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Episode 31 - TPF 2017 & National Videogame Museum

Eclectic Gamers Podcast·podcast_episode·1h 28m·analyzed·Mar 27, 2017
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claude-haiku-4-5-20251001 · $0.031

TL;DR

TPF 2017 trip report covering custom games, Elvira 3 announcement, and Spooky's Alice Cooper reveal.

Summary

Dennis and Tony from Eclectic Gamers Podcast provide an extended trip report from Texas Pinball Festival 2017 and the National Video Game Museum. They discuss custom homebrew games (Total Annihilation, Buffy, Spinal Tap, Doom), industry announcements including Elvira 3 (Dennis Nordman/Stern), and Spooky Pinball's Alice Cooper's Nightmare Castle. The podcast covers their tournament bracket results (Twilight Zone vs Star Trek TNG) and broader observations about the festival lineup.

Key Claims

  • Total Annihilation was the best-playing custom game despite losing Best Custom Game award; featured impressive engineering with ball lock via stand-up drop targets and single-level 80s-style playfield

    high confidence · Dennis and Tony's direct gameplay experience and extended discussion of the game's mechanics and appeal

  • Buffy the Vampire Slayer custom game won Best Custom Game of the Show, built on heavily modified Swords of Fury layout

    high confidence · Direct statement: 'this game did win Best Custom Game of the Show'

  • Cassandra Peterson appeared at TPF 2017 for Elvira 3 announcement and autograph signing (long line, not in costume, does not perform in costume anymore)

    high confidence · Tony's observation of the autograph line and discussion of Peterson's current appearance status

  • Spooky Pinball's Alice Cooper's Nightmare Castle will have 500-unit production run (largest for their official non-contract games) at $6,250

    high confidence · Dennis's direct statement of announced specifications

  • Texas Pinball Festival has become the primary venue for major pinball industry announcements, potentially surpassing Pinball Expo

    medium confidence · Dennis's opinion: 'Texas Pinball Festival is seeming to be the go-to source for big pinball announcements'

  • Spinal Tap custom game (Flash Gordon modification) played very easy with generous ball saves, making extra ball shot consistently hittable for non-expert players

    high confidence · Tony's direct gameplay experience hitting the extra ball shot three times consecutively

  • Twilight Zone won the Eclectic Gamers Modern Widebody Tournament with 56.8% of vote vs Star Trek TNG's 43%

    high confidence · Dennis's tournament vote calculation

  • National Video Game Museum entry was $12 (with TPF discount available), featured ~40 playable arcade games, and was structured by concept/theme rather than chronology

    high confidence · Dennis's direct observation and Tony's museum description

Notable Quotes

  • “it's probably the game I liked most out of everything at Texas this year. It was so, the way it played, the rules and everything. I mean, it's just a simple whitewood. There's no art or nothing, and the game is amazingly fun.”

    Tony @ mid-episode — Strong endorsement of Total Annihilation as standout experience, emphasizing gameplay over presentation

  • “I think if it had a paint job, it would have won. I think some people must have come down to this isn't a finished project yet, and the judges couldn't support it.”

    Dennis @ mid-episode — Analysis of why technically superior Total Annihilation lost Best Custom Game award despite close judging

  • “That line was out the door, and I think that line was out the door for probably a couple hours.”

    Tony @ mid-episode — Indicates strong collector/fan interest in Elvira 3 announcement and Cassandra Peterson appearance

  • “I think a pin that's branded Elvira, that's targeted towards collectors, can probably be very, very successful, especially if you have this unified look to it with the other games.”

    Dennis @ mid-episode — Market analysis suggesting Elvira 3 positioned for strong collector appeal

  • “if you're a fan of the 80s style of games, especially the pre-Ramp era, but you want the complexity of a more modern game in terms of rules and what you can do with features, I think this is what Gottlieb wanted with its street level, if they had had the technology.”

    Tony @ late-episode — Design philosophy positioning Total Annihilation as bridge between classic and modern gameplay

Entities

DennispersonTonypersonTexas Pinball FestivaleventNational Video Game MuseumorganizationDennis NordmanpersonCassandra PetersonpersonSpooky PinballcompanyTotal AnnihilationgameBuffy the Vampire Slayergame

Signals

  • ?

    event_signal: TPF 2017 featured significant homebrew showcase with notable custom titles competing for Best Custom Game award

    high · Detailed coverage of Buffy, Total Annihilation, Spinal Tap, Doom; formal award voting structure in place

  • ?

    community_signal: Strong collector demand for Elvira brand: Cassandra Peterson autograph line lasted hours, indicating sustained fan interest in franchise continuation

    high · Tony reports line 'out the door for probably a couple hours' and Dennis identifies this as validation of collector market for Elvira-branded pins

  • ?

    design_philosophy: Total Annihilation represents potential market for modernized pre-ramp era gameplay: single-level playfield with sophisticated rules/features appeals to design purists despite lack of art

    medium · Tony's commentary on what Gottlieb might have intended with superior technology; hosts agree exceptional gameplay can compensate for minimalist presentation

  • ?

    event_signal: Texas Pinball Festival 2017 as major announcement venue: Elvira 3 and Spooky's Alice Cooper's Nightmare Castle both revealed

    high · Dennis explicitly states 'Texas Pinball Festival is seeming to be the go-to source for big pinball announcements' and lists multiple major reveals from the event

  • ?

    licensing_signal: Cassandra Peterson involvement in Elvira 3 production; no longer performs in character/costume per current availability

    medium · Tony notes Peterson appeared at TPF but 'wasn't in costume or anything, and I don't think she does that anymore'

Topics

Custom/Homebrew Pinball GamesprimaryTexas Pinball Festival 2017 AnnouncementsprimaryNational Video Game Museum VisitprimaryPinball Game Design PhilosophysecondaryTournament Results & VotingsecondaryManufacturer Announcements (Stern, Spooky Pinball)secondaryCollector Interest & LicensingmentionedArcade Game History & Nostalgiamentioned

Sentiment

positive(0.78)— Hosts express enthusiasm about custom games (especially Total Annihilation and Buffy), positive reception of museum visit, and excitement about industry announcements (Elvira 3, Alice Cooper). Some mild criticism of Spinal Tap's theme fit and design choices, but overall tone is celebratory and encouraging toward homebrew scene and TPF as major event.

Transcript

groq_whisper · $0.267

0:00
Welcome to the Eclectic Gamers Podcast. Today is Monday, March 27th. It's episode 31, the TPF special. And if we sound a little tired, a little worn out, it's because it was a really late night by the time we got home last night. That's right. I'm Dennis, everyone, and we are pleased to give you a super special episode. Yay. Oh, yeah, and I'm Tony, just in case you did not really remember that. They know you. Everybody knows. Everybody to know me is to love me. Oh, yeah.
0:47
Yeah, we had a wonderful weekend at the National Video Game Museum and at TPF and a not-so-wonderful drive home when we ran into some serious weather down Wichita way, but everybody's home safe and it was a pretty good weekend all in all.
1:05
So it was fun. Fun times were had by all, or at least most all. And we're going to obviously spend the entire episode essentially going into the details of all of that. But we do have a few things beforehand. And I guess the first thing though, before we transition into any of sort of the normal topics would be our intros. It has been two weeks. We did have things going on before Texas Pinball Festival. We did go to an Aerosmith launch party at 403 Club, which was the day after we had our monthly pinball tournament at Pizza West. And I don't really have any highlights from the Aerosmith launch party other than, I suppose, ironically, despite the name, I never got in a single game of Aerosmith, either in tournament or even beforehand, because everyone was trying to learn it. And I hate standing in line. So I still haven't played Aerosmith, actually. I didn't play it at TPF either because we do have one on location now and I thought, eh, I'll play it when I get home at some point. The luster will eventually fade enough that I won't have to wait in queue and then I'll be able to figure it out more. But it is definitely getting a lot of respect from our local tournament players as a good game and that's always a positive because we love good pinball. But okay, we'll go ahead and get on with the main meat of the show. Before we go on to basically our massive trip report that is episode 31, I do need to close out the 2017 Modern Widebody Tournament because we did have that vote sitting out there. I actually let it sit out there longer. I took no computer down with me to Texas. I was like, I'm never going to be on this. Let's not even make the lie seem real.
Spinal Tap
game
Elvira 3game
Alice Cooper's Nightmare Castlegame
Ericperson
Mikeperson
Twilight Zonegame
Star Trek The Next Generationgame
Flash Gordongame
Swords of Furygame
Dragon's Lairgame
Aerosmithgame
  • $

    market_signal: Spooky Pinball increasing production run to 500 units for Alice Cooper's Nightmare Castle (largest for their official games) with modest $250 price increase

    high · Dennis reports specifications: 500-unit count at $6,250 vs previous $6,000 pricing

  • ?

    community_signal: Dennis Nordman returning as designer for Elvira 3 with original artist; maintains unified aesthetic across Elvira franchise games

    high · Dennis confirms Nordman designed original two Elvira games and is returning with same artist; Stern handling manufacturing

  • ?

    product_concern: Custom game Spinal Tap tuned unusually easy with over-generous ball saves and accessible extra ball shot; may indicate design-for-casual-players bias

    medium · Tony successfully hit dangerous shot three consecutive times despite being non-expert player, attributing to deliberately easier tuning

    • 2:42
    The vote did stay open. Let's not even pretend this is going to be a working weekend. Absolutely. Last time I brought it, we thought we were going to record down that we learned a lot of lessons from 2016 and employed them in 2017. I did bring down a pocket recorder just in case I wanted to do any interviews after the first day Friday of the Texas Pinball Festival. I left it in the room because I was like, it's so loud. I ain't ever going to want to edit this audio out. It's just too much of a pain. And we don't do a ton of interviews. We've stirred more towards guest hosts and it's been a while since we've even done one of those. But tournament results. So you had to wait a little bit or I had to wait a little bit to actually calculate them up. But the final round was what was going on. It was Twilight Zone versus Star Trek The Next Generation. If I recall, Tony predicted that Twilight Zone would win and I think by over 10 percent, so 60 percent plus. And I predicted Twilight Zone would win, but by less than 5 percent, which would mean somewhere between 51 and 55 percent. And we were both wrong. Twilight Zone did win, but it had 56.8% of the vote, with Star Trek having the other 43%. So I think no one is shocked by this finding, and we ended up running an entire tournament to tell us what Pinside had already told us. Yeah, there was no surprise coming out of this one. No, no, I was not one of those 56% votes, but it's really liked. it's beloved quite frankly some people feel it is the best game that was ever made i did actually play it yesterday at the end of the texas pinball festival it was i think it was the last game i may have played actually in a um don't recall no we played uh eight ball deluxe right after that that was the last game you're right you're right that's right it was the last one on the on the back wall row that we played right back as we were moving back towards the entrance for the announcements of all the awards they do and such. And yes, we got in a game of 8-Ball Deluxe because I won that one. I don't remember if I won Twilight Zone or not.
    4:52
    I don't think I did. I think my brother-in-law, Eric, I think won it. No, yeah, Eric did. Yeah, he was fortunate. He blew up that last ball. Yeah, it was a bunch of crap. Okay.
    5:04
    All right, so trip report, essentially. uh we went down on thursday so that we would have enough time the texas pinball festival formally starts for regular attendees like us on friday at around 5 p.m central but we wanted to do a little bit more than that and one of the things that we had learned about last year was the opening of the national that there was they have a national video game museum very very close like within five miles of where texas pinball festival sells so we went down a day early so that we could spend Friday going to the video game museum. And I thought we should go ahead. Cause we do cover video games, even though this is a little out of order. Uh, but we, you know, we were, we were probably there maybe three hours or so. I'd say, uh, yeah, something like that. We got, we got, we got back to the room and yeah, it was about three hours. Yeah. So anyway, I thought, well, we should probably go ahead and cover that. And we'll cover it first since we're going to spend so much time on TPF itself. But, uh, I guess broad thoughts, Tony, what'd you think of the national video game museum? It was, larger than I feared it would be and not as big as I wanted it to be but that's mainly because I think that thing could have filled that entire building and I would have been happy spending hours and hours and hours going through it was really amazing I enjoyed it a lot yeah the I didn't know what to expect other than I heard very good press about it that it was that was a nice museum and it is really very nice museum yeah it's done up I really like how they've laid it out by and large at least the you go in it's it's i mean it's truly set up in museum format to educate so they've got these uh stages they've you know kind of like video game stages they've set it up in stages where they give you a way to kind of navigate the museum as you learn about the history of the video games and it's not like how i thought it would be when i first saw they were staging where i thought they're going to start old and they're going to move modern and you're going to be walking through a chronology rather it's you right up front the very first thing you get to see is just the litany of consoles that have been created uh since the very beginning since the like the the what were they there was a magnavox or you know pre-intellivision sort of stuff the the tv hookups that were just the single games like the pong hookup and such all the way to that and then you you see it all on the wall when you walk in and then when you start going around rather than be organized by chronology the museum is laid out kind of by concept or theory so there's a section on sound there's a section on uh the handhelds there's a section on the uh people behind the designs so it's just it it's i really liked how they how they had structured it and you and a lot of the displays are interactive so there's the whole section on the video game crash yes yes the yes because the youngins now they're too young in to remember the video game crash i barely i don't remember it as a crash at the time i just remember games got really really cheap uh because all of a sudden i got a bunch and it was because prices were slashed but the uh you know you've got so you've got all these uh these actual games running the handhelds i got the handhelds out they got the they got the purell hand sanitizer all over the place so you can keep keep your hands clean and you go all the way through and once you're done with with the navigating the actual museum part they they have a little arcade uh it's just video games no pinball but because this is a video game museum however there were a lot of games i mean it might have been close to i think it's around 40 that they had on the and they have tokens so you can buy tokens uh sort of standard what i think It was a showbiz pizza place, back when I was a kid at least, where you got four tokens for a buck. And you get four tokens with your registration. And it turned out they had an arrangement with the Texas Pinball Festival this time where entry was like half off if you had your Texas badge, your wristband badge thing. So we actually went and registered. It was only advertised for Saturday and Sunday for that. But we went and were able to register earlier this time with TPF. They actually opened that up before noon. So we went, got the bands, and we got the discount. So we adjusted our timing a little bit because we at the Eclectic Gamers Podcast love to save money wherever we can. So anyway, they had a Dragon's Lair there. That was a little highlight for me. It's an arcade cab game that played a LaserDisc. And when I was a kid, it was my favorite arcade game. I couldn't do anything. I never knew how to do it. I never knew how to play it properly, and I didn't get anywhere. And in fact, I put one token in it and I got past one stage and I failed all the rest. I've actually got that game on Xbox 360 and have won it. But you get better prompts with the modern interpretations because it was just so hard because it was designed to gobble quarters. But it had a full motion animation. That's what was always the standout. So that was a big highlight for me. I also really liked seeing a lot of the consoles I had no familiarity with. we mentioned my brother-in-law earlier when we were talking about the end of the tpf he grew up with a lot of those consoles he had a lot of video game machines i didn't realize how many until he started saying okay i have that i have that i wanted that i have that i have that and it's like i didn't know any of these things existed i must have been in this little farm bubble or something because i was like i i'd heard some of them like the you know atari links the jaguar system obviously the more modern stuff I was familiar with like Sega and Dreamcast time and such they weren't things I was interested in but I always knew about him but he had his hand in a lot of those yeah I mean growing up I had my Intellivision because we never had an Atari we had an Intellivision and then I went from an Intellivision to an NES and then NES to Super NES and then you know then the Playstation yeah i'd say one of my uh what i thought was one of the neatest uh thing a couple i guess couple real neat display highlights first was uh where they have that well of consoles they have these giant like they look like super nintendo controllers and that's what you use it actually worked really well uh that's what you use when you could you could go on on these big screens and you can highlight and choose any of those machines and they would tell you a little paragraph narrative about their history, like what resulted in their formation, how they did. You had production count numbers, which were real interesting because... That were really awesome. Yeah, so Tony was loading up things like Game Boy, and then he'd load up PlayStation 2, and you just see, okay, where's the... What's the growth of this? Because I remember you had expected the Game Boy to have a higher number count than it did. Well, and to be fair, the Game Boy's number count was enormous. I think it had one of the highest number of counts of anything I saw the whole time. Yeah, it did.
    12:06
    It was... Anything north of 100 million is obviously massive. It was just... It was so ever-present. I mean, I had a Game Boy. That was my only handheld for over a decade was a Game Boy, a regular Game Boy. And so for me, I always just think, oh, well, everyone had a Game Boy. That was what you had. And think about any of the other handhelds. Nintendo started spitting out more handhelds. Yeah, because I never... the lynx and the jaguar i'd heard of them and but i never played any of them or i mean i played some of them but i never had any of them so uh yeah that was cool i i also i also really liked the uh display they had for the video game music they had a few tracks and you could switch them to hear what they would sound like on different systems so you take maybe a game that you knew from Super Nintendo, and you'd say, okay, but if they had made that for the regular Nintendo Entertainment System, what would that have sounded like? And the answer was generally, bad.
    13:07
    Painful to the ears in some cases. Especially you could do the same thing with an Atari 2600. What's that sound like? Oh, that sounds like the Nintendo, but even higher pitched and more screechy. Yeah.
    13:21
    The one that I thought was strange is it seemed like no matter what you did if you took music and you stuck it on sega genesis all of a sudden you got a drum track it just seemed like there was a new drum track that came along with the sega i don't know i don't know what what the deal was with that technologically but it's like okay apparently everything else gets a better better drum tracks like drum and bass now going uh at high bbm in the background of all the ones i tried out but anyway so yeah that was uh that was fun so i i would recommend And I mean, regular entry for an adult without a discount was only $12. So if anyone's ever down in the Dallas area and has even a passing interest in video games, I do recommend checking it out. I think it's worth the registration fee. It's real easy to spend a couple of hours there. No problem. Just going through the displays. And if you actually want to play some of the arcade games, I could see you popping in another hour or two there as well. of you oh yeah i could i could have spent a lot more time there playing more of those but i i i did not i mean i played a bunch of burger i played burger time several times and a bunch of other games but burger time was my game when i was growing up i had a handheld version of that actually or my sister did one of the real real small handhelds that was just the little black lcd uh ones that could fit in your pocket like one of those tiger games or something i forget the name. I actually didn't look to see, to try and find those at the museum. They had some of the little mini cab, uh, uh, Coloco ones or whatever that, that I have in my garage. Uh, cause those went, one of the few things I was able to point out and said, Oh, I have those that no one else had. But, um, yeah, that was really fun, but we, yeah, we had to leave because we had Texas pinball festival starting in the evening. And that is my segue into what the rest of this episode is going to be about, which is the 2017 Texas Pinball Festival. I guess, I don't know what we should start with. Tony, do you have any thoughts on where we want to begin? I don't know if we should go chronologically. I was thinking maybe we just sort of do it by maybe category of type of things. Because, you know, we have like the industry new stuff. There were the custom games. There was the more newish games that we finally got to try. And there's a sort of everything else is kind of how I think of it. uh yeah i think that that's probably the best way to organize it because otherwise it's just going to be rambling and we're going to forget something and we're going to forget something anyway i guarantee we're going to forget something going through it but our brains are addled still right now but we can't hold up this episode because you the people demand it and we must serve so uh let's go ahead and start with with the custom games then there are a lot there were a lot of custom games and i don't i don't imagine we've played all i know i didn't play all of them there may be some that uh that we both missed as well i took down a few notes of ones that i knew were there so i'll run down my list and then anything you have in addition to it we'll go ahead and we'll cover that way i think uh did you play doom i never got a chance there was always a pretty decent line or it was turned off or had an issue every time i came up to it right which was only which was mainly the line it only had an issue one time all weekend that i noticed but there was always a whole bunch of people there so i went and did something else yes uh i never played it either i just it was right there but beside a couple other of the homebrews and i i wanted to try it uh one of the one of the people we went down with uh i'm trying I don't remember which one, told me that he got time on Doom, and he thought it was all right, but he didn't like it as much as the other homebrews that were in that lineup. But, you know, and I don't remember exactly why. But anyway, it looked kind of neat, I guess. I think, yeah, I think what he said was it wasn't quite, you know, it's not quite finished, so there were a lot of things that had to be explained as you played it, which made it a little, obviously, difficult. But a lot of these are works in progress. So anyway, we can't really tell you about Doom. What about Spinal Tap? Did you play Spinal Tap? I played Spinal Tap one time I played it last year also and it's I feel about the same on it as I did last year It's an interesting game It's an interesting modification of Flash Gordon but it's nothing It doesn't really jump out as anything more than to me. It's not like something where it's like I want them to make this a production type game but that could be because I don't really care that much about Spinal Tap. So it's, it's not a game that tickles my fancy.
    18:00
    And I'm in the same boat. I've seen Spinal Tap. I've seen it once though. It wasn't, it wasn't a movie that resonated with me. So while I respect it for, for its humor, I just, it's not, it's not my sort of theme. I played it with Mike who came down with us and he's guest hosted for those who have heard our E3 episode and the episode where Tony wasn't available. them uh we both played uh played it you couldn't play it in two player they had it set for one player but he was waiting and watching while i played it and then vice versa and i know he was getting really annoyed annoyed with me because uh even though it's a modified flash gordon which i thought it's i was trying fast gordon to be a fascinating playfield layout it's i just it's so unique it's so you look at you can see this and you'll be like oh that's flash gordon you know because nothing else is quite like it.
    18:49
    But it seemed very easy. I actually, earning the extra ball on Spinal Tap is the same as, I believe, as earning the extra ball on Flash Gordon, which is attacking the stand-up drops on the far right and then hitting the stand-up target behind those, I should say, in-line drop targets. And once you drop them all, you hit a stand-up in the back, and that gives you the extra ball. I think that's the same as it is in Flash Gordon. I can't remember, because I have never earned an extra ball in Flash Gordon ever. However, when I was playing my three balls on spinal tap, I got it three times and then I quit going for the shot because I was so consistent. I could get that shot and I could save the ball every time. And I don't know if it's deliberately, if it's been tuned easier, but I'm not a great player. And if I'm able to hit what should be one of the most dangerous shots that successfully, I'd never played this before. And I got it and then I got it again. And then I got it again. And I was like, okay, I'm just going to let it drain out. And I should say, I'm just not going and make that shot anymore. I got a few of the things. So I felt that even though it's a Flash Gordon layout, it plays very, very easy. The ball saves were incredibly generous, especially towards on the outlanes. And I assume that's because Flash Gordon itself is an outlane drain monster. Yeah, it is. But I didn't really know what else there was. I felt like I saw everything that there was currently to see in the game. So if the software comes further along, I'd be interested in taking a look at it again. but it didn't really grab me myself. I think it's more that if I were into the theme, I'd really have appreciated it. But from a rule perspective, it wasn't really... There were other homebrews that I got more excited about. So it was okay. It was interesting. If you hate Flash Gordon because it plays too brutal, this approach to the layout, I think, would probably be a lot more appealing to someone like that. but I like Flash Gordon for its brutality.
    20:46
    All right, so that was Spinal Tap. Buffy, the Vampire Slayer. Did you play that one? Oh, yeah, I played that one. I was a big Buffy fan back in the 90s when it was on the air, watched it every week. It was a big group thing that we did, but this game was pretty enjoyable. It was, the art package, the art package done on it was really well done. It looked amazing. They had two of them there. They both, they were both, had slightly different coloration and stuff, but they looked amazing. And they were, they played, they played pretty good. They weren't, they weren't, I mean, they were a lot of fun and pretty enjoyable all in all. and there's one mode where you get to watch Xander die and if you mess it up he just drowns and you're so sad you fail that mode every time totally not on purpose Xander's the Yamcha of Buffy yes he is Dragon Ball Z reference for y'all all two of you have probably seen that show yeah no I thought Buffy was fun apparently a modified I guess a heavily modified Swords of Fury layout. I did not see Swords of Fury when I looked at the play field but I have less familiarity with Swords of Fury than I do Flash Gordon so that could have been part of it I thought it played better than Swords of Fury So I thought that was a definite improvement in terms of how they made the game function I thought the rules made a lot of sense. I felt like I knew what I was doing with it. It looked really good. The video clips and such I thought were really well integrated. And this game did win Best Custom Game of the Show. And I'm not surprised. I'm kind of surprised and we'll get to that but it definitely was worthy of consideration and I'm not surprised it was worthy of consideration I'm not surprised some people would have said that it was I don't think that it needed it I don't think it was the best but it was definitely worthy of the consideration well let's talk about the best then because I think your best and my best are probably the same and that would be Total Annihilation yes, Total Annihilation was an amazing game that was a ton of fun. And every time I played it, I just found myself enjoying it. I mean, it's probably the game I liked most out of everything at Texas this year.
    23:22
    It was so, the way it played, the rules and everything. I mean, it's just a simple whitewood. There's no art or nothing, and the game is amazingly fun. so once yeah when it gets art put on it i mean i'll be honest i don't think it needs art on it i think it's a i think it's a wonderful game as is but when it gets art on it man it's going to be amazing yeah i had seen and i think i even shared it on our facebook page uh a few weeks ago i've seen this game streamed before dead flip had streamed it and i was intrigued by it uh you I didn't see a whole lot going on in the LCD in terms of animation and stuff. It's kind of like electric spacey sort of techno-y thing. It has a very 80s throwback sound to it. And in fact, the layout is very 80s. It's all single level. It's not a game full of ramps. But they've got so much interesting technology incorporated, like the stand-up drop targets to do ball lock, which to me initially is reminiscent of Fathom, except it's actually set so that you could lock in balls in between the stand-ups rather than trying to just drop all your in-line drop targets and then get into a kick-out hole behind them all. And then those pop back up and sort of function as these stand-ups again where you have to drop each one of the targets and then you get your ball back.
    24:53
    The multi-ball I thought was fun. I was able to get into that. It was, no, I thought it was really impressive. an engineering marvel in a lot of ways and i think it would be telling to see if someone would actually a production model single level play field game uh which i'm not going to call it simple i'm just going to say it's just yeah it's a throwback in terms of the layout style but with today's technology i wonder if people could really have a lot of fun with something like that because I thought it was a lot of fun. Yeah, I loved it. And for me, it was the best of the custom games that I had played. I'm not shocked that it lost, because it's hard to be the complete package when you don't have art and you're just a whitewood. But they acknowledged that it was very, very close between it and Buffy, and I'm not surprised, because the engineering behind that is so impressive. that even though it's just a white wood, that it could go toe-to-toe with a complete game like Buffy, I think says a lot. I think if it had a paint job, it would have won. I think some people must have come down to this isn't a finished project yet, and the judges couldn't support it. I agree with you. But I would have. If I were a judge, I would have voted. I don't care. I don't care if it's a white wood. It plays so well that – It's so much fun. We'll just consider it minimalist in the way of art. We'll just call it a minimalist piece and go with it from there, just because there's so much packed in on the gameplay. If you ever see this at a show, definitely give it a try. If you're a fan of the 80s style of games, especially the pre-Ramp era, but you want the complexity of a more modern game in terms of rules and what you can do with features, I think this is what Gottlieb wanted with its street level, if they had had the technology. Yeah, I mean, the game only had, what, one pop?
    26:57
    I don't remember, actually. It has one pop on the right side that when you hit it, it pops back hard, and it flashes a light, and it makes a good sound, and it's just awesome. And you never know, based upon where you hit that pop, how that ball's going to feed back. it was really really impressive i i enjoyed that game so much that was those were all the custom games i could remember playing did were there any other homebrews that you tried those were the big ones there might have been a couple others but i don't remember them okay well let's go ahead and let's move on to industry news uh i'd say other than pinball expo and honestly it's getting to the point where I think you could argue even above Pinball Expo. Texas Pinball Festival is seeming to be the go-to source for big pinball announcements. It was last year, and this year was no exception. And so there are a few of them, and I think we'll just go ahead and start running down the list. The first one I'll go ahead, and this is in chronological order of the announcements, is kind of in the order of information and what I think is interesting to discuss. But The first thing is that Elvira 3 is getting made. Dennis Nordman, the designer who did the first two Elvira games, Elvira and the Party Monsters and Scared Stiff, is working with Cassandra Peterson. He's got his artist back. And the only other thing I really know is that the game will be constructed through Stern. I don't know if it's going to be sold as a Stern or if it's going to be sold under like Wonelli was under a different branding. but Stern's going to be handling the manufacturing process. No idea what's going to, I mean, that's all I know. No art, no pricing, no timeline really, other than obviously it's at the point where they're willing to announce.
    28:58
    That's all I know to say on it, other than there were a lot of people who were apparently, judging from the line for the autograph signing with Cassandra, a lot of Elvira fans in pinball. Oh man, that line was insane. It was out the door, and I think that line was out the door for probably a couple hours. Yeah, I don't know. And people weren't going to get pictures of her in the Elvira getup because she wasn't in costume or anything, and I don't think she does that anymore. But yeah, she's apparently got a lot of loyal fans. I think, and I've always suspected it because of all the online forum discussion I've seen, that a pin that's branded Elvira, that's targeted towards collectors, can probably be very, very successful, especially if you have this unified look to it with the other games. And bringing in the same designer and same artist guarantees that, I think. So I'm sure this is a win for Nordman and for Stern and for Cassandra Peterson and her license. So if you're an Elvira fan, this is great news. I know it's something that a lot of those collectors have been clamoring for for years. So, all right, so there's that one. Not particularly interesting news to me. But the next thing I think to hit on is Spooky Pinball. It was known that their third official game, non-contract game, was going to be announced. And it was, it's Alice Cooper's Nightmare Castle. And as was already known, I believe, the details are, I think it's a 500 unit count, which will be their biggest run yet of their official games. And $62.50, so $6,250, which slightly, I think that's $250 more than what Rob's on. Yeah, that's a $250 increase. So anyway, again, it was really just the announcement. I hadn't really seen anything else other than that. But obviously, what it would be, what the theme would be, it fits with their spooky, dark sort of tone. It has been indicated outside of that setting, but confirmed by Spooky, that this isn't going the music pin route that you currently think of, where basically you're playing an MP3 player and you're choosing songs, like how the Stern ones have been, Kiss and ACDC and Metallica. This instead is going to be more of a story mode where Alice Cooper is your narrator and you're going on this sort of adventure or journey with him, like non-music pens, basically. But what are your thoughts on this? Because I don't really know. I know some of Alice Cooper's songs, of course, but I don't ever really think about Alice Cooper or have ever been into him in a way where I care one way or another. Yeah, I'm pretty much in the same boat. I like the fact that it's not a music pen. I like that it's a story pen type thing. I think I have a preference for that over music pens. I mean, music pens are fine, but for the most part, I don't find them as enjoyable as other games normally. Some of them are good, but for the most part, I always feel like there's something else that's another game that's better.
    32:14
    This seems pretty interesting. Spooky is definitely showing that they have a certain genre that they like to fall into between Rob Zombie and now this and I'm hoping all the best for them Spooky is a personal favorite I won't be saying they're the best people in the business or this and that there's nothing wrong with them their games are all okay but none of their games have been truly amazing that I've played and I mean I played Jetsons and Dominoes when I was there over the weekend. I've played Rob Zombie and I actually really enjoy Rob Zombie but it's not like some wild out of the park amazer game.
    32:55
    So we'll see how things go with Alice Cooper. Yes, I know part of the reason for the price increase was Spooky indicated they wanted to take basically their argument is they're reinvesting that additional $250 into mechanisms and such into the games. So it will be, with them having a higher budget to work with, it will be interesting to see from a gameplay perspective. Because I'm not an Alice Cooper fan or against Alice Cooper, the theme does nothing for me. So it'll come down, Rob Zombie was the same way. So it'll come down to the gameplay. And so I'll be interested in seeing what they accomplish. While we were at the show, we have a Rob Zombie on location right now, actually. But while we were at the show, I played America's Most Haunted again, and I played Rob Zombie again. And I felt I could tell the difference in improvement. To me, it was an improvement that I thought that the mechanisms and concepts were better in Rob Zombie than they were in America's Most Haunted, that it looks more professional. I know some people disagree in the sense that I don't know anyone who disagrees and thinks that Rob Zombie looks cheaper, air quotes, cheaper than America's Most Haunted does. But there are some people who prefer the America's Most Haunted gameplay. And I can get at that because obviously those layouts are significantly different. But yeah, I think this is interesting. I like that the count's higher. I probably said that back when we knew they were going to do 500 units because it's going to mean their games are going to get out there more, be on location more. And I think that's going to be good because there's going to be better feedback and people will be able to, you know, if they're actually getting to play these at barcades and such, then there's going to be more clamoring for Spooky to do things because it's not going to just be private collectors that see him once you get to accounts like this. So that, I think, is very much a positive.
    34:49
    Industry news item number three would be Houdini. This was the only seminar I went to was American Pinballs. Yeah. It felt like a requirement for us with everything that's been in the news and how things have been. Yes. So, basically, despite this, I'd say overall this got a lot of, this has gotten a lot of interest out of Texas Pinball Festival. And it's not too surprising. In about a four-month time period, American Pinball has gone and they have indeed truly, totally redid what was shown at Pinball Expo. This is not at all, other than the name, it is not at all the Houdini you remember. It looks completely different. The layout is different. The art package is entirely different.
    35:38
    And the only details, no limit count. I believe the price MSRP is going to be $6,995, which I think has been known for quite a while.
    35:48
    And so I did not play this. The lines were too long. They had two machines available. And I did get a pretty good look at the layout and some of the features. And some other people posted videos up on Pinside. if you want to watch some of the gameplay that was being featured. The programmer was there. He indicated that the software is only about 20% done at this point. The design is not yet finished either. I've heard someone not with the company speculate that they felt the design was maybe 60% done.
    36:23
    Anyway, I guess let's just sort of, we can go into whatever on it. If you want to start with thoughts about Houdini or thoughts about American Pinball and their approach on Houdini, that might be best. Let me start with my thoughts on just Houdini itself. Now, they did say, and a lot of this stuff came out, is they completely skipped the Whitewoods stage. They went straight to a production machine or a prototype machine, I guess.
    36:47
    They have gone with, it's impressive to me that they've managed to get as much done in four months as they have. It's insane. And the fact that, as they said at their thing, 10 days before TPF started, they didn't have a working machine. And in those final 10 days, they were able to get two machines put together and lit. So at the time, or at the show, the game had some issues. There were some problems. There were some code issues, but with the code at 20%, and them being two prototypes that have been put together specifically to flip, I think they turned out pretty well all in all. I didn't play either because of the lines and I got in line for a little bit at one time but one of the machines went down and they were fixing it and then I wandered off to go play something else and never came back to it because the line was again pretty good sized and it was looking like I was going to be spending an inordinate amount of time in that line and I'm just a little too flighty for that I guess I was like I'm just gonna play something else now but what I watched and when I looked the shots don't look bad I didn't see anything that looked horrible some of the shots look real tight like really really tight but I'm impressed honestly it's better than I expected for four months of being where it's at it's better than I was expecting a complete train wreck out of the gate that's what I expected and that is not at all what we got.
    38:27
    Yeah. Well, I guess you could always say there was a train wreck out of the gate. We're just so far past that point now where they're trying to present themselves as having a new gate. And in regards to the second checkpoint, if we want to use a racing analogy, this was much smoother. This is what you would want to see coming out of a company.
    38:48
    My thoughts would be in terms of on Houdini itself. Yeah, the layout looked fine to me. I obviously I didn't get to play it. So I don't have a personal opinion on if it's my my style or not. I read a number of people posting on pinball forums about who did get to play it. It seems the general consensus is, is that it shoots pretty good. I don't you know, I don't know whether I didn't see anyone who said that they loved all this. You know, that was like this revolutionary sort of, oh, I love this design. I love everything about it. But you know what? If it's if it's fun, then that's what they need to do. It doesn't need to be top 10, pin-side ranking sort of game if it's got good and enjoyable shots, and it sounds like it does. Some of the features that I've seen them indicate, like they've got some cannon shots and such, which are neat little gimmicks. They're not going to break the plastics, and they're launching a ball from the bottom of the pinball table through a little catapult up to the top. You know what? That's pretty visually impressive, and I could see a desire to show off something like that to catch people's eye out on location. Because, hey, that's a fun toy idea. Jill Balser, during the presentation, was the primary speaker. They had like a panel of seven people, but he and the programmer who spoke the most and him definitely the most. And so, I mean, their big message with this, in addition to they were surprisingly to me transparent, surprisingly transparent about, though, like we've discussed in the past, they basically had to be, I thought, if you wanted to have the best foot forward. but they were you know acknowledging the very short timeline acknowledging how they skipped the whitewood stage and and how they went about skipping that stage without you know wanting to convey that they don't feel they've sacrificed quality on this um of course this you know it's raising a lot of questions in a lot of ways if this works out as well as the prototype basically is looking you know it'll be like okay well what it's almost begging the question for a lot of the other boutiques in particular why are you guys having so much trouble developing games on a timely manner if this brand new startup is able to get something put whipped together in four months what i mean what's it's like what's your problem they if houdini is this good this far along um and of course you can always go and flip it again and be like well but do we really need one year development times at all like from stern or whatever it which has raised these interesting questions because there are parallels obviously in the past you know gottlieb was notorious for having like a three-month development cycle versus the standard year nine months to a year that williams did and it kind of showed in some ways but you still had decent layouts that usually showed on the code side right but at the same time we're here at four months is where to get where we're at now and let's be honest i'm not assuming we're not going to see a production run actually hitting the ground until next year is my honest thoughts okay and i think they had they had told not at the seminar but i believe they told people they're shooting for june oh no i understand that that's what they're shooting for but just based upon the realities of things i would x i'm expecting early next year just because i they could completely surprise me they've already managed to surprise me a whole bunch they've managed to get a good start on fixing their issues that they entered the hobby with but the fact is no matter what they're shooting for there are more likely than not going to be delays as they get the proper polish on stuff so my expectation is for probably very early next year or maybe late this year, it's just going to be a matter of how many stumbling blocks they run into on the way, and how many things that cause minor delays, which is one of the things I like, is because while that's been said, at the seminar they said they weren't going to give an announced release date because it'll be released when it's done.
    42:59
    Right. And they also did the other thing I think needs to be important to mention is they're not doing pre-orders. They're going to a straight distributor system, so it's only going to be through distributors. They're not selling direct, and they're not doing pre-orders. Right, and they have been consistent about the no pre-order thing since the beginning. That's one of the few things that hasn't had to be changed by them. and you know I don't know I mean the theories online are though obviously I've had and I the documents are still available on our google I won't relink them in these show notes but on the episode where we've covered this sort of stuff I know that there are mortgages taken out in American pinball's name but it looks like there may be I don't want to say an angel investor but there's some sort of sizable financial backing that's allowing this to continue and in a way that's I mean, not really in a way. From a consumer perspective, this is good because it means that what might have sunk other entities, they're able to cash. They're just burning cash to get through all of this, I think. And that's fine. It's working. So, I mean, the big thing that American Pinball did that I think a lot of other manufacturers have not, perhaps because they can't do, is when they ran into all this trouble, they have gone and they have pulled a bunch of industry veterans in to save them. And it is working. You bring in Joel Balser He knows what he doing The guy this new sales guy they just brought on Jolly I think is his first name who going to set up all the sales stuff He is an established coin guy to work with distributors I mean, the programmer is probably the new... The artist, you did a lot of the art with Sega. That was one of the criticisms. A lot of people look at the art. The art's now steampunk in theme, which I actually like better than the old theme. Yeah, I do too. I like the theme. But, you know, more of the criticism isn't the theme so much as it is the style of the art, which I guess was much like what was done on Sega. But you would kind of expect that if the artist was someone who in pinball had kind of worked only on Sega and then got out of the industry. But the point is, he knows how to do pinball art. So they've been doing all of this, and the programmer has an established history in the homebrew side. So, you know, that is a really viable strategy. My guess on the whole why this four-month cycle has been possible is just a guess. I may not say this, and it may not be true, but I think Joel Balser had a design, and he brought it in with him, and he already kind of knew that it would work because he's designed a number of pins before. Maybe he had something that got shelved, and he's like, no, let's go ahead and use this, and we'll use the four months to refine it, and we can skip the whitewood stage because I already know it's going to shoot. Maybe they foam-corded it at some point or something. So all that is working very much to their advantage. The only thing that I was concerned, and I don't think it's a major concern at all. The only thing that they announced that was to me still concerning in a minor way is they apparently don't have any distributors yet. I was just I was a little surprised. That's what Jolly's for. But they even actively said in the seminar, if there were any distributors in the room that would be interested in talking with them about setting something up to come up to them after it was done. I think they have an idea of what they want to do for distribution on the American side, but it sounds like they have no – and this was, again, from pinball forums – it sounds like they don't have anything at all in the works yet on if people in Europe want to get the games or something.
    46:27
    Yeah, that was a little weird. But at the same time, seeing as they are starting their whole plan over again, and I think they're concentrating on getting the machine done at this time, I can see where they're getting a later start into setting the distributor up.
    46:48
    Yeah. Overall, they're probably going to be, in terms of boutique manufacturing, They're probably the biggest winner of Texas Pinball Festival because they actually had something to show that actually functioned.
    47:01
    And despite Spooky, or compared to something like Spooky, they had to salvage a reputation that was severely damaged. Spooky, you know, everyone loves Spooky. Spooky doesn't make major missteps in terms of PR. So Houdini, it's just is impressive for the fact that it is it is really, I think, helping a lot of people come back around and say, OK, we're willing to give this company another chance. Now, how many people end up going in on on a theme like Houdini? I know there are a lot of people who love magic pins. The $7,000 price point, I don't know. I don't know whether or not the features are enough that they feel like they're getting a premium quality to what they're buying versus what else is on the market at around that price point. But that's up to the consumers. I'm not in the market for it because I don't care anything about the theme. and I wonder if the more and more things are going I'm wondering if it's not becoming to the point that other than Stern Pros if it's not becoming the 7000 is just roughly going to be the new norm well it definitely feels like that is becoming the new norm I think the issue is is that the new norm because everyone like price that's just how much it costs now is what you and that what you have to market up to or is it that that's the new norm because everyone wants a slice of the collector pie and that's the dollar amount where you feel that you've got enough uh return you have this certain level of return on investment that you want and you want a really high margin and but that's the sweet spot where you don't break everyone's back doing it that there's still enough that there's enough of that collector pie at that dollar range it's not that you couldn't make the machine and sell it for five grand for example or even less i suppose but rather why do that when there are plenty of people that will sell that you can sell to for two thousand dollars more in pure profit and just pocket it because it is the same sort of thing like when the batman 66 came out and people were doing comparisons of what came on the super le or the le versus the premium and it's like well you factored in the cost there was another i think the slam tilt podcast did an analysis of what they priced out the things like the that you know they looked up and found where the toys were from uh and you know and how much those were being sold for at retail and added it all in and it was like the cost difference from a an le to a super le was like 200 worth of parts but it was five thousand dollars more as a machine so that's his profit if their analysis is accurate that's profit. So if it's like that and they're just like, okay, well, look, people aren't having any trouble selling games in that $7,000 to $8,000 range, let's go ahead and launch there. Because I know some people were hoping that American Pinball was going to be, and they still are in a lot of ways, that it's going to be the Stern competitor. But the thing that Stern has a lock on that no one else is competing at is at the lower dollar range in that kind of operator oriented environment and this pricing suggests to people that American Pinball isn't trying to target operators they're trying to target more wealthy collectors and that seems to be what everybody except for Stern is really targeting anymore is the collector market Sterner seems to be the only people that are still in it for the operator and still putting machines out priced for operators yes and and uh i i'd say it's probably as long as that pie is willing to continue to support new entities coming in and winning you know games on that order of seven to eighty five hundred seven thousand eighty five hundred then that's uh on paper i'd say it's probably the easier path to do you're not you won't have to sell as many uh your your margins are are better uh you know It is what it is. I think if people think American Pinball is going to be a stern competitor, because there's talk like that now, it's like, oh, well, this is great. Oh, I overheard some people talking at TPF, just amazing stuff. Yes, well, there are a lot of dreamers that attend a pinball convention. They can't all be realists like us. But yeah, anyway, but overall, I think it's a big win for the company. I thought Houdini looked pretty good so I won't give any opinion on gameplay because I didn't get any time on it and as you noted it was breaking down a lot they were very transparent about them just barely getting it working in time for the show and I deliberately decided I would not stand in line and play it because I didn't want to get a negative impression just because it was so early of essentially a prototype in terms of functional form last piece of industry news that I knew I wanted to touch on is what Dutch Pinball announced in terms of a new game and that's Bride of Pinbot 3.0 which is apparently as near as I can tell it's essentially Bride of Pinbot 2.0 which is a conversion kit for Bride of Pinbot but it's actually a full game with all new art and they announced that it would be a super limited edition run of 150 units priced at $12,500. So Tony, we saw the, we saw they had flyers with the art when we were able, we, we grabbed a flyer and we were able to look at it. I did not attend the seminar about, uh, Bride of Pinball 3.0, but we read up extensively on it while we were down in Texas. What are your thoughts about this pin? And we'll go ahead and transition this as well as to our, our thoughts about Dutch pinball. It's ugly. I don't think Bride of Penbot is that popular of a game to warrant a $12,500 SLE run. I definitely don't think they're going to sell 150 of them. I can't see a... I think anybody who wants a Bride of Penbot has a Bride of Penbot. And I think the art changes were not very good, really. I thought it went real Uncanny Valley, kind of awkward-ish.
    53:28
    Yeah. I just want to chime in on the art right now since you brought it up. Yeah, I wasn't a big fan. I thought part – I thought – I'm not a huge Bride fan. Pinbot is the one I like. But – and some of the thing with Bride of Pinbot 2.0 was fixing some of the code issues that people would have with Bride of Pinbot original. You know, like how you don't play it in a tournament because it's got too many random point, you know, the billion point shot and all that. But and I'm assuming this will still have those sort of quote unquote fixes. But obviously it's way more than the kit was, which is I don't remember what the kits were selling for. Twenty five hundred maybe.
    54:06
    But yeah, the thing about Bride that was always attractive was it had a really interesting look because that was a Python Angelo art package. And they are changing that to this weird plastic-y anorexic robot.
    54:22
    You know, maybe if it was a brand new thing and this was the look we got, I wouldn't be as judgmental. But part of the attraction that people have to wanting to get Bride is often the aesthetic to it. And you are saying, well, we're basically doing a vault edition of Bride of Penbot with our conversion kit on it. But we decided that Python's art sucks, and we're going to give you this instead. And it's like, okay. I thought the biggest – I mean, this is basically a B-list Williams game, and the art was what sells it. And you want to change all that, and you think that it's going to be worth over $10,000? I don't know. We have to bear in mind, we're at the same show where Attack from Mars Remake is there, and you're looking at the highest end version of that with the super awesome best topper I've ever seen in my life at $8,500. And you want $4,000 more for this?
    55:26
    Yeah, it's... No, it's... Here, let's just roll this all together. We know exactly what this is. Yeah, roll it. Dutch is boned. Dutch with their issues with ARA and the fact that they have no more Big Lebowskis. They can't make any more Big Lebowskis. And this whole fight, I mean, ARA's supposed to have, what, like 40 or 50 machines complete, ready to ship? Yeah, we should probably hit on a bit about that. Dutch Pinball released a newsletter to the people who are in on pre-ordered and such of the Big Lebowski. So and that's important part of it. And it may come up in the seminar. I wasn't at the seminar, but real, real quick summary of what was what was said in that newsletter. They gave a timeline of their version of the events. We'd already we've already talked extensively about the issue with our other contract manufacturer. What the newsletter said was we're going forward with a different contract manufacturer that wanted to do a small run of something. So we're doing Bride of Pinbot 3.0. They had apparently been planning to do this Bride of Pinbot 3.0 concept for a while, and they were going to use Aura. And Aura hadn't actually started production on it, and that, according to Dutch, is the core of the dispute regarding Aura and the additional money they had been asking for to do the Big Lebowskis. Apparently, according to Dutch at this stage, they did agree to the additional dollar amount so that ARA has asked for, but it was conditioned on having Bride of Himbot 3.0 built. And when they found out that there had been no progress on BOP3, I think I'm just going to start saying it that way, they withheld paying because they're like, you're in violation of contract. And as Tony has just said, ARA is like, okay, well, you're not getting anything from us. then we have 40 of your machines built. The newsletter also indicated, in addition to the machines, like all the spare parts, the boards, all of it, everything, that's at Aura. Dutch Pinball doesn't have any of it in their possession, so they don't have any replacement parts, repair parts. They have nothing. They have nothing right now. It's all tied up with Aura. And so what they're going to do is not preorder. They're going to let you go and put down $250 deposits, basically, on BOP3. You'll get a Translight for your $250. And then they will do this super limited edition run at the 12,500 with 100 units designated for the U.S. and 50 units designated for the rest of the world. And then maybe in the future, they'll do a non-special, I guess, a cheaper version that won't be a super LE version. but while that's all happening they readily acknowledged in the newsletter that big lebowski production is is ceased they will not be moving forward as they work things out with ara which means the new contract manufacturer will not be building out the rest of the big lebowski run they are jumping to game number two while this thing with ara sits yeah and to me this just comes off as it's a money grab.
    58:44
    It doesn't matter to me what Dutch says because Dutch has already been proven to be liars who says exactly whatever they feel they need to say to stay on people's good side. I think this bride grab is just a money grab to try and maintain some semblance of existence.
    59:05
    I know that there's legal issues and they're trying to figure out what to do and how to deal to get people's big Lebowski's out and this and that. But that's going to be probably years of litigation if it gets to the point of litigation. So all those people who paid money, many of them who paid fully for their big Lebowski's are now out $10,000 for possibly years. This is not a new thing that we have seen in pinball this is something that we've seen that i mean the zidware thing has the magic girl owners just got their machines and the rosa now's wonderland owners are still boned there's nothing they're never going to get anything unless unless something amazing happens i don't see how they're ever going to get anything and i think dutch is collapsing i think they're in full implosion mode i think the bride run especially at the price points are them trying to grab anything they can to try and maintain some semblance of order. And I think the fact that they already had so much work done for the Bride of Pinball 2.0, let them throw together this machine is a relatively cheap and quick way to go into production. And now they're just demanding huge amounts of money. And I don't see how they're going to get it. I don't think it's even possible for them to get it. I mean, I'm sure I say that. I know somebody's going to buy it somebody's not going to be paying attention there's people out there with so much money that they'll buy everything and they don't care there's people out there that have so much money that when it comes to a machine if they lose some it doesn't matter because they want the machine because they've got to have everything and those are the type of people who will buy this at this price point but the truth of the matter is I don't think there's 150 of those people in the hobby and I think Dutch Pinball is dying it's not a surprise people have been wondering if they are on the way out but I think this is very much a scream for help and I don't think they're going to get the help they need I agree with your analysis Dutch Pinball is definitely the big loser of Texas Pinball Festival that's for sure this did not go how I think they thought it would have gone I mean there was the talk beforehand that Dutch is going to be there. They're going to address the Big Lebowski issue. They're going to talk about some new game number two. They're going to have a game number two that they want to get to. And of course, people were concerned about that because game number one isn't resolved. And it's not like it's still on the line. This isn't Stern, where it's like, oh, well, here's a new game. And you know, well, the old games are still being made. It's not like that. And they've just been having so many problems, and they've been disingenuous about what those problems have been. And so even when you get a timeline, you're forced wondering, is this even the totally accurate version of it? But as you're going through it, it's like, well, people have been waiting for years. And they're like, what about me? And I think Dutch was thinking, well, we're not doing pre-orders. And people aren't going to be asked to pay the $12,500 up front for BOP3. So this is going to work. This is going to work. and it'll give the company cash because they claim that it's not a money issue that's holding up Big Lebowski in the sense that they don't have the money to finish the run. It's that they're fighting with Aura over how much money Aura wants because Aura wasn't doing everything they were supposed to do. I had read that someone said, I guess they had talked to someone with Dutch after the seminar, I believe it was, and that Dutch had indicated that it's not in litigation right now. They're still just talking with Aura. So they haven't started the legal process. Or that was the analysis of the newsletter was the interpreter. So if that's the case, then they haven't even gotten the ball rolling to resolve it legally. And if they haven't done that, it just begs the question, does Dutch think they would even win the legal argument? Because if they are if they're in the wrong, if the contracts on our side and Dutch knows that Dutch's attorneys like guys, I mean, you can try and do what you can try and leverage something here. But you know what? your contract says that they could do this, you have to pay them that amount and they don't want to because they're mad. It's not, I mean, they'll ultimately lose is the problem. And so they obviously can't sell more of a game. People are canceling their pre-orders with CoinTaker. They're not able to sell Big Lebowski's, which had a cap on the number of the run anyway. So if they want more money, they have to do something. So here's this idea. Don't worry, we're not going to take any pre-order money the deposits you know they'll give them translates for that so you know they'll make they could make in theory some money on that if you wanted a non python translate of this new abomination bride but yeah it's just it's so i could have i could have envisioned when i heard all this i still when i before i knew what the game was i thought okay all of this aside if people are blown away by whatever killer theme that dutch pinball is going to do for game number two it's going to have a lebowski effect everyone's going to be like oh yes finally but pulp fiction i i have to have it you know they're the people that have that dream theme it's like i have to have it i have to have it oh to take a not super stellar game from over 20 years ago and to say basically you're doing a remake except it's not an authentic remake We're changing the art on it. People already know how that game plays. They already know how that game plays. You're basically doing a Vault Edition, except you now seem to think that it goes for way more than anyone else's remake goes for. The Chicago Gaming and the MMR and the Attack from Mars remake, those are games that are under $9,000. Stern's Vault Editions are under $9,000. and here you are at $12,500 saying it's super thinking you're going to sell 150 of them. I mean, yeah, I get it. I'm sure they looked at Stern and said, hey, look, they were going to do 30 Batman or 25 or whatever and then they went up to 80 and they kept it at $15,000. But you know what? The thing is that was actually a different game. The layout wasn't just the Dark Knight layout. They actually changed the layout. It had a nostalgia factor because it was filling a niche that had never been satisfied before. Batman 66 had never been done before. There are tons of brides out there. And if you wanted it fancier with a DMD, they already made that and sold it. So there's no point. It doesn't satisfy anything. It doesn't meet anything. It's not rare enough to be super. And you know the gameplay isn't going to be awesome because you already know how bride plays. So I just, it's like, if it had been a wholly unique theme and game, maybe the strategy would have worked. I don't see how it works. Just, just being Bride of Pinbot. It would have been, I mean, it's like, if you were thinking, let's remake some really great classic and you're going through lists like 8-Ball Deluxe is really popular. Fathom's really popular. And then, you know, instead of, instead of any of that, you remake Gold Wings and change the art to another photo. I don't know. That's probably a terrible analogy. But I just don't – it's just – it's like that's the only thing they knew they could whip together quickly because they've done stuff with Bride before. And I don think it comes across as special or unique I agree with you It comes across as desperate and needing of cash And if you were going to do all that and Bride all you know how to do at this point that you can put together quickly they should have tried to just keep the same art and sell it as Bride of Pinbot Remake, not BOP3. Yeah, I mean, there's so many better games out there that are being remade. The Medieval Madness, the AFM, those games are not asking nearly as much. and they're more popular games and have better art packages to begin with, especially AFM. And when you look at Bride of Penbot, I mean, yes, Bride of Penbot has some good art, but it's not even great art, in my opinion. And the truth of the matter is Bride of Penbot's not even the best bot game. It's not even the second best bot game.
    67:29
    I don't see how they can do it. I don't see where this is a game deserving of a special edition run with costs this high. I can think of several games that I think would be more benefiting of a huge rerun, even at a big price cost like this. But even then, I think everything would be better done in the range of AFM. I think the way that AFM is being done is perfect. I think the price points are right. I think what they've done to the systems to modernize them and everything looks good. And, I mean, I'm real happy with how that's turning out. I think this is just, it's desperation. It's Dutch's last gasp. Do you think Dutch makes it through the year? No. I know back last year we thought, no, okay. Because I know last year we were talking about how I didn't expect American Pinball to make it through 2017. At this point, obviously my prediction is set. so I can't undo it, though I think I'm going to be wrong.
    68:32
    But yeah, Dutch, I think this was... I can't say it was a huge mistake. I think they don't know what to do at this point. And your description, desperation, is probably the best description that there is because I can't see anything else to it. I think there's a possibility, as a company, Dutch Pinball will still exist. this time next year, but they're not going to be making pinball machines. I don't see where it's going to happen. If they can't get the big Lebowski issues dealt with and with everything else that's going on, nobody's going to buy machines from them again or not enough people to keep a company in business anyway. And this whole attempt for this SLE is just not going to work. I don't see where it's going to put out what they want.
    69:26
    Yeah, I agree. Yeah, that's really the only negative thing I can think of from the Texas Pinball Festival. Let's go ahead and transition to the kind of new or new-ish games that we finally got a chance to play. You already mentioned a couple that you played, which was – Domino's was one of those. I did not get a chance to play Domino's. What did you think of it? It was all right. I mean, again, it wasn't like – it's not kind of like kill AFM or something like that, but it wasn't a bad game. I played it and Jetsons. Domino's is much better than Jetson's but I don't think Domino's is better than Rob Zombie but it was fun okay I did play Jetson's even though I didn't wait in line for Domino's and yeah Jetson's it was okay it's cute the theme is very approachable the shots are it's very Spartan in a lot of ways and that's been known it's going to be a simple pin that's it's supposed to be a simple pin i think that i see kind of what's what they're getting at with it um it's not like overly easy or maybe it is if i practiced it more but you know i was going along and there wasn't a whole lot it felt like to do getting the multi ball was really easy you know it was it's just approachable but it's not something that i would ever want in a collection because i don't think I'd enjoy shooting it, but it looked good. So I think, you know, it definitely, what the pinball factory, I believe, is who commissioned that one, and whatever they're going for, I'm sure they've done their market research.
    71:05
    We did stand in line for about 45 minutes and get a chance to play Dialed In. What'd you think of Dialed In? I enjoyed Dialed In a lot. I did terrible on it, but it was a lot of fun. The shots were satisfying. the way everything was laid out and when I was watching people play like the selfie mode was actually really cool the way it took the pictures and this and that it was fun to see different people when they went into selfie mode you could see the really serious try-hards people who were just totally deadpan pure concentration and then the other people were just having fun. They'd be smiling and laughing and this and that. But it was awesome. I had heard that Dialed In was a good game with fun shots, and having played it, I would say Dialed In is probably, you know what, I am going to say it. Dialed In is my favorite Jersey Jack game, period. I'll go so far as to say that after playing Dialed In, I liked a lot of the shots. I'm not a Lawler fan in the sense that I don't hate his games. I don't love them the way some people love Lawler and collect Lawler. I think this is probably the best Lawler game I've ever played. Granted, I'm going off of just one game being played and obviously watching a few others. But this is not just my favorite Jersey Jack game. This is a Jersey Jack game I actually wish I had. I'm not going to pay the price that Jersey Jack sells these for, so I'm not in the market for it. But I wish I was because I think this would be great in a home lineup. And I know we're getting one on location eventually, so I'm pretty excited that we're going to have an opportunity to play it out en route where I can afford to play it. But yes, a definite highlight from the major manufacturers. I really, really, really liked how that pin played. I thought it shot really well. I thought the modes were fun. I think the whole gimmick that they were going for with the – we didn't integrate our cell phones or anything, but the whole theme and how it works and sort of like playing SimCity in total disaster mode, it works. It just works. We'll have to see if outside of the Lawler fans, if Jersey Jack can sell a lot of these. They're definitely trying to sell them to the pinball collectors, and the ones that are playing it seem to be coming away very, very impressed. and so hopefully it will do well because obviously as an original theme it's not going to have that built in oh i i'll get that i like hobbit i'll get that my kids love wizard of oz it doesn't have that going for it but i think it definitely plays better than anything that jersey jack has put out before so who really says their kids love wizard of oz i don't know you know we were here in kansas where i feel like we're inundated with uh wizard it's it's kind of a weird mix as an aside to people that aren't from Kansas because there's almost a fatigue with constantly having Wizard of Oz references thrown in your face whenever they meet you because it's the very first thing anyone ever thinks of when they hear Kansas. But on the flip side, we also kind of market that stuff in a way because it's like our one export that it's not like we made Wizard of Oz but we try and claim it as our own because it's like the only thing that Kansas is famous for besides wheat and the world's largest ball of yarn which is in Kansas. I've not gotten and seen it.
    74:35
    We're not the Yarn podcast, so I don't think anyone will be upset. Yeah, it's definitely a thing we have to deal with. Yeah, well, I guess everyone has their cross to bear on these sort of things, and ours is that we have to carry the scarecrow in line.
    74:51
    The last newish game that I stood in line and played, and you did as well, was Alien Pinball by Highway. what were your thoughts on Alien? Alien was better than I had feared but not as great as I had hoped it had more call outs than I had been expecting back in the day originally and it was a lot of fun the parts of it when I played it I enjoyed it had sections that were a lot of fun it had some interesting shots that I really enjoyed some of the a lot of the back glass stuff worked out really well the LCD stuff and the cut scenes from the movie worked out pretty well I have to say it's a good machine I don't think I would buy one if I could afford one but that could be just because of the lack of Sigourney Weaver I feel hurts it a lot yeah it is a notable absence how could it not be I was surprised at well I knew because again like with Total Annihilation I did watch and we linked this on Facebook to the YouTube for it but Dead Flip had streamed Alien Pinball so I'd already seen and you had already seen a pretty good chunk of it and sitting there and playing it the video elements that pull clips from the movies with actual actors they are more present than I even thought after reviewing that footage from Dead Flip so So in a way, it does really good to make you feel like you're immersed. But I think the argument is that you're supposed to feel like you are Sigourney Weaver. I never got that vibe. So I really feel like when you're playing, you're just immersed in watching parts of the movie, parts that don't have Sigourney Weaver.
    76:45
    But it does feel like the movies. It felt like the movies more than I thought even after watching the footage. So that was good. as I had noted from the footage watch it definitely feels like it plays slower than Full Throttle plays the ball it is a trap and shoot game a total trap and shoot game and I am more of a flow person but they kill that ball speed wherever they can it does not feel like a lot and Full Throttle didn't either I think honestly when it comes to wide bodies I almost think that I'd probably go ahead and say Highways probably got the best formula for a wide body and has long time and maybe even not so long time listeners know i'm not a fan of wide body design i think it's an inferior design by default and and that's probably honestly going back a step why dialed in probably feel so much better than the other jersey jack games because in a standard cab it's got a ton of shots and they're tight and they but they feel good because it's all it's moving vertical a lot more than horizontal highway does a really good job about keeping that horizontal movement to a minimum. And the way they do it on Alien is there are a lot of shots all around. So when you, if you hit a shot, you hit a shot and you achieve something. If you miss a shot, then that ball bricks and then it heads straight down usually because it can't, it's not open. It can't float. The ball can't float all over left and right all the time, which is what makes wide bodies play slow, feel slow, and indeed be slow in terms of how long the time is until the ball gets back to the flipper all that said uh i mean i i enjoyed it i'd say i enjoyed it uh it's weird full throttle i really was impressed by last year at tpf when i played it and then we got one on the location and i just didn't like playing it very much i'd say i probably enjoyed this i was less surprised at my enjoyment of it than i was with full throttle it didn't shock me because i kind of knew what i was going into with it but uh and i did like that thing about the modes where you're trying to hit the shots and then not hit other shots that was that is awesome it is uh i did not like though they are doing a a mechanic where you you shoot the scope the scoop to start modes that's you know very reminiscent of adam's family does that uh jurassic park you know poor man's adam's family does that so there's a shot that you need once you've activated your scoop to go into your modes theirs though isn't offset very much it's almost straight up at the top of the play field is a little bit to the left of dead center but i saw there was a group of four of us playing it and there were multiple straight down the middle drains from that just kicking the ball back out and with that being a key required shot i i kind of wish they'd place that in a little bit different spot because it seems like that's going to be something that people are going to have to no pun intended from our prior discussion dial in in order to ensure that you don't feel like you're getting cheap drained all the time by something that you know it's going to roll straight down that's the sort of that's what the ball wants to do then you put your scoop awfully close to the middle of the between the flippers so it was just that was a little weird obviously you can try and nudge and save it i don't think people like to nudge out of uh or feed shots that you have to do nudging i think under my philosophy at least would be something that you do when you brick something that you do when your shot is bad but you know overall yeah it looked all right I thought it played fine. But yeah, the gameplay didn't blow me away. And we played Dialed In first. So unfortunately for Highway, I end up sitting there comparing it to Dialed In. It's just not as fun. But I thought they captured the movie essence pretty good. I don't know why you do Bishop torn in half as your game over. How do you not do Bill Paxton saying game over? I don't know. I thought the exact same thing. I mean, it seems like unless they decided that it was too much of an obvious give that they didn't want to use it. That's my guess. That's because they have clips with him and his voice throughout. So they have the rights to do Bill Paxton stuff. It's just I know the old video game did that and everything else because it's the obvious answer. It's the cliche answer. But come on. It's aliens. We gotta do the cliche. Do the cliche. Just this one cliche. Come on, you didn't give us Sigourney do this. But they did not. Made me a little, just a teeny bit sad. A tiny bit sad. Just a wee bit. Okay, well that was all the newish games that I tried that I wanted to discuss. Were there any others that you played? No, because I didn't play Batman 66. I've already, I've played Aerosmith at the Aerosmith launch party one time and it's okay it's got some fun shots and it's got some interesting things I'd like to get some more time on it to really decide but I mean I'm kind of not really feeling all music penny lately it's just, it's okay it's nothing that really grabs me, it's not something that would be, that's on my like to purchase list but I can't think of anything else I played that was new or new-ish.
    81:57
    Okay. Well, then I guess to wrap up, I'd say let's just other thoughts on the show in general or games to talk about. I did want to mention an EM that we played. I think it was when Best Restoration was Grand Prix. Yes. Yeah, everyone won Best Restoration.
    82:16
    And that game, A, that Restoration was amazing. Oh, yeah. It was the most beautiful looking EM I think I've ever seen. And it played really well. That game has some really satisfying shots. The spinner shots are so satisfying because it's the old school where you hit the spinner as it spins. There's a bunch of bonuses that the lights move up the bonuses as it spins. Oh, it's such a satisfying shot. It just feels good hitting it. yeah it's uh it's an interesting it does show that uh you can have multiplayer em games that did have some fun mechanics uh because obviously the the challenge that in the em era with the multiplayer things was you couldn't have really complicated like carryover things or anything like you could with single player because how would you keep track when you have four different players of all that you just take too much it just take too much hardware because you need a physical switch for everything the uh but yeah those spinners they were they were really fun to rip uh they loved to spin i got pretty dialed in on those shots actually for an em that was a really long playing em too it was it was real floaty it was a little floaty i think that was probably more because it didn't look like there was a lot of um uh angle on the uh play field yeah that that yeah that would explain it and and a lot of ems were not at the of their time they were often not put up at a higher angle uh and that's something a lot of people will do now to them to make them play but like i have uh believe i have sky lab up a little bit higher but it's probably my flattest game of all my games i have it's my one em in my lineup the uh and the nice thing about the you're so you're building bonus which is not a typical thing to do with the em game but they have these holes to collect the bonus and there's a left-hand bonus and a right-hand bonus and so it's like okay well shooting the left-hand hole doesn't make a lot of sense you keep ripping the right spinner so you need to try and get the other and obviously those are dangerous shots because they they put you uh you're shooting off to the side you're going to be near out lanes it's yeah it was it was a lot of fun i really that was probably my of the of the new ems you know not counting ems i had played before at the last year's tpf that was my favorite easily so that restoration i was not surprised that it won it i think it deserved it oh yeah it deserved it definitely deserved it that was uh no that there was no question that that game deserved it uh let's see other other some other thoughts here uh oh farfalla the zaccaria if i'm saying oh yeah farfalla yeah i'd never i've never played a game by that italian manufacturer farfalla was in our 80s uh pinball tournament the very first tournament we ran on this podcast it was the only one from that company that that met that list it had some really interesting ideas on it uh in terms of these little flippers that you could you could shoot to be your ball save they like little two inch flippers that served as lane guides but they'd also flip off to the side of the out lane to flick the ball back up i saw someone successfully do that had an upper play field that was kind of that had a little ramp drop down when you could gain access to it and then you try and attack targets up there so you know it's a game where it's mostly about attacking like drop targets which wasn't you know like you'd expect from that era or you expect maybe from a gotley for example but it has had a lot of really i thought interesting twists on just that the philosophy of the layout was just so different from anything I have seen from the American manufacturers.
    85:44
    So I thought that and that actually, that was that one best original game. Best original game overall, I guess, not restored game. It was down a few times during the show, but they did a really good job getting it back up because we finally got to have a chance on it. And there was even someone who I saw, they had a little pin slide badge that I had recognized from posting. He gave us some tips on how to play it and work those little side flippers because at first I thought, oh, they use side flippers to make lane guides to save money or something. I didn't realize they were functional.
    86:17
    That shows you how much I know about pinball. So yeah, that one, I liked that one. That was a neat event. It seemed like every time I sat down, I got in a discussion with strangers about pinball. We had people ask about the podcast and stuff. That was all really cool. of course it's it's always fun to talk pinball maybe just so interesting i'd sit down i i sat down randomly and i i saw brad from vp cabs at the same table who i'd interviewed back right after he was on shark tank so we talked a little bit about about that and what they're going you know how they've been having a lot of success and and um you know we just run into other people who were new uh there was another time tony and i were sitting down as a guy and he's like this is he wanted a pinball machine this is the first he was starting to get into the hobby and he really like the new stuff. They didn't like how much they cost. You go, well, welcome to the club. That's the problem with pinball. You just have a discussion about if you want to get something and you can find certain things you like and certain things you can sacrifice. Maybe you can get something within a price range you want. It's just all sorts of that sort of stuff. Obviously, when we go to the pinball tournaments, it's when we get to chill and talk to our area players about pins. A lot of that discussion because we go to the tournament stuff is on the competitive side. And this was a nice chance to talk more about just the games in general. Yeah, and just the fun.
    87:46
    And obviously you get different opinions because you're running into not just the same people. Oh yeah, we talked to a lot of interesting people and it was a great time. If you've not gone to something like the Texas Pinball Festival, especially if you get a chance to go to the Texas Pinball Festival, I highly recommend it. It is a wonderful show with a lot of games, and it's a lot of fun. And, I mean, I was easily happy to spend three days playing random pinball since we didn't do the tournament this year, and I had a great time. Mm-hmm. Yep. Well, I didn't have anything else to add. Did you have anything else to add? Um, not off the top of my head. I want to thank all of the listeners that we talked to this weekend and how great it was to meet all of you and it was a lot of fun and I look forward to next time I get to talk to all of you yeah it was fun for me too alright everyone we're out of here we're not going to plug any of the social media I'm just going to say goodbye everyone see you in two weeks everybody