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The `Great British Pinball Podcast Episode 26

The Great British Pinball Podcast·podcast_episode·1h 12m·analyzed·Jul 28, 2025
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Analysis

claude-haiku-4-5-20251001 · $0.031

TL;DR

UK pinball venues collapsing amid cost crisis; secondary market tanking; art debate over Harry Potter.

Summary

Scott Rundell and Neil McRae discuss the struggling UK pinball venue ecosystem, with multiple closures and downsizing (Tilt, Pinball Office, Highest Score) due to cost-of-living pressures, rising operational costs, and declining foot traffic. They highlight that despite claims pinball is thriving, UK venues face unsustainable economics. They then pivot to discussing secondary market collapse (games like John Wick LE dropping from £15k to £8k) and the sustainability crisis this creates for collectors and operators. The episode concludes with commentary on Harry Potter playfield art, AI tool usage by designer Christopher Franchi, and the importance of respecting pinball artwork as a legitimate art form.

Key Claims

  • Tilt in Birmingham, the longest-running and largest pinball venue in the UK, closed approximately 1-2 weeks prior to recording

    high confidence · Neil McRae direct statement about venue closure and personal experience visiting Tilt

  • Pinball Republic experienced extremely quiet summer months, with one Sunday having only a single visitor

    high confidence · Scott Rundell firsthand account of club attendance

  • Electricity costs at Pinball Republic are £400-£500 per month; landlord covered bills otherwise venue would be non-viable

    high confidence · Scott Rundell detailed cost breakdown

  • John Wick LE purchased for approximately £15k is now worth only £8k; this represents unsustainable depreciation

    high confidence · Scott Rundell personal transaction example

  • Jersey Jack Pinball is not making money and Harry Potter investment will consume their production capacity for the next two years

    medium confidence · Neil McRae speculation based on cost/sales analysis; not confirmed by JJP

  • Barrels of Fun sold approximately 1,000-1,100 Labyrinth machines, hitting their target, with some stock remaining on factory floor

    medium confidence · Neil McRae estimate of sales figures; exact numbers not verified

  • Stern is the only major manufacturer making significant money; CGC also delivers on product commitments

    medium confidence · Neil McRae opinion based on market observation

  • Christopher Franchi (Stern artist) stated 'pinball isn't art' during interview with Cary Hardy; used AI as a design tool on Evil Dead

    medium confidence · Neil McRae referencing Franchi interview; direct quote sourcing unclear

  • Pinball Office in Sawbridgeworth is shrinking from 25 games to 12-13 games, eliminating tournament capability

    high confidence · Scott Rundell statement about venue downsizing

Notable Quotes

  • “if you were to buy it in America, it's a lot cheaper than it is after it lands here, and that's just down to, obviously, logistics of import fees, duties, and tax”

    Neil McRae @ unknown — Explains pricing disparity between US and UK markets, relevant to venue affordability

  • “the only way you can play pinball is to come to someone's house clearly that is going to have a super negative impact on everything”

    Scott Rundell @ unknown — Core concern about venue ecosystem collapse and community viability

  • “I paid I don't know what 15 grand for the le yeah if i was to get eight for it right now um i would be lucky”

    Scott Rundell @ unknown — Quantifies secondary market collapse and depreciation crisis

  • “they're going to just leave the country... they're just going to sell off their games and then leave”

    Scott Rundell (quoting community members) @ unknown — Indicates collector exodus due to economic pressures and hobby unsustainability

  • “Insider Connected is probably the single best thing to come out of Pinball in a while for me. It's genuinely a great innovation in the pinball world.”

    Neil McRae @ unknown — Positive signal about Stern Connected platform's value to venues

  • “pinball isn't art... I just don't agree with that... his work is not art sorry mate that's a bit too much for me”

    Neil McRae (responding to Christopher Franchi statement) @ unknown — Reflects community debate on legitimacy of pinball playfield art

  • “it's not sustainable though because you i say in order to buy the next game at least in my world i'm happy to lose like two grand i'd say on a game that's reasonable”

    Scott Rundell @ unknown — Defines threshold of acceptable depreciation; indicates current market exceeds this

  • “if they don't this is the this is the challenge they face if this situation continues you know what it used to be was it's like you buy a game for seven grand premium yeah sell it for maybe six six and a half”

Entities

TiltvenuePinball RepublicvenueScott RundellpersonNeil McRaepersonPinball OfficevenueHighest ScorevenueKirkpersonChrisperson

Signals

  • ?

    business_signal: Multiple UK pinball venues closing or downsizing (Tilt, Pinball Office, Highest Score) due to cost-of-living crisis, rising electricity costs, business rates, and declining foot traffic. Venues unable to sustain operations despite tournament revenue.

    high · Scott Rundell and Neil McRae detailed accounts of venue closures and downsizing; £400-£500/month electricity costs; volunteer-based club struggling with single-visitor Sundays

  • ?

    business_signal: Jersey Jack Pinball not profitable; Harry Potter investment will consume production capacity for 2+ years as only focus

    medium · Neil McRae analysis of JJP costs vs sales; stated 'I don't believe they are making money'

  • ?

    community_signal: Collector exodus due to economic pressures; community members reported selling entire collections and planning to leave UK/abandon hobby if financial situation worsens

    medium · Scott Rundell reporting conversations with hobby entrants from COVID era now dropping out; two sources explicitly mentioned leaving country if pressures continue

  • ~

    sentiment_shift: Despite claims pinball is 'in the best place it's ever been', UK hosts dispute this, particularly for operators and venue sustainability; sentiment gap between US/international vs UK market perception

    high · Neil McRae: 'And I like to say you know Pimple's the best place it's ever been, maybe for the US... I don't even think the US is doing particularly great either'

  • ?

    competitive_signal: Barrels of Fun CEO described as smart, lean operator, risk-averse; choice of Labyrinth as first title characterized as safer than high-risk IP like Harry Potter; achieved near-target sales (~1,000-1,100 units of ~1,100 planned)

Transcript

groq_whisper · $0.218

0:00
Welcome to the Great British Pinball Podcast, and here are your hosts Scott Rundell and Neil McRae. Ladies and gentlemen, you've just heard that monumental tune that I know gets you in the mood to go and play pinball. But first, I'm joined here by the amazing, the brutally hardworking, despite the fact it looks like he's been kidnapped by someone in the Middle East and hidden in the back of a cupboard somewhere, Scott's Workshop.
0:45
Scott, how are you? I'm not too bad, Neil. How are you? I have to say my blood pressure's racing at the moment.
0:55
You've just heard my rant. I'm going to have a little mini rant because I still feel the blood pumping. It's going to set you off, I can tell. It's infuriating. So those of you that know, we run this place called Pinball Republic. And you also know that the Wi-Fi there is utterly shit. And we can't stream and we can't do anything valuable in today's modern digital world, right? So being that I'm in telecoms, I thought I would help them all out and get them in this magical thing called optical fiber. Ooh, optical fiber, optical fiber. That makes everything beautiful, everything fast, and it even makes this ugly mug look glorious in 4K ultra high definition.
1:40
Honest to God, if there was a prize for the most fuckwitted fuckup of fuckups, these guys in the mall would get it. um it's one of these places where everything is outsourced and they have manglement as i like to call it that just manages the outsource and there's and those managers are so overloaded that they can't remember what day it is let alone what fucking properties they manage and not only that they shouldn't they change where people are every time i'm dealing with someone new and it goes back to square one so we thought we'd got this over the line we thought and And we thought, glory, finally, glory, we're going to get fiber, optical fiber.

  • Highest Score in Salisbury is on the verge of closure; held extended hours event to test viability

    medium confidence · Neil McRae reference to news coverage and observation; specific closure status not confirmed

    • Scott Rundell @ unknown — Historical pricing model context; illustrates shift from pre-COVID sustainability

    Christopher Franchi
    person
    Zombie Yetiperson
    Jersey Jack Pinballcompany
    Stern Pinballcompany
    Barrels of Funcompany
    Turner Pinballcompany
    Insider Connectedproduct
    Harry Potter (JJP)game
    John Wickgame
    Labyrinthgame
    Evil Deadgame
    Rich Mallettperson

    medium · Neil McRae analysis: 'if you chose a title like harry parr as your first game and it sank you'd be dead'; Labyrinth sales figures discussed

  • ?

    design_philosophy: Christopher Franchi uses AI as design tool for playfield artwork (confirmed on Evil Dead); stated 'pinball isn't art' which community members dispute; debate over legitimacy of digital art in pinball context

    medium · Neil McRae referencing Franchi interview with Cary Hardy; discussion of AI tool usage and Franchi's dismissal of pinball-as-art statement

  • ?

    technology_signal: UK internet infrastructure inadequate for venue pinball operations; fiber availability inconsistent; Wi-Fi quality poor even in central London; infrastructure gaps preventing adoption of Insider Connected and similar platforms

    high · Scott Rundell's extensive rant about fiber infrastructure delays; Neil McRae Wi-Fi issues at pub; general agreement that UK telecom infrastructure is 'dark ages' relative to other European markets

  • $

    market_signal: Secondary market severe depreciation: John Wick LE dropped from £15k to £8k; Mandalorian LE at £7.5k; Ultraman LE dropped £6k; Labyrinth tanking in value. Collectors unable to sustain buy-upgrade-sell cycle, leading to market stagnation.

    high · Scott Rundell personal transaction data; community examples of failing resale prices; acknowledgment that £2-3k loss per game is becoming unsustainable

  • ?

    personnel_signal: Christopher Franchi (Stern artist) listens to Great British Pinball Podcast; responds to criticism regarding artwork philosophy and AI tool usage

    medium · Neil McRae: 'Chris actually listens to the podcast because he took the piss out of my bed'

  • $

    market_signal: UK game pricing significantly higher than US due to import duties and logistics; Stern remains cheapest option at ~£7k base; pricing unsustainable for collectors at current depreciation rates

    high · Ninja Eclipse at £7k quoted as cheapest game; discussion of import cost burden; acknowledgment that collectors cannot sustain £3-4k losses per game

  • ?

    product_concern: Harry Potter playfield art concerns raised; discussion of photoshop asset dumps vs hand-crafted art quality standards

    medium · Title reference 'Harry Potter and the case of the Dodgy playfield art'; comparison to Ghostbusters/Evil Dead quality standards

  • ?

    technology_signal: Stern Insider Connected platform is primary positive innovation supporting venue operations and player engagement; positioned as significant value-add for operators

    high · Neil McRae: 'Insider Connected is probably the single best thing to come out of Pinball in a while for me'; Turner Pinball has similar offering

    • 2:24
    But no, we're back at paperwork square one. What's insane about this is the fiber is actually delivered. It's rolled up in a manhole cover outside the mall. That's how absolutely bonkers this is. and people who work with companies that outsource huge amounts of things trust me on that they are going to fail um i've been on another slight tangent i've been working with a company that outsourced everything they've just had a big challenge with it because they did that and they can't fix it because they've got no one in the company that does it anymore it's all outsourced they've totally lost that capability um and it just shows that you know I'm starting to think that, you know, there is a moment of truth about, you know, everyone's trying to wring out the last penny of profit irrespective of how well it works or whether it's right for the customer. As a customer, I can't believe what a shit show this is. And actually, the telco that supported me, independent guys called ITS, I couldn't rate them higher. They're doing an amazing job. They're an all-net, business all-net. They're doing an amazing job. but every opportunity these guys are just making it and what you know what the you know what's crazy about this it adds value to the mall because all of a sudden everybody in that mall can get fast fiber for a third of the price that you can get it from anywhere else so i i it drives me nuts anyway we're going to move on talk pinball um breathe man breathe i might edit that out um anyway so it's been it's been a it's been a i actually i was looking at it was only like three and a half weeks where we recorded it feels like three and a half months yeah yeah it's been pretty busy month in all fairness isn't it yeah and we and so we're going to talk the first thing and finally i've opened up with pimoro public we're going to i thought we'd just talk a little bit about venues first of all um our heart felt um best wishes to kirk and his crew at tilt um kirk closed till i want to say two weeks ago now a week and a half ago probably the longest, biggest, most well-known pinball place in the UK probably even better known than Pinball Republic, it's been around a lot longer he had about 30 games and more importantly he had some fantastic craft beer some amazing coffees and teas whenever I was in Birmingham with work I would always stop by and give the games there a shout In fact, I had a team event at Tilt, I want to say, just before COVID, actually, it would be.
    5:14
    And we had a right laugh there. So, Kirk, we wish you well, mate. A tough time for you, no doubt. But, you know, I always believe that with every one door closes, another one opens. So we wish you well. But, you know, I've been banging this drum, Scott. You have. these venues, use them or lose them. And let me tell you there's another venue in, I want to say Salisbury highest score who I actually caught on the news because they opened up, I want to say six months ago.
    5:53
    I don't know the guy who runs it but I know Rich Mallett who's one of the tournament players was somehow involved in this. and the message was I'm shutting down one last weekend to see if we can keep this business running unfortunately I don't think it works like that and I think if he's close to shutting down my, sadly, my knowing what I know about running a venue, you're that close on the border your chances of recovering are probably not too great in all honesty. It's what happened before isn't it, we've seen it before in other places in other countries where they open up for a little bit longer because they get a bit of a burst of traffic, so to speak, from the goodwill of people rallying. So it's like a rally is probably the easiest way to put it. But then it just dies down again. It's weird, isn't it? Because we had people who I've seen even on the forums saying, oh, Pinball's in the best place it's ever been. And I'm like, I don't see it, not in this country at least anyway. For me, it feels like, at least from an operator perspective, it's harder than ever. there's obviously external factors to all of this it's not just people losing interest in the hobby it's the cost of of business rates it's the effectively economy being effectively in the bin in this country and people not having a spare money which is having a knock-on effect to everything right to people's buying habits as well as spending habits when it comes to going out so I just I do worry at the moment it's it's been a struggling business I imagine for you know for a lot of them for a while where they've just been doing okay and now they can't ride out the storm because there's nothing left in the coffers yeah you know the government comes in hits you for more corporation tax more uh yeah employee neck uh puts the minimum wage up um you know that that has a knock-on effect so that's definitely a factor rates and and other things are a factor um we're all volunteer based at pembora public so those things don't affect us you know Luckily, the minimum wage doesn't apply to volunteers, otherwise we'd be dead.
    8:00
    But I want to say that there's definitely, if I compare the last three months at the club have been awful for us, frankly.
    8:12
    Right. And we expect this because it's summer, right? Everyone wants to go out in their budgie smugglers and their mankines and with a handkerchief on their head and more suntan lotion all over their face than dust on the moon.
    8:32
    And basically, we expect to be quiet, but I want to say this past couple of months in the club has been super quiet. I mean, I think we had one Sunday where we had literally one person come into the club. Wow. Now, we're probably okay. thankfully we've got a great membership that helps us stay viable in those situations but there is no doubt there is a massive downturn in people coming to the club compared to pre-Covid but also and maybe this was the uptick because we were all locked in for so long but even post-Covid the six months after Covid before we had to close down if that was longer than that is maybe eight months um you know if you compare those two times we are definitely down and kirk you know when i spoke to kirk about this he always thought that you know this cost of living crisis was definitely having an impact and i wasn't so sure about that but now having you know we've got we've been in the club literally um almost a year ago to the day we signed the lease yeah um and you know we were busy buying paint and stuff to to get the club up and running um and you know just to get the just to get the the the location into a place where it was it would pass all the kind of you know bureaucracy of both the mall and health and safety and everything else electricity blah blah blah fire um fire systems etc etc you know we spent 10 grand And fortunately, we knew we were going to have to move, so we put the prices up, so we started to build a bit of a nest egg. We got two very kind volunteers that put in another 20 grand, which basically helped with the moving, a bunch of other things that we had to get done.
    10:30
    And we also had, you know, our insurance, we also have to insure everything. Insurance went up a little bit for two reasons. one of them all wanted more of a limit on liability that was higher so from 5 million to 10 million but also we got more stuff and you know we've gone from I don't know what 50 games to 75 games so all these things cost money and then also in the club we were very lucky that I mean luck isn't what we call it it's a miracle that the landlord paid our electricity bill that isn't the case and we're roughly paying 400 and 500 quid a month on electricity so if you open up on a Sunday, turn all the games on and one person turns up, that's a challenge I know the other venue, Pimble office over in Sawbridgeworth near where my father in lost days lives towards Stansted, just kind of that direction they have they've struggled and Chris announced that he's halving the size of the venue going from I think he had about 25 games they're going down to about 12 or 13 now much smaller place means they can't take as many vendors sorry as many customers or players or pinballers they now can't do tournaments there now before they're able to do tournaments now it looks very challenging to do tournaments there which is a great shame we wish Chris well because he's been on fire he's talked about closing for a while and I kind of feel that shrinking taking that first step to shrink almost feels like a stepping stone on the path of inevitability to where that might go because I think if you've got less space tournaments at Pinball Republic is literally what keeps us alive, if we run a tournament every month if we didn't do that we'd probably be in we probably wouldn't be out of business but we'd be sailing much closer to the wind than I would like so yeah and you know and I just feel that you know we as a community you know we're going to end up with no venues and we're going to have some big challenges around pinball as a thing where we can get together and we'll go back to the days where the only way you can play pinball is to come to someone's house clearly that is going to have a super negative impact on everything because people do you think there's any onus on the responsibility of the manufacturers is of these games if they want their industry to continue to thrive that they should be trying to help these operators uh it's a good question i mean look i think of course the answer is yes right yeah um but you know those businesses for the most part aren't exactly what i would call in root health either right yeah that you know they've been you know they've come out of covid on a high and then you know the the post-covid party high is hurting them badly um you know we've probably stern the only guy that's probably making significant money uh jersey jack i don't believe are making money i just don't believe it i look at their costs and sales and think investment on harry potter is going to take a little bit isn't it yeah i mean i think they could get there right but it means that for the next two years all they're doing is making harry potters and and you know we've seen that before with guns and roses right yeah and then the barrels of fun guy i think they've got guys i think they've got you know their ceo um he's a smart elephant no question about it is that the right word um i don't know he's a smart guy very smart i think he's um he runs a lean ship i think he knows what he needs to do to be successful risk averse isn't he i mean like well i think he i don't know i don't know if risk averse with labyrinth um um most of licenses is yeah i would say i mean it's not it's not batman is it it's not jurassic park at the same time think about it this way if you chose a title like harry parr as your first game and it sank you'd be oh you'd be dead you'd be dead in the water right like yeah i think that going down a route like labyrinth was probably a safe bet at the end of the day and at the end of the day they did sell through on their full like where was it it was close to selling through. I think it was like, what was their total count? Something like 1,100 that they were planning to do, and they did something just over 1,000. I think they hit the number, or at least they've made them, they're in stock. They've definitely made them all, but I think there's some still lying around in the factory floor, sort of thing that needs to be redone. I mean, Luke, so picking that IP that they went for, here's the upside of it. It's probably cheap, they probably get all the assets. yeah right and you know we've just had a you know chew back a moment on um i don't know if you've been watching like the the subsequent releases but they did a part where dylan talks it's not even uh dylan's voice actor and i realize he's no longer with us but just use the video audio clip i mean from from the movie and have him say it rather than having some some guy that's not even black yeah i mean the lines it's just bizarre i don't understand that i am yeah i mean we'll come back to that but yeah i mean look i think for sure price of games being expensive is a problem they're yeah and they're all pretty much you know still to this day the cheapest pinball machine you can buy is a stern which you know everyone beats up on stern but they're the it is strange Well, actually, saying that, the cheapest price you could get probably is the Turner ones, but not in this country. No, you can get them. So, actually, at Swavesey, they even – Oh, I know you can get them here. Yeah. Absolutely. I just feel like because of the – how can I put it? If you were to buy it in America, it's a lot cheaper than it is after it lands here, and that's just down to, obviously, logistics of import fees, duties, and tax. But it's the same for everybody, though, Scott, right? it's the same I just think from pricing wise I think it's similar to that of what we pay for a Stern Pro is what I was getting at and I think it's down to the fact that it's a numbers game there do you know what I mean if it didn't have to have such a small quantity being sold in this country then the price would probably be a bit better actually to be fair actually I'm going to correct myself so Ninja Eclipse is £7,000 so that is the cheapest game you can buy so but you know If it's 7,000 London in the UK, then I'd see how we'd try that. 7,000 for the base version. I think there's two versions, like a base one and a slightly better one. At least that's the case on Merlin's Arcade, which is the same price. And we'll speak about this later, but I've played Ninja Eclipse. Ninja Eclipse is a fun game. Actually, it's quite a tough game. All right. I was going to ask you about that, actually, yeah. Yeah talk to me about it later on after Yeah But look I think you know I remember paying seven grand seven and a half grand for my Ghostbusters premium.
    18:21
    You know, it'd be great. I mean, I think if we could get back to that, it would definitely be a big help for locations. It wouldn't help us in the club because we don't run any of the games. I mean, they're put there by volunteers, et cetera. so it is you know I think, I mean the one thing I'd say and everyone will say, oh Neil you're such a Stern shill, you're such a Stern fanboy everyone says this right and let me tell you I love CGC as much as I love Stern because I love companies that deliver and both those companies deliver but you know what's clear is that Insider Connected has definitely helped venues with Insider Connected is probably the single best thing to come out of Pinball in a while for me.
    19:08
    It's genuinely a great innovation in the pinball world. Yeah, and Ninja, sorry, Turner Pinball have got something similar, but I wasn't able to get it running last weekend. Oh, okay. Not because of Turner or anything, because the Wi-Fi in the pub was awful.
    19:27
    So I just couldn't get anything to connect. It's your truth of this country, isn't it? Where, let's face it, internet is still feeling like it's in the dark ages. I think in some places that is definitely true. It's getting better, no question, but we've still got a journey to go. It's still funny when I'm in the centre of London, sometimes I can't even get a signal. I'm just like, who is this carrier I'm with, and why can I not get a signal in the centre of Lehman Street? Yeah, I'll tell you why, because none of the landlords will let us build infrastructure on there. They all want to charge us insane amounts of money. Yeah, no doubt. And actually, they're not legally, So the telcos are legally obliged to be able to access stuff like that and build on it. It's called code powers.
    20:11
    Landlords prevent you from doing it and say, hey, if you want access to a roof, the service charge is 20 grand.
    20:17
    You know, or that sort of ilk. So to give you an understanding, there are 18,000 base stations in the UK. Multiply that by 20 grand a year.
    20:26
    Nowhere else in Europe is it like that. So, you know, and actually BT this week and I think Vodafone put out complaints to say, hey, we're shitting the UK because of this. It's a fair analysis. Yeah, it is very frustrating when you don't have internet access and you want to use something. So I took Kong to Swaze and everyone wanted to clock up achievements, but we couldn't do it. And doing Wi-Fi in venues, even if you've got good fiber in there, it's not non-trivial if you've got to invest in it. A lot of people just stick the crap box that came from the service provider in there. They're made to a price, and none of them are particularly great.
    21:11
    They've got better because competition has driven it, but they're not great. So venues, back to venues. Please visit Special and Lit. visit the guys in Kent and Medway I got a bit of an ear pulling from Tony because I never mentioned Medway but visit those guys obviously visit Pimble Republic Retroids some of the other venues up in the north there's a new club opening Blackpool Pinball Club still waiting to hear the details on that but please visit that when it opens I go to the pinball office and you know a lot of people say hey Neil it's come to pinball republic it's not cheap we've got to either park the car and that costs a tenner or get the train and that's ten quid return blah blah blah and I get it absolutely and you know but you know without support we're not if we still if we you know if the behavior we've seen in um the summer was to continue into the winter um i could see that starting to be the the coffin nails getting out of the box for us because that you know we so we've fortunately we've got a couple of folks that if we need for short cash they lean in right yeah but you can't run it like that sustainably it's just not you know if something happens to one of those people or you know they get bored of pinball or something you know this is the part i have found i've spoken to a couple of people that um i initially started the hobby around the same time i did so just around the covid era and they've just dropped out entirely yeah i said like do you go on the forum anymore this is no I said okay what was you what are you doing in your collection so I've got rid of them they're gone I said you even go play pinball in the middle and they said no not really and I was like oh wow and so you're going to come back to it I said oh well one of them told me all depends on the statement and if things get dire enough they're going to just leave the country I was like well great and then the other one said the same thing that they just said like yeah if the pressures get big enough, they're just going to sell off their games and then leave. So I was like, this is why I feel when people say to me, oh, Pimple's the best place it's ever been, maybe for the US, and I don't even think the US is doing particularly great either, I feel like for me at least,
    23:59
    it's put a pause on, normally I'd love to switch up my lineup, right? I've got to a position now where I would say my games are getting a bit long in the tooth, and I reached out to a couple of people privately and said, you know, you've asked about this game before. It's available if you want it. Just because I feel like I'd want to switch things around. They said, no, got no money, got nothing. And I think that's the problem we're in. Like now people are pretty much in a position now where either they're at maximum capacity, so they've got no spare room to buy any games. They don't want to sell any games because the market's gone and taken a nosedive because everybody keeps harping on about how you should sell a Monster Bash for four grand. Sorry. anybody who's going to sell a Monster Bash for four grand you are nuts you are absolutely nuts go sell in the US, at this point you may as well it's not worth it you won't even get Monster Bash for four grand in the US you get other titles cheap the US market is correcting quicker in terms of what is valuable some titles will always be worth a lot like Indiana Jones, Monster Bash Attack from Mars Medieval Madness they're always going to command money They're always going to come out money. Not maybe as much as they used to, but certainly not as little as that. Yeah, it's one guy that we have in the last, basically. Yeah. I think, like I say, if people want the market to kind of like, yeah, this slump that it's in, and let's face it, the market is flooded with games at the moment that aren't going anywhere. And it is because mainly nobody has any spare cash because no one else is selling another game. We need either fresh blood to come in, which I don't think we're in a position to have at the moment. like i don't think someone's going to be coming into the hobby in the current climate and going hey i've got money to spend let's go buy 20 games i i feel like it the only way to get movement back again really is to allow people to sort of sell games comfortably i'm not saying i'm not saying so they should be selling it like covid past what you want to call it post covid process that's probably the way you put it i'm just saying that if you expect someone to sell a game at like five grand less than what they bought it for they're not going to do it and they'd rather just sit on it and the market will just stagnate yeah I mean and also I think there's a lot of games there's a lot of kind of gangs of friends on WhatsApp that are buying and selling games between each other there is a lot of private trade going on still because they look at you put your game up on the forum and look there's a market reality and there's what you want for the game right sure i'll use a great example everyone's been banging on about it john wick right um john brick you mean but yeah carry on so john brick for those that can't shoot pinball um it's an amazing game the latest code mike and the guys done a phenomenal job on it so it's the you know they haven't finished it but you can see the game's taken some interesting steps you know i paid i don't know what 15 grand for the le yeah if i was to get eight for it right now um i would be lucky and and look so that's a big decrease man yeah absolutely this is why i say to you like going back to that whole like you know what the manufacturers need to do do they need to start facing some strong realities here that they can no longer turn around and expect people to punch down 15 grand for a game to then lose half of it within like the span of a year that's and this is and this is the point right um if they don't this is the this is the challenge they face if this situation continues you know what it used to be was it's like you buy a game for seven grand premium yeah sell it for maybe six six and a half you stuck in another 500 quid you bought the next one that was the motion right yeah for a little while it was definitely like that especially um for like the last three or four years like so yeah pre-covid uh running into covid it was definitely that right and yeah life was good but um you know we see you kind of see it um i mean it's like my labyrinth like i've seen other people trying to sell theirs and that they're tanking in value and i've seen like the same thing like what was it the ultra i know ultraman was a it was a horrible flop but then when i saw i can't remember who it is put it up for four grand i was like that's a 10 grand game yeah that's a six grand loss it was eight and a half so i actually had yeah i actually had one in order and i had a thousand pound down on it and carl d'angelo pinged me and said no this game's a shitter so i bailed out of it and took the grand hit with phil i get it if a game's terrible yeah it's going to affect its value but then there are some other games i think what was it like even kirk i think he's got a mandalorian le up right yep and he's gone down to seven and a half and i'm just like that's an le and there's other people telling me George should go for 7 as a pro and I'm like... LE has been in a bar. I mean, if you put... Yeah, it's a game, I suppose you can call it. The one thing you can do is buy an LE and stick it in a pub or a venue because you basically just make it a premium instantly. But I think there's a home use one that's only for like 500 more. No, absolutely. There is one. Yeah, no, look, I'm not saying that it's... So, the point is that some of these high-end games go in for a lot less money. And let me tell right in the u.s they're going for even less right yeah it's not sustainable though because you i say in order to buy the next game at least in my world i'm happy to lose like two grand i'd say on a game that's reasonable yeah but like to lose three or four it's like man i'd rather i may as well just rent a game at this point exactly lose less money or or you buy you know you go into the past and you buy a few old classics um yeah a lot of people tanking value by three grand think about a flash gordon or a um vector or something like that you know these are great fun games okay they're not they're not banging out um iron maiden music or anything like that but there's still there's still a ton of fun and again you want to you want to know how fun those games are come with people republics we've got about 40 of them so um yeah it's a tricky one but look and you know the guys at Loser Kid did their monthly pinball thing yeah we're probably prattling on too much about price aren't we should move on yeah so look use venues so let's move on and let's talk about the game you're all waiting to hear about you've probably seen videos millions of them Harry Potter and the case of the Dodgy playfield art um i mean that i i i come from my wife's like done playfield art and we all know that you know it's i i would say i'm very biased in that approach when it comes to art i much prefer a playfield to be driven by passion and driven by um someone who has spent thousands or hundreds of hours hundreds of thousands of hours building out the artwork i get the fact that ai is a tool I think Franchi had an interview with Cary Hardy. He was on a live stream. And he said, to me, it's a tool. I use it. He even said he even used it on Evil Dead. He did say, there's some stuff I just wouldn't have done. He used it as a tool to create an asset, and then he'll build upon it. So he'll be like, get me this, like a briefcase. And then it'll be like, okay, cool. Do this with it. Da-da-da. Then he'll be like, okay, right. I'm going to tweak that now and put that in. And I get that. I think that's absolutely fine. I don't see any major problems with it I think the only thing I disagree with his statement is that he goes pinball isn't art and I was like I just don't agree with that I really like for an artist to say that his work is not art sorry mate that's a bit too much for me I mean art has always been in the eye of the beholder right yeah absolutely but I know thousands not thousands but hundreds of people that stick their art of their play fields up on the walls they like it they love the way it looks I think it honestly is in itself an art form and and i do i do admire the work that a lot of the people have done i think some of it is like and that's why we promote these artists right we talk about zombie yeti we talk about uh you know franchi we we we know them by name because we respect their work and we'll put this way you know when a pinball machine's got shit art and you know when it's got great art I'll give you an example compare Walking Dead to Ghostbusters right? Ghostbusters was Zombie Yeti's first proper game that wasn't the Zidware For me he put playfield art back on the map again it was no longer a Photoshop asset dump it was like something that was in trauma fashion and then Chris Franchi came along did the artwork for Guardians and other stuff, Beatles Evil Dead. Evil Dead is just stunning. It is and I think he should be proud of it. Maybe he doesn't feel that way but he should.
    33:11
    Chris actually listens to the podcast because he took the piss out of my bed. If you're not listening, you need to take more respect of your work because it is good. We're telling you that you're brilliant, mate. We're the tea truck because you've earned it. We're looking forward to what you've got cooking in the oven.
    33:31
    I'm hearing it's BL juice. but we shall see, right? We'll produce some gremlins. Everyone keeps tossing and turning into the two, but yeah. Anyway, look, back on Harry Potter. Yeah, Harry Potter. Luke, let's get back to it. So, yeah, I said this all. I mean, I have to say the artwork on all of our – so let me reverse back. Harry Potter as a theme is meaningless, valueless drivel. I never liked the movie. Not a fan of the books, no? I read half of the book and then thought, this is just awful. The book. the first one I've watched the first movie I've watched bits of the others but honestly I'm like it bored me beyond belief I like the theme personally and I'll tell you billions of people do right I was on the fence to buy one of those free games so it was between Predator, Harry Potter and Dune and Predator then got announced and I was like, I want Predator and I dumped Dune. Chew you back, I'll put you off. Yeah, we'll go on to that later. Suffice to say, I kind of shifted back to Dune. I was like, I do like Harry Potter as a theme, but I'll tell you what I don't like is JJP's code. I just can't get my head round.
    34:53
    That's exactly right. But go on, yeah. Phil, actually, big shout out to Phil at Pinball Heaven. he invited a bunch of us to his girlfriend's hotel, which was a very, very nice hotel. We were in a stunning room. I took my wife. My wife was blown away by how good this was. She's like, this can't be pinball. It's too nice.
    35:17
    It made me laugh. I want to say there was about 50 people there. We had an open day. Actually, I missed that because I couldn't get up there. I just went for the evening thing, which was a dinner and a few beers. a lot of famous faces Jack was there from Jersey Jack which is good right promoting his own product Illinois Jack as I like to call him now but the game was there I got to play it and Luke I've said this before I think it's a good game I think it's a great game I think it shoots nice it's probably between that and Elton John I think it's roughly the same in terms of how good it shoots, although I actually prefer the Elton Jones theme. I'll probably be unique in that.
    36:02
    It's too old for me. I've got Metallica. That's my music pin, as far as I'm concerned. Yeah, but I think it's clear that Eric's got a real passion for Harry Potter. There this spinning staircase mech that quite cool The Hogwarts thing or the what was it the not hogwarts the what the game the quidditch yeah sorry i yeah it used to the upper playfield looks great it's great but then the staircase but then as you say it's like here's what it is like i've got this great great game great play for blah blah right yeah basically it's like okay we're gonna we're going to do the code and what they've done is they've put the code in a shell a metal shell they've stuck it in a four billion pound howitzer gun and they fired it at the game and it's just gone onto the game yeah and it feels nothing like being in a harry potter movie playing that game and let me let me let me let me give you a an example of a of a game where they totally nailed being in the movie jaws right okay that is and they just put out release one absolute top job to keith and the whole team the jaws is if you if you haven't got jaws in your collection go play one for an afternoon i'll put money on it you'll buy one it is such a good game now. It feels like you're in the game. You've got the humor from the movie. You've got little tweaks from it. The game shoots great. It's challenging. There's lots of different things to do. They've actually got an old 8-bit code that's completely different to the rest of the game.
    37:55
    And the music, when you're about to go into a molly ball, as you're about to start a molly ball, Harry Potter, right?
    38:06
    Oh, I'm in a molly ball now. Holy shit. Right? and what's frustrating I call it the attention deficit disorder edition because it does feel like there's 50 million things going on and I just don't know which way to look what's frustrating about it is David, oh what's his name gone out of my head, the guy who does the audio has done a phenomenal job of the audio and you can't fucking hear any of it it's a crime, it's an absolute crime and David Teel who's a i've just realized there's like a a school a schoolboy hero of mine from epic games when they did um winter games on the commodore 64 he did all the audio for that and so i've got a copy of my i've got winter games the original copy on the chicago i'm hoping he's going to be at expo i'm he's not sure he's going to be there anyway they did that great job they've done a great job of the kind of assets of the movie, but it just feels disconnected from the game.
    39:08
    To get the modes going, to get into a movie, there's a really tough scoop shot that I think what they should do is do a Guardians of the Galaxy and just put a menu up and say, pick the movie you want to play. Like they've done with Evil Dead, they've done with Guardians of the Galaxy. I mean, I hate menus in pinball, but that would be better. Because I've seen this where people are playing it and they're like, why isn't more happening? I feel a lot of it can be done through lighting as well. But, like, J.J.P. has a weird fascination with casino lights. I feel like… Yeah, casino lights and slot machine lights. Yeah, it's like the theme is… If you watch any of the Harry Potter themes, it starts off kind of light, and then it gets darker and darker and darker because it's all about Voldemort, the guy that should not be named. And effectively, as he becomes more prominent and obviously, like, you know, is getting stronger the the theme gets darker and darker the color palette gets darker and they've made a whole analysis on this right i feel like it'd be fairly easy for them to i don't know maybe they should do what they did with john brick they should just like wipe the code and start again like yeah i just i just don't think they're gonna do that um i mean apparently they've tweaked a few things but i just it's hard for me to comment i mean i only watch from streams right but i just feel like i i for me i'm a very big purveyor of ip ip is very king for me when it comes to making a choice about buying a game if the theme doesn't speak to me i won't buy it and that's why i went for dune because this theme does speak to me i do like dune as a ip i grew up with the the games as a kid so june 2 was like the godfather of like rts games and i absolutely loved it um and i feel Command & Conquer era. Yeah, I am.
    40:59
    Command & Conquer owes its success to Doom. They made the whole point and click. Everyone that's into those sort of games, go look up Tempest Rising on Steam.
    41:12
    It's a new game. The spiritual successor to Command & Conquer. Yeah, it's awesome. I've been playing it. So, okay, look. So, Harry Potter. Great job, Eric, on the play field. I think it shoots nice. Great job on the sound.
    41:28
    Okayest job on the artwork. I mean, great on the presentation. The game looks special. No question about it, right? Do you know if they've actually tidied up the AI mistakes now? Apparently. Do you play feel the art of it? Yes, apparently they have. So I think this, remember I mentioned that there was a delay because of something. Yeah. I think this is what it is. So you can have one right now. So if you've got one in order, hey, you can have one with the funny art or you can wait for one without the funny art.
    42:03
    So, I mean, I think most people will take the game because, honestly, what the AI are, I mean, they've got it badly wrong. And actually the artist came clean and said, Jersey Jack knew nothing about it. It was him.
    42:16
    And basically, again, he uses it as a tool. Actually, it's kind of funny because Adobe have been using AI in their platform since 2012. Oh, yeah, it's prevalent, yeah. it's not AIR man I'm like down until you can't escape AIR it's in video games now it's in voice actors being replaced by it it's just yeah it's hilarious I had some bozo email the UK Open because I used AIR in one of the adverts unless you stop using AIR I'm never coming to your tournament bye I mean honestly I couldn't believe it so look like I say the sound's great you know but the code nah they've just it's a big miss and I think unfortunately like so many other JGP games except Elton John except Dialed In maybe except Toy Story maybe a little bit of I've started to like Wonka a little bit better even though it doesn't have the Candyman but yeah look I think they've done I think if you're a Harry Potter fan you'll be happy if you're not a Harry Potter fan I don't think there's a good enough game that you would buy that over comp I just don't know why or Jaws, I just don't know why you would do that, it just wouldn't make any sense to me basically so there's that, let's talk about Predator so Scott you had one in order last time don't anymore do that next week to find out what game Scott has still got ordered I feel bad for putting the plug on it but Honestly, that game was on life support and then it just suddenly... It is. I don't know what... Imagine doing Harry Potter and Harry isn't in the fucking game. I've said it before. I had a discussion with Ant around this. He does all the premium restorations in the UK.
    44:13
    He was like... Because me and him are massive Predator fans. And he was like, Alien I can get away with not having Ripley in it because you don't think Sigourney Weaver when you think of Alien. I disagree, I kind of do I think she was the female protagonist as much as Predator but more so, I do think, I agree with him when you think Predator, you think Arnold he's there first and foremost the thing is in Aliens there's not a lot of catchphrases right get away from her you bitch is probably one of the key that's it get through that there's plenty of them, Game Over Man yeah exactly there's a few of them yeah but they're not all that's the point whereas in Predator I'm going to say 80% of Arnie if it's bleed we can kill it get to the chopper Dylan you son of a bitch all those things were Arnie yeah that's true a movie like Predator is built around Arnie if Arnie wasn't in Predator and it was some other bozo, the movie would be awful. No one would watch it. It'd just be... It was going to be Jean-Claude Van Damme, wasn't it? Wasn't that Commando? Oh, was that Commando? I can't remember now. It was one of them, yeah. Yeah, I know what you mean there. Jean-Claude Van Damme and Predator would be awful, man. It would be like... The Brussels from Muscles. No. I feel like they just don't seem to listen to their audience either. They just double down on it. and I'm just like, if you're going to ignore every criticism, that it should be, these are your potential market purchases, and you're just sat there just going, nah, it doesn't matter. Especially after Alien. Those that will buy it, those that won't, won't. Especially after Alien, when they put Ripley in, and boom, it started, you know, and then, you know, ABBA, I can't imagine ABBA's, like, you know, going to be featured as success stories and pinball volume. I think ABBA's going to go across as one of those games that was a bit like Venom or something. It was just an average game. More like that Primus game, but except for the fact they put the full effort into developing it. Primus, it was a re-theme of Wonelly. It was a re-theme of Wonelly.
    46:37
    Actually, it's a stunning-looking game, but unfortunately it's Wonelly. But look, I just don't know what possesses the thinking. and then also do all that marketing nonsense with the teasers you know because everyone and the thing is right they come across and I don't believe that they wanted to do this right at least I hope not they come across like they're trying to hide the fact Arnie's not in it by teasing stuff we're not going to if we come out and tell you Arnie's not in it no one's going to buy our game so we're going to piss you about and misdirect you it honestly felt like that for a while because even Genghis was basically avoiding the question even though he knew the answer.
    47:21
    Yeah. The less said about that, the better. Yeah. I mean, his impression, Arnie, is better than who they've got doing it, I think. But anyway, look, I'll tell you a funny story after this. If I share it here, I'll be shot down by the minions of Doom on the internet. I'm frustrated because too many companies keep taking glorious themes and wasting them I could rant about that again just please stop I was watching In Before The Lock that podcast on mods and there were a few guests on there saying do we really want Pimble Brothers to stop making games, I'm like, yeah, I'm sorry, but I do. Because they're balling it up. I don't want shit games with my dream theme on them. No. People might say, you know, that's a hot take or whatever, right? But I kind of just think if you're getting it so badly wrong... I think they took a right to sit on positive notes, right? I like the fact they used fast hardware. I think that was a good admission from them to turn around and say, right we need to address stability issues here our games need to be rock solid going out the door that should mean that the game is stable but 100% we've now got an issue where the assets aren't there the call outs cheesy kind of not in a good way cheesy either and also I've been looking at the game play and there's kind of a couple of I tell you in their defense Dune had the exact same issue barrels of fun they released it and they got people like adam savage and even david to play the game and both of them professed to be not very good pinball players and it looked like the game was nigh on impossible to shoot dirty paws in jeff on i don't know if you've been watching him on on twitch because he's doing really good stuff at the moment he's now also the i would say the composer i think is the probably the accurate term for for barrels of fun so he's now doing all the audio for Dune. And even he admits they fluffed up the initial release. But now the stuff he's done and the way he keeps pushing and promoting the game on a weekly basis, it's really useful. At least for me, it made me go back to Dune. If I hadn't seen his videos, I would have probably just said this game is a complete whitewash and I'm done with it. Because its initial release was terrible. The code was completely unfinished. and it was released too early and now it looks really good and I feel like it looks like it was a bad shooter as well which is what I was getting at it looks really clunky and now when I watch him play it I'm like wow this is what it can do it really can flow when you shoot the shots. I mean this is the thing I don't know what the I'd love to understand the thinking behind getting that release out when they did because Kong was already out we knew Harry Potter was coming it was precious I think to try and get out of the game first right but i don't know yeah but but it's not helpful when it then takes you nine months to build them you know and i just i don't look if they had a thousand of them ready to sell on a shelf then yeah you want to get out there but they didn't so i mean even you know um and even even starting with getting harry sorry getting king kong out you know they were a bit slow off the mark on that not not not as fast as they normally are yeah um but i just kind of feel like that they've missed I kind of feel that if they'd just taken a bit of time and I think all we're talking about is two weeks Scott and launched it with a bigger bang I think June needed another two months which is what it basically is at now but I feel like there probably was the pressures of Harry Potter I'm sure of it I get that but I think again in the land of pinball you know Harry Potter you know its biggest base is people in my daughter's age right probably you know the kind of gen z's right is that right i think no it's millennials right they don't buy pinball machines right so you know and doing back to your point june's been around a lot longer you know i used to play the games i watched the original movies i actually haven't seen the the new movies because I just haven't had time. I don't go to the cinema that often, but at some point I'll sit down and watch them, right?
    52:04
    But yeah, I'd love to... I don't know if David Van Ness has kind of said why with what the timing was, because they kind of just missed Texas Pinball Festival as well, which is kind of doubly frustrating for them, because if they got the game there, they'd be on to a winner, no question about it. but it's not ready, it's not ready. I mean, I think that's the key thing. I do feel like a lot of pinball companies at the moment seem to be in a state, like Pinball Brothers as well, right, with Predator. They release a game that's just not there, it's not finished. The assets, again, it seems to be really weird. They release games where they're pending license approval, and it's like, why are we in a situation where we're getting pending license approval? Like, Harry Potter, same thing, right? They said, oh, we can't release all this stuff just yet, pending license approval. It's like, what is going on? All the games that initially came out all had this kind of demo edition on them. That's right, yeah. Which made me, you know, when I saw that, and, you know, we'd heard all these rumors about licensing issues, I was like, well, that's why they've done that.
    53:06
    So, yeah, I mean, look forward. I haven't played Dune. I'm going to the U.S., Pinburg, next week, and Dune is there, so I'll get a chance to play it. Great. Feedback. Kong, you know, the other big game at the moment, It just goes from strength to strength. I took it to Swavesy, the pinball festival, last week. Have you adjusted your mech, by the way? Because for those that have got the arm blocking the... Yeah, yeah. Apparently it can burn out if you don't adjust it. Yeah, yeah, no, absolutely.
    53:37
    If you've been in radio control, right, you know this already. So comms arms are done by two radio control servos, right?
    53:47
    And basically, if you buy a radio control car, there's this thing called trim on the on the controller both both you just need to trim the servos um and if you know that they're servos limit the torso movement it just limits where the hands can go because okay because the you know the the zero point for servos is never the same place you buy 10 you'll never get two in the same bit like when you do like an eddy board right you adjust the sensitivity underneath yeah so so so you just need to adjust that i mean some people were taking Kong out of the game, I'm like, you don't need to take Kong out of the game. I mean, there's a... I don't think you have to do that. Well, yeah, I mean, everyone said, take Kong out. I was like, why do you have to take Kong out I didn do that I mean there was also a couple of folks who had loose screws Right Which is annoying for sure You know there should have been a dab of thread lock on on that but um you just got the menu you trim it so that it you know it only moves within you know a couple of millimeters or whatever yeah and bang you're good to go but um the game i mean i just i'm so i'm enjoying it so much um and they put a new code version a couple of weeks ago and it's just phenomenal it's actually going to be in the club for a couple of weeks because Matt kindly took it to Swavesey for me in his van and he brought it back and he was going to bring it back so I actually wanted to just take it to the club because So is that your LE at the club? Wow I had my Dungeons and Dragons LE at the club and it was fine it doesn't have the LE lock bar on it, I've got a cheap ass Oh right, so it's Joy's scuff Those are like I don't know The people that do that Dangly jewellery If I catch anyone doing that man Honestly I'll be going to jail for GBH It's like key in a car It's the same sort of thing man If I catch anyone doing that I think that's the safest thing About like having stainless steel Or like just standard black Kind of like what's the word I'm not saying plated it's not the right word I'm looking for Black thing on stern pros Yeah, the black coat that they use is really robust. I've seen where people have scratched the hell out of them. I'm like, who are the fuckers that do that, man? Honestly, if I caught someone doing that, I genuinely don't think... When I borrowed the Barrels of Fun labyrinth from David, the rooted one that he put on, because it was like the, what do you want to call it, the showroom game? It's probably the better way to put it. Yeah, yeah. Someone had scratched coins on the lock bar, so they would, quote-unquote, like work bearer inside the mechanism i was like you were scratching an actual powder coat there it's absolutely phenomenal that people just like stuff like that i've been there with just dickhead vandal so we had that game in the uk open before you got it and i was i was crying when i saw i was like who are these people that do shit like that yeah um anyway uh so and then um i played so ninja eclipse david was kind enough to take that to sway as a really good game quite a tough game, a couple of shots that are really hard, the lock shot's brutal on it.
    56:55
    How does it work? Isn't it got like a shot where it shoots from one shot into another, like a grappling hook sort of thing? Yeah, I mean, I thought, oh, that's cool, but then when you play it, it's like, that's shit. You just win.
    57:09
    I like the fact that he was trying something new. Yeah, it's great, but there's no skill involved in it. You're not doing anything with the ball.
    57:19
    I mean, if you play games with scoops and without scoops, you tend to find that games without scoops have got tons of great flow, right? If you're really in balls off two scoops I mean, I get, look, it was an experiment. It's not awful, but you don't get any satisfaction out of the shot. And, you know, that's it. So, and I made a bold statement on Pinside and on Stern Enthusiasts this week. Okay. The gong shot in Kong is the GOAT. Yeah, I saw that. It is the GOAT of all pinball shots, mate. I'm telling you. Right? Let me just explain it. Go on. Convince me. On this left flipper, right? Yeah. It is such a tricky shot. The ball's moving at pace. And that's the thing I'm calling the ball's always moving at pace. And you've got to hit it and it's getting and you get this and it's like and it kicks back. Do you mean it's better than the snick shot on Deadpool? I love the sneak shot on Deadpool I love the cross shot on the sword I love that it's awesome but this pisses all over it and then you can also backhand it which is where if you're less good at pinball you probably go to the backhand and again you can get a backhand wrong so that you're in real trouble but if you nail it the glory just comes out of the machine into your inner psyche I've been told to wrap up so let's move on to the Q&A quick Q&A yes Q&A so the Q&A was from Jag555 on the forum we should entertain more questions and his first question was send your questions in initially is what we're saying now we will do it more we do need to communicate more with the community so from our point of view this is the first one we'll do So he's asked the question to us specifically, saying, what is our most favoured Spike 2 as our most favourite game, and what's our least favourite game? So I'll let you start. So the least favourite is easy. Go on.
    59:33
    Monsters. I knew you were going to say that. Absolutely fucking awful game. I mean, I just don't know where to go on it. It is terrible. the next game I would say I kind of feel bad no go on I'm not going to let you off the hook other than just say it's terrible say why you think it's terrible the game's great but it has this big problem that when you're playing this game you have to listen to music by the band Rush and it is the most fucking awful music ever created sorry Tom Graff I know you love Rush people who love Rush you clearly need to get your hearing tested because it is utterly, utterly garbage. I mean, this is the thing. I mean, we've talked about this before, Scott, where audio is such an important part of the union for me. And you've got some Canadian guy, and it's like, no, I can't hear that. I can't listen to that. Even ear defenders on. So I've got a premium. I own a Rush premium. It's in the club. And I looked to see if I could do a disco Rush, right? But unfortunately, the way Stern have done it now, they've tied the music to the gameplay much tighter and it's possible but it's a hell of a lot of work whereas Iron Maiden it was literally drag and drop to get Disco Maiden on it so that's my two worst I might throw in I might throw in kind of Aerosmith as my next least favourite you're supposed to pick least favourite and that's it so the best so spike 2 best game I mean that's such a hard thing for me it's really easy it is James Bond 60th it is so it's right there it is absolutely stunning it's the one game that I'll sell everything else before I sell that it is such a fun game okay it's not a deep game you know if you're in it you know it's definitely not a deep game but the layout is awesome the rules are brilliant the music the integration the artwork's a bit ropey it's photoshop um but i absolutely love it um that might be down to licensing requirements right yeah well actually it's one of the few bond things that have got all the bonds on it it's very rare that you find that so collectors love the game uh i've sold a few off the gray market it. If I was going to call out a traditional more Spike 2 game, I think I'm throwing my hat at Jaws. But I think if you ask me in a month's time, I'll say King Kong because, again, I've called this. Again, Godzilla's another great game. I think King Kong is going to eclipse Godzilla.
    62:32
    I just feel that they've got... It's hard for me to say because I haven't played it yet. Yeah, but I think it's got all the potential to be as good as Godzilla. Will it sell as many as Godzilla? Probably not, but more because of the market and the fact that it's... And the fact I think Godzilla as an IP is a stronger IP as well. Yeah, I'll give you that. So, Scott, let's hear your two. My least favourite is a tie, I'd say. It's between Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles or Star Wars. Oh, okay. So, yeah, I get both of them. Actually, Star Wars. Star Wars kind of leans further into the dislike, because it was a cherished IP for me, and it's got the leaf underneath the hood. Do you know what I mean? And it's that horrible shot that if you shoot the shooter lane wrong, and just drains down the middle. It's like geometry, bad. Artwork, terrible.
    63:37
    Yeah, okay, it's got some decent video assets and it's got a really weird video mode, which they've never done since. It doesn't feel like you're in a Star Wars movie, though, does it? That's the issue. TIE Fighter on a spring. It's like, you know, it feels like a homebrew. And no offence to homebrews, right? I'm making one. But it does feel like a homebrew. It's like this is a low-budget effort game. And it feels like Stern was in a funny spot with that. they were like, we don't have any really money left we spent it all on the license, let's just throw something together kind of attitude so I don't think they were short of money for that game and actually after Godzilla, Star Wars is Stern's best selling game I know it sells loads but that's because of the theme that's the theme it's a great game I often write, when I look at people's lineups and they say I've got this, that and the other and I look at like what games they've got and like if they've got like a star wars i guarantee you they've got an alien and it's no offense to me i've got an alien and i know why it's because they like the theme they're buying for the theme and not for the game right or they might be star trek um maybe maybe not yeah so um actually i'll give you that turtle i used to hate turtles as well but then i figured out glanes drive me up the wall i just i lose my mind when the ball hits that metal at the end on the outline just goes boop and it's just like ahhh I grew up like that game initially I thought what but I also like tough games it's a very tough game I give you both of them they're definitely at the bottom so the Swavesey tournament I got Star Wars as my first game in both rounds and totally both games I hate the game when I get in a tournament whoever's playing me you've won I don't even need to play the game I'll just say you've won it's weird because I know you're a Star Wars fan let's hope the rumour is true I know you're not a fan of the sequels the rumour is true no no no hold on okay it's not that true then if you hear especially that man Kaneda right say Star Wars episode 23 it's fucking not right no company in their right freaking mind would do anything with episodes 1 to 3. No one. No one would do it. No, no, no, no, no. Right? It is Star Wars. Episode 4, 5 and 6. And let me tell you, one of the biggest mechs on it is a really cool Death Star mech that eats the ball. Right? People are going to be tripping over themselves for this mech. If that's true, I'd be interested. Because I really do love the original. And go on YouTube and say, and create you're full of shit right I am very confident about it I'm very confident that I'm going to be buying this game and I'm going to love this game and John Borg is going to blow it off the wall it's kind of weird though isn't it because they only just did the I say just it feels like it but look this is the problem right they stopped making Star Wars and all the dealers moan because it's a game they sell whether it's whether the business is good or business is bad Star Wars sells I mean yeah you often see boxes of them going out the doors don't you yeah so that was for me for the least for the most favorite it's easy it's metallica the remastered yeah it's just it's so i keep playing it i was playing it last night with holly and even holly was doing well on it she got like yeah there is it's honestly a thing of beauty and she got like i think it was 408 million wasn't an amazing game but bear in mind she's like you know seven months pregnant now and she's the size of middle earth it's difficult to reach her out flippers so she's doing really well she beat me on that game i was like i think i was doing all right i was like i'm gonna beat her i've got a really good game here i've got just landed on one ball i've got like 220 i'm gonna beat a pregnant lady yeah exactly and then she just literally when you start stacking those multiballs oh yeah it's honestly it's so good yeah i mean i love i love when you've completed the multiballs you get that mini wizard mode yeah i've got that twice it is awesome it is again borg and rey day rey days I think earned is... And it doesn't feel hard, even though everyone complains it is hard. It doesn't feel hard. I have no question about it. I think it's because it's just genuinely fun when you play it. Yeah, look, I mean it's... you can tell it's a good game, because when people said another Metallica? Why would I want one of them? I've already got one. And then the thing sells out.
    68:12
    It's just... they just smashed it, and I think if I was Stern, I'd be looking at, okay, what do we do for Metallica that we need to repeat? because animations music lights it's all tens for me exactly i just think i'm not a big metallica fan even bang on like the musicians have got energy when they're talking about it sometimes it's weird right i've always thought this is so strange like stranger things have that problem with that guy what's his name that plays the sheriff i can't remember his name now you see they're actors though this is the problem right voice actors yeah no look you can you can see it right? You can see it in different games where if you're a voice actor, like the guys on Godzilla, he's fucking smashed it because he knows what to do, right? If you just go pull a random actor, he needs direction. And if you don't give him that direction, he'll sound like, uh, the ball is glossed, right? It's the voice, but it's not the character. Extra ball! Some of them are frustrated things. It's awful. But yeah, look, I give you that. I think, I mean, Metallica's definitely in my top ten, I think. I mean, that's... I think it's my favourite Stern. It is my favourite Stern. Yeah. It's, like, that or Lord of the Rings. It's damn hard between the two for me.
    69:32
    It's funny, because we were playing Lord of the Rings, like, just a few days back, and I was like, I'm never going to sell this game. Like, I've been offered before, and I'm like, I'd be mad. Like, it's just so good. Yeah, I mean, it's like, I've got right next to me, because I'm moving games in and out, Jurassic Park, right? It's one of my faves. And the thing is, if you ask me the same question in two weeks' time, I'll have different answers because you play games and, you know, like Jurassic Park, at one point I wanted to burn the game. I thought it was awful, so hard. It is really hard. Now I can't imagine my game. I think I got that game when I was really kind of mediocre. I'm still mediocre at pinball, but I'm better than I was.
    70:13
    You want to go on a special one? Let's pinball skills teaching thing on. Yeah, maybe I should. Yeah, but I think for me, like, yeah, I generally would love to have another shot at having a Jurassic Park. I love the IP. It's the only, I don't like any of the sequels. They're all terrible movies. Oh, they're all awful. The original first movie was just so good. I've heard the new movies. Although, actually, the other movie, I'm sad to tell you, Superman.
    70:40
    Not good, no? It's fucking awful. James Gunn's messed it up, has he? It is awful. Oh, dear. I got to admit, I am a bit of a Snyder fan, so I probably wouldn't like it. I love Man of Steel. I do as well. I mean, you can't beat Christopher Reeve, though. I'm sorry. I mean, I know there's a cheese level in it from the kind of 70s, 80s that is also great. But I thought Man of Steel was great. The guy in the middle between the two, he wasn't bad, but he wasn't great. But I think letting Henry Cavill go was a foolish, foolish thing to do. He's getting old, though, isn't he? That's the problem. I think he's trying to do the next 10-year thing, isn't he? A-I-R. A-I-R, yeah. There you go. Yes. We've got to wrap up. Indeed. Thank you, Scott. We'll be back for our UCS, ladies and gentlemen. It's the one you wait for. It's the one that causes trouble, upsets people, and makes me laugh. It is the Pinfest spectacular episode. We'll do a video. Well, it's true, actually. we will do a podcast just prior to the show so we'll do one just before the show so you can listen to it yeah and get enraged by my comments such that you want to come and give me a punch in the face right i'm gonna i'm gonna i'm going to it's not a caveat but you shouldn't i'm gonna go full hardcore mccray for the next one great i'm looking forward to seeing friends uh yeah I think it's going to be genuinely good it's always great to see the people there and I'm not taking any games I'm not doing anything I'm literally a punter at large watch out if you've got a camera if it hits me I might do something evil to it and I'll be wearing a shirt you'll be able to identify me I'll be wearing a shirt my name is Colin and with that bombshell Scott and I wish you well have a great summer and we'll see you at Pinfest. See you at Pinfest.