Episode 923: "Kaneda's BBQ Rant & Momma Mia Monday"

Kaneda's Pinball Podcast (Patreon feed)·podcast_episode·21m 14s·held·Mar 11, 2024

Analysis

claude-haiku-4-5-20251001 · $0.029

TL;DR

Kaneda rants against American Pinball's BBQ game and ABBA announcement, predicting John Wick designer.

Summary

Kaneda delivers a scathing critique of American Pinball's Barry O's Barbecue Challenge, calling it a dead-on-arrival game with no market demand and poor design decisions under CEO David Fixx. He also critiques Pinball Brothers' announcement of ABBA as musically redundant, arguing the market needs hip-hop and pop themes instead. Additionally, Kaneda speculates on Stern's upcoming John Wick designer (predicting Jack Danger or Keith Elwin) and warns that 2024 will be brutal for manufacturers making mediocre games.

Key Claims

David Fixx has been at American Pinball for five years and has only delivered Hot Wheels, Legends of Valhalla, and Galactic Tank Force, all of which were poor decisions.
high confidence · Kaneda directly lists Fixx's tenure and game deliveries as evidence of poor decision-making.
Barry O's Barbecue Challenge is priced the same as a Stern Pro but has half the content, and is clearly dead on arrival with only 100 LE units planned.
high confidence · Kaneda explicitly compares pricing and playfield density, noting the low LE production run signals no demand.
Original IP pinball games have not been commercially successful in recent years; Dialed In was a sales disaster, and TNA saw minimal demand after initial release.
high confidence · Kaneda cites these games as examples of failed original IP strategy.
The pinball market is missing hip-hop music representation despite hip-hop's 50th anniversary last year, while being oversaturated with rock and music themes.
medium confidence · Kaneda states this as opinion/prediction but grounded in market observation.
Stern produces approximately 500 games per week (24,000 per year) and must find distributors for all of them.
medium confidence · Kaneda provides conservative estimate as part of analysis of Stern's vulnerability.
John Borg's game is not the next Stern release but the one after, suggesting the next game is either a Keith Elwin or Jack Danger design.
medium confidence · Kaneda explicitly positions this as a scoop/prediction based on indirect information.
Foo Fighters has lost $2,000-$3,000 in value since release, and the delayed topper release (one year later) has hurt secondary market appeal.
medium confidence · Kaneda cites secondary market pricing observation and timing critique.
Pinball Brothers' ABBA game will be the first Pinball Brothers machine without Andrew Highway's involvement.
medium confidence · Kaneda notes this as a significant change from Queen and Alien Pinball development.

Notable Quotes

“They are simply sticking their hands in the piggy bank of a guy that's got more money than pinball brains. And that's what he's got because if he had pinball brains, he wouldn't be green lighting this kind of game.”
Kaneda @ ~12:30 — Kaneda's core criticism of American Pinball's decision-making under Mukesh's investment; suggests financial backing is enabling poor game design.
“If you go back and you look at the nineties, what were the biggest titles? It was not original IP games. If you go back and look over the last 10 years, name me some original IP games that have been commercially successful.”
Kaneda @ ~5:00 — Central thesis about original IP viability; challenges industry assumption that original games are desirable.
“The next musical genre that needs to be represented in pinball, if you want to sell to men 40 to 60 years old, and these are men that grew up in the 80s and the 90s that now have disposable income. The number one genre that is missing from pinball is hip hop.”
Kaneda @ ~22:00 — Identifies market gap and target demographic insight; argues for hip-hop over ABBA as next music pin.
“I think this is gonna be a brutal year for everybody that makes mediocre games. And I think it's gonna be a tremendous year if we see stuff like the Matrix from Jersey Jack, if we see Back to the Future from Dutch Pinball.”
Kaneda @ ~50:00 — Market prediction; identifies licensed IP (Matrix, BTTF) as survival strategy, mediocrity as death knell.
“By the time they do release it, all the hype on the game is gone. Like everybody who owns a Foo Fighter LE, your machine has now gone down in value like two to three thousand dollars.”
Kaneda @ ~37:00 — Criticism of Stern's topper delay strategy and its impact on secondary market.
“It's a blank light show this game. All right, I'm moving on. It's a Monday. I want to be more optimistic. This company upsets me. This company enrages me.”
Kaneda @ ~14:00 — Emotional intensity of critique; reveals personal investment in industry health.

Entities

KanedapersonDavid FixxpersonAmerican Pinballcompany Pinball BrotherscompanyStern PinballcompanyBarry O's Barbecue ChallengegameABBAgameLegends of Valhallagame

Signals

?
product_concern: Barry O's Barbecue Challenge criticized for having half the playfield content of a Stern Pro while matching its price point
high · Kaneda: 'The game has half as much in it as a Stern Pro, and yet it's priced the same as a Stern Pro. So you have to have your head examined if you're gonna buy this game.'
?
product_launch: Barry O's Barbecue Challenge positioned as commercial failure with low production (100 LE units) signaling manufacturer's lack of confidence in demand
high · Kaneda: 'It is dead on arrival... they know there's no demand. That's why they're only making one hundred L.E.s'
~
sentiment_shift: American Pinball's reputation declining following pattern of underperforming games (Hot Wheels unfinished, Legends of Valhalla poorly received, Galactic Tank Force unwanted)
high · Kaneda: 'I don't want to see anything else from American pinball... This is an utter embarrassment and they should be embarrassed to even put this game into the marketplace.'
$
market_signal: Original IP pinball games have failed commercially in recent releases; market prefers licensed IP especially for premium-priced home games
high · Kaneda cites Dialed In, Black Knight failures and argues: 'people don't want original IP games. It's not 1990s anymore.'
$
market_signal: Hip-hop music genre significantly underrepresented in pinball despite celebrating 50th anniversary; market oversaturated with rock and music themes targeting 40-60 year old males
medium · Kaneda: 'The number one genre that is missing from pinball is hip hop... how are we flying over hip hop... we're going to 1970s like disco?'

Transcript

groq_whisper · $0.064

0:00

Mama Mia, here I go again, my my, how can I resist you? Mama Mia, does it show again, my my, just how much I miss you? There's something broken hearted Sitter, Sitter, Sitter, Sitter, Sitter, Sitter, Sitter Ah, happy Monday everybody, welcome to Kaneda's Pinball Podcast, are we gonna get Mama Mia, ABBA Pinball from the Pinball Brothers Look, I love ABBA. We're gonna talk about this, but ABBA to me is like Phil Collins. It's like guilty pleasure music for most of us out there, and it doesn't mean we wanna spend pinball money on a themed pinball machine based on ABBA. We're gonna talk about that. We're gonna talk about David Fixx. He ushered out the freakin' barbecue game like 45 minutes after I did my podcast on Friday. You heard my feelings on Saturday. I'm gonna share them I'm with you right now. You all know you're not buying this game. I mean, come on, people. You're not buying this game. And we're going to talk about the week of TPF. This is going to be a dud week. Like is the biggest news this week. Is it going to be accessories for the Foo Fighters pinball machine? Is that all we're going to get? Is that the only surprise happening in pinball? Let's start with this Barry O. barbecue theme. Now look, David Fix has been at the helm over at American Pinball now for like five years. In his tenure there, he has delivered to us what? Maybe Hot Wheels? Was that even David Fix? I don't think so. I think that was before David Fix. He did promise he was going to go back and revisit Hot Wheels and put a loop-de-loop and a jump in it. Remember he did that interview with Mr. Franchi and said, hey, we haven't given up on making this game more spectacular. He never did that. Then he made a deal with Riot Games and he brought Legends of Valhalla, the game we'd all not been waiting for. He brought that game to market and I get it, for those people who own it, don't cancel your subscription. I know the game is fun but let's be honest, Legends of Valhalla, is that the game you really wanted? And then he brought us the three years in the making, ten years in the making, Colossal Turd that is Galactic Tank Force. It's a game that nobody wanted. It's a game that never should have been made. And so then he brings us after all of these bad decisions. Why would we ever think that David Fix would make a good decision? His next decision is arguably one of the worst decisions in the history of pinball because he's playing with other people's money. This is how you land on a terrible idea like Barry O's Barbecue Challenge, a game nobody wants. Nobody wants. This is not a game. What is the pinball game that has anybody clamoring to get their hands on? And I know there's those people out there that are like pinball is more fun when we're making original IP games. Is it? Is it more fun? Because if you go back and you look at the nineties, what were the biggest titles? It was not original IP games. If you go back and look over the last 10 years, name me some original IP games that have been commercially successful. They've tried it a few times. It didn't work over at Stern with Black Knight. TNA was commercially successful for a little bit, right? They sold like 500 units or so, but then when Spooky Pinball made more, there really wasn't much demand for more TNA games. Dialed In was a disaster for Jersey Jack Pinball. I mean, Pat Lawler spent a lot of time on that game and it was supposed to be like Pat Lawler's greatest hits. It was an absolute sales disaster. And so here we are. Like people don't want original IP games. It's not 1990s anymore. You're not rolling into an arcade and just spending a few bucks on Roadshow or Junkyard. I mean of course there was a lot of original IP stuff back in the day. You weren't buying those games. And now that we're buying these games and everything's like over $7,000 now, you really have to ask yourself, do you want it? So they come out with this game, Barbecue Challenge, all right? And we've seen the game. It's empty. This game is empty. The game has half as much in it as a Stern Pro, and yet it's priced the same as a Stern Pro. So you have to have your head examined if you're gonna buy this game over a Stern Pro. And not just that people, you can pretty much almost go get a dialed in, which is a far better game than this for around the price of what this game is, easily around the price of what the LE is for this barbecue challenge. I get they're only gonna make a hundred but nobody's buying this game for eighty six hundred dollars or eighty seven hundred dollars Nobody's buying this game for that much money and they know there's no demand That's why they're only making one hundred L.E.s and they're also doing this weird thing where they're trying to say that they made this game to help support Barry O's family. Do you know the truth behind that? That's not what this is about. That's not how it went down We be right back Game sold So this wasn like a kumbaya moment between Barry O estate and the folks over at American Pinball If we really wanted to help out Barry O family we could easily raise more money and do a fundraiser and that would be much more beneficial than absorbing this turd of a game into the pinball market And that just where we at with this game We knew it was going to be dead on arrival It is dead on arrival It looks just like Hot Wheels There nothing going on in the pinball market This is the pinball show, Cengiz, Flip N Out Pinball Podcast, Straight Down the Middle, I'm not going to get to Ryan McQuaid's Cuphead game. Even if we do, it's not going to be worth it because this game tells me that these people don't get it. They don't get what anybody wants in pinball. They have no idea what the market wants. It's not just a whiff. They didn't just whiff at the plate. They swung the bat around and knocked off their little wee wee because they're over. They are done. I don't want to see anything else from American pinball. I'm sorry and if you're defending them, how can you defend a game like this in 2024? It's a travesty. It's an absolute travesty. With where this company started out with Houdini and even Oktoberfest was jam-packed. How can you go from games like that to this? This is an utter embarrassment and they should be embarrassed to even put this game into the marketplace. And I will fight anyone that thinks otherwise. Alright, so that's American Pinball's dead on arrival, Barry O barbecue game. By the way, was this Barry O's last design? Because they list like four other designers, like Dennis Norman had his finger on this, and so did Ryan McQuade. Are you kidding me? I could have designed this game in my sleep. There's nothing about this design that screams like it took three pinball designers to land here. Come on, this is garbage. Not to mention the artwork is terrible, not to mention there's no mechanisms in the game. It's absolute a joke. It's just a blank light show this game. All right, I'm moving on. I'm moving on. It's a Monday. I want to be more optimistic. I don't want to be upset. This company upsets me. It enrages me. And the reason why it enrages me, people, it's because it's not David Fix's money. The reason why this enrages me is this is Mukesh's money. They are simply sticking their hands in the piggy bank of a guy that's got more money than pinball brains. And that's what he's got because if he had pinball brains, he wouldn't be green lighting this kind of game. And they're abusing that relationship and they're making garbage. All right, Kaneda, calm down. Let's go on to something else. Let's go on to ABBA pinball, ladies and gentlemen. The Pinball Brothers, we knew for a very long time they were going to make a music pin next and it was based on a European musical act. I thought it was Scorpions, Wind of Change. I was wrong. They put out a teaser saying they're going to announce their next game in April and they had an old school helicopter from the 70s. Some people were guessing that it would be MASH. MASH? Why would the pinball brothers from Europe make a pinball machine based on an American TV show from the 70s that is what about the Korean War that hasn't been relevant in like 40 years? Why would the pinball brothers make MASH? Those people who were thinking it was that, I get it because of the helicopter, but no, somebody guessed it right. On an ABBA album cover, they are inside that helicopter and that is what it's going to be. ABBA makes great music. They've sold over 300 million albums. But do you want an ABBA pinball machine? I mean, that's how simple it's become now. With so many games in the pinball marketplace, Are you telling me that the next musical act that's going to fill the white space in the world of pinball is ABBA? Now it's not where I would have gone. It's not where I would have gone and it's not because I don't love their music. It's not where I would have gone because I just think again if you look at the pinball buying demographic, we've got more than enough rock and roll stuff. We've got more than enough dad rock filling up the airwaves in the pinball space. The next musical genre that needs to be represented in pinball, if you want to sell to men 40 to 60 years old, and these are men that grew up in the 80s and the 90s that now have disposable income. The number one genre that is missing from pinball is hip hop. I mean, it is at the point now, how are we flying over hip hop, which just celebrated its 50th anniversary last year? We're ignoring all the hip hop music and we're going to 1970s like disco? Is that really what we need? I mean we just got an Elton John machine and Elton John is a bigger artist than even ABBA and Elton John pinball machine is not selling. And here's what scares me about Pinball Brothers making ABBA is do you think they're going to make a game that shoots as well as Steve Ritchie Elton John And even though Elton John shoots so tremendously well if that game was themed Beastie Boys if it was a hip hop theme I know it so weird thinking about hip hop coming from Steve Ritchie but just go with me for a minute. Imagine if that was an Eminem pinball machine. Imagine if that was like a Dr. Dre and Snoop Dogg pinball machine. Imagine if it was like a Tupac or a Biggie pinball The best way I would do it is I would do a death row records pinball machine. I mean, that's how I would do because then you get Dre, you get Snoop, you get Tupac and it would be amazing. And the other thing you could do after you do death row records, you could do bad boy records. You get Biggie, you get Mase, you get Puff Daddy. I think it would be amazing. Maybe get creative like you're a hip hop music mogul and you got to bring the biggest hip I know it's probably really hard. And after hip hop, you know, you want to land on all the pop music we don't have. I mean, there was the biggest rumor for the longest time that Jersey Jack had the permission to do Michael Jackson pinball and they got scared because of the documentary. But where's all the pop music? I said this on my Saturday morning spectacular. All these pinball companies approach Taylor Swift and they wanted to make a Taylor Swift The pinball machine and she told them to shake it off and said no she's not doing it. Taylor Swift would do well. You know if I were to think about the pop artist that would do well in pinball format, obviously I think Taylor Swift would do well. I think a Madonna Immaculate Collection pinball machine would do well. I think Michael Jackson would be a no brainer. And if we're going to get more music in pinball, and I know it's very divisionary, I still think there are acts like Beastie Boys, Nirvana, Red Hot Chili Peppers, U2. I mean there are some juggernaut acts that we still don't have in pinball format. But personally, I'm over music pinball machines. I just am. As much as I love Elton John as a pinball experience, I would rather that be Top Gun. I would rather that be The Matrix. I want a game that shoots that well, that's based more on a movie property and has more The Storyline and a journey look and again I just say that because we have too many music pins I think we've oversaturated with music pins and I get it like if it's your favorite artist You don't care that there's other music pins But at some point this hobby is gonna learn a lesson like if you just keep doing music pins It's gonna get stale and I think we're there alright So that's me predicting that I don't think ABBA is gonna be a take my money now kind of game I'm not sure who's designing this game and this is gonna be the first pinball brothers machine that's been made without Andrew highways input because remember Queen pinball alien pinball those games were in development during the Andrew highway days So I am curious to see who designs it I'm curious to see what the artwork is because the artwork on Queen is not very good And I'm just curious if the pinball brothers now that it's up to them and nobody else and I don't wanna meatless buy a game if it's only for three, two or three grand. I wanna ask you, stuff comes into my head when I think of a potent filmmaker, I don't believe the other thing that I'm cake about four, three or three grand

14:03

and five grand and somebody pays from three, two, one G- batter to open five rounds. All in the frame, everything starts off I don't really want to buy much new in box anymore forever. I'm just tired of the prices and the bad decisions and the laziness by some of these manufacturers. The ones who are doing it right, you know who they are. But even so, the most vulnerable company in all the pinball is going to be Stern Pinball. If you think about it conservatively, if you just think about it on a conservative number, Stern Pinball makes 500 games a week. That's 24,000 games a year. Every single year they're gonna try to make 24,000 games a year, and they have to find homes for those games. They have to find distributors who want them. You know, let's talk a little bit about Foo Fighter accessories. It's gonna be the topper. It's probably gonna be some other stuff. I know people are still waiting on expression lighting from Stern. And this topper, is it gonna have spinners? I think the topper is going to be a thousand dollars. We're going to see it tomorrow and we know it's going to unlock some new mode in the game. This is Stern's new approach. They're going to want you to buy it because unless you buy it, you're not going to be able to unlock some special mode. What they've been doing with these toppers is giving people a chance to cut to the end of the game. So if there's a final wizard mode in Foo Fighters that you have not been able to get to, I think they're going to allow you a shortcut to play that final wizard mode if you buy the Foo Fighters topper. I mean, that's Stern's MO lately with these toppers. I will say, I think it's going to be nice. The Zombietti toppers are usually really nice, so I expect a really cool topper to put on top of the machine. The game's also a year old. You know, Foo Fighters, it had a great launch. I think we moved on to Jaws and other things We now starting to think about John Wick and I think Stern Pinball needs to stop the delay between topper and game They really need to learn a lesson Like look at Barrels of Fun They come out with Labyrinth and the topper's available right away. Jersey Jack, the topper's available day one in the box. And why is it the biggest pinball company in the world needs an entire extra year to put a topper on top of the game? And one of the problems is by the time they do release it, all the hype on the game is gone. Like everybody who owns a Foo Fighter LE, your machine has now gone down in value like two to three thousand dollars. And are you going to invest more money on a sinking investment? And I know unless you love the game, you know, unless you want to keep this game forever, you're probably not going to go in on these accessories. The biggest accessory fools were the guys who bought all that extra stuff for Godfather Remember when they sold the leg ornaments and the topper for Godfather LE? It was like $1,500 or $1,800. And those games have tanked in value so much, and if you bought those accessories, you're not getting your money back. All right, so we got Foo Fighters accessories on Tuesday, but I think Stern's in trouble, people. I really do. If the next game is John Wick, here's what I heard. You're going to hear it here first on Kaneda's Pinball Podcast. I'm going to give you a scoop. I know for a fact that John Borg's game is not next. John Borg's game is the game after the next release. So that leads me to believe that John Borg's game might be the new Metallica on Spike 3. This leads me to only two options on John Wick. I think John Wick is either going to be a Keith Elwin game and they go back to back with Elwin designs or John Wick is going to be a Jack Danger title. And Pokemon was the code name for the next Jack Danger game. And the reason why Pokemon, like Pokeman, you know, like shooting men, shooting mons, whatever it is, gotta catch them all is more of a reference to John Wick having to catch all of the bad guys that murdered his dog. So I'm going to make the prediction right now on Kaneda's Pinball Podcast that I think the next game from Stern, it's going to be John Wick and I think it's going to be designed by Jack Danger or Keith Elwin. Now if they go back to back with Keith Elwin, that doesn't really make sense because he just had Jaws come out and we know he's a prolific designer, but it doesn't make sense to me because if it goes Elwin, Elwin, Borg, then Jack Danger has to wait almost two years to get another game out. And I don't think they're going to treat Jack that way, especially after Foo Fighters sold so well. Now maybe because he's a new designer, he needs more time. Maybe that's the case, but man, I'm just going to make a guess and say that I think John Wick is Jack Danger. Alright, what else is happening in Pinball Kaneda? Well, we're going to get more this week as Texas Pinball Festival happens. I don't think there's going to be any big surprises at the show. The other game I saw coming out is this homebrew game by Tilt Bob, the Roadshow game. It looks like a wide body. I just saw a video of them flipping it with no music, no lights, no code, no nothing. All of these things are just physical balls rolling around the game. And again, people, I don't have a problem with people making these things. I just don't know who's buying them. And if you're going to go through all the effort to do this, that's fine. You know, it's on you. You're not going to get my money. But I just wish if people were going to go through all of the effort to make a game, you gotta get a license. You can't make original IP games. You can't try to get people to buy these things for five to six thousand dollars. If it's the same price of a Stern Pro, but not better than a Stern Pro, nobody's gonna buy it. And if you're comfortable selling just like 27 units after you put in all that hard work, that's on you. But I think this is gonna be a brutal year for everybody that makes mediocre games. And I think it's gonna be a tremendous year if we see stuff like the Matrix from Jersey Jack, if we see Back to the Future from Dutch Pinball. And those are the two big ones. I don't have anything else on my radar that I think is going to be as big as those two games and that's what I'm saving my money for. Everything else, I'm just going to watch it come out. I'm going to watch all of it come out. I'm going to try to play as much of it as I can on location. I think a lot of us are going to go back to playing pinball on location and only buying the magical games where the theme and everything is there for us. Everybody have a great Monday. We will talk to you soon. Thank you for being a club member. And I know, I know that each and every one of you is going to do the right thing and wait for the magic. Don't chase these new in box prices. Put the pressure on these companies and these distros to either lower the prices or make more magic. Later. the he сказать