Episode 767: "Is There A Better Batman?"

Kaneda's Pinball Podcast (Patreon feed)·podcast_episode·24m 10s·analyzed·Feb 7, 2023

Analysis

claude-haiku-4-5-20251001 · $0.034

TL;DR

James Bond 60th pricing criticism, Planetary Pinball manufacturing rumor, Stern spring release speculation.

Summary

Kaneda discusses the James Bond 60th Anniversary pinball machine's record $19,995 price point, criticizing its lack of substantial code and features relative to cost, while predicting Keith Elwin's dissatisfaction with the pricing decision. He reports rumors that Planetary Pinball may manufacture Big Bang Bar themselves due to delays at Chicago Gaming Company, speculates on Stern's upcoming March releases (possibly Foo Fighters instead of Venom based on Jack Danger's absence from Texas Pinball Festival), and discusses design iterations in Batman 66. He also addresses FOMO-driven secondary market pricing and advocates for hip-hop/pop music-themed pinball machines.

Key Claims

James Bond 60th Anniversary is the most expensive pinball machine ever released at MSRP ($19,995)
high confidence · Kaneda, opening segment discussing Bond 60th pricing
Keith Elwin was reportedly unhappy with the Bond 60th price and it was not his decision
medium confidence · Kaneda citing hearsay: 'I heard Keith Elwin was not happy with the price of the game. I hear it was not his decision.'
Planetary Pinball is exploring manufacturing Big Bang Bar themselves due to delays at Chicago Gaming Company
medium confidence · Kaneda reporting rumor: 'I'm hearing that Planetary Pinball is fed up with all the delays over at Chicago Gaming Company... Planetary Pinball is exploring how they themselves can manufacture Big Bang Bar'
Jack Danger's absence from Texas Pinball Festival in March suggests Foo Fighters (not Venom) will be Stern's next release
low confidence · Kaneda speculation: 'I think Jack Danger not being at TPF means we might get Foo Fighters instead of Venom... I think we're going to see a switcheroo'
Batman 66 has two iterations with improvements in later runs (better wood, rails, targets)
medium confidence · Kaneda reporting rumor from Thunderbird on Pinside about early vs. later Batman 66 builds
Stern Pinball Alley sign sold for $8,000 (originally $3,500)
high confidence · Kaneda reporting secondary market sale: 'Stern Pinball Alley sign... sold for... Eight thousand dollars'
Spooky Pinball is the only manufacturer transparent about production capacity and has consistently met schedules
high confidence · Kaneda: 'The only company that I've seen... has been very transparent about it has been Spooky Pinball. And the only company that's ever stayed true to their schedule to the T has always been Spooky Pinball.'
Stern Pinball's last new game before James Bond was Rush (December 2021/January 2022)
high confidence · Kaneda: 'Stern's last game was freaking Rush, right? And Rush was like December, January of 2021, 2022.'

Notable Quotes

“This isn't the Beatles. This isn't Batman 66 SLE. This isn't Elvira 40th anniversary. Those are fully feature, fully coded games with tons of assets. Like this thing has a cheap little LCD screen on the play field that tells you where to shoot next.”
Kaneda @ ~3:00-5:00 — Core criticism of Bond 60th's value proposition—contrasts with competitor games at similar price points
“I highly doubt he would run into this project. Now, what would have been exciting is if Stern Pinball said, hey, look, we're going to make a $20,000 pinball machine. We're going to give Keith Elwin the highest bomb in the history of Stern Pinball.”
Kaneda @ ~8:00 — Speculation on Keith Elwin's potential reaction to pricing decision and hypothetical alternative approach
“The only reason why many of these companies do not want you to know how many games they make a week. It's so easy. The answer is staring us right in the face. Because they don't want you to know how inefficient they might be.”
Kaneda @ ~14:00 — Industry critique on manufacturer transparency and production capacity secrets
“And that is why when you get up to a Keith Elwin machine it just plays like nothing else in the entire Stern portfolio. And I think universally, you might argue some of his games are too hard, but his shot geometry and his design is stellar, like absolutely stellar.”
Kaneda @ ~28:00 — Assessment of Keith Elwin's design superiority and play quality standards
“I'm not buying any more games in 2023. I'm encouraging every one of you to play each game before you buy it.”
Kaneda @ ~35:00 — Personal purchasing stance and community advice addressing FOMO and market saturation
“I know I put up on my Facebook page that we need a hip hop or pop musician pinball machine. We do. I don't understand why every single pinball machine is like dad rock.”
Kaneda @ ~55:00 — Market gap identification and demographic critique of pinball theme selection
“You're telling me that Eminem would not sell more pinball machines than Rush or Aerosmith? You're out of your mind.”

Entities

Kanedaperson Keith Elwinperson Jack Dangerperson George Gomezperson Jason KnapppersonThunderbirdpersonRampomaticperson

Signals

?
product_concern: James Bond 60th Anniversary criticized for inadequate code depth and features relative to record $19,995 MSRP; comparison to competitor games (Batman 66 SLE, Elvira 40th) showing superior content at similar price points
high · Kaneda: 'There's definitely not a $20,000 pinball machine here' and comparison contrasting Bond 60th's 'cheap little LCD screen' with 'fully feature, fully coded games'
?
design_philosophy: Keith Elwin reportedly unhappy with Bond 60th pricing and scope; speculation that higher budget would have resulted in more ambitious design (implied 'Bally Williams engineering masterpiece' quality)
medium · Kaneda: 'I heard Keith Elwin was not happy with the price of the game' and 'if Keith Elwin going into this was told this is going to be a $20,000 game, I highly doubt he would run into this project'
?
machine_intel: Planetary Pinball exploring in-house manufacturing of Big Bang Bar due to repeated delays from Chicago Gaming Company partnership
medium · Kaneda exclusive rumor: 'Planetary Pinball is fed up with all the delays over at Chicago Gaming Company... Planetary Pinball is exploring how they themselves can manufacture Big Bang Bar'
?
machine_intel: Jack Danger's absence from Texas Pinball Festival (late March) suggests Foo Fighters (not Venom) will be Stern's next release; speculation about strategic 'softer' themes while manufacturing moves facilities
low · Kaneda: 'I think Jack Danger not being at TPF means we might get Foo Fighters instead of Venom... I think we're going to see a switcheroo'
?

Transcript

groq_whisper · $0.072

0:00

Hold her up tight, make a little lovin', a little turtle dovin' on a Mason Dixon night. It's my life, oh so right, my Dixieland delight. Sit up, sit up, sit up, sit up, sit up, sit up, sit up. Welcome everybody to Canada's Pinball Podcast. I'm your host, Canada. Happy Monday, everybody. It's great to have everybody here. We're going to talk about what's going on in the world of pinball. And the main thing this week is going to be these James Bond 60th Anniversary Edition machines. They are finally going to make their way into the homes of these buyers who really are going to tell the entire pinball world how they spent $19,995 on this game. Actually, most of them will have bought this game off the back of the truck from their distributors for like $17,500. Now look, there's so much about this game, we really absolutely hardly know anything about the game. All we know is who designed it, which is one of the greatest designers of all time. We know the artwork is not very nice, but we also know that there's probably not much code in this game. There's definitely not a $20,000 pinball machine here, but this game is going to be unboxed. Now, one question I have is how many of these do you think Stern Pinball makes on the inaugural run? Do you think they're going to make all 500 of them? Here's my prediction on this game. I think when they make this game and people start unboxing this machine, I think the game is going to shoot just fine. Like, it's a Keith Elwin game. It's going to have good flow. But I still think for 99.9% of us, when we watch these rich owners try to justify their purchase, I still think the rest of us are still going to be sort of pointing our fingers at these gentlemen and laughing at them for spending this much money on a game that barely has anything in it. And that's the thing. This isn't the Beatles. This isn't Batman 66 SLE. This isn't Elvira 40th anniversary. Those are fully feature, fully coded games with tons of assets. Like this thing has a cheap little LCD screen on the play field that tells you where to shoot next. It has a spinning hat in the game that George Gomez did not want in his game. Now, look, I was listening to the Loser Kid Pinball podcast. They did a really good interview with Keith Elwin. If you haven't checked it out, go check it out. But I was shocked and I reached out to these guys because I was like, all right, think about it like this, ladies and gentlemen, you're interviewing Keith Elwin about his latest game in the world of pinball. What has the entire conversation been about when it comes to Keith Elwin's game? It's been about the crazy price of this machine, right? It is the most expensive pinball machine ever released into the world as an MSRP title, right? $19,995. All right. The one question I was just hoping they would ask Keith Elwin was this, Keith, what do you think of the price of this game? Keith, would you spend this much money on the machine? And they didn't ask the question. And I reached out to them and they said the reason they didn't ask the question is that Keith Elwin has no say over the price of the game. and that's why they didn't ask him the question. Now look, I know he didn't set the price, but he still has an opinion about the price. And that is why when you're interviewing him, why not ask him what is his opinion? When you're interviewing someone, do you stop asking questions on a topic because they have no control over it? It's like asking someone, hey, what do you think of the weather today? Well, I'm not gonna ask you that because you had no control over the weather. No, everybody has an opinion about the price of this game. And I really do want someone, when they interview Keith Elwin next, first question, Keith, what do you think about this James Bond game being priced at $20,000? Keith, what do you think about only making 500 of these games? Would you like to see more people get their hands on these machines? Keith, what do you think of the code in this game? Is it deep enough? And does it warrant the incredible price tag of this machine? Now, look, Kaneda doesn't really interview people anymore. People don't want to come on the show. I get it. I'm not going to shill their games. I'm not going to shill the companies. I'm just going to ask them the tough questions. Now, here's what I heard. I heard Keith Elwin was not happy with the price of the game. I hear it was not his decision. And this isn't the kind of pinball machine that Keith Elwin wants to make. And I guarantee you, if Keith Elwin going into this was told this is going to be a $20,000 game, I highly doubt he would run into this project. Now, what would have been exciting is if Stern Pinball said, hey, look, we're going to make a $20,000 pinball machine. We're going to give Keith Elwin the highest bomb in the history of Stern Pinball. Then we all would be really excited. And then we would probably see a Stern pinball machine that looks like a Bally Williams engineering masterpiece from the 90s instead of this very simple, overly barren game for this much money. Oh, but Kaneda, your heart been on the pass. Let's move to the future. All right. Here's something that no one's heard yet. Are you ready for some news from Kaneda's pinball podcast? So I'm here to tell you right now that, yes, Jason Knapp has half of the story down around Big Bang Bar. Planetary Pinball has the rights to Big Bang Bar Pinball. Now, in the past, Planetary Pinball has worked on giving licenses to older titles to Chicago Gaming Company to make remakes of our beloved old titles. I here to tell you right now on Canada Pinball Podcast a rumor I am hearing is the following I hearing that Planetary Pinball is fed up with all the delays over at Chicago Gaming Company I hearing that Planetary Pinball is exploring how they themselves can manufacture Big Bang Bar. Now look, I don't know if that company is going to be called Planetary Pinball or something else, but I'm hearing that this Big Bang Bar remake is happening, but it will not come out as a Chicago Gaming Company game. It's also not going to be Raw Thrills. I still believe that Pulp Fiction is going to be the first Raw Thrills title we see, and that will be made by Chicago Gaming Company. Are you starting to get confused? Does all of this seem a little nuts, right? How many pinball manufacturing companies do we need? We all know this. There's a lot of money to be made in pinball when you can do it right. There are millions of dollars that you can put in the bank every year if you can figure out how to manufacture like 2,000 pinball machines a year. Problem is, it's not like making a pizza pie. Making hundreds of pinball machines a year is extremely difficult. Making a few thousand is super hard. And there are not a lot of manufacturing places out in the world that are capable of manufacturing a few thousand pinball machines a year. You know, none of the numbers are really transparent. The only pinball company that I've seen since I've been doing this that has been very transparent about how many games they can make a week, how many games they can make a year, how many games they can make every 18 months. The only company that's ever been transparent about it has been Spooky Pinball. And the only company that's ever stayed true to their schedule to the T has always been Spooky Pinball. Now, look, I know a lot of people are like, well, it's a competitive advantage if companies like Stern and Jersey Jack reveal their numbers or Multimorphic. No, it's not. What is the competitive advantage to any of these guys? It takes way too long to get a machine into production. It takes way too long to R&D, to order parts from vendors, to figure out the artwork, to get license or approval, all of that. And you're telling me, what happens if Stern says we make 800 games a week? What does that do to Jersey Jack? The only reason why many of these companies do not want you to know how many games they make a week. It's so easy. The answer is staring us right in the face. Because they don't want you to know how inefficient they might be. They don't want you to know how long the wait might be. Stern Pinball's problem has never been about volume. It's just been about demand. Like the demand for a Stern machine is always through the roof. This company is still making orders they got a few years ago. Now I'm here on this episode of Canadian Spinball Podcast to correct myself. So I said that Elvira was indefinitely delayed. And now it looks like that's not the case. the February build of Elvira will be taking place. So if you ordered an Elvira and you were expecting your game to be built this month, there is still a very good chance that is going to happen. The thing George was probably talking about is after this run of Elvira, will there be another run? And I think that's where he doesn't know where it's gonna fall into the schedule. Here's another bit of really interesting news because if you saw on Facebook, A Mr. Jack Danger said to everybody that he will not be attending Texas Pinball Festival at the end of March. Now look, why won't Jack be at TPF? You have to ask yourself this question. If Stern Pinball is releasing a new game in March, and we are hearing the rumors are it is Brian Eddy's Venom or Jack Danger's Foo Fighters as the next two titles from Stern Pinball. Remember, Stern is on a really long delay. The last new game they came out with before James Bond, Stern's last game was freaking Rush, right? And Rush was like December, January of 2021, 2022. So it was a long time ago. Now, Stern Pinball usually makes three cornerstone games a year. And those games have been in development. Even though there's been like a supply chain shortage, we know that Jack Danger's game has been in development for a long time. We know that John Borg's next game has already begun. We know that Keith Elwin has been working on his game for a really long time, right? In the Loser Kid interview, it was really interesting. Elwin said he knows his game is not coming out for a while. So that leads me to speculate that there are two anniversaries happening in 2025. Jaws and Back to the Future and I think it's going to be one of those I do think it's going to be Jaws but I could see Keith Elwin making the 50th anniversary of Jaws pinball or maybe it's the 40th anniversary of Back to the Future I think both of those themes have a lot of people excited obviously Back to the Future is the one people are clamoring for more even though we've had a Back to the Future pinball machine I still think Back to the Future has more of a mainstream appeal than Jaws. But look at what Keith Elwin did with Godzilla. This is why Keith Elwin is so damn good. This is why Keith Elwin scares me because it doesn't even matter about theme. See, I would argue that Godzilla wouldn't do tremendously well simply because, you know, it's based on these old Godzilla movies that most of us have never seen. And look at what Keith Elwin did with Godzilla. He made arguably maybe one of the best pinball machines of all time with Godzilla. Now imagine what he's going to do with Jaws or Back to the Future. In the interview, he said something really interesting. He said he's working on his next game and it took them two months, two months of design to make sure the ramps are right in the game because there's a lot of action between the two ramps in the game. And think about that Can you imagine Keith Elwin over a 60 period laboring over the layout of his game And that is why when you get up to a Keith Elwin machine it just plays like nothing else in the entire Stern portfolio. And I think universally, you might argue some of his games are too hard, but his shot geometry and his design is stellar, like absolutely stellar. Now, speaking of design and layout, here's an interesting story I've been following. There is a rumor, because it hasn't been documented. There's a rumor that Batman 66 has had two iterations. That the early builds of the game were very clunky. It used cheaper wood. And the orbit rails were not the best. And the targets were not the best near the magnet. There is a rumor that when Stern made later runs of Batman 66, they fixed a lot of the issues. They changed the playfield wood. They changed the cabinet wood. And that the newer versions of Batman 66 play far superior than the original versions of the game. And look, I just spent $25,000 on a super limited edition of Batman SLE. And that's one of the original builds of the game. But I also heard from the person who's been talking about this, I believe it's Thunderbird on Pinside, that you're able to make changes to the older games to make them shoot better. Well, you're obviously not going to be able to change the cabinet wood or the playfield wood. Maybe some of the ball guides and the rails and the targets are swappable with the new items if you order them. I don't know. I think we need to figure this out. We need to get an old Batman, like an Ellie, and put it next to a newer one and play them side by side. I would love it. Is there anyone out there who can even figure out how to test this hypothesis? Because if this is the case and Stern Pinball actually did make tweaks to a game like mid cycle within manufacturing, this is a huge issue. I mean, it makes me think like, why wouldn't they make better changes to Ghostbusters? I mean, that's the one game that really needs them to go back, go back and fix some of the design issues with that game. And then I think you'd really have a game that's worth the money that game is getting. All right. Now, speaking of worth the money that something is getting, did you see this? The Stern Pinball Alley sign, you know, the humongous sign that Stern released a few years ago, you know, says Stern Pinball Alley. Guess how much that sign just sold for this weekend? Eight thousand dollars, right? And the guy who was selling it, really nice guy, Rampomatic, he's down in like PA somewhere. He basically offered the game for $8,000 or best offer. And he had a ton of offers, which leads me to believe he actually priced it too low. He easily could have sold this thing for $10,000 or more. And this just goes to show you where we're at still. Like the high-end buyer or the operator that wants something unique, they will pay a crazy price for stuff. This thing is huge though. Like I think some people underestimate how much craftsmanship went into this sign because he sent me pictures of it. In some pipe dream world, I was thinking like, oh, I'll get a new house and this thing would be perfect in my living room. And then I woke up. I'm like, Chris, you're a grown man. You're too old to make your house look like that. I don't need it. I need to be using my money to buy a house. I passed on making him an offer, but man, he sold it like an hour after I reached out to him. Here's the part everybody forgets. Stern Pinball originally sold these things for $3,500.

15:46

$3,500. And there's obviously demand for them. There's obviously demand for more toppers for Ghostbusters and Munsters. And I really don't understand why Stern never does another run of these things. Because here's why I don't get it. It's not Stern who's making any of these things. They're not making that pinball alley sign. Another company is. They're not making the topper for Ghostbusters. Another company is. And they could easily reach out to the original manufacturer of these things and just do another run. But that's not what they want to do. They love seeing this stuff. They love seeing us grown men throw three to four to five times what things used to cost at everything with a Stern logo on it. It's not that I blame them. It's just somewhat painful to see how we throw money out the door on this hobby. And FOMO is never really dead. It really isn't. Now, I said this on my Saturday Morning Spectacular. I am not buying any more games in 2023. I'm encouraging every one of you to play each game before you buy it. I'm not going to tell you not to buy a game. You know you're a grown adult. You should do what you want with your money. But what I do encourage you to do is wait and see. I encourage you to play all these games at the shows coming up. I also encourage you when a new game comes out, just wait a little bit and see where the market shakes out on the game. With so many new titles coming, right? And we counted them. There's like five new titles coming this spring, summer with five new pinball machines coming into the world. And that's not even counting like all of the James Bonds they need to sell, all those toy stories that are sitting at distributors. There are so many games that need to find a home. And then you've got hundreds and hundreds and hundreds of used games that are offered for sale every single month. And so if you just wait, you're going to have the best of both worlds. You going to be able to see what the inventory is what the market is and most importantly you going to be able to see if you actually like the game because you played it And that it And look I not buying a new game because I just don want anything else I'm getting to this point in my life as I look for a house. And I can tell you right now, we went house hunting this weekend. And I can tell you right now, for well over a million dollars, you get absolutely nothing within an hour of New York City. And I mean it when I say it is depressing. You could have a great salary. You could have a good job. You could have dual income. You could have a lot of money saved up. You could have all this stuff. But what I don't want to have is a lot of debt. I really don't want to have a lot of debt. My apartment is paid for. What we enjoy each month right now is cash flow. And that cash flow allows us to invest in wealth generation. And that's so important to me. I never want to go underwater on a mortgage or I just don't want to buy too much house. Now that being said, it's a hard time for Brendan and myself and we're really struggling with this because when you go from living in a city to looking at what you can get in the suburbs and then you see like the size of these houses and how close they are to their neighbors and these towns with so little culture compared to New York City, I'm not going to lie to you. I came out of that experience a little depressed, a little deflated and we're going to take it one month at a time. We are just starting the house hunt. The inventory is not there right now. And so pinball is a much needed distraction for me. It's a much needed distraction in my life. And I love covering this hobby. You can hear my voice. I'm a little tired. It is Monday night. I've been up early. I got up early with Killian. But I want to thank each and every one of you so much for tuning in to Canada's Pinball Podcast. Look, we are at the calm before the storm. A week from now we are going to see James Bond's 60th unboxing. That's going to be fun. Then we're going to start to see Scooby-Doo's land in people's homes. That's going to be fun. Then we're going to see if Jersey Jack Pinball actually reveals a game at the end of this month. Then we're going to be in March and we know what is happening in March. Like the dam is going to break in March. We're going to get the new game from AP. And I think I lost my train of thought earlier on in this podcast people. I think Jack Danger not being at TPF means we might get Foo Fighters instead of Venom. I think we're going to see a switcheroo. I think we're going to see Jack Danger's Foo Fighters, and that is why he's not attending TPF. We shall see if that is true. I think they need him back at the home fort. I think they might need him to do other stuff around the game. I think they might need him in the factory when Foo Fighters goes on the line. Isn't it going to be funny if it's not Foo Fighters? Like this whole time we've all been like, no, not Foo Fighters. And it ends up being what everybody really wants, which might be He-Man Masters of the Universe. We shall see. Because think about it like this. And someone had a very interesting theory. Stern is still so far backlogged on games and they're also moving their factory. So maybe it is a good year to come out with a couple games that are not going to have Godzilla-like demand. A couple of games they're not going to have Indiana Jones-like demand or Jaws. So maybe they're coming out with two softer themes to just give themselves some time to move into the new factory. Stern doesn't care. All they need to do is make sure they have this many games. They're making a week. They already have enough in the backlog to keep the line busy into next year. So this might be a strategic move to give their manufacturing some time to catch up. You know, so we're going to see the new Stern, the new JJP, the new American Pinball, maybe Pulp Fiction. And I just want to end this show by saying the following. I know I put up on my Facebook page that we need a hip hop or pop musician pinball machine. We do. I don't understand why every single pinball machine is like dad rock. We've had enough. It's not like we need more of it. And you're telling me that Eminem would not sell more pinball machines than Rush or Aerosmith? You're out of your mind. And also, there's so many pop stars that if they made pinball machines, they would do tremendously well. And look, I'm talking about stuff that even the pinball demographic, right? 40 to 60-year-old white males, right, which is the primary buyer of pinball. Most of us grew up with hip-hop. We grew up with pop music, okay? So don't tell me that the only thing we want in pinball form is rock and roll, okay? What about the Beastie Boys? What about Eminem? What about Michael Jackson? Like this stuff would not sell? Of course it would sell. And also like pinball is a high energy toy. And so pop music and hip hop is high energy. So I just think people are underestimating and being a little myopic when they say we don't need a hip-hop pinball machine. Of course we do. All right, everybody, thank you so much. It's Monday. More is coming in this hobby. I'm excited. I don't know about you, but I'm super excited you're all here. Our club members are doing great, and we're going to keep coming at you every week with new episodes of Canada's Pinball Podcast. Talk to you soon.