I'd rather be shiny, like a treasure from a sunken pirate wreck. Scrub the deck and make it look shiny. I would sparkle like a wealthy woman's neck. I said, I said, I said, I said, I said, I said, I said, I said. Oh, happy Monday morning, everybody. Welcome to Kaneda's Pinball Podcast. I got people triggered, people. People are saying, what's happened to Kaneda? Has he flip-flopped on Elton John? Is he going to pull a fast one like he did on Willy Wonka? What's going on over there in New York City? What happened to our beloved, venerable podcaster, Kaneda, that hates everything about pinball? Do we really want this man to fall in love with the machine and actually find joy and entertainment in the hobby he talks about for 10 years? Now, look, here's the deal, everybody. I still think Elton John is a phenomenal game. It is a phenomenal game. and out of the box. There's a lot to love about Elton John Pinball. It's finally a Jersey Jack game that plays amazingly well. The theme is integrated almost perfectly. And I'm here to tell each and every one of you, did I order one? No. Am I going to order one this week? No. Am I going to order one this month? No, I am not. Sure, I would love to own an Elton John, but I haven't lost focus on the bigger picture here, everybody. All of these games are overpriced and it's really, really difficult, even if you have an amazing time on a modern pinball machine, to walk over to these distributors and hand them this much money on a game. Because history has shown us over the last two years that you're going to lose a lot of money. I cannot ask you to remain a member of the Canada Club, if just a few episodes ago, I showed you that if you bought every new in box game over the last year and a half, you lost over $30,000 in value. So if I'm going to tell you that and warn each and every one of you, if you go in on these games right away, there is an 85 to 90% chance that you're going to lose a lot of money. The only new in box game people did not lose money on was Pulp Fiction because none of them shipped. That's it. Everything else lost money. James Bond, Foo Fighters, Galactic Tank Force, Toy Story, Godfather, Scooby-Doo, you go down the list, James Bond 60th, Venom, everything has lost money and not just a little bit of money, thousands and thousands of dollars. And so yes, as great as Elton John is, and it is a great pin, here's the reason why I'm going to eat, play, and wait. That's going to be the name of this episode is eat, play, wait. I'm still waiting it out. And here's why. If you go into the Elton John owners thread, these are people who have bought in Elton John. There's only 50 people who have voted or said they bought this version of the machine on pin side. And so even though this game is great, and even though I love playing it, I still think the majority of people are speaking with their wallets and they're saying it's still too much money. And all of this is overpriced. It's not just Elton John. The barrels of fun games are overpriced. Spooky pinball machines are overpriced. Stern pinball machines are overpriced. And I know on my Patreon chat, we're all trying to figure out what's the reason why all of these games are so much money. And it's not because of the scalpers. We were scalping for so many years and these companies didn't do it. It's all because of COVID and there was no inventory. There was a period in time in which no new games were getting made. Everybody was at home trying to quarantine, right? And then you had so much demand and so little supply because no new machines were being made. That is what caused the great pinball spike in prices by these manufacturers. It was not because of scalping we did on Ghostbusters and Batman five years ago. It was all because of the inventory issues. No distributors had any product. So if you had a Stranger Things LE, all of a sudden someone would be willing to offer you stupid money for it because there was nothing available. There were no premiums available anywhere of any hot title. And remember what Stern did? They basically made you wait two years even to get a premium. And then they raised the prices on those premiums and didn't honor the original price by which you ordered your machine. So it was a global pandemic that was like 100 years in the making. And it wasn't something that I did because I scalped a few pins a few years ago. Here we are in February of 2024 and we're getting some really good pinball machines out the door. You know, look, I know people are saying, Kaneda, you're way too kind on Elton John and way too harsh on Jaws Pinball. You haven't played enough of Jaws Pinball. Play more of Jaws Pinball. You're now saying stupid things like Elton John is a better theme for pinball than Jaws. And look, I still believe this, ladies and gentlemen, and I've seen Jaws. I've played Jaws more than most of you. I played it again at Jack Bar yesterday. I just want to tell you right now, Jaws is a really slow movie. It's a slow movie like The Godfather. And pinball is a fast-paced, high-energy game. And so when you hit the start button on Elton John and I'm Still Standing is like rocking out, instantly you're having so much fun playing the game and you're in it. When you hit the start button on Jaws, it's not the same thing, you know? Brody is like slowly walking into his Jeep You have to start the process of trying to find and capture a shark You know constantly capturing sharks over and over again Okay maybe for some people you find that exciting I just think that Jaws is not the greatest theme for pinball. And I'm not stupid, ladies and gentlemen. Obviously, Guns N' Roses is a better music theme than Elton John. So would Beastie Boys. And by the way, I don't know exactly when Beastie Boys is coming out. but there is a really strong rumor that Jersey Jack Pinball has the Beastie Boys. There is also a strong rumor that Stern Pinball is going to make Journey Pinball. There is also a strong rumor that Metallica is coming out. So there's a lot happening in the music space within the pinball world. We also know the Pinball Brothers are going to make a European musical act pinball machine again. And look, I'm going to be completely honest. Do I prefer a story-driven pinball machine based on a hot movie license that I love? Absolutely, I would prefer that over a music pin. But here's the problem, everybody. Name me a movie that we've all been waiting for to be made into pinball format that is perfect for pinball. Jaws is not that movie for me. It's not the old James Bond movies from the 60s. I'm sorry, but this pinball hobby hasn't really been serving up some of the most iconic movies that would be awesome in pinball format. So your options are really limited. Like, where is Die Hard? Where's Total Recall? You know, where's Bloodsport? Where's Akira? Where's Transformers Generation 1 movie? Where's The Matrix? Where's Top Gun? Where's Karate Kid? You know, we're about to get back to the future, and that's why everybody's so damn excited about Back to the Future. It's like, finally, we're going to get one of the most iconic movies ever made. That's so much better of a theme for pinball than Jaws. We're about to get it. We're going to get Back to the Future. It's happening. It's happening by Dutch Pinball. And it's going to be revealed sometime at the end of this year, which is another reason why, even though I love Elton John and I would love to have an Elton John one day in my home. And let me reiterate, I would love to have an Elton John in my home for $9,000 maybe for a platinum and maybe like $12,000 for a collector's edition because I don't think these Elton John machines are going to go up in value. Nothing is going up in value. Nothing is holding its weight anymore. And this hobby is so overpriced. And it is sobering. As much fun as I had at Jack Bar on the ride home, you know, I'm talking to my friend Derek and I'm like, well, you should sell your Godfather and get an Elton John. And then we do the math on it. He bought Godfather for $12,500 with shipping. He'll be lucky if he can get $8,000 for Godfather Ellie. So that's a loss of $4,500. And then if he goes and buys Elton John Ellie because he lost $4,500 on Godfather to get a platinum of Elton John, that's now $16,500 he has to spend to get that game into his home. And then what happens when Elton John loses $3,000? Derek is now all in, in total money spent, $19,500 he's had to invest to just get two Jersey Jack machines. It's just silly, people. It's stupid. You know, and even though these games are great, the high prices are just so sobering when you really look at the hobby right now. And I know I said like, well, what's $2,500, you know, if I just get the game right now? And I don't know. You know, I do agree with some of the people that are like, well, if we don't send these manufacturers and these distributors a little bit of a message that we're not buying in at these high prices, and if we just shoulder shrug and say, hey, it is what it is, what are you going to do about it? There's no use complaining. It just is what it is. And I'm sorry, that's not me. That's not Kaneda. I know I said that. And the more I thought about it over the last 24 hours, I realized if we approach life that way, it just is what it is, except what you're given. That is such a recipe for mediocrity. It's a recipe for getting ripped off. It's a recipe for just giving people a stamp of approval on things that don't deserve it. And so, yeah, I mean, there's people out there that are like, why are people rooting for American Pinball to fail? Why aren't people celebrating every single pinball company? Because companies like American Pinball deserve to fail because they don't make stuff people want and they haven't made good decisions and the product is not there. And so I woke up this Monday, new week, new Canada, new show. I still love Elton John. I think when you play Elton John, you're going to love it too. It is easily the best shooting Jersey Jack game to date by far easily and you know I'm watching all these people trying to change out their capacitors all of a sudden on their Wizard of Oz games to try to make them play better and it's not really working out it's kind of funny to me now everybody thinks they can make every single Jersey Jack game shoot as well as Elton John by just changing the capacitors on their games I think there's more than just that IO board and capacitors that are the reason why Elton John shoots so well I also think when people are slapping this $400 IO board into their older games, I think some people are might be seeing more than there really is. You know, people are like, oh, the slings are firing better. The pops are really hitting right now. Who knows? You know, I do believe that the IO board is making the games better, but I don't think you're going to get the same kind of feel as Elton John. The other reason too is like Elton John, the reason why it's so much fun is the layout is there. Like you can't change the layout on Guns and Roses even if you increase the flipper power. Same with the older Jersey Jack games A lot of the reasons why we were like not loving the gameplay they really weren designed by someone like Steve Ritchie who just knew how to make a game flow amazingly well You know Eric Meunier best flowing game is probably the most boring game which is The Godfather. Godfather shoots better than Pirates and it shoots better than Guns N' Roses, but it's a boring game. I mean, there's a reason why that game is not going to last long in people's collections. And I know people are like, whoa, have you spent time on Godfather? And I haven't. I got to be honest. I haven't spent much time on Godfather and I don't want to. I don't want to. I don't like this theme. Is it okay? Isn't it okay in the modern world where I don't have to give everything like the time of day? I don't go see every movie because I like movies. I don't go see every concert because I like music. There's just some things I don't want. I never will own a Godfather pinball machine. I think it's a terrible theme for pinball and it is a terrible theme for pinball. And with everything going on in pinball in 2024, you know, it's really easy. It is really easy to wait, people. Trust me. If you've seen what I've seen with Back to the Future, it's really easy to wait. Here's the other thing, too, about life is the more you wait and the more money you save, I think you're going to be less stressed out. I think you're going to have more peace of mind if you wait it out and make sure these games develop to the point where you know you're really going to want it. And I don't get there being any urgency at all right now with any of these games. Why would you urgently buy Elton John right now? Think about it. Jersey Jack is a company where they haven't shown us yet that they will finally complete the code on a game. And I know there's going to be some work to be done on Elton John. Not a lot. Out of the box, Jersey Jack games are usually like 85 or 90% of the way there. But they've shown us historically they won't finish that last 10%. I mean, the fact that they won't go into Guns N' Roses and really make the factory default settings the better settings that the fan base has made to make that game much more enjoyable speaks volumes about this company's desire to finish what they start. At least with Stern Pinball, you know they're going to finish what they start. You know they're going to complete Jaws Pinball. You know they're not going to stop until they make them great. But when it comes to Jaws pinball right now, like owning Jaws right now makes no sense to me. And watching the game again yesterday, watching John at Jack Bar play it, the game is still incomplete. I mean, I think it's only code .83. And if you want to buy one right now and be along for the journey, sure. But again, why? Why would you pay full price, wait on a game where the code's not going to be done for six months, And by the time the code is done in six months, you're going to be able to save thousands of dollars on the game. It's just going to happen, people, because Stern, unlike Jersey Jack, unlike everybody else, they're going to make hundreds of Jaws machines every single week. There are going to be 3,000 to 4,000 Jaws machines out in the world come six months from now. And do you think it's going to be hard to get a Jaws LE for less than $13? It's not. Do you think it's going to be hard to get an Elton John CE for less than 15 in six months? It's not. Do you think it's going to be hard to get an Elton John Platinum for less than 12 in a few months? It's not. Pinball Now has shown us it's a hugely depreciating asset. It's not a tiny depreciating asset. It's a tremendously depreciating asset. And I got to be honest, I had a lot of fun at Jack Bar. I go over there with like $20 or $30. I can hear the entire game. I can hear the call outs. I can get through the game. I don't know. Why would I need to own it? I take a $2.90 subway ride to Brooklyn. I'm there in a half hour. I can spend hours there. I can plug in my headphones. I now have been studying the rule sets on Elton John, and I'm excited to go back and now apply what I know about the game. But it's there. And if I show up every day when Jack Bar opens up, I can hit the game for like two and a half, three hours while Killian is taking his nap. I can have my fill of Elton John. And what I love about a game being on location, ladies and gentlemen, and here's the thing, having a game on location in which you're trying to set the high scores, that's equivalent to having internet connected because I want to set the high machine on the game in my neighborhood and I can see where the scores are and it's fun every time I come back to see who's put up what on the game. It used to be CJ had the top score. some dude went in there in like the 24 hours since I played it and put up 300 million plus points on Elton John. And so that becomes fun, right? If you have a good location where you want to get on the leaderboard at your location's version of the machine, that's enough fun for me, right? It's a lot more fun for me to do that, like spend $20, $30 every time I want to play it, then drop $12,000 to $15,000 and lose thousands of dollars on that. Like if I bought Toy Story 4 and I bought The Godfather, I would have lost almost twice as much money as my vacation to Disney World costs. On two pinball machines, I would have lost that entire trip. So all those memories, all the money that you could use to do something far more memorable, Was it worth it for those people who bought those Jersey Jack machines? Was it worth it for people who bought Venom and Foo Fighters and are now realizing they can't sell their games? So look, I'm glad that a lot of you have been angry at me for loving Elton John. I still love Elton John. I still think right now it's the game of the year. I still think that game embarrasses Jaws Pinball. I think as a total pinball package that game feels twice as expensive as Jaws Pinball And I think Jersey Jack finally has a game where people are not going to make fun of it because it plays like crap And I think Stern pinball next to it look really cheap. And it's always been that way. Jersey Jack machines have always made Stern machines look cheap, but they always played better. Now that's not the case. Now we have an even gameplay playing field. All of a sudden, that makes us realize how much everything else in a Jersey Jack game is nicer than everything else in a Stern machine. But it's all overpriced. Nobody is safe from that indictment. It is all overpriced. You're spending almost $12,000 now on spooky machines, on barrels of fun machines. You're spending $13,000 on a P3 multi-morphic if you fully load the damn thing. And if you buy a bunch of modular systems for that thing, it's like a $20,000 proposition. This is getting stupid, people. I'm sorry, but like when John lifted the hood on Jaws Pinball Pro, there's like nothing underneath the game. It really does look like any of us could build this game at our homes right now. There's like one little wiring harness going down the middle. The rest of it is just no board just plugged in. There's no more like soldering. There's not like wires running everywhere. It's very clean. It's very simple. It's very basic. And I'm sure the same is true for Elton John. And that's why it's like, well, how come if you guys have streamlined how to make these things and found out how to make them cheaper, why are we all spending 40% more than we were in 2019? It doesn't work out, people. Don't worry. Canada's not buying any of this stuff. I would love to have an Elton John one day, but you know what? I'll be satisfied playing it at Jack Bar, chasing the high score there, and that will be my Elton John kicks over the next six months. Yes, I need to buy a house. When I buy a house, I'm not going to be flooding it with every single new pinball release. Of course, I'm going to have less disposable income as I have a mortgage payment due. I mean, right now I own my apartment. Right now my cost of living every month is not high at all. But the world is getting more expensive. I don't know if you feel it. I feel it. My Demon insurance a few years ago for my Dodge Demon used to be like 250 bucks a month. The car sits in a garage in Brooklyn. I drive it maybe once or twice a month. Now Geico has increased the insurance on just that one car to $460 a month. And these insurance companies are doing it across the board. So I'm spending over $5,000 a year for a car that I barely put 1,000 miles on. That's almost a Stern Pro machine for a car to just sit in a parking spot. And that's why it's funny too because even though I think like, oh, the Demon's a great investment. It's gone up in value. Sure, it's gone up in value. but if I look at the total cost of ownership, I'm probably just breaking even on that car. It's not really a good investment. Everybody, have a great Monday. We will be back with more shows and more news. I think the news that's gonna happen this week, we're gonna start to see Pulp Fiction's get out the door. It's gonna be fun to see people's feelings on that game. I was watching IE Pinball play Pulp Fiction. Man, is that guy good. And man, does the game seem a lot better when he's playing it. I'll say that. We're going to have a month of Jaws pros going out the door. I think Jaws LEs are end of this month. So it's going to be interesting to see what people think of Jaws when they get it. I do think the Jaws hype is not going to last that long. Then we're going to get this Pedretti Gaming remix of Bally Williams games. As we slide towards Texas Pinball Festival, everybody always seems to drop a bunch of stuff in March. I think we most likely will see the next game from American Pinball sometime in March. I mean, Galactic Tank Force sales are dead. And if this company's chugging along with Maurice, they're going to have to have something around the corner. And soon, very soon, everyone's going to start to play Looney Tunes and Texas Chainsaw Massacre. So we'll get some real world reviews of those games. But take my advice, everybody. When I'm looking at the pinball landscape over the next six months, I don't think there's an urgency to buy anything. I really don't. I think if you wait it out and jump on the machines, this is the greatest period since I've been covering pinball where there is no more FOMO. You actually can jump on every game and play it over and over and over again. Play it for weeks if you must before you need to even pull the trigger on a game. There is no need to buy a game before playing it. If you're ordering machines now, before even playing it, the only time that makes sense, if it's one of your dream themes, that's it. Unless it's a dream theme, it would make no sense to order right now. And for some of you, that might be Jaws. For most of you, it's not Elton John. And for almost all of you, it was not Venom. It was funny when I was leaving Jack Bar, The game that he is taking out is Venom. Thank you. That game just does nothing for most of us. Everybody, be good. More episodes of the Canadian Spinball Podcast coming this week. But don't worry. I'm not going against my own advice. But I do love Elton John. And I do recommend playing it. I think you're going to love it. And yeah, I don't think you're going to want it for this much money. Later. You will die, die, die Now it's time for me to take a part In your aching heart Some people call me Maurice