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Episode 19 - Is Chicagoland Pinball EXPO Back?

Special When Lit·podcast_episode·1h 14m·analyzed·Oct 23, 2018
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TL;DR

Special When Lit recaps Chicagoland Pinball Expo with game reveals, industry insights, and community events.

Summary

Ken Cromwell and Bill Webb recap the 2025 Chicagoland Pinball Expo, covering vendor hall highlights, the American Pinball Oktoberfest reveal, Chicago Gaming Company's Monster Bash remaster launch, Deep Root Pinball's seminar with new staff introductions, and social events. They discuss game impressions, pricing competitiveness, and industry dynamics while sharing personal anecdotes from their expo experience.

Key Claims

  • Chicago Gaming Company released Monster Bash at three tiers (Classic, Special, Limited Edition) with price starting at $6,000, featuring colorized large DMD option on Special and LE models

    high confidence · Ken Cromwell and Bill Webb discussing CGC booth at Expo

  • American Pinball's Oktoberfest is a Joel Balser design with a roller coaster corkscrew wire form feature and highly vibrant, fragmented playfield art package with many micro art sections

    high confidence · Ken and Bill describing the game reveal at Expo

  • Deep Root Pinball stated they will release more titles in one year than all other manufacturers combined

    high confidence · Robert Mueller statement at Deep Root seminar per Ken

  • Deep Root Pinball is not concerned about individual machine profitability, only company-wide profitability

    high confidence · Robert Mueller statement at Deep Root seminar per Ken

  • Deep Root Pinball implements octo manufacturing processes

    medium confidence · Ken noting Deep Root's manufacturing approach mentioned in seminar

  • John Popadiuk appeared on Deep Root's panel and made oblique reference to past delays, suggesting machines should not take 4-5 years to release

    medium confidence · Ken's interpretation of Popadiuk's comments at Deep Root seminar

  • Vendor hall at 2025 Expo was fully stocked with no gaps or placeholder vendors

    high confidence · Ken and Bill describing vendor hall fullness on day one

  • Scott's Pin Stadium booth had 22 games with black tents and constant crowds throughout the show

    high confidence · Ken describing Pin Stadium booth at vendor hall

Notable Quotes

  • “Releasing more titles in one year than all other manufacturers combined”

    Robert Mueller (via Ken Cromwell paraphrase) @ N/A — Major competitive claim about Deep Root's production capacity relative to industry peers

  • “I don't know that I like that you have to pay to colorize the DMD. It's a software upgrade, not a hardware upgrade”

    Ken Cromwell @ N/A — Critique of Monster Bash pricing strategy for optional DMD colorization feature

  • “He's like, wow, dude, you look nothing like your voice”

    Zach Sharpe (via Ken/Bill paraphrase) @ N/A — Humorous aside about first meeting with industry personality Zach Sharpe

  • “it can't take four years or five years to come out. That's just not right”

    John Popadiuk (via Ken paraphrase) @ N/A — Popadiuk's statement on release timelines, possibly referencing past controversies

  • “You could feel the adrenaline...you can't buy that kind of genuine”

    Bill Webb @ N/A — Assessment of Deep Root staff enthusiasm at seminar, suggesting unrevealed projects in pipeline

Entities

Ken CromwellpersonBill WebbpersonChicagoland Pinball ExpoeventAmerican PinballcompanyOktoberfestgameChicago Gaming CompanycompanyMonster Bashgame

Signals

  • ?

    product_launch: Chicago Gaming Company released Monster Bash remaster at three tiers (Classic at standard DMD, Special/LE with colorized large DMD option) starting at $6,000

    high · Ken and Bill detailed tier differences, pricing, and DMD options; discussed impact on original Machine values

  • ?

    announcement: American Pinball officially revealed Oktoberfest at Expo on Thursday night at 8:30pm with Joel Balser design and vibrant playfield art package

    high · Detailed description of game reveal event, attendance at Oktoberfest announcement, description of playfield mechanics and art style

  • ?

    product_strategy: Monster Bash at $6,000 positions CGC competitively against Stern Pro under-$6,000 offerings, potentially steering customers away from other purchases

    high · Ken discussing Monster Bash pricing advantage and market positioning relative to other manufacturers

  • ?

    business_signal: Deep Root Pinball claims capacity to release more titles in one year than all other manufacturers combined; company prioritizes overall profitability over individual machine ROI

    high · Robert Mueller statements at Deep Root seminar per Ken's account

  • ?

    personnel_signal: John Popadiuk appeared on Deep Root Pinball panel, marking significant platform return; may reference past delays obliquely

    medium · Ken's observation of Popadiuk's appearance at Deep Root seminar and his comment about 4-5 year release timelines

Transcript

groq_whisper · $0.222

0:00
The Special When Lit Pinball Podcast is sponsored by Two Brothers Artisan Brewing, makers of Pinball Pale Ale.
0:08
The Special When Lit Pinball Podcast starts now. Here are your hosts, Ken Cromwell and Bill Webb. Welcome to episode number 19, a very special edition of the Special When Lit Pinball Podcast. I'm Ken Cromwell. This is Bill Webb. And we're going to be talking Expo. Expo in the news. So... What a crazy, crazy time. Dude, I'm exhausted. We're still recovering from Expo. Literally, I'm in recovery. And that could probably still be due to Thursday, but... All right, so this is where I think we're going to try to approach the episode. We obviously want to tell you what happened at Expo. We wanted to give you our takes on what we saw. We wanted to make you feel like you were kind of at the show going through it because there The Out Pinball Podcast is brought to you by the Out Pinball Podcast Network. We're back with more of the best of Expo as far as all of it goes. It was awesome. Yeah, I mean, vendor hall was packed, the game room was packed, which was kind of interesting because there was more electrical mechanicals in the free play area than normal, but that was kind of cool to see a lot of those. Yeah, I agree. I mean, and there's a resurgence I think of EMs that are currently happening, so it makes sense that you would see that. Plus, you know, it's probably easy games to bring and get admittance to Expo also. Oh yeah. But those are fun games. Yeah. Absolutely. So day one, right? Day one. Is that where we're starting off? Starting it off? Let's just go right. Day one. On a special episode of Special Winlet Pinball Podcast. Day one, we left for Expo in the morning. Afternoon? Afternoon. So I think we left here, we got to your house at like 2.30. We loaded up a slugfest. Loaded up a slugfest. I was bringing the Expo for somebody, so that was in the car. And as soon as we hit the parking lot, you know, someone in this podcast had the bad We'll see you next time. We're going to be giving away those prizes throughout the whole episode today. The banner stand just started breaking down, literally, pieces breaking off of it as we were trying to get it assembled. People are walking by, taking, you know, like, what are these guys doing? I know, it was like, Special When Lit was looking like Special When Shit at that point. We could have shopped a f***ing game, pardon my language, but we could have shopped a freaking game while putting this thing up. Yeah, it was bad. So long story short, or already too long into the story, we were actually, I had figured out that a couple of the poles were upside down. We were happy we got that done and we went over, we grabbed a quick lunch at a place that was in the parking lot and then we were heading into the VIP vendor party and this was just opened up an hour early for those that had brought games to Expo, members of the Pinball Media Corps, friends of Rob Burke, I'm sure. top13and mercuryfinballеры.com For watching, please like, share, and subscribe. It was full. There were not gaps on the floor. There were not obscure kind of vendors that were filling gaps because of vendors that had not shown this was stocked. Yes. And that was really, really cool to see. Real stocked. I mean, honestly, I don't, I mean, here one of the biggest booths was Scott's booth with the pin stadium. I mean, he had like 22 games there, you know, with black tents over everything so you could actually see the lights on. And I'll tell you what, there wasn't a time when I walked by that that vendor area was not filled with people playing games. Right. I mean, it was constantly packed with people. I mean, he had everything from Iron Maiden LE to Revenge for Mars, you know, Medieval Madness. I mean, you know, everything. Well, yeah, and it was interesting because at the time we were in the vendor hall early, Chicago Gaming Company had their area and they had three games that were all covered up. Well, they were covered up, but you could see the bottom was a Monster Bash. Right. The bottom of the coin door literally says Monster Bash through all the cellophane and the wrap. So that was like, okay, so Monster Bash is here. Yeah. They might be showing it today. Right, but it was interesting because they literally had it still wrapped because if they did not get approval, I'm assuming from the license holder or whatever, that might have just gone back into the truck. I didn't know what was going on there, but it certainly wasn't set up. That would have been absolutely hilarious, though, to let them sit there wrapped all weekend that said Monster Bash on the bottom. Oh, that would have been, you know, pretty rough. Well, yeah. And then, you know, on the top of it, see you at Texas. Yeah, you know, the wrapped up Monster Bash. I saw the Pinball Mafia machine or mafia by is it team pinball yeah and it was interesting because when we had walked by that machine first of all it did look nicer in person than I then it had looked in the pics it's still not something that I wanted to get in line to play but Roger Sharp was on the machine and one of the owners there he was kind of walking Roger Sharp through the actual you know the rule set and I'm like hey man this is kind of cool for www.ceramixnext.com
Deep Root Pinball
company
Robert Muellerperson
John Popadiukperson
Barry Ourslerperson
Joel Balserperson
Nirmal Vasaniperson
Pinball Lifevenue
Steve Bowenperson
Christopher Franchiperson
Zach Sharpeperson
Scott Danesiperson
Mike Nogleperson
Two Brothers Artisan Brewingcompany
?

event_signal: Chicagoland Pinball Expo 2025 vendor hall fully stocked with no gaps or placeholder vendors; Pin Stadium had 22 games with consistent crowds

high · Ken and Bill commenting on vendor hall fullness and Pin Stadium activity throughout the show

  • ?

    design_innovation: Oktoberfest features roller coaster corkscrew wire form that hosts found novel and impressive compared to typical pinball designs

    high · Ken's specific observation: 'I haven't seen anything kind of that twirly that works in pinball, so that was kind of fun to see'

  • ?

    design_philosophy: Oktoberfest playfield uses fragmented micro art packages scattered throughout rather than one cohesive art piece; vibrant colors polarize initial reception

    high · Ken and Bill discussing art package: 'it seems to be tiny little micro art packages that are kind of scattered throughout the whole playfield' with colors 'so vibrant' and 'a lot for your kind of eyes to take in'

  • $

    market_signal: Monster Bash remaster at $6,000 with high quality raises questions about secondary market impact on original machines and collector stratification

    medium · Ken pondering: 'how is that value now affected by a brand new Monster Bash?' and noting split between collectors wanting pristine originals vs. those indifferent to new vs. old

  • ~

    sentiment_shift: Oktoberfest's fragmented playfield art initially poorly received by Ken but appreciation grew over time with repeated viewing

    medium · Ken's narrative: 'When I first saw it, I didn't like it at all...As I've had more time to digest it and take it in, I've grown to appreciate what's being done there'

  • ?

    content_signal: Special When Lit Pinball Podcast provided extensive Expo coverage across multiple episode segments with vendor and game impressions

    high · Entire episode devoted to Expo recap with detailed vendor, game, and event coverage

  • ?

    community_signal: Expo facilitated multiple industry dinners and networking events with designers, operators, media, and community leaders in collegial atmosphere

    high · Ken and Bill describing lunch with Dwight Sullivan, Jerry Thompson, Jeff Patterson, and St. Charles Pinball Club members; multiple dinner tables

    • 6:29
    Uh, I whole ... Yeah, which we didn't. We behaved. Yeah, we were good. But, you know, good for them. Yeah, so that was kind of interesting. Don't forget about the black and white Twilight Zone. Yeah, so Great American Pinball, Mike Nogle had the black and white Twilight Zone there. He had the Scared Stiff crate edition where it was actually built to make it look like it's in an actual wood crate. He had some other pinball machines. Indiana Jones. Yeah, the Walt Disney Indiana Jones art package was there. So that was kind of cool. I mean, I also noticed as the show kind of progressed, more vendors had come in later that weren't originally there. Christopher Franchi had a booth set up there where he was selling large artwork prints. All the manufacturers had pins there. There was not anybody that didn't show up. I don't remember seeing spooky pinball on the floor, but I know that they had a machine at Pinball Life, which is now part of the Expo party. So technically speaking, they had one there. They also had one at Expo that was in a back room that was on, I think Troy Smith brought it in. Dampfstein by Jim ツneless P'z Big www.lyramods.com We'll get that out to you. So then at this point we're ready for the Oktoberfest reveal and that was at 8.30 on Thursday night at Expo. So the anticipation was there. We were hanging out a little bit earlier at the American Pinball booth. We were talking to Nirmal Vasani. He had been on the show as an interview guest a few weeks ago. And it was cool to kind of see him getting ready for his first reveal officially. He wasn't there when Houdini was there. And he was wearing one of those suits where it looked like there was a German bartender that was holding Nermal up on his shoulders. So Nermal's legs looked like the bartender's legs and then there were a fake pair of legs that were draped over shoulders, the German guy's shoulders, to make it look like he was being piggybacked. So it was cool to see that he had done something fun in an attempt to drive interest towards The game itself looked pretty cool. I mean, honestly, with the ramps and everything else, and especially the one that, you know, does the zigzag, it looked awesome. And actually, we had time to talk with Joel Balser. So you know, it was real cool. We got to see the game. The game looks like it flows really, really well. The design is really fun looking. It is. The roller coaster corkscrew wire form is pretty nuts. I haven't seen anything kind of that twirly that works in pinball, so that was kind of fun to see. What did you think of the art package? And when I say art package, let's talk about the cabinet, let's talk about the back glass, let's talk about the play field. Okay, so I think it's very correct for the game. Mike, not necessarily be my favorite, you know, but I think it fits well with the theme of the game and everything else. The first thing that I notice is that the colors on the playfield, they're so, it's, it's vibrant. Very vibrant. I mean, it's almost to the fact where it's just, I don't know that it's too much, but it's a lot in your face. It's a lot for your kind of eyes to take in totally. I also noticed that instead of like one larger cohesive art package, it seems to be tiny little micro art packages that are kind of scattered throughout the whole playfield. I don't know if I'm a fan of that or not yet. I'll say this, when I first saw it, I didn't like it at all. And I'm just being honest. And it wasn't because it's not good artwork, it's just not my style for a pinball playfield. I like vibrant colors, but I like something that kind of makes sense as one cohesive piece. And I couldn't get used to it. There was a lot of inserts in the middle of the playfield. Now that being said, as I've had more time to digest it and take it in, I've grown to appreciate what's being done there. I'm not sold on that being the art package for me yet. And again, when I say art package, this is not saying anything poorly about the artist because for what's there, it's cool. I just don't know if that's how I would like it all to kind of blend on the playfield. Yeah. It's colorful. It's so colorful. It's real colorful. Actually, you know, we're watching the stream again. You know, I mean, the game itself looks really, really cool. Yeah, so as we're talking about this, we've got the Jack Danger stream from Oktoberfest on and we're just kind of fresh in our minds. God knows we need it. A couple of long days. No, but you know what though, honestly, with all the toys and everything in this game, it looks cool. I encourage everyone to definitely check it out. I mean, that's where I'm at with it. I mean, it looks great. You know, I mean, for what I think was accomplished, I think it looks good. We'll see what happens. It's their second reveal, their second pinball machine, and for the amount of time I think that they had to work on it, it is what it is. So, let's see. Well, it is a Balser design, and we got to speak to him. You know, I mean, and he's done some incredible stuff. I like the design. I like the layout of the pin. It's fun, and, again, it's when we talk about Joe Balser, he does not have the We'll be right back. and we can absolutely get first impressions. So my first impression was that the pin shot really well. And my second impression or my first impression on the art package was that it was a little bit too much for me to kind of take in and I have to see if it grows on me. I like the cabinet artwork for the most part.
    13:44
    I didn't mind the placement of the American pinball logo, which is towards the front end of each side. I don't really care about that. When I have machines here, they're in a row. I don't notice them as much. The Out Pinball Podcast is a production of WGBH. Out Pinball Podcast, INDISC, Scott Danesi. The Out Pinball Podcast is a production of WGBH. Which is LEs that were there. There was a Classic, a Special, and a Limited Edition Monster Batch there. And, you know, subtle differences between kind of the Special and the LE, whereas the LE had the topper and it had the plaque. That and the Special Edition both had the extra large colorized DMDs. I think the only difference was with the Classic. Yeah. Where it had the dots. Classic had your same size DMD that you're used to on any Classic game, and it was not We'll see you next time. Medefan.com
    16:52
    The first thing that I thought when I saw that was like, oh man, like, I wonder what this does to the originals. I mean, obviously there's going to be collectors that prefer an original over a remake, but if you're having a hard time finding one that's up to snuff as far as quality and condition, I mean, it's a no-brainer to jump in on a Monster Bash classic at six grand, right? Oh yeah, honestly, I mean, this morning when I was picking up my Transformers game, I had to crawl underneath it and take a peek at it while, you know, no one was there. And, I mean, the thing's just built beautifully. And, I mean, that game, for what you're getting price-wise, especially for the under $6,000 budget, that game is pretty awesome. It was awesome. They look beautiful. CGC knocked it out of the park with Monster Bash. I mean, again, it's a remake of a game. You can't get anything better. I mean, it's unbelievable. No, I mean, unless you're talking Mike Fox's game who had a wicked playfield and I built him a brand new cabinet last year. Yeah, I mean, but that's true. But I mean, even so, think about that. Of all the money that was put into that pinball machine, how is that value now affected by a brand new monster? I mean, I just, I don't know. It's gonna be interesting to see what happens with the original monster bashes. Well, you got two types of people. The people that want a, an original game that's in extreme pristine condition, you know, All of these are great examples for people who don't care if it's a new game or an old game. I don't know that I like that you have to pay to colorize the DMD. It a software upgrade not a hardware upgrade as far as I concerned Can you offer it as a or upgrade at the time of purchase How much is the upgrade Isn it like Something like that I have to look. That could be wrong. Maybe it is like $200 or $300. But I think that's my only gripe with that. But how can you complain at $6,000? I also wonder how this pinball machine that's coming out into the marketplace, you kind of compare it to all the other pins that are out there. And there's not a whole lot of new pinball machines that are offered at a $6,000 or less price point. I mean, most commonly you think of like a Stern Pro at under $6,000. I mean, that's a huge, huge value. CGC now with the remake at $6,000. I mean, it's pretty competitive. I can see that price point steering people away from other opportunities or other purchases just because it is $6,000. So, you know, nicely done, CGC. And you know what you're getting with it, too. That's the nice thing. Yeah, and congratulations for getting that pin out. I'm sure that you were chomping at the bit to kind of get that one revealed. The Out Pinball Podcast is a production of WGBH. www.indisciple.com We'll be right back. In any event, it was fun talking to those guys and then we were getting ready to gear up for, we had a designated driver, so we had somebody that took us back home that evening. We did, and that designated driver walked out to the van responsibly and made sure to get rid of all the empty cups and everything. And literally, when you open the door on the van at this point, it smelled like, you know, a distillery. I mean, literally, you know, it just hit you and you're like, dude, you know, if a cop walks up right now, we're in trouble. We're in a parking lot, but yeah. Yeah, I'm sure it's not the first time somebody had drinks out of the back of a van. No, no, no, no. A little tailgating at Expo. So we get home and it's like 2.30 in the morning, I think, for myself. I get to bed around 3. And lucky for me, it's a Friday, so I've got three kids that get up and get to school. So I know I was up at like 6.30 in the morning. I was on like three hours sleep. You've got a three-year-old daughter. You were up early. Yeah. Best feeling in the world waking up after the Thursday evening expo excursion. Yeah, Friday was rough to say it lightly. I was joking with Bill, half jokingly. I said, you know what man, if we didn't have a room already set up for Friday night and we didn't have more people that we wanted to sit down and talk to, if Deep Root wasn't going to be there and if we didn't have a podcast where we felt that we owed an experience to ourselves and to the listeners, I don't know that I'd gone back on Friday. We would have sat home and nursed it. I would have been like, yep, good enough for me. I'll see what everybody else is doing. We're champions, right? We get up, we get over to Bill's house, and at this point, we had another pin we had to bring to Expo, which was Bill's Demoman. He was dropping that off for somebody else to purchase from him. So imagine, in not your best moment as far as feeling, the next day, hauling up, in my opinion, one of the heaviest damn pinball machines that's not a Jersey Jack. Yeah, I was smart and I had it ready on Thursday before we left, so it was already wrapped up and ready to go. Oh my gosh. The problem was, literally, it was, you know, Ken, Steve and myself. Our buddy Steve, who's from our pinball club. And we're all just straight miserable from the day before. So, you know, we get the game up and out of the house, no problem. We leave the, we go through the front door because it's easier. I thought Steve locked the front door of the house. He thought I checked it. Of course, it's my house, it's my fault, but literally we were so miserable it didn't really matter. So I get a call from the wife six hours later, hey, you know, the front door's been open six hours. Open or unlocked? We'll see you next time. Doug S dances Kid Planet's Heather And then thinking to myself, man, I'm not feeling my best. I wonder how I'm going to feel when I get into pinball life. So I walk in there and it's like freaking Pink Floyd, laser light show, smoke, everything spinning literally because there's like disco balls. And I was like, wow, that was like not what I was, it was probably not the best place for me at that time. It was not for any of us. But it was so fun, man. I was like, you know what? I got my three drink tickets. And at that point, there's no turning back. I was just going to call this a lost weekend. We'll be right back. In that prize pack we are going to be giving away a T&A cassette tape, compliments of Scott Danesi of Danesi Designs, Scott thank you so much, a T&A t-shirt from Pinball Life, a Novus 1, 2, and 3 kit from Pinball Life, and a PinGulp Premium from Terry and Margaret at Pinball Life. That is worth its weight in gold. So let's go ahead as we draw the hat, or the names from the hat. We have Nancy Kalinowski. Nancy! I think Nancy might have actually taken her photo in front of the Pinball Life banner. Nice. Which is, that's pretty awesome actually. So yeah, that's cool. Nancy, congratulations. Please contact the show, Special Winlet Pinball Podcast at gmail.com or via our Facebook Messenger at Special Winlet Pinball Podcast. And thank you Scott Danesi and Terry and Margaret DesWart from Pinball Life and staff for supporting the show and throwing a badass expo party. They always host awesome parties. Yeah. You know, I mean, you gotta give it up to them for how they do this every year with all the craziness and all, you know, bringing all that stuff in. You know, it's always just a great time there. Well, the funny thing was, we had just literally left dinner with Franchi and Zach late that night prior. Twelve hours prior. Was it even, yeah, I don't even think it was twelve hours prior. We're walking to Pinball Life, go upstairs to the bar to get a drink, and I hear, oh, there's that Ken Cromwell guy again. I turn around, it's Franchi. Sitting there big pimping on the couch. Him and his daughter there again. I'm like, dudes, you guys, really? How did you beat us here? Like, that doesn't even make any sense. Like, I couldn't even, it's like, all right. So everywhere I looked, there was Christopher French, he's got doppelgangers or he's got a way to astral project, but he was covering the territory. It was packed at Pinball Life. It was. It wasn't terrible. It's been worse in the past, but yeah, it was... It was very difficult. For instance, I wanted to jump on Alice Cooper Nightmare Castle, and the line was like 20 deep at Pinball Life, and I was like, oh man, it's not going to work here. So I was a little disappointed I couldn't jump on that game, because I do want to flip it. The Out Pinball Podcast is a production of WGBH. I don't even really recall ever thinking about Time Machine. I don't know that I've ever seen one. The hard part for me at Expo is I knew we weren't going to be there long and I wanted to make sure to say hello to everybody. So, Terry, Margaret, Mike Fox, Scott. Ran into Brian Kelly. It was good to see him. Wally, Gorski. I built him a cabinet for Scared Stiff last year. So by the time you get done saying hello to everybody, it was almost time for us to leave. And last year we were able to stay, we stayed past closed last year. It was a killer time. Yeah. The only reason we left early was because we needed to get back to Pinball Expo because we really wanted to get in to the Deep Root Convention or the Deep Root Seminar and we wanted to hear Robert Mueller and staff. So that was kind of where we were on our way out. So I think we stayed at Pinball Life until about 2.30, 2.45. And then we had like this lunch set up. We had invited kind of our buddies in the pinball industry to have this lunch at 3.30. Break
    29:05
    We're all power lunch, right? Of just people that... People in the industry. Yeah, that we just know and we were looking forward to get everybody on the same kind of page. So who's there? Dwight Sullivan's there, right? We had Dwight, we had Jerry Thompson. And Jerry Thompson does sound for Stern Pinball. Yep. Jeff Patterson who does This Week in Pinball. Yeah, I really wanted to meet Jeff because we had spoken so many times and exchanged emails and messages. I had never met Jeff. I didn't even know what Jeff looked like and it was awesome to meet Jeff because he's a Frost Sterling, They're one of the cooler people that I had fun talking to at Expo. Oh, yeah. Really good times. And then, well, we had some buddies from our St. Charles Pinball Club that were there eating lunch with us. Steve and Chris, who am I forgetting? Mike, I think. Oh, no, Mike was later. Okay. You know, and Friday's kind of a blur with lunch because we had lunch there and then we had, you know, which was a table full of people. And then later on that night, you know, we'll have to post this on our page, we had another We had two tables going Friday. Yeah. Because that group, it was just too big for one table. Yeah. And I think one of the funnier moments was, you know, meeting Zach for the first time. He was like, wow, dude, you look nothing like your voice. Yeah, he did say that. He's like, man, Bill, you don't look anything like your voice. Ken and I are like, you know, what were you expecting, Morgan Freeman? I mean, you know, I mean... Well, it's funny because you would come up to me later in that day and you're like, hey, look, what exactly did Zach mean by saying I don't look anything like my voice? Here's how yourげ SSJ Central
    31:24
    Hey, I'd be curious to hear what my voice sounds like. Draw up those pictures and send them into the show and whoever has the best caricature of a Bill Webb will send you an empty can of Pinball Pale Ale from Expo. Yeah, something. Right. So, good times. But that was fun. So we get into this lunch and then after lunch we're all pretty much ready to hit the deeproot seminar and that was a 515 seminar. So as we're walking into the hotel, I noticed walking in directly behind us like at a quick John Paul Stentz, John Packard, John Campus, This is not the best time. This guy's walking in late, busy dude, trying to get into this convention or this seminar that he's moderating. It should be starting right now. It's probably not the best time to make a first impression. I'm special when lit can. Let me introduce myself while you're... Let me hold you up while you got 200 people waiting. So I chose to divert and allow him through under the cloak of darkness as he didn't know what I looked like, so that was cool. So do you want to explain what you were anticipating Steve Bowden
    33:18
    We'll be right back. The Out Pinball Podcast is a production of WGBH. I'm not going to reveal a product, you're not going to show a machine I didn't think, but I thought that they would absolutely give something. I don't know that they didn't disappoint. The first thing that I noticed was when their panel was up on the stage and each staff member was introduced, the first person that was introduced was Barry Oursler and he had immediately had received an applause. The second person was John Popadiuk who had introduced himself and he did not receive the applause and it was like no big deal. John Popadiuk, Loser Kid Pinball Podcast, INDISC, Scott Danesi. And I can only imagine it's because John's probably not had that platform in such a long time. I think it may have been a smart move as a first step for John to try to not win the hearts over of the pinball community again, but just to get himself back out there so that he is accessible.
    35:36
    That's not for me to decide if he's somebody that should be forever damned in pinball or for somebody that should be forgiven. Common Myths, Common Myths Well, it almost sounded like he was saying that, for instance, well, you know, when he announced a pinball machine, he said something to the effect of it can't take four years or five years to come out. That's just not right. But then right away, I was like, wow, the irony of this being said, but maybe you're right. Maybe that was his way of kind of like acknowledging backdoor that it wasn't right that I have done this and that, you know, in the past, maybe that was his intention there. If it was, it's got to be clear because I didn't pick up on that right away as an apology. I Mark Dean Ramirez I Mark Davis I Mark Davis I Mark Davis I Mark Davis I Mark Davis I Mark Davis I Mark Davis I love that Bla cos lo lo lo lo racks towards the end numbers through supreme piece byfteero levels soup a blessingalnet Posca e eamhan l mejor love that microphone and explaining the situation at deeproot that was the other thing you know the whole staff there man those guys are pumped up about where they working yeah i mean there was nobody that was not excited to talk about why they have come to deeproot um that was a question that robert had asked them to answer and it was cool to just hear those guys uh so pumped up and although they knew they couldn reveal anything they like you know just wait just wait you could feel the adrenaline yeah from them talking yeah you can buy that kind of genuine so i would agree that they were biting their tongues on a weather I was initially supposed to be implemented in the game on John Popaduk's original design. I can only imagine if they're re-popping, or not re-popping but redoing Magic Girl, that you got to have that levitating ball that didn't work, right? It's got to be a Magic Girl, no? You would think but I just didn't want to speculate and say, oh yeah, they're redoing. Oh, let's just speculate, whatever. Okay, alright, speculating whatever. Yeah, so we'll see what happens. Other interesting notes, he said that he wasn't concerned about any individual machine being profitable. I guess as a company as a whole they've got this under their belt where the company makes profit. It's not worried about individual machines making or losing money. I thought that was interesting. The question and answer with the public that was there I think was more fun for me to listen to versus the kind of platform that the staff was given to kind of discuss things on their own. That was just my personal preference. The whole thing was interesting but in my opinion the second half the question answers I thought it was cool that he opened up the platform for people to have a platform to ask pretty direct questions. Especially when you get the crashed questions. Which we'll get into in a second. Releasing more titles in one year than all other manufacturers combined was a statement that Robert had made about Deeproot. And when he said that, I was a little bit taken aback. So this isn't somebody that is rethinking his whole process and scaling back on what he originally said. It almost seems like it's increased on setting expectations on the company as a whole. That's a lot of pinball machines and that's, I mean, big shoes to fill. Huge, huge shoes to fill. I can only imagine what they're doing. You know, octo-manufacturing is something that they talk about. Profitability not being so much of a concern on an individual release is another. So it's like it's very interesting to try to put the pieces of the puzzle together. The Out Pinball Podcast is a production of Iowa Public Television and is not intended to POD!". POD ascends to heaven, Virgin Mary, p-disc. Marie Luisa Salsas but absolutely crazy p-disc. The So, how did you get started in this kind of like, crashing the freaking seminar? You were in Ball Buster Stern. Yeah, right? Yeah. But I can only imagine there had to be some uncomfortability not knowing where Steve was gonna go with this. So, he had asked a couple questions, I should say like rapid fire, 25 second questions to most of the designers, you know, in all good fun. And he's like, that's all I got. And then he kind of put the mic down and walked to his seat and that was it. And it was interesting because Robert goes, he's smiling and laughing. The Out of Pinball Podcast is brought to you by Dennis Kriesel, the Out of Pinball Podcast. Robert Nott, who I've ever met him and then have Steve come into his seminar about his company. The first time we've really had them all sit down as a panel together. I mean, I don't know if I don't know how we took it, but visually he smiled and kind of left it off. But I wonder if that creates any additional motivations for him or what. But you know, Steve's a good guy and he's I mean, that dude's passionate about what he does. Oh, yeah. And I can only imagine that he's curious about what Deeproot is doing. So absolutely. Cindy Wright Drill The Out Pinball Podcast is a production of Iowa Public Television which is solely responsible for its content. And you registered, you received like this expo kind of like collector's magazine. Yeah. And on the back page of the collector's magazine, there's a piece of artwork. And if anybody hasn't seen it, we can take a picture of it and upload it to our Facebook page. But it's kind of like this sci-fi looking artwork. And John Popadiuk wanted to talk about that early in the seminar and Robert prevented him from doing so. So that kind of made me think, okay, well, maybe Popadiuk is excited about this because it's his game and maybe Robert didn't want him to talk about his game. But when it was asked what game that was, Robert asked for the crowd to guess. And there were three guesses that had come out. And one was Centaur, one was Cosmic Chaos, and then the third one was Raza. And Robert said, I can't tell you what game it is, but it is one of those games that was guessed upon. And that's how he kind of ended it. And he's like, you know, thanks everybody for coming. I think there might have been two more answers in there too. I thought there was only three. I think there was like five. Somewhere in there. Well, I was still probably coming down from drinks the night before. It was still a little rough, but I think there was like five in there, and I'm not trying to second guess you, but I think it was more than three. Are you sure? Yeah. Okay. Pretty sure. All right. Well, if I'm wrong, I apologize, but I thought there were three, but we'll see. I think Alice in Wonderland was thrown in there too, wasn't there? Well, that doesn't look anything like Alice in Wonderland. No, but people throwing guesses out. I didn't hear Alice in Wonderland. Oh, whatever. All right. Who knows, man? That was right after a trip to the van. All right, so it's either three or five, but if that's Alice in Wonderland, then that's the most shocking version of Alice in Wonderland. There's like space vampires and stuff going on in that back glass. Gangster Alice in Wonderland on the planet. Right, you're gonna be tripping balls in Alice in Wonderland. You're in space all of a sudden, so we'll see what happens. We did get a chance to meet Robert Mueller. Yes. Very nice gentleman. I'm really looking forward to seeing what they do. now that i when I'm like, hey, are you going to be sticking around? Are you going to be mingling after the seminar? Because, you know, I'd like to ask you a couple questions. And he's like, you know, I wish that I could. I've got a plane to catch. I actually had to bang out of here. So this guy literally kind of hustled in, banged out this seminar and was hustling out to catch a plane. But he did say Texas Pinball Festival is going to be huge and that there will be an opportunity for media to kind of get in and play some of these games prior. So we'll see what happens with Deep Root. We've been cautiously optimistic on Deep Root. And I think that's kind of where I'm at now. I think that watching the staff's reactions and how passionate they have been speaking about their jobs was reassuring to me. Is Deeproot going to go ahead and meet all these goals that they placed upon themselves? If they do, it's the most shocking thing ever. But even if they do half of what they are planning on doing, it's still ridiculously impressive. I just hope that they don't set the bar too high where it looks like they're failing, when in actuality they're still knocking it out of the park. www.deeproot.com All right, so we're going to pull two names at this point. Each of you will receive a deeproot t-shirt and a hat. Let's go ahead and knock that out right now. As the magic hat is waved in the air, it's a levitating hat. It should be. All right, so the first winner is Rodan Osborn. Rodan Osborn receives a deeproot t-shirt and a hat. Rodan, thanks for listening to the show. And then the next winner will be Matt Schmidt. Scott Schmidt, thank you so much, buddy, for listening to the show. You also have a deeproot t-shirt and hat coming your way. And again, thanks to Robert Mueller and Deeproot Pinball for doing a little cross-promoting with us and helping support our podcast and helping to support Pinball Expo 2018. So that's cool. So after that deeproot seminar, what happened, man? I'm trying to even recall what was going on. Well, we went back up to the room. Right. Right, so at that point we were checked into the hotel and we were able to go to the car. Now, compliments of Two Brothers Artisan Brewing, they had provided like a mini keg for us to bring into the room that night. So we brought that upstairs, we filled up a bucket with ice, had that chilled and we had pinball pale ale on tap. And we were inviting people back to the room to come up and just have a beer and chill out. Let's talk pinball. What do you like and what do you not like? And that was really, really cool because we had a lot of people kind of in and out. milkshake Ezoo
    49:05
    We'll be right back. We're all getting ready to kind of go down to dinner at, you know, once again, same establishment across the street. And we run into Jersey Jack. Yeah, so Jack was cool to meet because he's just, I don't know, I keep saying this about people, he's just a nice guy. Dude, Jack was cool, man. Very cool, very genuine. Very suave. Just kind of had this chillness about him. John Popadiuk, Automated Amusements, rad cabs or side art panels on cabinet, John Popadiuk, Bowen Klyce, Zach Meny, multiball, backglass, Johnny Pinball Podcast, INDISC, Scott Danesi. Well, we did, and we were talking to him for about five minutes and said, you know, we got this podcast, and, you know, he's like, well, what the hell? What am I coming on? So, maybe in the future, we'll get that set up and he'll be on the show. God knows he probably has enough to talk about. Oh, yeah, yeah. While we're on the topic of Jersey Jack, though, let's go ahead and do this. Compliments of Jersey Jack Pinball and Eric Minier. We've got a prize pack with some Jersey Jack Pinball Pirates of the Caribbean t-shirts. We have two of those that give away. So we're going to draw two quick names right now. And again, compliments of Eric Menyer and Jersey Jack Pinball. Alright. Raise the magic hat. So we're going to draw two names. Alright, so what is this hat? I can't see. It's a Stanley Cup hat. It's a Chicago Blackhawk hat. Ah, okay. Well, how did that make it into your house? Hey, man. Alright. So we've got two winners for the shirts. Who do you got, Bill? We have Ted Haran. Or Haran? Ted Haran. Thanks for listening to the show. You have a Jersey Jack Pinball Pirates of the Caribbean t-shirt. All right, and the next winner is Christopher Hopper. Christopher Hopper or Hopper? Two P's or one P? One P. Hopper. We'll make him Hopper. So, Christopher Hopper, you are a winner on the Special One-Lit Pinball Podcast banner contest. You will also receive a Jersey Jack Pinball Pirates of the Caribbean T-shirt. Thank you for listening to the show, and thank you Jersey Jack Pinball and Eric Menier for donating to the cause. Thank you, guys. Thanks guys for taking the time to review us, take pictures with the banner.
    52:00
    We don't have enough prizes to give away to everybody that fulfilled the requirements of the contest. But just know that we appreciate everybody reaching out and doing all of this. At one point during the evening, you went missing. I didn't know where you went. And I think it was right before we all ended up going to dinner that night after the chicken bone fiasco. Well, yeah, because you guys said you were just going up to the room for a minute. So I go walk around. We're going to the room and there's like nine people in there. I'm like, what's going on in here? Well, the problem was I gave my room key to Bruce because he wanted to go up there. Bruce, who's the head of marketing at Two Brothers, Artisan Brewing. Yep. So I'm like, yeah, no problem, Bruce. You got the beer? Good stuff. So he's like, we'll be back down though. So I'm walking around the vendor area for like an hour waiting to see you guys. He didn't lie. He was planning on coming back down, just not with any sense of urgency, I suppose. The road to hell is paved with good intentions. So whatever. So back to that. So yeah, so I'm like, you know, where the hell are these guys? So I wind up getting a text from Ken, he's like at like 8.45, an hour after they leave to go upstairs and get a drink and chicken bones or chicken wings. That bucket of chicken, I don't know where it came from. So you know, that's where I was. I was talking with Rob and Kim from Lear Mods and just making my way around. So that's where I disappeared to. You hung out with Rob and Ken a lot at Expo. They're great people. You guys are best buddies now. Yeah, great people. and he found a hit video on the network where Bill had performed on the fly equally popular and it is video on your live, Cause Sports Does bark, heoya me, Owen Jones and the group Little Insert. And that is reality, no V-ersions and I mean... It is mahdoll, it is a cell phone. It is, it is the� of my collection. Absolutely, it is vereidic at it's flap. Lots of film, lots bent, lots of boxes! garden ripe! What do you have to do at a garden sometimes? We have to get down and dig in! Did you see too slow? There is a픠A film or was it'a a video or was it a simınoute? No, it was video. The only thing on the menu I felt like eating was like a cheeseburger. I think I had like five cheeseburgers from the same place or from two different places in like two days. The worst I know I've eaten a year. I know. It's bad. I'm still feeling the effects of eating cheeseburgers and more so probably than having some drinks. Which that was an all-star pinball dinner. We had all of our St. Charles pinball buddies at one table and then some. And then across the way there was Zach and Brad. We had Straight Down the Middle, you had This Week in Pinball over there. Christopher Franchi. Franchi was there. Then you had Nermal walks in from American Pinball and he's still wearing the damn freaking costume from the reveal. I'm like, I think you could probably take that off, but man, he was all in. He was a trooper. He's like, I'm going to wear this the whole expo. So man, I'm like, give you props for that. He's like, where's yours? I thought you were going to wear one. I'm like, Nermal, I didn't even bring one, man. I'm sorry. We're lucky to be here. Yeah, yeah, exactly. So Nervo was, I think he was having fun at that point because he just kind of waltzed in and then we started talking a little bit about Oktoberfest, we were talking a little bit about business, and that was good times. We got out of there and then what did we do? I think we rolled back into Expo and at that point I like, it was like 11 o'clock, sick of drinking beer, I need like a glass of wine, so I think I grabbed like a glass of Merlot or something like that. The Out Pinball Podcast is a production of WGBH Nightmare Before Christmas pin that was there, which was cool to play. Archer was there. Did you get on any of those games? Yes. So what did you think? What are your thoughts there? I'd like to see the Nightmare Before Christmas pin get made. There's a buzz going around that that might be considered for manufacturing by a distributor or by a manufacturer, obviously. So I don't know anything definite about that, so I don't want to speculate on that particular instance. No, but either way, it was cool to see that. It was cool to play Archer, and then honestly towards the end of the night, you know, I kind of had family things going on the next morning, so I had to kind of bolt out of there, but you and a bunch of our pinball friends stayed pretty late after that. Yeah, so we were, man, we were there for a little bit after that. Let's do this though, before we talk about that, let's give away another prize pack, because I wanted to thank Charlie and KT over at Spooky Pinball for giving away the Spooky Pinball Mystery Swag Bag, and I still don't know what's in this thing. I don't know how big the bag is, I don't know how small it is, I don't know if it's some super shiny balls and a spooky t-shirt, or if it's an Alice Cooper Nightmare Castle new-in-box, but let's give that away if you don't mind, Bill. Yeah, you know, I didn't see the size of the bag, so it could be. There we go. Dave Fahlgren. Dave Fahlgren wins the Spooky Pinball Mystery Swag Bag, so congratulations, Dave. But thank you, KT. Thank you, Charlie Emery at Spooky Pinball. We really appreciate the fact that you were able to kind of help us with the podcast, and we're always happy to cross-promote for Spooky Pinball. So thanks, guys. Absolutely. Yeah, so I mean, in wrapping it up, at that point, Bill, the night was, I was on three or four hours of sleep the night before, and we were kind of going through the free play area and jumping on some of those machines. The vendor hall had closed at 12, so you weren't able to get on any of the new machines that were out at that point.
    57:51
    So I remember at one point we were like, hey, let's just get back to the room and let's call it a night. It was probably 1 o'clock, 1.30 in the morning. At this point I'd already left. Yeah, you were gone. So it was myself and our buddy Steve and Joe C. Oh, you know what, we're forgetting to talk about, you know, someone very important that we got to meet on Friday night and got to talk with. Oh, yeah. Yeah, can't forget about this guy. Because we've got to give him a shout out, right? Oh, yeah, definitely. That's Mr. Todd Tuckey? Yeah. auch he's got more videos on youtube lol www.indisciple.com We were talking about 1812 because one of our buddies bought a class in 1812 without the chattering teeth. And he's like, Todd, you might have this. Do you have the chattering teeth? He's like, I have an 1812 or two of them, but I don't have any chattering teeth. Alle Se Pakistan bye.
    59:49
    So then finally it's like, all right, man, call it a night. So I had my room with my two queen-size beds. My buddy Joe sees, like, dude, let's go crash. We get upstairs. I'm like, man, I'm freaking thirsty. I have eaten bad food all day, and I've been sipping on beverages throughout the day that had alcohol content in them. Not nearly as frequently as I did the night before, because I was still in recovery phase. I'm like, let's go get some waters, man, and let's just chug a bunch of that so that when we wake up, Because we were leaving Saturday morning. Yeah. We were coming back home. Go outside the room, go from each end of the hall, there is no vending machine. So I'm like, all right, well, there was a room with ice. We opened up the room where the ice machine was, no vending machine. I'm like, man, I got to go all the way downstairs to get to the vending machine, right? So we go to the front desk. This is at the Westin. Sir, could you please point me in the direction of a vending machine? I'd like to get some water. Oh, we don't have vending machines in the hotel. I'm like, wait a second, there's not a vending machine in the Westin? He's like, no. I go, what's open where I could buy water? He's like, well, nothing in the hotel. He was like sending me out to go to like a gas station, like down the road. I'm like, listen, this is the freaking Westin and I'm a customer, I can't even buy a water. So hey, Chicago Westin, either get a vending machine or make water accessible to your clientele because that was disappointing. Either, I think Joe had the idea, he's like, let's go downstairs back to the free play area because they had like those five gallon jugs We'll see you next time. There's something about fishing that you can do at a new вес day, really We'll see you next week. I think during the Stern seminar, they had their designers going through different things. I think Keith Elwin talked about even Archer. Stern Pinball, there was, I think George Gomez spoke about Deadpool. So it's what you would expect them talking about their games. There was nothing revealed as far as what's coming next. I guess John Borg at some point during a tour or on Facebook said that he thought Munsters would be released pretty soon. So not sure if that's something that's happening or not, but something that he said. So it's coming from the designer of a game, which I'm assuming is Munsters at this point. So we'll see what happens there. But speaking of Stern Pinball, we have lots to give away from Stern Pinball. A really cool prize pack from Stern Pinball. And I want to thank Stern Pinball for the prize pack. And I wanted to thank Zach Sharp directly for working with me on this. So we have actually three prize packs from Stern. Each one of these prize packs is going to give you a brand new Translight and a Stern T-shirt. So each winner gets a Translite and a t-shirt. The Translites that will be given away in this contest are Batman 66, Iron Maiden, and Deadpool. So pretty solid Translites. So let's draw three names out of the hat for this. There we go. One, two, and three. No peeking. Alright. So the first one, winner number one of the Batman 66 Translite and T-shirt, William Otiting. Alright William, thanks for listening to the show man. You are going to receive a Batman 66 Translite and a Stern T-shirt. Now T-shirts are cool because it says Stern on it so you can't beat that. And you are getting the Batman. Batman 66. Winner number two, which is going to be the Iron Maiden Translite and Stern T-shirt, it is Wayne Sager. Wayne Sager, thank you buddy, thank you for listening to the show. You receive an Iron Maiden Translite and a Stern T-shirt. Alright, last and not least for the Stern giveaway is Chris Belizzi. Chris Belizzi! So Chris gets the Deadpool Translite and the Stern T-shirt. Chris, thank you for listening to the show man and thanks for entering the contest. And again, thank you so much to Stern Pinball. We support pinball in general and Stern being so close to us proximity wise. It's fun to kind of get to know some of the guys that are working there. And although I'm not on such of a personal level with Zach, it was awesome for me to be able to reach out to him and for him to be receptive in helping us out promoting Expo and promoting the podcast. So Stern and Zach Sharp, thank you guys very, very, very much. Definitely appreciate it. All right. So I think we, what else do we want to cover on this episode? I think at this point we should just talk about Expo in general. Maybe each of us take 30, 60 seconds to talk about the general vibe of Expo, what we thought. Was it good? Was it bad? What would we like to see in the future? What do we not want to see in the future? I don't know if you want to kick that off or... You know, I think that I want to really give a shout out to Rob Burke and his family. I saw his wife there and his children there helping. Well, they're obviously grown adults, but helping with the show. The expo or the vendor area is was definitely you know packed which was awesome love that um free play area had a lot of good games and you had the galloping ghost which had the the arcade games and then the other uh homebrew stuff yeah you know this was probably one of the best years I've you know seen in the last five um it was a great show and actually you know I have an appreciation um after going there this morning and picking up my game because it was at Scott's The Out Pinball Podcast is a production of WGBH. The Out Pinball Podcast is brought to you by Rob Burke and his team at Out Pinball Podcast. Bill Nygren, The whole time that we were there, there was a buzz in the air and it was just, it was fun. It was intense. We had a couple of reveals. We saw things that we hadn't seen before during those reveals. We had some great seminars. We had information that was important that was offered during those seminars. Again, Bill, you hit it right on the head. Everybody that donated their time, anybody that donated a game, anybody that was a vendor that brought The Out Pinball Podcast is a production of WGBH. I had congratulated him and I said, please, if there's anything that we can ever do to help expand on this and to make it even better, let us know. But I'll sum it up in this, man. It's back. Chicago Pinball Expo is back. Absolutely. And if it grows on what it did this year, it's going to be the expo to be at in no time and sooner than later. That being said, I cannot wait to get to Texas Pinball Festival. I'm actually going to be booking flights here in the next couple of weeks. No. Yes. Really? Yes. You're in, huh? I'm in, man. All right. I know you got obligations, man, but you gotta figure this out. We will see. I'm definitely gonna go. The problem is, is you saw that it took a few thousand dollars to buy forgiveness for leaving the front door open. What does that mean? What does that mean, right? I'm going to Texas to look at some pinball machines, not that I don't have any in the basement or anything. Yeah, but we'll see. Hopefully we can make it. All right. Well, I'm gonna keep on you on this. All right. In closing here, I want to say this. Going to Expo has motivated me tremendously in a way that I didn't anticipate. I want to make sure, I mean, while we were there, we had a lot of networking. We were able to get a lot of new interviews lined up. People that we don't normally have access to have agreed to come on the show and that's exciting. I feel that we are better connected than we ever have been as a podcast and as individuals that are within the pinball community. I think that's huge. I'm very motivated to promote and to cover pinball at a whole new level at this point. So what I'm asking you guys to do is sit back and relax because we are just getting started. We're going to have additional user content. It's going to be exciting here. And so if Special Win Lit is a podcast that you've chosen to listen to over the last couple months, thank you. We do appreciate it. I'm motivated to do things on a whole new level. I feel like I'm like the deep root of podcasts right now. Yep. You definitely sound like it. I don't have the deep pockets. No, no. But you know what? When Ken and I talk about things, we will talk them, not to death, but we will run, you know, bounce ideas back and forth on things that we're going to do, how we're going to make this work, how we're going to make it better than, you know, than we've seen or how can we do it to the best of our ability, you know. Otherwise we don't mess with it. So I'm excited too. I mean, the future is looking like great things. We're competitive people. I mean, honestly, guys, over the last three months, we have just been getting our feet wet. And this is not something that we're used to doing. We're not used to recording podcasts. So if it's been a little bit rough at times and it's been not as polished as it could be, we apologize. We're still learning. We're going to always learn and we're always going to try to continue to improve on our last show. That being said, the things that we're looking to add and to incorporate within Special Win Lit almost as like an outlet for pinball in general is something that's very, very exciting. So look for some changes coming up in the near future. But speaking of exciting and something that's new and something that's awesome, I think we need to give away kind of the grand prize of the Special Win Lit Pinball Podcast Expo Banner Contest. And this was generously given away by Scott at PIN Stadium. And the PIN Stadium kit that you're going to be receiving can be for any game. And it's a full PIN Stadium kit with GI control and UV flasher upgrade. So if you get an opportunity to go to pinstadium.com, you can get a better idea and understanding of the product. But quite frankly, if you don't know what it is at this point, you might have been under a rock or you're just not wanting to mod your pinball machine. But it is something that does transform a machine like you're not anticipating. So thank you to Scott at Pin Stadium. Very awesome gift. Without further ado. All right. Let's go ahead and draw this name. The final hat draw, huh? And I hope it's Ken Cromwell. Yep. Or Bill Webb. Which we don't have our names in the hat, so that wouldn't happen. You know what? I did not upload our picture next to the banner, but that's okay. All right. So, Aaron Johnson. Aaron Johnson! Woo! You win the pin stadium, kid. Aaron Johnson, thanks for listening. Everybody that entered, thank you so much for listening to the Special One Lit Pinball Podcast. We'll have another episode up here in about a week or less. And again, look forward to some changes. And look forward to some additions. Look forward to improvement, because I know that we are. We are. Yeah, you know, we don't like to stay stagnant or not do things to the best of our ability. That's why we try and, you know, keep raising the bar on ourselves because if you don't, then you're falling behind. I also want to take a minute to thank Bruce Miller at Two Brothers Artisan Brewing. He's the head of marketing there. Hey, man, thanks for taking the plunge, so to speak, and trusting us with sponsorship of the show because it's been fun to partner up with him. He's a good guy and it's a company that I support also with Two Brothers Artisan Brewing, so we appreciate that. Guys, let's all work together, let's make pinball better, let's make pinball, you know, continue to make pinball fun and exciting, and let's get motivated, let's all get passionate about this, because, man, I'm telling you, right now I'm ready to jump out and do some crazy things. After a couple of days of sleep, of course. Yeah, I think I can use it. I hope I'm still motivated tomorrow when I wake up. I'm sure we will be. Still in recovery. I'm Bill Webb, this is your host Ken Cromwell, and you guys have a good morning, good afternoon, and good evening. And don't forget to take some time out of your day and play some pinball. So long everybody.
    73:38
    The special when lit pinball podcast is sponsored by Two Brothers Artisan Brewing, makers of pinball pale ale. You're passionate about all things pinball and great tasting craft beer. Two Brothers Artisan Brewing is a firm believer in pursuing your passions. For over 20 years, Two Brothers has had an unparalleled passion for their craft, their customers, and their community. Two Brothers Artisan Brewing wants you to follow your passion and drink theirs. Subtitles by the Amara.org community