you're listening to the head-to-head people podcast find us on facebook email us at Welcome everybody to the Head to Head Pinball Podcast. This is episode 83 and my name is Martin and with me... Is Neil McRae. Neil McRae. Look, people know your name, it's around, but who are you? I'm just kind of a loudmouth, bad pinball player if I'm honest with you. So I'm here in the UK I live just outside of London I've got a big kind of Pinball shed That I built About a year ago I'm also a founder of a pinball club Called Flip Out London And probably most people know me from my Streams where I stream pinball And show how the average player plays As opposed to the great players So you'll see me on Twitch I mean in the UK There's really only two, well maybe three or four now Streamers, really only two of us that do it More than once a week sort of Myself and Pinball Live Tim Yeah, he's a great friend of mine Oh he's a great guy Yeah he's just got a little baby so he's been a bit busy with that I was wondering where he is Ah fair enough So then talk to me about your pinball shed What is it like and what's in it? Maybe a bit of history I was in a pinball kind of when I was at school and university. In fact, I spent most of my university days in a local place in Edinburgh. And then I moved to London just after, well, I was just a week out of graduate university and got involved in a new start business around the internet. So I helped set up one of the first internet companies here in the UK. And whilst, well, if you're running your own business, you kind of just get really focused on that. You don't really do much else. So almost the whole of the The last pinball game I played Pre-2000 Would have been Terminator 2 And then 20 years passed Almost And I was at an event In the US A work event where they had a party And around the It was like in a hotel With a function room and a swimming pool And around the swimming pool they had all these pinball machines I was like, well I remember pinball fire over there and suddenly start, oh yeah, I really like this. And this was a 20-year gap. And by the time I got home and the airport, I'd bought a brighter pinball, which was the game I played when I was a kid, or rather a teenager. And then literally I just got hooked. And that was, scary to say, that was only two and a half years ago. And I've kind of got, when I do hobbies, I kind of do them big time. And so I had a little room here just outside my house that was actually my wife's gym but she never really used it so I kind of grabbed hold of it and then I filled out the six games very quickly and I thought, six isn't enough for me so I kind of built this it's like a log cabin but it's solid I'd get permits and planning permission and all sorts of cranes and stuff to build it but it holds about 20 games and it can hold about 40 players So we've ran quite a few tournaments here We literally finished building it last year And the key driver for building it actually was Mike Primo's Path of Play We ran an event for autistic children here in the shed And it went down really well The kids loved it And that was kind of the first event we held And really it's just my own little kind of man cave At the end of the garden And then I run tournaments I've got a tournament coming up on Good Friday I mean really just the UK Pinball team friends Which we're all pretty good friends Down in the south And then we have the leagues that are split up We'll talk about that later But I'm hosting a league round here And I've got everything The oldest game here is Meteor The newest game Is Deadpool LE And I've got all sorts of Mix of games from Williams CGC remakes A bunch of newer Stern games And The usual mix that you kind of see In a 20 something Pinball collection Although I would say I wish I'd built it bigger But my wife probably wouldn't have let me get away with that So would you say That you are more of a fan of the more Recent games like the Sterns that have come out Or do you have a good mix Of the older games as well My collection is probably more towards the modern games And that's probably, Marty, because they tend to work better. You know, you run a big collection, and I have a guy, Martin, and another Martin actually that helps me kind of look after them, fortunately, but when you run a big collection, you need them to work reliably. And, you know, there's nothing worse when your key games isn't working right in a tournament. It's just frustrating as hell. So I've erred towards the newer games because they tend to work better, although that's not always the case. I hasten to add but actually I love I mean you know for me gameplay is what it's all about you know so I've got Meteor it's like a it's a game you know it's 1979 40 year old game and the gameplay on it is just epic and I could play it all day and I don't really have a bias if the game is good you know then I might have it and then we also have Flipout which is a club that basically 10 of us came together in the UK There really aren't many places to play on location There's maybe Four or five That you can point to But none of them have got anything more than Six or seven games in it Apart from one place Called Tilt and my good friend Kirk runs in Birmingham Where he's got I think he's got about 18 games there now But it's quite far away from where we are So a bunch of us came together To kind of build A club just over a year ago now called Flipout and we all basically decided we'd put some money into it build it up, put some of our games into it and then the goal was to try and get so many members so that it would become self-sustaining we're kind of almost there but it's still quite hard because again we've probably got about 50 games in Flipout of varying ages all the way, we've got a couple of EMs all the way to a modern game like Alien for example but it's hard to run that many games it's hard to keep them going, keep them working well but every Thursday we get about 45 players in our league so it's really grown well and the venue's kind of now it's become kind of almost a default for kind of bigger events in the UK and we're hosting one there Later this year Which is kind of called The five days of pinball Which we'll talk about later on But it's very So I've put some of my games into that So I've got more than what I've got at home And we can get us on my But in Flipout we have some real Very rare games We've got Spooky by Zakaria Very rare game We've got a game that we just got called Cobra Where I think they've made 20 of them Again A Bell Games game From Spain, it's very very rare But plays beautifully We've got an Addams Family Everyone's got one of them We've got an Alien, we've got an ACDC We've got Embryon That's actually my game, I love that game It's a wide body College State game We've got a really great mix If you go to our webpage, clickoutlondon.com You'll see pictures And a list of games and we're open, you know, we run it as volunteer rants, so we all pick a couple of days a month that we open up and run the place we can come there, you pay £10 you can play all day, if you come on a Thursday we have a Thursday night league, you can play on that and that's really growing massively I think it's grown better than we expected but it's still, you know, we're still having to put money in to pay the rent which we're happy with because we want to have a good place where people can come together and it really doesn't exist in the UK unfortunately So I wanted to dive onto this if I can because this is a very, it's a very topical topic in Melbourne because we do have a couple of venues and some of them, as you're right, they may have five or six. There's one that's got, you know, more than, I think they've got about 20 machines. And for, you know, I've been in the, probably the Melbourne pinball scene for probably four years now. And in that time, many people have brought up the topic of, you know, a collective or a group of people that will come together to form this base. And I'm curious to know, and you can go into as much or as little detail as you want, how that structure comes together, how the responsibility comes together. and how do you select a property or a location and whether you are the only thing in that premises or whether you're sharing that with something else? Yeah, I mean, that's a really good question. I think my short answer is we got very lucky. So we're in London, which is, I think, rated as the third most expensive place to live in the world. Right. After New York and I think the Bay Area, which are the two other big, you know, the two other expensive areas. So one of our founders, Matt Vince, who's quite well known, he's a really great player, a great friend of mine, he actually runs a pinball location company and hire a company called London Pinball where he puts games on site and he's got, you know, there's a few of them around London, but it tends to be one or two games. There's maybe a few locations that have got more But he was looking for a warehouse To kind of store some of his Out of service games Or things that were swapping around And he came across this place In the south of London A place called Croydon Which is kind of about half an hour's drive From Gatwick Airport And half an hour on the train From central London And it's kind of a bit out of the way it's not in this town centre it's kind of on the fringes of the town centre you really need to it's a bit of a walk from nearest public transport but it's doable lots of people drive there it's got a little bit of parking and he found this place and the landlord was kind of, it was a bit of space that the landlord didn't have a use for and it was perfect for what we needed but if we paid the going rate we'd just never be able to do it. So we were very fortunate with a landlord that kind of got what we were trying to do. He was willing, because it was empty, and the quality of it was likely that he would never rent it at the kind of going rate that he would want. So we said, listen, we're willing to rent this. Let us run it. One of the things we're very fortunate is that heating and electricity is included. So we're able to... We got to a price that worked for us, and that we thought was sustainable. But if we were to try and find a regular venue in that part of town or probably any part of town, you know, I suspect we'd struggle. So we're trying to keep this, you know, around the £10 a mark for, you know, if you want to come and visit because I think if you go more than that, it becomes a bit of a barrier because you've got to travel to get there. It's not the easiest place to find, so you don't want to then be hit with, you know, a £20, £30 fee. so people who just come up on the day they can pay £10 but you can join as a member and pay £20 a month and you can come and go as much as you like and the goal we're trying to get to is as much recurring revenue that pays for the key things we need to pay for and then we the founder members there's about 10 or 11 of us we're paying more to kind of find to balance the books if you like but really it was Matt who found this venue and I think it's something Matt's been in the pinball industry for a very long time, he's a very well recognised player in the UK and in Europe I think he's in the top 200 on this part and he found this place and he kind of reached out he reached out to people who he knew could afford to put money in and who he knew would really want him to bring that venue together because we are all kind of, most of the events in the UK were at people's homes And as pinball grows That's just not sustainable You know 40 people turn up At most people's homes Is a challenge Me and a couple of My friends were lucky That we can We can cope with that Just But probably We couldn't cope with 50 for example So but flip out We could probably Cope with 80 Maybe 90 players And And And we've got the space For a lot of games So really A bit of luck But also You know I think the thing that You know We've all got different opinions about how we want to run it. My kind of opinion is less games with better quality, whereas some of the other guys are more games, even if the quality is not quite there, they'd rather have more games. And that's kind of a tension that pulls the club together. And it's what, you know, we've been up and running for about a year and a half now. We had our first birthday event just before the end of the year. And it feels to me like we're going to survive. I mean, for the first six months, we had days where nobody came at all and we're thinking is this going to work but Matt we put the effort in we put free wifi in, luckily I work for a wifi company so I was able to put that in at a good price we put in some lighting, we did a lot with the electricity, we put some screens up so we could run tournaments we've just recently carpeted out one area and it's Going okay but you know but it's You know you've got to be willing to compromise You've got ten people running this And you know we have committee meetings that can You know we can get quite heated about Certain things we feel passionate about But I think Generally we all believe That having this is better than Not having it so we've Kind of found a way that works I'm probably the Most pushy because I really Get frustrated with games that don't work And you're running 50 games And most of the games we've got in the club Probably 25% are kind of Newer, the rest are kind of Pre-2000 Some of them very old Into the early 80s, even 70s And they Take a lot to keep going And if you've got that one Scoop or that one saucer that doesn't work right In a game like Whitewater It just kills the game It's very frustrating So I think we've So we've actually now got a tech that kind of works there a couple of days a week that we've decided to pay for because we think that's the right thing. That has definitely helped, for sure. I'd still like to do more in that space. I'd like, you know, we've not got many very modern games, which I'd try to help with that by kind of trying to figure out how we can get some. But, you know, the price of games, I know it's just really, you suffer the similar challenge. Well I think it's actually worse over there Someone was telling me that An LE Like a Munsters LE is like £10,000 Yep that's right That's ridiculous money Absolutely So listen When I look at what an LE costs in the US And I work for an international company I travel a lot I know what the pounds to dollars are It feels to me like We're not getting a great deal And I buy a lot of games So I'm sitting in front of a Batman LE A Deadpool LE A Guardians of the Galaxy I've got a lot of games They are expensive It's just not a cheap man They really are As soon as I heard that I stopped whinging I mean obviously I'd love US prices But that's crazy Well to give you an idea Beatles here is £12,000 And that's twice That's almost twice the price Of two Stern Pros And actually I'd love to buy one But whilst I could probably afford to do it I've kind of set this limit That if a game's more than £10,000 I'm just not going to buy it I'll wait until it comes up second hand Or nearly made And I'll buy it Because I just think if we If we keep feeding this kind of Price greed Maybe greed's the wrong word but this kind of price elevation, I think it just hurts the hobby in a medium period of time. And I'm someone, I've got another hobby, I'm into cars in a big way, and that whole space has just been a real boom and bust where prices of certain cars went crazy high to the point where now there's no, you can't buy or sell anything now because it's got so expensive and there's so few people that have got the ability to pay it. I'm very nervous that's the case. And in the UK, where we're kind of fledgling, trying to build up the pinball industry, if you will, if you think almost three years ago, an LE was probably £7,000. For it to go up almost 50% is really challenging. And I think it's something that the distributors and manufacturers need to think about. And so I work with a guy called Phil who runs Pinball Heaven, who's really the main distributor here in the UK. You know, he works his hardest to keep the costs down, and he does a great job of it, but some of his input costs, you know, he just doesn't have control over. So then, just going back to the venue that you've got there, what do you do for food and alcohol? Good question. So at Flipout, this is the next challenge. You know, to sell alcohol, you need a permit, a license. And it's a challenging thing to get. And really, from a volunteer point of view, we just decided we're not going to sell alcohol. You can bring alcohol, and there's literally on the way to Flipout, there's loads of places you can buy it. But we decided that we just didn't want that headache. you know there's big penalties for underage and big penalties if you don't manage it right, plus you've got to be able to store it and you need cooling fridges and stuff and we do have that but not for a huge amount of stuff so we literally decided bring your own beer, that works I think we don't have any big issues with that, we don't get any feedback that not being able to buy booze is a big issue you know and And we think that's worked really well. I mean, we occasionally have the odd debate, like, if we're running a big event, should we get a temporary license? But, you know, it's not just about having the booze. You've then got to have someone to manage running it, you know. And that's almost a full-time job because you can't just leave people to help yourself. So we've erred away from that. With food, it's kind of the same situation. You know, in a couple of events, we've done kind of simple food. But again, in the UK, we have very stringent health requirements if you want to prepare foods. And, you know, to do that, you know, you've got to have a kitchen that's of the right quality, you know, food prep area, food storage area. And again, we decided, OK, we'll sell some, you know, chocolate bars and stuff like that and kind of candy. And we sell soft drinks, you know, Diet Coke, Coca-Cola, stuff like that. but that's it, we've kind of found that and again we're kind of fortunate being in London we have this thing called Deliveroo Yeah we've got that I think that's where it works you can order food and get it delivered to the venue and lots of people do that and again that means you get great food, whatever food you like from Chinese to American to Indian and you get it delivered in 20 minutes because we're 20 minutes away from the centre of Croydon where there's all sorts of restaurants and stuff. So, again, that works for us. I think we'd probably like to do more on that, but it's just when you're running a volunteer organisation, I think if you want to go to that space, you're then really looking at hiring full-time staff, and that's so difficult. The cost to pay people, what is the living wage in London, would just make that prohibitive for us. It just wouldn't work for us So we've got ways that we cope with that It's not ideal but again I think it's A compromise that works for us Fair enough Now how have you been Building the member base Sure I mean most of it Initially by word of mouth So a lot of You know I'm sure this seems true in Australia But there's like a core Crew of us probably about 30 Players that you know We're the heavyweights of pinball, if you like, in the UK, or in London, actually, to be more specific. We got most of those players to sign up and join. And then through word of mouth, more and more people have started to come. We have a Facebook page, Flip Out London. We have our own website. And we take flyers to other events that we know where there's going to be lots of players and we'll hand them out. We've also done a few press things with the local Croydon press and that's generated some insight to us. So one of the other things that we've done, we've done a couple of these now, is corporate events where a corporate company will pay us a few hundred pounds to rent the place for an evening for a team building event or something like that. Now we're not probably the flashiest place To do that But for everyone that's come We've done about four or five of these now They've really loved it And it's great money for us from a club point of view And again they bring their own booze They bring their own food And that works And again that's then expanded People knowing about the place But really most of it is down to Word of mouth I do the odd stream from there as well and we use that video so that people can see what we've got. And, you know, I would say most of it is word of mouth. Again, you know, trying to advertise to people who would be interested in this is quite challenging. You know, when you look at Facebook advertising, which we did have a look at, we did a few sponsored things through Facebook. you know you get a mix of people who would be interested but it's really hard to pinpoint that into a success criteria so yeah so really I think word of mouth is how most of this is happening and so how many days a week are you open? we're open Thursday nights we're open Saturday all day and Sunday all day and occasionally we might be open the other day if one of us is free and we decide to open and we advertise when we're open on our website so that people can check that we're open. But pretty much every weekend, unless there's kind of a major league event, so if there's a UK league event, then most of us are at the league event, in which case we kind of advertise that we're closed. And it tends to be that most people who would be coming to us are going to a league event anyway, so it kind of works out that way. Okay, so then a question for you, and this is for, not just for the UK and straight, but for everywhere, what sort of advice would you give to somebody that's considering going to a tournament? We have talked about it many times because there is this, I don't know, there's this barrier to actually going, but to people that are listening, what would you say to them? I would say just kind of go along open-minded And actually go along to enjoy it And don't take it too seriously I remember my first tournament My goal was I don't want to come last And actually Having that sort of thinking Actually made me play worse I think just go as relaxed As you can Go meet people, say hello to folks But tournaments Are a way for you to learn how to play pinball and that's the reason why I started going I wanted to really learn how to improve how to play all the best players go to tournaments you can learn a hell of a lot from them and my advice is to absolutely go with an open mind, don't worry about the results because even the best players have a bad day and some of the The less good players have a great day occasionally. So I just, you know, as a way of me, I've met loads of friends through going to tournaments and events. I really enjoy it. My biggest challenge is I kind of, I really suffer from nerves. It's kind of crazy. But, you know, if I get those nerves under control, I can play really well. If I don't, it's like I've never seen up in Bulgaria in my life before. Yeah, we've all, I know that. That is the absolute key because, you know, as you're learning, you're learning new skills, things like, you know, dead bouncing and, you know, let's say a live catch. Now, you can do that, particularly the dead bounce, I think was the real hard one to get over, to have that confidence that you could do that in such a nerve-wracking situation as a competition. but once you do let that fear go your game will just improve because you will be able to do things that you've been practising that you're a little bit too nervous to do in a live situation I think my sense of that is one of the hardest things to learn to do is not to flip sometimes a lot of people ask me about that what's the first thing I should learn to do when not to flip it's really and when you learn that and when it becomes second nature you make a massive step on your ability to play because you suddenly start to think you're thinking more maybe a few seconds in advance of where you were thinking and all of a sudden great things can come together and the game that really taught me that is Walking Dead learning when not to flip on that game is crucial because it'll eat you alive otherwise. One of the first things that when... Every year at PAX in Melbourne, we do learn to play pinball sessions and the dead bounce or dead pass is probably the second thing that we talk. But we actually... The first thing that we say is what I think is this profound thing. It's probably not. I'm probably just, you know, beating myself up. But what we actually say is your objective is not, your first objective is not to flip the ball up to all those targets and ramps. Your first objective is to slow the game down. That's it. Once you do that, once you learn that complete change, that's the fundamental, the difficult end, I'm now trying to slow the game down, then you can start, you know, getting the targets and all that kind of stuff. But as soon as you know that your main objective is just to get more control, everything else comes after that. Totally agree. And I think that's, it's hard to learn that, especially when you walk into a tournament scenario where you suddenly start to get nervous. You kind of, you forget to play how to play. And you go back to kind of raw, hit the ball, hit the ball, hit the ball. and when you remember that when you remember the key things of how to play when I go into a tournament and I can if I look at my ESPOR results I can tell you the tournaments where I remembered how to play and the ones that I didn't and it can be really frustrating sometimes but you go to the next tournament, you reset, you kind of pick up and you kind of learn from it the one thing that we are blessed With Marty We have such a great community No matter where you go in the world We have such a great community that wants to be friendly Wants to help you, wants to get to know you We're very lucky in that regard And something that As pinball grows I hope we maintain that Because for me that's a really big win for me Agreed So you've also been To a lot of tournaments overseas right? Sure, yeah So you were there at Pinburgh last year? Yeah so I've been to Pimberg twice I'm going to Pimberg this year Pimberg is just Such an event You can't describe it in words I go there And I went there the first time I think when I went to Pimberg The first time it was my second tournament Really? Of any? Yeah Second proper tournament And I didn't really have any expectations I didn't know The scary thing was You've got all these people who know what they're doing And you don't know what you're doing But you pick it up very quickly And I played really well I came away with it thinking I did really well here I got to the C group And again My goal was not to come last That's just kind of how it went Just don't come last And I played on games The Papa games are set up so well So tough a player on games that I just never heard of and many people hadn't heard of so you kind of reset the knowledge part and I came away with it on such a high Marty I was kind of like thinking okay how do I get a ticket for next year and then again the following year, last year 2018 actually I kind of it was kind of a story of two halves The first day, I got so nervous. I could not play. I was so bad. And at the end of it, I was getting, you know, at the end of day one, I was looking for how can I fly home. This is going to be terrible. I'm going to burn all my pinball games. And then the next day, I just kind of, I just had nothing to lose because I was in the E group. I played terribly. You know, I just came in with no pressure at all. And I smashed it. I was kind of top of the E group For like four rounds I think And then I got into the final On the Saturday Which is the goal The goal is to stay in the competition on the Saturday And then again I get into the finals All the pressure comes back And I play terrible But I loved every minute of it And I'm so looking forward to This year's in August Flights are booked Hotels booked I mean for me you've been there, it's not a cheap event to go to it's probably a few or three thousand pounds easy and then it's not a cheap hobby, there's no doubt about it you're right, but honestly I come, I mean every pin bar I come back with a high that sees me through to Christmas because you know, we see friends that we haven't seen we usually only see on Facebook or on in other ways but it's just a great vibe and all the guys at Papa that run it are just, and they're volunteers I mean for me they are the heroes of pinball because most of them are players that would play in this event you know you've got Bowen who's just a superhero in so many ways who runs the tournament does a great job Doug who is just the nicest guy I've ever met in my life, Elizabeth who's really wants to make sure everybody individually enjoys it and a thousand other people that help set it up I mean just the notion of moving two pinball machines for me is like enough for a year but moving five or six hundred that's just an amazing undertaking and to step up to a thousand players this year, it's just super exciting and I'm still looking forward to it, it's going to be a great event and I heard that it sold out in 5 seconds, so how quick were you hitting F5? I mean there was the two sessions, there was a VIP session which basically was like I don't think that even registered on the clock I refreshed and it was sold so I actually, I kind of went a bit crazy, so I had like I've got like an office in my house, I kind of had three laptops I had my wife on one I was on two I'd hardwired everything so I turned wifi off, I cabled everything up I had a friend who was I had two friends who were also in a bit of a group, which I know is probably a bit a bit shady in some ways but frankly, if I get a ticket I don't care I think last year people were, I think we'd heard that there was only two people that had maybe bought five tickets or maybe four tickets. But because it sold out so quickly, people weren't taking chances this year. So I think the number of people that bought five tickets this year will be significantly higher than last year. Yeah, I think, I mean, I ended up with two tickets this year because one of, so we were all on Facebook Messenger saying, have you got it, have you not? And one of our guys lost comms and it was kind of like in nuclear approaches, you don't hear launch your missiles, so he bought the ticket. So I ended up with two tickets, which we got refunded, and I think it's been, from what I can tell, it's already been reallocated. And basically, Papa got a free 25%. So, you know, frankly, you know, the ticket price for this... It's nothing compared to the accommodation and flights, right? I would genuinely... I mean, I'm probably one of the crazy, In fact last year The way I got my ticket last year Because I was actually flying when the tickets Were released last year so I couldn't buy them But luckily Path of Play had an eBay ticket And I made sure I won it Well there you go that was you Yeah that was me so I won that ticket And Mike And Path of Play The autism thing is something I'm passionate about So donating that money and getting a free ticket it was very easy. That's actually a weird name there. Absolutely. There's been a lot of talk since that. I've read on a lot of forums, I've had a lot of conversations with people about what do we do? What do we do with this supply and demand issue? And one of the suggestions, and I don't know how I feel about this, for you and I, this is an easy thing for us to say, right? If someone said to you, the VIP tickets, There's 50 of them, and let's say they're, I don't know, 500 bucks, 750 bucks, 1,000 bucks. But not just that, put the price of Pinberg up, like double it. What does that mean? For you and me, that means nothing, because that is still such a small proportion of what we're paying to get over there. But what do you think the impact of that would be? I think it's really hard to say. I think there is, I mean, I think you've got to think about how do you help ReplayFX and Pac-Up put on a bigger event? And it's clear that funding is one of those things that they need. Yeah if you hear Doug and Elizabeth and others speak they talk about training techs and training TVs but that costs money And it kind of you on this feast of give them more money so they can do more stuff and make it bigger versus don't give them so much money and make it more accessible, but maybe it doesn't grow so quickly. So, you know, I don't think there's a right answer, I think. But what I do know is there's clearly a bunch of people at the Replay Foundation who really know what they're doing. And I You know I super trust them To do the right thing I really welcome the fact That they make this open for everybody So if you're whether you're Keith Elwin Or Keith nobody He's got the same chance of getting a ticket I really hope they maintain that Because for me I think that's really important And so far I don't think we've seen Any big major major players Not get a ticket in the end One or two maybe This is true. There have been some people that have been probably in the waiting list but got in anyway. Exactly. And last year, actually, I was at the desk, and I think everybody who turned up on the day actually got in. They didn't turn anyone away. Except for the one person that forgot to check in. Yeah, and then annoyingly, there was a couple of people who didn't turn up the second day, which frustrated, you know. that for me would really grate me if I hadn't got in and found out people hadn't turned up so I mean I put my complete trust in the Replay Foundation because they've done such a great job so far they know what they're doing I think their goal should be focused around expanding capacity rather than frigging with how they sell the tickets I think that's probably not the right approach and all you'll end up having is a different set of unhappy people or maybe if you're really unlucky the same unhacking people talk of lotteries and stuff like that I'm less convinced about that however I do think if I was in when I heard about the VIP tickets I'm thinking excellent I was hoping they were kind of crazy expensive because I would buy one I'm fortunate enough that I can do that and as we all know the cost of going there is the ticket price is the smallest one But they were a modest increase And I think perhaps maybe A bit of experimentation From the replay effects So for me I'd like to see them do more on that Because when I go there I buy loads of t-shirts Not just for me but for friends I want to give them cash So they can make things even better They can get better New York games They can pay the people who help run it The logistics of running that event I run some big events I mean, I run a network across the UK. That's my business. And, you know, the logistics of what they do are scarier than what I do. And there's very few industries where that's true. And I want to figure out what's the best way to give them what they need. What is the energy they need? Is it money? Is it people? Whatever it is, I want to try and help them. Yeah, cool. All right. One more thing I want to ask you before we go into the news of the week. Sure. I want to talk to you about, it's an interesting topic. I want to talk to you about highway pinball. Now, okay, so the reason why I want to, okay, the reason why I want to bring this up is because I feel in a way that we are kindred spirits in this situation. You've got highway over there, which the before and after are very different, and we've got Homepin over here and the before and after are very different. And what I mean by that is, the before is, we're rooting for them, we really want them to be successful, we can't wait to see what they want to do. And then the after is, fuck me, don't even want to mention them, right? So, what I guess I want to know is, like we all know the ins and outs of Highway. What I want to know from your personal point of view, Did you feel that there was some Sort of additional let down Due to like national pride That kind of thing No I don't think so I think You know pinball kind of transcends Those boundaries I mean I think And you know You start with us saying that pinball is hard And it really is Any hobby that sells Or kind of A thing that sells the price of things around the thousands of pounds or dollars is going to be hard. And for me, what I'm disappointed about in Highway the Most is there was actually no reason for it to be a failure. What caused it to be a failure was nothing to do with pinball. It was to do with poor leadership and poor management. Alien is an outstanding game. There's no question about it. I absolutely love it. It is absolutely one of the best games made. And the folks that did the design work, did the coding, did the artwork, they smashed it out of the park. And I've met quite a few of those folks, and I kind of remind them to be proud of it because it is a very special game in my view. We have won at Flipout, and we just had our last league that one of the games was Alien, and I really enjoyed playing it. It's deep, it's complex, it's got some fantastic shots. How's the maintenance on it been? It's been, it's not been without issue. But, I mean, when we first got it, we had this weird, strange thing where it would trip all the high power coils, etc. But it kind of went away by itself. I don't think we really understood what fixed it. We did many things to improve it. But actually, since then, it's been pretty robust. We've had the odd switch go. We've had to adjust some flippers. But it's been fairly reliable, as reliable as any other game that you might buy. Yeah, sure. And we're kind of fortunate in that some of the highly employees are good friends of ours. So if we were to have a problem with it, I'm sure we would get support to solve it. But you know We run the UK league The London chapter Of the UK league on it About 45 players that didn't miss a beat And the integration And the sound is just So well done It frustrates me That you know All the things that were nothing to do with the game Is what caused this to end up In the mess that it ended up No, no, but my question going back to it was, you know, before all the shit started happening with it, were you guys, like, proud that there was going to be this UK company that was going to make its name in the people world? Because that's how we felt. We were kind of like, oh, my God, this is great. There's this Australian company that has got these grand plans. We're all for this. This is going to put us on the map. Was that kind of the same thing there? Yeah, I think some of my friends would feel that way. I'm not really a big Kind of jingoistic sort of person That says you know UK is brilliant Because I Go all over the world And for me I just want the world to be a better place as a whole But yeah There's no doubt that having a pinball Manufacturer in the UK that was Turning out top games You know and Alien was A really Great game there's no doubt that That was fantastic news for us because it would bring more interest to the UK. Sure, that's right. I mean, unfortunately, because of the way that certain things happen, and there was a previous game on Highway called Full Throttle. Yes, I played it. Which was pretty, I think it was a game that was close to, yeah, I mean, I'm trying to be a bit more, I'm a nice guy. That's my UK slang there It was pants Yeah, it was pants I mean, that's probably what I would call it If I was in the bar But I think And also it had huge reliability issues Every time I would go to one There would be something wrong with it So there was one in Tilt in Birmingham That I don't think ever worked And then I laughed Because at the first Pinberg The first game that failed The first Pinberg I went to The first game that failed was full throttle And I kind of laughed at that I said there's like 50 year old EMs That are working better Than a one year old game from Highway And I just found that hilarious Yeah well I played That full throttle I've told this story before At the public facilities And I was playing it And it broke down And they had those sheets That you could write That there was a fault in it I said blah blah blah this is the fault And this game is not very good I'm sure they knew that already But I just thought we needed to know I mean I think Listen you look at Most pinball manufacturers first games They probably weren't that great right So I think you give them You give them a You would give someone a break on that And say okay wasn't that great But you've learned a lot Next game should be better I think one thing Andrew did The one thing he did a good job of In fact the only thing he did a good job of He did get a great set of talent To build the second game You know beyond Everything else he did I think was terrible And some of it was personally I mean let me be really clear Marty I would never own an Alien game Because of What happened for it to be built You know people were taken advantage of People lost money for me, that makes that game unownable for me. I just, I couldn't bring myself to own it, despite the fact that it's an excellent game. So I'm kind of lucky that we have one in the club that one of my friends owns and I'm able to play it. But it's not a great story for, you know, if I was to talk about British business and, you know, we're going through this madness of Brexit right now, it's not a story I would talk about how Britain's great at manufacturing but in reality a different leader running that same company and they would be on their fourth game by now and I think that's why the Pinball Brothers who were the investor kind of took over but by then it was too late, they intervened way too late in the process you know if they'd intervened I remember the first kind of unveil of Alien Expo in 2016, maybe 2017, if they'd intervened then I think we'd be in a very different place and it's really it's heartbreaking to see that because the passion that the people I know here in the UK put into it and still have for it it's sad to see that it was really mistreated Andrew mistreated a number of people and it's and his behaviour on saying he had games to ship when he didn't and stuff like that. It's just a horrible thing. And, yeah, that reflects badly. I mean, if you're a guy in the US and you put money down for this alien and you've lost that money and some other pinball company sets up in the UK, you're going to think twice, right? Exactly. And that was kind of one of the points that I was getting to is that, you know, the before... And I'm also not all that nationalistic myself, right? I love living in Australia, but, you know, I don't have a flag outside my house, right? But I was thinking, you know, it would be very cool to have it. And, yes, we've got haggis on their way, by the way. But it was that sense of pride that was taken away. And I think that that's probably the missed opportunity for you as well, is that not only did they have good plans on their way, they had a good team, they had a good roadmap, they just had a guy that could talk a lot. He was very good at presenting. That's the one thing I think he was good at, was being able to tell a good story. But he was just a terrible businessman. But the other part of it is, when it all goes shithouse, I don't and I'm doing what I say that I hate and that's because you're in the UK I'm talking about highway. It's like because I'm in Australia people talk about home pin, right? But the reason I'm saying that is I don't want people to think that I'm a dickhead because home pins in Australia or technically in China just like, you know it would be good for somebody in the UK to give it a go again but you're always going to have that stigma of highway. Well, yeah, I mean, we've got Team Pinball. Well, I was going to talk about Team Pinball as well, because they count us like phoenix from the ashes, right? Yeah, yeah. I mean, and the people who run Team Pinball, awesome, awesome people. And basically, it must have been really hard for them to kind of dig deep and start again. And the Mafia, it's actually a fun game. I streamed it a couple of months ago, and I really, really liked it. a lot. Me too, I think it's, you know, in a world of games like TNA, it's kind of in a similar vein where you're going back to basics. I mean, the challenge they face is how do they industrialise it so that they can make it affordable because, you know, they were in the same price bracket as Guardians of the Galaxy and I don't think there's many people that are going to buy Mafia over Guardians of the Galaxy at the kind of same price points and that was even here in the UK. So I'm looking forward to seeing what their next game is I'm sure they're working on it I think they've probably learned a lot from a first game And will probably think differently But you see the presentation the team, Pinball, give And actually at UK Pinfest last year I streamed their presentation And you see them building games in their living room and they've really done this from a passion point of view and I really hope that they're successful I think they learned a lot on not how to do certain things particularly around dates and expectations I think they've got that and I hope they keep going I haven't heard much from them since last year but I really hope that they figure out how to build games and sell them at a price point where people are willing to do them. Because I think that was a definite issue for Mafia. That was actually the only thing, really, was the price point. And I sort of gave them a bit of a lead pass. I was a bit sympathetic towards them because, and you've sort of given me some further information that backed up what my thoughts were. Like, if they're assembling these things in their house, right, and I've looked under the machine, it's not the most complicated machine, right? but this is a small group of people putting their own money into it to recover that kind of money for the amount of units that they have. It forces them into that price point. The only way they could have that machine at a lower price point is if they had a 10-year plan where they had funding for 10 years, you know what I mean, and they had enough money to be able to put into it. So I'm kind of giving a bit of a defense by saying, you know, good on them, it's actually a great machine. yes, it's a massive sticking point with the price, but they couldn't do it any other way. They'd lose money otherwise. I mean, I think trying to raise the funding for the sort of business that pinball is to create a credible, you know, factory. Yeah, they go to the bank saying, you know, we want to raise some money and, you know, we're going to be a pinball company. The bank manager goes, hmm, okay, let me do a bit of a research on pinball manufacturers in the UK. sorry, loans not being approved a long list of doomsday companies if someone came to me and said Neil, can you loan me some money to set up a pinball company I'd take them to the bar and figure out, actually I think you want to start a pinball company would be my kind of first reaction to that but I think those folks that are in the industry and have the skills and capabilities to build it's great to see them doing that and I wish them success, but I think you're right. I think unless they find the big chunk of capital to build the right automation and supply chain, et cetera, then they are going to struggle. I think for the most part they were just buying parts from the regular pinball distributors, which is not going to make the price low. And if I think about Homepin, probably the one thing or one of the things I think that Mike got right there is kind of getting that under control where he's got a lot of good control over the manufacturing or the supply chain of parts such that he can keep the price low. I mean there's a whole bunch of other negative Stuff I can talk about on Homepin But I think I think Mike has the right Operational factory experience I'm not sure he's got The sales and market experience And frankly I mean I've had blazing Rows with Mike because I am a huge Thunderbirds Fan So in my office I have a big picture of Of some Thunderbirds artwork And I look at the Thunderbirds pin And when I see it all I want to do Is set it on fire Because the artwork is just Abysmal The game's not great either It's not bad but it's not great Again for a first pin I'd give them a pass on it But the artwork for Thunderbirds Just makes me cry whenever I see it It's just terrible It was the only thing I liked About it was the art Oh god I'm going to stab you next time I see you you can, you can when it comes to Home Pin and Thunderbird you can stab as much as you want look, I know a lot of people thought that the art style sort of didn't do it justice but I kind of saw it as as though you know what, it was, imagine if Data East, back in the early days of Data East, had released the pinball machine Funny Birds would have been it Like the art style was very Data East The rules are very Data East The layout is very Data East If you think, you know, Batman Data East With that centre ramp as well That's what it's like When he was saying, you know, we want to do You know, that old school sort of Williams Bally game Well, if not, you've actually produced An homage to a Data East Yeah, I agree with that I mean, for me the artwork I mean actually the artwork is okay Except for the characters And that's where It really is though but actually in Mike's Defense and this is the thing I find unbelievable ITV studios who are Literally a stone's throw Away from where I work They approve the artwork so I have some sympathy for Mike When he says well I've submitted this to the guy Who owns the license and they were happy with it And I kind of wish he'd submitted It via me but I've got a few friends Who Are a big Thunderbirds fan And I think all of us feel the same I mean you know It was I think Mike's got to do A hard thing I think he's probably got 60 or 70% of the way there But for me as a Thunderbirds fan it feels like he's Robbed me of my childhood to some extent But it's hard I've met Mike a few times And he gives as good as he gets Which when you're face to face I think is fine I think when you're on Pinsire or some of the other forums He just comes across really badly And I don't think that's what he means But also I know that there's some There was some issue with Games going to Australia I don't know the full story but I know there was some Challenges with that where it's Got a bit kind of ugly I think I think People may have started Receiving them The main forum that we go to Aussie Arcade Is actually banned from talking about Homepin so we can't get any updates And I'm not going to go to his Facebook page But I believe people have started Getting them Well that's good because there's nothing worse than People who get you know there's so many people Being ripped off in this business You know for that When I heard that story, I was thinking, oh, no, not again. That's what we're all thinking. Yeah, yeah. So, you know, listen, I think, again, I saw Mike's story of Homepin, and, again, you look at what he's achieved, I think it's impressive. But for God's sake, Mike, higher sales and marketing. No, shut your mouth. Get out of the way. Yeah. Look, and this is the whole thing. So we have what's called an Aussie battler. Have you ever heard of that term? I haven't heard of it yet. So you deal with this And everyone loves Everyone loves an underdog Especially Australians And we call them the Aussie Battler Somebody that's battled their way through You know, all sort of oppression And hard times And they've come good The Aussie Battler And that's what we want We want him to be the classic Australian The Aussie Battler But he can't with his mouth No, no, I agree I agree. I mean, setting up in China, what he's built there, that is no... I mean, what he's achieved there is pretty impressive. I absolutely get it. But people can't see any positive now because of the way he's conveyed himself. And rightly so. I've taken a lot of screenshots of stuff that this was back really early in the day. Remember I was talking about the before and after. When he said some really, really offensive things, which I found personally quite offensive. And you're the CEO of a company, and people can't get past that because the man and the company are the same. Yeah, I mean, I think, you know, I do see some... I mean, I agree with everything you said there, Mario. I do see some, perhaps small green shoots of him, you know, thinking differently because he's updated some things in the game that everyone told him he needed to do, and he said, no, I don't need to do that, and then he's done it. I do think he's one of these folks that hates to be wrong. And in this industry, you just can't afford to do that. You've got to admit that you're wrong, you've got to fix it, and you've got to move on to the next thing. Yeah. There you go. I think we're done there. I think we've covered that sufficiently. Indeed. All right, let's move on to some news. And probably the most topical thing right now is it's tournament talk. We're going to continue with that. And that's the Stern Pro Circuit Championship that happened, well, it was today for me, but I think it was last night for you. Yeah, it was last night and yesterday for me, that's right, yeah. Yeah, like I think when I woke up this morning, I'd already seen all these messages and I think it was probably halfway through just the qualifying stages. And because I had a day already planned today, I didn't really get to see much. I sort of snuck out every once in a while to see some of the action, But did you manage to see much of the stream? So I watched most of it from the middle of the first round right to the end of the qualifying. And then it was kind of one in the morning. And if I stayed up any longer, I'd probably miss recording this, frankly. So I kind of watched the qualifying, and it was just fantastic. I mean, first of all, the quality of the setup of the games. The games were brutal as hell. But I tend to I actually prefer that I love it when the games are really hard And then You know the first round And holy shit Keith Elwin's out, Zach Sharp's out I know Sunshine Bond's out You know that gloriously Brilliant player Jeff Teolis is out Zach I had money On him leaving first round so I made good out of it Yeah, I'm down a monkey, as we would say here in the UK, because I have my money on Jeff being a wild card. You know, both the Sharps are out. It was Steven Bowden. You know, that was like, wow. And then you look at who was kind of left in. You know, a guy, Derek Price, not well-known, but I've watched him play. I've played him a couple of times too, yeah. He's a good player. Yeah, a very good player. You know Alex Harmon Another really Interesting player Phil Burnham, another great player And then Andy Rosa And then a couple of guys I know Because I go to New York quite a lot Greg, Poverely and Albertos and Tani Who are again great players To see them Still in it in the second round Was fantastic and then some really epic matches. The only thing I'm a bit sad about is there was only really one classic game, oh, sorry, two classic games played in that round. Ali and Stars, I think everyone played. Ah, Beatles. Yeah, Beatles, but I don't think that's a classic. No, I don't. But you're right, it's kind of halfway house. But everyone kind of played, you know, I think everyone had a view of the games coming out of round one. You know that Staying with the modern games is probably a safer bet I'm not sure everyone Who went out in the first round Might think That was the case Going into the second round Where you know the first round There was a Chia, there was a Stars, there was an Ali Played second round You know basically Pretty much everyone went back to the To the more modern games But some I mean some epic games It was an unbelievable game of monsters where people say that's an easy game. In fact, I have said it's an easy game. And you wouldn't think so from seeing how it was set up. You've got Kaylee George, who picked the game in round two, group one, didn't even score a million points on it. Such was the, I think, a combination of the talent, a combination of the set up and the surroundings and the fact that it's the Stern Pro Final you know put a lot of pressure on folks so and then the stream followed group one for most of the evening and group one was Kaylee George, Derek Price Robert Gagno and Raymond Davidson so you know three major winners there and it was it did not go the way you would think it would When I think Initially both Robert and Raymond Kind of struggled a little bit And Keeley And then Derek was First game didn't do so well But second game Batman 66 He blew it up He went for a strategy That most folks would not know about I think But it generated him a massive billion score And then Guardians He kind of did the same thing Next game Had a great Super jackpot On Groot with loads of Multipliers on it Again it's one of those things Martin where you hook it all together And one shot can be the difference Because you've hooked it all together One shot makes all the difference He absolutely nailed it And then he kind of struggled a little bit On the last game but went through in the end I mean I would say It was great for the underdog Last night and then And then the eventual winner I didn't watch the I watched a little bit of the finals Which is a You know basically In the finals There was ten players And the goal is not to be last If you're last You're kind of You're kicked out And the next guy comes in And you know Andy again He won a couple of rounds He didn't win all of them But he won when he needed to And Andy Rosa Who I've met once before I don't know him well But I've seen him play And I think he's a genius I think of nudging is what I would say because these games the tilt on them was horrific he tilted tight and he did a sterling job to march through and win it and it's great to see again I always love to hear about people that win things that you don't know so well you know when you hear the same names all the time it gets a bit predictable it's like you're cheering them on and yes well done Keith Elwin but again yeah exactly So I was really happy And I think the whole The whole evening goes well There's a couple of things that they did They kind of stopped mid-round To do a few Things with the crowd I think they'll probably think differently of us Is my sense But I was looking at it I have to say This is my ego here I really wish I was in this tournament Because I know I can play better than how they were playing which is of course total rubbish but I did kind of wish that I wasn't where I would have come if I'd been in this tournament because it was so not what you expected and I think when you get an event like that that isn't what you expect it's really great for the pinball community to see So before we started recording tonight I sent you through the show notes and where the section where it says Stern Pro Circuit but there's only one line I put in there, and I want you to read that out. Yeah. Andy Rosa headlamp, yes. Yeah, I mean, I kind of, it's kind of amusing. And let me tell you why, right? And we'll come on to this maybe later on, but we're running this big event in the UK called the Five Days of Pinball, which is basically a number of small tournaments surrounding a really big tournament called the UK Open. and one of the first things we were asked by a guy is I've got a little lamp that I use when I'm playing games, is that okay? and I'm like, what? and it transpires that this gentleman I think has probably got a bit of an eyesight deficiency which I have as well so I can understand where he's coming from, but then I see last night this kind of head torch on Andy and I'm thinking what the hell is that? and but so Andy Rosa was playing with you know those, you kind of pick them up at Home Depot or in the UK B&Q which is a band around your head that's got a light on it so if you're working you can see and it was I was like, when I saw it I was like what the hell is that? I thought he was just a joke but you know at the time when I was looking at it he was smashing Deadpool and won the Deadpool round and he won the tournament so clearly whatever it is whether it's a help or a hindrance I don't know but it felt to me it felt a little bit unnecessary but I take it from the point of view I would probably benefit from more light on games because I've not got great eyesight but it's kind of the same for everybody is the way I look at it and it did look a bit nuts when you saw it. And I think, you know, if that was to distract a little player or, you know, I don't know how you would cope with that. And it was quite a tight space that they were in. But it was very funny when I was seeing that because I came out to take a double look. I was like, what the hell is that? It's literally what everybody has been talking about today. Like, well done, congratulations, $2,500 US dollars and a Stern pinball machine that's fantastic, well done great, you did an awesome 14 hours of pinball, but all people have been talking about is this headlamp and let's face it it wasn't just the headlamp he had the headphones he had the gloves and the beanie it was beyond stumble and and this is, you know I've met Andy a couple of times and you're right super, super lovely guy, really, really friendly, very approachable, he's really nice. And he just knows what he needs to do for him to have a better experience. Now, that light may be really like 1%, like an improvement to your game is that. But at that level, 1% is everything. Absolutely. I mean I think You know You talk about You know When you hear about Great teams in sport They always talk about Inches You know And I think this gave them An extra inch And gathering those inches If you can put Four or five inches together You know That can be huge I mean I kind of When he was playing Deadpool I did make a joke I was watching my wife And said all he needs Is a Deadpool mask And he's But listen You know He didn't break any rules He played fantastically well And I don't think any other players complained about it I didn't hear anything about that And the commentary Guys did mention it but said it was fine You know He played within the rules He played well I think if he hadn't had the torch I still think he would have won it When I saw him play on Deadpool You know He was just on fire really So yeah I mean, it'll be one of those kind of, you know, pinball legend things. You know, Andy the Torch Roser is probably his future name. But also, don't forget, it's going to be shown on ESPN. Yeah. So we're going to relive this all again. Indeed. I think you'll probably see a few more torches is my expectation of it. Well, you know, I mean, pinball gloves, they started sort of appearing a couple of years ago, and then you saw more and more of them. When I say more and more, I mean, first there was one, and now there's probably three people that use gloves for pinball. But, you know, it's a thing, sure. I mean I I mean I The thing that I have The thing that I do when I'm playing pinball I've got these Bose noise Canceling headphones That absolutely improve my play There's no question about it Especially at an event like Pinball Where the noise is You know really loud It just takes out all the distractions Let's me focus on the ball and flippers I've got some music that kind of gets my mind Beating And without it Again I can pick at the tournaments Where I had headphones and where I forgot to bring them Or I didn't charge them I can pick them out because my play Is so much better when I've got them And You know Is that An unhelpful help or is that Something that anyone can do I just think you see different Players play well in different Environments And then you've got someone like Raymond Davidson Who, when he's in a tournament And I watched this at Pinburg And it kind of blew my mind actually He was in the final At Pinburg Or the course, I can't remember if it was the final or the course But he would actually walk all the way Off stage and go away and hide Whilst the other players were playing Because He didn't want to see What they were doing He just wanted to focus on his own game and again that's another inch for him he takes that inch, it gives him something by doing that and I could see him going away I could see him going away when it wasn his turn to play and I thinking that a bit nuts and also he must be knackered by the time he runs back up the pinball stage because it a big kind of winding ramp that you have to go up. But it works for him. And I think this is a key thing. If it works for you and it's in the rules, then it works for him. Yep. Exactly. And just with the headphones, I heard it only fairly recently, and it was from a good friend of the show, Jeff Teolis. And what he said about headphones was, because I always thought, you know, headphones are great because it blocks out all the distractions and allows me to focus. But what he said was even more profound, and that is, it makes you forget that you're in a tournament. Agreed, yeah, agreed. That was exactly it from that moment, because whenever I've got the headphones on, I don't feel the nerves because I don't feel I'm in a tournament. It's just me playing the machine. And I agree with that. I think it just kind of takes you away from the fact that you're in a place, in an event, you're in your own little zone that no one can kind of distract you on and allows you to focus so I agree with Jeff on that for me I just found I think the first Pimberg when I didn't have headphones there were just so many things, people moving around and it was just so easy to be distracted and then I saw a few folks with headphones and I thought I'm going to give that a go and I found that it really works for me absolutely good so there you go, so there was the Sturm Pro Circuit Championship, so well done Andy Rosa, now next bit of news, it's only a small one, I'm just going to put it out there that there's a Michael Jordan pin up for sale, now this is a Lethal Weapon 3 conversion and I saw it up on Pinside on the marketplace, so it could be a gag for all I know but I think it's real for 9,000 or best offer US dollars. Yeah. What do you think? Like, that's just ridiculous, isn't it? I mean, I think it is crazy, but in a world, you know, so I'm known for being a big space nut. If someone did a re-team of a game around kind of Apollo 11 or something, and it was a good game, I might pay $9,000 for it. Sadly we've got Apollo 13 Which I wouldn't pay anything for It's a shocking game Don't be like that Honestly 13 ball multiball Hilarious awesome There's nothing else to the game But that's still very cool It is cool But it's a game you want to play day in day out It's just For someone like me It's kind of like my mecca It just doesn't hit the mark And also it's so hard to keep it running With a trough And actually two of the pinball Pets in the UK Won't touch it, they've got them on their website I don't work on Apollo 13 machines Because it's so hard to keep that thing going Actually I've got The translate for it signed by Gene Kranz Jim Lovell Fred Hayes And I've still got it I kept the translate but I got rid of the game but I mean, you know, listen if someone's into Michael Jordan you know, why not? If they've got the money, they like Michael Jordan they like the game, then why not? I think, you know, but I think it's probably the niche collector end of the market that folks will do that for but yeah I mean, I looked at it and thought, wow and then my first reaction was I don't remember anyone making a Michael Jordan game and then that's when I realised it was a re-theme some of the re-themes I mean I've seen it we had a few of them at UK Pinfest we had a guy who re-themed World Cup Soccer into oh the name of it's gone out of my head now it's one of the Tarantino movies Kill Bill? Yeah Kill Bill sorry that's right and you can see that it's still a World Cup soccer But it's such a good use of those rules Into Kill Bill And if you get a chance to play it I think at the moment it's in the Amsterdam Dutch Pinball Museum But it does travel around a little bit If you get a chance to play it, it's a really good re-theme Of a title that Kill Bill or one of the Tarantino movies Is a great theme From my point of view But I go back to the point I know you've talked about this a lot, Mario Which is, for me, seems helpful But it doesn't determine whether I buy the game or not Yeah And Lethal Weapon 3 Lethal Weapon 3 is It's a good game It's one of the better Data beasts, I'll say It was also converted into an Aaron spelling machine There's two of them And I've seen one of them in person Oh dear I know So it's just one of those Like I guess it was probably at the time And maybe Data East were the only ones That were doing those kind of conversions But I could just think of a lot more games That would have been better Do you know that there's a Red Bull We've seen Dyer made it Yes, I've seen it Yes, me too There's a There was a Well, there was There is a TV show I think we've talked about this It's called The Block And it's effectively they get these couples, these douchebags together, they put them in these decrepit houses and then they have to you know, do them up, renovate them and it's a fast-changing and blah blah blah and so yeah, so I think two pinbots I think they were, got converted into the block machines like just fuck off these people like just stop it I mean I can at least sort of thought, actually if you're going to re-team a game Iron Maiden's the one to re-team because it's such a great game It's a great game, yeah. And Red Bull, you know, I mean, you kind of, you almost want the phone upstairs and say, hey, how can we collaborate on a game properly? That would be a great combination, I think. But yeah, I mean, listen, I love the passion that people have to do that. I think it's creative, it's great. It also challenges, you know, in some ways it challenges your thinking. You know, often when I hear about a re-team game, I think I was going to be clunky or it's not going to work right. But when I saw Kill Bill, I was so impressed by it. you know, so you guys should make some of these because I'd buy one because it just played so well and, you know, but I love the passion that people put into this and hope that, you know, folks continue to do stuff like that you know, maybe it's not everybody's cup of tea to set the theme but if the game's decent and it kind of makes the mark then why not, you know it's good to see people have that sort of passion, I think I'm just wondering, I only vaguely remember the Kill Bill machine, but I can see it here, and I can see what they've done, and it looks amazing, right? Yeah. But have they changed the rules and the animation and all that stuff? They've done a little bit of that, but not as much as I think they would... They've done a little bit of it. They've put a screen in the back, and it's running off... I think it's now running off P-Rock, as I recall. And yeah they've done some integration of the movie clips And it's It comes across really well done It's probably the best It's probably the best Retheme I think I've seen And Dennis and team that have done it I think it's Dennis They've done a few So the guy who runs the Dutch Pinball Museum Is involved in this I forget the guy's name but he is he's driven a couple of these and actually if you get a chance to go to the Dutch Pinball Museum I highly recommend it 100 games, some really interesting games there but they've done everything from kind of re, they've done plastics, they've redone the playfield with the you know the lights and stuff, they've done a lot of great things with the artwork they've They've got this They're called Pinovating I think is the name of what they're called Yeah They've got a big screen in the back It kind of looks like a Jersey Jack machine In some regards but they've still got the DMD There And when you look at the game You can see If you've played World Cup Soccer and you know it well You can see kind of the things that are still A bit World Cup Soccer Obviously one of the big things that's gone is the ball But you can't tell You can't tell that it's a World Cup soccer game from a Playfield point of view If you just look at the cabinet And the side It looks like a professionally done game And for me When I saw it I was thinking wow this is awesome And again I streamed it at UK Pinfest They brought it over Last year and we did a bit of streaming on it And they talked us through how they built it And again the thing that you walk away from If you watch that, it's on YouTube. The thing that you walk away from is just the passion that people have for pinball. It's fantastic to see. And again, in a world where some people might argue that some of the manufacturers play really safe, in a world where you've got a few people trying things and experimenting in different ways, and maybe someone picks up an idea from them, I think it's great. But if you haven't seen the Kill Bill rehash or review, I really encourage you to go have a look at it, because I think it's outstanding. I will link some information to it in the show notes. So if there's a YouTube clip, I will link that. All right, so moving on. Do you play much pinball virtually? The only virtual pinball I play Really is on my Nintendo Switch So I've got And a little bit on my iPad Usually when I'm travelling My job means I'm usually Flying a lot So if I'm on a plane and kind of bored I'll get the Switch out on my iPad And I'll play That sort of virtual pinball The sort of virtual pinballs Where they're built like a cabinet I've tried a few of them They just don't do anything for me at all I'm afraid Yeah, I agree But playing it on your Switch is fine Yeah, okay The reason I'm bringing it up is that The next three machines have been announced For Pinball FX3 And that's Theatre of Magic, Champion Pub and Safecracker And The more I see them The more I wish they didn't exist And you effectively What I mean by that is You get the Classic Edition But then they've got these ones where they've done the whole pinball FX thing where they've got, you know, animated ball trails and on Theatre of Magic they've got this magician woman that can levitate and then she shrinks into a into like a magic hat. What's it called? Champion Pub. That guy that turns around that looks ridiculous is animated with his punch. I'm like no, no guys, please don't do that. Yeah, I mean, the same I mean, the medieval madness one I've got On my Switch, and the way that they've Set up the default buttons Means there's one button that you press That transfers you from the normal Mode to the kind of advanced Mode, and you keep Pressing it through the game, and halfway I had to remap the buttons, because the default setting Means that halfway through, the dragon will just start Flying, and you're like, what the hell? So, I mean, I For me, I don't play it enough that it Bothers me hugely But what I do think would be bad Is for that to kind of position Pinball in a way that isn't the case Yeah So I'm kind of with you on that I mean, Fair Magic, Champion Pub And Safecracker, I mean if you're going to pick I mean From a General public point of view, they're probably good things To pick But from a pinball point of view, they're probably I mean, I've got Fair Magic I've got a really blinged out one It's got all the gold on it I love the game but it's a game for Just enjoying pinball not anything else Really But Champion Pub I think is a Terrible game Safecracker for me is not pinball It's a weird game That happens occasionally to have a ball bouncing around We've got Champion Pub and Safecracker in our club And when Safecracker is in the competition In a tournament The guy's running it I just think why is this in a tournament I love Safecracker Yeah I know I go look for my safecracker token So I can just stick it in And get the biggest score and not have to worry about it I just Some of the guys in the club love both the games But for me they're not I think isn't Champion Pub One of the Papa games that they'll never Use in a tournament I find that Champion Pub In two games that they would Never use in a tournament But listen I think There's some stuff that Pinball FX have done that I think is Quite good If you're into Virtual pinball And when I look on Twitch When I'm streaming I'm looking to watch pinball The amount of people that are streaming pinball FX It's quite a big number now So they've definitely got Some sort of momentum But it's There's a friend of mine He's got a real pinball machine and a virtual one Because he doesn't have the space for Many games And it really works for him I mean I For me it just does nothing for me At all when I play that game And he's got one that's got a couple of coils in it So it sounds like it really feels like A pinball machine But that It's also got A proper DMD in it It's got two big screens It's got a shaker motor or it might as well be a pinball machine because it's got so many parts in it, but the 3D aspect of it and the way the ball moves is just not right for me. And I find myself getting infuriated by it because I think it does things that it shouldn't have done or it doesn't behave in the way I think it should behave. It almost uneducates me into how to not play normal pinball. Yeah, fair enough. I mean look I think the advantage that it has is for those people that don't have access to these machines they can at least have some type of experience I also think it's really good if you want to understand rules because yes I agree you know it'll go through there yeah I mean I've got Pinball Arcade before they I mean I've bought every when I heard that you wouldn't be able to buy the tables anymore I bought them all basically purely for that understanding the rules point of view Because they had the license Since they moved to Pinball FX So I went and got all the games I didn't have That I didn't know the rules for Because it is very useful at learning the rules I agree Yeah, and I'm curious to know What's going to happen with Pinball Arcade Because they haven't really They haven't released new games for a long time So maybe our good friends from Pinball Arcade Jared, right in Tell me what's going on with Pinball Arcade And whether they're actually Because people are sort of saying that they're going to, you know, start, like, really start releasing all the Stern machines and then the Stern electronics games. I don't know. I don't know what's going to happen there, but... I hope they do. I mean, I think they did... I mean, the Star Trek, Stern and Star Trek that they released, I thought was very good. I've got that on my iPad. I play that quite a lot. It's, I think, one of their better convergents. I'd love to see them do Meteor. Yeah. It's one of my favourite games. I'd love for them to do that because I just played the odd game in the airport on fly. You know, it would be great. So I hope they do do that. I hope they continue. Well, yeah, I mean, they did. Flight 2000 is... That's right, yeah. Yeah, so they've already gone back to that catalogue so they could do it again. Yeah. Now, but speaking of CERN, so we had a CERN of the Union this week and there was a couple of things. So the first thing that they mentioned is that Munsters will be at Texas Pinball Festival. Well, we kind of knew that. But I read somewhere that there's going to be about 16 Munsters At Texas Pimple Festival 16 of them Yeah I have to say I think they want people to play it Which is good I'm not a big fan Of Munsters From a game From a longevity point of view The shots on it I think are probably Some of the best shots in pinball For me I'd love to see it re-themed with a different code that's a bit more deeper but the artwork, I mean the artwork on it is so good, it's probably one of the best particularly the premium, I love the black and white but the game didn't do enough for me I had an LE on order but I cancelled it because the game just didn't do enough for me that I was thinking and I thought to myself It's kind of like Guardians of the Galaxy I'm a huge Marvel fan When that game first came out I was so disappointed I didn't buy one But now I've got one Because it just went in a path It was so good I'm kind of hoping that happens with Monsters I'll maybe go buy One if it does I think it suffered from a bit of Hype to start with And I think This is the one thing that I don't know how they do this But I kind of wonder how Stern Might manage that hype More effectively Because I think Deadpool for example I absolutely love that game I didn't get a huge amount of hype Compared to Monsters But I personally think it's a much better game And Deadpool itself Is such a timely Theme It just didn't feel like It received the same sort of Hype around it I don't know why it is that some games get You know thousands of people Talking about them and others get about a handful And I don't know How Stern can cope with that Because I think The impression I get is Guardians didn't sell that well but it's a great game Versus Monsters it seems to be They can't build enough of them is the impression I'm getting Yeah well look I think Well, okay. If you've got a great layout, and we said this before, if you've got a great layout, the code can come. And it was really interesting because I read all the comments about people saying that it was really shallow. I then played it, and on my third game, got to the second wizard mode, which is effectively the final wizard mode, and kind of went, huh, I can kind of see what people think. Now, I've not been able to do that since. so it's this real balance of trying to have a nice short sharp game but maybe it's just a little too shallow and they just need to just lengthen it a little bit because it has got still to this day a lot of negative feedback about the depth of code yeah I mean I genuinely find that hard to find a bad spinball game There's different things you kind of Levitate towards And for me I got to the place I mean I streamed at EAG When it was kind of the first real launch Outside of CES EAGs are equivalent of Arcade And coin op Show in the UK And they had a few of them there I streamed it for one of the days And I have to say towards the end of it It was doing six hours of streaming of the game, towards the end of it I was thinking I've had enough of this game and that was very early code, I think that was the first code that it came without the box but the ramp shots were just so satisfying I was like wow, I could just hit the ramp day in day out and I think they've got to I think you're right, I think they've got to do something to just stretch that a little bit, however you know, watching the Munsters at the Stern Pro Circuit final last night, it was like a different game It was still hard I wonder if there's something about How that game was set up And how you might So that game had no ball save whatsoever Even on the multi balls And that made it A lot more challenging But I think there was a certain time where there were some Players who kind of They tried something And it finished but they didn't score A lot of points out of it so they had nowhere to go and I think there's something in that that says okay how do you bring back in some of the modes that you might not have done so well on or another level of those modes I don't know it's quite a challenging one for them to figure out but I hope they do because I'd love to pick one up but I looked at it and thought and I've got a Monster Bash LE remake on the way to me it just felt like they were so similar I know Monster Bad for me is a known quantity and I've got to hold on to that and see what happens with monsters but the artwork some of the shots are beautiful I think set up in code are something to look at well you've got a Deadpool LE you said and I streamed a Deadpool LE it was probably about 3 or 4 weeks ago and when I was doing my this week in Pinball and was talking about it, I made the point that I don't think the code in Deadpool is actually that much deeper than Munster's, but it doesn't get the criticism that Munster's does. And I think that's because it's not just about the depth of the code, it's about that the code is very linear. You do Herman, you do Buddy Lily, you do this, like, it's forcing you to do these things and it's sort of dumbing it down somewhat. Whereas, if you think about Deadpool, it really is, get the three battles, do that twice and you're in the wizard mode. Yeah, I mean, I think with Deadpool, yeah, I agree, it's a really good observation. I think with Deadpool, though, I think there's a couple of shots that are much harder, though. You know, the I mean the kind of ricochet shot for the katana multiball, the ninja multiball is a tough shot, some people call it you know some people say oh it's a bit kind of clunky, I was like hmm it is if you can't hit the shot, if you can hit the shot it's smooth yeah that's right and then even the loop shot so for Dazzler that it looks like an easy shot but it's not as easy as people think, I believe. But again, when you hit it, it's another one of those shots. And then you've got the shot, I forget which character, it's right at the top. And that is such a hard shot to hit and get it right, especially with the spinner on it because it will sometimes interfere with the ball. Yeah, that's right. But I think a great observation about how similar they are. And I think the latest pair of codes that they dropped out from Deadpool really kind of mixed that game up in terms of what strategy or what direction you go in but you're right, I think there are elements of where you can run out of things to do on Deadpool for sure but for me, I'd probably maybe a little bit relate to the theme of the music as well I think that Deadpool is brilliant I think they did an absolutely stunning job on the music in Deadpool but you know, listen the thing I always reflect on is It's great that we're getting so many games that people Have different views on, you know, you might like this one Or you don't like that one, as opposed to one game every Year where, you know You have no choice That's exactly right, and I think Most of the time people are nitpicking, like, oh, you know I wish that Code wasn't so shallow Because the shots are so butter You know It's like, it's a great shooting game We do want More, we do want there to be an evolution and when there's something like, I think when Monsters comes out and people go huh, it's not that deep that's because their expectations are that games are getting deeper and deeper because, you know, Iron Maiden just came out right? So that's just people I genuinely think Iron Maiden is a bit of a landmark game in terms of what you can do with shops and code and I, you know I'm really looking forward to what his next game is because yeah and I'm really looking forward to see how he evolves what do I mean, I absolutely hate Iron Maiden, I cannot stand the music at all but I have the game and it's one of those games like Walking Dead it's probably the last two games that ever go in my house because I love it so March. I was a bit frustrated by it with some niggles with it and actually one of the things I think it's a trademark if you have problems with a launch stick, a bigger coil in it sorts it out on the game massively so and it plays so much better when you do that but I love it, again it's one of those games in a tournament or in an event where if it's going well the high that you get from it when you walk away is just so Oh, amazing. I love it. There you go. So just further with Stern of the Union, so back to the Munsters, there is a rule sheet that was released as well in February, so that'll spell everything out there for you. Before I get to the big probably point here, Stern also were at the Toy Fair in New York, which was kind of cool after they, you know, were in that whole Toy Hall of Fame thing. So, you know, that's cool. Yeah, no, I think you get to see them at other things than just pinball events. I think that's really important. And people are saying, you know, what are they doing to promote pinball? Well, that's massive. Exactly. It's huge. I mean, they were also at a car show when they released that car game. I forget the name of it. Yeah, that's right, Mustang. They were at the, I think it was a launch in, I think it was in New York as well, actually. There's a big car show in New York where they had loads of Mustang pins there as well. So I think it's great to see them at these non-pinball events Because I think that's how you get word of mouth to other people Is that they play games in locations that they might not have seen one There you go Under code, well, I've got the months The team continues to work on the next code release coming this month So, you know, it could happen Well listen I mean Last night at the Stern Pro Circuit finals They were running a new release of code On monsters, one to fix There is a specific exploit on monsters That they fixed I don't know what else was in it I couldn't really see anything, it was hard to tell But I think that code is probably more developed Than perhaps this is So I think we'll definitely see that code Soon, which is great Because I think that exploit is not what was as great to use in exploits sometimes not in the spirit of the game that's exactly right just top of my head two things that they could probably work on better Eddie letters and then Eddie loops that's kind of not that great they could turn that into something better and Marilyn the Marilyn thing I just I don't know whether that really does anything that's exciting no I absolutely agree on both of those points I think there is Opportunity in both those shots Agreed So Batman 66 There's a new Batman update in the works And Ghostbusters code update Remains in our schedule I'm looking at my Ghostbusters in the corner Of the room where it looks very sad And saying please give me my code update Do you think it needs new code? I think it needs something To finish it off Actually Ghostbusters Is the first new inbox pin that I bought I bought the premium I'm a huge The theme, the music The way that they integrated all the Call-outs, just awesome The game, the whiteness Of the flippers, you could debate that All day My mind is, don't let the ball Go down the middle and you should be fine That's so good I think It's like every game I think it would be good to see them kind of do something that's a bit more of a crescendo at the end and I don't know what that is I have a horrible feeling we're going to be disappointed by the next code update no matter what happens but there are a couple of bugs that I'd like to see them sort out as well but again I think Ghostbusters, I know a lot, it's a wide opinion, I think it's not a great tournament game, I agree with that, but I think it's a game just to sit and be with your buddies playing dollar games, I think Ghostbusters is definitely one of those great games, it's funny, it makes me laugh they did a great job on the sound, I mean the artwork on it is just out of this world and it feels it's got this kind of tarnish with this not quite finished and it's such a big game and also, I think it's such a big game for Stern from a business point of view. I think they've done so much business on it that it kind of, I think they owe it to it almost to finish it off. But let me tell you though, my friend Matt that I mentioned earlier, Matt Vince, I think he's got four of them. Because on location, he tells me that game earns more money than any other game. Yeah, because the ball keeps flopping out the bloody outlines. And the flipper gap. Like, you know. He takes it down to the seams So he's I mean he bought one Anywhere he puts it It just Coins up massively And He's bought I think four of them And if anyone ever If one comes up second hand He's always keen to buy it Because he knows he's got somewhere to put it Where he can make money But I I really I really like the game So I'm a big Ghostbusters Kind of Fan So it's good to see it And I hope they finish it off I actually have a bit of a thing on Batman 66. So as I understand it, Lionel's actually working on a new game now. And he is still working on Batman, but not the only thing he's working on. And this is an interesting interject I might have here, Mario. So I know you had my great friend Colin MacAlpine on last week. Yeah, he's awesome. He made a disparaging comment about Attack from Mars remake. I want to challenge. he talks about the droopy flippers and it's a debate that comes up here quite often so I have, I've had for my remake LA, it's one of my favourite games I think they did a great job of it, but it has the droopy flippers and everyone says Neil you need to fix the flippers on that and I'm like no I don't, that's how it's supposed to be, so when I heard Colin's disparaging comment I'm sorting this issue out so I emailed Brian and Lyman and I asked them the question where should the flippers be? And both of them replied, much to my surprise I didn't expect to get a reply but it was great that I did both of them replied that the flippers should be droopy they should be a quarter of an inch below the holes so unfortunately fans of AFM and Medieval Madness as well Brian said both of them should be the same The right place to have your flippers On both those games is to set them A little bit dribbly So that's the official pick That's the way it's supposed to be Okay fair enough So that's like emailing Sorry Emailing John Trudeau in jail Wherever he is And saying hey John Where should the flippers On Ghostbusters be Should they be so far fucking apart That you can never hit the ball He would reply back to you and say Yes, they need to be as Far apart as possible And drooping as much as possible So That doesn't mean that that's the best Place for them, is what I'm saying Well, I realize Perhaps not, but Certainly I You know, for me I prefer the We've got an attack from bars We've got one in the club the one in the club is level and I much prefer them to be droopy and it's kind of winding up my buddies who've got this game because it's a constant battle that we have because when they come in my place I'm like you need to pick your flippers they've got to be set up for how you the owner wants to play it or if it's on site how the public wants to play it indeed well but you know listen I'm not going to argue with the designer of the game No, exactly right. So I'm not going to argue with John Trudeau. Anyway, so the last thing I want to talk about, Senator Union, is the Stern Insider Program. This is going to sound like I'm a bit of a shill for it. I'm not. I really kind of kept hearing about the Stern Insider Program, and now at least by reading this I know what it is. And it'll cost you $29.99 per year. Registration is now open, and it provides exclusive behind-the-scenes access to the world of Stern Pimple. Membership perks include exclusive limited edition merchandise, special admission to Stern-sponsored events and private access to exclusive webinars, videos and interviews with game designers, programmers, artists and other Stern insiders. So, you also receive exclusive access to launch webinars, live streams of games, strategies with top players, blah, blah, blah, advanced sneak peeks at upcoming accessories, merchandise and other products. but you also get a free t-shirt so I think that's what I would go for Yeah I mean listen I've seen a lot of kind of debate on this I think anything that CERN do to engage more with their customers and particularly their home use customers which I think this is where this is aimed at why is that a bad thing okay they're charging 30 bucks a year but managing you know running this sort of stuff is It doesn't come for free. You need people to administer it. You need to create content. You know, it's definitely something that is hard to do. I think this is a good thing. I've tried to sign up, but there was some problem with the website when I tried to sign up. And I've seen that a few folks have got the box that it comes in, and it looks pretty, you know, it kind of feels like Apple-like, you know, when you buy an iPhone or a Mac. Yeah, it does. It's quite premium then. Yeah and it looks You know pretty good And it's 30 bucks for a t-shirt At the end of the day if all it is is a t-shirt Then okay it's a little bit of an expensive t-shirt But it's still you know I think there'll be more to it So I really welcome this I think You know let's give it a go Experiment and you know I talked about how does Stern Manage the hype between different games more I think this might be one way That they do this And they're not the only company in the world that does this sort of thing. No, they don't. The parallel that I know of is the Hog Group or the Harley Owners Group. And I know this because my company does work with them. And it's effectively the same thing. You sign up, you become part of the Hog Group and they send you out a patch, right? A patch? Yeah. A map of all the wherever you are, some of the roads that you can go and you know, ride your Harley Davidson, and you get a monthly newsletter. That's it. But people pay for this kind of stuff because when you're buying something that's, you know, a significant purchase, 10,000 pounds, Neil, 10,000 pounds is what you are paying for a stern machine right Fuck that a lot of money You if you paying that kind of money don you want to feel part of an exclusive club or a collection But this is what it is. Absolutely. Just about everything, and particularly in gaming, you know, even before, like, internet and connectivity was why you paid for a subscription, you could still join the Sega Club or the Nintendo Club, right? Yeah. That's just how it's always been. That's what this is. I think the stern I think the use of the word insider is probably the bit of the weird part of it, just call it the stern bloody players club or something, I don't know yeah, yeah I mean, listen I agree, I think let's see how it goes let's see what they offer if they don't offer anything that's of the value then this thing will die by itself because people won't resubscribe but you know, $30 to me is £20 you know, it's kind of In pinball terms It's tiny I think a lot of people have been nagging about it Probably never bought a new game Recently anyway So it's probably not that useful to them But I think This is a good thing that Sterling are trying to get closer To their community I think it's probably overdue Whether this is the right answer to that Let's wait and see But I really applaud them for giving it a go And I hope they I hope they really put a lot of effort into it Because I think this can help them With some of the unfair Criticism I think sometimes Stern get Mostly because People don't know what's going on Or there's uncertainty But anything I think that improves Commons between the people who play the games And buy them and Stern I think is a good thing from my point of view I think there's also a bit of a I don't know if it's a weird sort of resentment People sort of go, oh you know Stern they are making millions of dollars that they should give this stuff out for free. Well, no one said that they're making millions of dollars. Yeah, it doesn't feel like to me that they're making millions of dollars. I mean, I think they're doing well, and I think they're doing probably better than they have done for some time, but to build on that momentum, you just think of all the people they've had to hire, they've had to buy another factory, the supply chain, I mean, you've been to the Sturm factory, the amount of stock that they have to keep. and then everything's manual they have a great facility that they're improving day by day you see all the effort that goes into designs, into licences, into artwork, there's no doubt in my mind, if you look at kind of pre, I think I call this kind of before Zomby Yeti and after Zomby Yeti started working at Stern, there's a difference in the artwork quality for sure you know games prior to Ghostbusters and then games since Ghostbusters I think you can see it so you know I think I struggle with the resentment when you know games that are coming out are so good I mean if you look at the last two years I don't think Star Wars released a game that's been bad they maybe have not had the right code at the start, which I think is something that they've recognised and are improving for sure, but I look at I can't think of a game that isn't a good game, it might not be your theme, I'm not a great Aerosmith fan and I find the game quite hard, but I know people that love it, so I think they're doing a tough job in a tough market, I don't think they're making tons of money, they're making enough to invest and generate investment and I welcome this. So this approach to trying to get close to their customers, I think is great. And I really hope it's a good starting point to build on and people, you know, 30 bucks is, you know, I hope looking back a year from now, you think, why wouldn't you join it? No, exactly. That's my hope. Yeah, I know. But again, for the likes of us, we're spending thousands of dollars just to travel for a three or four day pinball tournament. $30 isn't that much. Exactly. Absolutely. And again, you've got a $10,000 pinball machine. So anyway, so speaking of Stern and Stern employees, really bad segue here, but I'm going to go with it anyway. So we've talked the last couple of weeks about this whole betting phenomenon that started, right, where you can now bet on the results of pinball events. And the last one that was on was Obviously the Stern Pro Circuit Championship I don't remember what odds Andy Rosa had on him But I don't think he would have been one of the favourites Yeah, I think my recollection is I think he was in the 500 to 1s for odds Right, yeah, there you go So I wish I'd put a few bucks I wish I'd put $30 on him Well, I was actually looking at Tilt Forums and there's a thread on it. And someone had said the day before the results came out that they had put money on Andy Rosa. So good luck. Well done. Well done, yeah. Yeah. Well, good on you for thinking that. That's great. And I think, Marty, I think on this whole betting thing, so here in the UK we have the kind of grand national and everybody puts £10 on a horse. Just everybody does, right? Or even if you've got kids, You'll pound on for them right It's Melbourne Cup for us right Yeah and I think if this And in my mind I think pinball is just not Secure enough to do any proper Kind of Betting or gambling on it There's just not enough Governance around it in my view But if it's the odds Will this guy who just won this win this Like you've got in the Notes here Then that sounds like a bit of fun You know, it sounds harmless. And as long as, you know, I think Colin said this last week as well, as long as people are, you know, betting with dollars rather than thousands, then, yeah, let's have a bit of fun. You know, that's not the end of the world. But this is what happens. People think about this and go, well, you know, what's stopping Keith Elwin putting $10,000 on him to lose and then throwing the game because that's $10,000? people go to these extreme examples to justify their point that's not, most people are just going to put 5, 10 bucks on and just you know the next one that comes up says will Keith Elwin win Pinberg 2019 so he's got 10 to 1 odds of yes but he's got negative for no, so you will lose your money if you put no that's crazy The next question was Will the 2019 Stern Pro winner Win 2019 Pinberg It's just for shits and giggles isn't it Isn't this like monopoly money No one's betting on you know Pinberg You look at some of the ways that's gone in the past few years Okay Keith Ellwood won it last year But from you know he came back From you know From not a great place to win it And deserved to win it in the end But But, you know, the year before, when Colin won it, I don't think anyone had him in the scope to win it, although he deserved it the way he played in the final. It was fantastic to watch. You know, so, yeah, exactly. And I think like Pimberg, you know, how do you guys even know Keith got a ticket? They probably don't. So, you know, yeah, for sure. It's just a bit of fun, then why not? And I think it's good to have a little bit of fun. And let's Let's kind of hold it at that And not get too crazy about it Yeah there you go I'm just personally annoyed that they don't have odds on me That's why I'm not seeing them They do I just think it's down the list Okay okay I'm building to one And speaking of we talked about Munsters before So everyone knows I'm a massive shill for Pinstadium Mainly because I don't need to have a Minus helmet headlamp because I've got pin stadiums so what I found out this week is that they're actually doing many pin stadiums for the lower play field of Munsters now that's all well and good people are going oh god it probably doesn't need it it's so bright that may be the case but I did ask Scott from pin stadium I said well will they fit in just about any other lower play field and he's like yep most of them Because there are some lower playfields That are actually quite dark Yeah So I don't know if it was the prototype But I saw a picture of them In Munsters And actually I think I'm not the biggest fan of Prince Stadium I kind of sit in the middle If they're on a game Fine if they're not, it's not the end of the world Although there are games where I think You know I've got a theory of magic that's quite a dark game, I think they do help but I tried them out and the inconvenience of having to get into a game and move them around, they just didn't swing with me but the mini ones definitely make a difference on the pictures that I saw and again, I think it's great to see someone innovate and try stuff to help the games be more playable My message is To the designers If someone can sell pin stadiums Then you guys have got an opportunity To make the playfields brighter Well that's it I'd like them to fix it Right and if you've got somebody I'm going back to this again If you've got somebody In a tournament with Stern Machines Putting a fucking light On his forehead To see the game That's telling you there's not enough lights Absolutely I agree with you I think they need to think about that And do something about it And they have done it You look at Iron Maiden Where there's a couple of spotlights At the top end of the playfield That really make a big difference And Star Trek I think is another one Where they've put some spotlights that make a big difference Whereas Deadpool Could definitely do with a couple of spotlights for sure Well, probably you should mention Iron Maiden, because I always felt that the middle part of the playfield, you know, just above the flippers, is probably the dead zone. And on the weekend, looking at the Stern Pro Circuit stream, it was really dark in the middle compared to any other machine that was being played. Yeah I mean I think I'm always, when I see something on a Stream, being a streamer Myself, it's always Hard to gauge what the light Looks like from the stream Versus in person Because you don't know what overhead lighting There is Yeah and also what the camera settings What type of camera they're using So one of my jobs is we run BT Sports, big TV channel here And you know we've got cameras that, you know, million pound cameras and lights and stuff. And I always find it really difficult to position, is that game too dark or is it the stream? And I think Star, you know, not Star and others are trying to mix the two things up, which is how much ambient light is there versus how much light do I need to add in the play field? Right now, to me, it feels like they've just not got that right and they need to add more light in the play field. in any circumstance, even in a bright location, it's still not enough and I think they need to do more to put light into it and also, you know, make it an option so that, you know, if you don't want it bright, you can turn it off. You know, I look at CGC I've done with the remakes, I mean, you can make those games so bright you need to wear sunglasses to play them you know, matter of fact, for Mars I actually like it bright, but there's a guy Peter Blakemore who's one of the top players here he plays my Attack from Mars with sunglasses on I kid you not because it's so bright for him so I think you know Iron Maiden I think you're right at the bottom it is a bit dark but I think there is to me it feels like there is definitely a gap here to be filled and the Pittsburgh guys have done a great job of filling that gap but I'd like to see it be more built in than kind of an accessory that you kind of have to pull on. Understood. All right. Just a little bit on social media. Steve Ritchie. You know Steve Ritchie is, don't you? Yes, indeed. So he's actually just, well, I think it was a couple of days ago, he put up a post saying, can't wait, all in caps, by the way. Come on, Steve. He said, can't wait to hit the road for the Texas Pinball Festival. TPF rocks. I look forward to hanging with you guys once again Yeah, he's talking to me Come to my seminar Of course he is He says come to my seminar Friday at 9pm Secrets will be revealed Mike Zinicor and I will answer all your questions So he said right there We'll answer all your questions So if I said to him Is your next game Black Knight 3000 What would he answer? Would he answer it? Well, I hope so Otherwise I think we can challenge him We can summon him to the court of public opinion And let him be on trial Rather than him being the judge Right, exactly Do you think that's his subtle way of saying That he's going to announce what his machine is? Well, I certainly hope it is Again, this is something I think Scaram generally do bad The whole world knows everything And then they announce it Why can't they announce something Because they know the whole world's going to find out about it It just feels a bit silly But listen Steve for me Is a pinball hero He can do no wrong in my book In fact we put because of all this noise around Black Knight 3000 We put Black Knight 2000 in our league last week Which is such a hard game I struggle with it I put it in and I think I scored like 80,000 on it Absolutely terrible game on it So I kind of hope it is You know I hope that's what he's doing There's a lot of rumours around Steve But what his future is I think Steve will be making pinball games From his deathbed I just think he will go on and on He's got such an inspiring Creative Talent That I think he will go on And on and on And he will continue to make great games He gets a lot of flack for Star Wars And I actually like the game Star Wars, what I don't like about it is as a Star Wars fan there just wasn't enough on the play field for me I would like to see more but if you take that game on it's own I think it's actually a pretty decent game, with one or two things it could be improved but like most games there's always room for improvement but I've got Stern Star Trek, I've got William Star Trek Next Generation and I absolutely love both those games I think they're outstanding, I've got Spider-Man it's a brilliant game I love what he does I think I've got no fear, my wife loves this game, I'm not that big of a fan of it but she really likes it I think I've got World Poker Tour which I absolutely love very tough game but it's a great player I think Steve will be here forever And I think he'll be sticking out great games that people Find and I hope Part of me hopes it is Black Knight 3000 I just hope it's not as hard as The previous games Because I struggle with both of those games But I think it'll be Really exciting to hear what he's Got to say and he's such a fun guy I mean After TPFL last year I was actually staying in Texas For business and he was there as well and I had breakfast with him a couple of times and he sat down and we chatted about pinball a couple of times he's such a friendly guy and he my wife really likes him, they met up because he was one of the volunteers at TPF and Steve Ritchie is such a great guy so I'm really looking forward to seeing Steve at TPF, I do think he gets really excited about that show in particular so I'm looking forward to seeing what he's got to say So you're going to TPF? I am, yes. Oh, you don't know that? Oh, there you go. Yes, I am. I will see you then. Indeed. That's all. Yeah, actually, I'm annoyed that you said that last week, because I managed, literally three days ago, managed to get into the tournament, because I was on the wait list. Right. I'm really forward to it. But, yeah, there's me and a couple of other guys from the UK coming out as well, because we used to go to Expo, but not the last Expo, The one before it was so bad We're not going back to that Although the last year's expo was a hell of a lot better So I really enjoyed it actually So I'm probably going to go this year as well But I managed to So sometimes I manage to tie this in with work So I can fly out Do a bit of work then go to TPS And head home Oh there you go, we'll get to pitch up at TPS Indeed, I'm looking forward to it Awesome Last couple of points One was that the reason why I couldn't, one of the reasons why I couldn't watch a lot of the Stem Pro Circuit was I was actually streaming myself tonight, and I was streaming Cosmic Cart Racing by Multimorphic. Have you played any of the Multimorphic games? I've played one of them, which I think is Lexi Lightspeed, is there? Yes. What did you think? I enjoyed it, but it wasn't pinball. Okay. Makes sense Yep Totally agree with you It's a great entertainment thing But I wouldn't call it pinball Okay I know what you mean I would sort of say politely that you're probably wrong But No, what I'll say is I know what you mean in that It doesn't fit the framework of what we expect a pinball to be And I don't actually even think and I'm now going to think more about this because I just streamed Cosmic Car Racing for a couple of hours. It's actually beyond the screen because, you know, people sort of talk about the flippers not feeling quite right. Well, they're better than Gottlieb Premier Games and that was called Pinball, right? I don't have a problem with the flippers. I think they're fine. Yeah. It's actually not even the screen. I'll tell you what it is. It's the rules framework is so not what we expect from pinball at all. It does not obey the laws of pinball rules that we've been used to for the last, well, let's call it nearly 50 years for me, but I don't know, probably there or thereabouts. You know, we're not used to that. And so, what's its name today? Constant Kart Racing. I've just got to tell you, it is one of the most spectacular things that you will see. Each of these ramps has got full strips of RGB colour changing lights and the light show it puts on is just... I've never seen it. It is that freaking amazing to look at. Stunning. Spectacular. There you go. I've said it. Well, I'll look for... I'll go find that TPF and have a go. It sounds brilliant. Yeah, do. But to look like... Now, The thing that was not quite right for me with Lexi Lightspeed, I felt the shots were a little bit... They weren't right. And again, all I'm hearing now is that person that wrote in saying all I like is fan layouts. That's not the case. But, you know, Lexi Lightspeed, it just felt... It was just a bit odd. It was just... You had some things at the back of the game, but it didn't feel like you were shooting anything. It just stuff happened. This layout, because it's a whole new bolt-on that goes into this, is so much better because there are lots of flow shots. You've got orbits, you've got two ramps, you've got a center shot that sort of is a mini orbit. You've got a sort of inner mini orbit. It's just great. But the rules are not like pinball rules. You are not trying to get a score. There's no such thing as a jackpot. There's targets, but they don't really do anything. You're in a game like Mario Kart, and your objective is to get to the end in first place. And how you do that is by hitting the shots. That will give you a temporary boost that will keep your speed up so you get over the line first. Yeah. And that's why I kind of see it as not Not really being pinball It's not It's not pinball it's just not what we expect And actually by calling it pinball I think you I think you undermine At least on Lexi I think for me it undermined What was good about it by calling it pinball The problem is What do you call it Well it's like saying Those pinball FX games Right where they completely distort the originality and the truth of pinball, but I still think it's pinball. And that's why I say this multi-morphic platform is still pinball. But if you want the same sort of experience that you're going to get from any other machine that's been manufactured at the moment, where you've got ramps and you've got targets and you've got multi-balls and jackpots and playfield multipliers, that's not in the DNA of any of these games that you get with a multi-morphic platform. And this Cosmic Kart Racing was, not only was it just so much fun to shoot and to play, there was four of us playing it for a good couple of hours. It was an amazing party game. Just with your mates together, it was kind of like last man standing because the way it works is you play a race If you come first in the race, you continue If you don't come first, it's game over After you win that race, you then do like a time trial The first one, all you have to do is hit the right ramp And over and over and over And that'll just keep boosting Then you play another race again And if you win, you keep going And then there's another sort of mini game And they were kind of getting more and more inventive As we went along Until we get to this, I think it was the fourth race Which nobody could ever get through because it was so freaking hard But there you go Best class of the car racing We also played, I think it was called Grand Slam Rally Which was a baseball game It was fun, it's fun It's fun That one's more like a pitch and bat game That's the first game ball Yeah I think I saw that On another game that was So I saw the Let's see I think I saw it at TPF last year, and then it was that, there was one game at Pinburgh that Pinball Star had brought with them and the thing I'll say about it is, at TPF, trying to get on one of those games, you had to wait a while there was a huge hype around the booth, and then I finally got on to Lexus, but like I said, I thought it was fun, I enjoyed it, I could see with a bunch of friends how this game would be great, and actually that's one of the things that I think it's another area of You know that more Pinball needs to expose more Which is that kind of challenging your friends Aspect You know like TNA So yeah I mean UK Pinfest last year Friday night Sorry Thursday night after we'd set up I took my TNA There because there's not many of them in the UK Put it on co-op mode And we just played for like four hours In co-op mode And it was such good fun So that player You know Local play aspect where it's not just about Getting the best score but doing Achievements I think there's something In that in pinball that it's great to see That these guys Have looked at that So I'm now quite excited to have a go At one of them although I'm fearful It might end up on an expensive purchase You may do I was really surprised By this I think mainly because I felt the layout for Lexi Lightspeed was just too weird. It was too far back, and you couldn't really tell what you were doing. This one has just got much better shots. They're not conventional. It's not still your standard fan layout positioning, so it just works well. And as I said, the LED lighting on this is spectacular. So hopefully you'll get a chance to have a look at it at TPF. I'm looking forward to seeing that. I think these games that do something different are the things that probably I get most excited about when I go to shows like that. So looking forward to that. Yeah. And probably the last thing from me for this week is a bit of mail. This was a follow-up to when we were talking about we'd said that CGC's next game is very likely to be Cactus Canyon and the original coder apparently was going back and completing the code. and someone, Shane, hi, Shane, wrote in saying, managed to find that the coder on Cactus Canyon is Matt Correal, who was also the designer. He was the main coder on No Fear, Safe Cracker, two of your favourite machines, and then worked on Star Trek Next Gen and World Cup Soccer, which are kind of your favourite games as well. So there is actually a thread on Pinside about it, and what's interesting is that someone said that they spoke to Matt years ago and he has done a more complete code but I think he needs to either get paid for it or work with somebody that will help him work to the end and get some money for it. I guess that's probably the case. Yeah, well, hopefully CCC have had a conversation with him and also I hope they've talked to Eric about CCC because I think that's stuff that would be good to take out. We have a CCC in the club I think there's elements in that That would be good to see in the remake As well Who knows If that's the case But it would be great to see it For sure I actually like Cactus Canyon I really enjoy it It's not a deep game But it's a really fun game to shoot Again, one of those games with a few friends Can be great fun We've got CCC And the reliability of it With the PC in the back of it Is not perfect But once it's running And you get to the Cowboys vs Aliens mode It's just fantastic fun So I'd like to see that And if Matt's got more code Then by all means Let's put it in there And mix it up a little bit That would be fantastic There's a lot of rumours that there was extra Monster Bash I never believed that To be honest with you I kind of hoped it would be the case But the realist in me said No they're not going to do that They don't need to do that So it would be fantastic To see it And to really see the last game that Williams Did before pin 2k To have kind of gone out on the high That it should have done really I think it was a bit of a damn squib Well I think the difference between those two is that Monster Bash was code complete. It was shallow, but it was code complete. So I think that was wishful thinking. Cactus Canyon, even though you've got CCC or Cactus Canyon continued, it wasn't a finished game. The code wasn't finished. So I think they have... I don't know, what I'm trying to say is... It's almost like they... I was going to say responsibility. They don't. I was almost going to say duty. They also don't have responsibility or duty. But, fuck, it would be nice to do it for the fans to go and play the code. You know what I mean? Totally, you might. I think if you think about Attack from Mars, where they went back to the original artist to do the remake, so the topper and the backboard artwork, they actually went back, got the artist and got them to create that, Really won a lot of kudos points For them in doing that So they've done You might argue they've done something like that So if they were to go back to the original code Or get him to help finish it off I think there would be a lot As you say No they don't have a specific duty to do it But if they did do it It would really land well with the community Oh god yeah They'd go straight into hero status Maybe not so far but We'd love it that's what we'd love. And that would be a situation where, and it doesn't happen that often, where a company meets the expectations of its fans. Indeed. No, I completely agree with you on that. And again, I was actually kind of hoping that the last game Monster Bash was Cactus Canyon because I had an original Monster Bash, so I was looking, no, please make it Cactus Canyon because I'd much rather have got that. But I think if they do something, In every game they've added something to it And I think there is an expectation That they will add something to this If it was code I just think they'll sell like hotcakes Is my expectation What else have you got for me, Neil? Yeah, so maybe if I just talk about Two big things that have gone on in the UK So we have the five days of pinball Which is effectively It's the UK Open which is the biggest tournament in the UK that Martin Hayup who you know is well known in the industry it's his tournament, I am actually I am not going to play, I am going to TD it because I want it to be I personally want it to be the biggest thing it can be so we're hosting it at the club and the five days of pinball starts on it would be Wednesday Wednesday, the 17th of July, and our first tournament's in a place called Chief Coffee. It's a small coffee bar. It's got some really great pinball machines. Sam, who runs the place, does an epic, I mean, the best coffee in the UK, I would say. And he's got some brilliant games there, actually. Has a Monster Bash there, interestingly, but also a lot of new games. So there's a tournament there. And then on Thursday At Flipout we've got a tournament There Just a one day tournament And then Friday, Saturday, Sunday We have the UK Open Both Classics and the Main And we've Got about 50 games there We're expecting probably I'm hoping for that we'll get about 80 players For both those And then on the finals day which is the Sunday, we're also going to run another tournament for those that didn't make the finals to keep people engaged. But that kind of runs from Wednesday the 17th through to the Sunday. Five days of pinball. The website for it is tournaments.pinballnews.com. We're opening registration soon. It would be great to have you there. We're really a flip out in the London UK pinball scene. We're putting a lot of effort into it Not to play the UK Open is a big choice for me Because it's a But I want to make sure It runs really really really well And then the other Another big event That we've talked a little bit about is UK Pinfest Which is August 23rd 24th, 25th UKpinfest.com So we basically get It's really the only dedicated pinball event in the UK It's our equivalent of the Texas Pinball festival, not as big as that but we're working on it and the team that run that are great, starts Friday, on the Friday they have a VIP session where we limit the number of people that come just so you can get to play the games a bit easier because it does get busy on the busier days, again there'll be a tournament there as well and we'll have some big we have some seminars there, we haven't nailed them down yet but we're working on them but again it's a great time it's August bank holiday weekend so it's a big event for us I guess there will be about 120 pinball machines there this year and we had Kill Bill as we talked about earlier there and we also had Mafia and Thunderbirds there as well so there will be some new stuff there watch the website for more info but those are the two big events in the UK that I'm really excited about and hope to see anyone who's coming to the UK or in the UK those times, you know, ping me and I'll get you plugged into it and it would be great to see. We really want to try and bring some more, definitely folks from Europe, but if anyone's, you know, in town those weeks on holiday or something else, then hook us up and we'll look after you. Awesome. Well, there you go. Well, good. I'm so glad to hear your story and what you're doing for the UK scene. I was in the UK four years ago and I struggled to find pinball and this was in the heart of London, right? I did find like an arcade and it had two machines and one of them wasn't working properly. So it's good. We're sort of in sync. Like four years ago in Melbourne wasn't so crash hot but through the likes of Jimmy Nails who started pretty much the competition scene in Melbourne. And in fact, I think this week coming up at the Peacock Inn, it'll be the last night. This particular tournament or comp has been going for four or so years. It was the first one that started having its last night this week. And it's because of people like him and people like you and obviously the group of people that you've got. and it's what Roger Sharp said was that you know it's all grassroots, you've got to get there and you've got to get to the people, get the word of mouth happening and that will grow it and so well done Absolutely, I appreciate that and then good Friday here if you're in the UK at my house I've got a tournament running Domino Arcade anyone's welcome but probably not thousands of people but 203 look at playfootball.uk where you can register for it if you want to come along and so we do dinner we do lunch, we do the whole shooting match, we look after everybody it's a great event to get my games played for more than an hour which is also good because I'm always slightly worried that I've got all these great games that not a lot of people can play so I open it up for that and we're also doing Pack the Play Day with Mike, so we're inviting some autistic kids around to play again because that went down so well last year. So that's a couple of things going on at Domino Arcade as well. Awesome. Good stuff. Well, thank you, Neil. Thank you very much for coming on and being my co-host for this week. You were amazing. Thank you for that, Mark. It was great to do this. I was a bit nervous, but I think hopefully we made it. We did. Alright, thanks everybody for listening. We will do this all again next week so please don't forget to email us at head2headpinball at gmail.com, go to the Facebook page, Instagram, Twitter, all those kind of social media type places and we'll speak to you all again next week so it is goodbye from me and goodbye from me thanks Mario, thanks everybody thank you