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Pinball Magazine & Pinball News PINcast June 2023 recap

Pinball News & Pinball Magazine Pincast·podcast_episode·1h 30m·held·Jul 4, 2023
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Analysis

claude-haiku-4-5-20251001 · $0.035

TL;DR

June 2023 pinball recap: Punny Factory, Space Hunt debuts, Haggis tease, Stern hires, Venom rumors.

Summary

Jonathan Houston and Martin O recap June 2023 pinball industry news, covering the first public showings of Pinball Adventures' Punny Factory and HEXA Pinball, a teaser from Haggis Pinball for an upcoming remake (possibly 8 Ball Deluxe or Centaur), Stern's expected Venom announcement at Comic-Con, key personnel hires at Stern, and multiple code updates for Stern games.

Key Claims

  • Punny Factory was first shown publicly at the Northwest Pinball and Arcade Show in Tacoma in early June 2023

    high confidence · Jonathan Houston and Martin O confirmed this in the recap, noting it's the first weekend of June at that specific venue

  • Space Hunt had about 40% of code implemented at the Salon de Pontac show, with 30% more nearly ready but undebugged, and final code expected by end of 2023

    high confidence · Martin O provided specific technical details about Space Hunt state at the show and development timeline

  • Stern's next Cornerstone game (post-Foo Fighters) is expected to be announced in July and playable at Comic-Con

    high confidence · Jonathan and Martin cite Orange County Pinball as the source of this confirmation

  • The next Stern Cornerstone game is rumored to be Venom, designed by Brian Edington with Dwight Sullivan on software, though rumors suggest it might not be Venom

    medium confidence · Martin O discusses speculation about the game, noting previous rumors dating back before James Bond

  • Kyle Spiteri from Marco Specialties is moving to Stern Pinball technical service department

    high confidence · Kyle revealed this in a Marco Specialties Pintech video focused on Foo Fighters (Pro) (Premium/LE) with designer Jack Danger present

  • Haggis Pinball teased a remake game with audio clues suggesting either 8 Ball Deluxe or Centaur, but no title or production timeline confirmed

    medium confidence · Jonathan and Martin discuss the teaser video with pool/billiard sounds and motorcycle audio

  • Stern is moving to new premises in October 2023

    high confidence · Jonathan mentions this move in context of Venom production timing

  • Pinball Adventures has announced a third game called Sushi Madness (formerly Sushi Mania) in addition to Punny Factory and Elements

    high confidence · Martin O clarifies the name change and confirms three titles in the pipeline

Notable Quotes

  • “The theme not very appealing to that particular person... it's a very light-hearted and, I guess, non-serious theme to it. It's a very refined taste.”

    Martin O @ early discussion of Puny Factory — Describes the division in player appeal for Puny Factory's whimsical theme

  • “What's not really helping this game, I suppose, is that on their social media, the company is already teasing their second game, Elements, and the third one, Sushi Madness.”

    Jonathan Houston @ Puny Factory discussion — Critiques Pinball Adventures' marketing strategy of announcing multiple titles before the first ships

  • “Well, the current state is that hardware-wise it's 100% finished, it appears. The colors are popping... code wise they had about 40% of the code in the game another 30% was almost ready to go but still needed to be debugged.”

    Martin O @ Space Hunt discussion — Provides specific technical breakdown of Space Hunt's development state

  • “You almost wonder why people announce games when they can't make them yet. But I'm sure there are business reasons for that, and also to keep the public's mind.”

    Jonathan Houston @ Haggis Pinball teaser discussion — Reflects on industry trend of announcement-to-production delays

  • “James Bond 007 60th anniversary game was prioritized at the cost of Venom... Foo Fighters probably went ahead because Foo Fighters were going on tour.”

    Martin O @ Stern title scheduling discussion — Explains business logic behind Stern's recent release sequencing

  • “Cal revealed that he is actually moving to Chicago to work for Stern Pinball... he's being hired into Stern's technical service department.”

    Jonathan Houston @ Kyle Spiteri hire discussion — Breaking news of key personnel move from Marco Specialties to Stern

  • “There's been some criticism in the past that it's been difficult to get parts out of Stern Pinball Inc.. So they've been non-responsive to some degree.”

    Jonathan Houston — Notes customer service challenges that new hire addresses

Entities

Jonathan HoustonpersonMartin OpersonPinball AdventurescompanyHexa PinballcompanyHaggis PinballcompanyStern PinballcompanyJersey Jack PinballcompanyNorthwest Pinball and Arcade ShoweventSalon de Pontac Pinball Showevent

Signals

  • ?

    product_launch: Puny Factory first publicly shown at Northwest Pinball and Arcade Show, Tacoma WA, early June 2023. Limited reception with two comments noted; theme polarizing (Marmite theme)

    high · Jonathan: 'first public showing of Puny Factory... at the Northwest Pinball and Arcade Show in Tacoma' and 'I saw two comments on the game. One was positive, and the other was positive in terms of that the game was playing... but the theme not very appealing'

  • ?

    product_launch: Space Hunt by Hexa Pinball premiered at Salon de Pontac show (second weekend of June). Hardware 100% complete, 40% code implemented, 30% nearly ready, all code expected by end of 2023. Very positive reception

    high · Martin O: 'the current state is that hardware-wise it's 100% finished... code wise they had about 40% of the code in the game another 30% was almost ready to go but still needed to be debugged'

  • ?

    announcement: Haggis Pinball teased upcoming remake game via Facebook/YouTube video with visual and audio clues (pool/billiards sounds, motorcycle audio). Title and production timeline not revealed. Speculation points to 8 Ball Deluxe or Centaur

    high · Jonathan: 'Haggis Pinball announced that they would be teasing a game around the middle of the year... visually actually not very exciting, just a bit of gold dust floating around... audio-wise, well, there are sounds from a pool hall'

  • ?

    announcement: Pinball Adventures announced three-game pipeline: Puny Factory (shipping), Elements (Pinball Expo 2023 debut), and Sushi Madness (third title, formerly Sushi Mania)

    high · Martin O: 'Sushi Madness is the title of what third game from the adventures' and Jonathan: 'they're already teasing their second game, Elements, and the third one, Sushi Madness'

Transcript

groq_whisper · $0.273

0:00
First public showing of Pony Factory First public showing of Space Hunt Haggis Pinball teases the next remake game Hi, my name is Jonathan Houston and I'm the editor of Pinball Magazine joined here by Martin O, the editor of Pinball News and we're here to look back at all the exciting events in the pinball world in the month of June 2023 yes and usually we say it's been a very busy month with lots of exciting stuff happening not so much this time not so much there is a lot happening we do have two new game public reveals so to speak but we already knew they were coming so that was a little bit less exciting and well we'll talk about that and all the other events and let's see if we can move on quickly and not make this a two hour broadcast. No, we are not joined by any special guests this particular month so we should be able to get through this and get you all the latest news, bring you up to date in a fairly swift manner. So let's start straight away with our very first headline which is about the very first showing of Pinball Adventures' Pony Factory game. Right, which was at the Northwest Pinball and Arcade Show in Tacoma, near Seattle, that is, at the start of June, first weekend of June. I did not see that many comments on the game. Actually, I saw two comments on the game. One was positive, and the other was positive in terms of that the game was playing. playing good, but the theme not very appealing to that particular person. Yes, I can kind of imagine, well, it's not going to appeal to everybody, because it's a very light-hearted and, I guess, non-serious theme to it. It's a very refined taste. And it's quite a simplistic game as well, in terms of the design, but still has some nice features and some nice shots on it. I haven't played it for a good time now, not since I first saw it at Team Pinball when they were doing the development of it for Pinball Adventures. But it certainly shot nicely then. But there's an awful lot of development gone on with it in the intervening years. I don't know if I should say months, but yes, it's years. And I think it looks very nice on the playfield. I mentioned this before. The toys on there are very nicely done. but the yeah as you say the theme is what we over here tend to call a Marmite theme which harks back to a an advertising theme for a e-spread which is their advertising tagline was you either love it or hate it and they hope there's enough people who love it that it sells well what's not really helping this game, I suppose, is that on their social media, the company is already teasing their second game, Elements, and the third one, Sushi Madness. Well, every other manufacturer, as soon as they have one game on the line, that's the game they're going to hype the crap out of. Well, okay, yes, that's true, and... And Elements, I'm sure, is going to be some way away as well. So, on the other hand, you know, it gives, well, I was going to say, it gives a sense of reassurance that the company's around for a long time and going to be there to support their games into the future. But then immediately I thought, oh, well, Deep Root announced about 10 games and look what happened there. So maybe that's not a fair comparison. What happened there, we'll talk about later. But we will indeed.
@ Madeline Benz hire discussion

  • “It's got two Tommy gun wielding articulating thugs... A hand painted custom gangster car with headlights that light up... More than 30 individually controlled RGB LEDs.”

    Martin O @ Godfather topper discussion — Details the extensive collector edition topper features

    • Comic-Conevent
    Punny Factorygame
    Space Huntgame
    Elementsgame
    Sushi Madnessgame
    Venomgame
    Kyle Spiteriperson
    [name withheld pending review]person
    Dwight Sullivanperson
    Jeff Cernavaperson
    Madeline Benzperson
    Elizabeth Gieskeperson
    Marco Specialtiescompany
    Gary Sternperson
    Jack Guarnieriperson
    ?

    rumor_hype: Strong rumor that Stern's next Cornerstone game is Venom with ties to Comic-Con 2023. Designer Brian Edington, software Dwight Sullivan. Game allegedly finished for a year but deprioritized for James Bond 60th anniversary and Foo Fighters tour. However, counterrumor suggests it may NOT be Venom

    medium · Martin O: 'the game is supposed to be designed by Brian Eddington... apparently the game is already finished for a year' and 'there is a certain comic element to Foo Fighters as well... if those titles have been swapped the other way, because the game is based on a fictional Saturday morning cartoon series'

  • ?

    announcement: Stern's next Cornerstone title expected to be announced in July and playable at Comic-Con San Diego (late July). Production expected to start in September 2023

    high · Jonathan: 'the new game announcement is expected this month [July]... the new Stern Cornerstone title will be playable at Comic-Con' and 'production likely to start in September'

  • ?

    personnel_signal: Stern Pinball hired Madeline Benz as customer service representative and Elizabeth Geisk as game software developer, addressing past criticisms about parts availability and service responsiveness

    high · Jonathan: 'stern has announced the appointment or two appointments... Madeline Benz as customer service representative... Elizabeth Geisk as a game software developer' and 'there's been some criticism in the past that it's been difficult to get parts out of Stern Pinballs'

  • ?

    personnel_signal: Kyle Spiteri, prominent technical expert and host of Marco Specialties' Pintech educational video series, hired by Stern Pinball to technical service department. Will continue Pintech videos

    high · Jonathan: 'Cal revealed that he is actually moving to Chicago to work for Stern Pinball... he's being hired into Stern's technical service department' and 'he's still going to continue the Pintech live so it's not a total loss for for marker specialties'

  • ?

    product_strategy: Industry trend of announcing games well before production begins; Pinball Adventures criticized for teasing Elements and Sushi Madness before Puny Factory ships; concern parallels Deep Root's announcement strategy

    high · Jonathan: 'what's not really helping this game, I suppose, is that on their social media, the company is already teasing their second game, Elements, and the third one, Sushi Madness' and Martin O: 'you can announce a game now and don't have to actually go into production of the game for quite some time'

  • ?

    code_update: Multiple Stern games received significant code updates in June: James Bond (v0.92-0.93) with new modes and scoring; Godzilla (v1.6-1.7) with bug fixes and new King of Monsters modes; Rush (v1.12); Foo Fighters (v0.95) with bomb mod features

    high · Martin O detailed each: James Bond 'added the 007 scoring feature' and 'Ahoy Mr. Bond Wizard Mode', Godzilla 'introduced the King of the Monsters challenge mode' then fixed topper bug, Foo Fighters 'added a new bomb mod mode'

  • ?

    manufacturing_signal: Stern Pinball moving to new facility in October 2023; unclear if new Cornerstone game production will start in current facility (September) or wait for new location

    high · Jonathan: 'they have a move coming up they do yes in October it's meant to be in the new place in October so if they're going to start making these in September I wonder whether they'll wait until they're in the new place'

  • ?

    code_update: Jersey Jack Godfather received v1.08 update adding tutorial videos, electronic manual, topper support with knocker sync, speech adjustments, rules display updates, and audio equalizer

    high · Martin O: 'new code for the Godfather which adds tutorial videos to the track mode... they've added the game manual in... support for the topper so it's now in sync with everything else'

  • ?

    licensing_signal: Gary Stern, Jody Dankberg, and Seth Davis attended Las Vegas Licensing Expo in June; Jack Guarnieri of Jersey Jack also present; annual event for IP acquisition and licensing deals

    high · Jonathan: "I've seen a photo of Gary Stern, Jody Dankberg and Seth Davis at the Las Vegas Licensing Expo, which was held earlier in the month... Jack Guarnieri of Jersey Jack Pinball... scoping out ideas for new titles"

    • 4:26
    But anyway, Elements is supposed to be debuting at Pinball Expo. I think we mentioned that already a couple of months ago. This year's Pinball Expo. Yeah, exactly.
    4:39
    And we'll just have to see how many Punny Factory machines will get sold in the end. Yes, and you mentioned a game called Sushi Madness. Right. Right, Mania. Mania? No, no, it's now previously Sushi Mania, and it's now called Sushi Madness, yes. Right, okay. I wasn't quite sure why the name changed. I did Google both titles to see whether there were any obvious trademark infringements, and both titles are used pretty heavily around the world, so I don't imagine that one is any better than the other, But Sushi Madness is the title of what third game from the adventures. Yes. Okay. Well, anyway, back to Pony Factory. Yes.
    5:38
    Jeff Cernava or Cernava, I'm not sure how to pronounce his last name, of Mad Pinball announced that he's taking one of the first production units of Pony Factory on tour of Ohio locations. Oh, okay. So if you're really curious, and in the Ohio area, which is a rather big area, I realize that, but there is a chance for you to play Pony Factory at, well, for example, the Unhitched Brewing Company in Louisville, Ohio, which is where the tour takes off. and it will be the fancier engraved edition of Bunny Factory that will be on tour the one with the black cabinet I think there are only 10 of those being built aren't there chance to see it see a rare game exactly and then the tour continues July 19th to Rack It Up Arcade in Canton Ohio and a week later or a small week later july 24th at quarter up bar and arcade in akron ohio and jeff is actively looking to adding additional locations to the tour schedule beyond that well correct me if i'm wrong but isn't the state of ohio i know it's quite a large state isn't that also where the past times arcade run by mr rob burke is located that would seem like a a suitable location to show the game. Yeah, and Rob might even buy one. Yeah, if he hasn't already. Yes. Yeah, yeah, absolutely. But anyway, if you're looking to play Pony Factory,
    7:26
    this is an opportunity. I think the game is also being shown at another pinball show, which I don't remember. which one? Pintastic maybe? No, no. It was a rather odd name. Don't recall it right now. Sorry about that. Poor journalism on my end.
    7:50
    I guess it would be one in the northern part of the United States. Yeah, let me look it up. I have that.
    8:01
    Okay. In the meantime we will I was going to say some more information about Pinball Adventures but I don't actually have any more information about them so we'll have to wait for you to check which show it is that Punny Factory is going to be appearing at It's going to be at the Yegg Pinball and Arcade show July 20th to July 23rd Toronto yes I think so and then the next events where you can find the Pinball Adventures themselves is Pinball Expo in Chicago. Excellent. Okay. Well, we look forward to playing the games there in its finished format. Yeah. And the debut of Elements will also be there. So that's two for the price of one. Fantastic. Another reason to be at Pinball Expo in October. Right. But that was not the first or the only new pinball machine that made a public debut. Absolutely not, no. No, no. And we announced this one also last month. Yeah, we previewed it in our previous pincast. Yeah, Hexa Pinball from France. and I just learned that the name Hexa Pinball is basically chosen because of the shape of France being sort of like a hexagon, which is why they decided to call the company Hexa Pinball. Oh, I thought it was because there were six people involved in setting it up. No, I think there's way more than six people involved from what I read, and we'll get to that in a minute. But, Hexa Pinball teased and announced their Space Hunt game last month already. It's an original theme.
    10:00
    And they also announced that they would premiere the game at the Salon de Pontac Pinball Show, which took place the second weekend of June, which they did. and the game was very well received for what it is in its current state. And the reason I say that is... Yeah, what is its current state then? Well, the current state is that hardware-wise it's 100% finished, it appears. It looks gorgeous in person. The colors are popping. They had the elegance cabinet,
    10:37
    which is something similar like the butter cabinet from Supergirl. Yeah, ultra glossy, yeah. and code wise they had about 40% of the code in the game another 30% was almost ready to go but still needed to be debugged and they didn't want to risk the game shutting down in the weekend so they decided to just show with 40% of the code, which included actually four modes and a wizard mode.
    11:20
    And they're currently working on the remaining 30% of the code, which should be ready by the time the game goes into production, which is by the end of 2023. But the first impressions of the game were, other than that the code is still a bit shallow, so to speak, were very good. and positive. Okay, and no indication when the game's going to be shown anywhere else. I mean, I think all the there are only three distributors of the game and I think they're all based in France. So I'm not sure what the international situation for that would be. But it'd be nice to see it at one of the world major shows rather than strictly within France, because I'm sure it would if it looks as great as it appears and by the end of the year they'll have all the code done it'll be time to be promoting it quite heavily right so I have no confirmation of other shows where it will be it would be nice to see it at Pimble Expo of course yes indeed but let's put it like this we don't know whether Hexer Pinball will be there but it's not the first time that a European pinball designer slash company showed up at Expo and blew the roof off with a game yes Dutch Pinball comes to mind but also Antonio of Quetzal Pinball comes to mind who made that trip several times yeah indeed well of course Romain who is part of the team behind Hector Pinball, he goes over there on a fairly regular basis as well right, so in the meantime I'm looking at the flipduke.fr website which is sort of like the French Pinball Forum there's a couple of shows announced for later this year French shows yes, French shows I would not be surprised if Space Hunt would be popping up at any of these French shows and if you're interested and speak French then I highly recommend checking the Flip Duke forum out well I was going to suggest if going over to the US or taking a machine over to the US is too far maybe it would be really nice for them to turn up at the Dutch Pinball Open Expo in November, by which time all the code should be done and they should be, you know, about to be going into production. Right. Well, that seems like a very good idea. Yes, if there's somebody associated with that show around, then maybe they'd like to have a word with them. Well, it comes to mind that Nicolas of Pinsound in France, who is actually also providing the speakers and shaker motors for this game, usually attends the Dutch Pimble Open. So maybe Nicholas could put in a word or suggest to bring the game there. Or maybe he brings it himself. I don't know. Well, fingers crossed. But we'll float the idea and see. Could it be nice for us to be able to play it without going to one of the, I would say one of the smaller shows, one of the globally smaller shows in France,
    14:59
    even though I'm sure it's a great show, whichever one it turns up at. But, no, fingers crossed for that.
    15:05
    And good luck to Hexapimble with their Space Hunt game. Yeah, absolutely. I look forward to playing it, as well as Puddy Factory, of course. Yep, so those are two titles, two new titles, which have been announced and have been shown. But we also have a teaser for an upcoming game, which hasn't been announced, and in fact we don't even know what the title is, just yet. No. All we know is that Haggis Pinball announced that they would be teasing a game around the middle of the year, which is correct. It's exactly what they did. They posted a video on their Facebook, and I'm sure you can also find it on YouTube, with visually actually not very exciting, just a bit of gold dust floating around against a grey background.
    16:02
    Just revealing their logo and saying coming soon. Yeah, exactly. And audio-wise, well, there are sounds from a pool hall where billiard balls are being shot around and there's the sound of a motorcycle riding away.
    16:26
    Taking off, or whatever you want to call it. Yes, I think that's right. So speculation has begun and the easiest, of course, is to say either it's going to be 8 Ball Deluxe or Centaur. Centaur being a half-man, half-motorcycle creature who could be playing Billiards or Pool or whatever you want to call it. Yeah. I haven't actually heard 8 Ball as being a suggested title for the next remake. 8 Ball Deluxe, yes. Well, it could also be 8 Ball Champ, but nobody likes that game. No, not that much, no.
    17:04
    But 8 Ball, I wouldn't have thought it would have been that popular as a remake title. 8 Ball Deluxe, yes. I think a lot of people, well, maybe it's just me, but a lot of people have very fond memories of playing 8-ball deluxe, and those games are still fun, even these days.
    17:22
    Or maybe especially these days, when things have got so complicated, there's a nice simple rule set and a challenging play field. But I certainly spent many hours playing 8-ball deluxe at college, when one of those games had got me into pinball, I think. so I've certainly got fond memories of that but Centaur as well although I never quite mastered Centaur the same way as 840 Lux it seemed like a tougher game to me well it's a very fun if we're dishing up memories I have very fond memories of winning a classic tournament in Germany probably like 10 years ago where I happened to play the final on a Centaur game and the interesting thing there being that I happened to shoot a ball up the playfield on the right hand.
    18:16
    At the same time, the game was releasing balls for a multi-ball. So we have two balls clashing at the top of the playfield, one rolling down the in-lane or the shooter lane again. Oh, right. Clashed against the other ball, which gave me a very easy multi-ball to win the tournament. Ah, well, of course, you would be expected to manually launch that bulb. Oh, nobody told me.
    18:44
    I'm sure an honest mistake. Yes, absolutely. I had no idea. I didn't know where that bulb had gone. My wrist was blocking my view at the bulb, so I could not see it. Quite right. Yes, I'm sure they'll quite understand that. that yeah so anyway um that's about all the news from haggis that there is um yeah no indication exactly when the game's going to be fully announced or or indeed when it's going to be actually made because that's um as we've seen many times and we mentioned it already here that you can announce a game now and don't have to actually go into production of the game for quite some time.
    19:28
    Yeah, that's a trend which is rather disturbing, I suppose. Yeah. You almost wonder why people announce games when they can't make them yet. But I'm sure there are business reasons for that, and also to keep the public's mind. If everybody else is out there announcing games, you don't want to be seen as the one who hasn't done anything for a year, simply because you can't make them. Yeah, well, Dutch Pinball being the exception, but we'll get to that in a in it. Okay. Well, I think that, as you say, I think that wraps up Haggis Pinball in Australia. So let's move on to the... Hopefully more news on the Haggis next month. Well, yeah. Hopefully the... rather be a tease of another tease or it might even be a tease of a game.
    20:14
    Ooh. Yeah. So as I say, moving on to the world's biggest pinball manufacturer, that would be Stern Pinball. Yeah. And they have, well, a few announcements this month. no new game announcements but actually the new game announcement is expected this month ah ok yes well let's go let's pick up on that then so in July we are expecting the next title to be announced after Foo Fighters which is currently in production a new cornerstone game so three models pro premium and limited edition and it has already been confirmed by Orange County Pinball, who is a reseller or distributor for Stern in California,
    21:04
    that the new Stern Cornerstone title will be playable at Comic-Con. Right, and where is Comic-Con? Do we know? Comic-Con is at San Diego? San Diego, yeah, I think so. have yeah okay and that's in july is it or yeah i think around 2023 of july okay that that weekend i suppose um from from memory that is right don't take my word for it so but uh no certain usually has a big presence there jack danger uh uh hosting a tournament where you can win lots of goodies in the marriott uh oh yes nearby the venue yes they don't have their own little set up there don't they Right, and Stern usually also teams up with one of those record labels that does heavy metal music or even harder.
    22:07
    Yeah, Thrash, something like that. Yeah, and last year there was already quite some speculation as Ozzy Osbourne made an appearance at the booth of that record label. and Seth McFarlane if I'm not mistaken was also involved and he appears to be involved in the comic Venom which is rumoured to be Stern next Cornerstone oh that a nice tie in well done yeah and the game is supposed to be designed by Brian Eddington I think with Dwight Sullivan on software Right.
    22:51
    And apparently the game is already finished for a year, at least according to rumors. Is that finished in terms of build or in terms of software?
    23:02
    Probably design-wise. And software, I don't know, they had a lot of extra time, I suppose, to work on the software. But the James Bond 60th anniversary game was prioritized at the cost of Venom to be released in time for the 60th anniversary of James Bond.
    23:26
    And then we also had Foo Fighters, which probably went ahead because Foo Fighters were going on tour and Insider Connected was tying into that tour, so there's a reason to move along or to prioritise Foo Fighters over Venom, I suppose. Yes, that may also have been a contractual thing, I doubt it, but it's also worked out nicely if Venom is launched at Comic-Con. Although there is a certain comic element to Foo Fighters as well, of course, if those titles have been swapped the other way, because the game is based on a fictional Saturday morning cartoon series. Right, yeah. So this is probably the time to launch that Saturday morning cartoon to a bigger audience. Well, it would be good for them to have both Fee Fighters and Venom at Comic-Con, wouldn't it? Yeah, exactly. Anyway, and then there is, of course, a rumor saying that it will not be Venom that is the next Cornerstone game, and we're in for a surprise. Well, we have mentioned that we thought it was going to be Venom all the way back before James Bond, I think, and then again before Food Hiatus. But it's been on the cards for some time, as you say. So it'll be nice to actually see it, because I think it must be Brian's turn, Brian Eddy's time to have his next title out. Yeah, it's been a while since Stranger Things, which was his first title at CERN.
    24:54
    Yeah, that's about 18 months or so, I'd say. yeah probably more even anyway I'm trying to remember we saw it at EAG in London yeah it was in January so yeah that's more than two years ago because I haven't been there in two years oh is it that long oh wow yeah wow okay doesn't time fly yeah so more than time for an E.G. Brian Eddie game so I'm looking forward to that so as you say I expect you to be at Comic Con and production likely to start in September, I guess. September, yeah.
    25:33
    Stern is now joining the other companies in announcing a game and holding off production for a couple of months although Stern have a busy production schedule as it is already because huge backlog of older titles and well, they're still cranking out Foo Fighters and James Bond games and well previous titles too which is quite often a long wait if you want to be on that list yeah so and they have a move coming up they do yes in October it's meant to be in the new place in October so if they're going to start making these in September I wonder whether they'll wait until they're in the new place or there will be the last game to be made in the current premises yeah okay so anyway there was more news from stern but it's more on the um uh human resources uh level i suppose yes absolutely yes uh stern has announced the appointment or two appointments actually uh first one is of madeline benz as customer service representative is she related to I wouldn't like to suggest that in any way. But it's good because I think there's been some criticism in the past that it's been difficult to get parts out of Stern Pinballs. So they've been non-responsive to some degree. So if you have a new customer service representative, then hopefully that situation will or has already improved. and the second appointment is of Elizabeth Geisk as a game software developer so a new game developer or new software developer I should say both appointments are as Stern says as part of our organisational commitment to investing in all processes of our rapidly growing business well it's true but they do seem to be taking on people at quite a rate but of course they are moving to larger premises as you mentioned just now. But also, of course, we never actually get to hear when people leave a company. So there may be... You know, there's no press release for that. Why is it? Only when people die. Or new positions that are being created. Or they're replacing previous people. But anyway, congratulations to both Madeline and Elizabeth on their new appointments. Right. And that's not all. No, exactly. Because Marco Specialties has these Pintech videos in which they do a deep dive into certain games or they discuss how to fix certain problems with games and so on which is often done by Kyle Spiteri and Emoto Hardy as the host and in their most recent Pintech video in which they focus on Foo Fighters Premium, with designer Jack Danger also present, Cal revealed that he is actually moving to Chicago to work for Stern Pinball. Wow. Okay. Well, I guess that kind of makes sense, as he's so deeply involved in the technical side of Stern's machines, and that's what he has in-depth knowledge of. So, yeah, a great move and a great hire for Stern Pinball. and I guess a loss for Marco I was going to say I don't think at Marco they'll be very happy but is he going to continue doing these Pintech live streams well he's being hired into Stern's technical service department yeah makes sense and you can make of that what you want that's all the info oh right I thought there was some nuance to be gleaned well he's still going to continue the Pintech live so it's not a total loss for marker specialties but of course they won't have them on a day to day basis anymore ok well so good news there for Stern and Kyle congratulations to him again on his new appointment as well so as you said most of the other news this month is about code updates which have been a lot I think and some have been quite significant so although we were talking about the hiring of a new software developer.
    30:12
    Stern have not been quiet. Hauling back. Yeah, they've been very busy. So I'll just rattle through them fairly quickly, if that's all right. And Jonathan goes off and gets his cup of tea or has a short nap.
    30:26
    Yeah, James Bond, big update at the beginning of the month. Version 0.92, which added the 007 scoring feature and also added the Diamonds Are Forever background music to 007 scoring. Added loads of scoring rebalances and bug fixes, new video and audio clips, quite a lot of rule changes too. And added, for those who are interested, 41 insider-connected achievements to the game for completists to collect. So that was James Bond 007 at the beginning of the month and then later in the month there was a version 0.93 came out which added the Ahoy Mr. Bond Wizard Mode, available at the right ramp when you completed all the villain modes, or the henchmen modes, or spectre modes, or the key branch modes.
    31:21
    And I won't go into details of exactly how it works, but it's a single ball wizard mode hurry up. We just make one of eight lit shots for jackpot or double jackpot and collecting all the jackpot and double jackpot awards will then light the side ramp or the right ramp for super jackpot so that's the Ahoy Mr. Bond wizard mode which I'll probably never ever see unless somebody else is playing maybe watching Keith Owen play the game certainly watch it on stream, I'm sure somebody will go through it, Jack Danger will probably do it as part of his recordings or live streams Godzilla has not been left out either because it actually had two updates. I don't think it was unusual. It was intended to have two updates. But Virtual 1.6 came out which was a minor update but introduced a bug which killed the topper, which is their most recent release of toppers. So hardly the lighting worked on it.
    32:25
    But it did introduce the King of the Monsters challenge mode. Then 1.7 came out very swiftly afterwards on the 16th of June, which fixed the bug introduced in 1.06. So the topper is now working again and added the new King of the Monsters Time Attack mode, which is one of those mini games you can play by holding in both flippers at the start and going into the game mode menu. And also added high score tables for the King of the Monsters time attack scores and the most time available sorry, most time remaining when you finish the game. So it's something you have to complete within a certain amount of time. So it's high score tables for that. Wake up, Doron. This is very exciting stuff.
    33:16
    We're almost there. Rush also had an update. Version 1.12 on the 20th. Nothing much there. Nothing major. A few tweaks to the rules. couple of adjustments don't need to go into it too much and uh foo fighters was the most recent one i think uh 27th of june so it was about a week ago had quite a lot of bug fixes for features which weren't quite working correctly and and put some potential crashes as well and added a new bomb mod mode which uh awards a bomb bonus as part of the final shot that's worth the value of all shots that were that you made during bomb mod mode so uh that's a nice new feature to add to Foo Fighters it's obviously still in development 0.95 is its current one not reached version one just yet but uh that wraps up all our code updates for Stern Pinball games yeah but not all news about Stern Pinball because there's still a little something to mention um I've seen a photo of Gary Stern, Jody Dankberg and Seth Davis at the Las Vegas Licensing Expo, which was held earlier in the month. They were not the only Pimble Company present, but we'll get to that later on. Okay, yes. So, obviously, well, they are regular attendants. Well, Gary Stern certainly is regular attendees at licensing shows. Yeah, Jody as well. Yeah, Jody I think is head of licensing, I think, officially. Yeah. So, yeah. No surprise that they are at that. So looking at future titles.
    35:00
    Okay. So moving on or moving across the street to Jersey Jack Pinball. And, well, not an awful lot of news from them. They did rather strangely officially announce the topper to the Godfather game. Right. Which was. We kind of seen that before. Yeah. It's no news No, it was in the initial launch But now they've confirmed exactly what's on it I suppose now they've got They've been making collector editions for a while So it's not really a big deal So anyway But what's on that topper? Please do tell Wow, it's got two Tommy Gong wielding articulating thugs Which is what everybody wants A hand painted custom gangster car with headlights that light up. Laser steel cut New York City skyline, which actually does look very nice, I have to say. More than 30 individually controlled RGB LEDs and, unusually for a topper, adds a second knocker into the back box, which is used for when the Tommy gun is firing. The Tommy gun has light on the end, or Tommy guns have lights on the LEDs on the end, which flash to simulate them firing. Well, there's also a knocker in the back box which also fires at the same time in sync. Does it give a replay every time it knocks? No, hopefully not. It just scares the bejesus out of everybody.
    36:31
    But I suspect it's a little quieter than a standard knocker. But that is the topper, which, as I say, we have seen before, but they were promoting it this time. Well, it's only available, I believe, the collector edition anyway so it's not like you can go out and buy one specifically but they i uh did they start building those collector yeah oh yeah i think so i think i've seen them well there's the logic yeah well this is what the now it all makes sense the people who ordered it will get yes and those who didn't order it because they sold out um won't be getting it uh so there is also, we're talking about the Godfather, there is some new code for the Godfather which adds tutorial videos to the track mode, which is something that Stern did initially, I believe. And I'll probably get corrected on that and say, no, no, no, Jersey Jack did it first, or somebody else did it first, but those videos have been added to the Godfather, so in a track mode it'll tell you how to play the game. And they've added the game manual in, as well, in electronic version, so you can reference that through the large screen in the back box. They've added some adjustments to control what the bad guys say within the game. So I don't know whether that's family friendly as it were. Quotes around both family and family friendly. They've added support for the topper so it's now in sync with everything else and the knocker fires. So I guess that wasn't in the game before so maybe that's another reason why they've been promoting the topper. they've updated the rules display, speech and other effects a couple of minor bug fixes and they've added an audio equalizer to the game which is another thing that we still haven't had for a while but it's nice to see that I guess that's in software terms rather than any additional hardware they've been putting in the games so that's version 1.08 of the Godfather right, so and guess who was also at the Las Vegas licensing expert. Oh, I can see a theme developing here.
    38:43
    It was Jack Guarnieri of Jersey Jack Pinball. So, also scoping out ideas for new titles. Yeah, so well, it's an annual event, so everybody is of course trying to seal the deal, or at least get in contact with the right parties for certain licenses. And of course, at these shows, the licensors are displaying which licenses they have available or have become available contrary to previous years or editions. Yeah, which ones they're particularly promoting at this particular time. But also, I guess you can keep an eye on the competition and see who they're hanging out with, which companies they're in discussions with. Well, the funny thing is that the competition is usually no surprise. They know. Jack knows what Stern will be building, and Stern knows what Jack has, and other companies know as well. But let me say, it's not unknown for one company to attempt to steal a license away from another once they know they've got it. no because they could be playing a call and thinking there's nobody else going no other pinball company going after this license so therefore they can get it at a good price but if they find out that somebody else is going after it as well then it might be a matter of getting the credit card out or the checkbook and trying to outbid the other company we're referring to the spooky pinball situation where Stern Pinball scooped away Godzilla while Spooky already negotiated that deal well that's not the only instance of that happening but I think it's the only one we can talk about right yeah no there's actually it's a war a jungle yes there's so much everybody thinks that these people in the pinball are the nicest but wait till you have to do business with them yes and there's some dirty tricks you get to see a whole different side of certain people Yeah, but we won't go into that too much now. Let's keep it light, keep it friendly. Right. Because we're also moving on to another pinball company, one you just mentioned, in fact. Yeah. Spooky Pinball. They have some games as well. Yeah, they hosted their first livestream on their new Twitch channel with America's Most Haunted gameplay. America's Most Haunted being the first game that Spooky developed almost a decade ago. Yeah. So first game, first one to feature on their new live stream. Yeah. Right. Yeah. But they're also still posting gameplay videos of new code on YouTube as well, which is actually what they did for a bunch of code updates during the past month. And I'll take this one. well Scooby-Doo saw a code update version 2023.06.22.17 are you still with me?
    42:07
    yeah those are my lottery numbers ah well you must be in luck then the thread character mode has been added plus some lighting rule and gameplay setting changes and that's mostly what that one is about. And there's a gameplay video available on YouTube.
    42:27
    As well is there for Halloween and Ultraman. Both version 1.11. And in both games, the video and audio systems have been overhauled for better sound balance and more control, along with smoother video playback. And there's a lot of rule changes and mode fixes, new light shows, as well as numerous bug and potential crashes fixed. Yeah, there were quite a few things that crashed the game previously, and hopefully they've caught all those now and fixed them in version 1.11. Yeah, and that already rounds it up for spooky pinball news. Now, contrary to earlier companies that we discussed, we do not know whether Spooky Pinball attended the licensing expo in Las Vegas. No, I haven't seen any pictures of anyone from the company there. So it could well be that they've already got all their titles sorted out for the next few games. Yeah, and you don't need to go there. Yeah, exactly. but sticking in the Chicago area Chicago Gaming yeah talk about licenses and of course one of the big licenses of recent times has been Pulp Fiction which we've been talking about for a long time and of course the game is now was revealed at the Texas show in March indeed and it is now as of June available to play at the Logan Arcade in Chicago, downtown Chicago. That makes it two arcade locations in the Chicago area where the game is available to play. Yeah, Antarium being the other one. Yeah, and I still consider these test locations to see how the game is holding up,
    44:25
    what needs to be improved hardware-wise. yeah so we mentioned before about games being announced but not actually being available to purchase just yet or not being able to be delivered just yet and production for Pulp Fiction is currently scheduled to begin in October but only the small run which will be for locations and distributors now I just to create a bigger appetite yeah that's right It's like a tease, another type of tease. Even though you've launched a game, you can then tease people with what the games are going to be like. But, of course, you can always go to Interium or Logan Arcade if you're in the Chicago area or plan on visiting and play the game there at any point. But these first run of games, as I say, they'll be for locations and distributors. So they will probably be the ones that will have the bill adapter on the front on the coin door so rather than the more classic Bally stained steel coin door which didn't have room for a bill acceptor.
    45:37
    So apparently Chicago Gaming will be watching these games closely to, as you say, sort of like test games or samples.
    45:46
    Right, but also to perfect the production process. Right, okay. So the games may change after that point, if they find something in the process. Or at least the way they built the games. Yes, exactly. If they find there's either something in it that needs changing, or the way in which they put the game together needs changing.
    46:08
    But the actual main batch of machines won't start until December or January. Right. And then even after that, the biggest bulk, the biggest order of machines won't be built for another two to three months after that. So we're looking at least a year after it was revealed in March at the Texas show until they stopped doing their main run of machines.
    46:37
    But there you go. So revealed and then probably a year until you actually get your machine, probably. Right, okay. Now there was a little bit of more Chicago Gaming news related to Spooky Pinball that we just mentioned or talked about.
    46:57
    It is no secret that Spooky and Chicago Gaming are working together on a Ben Heck designed pinball machine. Yes, we mentioned that a long time ago. yes now Ben Heck one of the dream themes of Ben Heck for pinball would be the Bible stories because everything is numbered in the Bible which makes it a great theme for pinball now at the time Deep Root jumped on that idea and they were set on producing a fire and brimstone theme. Yeah, it was one of the very latest ones I know. And then lightning struck and that never happened.
    47:57
    But Chicago Gaming is, well the rumor has it that the theme of this spooky slash Chicago Gaming pinball machine is not going to be the Bible, but close enough Monty Python and the Holy Grail. Well, that would be a fantastic theme. It's full of possibilities, of course.
    48:21
    And everybody loves a game that's got a lot of good humour in it. Right. Except when it's Bunny Factory, but that's not good humour.
    48:33
    Right. But it's just a rumour, so it might still just be the Bible, because the Bible is license-free, and Monty Python is not. So, we'll just have to wait and see. For the next couple of months, Spooky is still building Scooby-Doo, so they're busy anyway. Yeah, as indeed are Chicago Gaming, as we've just been mentioning.
    48:55
    And, I mean, they are so busy that the topper for their Bad Mother Flipper limited edition of Pulp Fiction won't be built until February 2024 at the very earliest. Again, we saw those at the Texas Pinball Festival in March, so that will be a year away as well. They're the ones with the dancing characters on the top and the Jack Rabbit Slim scene. So they're very integral to the game and look very attractive and well animated. But not until February 2024, the earliest. So that probably, if it says at the earliest, that probably means quite some time after that. Right. Yeah. The timelines with Chicago Gaming, not very accurate. Yes. Optimistic, should we say. Yeah. Okay. Anyway, so there was also news from Hongpin in Taiwan. Indeed there was. Quite a bit, actually, I would say. Yeah, well, they finally started building, well, we mentioned this last month already, building This Is Spinal Tap.
    50:17
    And apparently they had one of the This Is Spinal Tap games on test in a British pub in Taipei. and from those tests it turned out that the game could use a center post between the flippers so that the ball would bounce back, Pulp Fiction has one as well and we've seen it on many other games as well basically a static post that the ball can bounce back on with the rubber but the testing of the game with a rubber with a static post between the flippers turned out to be highly successful so they decided to add one in every production machine yeah okay I always find them a bit of a mixed blessing personally never quite sure whether to trust them whether the ball is going to bounce back or bounce away but I guess it increased the ball time and made it easier to play the game so maybe there was a rather large flipper gap. I mean, I'm sure it'll be popular in most games to put a center post in, but if it makes the game play too long, then not so popular with operators.
    51:40
    Right. Okay. Well, you can always take it out. I guess, yeah. If you've got a plug that can go in there and fill in the hole. Yeah.
    51:50
    Anyway, they also showed pictures of power boxes being assembled with a switch socket connectors fuse and a filter um they were supposed to run 100 but apparently they only made 99 because a forklift ran over one of uh of the housings of the of the hundredth yeah this is where they were being powder coated i believe yeah so that destroyed that one so uh 99 um being made so uh maybe that's the size of the first run of machines yeah actually I think these were I'm not sure whether HomePin is using them for their own games I think these were WPC replacement power boxes with all the different voltages I mean I actually happened to talk to Mike Kalinowski the owner of HomePin a couple of weeks ago because I was wondering like who is buying these things?
    52:55
    What, the games or the power boxes? No, the power boxes. Okay. But apparently there's a lot of people that at some point needed a transformer or what have you or a power box, took it out of an old pinball machine that had issues anyway or was already used for parts or what have you because it's hard to imagine these days, but a decade ago, pinball machines were still parted out just to use the parts for different machines. But nowadays, games have become so expensive that everybody's putting them back together. That's right, yes, that's true, yeah. And then you need a power box. Yeah, you've got a project game, as they call it, that's missing some parts. Yeah, being able to buy them from,
    53:46
    with, firstly, they're new, but also improved because those filters in some of the older games can be problematic, as can the fuse holders. So, and not all of them had the sockets as well and the switches can become a little intermittent too. So, yeah, replace the whole lot with a brand new box and all the problems go away.
    54:10
    Right, okay. So, and there's more news. A bit of exciting news, I think. On the Aussie Pinball Podcast, which is aired on the Pinball Network, if I'm not mistaken, Dr. John Cosson had the earlier mentioned Mike Kalinowski as a special guest.
    54:34
    Yeah, and they talked about Thunderbirds, the first game that Hoping developed. and the problems that they ran into which we won't go into now but obviously Homepin is known for having a lot of delays in the Thunderbirds design process which were addressed as this is Spinal Tap but it gets more interesting as Mike revealed to have secured the license for an extremely famous movie but of course he didn't reveal which one I just mentioned that I talked to Mike he actually mentioned it to me I can confirm it is an extremely famous movie right as extremely famous as Spinal Tap or more ok so moving up yeah but Mike also indicated that the license is a difficult one as about six parties hold the rights to various aspects of the license. About six?
    55:46
    Well, probably six. Okay, so it's not going to be Snow White and the Seven Dwarfs then. Okay. Well, it depends on who owns the likeness of Snow White and who of the dwarves and whether that's in the same deal or maybe you get a package deal like you get six dwarves and the seventh is for free. Or perhaps you get five dwarves if you could buy the limited edition or you can download the extra dwarfs for a digital download I think we're on to something I don't want to start putting this money making scheme out there too clearly I can see it but certain people, certain companies would see that as a potential revenue stream anyway, probably not Snow White then extremely famous movie that's all we got is it? and the plan is and actually I'm not sure whether I should take any credit for this but what I suggested when I was talking to Mike and he mentioned the theme to me and I was like ok I said to him like you should do this as a belly 80's style type of game which actually Pulp Fiction just did and I even suggested to Mike to take a look at Pulp Fiction because that's to me probably the best integration of an 80's style cabinet and artwork and everything but still modern day gameplay right so the leak now is it's a famous movie but probably from the 80's Maybe.
    57:34
    It could be Saturday Night Fever. That would be a good one. It could be... Grease. I was... Well, are you familiar with The Sound of Music? I am, but it's not from the 80s, so that wouldn't make any sense. Well, no, but we're not making electro-mechanical games anymore, so...
    57:53
    Hmm, okay. Dore mi fa sol la tido. Oh, yeah. I can see Dora me fa solitido multiple. How about that? Once you spell out every note, yes. Yeah, make it a target, you know.
    58:15
    Every note is a target, and you have to spell out the entire octave. I like it. Okay. And that's the entire game. Right. So when might we get to see this mystery game? well this mystery game is scheduled or supposed to be revealed at pinball expo 2024 oh right so we've got to wait that's a contractual obligation so yeah but so was this is spinal tap but that never happened yeah that was very loose just like that was with martial lamps meant to be the game meant to come out but then that requirement kind of went away so hopefully we will get to see hopefully we get it revealed before Expo and then we get to see it and play it at Expo and the best news the game is supposed to cost less than $5,000 US dollars I'm not sure whether that is including the shipping and the import duties and everything but from the factory it's supposed to cost $5,000 or a little under that. So that's the aim. That would be quite a challenge. But, I don't know, without knowing what's in the game.
    59:38
    And, of course, Mike makes a lot of his own parts as well. So that should help cut out some of the overheads in buying the components which are needed for the game. But, yeah, that would be quite a challenge. But it could set a new benchmark and encourage others to go for cheaper games. Other people have tried and no one's done it yet. Well, I'd say Pulp Fiction nailed it. Yeah, but not on cost.
    60:08
    No, that's true. Or they did and they make a lot of money on that game. Yeah. Okay, so that's our home pin news, I think. I don't think there's anything more to come from them just at the moment. So let's head back to the US and the Chicagoland area and American Pinball. Because we've mentioned before about how they brought out a fixed kit, I suppose, for an issue they had with their new current title, the Galactic Tank Force, where the tank target bank that's in the middle of the playfield just above the flippers, was suffering from bending back and deflecting balls or making air balls. And they had a kit which would fix that.
    61:03
    Yeah. Speaking of fix, if you want to hear the entire story about that, then check out, I think it was two episodes ago, where David Fix was a special guest and addressed that he would be addressing the issues that have now been addressed. Yes, there is an additional bracket which you can attach to the back of the target bank, which will stop the target bending back. The other issue, of course, you mentioned was about magnetic balls in the game. Yeah. Well, thanks for addressing that. Yeah, indeed. Anyway, the point is that there is now a step-by-step guide for installing this. A video guide, sir. Wow. Okay, even better. Well, that's why it's on YouTube then. Yeah, so, well, everybody's got a smartphone these days, so you basically have the video tutorial in your hand, and you get a step-by-step guide to guide you through the process. No better way of seeing how to install this new bracket than by seeing it being installed in a video. Yeah, the only thing that I found a little disappointing is that they broke kayfabe, so to speak, with this video. Here we had a tech as a tech telling you or explaining to you how to install this. It was not in character as the previous video. Ah, I see. Yes. That would have been more.
    62:36
    Yeah, I think I probably just want to be a little more serious on this one because it is a known problem and don't want to be seen to be taking it too lightly.
    62:47
    So kudos to American Pinball for getting that video out and getting the fix fixed. Okay so moving over to the Netherlands and Dutch Pinball. Oh yeah and there's been some news from there I'll let you handle that one. Yeah well thank you very much. Dutch Pinball posted a video on Facebook of various assembly line employees putting together various assemblies for the Big Lebowski pinball machine like the bowling mech and well there's quite a few mechs on that game that need to be pre-assembled before they are put into the game and the idea behind the video is to lure potential assembly line workers into coming to work at Dutch Pinball.
    63:42
    Basically, at the bottom it says that they are looking for assembly line employees and the video is to illustrate what you would be doing. Right, okay. So it doesn't look too complicated then, I guess.
    63:56
    Too gruelling for somebody working on the line. No, no, I don't think so. And I think certain people have proven that, well, I don't want to sound in any way demeaning or anything, but Mexican women can put pinball machines together. So it's not like rocket science, so to speak. Okay. It's basically once you know what you need to do, okay, this screw goes there, you put it there, you screw it in, and you move on to the next part. Right. Okay. But that's not all.
    64:36
    Because I gave Barry a phone call earlier today to which he did not respond. But then he called me back.
    64:46
    And we had a little talk. And I do have a little scoop. Do you? Currently, yeah. Which kicks the ball out where? it kicks it out right into the onto the play field in between the flaps okay a good place for a poster possibly yes so anyway um production of the big nabowski is still uh going ahead uh full speed um they're actually intending to start working on saturdays as well to speed up the pace even more.
    65:26
    And, well, with summer holidays coming up, they're also looking to hire a bunch of summer job employees. As we just heard from the video, yeah. Yeah, but not, well, they're also looking for permanent forces, but also if you just need a summer job, you know, you need to make some extra money in between going to college or university or whatever then this is an option but the most interesting thing I think is because I asked Barry okay so when can we expect a new game from Dutch Pinball which has been in the works for years don't think Barry has not worked no we don't but we also know that Barry wants to he doesn't want to announce any new game before he's finished the production of early achiever games for the Big Lebowski that everybody is made whole and has their game and what he told me is he is aiming to announce their next title around September 2024 which is more than a year away and then production should be starting early 2025. Is it going to take that long to get all the early achiever games in? No, I think he's just... There's that many orders for the Big Lebowski, which are not early achiever games.
    67:02
    But the orders still keep coming in on a daily basis, I suppose. It's a popular game. He's going to build games as long as he can, as the license will allow it. Right, so do they tell you when you're going to get your game?
    67:17
    Yeah. Apparently, my game is... Well, there's 19 games ahead of my game, of which five are already in production.
    67:28
    So I suppose that's like within a month or two? Yeah, a couple of months, I'd imagine. Yeah. Yeah, so... And I'm not the last game on the line. Oh, no. No, no, no. but now they're currently in the 140 range of early achiever games and my game is 161 so with the 5 that are already in production so that leaves you about 15 or so before yeah ok well fingers crossed I can almost touch it yes and then I guess you be able to go and pick it up from the factory yourself won you Well I expect them to shit to deliver it here on my door in a gift wrap paper
    68:19
    Delivered by Barry himself? With lots of extras and what have you. And then I'll probably tell them, oh, I don't need it here. I need it somewhere else. Yeah. Okay. The price you paid, incidentally, the price you paid when you bought it, does that include delivery then?
    68:33
    I have no idea. So long ago, forgotten. Not surprised. I barely remember what I paid for it. But not mention that, a lot of people will be very jealous of all the steel you got. I have a very nice life, people are really jealous of me. Yes, of course. Well, actually everybody is.
    68:52
    Anyway. That rounds it up for Dutch Pinball, but OK, so the scoop is expect a new Dutch Pinball title not any time soon. Right, yes. unless September 2024 is soon in your book I think it's not and even then and maybe Barry is just telling me this to put everybody off and then surprise so they don't keep bugging him to say when's the next Gangs of Me announced or what's it going to be yes okay well moving back to the US then and Multimorphic not really any news from them is there But we mentioned before that they were doing a series of introducing people from the factory who were working there, and that's continued. They got introduced into more of their assembly line through their social media feeds.
    69:45
    Yeah, and that's about it. Yeah, no new games. Production of Final Resistance still has to start, so we're just waiting for that. And in the meantime, they're just working away at their backlog. Yep, and we're not aware of Jerry or anybody else from Multimorphic being at the licensing show. Just throw that one in there. Yeah, no, no, neither was Barry, by the way. No, okay, he probably doesn't need to be. From Dutch Pinball. He's not going to announce anything for at least a year, and there'll probably be more than a year in building it. Do we know whether David's fixed from the American Pinball? Was it the licensing show? We don't, but somebody who has done some work for them, I think, is Roger Sharp. and he was at the licensing show very observant Martin ok so plenty of pinball representation there any chance the pinball brothers from Sweden were at the licensing show they were not spotted as far as I'm aware but that's we don't know they might probably be in the market for a license or two coming up They've been building Queen for quite a while. Well, they've been announcing it for quite a while. And they have been building the Rhapsody edition of Queen, which are models destined for the United States. And they've also, in the meantime, been shipping Queen games to various European countries, too. So they are busy building Queen games. And we, I don't know if we're expecting an announcement on a new title anytime soon. maybe well we'll just have to wait and see yeah it must be getting on for that time because bearing in mind that people announce everybody announces well in advance of actually producing games then I wouldn't be at all surprised if we get to see a new announcement from Pinball Brothers something I don't know Martin no I can't that's just a hunch that's all anyway Pinball Brothers of course work closely together with Pedretti Gaming they do and they're a Pinball Corporation joint venture as we've heard we did not see any representatives from Pedretti at the licensing show either not that we necessarily know what they look like if we did true yes but long story short no news from Pedretti although they are busy building their whirlwind Total Chaos 2.0 indeed, yeah and working on future titles as well I'm sure oh yeah, yeah, yeah it sounds like Martin knows something that he can't talk about yet again, yes probably, but I can't talk about it so I won't right, okay Bittronic in Spain, I'm actually curious whether there's any news they were not spotted at the licensing show in Las Vegas. But I'm actually more curious. They had a fire in their pinball factory a couple of months ago. They expected to be back in production a month or two later, but actually we haven't heard anything whether they are.
    73:11
    Yeah, I think that was last year, I think, wasn't it? The fire? Yes, because I saw them at the EAG Expo and they said they were back building games then, so that was in January.
    73:24
    I don't think there's a problem anymore. Worry about nothing. There are probably supply chain issues that are impacting more than that fire.
    73:34
    Okay. But no other news from Bitronic. Neither from Quetzalpinbo in Spain who designed the upcoming Tokyo Perfect Drift title that Bitronic would take into production. So we're still waiting for that to happen. No news from Turner Pinball either with their Ninja Eclipse game that was shown at the Texas Pinball Festival in an early development stage. Yeah, Christian just said they wouldn't be making any more announcements so they got something concrete to show people. So that's fair enough. They haven't posted anything, any teases, any updates or anything on their social media feeds either. So we have to assume nothing new from them.
    74:23
    Right, okay. They were not spotted at the Las Vegas licensing expo? No, I don't think so. I think everybody saw, probably Chris, if it was. I don't think he was seen there.
    74:33
    Okay, okay. Just checking. Cardona Pinball, who make 2.0 kits for Nova Govers and Black Rose. Yes, quite right. Very well remembered.
    74:45
    No news from them? No, nothing about any other kits being available. I think they're still working on their Black Rose one at the moment any news from Circus Maximus who are working on Kingpin Capcom Kingpin remake no constantly reminding us that the project is not dead but it's kind of just on permanent hiatus it seems right ok any other news well yes there's the gift that keeps on giving which is the Deep Root story rolls on through the legal processes.
    75:24
    This month, there's been a couple of bits of information. Firstly, there was the liquidation of trying to recover as much money as possible from the family of companies. And the trustee of that liquidation fund has reached agreement with numerous parties who received money from various deep root companies, which the Securities and Exchange Commission, the SEC, alleges were unlawful payments. Those include people who made gains on their policies which was paid for by new people paying in, which is kind of like what they claim as a Ponzi scheme. So people who did take money out only got it because other people were paying money in not because their actual funds were making any money because we know that they didn't. Also for Robert's expenses commission credit card payments for personal expenditure as well now these are fairly might sound like small amounts but the biggest one of these was American Express who have agreed to repay $650,000 of a total claim by the trustee of $1.533 million for Robert's spending on personal expenses this is their quote personal expenses including his daughter's private school tuition, federal income tax payments, medical and dental bills, family vacations, his second wedding, his second divorce, his third wedding, jewelry for his second and third wives, and lifestyle spending for him and his family. What about his third divorce? We haven't heard about that. There's probably no money to pay for that at the moment. So that might be pending.
    77:11
    Anyway, so the agreement is needed for, sorry, from the court for these, the recovery of this, but it would be a total of $816,596.71,
    77:26
    recovered from all those various people who took money out and have agreed to pay it back to some degree.
    77:35
    So, hold on. I do have a question. So basically this means, So Robert was spending all this money that people put into the company for personal expenses. This is what the SEC claimed. Yeah, yeah, okay. And in the end, American Express is basically paying back like half of that. Not even that. About 50%. But still, Robert got to spend the money and nobody's touching that. Well, I guess some of it is not recoverable. Probably things like income tax payments. I don't suppose the IRS is going to be paying money back.
    78:20
    But he went on vacation. He did his wedding and the divorce and everything. If he's been on vacation, I don't know how you recover that money.
    78:29
    But I suppose some of that was charged to the credit card. Okay, so American Express is paying $650 back. $650,000, yeah. Sorry, yeah. But so the remaining, can they claim that with Robert? Because he spent it. He did spend it, yeah. Well, there's no money there to pay it back anyway, so it's all a bit of a moot point. But what was actually interesting, the most interesting part of all that, is that American Express agreed to repay anything because American Express have a huge number of lawyers who will defend any claims against them and they obviously decided that they couldn't defend it in its entirety and some of those payments shouldn't have been made.
    79:17
    And so they settled for still $650,000. It's quite a lot for them to agree to hand back. I mean this is bear in mind this is not money which they themselves made this is money which he spent through the card to other people so there was decided that's the best way of going ahead rather than trying to take it to court or have to defend their position so anyway over $800,000 recovered for those people who lost money in the scheme of things or schemes of things, which is something like $60 million in total. It's a small fry. But we'd also mentioned last month how Robert and the Security and Exchange Commission were going to take part in mediation with a judge to try to find an agreed settlement to the SEC's charges.
    80:17
    They met on the 20th of June for their mediation. No agreement was reached. so the case now goes back to court for a court hearing unless some other agreement is reached in the meantime that to me was no big surprise because I can't imagine Robert admitting to any of this stuff that the SEC is alleging because then he makes himself liable to criminal charges from the Feds so if he can deny everything all the way down the line make it that much harder for a criminal case to succeed at the moment it's just a civil case with the SEC talking about trying to recover money there's no jail time or criminal charges pending yet but we're expecting them at some point so that's the latest update from the Deep Root story right okay well thank you for that So, well, there's another story from the UK. I'll let you handle that as well. Yes. Well, we mentioned before about the possibility of Capcom's Big Bang Bar being remade. We were talking just now about Kingpin. We were just talking. Kingpin. We mentioned Kingpin. We have mentioned Big Bang Bar 2.
    81:38
    Oh, but not in this episode. Oh, not in this episode. Sorry. In earlier Pinkast. Yes. Yes, I was about to mention And tying in with A possible remake of Kingpin, which we were talking about Earlier from Circus Maximus Phil Palmer from Pinball Heaven In the UK Mentioned in a video interview He is very certain that Capcom's Big Bang Bar Is being remade And is already in pre-production Whatever pre-production Would be In fact there's even an article about the game on Pinball Heaven website mentioning it, they think Stern Pimble gets their vote as a potential manufacturer where Keith Elwin would further develop the game for Pro, Premium and LE versions.
    82:26
    Yeah, well, keep on dreaming I would say because I don't see that happening. I don't see Stern doing it at all.
    82:32
    No. I imagine it would be, well, bearing in mind who is most likely to own the rights to Big Bang Bar. it's not entirely clear but it's suspected that Planetary Pinball as part of their purchase of various Capcom parts and rights from Gene Cunningham I think they renewed the trademark for Big Bang Bar a couple of months ago so they would have it, I can't imagine they would be licensing Stern to make it, so far more likely it would be someone who has worked with them in the past to make remakes of 2.0 games, shall we say. So, without naming any names, I think we... But you can do them all. Yeah, I think one of the companies we mentioned earlier is very much in progress. But we mentioned all of them earlier. Well, there we go.
    83:30
    Almost certainly one of the ones we mentioned earlier. And my understanding is that it's being held up at the moment in rights issues as to exactly who owns the rights to what because um obviously there's there's multiple different aspects to any any game there's the the artwork the sounds there's the title there's um uh i know you can't um can't patent uh a playfield design but um there's a lot of voice talent as well in the game, and what is owned by whom is complicated, and not everybody is necessarily working in the same direction. So, at the moment, I think it's
    84:17
    complicated, and it's it could be sorted out at some point, but don't expect it to be sorted out any time soon.
    84:26
    Yeah, so don't get your No, at least not yet. But if you're in the market for a Big Bang Bar pinball machine, I might have one for sale if you come up with a very good one.
    84:38
    Okay, let's have a for sale section on the pin casting. Okay. Okay, so we're almost done with that. Well, we mentioned the licensing expo in Las Vegas already a couple of times. Yeah, many times. yeah I'm not sure whether you received the same email that I did ah you did so we mentioned George Spelvin from a mysterious new pinball company already last month announcing that they were teasing a new game at various pinball events like Texas Pinball Festival and The Allentown Show and Pintastic and what have you.
    85:26
    Not sure whether these are all correct. But okay, various pinball events. Apparently, well, or they sent out a new email, or George did.
    85:38
    Basically saying that he had tons of fun at the Las Vegas Licensing Expo. including photos of Gary Stern, Jodie Denkberg and Seth Davis on one photo being present. Jack Guarnieri walking by in a second. Roger Sharp signing in as well, collecting his badge.
    86:02
    And they put in a photo of a sort of business card with their flipper and ball logo which sort of looks like an explanation point which was stuck in between the metal parts of a robotic hand that reminds a little bit of Terminator. Yes.
    86:28
    And the last image in that email was again the logo that looks like an explanation point and the text accompanying it saying things are not always what they seem.
    86:48
    So, Martin, who do you think it is? I have no interest. As I said, I'm very low threshold for all these teasers. If you've got something to present, present it. Stop messing around. You want to be taken seriously. But, hey, because I guess they can have a bit of fun in the meantime. I guess they haven't got anything to actually put on sale yet. So they're just trying to do this marketing.
    87:13
    a method of trying to build interest in them before they actually reveal who they are but i'm keen not to to buy into it too too much you know and encourage all this uh
    87:26
    well we've got so many other companies out there all you're making games or about to be making games um tell us why your company is different that's what i want to know hmm yeah now since they attended the Las Vegas licensing expo I recall Joe Kamenkow is living in Las Vegas as well oh ok any chance that Joe Kamenkow might be starting up his own company that would be a bit of a shock given his close relationship with Gary Stern yeah but then again he also announced Jersey Jack having a certain license which was a shock to many as well that he would reveal that. Yeah but that wasn't done to boost Jersey Jack No that was done to we can't really speculate exactly why but anyway let me just throw in a rumor and we're not about rumors but could it be and the only connection being Las Vegas, Las Vegas someone from the pinball industry starting up a new company I mean if anybody would have the money to do it it would be Joe Kamenka true as I just said he was as I'm aware a very good friend of Gary Stern but then so is Eugene Jarvis and yet here we have Play Mechanics producing their first pinball machine in collaboration with Chicago Gaming. Yeah, not with Gary Stern. Although they obviously did with Big Buck Hunter. That was a collaboration with them. But now they're going with Chicago Gaming.
    89:22
    So, you know, just because people are friends doesn't mean I suppose they can't be competitors too. Right. So, anyway, on that thought, that rounds it up for the month of June 2023. It does. We'll be back at the start of August with our next Pincast, looking back at all the excitement from the pinball world throughout the month of July, this month. So, until then, from me, Martin A. of Pinball News,
    89:49
    and me, Jonathan Newsom of Pinball Magazine, we wish you a fantastic month and have fun playing pinball.
    89:58
    Yeah. Oh, and by the way, I got a note from Alessio Crisanti from Italy. There's a tournament coming up, I think, in September. Are you going?
    90:11
    September? No, I think I'm away in September. Oh, okay. I figured I'd just mention it anyway. Thanks.
    90:19
    IFBA tournament, IFBA tournament in Italy. Look it up. That's all. Don't forget the UK Open as well, which is a huge event. being run by our good friend Neil McRae here in London. So if you're into tournaments and you haven't signed up for that yet, make sure you do see him because all the places are almost gone. Yeah. Okay. Well, thank you for that. Bye for now.