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The Pinball Show Ep 78: Another Stern Pinball Release?!

The Pinball Show·podcast_episode·1h 6m·analyzed·Oct 11, 2021
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claude-haiku-4-5-20251001 · $0.036

TL;DR

Insider Connected live; Jack Danger rumored designing new Stern home pin; JJP adds designer; Game 4 coming soon.

Summary

The Pinball Show Episode 78 discusses Stern Pinball's Insider Connected platform launch with six eligible games and upcoming achievements/badges system, rumors of Jack Danger designing a new Stern home pin (possibly Jurassic Park themed), Jersey Jack Pinball hiring Mark Sadan as a fourth designer, American Pinball's unannounced Game 4, and details on Insider Connected's three-tier subscription model and operator tools.

Key Claims

  • Jack Danger is designing a new Stern home pin that may launch at Chicago Pinball Expo

    medium confidence · Craig Bobby reporting rumor on TPN Industry News segment; unconfirmed but aligns with prior mentions of Danger working on something for Stern

  • Mark Sadan (Metroid homebrew designer) hired as Jersey Jack's fourth designer

    high confidence · Ken Rudberg's JJP update; rumors suggest Pat Lawlor may retire after Toy Story, bringing team back to three

  • American Pinball Game 4 reveal expected around Pinball Expo (late October)

    high confidence · Brian Cosner/Kaz reporting; David Fix appeared on Canada's Pinball Podcast discussing unlicensed titles and supply chain

  • Insider Connected retrofit kit pricing and availability still undecided as of podcast recording

    high confidence · Craig Bobby reporting parts delays preventing kit availability announcement; hosts confirm uncertainty

  • Star Wars the Pin has sold well for Stern but less than commercial units at Flippin' Out

    high confidence · Zach Minney (Flippin' Out distributor) states commercial units outsell home pin version for their collector-focused customer base

  • New home pin likely to be Jurassic Park based on George Gomez's prior statement about iconic universal themes

    medium confidence · Zach Minney speculation citing archival stream from two years ago where Gomez suggested next home pin would be iconic/universal like Star Wars

  • Insider Connected Pro for operators initially free with undecided future pricing after six months

    high confidence · Zach Minney citing dealer webinar with George Gomez and Gary Stern; pricing strategy still in flux

  • Avengers game removed from initial seven eligible Insider Connected titles; now six games at launch

    high confidence · Hosts reference licensing approval delays causing Avengers exclusion from launch window

Notable Quotes

  • “I've been hearing this for months...Keeping a theme quiet is one thing. Keeping people's occupations quiet is quite something else.”

    Zach Minney @ ~28:00 — Host's skepticism about secrecy around Jack Danger's Stern design work; suggests either surprise reveal strategy or unusual communication from manufacturer

  • “Have you sold more of the Star Wars pin unit than any other Stern pinball machine? I would say that the answer is they have not sold for us as well as the commercial units.”

    Zach Minney @ ~35:00 — Direct market data from authorized distributor on home pin underperformance versus commercial machines

  • “My guess would be Jurassic Park...because when it comes to Jurassic Park, it's heralded as one of the greatest games ever made.”

    Zach Minney @ ~41:00 — Distributor speculation on next home pin theme based on prior Gomez interview and IP iconic value

  • “They still don't know the price of the kits. And I think Craig Bomby was reporting that they don't know the price of the kits...because of parts delays.”

    Dennis Creasel @ ~54:00 — Confirms continued uncertainty on critical Insider Connected retrofit pricing due to supply chain constraints

  • “I don't understand why the kit price isn't known. I agree. I totally agree.”

    Dennis Creasel / Zach Minney @ ~55:00 — Host frustration with lack of retrofit kit pricing clarity despite platform launch; suggests incomplete rollout

  • “If there is a new layout or theme of the pen...the differential between the pricing on this compared now to a Godzilla Pro is over $2,000.”

    Dennis Creasel @ ~33:00 — Pricing gap concern between home pin series and commercial Pro models; sustainability question

  • “Most collectors don't consider them...They're not commercial-grade pinball machines. They're toys.”

    Zach Minney @ ~39:00 — Market perception issue for home pin line; lack of coin-op feature limits collector appeal

Entities

Jack DangerpersonMark SadanpersonJersey Jack PinballcompanyAmerican PinballcompanyStern PinballcompanyInsider ConnectedproductZach MinneypersonDennis Creaselperson

Signals

  • ?

    event_signal: Chicago Pinball Expo (October 2022) positioned as major Insider Connected and game announcement venue

    high · Stern app launch planned for expo; Jack Danger home pin rumored reveal; American Pinball Game 4 expected; Stern seminars scheduled; hosts expect 'a lot more' clarity on kits/pricing

  • ?

    product_concern: Jersey Jack potentially losing designer capacity if Pat Lawlor retires after Toy Story; Mark Sadan hire may be defensive staffing

    medium · Ken Rudberg speculation; reasons for fourth hire unclear given JJP's two-year release cadence; supply chain limitations may be constraining release speed rather than design capacity

  • $

    market_signal: Home pin series (Star Wars) underperforming vs commercial units at distributor level despite being 'very successful' per Stern claims

    high · Zach Minney (Flippin' Out distributor) directly states commercial units outsell home pins; collectors avoid due to lack of coin-op mechanism; market perception as 'toys' not arcade equipment

  • ?

    personnel_signal: Mark Sadan (Metroid homebrew designer) hired as Jersey Jack's fourth designer

    high · Ken Rudberg official report; documented Pinside chronicles of Metroid build; background in software, rule development, lighting, fabrication

  • $

    market_signal: $2,000-$2,500 price differential between Stern home pin series and commercial Pro models; sustainability questioned

    high · Hosts calculate current MSRP difference ($45.99 vs $13,000+ Pro); debate whether pricing increase justified for new Jack Danger design; concern about collector adoption

Transcript

groq_whisper · $0.200

0:00
Warning, the following episode contains adult language and screaming goats. Listener discretion is advised.
0:11
The Pinball Network is online. Launching the Pinball Show. Episode 78 is now connected live where Dennis and I talk about the Nordman product line hitting stores. his feeble attempt at dethroning me as Topper King. Shake and Bake's report of another machine release from Stern Pinball. More Insider Connected details. Playing against others on the Insider Connected platform. American Pinball's worst kept secret. Jersey Jack announcing a new designer. Keith Johnson's reply to our last Pinball Show episode. Dennis just saying some random shit. the TPN team growing even more, and what's coming up this week on the Pinball Network. Truly, thank you, everyone, for the continued support. Enjoy the show.
1:11
Pinball is a game of skill. For some, it's a passion and a lifestyle. It's time for the Pinball Show. It's pinball with personality.
1:28
Ladies and gentlemen, welcome back to the pinball show. This is episode 76 with your host, myself, Zach Minney, and my co-host, Dennis Creasel. How's it going, Dennis? Hey, it's going good. We made it to 78. Whoever would have thought it. Me. Yeah, that's true. I always have believed. This is really not a very special number at all. Not really. Not really a special number. I don't know what your special number is today, but I've heard, we're recording on Sunday, everybody, that you have a birthday today. Yep, but the show must go on. I suppose the show must go on. I do not reschedule things around. I know you don't want me singing. I did, just in case you allowed me to sing. I am naked sitting in my studio right now, and I was just going to sing you the rendition of Marilyn Monroe's Happy Birthday, Mr. President, but I didn't think you'd be a taker. Why would you sit naked when you have, like, all those underwears with your face on them that you bought? How are you going to celebrate your birthday? Oh, I'll probably see my parents here in a couple hours. Nice. And then that should, I'll watch the Chiefs game tonight. That's not until after seven, though. Oh. This last week, it looked as if you purchased yourself a birthday item that I never thought you would own ever. And that is a pinball topper. Dennis, congratulations. Congratulations. No, I... You got a topper for yourself. I have a topper, but I didn't buy it. Well, semantics, I suppose. I won it through my sheer will and skill. And lack of Velcro. And there was drama. The shenanigans ensued. It's a good walking dead topper. I don't know which one. Like, I don't know which company makes that one. I don't either. It looks like a laserific topper. That's what I thought. but then I went to them and it looked like they had a different design. Yeah, it's one that I hadn't seen much of at all. So I was wondering the same thing. It looks good. It's very red gold, we call it. I like the looks of that better than the one at Laserific. So nicely done. That's a good-looking topper. Yeah, well, you know, it didn't come with a special zombie goat mode. Damn.

“I don't get it. They still don't know the price of the kits...I think we're going to get a lot more during Expo.”

Dennis Creasel @ ~54:00 — Defers clarity on kit pricing to Chicago Expo seminar; suggests Stern using expo for major announcements

George Gomez
person
Chicago Pinball Expoevent
Craig Bobbyperson
Ken Rudbergperson
Star Wars the Pingame
Jurassic Parkgame
Pat Lawlorperson
David Fixperson
Flippin' Out Pinballcompany
Gary Sternperson
Eric Menyerperson
Steve Ritchieperson
  • ?

    announcement: Insider Connected platform officially live with six eligible games; seventh game (Avengers) excluded due to licensing delays

    high · Craig Bobby reporting official Stern announcement; forum launch delayed to January 2022; three-tier subscription model confirmed (free, All Access, Pro for operators)

  • ?

    product_strategy: Insider Connected retrofit kits delayed due to parts shortage; pricing and availability still undecided

    high · Craig Bobby reports parts delays plaguing rollout; Gomez/Stern webinar failed to provide kit pricing; hosts confirm uncertainty persists

  • ?

    product_strategy: Insider Connected three-tier model (free, All Access paid, operator Pro free/TBD fee) represents Stern's shift toward SaaS/loyalty platform

    high · Detailed tier breakdown from dealer webinar; all six games have achievement/badge systems; dedicated game forums; location-based achievements (Chicago Godzilla example)

  • ?

    rumor_hype: American Pinball Game 4 reveal imminent, likely at Pinball Expo; no official confirmation of theme

    high · Brian Cosner/Kaz reporting David Fix interview on Canada's Pinball Podcast; 'worst kept secret' reference in episode intro suggests strong underground knowledge

  • ?

    rumor_hype: Jack Danger designing new Stern home pin, possibly Jurassic Park themed, launching at Chicago Expo

    medium · Craig Bobby TPN report; rumor unconfirmed; aligns with prior months of speculation from Minney's sources; Danger known to be scaling back streaming for family time, creating design availability

  • ?

    business_signal: Stern using surprise/rumor strategy for Jack Danger home pin reveal rather than pre-announcement; unusual for designer hire communications

    medium · Zach Minney notes Stern announced Brian Eddy hire openly but kept Danger work quiet; speculation about surprise reveal to boost sales appeal; aligns with expo launch timing

  • ?

    technology_signal: Insider Connected rolling out with game-specific forums, achievements, badges, and operator token/coin currency system

    high · Detailed webinar breakdown; Travis Murray, Joe Lingobirth, Craig Bobby demonstrated achievements on stream; forums launching January 2022; Stern staff encouraged to engage (vs Pinside guidance against it)

    • 3:42
    Brains. I guess it's a sheep, but we work with what we've got here at the Pinball Show. So speaking of voices, I gave you an early birthday present that you received, I think, yesterday. Yes, thank you. That was very kind of you. And thank you for not including any of them under ruse. No, I knew better than that. What Dennis Creswell got everybody was an official pinball show new T-shirt that was announced yesterday, day before. The Nordman series of merchandising. merchandising yeah yeah you uh you put that logo together a few weeks ago uh nordman is a hit numbers don't lie i only report the facts you should see our merch we sell more merch than anybody out there in pitt so yeah go get your nordman t-shirts or hoodies or i think there's a i think there's an underwear form of the nordman yes someone sent me up a clip of it and said how hey people are buying this and i said i don't know but if it sells like the like the other sets one yeah not many yeah the the crotch says the silver ball knight and on the butt and says they only showed me the butt so instead of saying yeah instead of the butt saying like juicy like we're used to it says nordman oh it's good stuff yeah nothing much happened to me this week i was saddened and pissed off and angry by the fact that I keep on seeing all these social media posts of people playing Godzilla pros on locations. And Dennis, ours, our pro allotment for locations got stuck in Chicago this last week. That's the capital of pinball. So frustrating. I'm like, they're in Colorado and I can't get them here. I'm within driving distance, people. It's supposed to be here Thursday. Employees at FedEx, there's not enough drivers. so it sat in a semi and doesn't come until this morning, which is Monday. I'll go pick it up. Well, I wish you luck. I've been hearing very good things from people who have gotten a chance to play it. I know. Man, I'm so pumped up. I'm also pumped to hear what is in the news this week. We've got our correspondents to handle the headlines for us. You want to give them a listen? Yeah, let's listen. It's time for TPN Industry News. Hello and welcome to the Pinball Show's Stern News Update. I'm Craig Bobby. Well, Wednesday, October the 6th was a monumental day in pinball as the world's largest pinball company launched its much-anticipated Insider Connected site to allow players a chance to sign up, set up their player profiles, and connect with others online. And although access to Insider Connected is currently only available through the Stern website, a specific Stern app should be available in time for the Chicago Pinball Expo later this month to make access easier. Now, once logged into Insider Connected, users also get a chance to explore the current six titles that were open for viewing and see the new achievements for each title that will be available at launch, with remaining titles available by the end of the year. So the million dollar question is, when will the retrofit kits be available? Well, according to Stern Insiders, parts delays have plagued the rollout of the all-important kits, which will allow previously sold games to be added to the network. So availability of the kits is still to be announced. And speaking of delays, Stern is now so concerned about keeping up with demand that it's currently ordering important parts to take them well into the 2023 season so they can keep those production lines moving to try and avoid more costly delays. And what would the news be without a hot rumor? And this week we have a doozy as it's rumored that Stern is launching a new title at the Chicago Pinball Expo at the end of October. Say what? But before all the Rush fans bombard local distributors with their down payments, the rumor mill is claiming that this will not be a quarterstone title, but another Stern home pin and will be helmed by none other than Stern's ambassador and host of the dead flip Twitch stream. Yes, you guessed it. Jack Danger. Sick. What? Jack, who has been very public in his recent pullback of his streaming schedule in favor of spending more time with his family, has also apparently been tickling the whitewoods by helping Stern design their latest home pin release. Jack is also scheduled to be hosting a seminar at the Chicago Expo, which might further explain his involvement with Stern at the show. What's the theme of this new home pin, you ask? Well, for the answer to that, we shall have to wait and see. For the Pinball Show, I'm Craig Bobby. Catch you on the flip side.
    8:32
    Hi, this is Ken Rudberg with your Jersey Jack update. Just when we thought that Jersey Jack Pinball had locked in its A-list roster of three designers, in Eric Menyer, Pat Lawler, and Steve Ritchie, we've got news that JJP is adding yet another designer to the team. Mark Sadan, who is best known as the designer of a homebrew machine based on Nintendo's Metroid, is now the fourth designer for Jersey Jack Pinball. Mark has chronicled his Metroid build on Pinside, and it's been a fan favorite at all the shows that he's taken it to over the past few years. Mark has a background as a software engineer, and he has shown off those talents in the Metroid build, but he's also demonstrated his skills in rule development, lighting design, and even fabrication and welding. Mark appears to be a jack of all pinball trades, so it's no surprise that he was snapped up by a pinball manufacturer. But many are questioning why Jersey Jack needs a fourth designer when they're currently averaging a new game every two years or so. There are rumors that Pat Lawler may retire after his Toy Story is released, which would bring the team back down to three. It may also be that Jersey Jack has been limited by global supply shortages and has not been able to ramp up as quickly as they have wanted to. Whatever the reason, Jersey Jack Pinball is clearly looking toward a time when all of its designers can be working and developing new games, and their release schedule can be sped up. How soon this can happen depends on a lot of factors, but at least now, game design talent is not one of them. For the Pinball Show, this has been Ken Rudberg.
    10:17
    Hey, this is Kaz with an update on American Pinball. David Fix was a guest on Canada's Pinball Podcast this past week as they discuss the upcoming unlicensed titles, the different trim models, moving into a new factory, and dealing with supply chain issues. There's also been a lot of rumors and speculation on what Game 4 is going to be. I have yet to receive official confirmation, but look for that reveal to be coming in the next few weeks, sometime here right around Pinball Expo. So don't forget to attend American Pinball Seminar at Pinball Expo. It's going to be Thursday, October 28th at 7 p.m. I look for games to be there, to be playable, maybe even to be able to be purchased at the show. So I hope everybody has a great week and has fun playing pinball. For the Pinball Show, this is Brian Cosner.
    11:09
    Phew, well I'm sure glad we got to hear from those correspondents. Greg Bobby coming out with some rumors and news here, isn't he? He's got his second wind after five camping trips for 2021. maybe he's been making appearances on streams and everything craig bobby reporting a rumor about a another rendition of the pin by stern pinball coming out very soon that launch possibly at uh at expo or sooner than that and he's he's reporting that the rumor he's hearing is jack danger is getting his chance at design now i had been hearing through my own sources that jack danger had been working on a design for Stern Pinball. This is the first I had heard that it might be the pin model, though. Myself as well. I've heard that he's working on something, as we talked about an episode or so ago. You know, isn't that kind of odd?
    12:04
    Not him working on something, but why has it been hush-hush? Remember, they announced when Brian Eddy was brought on board, and we had to wait a couple of years before we saw a game. And everyone was all like, wow, yeah. I mean, Jack's well-known. Sure. You would think that'd be a – unless they're doing like the surprise reveal, hoping to boost sales kind of thing. Well, then, oops.
    12:27
    It's pinball, guys. I mean, keeping a theme quiet is one thing. Keeping people's occupations quiet is quite something else. I've been hearing this for months. It made me think, though, and I don't know the answer to this. I should as an authorized dealer. Are these home versions of the pin, are they getting insider connected? Interesting. You know, I would think no. I would think no as well. Because I think part of the – only because part of the thing about the pen was to try and keep the pricing down. And obviously, if you're adding in a couple hundred dollars – I mean, this is just my opinion, obviously. But my big issue with the pen units is I still think they're just too expensive for what they're trying – like, I get it. I understand all the sacrifices they're making for it. But when you think about, and I think we've had this conversation before, but when you consider all of the other game room stuff people might choose to get, like foosball and an arcade cabinet and stuff, this is still just way more than pretty much everything else. That's true. Current MSRP on the pen is $44.99. See, that's just, I mean, that's like about $400 less than what I bought a Pro for a few years. Now, that was years ago, a few years ago. I still love that when you go to Stern Pinball's website, though, they show up under affordable home game. Do you think there will be a renewed interest, number one, if there is a new layout or theme of the pen, And number two, that the differential between the pricing on this compared now to a Godzilla Pro is over $2,000. We're looking at almost $2,500 here. Well, we're assuming that there wouldn't be a price increase along with this new game. Oh, that's true. And I think there will be. Oh, okay. Okay. Now, how much will, I mean, you may still have a good point. I just, I'm skeptical that the gap will be the gap as we currently understand it. it's a mix you know i've heard like star wars the pin pretty well received layout i i'm not sure how well these games have sold though overall i still for me it's not i'm gonna assume that it will be a decent shooter like at this point i don't think stern is gonna let anything below a c grade go out i did want to make a correction i made a mistake looking at current pricing as of september 17th The MSRP for these, the pin series, is now $45.99. But we also have it noted on the pricing schedule for 2022 that it remains $45.99 for the Star Wars, the pin. Right. I suppose that could change, but I think it may stay the same. I mean, if Jax reworked the layout, which if he didn't, then why would it be a different designer? Stern does this all the time. Look at Godzilla and how, okay, well, everything else went up a little bit. Godzilla went up a lot, and they're going to wait a little while before they catch the rest of the games up. I could totally see them with a – especially having to pay a new designer saying, okay, well, we're going to have to charge more than we charge for Star Wars because we – this is not the same old layout with just a reskin on it. But the big obstacle with these pin units is that I think most collectors don't consider them. They don't have coin mechs, so they're not considered – I mean they're just – they're not commercial-grade pinball machines. They're toys. That's how some people see them. They're toys, not arcade equipment, and so there are just some people that will not consider it no matter what. Obviously, Jack, being a well-known streamer and a well-known pinball enthusiast, he'll probably move some units just for people who want to try his stuff out and give him a chance. So that'll help a little bit. Ultimately, I think the expectations Stern has for any pin unit are probably modest. Yeah, and Stern has told us dealers that they have been very successful, the Star Wars, the pin series. Some people prefer it to the game that is the commercial title. And you may not be able to answer this, but you are a distributor. You sell this along with other games Have you sold more of the Star Wars pin unit than any other Stern pinball machine I would say that the answer is they have not sold for us as well as the commercial units That's the quick answer because sometimes I get accused of running around the question. That's the quick answer. Yeah, don't you run around my question. We don't sell them as well as we sell the other titles, commercial titles. However, every dealer has a different population and focus of customers. Our customers are primarily the collector market, the enthusiast market. I wouldn't see our customers clinging on to this as well as a brick-and-mortar retail shop that it's sitting in aligned with pool tables, dart machines, arcades, etc. You know what I mean? Yeah, yeah, I get it. So I could see them selling better in a retail location. Your caveat is noted. Yes. So I don't know. I'm interested to hear more about this if it is. What's the license? What's the theme?
    17:40
    I don't know. I don't know, but. I have not been hearing. I'm going to guess Paw Patrol, but I've not been hearing anything. I have a good guess. You want to hear my guess? Sure. My guess is based on archival video from when Kim Cromwell, Special One Lit, and Bill Webb, they were doing a stream with George Gomez. They streamed on the Flippin' Out channel both, probably two years ago, when the pin Star Wars came out. And when asked if they were going to do any more of these and what theme, George Gomez, this is right after Jurassic Park came out, George Gomez said, I don't think it's a stretch.
    18:22
    I'm rephrasing here. I don't think it's a stretch to kind of consider what titles we're going for here when we go for something like a Star Wars. So the next one very likely will be something that is very iconic and universal to pinball buyers. So my guess would be Jurassic Park. Okay. And if that's the case, then we'll really see what the pin is. because a lot of people pooh-poohed and looked down, still do, on Star Wars, the commercial title. But when it comes to Jurassic Park, it's heralded as one of the greatest games ever made. It's going to be hard to surpass that with a different label. Yeah, but I never thought that the goal of Star Wars, the PIM, was to surpass Steve Ritchie's Star Wars. No, it wasn't. I think they view it as a different market. Sure, but that's what us enthusiasts are going to talk about. That's what we're going to do to comparison's sake. But that's not who it's aimed for. Because I'm thinking to myself, if a person's at home, they hate, they love Star Wars, the theme, and there's millions that do. But then they see this come out and they're a diehard pinball person and maybe not like the commercial rules or the commercial title when it comes to layout. And it gives them a chance to still be able to own a piece of Star Wars pinball. Whereas if it is Jurassic Park, you don't see that same thing, I don't think. Maybe I'm wrong. We'll have to wait and see. I don't think we're going to have to wait too long I'll tell you that much more insider connected details have emerged this last week as dealers and insiders attended a webinar hosted by Stern Pinball and presented by George Gomez and Gary Stern I heard you have like 20 insider connected accounts I don't have two I've got two I rounded up to the nearest 20 I'm afraid to say I have two because I'm worried Stern's going to be like stop why do you have two we're going to delete one I have one that I pay for All access. And one that's flipping out. Let's call it Nicole's. I have one, like a normal human being. Why don't you give everybody, because this last week everybody's been talking about what everybody's username is. Everybody, save me, follow me on the Stern Insider, which I think is kind of a movement. I have people trying to have me take Zach's pool. That was clever, though. You have to give them credit. Yeah, but I want it to be Zach's above ground pool, and you can't have that many characters. yeah it kind of spoils the joke i don't need my tag associated with you oh crease a white that's like creepy that's some creepy stuff we'll just wait until we get the expo and people yell shit out again oh my god yeah i actually i think i was on a a thing uh we could talk about later with on for tpn and and travis kept calling me didn't i noticed that no one actually says that right Oh, my gosh. I remember. No, but online they do. I love it. So, yeah, everybody's picking their username. What's your username, then, so people can follow? Well, and I say how I won't have anything associated with you, and then I ended up doing Nordman. Yes! I hope Dennis Nordman doesn't mind that I did that. They said don't use your real name, so that's not mine. I hope he doesn't take my name. That would be really weird. It would be like some Inception-level weirdness. He's the hero we deserve. So how do you spell it, though? So people can look it up. I did not put in the hyphen. So I did, but I did a capital N, capital M. Oh, perfect. So I did Nordman. I love it. Mine is Zmini. And then the other is, I think, Flippin' Out Zack or Flippin' Out Pinballs. I don't know. And I put my location as Swear to Me Coal Mine.
    22:00
    Because naturally, the caped canary in the coal mine would have his Nord cave be a coal mine. I love that on the official Nordman pillows that you can find on flippingoutpinball.com, a little Easter egg on the back of the pillow. It says, where is she?
    22:17
    It really should be, where's Lucius? Because if there's anything that the Nordman needs, it's his engineer. Well, that's perfect. Man, so good. They're really hyping up that the achievements are very distinct game to game. and we did see on recent tpn flipping out pinball stream yourself travis murray joe lingobirth and craig bobby all on a videocast going through some of the examples of different title achievements and it it was varied to a very large degree i would say yeah we spent about 45 minutes on turtles seven minutes on led zeppelin and two minutes on godzilla it was great really they're really balanced and and you know what they they're telling the truth they were very distinct yes it wasn't just a a blanket scored this many points on every game it wasn't anything like that they also talked about profile badges in this webinar that's going to be awarded for a variety of events or repeat play or many diverse accomplishments but think like um profile badges like lifetime kind of things like a hundred thousand spins on iron maiden or whatever it may be they also gave the example i thought was pretty cool they said like for example a profile badge you'd get one for godzilla destroys chicago but you can only get it if playing the game in the city of chicago that's clever i like that and i hear you can only get it if you use delta airlines to fly to chicago look at that cross promotional planning oh it's your sky points yeah yes and i I know they have a big hub in Atlanta, not Chicago, but work with me here, people. Existing loyalty programs for Stern Insider and All Access are going to be rebranded. So it becomes a little confusing because we're used to hearing Stern Insider, Stern Insider All Access. You get the podcast for free, but you've got to pay more if you want to get the box of trinkets, et cetera, et cetera. So they're merging them and rebranding them all together. There's now three different models, if you will, or three different. Pro, premium, and Ellie. Yeah, well, here's how it goes, listener. The free one is called Stern Pinball Insider Connected, right? That's the free one. You sign up for free. You can get the achievements, all, et cetera, yada, yada. Then there's a paid version. That is called Stern Pinball Insider Connected All Access. That designation of all access is going to be very similar to the all access subscription you did before to get your little free swag and behind-the-scenes stuff. So it's a similar type of subscription fee, but they're getting rid of the or can in the trinket box each year, I believe. The third version is for operators. That is termed. God, now I've got to read this. You see it now. You'll see it forever. It's called for the operator Stern Pinball Insider Connected Pro. It's free to try out. And there's been no decision if they're going to change this to a nominal fee after six months or so. They're still undecided a lot on pricing. Yeah, I'm a little surprised. I'm almost concerned. And I know you haven't talked about the kits yet, but I don't get it. They still don't know the price of the kits. They don't know the price of the kits. And I think Craig Bomby was reporting that they don't know the availability either because of parts delays. I can understand that. I just, well, I mean, so the Insider Connected Pro for the operators, like, I don't, I really don't get it. Well, especially they're on location now. I mean. They're live. I guess maybe the logic is they're not sure how much uptake there's going to be yet. So that's why they're not sure if there needs to be a fee or if the operator uptake's not that good, they'll probably want to keep it free. So I can kind of see that. I don't understand why the kit price isn't known. I agree. I totally agree. I think we're going to get a lot more during Expo. It gives them something to talk about during that seminar. But I could be wrong. Again, I don't know why pricing should be a mystery, though. This is not a mystery award. I'm not shooting for a mystery award here. You're not wrong. There are two distinct currencies that you're going to kind of see throughout the Insider Connected system and programming. You're going to see gold coins. You're going to see tokens. Tokens can be given away by operators. So you might achieve some tokens. Anytime you see tokens, that's an operator thing. Anytime you see gold coins, that's going to be a Stern Pinball thing. If I get 100 gold coins, do I get an extra life?
    26:55
    It's a Mario reference. Do you see the new theme park? They're really planning that for Orlando. I've heard about it, but I've not seen anything. I think it's going in the new Universal Studios. There's going to be another park, Universal Studios Park. I love theme parks. Do you like theme parks? Not as much as I used to. The thing is, I always think I like them, and then I forget just how much time is actually spent standing in line.
    27:19
    You're doing it all wrong, Denton. You go with me. We got a plan, an action plan. It's going to cost you two to three times as much, but we don't wait in lines. We don't. We're above waiting. I do have a weird feeling whenever I'm walking through the VIP lines. And people are like, they're scoffing and they're sticking, like, who does that guy think he is? I'm like, somebody that don't want to wait 45 fucking minutes in a line. That's who I am. Would you not pay triple for that? I would. Well, I mean, last time I went out to Florida for the, they didn't have that yet. So, I don't know. Okay. Yeah, I do love the whole VIP thing. You can get the parks knocked out in one day and take your time, shit. I don't like lines either. but I love the dark rides. Are you a thrill-seeking roller coaster kind of guy? Are you a dark ride? Yeah, I usually prefer the aggressive roller coasters. Oh, I call these rides Worlds Under Metal. I love them. Well, you know, the thing with, obviously, the thrill rides, the aggressive roller coasters, is that they kind of manually induce fear, which is perhaps the only emotion I can still maybe feel. You can muster up. Holy shit, I'm 200 feet in the air. That is scary. I'm a little gun shy now I bungee jumped as a kid but now I don't like going too high or too fast it scares me I look at my mortality very seriously nowadays I stick with the artificial thrill of being on the Harry Potter rides and feeling like what are those things called that suck your souls them being in your face don't give me too much CGI on a screen though people now let's Jim Henson that shit up I want to see puppets Eligible games. They said about a month ago there was going to be seven eligible games at launch. Now, six. Sorry, Avengers. Well, they said that they're waiting on licensing approval for some of these things. Yep. I was like, huh? That's noted on their site. Your Insider Connected machines do need to be registered during setup, so you're going to have one final old-fashioned code update, George Gomez said, before being able to update via Wi-Fi. One more code update. that's the one everybody's worried about. It's going to break your machine if you've got some secondary software on there. But they didn't say whether it would or not. I don't know. I wondered and I asked them in the webinar, are you guys suggesting that people don't swap these kits from game to game? I can only imagine kind of like video output cards. You're like, well, I don't need 20 of them. I'll just keep swapping it in between games. Save money. And they said, you'd have to unregister the game to swap it to a different game. It can be done, though. It sounds like it'd be a pain in the ass, though. It would be a pain. Yeah. No one likes to unregister. They also talked about a way to transfer registration if you end up selling the game. But I'm like, why would you need to transfer the registration?
    30:16
    Wouldn't you just log out? You're not in using the QR? I don't know. Well, let's say like an operator got one and wanted it to be a verified.
    30:24
    Makes sense. Because that's the only way to get my 2,000 XP. Insider Connected is now live. You can sign up at sternpinball.com slash insider. And here's one of the most interesting parts that I'm pumped about. Maybe I'm overselling this, but every single game in the Stern catalog of Spike 2 with these Insider Connected capabilities is going to have a dedicated page and forum. Now, the forum's not likely to go live until January 2022, but having a dedicated forum for each particular game, I think, has great potential, Dennis. Yeah, we'll have to see if it catches on or not. In a way, forums are kind of like yesteryear, so I just don't know. But I'm just thinking this is a place where Stern employees, creators, can actually interact and help out, troubleshoot, problem solve. Right. And it's one dedicated place. And if they do moderation better than Pennside, it may be a really valuable resource. And the main thing, as my understanding is, since it's Stern hosted, Stern staff will be probably encouraged but definitely allowed to use it. Whereas I know Stern has a standing, I guess we'll say guidance, that staff are not to engage on Pennside. I love that last stream that you were doing with Joel and them. We had Dwight Sullivan in chat and Raymond Davidson in chat, both Stern creators. and they were really open and excited about these features, and we had a lot of fun that stream. You guys have to go back and watch that VOD. There is a little bit more, and then we'll move on here. Numerous features still in the works we're going to learn about next year. I did find interesting that Stern has nearly doubled their tech support staff, now running seven days a week. Some are specialized to help with Insider Connected. I asked about whether or not they were going to adopt this model like raw thrills does with big buck hunter like big buck hunter you drop three dollars on location for a play you're enabling yourself for possible qualification of a championship so that's why you're paying more but there is a there's a coin drop split between the location and back to raw thrills same when you drop a dollar in there albeit it's a small portion but it's still a portion i asked about that do you guys have plans on doing that in the future and they said they have no plans for it, but they haven't fully determined yet how to manage all of that in the future. That'll be interesting. And the last question I asked for you beautiful people out there. They were talking, and I said, my homie Gomi, Gear Bear, will there ever be a day that this Stern Insider connected system is the system that will allow players to play a game with one another from separate locations? Think traditional or even co-op, how fun that would be. George Gomez did not want to get into details He simply replied yes that all I need That when you going to get people to adopt this system even more in my opinion On to other Stern Pinball news Did you see this Pinsider Scandal? It goes by the name of Scandal, S-C-A-N-D-E-L-L. I believe you used to do animation for Deep Root, RIP? I didn't see this thread, but I did see some of the work that's gone into it. Scandal, again, are reanimating portions, especially of April, on Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles Stern Pinball. And it's pretty damn amazing, in my opinion. You can find them on Pinside. This is not going to go over well with Stern, I wouldn't think. Well, the moment you integrate the Insider Connected, I don't imagine you'll be keeping this. It would be hard for me to say I disagree with this because it looks good. The animation is really good. Now, we don't see movie animation. We just see stills. But if they can get that to work, that's phenomenal in my opinion. We also heard a good interview with Zach Sharp this last week, Stern Pinball's Director of Marketing, on the Final Round Pinball Podcast with Jeff Teeles and Martin Robbins. They talked a lot about insider stuff. They talked about the release of Godzilla, about the position that Zach Sharp is oftentimes in when things start to leak or get discussed. So go over to TPN's podcast browser and listen to that.
    34:44
    You want to talk about American Pinball? I would love to talk about American Pinball. Is AP connected?
    34:50
    To what? To the Internet. I don't know. I've never owned one. I don't think so. Rumors continue to swirl around about Legends of a Hall of Bing. The next title from American Pinball. Now, to me, this has been voiced for an entire year. Doesn't really feel like news to me. Yeah. But I'm hearing screams that this is news.
    35:13
    I've heard this one, and I've heard some speculation as well because they keep re-upping the trademark for Sherlock Holmes. So those are the two that I hear. Good observation.
    35:25
    Dave Fix, he was interviewed recently on a pinball podcast. Not a whole lot of info from that interview. A couple statements kind of piqued my interest.
    35:35
    He said that Stern Pinball, he was talking about just the delays and the parts delays. He said, look, they're only going to announce one game this year from AP instead of the two that he was talking about a month ago. Okay, well, we're near the end of the year, so it's like at this point. And, you know, he said the next two are going to be unlicensed. And with that, he also talked about Stern Pinball. He was like, the parts delays are for real. and I guess he's alluding to them only getting out one game this year because of it. He said only two games out this year from Stern and not three because of chip shortage. We've heard a lot about the chip shortage in reference to getting machines and accessories out. I found it odd, though, Dennis, because that statement's just not true. Stern's released three games to my knowledge. Right, right. Yeah, that's strange because Led Zeppelin, Mandalorian, and now Godzilla, that's three. And then if Craig Bobby's right that we're going to be seeing another non-cornerstone coming, that's four. And then if the rumors are correct about the third cornerstone kind of this year, December, that seemed odd. Like, well, that's not true. They fixed it, so they're not going to raise prices. I thought they were doing a surcharge. Yeah, surcharge. He said, quote, we're not going to raise the prices crazy. Oh, okay. I don't know what crazy means. Crazy. I always think dialed in when I hear that. I do too. Joke out. So there's a surcharge and he was alluding to there being an increased price. But when talking about like $10,000 Ellie's, he was like, no, no, no, no, no, no. You're not going to be seeing any of that from American pinball. So we'll see what's to come here soon. Probably from Expo because if Dave Fix is working with pinball Expo, As kind of a paid employee or contracted employee, whatever he does over there with Rob Burke, one can only assume that he also has some leverage to get their new release at the expo. So I think that's when you'll see it.
    37:40
    That would make sense to me. We'll see some Legends of Valhalla. See, I like the acronym for that, LOVE.
    37:48
    It's LOVE. K-Love. Which is Norwegian for fish. I don't know that. I made that up. Sorry, Norwegians. But it was so good. I wish it was true. Feel free to email the Pinball Network at gmail.com and say what lov actually means. This is Norwegian for fish. Jersey Jack Pinball is in the news this week in a big way. They announced another designer, Mark Seiden, from the homebrew scene. Many of you probably know him for his Metroid Prime homebrew. Really some cool stuff in that machine. but they welcome him in as the newest member of the Jersey Jack design team. It talked about on social media, Dennis, that Mark is well known within the pinball homebrew community for his skillful and creative designs. When asked about his new endeavor at JJP, Mark stated, quote, I'm super excited to be at Jersey Jack pinball to be working with this very talented design team, end quote. You excited? Is it needed? Are you confused? What are we doing with Mark? I mean, it's a mix. And this was something that came up on that live stream on the Flippin' Out channel earlier in the week. But that, you know, Jersey Jack does – you need junior designers. So it's good given that you have – now with the four of them, you have half of the team that's very seasoned and can't be there forever. You've got two younger people that can be cultivated into becoming the new mainstays. mainstays but practically speaking i'm having a really hard time imagining we would see anything from mark before like 2025 given jjp's production speed sure sure so i can't i personally am not excited in the sense that i i know i'm not gonna at least i believe i'm not gonna see anything from mark for a few years but that doesn't mean it's a bad move for jjp to do it especially if they're i mean if they're just sitting on all this gnr money okay why do you announce it now though Well, again, why keep it secret?
    39:49
    That's the thing back with Stern and Jack and the design that just doesn't make any sense to me. Normally, when people work for places, it gets out really quick, so you might as well make an announcement. Okay, well, that does make sense then. He's going to update his LinkedIn. We're all going to know.
    40:02
    Damn LinkedIn. LinkedIn is weird, though. Check out somebody's profile. They know. Yeah, that's why I always open a private window and do it.
    40:11
    Oh, work around there, huh? LinkedIn's always spamming my ass. I'm like, look, I'm not going to use your social media because you're always trying to get money from me. Piss off. Always exciting to hear about new additions to a pinball company. The newest addition that I'm most interested in is a rumored Toy Story pinball machine. Someday. I don't know who would be on code of that rumored title, but maybe it's Keith Johnson. He did chime in on the TPN Pinside thread regarding our discussion last week between Greg Bone and I about re-theming Dialed In and why that seems like a no-brainer to us. Yeah, I read that. He has a lot of really interesting stuff he shares from time to time. Keith Johnson or Greg Bone? Keith. All Greg does is say something, you disagree, and then he pivots and tries to sound like he agreed with you. That's what Greg does. Keith would tell you, you're wrong, Zach, and here's why you're wrong. Very, very different personalities. So Keith Johnson says, quote, For purposes of re-theming a game, I generally consider the work of a pinball machine to be one-third art, one-third mechanical, one-third software. Parentheses, this is a very basic way of looking at it, but it probably works. So if you re-theme, you generally save the mechanical. Always have to redo all the art and software is probably 33 to 100% redone, depending on how well everything meshes. So if you take the classic figure of like a million dollars to design a game, you're looking at about one half to two thirds of a mil to do it. The math changes if you have inventory to get rid of, which happened pretty obviously a couple of times while I was at Stern. It can easily cost more not to retheme it depending on what you have in stock. End quote. Keith Johnson. Good insight there. Yeah. Good insight. Crazy. Oh, sorry. I still disagree, Kiefer. Who are you to disagree with Keith Johnson? I'm Zach motherfucking Minnie. That's who I am. You're nobody. I still can have my own thoughts. He might have more experience and knowledge around this, but I still have thoughts. So I get what he's saying. Hey, call him and tell him about your idea for three, no, ten. Yeah, ten competitive pinball machines. Don't sell me short.
    42:28
    That's what your ideas are. I laugh at them. I talked to Kiefer and Joe Katz about stuff like that. I haven't pitched on that one yet, though. Did you tell them about the time you said that Avengers was a fan layout? Oh, look, I got it wrong. I owned up to that. I missed a shot. Didn't see that little side shot. How can you miss a shot? That was the moment I knew you didn't like Elwynn games. I own them all and have one on me. And I ignore any flipper that isn't down at the bottom. I get what Kiefer's saying here. I understand. However, it was interesting to hear him say, you know, roughly a million dollars to design a game. Okay, well, then numbers don't lie. If you're doing another game, this would be one half to two third of a million to do it, which is cheaper than one million dollars. Sure. I don't know what the argument is. He's just saying. Well, but part of it is people that are into the layout and the rules, assuming you're keeping those aspects the same, like how many could they expect to sell just by writing? re-theming because you're you've already got sales out there and games out there right and those that aren't about theme and we you know you and i both agree theme is a great deal but everyone who would go up to that go oh yeah but but i've played this before because it's dialed in it's just reskinned my argument would be if done properly and it's a killer theme and it's integrated well into new code it would sell to dialed in owners they would simply just resell or move the game along some people would still prefer the original theming of a dialed in but other people would want the new thing that they can relate better to and it's cheaper to produce i just i'm not aware of there being a lot of precedence for that uh be it something like uh you know as as blatant as the shrek and family guy differences to uh taking the comic art version of spider-man and how few those sold sure and i i still get i mean i get the argument that he's saying look if we had a shitload of games that we couldn't sell sure then you retheme them because they're it's already kind of there but because and dialed in remains my favorite layout that has come out of jjp so i see that and i could see going well we know the layout's a winner so that's why we kind of want this to happen but they've got four designers they're constantly making these new designs which they know will be fresh to everyone and so that potential audience pool probably is identified as larger with that and they're thinking as well but why take the chance even of just using a theme to sell more dialed ends when we could do something like gnr which is going to you know blue dialed in out of the water in sales so let's go on to toy story and not you know let's not live in the past true the designers are designing faster than jjp releases games very true we know that JJP has two lines going now, though. Did you know that Back to the Future was made in approximately six hours? Doesn't surprise me. Nope. I round it down to make it even cooler. Yeah, doesn't surprise me. I still think it's pretty sad if it took six hours to think of that turd. Sorry, Joe Kamenkao. Love you.
    45:38
    Bring it back, Joe Kamenkao. Redeem yourself. Hey, Dennis Creasel, you like analogies? sure a good analogy is a great way to explain something to someone else are they metaphors similes what the hell's the difference there's one with as and like and one just assumes yeah those are similes what is the blank is to blank as blank is to blank what is that that's nothing maybe that's just an equation let's try one on the greatest pinball podcast character is to Nordman as the greatest pinball podcasting segment is to pinball market trends. Why, when we do shows now, do you like take these end parts and whisper them? Oh, it's been a whole thing. I've been basically performing oral sex on this sure mic right now today. It's just, just so you all can hear me and I don't fade off. I have some whisper under my breath. Why are you licking the microphone? Oh, my gosh. What is that? Have you seen that? I've heard of it. Well, hearing of it is horrible. I posted it in our Discord, TPN. VIP, TPN Discord. Somebody was talking about the... Is it ASMR? Is that part of the licking? I guess. Do people find that ASMR-y? Yeah, I don't know. It's chicks that lick mics. and I don't know if it's supposed to be soothing, erotic. I'm not sure what it is, but I'm going to trend it down this week because have you ever heard the sound that that makes? Oh, it's disgusting.
    47:22
    You can have the most beautiful, for me, woman, but beautiful woman performing this lick service onto a weird, almost phallic-y microphone attachment. What the fuck is that thing, first off? But doing so annoys me. It angers me. It really makes me angry. I don't know how anybody can be turned on to that. I just want to slap their wrists and say, you have better manners.
    47:50
    Stop. We should do that. No, we shouldn't. Can you guys hear that, the complaint about my audio quality? turning up this week is mandalorian by stern pinball that's licktastic number one because it's holding value overall they're back ordered and they're hard to get and they keep bumping the production making them even more desirable but number two check out the pin side top 100 listener this mandalorian pin has climbed up up up all the way to position number two how about it Wow, that's pretty high That's really high Do I believe it deserves that number two spot? I'm a show, I'm a company man I would say yes No, no, it doesn't deserve number two It's a damn good game, I love mine But no, not number two I don't know if it finally got enough Some antics here It's training up Also training up this week is Elvira's House of Whores Topper You're the Topper The Topper protege How dare you try Why am I not? Dare. How dare you try to come at me upon my fortress? I end up achieving a single topper, and here you are accusing me of things. Unfounded accusations. No, there's treason behind the scenes. You're trying to build a topper army. Don't think I don't hear things. I don't. You know, this is the paranoia of kingship is what it sounds like. You are nothing more than a young squire out there with a mere pitchfork. You cannot infiltrate my gates like that. They took our pinball toppers. Charm alone. It will not happen. Could I do it with two scoopy snacks?
    49:41
    Elvira's House of Horde Topper. They've indicated by Stern that you may not see him again. I'm not sold on that idea. But you may not see them again so you seeing numbers fly through the roof right now on that particular topper Everybody made fun of it because I had a little box that opened up with a screaming effect It was stupid Yeah It was a sticker What stupid now Everybody wants one They want a sticker. See them sell for like 2K. 2,500.
    50:11
    Damn. That's high. I'm feeling generous. Also trending up this week is the Pinball Network. Bias, bias, bias. That's right. TPN is trending up because the numbers don't lie. and your man only reports the facts. And the facts are, we've added six streamers this week. That's a half dozen. A baker's dozen. We've added a lot of streamers this week. More to come next week, believe it or not. And some big things coming, hopefully, to YouTube and to streaming as well. We need more podcasts. I think TPN is subjectively trending up, right? Even you would say that. And volume, at least. Quality. I hope so. I believe so. We've added these streams, so I'm confident. Yeah, a list of the streams that we've added this week. Shout out to House Hardy. For those of you in a cave, House Hardy, it's Reby Hardy and her husband, Matt Hardy. They just so happen to be professional wrestlers and immensely popular and entertaining. You know, I don't think Reby still wrestles. I loved their series of detective novels when I was young.
    51:21
    Man. oh happy birthday deuce so we added house hardy they're a wonderful wonderful stream you gotta you gotta go over there and check them out as well as pride pinball pride pinball coming in sean what's up frisco pinball i love frisco's enthusiasm he's hype i'm hype let's go we got wild dog arcade i do like i've been a consumer of wild dog for a while now they're like three cameras not enough four cameras motion to the bullpen we need five cameras or six cameras they've got headsets they high production value they're really entertaining stuff and they like rick and morty so i like them we also have wicked pizza pinball pit pissa pissa yeah yeah it's a Wicked Pissa. Yeah, it's in New England. I like my tagline. I've actually seen this one a number of times. Taking the piss out of pinball. Chuck Webster over there. And he also does the NEPL leagues over there in New England. New England Pinball League. You ever been up around that area? No, I've not been further northeast than New York.
    52:30
    Say what you say. Yeah. So we've added those streamers. More to come. And we received, which gave me a network boner, we received a very specialized shout-out from Matt and Reby Hardy on their stream Friday about the pride and happiness that they have joining TPN. They're boosting their game. They got a custom computer rig and multiple DSRs being built as we speak. Now, they're in the middle of nowhere in North Carolina, I believe, VIPs. So their Internet connection's not the best, but they're working on it. And they said they're honored to be a part of TPN. They're hyped up. And because of that, it made them want to bust their ass even more, getting this big streaming setup set up. So shout out to that. We'll take a listen right now. Guys, another big announcement that we didn't even get to yet. We were going to announce it on a pinball stream, actually. And we were going to do a pinball stream. Oh, this is a big one. Either tonight or tomorrow. And we were not able to because if you watch the first few minutes of this show, right? Max, thank you. Still on this hype train. we're not team members of the pinball network so cool so happy to be a part of it and uh we've got some good stuff coming yes part of what inspired us to up our pinball game you know we was gonna do it anyway but we were like well damn now we now we really gotta up it whoa lost wolfling love that name i got a little wolfling he's probably lost in the living room right now i'm wondering what we're doing thank you for that sub welcome to house hardy welcome to the fam level one Uncomplete. Love to see it. Thank you. So lots of good stuff. Oh, Spazzy Mac 88. Pasta check. Boom. It's a great stuff, and I'm super excited to be part of the Pinball Network. I'm starting to enjoy and appreciate pinball more and more, so I'm super hyped that we get to partner up with the Pinball Network. It's so cool. Nice. So all is well in the pinball world except for those that are trending down this week. And trending down is American Pinball's Hot Wheels. Shit. Trying to sell them. I'm not going to lie to these people. You're too beautiful. Too lovely. There's one on pin side right now, Dennis. It's been sitting for a month at 5,600 blocks.
    54:41
    No one wants to go for those RPM targets. Never make stand-up targets the main feature of a game. Sorry, Clifton. Hot Wheels is trending down, unfortunately. Still a fun game. A lot of people love it. They're not selling like everything else is right now. Can something be mean and true at the same time? Sure, why not? Also trending down this week, oh, spending $1.50 for 1,000 SoundCloud listens. Makes you wonder what somebody would do to win a $4 trophy then. Ooh.
    55:19
    Enough of that bullshit. Let's jump into Deals of the Week. Buy, buy, buy. Deal of the Week this week can be found on Pennside. It's a Guns N' Roses limited edition. Get out your checkbook, Dennis, because DS Games out of Jonestown, Pennsylvania is selling a GNR LE with less than 200 plays. Why so few plays? I don't know. There's no issues. It's number 440. Complete goodie bag is attached. Maybe there's a small nick on the right rail, but it comes with a new side rail. First floor, you don't have to worry about carrying that heavy bastard up a flight of stairs. $9,900. Buy, buy, buy! That's a good price. They just raised this thing to $11,000 for a new one, so $9,900. You can get it now right outside of Harrisburg. Go get you some. Also training up this week is a Bally Scared Stiff Playfield NOS clear-coated. Wait a minute. I don't know that NOS playfields, in particular Scared Stiff, are not always the easiest to find, but this one has been stored in a controlled environment and has a clear-coated playfield? Come on. $1,000 or best offer. This is outside of St. Charles, Missouri by Technical Steam. Chugga chugga. I almost want to buy this. Do you have a scared stiff? No, but it's in my... Then why would you buy a playfield? An NOS playfield? You guys have heard it here. I will buy stuff that I know that I will like in the future. It's goofy. It's just goofy. Why? You're not going to be able to get this stuff easily. Let it go to someone who could use it. I'll use it, dammit. No, eventually it doesn't count. I'll use it. Cookies are sometimes food.
    56:53
    What the hell? I just decided I was just going to say random stuff when you're just going all cuckoo. Oh, my God. Loud noises. You know, Zach, one time I killed a guy with a trident. That doesn't surprise me. It escalated quickly. My response to stuff like that is, what the... Deals of the WTF this week. We've got one. It's a hot one. Talk about technical steam. I'd take a steamer on this deal. Lord of the Rings, outside of Marshville, North Carolina. J Striker on Pinside J underscore Striker I like J Striker So this isn't a personal thing Sometimes it is a personal thing Sometimes I don't like the people That I do deals of the what the fuck on But this one I do J Striker is a cool dude Talks a lot on Pinside He's got a Lord of the Rings It's gorgie Look at this thing It's powder coated Oh my god it's got the shooting app It's got the Palantir You see that? Big ol' ball right there Looks good path of the dead it's there everything's there it's wicked cool that's my that's that's all i got for new england not bad right yeah it's okay it's got the topper do you see the topper wicked awesome he wants fifteen thousand dollars for this jay striker i strike thee with uh dennis's trident no no no i don't care if you got lights coming out the back of this thing to make it all pretty and fancy i don't care that there's no wear on the cabinet. I don't care that this thing is damn near mint. You know what I would do with $15,000? Probably buy 15 scared stiff playfields. Because you would use them all? I'd buy a Lord of the Rings Ellie that's mint, and I'd still have a couple thousand dollars in my pocket. Sell, sell, sell! Yep, sell, sell, sell, and do. Fly, you fools. Alright, ladies and gentlemen, this is not just another pinball gimmick. No, no, no. It's no upper playfield with simple stand-up targets. Give me a break. It's pinball market trends! Let's close the barn doors, Dennis.
    58:54
    Yeah, yours is better. More rusty. Well, I was a horse. I thought you were the squeaky door. Oh, your horse sounded like a squeaky door. You probably thought I was a squeaky hen. Yeah, you sound like a squeaky hen. That's how bad my voice is today. Where can people find you? They can always reach out at eclecticgamerspodcast.gmail.com Easiest way to reach me. Oh, I thought you were going to give your home address out. That's where they literally can find you. No, I need more packages.
    59:16
    I know you roll your eyes every time you see a package from me. You're like, oh, my God, the worst. You gave me a heads up that something was coming, and later in the day, I opened the door, and I was like, this doesn't look like a pinball machine. And I picked up the box, which was huge, and I'm like, this is really light. I'm glad we didn't decide to get you one of the first Godzilla pros, because now you'd been bitching. Everybody else has got their pro. Where's mine at? Yeah. Chicago. What an excuse. You can find us both at the pinball network at gmail.com. I look over most of those emails and coordinate that so I can send them to Dennis as well. Check me out at straight down the middle at sdtmpinball at gmail.com. And if you're ready to buy a brand new pinball machine, you can do so from Flippin' Out Pinball. Product showcase this week, Godzilla Pro. Pre-order. I believe I have a spot or two left in the November 2nd round.
    60:09
    Yeah, we also have some Willy Wonka L.A.'s coming in. still have some spots available that that's a great game beautiful game jump on it avengers pro do i have any avenger i might have an avengers pro star wars the pin comic buy one for your granny she wants to play pinball too think about the promotion you could get if you buy one for yourself and take it in to your workplace for like two months three months people will love you you'll get the employee of the month who doesn't want that dennis uh would you award somebody employee of the month if they brought in a freaking pinball machine to play during break? I mean, I suppose. That's a pretty big perk. Godzilla pre-orders and accessories. Latest I've heard on that. I haven't heard anything on that, actually. Just keep the pre-orders or the interested list. Come and email us at Zach, Z-A-C-H at flip, the letter N, out to pinball dot com. We've got more Beatles gold coming. Big Buck Hunter Reloaded. Want to make some money on location? Get one of these there. We've got Stranger Things Art Blades. We've got the shooter rods as well for Stranger Things. Guardians of the Galaxy. Groot Head Shooter Rod. I've got accessories. I saw a Jurassic Park topper on Pennside sell for $1,000. I'm like, you dipshits. $600. I've got them in stock. What are you all doing? They're not checking out flippingoutpinball.com. Iron Maiden Shooter Rods and Art Blades. Banners. I've got a whole palette or two of accessories coming in this week. That accessories department is stern. If you're listening over there, you know who you are. You're killing me. You are killing me. I never know what I'm getting, but it's never what I need. It's a surprise. It's not the accessory I want. It's the accessories I need. We may have some Mandalorian armor coming in. How about them apples? Straight from the foundry. Hopefully we'll get some more Mando accessories. I know that I think other dealers have been getting shooter rods. We still haven't received ours. We ordered a shitload. Who knows? I'd give up. No timeline for Topper either. Whatever. Escalator turnaround time is still 8 to 10 weeks. Hashtag parts delays are real. But I'm announcing this today, listener. there's a possibly from flipping out pinball chicago pinball expo special for those of you interested in picking up an escalera at the show why wait eight to ten weeks maybe the special is going to include no shipping that saves you a couple hundred bucks right there so be on the lookout follow like and subscribe the flipping out pinball facebook page and you'll get some updates on snagging one of those merch is still online at flipping out pinball.com if you want to buy your favorite t-shirt from the pinball show or maybe the nordman series or hell maybe even puppet pals straight down the middle you name it and we also dennis off to talk to you about this is exciting news off air but we had a non-tpn provider reach out to us and interested in us doing some t-shirts and selling some t-shirts for them so that's cool right interesting tpn last week was final round pinball podcast with zach sharp i love that episode see who martin kills off flipping out pinball stream videocast with dennis creasel travis murray craig bobby and the host joel engelberth they discussed insider connected the new jjp designer and one of my favorite segments ever off the cuff was called dennis debates and a debate it was ultimately he was wrong and you know it's your birthday so i don't want to rub that in but it It was a good segment, Dennis. Good segment. We also had an iron pinball battle from Don't Panic Flipstream. They battled Stranger Things between Don't Panic Flip George and Fliptronic Jordan and Becca. And I've got to say, production value, freaking awesome. Even when they started, George had a little transition that came in, just like the old video games. It said, fight, and it had the graphic. Oh, jeez. TPN's on fire, y'all, and we're not stopping any time soon. And this week you're going to find on TPN a triple-drain pinball podcast. Also, Silver Ball Chronicles, potentially. We'll probably hear a TPS interview show with Matt Morrison. Puppet Pals, they made a very rare video appearance on social media this last week. We saw Steve's arm. He got a bunch of merch. That was really cool. So I'm glad to hear that those pals are doing okay. I was worried there for a moment. Hopefully we'll hear a podcast from them very soon. events wise at TPN. We do have something to promote it. It's called the Pinball Super Series at District 82 and it's going to be streamed on Fox City's Pinball Stream one weekend. Six tournaments or for Travis Meary tournaments. Cash prizes. Over 100 pinball machines. Streaming live October 14th through 17th on twitch.tv slash Fox City's Pinball. We'll sell you the entire seat but you'll only need the edge. All right, Dennis, I think that about wraps it up. Jeez Louise. Pinball media is making me tired. Forever sleep. I could have went with, this pinball media is making me thirsty. For Dennis Creasel, I'm Zach Minney. And always remember, it licks the mic with its tongue to achieve a sound akin to dung.
    65:09
    And always practice safe pinball. And happiest birthday to one of the greatest people in pinball and a true ambassador for this industry, Dennis Creasel. Happy birthday, buddy.
    65:21
    Mine is working. As my dogs are barking. Why do you have dogs? How many dogs do you have? This is our microphone test. I have two. Two. Are they small, yappy types?
    65:35
    Considerable. Mid-size. They're not Yorkie types, but they're mini golden doodles, so they're... Mini golden doodles. Yeah, expensive mutts. They sound expensive. Yeah, they're just, they're, I don't know, three foot long? So is their fur gold foil? Can you not touch it? No, not gold foil. depends on the series that you get. There's different series. F1Bs, F2Bs, first generations, F1s. Why couldn't you just call them LEs? Why does everyone have to have their own LV? These dogs wouldn't be LEs to me. They're a pain in the ass. Oh, dogs. At least they're not cats. That's true. I've never cared much for cats. No.
    66:14
    And please stop accusing me of creating that Canadas Pinball Podcast fan page. page albeit pretty on point and hilarious if i have issues i will tell you directly no need for fake troll ass accounts here my friend