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Episode 75 Part 2_Golden State Pinball Festival Recap (1)

The Spinner Is Lit Pinball Podcast·podcast_episode·1h 34m·analyzed·May 20, 2025
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TL;DR

Golden State Pinball Festival 2025 recap: tournament results, new games, and event logistics.

Summary

Spencer and Dan recap the 2025 Golden State Pinball Festival, covering event logistics, tournament play, competitive highlights, new game impressions, and venue experience. Key topics include Portal's P3 attendance, the GSPF tournament with Dustin Goldberg's win, Tiltalica team competition, Kong's strong showing, and general praise for event organization and game quality.

Key Claims

  • Golden State Pinball Festival 2025 had nearly 200 games set up and running by Thursday night, with all booths and screens operational by Friday 1 PM opening.

    high confidence · Spencer describing the setup process and efficiency

  • Portal (P3 machine) experienced reliability issues at the show, primarily flipper problems, but was played heavily with 10-20 person lines.

    high confidence · Dan's detailed account of Portal maintenance throughout the weekend

  • Dustin Goldberg won the GSPF finals tournament, defeating Jack Slovacek and others in a competitive final round.

    high confidence · Spencer announcing tournament results after finals

  • Kong (Stern) had at least 11 standard units plus a LE on the show floor, allowing easy access without long wait times.

    high confidence · Spencer and Dan discussing Kong availability and wait times

  • Tom Collins created new ROM code for Victory that prevents upper flipper abuse by requiring orbit shots to requalify drops.

    high confidence · Spencer describing Victory rule changes discussed during Elk Grove Pinball stream

  • Kong Pro lacks the moving gorilla toy and tilting train present in Premium/LE versions, but maintains satisfying shot matrix.

    high confidence · Spencer and Dan's comparison of Kong tier versions after playing both

  • Weird Al, Dune, Evil Dead, and Portal had the longest wait times at Golden State Pinball Festival.

    high confidence · Spencer and Dan discussing Saturday crowd dynamics

  • Mark Scoff won the pinball show's pin golf competition with a score of 21 over nine holes.

    high confidence · Spencer announcing pin golf winner and describing scoring

  • A second Tiltalica competition night was needed after one Metallica cabinet experienced component damage ('let magic smoke out') on night one.

Notable Quotes

  • “We flew this year instead of drove... They have a total system. Like, so it's where the first couple of years, I remember working load in and it felt like it was just a complete, you know, scrum of just activity and people running everywhere. Now it's like they move them, they put them into position, then guys come in behind them and start setting them up...”

    Dan @ early in episode — Contrasts event organization improvements over multiple years, showing professionalization of Golden State Pinball Festival

  • “Nobody quite caught my high score... if they do buy one, make sure to tell Multimorphic that you saw it at Golden State Pinball Festival. Not only will you save a pile of money, but they'll give me some money, which would be cool. But I didn't do it for the money. I just did it so that, you know, the show would have a new release, right?”

    Dan @ Portal discussion section — Shows community-first motivation behind Portal's attendance and hint at conversion sales from demo play

  • “All I did was sit on my butt and talk about pinball... We really have to give the props to a friend of the show, Rick Demo and Elk Grove Pinball on Twitch. He's the one who brought this set up out. He's the one who set it up. He's the one who really makes the magic happen.”

    Spencer @ tournament commentary section — Credits Rick Demo/Elk Grove Pinball for streaming infrastructure and production

  • “Congratulations to Dustin who took first... Jack rolled in qualifying, like he never lost. So I thought he was going to be unstoppable. And yet somehow Dustin Goldberg just found a way.”

    Spencer @ finals recap — Highlights upset victory in tournament and Jack Slovacek's qualification dominance

  • “Kong... is definitely, for anyone who's wondering, that is Stern's next killer. Like that game is awesome. It's incredible... I worry about the pro, you know, because you don't have the moving toy and the tilting train... but if you're playing the pro and enjoying the shot matrix and the flow and the action, you're not going to feel slighted.”

    Spencer and Dan @ Kong discussion section — Early assessment of Kong as Stern's strongest recent release with nuanced tier comparison

Entities

Golden State Pinball FestivaleventDustin GoldbergpersonJack SlovacekpersonDanpersonSpencerpersonRick DemopersonPortalgameKonggameTiltalicagameDavid Olanskyperson

Signals

  • ?

    event_signal: Golden State Pinball Festival 2025 featured nearly 200 games operational by Thursday night, with efficient multi-stage setup process and strong Friday opening crowd.

    high · Spencer: 'They had almost 200 games set up and running Thursday... by the time the show started at one o'clock on Friday, they had everything set up where it was supposed to be'

  • ?

    product_launch: Portal (P3 Multimorphic) successfully attracted significant player interest with 10-20 person wait lines despite flipper reliability issues; demonstrated conversion potential for new players.

    high · Dan: 'It got just hammered. Like that game got played and played and played and people were waiting in line 10 and 20 deep' and 'they ended up buying one and becoming more pinball people too'

  • ?

    product_concern: Portal P3 experienced flipper module failures under heavy show play despite home reliability; required ongoing maintenance and module swaps.

    high · Dan: 'We were just having that classic pinball problem, which was a flipper problem... I was getting set to reinstall the flipper module'

  • ?

    competitive_signal: Dustin Goldberg won GSPF 2025 finals over Jack Slovacek, who dominated qualifying rounds; finals featured four strong players (Slovacek, Wagonsoner, Garvey, Goldberg).

    high · Spencer: 'Jack rolled in qualifying, like he never lost. So I thought he was going to be unstoppable. And yet somehow Dustin Goldberg just found a way... Congratulations to Dustin who took first.'

  • ?

    design_innovation: Greg Wright's Tiltalica board enables two Metallica machines to interact, creating team-based competitive gameplay with mechanical interference (ball locks, multiball effects).

Transcript

groq_whisper · $0.282

0:00
Welcome to the Spinners Lit Pinball Podcast, episode 75 and a half. Part two. Thank you. We are. Thank you, Dan.
0:32
Golden State Pinball Recap. Recap 2025. And with me, I'm Spencer, one of the hosts. And with me is my co-host, Dan. Hey, what's going on, folks? We're back. We made it through a live. Hey everyone. I'm surviving.
0:52
We, all three, before we started recording, all agreed to do it because the show must go on. We've all been falling asleep all day. We got very little rest this weekend, but it's well worth it. So we're just back. It's Monday after the Golden State Pinball Festival and we're all exhausted, but we all had a wonderful time. And we're just going to do just a nice little overview for all the listeners out there. If you made it there, great. If you didn't, maybe next year. I'm hoping this will be a fun little way to kind of live vicariously through those of us who have the battle scars and survived 2025's GSPF and the smiles to prove it. So Thursday, I'll just give a little overview. We flew in. We flew this year instead of drove. Got there in the evening, came in to say hi to everybody for a bit, had a cold drink and went back to our hotel to get a little shut eye. Dan, you camped this year. Yes, so Thursday for myself and Will, who was here, who is here, but he didn't want to record tonight because he's sleeping in the garage, I think. We picked up the camper Wednesday night. Did we get a Wednesday night? No, we got it Thursday. And we rolled in early on Thursday. And then, you know, we were on load crews. Will was on a load crew and I wasn't on load crew, but I had to get my games on to David Van Es, Pinball Machine, Knapp Arcade, Raydaypinball Podcast.
2:55
I was game builder. I was helping out. Actually, mainly Ryan Dunn because he had so many games. I was helping put the legs on and obviously raising them up and leveling them and stuff like that. Actually, I didn't have to level this year, but I did help them out with that. So yeah, I definitely volunteered on Saturday. And they have a total like- I'm sorry, sorry, not Saturday, Thursday. Sorry, Thursday. They have a total system. Like, so it's where the first couple of years, I remember working load in and it felt like it was just a complete, you know, scrum of just activity and people running everywhere. Now it's like they move them, they put them into position, then guys come in behind them and start setting them up and then guys come in behind those guys and get everything leveled and cleaned and plugged in. And you know, yeah, it's just the show builds itself so much faster than you think that it would. Where before it felt like, okay, well, we're kind of starting on Thursday, but Friday it really happens.

high confidence · Spencer describing Tiltalica tournament complications and Greg Wright's repair

  • David Olansky received the Steve Charland Award at the Flip N Friday Kickoff Dinner for his EM restoration and volunteer work.

    high confidence · Spencer announcing award recipient and describing his contributions

    • “It reminded me of like Godzilla Pro where it's like you miss the stuff, but there's still enough there and it looks full enough that like you don't really feel like you're missing out.”

    Dan @ Kong tier comparison — Contextualizes Pro tier experience against industry precedent (AC/DC, Godzilla)

  • “Yeah, the gong, I thought, like, it's almost like with Godzilla, like, hey, the building being missing is like a huge deal and it really changes the game, but like, to me, the bigger change was always the Mechagodzilla thing is missing... missing the big animated King Kong toy and the physical ball lock sucks. But that, that gong being missing really changes the game.”

    Spencer @ Kong Pro limitations discussion — Details mechanical play differences between Premium and Pro tiers, specifically gong impact

  • “I had a young lady and her, uh, boyfriend, husband, I'd imagine I talked to a couple times and she was wearing, uh, the cake is a lie T-shirt... And she was just ecstatic that it was there... And then they ended up buying one and becoming more pinball people too.”

    Dan @ Portal section — Documents conversion of new player to Multimorphic customer via Portal demo experience

  • “It got just hammered. Like that game got played and played and played and people were waiting in line 10 and 20 deep... bringing Portal to the show was a lot of work... moving a P3 is always a fun experience.”

    Dan @ Portal impact discussion — Quantifies Portal's draw and logistical burden at festival

  • “There's a very aggressive form of pinball. There's a lot of trash talk, a lot of yelling, a lot of knocking each other out, but it was super, super fun to play with Alex and Juan and Jack was absolutely super fun. I got a knockout and getting a knockout just makes you extremely stoked.”

    Spencer @ Tiltalica section — Describes Tiltalica's unique team-based gameplay and social dynamics

    • Tom Collinsperson
    Mark Scoffperson
    Greg Wrightperson
    Multimorphiccompany
    Stern Pinballcompany
    Elk Grove Pinballperson/organization
    Mike Hozierperson
    Eric Wagonsonerperson
    Steve Charland Awardproduct
    Victorygame
    Napa Arcadeperson/organization
    Rayday Pinball Podcastorganization
    Erica's Pinball Journeyperson
    DRI374person
    The Spinner Is Lit Pinball Podcastorganization

    high · Spencer: 'Greg Wright... made a board that allows you to connect games together and, you know, have them affect each other' and 'we played until one of the Metallicas went up in flames'

  • ?

    code_update: Tom Collins released new ROM for Victory (1990s Williams) preventing upper flipper abuse via orbit-requalification mechanic; increases checkpoint difficulty.

    high · Spencer: 'Tom did the new ROM... one of his new rules is going to be where you can't just sit there and abuse those upper drops... you'll need to shoot the ball around one of the orbits to requalify those drops'

  • ?

    product_strategy: Kong Pro lacks moving gorilla toy and tilting train found in Premium/LE; Stern's cost-cutting strategy affects physicality but preserves shot flow satisfaction.

    high · Spencer: 'I worry about the pro... you don't have the moving toy and the tilting train... but if you're playing the pro... you're not going to feel slighted'

  • ~

    sentiment_shift: Kong generating strong community enthusiasm post-release; characterized as 'Stern's next killer' with praise for new display innovations and visual art coherence.

    high · Spencer/Dan: 'Kong... is definitely... that is Stern's next killer. Like that game is awesome. It's incredible... I love the new display work... I think that's going to be a real game changer'

  • ?

    content_signal: Elk Grove Pinball (Rick Demo) streamed GSPF 2025 tournament on Twitch with 6-hour qualifying feed; archives available for replay with highlights anticipated.

    high · Spencer: 'I go look and see that it's a six hour feed on Twitch... Rick Demo and Elk Grove Pinball on Twitch... he's the one who really makes the magic happen'

  • ?

    venue_signal: Dune, Evil Dead, Portal, and Weird Al experienced longest wait times due to single or limited unit availability; Kong avoided queues via ~11+ units on floor.

    high · Spencer/Dan: 'There were a few games with really long wait times. That was Dune, Evil Dead, and Portal because it was only one of each of those... The only reason Kong didn't have long wait times is because... I think there was like 11 on the show floor plus the LE'

  • ?

    community_signal: Golden State Pinball Festival organization has professionalized over multiple years; load-in efficiency improved significantly with staged crew system replacing ad-hoc 'scrum'.

    high · Dan: 'The first couple of years... it felt like it was just a complete, you know, scrum of just activity... Now it's like they move them, they put them into position, then guys come in behind them and start setting them up'

  • ?

    manufacturing_signal: Kong available in significant quantities (11+ standard units plus LE) at festival, suggesting healthy production capacity for Stern's current lineup.

    medium · Spencer: 'Kong didn't have long wait times is because... I think there was like 11 on the show floor plus the LE in the tournament'

    • 3:51
    They had almost 200 games, uh, set up and running Thursday, maybe even more, uh, Thursday night. On Thursday. Yeah. And then I think in total, by the time the show started at one o'clock on Friday, they had everything set up where it was supposed to be all the booths, all the, all the screens and the entertainment and, you know, everything was, was up and running. So yeah, the setup is, you know, especially when you're working at the show and you're working with the organizers, like the setups are a big part of it. And, uh, you know, the tournament room, you know, is, is its own world too, with the, with the streaming rigs and all the tournament screens and whatnot. So, you know, just a humongous, humongous, uh, you know, shout out to those guys, you know, what like Mark did and stuff, uh, the people who are checking the games in. John Popadiuk, Bob Betor, Knapp Arcade, Raydaypinball Podcast.
    5:14
    I'm just like, wow, you guys made that look really easy, even though I know it was incredibly hard and a lot of backbreaking labor. Now, getting out of the show, we'll talk about that later. Like, that's a little more chaotic, because it's everybody trying to get out of Dodge, but that also felt like it happened so much faster than I thought it would. So yeah, they really have got it going on. The setup is really, really efficient. Well, I have to say that Thursday, when I came in there, there really, like, there wasn't com Nick complicated aslgts. Analyzer Bob Betarczhan, Lyle
    7:12
    Like I said, we got in there probably about 7, 7.30, you know, started saying hi to everybody and things were already, you know, looking really good. Yep. It was awesome. So we're going to go ahead and jump into the Friday morning opening.
    7:31
    Well, you know, Dan, you did something real special. You took one for the team. I want to emphasize this real quick, give just a brief overview. With a lot of help from a lot of people, Mark, you guys got portal to the show. Oh yeah. Yeah, that was portal and tournament commentary were kind of my show this year. Yeah. Because as a featured attraction, you know, and it was doing that pinball thing and being not as reliable as you would hope for it to be, but, you know, it just didn't need a lot of attention. And it's not that there was anything really, really, like, disastrously wrong. Boards didn't blow up, anything like that. We were just having that classic pinball problem, which was a flipper problem. But, uh, yeah, you know, we, uh, you know, and I'm still, I'm actually still communicating with people about it. You know, there are a lot of folks who unfortunately might've found it once and it wasn't working right. Or they walked by and it was off or some of the walkthroughs it was off, but for the most part, it was up and running. Uh, it got just hammered. Like that game got played and played and played and people were waiting in line 10 and 20 deep. You know, there were there were a few brand new games that, you know, this was your first chance to look at. And so, yeah, bringing Portal to the show was a lot of work. Like it was exciting. You know, moving a P3 is always is always a fun experience. And it wasn't the only P3 there. Erica from Erica's Pinball Journey brought her P3 and absolutely helped her. Ryan combination
    9:56
    And I'm like, great, yeah, let's do it. One of the geniuses of the P3 or the geniuses of the P3 platform is that it's all modular. So yeah, just one plug and you pull those flippers out, you put them in and then it worked great and a lot of people got to spend some time on it. Nobody quite caught my high score. There is a YouTube video done by, let me make sure I steer you the right way, by DRI374 from Raccoon City Pinball. So there's a great half hour long gameplay. They let him in kind of early and he was recording some of the games. And I talked to him and reached out to Multimorphic and said, is this cool? And he's like, they're like, yeah, that's why it's out there. Awesome. Steve Tr Quaglia, It's so nice that you constantly checked on it. You were always going back and forth. Every time I walked in the showroom, either I went in the tournament, you were there doing commentary, and then all of a sudden, magically, you appeared in the showroom checking to see if it was working all right. And if it wasn't, you just got on it right away. Because you really care about those people who come and travel to the show, and they want to get to play that. And it really was nice of you to get that fixed and working as much as possible. Because it is a challenge with those P3s when they get to play. We're live at the P3, and we're going to talk about some of the things that you've been doing to get that constant play at a show environment. I mean, I've never put my P3 in that sort of environment. You know, it's been like a home use baby. So all I can say is like at home, it was 100% reliable. Some of this is just, you know, show environment drama. You know, if, if you really think, Hey, I'm going to buy a P3 and I'm going to take it to pinball shows, it's like, okay, well, you know, be ready for this. But you know, for anyone who's listening, who was kind of worried, like they're just like, oh man, what is it unreliable? It's like, you know, if you're going to put this in an arcade where it's going to get played, you know, hundreds and hundreds and hundreds of times a day or a week or Justin�el,
    12:38
    Kkelijk Engel, Not laughing John Popadiuk, Bob Betor, Relax Mat债t une , Andrew Mulvaney, grupo en paul, uncios petit CVR & Review Banco Senado. I'm going to make that thing as perfect as it could be. And so hopefully for the people who did get to play it and, uh, and you know, they enjoyed it. I had a young lady and her, uh, boyfriend, husband, I'd imagine I talked to a couple times and she was wearing, uh, the cake is a lie T-shirt, the cake is a lie T-shirt. And she was just ecstatic that it was there. And unfortunately at the moment she was about to take a picture with it and it was off because I was getting set to reinstall the flipper module. I said, hey, wait, let's get it working first. And she's like, oh my God, this is great. You know, how long is it going to take? It took a minute to pop in the flipper module and power it up. And then they were able to play it and try it and experience, you know, the, the excellent theming of, of portal. So super, super awesome. That's awesome.
    14:17
    Also, that thing is super heavy. So if you're going to move it, bring friends. Awesome. And then they ended up buying one and becoming more pinball people too. If they do buy one, make sure to tell Multimorphic that you saw it at Golden State Pinball Festival. Not only will you save a pile of money, but they'll give me some money, which would be cool. But I didn't do it for the money. I just did it so that, you know, the show would have a new release, right? And you know, that's the whole thing is we've had, we've had opportunities a few times now John Popadiuk I worked from 9 to opening, helping games that were still coming in get set up. And then we opened. And what a good crowd for Friday, early even. Good crowd of people coming in, playing the new games, and old ones, and seeing friends and having a good time. Got a little bit of time to play some pinball, but I immediately had to kick it over to my Steve Charland, Chief Executive Director, The Main Gig of hosting the Flip N Friday Kickoff Dinner and handing out the next Spirit of Steve Charland Award to this year's recipient, David Olansky. And that is always an honor, a privilege and a joy to be able to do that and to share that I'm going to go ahead and give a shout out to Andrea Soni-Neff and the Girl Scout troop. I always feel like I need to run a tuxedo. I always feel underdressed because it's such a nice, nice affair and a nice evening. The food is amazing. And the people as always are wonderful. And congratulations to David Walansky, who, if you don't know who he is, he does work on solid-state games and he knows how, but his main area of focus is electromechanical EM games, and he volunteers at the City Pinball Museum, at our show at Pinnagogo. He used to volunteer at Banning. He's the main EM tech over at INDISC and keeps all the tournament EM games up and running John Popadiuk, Bob Betor, Knapp Arcade, Raydaypinball Podcast.
    17:39
    I'm going to play the first installment of the tournament, the open tournament. Qualifying round one. Yeah, thank you. Qualifying round one. And I had a lot of fun. It was great getting to see everybody. It was kind of a social atmosphere, talking to all the tournament players. But unfortunately, as far as my playing goes, not so great. I, uh, I did, I'm, I don't know either, maybe I wasn't in a competitive mind set, but I did, uh, try my best and, and get used to the games as much as possible. Considering we had no practice, I just pretty much as everybody else went on a game cold to see where the shots were and everything. And unfortunately I couldn't find them. Uh, Rush is a perfect example. It was kind of embarrassment. I was the first to get streamed and I drained the first two balls instantaneously. I don't know if it was my fault or if I just got unlucky, but I know the first one was just a total house ball and there was nothing I could do about it. Hit the sling and gone. But the games played absolutely great. They were brutal as usual. Some people I talked to had a different perspective on it, but to me I just saw that when you miss a shot, you're dead. It's just that's the way that they're set up. Tilts were very reasonable. There wasn't an issue as far as that goes. Tim Kitzrow, Loser Kid Pinball Podcast. Okay. They just, you know, there's a, there's a small ring. Oh, okay. And, you know, you're, you're gonna get that contact when you put a big move on, on the game. And I mean, I was honestly, I, I, I was pretty much on the, on the mic the whole time. I think I might've missed part of one qualifying session and I, I ended up having to run out and service Portal. Let's marte through some of the main, but the 1, Subtitles by the Amara.org community
    20:52
    It played great, other than that, and I like that game. I hate that game. We played that game in my league. That's one of Adam's games. Oh, okay. Okay. And I just can never quite like, there are ways to make points on that game, but it's like, give me Robo War like 10 times. Yeah. Over Excalibur. Yeah. The other game that was brutal was Gods of War. That destroyed me. Oh my gosh. I actually love Mars God of War. Yeah, Mars God of War. And that is another game that we play in my league. Okay. I actually love Mars God of War. The trick with Mars God of War that I think that, you know, a lot of people don't really realize, and maybe this is just me, maybe there is a way to do it differently, but I'm like never use the upper flippers. Oh. Oh, like pretty much all the shots are makeable from the lower flippers and the upper flippers just get you in trouble. Yeah. It gives it that side to side action. Yeah. It just, what happened to me? Yeah. It comes off at a shallow angle and, and just, you don't hit the shot. Like there's one shot very specifically that you kind of backhand from that upper flipper to get it into one of the, one of the locks. But yeah, beyond that, I'm like, oh man, just, it's a lot like big game. Tim Kitzrow, Loser Kid Pinball Podcast.
    22:46
    We're in NorCal. But yeah, we had a very eclectic lineup of classics because we have a guy who just happens to own a bunch of Gottliebs. You know, we had some early Williams stuff. We had Victory, which has also become a big popular tournament game thanks to the new rules that Tom Collins set up for it. Oh, Tom set that up, huh? Okay. Yeah, so Tom did the new ROM. And actually, if you watch the Elk Grove Pinball stream qualifying, it was actually, I think it was during the finals he came into the booth with me and while there was gameplay we talked about the changes that he made and the changes that he planning to make Oh, that's cool. I know that Mike disabled the upper flipper so that you couldn't do that all day long to get the points to make it more challenging. And one of his new rules is going to be where you can't just sit there and abuse those upper drops. Like, you'll need to shoot the ball around one of the orbits to requalify those drops. Oh, okay. Okay. So, because we, we, we agreed that it was like, it's nicer if everything works, you know, those upper, those upper flippers, you know, that's a fun gameplay element. Yeah. And turning one of them off sucks. It also makes checkpoint three a lot harder to get and checkpoint four a lot harder to get when you don't have that extra flipper to feed, you know, your other flippers. So there's going to be some more changes to victory, but yeah, victory is one of those games that I don't think that a lot of people have played because it was like this stupid, like racing game from the nineties by the company that nobody liked. And then when you actually play it, you're like, oh, victories. Like you went terrible, right? Like it's got this terrible shot map and none of the shots seem to do anything. But then when you figure out that the whole idea behind victory is like that series of like seven shots you need to make and then when you start it it's like a continuously building hurry up then you're like oh my gosh this is awesome like once you know the gameplay flow that game is great yeah it's a good one and it's rare you don't see that the only place i played it was pinball arcade i i learned how to play victory and that was a fun game i really enjoyed it i played john wick that was just Just brutal. More brutal than the actual game when it's set up normally. That just killed me instantly. Obviously with Jack, that was a different story. He could blow that one up, but not me. So yeah, I just had a lot of last places. I did have a couple of firsts. I was excited I got a first in Kong. That was cool. I love that game. That was really a highlight of that tournament was getting to play that the first time. That was exciting. I wish I was put in Labyrinth. I wanted to play that one. I know my friend Steve Rowe, he played it twice, I think, or maybe even three times. I can't remember, but he had that game more than once and did pretty well on it. So he started getting to know that game a lot better. But yeah, there's a great variety. There are a couple of games I played. Actually, I played Lady Luck and that killed me just as much as it did when it was up in Tahoe because Tony brought that one. So it didn't matter. It was the same. And then the other ones, all the other games, I can't think of all of the ones I played, but the match play, target match play is really fun. And it went faster than I thought. I was pretty impressed how it started right at 10. I mean, that's one great thing about Mike is he gets those tournaments starting right away and it was very organized and we were able to put in our own scores and then they verified it. So that sped up the process a lot. But I was really impressed to see that the tournament was done right before 5, which was great. So, but yeah, that's pretty much what I did mostly on Friday was the tournament. And I know Dan, you did all the commentary and I just commend you. That's a lot of work. You know, when I go look and see that it's a six hour feed on Twitch, that's a lot of talking. So I commend you. We're going to have a lot of fun with you, Dan, for giving that great commentary along with Rick. All I did was sit on my butt and talk about pinball. You know, we really have to give the props to a friend of the show, Rick Demo and Elk Grove Pinball on Twitch. He's the one who brought this set up out. He's the one who set it up. He's the one who really makes the magic happen. Surprisingly, you know, Rick did not play. You know, I kind of anticipated that Rick would play, and I probably would have tried Subscribe Now for getting to know pod theology and the epitome of introspection! The Just so Is gentlemen at home time at least of our burst her burmester i think that's why and uh... my wife jamie i actually did commentary cannot was rated and jamie is you know she place pen ball but she doesn't play tournament pool so i'm really interested to walk sense the worker observation all i have to watch that that's cool and then we had it go their other unofficial competitions right so we have by little flippers and they are much and state enough if you want to know like part of the the New it with with multiple teams and my team which was called universe a and it was me jack alex lambert jack jarrett alex lambert and and one bermudez we went through the entire qualifying undefeated and then we got to the final so tilt alica I'm sure all of our people know it's like a battle version of metallica Tim Kitzrow And County OK guys thank you so much for tuning in today, otro pont Carmigliano. Greg Wright. So, Greg Wright? Yes. So, he made a board that allows you to connect games together and, you know, have them affect each other. And so the first night, which we streamed, and it'll also be available on Elk Grove Pinball thanks to a humongous effort by Rick, we played until one of the Metallicas went up in flames. Literally. Yeah. Yeah, well, I mean, it didn't burn, but yeah, it let a lot of magic smoke out of some transistors.
    30:20
    And Greg not only came through on the board, but he also came through on the repair. So we had a second night of Tiltalica where we did the final. And then the final, uh, we ran into, uh, two other teams, one of which, uh, uh, Dustin, who we're going to talk, uh, talk about in a few minutes, uh, Dustin Goldberg. Kevin Fitzgerald, The Ultimate Winners, Willard and Friends Mike Garcia, George Gonzalez, Rory McClure, and Jake, who plays in our Folsom League. He's the current Folsom champion, in fact. We ended up fading to third. It was super fun. It's a very aggressive form of pinball. There's a lot of trash talk, a lot of yelling, a lot of knocking each other out, but it was super, super fun to play with Alex and Juan and Jack was absolutely super fun. I got a knockout and getting a knockout just makes you extremely stoked. So yeah, that was crazy fun. And you know what I'm really happy with, Dan, is you got to participate this year. I know last year you were tired and you had to go home and it was really nice that you You were on the campground and you actually not only participated, but you actually competed in it. Yeah, I'd played in Totalica before. Like, I'd actually played, you know, I didn't got knockouts before, but yeah, it was nice to actually be there for like the, the, the, the meat of it. And there was a camp wide pin golf competition, a camp silver ball pin golf that just happened The winner of the pinball show is Mr. Mark Scoff. I know, I can't believe it. Now I don't know how many scores were entered or how many scorecards got lost, but I was still excited even with the amount of people that played. I did pull off a win. I won a backglass to The Hobbit, which is pretty cool, but I have no idea where I'm going to put it in my house. It's really cool to see that and get awarded with that for playing really well. I had a killer night on Friday night. I played only three holes and I got three hole-in-ones, which was crazy. Nice. Yeah, I did really well on Theater of Magic. It wasn't that hard of an objective, but you had to be consistent hitting that loop over John Popadiuk, Bob Betor, Kanyo Klyce, David Van Es, Spinball Machine, Kanyo Klyce, David Van Es, Spinball Machine, Kanyo Klyce, David Van Es, Spinball Machine, Kanyo Klyce, So basically what that was is it was not only just the game fire, but this was last year as well. But we had, I know him as Creech. He set up a thing where it has... His name is Greg Creech. Thank you. Greg Creech. He had a setup where if you made that certain shot after you qualified a multiball, John Popadiuk, Bob Betor, Knapp Arcade, Raydaypinball Podcast.
    34:24
    John Popadiuk, Bob Betor, Pinball Machine, Knapp Arcade, Raydaypinball Podcast. K sociales Portable Question Time But yeah, so congrats to Mark for, for, you know, winning. It's, it's a wonderful consolation for that tough qualifying round. Yeah, it, it felt good and it was really nice to, you know, relax and play for fun, but I just happened to get really, really fortunate to, to nail it on my first ball. So that was awesome. So I ended up with four hole-in-ones. That really helped me. I ended up with a score of 21 was my overall score for the nine holes. Yeah, it was a good Sunday. We had the GSPF finals, you know, and this, you know, the tournament's all run by Mike Hozier, who's been doing it for years and does a fantastic job. You know, all of his scorekeepers are, are good friends of ours from our league. Uh, you know, Jeff Claybaugh, Erica and her husband, uh, Kevin. So they're super, super friendly, super, super nice. And they do a great job. So it was Jack Slovacek, Eric Wagonsoner, Jared Garvey, and Justin Goldberg, and they played a rush and they played the uncanny X-Men and you know they were both super super brutal you know just you know really really great really really great competitions and their last game was on Black Knight Sword of Rage which we were kind of you know joking about we haven't seen a lot of Black Knight who'd be crazy enough to choose that but that did come down to the final game and in you know a very very close round it was a matter of We're going to have a 7-6-5-3 in terms of the scores, you know, so nobody, nobody ran with it. Congratulations to Dustin who took first. Wow. In an absolute, you know, absolute just wonderful, wonderful performance. And I thought, you know, like Jack rolled in qualifying, like he never lost. So I thought he was going to be unstoppable. All же2
    37:41
    Oh, my gosh. Wow. So, yeah. And, and Jack, you know, he didn't just roll over like, you know, he ended up, he ended up winning the final game. It just was too little too late. You know, he won that game of Black Knight. So it was... Oh, okay. ...it was an awesome final, final round, four great players. So ultimately, it was a fantastic tournament, there was great sportsmanship, there was awesome competition, and I'm sure he'll be able to catch replays of it and I'm sure that he'll You'll put together a highlight reel of it on ElkGrovePinball.com. Also, I forgot to mention that Thomas and Jake were also helping with the tournament as scorekeepers. So a huge thanks to everybody who contributed to the GSPF 2025 tournament. Awesome. And now we're on to Saturday fun. Did anybody make the swap meet this year? I did not. I don't, I didn't, because I was working. I was doing the morning shift again. You know, just roving. And I did that 9 to noon and then started playing pinball and eating a lot of good food. You know, getting, getting in all the games that we've talked about that, you know, that none of us had played yet. And, and we'll share our, you know, quick overview of that in a little bit. You know, Saturday was great. Tim Kitzrow, And the crowds were huge, you know, but you still got a game. There's only a couple of games with, well, a few games with really long wait times. That was Dune, Evil Dead, and Portal because it was only one of each of those. And Weird Al. Yeah. Yup. There were a lot of wait times on Weird Al? There were a lot of wait times on Weird Al. There was a line behind it. We're not such an awesome game. It is. We all love it. But yeah, cause the only reason Dan brought this up before we got started recording, it's like, well, the only reason Kong didn't have long, long wait times is because you get on one pretty easy because there was, I don't know the exact number, but I think there was like 11 on the show floor plus the LE in the tournament. Correct. So, which is great because then everybody can go play. There were, there were at least 10 King Kongs. Yeah. And that is definitely, for anyone who's wondering, that is Stern's next killer. Yep. Yeah. Like that game is awesome. It's incredible. The way it shoots. I worry about the pro, you know, because it, you know, you don't have the moving toy and the tilting train and all that. And I played the pro first before I played the premium and shot wise and fun wise, you don't miss out. You don't, you don't feel like you're missing out. You know, if you get the premium or Ellie and you have that stuff, it's really, really, really cool. But if you're playing the pro and enjoying the shot matrix and the flow and the action, you're not going to feel, you know, you're not going to feel slighted. I don't think. It reminded me of like Godzilla pro where it's like you miss the stuff, but there's still enough there and it looks full enough that like you don't really feel like you're missing out. Exactly. Well said, Dan. Yeah, well said. More than the animated gorilla, I kinda missed the gong. Yeah, I love the gong. The gong was my favorite. You love the what? Yeah, the gong, I thought, like, it's almost like with Godzilla, like, hey, the building being missing is like a huge deal and it really changes the game, but like, to me, the bigger change was always the Mechagodzilla thing is missing. So it's like, yeah, you know, missing the big animated King Kong toy and the physical ball lock sucks. But that, that gong being missing really changes the game because that does some wild stuff. Like it'll whack the ball back down at you or it'll, it'll impede your progress. But usually it's, it's just, it's a really satisfying thing to hit with a pinball. Yeah, it's really cool. It's going to be like ACDC's Bell where eventually on the pro... It is kind of like ACDC's Bell. Right. Well, with the pro on ACDC, they eventually... I mean, ACDC had a lot of revisions, right? So you had your original pro, then you had your premium and LE, and then when they got to the vaults on the pro, they changed up the play field art, they added in a little bit more of, you know... The Bell still doesn't do all the same stuff, but the Bell does more, rather than just sort of existing there. So, ACDC might be a special case, but yeah, I just, man, it hurts my feelings that they didn't put that on the pro because that would have made that pro an absolute slam dunk. But, you know, I'm sure they're trying to incentivize us to spend the money and get a premium. Right. Yeah. And it is cool to see the Kong, you know, smash the train, tip it upside down. That is a really cool moment. And the personality, it is choreographed with what happens on the screen and what happens and the gameplay it's really cool and it's definitely has more personality than the Hulk does in Avengers it definitely fits well with the code yep but yeah great game and it looks gorgeous in person by the way so for people who say the art is not that good I disagree I looks great in person I think I want to find a chance to look at the le the tournament I like why there are people that are so often arms. I thought it looked beautiful. Yeah. Oh yeah. The LE looks awesome. That back glass is tremendous. Yeah. Oh yeah. It really is. The mirror back glass is amazingly beautiful. I just think that a lot of people don't love the... It's almost like what happened with Jurassic as well. A lot of people don't necessarily love that art style, but I like it. I think it has a very cohesive presentation. The art looks right. You know, it looks like their version of King Kong, but the art looks right and it matches the display. And I'll tell you, man, I love the new display work that they've done on that game where the scores are larger. And I haven't seen it and I didn't play with it at the show, but like I love that new Stern menu system. And I think that's going to be a real game changer for Stern's going forward. Yeah, that's true. You know, it's really funny when they were setting up early Friday morning, guys were setting up Dune. I was talking with them about it. I said, you know, it looks, you know, switch back and forth, but the cabinet and the cabinet aren't the quality of the butter cabinet style, a rad cow style. I said, you know, I always, for years, ever since I remember ACDC coming out, ever since that, because everybody's kind of aligned it and I saw it in person, I went, oh my God, it's not, you know, it's way better in person. You know, picture and video. I'm John Popadiuk, and I'll see you next time on Ninja Eclipse.
    45:19
    Great first effort. Not a bad game at all. Good game. Not, you know, I need more time on it, but I didn't think it was great, but I thought it was good. And I hope they can continue to, you know, like a lot of companies have, get better with each game, like Spooky has, you know? And I hope they don't backslide on their next title. I'll say that. And Spencer, one thing that you have to understand too is, I don't know if you got a chance to see Under the Playfield. I did not. That is quite a sight to behold what they did because they made it into circuit boards. That's what you told me. Yeah. Yup. And the LEDs are all soldered in. The nice thing about it is if you have a little bit of soldering experience, you can replace it, but I'm sure those LEDs would last a pretty long time. What, on Dune? No, not on Dune. On Ninja Eclipse. Oh, well, that's how they did the Medieval and the Attack from Mars and all that remakes too. I mean, in fact, that's how most pinball machines are now. Oh, okay. Well, it's pretty impressive. It looks way different than the other games that you're mentioning because it's all modular, so it goes in, basically, you just take the part right out, put it back in, and it's all Molex connectors, so you don't have to do any soldering. It's pretty cool. I have a picture of it. I'll share it with you later, and you can see it, but it was pretty cool how minimalistic John Popadiuk Bob Betor Pinball Machine Knapp Arcade Raydaypinball Podcast It went the whole show There were no issues that I saw I kept going by it and everybody was playing it And it was really a good artwork and great sound good call outs It was an overall good package It's a good basic pinball machine. Right, right. It's not a great game, but it's a good game. Like, yeah, I mean, it's not basic isn't bad. Like there's a lot of games that you might call kind of basic, especially by today's standards that are very good. They're just good down to earth pinball. And for this company's first effort and you know, no matter how much people say they love them or they hate them or they can't get behind them, it's an original theme with original art that, that does its own thing. So yeah, I think it's cool and I think that they're, I'm looking forward to seeing their next game, but unfortunately they made like what, a hundred of them? Yeah, not many. You're not going to see a lot of those things, you know, no matter what. So another really cool game to have showed up at Golden State. Yeah. Well, that's why I always tell people, you see something like that, you know, not just with pinball, but anything, if opportunity presents itself, take advantage. BLANK And, uh, um, we, you know, it's fun. It's way more fun than I thought it would be. And the really cool thing about that, I was talking with the guy who brought it, cause he got an award for most unique, uh, most unique game brought to the show, which we presented to him. Um, it's now been placed in the possession of the Pacific Pinball Museum because his wish was to have it instead of some private collection somewhere in somebody's basement Well, nobody ever got to see it again. Did the general public have the opportunity to play it and enjoy it? Oh, that's cool. That's really nice of them to do that because like you said, that is a really rare game and it's not easy to play. That's for sure because it uses joysticks to activate the flippers instead of buttons. But, uh, it's really cool cause the ball looks like it's floating, uh, instead of, uh, it's a neat optical illusion where it's mirrored. Uh, but it does seem like the ball is like defying gravity. It's pretty wild. Yeah. It's pretty cool. I know talking to other people, like you were talking to Dan, who'd been to a California Extreme in years past, that one usually shows up there. I just, you know, I never made it to California Extreme when I still lived in California, because that was always the height of my busy season. So to have him show up and be able to play it and enjoy it was really, I just thought, you know, a real special treat. Good. Yeah, that's great it was there. So were there any other games that stood out for you guys, old or new? During the weekend? Well, I have to say that I had an opportunity on Friday because there was only four people waiting in line. I was like, this is a chance to play Dune. And I was so happy thanks to Brian Savage and I think it was brought by Ace Goge, is that correct? Is that who brought it down? I don't know. I don't know exactly. I think when Alex talked to me, I think that's what he said. But regardless, whoever brought it, thank you so much for having that at the show. And thanks to Brian Savage for making that happen. So it was really cool to see that at the show and obviously people were looking forward to it. And I'm really happy because we made those promises and we delivered, which is great. But I did get to play it. And first of all, I want to say about the artwork. I think the earth tones fit really well with the game and it was beautiful. It did not look drab or boring, even though it had a lot of browns in it. It fit really well with the theme. The back glass is gorgeous. Absolutely beautiful artwork. The side cabinet looks great too. And the layout was super fun. A lot of times I kind of took a second look at it and it reminded me a little bit of a white water layout. But what I was really impressed with was that the ball didn't always come back the same way I expected. There were some hidden diverters somewhere in the game that made it go in different directions. But it shot really smooth and the shots were a lot more easier to make than Labyrinth. It was way less clunky and definitely not a lot of brick shots. So that was really nice to play that and the mech was really cool with the worm, how it came out of the playfield. And it did a couple of things. It held the ball. It sunk the ball in the middle through the hole and it looked just like it was getting eaten up. Of course it raised up and then it released the ball onto the habit trail. That was cool. I didn't really get to bash it because I don't think that was in the code yet, but I was really looking more at the shot geometry and the fun factor and I have to say I really had a great time shooting that. There was one mode that was really cool where if you drain it out of the left drain, you have to put yourself in the, I don't know if it's called the pain box or whatever, but in the movie they had to put their hand in a box to be able to withstand pain. And what was really cool is it required you as the player to hold the action button down And that was where you had to use either the left or the right flipper one handed. So you're holding the action button down and you have to switch your hands quickly to the other flipper to make one particular shot. In this case, I had to make a shot of the left orbit. As soon as you let go of the action button, you're dead. As soon as you hit both flippers at the same time, you're dead. So there's no way to cheat. John Popadiuk, Bob Betor, Knapp Arcade, Raydaypinball, Street Winner, I had a two-minute play keeping that ball alive as I was watching and tracking it going to each flipper. However, I did not make the shot, but I sure had fun trying to juggle the ball around. They did a really nice job. John Popadiuk, Bob Betor, Kanyo Klyce, David Van Es, Bally Williams, Straight Down the Middle, All of this stuff is going to be on my YouTube channel. I'm John Popadiuk, and I'll see you all next time. Thanks for watching. I'll see you next time. Bye. The actual gameplay, it's kind of like, here's your last chance. And then you can continue, kind of like the oxygen destroyer or whatever that is on Godzilla. Is that what it's called? Yeah. But that's like a rescue mode, right? Like when you're trying to save yourself. True. But that's a, you know, Dune was way better looking. I don't know why, if it was how they had it set up. It seemed like it was on short legs, because that game seemed tiny. Yeah. I was thinking that too. Yeah, it was really cool. I mean, I wish that I cared one little bit about Dune as a theme, but it's a great looking game and yeah, you can see the evolution between Labyrinth and Dune. And there was an interesting Mac on the left side of the wire form. It was like a hook and it was interesting how it worked because when we first stood in line waiting for it, The ball was stuck in that hook and it like it didn't push the ball like it was supposed to as part of the part of the or as part of the gameplay. But it does two things. It either lowers and then the ball goes down to your flipper or it kind of pushes it out by squeezing it in that hook mechanism to push it forward to put the ball in a less control instead of just going right to your left flipper. Tim Kitzrow, Loser Kid Pinball Podcast.
    56:39
    voltage charge, miniball lockup, HUGB The game that honestly, man, that blew me away was Evil Dead. Oh yeah. Like how, I mean, I know it's been said, I know that there's media, I know people are getting them, but like how hard did Spooky execute on this game? Oh, dude. It was so good. Everything's up to 11. I think it's, honestly, I think it's Jersey Jack level.
    57:40
    I agree. Like, they pulled out every stop with this game. And yes, I know that the theme is, is niche-y, that's Spooky's Way, you know, they, they want to sell 800 games to Evil Dead fans rather than sell, you know, 5,000 games in general. But man, that was a game that like, it deserved the attention and that, you know,
    58:04
    And that's the main line that I've ever seen for a game at our show, ever. Yeah, we could have had ten Evil Dead's and people would have been waiting in line for them. Correct. Yep. Yeah, that's my pick for like this, the main line, you know, has been released game of the show. You know, I'd say portal, but I'm a little biased. There you go. Sure. But, uh, and Mad Max. Thank you. Cause that's, uh, That homebrew of Mad Max was un-be-freakin'-lievable. Like, if somebody, you know, I talked to those guys about it and, you know, they kind of told me about how long they'd been working on it. And to me, that game looks amazing. Production level. That's what everyone has said, Mark. Everyone. Dave Yel 思οιπόν, Jay Matar wanted to discuss Pinball only since we разыz惻lencently had the mic, and disturbing the avoided surprise on Instagram of 1981 información Beach交流 acknowledgement of Pinball's anniversary inocking artist Knowlesa RA, Valor. And like, we just love the movie. I'm like, awesome. Good for you guys. So yeah, so I got their information. So you know, right now we got to focus on this episode, but we're going to be reaching out and hopefully getting them on the show. Oh, awesome. Yeah, I would love to hear it. I know just a real quick in a nutshell, the one that did the actual code and all the movie clips and everything, it took five years to put that together. Tim Kitzrow, That's what they were telling me that they've been working on that game for the better part of five years. And it showed. Yeah. It just showed. Yeah, a passion project for them and just excellent, excellent. I mean, there were several cool homebrews there. Yeah. But Mad Max, you know, was head and shoulders the most polished and professional looking product. And an active topper that scared the crap out of me. And a really cool topper. Yeah. Like the topper made the game. Like you saw that from across the room and you're just like, oh dude, this is going to be epic. Yup. And uh. Yeah, absolutely. Now here's the deal though, right? Okay. So this is the newer Mad Max, right? Not the newest cause they made that Furiosa movie, but, and I don't know how much you guys watch Mad Max, but it's like, I want a pinball machine based on the road warrior. Oh, absolutely. Uh huh. Right, the second Mad Max where it got really good. Just so we could have like a Lord Humongous mode where it's like, you know, maybe it's like a hurry up or something, he's trying to talk you out of it, he's like, just walk away. Nobody has to drain here, just walk away. Yeah. The Ayatollah of Rock-a-Rolla. The Ayatollah of Rock-a-Rolla, Lord Humongous. Yeah, and the presentation of it was awesome, but the geometry was great. I mean, I was shooting that thing and it felt just wonderful. It was flowy and, but different. It wasn't at all cookie cutter design or something you could see, oh, they use this old playfield for this. Was it just me or did it remind you a little bit of, uh, Airborne? A little bit, a little bit with all the habit trails. I love the use of the- All the habit trails, very habit trail heavy, but yeah, just unique and fun and a great theme. And, you know, yeah, obviously a labor of love, like just, you know, hopefully, I mean, I don't know if those guys even aspire to make pinball machines, but, you know, hopefully that that will be, that will be something that somebody notices and, you know, brings those guys in to do some, to do some work. Absolutely. Yeah. I love the use of that upper flipper where it would knock it over, if you hit it right, John Popadiuk, Bob Betor, Knapp Arcade, Raydaypinball Podcast.
    62:49
    Welcome. So what else did we do on Saturday? We had Pinball University. And I missed all of it. So I can speak a little bit to it. I didn't get to engage in too much of it, but I did actually kind of inadvertently end up being part of the P3 class, and I got to check out the Stern class with, oh man, I'm going to do it again with Kyle Spiteri and the Pinball Pirate. And it was put on, uh, by Emoto and it was awesome. Tons of people there, tons of great questions. And they showed you about, uh, troubleshooting on Stern games and a lot of like, this would be a great class for people who want to work on their games because he explained a lot about why node boards do what they do and how you can move node boards around to troubleshoot. And then, uh, I was in there at the time because I was working on troubleshooting portal. And I worked with Manu and Erica while I was getting some parts. But I actually sat in on the class and watched him completely break this P3 down in 10 minutes, completely put it back together in like three minutes. And people were asking a lot of great questions about it. And, you know, it was, it was cool. And there were a lot of other classes. You know, the problem is, is that I think you get into the, there's so much to do with this show that you don't Awesomes from zaddam.com
    64:45
    Tim Kitzrow, Leadアンテيسboat Yep. Yeah, it was cool. That's great. Did you, is that anything else or just that one or just those two? Nope. I was just there for the Stern one. Like I showed up right as the Stern one was kind of starting and then I stuck around through the P3 seminar. And because I was waiting and because I had a P3 and I'd worked with some of the newer module stuff, they started asking me questions. Oh, so how many balls does Portal use and has this changed? And I was like, oh yeah, I can kind of speak to that, you know, talking about like the updates, you know, the magnetic arts, stuff like that. So really, really cool, really, really cool thing. And honestly, I'm a little, I think that, you know, especially if you have knowledge to share, I know that they're always looking for people to do interesting seminars, you know, so to be sure to talk to the organizers and see if you can get involved. I know about this P3 seminar. I would have loved to have been involved in it and I could have worked with, you know, I met these people. So I didn't know Manu before, I didn't know Erica before, and it's the first time meeting them. We've been following them forever, right? You know, they're friends of the show, you know, we communicate online, but it was good to finally get into that community. And like now, you know, that I know some pinball, some P3 people, you know, here in NorCal, Fl軻
    67:06
    John Popadiuk, Bob Betor, Knapp Arcade, Raydaypinball Podcast. Justin Buffer, You stole a car. I did not steal a car. What I did is I always brought my sound equipment every time. I always brought my microphone and everything. I was like, oh, we got to do a podcast. And I know that we're all separated and we all are doing our own thing. But what I want to do is I wanted to see what the impressions were from all the people that attended the show. So I went out there like a reporter, grabbed my mic. Thank goodness it was a little portable studio in my hands. And I went out and I had a mic. John Popadiuk, Bob Betor, Kanyo Klyce, Raydaypinball Podcast.
    68:58
    I know I talk too much detail who I talk to and everything but you'll get to hear that and it will be a real great opportunity to hear the impressions and the feedback of people that attended the show, organized the show, and are always influencing the show with different things so it was really cool. Mark Stopp man our man in the field. It was so great. He interviewed me briefly and he also got to talk to a few new people who'd never been to the show before. Yup and they're hooked. I can tell you that. So it's really cool. I might be a little distorted on my part because I was, I couldn't see my levels when I put it towards my face, but I could see the levels when the other person was talking. So if it is a little distorted when I'm talking in the microphone, I apologize to all the listeners, but I think you'll still be able to understand it pretty well. But I know that the people who are interviewed are, should be crystal clear in the audio recording. I am dying to hear these interviews. I am too. We are fantastic. Did you ask them what they thought of the Spinners Lit Pinball Podcast? I did not ask them about that because I was focusing on the show, but I did ask them if they wanted to be on it. Did any of them act like they heard of us? Yes. Yes, there were a few people there. I had more people this year walk up to me and tell me that they were listening than I ever have before. Oh, that's great. We're getting traction, boys. So, good stuff. And they said, except for that Dan guy. I said, I am that Dan guy. And they said, oh, except for Mark.
    70:32
    And we gave out free buttons Gave out free buttons to everybody that I found Yep Everybody that I was encountering and hopefully not giving it to the same person So I was really trying to find different locations on the site and at the show so it wouldn't be the same people all the time. But it was really awesome. We interviewed Will six times. Yeah. Yeah, exactly. It was really wonderful to be able to hear everybody talking about the show. And you're right. We're getting feedback and on top of that we had Keith Elwin there and his brother that attended the show and Mike Vinacore and also Michael Grant. People from Stern are recognizing that Golden State Pinball Festival is a legitimate pinball show that personally is the best in the country. Yeah, my understanding is that Keith just kind of came to hang out. Yeah, he did. Yeah. Like he has family and he just wanted to come and see what it was all about. Yeah, they camped right next to us. That's awesome. Yeah, Will gave them a block of cheese because they were our neighbors because Will came down with like all this cheese and they invited us over for dinner. And so we're over there having dinner and I'm sitting there and right at my left elbow, I'm sitting with Keith Elwin. And you know, Keith is not a man of a lot of words, but you know, he was having a good time, and I think everybody was having fun, and there were just tons and tons of fun people. I mean, there's that whole Bay Area Pinball contingency, the Bay Area Pinball Department, whatever they call themselves, San Francisco Pinball Department. Sorry, don't hate me. You guys are awesome. We had a really good time hanging next to you, and I will say this, you guys know how to party, We're live at Camp CCPL, and we're going to tell you what's going on. It's amazing. It's good. It's nothing like any other show. It's as good as the show at this point. Yup. Like it's unbelievable. The camp is fantastic. I spent way more time at the camp than I did actually inside the show floor just because there was so much to do and so many people to talk to. And it's not like there wasn't great stuff on the show floor. I just wanted to get out of the way and let people who were in there playing games play their games because I knew that there was tons and tons and tons of cool stuff to do We are together making it together. 地 mais ab葉 irritante mayors de Approamus a have we done Mr a We had the little flippers competitions happening for kids. We had the flea market, which if I had more time, like I sold at the flea market one year and I really had a good time. Like it was super cool and I think I made upwards of like $75, which doesn't sound like it'd be worth it, but I mean, hey, come on man, money's money. Yeah, exactly. But I think that what you really run into is just, again, there's, you know, we keep I'm going to keep coming back to it, but there's a lot of ways to have fun at the show. It's not just pinball. The festival is truly strong with this. It's not just something that we call it. I mean, maybe at first it's like, oh, it's a pinball show, but it's a festival. It has really grown into a legitimate festival where the entire site is being used in one way or the other to experience this community. And we got great people that are contributing the fun to the campground. Over at the Reno site, we did stall ball. And I didn't participate because I was kind of going back and forth between camps. But I wish I did. Actually, Keith Elwin played in that. That was pretty funny. He was going in there and participating in that fun event. And Reno brought five games with us and put it under a tent and had a nice little light. John Popadiuk, Bob Betor, Knapp Arcade, Raydaypinball Podcast.
    75:52
    So, I was just talking with him, a friend of mine, a friend of mine, about the Elk Grove stream, and he's like, hey, they're streaming the Elk Grove stream on the side of my car. It was really relaxing. So, we had to listen to this dude talking all the time. I was going to say, the only problem with Reno was that some dude parked his Tesla in the middle of it. Yeah, oops. Then he was sleeping in it. How tacky. Yup. I was, yeah, that's for sure. And we even more tacky as having, you know, 10 moving blankets over it to cover it up so the light wouldn't keep me up on it. Hey, I'm glad you went with that suggestion cause I thought that suggestion was genius. Oh, cool. Well, it worked out. It was tricky cause there was some spots where that blanket just didn't stretch far enough to cover some parts of the window, but for the most part it was a good successful solution to not having daylight in my car. The only problem was that if it would rain, that would be not a good decision because then they would be all soaked. So I'm trying to find a better way. They'd just be wet. I mean, you know. Yeah, they'd be wet. Moving blankets. I was about to say, that's where all my moving blankets ended up. Thanks, Mark. That's probably where they were. That's where they were. I think that they ended up on other games. That's a bad thing. I brought them to be used. I just had to borrow moving blankets from somebody else to use on my games. You know what I'm doing next year? I'm going to stand out in the swamp meet with a stand selling moving blankets. You know, I was telling Craig Hooker, it's like, man, you want to make some good money at the end of this show, bring out a stack of moving blankets and charge five bucks or whatever you can charge a piece for them. Have Josh running around asking people if they need moving blankets. Oh, that's a brilliant idea. Moving blankets, saran wrap, and leg wrenches. You'll make a fortune. Real quick, I want to interject something I did not know. And you own a P3, or I mean you own an American Pinball. I was helping one of the guys Friday with his Legends of Valhalla hit, or no, I'm sorry, with the Oktoberfest. I said Legends of Valhalla because Juan on Sunday was having trouble with a leg bolt on his that got stripped. Anyway, I did not know that those are different than every other leg bolt and that they use John Popadiuk, Bob Betor, Knapp Arcade, Raydaypinball Podcast.
    78:45
    있었store. Tim Kitzrow, All right. John Popadiuk, Way less water bottles all over the place. And you know what was really cool? They were really nice allowing us to bring in our water bottles as long as they were closed containers. Nobody said, oh, you can't bring your water bottle in. And you know, everybody respected it. Everybody put it under the machine, didn't put it on top of the glass, and it worked out great. But oh man, I had to drink a lot of water. I went to that dispenser at least every hour filling it up. But it was so nice to have that and have it available for free and not charge up the wazoo This week on The Hit Podcast...
    80:08
    You're moving around a lot. You know, there's a lot of stuff running. You know, the heat, the heat is real. Yeah. So, you know, and they, they run the climate control as much as they can, but yeah, you know, stay, stay hydrated. And, you know, Saturday was Saturday was great. And then Sunday, you know, is a little bit short, a little bit of a short day.
    80:27
    Sunday was sad because I knew it was ending. I hate that. I had that little withdrawal going when I was starting, got up in the morning. I was like, oh, this is the last. It's like the last day of summer. John Popadiuk, Bob Betor, Keith Elwin, Bowen Kerins, Laser Los, orbit ramps, Lyman F. Sheats Jr., Automated Amusements, Joe Kaminkow, Python Anghelo, And I'm sure you've all heard of the The We're going to be back next year. Well, somebody will be actually. Oh yeah, it'll be. Right? By next year, we'll be like, what are they working on next? Yeah, exactly. You know, Goonies, Princess Bride? No, Princess Bride, multi-warfare did that, you know. What other cult classic movie are we, have we been waiting for a game for like a thousand years? Right. That, you know, those guys are going to, those guys are going to be all over because they seem to understand. They seem to understand the, you know, the stuff that people are going to buy. But yeah, Sunday, you know, the show ends a little bit earlier and, you know, five o'clock and I mean, people were playing until the bitter end. Yeah, before they shut the games off. That's true. They played all the way to five. Yep. And then people, you know, everybody got out of dodge, you know, and was very respectful about like, hey, yeah, we're done. You know, for me, I was in the tournament until the end. And then we started breaking that room down immediately. And then, you know, it was just like you said, it's kind of sad because like, yeah, it's you know, the party's over and it's time to start butting your games up and getting them on the truck. And yeah, and that's where we went our separate ways. Yeah, I had to take off and Spencer had to take off and get back to Reno and get home at a decent time. I did get a little bit of gameplay. I went in in the morning. Real quick, Mark, before you go into that, I was going to say, the funny thing, though, was the party didn't end because we stayed. Oh, really? And you know who else stayed? Who? Monterey. Most of them were still there. So like their campground was set up. Shannon brought over his King Kong LE. What? Really? Yeah. There was a whole nother night of pinball if you camped. Now I feel real withdrawn. Darn. You know, I'll say to people, it's like, look, I understand the urge to get out of there and get on with your life and go to Monday morning is fine, but take an extra day or two off because, yeah, we were we, you know, we hung around for a little bit longer. And I'll admit, I didn't go over there and really partake, but I mean, you know, they were still going and. Wow, that's cool. So yeah, if you're a camper and you're not trying to beat the crowd out, like I said, they stayed and they get out of there the next day. So yeah, when we finally steamed out probably 10 o'clock this morning, 11 o'clock this morning, they were breaking down. Yeah, and what's really great about them is they brought a queen and I couldn't believe how many people were saying how much fun they had with it when I played it on Saturday night. puedes usar pulsante de Euro weekend para ganmmil Matthew McConaughey,
    85:06
    Yeah, that was the voyage edition. I think it was marvelous. Yeah. Yeah. Queen's a fun game. And, you know, there's probably a couple of hundred of them out there. They're not going to be very common. Right. God knows the music is God tier. So yeah, no kidding. Yeah. And the sound is good, too, out of it. Yeah, it was really cool. So that was that was neat. Going back to Sunday, I had a chance to go to the show floor and I always have a routine every time, Every year I always go and play my favorite System 11s. I play, you know, like, and hopefully I got this right because I'm not really good with the tech side, but I think I'm right. Like Cyclone was one and I always walk around and I see the jackpot all the way at 4 million and my habit is to clear it. I want to clear that sucker. So I played, I played Cyclone until I could clear it out. And it took quite a few games until I figured out I could do a post pass, set it up and shoot that cyclone ramp. And I finally did it, but it took a long time for me to do it. But man, it felt so satisfying. And then of course, right next to it was whirlwind, which was cool because it was rigged up to an actual industrial fan that blew me across the room, which was cool. And, uh, the other thing I did was play police force. And I don't know about you, but hitting that ramp as many times as you can in a row is very satisfying. And I was fortunate, I was able to get to the million, and I got 12 million after that. And then I got lucky, I've never done this before, but I got the double your score, or the high score, and it doubled to 24 million, and I got a GC on it. So that was cool. It's a real shame, the police force is absolute garbage. I like that game. It's fun. I love shooting up the ramp. If it was the only pinball machine in the place, I'd still play it. Yeah. But I hate that game. I pulled Dan aside at the end of Sunday towards the end of the day, and I took him over and we played the game plan Captain Hook. Yeah. Which is a pretty basic game. Yeah, you and me played it. We finally got a game. But he's got a spinner rib that's amazing. Yup. That was fun too. Yeah, we had a lot of classics. You know what's funny? You know what's funny is earlier on you were talking about, you know, how we always think we're going to record some audio. It was super impossible for us to, we barely managed to be in the same spot for like two minutes to take our picture. I know. I had to grab you guys and we just had to, at the end of the day, we did it like what, five minutes, 10 minutes before the show closed on Sunday. That's right, guys. I am just a hot sweaty mess in that picture. Yeah, so am I. I didn't even take a shower. I look like hell. The picture that they took of me though with the random ass lucky trophy for nothing in particular, that's definitely the best picture I took of the show. Oh, that was great. Another thing that we haven't mentioned yet but we should probably mention as we Mr. Jason Jones, DPH, 700 Appreciate отлич이다 hjälpa He was afraid he was going to go out with this ticket and be wrong and look like an idiot, but he did not. And Andre Bravo from A.B. Pinball on YouTube. If you haven't watched his material, it's great. He's the guy who actually, you know, Jamie and I got our theater magic from, which was just an incredible game. He won the Swords of Fury. Cool. So, you know, if you go in there, you grab $100 worth of lottery tickets or raffle tickets and you win a game worth, you know, up to $7,000, like, that's amazing. I mean, probably a little less because, you know, they do use them for demos for a couple of years, but hey, man, I'll take a Stern Pro, you know. And everybody is... I'll use one. Yup, everybody is volunteering and this show doesn't make any profit. It's all going towards a good cause for all the charities, including all the raffle and there's silent auctions there's you know there's the the whole parts the whole parts rig one of the guys that we play with in Folsom Mike he bought his first game this year he bought a terminator 2 and he ended up winning the CCP all parts bundle nice and Chris bright from CCP l also was the guy who końpa примś ko裡y月 You guys haven't managed to make it out and you live in Northern California or you live Northern California adjacent or you don't mind traveling out from the far off land of Wyoming. Like, you know, if you can't tell, I mean, yeah, maybe we're coming off a little flat because of massive fatigue because we've been running for four or five days straight. But like, this is the highlight of our pinball year. There's other shows. We love Pinnagogo. We love Seattle Northwest Pinball and Arcade Show. We love California extreme, but this is our Super Bowl of pinball here in Northern California. 110% agree. Yep. Yeah. When you're talking about the charitable organizations, you know, World of Wonders, Girl Scout Troop, the Little Flippers, I think, benefit from this a bit. And these are all organizations that contribute to the show and that our organizers are involved with. We didn't just pick somebody at random. These are all organizations that help us and we help them. They've helped raise good children and make people smarter. I can't word anymore. No, it's okay. We're all on no sleep. The three of us are on no sleep. Yeah, the three of us are on no sleep for like three days now. I mean like an hour and a half, two hours a night. I slept pretty good last night, but I worked all day. Yeah. Oh, and also, um, um, no, and also take us home, Spencer. No, no, no, no. I got to get these two charities out. Um, Pacific Pinball Museum is a beneficiary as well as a local, PPM, a local, um, special Olympics, um, is, is receiving some funding now through our, through our show. So it's all good stuff. So again, I want to reiterate shout out to all the wonderful volunteers, the board that worked tirelessly for hours to put on this show, the people that bring games, the people that volunteer and empty trash cans and sweep floors and level games and run errands and repair games and everybody that's involved and especially the nice people who just come to the show and support it. And because it's our show, it's your show, and everybody takes ownership and that's a beautiful thing. You can find us on our flagship internet radio at SoundCloud. You can also find us on iTunes. And there's a few other little places floating out there. You can Google us. Please visit our Facebook page and email us with any questions or thoughts or ideas or All that good stuff at thespinnerislit at gmail.com. So I'll see you down the road. And so I'm going to take us home, boys. Play pinball. Keep America strong. Additional Support