Journalist Tool

Kineticist

  • HDashboard
  • IItems
  • ↓Ingest
  • SSources
  • KBeats
  • BBriefs
  • RIntel
  • QSearch
  • NName Review
  • +Health

v0.1.0

← Back to items

Why Gottlieb's Aren't Chris' Favourite Manufacturer

BlahCade Pinball Podcast·podcast_episode·17m 15s·analyzed·May 30, 2016
View original
Export .md

Analysis

claude-haiku-4-5-20251001 · $0.024

TL;DR

Chris criticizes Gottlieb's solid-state design philosophy as inferior to Williams/Bally, using TX Sector as prime example.

Summary

Chris Frebus (Shut Your Trap) delivers a solo episode ranting about Gottlieb's decline from respected EM manufacturer to mediocre solid-state producer. He criticizes TX Sector (1988) as boring, poorly designed, and lacking progression—comparing it unfavorably to Williams titles like Earthshaker from the same year. He argues Gottlieb excelled at EMs but lost the plot with alphanumerics after being purchased by Premier, calling for FarSight to stop adding Gottlieb tables and focus on EMs instead.

Key Claims

  • TX Sector has a 'fantastic, amazing sound package' but it's no better than Xenon despite being 8 years newer

    high confidence · Chris directly compares audio quality and expresses surprise at community hype around TX Sector's sound design

  • TX Sector lacks ramp combos, flow, progression mechanics, and meaningful gameplay progression between balls

    high confidence · Chris details specific mechanical and rule design criticisms of TX Sector's playfield layout

  • Earthshaker (Williams, 1988) is vastly superior to TX Sector (Gottlieb, 1988) in progression and mode design

    high confidence · Direct side-by-side comparison of same-year releases showing Williams' superior design philosophy

  • Gottlieb excelled at EM tables but failed when transitioning to alphanumeric solid-state after being bought by Premier

    medium confidence · Chris theorizes this as the turning point where 'the wheels fell off the cart' for Gottlieb

  • Stargate and Waterworld are both 'horrible/terrible' Gottlieb tables despite community interest in them

    medium confidence · Chris dismisses community requests for these titles, calling memories of them 'delusional'

Notable Quotes

  • “And every ball winds up being its own game. And when you start the next ball, you've lost absolutely all your progression.”

    Chris Frebus @ ~8:30 — Core criticism of TX Sector's mechanical design—lack of ball-to-ball progression makes each play feel reset

  • “If you have a really good layout and apply a good set of rules, you can have a really good table. If you take a good layout and apply a bad set of rules, you get a boring table. If you take a bad layout and tack on bad rules, you wind up with TX Sector.”

    Chris Frebus @ ~14:15 — Succinct design philosophy framework summarizing Chris's critique across multiple Gottlieb titles

  • “They are all crap. They're boring. There's nothing good going on in these tables. And not only that, the rules aren't clearly obvious.”

    Chris Frebus @ ~10:30 — Strong condemnation of community-praised Gottlieb tables (Class of 1812, Lights Camera Action, Rescue 911)

  • “Gottlieb was just like, nope, this is how you make a table. Boom. This is what makes it fun. You know, they knew what they were doing. They were shooter tables.”

    Chris Frebus @ ~11:45 — Chris acknowledging Gottlieb's strength in EM era before their decline

  • “Your memory of it is delusional. Don't even think about asking for Waterworld, because it's a terrible, terrible table.”

    Chris Frebus @ ~12:30 — Dismissive critique of community nostalgia/desire for classic Gottlieb tables

Entities

Chris FrebuspersonJared MorganpersonBrad BakerpersonJohn TrudeaupersonTX SectorgameGottliebcompanyWilliamscompanyBallycompanyFarSight Studioscompany

Signals

  • ?

    business_signal: Chris recommends FarSight abandon Gottlieb solid-state titles and focus exclusively on EM catalog, suggesting current Gottlieb selection strategy is poor

    medium · 'If Farsight wants to make more Gottliebs, make EMs. They knew what they were doing with those... just stay away from the Gottliebs, please, please'

  • ?

    event_signal: Blockade Podcast pursuing 100 Twitter followers milestone; social media engagement metric from Chris at episode close

    high · 'We are, we got 99 followers. I want that hundred follower really bad. So come on, sign up, push us over the edge, please'

  • ?

    competitive_signal: Chris positions Earthshaker (Williams, 1988) as vastly superior to TX Sector (Gottlieb, 1988) in design philosophy, with bonus/progression systems that carry across balls

    high · 'There is a true progression going on. There are bonuses that you're collecting. You're working your way through all these little mini modes... they travel from ball to ball'

  • ?

    design_philosophy: TX Sector criticized for lacking ramp combos, ball flow, drop-target monotony, and zero ball-to-ball progression—each ball resets all progress

    high · Detailed mechanical breakdowns: 'The ramps have no combos. There's no flow... dead ends on the left and right side... when you lose your ball you basically starting back at square one'

  • ?

    design_philosophy: Chris articulates design framework: (good layout + good rules = good game); (good layout + bad rules = boring); (bad layout + bad rules = TX Sector)

    high · 'If you take a good layout and apply a good set of rules you can have a really good table. If you take a good layout and apply a bad set of rules you get a really kind of boring table'

Transcript

groq_whisper · $0.052

0:00
This is the Blockade Podcast, with your hosts, Chris and Jared. You are listening to a very abbreviated blockade podcast. Abbreviated because I, your host, Shaggy Trap, a.k.a. Chris Frevis, am going solo this time. Jared is not able to join us due to family illness.
0:48
And like the good husband he is, he's supporting his wife as she takes care of the kids. And rather than, you know, abandoning her for an hour to do a podcast while little ones are yakking up their lungs. Uh, so anyway, um, but I did want to do a session this week because next week, uh, there most likely will not be a session due to myself having, uh, working on a Saturday. Yeah. That sometimes happens. Um, I got onto a movie and they, uh, cause of the holiday and it's not working on Monday, but I still want to do a five day week. so therefore five day rolls into saturday and that means no podcast but that's okay because i hope you guys got your fill from last week with our guest bread baker that was pretty awesome of him um i listened back to it and was rather shocked just how quickly the hour passed that he was with us and i i'm blown away that he was with us for that long um he probably could have gone on for another 20 minutes easy. So we definitely appreciate that. And again, if you're wondering who the heck Brad Baker is, go listen to the previous episode, find out he's the founder of VB Cabs, go to virtualpinball.com, check out their virtual cabinets. If you have the dough, you can then have a, well, I don't want to call it a fake pinball machine, but it's a Real pinball cabinet with virtual pinball on it. So it's pretty cool. But what I did want to come in here and kind of rant about today is, so this past week, I believe on Friday,
2:31
Farsight dropped TX Sector into the pinball arcade. And TX Sector is a Gottlieb table, specifically a Gottlieb Premier. It came out in 1988, the year after Victory. and I can't remember what else came out that year along with it. There was another Gottlieb. But anyway, like I said, those Gottlieb Premier tables.
Blockade Pinball Podcastorganization
Earthshakergame
Xenongame
Medieval Madnessgame
Indianapolis 500game
Roller Gamesgame
Victorygame
Lights, Camera, Actiongame
Premiercompany
Data Eastcompany
Wizard Amusementscompany
  • $

    market_signal: FarSight's newsletter announces Indianapolis 500 (Gottlieb EM) for Season 6, which Chris endorses as proper racing game design

    high · 'The good news is they just came out with their newsletter. And season six, it looks like, is going to be starting with Indianapolis 500. That is a fun table'

  • ~

    sentiment_shift: Community perception of TX Sector as 'one of the better Gottliebs' contradicted by Chris's assessment; suggests possible disconnect between nostalgia and objective gameplay quality

    medium · 'A lot of people had been like, oh, yeah, get TX Sector. It's one of the better Gottliebs... You said the same thing about Class of 1812... They are all crap'

    • 2:56
    And I've had a longstanding theory that I'm fine with any of the Gottlieb EM tables. Even some of the early Solstice tables. I mean, when you look at Black Hole, hey, that's a quality table. I got no issues with Black Hole. I have issues with haunted house but that has less to do with the rule sets or anything and the flow of the ball and more to do with the fact that I hate double flippers and especially on the right side where there's that gap that the ball falls through so that's more just a personal matter that I just load that table but But yeah, so anything pre those. So early, early, what is that? 81, 82, maybe up to 84. I don't know. I'm not sure what year those are. But anything before that, Gottlieb was doing pretty well. And then obviously they tried to jump into the whole alphanumeric market. And they'd gotten bought out by Premier. and I think that's where the wheels fell off the cart.
    4:07
    So the tables that we've gotten that just bug me. Okay so we have victory which I don think is a bad table layout It just got a bad set of rules And had it had different rule sets
    4:25
    if it had been programmed by Williams or Bally, I think then it would be a really cool table. But instead, it's just repetitive, hurry up after hurry up after hurry up and do your checkpoints, and you do your checkpoints, and now do your checkpoints again. There's no progression of a race. There's nothing, you know, advancing in that form. And I think that's the downfall of it. But I think the table layout is actually kind of fun. So to me, that's one of those, it's addictive, but it's also bad addictive. It's like so bad, it's good, you know, that kind of thing.
    4:59
    But then when you start getting into, you know, lights, camera, action, which is just, it's so boring. And I just think it's a terrible table.
    5:10
    So I'm not going to bog down on all the Gottliebs that make a rundown list because we know what's in the pinball arcade.
    5:19
    But anyway, so now we're getting TX Sector. And a lot of people had been like, oh, yeah, get TX Sector. It's one of the better Gottliebs.
    5:31
    And so then you ask, well, why is it better Gottlieb? And everybody always talked about, oh, it's got this fantastic, amazing sound package.
    5:38
    So I have not had any prior experience to it. Never played it in real life. So me seeing it on Pinball Arcade, this is my first foray into TX Sector.
    5:52
    So I boot it up, start playing it, and I'm sitting there thinking to myself, this sound package is what you all are freaking out about, as it's so incredibly awesome. Because to me, it's no better than, say, Xenon, and Xenon came out in 1980. well 1979 if you're farsighted um but uh yeah so you know here you've got eight years separating these two tables and i don't see anything fantastic about the sound design so and i actually start you know playing it and it's one of those tables where it's just kind of giving now they're not necessarily random uh sound blips and and you know call outs of voice that are happening but they are also not instructing you in any way shape or form it's more like oh well if you hit you know this particular uh target also it's gonna say dx actor or something like that you know it so it's giving a specific call out to a specific shot but that call out is not sitting there telling you go for the wall or you know anything else like that it's not directing you towards anything now you want to say just said go for the wall because i got roller games on my mind I always say Roller Games has a fantastic audio package. It's got some of my favorite music of any pinball machine out there. But you know what else it's got? Good gameplay.
    7:15
    I'm not sitting there telling everybody that, oh, you need to go play Roller Games just because the audio. I mean, what's the fun of that? You know, you want to have actually good game. So the more I'm playing TX Sector, the more and more I'm just like, are you kidding me? this table is just driving me nuts because what are you shooting at the ramps have no combos there's no flow it's not like you can you know do a medieval badass where you know one ramp leads to the next ramp and then you get back and forth and do you know the kind of figure eight if you will of a ramp action it that doesn't increase your point tolls it's got two dead ends uh on the left and right side which are where you can trigger your um or collect your your uh extra balls and your specials but again it's dead end so there goes the flow there and there's not really any loop to uh to shoot so the only thing you have left now is your drop targets and this is one of those tables where you shoot the drop targets and you got to shoot both banks in order to get to the next multiplier, I guess is what you will do those both banks three times. And I believe that lights your extra ball But the part that just bugs me to no end is that then when you lose your ball you basically starting back at square one So each ball is its own game There no carryover no progression going on
    8:46
    And each ball winds up being its own game. And when you start the next ball, you've lost absolutely all your progression. that kind of reminds me of of what i didn't like about uh city of gold el dorado city of gold and what is vastly improved by the em of el dorado um i don't know there's something about that that i'm so not a fan of that um because then you know ball one is the same as ball three there's no So if you have a really bad ball one, I guess the flip side is, oh, well, yeah, I had a bad ball one, but I can have a great ball two. Or I can have a great ball one and a really bad ball two. And ball three is essentially the same thing as having a really great ball one if you do a great score on that. I don't know. It just is irking me.
    9:43
    And it comes back to everybody keeps on saying, oh, this is one of the better Gottliebs. Yeah, you said the same thing about class of 1812. You said the same thing about life's camera action. You said the same thing about rescue 911. And you know what? They are all crap. They're boring. There's nothing good going on in these tables. And not only that, the rules aren't clearly obvious. And it's like, what year were you made in? You're made in 1988. This is the same year that Williams is sitting there putting out Earthshaker. Now compare Earthshaker of 88 to TX Sector of 88. There is a true progression going on. There are bonuses that you're collecting. You're working your way through all these little mini modes. Now this is obviously before DMDs had true wizard mode going on, But still, you've got all these modes that you can work through, and they travel from ball to ball. You have bonuses that travel from ball to ball.
    10:54
    You know, go back even to Stern with Flight 2000. Things carry over. It's like, what is your problem, Gottlieb? And for that, you know, all these people that are sitting there wanting more Gottliebs, God forbid.
    11:09
    And they're like, oh, well, I want Stargate. You know what? I've played Stargate. It's a horrible table. I'm sorry. It is. Your memory of it is... you're delusional.
    11:20
    Don't even think about asking for Waterworld, because it's a terrible, terrible table. Just quit it. If Farsight wants to make more god leaves, make EMs. They knew what they were doing with those. Those were built solidly, even though the rule sets were very basic, like most EMs. They were kings of it. They knew what the heck they were doing. Williams was still fumbling about trying to, you know, I don't know. It was almost like Williams was trying to put toys and tricks onto EMs and they just weren't working.
    11:51
    You can see, you know, they're doing very bizarre table layouts and stuff. Whereas Gottlieb was just like, nope, this is how you make a table. Boom. This is what makes it fun. You know, they knew what they were doing. They were shooter tables. and then it's that strange thing where you know suddenly williams just they they they figured it all out they started dumping it into their tables and bally was figuring it out the same time too and i i found it strange that they i always associate them as being the same company but obviously they're they weren't back then there were two different entities um but it's it's so bizarre that they had figured it out and just left Gottlieb in the dust.
    12:33
    TX sector is designed by John Trudeau. Trudeau has done some interesting tables for Williams even. And that's where I, again, it comes down to, it's not well on TX sector. It is kind of the layout, but it comes down to the rules and what they have you shooting for. And yeah it I don know This is nothing against Farsight and the build that they made of TX Sector It has everything to do with the choice of TX Sector which is like Now, the good news is they just came out with their newsletter.
    13:08
    And season six, it looks like, is going to be starting with Indianapolis 500. That is a fun table. that when you compare to victory is how you do a racing table now there are a ton of of uh racing style tables out there and it's certainly unfair to can you know compare indy 500 to victory but it's that whole mindset of if you take a good layout and apply a good set of rules you can have a really good table if you take a good layout and apply a bad set of rules you get a really kind of boring table. If you take a bad layout and tack on bad rules, you wind up with the X sector. Sorry. That's just my opinion of it. So anyway, yeah, Gottlieb sucks. Hate them all.
    14:01
    I made the mistake in a thread of actually lumping in Last Action Hero mistakenly because I used the initials of LAH when I was thinking of Lights, Camera, Action, LCA.
    14:15
    And yeah, my hate for Data East tables is, it's a thing too, but it has more to do with the build quality of their machines rather than the rules of their machines because playing them on TPA, I don't mind them so much. But when I would find them out in the wild, they were always broken, always underpowered flippers or toys that didn't work and stuff like that. So digital with Data East is actually proving to be a good thing. So, hey, bring on some more Data East if need be. But just stay away from the godly, please, please. Okay. Anyway, that was my little rant just to give you guys something for a blockade podcast and to just kind of give you all a heads up of what's going on and why you're not going to be getting a true podcast this week and a true podcast next week. But don't worry, we'll hit it hard by then. I'm sure there'll be plenty of stuff that has happened for us to talk about. Me, I'm going to go see X-Men Apocalypse and maybe I'll taunt Jared with that kind of stuff that bugs him that it's not pinball talk.
    15:27
    All right. Hey, check us out. Subscribe to us on Twitter. we are at blockade or you can hit me up at shut your traps or Jared at Jared morgues with the blockade account. We are, we got 99 followers. I want that a hundred follower really bad. So come on, sign up, push us over the edge, please. Don't forget about our t-shirts at let's see. It's a represent.com forward slash blockade dash shirt, pick your color and enjoy the cottony comfort if you want to hit us up with an email go ahead we are blahblahblockade at gmail.com alright gang well we'll hit you up soon we'll let you know when we're recording next via twitter and thanks for listening bye bye wizardamusement.com the west coast leader Classic Pinball. Makers of custom pinball shooter rods and buyer specifications. Swap out your standard ball plunger with something themed to your specific table. Installs in less than five minutes with no custom tools. Even if you don't own a table, looks great as a pinball memento to admire. Prices start at $39, but mention Blockhead Podcast and receive 10% off your order. Wizardamusement.com. Sales, restoration, customization. don't forget to leave a review on itunes or your favorite podcast hosting service that is delivered to you can't prove unless you tell us how now stop listening place it in ball