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Episode 43 - Evolution and Future of Pinball

Special When Lit·podcast_episode·58m 21s·analyzed·Mar 19, 2019
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claude-haiku-4-5-20251001 · $0.029

TL;DR

Hosts discuss future pinball innovations: online connectivity, grading systems, and Pinball 2000 tech revival.

Summary

Ken Cromwell, Bill Webb, and Steve Beattie discuss the evolution and future of pinball technology on Special When Lit podcast Episode 43. The hosts explore potential innovations including network connectivity for online competition, universal pinball grading systems, and advanced display technologies like Pinball 2000 reimplemented with modern projector/AR capabilities. They also preview their upcoming Texas Pinball Festival coverage plans.

Key Claims

  • Jersey Jack Pinball may reveal Wizard of Oz Yellow Brick Road Edition at Texas Pinball Festival

    medium confidence · Ken Cromwell states this as 'the general rumor' about TPF announcements

  • Stern Pinball is rolling out network connectivity (ITnet) for pinball machines

    high confidence · Ken Cromwell directly states 'Stern Pinball is rolling that out' regarding online connectivity features

  • Golden Tee Live allows head-to-head play and betting with IT taking a commission on transactions

    high confidence · Ken Cromwell provides specific details about Golden Tee's business model as a comparative example

  • Steve Beattie has approximately 17 pinball machines in his collection

    high confidence · Steve directly states 'I think I'm at like 17 right now' when asked about his collection size

  • A universal pinball grading/appraisal system at $150-$200 per evaluation could improve secondary market transparency

    medium confidence · Ken Cromwell proposes this as an innovation idea, drawing parallels to comic book and sports card grading

  • Pinball 2000 technology was discontinued when Williams/pinball manufacturing shut down, cutting development short

    medium confidence · Ken Cromwell speculates about the platform's potential: 'stories are that when they shut pinball down, they were really making strides'

  • Revenge from Mars (Pinball 2000) graphics were ahead of their time 20 years ago

    high confidence · Ken Cromwell states this as established fact about the game's technical achievement

  • Ken Cromwell spent five digits on a Brian Kelly HUO Scared Stiff with clear-coated playfield

    high confidence · Ken directly discusses selling this high-end machine and the anxiety of shipping it

Notable Quotes

  • “Pinball is about the people and getting to relax, have a good time.”

    Steve Beattie @ early in episode — Articulates core community value and philosophy underlying hobby engagement

  • “I want to see a universal pinball appraisal or grading company step forward and be able to have a scale in which they're able to come out and appraise a used pinball machine using that same scale on every single pinball machine”

    Ken Cromwell @ mid-episode — Proposes major market innovation for secondary market standardization

  • “When you sell a machine like that, when I sold Demoman, I literally had a long list of negatives. Translates scratched. The cabinet is beat up. and then I had my list of positives.”

    Ken Cromwell @ mid-episode — Illustrates seller best practices and anxiety around condition representation in high-value transactions

  • “I'm spending $7,500 on pins now that don't have it.”

    Bill Webb @ late episode — Indicates current market pricing and openness to innovative features at premium price points

  • “Technology has come way too far for us not to be taking advantage of that.”

    Ken Cromwell @ late episode — Core argument for why manufacturers should modernize display and projection technology

  • “The disco ball that spins around and reflects a little LED, and it's going, I see it on my ceiling, I see it on my walls. I'm all happy that it's projecting outside of my pinball machine.”

    Ken Cromwell @ late episode — Concrete example of how low-cost ambiance enhancements drive player satisfaction and differentiation

Entities

Ken CromwellpersonBill WebbpersonSteve BeattiepersonSpecial When Lit Pinball PodcastorganizationTexas Pinball FestivaleventStern PinballcompanyJersey Jack PinballcompanyWizard of Oz Yellow Brick Road Editiongame

Signals

  • ?

    announcement: Jersey Jack Pinball expected to reveal Wizard of Oz Yellow Brick Road Edition at Texas Pinball Festival

    medium · Ken Cromwell: 'the general rumor is that Jersey Jack Pinball may reveal That Wizard of Oz Yellow Brick Road Edition'

  • ?

    product_strategy: Stern Pinball implementing ITnet network connectivity feature for online tournament and operator monitoring capabilities

    high · Ken Cromwell: 'Stern Pinball is rolling that out' and discussion of ITnet functionality for competitive play and error code monitoring

  • ?

    design_innovation: Low-cost ambiance innovations (disco balls, bat signals, toppers) driving significant player satisfaction despite minimal manufacturing cost impact

    high · Ken Cromwell discusses Deadpool disco ball and Batman 66 bat signal as examples of effective low-cost differentiation

  • $

    market_signal: Industry-specific proposal for universal pinball grading/appraisal system modeled on comic book and sports card industries to standardize secondary market valuations

    medium · Ken Cromwell proposes $150-200 professional appraisal with standardized grading scale to reduce transaction friction

  • ?

    rumor_hype: Community interest in reviving Pinball 2000 platform with modern display/projection technology (AR glasses, holograms, advanced projectors)

    medium · Multiple speakers discuss Pinball 2000 revival potential and express enthusiasm for display innovation beyond traditional DMD

Transcript

groq_whisper · $0.175

0:00
coming at you out of st charles illinois the special when lit pinball podcast starts now hello what's going on pinball land and welcome to episode number 43 of the special when lit pinball podcast i am ken cromwell i am bill webb and we want to welcome uh special co-hosts of the show today, our good buddy Steve Beattie. Steve, what's going on? What is going on, guys? Glad to be here. Yeah, we're glad you're here, too. Steve's going to be taking the TPF journey with us. For those of you that may or may not remember, Steve was with us at Expo, and he was the participant in the famous old worm bucket of chicken incident that Greg Bone's brother brought up from the southern Indiana area. Steve had consumed that, and we'll get into that a little bit later. But Bill, what's been going on with you man what's happening nothing just uh living the dream um got a stereo put in my car don't know if i mentioned that last week so we're real happy about that um other than that that's about it man just getting pumped for texas you're modding the car a little bit uh yeah just 1500 watts yeah yeah audiophile yeah it's all right bill is the big audio guy back in the day especially he was uh he did competitive uh audio shows right yeah yeah so it's nothing crazy like back in the day but you know the roof moves like half an inch so it's good enough yeah you know my wife hates it she you know my daughter she's like dad at home so you know i'm like and you're still like one and a half miles away yeah right that's good times well good so and you just picked up a go-kart or something too didn't you you were just telling me we were talking about that on one of the episodes i had a go-kart as a kid and it was stolen and over the weekend i found um one that It was real close to the model that I had. Wrong color, but found it Sunday night at 4 o'clock, and I tell the wife, listen, I'm going. So drove to Wisconsin last night to go get it and brought it home. You're in buy mode. Got it fired up today. Yeah, yeah, a little bit. Have you done anything pinball related in the last few days? There's a Project Whirlwind that's on the back burner. We'll talk about that later. We've got to get into some Project Whirlwind.
2:12
Myself, I am picking up a meteor. I think I talked about that last episode. I am going to visit a house tomorrow That has an evil Knievel So if anybody's looking for an evil Knievel I don't know that that's on my keeper list I'd be happy to trade one for a class of 1812 I'll throw that out there Steve, what's been going on with you? Now Steve, for those of you that don't know And you probably don't unless you know us personally Steve has a pretty substantial collection And a super nice I want to say an outbuilding But it's like a separated garage Yeah, it's a detached garage 20 pins approximately? I think I'm at like 17 right now. 17? Yeah, man, not much new. You know, I got a Star Wars Pro a couple weeks ago and just been kind of banging away on that. Yeah, yeah.
Pinball 2000
product
Revenge from Marsgame
Magic Rollergame
Circus Voltairegame
Medieval Madnessgame
Scared Stiffgame
Golden Tee Liveproduct
Incredible Technologies (IT)company
Batman 66game
Deadpool Premiumgame
Jason Fowlerperson
Christopher Franchiperson
Deep Root Pinballcompany
Brian Kellyperson
?

event_signal: Special When Lit podcast team (Ken Cromwell, Bill Webb, Steve Beattie) attending Texas Pinball Festival with planned content creation; staying at Indigo Hotel

high · Detailed discussion of TPF logistics, arrival Thursday afternoon, hotel location, and planned social events

  • ?

    gameplay_signal: Player preference emerging for display placement on playfield or directly behind rather than requiring upward gaze, as evidenced by interest in Pinball 2000 and related platforms

    medium · Steve Beattie: 'I would really like to see my display either on the play field or directly behind it. Because I cannot look up as much as I need to.'

  • ?

    pricing_signal: Collector/player willingness to pay $7,500+ for machines incorporating innovative display technology (Pinball 2000 revival, AR, projection)

    medium · Ken Cromwell asks if players would spend $7,500 on Getaway 3 with Pinball 2000 tech; Bill responds affirmatively

  • ?

    operational_signal: Significant seller anxiety around shipping high-value machines across state lines due to condition representation risk and lack of standardized evaluation

    high · Ken Cromwell extensively discusses nervousness shipping five-digit machines and underselling to avoid buyer dissatisfaction

  • ?

    community_signal: Established norm among serious collectors to aggressively undersell condition descriptions to exceed buyer expectations and maintain reputation

    high · All three hosts confirm practice of brutally honest/harsh condition descriptions; Ken sold Scared Stiff $200-300 below market to ensure buyer satisfaction

  • ?

    design_philosophy: Emphasis on mechanical effects (castle destruction, spinning toppers, projection effects) as critical for thematic cohesion and player immersion

    high · Multiple examples cited: Medieval Madness castle, Deadpool disco ball, Batman 66 bat signal as theme-enhancing mechanical elements

  • ?

    industry_signal: Texas Pinball Festival lacking major new game announcements; hosts shifting focus from product reveals to community engagement and seminar content

    high · Ken Cromwell: 'doesn't look like there's going to be a company...revealing anything that's going to be cutting edge or completely new' at TPF

    • 2:58
    You know, in the land of pinball, I've been a little slow. Man, well, I mean, but you pretty frequently have machines coming in and coming out. And what would you categorize yourself as, like a flipper, as a collector, as a hobbyist? I'd say like a casual collector.
    3:16
    You know, I'm not looking for the nices of nice. I'm not flipping everything. I worked my way, you know, five years to get the collection to where it is. Yeah. And I'm pretty happy with it. And I'm slowing down because moving a lot of machines gets to be tiresome. Takes its toll on you. Yeah, it really does. You're a young guy. You're in your 30s. It does, yeah. Wait until you start moving these machines in your 40s, Bill. Still though, yeah, you know. Bill, you're still in your 30s. Yeah, barely. I'm the elder. I'll tell you what, moving anything over 40 sucks. It's not good. Moving yourself is quite the process. I literally wake up every single morning, and it's like, all right, remember back in the day when you would get aggressive on a workout program, and like that first day you'd overlift, you know what I mean? Instead of just doing like chest and tris, you'd do a total body workout like for two hours, and then you couldn't move for like four days. That's how I feel. We haven't dug an inch on that.
    4:09
    I used to run health clubs, believe it or not. So, like, I've had my ups and downs as far as workouts go. Well, with Steve, I mean, honestly, when Steve invites you over, you know, especially when the weather's great, he's got the garage open, the wind is coming in, and you always throw down on, you know, whether it's chicken wings or fries. I mean, you've always got just some of the awesomest spread, too, whenever you're hosting. Yeah, man, thanks. You know, I love hosting. I mean, that's what pinball's about, man. It's hanging out with buddies and, you know. So glad I met you guys a few years ago and, you know, were able to rock out once every couple weeks. I remember how we met, actually. I mean, because we both reside in St. Charles. Yes, I do. And it was like years of us kind of corresponding back and forth on different games and arcade games and pinball, and we never even crossed paths physically. Then I remember one day I think I came over to your place to check something out. I think you posted something on Pinside about wanting to try a local BSD. Yes. Yeah, I'm Stoker's Dracula, and I invited you out, and you came out, and I was like, yeah, this game's in. Maybe not what I thought, but hey, man, come on over. I got pinball night going on this week, and here we are now. The rest is history. I was just going to say, the rest is history. It is. Well, the reason we have Steve in again, because we're going to be doing TPF together, myself and Bill and Steve, and we've got some other friends that are coming down from the Chicagoland area, but it's going to be the core three. I'll talk a little bit about the plan of attack at TPF here in a little bit Before we do that though, obviously pinball news wise We're kind of in the calm before the storm so to speak I think everybody's highly anticipating anything that we may or may not see At Texas Pinball Festival From the looks of it, it doesn't look like there's going to be a company That's going to be there revealing anything that's going to be cutting edge or completely new I think the general rumor is that Jersey Jack Pinball may reveal That Wizard of Oz Yellow Brick Road Edition which is fun and interesting that they're going to reveal it. But again, this is a pin that's been reintroduced to the public with different options, different models over the past several years. So as far as like a core game that people are anticipating, it's just not there. So at that point, I think it's interesting because we get a chance to kind of dissect TPF on a personal level and really find what our personal interests are, whether that's going to be to go to seminars, corresponding with other people that we know outside or inside of the hobby that we've never had a chance to meet. Just hanging out with people. I think, Steve, you said it perfectly. Pinball is about the people and getting to relax, have a good time. So I'm looking forward to that. But let's talk a little bit about pinball going into the future. We've seen arguably progression in pinball in regards to introducing an LCD versus a DMD pinball machine. We've seen LEDs replace incandescents. We've seen upgrade in audio systems. Laser-jet playfields versus screen-print playfields. Absolutely. We've seen advancement of code. What is it that we are to anticipate going forward? Where do we go from here? And I wanted to take a few minutes and talk about network connectivity for pinball machines and just kind of get your feelings about network connectivity. Now, obviously, to be able to get a pinball machine to connect online opens up a bunch of different doors. and I was just curious as to what you guys think the benefits or maybe the lack thereof there would be in regards to network connectivity with pinball machines. Bill, I don't know if you want to fire it off here. Well, you know what, I mean, you bring this up and it really kind of, you know, just talking about this really reminds me of the George Gomez game, NBA Fast Break, how you could link two games together to be able to play. Yeah. And, you know, I'd like to see some of that down the road. You know, if you could link up two games, you know, the theme might be hard to integrate something like that. Like head-to-head? Head-to-head competition. Sure. But I think that would be real cool to be able to play across the world somebody that's got the same game and either you're playing together to try and defeat the game or competing against one another. Okay. So, I mean, that's what first comes to mind there. So, I mean, and that's absolutely advantageous, I would think, to anybody that's sitting at home that wants to compete and doesn't have players at their house that play on the same machine. You're able to kind of jump online. Well, let me jump in here. Well, I mean, here, the other thing about that is, you know, I mean, as far as from an operator standpoint, most of these games are going into homes. So the operator standpoint, you know, being able to check, you know, what you've earned, are there error codes or whatever, yeah, that might be helpful. But I think you'd benefit more from having people being able to socially interact wherever you're at, playing a game against each other. Right. And, Steve, I'm going to come to you in a second, but I can't agree with you more, Bill. Well, what I think the basic model for connectivity online competition is like you look at your golden tea machines, golden tea live. And especially in the home market, you can take your golden tea 2019 or 2018. And at any point you can connect and you're thrown into a tournament of 20 players and they just keep filling up and they never stop. And you play your game. And then at the end, you see where you ranked amongst 20 players to be able to do that with pinball. Maybe you get people in groups of five, and I've got an ACDC pinball machine, let's just say, and I go in and I go to tournament mode and I play my game. I wait for five more people to play their game, and I see where I ranked in that little tournament. I think that's huge. From an operator standpoint, like you said, being able to go in and see if there's error codes, what's earning, what might not be working, that's pretty awesome too. But head-to-head competition is huge, assuming that by pressing a tournament button, all the rules stay the same. You know what I mean? So everything is uniform. You don't have extra balls turned on on one machine and vice versa. But that would be pretty simple to code in, I would think. Yeah, yeah. I mean, I think you'd have to put a switch on the glass to make sure somebody's not playing with a glass off, knocking the, you know. But see, then, I mean, you're not, like, for instance, on Golden Tee, you can literally, you can go head-to-head or have tournaments, and you can bet money. and it's legal, and you can charge your card, and you can play people. Now, IT, which is Incredible Technologies, they take their dollar hits per transaction on that. So if I'm playing you head-to-head, Bill, for 18 holes at $5, we're both paying $6. IT takes the juice, so to speak, the $2, and then we split the $5, however we divvy that up. Maybe first place takes all 10, or first place takes 8, second place takes 2, and you can do that with tournaments. I think that's an interesting concept with pinball, potentially. But to your point, there are way too many variables, way too many ways that you could cheat the system when it comes to, you know, online kind of gambling, so to speaking, head to head with pinball. Well, yeah, I mean, right off the bat, too. I mean, besides the glass, you know, glass sensor to make sure the glass is actually in place, you'd also have to make sure that the game is level with level back. Yeah, yeah. You know. Oh, and the plumb bomb, the plumb bob is actually installed correctly. Yeah. Not wrapped up with tissues. Yeah, exactly. Just, you know. What do you think, Steve? But, man, that's tough. I mean, when you have something physical like that, you know, your outlanes, everything about the way the game is set up, you can have an advantage. And if there's money on the line, I don't really see it working out. I don't either, not with the money aspect. Yeah. But other than that, I mean, it'd be great to play your buddy, you know, down the road or across the country on the same machine. And, you know, but I think just like anything else, like when a new machine is released, there's going to be hype for that machine. And I think potentially you can have 100 people online at the same time playing the same machine globally. I don't think that that's too far to reach. And if you're able to, let's say, bring a machine into, say, taverns are taking their high score and they're playing another tavern in a tavern tournament. So now everybody's coming in and they're they're playing against locations. I mean, that could be fun. but absolutely I think it brings a social element to something that could absolutely use it and are there going to be the cheaters absolutely it's all in the spirit of things and you know do you really want to cheat on a virtual or an online pinball tournament I mean that's that goes back to integrity and people's interpretation of their integrity so we are going to see that advancement Stern Pinball is rolling that out I think we're seeing it in different aspects we'll see how IT net for Stern actually goes. Obviously, it's all up in the air. What do you guys want to see moving forward that we haven't seen? Because I'll tell you one thing that I would like to see pinball related moving forward that I think might be innovative.
    12:53
    And I think it would help with pinball used purchasing, sales and resales. And I tried to get into this a little bit last week. And ultimately, it got edited out of the podcast. But what I would like to see, and this is kind of our wildcard segment of pinball progression in the future, I want to see a universal pinball appraisal or grading company step forward and be able to have a scale in which they're able to come out and appraise a used pinball machine using that same scale on every single pinball machine and be able to give it a grade on play field, on cabinet, on everything. and then give it an overall grade, be able to charge the seller or even the buyer, if it's going to be an investment, quote unquote, a rating. And maybe you rate it like sports cards or comic books. Maybe this is a, you know, I've got this Twilight Zone. It's H-U-O, and it graded a 9.2. And now I've got this grading scale that I'm able to put in my advertisement from a reputable company that came out and already praised it. And so what this does, it takes all the guesswork out of trusting somebody on their evaluation of a machine when they purchase. And I think if this company even charged $150 or $200 to come to your home and do this evaluation and then be able to slap their approval, like a PSA DNA certified signature for an autograph or something like that. A little sticker in the corner. Yeah. And some paperwork maybe they come out and they go over that machine for 45 minutes or an hour As a seller I comfortable on being able to say this was graded a 4 maybe on something old or an 8 on something in the 80s And the buyer is going to be like, you know what, I wanted to buy something that's 8.5 or over, and this is right where I need it to be, so that's perfect. I don't know if you guys had ever thought about that, but coming from the collectibles market, I think it would translate very well into pinball. because there are high-end collectors. And again, it just alleviates any type of discrepancy because my collector quality is different than somebody else's collector quality. My player's condition pin is different from somebody else's player condition pin. But if I can look at something that's universally accepted as far as a grading system, I think it makes perfect sense. Yeah, I agree with you. Kind of like comic books. I mean, that's a standard way of grading comic books.
    15:27
    Yeah, I definitely agree with that. It would definitely help clear up some of the red tape and pinball purchases. And I think at $100 or $200, I mean, for me, to be able to have the peace of mind as a seller, knowing that I'm not misleading anybody, or as a buyer, knowing that I've got something that is reputable, it's worth the $100 or $200 for the peace of mind. I agree. I mean, it makes no sense to be concerned. I always undersell my stuff. You do, Steve. I agree. Just to make sure that nobody's upset when they get it. I think you're hard on your condition of your listing sometimes. I think you need to be. I agree. Like you said, everybody has their own rating system. Well, you know what? When you sell a machine like that, when I sold Demoman, I literally had a long list of negatives. Translates scratched.
    16:20
    The cabinet is beat up. and then I had my list of positives. And I know I sold that machine probably $200 or $300 less than I could have got for it, but I wasn't worried about the guy coming back saying, you ripped me off, you didn't tell me about X, Y, and Z. I literally described every single negative to a T. And you are definitely the same way with how you post stuff. I think we're all three the same way. When we all sell a machine, we want to be brutally harsh on what's happening because when somebody picks it up, it wants to be reviewed as better than advertised or better than, you know. uh and and that's just especially now and i know steve you do this a lot i think the last few pins that i've sold um last several pins that i've sold have been shipped out of state and that's always a very um stressful experience for me because my biggest fear is is shipping a pinball machine in what i think is is a brutally honest description and somebody getting it and being like man you said that this was this but it's worse it's not like you don't want never want to be in that position. You want them getting it and being like, wow, this is way nicer than I thought it was going to be. You know what was super nerve wracking is what, so my second scared stiff was a Brian Kelly, H U O restored scared stiff with a clear coated play field. And even that, I mean, when I sold that machine, I had it listed. I mean, that's going to a high end collector. I mean, that was above what I should have looked into purchasing because it just, it scared the hell out of me to have it in the house and i talked about this in the past but even that condition wise i was so concerned about making sure that somebody else that bought it and somebody bought it i think it went to texas actually and when he got it he was like man you know uh it was great and it's such a relief when they receive that machine and they're happy you never know how it's gonna you never know and on a purchase like that i mean that was uh that purchase was in you know five digits uh when i sold that and it was just just nerve-wracking Just scary. I always want somebody to come here, look at something, put cash on the glass, handshake, and that's it. But it doesn't always work out like that. It normally does not work out like that because shipping has become so prominent. And I've shipped so many machines, especially as of late. Well, especially with your higher-end machines. I mean, that's just kind of the nature of the beast with the higher-end machines calling for $8,000, $9,000, $10,000. dollars honestly when i bought wizard of oz it was the the most money that i spent on a pinball machine yeah i couldn't be there to pick it up you know and honestly i was going off of a family member's word saying oh this thing is beautiful well you know that's like saying oh we've got this pinball machine we've had in the basement 20 years it's absolutely beautiful it's nothing wrong with it right you go there and the playfield's blown out you know credit dots you know dot dot dot dot dot dot going on and you know whatever but dot dot dot dot yeah yeah you know it's bad when it's not one credit dot you got multiple credit dots you're like oh there's two year aft fan oh hell no yeah it's like every time though right yeah it is you know this is a beautiful machine this is this has been in our family for years oh yeah not good a family heirloom pinball machine yeah yeah sit next to the garden for two years because they forgot about it and then they bring it back in the house so you know it's got more dry wrath than the ss minnow by now and you're like what the so all right so anyways i mean that's what i'm i'm just thinking progressing forward that would be kind of a cool innovation in pinball and it's not it doesn't directly affect the manufacturing of pinball machines. But I think for the hobby in general, it'd be advantageous to have something like that. Steve, is there anything that you thought that might be a cool addition to the pinball hobby, manufacturing, collector side, anything that you... You know, something that's not been around. No, not really. But I really like to see my display either on the play field or directly behind it. Because I cannot look up as much as I need to. For the LCD? For the LCD. Interesting. So that's kind of why I brought up Magic Roller earlier. And, you know, Circus Voltaire. Circus Voltaire, yeah. I would really like that. That even a DMD or something where you don't need to look up. Revenge from Mars. Yeah. Well, Pinball 2000. Yeah. I mean, I would love to see a couple more of those come out. That'd be great. That would be, you know, honestly, that's where I'd be at with new innovation. I would love to see that platform be taken to the way that it was originally designed. Same here. And see themes like medieval madness and getaway. I mean, even some of your licensed themes I think would really lend well to that. I mean, we've talked about this in prior episodes, that I think that that platform really got robbed of what it truly could have become. What do you mean? What was that? Pinball 2000. Oh, yep, yep. Well, I mean, yeah, that was unfortunate how that went down. Yeah, it had its legs cut off right when they were really getting going. And, you know, stories are that when they shut pinball down, they were really making strides in figuring out how to keep areas dark, keep areas light, especially with the animations. You know, you look at a pinball, Revenge from Mars, per se, right now. And for the time, 20 years ago, I mean, it's literally been 20 years now, that was ahead of its time, you know, especially for graphics. So imagine what you could implement now, you know, especially if you didn't like it. I mean, you could get like a $17 part from China that would rock your world projector-wise on a pinball machine probably. And to be able to see things not even reflected in the glass but like holograms. I would love to see like holograms on a machine. Even projected on a play field. So now we're going projected. How about some virtual reality pinball? See, I've been – well, we see virtual reality pinball. I'm talking about augmented reality pinball. And I've said this so many times. You can put on this pair of glasses and it would be crazy. Clear pair of glasses where you're seeing everything as you normally would, but the augmented part, the additive part, is graphics that are playing part in the reality that you're literally seeing in real time. Pinball 2000, but you can see better. And you know what? The argument is, well, I don't want to wear glasses when I'm playing pinball. That's fine. You know what? You can do something like that with Playfield Glass and now we're going back to Pinball 2000. But you can certainly do something that would be, I think, a little bit more impressive than what it was 20, 30 years ago. Oh, yeah. There's just – technology has come way too far for us not to be taking advantage of that. So we could be. So let me throw this back at you now. So you have a brand new, I'm going to use Getaway 3, with the innovation of Pinball 2000 with today's technology and the starting price is $7,300, which would be inflation today for a $4,000 pin back then, right?
    22:52
    Would you spend $7,500 on a theme like that that you would have that kind of new technology rolled into it? I'm spending $7,500 on pins now that don't have it. I think it would take some time for everybody to hop on board if there was something that drastic to be spending the $7,500. I agree, but you know what? I mean, honestly, Jersey Jack is still selling these machines at $8,500 a pop. I don't see why you couldn't get 8% or something. Certain premiums in the sevens. I mean, you're not that far away, and to have something innovative like that, I mean, it just makes sense. If Deep Root, let's say, I mean, and again, just for the sake of conversation, to your point, Bill, If Deep Root came in and they implemented some higher-end Pinball 2000 aesthetics and technology into a pinball machine and they charged $6,500, is that something that would sweeten the pot for you? I think so. I think so, too. I think any of these companies can do something like that. And you see, something as simple as a Deadpool premium owner, and people are going to laugh at me, but the stupid disco ball that spins around and reflects a little LED, and it's going, I see it on my ceiling, I see it on my walls. I'm all happy that it's projecting outside of my pinball machine. It's such an insignificant thing price-wise, but it creates an ambience that I don't normally get from something else. And that's got to be not a very expensive part. It's not holograms. It's not projected lasers. It's not augmented reality. But it's effective in me thinking that, hey, this is something that's kind of cool. And people that are not playing this machine can see the disco stuff going on in my room, and I like that. On the Batman Super Ali, Batman 66, the bat signal coming off the topper and hitting the ceiling, as ridiculous as that sounds, because that's not anything that's ridiculously innovative as far as what technology can offer, but on a pinball machine, I think that's a super cool thing to see. So just little things like that can make a big difference. So if you can take something and make it bigger with a little bit more investment and a little bit more creativity, it just makes sense that we see these things, that we see these progressions. Well, I mean, here, anytime you have something like that that really helps pull the theme of the game together and makes it really feel cohesive, when you start adding the disco ball, supercharger, or mechs like that, castles blowing up. I need these little things. The castle mecha medieval madness has got to be one of the coolest experiences in pinball when you blow up a castle. Absolutely. I think it's awesome. Yeah. So I think that with those innovations and those little things are really what could propel pinball into the future. Right. So, I mean, hey, the foundation is there.
    25:38
    This is where competition is good. Right. Let's see the new offerings. Let's see what kind of gets everybody to want to aspire to do something different. And we'll see where it goes. We'll see where it goes. You know, even a new Austin Powers game with the sharks underneath the lower playfield, you know, under some glass with laser beams attached to it flying, you know, around to be pretty cool. Sounds easy. Hey, no problem. Hey, whatever it takes. So the situation right now, so we're recording myself, Bill, and Steve, who is our special co-host and partner in crime down at the TPF, Texas Pinball Festival. We are just a couple of days away from actually leaving. So as we record this episode, it is a Monday evening. This gets uploaded Tuesday afternoon. And then by the time you're listening to this, we may already be in Texas Pinball Festival or we might be leaving because we arrive on Thursday. So the question, or I just want to talk a little bit about this, because we talked about, Bill, like what we expected to see at TPF on our last episode. But as a group here, I wanted to talk about the content that we plan on offering during our visit to Texas Pinball Festival. So we fly out of here in the afternoon out of Chicago, O'Hare, Thursday afternoon. We arrive, I think, around 2, 2.30 Frisco, Texas time. And the first thing that we need to do, obviously, is get ourselves checked into our hotel. For those of you that don't know where we're staying, we're at the Indigo Hotel. And I'll tell you what, Bill, I reached out to people asking where everybody was staying because I wanted to see who's staying at the Indigo. And, guys, it looks like it's just us. It's just us. Perfect. It's just us. Now, graciously, Jason Fowler from the Slap Save Pinball Podcast does have a hotel room across the street. And he has welcomed us in as like a boarding house and where we can take care of any alcoholic cravings that we may have or maybe drop off some pinball memorabilia that we had purchased or just kind of visit. So I think we're absolutely going to take Jason up on that. I told Jason, I said, I think we're going to be pretty familiar with your hotel. But we get in there. The first thing that we're invited to, right, is this Christopher Franchi dinner. and it's for, I forget his listing, but it's not for the higher clientele personalities of pinball necessarily, but it's just people that are in pinball looking to have fun. And we accepted this invitation. We appreciated that he had it out there, so we're absolutely going to show up for that, right? Absolutely. Thanks, Chris. And his wording on that was so choice. Honestly, when I was reading that, I was thinking to myself, it sounds like that Randy Travis song, I'm going back to a better class of losers. you know just you got me on that you know i was joining with yeah to my country fans out there you know they'll they'll get it but uh yeah that's thursday night which should be a great time um don't forget we're gonna rent a lamborghini from an exotic rental car and i'm looking forward to that because i've not ever been in a lamborghini and i'm pretty sure you can't fit three people so to figure out what we do with steve is going to be interesting i drive do you guys drive stick yeah i do i don't drive stick all right well so ken i'll be ubering the lamborghini found to sit on someone's lap uber exotic right no just kidding that's not happening but uh yes we got that on thursday yeah so thursday will be interesting and in the show tpf doesn't even really start until friday now when friday rolls around um so this is what we plan on doing guys and i think we kind of teased it or discuss a little bit at the end of the last podcast originally we were thinking to ourselves you know we're going to kind of just absorb tpf because it was the first time that we going to go down there we didn need to try to go down there and try to record and get interviews and edit stuff up and that sort of thing Let just go down there Let experience it as our first time Let come back and reflect on it Well, what's recently kind of happened is we got the go in our A double S a little bit here. And so we're bringing recording equipment down, our portable recording studio. And our plan, assuming I don't have any mishaps or Bill or Steve, is to actually offer content every single day that we're down. Now, we're not going to consider these episodes. So on Thursday, going into Friday, you're not going to have episode 44 or 45, 46, 47. This is just going to be TPF bonus content. And we're going to upload that the morning after. So Thursday, when we're down there, expect some content from us Friday morning because we'll get that edited up and thrown out, uploaded through the hotel. Hopefully the Internet's a solid there. Friday, we go all day. And then you can expect an upload on Saturday. And what we want to do is we want to just kind of talk to the pinball fans of pinball. Not fans of the show, but fans of pinball. If we're going to be able to grab somebody that's working at a pinball company, great. Let's just see where it goes. At the end of that night, let's all three of us sit down and talk about what happened that day. Now, when we get back on that Monday, we're going to have like a recap show. And then, Steve, if you're available because you're going on this adventure with us, we'd love to have you back in. I would love to. Right. Assuming you're not suffering some salmonella poisoning from some warm chicken that may or may not happen. I'm buying warm chicken down there, by the way. Right, exactly. So Thursday, Friday, Saturday, you'll have content uploaded on Friday, Saturday, Sunday. Sunday we fly out and we're back in Chicago Sunday afternoon. Monday we do the recap show. So expect back-to-back-to-back-to-back content from Special One Lit Pinball Podcast on Friday, Saturday, Sunday. And then we've got our Monday episode that usually goes into Tuesday. So I would say four out of five days is not going to be bad. Now, we do want to ask all the listeners, who do they want to hear from down there? Because I do want to ask, last year at Pinball Expo, we had our bucket list, the guy that we wanted to sit down and talk to, and it was Jack Canary from Jersey Jack, from Jersey Jack Pinball.
    31:31
    I want to know this. Please, you can message us on Facebook at Special One Lit Pinball Podcast. You can email the show at specialwhenlitspinballpodcast at gmail.com. You can PM us on Facebook. Who do you want to hear from at Texas Pinball Festival, and what do you want to know from that individual? Because I guarantee you this, if we've got that carrot kind of dangled, we're going to do what we can to kind of find that out for you. Yeah, yeah. I mean, it's hard for us in this position, too, because we've kind of met a lot of these people and have interactions with them, which is really cool. Definitely a position I don't think any of us thought we'd ever be in. But, yeah, honestly, running into Jack Canary again would be awesome.
    32:14
    Steve Ritchie, I'm sure if he comes into anything. Steve will be there for sure. He comes with jokes. He comes with an entourage too, Steve. And he's going to be – he's got his own seminar planned. And so this is the thing too. He said that secrets will be revealed during his seminar. Now, I don't know what that means per se. And I don't know if either of you want to speculate. I certainly don't because I just don't know what they could actually do. I'm speculating BK 3000. Black Knight 3000 for you, Steve? All right. So you think they're going to... I think he's going to hint. Hint at it? I think he's going to do something. He has referenced the Beige Knights on a few occasions. Well, we'll get him down there. Okay. All right. Yeah, we'll see. We'll see. What do you think, Bill? I think we'll get him some drinks and find out the truth. I don't think you have to get Steve Ritchie drinks. I think he's packing his drinks and he's ready to go. But it would help. But last year, I think he did like the confessional down there at TPF and we weren't down there. So I don't know exactly how that went. So it'll be it'll be interesting to see what Steve does during his conference. I did want to make a special mention because Nick Baldridge and Ryan Claytor, these guys have been in pinball a long time. And Nick has done he hosts a bingo podcast and he's got this multiplayer bingo or multi game bingo machine that simulates all the bingo machines on one unit. Ryan Claytor has been in pinball. he's a celebrated artist these guys got together collectively and they put together it's called coin up carnival and it's uh it's an em publication and for those of you that might not understand what em is em simply means electromechanical uh versus what we now are playing is called solid state so this is anything em old school stuff whether it be pinball machines or or even old school um em you know you know games they've gotten together they've done this uh publication that's coming out. Now, they are going to have, if you're into this kind of stuff, and even if you're not, I find this interesting because, one, it's an additional pinball publication, and who doesn't like that? There's not a whole lot of prominent pinball publications. Number two, I like learning about things that I'm not already exposed to, and as somebody that hasn't been heavily into EM or electromechanical, this really, really interests me. And at TPF on Friday at 8 p.m., they will actually be doing a seminar based on this publication and they will have a booth down there. So for those of you that may not know what this means, perfect. This is probably a great seminar for you. And for those of you that are fans of EMs, please get yourself in there. Support these guys because there's a limited amount of copies. I think I don't remember what it was. I think it might have been like around a thousand or eleven hundred and they go on sale. You can actually buy the publication at TPF. Listen, they've made the podcast tours. They've they've done their interviews. And it's just it's interesting to hear these guys talk. we were real humbled that they reached out to us to kind of share this news with us. And we wanted to make sure that we shared it with the listeners. So get down there. Check it out. Yeah, I definitely know that that's on our list. We definitely want to try to get down there and see what's going on. Right. You can go to coin op carnival dot com if you'd like to get a little bit more information on that. But other than that, if you're down a TPF, jump in there. I want to get those guys on the mics and talk to those guys a little bit. Yep. With that. And then Saturday morning or Saturday morning. Well, Saturday morning I'll be in a state of coma. Right. There is no Saturday morning. But we'll be able to sterilize things from five feet away if we breathe on them. So that should be a good thing. You know what's going to happen is Saturday morning, I fully anticipate the feeling of death.
    35:42
    And there's nothing worse than adding up a breakfast. And I'm like Expo where literally Friday we all woke up after Thursday night hanging out with Franchi. until, what was it, like 2 o'clock in the morning, getting home at 3, 3.30. Dude, that was a rough night, and you had to wake up at 6.30. I didn't have that problem. And then we had to come over and move a demo man out of your basement. It was like so many things I never wanted to do in my whole life, I had to do like a really bad hangover. Oh, yeah, dude. I was a cloudy guy. We helped each other move machines. Oh, yeah. Hungover, flu bug, doesn't matter. We're going to get it out. Doesn't matter. Right. I don't advocate excessive drinking. It was an October evening, and it was Pinball Expo, so I kind of let myself go a little bit. All's good, friends, good company, good drinks, good food. Absolutely, absolutely. But going back to TPF that Saturday night, we've got the Twippies.
    36:35
    We're big supporters of the Twippies with everything that Jeff Patterson has done at This Week in Pinball. Absolutely. To be able to get the notoriety from not just the pinball community, but now you're looking at the manufacturers that are all taking note on this. and there's been a lot of support for the Twippies. We've got the hosts for that evening, which will be Jeff, and then, of course, you've got Zachary Menny from straight down the middle, flipping out pinball. You've got Greg Bone from straight down the middle, both class acts. I couldn't think of three better individuals to kind of unify to put these pinball awards out. I agree. Those guys rock. Yeah. Can't wait for that. I'm really looking forward to it. I'm looking forward to see friendly competition and congratulations throughout the winners, And, you know, this is the thing, and I've been thinking about this for a long time, and not the participation award thing where everybody's a winner, but literally, I mean, if you're doing anything in pinball that warrants recognition to be nominated for anything on this Twippy list, congratulations to you. And for those that received the votes because they were the favorite of the community, extra congratulations to you because you hit on a soft spot that people recognize. So I think anybody that attends will see pinball greatness and the evolution of pinball right in front of your eyes and on the stage. And I think that's going to be something that is going to be pretty important. It's going to be good times. Hey, Bill and Steve. Yep. Hey, guys. We're still here. You guys ready to play a little drain it or save it? Absolutely. it's time for this week's edition of drain it or save it drain it or save it's brought to you by learnmods.com offering quality pinball playfield mods and lighting for your machine l-e-r-m-o-d-s visit learnmods.com today all right guys you ready so we're going to go with the first category the first item up for drain it or save it today is going to be under cabinet lighting for those of you out there that don't know what that is it's when you've got leds underneath your cabinet projecting color on the ground to give kind of a glow effect creating some ambience and we always start with the guests right absolutely so steve drain it or save it under cabinets pinball lighting go going to drain it because all of my machines have underneath them you've got none um yeah you know what if i had a nice really nice collection with nothing underneath i think it would look great don't get me wrong but i store pinball parts in bins underneath my machines you don't want those illuminated for people to say no that would look horrible it really would so you're training under cabinet lighting i'm draining all right bill what you got there under cabinet lighting go all right so i don't have the under cabinet storage feature like steve does but he has a beautiful garage floor so i could see why he would have it lit up but honestly so i got uh nine machines in my basement right now none of them haven't only because literally it's gonna be you know it'll start with wizard of oz and we'll go to transformers blah blah blah next thing you know you're a thousand dollars in under cabinet lighting so because i don't want to put the money out on that i'm draining it all right i'm gonna save under cabinet pinball lighting i think if tastefully done and it blends in with the decor the cabinet or the general ambience of the machine i think it offers a really cool kind of glow effect again it has to be tastefully done You don't want to have a rainbow going throughout your pinball showroom, so to speak. But I've done it on many machines. Ghostbusters was one of my favorites. And I had a nice little purple soft glow underneath. So I will save under cabinet pinball lighting. The second item on the docket today, we're going to go to Bill here, is turning down the pinball audio of your machine and turning up outside music. See, I don't ever turn down. I'm going to save this. But I don't turn the machine down. I just turn up the stereo in the basement a hell of a lot more. So you're just listening to a mishmash of a bunch of different audio. Yeah, some rap music to rock music to whatever hits the fancy that evening. But, yeah, definitely I love having other music, especially your 90s grunge era and stuff like that when I was playing pinball. That really sets the tone for me. So you're saving it. So you're saving turning down the volume on your machine to listen and turning up the volume on something else elsewhere. Yes. Okay, Steve, what do you got? I'm going to drain it. I'm not going to go through all 17 of my pins and change the volume on them. It would be turning them all down. Well, yeah, that sucks.
    41:13
    I'm not doing it. If somebody wants to listen to music, just turn the music a little louder. You have music going on in your garage over there, right? Yeah, I got some background ambience going. But, you know, it's getting to a party. So what becomes the background ambience? It's the pinball machine or the music that you're pumping through your garage? When I play, I prefer to hear the machine. Okay. But some people come over, and I'm not going to name names, but they turn the music up way loud. Yeah. And it kind of messes up my game. Like, I like to hear pinball. Yeah. See, some of my better games are with the music just blaring.
    41:51
    You know, those are some of the better games that I know I've had. I could see that. I've had some good games. Don't get me wrong, but... All right, so you're draining that. Draining it. All right. I'm going to drain it also, man. I think a big part of playing pinball is getting enveloped in the machine, and to hear the audio that's going on in the machine is super important to me. I love Stone Temple Pilots. When I'm playing Deadpool, I don't want to be hearing the acoustic version of Plush. I want to know what's going on. The other thing that I find very difficult, and I just can't figure it out because I'm not a tournament player, but I see these guys in tournaments wearing their their bows and noise canceling headphones and they've got their own thing going on but what about the audio cues of the machine uh for instance like on a Star Wars when you when that machine starts letting you know hey you've got to hit the multiplier shot again otherwise it's going to go it's like boom boom like you don't hear that so I I assume these guys are just seasoned professionals where they just know or they just don't let it affect them and maybe that's to their advantage but for me I do like hearing the audio of the machine. Now, that being said, right after this, we're doing a test stream on Deadpool, and that's going to be totally turned down, and we're going to be turning up some background music. So for streaming standpoints, I will save it, but for personal standpoints, I will drain it. Now, finally, the last item up.
    43:07
    What's a pinball podcast without some pinball controversy, guys? Absolutely. I mean, controversy is like it's the tabloid-esque stuff that's going on, and it happens here or there. and it's the spoon that stirs the pot. We try to stay out of the controversy as best as we can, but you know what? It just falls into our lap sometimes. And the third item is going to be Christopher Franchi's artwork for Pintastic. Now, this story has kind of developed where originally he kind of unleashed the concept artwork for Pintastic that was received by the community and then Pintastic after some negative feedback decided they were going to part ways with Chris or Chris was going to part ways with Pintastic because they couldn't come to a mutual agreement on what that artwork should be. And now since then, Pintastic and Christopher Franchi are back on the same page, and that artwork in some capacity is going to move forward. But to make it simple here, guys, Christopher Franchi's artwork for Pintastic as we see it now. Bill, or Steve, let's go to you, Steve. Steve, go. Chris or Franchi? I'm saving it. Saving it? Saving it. A little cleavage, whatever. Cleavage, is that what you're saving, the cleavage? Well, I'm saving the whole art package. You know, maybe he's going to redo it a little bit, but either way, I save it as it is. Yeah. You know, you've got an octopus in space, a little spacesuit, a little cleavage, whatever. Okay. You see it all over the place. It's fine. So you're not offended going to... No, go ahead, Bill. That's okay. Are you draining it or saving it? I'm saving it. He said save it. I'm still saving. I'm monitoring this. I'm still saving it. Bill, are you draining or saving Christopher Franchi's Pintastic artwork? I would save it. I think it looked cool. I could see how some people might not endorse it as much, but I thought it was cool in its artistic expression and let it roll. you know yeah it wasn't overly grotesque i mean were there features that were maybe enhanced a little sure but you know i mean you're never going to make everyone happy this isn't unicef this isn't march of dimes so it certainly isn't this is pinball yeah and that's the thing like i mean yeah i mean we're not taking on those those causes and i don't know that we should be held accountable for that but uh so you're gonna you're gonna save it yeah i'll save it we got two saves uh guys i'm gonna be honest with you uh i am totally gonna save this also oh yes and i'll tell you why i i think the artists had a vision of of a period of time with that artwork now although the cleavage is kind of accentuated with the cutout in the space uniform it was purposely done so because during that time period that is kind of what was going on with like pinups and stuff like that so where i don't think christopher franchi could have absolutely made something that was completely risque totally and and totally gone overboard so he did it in what he thought was in the spirit of his design. Now, that being said, I can absolutely not agree with, but appreciate where there might be some counterpoints to that design. But ultimately, I think that no harm, no foul, in my opinion. So I'm going to save that artwork. We had under-cabinet lighting. Steve, you drained that. And Bill, you drained it also. I saved the under-cabinet lighting. Now, turning down pinball audio to increase outside music, so to speak. Bill, you saved it. And myself and Steve, we saved or we drained it. We drained it because we like to hear our pinball machines. And then as far as Christopher Franchi's fantastic artwork, we're all going to save that with our buddy Christopher Franchi. Chris, you're safe on the island for another week. Yeah, buddy. Right. All right. So let's do this, man. Let's close this out. And let's close this out psyched up because the next time that we press the record button, it's going to be in Frisco, Texas at Texas Pinball Festival. Hopefully we can do that at a Waffle House. They don't get more legit than a Waffle House. I've never been to a Waffle House. What? All right. So I lived in Clearwater, Florida for years. Clearwater, St. Pete. I'm avoiding it. Waffle House. Why would you avoid it, though? I don't understand. It's a thing. No. Why is it a thing? It's Waffle House. Now I avoid it as a northerner. As a northerner. All right. I just avoid it. I'm going to get you involved in that. There's a couple things I wanted to do before we close out this episode. Number one, and I think myself and Bill, we wanted to congratulate Scott and Cindy at Penn Stadium for the birth of their new, their baby Penn Stadium, right? Well, actually, they had a kid. They had a baby. Nice. Now, Scott originally was not going to be able to go down to TPF because Cindy was around the time of the delivery was going to be TPF. The baby came early. It's allowing Scott to get down there. Cindy, good job. I'm assuming you're going to stay home with the baby. But you know what? Knowing Scott, you might see a couple of pin stadiums on the baby, and they might bring it down there and just have it on display. You never know. On a more serious note, I wanted to do a little shout-out to Head-to-Head Pinball. I think everybody that's been listening to that podcast over the last several months and in years, you've noticed that Ryan C. has not been on the show. Myself and Bill, we had wondered what had happened. Now, those that had stepped in in his absence had complete respect for and they did a great job. The show is just not the same without Ryan. And any type of wondering what had happened with Ryan, why he wasn't there, was cleared up today. And to summarize, if you get a chance, go back to the latest episode of Head to Head Pinball. and Ryan discusses it. But, you know, he essentially says, Bill, and I think we can both kind of relate to this, that where he finds the Pinball Podcast fun and he likes to contribute, it becomes immersive in his week prepping for that show and thinking about not things that he likes or doesn't like but how it's going to relate to the show. He had some situations, actually an unfortunate situation, where he's got two family members that are close to him that are in potentially dire situations. So that lies heavily on your mind. He talked about his state of mind and how it's been altered into a place where it's never been before. I can certainly appreciate that. I've been there. I have not reached out personally to Ryan, and I hope to do so. But I wanted to say, hey, man, I – Either way, we're thinking of you. Yeah, dude. Nothing but the best. And, you know, it does become a little exhausting trying to come up with stuff every week and, you know, trying to make sure to put this as a priority. So, honestly, when you have family that's sick and other things going on, it just definitely rings true where, you know, this isn't a liver or kidney. This isn't life-altering stuff. It puts things in perspective. Yeah. Right. You know, family is always first, you know. And, honestly, I think we could all agree that, you know, if our families needed us more than this podcast does, you know, all the listeners would say sorry. Yeah, for sure. And I don't think anybody would hold it against us. So what I did appreciate with Ryan was the transparency. He kind of laid things on the line on what he's been experiencing, what's going on. And if you get a chance, again, listen to that latest episode of Head to Head Pinball. It was good to hear Ryan and Martin back together again, knocking out an entire episode. And, you know, towards the end, Ryan kind of puts a lot of things in perspective for himself. And I think for a lot of people that are not only in pinball podcasting, but in everyday life. I mean, things change. Your priorities change. Your passions change. And just because you go into another direction, it doesn't mean that you're leaving anything behind. And I think right now Ryan's just trying to make sense of what's happening. And we do wish him the best of luck. So we absolutely wanted to say that. Thoughts and prayers with you and your family, man. Right, right. Thanks, man.
    50:59
    To kind of go completely 180, last call for Texas Pinball Festival delivery shirts if you guys want a T-shirt, especially on the Pinball Podcast. Let us know your size, $25. as long as you get us that order by Wednesday.
    51:12
    We'll just bring it down to TPF for you, and then you can pay some cash. And then finally, I wanted to go ahead and thank the co-host tonight, and that is our buddy Steve Beattie, who's going to be our partner in crime at TPF, as we knock down the doors of pinball podcasting and blow up TPF on a nightly basis. That's going to be awesome. Right? So what are you excited about, man? Because we have not talked about this. You know what? Just hang out with Bill and Ken. It's going to be great. If that's what you're relying on, then it's not going to be great. You know what?
    51:46
    Now, before we ultimately close this off, Bill, Whirlwind, again, every single week we get people asking about Whirlwind. And honestly, every time we post anything on our Facebook page, and we're up at about 400 likes now, which I think is great, it's a smaller percentage of our listening audience. And so could you, again, just kind of a weird personal request. If you're listening to the podcast now, one, thank you very, very much. Would you do us a favor? And there's not a contest for likes. I understand this on Facebook, and a lot of you might not be on Facebook. But could you do one of a couple things? One, could you maybe, if you're on our Facebook page at some point, like hit that thumbs up button because it's cool because we like to see who's in there. We look at your profiles and we see who you are. uh number two if you're not on facebook if you could jump on any of the podcasting sites and just maybe review our podcast honestly um if you hate it i apologize but if you like it if you could you know leave some feedback that would be great it just kind of gauges um we gauge your how your interest and then how we're gonna drive the show yeah drive the show because we've said this before it's our show in the sense that we talk about pinball but it's a show for you guys because we're all part of the collective pinball.
    53:04
    Yeah, there's stuff that we've talked about that we really wouldn't even think that people would have liked, but because of interest shown on our Facebook or messages that we've got, we've really dug in depth and tried to dig deeper into these things so we could have conversations about that between you and I and engage the Facebook community and our listeners into these things. And there's a poll I'm going to put up because I've been curious about this. I think we've been doing this for eight months, right? Yeah. So our initial episodes were just kind of getting people to know us a little bit. Our interviews have always been very, very popular for the most part.
    53:40
    I often wonder. It's all downhill for me here. It is. It's all downhill. But I've wondered this. People that tune into this podcast, do you tune into the podcast because we have access to people and you want to hear interviews? or do you turn into the podcast because you enjoy the conversations that we offer on the podcast? And the last few weeks hasn't been very newsworthy for the most part. And after like our Brent Bruner interview and Steve Bowden interview, we kind of backed off the interviews because anybody that is pertinent in pinball wasn't really offering anything. So there was really nothing to talk about. So that being said, we've had a lot of feedback for people that had emailed us or messaged us and said, hey, we really appreciate it. Just kind of hearing you guys talk about pinball. Don't feel like you have to cover the news. It don't feel like you have to have an interview because it's just kind of the pinball conversations that we kind of appreciated. So and I'll put a poll up. Think about this at some point. I mean, what is it that you want out of the show? I mean, where do you prefer to see it to go? Now, we're going to drive the show to where we feel comfortable, but we can absolutely veer off into a direction where we think the majority would like to see it go. I mean, that's not going to be an issue. So we'll talk about that at some point. But listeners, think about that. Think about that. Bill, whirlwind. Whirlwind update. Whirlwind. What's going on with the whirlwind of all-time whirlwinds? Well, we'll see when it's all done. So on Friday, my buddy Dave Fahlgren. What up, Dave? Friend of the show, Dave. Dude, he actually picked up my CPU, which had a couple of issues from having a board clip that wasn't supposed to be where it was.
    55:26
    Dropped it off to his buddy Tom down in Plainfield. Had it back within 24 hours. That is a ridiculous turnaround time. Yeah. And at an affordable price that you don't have to mention, but it was ridiculous. Ridiculous. Yeah. So thank you to Tom and Dave. You guys are awesome. Yeah. So because of that, I... Oh, you know Tom, too? I've sent boards down to Tom, yes. Okay, cool. Good dude. So because of that, I was able to get the boards back in, so that's finally wrapped up. I got the underside of the play field all done with all the powder coating. And, yeah, I was actually able to flip the play field over on Sunday and start working on populating the top, which is going to take a lot of time because I have a lot of stainless steel to polish and whatnot. But it was nice just to see everything flipped over for the first time, as well as the white display on for the first real time. I love the white display. Yeah. I mean, I think that's a huge, tasteful addition. I've never seen it. Oh, white on Whirlwind? Yeah. That's going to be good. It's got to be good. Good times? Yeah. So we're getting close on it.
    56:26
    Yeah. Just really just trying to crank down now. And actually, I'll show Steve because he didn't. Oh, so Bill on the podcast is showing pictures. So that doesn't correlate. But let's do this. On Wednesday, let's upload the pics on the whirlwind, the update, to the Facebook page. And then at the same time, maybe we'll post that poll. Yeah, it looks good, man. It looks really good. For those of you that can't see it, I'm looking at a nice whirlwind with some nice stuff going on. I hope that painted the picture for you guys. That's pretty huge. It's pretty good. So, yeah, hopefully we'll get it populated before the 20th of next month. And, you know, nieces and nephews will be able to get to play it. Awesome. Yeah, on that note, I think that's probably about it. Wrapping it up. Anything else, gentlemen? We wanted to thank Steve Beattie, our good buddy, for coming in, who's been sipping the fine juices of ecstasy. Well, no, not ecstasy, like in the sense of a drug. No. Alcohol. I'll take some alcohol in.
    57:21
    So thanks for Steve for coming in and having a couple beers and prepping ourselves for TPF. I wanted to give a special thanks to our friends, Rob and Kim at Lermods.com for being sponsors of the show. Rob and Kim. Yep. Rob and Kim. Love those guys. Yep, they're awesome. Good times. The best mods. And you know what? Again, if you have a Munsters pinball, you're looking for a tasteful mod, get on that site, LureMods.com. For sure. Look at the coach car, illuminated coach car. And then, you know what? Use the coupon code SWL10, which is special when lit 10, SWL10, and get 10% off the order. It's good times. Right? Bill, you got anything else, man? No, I think we're good, man. For Bill Webb. Yeah. Total TPF. For Bill Webb and Steve Beattie, I am Ken Cromwell. Everybody have a good morning, good afternoon. and don't forget to take some time out of your day and play some pinball. So long everybody. See you at TPF!