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First Impressions: deeproot Pinball Launch w/ VIP Correspondent Chris Chandler

Flip n Out Pinball·video·1h 56m·analyzed·Sep 24, 2020
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claude-haiku-4-5-20251001 · $0.035

TL;DR

VIP media tour of Deep Root Pinball's Raza reveals technical delays; pin bar and cabinet features detailed.

Summary

Zach Sharpe Minney interviews Chris Chandler, a TPN correspondent who was part of a six-person VIP media tour of Deep Root Pinball's facility. They discuss the cancelled Raza reveal, technical issues that prevented launch, and detailed specifications of the game including the innovative pin bar (full touchscreen), cabinet dimensions, audio system, and mechanical features. The tour group's feedback reportedly influenced Deep Root's decision to postpone the public reveal.

Key Claims

  • The six VIP media members signed an NDA limiting what they could publicly discuss about the tour

    high confidence · Zach Sharpe explicitly states this in opening remarks; Chris Chandler confirms

  • Technical issues with Raza and feedback from the six media guests led Deep Root to cancel or postpone the planned reveal

    high confidence · Jeff Patterson's This Week in Pinball article, cited and discussed throughout the interview

  • Raza features a full touchscreen 'pin bar' that displays game state, goals, and MagnaSave controls

    high confidence · Chris Chandler describes the pin bar in detail; visible in photos discussed

  • Raza's cabinet dimensions are similar to standard Bally/Williams machines

    medium confidence · Chris Chandler states this was communicated; Jeff Patterson's article notes 'similar to Bally Harry Williams'

  • The ramp issue that became known as 'Rampgate' was overstated; Chris played both machines and found the improved version satisfactory

    medium confidence · Chris Chandler's firsthand account of playing Raza at Houston Arcade Pinball Expo and the tour facility

  • Raza's backlit wrap-around cabinet artwork looks impressive in person, better than in photos

    medium confidence · Chris Chandler's direct observation; notes initial surprise but growing appreciation

  • Deep Root's hospitality during the tour was excellent; staff including Rob Quinn and Steve Bowden were gracious

    high confidence · Chris Chandler's direct experience; corroborated in This Week in Pinball article

  • Raza was one business day away from being ready for the scheduled reveal

    medium confidence · Chris Chandler's paraphrase of what Deep Root communicated to the tour group

  • Chris Chandler became Deep Root's TPN correspondent after playing Raza at Houston Arcade Pinball Expo

Notable Quotes

  • “I mean, it boils down to that whole thing I talked about where when you're involved with a thing for so long and you see the evolution of it, sometimes without that outside perspective, you may not quite see the forest for the trees type of thing.”

    Chris Chandler@ 19:49 — Explains the core reason why Deep Root cancelled the reveal despite being so close — lack of external customer perspective during development

  • “The pictures I would have to say don't do it justice. It actually looks really cool in person. And yes, the analogies to a fish tank are probably appropriate. But because that was one of the first comments we made, but I have to say in person, it was actually really impressive.”

    Chris Chandler@ 27:31 — Positive assessment of Raza's backlit wrap-around artwork design that contrasts with community skepticism

  • “There weren't uh like people swinging up in the chandeliers or uh, you know, like a thousand pinball machines all over the place, right? It was just a kind of like a collectible, your traditional office cubicle farm, you know?”

    Chris Chandler@ 13:20 — Describes the mundane reality of Deep Root's facility, countering expectations of secrecy and elaborate setup

  • “Well, no, because I suck. But the times I did hit it solidly, I never really—it didn't limp up the ramp or anything. It never felt like it was broken or cheeky is the best way I could put it, right?”

    Chris Chandler@ 17:18 — Addresses the 'Rampgate' controversy, noting the improved ramp on the tour version performed well

  • “One of the features that I thought was really cool is just to the left of the MagnaSave, you can see sort of a stack of cards there. And that would actually tell you the different goals that are available based off the game state.”

    Chris Chandler — Describes innovative pin bar feature that dynamically presents available goals to guide player progression

Entities

Chris ChandlerpersonZach Sharpe MinneypersonRobert Dave MuellerpersonRob QuinnpersonSteve BowdenpersonJeff JohnsonpersonBarry OslerpersonJohn Papadukeperson

Signals

  • ?

    announcement: Deep Root Pinball cancelled or postponed the planned public reveal of Raza scheduled during the VIP media tour

    high · Multiple references to reveal being cancelled/postponed; This Week in Pinball published details; Chris Chandler and Zach Sharpe discuss the cancellation as fact

  • ?

    product_concern: Raza had technical issues preventing launch-ready status; specifically mentioned but Chris cannot elaborate due to NDA

    high · Chris Chandler: 'That I specifically cannot elaborate on'; Jeff Patterson's article states 'unfortunately, due to technical issues with Raza...it was not ready for launch'

  • ?

    design_innovation: Raza features a full touchscreen 'pin bar' with dynamic goal cards that change based on game state, similar to Pirates of the Caribbean compass but more extensive

    high · Chris Chandler detailed description of pin bar functionality; photos visible in interview; This Week in Pinball article coverage

  • ?

    product_launch: Raza was reportedly one business day away from being ready for the reveal, suggesting imminent but not quite achieved launch readiness

    medium · Chris Chandler: 'They were like one business day off from getting it. So close. They were close.'

  • ?

    content_signal: Six VIP media members (including Chris Chandler) given facility tour and early access to Raza; their feedback influenced postponement decision

    high · Chris Chandler attended tour; This Week in Pinball article published coverage; feedback explicitly discussed as catalyst for reveal cancellation

Transcript

youtube_groq_whisper · $0.348

0:00
I want to introduce to you guys somebody here special, but before we do that, I want to say hello. I'm Zach Minney with Flippin' Out Pinball with the Pinball Show from the Pinball Network and originally from straight down the middle, a pinball show. I think we just cut the pinball show. It's just straight down the middle now.
0:32
We're so Madonna or Prince. But thanks for hanging out tonight. We are going to be chatting with one of my good friends. He is the TPN correspondent for Deep Root. He is Chris Chandler. Let's see if we can get a hold of Chris here now.
0:55
Does it work? Are you here? I'm here. Hey! Holy shit, Zach and more technology. Poor man ain't got nothing on me.
1:08
I don't have dildos flying everywhere, but you can get the feeling. You can start somewhere. We got two dildos right here. Me and you.
1:18
How are you today, dude? Oh, man. It's been a fun 72 hours or whatever it's been. Yeah. It'll be fun, they said. I'll be at VIP.

high confidence · Chris Chandler's direct statement about reaching out to Ken to become correspondent

  • The playfield lift mechanism and hood design are not final features

    medium confidence · Chris Chandler notes Deep Root indicated certain features were still in development

    • @ 21:00

  • “They had it jacked all the way up at Pinball Expo, 100%, and it was in the auditorium that we've heard so much about, which is just kind of a giant conference room with some stadium seating in it, or any movie-style seating. And it filled that entire room with sound.”

    Chris Chandler@ 32:33 — Confirms Raza's audio system is loud and distortion-free at maximum volume

  • “I work in the software development industry, so I sort of draw some analogies from that. When you go and you write software, sometimes if you don't have touch points with your actual customers, you can spend time going off building things that you have a perceived value of that maybe they don't have the same shared value.”

    Chris Chandler@ 14:33 — Professional analogy explaining why external feedback led to the reveal cancellation

  • “I mean, luckily, you know, in my tenure, both on Special Inlet and here, as a joke I like to say, I've been able to report on two things, Jack and shit. There hasn't really been anything to report on with Deep Root Pinball.”

    Chris Chandler@ 6:45 — Self-deprecating comment about his role and the information vacuum surrounding Deep Root

  • “So it's kind of like the compass on Pirates of the Caribbean, but kind of more so, right? At the beginning, it'll start off—the whole game's wide open. And so it will present a significant stack of cards. But as you, say for example, start a mode or kick off a multiball or something like that, then those things will change.”

    Chris Chandler@ 21:24 — Details pin bar goal card functionality that adapts based on game state

  • “I'm 5'7". I have no problem seeing it. So, you know, if you think about how much an apron takes up and all that, it ends up being a wash from what I can tell.”

    Chris Chandler@ 23:56 — Firsthand rebuttal to community concern about flipper visibility with pin bar design

    • Deep Root Pinball
    company
    Raza (Retro Atomic Zombie Adventureland)game
    This Week in Pinballmedia
    Straight Down the Middle: a pinball showmedia
    Houston Arcade Pinball Expoevent
    Texas Pinball Festivalevent
    Pinball Expoevent
    Pirates of the Caribbeangame
    Medieval Madness Heavy Metal Meltdowngame
    Matt Scottperson
    Travis Mearyperson
    Kenperson
  • ?

    manufacturing_signal: Raza uses Baltic birch construction, proprietary hybrid dovetail joints, 24-inch ultra-wide high-res LCD display, hydraulic-assisted glass lift, stainless steel hardware

    high · This Week in Pinball article specifications read and discussed; Chris Chandler confirmed details from tour observation

  • ?

    industry_signal: NDA-protected VIP media tour created information vacuum; collaborative group effort by six media members to synchronize messaging; original plan was joint podcast recording

    high · Chris Chandler explicitly discusses NDA constraints, coordination among tour group, failed original plan for same-night podcast release

  • ?

    gameplay_signal: Rampgate controversy appears overstated; improved ramp on tour version performed well; possible variance between two Houston Expo machines

    medium · Chris Chandler: 'I didn't think it was that big of a deal...The times I did hit it solidly, I never really—it didn't limp up the ramp'; notes two different ramps on two machines

  • ?

    design_philosophy: Deep Root's challenge: developing in secrecy without external customer feedback created divergence between developer perception of quality/value and actual customer expectations

    high · Chris Chandler's software development analogy: 'sometimes if you don't have touch points with your actual customers, you can spend time going off building things that you have a perceived value of'

  • ~

    sentiment_shift: Community skepticism about Raza's design (particularly backlit wrap-around artwork, pin bar, flipper visibility) may be partially unfounded based on positive in-person impressions from tour attendees

    medium · Chris Chandler addresses multiple community concerns: backlit artwork 'looks really cool in person', flipper visibility non-issue for 5'7" player, pin bar doesn't feel obstructive

  • ?

    personnel_signal: John Papaduke (Papa Duke) present at Deep Root facility but had limited interaction with VIP tour group; Barry Osler actively engaged with media

    high · Chris Chandler: 'Did see John Papaduke walking around...there was an interesting contrast...Barry, like, actively hung out with us'

  • ?

    business_signal: Deep Root's decision to open facility to VIP media and share information (instead of maintaining secrecy) intended to address information vacuum and prevent speculation

    high · Chris Chandler: 'Rather than have people guess what was going on, it's like okay, well look, this is what we're willing to share'

    • 1:30
    I get to cover a new company, they said. That's right. Oh, man. When did you get back? It was Monday afternoon. It's like a four to five-ish hour drive from there, from San Antonio to Dallas, where I live. Okay, so you're in the Fort Worth area?
    1:49
    Dallas area, yeah. Dallas area? Okay, very good. Fort Worth. That's a scrub city over to the west, you know. It's no Frisco, right? I'm basically one suburb over from Frisco so I'm like a 15-20 minute ride to where TPF is held well I know where I'm staying next year then Screed Hotel absolutely, I told you, Lake House next time you come that is right, you did extend the invite to me nobody else is allowed just me so we're going to get into some of your experience at the Deep Root tour I'm excited to hear what you have to say about that. Listeners, viewers know that they did sign, the six individuals that went did sign an NDA. Excuse me. So there's still some limits to what you can discuss or talk about. Is that correct?
    2:40
    That is correct, sir. Okay. So if I and when I say something that's stupid, idiotic, or something you can't discuss, just tell me. Can we end the stream now? Or you can just do the... Sorry. We can do that as well. All right, who we got in chat before we start diving into this thing?
    3:04
    Chandler, the pen handler. Yeah, poor Crystal. She's in South Carolina, I believe. Isn't that where Marco's at?
    3:14
    Yep, yep. Was it Columbia, I believe? Yeah, Columbia Razor. Nope. Jobber's going to camp out at Walmart. This is my dinner tonight, Chandler. What did you eat for dinner?
    3:27
    I had a couple of liquid beverages, and then, yeah, I moved to bubbly. Lame. I'm not conditioned like poor men. I've got to work my way into it.
    3:43
    Where are the poor men at right now? I don't know, Billy. Why are you getting in here? I don't need them wrecking the stream. All right, so you traveled down there. You were down there for how long?
    3:59
    I want to say I left Friday morning-ish. We all got down there early, you know, took it easy, had a nice dinner, because we had to get up pretty early to make it there on Saturday. So it was great meeting everybody, you know, because most of the people have probably met each other through, you know, different events, different conventions, whatnot. I'm relatively new to the hobby. I've only been doing it for a couple of years or so. So, you know, it's nice to meet the whole gang, right? But, yeah, got there Friday, left Saturday or Sunday morning, rather. I heard you guys had one night where it was a little rough for you guys, partying a little bit too much, eating tacos and enchiladas or something.
    4:45
    Oh, it's Texas, man. People tell us that. So, yeah. So, no, we had a little Tex-Mex on Friday. Nice. A little barbecue on Saturday. Yeah. Just all the stereotypical Texas tropes. I've also heard that the Deep Root crew took care of you guys while you were down there. Oh, yeah. Yeah. I mean, that's the one thing that, before we get into any of the pinball-y stuff, is, I mean, the Deep Root folks just opened arms, brought us in, made us feel at home.
    5:16
    Great hospitality. I mean, it was very nice, very accommodating, and, you know, pretty open, honestly. I really expected, you know, a whole bunch of drapes over things and lots of things hidden, and a fair amount of trust there. I was pretty surprised. Prior to today's TWIP release of information, it was kind of a mess. I was confused as to what the hell was going on there was many delays over the last couple of years there was reveals planned that didn't pan out and then you guys all went down there to do a reveal and you've seen everything you've experienced everything but instead of rolling out something or the reveal in general it was cancelled or it was delayed or it was postponed phoned. So that was confusing to a lot of the community and probably confusing to you guys. I don't, you don't have to, you know, elaborate on that, but I can only imagine I was saying on loser kid pinball podcast, I didn't, did not envy the, the aftermath of what you guys probably had to experience getting all kinds of floods of emails and messages and calls. Is that true? Did you, did you have a lot of people reaching out to you saying, what's going on, as if you're now a spokesperson for Deep Root?
    6:44
    Yeah. Luckily, you know, in my tenure, both on Special Inlet and here, as a joke I like to say, I've been able to report on two things, Jack and shit. There hasn't really been anything to report on with Deep Root. So I'm a relative unknown. In fact, I kind of cracked a joke when Deep Root posted on their Facebook page, you know, oh, six pinball celebrities were here. as like five celebrities and Chris Chandler.
    7:12
    Who's this asshole, right? Yeah, so for me personally, I didn't get a whole lot of hit. I mean, I got hit up by a few people, but there's other people I know that, yeah, people came out of the woodwork to ask all manner of questions.
    7:30
    So, yeah, we were seriously walking away from this thing going, oh my god, what is the next month going to be like? Because there's this information vacuum. And you know what happens in a vacuum. People start coming up with crazy theories and stuff like that. And honestly that's the main thing I can think of as to why they decided to open it up is rather than have people guess what was going on, it's like okay, well look, this is what we're willing to share. I heard that their new technology and iOS system has been implanted into each six of you, so you guys are kind of programmed. Right now I'm talking to Robert Mueller. Yeah, we had ShareOS 5.7 installed. We're waiting for the update.
    8:18
    Nice event, Chandler. Yeah, yeah. So everybody was nice down there. It was informative. It was a great experience for you overall. You want to dive into a little bit of what this week in pinball released today for everybody?
    8:35
    Yeah, I figured that's probably the best way to go through it is just kind of that'll keep us on track, keep us in the safe zone. That's right. That's sort of what we're permitted to go into. So we've got a question here from the tour group. Did you guys sit down, tribal meeting, and have your torches out and derive of this? What is this? Yeah, I got voted off the island in the first round. I'm still a little bitter about it but you know I'm recovering so yeah I mean that's the one thing I will say is that early on we decided to try to our original plan was to try to release a joint podcast actually you know like honest reactions like that night go to the hotel while it's still raw record everything and then After what happened, unfortunately, we just weren't able to do that.
    9:34
    So, yeah, it's been a very collaborative group effort, everybody keeping in touch with everybody and making sure that we synchronize on what it is we're going to say and do. So, you know, it was a really good group effort, I guess is the best way to put it. Was there any of those six media members or other five that you just found despicable? No, I'm joking.
    10:03
    I'm joking. Not that Lauren. She's just so mean. Was she nice? No, I'm just kidding. She's the nicest person in the universe. Gotta love pinball media, bink. I mean, I won't say everybody as far as I knew them from their on-air aspects. They're all true to life. What you see is what you get. Yeah, Jeff says in the write-up here that you guys got to spend a lot of time with staff, including Bowden and Quinn Johnson. They were extremely gracious and earnest and helpful.
    10:35
    Yeah, Quinn's a cool guy. I had never met Steve either, and it was interesting talking to Steve about the rules aspects, but hearing Quinn just talk about the narrative and stuff that they're trying to do, I mean, it was really interesting.
    10:49
    Very cool. Quinn's the storyteller, isn't he? Correct, yeah. Yeah, he actually used to work on the TMNT comics, like one of the generations of it. So I had a little aside with him about a recent release from another company. That will remain between he and I, but I was interested in his take on what he would have done differently. But no, actually, Quinn and Steve were like our ambassadors that sort of made sure that we were always connected. We always had somebody to talk to. Actually, Barry Osler was hanging around with us for quite a while as well. Did see J-Pop walking around. I talked to him a couple of times. What was it like? Give me a little insight on J-Pop. You know, I didn't talk to him a whole lot.
    11:39
    Kind of as interesting as, you know, you've seen him in, you know, different expo recordings and stuff like that. Let's sit down with J-Pop. Yeah, there you go, curious. It's not too, yeah, there was an interesting contrast between J-Pop, we would sort of see him as we walked by and did stuff, whereas Barry, like, actively hung out with us, you know. Oh, cool. So, yeah, it was cool. I mean, to have, you know, a legend in the hobby, like, actively take time out and hang out with you, you know. Yeah, I've reached out to Barry before, asked him to be a part of something, and he was super, super, super gracious. what would have happened if you would have done a full embrace with J-Pop just you know behavioral characteristics what would have happened what would you have guessed I'm going to guess HR probably would have been called that's just I love Circus Voltaire maybe let me show you my remaster that's right magic girls alright so you guys seen the whole gang down there Robert was hanging out. Every time I've interacted with Mr. Mueller, he's been pretty gracious. Oh, very.
    12:52
    Communicates very well, so I've had great experiences with him. He takes constructive criticism well, feedback well, and even offers it in a good way as well. So you guys had a good experience with him. Tell me, the first thing you seen when you walked into the doors or you were escorted into the doors, can you say what you seen? um can't go into a lot of detail but um i mean it's just kind of like a whole office okay all right you know uh there weren't uh like people swinging up in the chandeliers or uh you know like a thousand pinball machines all over the place right it was just a kind of like a collectible your traditional office cubicle farm you know yep that's uh stern's got one of those as well and does jjp have one at their new place i don't know all right so jeff is saying Unfortunately, due to technical difficulties with Retro Atomic Zombie Adventure Lane and other questions and concerns that were brought by the guests during and after the tour, it was clear that Deep Root was not ready for launch. Now, I've read this twice now, Chandler. it sounds as if from the official statement from Deep Root as well as the follow up here with TWIP it sounds as if the guests, the VIP media guests were the ones that helped HALT going forward with an actual reveal, true or false hey guys that's Robert, it's one Michael you know I think maybe it goes back to what you said about him taking feedback I work in the software development industry so I sort of draw some analogies from that when you go and you write software sometimes if you don't have touch points with your actual customers you can spend time going off building things that you have a perceived value of that maybe they don't have the same shared value. At the same time you may have a perceived level of quality that may not match up with, you know, what the end customer is looking for. So, you know, that's kind of how I would, that would be my takeaway, is that part of the challenge when you're trying to be secretive and trying not to let information leak out is, you know, you sometimes don't have that view of the customer, right? So that's why you have things like focus groups and things like that. So that's really kind of what I would chalk it up to. Okay.
    15:29
    He says here in the write-up that Mueller is receptive to all of the criticisms, concerns, thoughts, and you guys appreciated his open mind.
    15:42
    He goes on to talk about the leaked pictures of the Raza and saying that the final cabinet features or the final, quote, under the glass features, they were waiting for parts. Mm-hmm. Did you guys get to play Raza?
    16:00
    Yes, we did. Okay. Did you play it at Houston Arcade Expo? Yeah, I did, actually. It was seeing it at Houston that inspired me to reach out to Ken, back when Special Olympics was around, to become the Deep Root correspondent, actually. so I spent a fair amount of time when I was there at Houston myself my friend Derek, my friend Joe we spent a lot of time playing Raza actually much more so than anything else there and it's hard to describe like we just am I going to say it's the best pin ever? no, but it was fun we had a good time playing it and did it need some tweaks? sure I'm not going to bring up Rampgate because for me I didn't think it was that big of a deal you know it's one of those things where you see somebody's video clip and people draw a conclusion so it's the classic I've never played this I saw something on YouTube I'm going to form my everlasting opinion of this pin's worth based off that so when you say it wasn't a big deal were you able to hit that ramp pretty consistently well no because I suck but the times I did hit it solidly I never really it didn't limp up the ramp or anything it never felt like it was broken or cheeky is the best way I could put it right you know I'm not Travis Meary but you know then also there were two machines and apparently there were two different ramps on those machines so it's entirely possible that the machine that Travis was on was not the one because I primarily played one machine in particular so it could just be luck of the draw that I ended up on the machine that had the less rampy ramp. I don't know. Now when you played the new one though, Chris was there a difference? Oh yeah. You've played both. Was there a difference? I don't know how much I can talk about that but I'll say I was happy. Okay, so the new experience was much better than the one in the expo.
    18:10
    For what I was able to play, yes. Okay. Now, when they say technical issues, can you elaborate on that? That I specifically cannot elaborate on. Okay. Good to know. I'd like to know where my boundaries are there, Chandler. Okay. So, plead the fifth on it. So, Jeff says, unfortunately, due to technical issues with Raza and other questions and concerns that were brought by the guests, it was not ready for launch. All right. Did they talk to you? You don't have to say what they were, but did they talk to you guys about what the final cabinet features or under the glass features would be?
    18:48
    There's some of that elaborated later in the article here, so we can talk about those when we get to them. I mean, one of the examples is on the sides.
    19:01
    The side art that they wanted to show us was it's lit up from behind. so it's P-E-T-Z with lights behind it and it shines out, like they talk about that later here in the article that was some stuff that you know, they had a little like I said, they were like one business day off from getting it, so close they were close what do you think happened, why announce a reveal, as we're getting to the pictures here, platform, pin bar, pin armor why announce a reveal if you don't know for sure that everything's going to be ready?
    19:40
    That's the $64,000 question, right? Hard to say. Again, the only thing I can think of is it boils down to that whole thing I talked about where when you're involved with a thing for so long and you see the evolution of it,
    19:56
    sometimes without that outside perspective, you may not quite see the forest for the trees type of thing. Of course. It's hindsight. It's easy to say why did they do this? Why didn't they do that? I get that. What are we looking at on the screen here, Chandler?
    20:15
    That is the pin bar trademark. If you look at the far right over there next to Mr. Bowden's right hand there, you'll see in this particular case, there's a MagnaSave.
    20:31
    So rather than having a third physical button, the MagnaSave is there on the screen, right? But actually, I'm kind of getting ahead of myself. The pin bar is kind of as described later in the article, it is just a full touchscreen. They can really kind of do whatever they want to do with it.
    20:49
    And so you can show things like scores, progression towards goals, what have you. One of the features that I thought was pretty cool is just to the left of the Magma Save, you can see sort of a stack of cards there. And that would actually tell you the different goals that are available based off the game state, what you're doing at that point in that time in the game. And you can actually tap through them and it'll cycle through them. So it's kind of like the compass on Pirates of the Caribbean, but kind of more so, right? At the beginning, it'll start off, the whole game's wide open. and so it will present a significant stack of cards. But as you, say for example, start a mode or kick off a multiball or something like that, then those things will change. So the idea is as the game state changes, you can put different things there to help guide the player. Did your hands ever touch the LCD screen, your palms, unintentionally?
    21:50
    Not that I recall, no. But, I mean, you can tell that you – sorry about the sneeze. No, it's fine. Get a good one.
    21:57
    But, you know, you can tell you kind of have to – you do have to put a little bit of thought into how you hold your hands, depending as to how much you bring them over, you know.
    22:06
    But I wouldn't say it was, you know, overly obnoxious or in the way or whatever. And real quick, no, it doesn't cut your damn hand. Everybody on Penn State, I stop with that shit. It does cut your hand. Well, you can see where the inside of that LCD screen would, I mean, even Bowden being careful when a photo is taken here, he's close to that. I just didn't know feel-wise if you're, because I think, I don't have a pen by me, I'm thinking that my palm is going to touch that screen, and if so, if that's a problem or if it's a feel thing. Yeah, it just depends.
    22:52
    You know, there's audio cues if you happen to accidentally hit the MagnaSafe, for example. You know, stuff like that. I know in the article they talked about adding, like, haptic feedback or something in a future release. So, yeah, there's ways to work around that. You know, I have very presidential hands, so maybe I'm not the best person to make that call. I see. I see. Okay. Does it look That pin bar Did it look Good in person Yeah It's got a You can kind of see a little bit of it There's a rubber seal around it Because that was one of our main concerns What's going to happen if it's on a wrap And somebody puts a beer on it But yeah I'd say all in all it looked pretty decent Visually it looks cool with that screen on So I'll give him credit there. And I will say another thing that I've seen people on Pinside talk about,
    23:52
    you know, it's like, oh, short people aren't going to be able to see the flippers. Well, I'm 5'7". I have no problem seeing it. So, you know, if you think about how much an apron takes up and all that, it ends up being a wash from what I can tell. I mean, I'll put it this way. I didn't think, like, holy crap, the flippers are further up than normal. Like, it at least didn't register. Are they further up than normal? But I don't know. I'm not saying they were. That seems to be the narrative on the inside. It seems to me like the apron is not really an apron anymore. It's taking the arches for the outline. Yeah, exactly. Exactly. Where you have your rule cards and all that stuff, they just sort of drew a rectangle around that, and there you go, right? So I'm not sure where that's coming from, but just wanted to put that to bed because that's another area that's just going over and over again. Of course. Did they talk about the size or length or width of this game? Is it a standard? Is it longer? Yeah. I didn't get a ruler out or anything, but it's supposed to be the same dimensions as the typical Valley Williams.
    25:02
    They didn't mention that in the article. As we're getting into the cabinet specifications here and the back box, there's going to be a couple different builds of this thing. You get an arcade build. We'll get into that. But generally speaking, the dimensions are, as Jeff at TWIP is calling, similar to Bally Williams. Yeah. And the general shape of the cabinet is, quote, standard with side and front areas and standard coin door.
    25:32
    Correct, yeah. So we'll acknowledge that this will trigger your OCD because it's not going to look like all your other back boxes. Absolutely. But, yeah, at least by appearances, it seemed to be very similar dimensions.
    25:46
    We didn't see the one on the arcade edition. They only had the one on the other two editions. I wonder if it's safe to say that the arcade edition is probably just like the damn thing they had at the expo.
    25:59
    Probably, but they mentioned in the article that it has the wraparound thing going on. So, couldn't say for sure on that. Okay. Yeah, we didn't see it, so. Yeah. But, I mean, if they're making similar dimensions to the Bally Williams, then it's probably the same thing. Yeah.
    26:18
    Am I supposed to know what the hell Baltic birch is? Terry, where are you at? You're a wood guy. Yeah, there you go. Baltic birch? Is that like a good wood? Yeah. Harder wood, I guess. I don't know. Okay.
    26:32
    Proprietary hybrid dovetail. special adhesive process of reinforcing the joints. So it's a sturdy son of a bitch. That's what I'm reading.
    26:46
    Cylon style grill. What does that even mean? I don't even know what that means. Arcade edition. Cylon style grill. Good to know. Although I think they use that same wording in both of them. So it may be what you're looking at here. Not that it's not. It looks more standard on this arcade edition cabinet. The back box does still have that panoramic wrap backlit artwork. Could you tell, Chris, when you were looking at this game, is it a trans light? Is it a... No, it's a solid piece of, I'm going to say plastic. It's not plastic, but I don't know what it's made out of. But, yes, it's a solid piece that's wrapped around with the art printed on the inside of it. the pictures I would have to say don't do it justice it actually looks pretty cool in person and yes the analogies to a fish tank are probably appropriate but because that was one of the first comments we made but I have to say in person it was actually pretty impressive and you know it was a little you know a little surprising to see it at first but then the more you saw it it's like oh that's kind of cool so it's different Okay, a 24-inch ultra-wide high-res display. Yeah, so that's the same display they had in the cab at Houston.
    28:10
    How visually different is that than one of the newer CGC extended XL displays? I haven't seen one of those in person, so I couldn't say, except for the fact that this is obviously fully, you know, it's not dots, right? It's a full LCD display with proper full res animations and all that stuff. Okay.
    28:33
    Oh, this is interesting stuff, man. Okay, so we're looking at the main head here. They're using stainless even around that. Man, stainless just, it's fingerprints and everything. I'm worried about that.
    28:48
    I need to ask Robert. I need to message him and say, why didn't you tell me? They did say some of these things weren't final, right? so I don't know if that, you know. Maybe I can still talk him into Chrome Yeah exactly With a fingerprint even more All right so you think that this is not a trans light Were you told that it printed on a plexi or is it just merely a plexi That's just a guess. Okay. All right. But it is one solid unit, though, I'll tell you that. It's not three pieces glued together. Like, it's very smooth line all the way around. Gotcha. All right. Now we're going to see this hinged assisted lift and drop glass. I don't want to hear anything drop when I'm talking about glass. Glass frame and lock bar seal. What the hell? What they mean by assisted lift and drop is you see the shocks there? Hydraulics, yeah. So it's, you know, like a hatchback or a trunk or something, right? And, I mean, it's one finger and the whole thing just comes right up. It says this is not the final version of this feature. Yeah. Did they tell you what the final, like what are we missing then? It looks like it works for me. Yeah, it seems fully functional to me. yeah and again the driver behind this is you know what do you do with your glass when you take it off right so just having it permanently attached to the machine and I mentioned later in the article that they have a we didn't see it but there's supposedly going to be a pin stadium-ish at least based off the description of what it sounds like to me pin stadium-ish type of functionality right with lights inside you know a channel or something inside there so it's being bathed with light from above Poor Scott is probably all fired up. I think he's got the thing patented and everything.
    30:28
    Good luck. There you go. All my guests based off what was in this article, nothing that they talked about. Yeah, same thing. I read the same thing. So does this glass come out at all?
    30:39
    That's a good question. I didn't ask that. Okay. All right. It looks like a longer piece of glass because I see some extensions. Chandler, can you see one? Yeah, I can see it. did. Okay. Yeah, I don't know. I mean, the problem is the geometry of all of this is a little different, right? With that, with the pin bar, trademark, it comes up, you know, again, it comes up like an apron would, right, whereas the glass would go all the way down. So, my guess is it's probably not a different length glass. It just seems that way because that bar you see going, that metal bar you see going across there is where the pin bar meets the hood, or whatever they're called. it, right? Okay.
    31:23
    How do you get in the back box? There's no need to. It's all underneath. Interesting. Or at least that was what I understood. Okay.
    31:36
    Can you lift the play field on this game? Oh yeah, absolutely. Yep. Lift the hood up. Play field comes up too. Pretty good. Again, I think some of that wasn't final as well. So take it for what it's worth, but yeah. So they're doing the whole, pull the whole damn thing out in front of the thing and twist it and turn it all around? No, it's not that patent thing. It's got the hood part of that patent, but the other part wasn't there again. Not final. Who's this guy? I like him. Is that Quinn? No, that's the Unity programmer. The Unity programmer. Yeah, that's why he's got a laptop in his hands. Oh, gotcha. All right.
    32:22
    Does this sound good, this game? Dude, loud as hell. I mean, you could crank this thing up, and there was no distortion on it. They had it jacked all the way up at 100%, and it was in the auditorium that we've heard so much about,
    32:40
    which is just kind of a giant conference room with some stadium seating in it, or any movie-style seating. And it filled that entire room with sound. So I can't imagine anybody would want anything louder.
    32:58
    It had the ability to be very loud. We're going to touch on a couple more parts, Chandler, and then we'll go to chat to see what they're drumming up. All right, so did you listen to and get to hear that 4.1 system? I don't know if you said that.
    33:11
    Yeah, yeah, that was on the one that we had. And it sounded good to me. Designed it. Like I said, no clipping I heard, very solid sound. So this thing's running off a PC, right?
    33:24
    I believe so, yeah. I think they say something like this. I think they said it runs Linux or something like that. We didn't get into that when we were there. Did they talk about accessories at all? I know we're talking about toppers here, and they've all got spots for toppers. Are they going to be selling toppers or just come in on that big addition or what? I don't remember what they said in the article about accessories, so I'm going to plead the fifth on that.
    33:56
    Sorry, guys. I'm no Jack Danger here with this fucking stream, so I'm not fair with that. So, yeah, in a spin ball, I don't remember being overly facey the way Rick and Morty is, but, I mean, you can crank it out plenty loud, that's for sure.
    34:11
    All right, did you guys get to see the topper at all now? I'm a topper whore. Oh, okay, so we can't go either way on that one. So you might have, you might not have. If you see a topper in this article, then I can talk about it. If you don't see a topper in this article, it either may or may not exist.
    34:30
    Shorting your topper. Why in the hell, this is just me being a pinball guy and you being my buddy, why in the hell would you go all these different options? What a pain in the ass. As a manufacturer, I would not want to deal with all this. So you get a vinyl-based wrap, direct print on the wood with pin armor coating, providing high-gloss hammer-tested protection, or a backlit, double-printed PETG. Lighted side art panels are featured on the extra-limited edition. Some other available options include standard or anti-reflective. Just pick a glass. It says fingerprint-resistant glass. Cary Hardy, were you touching that thing? Because even this Invisiglass and crap like that, it fingerprints worse than standard glass. Are you saying that Cary's fingers are grubbier than us?
    35:20
    You just said that, not me, but yes, yes they are. Not like the, I hate Invisiglass, I hate all that stuff because it's so hard to clean. But I'm going to have to, screw the hammer test, I'm going to fingerprint this son of a bitch up. I'll bring my kids over. We'll see how smudge-proof this shit is, Robert. Okay. So you talked about that earlier, but additional GI lighting to the underneath of the glass frame for a variable diffused lighting of the playfield area. Let's go back up and see what area. So I guess right through here. Yeah, I'm guessing, yeah, it wasn't theirs, and we didn't really talk about it. It's a good idea.
    36:00
    Yeah, it makes sense. All right, before we get into, let's see, the tour group saw some but not all the features. Lifting glass top works smoothly. We didn't see the Cylon-style grill with the panoramic wrap backlit artwork, but did see the floating back box with the panoramic. Okay, so basically the same thing. The backlit side art panels that come on the extra model were due to arrive, so you didn't get to see. Yeah, that's what I mentioned there off by one business day. It was really close. But what would that have even been? Is this on the cabinet or on the head? The way they describe it, yeah. So I think P3's got something similar where you can slide art in on the sides. Alien Highway, yeah. Yeah, okay, there you go. And it's lit from within, right? So imagine, you know, something that is PETG. It's like things that they make plastics out of, right? So you have that with backlight behind it. so basically the sides light up. Oh, okay. That'd look badass. It would look totally cool. Is it going to fill up the whole thing or just the panel?
    37:09
    What I was talking about, it slides in on the sides of the cabinet. Yeah, I know how lightweight it is. It's got that one little spot, though, that lights up.
    37:18
    The way they described it, it sounded like it was the whole thing, but again, we didn't see it. Bobby Pinball, you've got to light that whole damn thing up, bud. You've got to light it all up. Okay. So before we get into the proprietary thing that they were shitting their pants on with the pin bar, let's go back into chat and read what I'm missing. Looks like my sweet, sweet best bud, Kanade, is in the house. What's up, Chris?
    37:42
    Let's see. Chris likes the pin bar. Okay, let me go through here. People are liking pin bar. That's a good point. I mean, looking down is easier.
    37:57
    Yeah, absolutely. Without question. Let's see. Chris says he'd buy a Browse if he could. Okay. All right. NS Pinball says the Houston animations were really nice, so I would fully expect that to carry into the pin bar. Agreed? Mm-hmm. Yep. Kerry Hardy says the flippers are in the same place. apron has been turned into the pin bar. Yeah. And that seems about right, geometry-wise and everything. Again, I didn't walk up to it and go, what the hell? Why are the flippers so far out? Yeah. And for listeners or viewers who are not familiar, Kerry Hardy was one of the six media members that went there.
    38:47
    All right. Canade's being mean to Derek. Don't be mean to Derek. As he usually is. The jobber doesn't want us to refer to Bally Williams. Okay, Kerry Hardy says, Birch is strong and expensive.
    39:02
    Okay. My wood's strong and expensive as well. I didn't do the birch, though. Okay. All right. Anything else? Any other questions? Every time Zach says, Chris, I want to answer. I bet you do.
    39:16
    All right. Lord of the Ring Breath, what's happening? What's happening? Did it look like an expensive machine, Chris, or it looked like a Value City furniture pinball edition?
    39:29
    No. I mean, in every way and shape and form, a pinball machine. It wasn't the pin, right? It had proper coils on it and max and all that fun stuff. So there's nothing about it that, to me, felt cheap or phoned in per se. Is there a feel that you can compare This game to Does it feel more soft like a Like a J.J.P. Or was it more snappy and Fast The flippers had Some aggressiveness to them Probably more stern maybe It wasn't more In my opinion I always kind of felt At least on most of the J.J.P. That flippers feel a little more Lazy maybe for lack of a better term I don't know how best to describe it. No, I know what you mean.
    40:25
    But, yeah, I put it more on a stern side of the spectrum. Okay. TurboGrafx asked, and I think Chandler said before he can't answer that, was there an actual factory?
    40:41
    Let's see. What if their other 80s theme is Beetlejuice? Now we'll get into the Jager we'll get into the themes of Them I'll give you My opinion on what they mean And if there are two 80s themes Or if they were referring to one In a prior slide Alright Tess Bishop says the flippers aren't lined up in this photo Yeah That's pretty nice What the fuck Okay Were they playing this game a lot?
    41:23
    Was this like a game that they're testing out? Did they prep this? Did it feel like they prepped this game for you guys to experience? Or did it feel like, hey, we're busy here. Jump on in. See what we're messing with and how we're messing with it.
    41:39
    No, they were folks working on it. Okay. So it wasn't like they just said, there's a machine over there. Go have fun playing it, right? I mean, it was a concerted effort. All right. The pin bar.
    41:51
    Yep. TM. Yeah, TM. So I don't know if this is a Jeff Patterson statement or a TWIP or if this is a Robert Mueller telling Jeff Patterson to write, the most intriguing innovation on deep root pinball machines is the pin bar. Agree or disagree, Chandler? I would say it's far and away the most different idea, right? you know, you could argue the wide LCD screen is okay, so just push down the LCD screen, right?
    42:23
    You know, as far as if you're going to look for something in this machine that no other machine has, well, I mean, this is clearly it.
    42:31
    That doesn't always mean a good thing, though. Yeah, it depends on your perspective. You know, there's lots of reasons why they went with this route, right? And again, it kind of goes to the pinball for the masses thing, right? They're trying to make it easier to use these things. And what does everybody know how to use? A touch screen. But, someone could argue that this looks a hell of a lot more complicated than a fucking start button.
    42:56
    Oh, well, this isn't what you see whenever you walk into the game. This is basically what happens when you open up the coin door of a traditional game and start entering into the diagnostics. I wonder if there's a lock screen, though. You've got kids coming up, they're pressing these damn things, and you're like, oh my God, you've done turned my coils up, I'm burning stuff up here? No, there is. You can hide the settings behind a pin. So there's, and there's different actual profiles that you can have. You can have a home profile where, you know, maybe it's less, you know, restrictions to get into menus and do stuff with, or a public setting, which, you know, is for if you're routing it or what have you. And then, you know, in that case, there's a lot more restrictions of how to get in and change settings and so on and so forth. In either case, though, they have this profile system, and maybe you've done that in the article here, but they have a profile system that you can log in with and carry that profile with you, right? And there's things like achievements that get tied to that and your high scores get tracked. Is that like a Bluetooth thing? I'm sorry? I would think that's a Bluetooth thing, right?
    44:04
    No, I believe on the – well, you know, they didn't quite get into that. I don't know if you can tap it in on the screen, or they do have an app. And so I don't know if perhaps the app maybe helps with that. We didn't get into that too much. I saw the app very briefly. Okay.
    44:21
    Let's see. There's a good question up here. All right. Pirate Captain Red, I said, was there only one machine to play?
    44:30
    Yes. Okay. All right. Kaneda, you are something. Everybody always asks me what I think about Kaneda. They're like, so is it real that you guys are... I'm like, Kaneda is a pain in my ass, and he's a lovely man all at the same time. All right.
    44:53
    Lucky Creature said, sounds like a video game. I want a pinball game. Didn't Scream do a video game or what? No, not at all. Not at all. I mean, in fact, if you don't like the bar, it's basically used for a start button and MagnaSave. You can completely ignore all the rest of it, right? I mean, you get plenty of information on the back screen. You don't have to go mess with this thing if you don't want to. With one exception, you can't implement things like video modes on it. So, you know, there was one in particular that I saw on there when we played Rasa. So I don't know how much I can really share about that. But, you know, rather than using flippers and stuff, maybe talk about this.
    45:42
    Yeah, I don't know if you're fruit-mingling it up, but, you know, there's video mode type things that you can do in it for sure. So this is the diagnostics wizard here. You get to go through the switches, solenoids, lamps, GI sounds, et cetera. Here's your gameplay settings, Rasa settings, support, statistics. It feels like a basic operating system on any pinball machine. It's just more visual for you. Instead of being on the back box LCD screen a la Stern or JJP, It is merely on a display that is closer to you as you look down. Exactly. Yeah. Yeah, that's primarily what a lot of it is. It's just making it easier and less intimidating for normal humans to get in there and look at that stuff, right? And they mentioned in the article that, you know, there would be some things around troubleshooting and stuff. Like, you know, I don't know what that would be per se. Who's wearing the Adidas here?
    46:45
    I think that's Stenyra Patterson. Is it? I'm the lovely hand model in this case here. That's a nice hand. I'm going to have to give Jay Petty's a hard time. It's like, Jeff, you're going to take a picture. Just pull up the damn hinged hood on the tank there and pull that damn flipper down.
    47:02
    All right. The pin bar is the most powerful, revolutionary innovation ever to be added to a pinball machine. It takes the modern touch display used countless times a day on our smartphones, tablets, laptops, and kiosks and creates a permanent blank canvas for us to expand with infinite possibilities. It links the physical world to the digital. It opens doors to nearly endless new ways to interact with your pinball machine. Okay. Bigly, yes. So we covered most of what this thing can do, and we missed a lot of it, but basically you control the whole damn thing through that. well that and game as you're playing the game there's different game state things that you see there right so you're not having to look up i think that's a big part of their philosophy of not having an entire regular height lcd is you know even when you do look up you only want to look so far up the play field not having to look up here for something and then have your ball drain right i think that's the philosophy yeah yeah lord of the ring breath says it well he said just imagine using MagnaSave with your thumb and never having to leave the flipper button.
    48:13
    That's a good point. No action button, right? For all those people that are out there, action button haters. Mm-hmm. Well, one could argue this is infinite action buttons, though.
    48:24
    Action button lovers. Yeah, lovers and haters. Extra action buttons. Rick Schott wants me to show the topper. Show me your topper, Haver. All right. Let's see here.
    48:38
    So that shot gene is the sort of next suggestion thing. Oh, one thing we should talk about, because I don't know if it will come up elsewhere, it maintains a shot log, right? Yeah, okay, yeah. So as you're, because this is pretty unique.
    48:55
    So as you play the game, it goes and it logs all the things you hit, right? And it will group up events as appropriate, right? If I hit a spinner, say I get 10 flips on spinner, then it comes back to the flip where I rip it for another 12 or something. If there's enough time between those two, it'll show up as two different events.
    49:23
    And so, in essence, I'm going to guess that has to do with their ability to save games and start the games back up, which my understanding is you can even do that on a different game. I could be wrong on that, but that was kind of the impression I came away with. I can see that working. And so I think that game log thing is key to that, right? If you have the timing of the events and the exact events, you could go replay that through the game rules and then reset your game state right back to where it was, right? Just by replaying those events. Sounds like a nightmare to code. Code is code. I don't know how you do it when you're fast forwarding though. The best five minutes into a game, don't want to sit there and wait five minutes. I'm hoping it doesn't work like that. You use the pin bar. Slide it over. Well, it's not tracking the actual path.
    50:21
    No, no, no. It's tracking the events. If I hit the second stand up of this group over here, it'll know that I hit that one. and it will know at what time I hit that one because maybe it's a hurry up and if I didn't hit it in time, I get your points. So that kind of thing, right? The time because every pinball machine is going to track every switch hit, but it's the timing.
    50:43
    Yeah, so it apparently keeps that in very great detail. So, yeah. So is that the Shot Genie? I've never heard of anything else, any other machine that does something like that. Yeah, that's pretty badass. Is that the shot genie or suggested shot genie? What is that? No, that's that card thing I mentioned where it tells you, you know, here's the shots you can do. It's the thing that's like the compass on Pirates of the Caribbean.
    51:08
    Except for instead of showing you one shot, it shows you multiples. And then the further, my understanding was, the further you get into a mode or whatever, it will sort of help you focus on the important shots in that mode or something like that. But, yeah, so here are the future features. Play against a saved shot log. so imagine you have a challenge mode where it's like you know beat Steve Bowden's score right which you know we're all going to fail miserably at right but imagine that there's some sort of challenge put out there or you could maybe you could challenge your friend right I put up this score in this amount of time and here's the events and maybe you can run their score up at the same time your score is running kind of like a ghost on a like a car racing game or something like that I don't know Again, they didn't say any of these things. I'm just making wild-ass guesses like the rest of the Internet here. I like that individuals with disabilities, they have virtual buttons for those people as well. That's nice. Load, save game states. Video support calls.
    52:13
    Yeah, that one. Don't know about that because I don't recall seeing a camera anywhere on it, but that doesn't mean there wasn't one. And again, not viral. multiplayer video chat.
    52:26
    So that's all in the future capabilities of it. There's none of the stuff that we saw. Okay. All right. Let's see what else. Due to technical difficulties or technical issues that Raza was experiencing, the pin bar interaction was what Twip is calling glitchy.
    52:44
    Steve Bowden showed many screenshots of planned features and displays, and it looks like this could be an incredible new feature, emphasizing could. Did you guys not see this functioning?
    52:56
    No, we saw it functioning, absolutely. Again, there was some glitches with it. Not that we're ready to get into the details of those, but it absolutely worked. I mean, we were able to do Magna Saves, you know, stuff like that. So we were able to go on all the menus and look at stuff. So it absolutely worked.
    53:18
    did they think it was going to work or they were expecting it to still be in the coded coding? I think what they're talking about, I think what Jeff's talking about there is the things that you could do from a notification and player information standpoint that they maybe hadn't implemented yet. Right. So if you went back to that, that first shot of the pin bar there, you know, you had the, the magazine, you had the, or the stack of cards, I forget what they call it, Shock Wizard or whatever they call it, Shot Gene.
    53:54
    And then you had that middle section there, right, that was more or less not quite an exact duplicate of the back, but they were coordinated, though.
    54:03
    So, you know, as events happen, you see something on the back that folks waiting to play and watching can see and that the player themselves can see as well. But it had little cards around it that, you know, if you're in a mode, maybe those different modes have different colors, and your progress in that mode would be reflected inside that little card and stuff like that. There's just all these different things you could do with it, right? It's not to say that it didn't work. It's just that maybe some of that wasn't all there just yet. I mean, it was like dreaming all the different possibilities that they wanted to do with it. People in pinball lose their ever-loving mind using an action button. do you know if when playing a lot of these games did they talk about how much that pin bar will be used during gameplay well it's specifically discussed but I mean I'll say that what I saw in the game the only thing you ever had to interact with during gameplay was just the MagnaSafe that was it it's not like there's like 70 buttons that show up and you think you're like flying 747 or something I didn't know if we're doing like a virtual multi-morphic where I'm playing the fucking keyboard Yeah, exactly.
    55:11
    You don't want to use the WASD to navigate your way around a pinball machine? No, I do not want to deal with that. Two buttons works. Give me some foot pedals, maybe, because that's another limb.
    55:28
    It was not interaction overload. Again, the way I would view it is think of it as almost augmented reality for pinball in the fact that you're getting extra information there that normally you'd have to look up on a back box and then sometimes you have to learn how to decipher it like for example Wonka I need a fucking decoder to figure out what the hell's going on in that back box the kids are relatively obvious but there's small text in places and you've got to know that oh it's spinning three times a second and that means this And, you know, there's lots of things that if you own that machine, you eventually come to learn and know. The intention here is, like, blatantly obvious, very simple information displayed to you right by where your hands are. That's the gist, right? Okay. Now, Kaneda's poking me and saying that there's going to be ads here, so get my flipping out banners ready. Already in the process, brother. I do like that. I like that there can be some advertisements, trailers, teases for additional games. I'm presuming that's where Diablo Unwrapped. That would be my guess. I don't know that for sure.
    56:44
    We'll figure out how to get the flipping out stuff on there. We'll figure that out. Let's talk about these play fields. There's a girl, Crystal. Hashtag hammer. That's right. He's got his little hammer there. What are these good things? What the hell is this? They were like little guillotine type things just to, so that way the ball drops were consistent, right? Because you didn't want to have it where, you know, they drop it a half an inch off the play field on one and all the way from up here on the other, right? So, you know, we use those devices to, in a relatively scientific manner, drop balls. Yes, get your laughs out of the way. Drop the balls. You have to drop them balls onto the playfields and just see the difference between the one you see over there is a traditional playfield from Houston, and that's the newer one with the pin armor, as they call it.
    57:43
    Yeah. Okay. What was your impression of the playfield? I mean, as far as the hammer test goes, it passed 100%. I mean, without question. But to be fair If I playing devil advocate here Because that my job If the damn thing looked like a lemon or an orange peel how do you know if it worked
    58:07
    The way it was orange peeling was, it was different than a nice round dimple that you would see from the ball, right? You could see the individual little specks of the orange peel. So it's hard to describe it until you see it. I know it sounds like much bullshit, but I'm telling you. It worked. I don't have any reason. Yeah, you didn't go down with investment or anything in there. It's a lie, right? Yeah. It legit worked. Now, again, as called out in the article, you know, that comes at the cost of it having orange peel and raised on the art, on the insert art and stuff like that.
    58:54
    It's one of those things where you can get a double free play field, but it comes at this cost. Is that necessarily what people are willing to trade for? I don't know what the market would have to say. What the hell is this thing going on over here? Who's bringing in the big guns here? I'm impressed. We call that a camera. Somebody knowing what the hell they're doing. Nicely done. I like it. were they filming at that time? Like, what was the deal there? Yep. Okay. So this is Deep Root filming, or like a production. This isn't one of the six guests? No, it's not one of the six guests. All right. So what are we looking at here? Just more?
    59:31
    Yeah, yeah. As Robert was going through and talking about the differences and, you know, about to do an administration of hammering one versus hammering the other. Okay. So, yeah, hammer indeed was applied. It wasn't done gingerly.
    59:49
    At the same time, nobody went WWE style on the thing either. Somebody said that was Carl D'Angelo rig over here. Yeah, yeah. They were hoping to do a little streaming perhaps at one point. They got the design for the head.
    60:05
    But you can't tell it. So there's two rigs there. The reason why one of them is significantly bigger than the other, and they talk about this in the article, the smaller one holds the standard pinball the bigger one holds this giant I mean it's I don't know about yay big no idea what to compare that to but you know not quite a baseball but it was significantly heavier than a you know than a pinball and dropping that on the standard play field was you got two major divots because you know it hit and then bounced and even got to some extent with a regular pinball as well.
    60:45
    So, but yeah, in case you're wondering why there's two different gizmos there. Now, Kerry Hardy says in chat, if people don't like the dimples, they are not going to like what the orange field looks like.
    60:58
    Yeah, I would actually concur with that. It looks like a dimple playfield. Eh, I wouldn't say it looks like a dimple playfield, but it's definitely, I mean, the industry has become customs to having a glass smooth playfield. Yes. So until they get it to that point, my take is that they would probably want to look at it and refine it.
    61:25
    I've asked this to one of my co-hosts on the podcast before. Would you rather have a dimpled playfield or an orange peel playfield?
    61:38
    It's kind of a trick question. Yeah, I mean, the thing is, ultimately, if it gets diddable enough, it ends up being orange PLN. So it depends on your destination and how long it takes you to get there. I'm going to let everybody know right now, this is my favorite innovation that I've seen by Deep Root Pinball. Yeah, apparently there's somebody, I forgot who, mentioned that Gottlieb apparently did this back in the day. But yeah, one critique we had was that there's not part numbers on every one of these. Oh, okay. But, I mean, there may be numbers, like, you know, B23, for example, right? But, you know, having some of them have very specific part numbers, like, you know, 4906B, RGB4. Well, you can see that right next to that. You've got the CJ4, blah, blah, blah, you know. So having that would be super cool, right? You know, you go to replace something, and, like, bam, you pull it off, and there's your part number. Yeah, I like that. That's pretty sweet. I do like this. Now we're using Node board components.
    62:45
    GI. Yeah, that would be Node. I don't know. Okay. Looks pretty typical downstairs here. Yeah, again, the thing to take home is that there's not, you know. It's a pinball machine. If you flip the play field up and you're going to look at it and go, okay, that's pinball machine.
    63:09
    Again, do some of the boards look a little different? Sure, but not dramatically so. It's just pinball machine. What we talked to you guys about this being an early version of the pin armor, I could have swore that I had heard the company pin armor before. Did they buy a company that was making mods and pinball called pin armor? I could have swore there was a company making like covers or something with pin armor. Yeah. Maybe not. Okay.
    63:41
    But Jeff alludes to here, the ball seems to roll normally, act normally as it would on any other play field.
    63:49
    Yeah, because those are immediate concern, right? So we did sort of incline it and, you know, roll the ball down, roll slowly, so on and so forth. I didn't see any significant movement or, you know, any movement I could see at all in the ball. So, but. Did you see any soldering?
    64:10
    Plug and play? What was it? Did I lose you? Can't hear you, sir. Can you hear me? Yeah, I can hear you now. Sorry, I was tweaking that camera. Kanae was asking a good question. Did you see any soldering on the games when you flipped them up? Is it a typical there? Is it a plug and play system? Or how do you repair that? They were really big on everything being connector-based, right? So there's, you know, Molex-style connectors on pretty much everything. Okay. So, I mean, and Stern's been doing that lately, which is really helpful. Oh, yeah, yeah. I mean, nothing sucks more than having a vertical play field and having a solder and crack stuff. Hell, yeah, man. All right. So we've touched on audio. You said it sounds damn good.
    64:58
    These vents, though. Bobby, Bobby, Bobby. Well, so, yeah, the intention there is it's supposed to apparently blow sound up your body or something. I don't know. I'm not an acoustic engineer, but, you know. Did you notice it vibrating your pantalones?
    65:17
    No, I didn't. Okay. I need to talk to Bobby about this black coin door that bugs the shit out of me. And who?
    65:26
    Kerry Hardy. You should have ripped these damn plastic. What? Who put this pin together?
    65:34
    Why do they have the front legs jacked up, Chandler? What the hell? Is it like a sloped carpet or something? Sorry. I don't get some of these things. Like, this is a clusterfuck of a picture for me. And it's not innovation.
    65:52
    It's just weird. Like, this is what scares me, Chandler. Listener, viewer, this is the kind of stuff that scares me. Because if I were to walk in and look at something like this, and I see the front legs of a pinball machine jacked up, I see somebody using plastic cabinet protectors that tear up a cabinet. Why even add them? This is a new cabinet. Put the metal ones back there. I see vents that look a bit unfinished and flanked right beside them as a black coin door. Nothing else on the trim level is black.
    66:26
    That's what worries me. Then I look up at this pin bar and I'm like, is that even really manufactured the way that I'm going to like it? If I'm not liking the small, easy-to-catch details here, it's that kind of stuff that just kind of scares me. It looks cool, but some of this shit is just weird. Just weird.
    66:48
    Okay. Sorry. Rant over. Electrical. I'm not talking about this. It's a computer. If it works, great. If it doesn't work, we're going to have issues.
    67:03
    The pin bar is a 19-inch cut panel with... How do you say that word? Acid touch overlay. You're a fucking stud. Okay. We're going to skip that. I do like dongle. I can say that.
    67:17
    Cool dongles, by the way. Why is that important? I don't know. Wi-Fi dongles to deal with the demanding Internet online connectivity needs? for an omni-channel worldwide access. Bye, bye, bye! I guess. Yeah, that one was lost on me.
    67:37
    So sleep mode when it's not in use, just like most other devices in your home, reduces electrical and power when not in use.
    67:45
    That's interesting. Sounds good to me. One-person setup. Okay. Yeah, so it just is, and this would make your challenges, Greg, around who can set up the pin quicker versus eating a pizza or whatever and make it a slam dunk. So the idea is you put your front legs on as normal and then there's a whole thing that apparently, and we didn't get to see it because like they say they're going to show it at Expo, but there's a little thing that apparently makes standing the backside up without having to kill yourself and try to balance it and put the legs on at the same time or whatever.
    68:23
    Didn't get to see it, So, can't speak to the details of that suggestion. And what's interesting is apparently it's universal.
    68:36
    Okay. So, it is mounted to the bottom of this pinball machine standard. Is it like a… Well, I didn't see it, so I can't tell you. Okay. I'm trying to figure out what in the hell it could be, though. It sounded like it was something that flipped out You know, whenever you Lifted up the bottom of the cabinet The back of the cabinet Where you would normally go and put it on a chair or something And then put the legs on It sounded like it was something that would flip out from underneath You're still going to have to bend down and pick the damn thing up And then kick out this You know Yeah, I don't know So apparently they're going to show it at Expo Virtual Expo Oh, Virtual Expo So they specifically Chose not to show that to us Robert you gotta show up To the virtual expo I don't need any more delays here I want this all to work I want this to be one of the greatest Pinball experiences of my lifetime Well and that's really what it's all about Right because he's trying to Fix like all these annoyances So that's the gist But you can fix annoyances but if you're bringing on more then look at look at how shitty this show robert's gonna call me and be like son of a bitch what and home depot is happening here Is that under the shooter house? No, I was going to say It looks like it's under the shooter If I'm saying it right I don't know Does that not stick out like a sore thumb there?
    70:24
    Look, here's the other thing If you're going to have that ugly ass black coin door Paint these damn things black too Alright, I'll stop with the whole That thing Love you Bob I love you, Bobby Pinball. All right. One-person setup is going to be demonstrated. So lifting the back of the machine to install on both the rear legs, vice versa. Once done, the application could be stored underneath the machine or removed. So if you're storing it underneath the machine, then it is not attached. Stored underneath the machine.
    71:02
    Well, you said something like, yes, the attachment plate should be compatible with the majority of other. Oh, so if I'm reading that, What I think that means is there's a plate that goes on the machine, and then this thing is a doodad that helps lift it and hold it up. So I wonder if it's some sort of like, you know. A jack or something. Yeah, exactly. Like I'm a Formula One fan. They have these jacks that you just go like, you know. It looks like a dolly almost, right? And you try to use that to lift the front of the car up. I wonder if it's something like that. For all of you guys that put pinball machines out of the box together, or if you transport it vertically, picture what – that's why I'm getting confused. You put the front two legs on, right? Yep. You put it down to the ground, ass into sitting on the ground. Yep. How would one then get under this machine to jack it up?
    71:57
    You know what I mean? Yeah, yeah, yeah. You'd have to have access to it from the side or something almost, right? I don't know how that would even work. Okay.
    72:08
    Don't bring physics into this, man. Yeah, right. All right. Assisted leveling, that's cool. Basically, it's going to let you know, kind of like the multimorphic, left or right, up and down, probably on that pin bar if I had to guess. The way they described it was it would automatically level it. It has some sort of mechanics in it. And again, that's another thing we didn't get to see.
    72:35
    That's cool. If that's the case, that's pretty damn cool. Yeah. Okay. I like the turtle approach reference. That's nice. Yeah.
    72:44
    I got hurt when he started talking about it. I was like, oh, shit, we've all done that. What is this John Papaduke theater of magic shit here? The pin pod. Well, see, when we arrived, Robert popped out of the top of it. That's awesome. No. It would have been awesome if he did, but that didn't happen. He just ruined it. that would have been great.
    73:07
    This looks like some Harry Houdini shit right here. Well, it's interesting. It's basically like a customized,
    73:17
    I wouldn't say the palette, because it's a solid piece. It's a crate. And then four pieces of ply that are already routed out and everything to fit together. That's a crate.
    73:27
    I want this. Oh, no. If you go to shows, I think this thing would be invaluable. This is why I don't sell used pinball machines right here, ladies and gentlemen. Because I don't want to do that each and every time. And that's the only way to properly ensure a used pinball machine is to create the damn thing up. I don't want to do it.
    73:53
    Yeah. And so yeah, this little bracket thing was to use this really simple tool to pop them off and on. Or pop them off and then put them on. You sort of put them around. I love the things that excite me the most are probably the cheapest things. I like this, and I like the printing on the bottom of the play field. Okay. So it is what it is. You see it, FinPod. Yeah. I wonder if every deeper game is going to come in one of those.
    74:18
    Let's see here. Yes. Reusable pinball storage and shipping container. Optional. Okay. Optional. Okay.
    74:29
    Just saying, Bobby Pinball. that'd be cool to make that a feature on the biggest edition, the nicest edition alright, the tour group did not see the one person setup or assisted leveling, we did see the pin pod and it worked well overall and seemed like a heavy duty way to safely move a pinball machine yeah, it was pretty impressive and there's also the little it's got like rubber feet on it, you know, it kind of made it easy to scoot around and things like that. Anti-vibration feet and those little orange guys there.
    75:05
    Here's what we're going to do. We are going to put Dennis Creasel in one of these pin pods and we're going to skip his ass to TPF next year. We're going to see... You put a Gottlieb in there and then you put him next to the Gottlieb. And then you shut it down. Uh-huh. Some of the features that they are planning.
    75:27
    Interesting. that jeffrey but 2021. okay first the ae system is expected to be enabled for all machines equipped with deep root full range 4.1 okay i don't even know what this means is that the front speaker things that that was an audio extension it's somewhere else in the thing okay so that's uh okay So you get that when you get that 4.1 system. Does that sound like that's coming until 2021?
    76:02
    Well, for all machines equipped with the 4.1 system, yeah. That's the thing. There's options that you can choose based off. Maybe that's later down, but what each machine gets. Yeah, and whether you know or not, you don't even have to answer. but my thoughts are, okay, but if I want one for Rasa, do I have to wait until 2021? And if that's the case, maybe they're not planning on shipping until 2021 regardless. I don't know. It brings up a lot of questions there. Second, we will add ambient light, auto-adjusting to the new game. I hate that idea because it sounds nice, but have you guys ever had one of those damn systems, like on this piece of shit, whenever this ambient light, oh, my, makes me so mad. Hate it. I think they're talking about the Penn Stadium-like functionality. I think that's what they're talking about.
    76:56
    All right. Haptic feedback. So you're going to get this lockdown bar to vibrate. Yep. Right. Okay. Is that Mrs. Chandler?
    77:09
    I hope she rings your neck here in a minute. She's probably yelling at the kids. All right. Software, I'm going to spare you guys. You guys can go back and read that. Cool shit. omni-channel.
    77:20
    So this is basically the online cloud stuff. That we've expected somebody to do at some point. Yeah, yeah.
    77:29
    All right. Blah, blah, blah. Shot logs, scoring features. It's all very impressive. Read through this whenever you get time.
    77:38
    This Week in Pinball did an extraordinary job laying this out. And if it was just given to them to lay out, then Deeproot did an extraordinary... whoever did it did a really good job with this. That's Jeff. Jeff, a lot of times. He's great when it comes to the deep dives and stuff like that. I remember, man, knowing how much freaking time he put into that stuff. All right. He's probably been working on this for a bit, too. It's nicely done. Three-model system.
    78:05
    So we've got more ways to confuse, and this is not Deep Roots' fault. This is everybody's fault for not having similar language. So we've got an arcade edition. That's the budget version. I like the name of it. I like Arcade Edition. A little confusing, but I don't mind that.
    78:24
    The X Edition introduces our floating back bar aesthetic with upgrades over the AE. That's the X Edition. Yeah, that's the mid-range one. So there's an X Edition and an extra.
    78:47
    It's just that. It's the limited run numerically. That's their LE, basically. Okay. That's the fully pimped out, like, all the things.
    79:03
    It says all the extra luxury items. What are the three models called? Arcade, Extra, and then X-Edition?
    79:15
    Shit, I thought it was easy. Alright, these are the additions we're focusing on. Customization is easy and allows you to have power over your purchasing cost, which is in return, I fear, going to take more time. Games may have one version, two versions, or all three versions available. Nice, I like that. Customization is easy and allows the customer to have power over the purchase and cost.
    79:41
    Simply tells me that we're going to have online ordering for the most part. Can we get into the playing titles?
    79:49
    Let's do it Alright Last thing I can't tell you anything other than what's on here Absolutely Alright I'm going to be honest with all of these For better or worse Okay You still hear me Chris? Sure can Okay I had a cord Messing up here Alright Yeah, by the way, your battery light is blinking on your camera. Thank you, thank you, thank you. All right, reading through the chat. Let's see.
    80:23
    Is there anything I missed? Okay. All right, top rope's in the house. What's happening, top rope? All right, so I'm going to let you guys, as I change my battery, read the details of fire and brimstone. I will say that the mention of this thing the first multi-denominational religious pinball game actually had somebody legitimately laugh out loud very briefly not sure if that's a PTSD reaction or what but I don't know yeah and as you can see this is one that robert is designing himself um obviously you know not 100 independently i'm sure he's got some got some help from his other folks but so what were you saying here i missed that uh just that fire and brimstone uh you know robert is the designer the prior designer um you know i'm sure he's getting some help from other folks good for him though paul's there good for him because if i was putting this much time and money my ass would be designing pens too. I don't want to hear nobody hating on Robert Mueller designing. If the dude wants to design a pen, damn right, I'll be designing the pen. If I was Gary Stern, I might as well be designing pens. If I was George Jack, I might as well be designing pens. Alright, sorry.
    81:51
    As much as people want to back on it being a religious based theme, the thing is, there's a lot of religious summer camps.
    82:02
    They stock things for kids to do, so I don't know, maybe that's a market that has been tasked. I don't know. Are you going to sell you a billion of these things? No.
    82:14
    It's still odd to me. Yeah. What do you got first off? Who follows primarily the Old Testament anyway? I mean, even Christians.
    82:25
    Judaism is based off the Old Testament. Okay, so is it focused more towards Judaism then? I thought I read somewhere that you get the first multi-denominational religion. I'm sorry, guys. I'm ignorant when it comes to a lot of religious stuff. Okay. I made a joke today that I think was probably pretty gold. I said that instead of choosing your buccaneer, your pirate, or your house, maybe you choose your religion when you start the game. See, come on. Come on. That's pretty damn funny. Oh, what? That was good. Pray, pray, pray.
    83:09
    All right. Here's the one people are talking about. People love the food truck. Can't get enough of the food truck. More food truck. Food truck.
    83:24
    If you were to name a hundred themes that you would like to see done, original themes, Robert Mueller, original themes, Who in the hell would have named food truck? I think people would have picked snakes and spiders before they would have food truck. Even maybe boogers and poop before they would food truck. Am I wrong?
    83:50
    Yeah. I mean, those could be modes within food truck. We don't know. Wrong. I don't know. I just don't know. I saw this first thing I felt when I saw this Oh my god Robert Dude what are you smoking food truck Alright Maybe it's fun It's awesome You know what game is fun and awesome I don't give two shits about dialed in Yeah I mean that's the thing People always talk about theme And how important theme is But you know One example I'll use is Pirates I can give zero fucks about Pirates It's a movie franchise, but that's a fun game.
    84:37
    That's a good argument to make. I'll spare the time from arguing against it. But food trucks. You're getting the orders filled quickly and accurately to keep your social media reviews up. Got to keep that Yelp score up, maximize your scores. Watch out because the Roach Coach will try to steal your customers. And look for any opportunity to post bad reviews and sabotage your business. The features on this are just some all-around cool toys, mechs, along with a fast-paced visual ordering queue.
    85:08
    So basically, Overcooked the Pinball Machine is what I took away from it. Meaning? What, the game Overcooked? Have you not played that? No, I don't know that one. Yeah, it's known as the divorce maker. I'm sure Chad will start going crazy with it. But, yeah, Overcooked is this game where you have to make dishes to serve to people, and each person has to have their own certain thing that they do. And if you don't do it all together, you end up failing. And everybody's like, get a studio, get a studio. People are screaming and yelling at each other.
    85:42
    That's what I thought whenever I heard this. Yeah, Robert, I'll probably buy one of your games. I might buy several games Food Truck will not be one of them nope and a good follow up to that is Merlin's Arcade so this one's interesting because we see a lot of I think they're trying to go old school here and I'm kind of confused what the source is yeah that's interesting as well for the three-fourths.
    86:25
    One-fourth. Good versus evil. We've got mixing. I don't like when we mix up media. We've got 2D art and 3D up here.
    86:37
    Nope, another mess for me. This is Norris. Medieval Arcade Olympics set in the 80s. In the 80s? Which 80s? Trained with Merlin in the Knights of the Round Table battle, Morgan Le Fay to regain the Holy Poppin' Grail.
    86:54
    Man. So these kind of original themes are going to do one of two things They going to be so cleverly written and poking fun at themselves that they going to be ironic they're going to be satirical, they're going to be hilarious, a la Medieval Madness. Or they are going to fucking flop like Pony Factory.
    87:21
    Yeah. It's pretty digital. It's either going to be number three on the pin side I remember 333. It's, it's, uh, this is based on the eight ball deluxe with flow. Eight ball deluxe doesn't have a lot of flow, a lot of drop targets and stuff. Uh, precision around new max, a unique gameplay heads up display.
    87:41
    Hmm. Okay. Yep. Don't want that one. Isn't that weird that we can look, it's 2020. You guys, this is what we do. Theme is a lot. Theme is a lot in this game. Or in this industry.
    87:59
    Look at these pretty guys. The Who. Yeah, I know a lot of people will be excited for this, but I'm not a dad rock pin kind of guy.
    88:11
    Did you just talk about food trucking and talk down the Who? Is that what just happened right there? Yep. The Who.
    88:20
    The Who plays good music. I like the Who. Didn't they do Bob O'Reilly? take the legendary band the who on an amazing journey in the search of the pinball wizard careful some unique mechs some i already got rid of some unique mechs and special effects round out this musical spectacle that could be cool i like orsler games that could be cool did he ever figure out the damn guy's name is oustler orsler god it's like the biggest mystery of deep gladiator now this looks pretty cool
    89:07
    spent a little time looking at that annoying plate there we need to have a discussion broke a piece off right there I hope he doesn't try to do a barrel roll that thing is going to go right in his pit You play as Sepsis. This is what happens when you get poked by one of those claws.
    89:30
    Septimus Prime, a captured slave who must rise in the ranks of the gladiators of Rome. Hone your inner bone skills. Kill the senators and overthrow the emperor who killed your family, bastards. And enslaved you. Almost sounds like a film I've heard of called Gladiator. It's based on the 3D space cadet layout. Yeah, that's the part that's interesting. is them taking the old Microsoft 3D Space Cadet and turning it into a physical pin.
    90:02
    The first virtual table converted to a physical layout. Subways galore. Although technically that's not true. There's people that did Time Shock. Yeah. I thought there was another one as well.
    90:16
    Okay. So Gladiator, it's got potential. It's better than Lexi Lightspeed. it's a better thing than that it's got potential I'm not shitting on that one yet that loin plate though this is the one that I wanted so bad to maybe be different Yukon Yeti trademark I'm going to give Deeper Pinball a shit load of credit for the title of this game the title is gold Yukon Yeti? Get out of here. Do people want a follow-up to Whitewater? That might sell as an original theme. That really, really might sell. We've got Nordman and Mueller designing this. I presume and I assume that Mueller jumped in when Nordman jumped ship and finished this game out, if I had to guess. So the concept is it's a goofy and lighthearted game. Oh, why?
    91:23
    The mischievous and lovable teenage Yukon Yeti feuds with gold miners against the backdrop of the 1890s Yukon gold rush.
    91:32
    Okay. Damn it. How close. What is this thing? Chandler, what is that? I don't know, but it apparently likes pizza. I like pizza. Now it looks high.
    91:58
    That's good artwork right there. It's actually really good artwork. That's not good artwork. And that is good artwork. It looks kind of like Calvin. Calvin House.
    92:12
    This could be cool. I'm not out on this one. Is it because of the Yeti nips and the one on the bottom center? I'll see them.
    92:24
    I like those backwards nines and Gs. I lick them. All right, so who doesn't want a sequel to Whitewater, New Max, and the great multi-level flow you expect from the original? Man, I'm wondering if they get licensing rights for that.
    92:41
    Well, I think that's why you're seeing it with a different theme, right? I mean, as far as I know, you can't copyright a, you know, if it's in the spirit and in the vein and in the theme of an existing play field, but not an outright copy of the play field. No, I'm talking about just the license that is Whitewater.
    93:02
    Oh, no, I think that's the thing is the way I read this is we're not licensing Whitewater. equal to white water. That is an indication that that is a thing. They have to have a license for that.
    93:20
    Or the ability to share or to use that license, I would guess. Okay. Let's see what else we got.
    93:33
    Machine Age by Nordman. Yeah, this one was one that folks there that involved with the code aspects were really excited about. They couldn't really elaborate on the details of it,
    93:51
    but they were actually, this is one of the ones that got set out all of them. This is one that they were really passionate about. Gotcha. Okay, so there was some internal hype on this one. The concept is that you were dropped into a battle spanning ages, beings, and time itself. Help two dieselpunk heroes take on the world's greatest threat in this dystopian thriller with the help of a mystery ally.
    94:18
    Features an open layout with three first ever mechs. Stunning video game quality animations. Machine Age.
    94:31
    Okay. I'm seeing a lot of Egyptian references. Time. We've got ships. Okay. I can get behind that for now.
    94:50
    This game is to be determined, but I think it's going into the deep root. I think that's what it is. It says, under features, a re-envisioning of the classic Black Hole.
    95:02
    Okay. Groundbreaking mech that redefines multi-level play fields. Is Robert doing the old switcheroo on us here? Maybe.
    95:13
    Space pirates keep order in the cosmos by causing nightmares for the villainous trade syndicates. Progress from grunt to captain in this cosmic keep-what-you-steal epic.
    95:25
    All right. We'll have to see. To be determined. He likes space. We got space. Space. We got Raza. Space. A lot of sci-fi. He said in the past he used to use sci-fi.
    95:42
    Yeah, that makes sense then. What are we missing here? Oh, snap. There she is. The one, the only, the magic girl. I've got to watch my hands.
    96:00
    Okay. C-Y-O-A world. What is that? Cover your own ass I don't know What does that mean I think that's what it means Hundreds of plays To win Oh Maybe it's like a road like Or something Where you come back into it Or something I hope so That would be cool Oh Choose your own adventure Okay thank you Yeah Cover your own ass Is better I like it so magic girl I'm excited about magic girl even just the looks at the one that didn't work seemed pretty cool to me I like the theming of magic girl this is not it's not magic girl it's the new magic girl 2.0 yeah it seems to be reimagined arts Yeah, she's no zombie yeti magic girl. That's okay.
    97:05
    I still like the theming. I still like the colors they use. Hopefully they'll mimic a lot of that stuff.
    97:11
    The elixir of immortality. Papadoop. I think that was Bud Light we were drinking earlier, right? What's that? The elixir of immortality. Yeah, that's right.
    97:25
    And then the thing that gave me a straight erection today. Midday erection was a simple phrase that says, hey, you guys.
    97:46
    Now, maybe I'm reading into it too much, Chandler, maybe. But other titles in development include Alice, combative racing license.
    98:01
    What is multiplex? Is that shopping? What is that? Movies? Movies, maybe. I don't know. That's what I would think of. I think multiplex. A popular board game license. You can give me a risk or sorry. Okay. Then I see 80s movie license.
    98:17
    And then I go back up. And I read fucking, Hey, you guys, which is one of the most iconic phrases from the dream theme of all time for me,
    98:30
    and that's the Goonies, ladies and gentlemen. The fucking Goonies. Okay. So, if it took me buying three of these shit games to get the Goonies, I'd do it. So, you totally redeem yourself if Deep Root Pinball has the Goonies. Sold.
    98:53
    Sold. That's it. That's all I need. That's what themes do. That is what themes do. Bye-bye-bye! Absolutely. Exactly.
    99:11
    Kaneda, I hope not. No, you can't tease us with this and give us something else. You cannot tease us. Hey, you guys! No.
    99:22
    No. You can't What do you think if they have the Goonies license? We see no other license here Chandler I don't know Maybe it's from Xanadu Who knows I will burn a Xanadu pin if that's what it is This better not be a troll What the hell Who's calling in right now I'm not answering the phone What is this Oh, I lost Chandler.
    99:57
    Did I get you guys still in chat or did I lose you? Chandler, are you still there? I got too excited about the hey, you guys.
    100:05
    All right, thanks, Chris. How? How did Deep Root secure the rights to the Goonies? there's nothing in my mind that even wants to make sense of any of that. You still there, Chris?
    100:28
    Yeah, I'm on the office computer, which is cut off for the kids at 10 o'clock. I'm sorry about that. No, you're fine. I was just having a midnight wetness here talking about the Goonies. And I'm assuming it's the Goonies because it says, hey, you guys. And there's no reason to put a damn slideshow in the middle of your presentation that says, hey, you guys, period, dot, it's the Goonies.
    101:01
    Until I'm told otherwise, it's the Goonies. I have now officially purchased a pinball machine from Deep Root, my first one. It's called the Goonies. Robert, don't fuck this up. Deep Root, don't fuck this up. Don't put this in the purgatory that is alien pinball or the Big Lebowski. Please, please, for everything that's important in pinball to me, don't fuck this up.
    101:29
    This does so much for me. You guys don't understand. All right. What did we miss? I'm a supporter of Deep Root now. I don't care of how much fun I made fun of these cock vents. I don't care.
    101:48
    How did, how, Chandler, if they got, hypothetically, if they got the Goonies, how? How do you come in as a new company like this and get the Goonies? And if that's the case, shame on you, Stern Pinball. Shame on you, Jersey Jack Pinball. Shame on you, CGC. Shame on you, Spooky Pinball.
    102:08
    Unacceptable. If Deep Root can come in under the radar and have nothing built and have no manufacturing set up, and they secure the rights to one of the greatest films of all time, not to mention your primary buyers, just their childhood,
    102:32
    and you didn't secure that license and Deep Root can, that's more shame on you than it is anything that you could say negative about Deep Root in this entire discussion, in my opinion well a lot of people have the argument of whether or not things escaped the 80's right, and I don't know, maybe it was a little too old for it or something but, good news is okay Christopher Chandler yes really?
    103:04
    That's not... Oh my god. Alright. There, I said it. Fucking Michael Jordan's a horrible basketball player too.
    103:18
    Doesn't hold up. Nobody... We'll log off here. Nobody's allowed to say that the Goonies doesn't hold up and say anything positive about fucking Fire and Brimstone, Food Truck, Merlin's Arcade, Gladiator, Yukon Yeti, Machine A, Title II BD and Magic Girl. No.
    103:37
    No. Don't get me wrong. If I got to stack rank those things, it's without question. But I don't know. I guess I just don't have the woody for it that a lot of people do. Fair enough.
    103:48
    You know? You know I love you. Themes are to the individual, right? Yeah. You're the one that's in our group chat and stuff that pushes the original stuff, aren't you?
    104:00
    There's somebody in TPN's group chat or the course on your chat. Am I wrong? No, I mean, I'm definitely like a System 11 type guy. I like a lot of the older pins back when things were original themes. But I'm also not part of the group that says, oh, everything should be original themes because we're tired of seeing Avengers done for the 73rd time or whatever. I think in today's market you've got to have a theme again, I know this has been said a million times before but look at Spooky and look at what happened with that don't get me wrong, Scott's a great designer Spooky's a great company under no other circumstances would they have sold out a pen sold out 750 units in four hours if it wasn't for that theme. Absolutely. You're correct. Now, that doesn't mean that you can't make a pin, like let's say Fire and Brimstone, that is for a very niche market, and you know you're only going to sell 200 or whatever that number may be. And if you can make a business doing that, then that's fine. You may not have to be, you know, your objective may not be to go over the market share, right? So you may not care. It has come out publicly saying that is their goal. That is their goal, is to sell more pinball machines in a given year than all of the manufacturers combined. That is their publicly stated goal. Yeah, and they were also going to ship 17 pins each year and so on and so forth, right? I think you're going to see a lot of that get walked back, right?
    105:47
    We're no longer hearing that pinball is easy, for example. I do wish them the very best. I think a lot of the stuff that they have planned out here, that they have laid out here, particularly stuff like that, it's great. It's really good. I like the concept and the idea of the pin pad here. What is it called?
    106:08
    Pin bar. I went pin pad. There are some things that I question. There being so many pinball people in one area that they let things go.
    106:24
    But there's some cool stuff. There's some visually stunning stuff. Pinball is about gameplay and it's about code, and those are two things that we don't have the capabilities of experiencing right now. So visually, from what we're seeing, it's a mixed bag for me.
    106:42
    The way they've presented everything and held themselves, that has been a very, very, very negative entrance into this industry. if you can back it up then it's totally fine talk all the shit you want on the court if you can back it up Jordan did it all the time but if you're Keith Bogans maybe not talk as much shit but having said that they have the Goonies I'm a buyer and if their plan is to not sell that many pins Fire and Brimstone will do it Food Truck will do it Merlin's Arcade will do it I don't care how great these pins are I don't care if they're fitting into a standard cabinet of a pinball machine it's going to be hard to care how much they are unless you can program these things yourselves or the pinball community can reprogram these things then you might have an open source good thing or unless they have some of the funniest fucking people that have ever entered into the industry of pinball that can do these stories and themes justice. Yeah. Well, that is part of what they brought Quinn in for, right? Is to help with that. Okay. We'll see what you got, Quinn. I'm going to meet Quinn. I want to hang out with Quinn. Quinn is a cool guy. I've heard a lot of things about Quinn.
    108:09
    Yeah. He's a good dude. Hey, Yukon Yeti actually. In the right hands? Yeah. I mean, would I be thrilled about it? No. but I could, again, it's like I could see the market for it. Not for me, but. I'm just sold on the name. Damn. That's a good name.
    108:27
    All right. But, yeah, like you said, I mean, the thing I came away from with over the whole weekend is the pieces are there, right? You can see what they've been working on.
    108:40
    The challenge is just, you know, that you got to, you know, it's like being a chef, right? You can have all the right ingredients, and if you put too much garlic in it, the whole dish is off. So it's just a matter of them, you know, it's really down to sort of that spit, polish, refinement, togetherness, cohesiveness that I think will, which, by the way, is hard, right? Whenever you go broad with the number of features you implement and the amount of problems that you try to solve, each one of those adds complications. That little footbar thing that we talked about earlier, that's another thing you've got to figure out whenever you're assembling the thing.
    109:27
    What part of the stage does that come in? Which is why everybody's asked. You have to look at these things and say, does that add enough value? Is there enough care about to bother with that? Or do we maybe wait? Can we ship a core pinball experience to start, learn how to manufacture, learn how to build, get all that stuff done, then let's bring in a pin bar. Then let's have online connectivity. I think what happened is what in the software industry we call scope creep, right, where just the amount of things that they wanted to tackle just got so broad that it was hard to get it all over the finish line together. a good way to put it it's my Tuesday morning quarterbacking if I was armchair quarterbacking which I've got a big mouth and a microphone so why not I get ripped on enough for doing so if I'm Robert Mueller I stop what I'm doing and I continue working on Raza you've already popped the cherry on that thing you continue working on Raza you take all of your other games. You take Fire and Brimstone. You take Food Truck. You take Merlin's Arcade. The Who's Fine. You take Gladiator. I'm going to keep you, Kanye, for now. You take Machine Age. You take the TBD and you Sheldon Magic Girl. But you take all of those and you stop everything with them. You take whatever resources you have, whatever money you have, and you start buying licenses. And you re-theme every one of these damn shit licenses to actual licenses that people want. I don't even care if they're not as good a license. Don't care.
    111:18
    An actual movie, an actual TV show is better than these. Yeah, I mean, again, in this age, it's really hard to see how you go without a license, right? I mean, T&A is like the lone exception I can think of in recent times. No, it only sold 550. Robert Mueller's needing to sell more than 550. I can guarantee you that. Oh, yeah. No, exactly. I mean, you run the math on it. There's a lot of units they've got to sell just to even break even. If they've got all these whitewoods, make use of them. Cheese grater, hold the art down, start over, get yourself some 80s horror films. There are some cheap licenses out there. Think about it. I guarantee you there are some licenses out there that are $50,000.
    112:08
    I guarantee you. Some cult classics, $50,000, $100,000. It's ignorance. I don't know enough about this industry, apparently. But that, I would never think of. Would never happen.
    112:26
    It's generated a lot of buzz, Zach. the guy is a lot wealthier and a lot more successful than I am. So apparently he's doing something right. So I can't hate too much. I mean, that's sour grapes.
    112:38
    He's doing something right to get where he's at right now. So I'll back it up because he's got the Goonies license. I'm in. Please don't mess it up. Anything else you want to close on, Chandler?
    112:51
    No, I mean, other than just what I started off with. I mean, can't thank them enough for having us all go out and visit. And, again, they were really, you know, hospitality was through the roof. And, you know, I wish it would have played out differently in multiple ways. You know, not just not being able to launch, but things that happened after that and then the sort of forced reveal. And, you know, it sucks to work all this time on it and then not be able to control the narrative. But I don't know. I think it was very, very nice to bring and not only invite people, but to pay their way. I've been in several situations in this industry where I've put work in, and I don't see Robert Mueller being the way that I've experienced in the past. So, yeah, paying, that's unbelievably kind, and it's a good indication of probably who he is. So I can't wait to meet the guy. I can't wait to meet the rest of the team there. For the most part, I'm having fun here. I'm poking and pissing and shitting over here. We're having fun. I do wish them the best because more good pinball is good for me, And as a dealer, you guys know, I'm looking to always buy, buy, buy, and sell, sell, sell. So I wish them all the best. I appreciate you going down there, Chandler. That means the world to not only myself, but I echo that from everybody at the Pinball Network that went down there, including all the other five individuals that went down there as well. You guys are, it's people like you that are helping the community, not just the industry and the moneymakers in this community, but the actual community and the camaraderie between us all as a family. It's corny, it's hokey, but nonetheless, it is still true. So, if you're looking for your Deep Root machine, I don't know where the fuck to buy it. I don't even know how much it costs.
    114:56
    So, I'd love to say you buy it from Flippin' Out Pinball, but unfortunately, turning down this week is hopefully the prices on Deep Root pinball machines. When will we know? I'm not sure. Are we going to be doing a lot of South South South? Or is it going to be more Yukon Yeti and the Goonies with Bye Bye Bye? You tell me. Only time is going to tell. Is that time going to be 2020, ladies and gentlemen? Or is it going to be 2024?
    115:29
    I don't know. I sure as hell don't know. Oh, for Chris Chandler. I'm Zach Minney. I'll see you guys later. Chandler, I love you, buddy. Thanks so much for being here and hanging out with everybody in chat. Fucking love you guys, too. buy your next pinball machine for me shit sweating here haven't eaten dinner give a guy a chance see you guys what if they're holding out on fire and brimstone choose your religion atheism wizard melody