time. There were always people waiting to play both games, which was fantastic. Um, Um, Josh, what what do you think? What was Josh, what what do you think? What was your favorite room to model? because I know that some of them have a lot more interesting or a lot more challenging architecture than others. Yeah. I mean, I guess the one that Yeah. I mean, I guess the one that stands out to me the most is the basement because there's just there's a lot of pipe work and these gauges and like man, I mean, I did my best. I looked up old boilers. I looked up the exact boiler that they have in that basement and I looked for every piece of reference I could find so I could get all the pipe work correct. like I got I got really nerdy with making sure that everything was like as on point as possible. Um yeah, I think that was my favorite cuz and it's spooky. There's a wheelbarrow ghost multiball happens down there too. Um Um is absolutely my favorite too. That is such a good like I just that's Yeah, it is difficult to get into because you got to get those rollovers in order to uh to be able to spell uh open and then to be able to get it in there. I just it's it's a high value high difficulty it's it's a high value high difficulty to unlock uh multiball and I love that. Love it. Yep. And it's a lot of fun once you're Yep. And it's a lot of fun once you're in it too. Totally. Um there's some older questions Totally. Um there's some older questions I missed. Jason says, "What primary application and tools are you using to make the animations and digital models?" Josh Um, honestly for this project I used mainly Blender. Um, Blender. I love Blender. Personally, I use a lot of Unreal 5 in uh Dune, but in this project it was Blender cuz there's a lot of great add-ons to help with my workflow. Um, the asset library. I set up this awesome asset library. So, every time I modeled like a new style of door or a new style of window or a new style of trim, I could build it into my asset library. So when I started a new room, I could I could look for any consistencies from stuff I've already done and drag them out into the world and sort of get get things blocked in to save myself some time. Are you planning on renovating your home Are you planning on renovating your home with some of this uh new architecture that you're now compiling it? It gives me a better eye, compiling it? It gives me a better eye, honestly, cuz now I'm just like, hm, yeah, they really uh they really slacked off here. Man, this trim is cheap. We should get Man, this trim is cheap. We should get some Winchester trim in here. Yeah.