Well, I hope you're ready, kids, for a pre-expo version of this Pitball Podcast episode. But not only that, we got some Metallica news dropped on us just an hour ago. Can you believe it? How sick is that L-E-R? Come on. I love it. Bring it. Self-destruction. More like wallet destruction. Who had that in the bingo card? Coming up, heading into Expo, that this was going to be the Metallica remastered. Well, I guess we all knew because Stern had told us, and it's been strongly rumored that they were going to go ahead and bring this game back. So before we get into my planned episode for 153 to talk about, all about the approach for me to Expo and the show floor in particular, let's talk about Tallica for a little bit. I mean, yeah, bring it, bring it. All right, so... Quiet, you can't calm down the metal. All right, so this game corrects just about every single thing I had seen as a shortcoming to the Metallica Spike-1 Dom X Display game, right? Of all the musical themes in pinball that we have seen past, present, future, aside from Dolly Parton, this, this is my favorite one. And by far, okay, if you were to look at a number line, right, let's go back to grade school integers, and if you looked as far down as negative as you can see, down there in the distance waiting on a bus is ABBA, okay? And then I'm over, you know, positive 25, and then Metallica's sitting there right with me. The only thing closer to me and my musical interest in pinball, besides Metallica, would be, you know, Insane Clown Posse or, like, a decent Weird Al. I'll just put that out there. So, like, come on, man. This game, game's fun. I played it in Tyrian when I go over there. They got a pro. Most locations that have played this had the pro. I went out to Wizards World in Indiana, and I got to play in LE finally, and, like, I started to get it, okay? I get the code's pretty basic. It's of the era, right? So the code had a bit of a shortcoming. The Domagics display is not really kind of where we're at now in modern pinball. And the price was kind of, you know, a stumbling block as well. because this game was so revered and you would have to get the road case, right? You'd have to get the road case. But because of its limited supply and high demand, for the same price you can get a modern era pin, so it just was never in the cards for me to go ahead and grab Metallica, even though I do love the music so much. The other big shortcoming for me with the OG Metallica was that art, man. I get Dirty Donnie has an aesthetic. I actually like a ton of his work. I don't like the Metallica work that he did I don't know, for some reason it strikes me as like Funko Pop type art I am not an artist, I hate to criticize anybody Who am I? It just didn't vibe with me It's kind of like if you look at the Guns N' Roses limited edition artwork That Jersey Jack put on their game Where it's got actual concert posters through the era done by different artists Fantastic looking, fantastic looking, right? And then you look at the standard edition where it was more of a cartoony take I get that it's an aesthetic, but I wasn't vibing with it, homie. And that's how I felt about Metallica. So for a multitude of reasons, high costs, some shortcomings, when I put it through the balance sheet calculator, there were other games I'd rather have instead of Metallica. But I love that theme. That theme is so super strong, man. That music? Come on. I mean, we had it in the intro. But now, Stern Dunn corrected all of that. Now, there was this rumor longstanding that Metallica was looking at Guns N' Roses. They're probably talking to Slash. right? They're probably at the French Laundry in LA or at the Ivy, right? James Headfield is probably, you know, cutting through some watercress salad, looked over at Slash over there. Saunter's on over. Hey, buddy, how's it hanging? Nice curls. And it's like, hey, man, have you seen the pinball machine we just released? And probably they did. And they were like, what in the ever-loving heck, man? We got this dot matrix display garbage. We're Metallica, dude. We rock arenas still to this day where dates need to be added because they're filling arenas you know it's like come on so the rumor is that they toured the store factory stern factory and they were like hey i think we kind of want one of these modern type games what can you do so that was the nightest for all this plus the game is still trading at higher dollar amounts so it was strictly in the crosshairs of a company looking to make some money so the union of everything was great the band was interested in doing it the license holders were interested in doing it stern is interested in money we're interested in new games and here it is the art absolutely slaps. James Rice Davies, who's this artist? I'm still getting to know him. But when I saw the early pictures of the backbox side art on the cabinet, I was like, dude, if this is on the pinball machine, fire. Dude, this is absolute fire. The back glass on the LE, fantastic. I love the foil on the art. Everything about art-wise, it looks great. Dot matrix display out, spike two monitor in, live concert footage, expression cabinet lights, expression lights in the cabinet what else do you want look through all the the mechanisms and the sculpts that had been a little problematic in the past those have been fixed and it's everything you would want i love the idea of a remastered spike one game please do wrestlemania next i know it'll never happen but i would like to see that but i think this bodes well for the remix we're going to see from tron from ghostbusters lord willing and the creek don't rise mordor bubbles over with Lord of the Rings. I love it. Yeah. Go back to walking dead. Even, you know, dip into that, dip your toe in there. Maybe hold off on some CSI. I don't think we need to go nuts here, but loving these remasters Stern is just like dumping games in our lap left and right man Um yeah so we get to play this thing Saturday it be at Expo That was in the confirmation somewhere I read that I think Nap Arcade had a great rundown of everything. So it sounds like Saturday, general public will be able to play it. I think I'm going, well, I know I'm going to Stern tomorrow morning. This will be Thursday on my way down to Expo. I'll be down there 10 a.m., and I'm hoping that they got these things set up in the streaming room, and I could waltz on in there and get my digits deep in Tutalica, deep in Tutalica. And hopefully there's a couple of Diet Cokes left in that mini fridge there behind the bar. I'm making myself right at home over there at Stern. So happy to be able to bring that to everybody. What a great stop on the way to Expo. Swing by Stern. Check out their new silver bean ball that they put up in front of the factory. It's looking great. Everything's firing on like at least seven and a half cylinders right now. In the world of pinball, I am exuberant. I'm exuberant running on no sleep. Shift 18 of 18 is tonight. And then we're heading to Expo, so come party. I'll have favors, man. If you see me there, say what up and get yourself a button, a sticker, a shooter rod, or some damn thing. I'll have a backpack, a mystery with me. Hopefully, reach in and see if you are feeling lucky. I'm feeling lucky. So here's my approach, right? It's noon. It's after the stern. I've been talloc-ed out. I'm on the show floor. I got my credentials. I got my armband. And I got a mission. And I wrote down my mission list. And I thought I would share that with everybody as kind of like what my plan for Expo is. What am I going to first? What's going to be the game of the show? What surprises are in store for all of us? Here is Don's rundown for Expo 2024, 40th anniversary, Schaumburg, Illinois. Let's do this damn thing. First off, I hit the show floor. I'm making a beeline for Dutch pinball. I'm going to go play Alice in Amsterdam. I can't wait to get my hands on this game. This game came out at the same price as the Talica LE. The art is complete. Oh, man. You can't even compare and contrast these. It's not even fair to Alice. I want to go play this game. I want to play this game. You know my thoughts on it. I talked about it all in the last episode. Really, opinions on Alice are running the gamut. People that bought it are fiercely staked in. They're dying on that hill, defending that decision to make it. They can't wait to get their game. They're very happy about it. And I'm happy for them. And thank God there's only 500. So it's not as if, you know, this game's going to be floundering, collecting dust at district bidders and, you know, devaluing, right? So if you're into it, I think it looks cool. I still think it looks like, you know, a game from the 90s that's been remade with $3,000 of mods and, you know, maybe not worth the sum of its parts. But that's going into it. I haven't played it yet. I'm hoping it's a shooty flow monster. And I'm going to have, like, the biggest regret that I didn't FOMO myself into getting one of these. But that's the first stop. I got to play this thing. I can't walk around Expo knowing that this thing's in the room and I haven't even put some balls through it. So first stop, Dutch Pinball, going to check that out. Going to circle back because Dutch, at some point, I haven't checked the seminar schedule, but they're doing a little like, you know, here's our new game. Here's how we made it. And the rumor is that they may do some confirmations of Back to the Future. I think now would be a fire time to do that because all the deposits have sold out for Alice in Wonderland. So it's not as if they come with Back to the Future information now. They'd only be helping themselves. Well, they'd be helping themselves as long as they can actually bring the game to fruition in a good time frame. You know, I think we all got teased a little bit too long there with Amsterdam Alice. So we'll see what have yous there. So Dutch Pinball, I'm a big fan of Dutch Pinball. I love their build quality. As soon as I saw the flyer for the Big Lebowski with that rug, I had to have it. Fortunately, I managed to have it across one, had a great time with it, and I did sell it. but I sold it to a friend of mine on the caveat with the instructions that when he tires of it and is looking to flip it on over, sell it on down the road, he is to contact me first so I can have first right of refusal on a buyback. Because that game, by all intensive and intents and purposes, it was fantastic. So go Dutch. I'm a fan. I'm a fan. My next stop at Expo, in the giant Expo Center, will be with Turner Pinball. I'm going to go play some Ninja Eclipse. That game is in production now. I've played every iteration at every show this game has been at, and so I want to play one of the production-quality games, which I think are rolling out now. So I'm going to get some time on some ninja clips just to go throw the ball back and forth between the scoops. I want to see if the modes have been enhanced any. I want to get that ghost person wooing at me. It's a fun, clever little game, and I want to go play it. I want to hang out with Chris Turner because he's cool. Plus, I need to restock my Turner pinball stickers. As people have been ordering things from me, sending sticker requests. I've been throwing some Turner stickers in there, here and there. I throw in some of those. I throw in some Captain Crazy's Arcade. You never know what you're going to get when you order something from me. Ask anybody. So let's stop. Number two. Stop number three. We'll swing through Stern. I want to go and plunge every X-Men that's there and see what is even going on. I want to try the auto launchers. I want to try the shooter rods. I want to put some more time on the pro. I have the LE behind me. I love how it plays. I wish it plunged a little better. I'm hoping that a fix is coming. So far, early sources are saying that there's a metal diverter ramp in the back that maybe the ball's catching the edge. Somebody, resourcefully, puts a Mylar across that and says that it improved it. I know when I got a Bally Williams shooter rod, it's like an eighth of an inch longer than the stock stern one. That seemed to help a lot. I did a live stream the other day, and about 80% to 90% of my plunges were full plunges from that. Setting the auto launcher to 230 seems to be helpful, but it's still not consistent, not how I would like it. We'll wait and see what happens, but I'm going to go play and plunge every one of those. I'll spend some time on Bond. I can't wait to get reacquainted with Venom again if it's there. And then Saturday, Talica will be there, so go check that out. I was saying Alice in Wonderland was going to be the longest lines of the show, but I think that Metallica LE, people will want to get in on it. Insider Connected on Metallica now, dude. Come on, the Bloopy Doops, man. I want Metallica Bloopy Doops, brother. I'm so excited. After Stern, I'm going to wander on over to the Pinball Brothers. I can't go a minute longer and not play ABBA. Once I finish with Alice and we went through Stern and played and hung out with Turner and maybe got a hot dog I want to go and play some ABBA finally I can think of a musical theme I least interested in in pinball than ABBA It's just not my – I ironically love disco. If this was Bee Gees, I'd probably have one ordered, man. The way that Andy Gibb hits those falsettos, it's just magic. It does something to me. Andy, Barry, and Robin, man, what a treasure that we had. Just in terms of pure ridiculousness masquerading as mainstream success, I love everything about the Bee Gees. Give me Bee Gees. Donna Summers, not interested. ABBA, gosh, guys, come on, man. I can't think of anything a little bit more grating. But, hey, ABBA's your jam. Fantastic. I want to play this thing. I want to play this thing and be able to give my impression on how it is, how it is to lock those balls in the helicopter. Does it work? Does it not work? Does it shoot better than Queen? where the flippers like all of it man all of it i want to collect avatars i've never collected avatar in my life and i will do that tomorrow on the show floor as stop number four where are we going after that there's so much going on at this expo that i'm hype about jersey jack pinball will be my next stop and i'm going to go straight to the tent they're going to have a avatar ce with a triple color uv play field the uv reactive plastics and rubbers and all those uv like goodness that's in there, the UV on the art blades, the huge topper, and they're going to have it in some sort of tent. So there's a dark environment, maybe with extra LED lights or UV lights and really set this thing off. I played an LE cabinet or a CE cabinet, collector's edition with the topper, but I haven't played it with that play field. It wasn't available yet. I talked to Mark, the designer of this game, just with less than a week ago, I was in Chicago and he had just gotten back from Bader with that new play field. So Avatar CE, I still am not regretting my decision on getting that. I want that game as soon as it is made because like, and it's not just because of the theme, not the movie theme, but the aesthetic and the environment that it creates with that UV, with the good play field, not the Mirco one, no ghosting, no whatever other problem pooling and all that business. No, no, no, no, no, no, no. Plus the, like the three UV inks, the topper, the whole thing. I've got a spot set up for it where it's going to be like, it's going to be a focal point in the area by the bar where Lebowski once stood. It's going into the Lebowski slot. I sold Lebowski on the strength of how much fun I had playing Avatar. I can't wait. I'm going to scram it up. I'm going to beat the crab monster to pieces. I'm going to stop by and I want to see like the full aesthetic with all the lights because no one's ever seen that yet outside of Jersey Jack themselves. So very enthusiastic and excited for that. I think after this, I probably need to reload my nachos, grab another Diet Coke, and then I'm going to hit up the electric playground. These are the folks that make the amazing toppers for Godzilla for Twilight Zone with the moving ball. I still love that. I still want one, even though I will probably never own a Twilight Zone pinball machine. I still want that motorized topper to stick on my wall. It just looks so cool. The ball comes rolling on down. Kinetic energy in a topper. I dig it, man. They got their new Attack from Mars topper. I saw a glimpse of it in Texas they had a little peephole set up so you could catch a glimpse on a concept prototype of what they were making I want to see it on an actual game in gameplay mode and look at the interactivity and I kind of want to compare it to the one that came with the limited edition or whatever from CGC so I'm excited to go and check that out if you purchase one you get a free hat so there you go also they're going to have the Tony Hawk's Pro Skater game homebrew at their booth I want to go get my hands all over that. This is a theme that people have been asking for as long as I've been in pinball at this level. So I want to see what this dude presented. I saw a little bit of the video, video footage. I don't know if it was the one that was released by nap or one that I got sent privately. Uh, but the, there, there's mechanisms in here. They're doing cool things that just don't exist in pinball, even in radical. So I want to go spend some time there. I'm gonna hang out with Robin and his brother and just kick it, man, at the TEP booth. So that'll be good times. That'll be fun. Go check that out. Get yourself a topper if you need to get one. Their Lebowski topper sold right the heck out. I still have mine over here. It didn't go on my Lebowski game. It's still in the box. It's going to another friend of mine. Spreading the love around. After that, by this point, it's time for spooky time. Spooky doesn't have a new game that's going to be at this show. Spooky 13, it's bubbling out there somewhere. I can feel it. I think we're going to see it in December with the reveal. I think we'll be able to play it in January, February, but definitely at Texas Pinball Festival. They have disclosed that their new game will be playable at Pinball at the Beach in February, which I still need to book my travel to to go check that place out. It's hanging out at a hotel on the beach near Tampa. And then we get to play pinball and hang out on the beach and have tacos and all this business. It's in February, which is the perfect time. The doldrums of winter will be upon us. All the lakes in Wisconsin will be frozen. But I can be go kicking it on a beach, hanging with my spooky bros, playing game number 13 by the beach. What's more fun? than that. Not much. Not much that's legal anyway. But I want to go by the Spooky Booth because they always bring one or two butter cabinets of their games. And so you cannot replicate this on a YouTube show. You can't replicate this in photos. You got to see the butter in person. It feels, and it's clear-coated just like a play field is. I like to rub my hands all over it, leave my greasy fingerprints. I just, I can't help myself. I got to touch it. I caressed the Scooby-Doo cabinet so much at shows that it would have had invested in the butter cabinet and it looks it looks fantastic i'm looking at it now love that butter cab uh so if you want to see looney tunes in butter tcm and butter and maybe they'll bring out another tna butter maybe they'll bring in alice cooper i can't wait to see what all these guys are bringing they always show up with like some surprise uh you know they had something still new in box you know they might bring a domino's butter cabinet and have it for sale on the show floor for twelve thousand dollars and if you could tell me a better use of $12,000. I'm going to tell you, you're probably right, but that game is better than it has every right to be, man. I love you some Domino's pizza adventure. Avoid the noid. All right. So after this okay I think I have covered a lot of the big heavy hitters I probably have waited six hours in lines by this point So it will be time to go pass by my friends at the poor man pinball collective and their booth which is like it it's like a flea market. Uh, it's, it's a, it's a, a booth and a drunk tank masquerading as a flea market. I think is the best way to put it again. The vibe is super chill. Always have fun with those guys over there. You never know who you're going to run into or what's going to happen after you come out of it. Uh, there might be NES video games for sale over there. Like who knows? I bought a Velcro strap for a pinball machine that somebody made. I got some pinball viewing glasses are anti-glare, anti-reflective. You never know what you're going to find at any time of the day over at the poor man's booth. So check that booth out because it's going to be, it's just madness. It's just madness. Okay. After that, I get to go check and see, I don't know. I have no confirmation on this. If pinball adventures will be back at expo, there were there last year with elements. Reportedly. I spoke to him a few months ago, Andrew from Pinball Adventure shout out to you, you crazy Canadian killing doves and killing time and mending hearts and making pinball that's what this guy's about but supposedly he's been working on Elements this whole time it's in a much better build than it was last year when we saw it, so will we see it again? will we be able to play it with a glass on? I'm excited to see what happened with Elements and I want to spend some more time on Punny Factory if he's there, he's gotta have brought a Punny Factory that game is achieving legendary status within the community it's actually not that bad of a game it's it's kind of weird good luck getting all 50 punnies right and the code is finalized from what he said uh but man that was very much a game at a time and place and i was i was close man i was close to buying that donald guy's game uh that he must have spilled paint thinner or something on the play field um and i was gonna try to get that custom built not the custom build the engraved one where they only made 10 of them. I offered him like five grand and I would fix the play field and swap it out. And he wouldn't go for it. And then he was going to throw it off of Todd's hook. He's roof. And then like, there was a lawsuit. He was refunded his money, but then he refused to give the game back. Cause he was like spiteful. And so then like something was filed in court. And I don't know what happened with all of that, but, but as you follow that rollercoaster sometime, kineticist do a deep dive or nudge magazine, maybe do like, like, like a semi serious writeup about that whole exchange. Cause it was, it was wild. Somehow I ended up kind of right stuck in the middle of it, front row seat, man. And, uh, I, I didn't know whether to bail from pinball or just dive in with both feet at that point. It was, it was nuts. It was sort of strange things happened. Um, some, some words were said, and I don't even know how I even got caught up in it. Uh, but, but that was, that was definitely wild. I want to go spend some more time in the punny factory is smashing, smashing a punny. It's fun. Every time you do it, every time you shoot in there and it goes through the plastic tube like like i dig it it's a simple thing but i'm i am i'm a man of simple pleasures i'm a man of simple pleasures all right following this i think i'm going to spend the balance of my time over in the homebrew area because those guys they're bringing the heat man i'm so impressed by what i've seen with people and their homebrew games from beer fest uh to ghost in the shell to everything else the greatest showman i hope that it's there so you can play it saw Friday the 13th all these fantastic games that have clearly inspired me I came home from the Texas Pinball Festival and in one week I had a cabinet with a white wood in it like one week scratch built right I took measurements from my spike cabinets I went to Home Depot several times threw it together now it's ready for wiring it's got the fast boards in it I'm ready to put the switches in and then we're going to start shooting an actual homebrew developed game that I'm making kind of just to see like how possible is this? Because these guys make it look so easy. And so far I've got a full machine sitting in my studio here. It's got great armor. It's got awesome speakers. It's got a Bluetooth amplifier in it so I can put music in there. It's blasting out of the cabinet. I love it. So now can I program a game and wire one up successfully without the whole thing turning into a flaming fireball in my downstairs basement? That remains to be seen. So I will be at the homebrew area with Aaron from Fast Pinball and Ernie from Trident Pinball, maker of the homebrew kits. And hopefully they can kind of guide me through those final little tips on wiring this thing up to actual power in a way that I'm not going to just blow everything up. So I'm going to be hanging out over there. That's going to be so fun and fantastic. Expo kicks off for me tomorrow after this shift when I get off. the other thing final thing that I really want to go and see when I'm on the show floor at Expo 2024 Schaumburg Illinois is you guys I want to see y'all man I'm going to be there hopefully with my little backpack my Adidas backpack full of buttons pins stickers start buttons flipper covers a couple of shooter rods whatever random stuff I can I can send in there and if you come up and if you would begrudgingly ask me for a selfie and like feed my ego a bit I'll give you a handful of cool stuff. I got a couple of new prototype t-shirts I'll be wearing. If there's some positive response, which there's already been from the very few people that have seen it, check out the discord, man. We got cool stuff going on over there. Uh, then we'll put those into production. I'll be selling those. So new shirts for the new year. It's spooky season. It's October. It's pinball expo, the 40th anniversary. I can't wait to get in on this. I'll even swing by, uh, American pinball and see if they've made good with, um, uh, Dennis Nordman there. Maybe there's some barbecues. Maybe we'll see a Yukon Yeti or two. Who knows? What I do know is we're going to hear some Metallica. I'm going to go put Master of Puppets on. Y'all, y'all be cool. If you're hitting the road or if you're already there, be good. Be careful on the roadways. Let's all hang out at the Pinball Expo. It's happening now. It's starting now. Let's go. on your desk at the front door. It's on SpinballPodcast at gmail.com. If you want to get in on anything, order a t-shirt, order a signature, whatever the heck you want. I got banners, I got stickers, I got all kinds of crap, man. Email me your thoughts, kick that action, jump on the Discord, the Facebook page, the Patreon if you're a homie, and let's keep making this pinball thing as awesome as we can. Your life burns faster.