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Episode 15 – Pinball Expo/TSex Strikes Back

Slam Tilt Podcast·podcast_episode·held·Oct 20, 2016
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Analysis

claude-haiku-4-5-20251001 · $0.041

TL;DR

Pinball Expo 2016: Stern vs JJP rivalry peaks; Batman 66 and Dialed In!!! announced; industry tensions high.

Summary

Slam Tilt Podcast covers Pinball Expo 2016, focusing heavily on competitive dynamics between Stern and Jersey Jack Pinball (JJP). Major announcements include Stern's Batman 66 Batman 66 (LE) (sold out at $15,000) and JJP's 'Dialed In!!!' (Pat Lawlor design, $9,000 LE / $12,500 Collector's Edition), with attendee observations on game design, pricing strategy, and industry tension. Notably, Stern banned Pinball News from factory tours and the after-party over critical commentary on Batman 66 pricing.

Key Claims

  • Batman 66 Batman 66 (LE) sold out with 80 units at $15,000 each (originally announced as 30 units)

    high confidence · Ron and Bruce discuss the Batman 66 (LE) sellout; Ron states 'they widely sold out' and Bruce notes '80 people paying $15,000'

  • Pinball News (Martin) was banned from Stern factory tour and after-party due to criticism of Batman 66 pricing as 'milking collectors'

    high confidence · Ron reads the exact quote from Pinball News article critical of pricing; confirms Martin was told he couldn't attend

  • Gary Stern publicly acknowledged ghosting issues in Pinball machines, primarily Ghostbusters, for the first time

    high confidence · Ron: 'he actually came right out and said you've had ghosting issues primarily with Ghostbusters but with some other games' and notes this was the first public acknowledgement

  • Jersey Jack Pinball pre-sold 500 units of Dialed In!!! (unlicensed game) to distributors

    medium confidence · Ron quotes Jack: 'I've already pre-sold 500 unlicensed games, basically insinuating...from his distributors'

  • Stern deliberately scheduled the Batman Kapow booth pizza giveaway (8 PM Thursday) to conflict with Jersey Jack's game unveiling at the same time

    medium confidence · Ron describes timing: 'at 8 o'clock was the big Jersey Jack unveiling...at also at 8 o'clock, the Kapow booth...they brought it out in the hall right next to Jersey Jack'

  • Dialed In!!! features five magnets total (three on bottom, one top, one upper right), photo/selfie modes tied to phone integration, and subway system with trap doors

    high confidence · Ron provides detailed playfield breakdown based on hands-on play at Expo

  • Pat Lawlor displayed notably positive energy about pinball and the industry at Expo 2016, contrasting with his previously pessimistic public stance

    high confidence · Ron: 'This was definitely a different Pat Lawlor. He was like, this is awesome. You could tell he was thoroughly enjoying being there. Big time.'

Notable Quotes

  • “Stern were clearly milking this title for every last drop they could wring out of collectors, and that appears to be fully confirmed by the prices for the three models.”

    Pinball News@ 6:25 — The critical comment about Batman 66 pricing that led to Stern banning Pinball News from factory tour and after-party

  • “I've already pre-sold 500 unlicensed games, basically insinuating...He's literally already pre-sold 500 of this game.”

    Jersey Jack Pinball@ 19:44 — Demonstrates JJP's confidence in Dialed In! sales despite unlicensed theme; directly contradicts Stern's assertion that licensed themes are necessary

  • “You guys know Lyman. He wants to get every single display effect, every sound effect all synchronized perfectly, and it's just not there yet.”

    George Gomez@ 15:32 — Explains why Batman 66 machines were non-playable at Expo; indicates software/code quality concerns

  • “If you have the legs all cranked down, it's automatically at 6.5 degrees.”

    Pat Lawlor@ 21:52 — Indicates Dialed In! design includes automatic leg leveling feature similar to other manufacturers (possibly Williams reference)

  • “I think it will earn very well...the only thing I have is that photo booths...those things earn well now you don't have to go to your photo booth you just go to your pinball machine”

    Tim@ 32:17 — Speculates on operator appeal of Dialed In! based on selfie/photo feature revenue potential

  • “The thing it seems like more than just a cell phone theme is it's like a rescue the city theme...it has this cool art direction that's just totally custom.”

    Tim@ 23:20 — Defends the 'Dialed In!' title as part of broader SimCity disaster/rescue narrative rather than just phone-themed game

Entities

Slam Tilt Podcastorganization[name withheld pending review]personBruce NightingalepersonTimpersonPinball ExpoeventStern PinballcompanyJersey Jack PinballcompanyPinball News

Signals

  • ?

    industry_signal: Clear evidence of deliberate competitive scheduling and public dig campaigns between Stern and Jersey Jack at Pinball Expo 2016, including simultaneous event scheduling (Batman Kapow booth pizza at 8 PM vs JJP unveiling at 8 PM) and critical comments about each other's design philosophies (LCD backbox size, licensed vs unlicensed themes)

    high · Ron documents multiple instances of what he characterizes as gamesmanship: Gary Stern's comments about backglass visibility vs JJP's full-screen LCD, Joe Kamikow's dismissal of unlicensed games, and the deliberate timing of Stern's free pizza giveaway during JJP's unveiling

  • ?

    product_concern: Batman 66 machines were non-playable at Expo despite being on display, with George Gomez explaining that code/software synchronization is not yet acceptable for public play, suggesting serious software development delays

    high · George Gomez: 'He wants to get every single display effect, every sound effect all synchronized perfectly, and it's just not there yet.' Ron confirms machines were only display pieces, not playable demos

  • ?

    collector_signal: Jersey Jack Pinball's repeated release of multiple limited edition variants (Wizard of Oz Standard + second LE; Hobbit Standard + Smaug + Black Arrow) creates backlash from community for maximizing revenue through FOMO-driven releases rather than genuine product differentiation

    high · Bruce: 'You made your money on your first two limited editions. Really bad. Really bad taste.' Ron notes JJP made 'second limited run and called it something else' for each IP

  • ?

    regulatory_signal: Stern Pinball banned Pinball News (media outlet) from factory tour and after-party citing critical comments about Batman 66 pricing, representing a notable media relations incident and potential free speech/criticism suppression

    high · Ron reads Pinball News critique of Batman 66 as 'milking collectors' and confirms Martin was explicitly told he couldn't attend factory tour or $30 after-party

Transcript

groq_whisper · $0.381

0:00
Look, honey, you wouldn't hurt me, would you, sweetheart? Sweetheart, you're reasonable. After all, we're married.
0:17
Consider that a divorce. Coming to you from beautiful upstate New York, this is the Slam Tilt Podcast, a show about all things pinball. I'm Ron Hallett here with my co-host, Bruce Nightingale. Hello. And welcome to episode 15, Star Trek Generations. Or... Or as I like to call it, the Pinball Expo Post Game Spectacular Extravaganza. Woohoo! How exciting. Yes. So I heard you had a nice vacation last week from two things.
1:05
I did? Yes. One was from this podcast you disappeared from. Yes, I was not on last week. Well, I kind of was. Yes, you were. He actually edited more than he ever edited before, guys. So I have to say thank you for doing.
1:21
He did a great job of editing. Unfortunately, it was a long episode, and it was a good episode. We had a lot of good feedback from it, but unfortunately, Ron was not in it. We had a couple of zingers in there, too, and I have a couple of notes from that also, so we'll redo them again this time. I defended myself awesomely, and it could not be heard. Yes, so welcome back. Yes, thank you. Thank you. And welcome back from your vacation from Expo. Yes, and I'm not the only new person on this podcast. Well, it's a return visitor. Yes, a return visitor. So we've only had two guests.
2:00
And I don't think we could bring back the same person two weeks in a row. No. So, hello, Tim. Hello. How's it going? Thanks for having me on the podcast once again. Thank you for being on the podcast, sir. Exactly. Thank you very much for being on. We had a great response from you when you were on. We love having you, plus you also are a great friend. that's why we wanted you on. Thank you very much, Bruce. Plus, he gives us that younger demographic we're looking for. Oh, sorry. I thought I was on mute. Damn it. Sorry. No, because we're so freaking old. Yeah, well, one of us. But yes.

Jersey Jack plans a third limited edition variant of Hobbit (The Hobbit Black Arrow Special Edition) following The Hobbit (Standard Edition) and Hobbit Smaug releases

medium confidence · Ron notes JJP announced The Hobbit (Standard Edition), Hobbit Smaug, then The Hobbit Black Arrow Special Edition Arrow Special Edition, and predicts more may follow

“You made your money on your first two limited editions. Really bad. Really bad taste.”

Bruce@ 21:10 — Criticism of Jersey Jack's strategy of releasing multiple limited edition variants (Standard, Smaug, Black Arrow) to maximize revenue

  • “It will either just go all the way around so you can do nice flow ramp shots. It will divert it to like a mini little upper part...Or the third thing it will do, it will throw it around to like an eject saucer...”

    Ron@ 26:09 — Detailed description of multi-function ramp shots, exemplifying Pat Lawlor design philosophy of shot variety

  • “Pat, why the fuck did you just kill my flipper?”

    Vince (from RGP/Pinside, captured on Ron's YouTube video)@ 29:04 — Humorous moment illustrating the laser/flipper disable mechanic in multiball; shows Pat Lawlor engaging with players

  • “I think one of the years I did it, you were with me...There was, yeah, like, Spider-Man. Like you said, the targets were on wrong or something.”

    Ron@ 5:33 — References previous Stern factory tour quality control issues (Spider-Man with misaligned targets)

    • organization
    Batman 66game
    Dialed In!game
    Gary Sternperson
    Pat Lawlorperson
    George Gomezperson
    Jack Dangerperson
    Jack Dangerperson
    Pinball Newsperson
    Steve Bowdenperson
    Joe Kaminkowperson
    Keith Johnsonperson
    Vinceperson
    Aliengame
    The Wizard of Ozgame
    The Hobbitgame
    Ghostbusters (Premium)game
  • ?

    community_signal: Jack Danger from Stern actively streamed gameplay at Expo via Twitch, with stream viewers recognizing attendees in real-time (Ron identified by chat), indicating deepening integration of streaming content with in-person events

    medium · Ron: 'Jack said, someone on the chat said, is that Ron?...I have no idea who recognized me' while watching Jack stream Ghostbusters Premium at vendor hall

  • ?

    design_philosophy: Dialed In! demonstrates Pat Lawlor's design philosophy of multi-function shots where single playfield elements trigger different outcomes based on game state (ramp diverts to three different destinations depending on mode/state), maximizing decision-making and shot variety

    high · Ron's detailed breakdown: left ramp offers three distinct shot options depending on game state; right orbit feeds different ramps; five total magnets create varied ball reactions

  • ?

    product_launch: Jersey Jack Pinball announced Dialed In! as a new Pat Lawlor design with three pricing tiers: $9,000 LE (6,999 unit limit), $12,500 Collector's Edition, and an unannounced third variant (Black Arrow Edition equivalent), with 500 units pre-sold to distributors

    high · Ron's firsthand report of JJP unveiling; Jack Danger quoted pre-selling 500 units; Keith Johnson discussed pricing strategy; third variant indicated by Ron's prediction of additional release

  • ?

    product_strategy: Stern's Batman 66 Super LE priced at $15,000 (2x typical premium pricing) for 30 units (expanded to 80 sold); suggests aggressive premium pricing strategy and willingness to expand limited run quantities based on demand, conflicting with scarcity positioning

    high · Ron: 'they widely sold out' with 80 units instead of announced 30; Pinball News article criticized pricing as 'milking collectors' and 'shamelessly' cashing in

  • ?

    gameplay_signal: Ron and Tim's assessments of Dialed In! highlight Pat Lawlor's approach to balancing accessible shot design with deep rule complexity; both players emphasize shot quality and flow over rules comprehension, suggesting design prioritizes playability for casual players while maintaining competitive depth

    high · Tim: 'I think it's really, really awesome...it's like a disaster SimCity game.' Ron: 'when I play this game, just immediately...it's like, oh, it's the Pat Lawler game' due to obvious shot quality

  • ?

    technology_signal: Dialed In! features novel phone integration with selfie/photo capture modes tied to game state (selfies on every switch hit during certain modes), and phone-based mode selection, representing emerging trend of smartphone integration in pinball design targeting younger demographics

    high · Ron describes selfie mode 'like dough mode on Simpsons...click, click, click...picture after picture of your face will go on the display'; Tim notes this feature attracts attention and engagement

  • ~

    sentiment_shift: Pat Lawlor displayed notably positive, enthusiastic energy about Dialed In! and the industry at Expo 2016, representing a significant shift from his previously documented pessimistic public statements about pinball's future

    high · Ron: 'This was definitely a different Pat Lawlor. He was like, this is awesome. You could tell he was thoroughly enjoying being there.' Contrasts with 'Doom and gloom' statements from earlier seminars

  • ?

    business_signal: Gary Stern publicly acknowledged ghosting/playfield defects in Stern machines for the first time, admitting issues primarily with Ghostbusters but affecting other games, then downplayed scope by claiming only one defective machine known in Chicago area, offering distributor-replacement remedy

    high · Ron confirms Gary Stern 'came right out and said you've had ghosting issues primarily with Ghostbusters' and offered replacement process; this was 'first acknowledgement of anything' prior to Pentastic discussion

  • $

    market_signal: Dialed In! pricing ($9,000-$12,500) creates accessibility barrier for most U.S. operators outside major markets like NYC; Ron and Tim debate whether operator revenue potential (via selfie/photo features) justifies investment cost for location-based play

    medium · Ron: 'At a price point of other than maybe New York City and some of your bigger markets I don't see how operators are going to be getting this game.' Tim counters with photo booth earning potential hypothesis

    • 2:42
    I've been elected since the 80s. I'm sorry. I'm not that old. I can fill Bruce and Ron in on the latest fashion trends so we can really get the younger demographic dialed into the podcast here. Yes. What, T-shirts and jeans are still not in?
    2:58
    JNCOs are back, if you didn't hear. What the hell's a JNCO? Yeah, what's a JNCO? Is that like a Geico?
    3:04
    I don't know if I want to explain this. In the 90s, there's a pair of jeans that makes it big because it's extremely wide. They brought it back last year. So it's like a tree for my fat ass.
    3:16
    Well, it gets even longer at the legs. Some of them are up to 36 inches long at the legs. So it's like 70s bell-bottoms? I'm confused. Yeah. What the hell? Okay. Gee, that's why you need me. Yes. I know. We do need you. I am very glad we have you. I'm trying to make references that no one can understand. You totally lost me on that one. Totally lost me. So, first, news. We're just going to go really not do our normal news report. We're just going to go right into show report. Show report. Yes, we're going to go into Pinball Expo 2016, which I noticed on Pinside. I hate to mention that first, but Mike Pace acted as usual. You know, what can we do to make the Expo better?
    4:07
    And the usual response is, like, remove yourself from it. No, I've known Mike for years. He doesn't mean bad. He really doesn't. He means very well.
    4:18
    He's gotten the show a lot better. He really has. You wouldn't know that by the written string there. Well, look, as other people have said, pinsiders have a bigger bark than their bite. There was some validity to a lot of the stuff that was said. I would say it was definitely less people there this year. I would say the vendor hall definitely had less stuff in it this year. Because I wasn't there. I mean, I could tell you, Just by the fact that I was able to get on games quite easily in the free game room, which is not usually the case. So that's what I usually use as my barometer.
    5:00
    Okay. Well, let's go over. Let's go over. Let's start at the beginning. So I get there Thursday. Okay. And the first. You're there after. You're actually after the. You come in what time? I can't. We got there around 10 or 11. So we were not there for the factory tour. Okay. which you never have done, I don't think, have you? I've been to, like, two or three factory tours. I did it last year. Oh, you did? Okay. Yeah. I think one of the years I did it, you were with me. We both went to the factory tour. Was that the Star Trek one?
    5:33
    There was, yeah, there was, like, Spider-Man. Like you said, the targets were on wrong or something. That much I remember. Yes. And so, like, and they had footage from it that actually Stern produced because the pinball news wasn't allowed to go yeah that's the first thing i want to go on to yeah yeah basically pinball news typically goes on the tour and they they come back with uh pictures from the tour because they are pinball news and they were banned from the tour and they were also banned from the stern after party due to comments made about the uh batman 66 game and I actually looked this up earlier to see exactly what they said to piss them off that much, and here we go. Basically, Stern were clearly milking this title for every last drop they could wring out of collectors, and that appears to be fully confirmed by the prices for the three models.
    6:37
    The Super LE shamelessly tries to cash in with a price tag of $15,000 for the 30 machines available. So I would assume it's that wording that was the issue there.
    6:50
    Well, I guess we're not going to ever get an interview or anything from Stern, probably banned also, too, once they get to know us a little bit more. Hey! Yeah, yeah, yeah. Bruce will not be allowed in the factory tour. Sorry, sir. You cannot attend.
    7:03
    But, you know, Martin has been doing this for upteen years. That's what I can remember. I believe he was doing it before I ever started going to Expo. Yeah, exactly. And to cut him out for one comment, his opinion, and guess what? You know, we see opinions all the time on the news. It seems like it's getting more and more popular lately. You know, I think it was very childish. I think they're listening to the wrong people there. When another podcast makes comments and then kind of had to apologize this week and not had to apologize to other people with comments too. So I'm right in Nate's boat, and he even said, he goes, I'm probably not on their A-list right now for getting interviews like that. I actually, I don't think he went too far. He was stating the truth. It is too much money.
    7:56
    What is too much money? They sold out. It can't be too much money. Guess what? Then we just proved 80 idiots are in this freaking hobby. Yeah, not 30, like originally was stated. Yes, we can get into that. Yeah, I was going to say that. Not only did they sell out, they widely sold out. Yeah, I don't know why you would sell it out either, you know, but Tim, what do you think of 80 people paying $15,000 for a machine with matchbox cars on it?
    8:28
    I still have some student loan debt I'd like to get paid off, and if any of those people would also like to donate to the Help Tim Pay Down His Student Loans Fund, And maybe you feel better about yourself. Maybe you wouldn't. But, hey, it really helped me out.
    8:46
    You know, I don't understand the whole point about it. But cutting out Martin was really a terrible move. Really. I lost a lot of respect for Stern on that one.
    9:02
    And you didn't bash him either. He just stated what he found out from Stern afterwards in his articles about Expo. He just said, I tried, you know, I was told I couldn't come there, and that was it, you know.
    9:13
    He could have made it a rant. Yeah, yeah. I talked to Martin. He probably will be getting his $30 back for the party that he wasn't allowed to attend, so. Yeah, he should have. But it's a very low-class move.
    9:29
    There was a lot of low-class stuff going on, which I'll get into. There was a lot of games. If there was a theme for this expo, it was definitely the J.J.P. versus Stern. That was a definite 100% five. There was deliberate scheduling of things against each other, which I will get into. There's more of even than that. There's actually three or four companies. Yeah, yeah, but Alien was there, but they were kind of doing their own thing. But they did it, but at the same time. They did it at the same time as J.J.P. Yeah, but I'm talking like you asked me during the Expo what was the vibe of the Expo. That was the vibe of the Expo, which we'll get into now. The first thing I attended, I attended the Gary Stern seminar. Yes. That he has every year on like the state of the company and all that stuff. And he had Joe Kamikow there. Yes, he did. Who also spoke. And they were talking about like the Batman game and all the usual stuff. And they were talking about the 30 years of Stern, you know, slash Data East, slash Sega.
    10:36
    And he got to the end. Well, actually, before he got to the end, there were some digs on Jersey Jack. Because they brought the Super LE in. The Batman Super LE were showing it off.
    10:50
    And they were showing, they were basically stating how, look at the LCD. We made it this size so you can see the back glass. we believe that back glass is a big part of the game. Imagine if you had an LCD that took up the whole back box and you wouldn't have this back glass, which was, of course, a direct.
    11:08
    That was a direct comment towards JJP and their full LCD in the back box. And then they also, when Joe Kamikow was speaking, he also stated how basically they're talking about license themes and how it would be stupid to do a non-licensed theme, who's going to buy that? It's just not a smart move, in his opinion. So, again, another dig against Jersey Jack. Well, don't forget, he goes after licenses, so of course. Yes. These are both digs. But I just want to point out to the people who don't know this, he goes after licenses to make his product more attractable when he's in a casino Because people do gravitate to things that are in their past. To weigh in on both of those, they're both very odd digs, in my opinion. The first one with getting rid of the back glass.
    12:09
    Yeah, well, a video display can be considered a back glass that has animation, too. Their comment was, if you turn off a JJT machine, you see nothing. At least when you turn off a Batman, you see a back glass. But it's a dark back glass, so...
    12:28
    Go ahead. The second one's weirder because if they're saying that, why would you do an unlicensed theme, they should be happy because their opinion is, oh, this game's not going to sell, so therefore we're going to win this battle or whatever. So they just didn't even need to make that dig if they really believed that. Right? Yeah. Well, they didn't see the machine yet at that time either. Right. That's true. They didn't see Dialing yet. Well, they knew it was the original theme, though. No, I know that, but they didn't know what it looked like, how it played, everything like that. Well, I thought the most interesting part of Gary's talk was at the very end.
    13:08
    And it was at the very end, like, oh, one more thing. And he acknowledged, I believe for the first time publicly, and he was acknowledged, the ghosting. he actually came right out and said you've had ghosting issues primarily with Ghostbusters but with some other games so he took the usual approach, admitted it then downplayed it, the second part where he said like I only know of one in the Chicago area that has this issue and it's actually an Attack from Mars, it's not even one of our games, that's actually what he said but basically he said contact your distributor if your plate bill is screwed up we'll replace it and there you go I've seen it I've seen the ghost thing I've seen it on multiple machines it's much more common I'm pretty sure than one game in Chicago yeah that was his comment someone recorded that seminar I am verbatim what he said and then he said it was an attack from Mars I don't know if he was being funny or whatever but there you go So, it's like, huh, okay. So that was pretty cool that he actually mentioned that. Because the only other mention of that, during actually Pentastic, that's how long ago this was, Steve Ritchie mentioned the production delays, but wouldn't say what it was. But that was kind of the first acknowledgement of anything. And then this one was the actual issue. So that was interesting.
    14:44
    So then let's see. I'm looking at the schedule. That was at four, and then they showed the Super LE. Then they wheeled the Super LE into the vendor hall, which opened at six. So I got to go in there and see the three Batmans, and they're all, I almost forgot one of the most important things, the fact that the Batmans weren't playable. When they had the Super LE in during Gary Stern's speech, George Gomez showing it, and he was totally into it. You could tell he loves the Batman 66. Look how great this is. Look at the bat signal. This plays like this has 30,000 clips from the, you know, it's on and on. And at the very end, he's there, and I'm trying to get this exactly what he said. I'm sure someone recorded this, so you can check my memory. But it was something like, you guys know Lyman. He wants to get every single, you know, display effect, every sound effect all synchronized perfectly, and it's just not there yet. So, you know, he's not going to let me let you play the game. So it's just going to be for basically something to that effect. So basically the software is not at a point that Lyman is happy with for you to play the game. That is pretty much what he said.
    15:58
    So when they opened the vendor hall and I went in there, you had the three Batman games basically just sitting there,
    16:07
    which is, you know, it's lame. I mean, they had to do what they had to do. But I remember going to one of my first Allentown shows, and someone had, like, a fun house that looked like the most awesome-looking fun house ever. And they literally – it wasn't for sale, and you couldn't play it. It was just sitting there just to show off. Like, that is the stupidest thing ever. And to be talking about a party the next day about it. But we'll go into that a little later on. Yes, yes, yes, the party. We'll still go into Jack. Yes, so you got that. You got the vendor hall. and the vendor hall definitely had less vendors.
    16:44
    They had a Ghostbusters premium there that Jack Danger was streaming. And I walked over there and somebody knew who I was because Jack said, someone on the chat said, is that Ron? So whoever you were who recognized me, hello. I have no idea who recognized me. But I got to play Premium for the first time. So the first time I played Premium was on a Twitch feed. Not your own, which is sitting in your house. Yeah, not my own, which is sitting in my house. So I played two games. It's all right. Again, didn't really play it enough to tell anything. We'll be going into that a little later on also. Yeah. So that was fine. So then during this time, they unveiled over at the Hooters, well, Twin Peaks, it's called. It's basically Hooters. across the street. It's actually in the Expo parking lot. They unveiled Alien, which I saw the pictures. It was really crowded in there, so I didn't get to play it then. But we got to see Steve's live video. Yeah, Steve Bowden had a live stream of it, so he kind of got to see it in action. Hi, Steve. Fun with bonus. So, he's under an exclusivity agreement with the Coast to Coast Pinball, so we can't get him on here. Oh, really?
    18:04
    I don't know either. I don't think so. I think you come on and we ask them. I went to the, at 8 o'clock was the big Jersey Jack unveiling.
    18:12
    And they had like five games under rafts, under black sheets. And the gamesmanship started as also at 8 o'clock, the Kapow booth, which is, that's the booth where the Batman, the Batman games were, the Kapow booth. We're going to be giving away free stuff and pizza. which originally they were going to give the pizza away at the booth, but then they were told you can't do that, so they had to bring it out in the hall. So they brought it out in the hall right next to Jersey Jack, right next to the room where they were going to unveil the games, wearing their stern hats, giving out the free pizza. So you got free food.
    18:56
    Okay, I'm just laying down some. You got free food from Stern and Kapow Pinball on Thursday night. Gotcha. Okay, let's go back to Jersey Jack. Yeah, so what they did with the Jack, people were coming into the ballroom, and they were told, like, no, leave the ballroom. We want to set everything up a certain way. So everyone had to leave, and we all walked out. Then after like 10 minutes, walked back in, and they had the games, like, you know, under wraps.
    19:26
    And I think they did a Periscope feed of the unveiling also. So, yeah. That's where I saw it, actually. So you had Jersey Jack, and one of the first things he says is, you know, some people say you can't sell any unlicensed games.
    19:44
    But he says something like, I've already pre-sold 500 unlicensed games, basically insinuating. He's literally already pre-sold 500 of this game. I don't know. Yeah, from his distributors. Yeah. From his distributors. Yeah. So I thought that was like, hmm, interesting. Okay. then Pat Waller comes down well hold on you still got more there well all the other announcements okay yes two announcements there's actually three he said Wizard of Oz is still being made Hobbit the final code for the Hobbit is now going to be done oh yes it's going to be released and just like we did with the supposed limited run of Wizard of Oz and then we created They had a second limited run and called it something else. They're going to do the same thing with this one, because you have the Hobbit Standard, the Hobbit Smaug. I hope I say that right. Then you had the Hobbit Black Arrow Edition.
    20:43
    What the F? What the fuck? That's just to get more money from you. It's limited. That's the problem. Yeah. That's the problem with Jack, and I have a big beef with this. You made, first, the original limited edition.
    20:57
    Then you make the smog edition. Then you make different side art with the things. Now, oh, that was sold out. I've got to make something else.
    21:09
    Sorry, Jack. You made your money on your first two limited editions. Really bad. Really bad taste. Your first two limited editions, Bruce is saying. Bruce is kind of breaking up here. I think it might be the hotels. He's at a hotel, and I don't think their internet connection may be not the best in the world. No, and the hookers are all around me. Yes, yes. So, yes, he said that.
    21:36
    And Pavlo came down, and first they kind of showed some of the things they changed, like the cabinet, they made some changes. The bubble level's back. Woo-hoo, bubble levels. They made the LCD so it swings out so you can service stuff.
    21:52
    What I like the best is if you have the legs all cranked down, it's automatically at 6.5 degrees. Yes, which is just like another manufacturer, along with the bubble level. Yeah, I wonder who that is. Yeah, maybe that could be like Williams. Yeah. So they went over that technical stuff. And then I can't remember if it was before or after he unveiled it, But he made a comment that, you know, in our games, we don't put off-the-store-shelf toys on our games. We have custom-molded pieces on our games, which, of course, is another stern dig.
    22:31
    Then they unveiled it. Dialed in. And actually, before they did it, they gave out, like, this little mini comic book for dialed in to anyone who was there. So that's pretty neat. It was like the big unveiling. And like the last panel of the comic book had a guy about to hit the button, you know, the Pat Waller button, the red button. Yeah, the red button on the Switch, yeah. So they unveiled it. And I might be the only one who liked the title. Everyone else seems to hate the title. I don't mind it. It's actually growing on me. Yeah, dialed in. But what do you think of the title, Tim? Just so that everyone knows you're still there.
    23:09
    This is not a joke. I'm 100% on board with it. I think it's really, really awesome. Okay. So you have people that really like it and my cell phone is okay, which is totally not the norm. So go ahead. Tell me your reason why. The thing it seems like more than just a cell phone theme is it's like a rescue the city theme. It's not just one thing about cell phones. It's like this whole story. And I really like the art style being this sort of like comic book rescue sort of like thing. From what I've seen of it, it looks like, hey, it has this cool art direction that's just totally custom. Yeah. It's like a disaster SimCity game. SimCity disaster. The name of the city is called Quantum City, which is what a lot of people were saying. That would have been a better name, just calling it Quantum City. But I don't know. If you saw the cabinet art, it's not dialed in. It's dialed in with an exclamation at the end. That's important. That is part of the title, and it does look cool on the side. I like it for a couple reasons. First, it's a little bit like Atoms, with the three magnets on the bottom and your lanes being exactly set up like Atoms. You have the voices from, like, Roadshow. You have Crazy Bob. And you have the voice for, like, the computer, like, Safecracker, the Candy 2000s. She's got a lot of different game pieces into this game. There was a lot of Wizard Blocks in this, too, for anyone who's ever seen the original, the prototype. I will say, so I got to play a ton of it.
    24:44
    And I've made it clear, I think, on previous podcasts what I think of Wizard of Oz and Hobbit. I am not a rules guy. I'm not saying, like, the game totally has shitty rules. I will notice that. But I am more of a shot guy. I like how games shoot.
    25:02
    I never liked Wizard of Oz. I thought it had a lot of crap on it, but I just never had fun shooting.
    25:12
    Hobbit, I have no fun shooting that at all. No, I agree. It's just, what is the upper flipper for? You hit the drop targets, and maybe to redirect the ball, if it's coming down the orbit a different direction. There's, like, two things.
    25:25
    I don't care if it's got, like, you know, 30 modes and 12 levels of whatever, and I just don't like shooting it. when I play this game, just immediately, if you've played enough with the different designers, if you just stepped up to this thing, it's like, oh, it's the Pat Lawler game. I mean, it makes it very apparent to you immediately who designed this game.
    25:49
    And there are so many shots that all feel good, and a lot of them do different things. It has, if you're a fan of, like, the taxi or fishtails, like, crisscrossing habit trail ramp thing, You will like this. You can combo that. But the left ramp will do three different things depending on what's going on. It will either just go all the way around so you can do nice flow ramp shots. It will divert it to like a mini little upper part where it will just fall into the pop bumpers. Or the third thing it will do, it will throw it around to like an eject saucer at the top that will eject it out right to your upper right flipper where you can hit it off another ramp.
    26:29
    That's like three different things for one shot. Now, the right orbit actually feeds the ramp that comes back to your – make sure I get this right.
    26:40
    It feeds the ramp that comes back to you. Then the left orbit either goes all the way around to the upper right flipper, or there's a trap door there that comes up, and it'll go underneath. There's a full subway system in the game. On the right side, it has a magnet like the Ripley's. It's up higher, but it's like the same thing. It doesn't really drain you. It just kind of throws the ball around in a cool-looking way. It has at least two magnets in the middle of the play field that screw with the ball and vary multi-ball. They're up higher than they are in Adam's family.
    27:14
    There's five total. There's five, okay. Five total, three on the bottom, one on the top where you saw, and then one on the upper right-hand side. I heard somebody mention that in one of the videos. It has in the center, well, it has the guy that comes across like Buster Bass Dracula style, or you could say Big Buck Hunter style, however you want to look at it. Some dude on a target, he comes across, you hit him. Then it also has a hologram thing in the center, which I believe if you hit it, it either stops it there and throws it back at you, or it actually goes through up one of the ramps, like a habit trail, and comes around. I was just doing this from memory here. It has the Wizard Blocks inserts. The Wizard Blocks had these, like, dotted inserts that came down and, like, crisscrossed. And these have almost the exact same thing. And they're basically pointing at your flipper. And what happens is if you're in multi-ball, they will fire at you. And you'll see them coming down, the lights. and if you're trapping a ball and you're not paying attention, it will kill your flipper.
    28:26
    It will go dead and quiver, like, oh, die, and then it'll come back after a second or two. And you can stop the laser by hitting the target. You can stop the lasers by hitting the targets they come from. So if anyone checks out our YouTube channel, I can finally plug it because I have all the games I'm talking about. I have footage. Even Batman, which who cares? You can't see any gameplay. But you can see I got Vince the corn from RGP and from Pinstine. He's playing it, and he's got the ball trapped. And you can hear Pat Lawler yelling at him, incoming, incoming. And he's like, what the hell are you talking about? And his flipper dies. Then he has to, you know, Pat, why the fuck did you just kill my flipper?
    29:08
    And Pat comes over and explains the rule, like, you know, you got to hit the target, the laser when it comes down. it just played so good. So, Tim, you think Ron hates the game?
    29:21
    No, I think he likes it. I like it, too. I like it. Hey, Mikey. So, now, hold on. Now, tell them the price. Yeah, okay. Yeah, the price. Three options. Three? There's only two that I know of. There's three. Okay, you'll have to tell me about the third one. I'm unaware of the third one. The basic is $9,000. No. It was called the LE. Yeah. No, no, no, no. Yes, yes, it is. If you listen to it. I did listen to it. If you go to their site, the LE is $9,000, and it's listed as a limited run of $6,999. In other words, it is their main one.
    30:01
    And I talked to Keith Johnson about this, and we can get into that later. But that was announced, and the collector's edition was announced. collector's edition is like 12.5k so but the thing is I'm going to say is there's going to be a third one that's not well some of their programmer didn't hear about it let's put it that way I guarantee the programmer didn't know about Black Arrow until like three weeks ago or four weeks ago okay so I played a ton of it But, I mean, the price is too high for me to consider.
    30:45
    And the weird thing is, and those who have been at, I'll bring this up. Pat Lawler, in a lot of his previous seminars, especially near the end, he was kind of down on pinball, honestly. Doom and gloom, it's over, all that. This was definitely a different Pat Lawler. He was like, this is awesome. You could tell he was thoroughly enjoying being there. Big time.
    31:13
    You can see him in your video when you have the senior just talking about where the flipper gets disabled. He's right there on the video. He's like, see, the city's attacking you, so you've got to watch out for their lasers. They're going to disable your thing. He's all excited talking about this game and explaining it. Yeah, he was like that the whole time. I mean, he was totally into it. And another thing he's always been into, on all the seminars I've ever attended, into, like, supporting operators. He will always and this was no exception he would do like if you an operator you know They go stand up Or the operators you know everyone applaud the operators At a price point of other than maybe New York City and some of your bigger markets I don't see how operators are going to be getting this game. I don't know. What do you think, Tim? You go to the New York City area. I'm sure they'll have one there. Yes, and I think operators will love this game because I think it will earn very well. I don't have any data to support this. the only thing I have is that photo booths I guess it's an arcade you know when people just go into a photo booth and get the pictures taken those things earn well now you don't have to go to your photo booth you just go to your pinball machine and it's taking photos of you and from what I heard this feature really attracted people to look at the game and grab people's attention on the game Well, this goes to your point you talked about almost a month ago, Tim. Innovation, new stuff coming out. I know they already had this in development, but boy, they are looking at the younger generation, aka yourself and other players, and saying, wow, this is what's going to grab new people. We need to grab new people. Unfortunately, I've heard this feel from Pat before when it came to Safecracker and a couple other things. They're like, look, State Park has been the newest thing. It keeps people wanting to come back and collect these coins. And at the time, coins were very popular. You know, so who knows? I thought it was incredibly technology. You know, you can actually use your phone for certain modes. Yeah, let's talk about that. The two main features, the phone features, are, one, there's a certain mode. It will take selfies of you. And if you get it going, it's like it will take a selfie every switch hit. So think of, like, dough mode on Simpsons. You know, dough, dough, dough, dough, dough, except with selfies. Like, click, click, click, click, and, like, picture after picture of your face will go on the display over and over and over, and it'll cover the whole thing. It's pretty funny. Yeah, you had people, like, going next to the dude playing, giving him the finger to see if it would come out on the, you know, the selfie, that kind of thing. They also had Bluetooth connectivity where you put your phone on the glass over, it's like, I think it's three or four blue lights.
    34:04
    And it pairs with the game. When you start multiball, you can then play it with your phone. And supposedly it unlocks, like you can do things, kind of like maybe the handles on Demoman where you hit stuff with the handles, it's worth more. If you do it with a cell phone, it's worth more, that kind of thing.
    34:23
    Great ideas. Yeah, it was pretty neat. It was definitely neat. Definitely neat. And I honestly think it was the best game of the show. Yeah, I agree with you, Bruce. Yes. Another thing with the selfie feature is it's, I think when people saw the dialed-in theme, said, oh, man, this could be tacky. This could be such a desperate appeal to people my age, to millennials or whatever you want to call younger people, that it doesn't go over well. it's just like something that's very out of touch for other people buying the game. But it really didn't seem like that. I mean, the selfie feature to me is a great use of that screen because it's dynamic content. It's dynamic images on the display that change based on wherever the game is, which you haven't ever had before. So just that as a good way to incorporate how could we put some dynamic video into a pinball machine is an interesting idea in my opinion. Yes, and another cool thing, and I think I have this in one of the parts of my video, it has like this little ticker that runs across the bottom of the screen, like the news ticker, and it's got comical things, like a woman locks herself in her house or whatever. There is a bunch of them, and I'm sure they'll end up, there'll be more and more, but I laughed my ass off. I thought that was hilarious. I mean, the whole thing is just goofy. It was just fun. It was totally original. Enjoyable. Wow, what a concept. It was fun, which I've never had playing a Jersey Jack game before. Fun. Now, hold on. We gave the props to the game. Well, I want to give one more prop here. Okay. Before I start going back into the dig. Yeah, before we go into the digs.
    36:05
    The software is like 20% done. That's what they said. I talked to Keith himself. It's like 20% done. So it's got a long ways to go. But the actual hardware, the game itself, it had maybe one ball that went airborne and got stuck behind something that they had to get it out. That was it. These are five games that got just pounded for like three straight days. Well, I don't know if they were there Sunday, but at least three straight days. The thing had no issues. Nothing. And when you were playing that game, I mean, every shot worked. Everything worked. So the software might have only been 20% done, but that play field was definitely fully vetted, if you will. I mean, I just saw no issues with it. As opposed to some of the other, at least one of the other games. We'll get into that. So what's your dig? I'm very impressed with it, you know. I got two of them. Okay. What has Jersey Jack been talking about all for the past year? I don't want anybody's money he wasn't going to take any pre-order money the game was going to be out before he charged for it yeah and that's just the total 180 again it really annoys me what did he do just explain so I take it that you can pre-order or deposit put deposits down but you weren't going to get the game for at least 9 months another wait game I'll tell you, though, as done as that play field is, that month, all those months are for the software. That's it. I mean, it's not like they have to get anything more working.
    37:51
    But the good thing is they moved the electronics from the bottom of the play field to now the back box. Yeah. Yeah, I mentioned that. Yeah, it's basically, it's a Williams cabinet now with an LCD in it. Yes. You know, and I'll say, for those out there who like them, and that's probably most of us, this felt like a Williams game when you're playing it, which it should. It has all Williams mechs in it. But I never felt with Wizard of Oz or Hobbit that it felt like a Williams game. This thing feels like a Williams game. The flippers, just the way it plays. I think you can see it in the footage I took, just how fast that thing is. I mean, it plays like a Williams game. I think they hit a home run. everyone was happy. Let's put it that way. When I went back there Friday, they were just as happy. Well, people who weren't at Expo weren't happy. The people who were there. When they announced it,
    38:48
    Pinsty basically shit on this game like there is no tomorrow. And they look at that. I was talking to Keith Johnson. He was like, holy shit, they hated it. Yeah, well. Yeah, so we'll get to that.
    39:03
    But, yeah, I was like, seriously? Because I had played it a bunch by then. It's like, how can you hate this game? It's like, oh, yeah, that's right. They just saw pictures and made an immediate opinion without playing it. I forgot. Yeah. Never mind. It's typical. And they're sad they couldn't be there. They wanted to be there, and they couldn't. So they had to complain on Pinside where they're all their friends. Mom wouldn't let me out of the basement. Oh, God. Jesus Christ. Mom wouldn't let me out of the basement. Yes. I was a bad boy. Unfortunately, turning his camera off has made the sound better. and we can hear Bruce now.
    39:36
    On Pinside, though, it was Ryan Wonger who posted his first opinion on Dialed In, and his post was very positive, pretty much what you covered there, Ron, and he got all upvotes on Pinside. So I will say they did listen to someone who actually played. Yeah, yeah. Was he the one who said, like, I liked it and, yes, I played it or something next to it? Yeah. I saw that. It's like, wow, what a concept. I just think, whenever I think of that, I just think of ACDC when the pro came out and he had the big Angus face. People looked at the play field and said, oh, my God, what is this, Terminator 2 with a freaking bell instead of a skull? This is the most unoriginal thing ever. This sucks. This is horrible. This look at his face. This is terrible. And then people started playing it. And all of a sudden, this game is awesome. I need to play more. This is awesome. So, you know, play the game, people. That's all I got to say. Just play the game. Okay. Okay, so that was the events on Thursday. Now, Friday morning, I did not get to attend the American Pinball seminar to find out about Houdini and Magic Girl. You missed something on Thursday. Well, what did I miss on Thursday? Who was supposed to be talking on Thursday and never showed up and canceled.
    40:51
    Oh, was that Pinball? That's Pinball. Yeah, that's Pinball never made the plane. So they didn't show. So that's basically what I heard from one of the seminar organizers. They just didn't make the plan. And that's not good. That's not a good thing.
    41:07
    Bruce thinks it's not a good thing. It's the end of the world. No, no, no. I'm just saying, you know, it should have been there, answering questions from the consumer. Even if you didn't have a new product or a new thing, you know you have your booth with CoinTaker, with your two products there.
    41:24
    You should have been there. Yeah. I think Cointaker still has one of the older... He does. One of the older... What's the name of the game again? Big Lebowski. Jesus. Because they had it apart a lot.
    41:39
    But I'll pass that just because I think they still have one of the older prototypes. But that was still a disappointment.
    41:47
    Eh. And I got to play Big Lebowski again, and I actually got to play a full game. So it's all right. I mean, I probably would help if I watched the movie.
    41:58
    I've never seen the movie. So, um... Friday morning. Friday morning, I was in the X-Brawl tournament, X-Bowl Brawl, partners tournament with Dad,
    42:08
    and for the fourth consecutive year, we finished just out of winning anything. Congratulations. Like Steve Bounton says, always be cashing. Mine is almost be cashing. That's what I want mine. That's my motto, almost be cashing. We ended up in B division and, like, top two get stuff, and we ended up third.
    42:31
    Congratulations. Yes, congrats, Ron. My father was on fire. As good as he's played in a while. I think he was ready for retirement. He might reconsider now.
    42:41
    So you sucked. No, I played good too. Okay. But they had – the one team was, like, Adam Lefkoff and Keith Elwin. So I was like, okay, can we just give them the trophy now? I mean, they won by like 11 strokes or something. It wasn't close. So did you play Blackjack SS or Blackjack EM?
    43:01
    I played Blackjack Solid State was in the tournament. Nice. It was the last game I played in the third round.
    43:09
    I basically, because this is golf format, so I think the score to get was like 60,000. They were low scores. But I was probably the only one there who knew how to play it. And luckily, when I stepped up to the game, my hand was – I was beating the dealer.
    43:27
    So just right flipper, tap pass, hole, right flipper, tap pass, hole, like four or five times, boom, score, done. Nice job. And they also had an EM black check. Which has much better art than Backglass, by the way. Yes, but it made only 110. It's a two-player game. What did you think of that? Played just like the solid state, didn't it? Yes. Played the same rules, except it doesn't make the cool da-da-ding, da-da-ding, da-da-ding when you hit it in the hole. It just makes a regular sound. So that makes the solid state superior. Yes, of course. But that was where I was in the morning.
    44:01
    So I didn't get to see the American Pinball thing. Just go to pinballnews.com and read their synopsis. He didn't miss much. John Pabaget wasn't there. Houdini wasn't there. Yeah. So nothing was there. Yeah. So there you go.
    44:19
    So. So let's see. So. Party time. Is it party yet? Hold on. I'm looking through the. The only thing that was interesting that second day was. Well, I also bring up because we got Tim here.
    44:35
    Tournament psycho. The Thursday was the totally different tournament format this year. I think we went through that in a previous episode. Well, Trent argued it wasn't that different. Well, yeah. Yeah, I think the idea was to finish earlier. That did not happen at all.
    44:56
    Again. Not with Hand of the King being an unlimited length increasing multiball, turns out. Oh, well, we can get Tim's comment on that. Basically, we'll get that out of the way quickly then. The tournament basically is qualifying all day Thursday. Okay. So you played two entries on every game, and it was the full Sternament, all Sterns. I can't remember what they all were. So Trent has told me that if Josie Jack was going to bring games to have before Thursday, he would put them in the tournament, but they haven't up to this point. They don't give him the games for the tournament like Stern does. So the Sterns on top of it, and Jack just hasn't gotten games or anyone else for that matter. Yeah. So you had to play two games on each game. And you had to pay $60 up front. And even with that, all day Thursday, I still saw people there to the very end rushing to get the stuff in.
    45:53
    And then they took the top 60 – no, no, it was the top 40% ended up in A, and the bottom 60% ended up in B. and then they did the playoffs, which they did in a bracket format, head-to-head. Each match, best two out of three games. They had a loser's bracket, too.
    46:12
    So Friday was basically B, which did finish on time because it's B. And they did finish. So it's like, okay, this is looking good. This is looking good. They had the Class 6. Class 6, they did the usual format where you just keep paying for entries and the finals are on Sunday. that was unchanged.
    46:32
    So then came Saturday, and basically they played all day and did not – do you remember, Tim, where they got to when they quit? I don't think they were even to the semifinals yet, maybe the quarters. I think you might be able to – I don't remember. It was – because I came out after the banquet, which we'll talk about, but they had all the games off, and they were basically like, we're done, enough. And this was at around, I don't know, 10, 11? And I looked at the brackets, and they still had rounds to go. So that obviously did not. The idea was that would be done, and then Classics would be the only thing on Sunday morning. I think they were playing to what time on Sunday? Because I know they didn't film it, but Steve Bowden was there with a well-charged cell phone, and I think he got the entire finals in there.
    47:32
    But he said Keith played Hand of the King for so long against Zach that he didn't want to miss his flight. So an hour-long game.
    47:41
    So I think Zach was in the winner's bracket, Keith was in the loser's bracket, so Keith had to beat Zach twice, Zach Sharp, Keith Allen. So Keith must have beat him twice. He did. And took yet another title. the semi-retired who has won what, Pinberg? He won Expo. He won something else too, didn't he?
    48:06
    Never Drains. Yeah, Never Drains. California Extreme. Yeah, that's what I was thinking. Yeah, so for a semi-retired guy, he's winning more than he did when he was not retired.
    48:21
    And plus also building Archer. Yes, Building Archer. So we're to Friday now. We'll get to, let's see. I'm trying to see where Alien, I thought Alien was on Friday. Yeah, it was. So at 4 p.m., skipping to 4 p.m., they had the Alien reveal, which they already had the reveal. I mean, it was already played. But they brought the game in, and they did a whole thing about, you know, the making of the game and what was involved. and then they took the game and put it in the vendor hall. They actually had two of them there. One was, like, the LE, which had, like, the rotating police light things on it, beacons, and then, like, the regular one, which Alien had, like, what is it, 6,500? How much is Alien? Right around 6,300. Yeah, 6,300 is, like, by far the biggest bargain in pinball. Really, it has to be at this point. I played it. I mean, it looks good.
    49:26
    I mean, I found it clunky, but, again, I was missing a lot of shots. Typically, you miss a lot of shots. It'll seem clunky. You know, no fear will seem clunky if you can't hit anything. So I think it was just my lack of skill. They did have one ball issue that they – one ball hang-up issue they have to fix, and they're aware of it. And you can see it kind of on my footage, the main left ramp. When you hit it, it would get to the top of the ramp and kind of just stop sometimes, and you'd have to kind of nudge it. And I think there's actually some kind of lock mechanism they have there. And I talked to one of the programmers. They're going to do something in the area to fix the problem. The other issue was the main toy, and they show this on their promo video, was they have a big alien head, a xenomorph, whatever it's called. I just call it the alien. and the alien head, like, the mouth opens, closes, and there's a magnet in front of it. And what's supposed to happen is the magnet in front of it catches the ball, the alien opens its mouth, and then a tongue thing comes out where the magnet grabs the ball and pulls in it. Looked cool as hell in the promo video.
    50:35
    Unfortunately, it did not work while the game was there. So they had that. That was all. It did look cool in the promo video. Yeah, it did. Looked very cool. It looked great, but I wish it worked there. Yeah, it did not work there. The games were really short.
    50:53
    The one thing I didn't say about Dialed In is the games were very long. On Alien, they were very short. They had it set up. You couldn't put more than one player in. You couldn't do, like, four-player games that were just doing single, but the line never got that long because the games were just like, done. You're done.
    51:11
    I don't really have much more to say on that. I only played it two or three times. I got some footage of it. I was trying to catch someone getting a multi-ball, and I could not. I asked one of the programmers, like, what's the easiest way to get a multi-ball? And he basically said, if you hit under the alien head, they got two targets there, kind of like Sparky thing. Like, if you hit it enough times, that'll start a multi-ball.
    51:32
    I tried it. I couldn't get it started. I couldn't. You could tell that the software was really, really early. When I talked to the guys, they said, like, some of them, like the American crew that's working on it, The first time they actually got a hold of the game was Wednesday.
    51:47
    They unveiled it Thursday. Just to give you an idea of the time crunch they had to try to get the thing working. Do you know which programmer you were talking to, Ron? I was talking to, name some names, I'll tell you if it's the one. Joe Schober. No. I wanted to talk about how I saw his name as lead programmer on the game because he wasn't involved with Full Throttle, and he's a guy who's from the Free State Pinball Association area. If you've ever seen the league manager software, he's the one that does that. And they got him to do his first pinball software on this game. But what does he look like?
    52:27
    Older guy losing his hair. Losing his hair like glasses? Yep. Yeah, I sat right next to him in the banquet. He sat next to me. He was next to me and Koi was next to him.
    52:40
    Okay. So, yes, it was the other, because, yeah, they announced, like, the two programmers, the one, like, they had, and then, which, I apologize to you, I don't remember your name. I'm sorry. I see him at the shows, too, all the time. He's another, I can't remember his name. I'm sorry. I think he worked on Full Throttle, too. So, go on, help me out here. I was excited to see Joe's name because I had talked to him previously about just some stuff, Some programming I did for fun involving pinball stuff and using his league manager software to get some statistics.
    53:14
    So I'm like, oh, there's a programmer I recognize. I don't think he's made a game before. This will be cool to see how this goes because he's a very good player too. Yeah, yeah, because when I saw him, it's like, wait a minute, I recognize that guy. He's a pinball player. I've seen him play before. It's like, oh, so okay. Yeah, he actually bought a lifter in the past. Ah, and he's the same age as me. So when you say he's older, you're saying I'm older. You're insulting me. but not as old as me. No, no. You're clearly older than all of us.
    53:41
    So, on to the party. Oh, yes, yes. And once again, in gamesmanship, and this wasn't announced until later,
    53:53
    to like a couple days before the Expo, they added an event at 8 p.m. in the main ballroom, well, in the ballroom where they were doing the seminars, called Deep Dive Into the Game, where basically they had the game set up. They had the whole design crew there. You could talk to them. You could play dialed in.
    54:11
    And they had free pizza. Yeah, pizza has definitely seemed like a trend here. Now, how was the food at your expo party that you paid $35 per person? I paid $35 to get no free food. I take it I paid for the entertainment. That's what I was paying for. Oh. Oh, and how did Batman play while you were there? Okay, okay. Here we go. Let's get on with the shitstorm. The shitstorm that is the party. So go to the party. The main festivities started at 8. So I got there a little before then. You go. It's one of those, like, you know, trendy, overpriced-like places, that type deal. They had a Ecto-1 and the Batmobile outside. That was cool. Everyone's taking their pictures. you know, with the cars.
    55:04
    You go in, they got all the dudes, you know, with the security, you know, with their arms folded in front of them, with the black suits on and all that, like, really? Okay, whatever.
    55:16
    I'm not a bar guy, or nightclub guy, I guess you could say, so it's just like, whatever. You walk in, they have the bar area, and they got two Ghostbusters there.
    55:28
    That's it. that's it. Your IFPA tournament was basically, they had one of the Ghostbusters in tournament mode. Five bucks a play. Yay! The other one was a free play. That was it.
    55:43
    It was very obvious that Batman was supposed to be there. Well, the thing is... Because the whole thing was Batman, Ghostbusters theme. They had What's-His-Face from Ghostbusters.
    55:57
    Ernie Hudson. Yeah, Ernie Hudson was there signing autographs. Obviously, and they had enough space in that area where the two Ghostbusters were. There was obviously supposed to be Batman there. And it just didn't happen. Okay, so hold on. How many games did they have at the factory sitting there? Well, they had three. Well, they were the same three that they brought to Capel. That was the only three. No, I know that. But, I mean, how many games do they have sitting in the background for all their employees to play and people who come there to play of all their newer stuff, even stuff they're still running?
    56:34
    I don't understand what you're asking. Well, the thing is, they should have brought these games that were sitting at the warehouse, a.k.a. Metallica, they have sitting back there. Kiss, the line that they always show when they have demo games and that kind of stuff. Okay. You paid, and you have 400 or 500 people coming to your place, paying 30 to 35 bucks a piece,
    56:55
    and all you got to see was a roasting of the... No, no, we'll get into... Well, no, there was more to it than that. We'll get into that some... That's fine. But I mean... But I do hear stories originally it was supposed to be in another location that actually had some games, but I heard that somewhere.
    57:13
    So they had... You know, Jack Danger was the emcee. They had Gary Stern, like, who's dressed up as the Penguin. Oh, sure. Yeah. Wah, wah, wah, wah. So they had the first – it was basically what it said on the flyer. Sort of smaller. They had an acoustic artist. She was actually excellent, the first one they had. And then in between the music, the entertainment, they would play – they'd just play music. And what music was that? And subtly, they played ACDC, Rolling Stones, and Kiss. And then they also played Aerosmith, and they also played Iron Maiden. Can I know Metallica? No, they didn't play any Metallica. They might have played it later. I didn't say that long. Yeah, you didn't say it long. So, hold on. Going by our thing that we said, we were right about Batman being there. We didn't know about playability, but Batman was there. So one up for us on there. Well, Batman was not at the party.
    58:21
    No, the Batman the pinball machine. Yeah. Okay. Two, I kind of said something actually kind of a little bit true, too. The Super Ellie was supposed to look like a Batmobile. When you look at the sidearm and everything. Yes, you are correct.
    58:35
    But third, Aerosmith did not make it there. So I wanted to say that was wrong, but I think it was planned to be there because. Because there was a, what is it called, coffee table book? By Ernie Donnie. Ernie Donnie Art that was published on a writing, I believe. And in that book, it had Aerosmith. Yes. The actual art. It had the whole cabinet, showed it with the LCD in it. So, yes, it will have an LCD.
    59:04
    And I'm thinking that that was, Aerosmith was supposed to be done by then. Yes. And they just had so many delays that it just didn't happen. yeah so but go ahead go about this Phil now we went through all the so they had the acoustic artist it was good and then they had the second one they had Swallow the sword yeah is the sword swallowing woman there who did the you know walk on glass bed of nails sword swallowing then they had a magician then they did the roast and they had, oh, it was the first, they were mostly Gary Starr. Hokey, hokey, hokey. And they had Eugene Jarvis start, which if any of our listeners have ever heard Eugene Jarvis, he's typically entertaining and he's not adverse to using F-bombs, lots of them. and he's the guy who did Defender, Robotron, Smash TV, Firepower, F-14 Tomcat, taking the pinball direction.
    60:15
    And some of the stuff he said was hit and miss. He had a lot of comments about shafts and shafts not working, you know, because Gary's old, get it.
    60:24
    But he did make one comment that I thought was hilarious. You go there, but, you know, but, Gary, Gary, $15,000 for a pinball game? Are you fucking serious?
    60:37
    And you hear people, ooh, like, how many boats do you need? It was just, I thought that was quite funny. Like, wow, okay, okay, the gloves are off. So after he was done, they had Joe Kamikow come up there, who was obviously fairly intoxicated by this part. Just part. You could just, you could hear it when he was talking. Hell, he sold 80 Super LEs. Yeah, he was celebrating big time, yeah. He was celebrating. Yeah, kapow. So, he starts doing, like, a more heartfelt Gary speech and telling everyone to be quiet.
    61:16
    Everyone be quiet. Shut up. Be quiet. No, this is serious. Quiet. And this is one of these places where, like, not everyone can see the stage area. There's, like, a bar area. and he's telling people in the back to shut up and be quiet and all this, and he keeps stopping as he's talking, telling people to be quiet when he's obviously thoroughly inebriated. Sounds like you had a bad set. What was that? Terrible set. Yeah. You just got to give up at that point. Yeah. So it's like, okay, now it's getting to the uncomfortable land, you know. And at that point, I was there with my father. I'm there like, I'm out. Because I wanted to see Ed Robertson. But I wasn't going to wait through all that. So I left, drove back, and the buses going back were full. I'll say that, too. My bus was full with many drunk people, which I don't know how people get drunk that fast. They must have no tolerance, some of these younger guys. Just saying.
    62:15
    Because they're like, oh, dude, we should stop at a gas station and get beer. Tell the bus driver to stop and get some beer. Although they did have a funny comment when we pulled up to the hotel. They were like, oh, little pinball machines. That looks like fun.
    62:31
    I laughed. I was just on mute. Sorry. Yeah, I thought that was true. We'll redo that take. So I went. I was like, I wonder how the Jersey Jack thing is going. Because it was like maybe 10 o'clock by now. It was like two hours later.
    62:45
    The pizza was gone, but the games were still getting played. Steve Bowden was there. I was talking to him, and then Keith Johnson comes over, and the three of us are talking for like an hour.
    62:59
    So I was thinking to you, Tim, I was like, you know, Tim would probably like to be here. He would probably get a kick out of this. He'd probably be asking, like, programming questions or something.
    63:07
    Yeah, that's my bias as a programmer myself, to ask about the programming. I'd be all about, if Keith Johnson was there, I'd just be talking about his plans for Dialed In. I'd be so excited. So good thing I wasn't there. he probably would have been annoyed with me we did say I mean we mentioning the Pinside thing and He like you know damn And that when I asked Keith like the LA 9 what's the regular one going to be? And his response was like, I don't know. I don't know how much we could take out of the game.
    63:40
    So that's why I say I don't know if there's going to be this other version that Bruce thinks there's going to be. There will be. Okay. Bruce has the inside info. So, no, I'm just guessing. This is totally speculation. I'm guessing there's going to be a third one because something will come up. Money will be needed. Well, I will say, this is one of the games that Bruce has brought up that he likes that I totally disagree with him on. But Keith Johnson does indeed own a high roller casino. Woo-hoo! So, yeah, yeah. They use it during the – he's one of the league locations for probably the, whatever, Chicago Pinball League. Chicago. So, yep, that's one of the games they used. So there you go. Nice. He indeed has it.
    64:27
    So the party was a bust. Yeah, well, for me it was. I mean, there were people there who said they had a good time. I'm sure there was, I think there was like 100 people by the end that actually stayed to hear the Ed Robertson thing. So, but, I mean, it depends what you went there for, I guess.
    64:45
    But I'm the type, you know, I don't drink at all. And when people start to get intoxicated, I get thoroughly annoyed, usually when they start to get annoying, and I will just leave.
    64:57
    That's my MO. And as soon as Kamikaze got on the mic and it was very obvious when he started speaking, like, oh, okay, he's feeling no pain. And then it starts to get to the awkward thing. It's like, okay, I'm out. So that was the party. Wah, wah, wah. Well, I'm trying to think if there's anything else interesting came up in our conversation that I can actually mention on the air.
    65:24
    Oh, yeah, Keith did say, they were saying on Pinside that he didn't look enthused during the Periscope reveal.
    65:32
    And I just want to let everyone know, as Keith told me, he got 20 hours of sleep in the last week. That's like maybe three hours of sleep a day getting the game ready. For these people. For these people to play. So if he didn't look totally enthused, deal with it. That's the reason.
    65:52
    Okay, so Saturday morning. Let's see, I'm going to the schedule here. I'm going to lead this one. Yeah, lead this one, because my Saturday, I've seen pretty much all the stuff, and I'm just kind of going and playing games at this point. Chicago Gaming. Okay. Cancels.
    66:11
    Completely does not show up at all. No games, no message, no comment, nothing. I did hear through the grapevine, though, that whatever the next show is, or one of the next shows, they will announce Attack from Mars. So take that as it may. I did hear that through the pinball grapevine, so we'll see if that's right.
    66:36
    Okay. P3 was there again. Yep. Again. Multimorphic. Yeah, Multimorphic. The fourth year we have not seen a pinball machine.
    66:48
    Well, the name of his thing was Multimorphic, the P3, the future is here today. So I figure it's got to be close. It's got to be close. Nope, he said February. All right. Which I can't believe because he said last year is going to be coming out this year. Hey, you know, delays, delays.
    67:07
    Four years? Eh. Yeah, I'm glad I'm not on that boat. Sorry, sorry, it's just the truth. They had a lot of the, in the vendor hall, they had a lot of those custom one-off games. They also had the Pabst Crusher, whatever that thing is called. Beer can crusher. That thing sucked.
    67:30
    Yeah. That thing sucked. I was annoyed by the music and the speech calls almost instantly. Is that the same play field as Lonelli? Yes, it is. Exactly. Exactly the same. Okay, because I'm playing it, and it's like, this play field looks familiar.
    67:47
    Exactly the same. I played the Domino's game. And? Well, I wasn't crazy about the Gottlieb System 1 sounds that it was giving me. Oh, God. It's like, where's the sound effects? Like, really? This is the sound package? Yeah, I know it's early. Give it time. I just thought it was pretty bearish name to be with. They're shipping. Yeah, what is it? Like five grand, though? How much is that thing? It's $5,200. And it's an e-commerce deal through Domino's. Yeah. You have to buy it through Domino's. I just, eh. But PBR is the same with you have to buy it through PBR. Yeah, through Passage to the River. Yes. Now, I saw some things I liked in the Buffy. Looked very nice. Yeah. But I want to give a shout out, and I don't know the guy's name. But there was a nightmare before Christmas there.
    68:38
    I heard about this. One-off game, and he had, like, the Rams were like cardboard. But, dear God, that thing played good.
    68:46
    My word. I mean, you would just go by shots and flow. I want to see that play field used somewhere. Or maybe hire somebody. Somebody hire him, then. Hire this guy, man. Hire him. I don't know who he is, but hire him.
    68:59
    Because he's there, you know, yeah, making it for myself. So, you know, unless – I hope he's there next year. I hope it's more complete. I mean, I didn't even care about the software in this case. It just felt so good to shoot.
    69:10
    I just thought I'd give a shout-out there because he was right across from the three Batmans, which I thought was funny. So you've got these games here that I can't play, and then you've got this dude with a game with, like, cardboard ramps, and I'm getting more enjoyment than staring at the Batman games. Yikes. I like the Iron Man back box that they did – somebody did. It did Iron Man with, what, the LCD in it. LCD display with the movie stuff in it. It looked really good. Yeah. Which is a one-off that you'll never get to play unless you go to Xbox.
    69:43
    Yeah, of course. Great. Thanks, guys. Well, licensing, man. What do you want? The best thing I saw. Yeah, I know. The best thing I saw was actually Duncan Brown's thing about the lost Harry Williams design. Yep. They had that right outside the free play area. I got to play that.
    70:00
    And? And it's all right for a 1972 EM, which is what it would have been if it was made. Yeah. Had like a motor in it, rotating thing.
    70:12
    It played all right. That's cool. But at least Duncan was so dedicated. That's a really cool thing. Yeah. It's Harry Williams. How can you go wrong? I know. How can you go wrong? Okay. Python Angelo was a lie. He would agree with me because Harry Williams was God, according to him. Okay. Okay, so show one through ten. Hold on. Vendors inside the hall. Oh, I'm not going to be able to remember any of them. Sorry. No, no, I'm not saying that. How were they compared, like, to, you know, less than last year? Less than last year.
    70:48
    Wait, rating? Yeah, like, say, one through ten. You know, one being the worst. Like, oh, God, I never, you know, go back to the show because of the vendor thing so bad. I mean, I don't like to give ratings. I'll say less than Allentown. Okay. That's not good.
    71:07
    You said the mood was, you know, JJP versus Stern. Yeah, JJP versus Stern. I'll say the attendance was definitely down, even though the free playroom rebounded. Yes, I saw that. Because the 30th end of – not the 30th. The 30th X-Ball was, like, the best. They had, like so many games, they actually had an overflow room for the free play area. Then last year it kind of went down.
    71:35
    This year at least. Beauregard had a bigger place too. Bigger spot this year. Who had a bigger spot? Beauregard.
    71:46
    No, it's the same room. Oh, it was? It was the same room. Same room he's always in. He won't be there next year. He said that last year too, but he said that again. He did say that. Yeah. Because it seems like P-Sack pissed a lot of people off again. But they say that at the end of every expo. Yeah. Congratulations to Oren Day, getting recognized by the Mike Pazak and them for his service in the pinball community. And Connie Mitchell. Yes. In the Hall of Fame. And the guy responsible for taking all those wonderful photorealistic backlashes on those Gottliebs, you know, like Hollywood Heat, Genesis.
    72:21
    Yes, he was inducted into the Hall of Fame. And he had a really funny story, too. So he was very entertaining.
    72:28
    I'll say that. That's all on that one. But congratulations to Oren. I've known Oren for many years, and he is a great guy.
    72:37
    So that was the show. You left Sunday morning, like always? Yeah, left Sunday morning. I'm trying to think if there was anything else I missed. You missed the finals of the tournament? Well, yeah. I missed the finals of the tournament. We don't stay for that. That's why I never play in the tournament because we leave Sunday morning. Who won the Classics? Yeah, Tim, who won the Classics? I never heard anything. Oh, I don't remember. Damn. Bob gave a post on Tilt Forums, but I'm going to have to look it up, so we can skip that for now. Okay.
    73:17
    Tim's our tournament expert, and he can't give me the results. Well, I just remember hearing about the May and all the stuff that happened there. I'd like to talk about that if we have time. Go ahead. This is the post-Expo spectacular. This needs to run long. This is an important show. Right. Okay. Well, the final rounds were Zach Sharp versus Keith Owen, two of the best pinball players in the world. and I heard from Steve Bowden that Keith Elwood played Hand of the King for so long against Zach Sharp that, you know, I said he had to leave or he thought he was going to miss his flight. So he didn't actually get to see that multiball ever end. And I think this is going to, as Expo has in the past, this is going to prompt a needed code change in Game of Thrones code because I was thinking about the situation. What happens if you're playing head-to-head against someone and your opponent puts up $10 billion in Hand of the King and you play your Hand of the King and you drain out? There's no way on the game right now to get $10 billion unless you have a really good Iron Throne, and even then it's tough. Hand of the King is so overvalued right now, especially if you go into it with the perfect stack of Sark, Tyrell, Lannister, and Greyjoy with your Martel Adaball. So I think this will prompt some code changes like we saw with Star Trek back two years ago when Yorian timed out every moment to success there. Then they should have actually played Star Trek because I need another freaking code update to fix the damn bugs.
    75:03
    What are the bugs in Star Trek? What's wrong with Star Trek? They did have Star Trek there. Yeah, but there are still bugs in Star Trek. Like what? Keith actually made it where it said error on the screen. That's if you get to, like, five-year mission or whatever. I'm not getting that. Oh, yeah. Keith has mentioned those bugs before in the Wizard of Oz. Yes, he has, and they know about them, and they just go, eh, it's mostly done. There's bugs in the second episode of, I forget now. It's been so long. But, you know, it's been 18 months. It needs a tweak. Isn't the new Ghostbusters code supposedly buggy? Oh, I can talk all about those things, too. Well, that's going to be coming up. That's next, actually. That's the next thing. But so, yeah, it ran long. The tournament, I think, ended at 545. Which is good for them. Yeah, but still, they were trying for a lot earlier. Now, if they did what Levy did and just used all stars, they would have been done immediately. Hey, we haven't done that yet. Also, we need more stars. If you have a Stars, please get in contact with myself or Levy by October 29th. And sell it to me afterwards.
    76:18
    Well, I have one, but I'm not going to New York City. Sorry. Dang it, Ron. We need your Stars. We need to make it the greatest Stars-only tournament ever. I just love it. What is it called? Like the All-Stars Tournament? Yes. I love that. The All-Stars Tournament. Right now, we only have two copies of Stars. Really? We can get two more. So you got Keeler's and... Levy had one. Okay. So, wow. So that's it, man. Come on, people. Respond. It's got to be some sport. If you bring a Stars or sell a Stars to Levy, you get free entry into the tournament. Also probably something a little better than that, but free entry guaranteed. Free entry for like, don't you play like one ball or something? That's only... If you sell it to Sars to me, I'll let the guys use it. How's that?
    77:11
    Okay, so two people will buy your Sars. Sars is high in demand. You can probably get a good price on it. I know. If somebody sells me a Sars, they can deliver it right there. You know, we'll figure a way to get it down to New York City. How's that sound? That sounds awesome. All right, here you go. We're putting it out there, folks. We need your Sars. And this tournament features the lowest available TGP, lowest offers allowed by law. By law.
    77:40
    This is a tournament where one ball on stars is your qualifying entry. You get one chance. That game does not count as a valid pinball game, but we move on to the finals, where it's one ball head-to-head games until we get to the final two players, where they finally play a three-ball game of stars. This is the one valid game. So this tournament will last five minutes?
    78:05
    Yes. It's going to be the shortest tournament ever. They'll all be streamed on my Twitch channel, too. Yes, let's plug that. Yes. I've been streaming a lot of pinball, and it's a lot of fun. And what was the last game you did that you streamed on your Twitch channel, Tim Balls. Yes, Tim Balls. T-I-M-B-A-L-L-S. I streamed brand new code Ghostbusters with a center post. What? Wait, wait, wait. Hold on, hold on. Was this a factory option? No, it's not. This is a modification to the game. So somebody was crazy enough to drill. No, no drilling.
    78:49
    This is a upside down center post. This comes off. It's an extended slingshot, which is also an airball protector above the flippers, kind of. And the center post comes down from that. You'll see it when you come to my house, Bruce. So it's cheating. I bought the piece for the – to prevent the balls jumping over the rails. I wasn't planning on putting the center post piece in, but it comes with it. It's cheating. It's a modification to the game. It's cheating.
    79:26
    Well, you might say that a game like Dracula, Bram Stoker's Dracula, is supposed to have full-length flippers according to the game manual. But most everyone puts lightning flippers on them. Well, actually, Williams did. They changed it the last millisecond. But it was designed, allegedly, for full-length flippers. Yeah, but here's the deal. Dracula, Fish Tales, Doctor Who, they were all designed with regular flippers. They were switched to lightning flippers due to requests from their distributor in Germany, who was their biggest customer. That's why they ended up that way. So you could argue all those games are supposed to be played with regular flippers. You could also argue that Stern's Spider-Man should be played with a center post, but sometimes it's removed, especially at pop-up events. I like the lightning flippers on a Spider-Man myself. Right. But what I will say after having played it is the analogy for Ghostbusters with a center post and without a center post. Ghostbusters without a center post is the raw, real experience. This is like you're walking into the actual Amazon rainforest, and you want to be right there with nature, but you're constantly checking your boots and your pants for the most deadly animals, snakes and insects that will sting you and kill you and maim you and spiders and stuff. Ghostbusters with the Center Post is Rainforest Cafe. It's fun, comfortable. You get a lion watching you eat some ribs. it's a great time. You got music from the 90s. Everything's all cheery and stuff. It's a much more Americanized experience. The music from the 90s was really cheery.
    81:17
    Oh, elevator music is what I was referring to. I'm thinking grunge. It's like the 90s had some of the most depressing music ever. Now, hold on. Now, if you didn't have the center post with the new 1.10 rules, how is it?
    81:31
    If I didn't have the center post? Oh, it's... But you still had the 1.10 where you don't have to talk about the code. When you don't reload... Well, tell us first the changes. I'll let you talk. Let's have Tim, the code guy, explain to us the changes. The biggest change is mode status. So,
    81:52
    normally on Ghostbusters, if you don't start your scene, depending on the game settings, like easy, medium, or hard, you have to hit the ghost a certain number of times to bring the ghost down, then hit your ghost, and then that lights your modes. This time it's like factory settings. It's just one hit to the ghost target no matter how hard you make it, or no matter what part, not hard you make it, but how far you are in the game. So if your modes prime out, you just hit the ghost target one time, it brings the ghost down. You don't have to spell ghost out anymore. So those targets are always flashing, which makes it a little easier to pound away on that ghost target because you're not as likely to drain from making that dangerous shot over and over.
    82:36
    But your modes themselves continue from ball to ball. So if you end a ball but your mode's still running, you don't have to plunge the skill shot anymore to continue it, or you don't have to bring Slimer down to continue it. It just starts off continued.
    82:52
    But this causes an issue because the skill shots, as you may know in Ghostbusters, the super skill shots or the playfield skill shots, say things like negative ESP ability or award Tobin's guide. But those things aren't available while a mode's running. Now that the mode's continued, if you plunge that on the skill shot, it says it's awarded, but it will never give you that award. So that's a little bit of a Ghostbusters bug right now if you keep mode continue on. There's also mode timeout where if you don't hit all your shots in a mode, you just go on to the next mode. When you hit your ghost again, you can just start at the next one. You don't have to pick up where you left off, which puts the we came, we saw mini wizard mode much more into play in the new Ghostbusters. Does the timer stop if you don't hit anything or you can just time everything else? Yes. It's not like they learned their lesson for that, for sure. If you just trap the ball in a flipper, your timer will pause, so you actually have to be making switch hits to progress. Well, they don't always learn quickly, because I remember when Family Guy first came out, and they put that in tournaments. Everyone would just start all the TV modes and just time them all out, get the TV wizard mode. It's one of the most boring things ever. Yeah. No, you have to make switch hits to continue. Any other changes?
    84:18
    Yeah, just, well, the game's pretty much becoming a game that diverges heavily between tournament play and non-tournament settings where in tournament settings you have to earn your awards and certain things and stuff in regular settings you're getting crazy awards out of the pop-upers like light extra ball from the pop-upers you get um add balls lit much more easily You get add-a-balls from the pop-upers. You get add-a-balls from the captive ball. And there's a new video mode on it, too, called Don't Cross the Streams. Oh, boy.
    85:01
    It's much more enjoyable than the other video mode, which is a luck-based video mode. This one requires a little more skill. And it's more like solid points than the risk-reward of the negative ESP video mode.
    85:18
    So this was your first time playing a premium, right? Second time. I played the premium at Sunshine Laundromat, which made me never want to play Ghostbusters again because the scoop wasn't, the left scoop was going straight down the middle every time. The tilt was tight. I had to slide save constantly, which is one thing the center post takes away is damage to your floor and the game from slide saving all the time to cover the center gap. And the Magnus things were much more friendly. I don't know if that was code or just the way they were this time. But times when the Magnus thing would throw the ball straight down the middle were mitigated by the center post. Cheap drains like that were often not as tragic as they would be without it. So I honestly say it's a different game with the center post, but it's one where you feel less ripped off. You can argue, and many people have, and many people who want to be macho, macho pinball guys think, oh, you got to play it. Macho pinball guys, yeah, I want to be a macho guy. An old 70s song that you won't know. Yeah, I've never heard that song before. Village People, you don't want to hear it. No.
    86:31
    That's their, like, number two hit after YMCA. Wow, see, Tim even knows the oldies. I think he just said that. No, but he really knew it. Oh, he knew that, huh? How about in the Navy? Was that their third biggest hit? Third. Probably. I mean, I have a Village People record. Excellent. Wow. All right. It's in my other. Well, I believe one of those macho pinball guys you're talking about is Levy.
    86:56
    I'm not going to name names. Yeah, I'll name names because he said it right on Facebook. He said it'll, I think he said something about it'll knock the universe out of alignment or something if you use the center post. yeah this is this is just um to use a very uh contemporary phrase here this is toxic max masculinity run amok people saying training wheels all this stuff it's a different game and it's a much more relaxing game the stress just melts away it's um it it brings the game time up to that of any other certain besides maybe metallica where you're hitting and walking dead. It brings it up to Game of Thrones level. It brings it up to ACDC level. It doesn't make it super long or anything because Ghostbusters right now, you're lucky if you get a minute per ball. So you're a convert? Yes, I'm a convert to the center post for recreational play. Tournaments, by all means, keep it factory. It's tough.
    87:55
    every time, I kind of said, every time it hits the center post, it's preventing me from either making a huge slide save or just a drain. And if you look at all the times on my stream, because you can see the uploaded video of how many times it hits that center post, and you count all those as drains, you see, wow, this is really a big change. But we're having more fun.
    88:20
    Okay. More fun. That's what it's all about. Yeah. So any other rants? We have one. I know he does. I know he's got one in him. Okay. Oh, I can talk about wide bodies. That's what I wanted to hear. Wide bodies. Okay. We're talking about just any wide body? Just generic? Well, Alien's a wide body, and Dialed In is not a wide body. That is correct. And I would say that Dialed In definitely won Expo, won the show of all the new games there. And it feels better. and I would argue that part of that is because it's not a wide body.
    89:04
    Now, the reason I say this is because I will agree with Bruce that wide bodies, valley wide bodies like Paragon and FutureSpar are awesome, fun games. They're great. There's a couple others. Yeah, there's some good ones. Big Game. There's Flight 2000, even though you have to go by the Scott rules. definitely you gotta go by the Scott rule there's different classes of wide bodies Paragon is a wide wide body something like Gottlieb is the widest yeah but something like big game is not as wide something like big game is more like a Twilight Zone or Star Trek Next Generation type wide yes but I'll say once you get to the DMD era of games there unless someone can prove can come up with a contrary example when you get to the bottom quarter of the play field on a wide body you start to run into problems and what I think is like Wizard of Oz you have these what do you do in the outlying areas there's so much space here we have to do something oh let's put a stupid little rollover game that puts your ball back into play for some reason. Or you have Hobbit where it's like, well, what do we do here? There's so much space at the bottom. Let's just add 12 more in lanes and make it so no one can ever lose their ball and put a center post on. Why not? That's a case where the game does not need a center post. I'll say that. Can I mention one thing? I noticed on all three Jersey Jack games, Ron's pet peeve, the left kickback works every freaking time.
    90:52
    Well, definitely on Dialed In it did. Yes, it did. And so it does on Hobbit, and so it does on, well, Wizard of Oz. Okay, Tim, how about Demoman?
    91:01
    I don't see anything weird down there. Demoman has just weird slingshots, but... Indiana Jones? That has, see, that has a interesting code tricks for the outlanes, because when you hit the center drop targets, it goes outlane so often,
    91:19
    just because of the geometry of the playfield, that if you hit it fast enough, it has to give you the ball back into play. No, no, you can disable that. You can, but... But you can disable it. Yeah. And Star Trek's the same way. Star Trek doesn't have next-gen. They're just very open outlanes. You can argue the slings are up so high because of the cannons, basically anything that goes in the area is gone. Yeah.
    91:48
    Popeye? Popeye. I played a Popeye yesterday, and I don't get that game. My wife actually loves it. Kathy actually loves it. We played it at Neil Parrish's house a couple weeks ago. She played that more than any other game, including Shadow. Well, maybe if you get that, you can get rid of the MC, which you give it to me.
    92:17
    Not going to happen. Oh, well, I tried. So here's the thing. I'll continue this rant. Rant away. She interrupted. Go for it. Williams knows how to fix things. I'll admit that. Williams has made the wide body work.
    92:31
    But Jersey Jack and Highway both went right for wide bodies. and I'm not sure why because I wouldn't I would say that the size of a pinball machine um making it wider making adding more shots doesn't make it any more fun especially if those shots aren't fun to hit I think that's kind of the case with full throttle it has 18 shots but the game's so split up that like when you start a mode it's just going to be like shoot any right shot, all four of them are lit. Shoot any left shot, all four of them are lit. So if you're considering starting a new pinball company now in 2016 or the future, just go with regular length. No need to get crazy with wide bodies. Just the normal length is fine. You don't have to come up with stupid, yeah, normal width, sorry. You don't have to come up with stupid outlane games. You don't have to design your outlanes like a funnel, which sort of looks like a little bit on Alien. We'll see when I play it to make it more fun because it's not more fun to play pinball after you lose your pinball.
    93:41
    That's a mini-rance, but it's one that I thought was worth sharing. So you're basically going with the Steve Ritchie thing where the flipper area is the sacred area and you don't do any weird shit in the area. Yes. Levy and I talk about this all the time. They figured this formula out way back in the day. Just keep it what it is. When you have Paragon or Future Spa, you can get away with putting a pop bumper in the outlane area there. And that just, I don't think anyone would try that today. And for good reason.
    94:17
    There's no way you can make that pop bumper fun in an outlane area, I think, yet. So no one's tried that. But they're still trying to do wide bodies. It's not meant to be fun. It's meant to train you. That's why it's awesome.
    94:31
    No, you can work that pop-up in Paragon like crazy, and you can get it to go into the in-lane. And 1,000 points, like a future spot 1,000-point pop-up can be the difference maker in that game. A 1,000-point pop-up on any contemporary game is not going to be a difference maker, unfortunately. Yeah, if you're playing Paragon and it goes over that left side, as you're trying to bump it out of there, lift up your left flipper. make sure it's up because if you don't it can hit right on that pop up at the right angle and doom it just shoot right down the inline and drain it on you if you don have that sucker up usually they always tell you never keep your flippers up This is one exception Only keep the one flipper Yeah only keep the one flipper up Yeah, Alien, it's got like the right side. It kind of has the loop around to the in lane, kind of like full throttle-like. And then the left side, it's got the bizarre, like those posts, which are supposed to eventually, what they said that's for is what will happen is if you have a ball locked, there's like two inserts there. One of them will light. And then if you go down the lane with the insert, the lit insert, you'll get the ball back. The one you locked will unlock.
    95:46
    Okay. But you'll have to relock it. That's what that's for. That's how it's supposed to work. I kind of like that idea. It's almost like Last Chance on Black Lake 2000. Yes, which according to Keith Johnson, that is a bug.
    96:03
    If you ever play Black Knight, when you get last chance, you can no longer lock balls. Right. Now, I always thought that was just done on purpose. He said it's a bug. Well, no. Well, hold on. There's a revision that fixes that bug. Because I played one in Central New York, and I can lock the balls after getting last chance. Yeah, I want to see that. What revision? That's some homebrew thing if someone did that. Possibly, but another one in central New York I can lock afterwards.
    96:39
    Because I went and got jackpot after. I always took it to mean, like, yeah, it's your last chance. Like, you don't train, but you can't lock balls now. You have to get an extra ball now if you want. Because if you get an extra ball when you play that, then you can lock balls again. But I guess Keith says it's a bug.
    96:56
    Like, he talked to Larry DeMar in the program. It's a bug. I thought it was a feature so there you go Ron repairs none probably right none I made a little modification to the Metallica where I removed the block of doom and replaced it with the Newton ball like the pro is and it doesn't really change anything it registers just the same it just it looks better and the block was already getting pounded to shit.
    97:31
    So, and let's see, anything else? No, that was my only, and that's not really repair, that's just a modification.
    97:42
    Do I have any repair news? Yeah, how about you, Tim? Is Roller Games still working for you? Yeah, Roller Games works great. Well, no, I do have a little things I could tweak on it right now. I'm having problems with getting the plunger to go all the way around I think just because my spring's getting a little weak so maybe you want to fix that but everything else works great that takes the super stiff spring yep they use that, it's like Blackjack 2000 I think has it Centaur is officially done oh my god it's done finally It's done finally. It will be available at my tournament.
    98:29
    Finger Lakes Open. So that's a good thing. Next week, Zach is coming over. Got to plug Zach again. Zach is going to come over. And when I get back from Atlanta, we're going to start playing with nine ball and see if we can get that ready for the tournament.
    98:46
    Good luck, sir. Another great story. supposed to help me, but you haven't. I know. It is a great Stern game.
    98:57
    I'd like to give a couple shout-outs to some plugs. We've got to plug our fans. We had a lot of comments, actually, on the video so far, which is very good. Keep them coming, guys. Yeah, we had Scott, of course, comment that said, basically, aliens. Yeah, it looks clunky. Sucks. Yeah, Scott's comments are usually, they're rarely glowing.
    99:23
    Yes. Eric Russell from Central New York, our friend, all three of us, he commented on Scott's commentary about too hard of a, too tight of a tilt. So let's talk about that real fast. Eric feels like a game should not be, now I don't know, have you ever played a scottified game, Mr. Tim?
    99:47
    I don't know what that means. This before his time. He's never been there. It's tighter than that. Tighter than that. I see. I never tilted his games. I never had a problem. Neither do I. And neither did I. But other people, of course, did and walked him across the floor, as he said. And truly, I remember that. I remember that happening. And I was like, man. And then he went scottified. He actually is in the Steve Bowden Fun with Bonus.
    100:15
    I actually looked it up, and he does have his thing in there, scottified, where a machine is really tight tilt, and Eric disagreed with that wholeheartedly. What do you guys think?
    100:29
    I never thought his tilts were over. They're no tighter than what I have. I agree. I never had issues tilting his game.
    100:39
    In my opinion, as someone who likes to move games, I also like to save up my tilt warnings for one big slide because of the advantage it can take for debounce time on sterns and stuff. That no matter how tight you set your tilt, it's never going to prevent a player from sliding it pretty much. Unless you have rubber feet underneath it. But I proved that wrong at Pinberg by walking some games across the room there. Yeah. I'm not that big of a guy, too, but you can really put your whole weight into it. You can get those things to boost. They'll never prevent you from sliding a stern.
    101:24
    Yes. You're sliding like an old dally. It's just going to tilt, done. Right. Yeah, I don't see that for that.
    101:30
    I mean, it's – But I believe in some games you need to have a tighter tilt. Yeah. I think it varies with the game. If you're playing, like, World Poker Tour or any of those things, it's got to be tight. Yes. Yeah. If you're playing like stars, if you make it ridiculously tight, you've just ruined the whole game. You've ruined the whole game and you've ruined any enjoyment because you will just suck. You will not be able to do anything on it.
    101:57
    There is a game that people like to set tight, but I think it's too much and it happens a lot, which is Lord of the Rings. No, tight, tight, tight. Well, no, I mean, like, tight, yes, but the tilt debounce time is very, very low on that. So one big move is going to tilt you if you have it set, like, three-quarters of the way up. But people get it all the way up, and there's a problem, it seems, I've noticed in All Lord of the Rings, where the action, I think, on the diverter to the orthotic shot moves right into the tilt bomb for some reason. So when you get balls plunged out in multi-ball, I've just noticed a lot of quote-unquote phantom tilts, which are because of just some weird designs of that play field putting action on the tilt bob from the auto launch. Something about the auto launch. Yeah, well, there's also, and here's a tip. This is actually a Keith Elwin tip. The sterns of that era, like your early 2000s, Lord of the Rings, like Simpsons, T3. Yep. They had issues with the ring itself. So you get bizarre tilt behavior.
    103:15
    He recommends highly to sand down the ring. Yes. Take away the gold coating so it's actually metal. Yeah. It's almost like a gold, like a, not a copper, but it's like a gold. And I'll tell you, I had a lot of, I'd have weird issues on my T3 where sometimes, like, You'd shove the thing, and you'd hear the thing just bouncing all over the place, hitting the ring, and it wouldn't register. And other times I'd barely breathe on it, and it would tilt immediately.
    103:44
    All that weird behavior went away after I did that. Okay, so maybe that's the trick. So it's all, like, I guess early 2000 games have this issue.
    103:54
    So he had some other tip other than sanding it, too. Keep sanding it, I think. You'll be surprised. it might have been like standing where it actually hooks on to the other part. Oh, the ring. Yes, the top part. The top part would actually, yeah. Just to make sure the connectivity is good or tighten it or make sure everything is good there.
    104:19
    So there you go. I wish I could find the post. It might have been on ToeForums, so you can look for it there, Tim. It was there, so I'm trying to think of the subject that brought it up, But I think it was Tilt Forms he brought that.
    104:33
    And sure enough, I went right down to Cares and tried it. It's like, oh, that worked. Thanks. Did you see the video that Steve posted on Fun with Bonus about tilts? The one that Soren made, I think. Yeah, that's really good. I still have to look at that. Yeah, it was. It's really good. Very, very interesting. Yes.
    104:50
    A lot of knowledge on how to set up a tilt. The theory behind tilting, everything, and the balance, and moving the ring. He did an excellent job. He also explained phantom tilts in a way that was very awesome. And very logical. If you want to go to YouTube and search the pinball tilt and by the channel Dots and Loops or go to Fun With Bonus and look at recent posts, I highly recommend watching the 17-minute video if you want to become a better pinball player. It taught me so much about how to move the game and what to look for. Or setting up the game. And setting it up, yes. Damn, I'll have to look at this video. I've not seen this video. Very, very. I recommend it for everyone. That's a true pinball podcast thing right there. Say, like, you really need to watch this video about the plumb bob. It's awesome. So a little sneak peek of something he points out. The reason for phantom tilts is that when you move the game, you get the tilt bob moving on a certain axis. But the tilt bob will only settle on another axis because if you think about how the bob is being held in place on the hook, it's only going to move parallel or perpendicular to that hook, and it wants to find that axis to rotate on. So if your ring is out of alignment, it may go into that axis, and then tilt after you've made a move a while ago.
    106:20
    And he has a video explaining how it would work. He shows you how that motion would happen. It's pretty cool. Yeah. It tells you how to use your ruler and see how it moves. Really great stuff. Use your ruler? Oh, my. Check your outhold, too. Oh, God.
    106:39
    A couple more things. Do you want to do games we like, games we hate, or are we just going to wait on that? We'll wait on that. Well, Tim might have one or two. You don't know. Well, okay. Yeah. Tim, do you have anything?
    106:54
    If not, no big deal. we can skip. No, we can skip. Okay. Any new play field feature you'd like to see?
    107:04
    Oh, I can talk about that. New feature I would like to see? I want to see a lot of dynamic, randomly generated video content. What I want to see in Dialed In with Completed Software is instead of pre-rendered videos of a city being destroyed, I want to see seeded disasters like in SimCity come in like a hurricane and come destroy the city, and I want to see the growth of the city dynamically done. I want to see something that really sets the LCD apart from the DMD as not just an extended DMD with better graphics, but a new frontier of technology. So me, the young guy, the software guy, wants to see leaps and bounds. A new frontier of technology. I want this LCG era to really distinguish itself from the DMG era. So that should be their Jersey Jack, a new frontier of technology. Also, if anyone wants to hire me, I can send you a resume, a programmer, and just get involved. I should have said that to Keith. I know this guy, Kim.
    108:11
    Ron? I've argued with him on the forums enough. Oh, Ron? Yes, sir. Any new thing you'd like to see in pinball?
    108:23
    I'll pass on that. I forgot what I did last week when I didn't record. I will see, though, another thing about Dialed In, like I haven't plugged in enough, one of your previous features you'd like to see or like to see come back, where you said the skill shot, like in the lane, like the inserts, It's like Lord of the Rings where it's got the different choices. Yeah. That's on Dial Day. I see. It wasn't implemented yet because you could see the inserts there, but they didn't do anything.
    108:56
    But that's only 20%. Yeah, it's only 20%. They figured we don't need that percent to play it right now. Very cool. My thing is going to be actually a bad thing, but I know it's going to be coming soon.
    109:08
    With the pricing of these games going up to $9,000 and $10,000 and if they go on location, I hate to say it guys it's going to be a buck fifty soon per game it's going to happen it's going to be a buck fifty soon I hate to say it, it's going to happen I think all games should really just use a card or an app or something to pay for it you shouldn't even need money I mean it shouldn't even be a big deal that it's a buck whatever, you just like, there you go but you watch, it's going to go to a buck fifty if the price goes up that high then I want to see the games be a pinball machine and a like fully uh fledged out SimCity remake in the game too with higher oh that's one thing I mentioned because I wanted dynamic video content the whole point of arcade games historically was you could put all the latest and greatest technology in them because you were selling them for more than you were with a console put a ton of graphics cards in there get some awesome rendered content going in real time make it better than video games. Make it awesome. Just take it to the next level and keep doing that.
    110:20
    Well, pinball's already better than video games. Come on. It is. Yes. But you could do so much worse still.
    110:29
    Okay. So I hate to say that's going to be a future thing. I hate to say it's going to happen. Yeah, but it probably will. One comment we like to talk about. iTunes. We have one negative comment on our iTunes thing. Oh, that, yeah. Hopefully some of our listeners will actually come up and step up and say, hey, we actually like your thing. The guy did it, I think, week one or two. Yeah, week one, we suck, we're boring, and they put it on there. And it's like, it's the only comment. It just kind of sits there. So if you guys, if you're listening, if you have an iTunes account, please post your comments. It would be nice to see. That's all we're asking. Tell us how we did. Did we suck more? Or if we talk more, say we're the worst podcast you've ever seen, and we can't imagine anyone would listen to this, because that would actually increase our viewership.
    111:15
    One more piece of news. Upcoming tournaments? Nope. Pinball Wizard is being released on iTunes October 21st.
    111:27
    Pinball with the movie? Not the movie with Gagno in it. With Robert Gagno. Wizard Mode. I was about to say, what's it called? Pinball Wizard. Oh, sorry, then. I wrote it wrong. Wizard Mode is coming out on iTunes October 21st, which is by the time this will be released, it'll probably be the next day. It'll be Friday. And no spoilers, but it does have a happy ending.
    111:52
    So definitely, if you like pinball, you want to see a good movie, definitely buy it on iTunes. You know, check it out. Highly recommend.
    112:03
    Upcoming tournaments. There we go. I got my list in front of me. I'll do this one because I believe Tim is participating, I think.
    112:14
    No, I'm not anymore. I had to back out. I'm sorry. You had to back out. Yep. Family comes first. But I may be able to go to Bruce's thing now. All right. Yes. It's not going to be a silver fest. One less competitor to go against. Yes. You can stay over, Tim. Thank you very much. You are welcome. See? That's how much of a friend Tim is. And since Ron's not going to be there, you get first dibs. Woo-hoo.
    112:43
    This Pintoberfest will be this Saturday. What is this Saturday? October 22nd at the Pinball Wizards Arcade in New Hampshire.
    112:54
    A grueling day-long tournament. I think last year I had one break of like 15, 20 minutes. That was it.
    113:04
    All right. And also, this Thursday, the day we release our podcast for this one, will be Syracuse Solid State Shenanigans. Love that name. 430 East Syracuse at the comic book store up there. If you need any information about it, you can go to centralnewyorkpinball.org. It will bring you right to the Facebook page. It will bring you, and you'll see links for that. Or if not, you can go to Cloud City Comics on their Facebook page and Syracuse Pinheads also.
    113:43
    October 29th, Buffalo, New York has the Domino Pinball Launch Party. There's going to be an IFPA tournament there. Come play dominoes. It's, I think, from 7 to 12 or 11 p.m. at the Pocketeer Buffalo Pinballs hosting this. The next day in Binghamton at Moonwalker Arcade is the first Binghamton tournament in eight to ten months now. It's on October 30th. I think it starts at 12.
    114:14
    Come check that out. Retro Game Com is November 5th and 6th in Syracuse. Stars the Tournament is October 29th, if you're not already. Okay, sorry. Yep, so Stars the Tournament. I need to plug this definitely, and thank you, Timmy, for bringing this out as far as the tournament. I'm going to write that down right now. It is October 29th. Where in New York City is that going to be at? The Funatorium. Manhattan, New York at the Funatorium. Yes, private location.
    114:43
    If you can find the event on Facebook, it is public, but you'll have to message myself or Levy for the address. Okay. But Manhattan, you can get there. Definitely a good cause.
    114:55
    Great time. good, very good tournament directors with Levy and our own Tim there. It'll be streamed. We'll compete with the Buffalo stream directly, I guess.
    115:10
    Ooh! It'll be an interesting stream. It'll just be drain, drain, drain, drain. Man, these players all suck. I got chats. I got chats. Oop, drain, drain.
    115:23
    Finger Lakes Open. my house, November 12th. Go to www.western wnypinball.com God, I got to start saying that right. wnypinball.com We have 29 people signed up. Somebody just signed up while we were doing the podcast tonight. So we have 11 free spots.
    115:43
    And how many people we get? Half of the people will be in the finals. So we get 40. The maximum of it is you'll have 20 people in the finals.
    115:54
    November 19th, the Catskill Classic Pinball Tournament. Saturday, 10 a.m. That is at Howard Levine's house.
    116:04
    I think you can look on. He's in Mountaindale, New York. And I think it's also on Orange County Pinball.
    116:12
    Yep. The information about that. So definitely check it out. Howard has a great collection, including, we've talked about in the past, his pool, sorry, his bowling-themed games. He's got a lot of them there. Plus, he's got a lot of good old hands. I will say, if you're in a tech like me and you happen to be on call that weekend, do not expect to have any reception. He has no cell reception. He has literally no cell reception there. It is truly out in the middle of – there's just a dead zone. It's the woods. Yes, it is. Give him the hillbillies. One more plug I want to give. Jim also commented, and he says, now he knows not to play Dolly Parton anymore. Thank you, Jim.
    116:53
    Because of a podcast with us commenting about it. And now also our most loyal listener is our most loyal listener. He actually is. He's only one of two people that's got their the 26 levels of suck. I forget. We did change it. Now it's the 26.
    117:12
    And November 5th, 4th and 5th. We are finally going international. It has been confirmed. Mr. Nightingale, one of the two people from Slam Tilt Podcast, will be tilting some pinball machines in Amsterdam. No, you will be slamming them. Remember, you're slam, I'm tilt. Okay, I'll be slamming them. I am signed up. I officially paid my entry a couple days ago. I was one of the last five people to get the tickets in. They have a two-day tournament. The Sunday is pin golf and Saturday is a main tournament at the town in Amsterdam, in between Amsterdam and Benray, where I'm going to. So you're going to be slamming some balls in Amsterdam. Oh, yeah. Okay. And not in the red light district either.
    118:04
    Yes, so I'll be out there. I'm looking forward to hopefully people coming up to me and saying, I know you! No.
    118:13
    We actually have a couple of Dutch people, actually, I know, follow the podcast through our Facebook page, so. Yeah, they're going to walk up to you and say, you Americans suck. We do suck. I do suck big time. Your election is funny. Yes, it is very funny. That's what they'll say. We won't even go there with the election stuff.
    118:32
    Uh, what else do we talk about? Uh... 24 hour or no? Oh. Yeah, that stuff's sold out. The list is so long. Oh. It's a great thing, you know. I'm excited for it. Yeah. And I am qualified for the circuit final in 40th place right now. Okay. So I've got to get all the circuit points I can. How many get to the circuit? Top what? 40. Oh, Jesus. Well, wait a minute. You know Steve Bowne's not going to be there. It's 41. So are you including that? Right. No, I'm not. Oh, okay. So you have a bump. Yeah. Yes. And you're going down in North Carolina also, aren't you? Yes, and I'm going to MAGFest in January. So between those three, I can hopefully pick up enough points to qualify. Yeah, for sure. Throughout their skill level, not a problem. So now hold on. Now when is the sanctum? Is that the weekend? Okay, 4th, 5th. So what month? 5th, 6th, I'm sorry. November. Yes. So hold on, hold on, let me go. Oh, it's coming up. Oh, dear God. Yes, so I expect Timmy to be on, we're going to make this now true, November 8th. Okay. We're going to have Timmy on. so he's either going to be really busy at the time. Yes. Oh, man. I'll be ready to go. By Tuesday, I'll be recovered. Okay. Now, he's a young guy, Bruce. It's a lot easier, you know. It's not like us old guys. The funny thing is I am going to be broadcasting from now until the 8th in a different state every time. Since I'm in Atlanta today, I'll be in Atlanta next week. I'll be in Connecticut the week after, or maybe Ron's house.
    120:19
    And then I'll be in Amsterdam. We're also recording in Amsterdam. There's going to be a five-hour time difference.
    120:26
    I'm probably going to ask Ron to do it at 730 instead of 830, so I'm not doing it at 130 in the morning. Yeah, I could probably do it even earlier than that because that's kind of late. It will be. We're going to be recording from there also, so I'll actually have a show report from that. Very nice. But we'll also have Timmy there, so Timmy, you might have to get on a little early. Hopefully we'll figure it out, but, you know, I want to talk to Timmy. He'll still be sleeping.
    120:51
    I know. Yes, maybe. Hey, I was fine. I went home. I fell asleep exactly at sundown, and I woke up with my alarm going off telling me to get to work the next day after about 15 hours of sleep. Fuck that. Yeah. I'm too old to be doing that shit anymore.
    121:17
    God, no. I just can't do that. That's too much. I'll hate pinball. I won't want to be near a pinball machine for a while after that if I do that. So.
    121:25
    Oh, God, no. I'm going to be tired. Wait a second. The funny thing is I'm landing the 5th of November that morning at like 6 o'clock in the morning in Amsterdam. That tournament starts at 11 o'clock. because I have to get my rental car, drive an hour after getting a rental car, after going a whole night flying across the ocean.
    121:48
    Yeah, I'm going to be nice and tired for that tournament. Okay, so you're saying your excuse is ready to go. No. That's what I'm hearing. Is that what you're hearing, Tim? That's what I'm hearing.
    122:00
    I'm going to be bringing speakers, and I'm going to be playing, I am a real American. Fight for the... So you're going to be Hulk Hogan. Okay. I'm going to say it's not going to be Hulk Hogan.
    122:12
    The only way you can do is you can play Twilight Zone because it's by Golden Earring, where I believe are a Dutch group, so there you go. They are. There you go. I could be in Lake Flynn. I wonder if that's, like, the most popular game in the Netherlands because it's got Golden Earring on it. It could be possible. I'll have to find that out for us. Or it could be TX Sector because it does have the Euro music. That's, like, there's more than one Gottlieb game that has that kind of music. I know, but that's the most popular. Do-do-do-do-do-do-do.
    122:44
    All right, we're nearing the finish line here. I don't think so. We've got to go longer. No, that's what the viewers, that's what our listeners are doing right now.
    122:54
    Pinball Extravaganza, the Post Expo Pinball Extravaganza show. Yes, yes, you have been listening to the What Bruce Just Said.
    123:04
    Don't forget, we've got to pay the bills. Did we just pay the bills? No, we just did the shows. Yeah. But I'm going to now do the pay the bills. Okay, pay the bills. www.pimballlifter.com. Come check me out. We have all your lifting and pinball supplies and needs.
    123:24
    Don't forget, also, our Facebook page is Slam Tilt Podcast. Go to Facebook and just search for Slam Tilt Podcast. go to YouTube and just search for Slamtail Podcast we actually have new videos up there now so if you want to see the excitement of Alien dialed in and well the great gameplay of Batman no you get to see the LCD animations which were cool I guess yeah so you can also send us correspondence at our email address which is slamtailpodcast at gmail.com I'd like to thank our guest, Tim Sexton, for joining us today.
    124:09
    So, Tim, what yourself? Thanks for having me, guys. That was fun. Yeah, I did Tim Balls on Twitch, Tim Balls on most social media platforms, too. You'll find me. And I'm trying to put some good gameplay videos out there and go in to play all the games I can. So hopefully you appreciate it. If not, just see me at a tournament because I'll probably be there. Yes, you will. And, again, that's Twitch. Just search for Tim Balls. You'll find his channel. He's been posting pretty regularly.
    124:38
    Yeah, he's been doing weekly games. My schedule is every Monday night I'm at the Sanctum. Hopefully Thursday nights now I'll be able to do an Orange County stream, and then weekends, depending on what I announce, I'll do a stream too. So you're having a life. Right, exactly. Well, pinball's my life. Pinball's a good life. That's a good life. Maybe you need partners now to come and do some videos on your podcast. Maybe you need some two hosts here that have a lot of pinball machines. Yeah, or maybe someone up kind of near me in the Hudson Valley would open their house to let me stream there and have everyone on from the podcast. That would be cool. The problem is, tell them, Ron, what the problem is. No, you can stream from my house. My internet is not the greatest It sucks Well no My download is 15 The upload is like Half Like 1.5 It's bad The upload is the problem My house I have 6 Oh that's good So come on up I can be on your channel too Tim But I'm closer Tim they're fighting over Tim's I'd be willing to give it a try just to see how if it sucks at least you could record it and post it later yes exactly or you can have special guests you can both come out I'd come out the Rons of course well we're going to be out there actually the night of the 30th and that week too yeah we could do that we could take this offline our listeners are going to sleep for this flight So thanks, everybody, for listening to us. We will see you next week. Say bye, Bruce. Bye, Bruce. Bye, Tim. Bye.