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Episode 17 :: The Electric Bat Cast

Electric Bat Cast·podcast_episode·1h 19m·held·Jun 25, 2024
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Analysis

claude-haiku-4-5-20251001 · $0.035

TL;DR

Electric Bat hosts discuss upcoming tournaments, American Pinball's He-Man confirmation, and arcade operations.

Summary

Electric Bat Cast Episode 17 features hosts Kale Hernandez and Rachel Bess discussing upcoming tournaments at Electric Bat Arcade (Waffles 2 and Dog Days of Summer 2), sharing insights on David Fix's Pinball Magazine podcast appearance where he confirmed American Pinball passion for He-Man and admitted past games lacked passion, and answering community questions about custom pinball builds and arcade operations.

Key Claims

  • David Fix confirmed American Pinball is working on He-Man and stated it's the first license the American team was passionate about

    high confidence · Kale and Rachel cite David Fix's appearance on Pinball Magazine Pincast where he allegedly said the American team was passionate about He-Man but not about previous games like Oktoberfest, Valhalla, or Galactic Tank Force

  • David Fix admitted Barry O's Barbecue Challenge was a 'giant misstep'

    high confidence · Direct statement attributed to David Fix on the Pinball Magazine podcast

  • American Pinball does not need money but needs help acquiring parts and talent

    medium confidence · Rachel and Kale speculate based on Ametron's strong performance and American's investor search focusing on amusement industry people rather than capital

  • Steve Bowden won Yagpin with games that had wood blocks to increase steepness, lightning flippers, and some games with very small two-inch flippers

    high confidence · Congratulatory mention with specific details about tournament machine modifications

  • The Dukes of Hazzard custom pin by Katie and Olivia (Outpost Codelia team) features custom boards, new multiball, and custom rules redesigned from Paragon

    high confidence · Jake Danzig's question and hosts' detailed description of the machine

  • Electric Bat Arcade has approximately 300 Discord members

    high confidence · Rachel mentions 'almost have 300 people in there'

  • Rachel handles 100% of the administrative work for Electric Bat Arcade

    high confidence · Direct statement: 'I am 100% of the admin'

  • Electric Bat Arcade uses machine audits rather than manual token counting for revenue tracking

    high confidence · Rachel explains they check audits monthly on all machines, taking over an hour

  • Pulp Fiction manual has mislabeled fuses for the bullseye magnet (shows F117 but should be F118)

Notable Quotes

  • “They get on a plane. Yeah, and it sounds like they've got enough of folks coming out so that they can just get like half a plane.”

    Kale/Rachel @ Early segment — Illustrates the 'Waffles' tournament's unusual nature: California players flying to Arizona specifically for Waffle House and pinball

  • “This is the first time the American team was passionate about a license.”

    David Fix (quoted by hosts) @ Mid-segment — Confirmation of American Pinball's He-Man project and admission that previous games lacked team passion

  • “He built a machine that outperforms a company that supposedly their specialty is making pinball machines.”

    Rachel @ Custom pins discussion — Critical comparison of Jake Danzig's custom Dukes of Hazzard reliability versus American Pinball's Galactic Tank Force

  • “The creativity is unmatched. And the art is rad. Just the style. It has a very special style that is distinct from all other homebrews, custom pens, whatever.”

    Rachel @ Custom pins segment — Praise for Tanner Petsch's custom pin artistry and distinct aesthetic

  • “I am 100% of the admin.”

    Rachel @ Admin discussion — Candid admission of operational burden at Electric Bat Arcade

  • “I don't use QuickBooks. I use Google Docs and sheets of paper.”

    Rachel @ Operations discussion — Reveals manual, informal record-keeping for arcade operations

  • “My biggest demand is more techs. I have a lot of people that would like to work for us as a tech, but unfortunately they don't yet know how to tech or how to tech expeditiously.”

    Rachel @ Staffing discussion — Identifies skills gap and staffing bottleneck for arcade operations

  • “If you are the person that knows about something and the other person, maybe that's not their area of expertise. It's your responsibility, I think, to do that.”

    Kale — Commentary on professional standards for podcast production quality

Entities

American PinballcompanyDavid FixpersonElectric Bat ArcadeorganizationKale HernandezpersonRachel BesspersonStern PinballcompanyHe-Manproduct

Signals

  • ?

    business_signal: Electric Bat Arcade operates with very small core team (Kale, Rachel, plus helpers) with significant admin burden primarily on Rachel

    high · Rachel: 'I am 100% of the admin' and 'still 90% of the work is being done by me and you on a daily basis.' Identifies tech hiring as biggest constraint.

  • ?

    business_signal: American Pinball seeking investors/help in amusement industry field rather than capital, indicating operational challenges despite parent company Ametron's strong financial performance

    medium · Kale: 'they don't need money they need help... they need to go on the shark tank of pinball... They're not just wanting capital because they don't need it. Ametron is doing very well.'

  • ?

    community_signal: Electric Bat Cast Discord community growing to ~300 members with active participation and advice-sharing among pinball enthusiasts

    high · Rachel: 'we almost have 300 people in there' and 'the whole community... offers advice'

  • ?

    event_signal: Electric Bat Arcade hosting multiple tournament formats including team-play variants (split flipper, traditional team) with casual, fun-focused appeal

    high · Discussion of Chewy's 'Bats Night Out' tournaments: 'He's doing these one-offs where he started out with a team challenge' with split flipper format being particularly popular

  • ~

    sentiment_shift: Strong enthusiasm for custom/homebrew pinball machines and recognition of their reliability and design quality exceeding commercial products

    high · Rachel comparing Jake's Dukes of Hazzard to Galactic Tank Force: 'He built a machine that outperforms a company that supposedly their specialty is making pinball machines. I always thought that was impressive.'

Transcript

groq_whisper · $0.239

0:00
Today's episode of the Electric Batcast is brought to you by Stern. Insider Connected. Head to sternpinball.com to sign up today. Marco's specialties, everything pinball. Pinball parts and more at marcopinball.com. And Game Room Goodies. Check out gameroomgoodies.com for new and used pinball machines, arcade games, jukeboxes, pool tables, and more. And now, the click and clack of pinball, Rachel Bess and Kale Hernandez.
0:56
it your notice yeah no need for a notice yes indeed good good you're on it so we've got some pinball what we've got some pinball to talk about right that's why we're here um what's coming what's going on the electric bat i want to um go ahead and hit this up because we have an exciting event happening tomorrow and hopefully I'll get this out tonight so people get excited about it. Yeah. What's it called? It is called the Waffles. It's Waffles 2. It's where people fly in from California so they can go to Waffle House because they don't have them there. And then they come to the bat and play a tournament during the middle of the day. and then they go back to Waffle House for dinner and then they fly back to California that night. It's a day trip. They get on a plane. Yeah, and it sounds like they've got enough of folks coming out so that they can just get like half a plane. Yeah. So this is going to be at noon on Tuesday and it's right before our league night. So this is exciting for our friends who own their own businesses or can work on their own time schedule. Or they telecommute with a green screen. Yep. They can play pinball all day long. Yeah. You can come and get some Whopper points. It's like an appetizer. You can get your Whopper points for the Waffles Tournament. That's right. And you can even win money. Yeah. Did you know this? I did know this. It's six bucks. One dollar goes to the IFPA, our friend Josh. He goes straight to Josh's pocket. Josh gets a buck. Every time we play pinball, Josh gets a little cut. It's funny. He's big. What a smart guy.
2:53
And then you have, okay, so it's six bucks. It's noon. It's Tuesday, June the 25th, which is tomorrow. Yes. Hope to see you guys there. Anybody's invited. It is limited to 40 people, and there are at least 11 people coming from California. Right. So let's make room for 29 Arizonans. This is just another point of how pinball is booming. It's huge. It is. We're blowing up. We're always seeing new people at the arcade. We have arcades around us expanding. Yeah. Like really expanding, just blowing out that waistband. We're coming for you, Portland, with all your games on location. Phoenix is on your tail. We're doing something. I don't know, but it's exciting, and people are doing things right. We also have the Dog Days of Summer 2. Yeah, another special tournament. The second installment of Roland's tournament. You win money here, too. Congratulations. Roland won the Stern Insider Connected Kit for his Elvira. Oh, that's right. Yeah, last episode we had people enter. Yep, and Roland won. Congratulations for that. dog days of summer too july 21st 2024 yeah that's next month and it's at the electric bat arcade it is a pin bull pit ball production i'm glad you said it i always screw that up i have it written down right here smart yeah there's a very cool graphic uh and all that stuff go go to our social media if you want to know any any more about it but i think i just told you everything i don't But that's exciting.

high confidence · Rachel and John Schapel discovery of documentation error; coined new term 'Erratica' for manual errors

@ Podcast audio quality discussion
Waffles 2
event
Dog Days of Summer 2event
Steve Bowdenperson
Jake Danzigperson
Dukes of Hazzardproduct
Sean Irbyperson
8 Ball Beyondproduct
Tanner Petschperson
Marco Specialtiescompany
Galactic Tank Forceproduct
Strictly Custom Pinball Machinesorganization
Barry O's Barbecue Challengeproduct
Yagpinevent
Pinball Magazine Pincastorganization
Ametroncompany
Pulp Fictionproduct
Chewyperson
  • ?

    design_philosophy: David Fix admitted American Pinball's previous games (Oktoberfest, Valhalla, Galactic Tank Force, Barry O's Barbecue) lacked team passion and were missteps

    high · Rachel: 'He admitted Barry O's barbecue adventure was a giant misstep' and 'He admitted they weren't passionate about Galactic Tank Force. I bet Nordman loved that they were completely not passionate about his potentially very cool game.'

  • $

    market_signal: Increased custom/homebrew pinball activity with significant financial investment and sophisticated design/engineering (custom boards, woodwork, CNC routing)

    high · Multiple examples: Jake's Dukes of Hazzard described as 'very expensive to build,' Arzach featuring 'custom woodwork... built... in his driveway... CNC... routed out'

  • ?

    personnel_signal: Possible interest in Christopher Franchi working on He-Man for American Pinball, though not currently confirmed

    low · Rachel: 'And hopefully, hopefully, hopefully Franchi's doing the art because Franchi would do He-Man right... Franchi, if you're listening and they aren't using you, let's do it.'

  • ?

    announcement: David Fix confirmed American Pinball is developing He-Man machine; first project where team expressed passion

    high · Kale cites Nap Arcade's interpretation of David Fix's Pinball Magazine Pincast comments: 'he said, do not worry. It's going to be amazing. It's going to be amazing. and we're going to knock people's socks off because he said, this is the first time the American team was passionate about a license.'

  • ?

    product_concern: Pulp Fiction pinball manual contains documentation error: fuse labels reversed for bullseye magnet (shows F117 but should be F118)

    high · Rachel and John Schapel discovered and documented error; hosts created term 'Erratica' for such manual issues

    • 4:37
    And Chewy, Chewy, I swear, this guy just keeps hitting home run after home run. I think everybody's aware of Chewy's world famous all classics bounty knockout tournament. Which is coming up this Sunday, this month. It's always the last Sunday of the month. Incredible.
    4:57
    And now he's doing these one-offs where he started out with a team challenge. So you pick three people.
    5:06
    Well, you. You pick two people. There's a team of three people. And these are called bats night out, right? So the first one was team play. And this was really cool because it was three people on a team, and each person had to choose before the tournament started whether they would play ball one, ball two, or ball three all night. You couldn't change. So you had to use a little strategy because on some games it makes sense. Like on classics, where bonus can carry over, you want your heavy hitter up first. On some of the other games, you want everything set up so you've got your closer, right? Certainly. So there was some strategy to how that went, and that was awesome. God, that was so much fun. And then he had another one. People loved it. They were so excited to do another team one. And then this last month, he did a split flipper, and then people decided they really, really loved that. one of the things that I'm excited about about these tournaments is that there are some people that are not into giant competitive tournaments, and these are much more for fun. They're not for points. It's very casual and very fun, and it's not 120 people yet.
    6:18
    So there's just something for everybody. Yeah. And you get to play in some form or another as a team. You and I were a split flipper team, and we got better scores on games than what we get on league night. Yeah, it was incredible. It was so much fun. We were getting gigantic scores, and it was so much fun. And we weren't the only ones doing it. When we would approach a game, I would tell you, hey, do this as like a strategy. And you were like, oh, I've never tried that before. Are you sure? and I was like, trust me. Yeah. Right? Yeah. And we won. I mean, that game, that particular game. Yeah, yeah, yeah. We didn't win the whole thing. No. But the one time that I had a strategy. Your strategy was, for people who are wondering, I usually plunge for the skill shot to get into the house, in Elvira House of Horrors. And Cale was like, no, no, no, stop doing that. I was the plunger. I was on the right-hand side for Split Flipper. And he's like, soft plunge. and then shoot it into the house or pick your shot. Well, soft plunge. Get it safely on the flipper. That will feed it to the right flipper.
    7:32
    And you have a little ball save, so if you kind of mess up. Which I didn't. Try it again. You never messed up. We had three balls, and you were successful at all three. And I love the look on your face when you pull it off. You're like, oh, that is a nice strategy because you trap up on the right flipper and you have so many shots to choose from instead of going for that skill shot. But you know what? If you go for the skill shot, that's cool, too. That's the great thing about pinball. You can do what you want.
    8:03
    Well, somewhat. You can somewhat do what you want. If I get people saying, Kale said I could do what I want while they're sliding things all over the ground. I have a few notes here. Man, we have a lot of questions. We do. And you know what? But I have, I usually, the camera that's pointed at us, I usually just have a battery in there. But now I have a gigantic, it's a massive external battery because we have a lot of questions. Oh, yes. So we're going to see what happens here. First thing I want to get into, this was pretty, Nap. Nap Arcade. Nap Arcade got in touch with us, was so excited. because he believes David Fix from American Pinball confirmed He-Man. He does believe that. We did a whole episode about it where you were not excited. Not excited for American to have that title. And this is the reason he thinks that American has He-Man. First of all, he's been hearing some rumblings for a long time, and he already thought that American had He-Man.
    9:16
    But then David Fix was on the Pinball Magazine Pincast, the Pinball Magazine and Pinball News Pincast. There was a man. It was like a three-hour. It wasn't all David Fix, but I guarantee he could talk for three hours. A hundred percent. But he didn't. They had different sections, and he came in for one. They got the shepherd's hook after. Yeah, yeah. He talked for about an hour or so. It was very interesting. What was really interesting, he usually seems to go on podcasts where they kind of are easier on him, a little softer. But I think it was Jonathan Joosten? Is that his name, Joosten? Yeah, J-O-O-S-T-E-N, Dutch. With those European sensibilities, he really hit them hard. Yeah, we call it the no-horse-shit European journalism. Well, because the earnings report came out, and American hasn't been doing very well. but on the flip side of that Ametron's been doing extremely well which is great for American right and so when those it was leaked that they were looking for people to buy into American it really seems like they don't need money they need help they need to go on the shark tank of pinball where they've just got Gary Stern and Marco Specialties and just all of the people that can get things done. Right. But anyhow, when they were looking for some help or investors or people to buy into American, it really looked like they were wanting people in the amusement field. Which is smart. They're not just wanting capital because they don't need it. Ametron is doing very well. They're doing all kinds of stuff. And if you want to buy in on it, I think you can get on to the Indian NASDAQ. Yeah, I don't know how to do that, but called Charles Schwab. Once they go public, yeah.
    11:17
    Some interesting things David said in this podcast. He admitted Barry O's barbecue adventure was a giant misstep.
    11:29
    But didn't he also say that that was going to be like a layout for future custom white label games? So if you want that, Jack Daniels, give him a call.
    11:43
    Yeah, I mean, this is another interesting thing you said. So, oh, well, back to He-Man. This is the reason Nap Arcade was like, I think this is coming. Because in this podcast, David Fix mentions a podcaster crying about them having a certain license.
    12:12
    That's me. I mean, not literally crying. But he said, do not worry. It's going to be amazing. and we're going to knock people's socks off because he said, this is the first time the American team was passionate about a license. So they were not passionate about Oktoberfest. They were not passionate about the Viking game, Valhalla. Yeah. But they were just building that. They weren't designing it. What about Galactic? They were not passionate about that. He admitted they weren't passionate about Galactic Tank Force. I bet Nordman loved that they were completely not passionate about his potentially very cool game. And they were not passionate about the barbecue game. He said this is the first time American team was passionate about the license. Cool. Well, I'm happy about that. But the unfortunate thing is there's a game in between now and He-Man. But they're not passionate about that. They're about to release another game they're not passionate about. Well, let's sit tight. It's going to be awesome. Very interesting stuff. You know, I still hope the best for them. And, you know, it would be amazing if they could get some help between now and then to make sure that He-Man is released with code that works and shots that work and parts that work.
    13:40
    And hopefully, hopefully, hopefully Franchi's doing the art because Franchi would do He-Man right. Yeah. I mean, it would be dope. I love that. You know? Yeah. We're still rooting for you. So, Franchi, if you're listening and they aren't using you, let's do it. We'll do an intervention?
    14:02
    Takeover? A hostile takeover? No, no, no. When you raise money. Like a Kickstarter? A Kickstarter. We'll get you some money, man. Everybody will put in a little bit and we'll do it. Americans should do a Kickstarter. They don't need money.
    14:15
    What they need, is there like a version of Kickstarter for talent? oh man pull out that burn cream there you went how about that i'm just saying they need you know the parts acquiring parts is not as simple as what yeah yeah people think that don't know about that we don't like pinball news is not our thing but since we did touch on that and and uh he man is your dream thing we thought we'd just uh give you that little nugget um and if you want to hear that whole podcast go to uh pinball magazine and pinball news pincast i think it's the last one man it's long it's like three hours uh let's drop it in start the tape on a um it's always fun to listen to david fix on a hot mic but this was this was a good one because jonathan really pushed him on because he was you know wishy-washy can't wait to chat at expo a couple months away Shout out to a great friend, Jake Danzig, who gave us, local pinball hero, he gave us an IRL question. He didn't write in. He showed up at the arcade. He showed up at the arcade, and he had a question. He played two games of pinball. I think he played John Wick. An analog question submission. Yep. He wanted, I think it was a top ten custom pins, home pins, whatever you want to call them, home boots, or custom pins.
    15:48
    But we don't really have a top ten, so we're just going to tell you some of our favorites that we've seen, mostly at conventions, right?
    15:57
    Mostly at conventions. I'll start with Jake's. Dukes of Hazzard. Put together by the Outpost Codelia team, Katie and Olivia did excellent work completely redesigning board sets and making that play field play differently than it did when it was a Paragon. For sure. And I know some people online have been like, is this really a custom pin? Isn't it just a re-theme? Man, they went beyond. It's totally different. Custom boards. They just used the play field and the cabinet. I mean, all the art. So the layout is the same. It's kind of like, would you call Beatles a re-theme? I don't know. Some people might. I don't know. It's a reimagining. Reimagining. Yeah, because custom rules, they added a multi-ball. So it's like, if you haven't seen this thing, it's based on a paragon.
    16:56
    But it's a Dukes of Hazzard theme. and if you want to see it in action you can uh go to youtube and search jake danzig what dukes of hazard dukes of hazard yeah pin and uh there's a whole stream we did man that was a long time ago was that like covid times i think so jake brought the orcadian olivia may actually i think they may have uh brought the the dukes of hazard to electric bat arcade for the day and we had a great time what but this the the this whole team went above and beyond and this thing is expensive like i don't want to say i mean jake's talked to us about it but this thing was very expensive to to build something like this and what was mind-blowing was the reliability yeah it worked consistently right which is the whole stream which galactic tank force can't even last stream. That's true. So this is really doing something. He built a machine that outperforms a company that supposedly their specialty is making pinball machines. I always thought that was impressive.
    18:13
    Yes. But let's not just talk about Jake the whole time, because he asked the question. He asked the question. But that's one of our favorite pins. Yeah. another one sean irby oh eight ball beyond you blew this up at expo and you happened to do it in front of him and a bunch of other people that i was really so happy because uh i mean those of you who know me i'm not like the best pinball player in the world but i hit this combo on on sean's machine and he was actually watching me and sean's a world-class player he was actually watching me and said i've never seen anybody combo that shot over and over again made me feel good Yes. Still makes me feel good. And you know that because I bring it up a lot. A lot. Yeah. So thank you for the compliment, Sean. And that's another game we really love. And it held up. You and me played the crap out of it. Mike Vinacore. Yeah. There were a bunch of other serious players. And we were just in a line, like, rotating, going, I need to play this thing again. Fantastic game. and really, really well done.
    19:24
    Every aspect of it, the art, the mechanics. Plus, me and you, we like that theme. Any kind of outer space-y thing is up in our wheelhouse. For sure.
    19:37
    And I think an honorable mention is the Trashland. Yeah, Tanner Petsch makes them very... Yeah. So as a fellow art school graduate I wish that we would have gone to college together at the same time I mean it always so neat whenever you see people doing real useful things in art school For sure, for sure. So it's neat to see the way that he's – like he's got one now where the ramp comes out of the machine and goes back in. And they just look very cool. They seem straight out of Juxtapose magazine kind of deal. The creativity is unmatched. And the art is rad. Just the style. It has a very special style that is distinct from all other homebrews, custom pens, whatever. And I think I hope he sticks with it and maybe teams up with someone that can help him dial in all of the components and make these like fully realized, like something that I could put in the bat. Right. Oh, and most importantly, reliable. This is an honorable mention because I tried to play it three times at Expo and I couldn't because it wasn't working. Right. So I think he does things like so outside of the box. Literally, I mean, like the ball travels outside of the cabinet, gets you a beer, then comes back.
    21:07
    But they don't always work. Right, like Python. This is Alice in Wonderland, but much. But man, are they cool to look at and A-plus work. Thank you so much for the question, Jake. And you can follow, there's a very cool, what do you call it, Facebook group? Yes. On Facebook. It's a Facebook group on Facebook. Crazy. called Strictly Custom Pinball Machines. Yep. I'm a member. It's about 10,000 members. Yeah. Let's get those numbers up and make everybody in that group happy.
    21:40
    Wonderful group of creative folks. Yeah. Now, are we – I want to mention another one. You have something? I was going to go into the readers' stuff. Okay. Well, I want to mention one more. You know what? You can do whatever you want. Excellent. Go with it. I'll just be quiet. The Mobius one that CW guys made that we played it at ZapCon this year, and it was beautiful.
    22:06
    And he has a full pin side. I think I've mentioned it on this podcast before. But please do it again. Arzach, A-R-Z-A-C-H, and there's a pin side thread following production beginning to end, and it's great. Check it out. It is absolutely fabulous, and you know I love some Mobius, so I was excited to see this. And the woodwork, the custom woodwork he did, whew.
    22:32
    Yeah, he built the whole thing in his driveway. CNC, like, routed out the place. I mean, it looks real, real good. Why are you laughing? Because I can't believe I added this. I don't even know if I want to say this in here, in the notes.
    22:50
    Let's just move on. Wow. How bad is it whenever Kale, it's like, maybe not appropriate. No, I don't know why I put this in here. It's like, I must have been driving and you added this.
    23:04
    I'm not even going to get into it. I'm going to save it for the next one. Okay. That's why, that's the, what do you call that, a cliffhanger? Yeah, a cliffhanger. Kale's going to say something funny next time. Next time. Hold on. I'm going to save it for it. We have an addendum to the Pulp Fiction Manual. Oh. This is important for, this is our, what do you call this, a public service announcement? Yes, one of my favorite things to do when I read, I always have a pencil next to me to edit in case I could come across some sort of error in a book or magazine that I'm reading. And this is not 100% my discovery. This is John Schapel as well. We've both come across this issue with two separate Pulp Fiction. and the manual is mislabeled the fuses so it it says that the bullseye magnet is powered it goes through f117 it does not it goes through f118 which if the fuse is not obviously blown and your magnet's not working it it can be very confusing because you've tested everything in line and like why is this not working so we we figured out should the f117 and f118 are reversed If you have a Pulp Fiction, go ahead and do a little arrow back and forth on that to let you know. So I coined a new term for this because I love finding these errors so much. What is it? Erratica.
    24:34
    Oh, I got goosebumps on that one. Errata. I like that. And this is no slight to Butch Peel and the team. No. Because that is an amazing manual. And at least it has a manual, unlike Galactic Tank Force. but that was a stab you ran out of burn cream now we're into stab cream no I'm sorry you guys just make it too easy so but Pulp Fiction does have I think the best manual and Bush just left Chicago you just told me that what a great guy wish him well wherever he wants to make manuals Manuals. He can come make manuals for us. Yeah, just come around. Yeah, just come out here.
    25:24
    Hope, wish you the best on wherever you decide to go do some stuff and write books and all that good stuff.
    25:34
    Okay. Can we get into the mailbag? Absolutely. Did you say I should start at the bottom? Is that the old ones? I think the oldest ones are at the bottom. We have a lot of messages. But start wherever you feel most comfortable. If we're going through all of them, it doesn't matter. okay I can't believe you put this in here from okay you know what let's go with it oh god Roland has one of our local players he's been going through and he's catching up with some older episodes yeah so he said on episode 14 you mentioned needing to have balls to do stuff balls of steel So, like, in an interview, if the audio equipment sucks, can you talk more about this and how you've used your ability to have balls in other situations? Like, hey, this situation sucks, or you're not meeting my bare minimum. Or, this is a waste of my time until we do it the right way cases.
    26:43
    Is that directed at you? I think both of us can take that. Yeah, well, we both have. Have we been in a situation like that? We've been in many situations like that. And I think that just comes with age. At the bat? Oh, not necessarily at the bat because we're kind of in charge. And we have, of course, we've come across situations that have been like, this is untenable. We need to either end this or change this. Right. And that happens. I mean, there's to everybody. Right. But as you get older, I think you, it becomes easier. Sure, sure. And if you haven't listened to that episode, it was all about David Fix. Wow, we're really... No, no, that's what he's talking about. Yeah, I know. He's like him and Steve Bowden. Speaking of Steve, congratulations to Steve Bowden. Oh, he just won Yagpin. Congratulations. And he, man, those games, I don't know how they were playing those games. because they were basically, well, they had, a lot of the games had. Some of them were on wood blocks to make them super steep. Make them super steep. And then you had lightning flippers on like almost every game. And then there was like a Godzilla and Attack from Mars that basically had the can crusher, Wodanelli flippers. They were almost two-inch flippers. They were so small. But Steve won it. Great. Steve kicked ass. Great player. Thank you so much. But Steve and David or Stephen and David Fix were on a podcast and the audio and visual was just like horrible. It was it was something you couldn't even listen to. And I was saying it's I think it's up to the podcasters to go, hey, man, let's pump the brakes and stop this and do something that the audience is going to actually enjoy. I mean, I've talked to so many podcasters who are like, you know, why did that that happen? And, you know, this day and age, I think it's just important for companies to understand, you know, get some good microphones. Go back and listen to episode 14 because I give some suggestion for like cheap microphones, USB mic or even cheap XLR mics. But in any field, if you are the person that knows about something and the other person, maybe that's not their area of expertise. It's your responsibility, I think, to do that. Oh, 100 percent. Like, for example, we run an arcade. We are the ones that know that you should always use that arcade's tokens in their token machines. Some people, it just doesn't even occur to them that if they don't, that it's theft, essentially. And it really, really hurts that arcade. So it's my job to educate people that maybe didn't think about that. Certainly. And there's been – it's not just Electric Bat Arcade. There was a local arcade that stopped using tokens because so many people were using other arcade tokens at that arcade. And that kind of sucks. Yeah, they had to pay out. I mean, they have to pay out the people. They didn't own all of the games, so they had to pay out people. And if people are putting in tokens from other arcades that they didn't put the money into their token machines for, that money is just coming out of that arcade's pocket. And it's like you said, it's sad. They had all these custom tokens made, and they had this cool feel and idea, and they had to stop using them because – And they were in the unfortunate situation where the arcade literally across the street was giving away tokens. So people would go there to get the tokens and then go across the street to use the tokens. and so if guys if if you if you're doing this or you know anybody that's doing it just educate them like yeah support none of these uh you know mall arcades the big corporate arcades they're all using cards now right it's usually like the the little guys that want to keep it real they're using tokens like like don't don't screw those guys over you know support them use their tokens and their machines and um otherwise you'll only be left with mall arcades right and then that and then it's your fault you specifically only only you can prevent mall arcade theft pinball game theft yeah okay well and one other situation i've um i don't run into this too much but where like somebody wants to fix a machine in a certain way and i'm just like no we're not we're not doing that um like like weird stuff uh like you will catch the machine on fire or you will break it or it looks yeah i have had i have had the balls to be like no stop what you're doing get away from the machine and and don't do that but so i think balls are good for both men and women 100 to uh tell people what's up let's move on to gutter ghoul we have a question from gutter ghoul he's um always on discord yes he's always on the discord and he is giving us another question if you want to be on uh the discord we almost have 300 people in there that seems like a lot isn't that crazy yeah and and people really excited about pinball we're meeting new friends yes and and offering advice and everything it's not just us like every the whole community community there um offers advice uh go to our website electricbatarcade.com go to the podcast tab and there's a link in there to get you into our discord it's a secret but now it's out you've told them yep now you can join from gutter ghoul and i haven't read these okay so there might be some big words i flubbed okay Well, I'll help you through it. I'll warn you. Can you give us a high-level view of the admin it takes to run the bat? I can already tell this is a question. This is a Rachel question. This is a question for you. Okay. Because you're the admin. I am 100% of the admin. Are you having to document tokens by machine to make sure they pay themselves off? How often are you restocking the Tiki Bar? Do you need QuickBooks or are you using Excel to tabulate and calculate the operating costs?
    33:14
    What's it like staffing the bat, contracted or full employees? Man, what? Those are really detailed. Let's go through them one by one. Do I need to break these down for you? Yes, because. This is what the Batcast is all about. The nuts and bolts of running a successful bar slash arcade, pinball arcade. Yes. We talk a lot about repairing things.
    33:39
    Let's hear it. How do you run this whole, this big operation? You're the captain of the ship. Let's go. Do you want to hit the first one? You want me to repeat the first one? Yes. Okay.
    33:49
    Are you having to document tokens by machine to make sure they pay themselves off? Okay. I do document by machine, but I use the audits. People see us moving around tokens sometimes, but we're only ever sorting the tokens. We don't count the tokens. That would be insanity. We go off the audits on all of the machines. So every month we check all of the audits on all of the machines, and it's a lot. Just doing that takes over an hour of documentation. And people think, I know when they see us going into our office and we're in there for like hours and hours and hours, I think people think we're just like goofing off. Or hiding from people. Yeah, I think they think that we're back there like smoking weed, playing pinball.
    34:37
    I would much rather be out there playing games with Ty. Absolutely. And Keegan. But most of what we're doing back there is admin.
    34:46
    We're trying to figure out how to do various things that need to be done at that time. But there is a lot of just data keeping, paperwork, all of that. So that leads into some other stuff. I don't use QuickBooks. I use Google Docs and sheets of paper.
    35:03
    There's a lot of scraps of paper trying to figure out various things. Stocking the Tiki Bar. We order stuff every week, figuring out what demand type thing of different things there are, different merch stuff, keeping tabs on where all that is. because we really are, as much as John Schaapel is a huge help, Chewy is a huge help, Mark also, and then, of course, all of the Bat Bar staff, but still 90% of the work is being done by me and you on a daily basis. It really is just a very, very small crew doing a lot, a lot of work. And I know the Wedgehead guys could tell you the same sort of thing. It's just a lot of work. And I would love to hire more people. I would love to have more techs. That's my biggest demand. And I have a lot of people that would like to work for us as a tech, but unfortunately they don't yet know how to tech or how to tech expeditiously. I need someone to come in that can hit the ground running and know what to do and do a good job at it. I don't have the time to train somebody because that's really like a years-long thing of figuring this stuff out. So that's my – the biggest need for me is more tech people. Everything else I can handle. And I'm lucky that our entire crew is very, very trustworthy. If I was starting this business, like for some reason I got picked up and put in a city where I didn't know anybody, That would be really difficult, too, because there's a lot of trust involved with this sort of stuff, and everybody on our crew is just fantastic and great, and we're so grateful for them.
    36:52
    And there's other just dumb, boring stuff, like dealing with insurance, dealing with state regulations, dealing with auditors, dealing with all of the, like, just stuff that any business has to do.
    37:09
    There's a lot of it. I would say that 85% of my work is admin-based, behind-the-scenes sort of stuff.
    37:18
    One reason we're really lucky is this has all happened over five years, where it started out with just you doing everything. But before there was a bar in the arcade, you and Mark, and then I came aboard. thank you for for hiring me you came in like four or five months into it yeah and um and then you know chewy he he comes in but um it was actually a very slow roll actually you know you and i were some of the first people working at the tiki bar yes i remember i had no idea what i was doing i was a bartender i didn't i didn't i got a bunch of books and i was shaking the drinks i was practicing yeah that was a lot of fun um but it was a very slow roll to like find all these people and and really kind of stress-free these people kind of like fell into position we were very lucky in that in that manner and we're like we're truly friends with all of these people yes these are all people that everyone that works for the electric bat um and some of them are contractors and some of them are employees just it varies um i would have them all over to my house and like they could spend the night and if they're listening we will we're gonna have a barbecue and slumber party as soon as it's not 150 degrees also it's a very small house with concrete floors so the concrete floors are great in the summertime yes man i lay on them yeah so does the cat yeah I'll lay on them straight out of the shower.
    39:02
    I think you touched on everything. You did a great job. You are an excellent question answerer. Thank you. Yep.
    39:12
    Okay. You ready to move on? Yeah, and if people have specific questions about the details of some of those things, I mean, sometimes that seems kind of dry, but it's also the stuff that I wish I knew that I had no idea about this stuff. Right. You know, have the air conditioner man on speed dial. Find a good AC manager. Oh, my God. You have to. In the summertime, Arizona, we have the most amazing AC guy. Yeah, hit me up if you need an AC guy. Yeah if you in Arizona and need an AC guy hit us up because we have this dude doesn sleep He amazing I can he a robot Thank you Gutter Ghoul for coming out and playing with us and also playing the game of sending us questions He really keeps us going. I don't know if we'd have a podcast if it wasn't for Gutter Ghoul.
    39:58
    He's very thoughtful. Yes. This is from, it's me, AJ. Okay. AJ. Yeah. Has the location and also like a bakery. That's so cool. Yeah.
    40:14
    It's me, AJ, on Discord. Not sure if it's been asked or not, but do you think placement has a lot to do with earnings of specific games? Like you mentioned, Elton John was moved and it dropped in earnings. Do you think where it was placed has anything to do with that? Yes. This is, again, the Trader Joe's thing. They don't just switch around the store for no reason. They want you to look at new things. So partly moving a game can increase its earnings or it can decrease its earnings, right, because there's prime spots, the spots that you see when you first walk into the arcade.
    40:52
    Those are good. And end caps are always higher earners because you can stand around. Your friends can hang out at those games a little easier.
    41:03
    And then if you put them kind of in the corner, there's a certain group of people that would prefer those. maybe some of the more introverted people don't want to be in the middle of the room and have people watching them. That's me. That's not you. That's you. You haven't been introverted a day in your life. You came out of the womb fishing for compliments. You know what?
    41:23
    I like to pull the game in the middle of the room with an extension cord. Maybe some flashy legs. Yeah, yes, sir. So if there are games that aren't being played, they might get moved around. We don't tend to do this too much because we just don't, I mean, they, but if I needed to, if there was a game that wasn't being played, I might move it, move it around and it would get some fresh eyes on it. Right. And you know, Mark Mandeltort of Marco's Specialties, he used to always tell me, if you ever start an arcade, he's like every couple of months, just move the machines around. That is Retail 101. It's what The Gap does. It's what Banero Public, Costco. It's all the same stuff that you shifted around, and it has a feel like something's new. But let me warn you, we don't always do that at the bat. And here's the reason.
    42:25
    You have over 100 people trying to find pinball machines on a Tuesday night. Right. When we have a tournament, we've actually had to label in match play, we've had to label pins. Which room they're in. Which we have three rooms in the bat and which room they're in to help people out. So that's, you know, it's a give and take. We really try to never switch around more, like maybe switch two machines or, you know, if one goes in the back, like certainly no more than three. Because, like you said, that does just create a little bit of chaos. Yeah. And then sometimes, like whenever we moved Elton John, when John Wick came in, a bunch of people like, oh, I miss Elton John. Where's Elton John? It's in the corner. Just turn your head a little bit, just a little bit to the left, and you'll see, oh, there it is.
    43:15
    So, yeah. Cool. Do move them. Thank you for the question, AJ. I hope we answered your question. If not, just hit us back up. We'll answer it again. And, you know, we love baked goods. Yeah. We're going to go visit him. Yeah. We'll buy some baked goods from you.
    43:33
    Okay. I think we have a long question here. Oh, this is from Amsterdam. Oh, from Ilko. Did you add this? Yes.
    43:42
    Ilko in Amsterdam. Thank you for listening to us. That's a long ways off, isn't it? Yes, it is. You know, me and my friends in high school, we always used to want to, like, take a vacation to Amsterdam. Why is that? Well, because they had these bars where you could do certain things you couldn't do in the States. But now it's all good in the States. You're talking about the pot bars, not the lady bars. I think you can do mushrooms there, too. Probably. Yeah.
    44:11
    Amsterdam seems beautiful. We'd love to come visit you, and we will hit you up if we do. Because it sounds like you know where some pinball machines are. Oh, I thought you meant you were going to go stay at Ilko's house. We might stay at Ilko's. Thank you for the question. Here we go. Okay. I have a question about dialing in my games. I am very lucky to own five modern Sterns in my game room. We are definitely staying with you when we come to Amsterdam because that sounds like a blast.
    44:40
    Almost every one of them has one or two shots which do not flow so well. Also, compared to some games on location or at the dealer's game room, for example, the back entrance of the building in Godzilla, the center orbit of Jurassic Park, and the wave ramp on Jaws.
    44:59
    Excuse me. Okay. So he's looking to dial in some shots. Right. On my machines, I have more rattles and more rejects for these specific shots than other games I have played, and for other shots, my machines play a lot smoother. There is always enough room to tweak the metal ball guides. Do you have tips on how to tweak the metal ball guides to optimize the flow of a modern stern game? Some sort of step-by-step approach. This is a great, great question. This comes up a lot. We talk about this a lot because especially people who are new to pinball, and they they order like they get a brand new a new in box stern and they set it up at home and they and they're like why is this not playing like the one at the arcade at my local arcade why is this one not playing like um like johnny bagels johnny bagels do we know johnny bagels that's a guy at bagelfeld yeah yeah um but um what i think what everybody even people who have been dealing with machines for a few years don't get this um these are all handmade machines and we know this for a fact because we saw them making them uh recently but um well i mean everybody knows this they've seen the videos of the factories sure these are all built by people and every single machine is different by people of people and for the people for the people um but besides that you know these aren't like done by robots and computers and exact I mean these are all hand built machines and you're buying an expensive science project this big kinetic art piece of art and little things that I think I don't think this guy is new to pinball he has five machines And, I mean, if you really want to, you can go drilling new holes to have balls go in different directions, but we never go that far.
    47:17
    But things like pitch make a difference. Pitch and leveling make a huge difference with how much, how shots are going to feel. For sure. um but they do i mean because even though you've got that dimpling in the in the play field at the factory the drill is still going and it may go in like a hair to the left a hair to the right and so even if two games are set up like with identical uh pitch and level they're still going to play different and that's part of the beauty of it too right these are these are completely unique machines um man i get off on tuning machines it's fun yeah it's fun just and it's your game you can sometimes we do it in ways that homeowners maybe wouldn't you know we'll get out a wrench or some pliers and just start like working on it yeah um not not too often though usually we'll just do it the way that makes the most sense if it's a ball guide you can unscrew it a little bit and then push it one way or the other and that will feed your shots a little bit different one thing that we did like on the um on the t-rex ramp on jurassic park if you're experiencing rejects on that ramp one thing that worked for us is on the plastic protector on the top of that ramp raise that up a tiny bit just like a washer's amount of height and that made for smooth flow. But there isn't a step one, do this, step two, do this. It really is there's an art to it, and you just play it and get a feel for it. And one trick that you do a lot, and John Chappell also, if you're getting weird action from a ball and you can't necessarily see it, is take slow-mo shots with your camera so you can see what is it actually hitting off of that's making it exhibit this weird behavior, and then solve from there. Sure.
    49:22
    But these machines are meant to be this way. So this is intentional, and it is part of the fun of a machine to have the glass off and mess around with it until it plays how you want it to play. 100% I don't have any specific examples he wants like specifically for the back entrance of the Godzilla building the center orbit of Jurassic Park and the wave ramp on Jaws I've never had an issue with that center orbit on Jurassic Park that thing's usually like a dream maybe his upper flipper could be adjusted center orbit oh like where the spinner is yeah oh i think that's what he's talking about that would be the center yeah i guess that would i was thinking the center of the playfield shot man our our jurassic i love playing that thing it's so like super broken in it's been played and and rode hard and played 30 000 times and it plays like a dream man it feels good maybe that's just what you just play play the shit out of it and see what's up but there are So in having done anything this extreme on modern machines, but on classic machines, specifically like free fall, I noticed there was a really nasty ball hop. And and we actually noticed we watched some streams of not competitive streams, but like people playing it. And I think there was a something in the factory where they just drilled the hole improperly. We saw it on other machines. I actually filled that hole, drilled a completely different hole, and moved the ball guide. I got Belsito with it. I forgot that you did that. Yeah. Jim is the champion of like, let's just put a screw in the middle of this ramp so it plays how I think it should play. Right. To not be afraid to do that. For sure. That's extreme. And we're talking about Jim Belsito of Southern California fame, Indus fame. He just hosted the World Championships of Pinball. Yeah, fantastic human being. Yeah, go check out IE Pinball Stream to see that whole thing. But he really drills new holes in machines. He moves ball guides. He gets the machine playing to the way he likes it and the way he thinks the competitors will like it also. Yeah, a lot of what he's doing is to make it so that you can't just repeat a certain shot that's lucrative over and over. So he may even add like extra gates or things like that. Yeah. Or a screw in the middle of a ramp. But yeah, play it how you want to play it.
    52:13
    Don't be afraid to move. I don't want to tell people to start grabbing pliers and bending stuff. No, don't do that. I do do that. We do do that. But we also have, we didn't start out doing that. Right, right, right. And you're not cranking on it. It's just like sometimes on the end of a ball guide, you may want to just hook a little one way or the other. For example, we have this in Mando and Stranger Things.
    52:40
    From the left orbit, the ball would hit. It wouldn't go straight to the left flipper. Now, I like it to go there on both of those machines. Because, you know, it is more of a challenge if it hits the slingshot and starts bing, bang, bonging everywhere. I don't think that's fun. Yeah. We try to get it to where it's going to hit that flipper. And even on a brand new machine, we just got a brand new Stranger Things. And we had to do slight adjustments to that to get it to play how we want. I mean, it's just like buying a guitar. Yeah, that's a good analogy. Yeah. Like, you might need to lower the action. You might need to raise the action. You might need to change the strings. to get it to play the way you want it to play. I hope there's enough musicians listening to where they actually understood that. But if not, you get the feel. Yeah, they get the feel.
    53:34
    Thank you so much. Ilko. From Amsterdam. I'm so happy that you're listening to us from so far away. Hello, Amsterdam.
    53:43
    This is from my boy, Lauren. Oh, Silver Dong. Silver Dong on Stern Insider Connected. people always like put the little funny names on their uh inside a connected account um and and silver dong is one of the best why do they call him silver dong because he's silverman right yes yeah he's silverman and it was like he has a company called silver dog productions oh that's right and then and silver dog i think maybe uncle joe turned him on to that now he's he's silver dong or uncle joe thought it was funny well yeah they're both right well thank you so much for your Christian, Lauren, and follow Silver Dong on Stern Insider Connected. You know you can follow people. Yes, yeah.
    54:30
    To what degree, this is his question. Okay. To what degree do manufacturers work with operators with regard to release timelines, game design choices, anything to do with the expectations of delivery of the game, etc.? Can I answer this? Please. Zero. They work with operators. Zero. Because they are beholden to their own books. They have their own financial schedules. They know how to design a game. I don't know how to design a game. I will say that we have casually worked with manufacturers to give them ideas for things that would be beneficial to operators on the back end. So there's a lot of stuff in like audits or even with Insider Connected, things like that that can be – but they're certainly not like – we're not contracted by them or anything. We just happen to have friends over there like, hey, wouldn't it be cool if this? Right. But they don't ever – none of the manufacturers care about – not that they don't care. It's just not – that's not how they make decisions. Right, right. But they do work sort of more closely with some of the bigger distributors. Yeah, some of the distributors.
    55:56
    Because they might need to – they run into issues where they have to plan, like, hey, what's coming out? because they only have so much warehouse space, stuff like that. I think they work a little more with some of those folks and maybe let them know what's going on, give them a little heads up. That's still them perhaps letting some people in on some information that they have already decided. It's not them calling Game Room Goodies, for example, and saying, hey, when would you like the next game to come out? That's not happening. Oh, no, nothing like that. But, you know, with timelines and what have you. Yeah, like informing them but not asking them. Not game design choices. Not at all. Not game design, not game theme, not... They don't want to take game design ideas from me because I've never built a pinball machine. Right. We don't know anything about that. Yeah, they have the team, they have the talent, and they're all making cool games. although we do have a suggestion for for a manufacturer for a certain manufacturer yeah well which one gi joe oh no just for any manufacturer yeah man gi joe i would i would american hero i would be all about that as long as somebody's gonna do and you can have you know you got the the pro could be the joe model right the premium cobra could be cobra and then the le they'll do it like Transformers. Remember it was like half Autobots and Decepticons. I thought you meant that the LE of G.I. Joe would be Transformers. Not the half. That would be super cool. You get the pro, the premium, and the Transformers. The Transformers. The G.I. Joe and the Transformers teamed up. It was a mini-series. It was a four-issue mini-series. I've got all the G.I. Joe comics. Do you know they're putting together a hardcover? Man, that's going to be cool. It's on Kickstarter right now of all the G.I. Joe comics, G.I. Joe, G.I. Joe Special Missions, the G.I. Joe yearbook. Am I getting too nerdy here? No. There's one person listening that's going like, hell yeah, G.I. Joe. I put in on that Kickstarter. Man, I would be all about a G.I. Joe pinball machine. I think it would sell so well. Yeah, yeah. I'm excited. See, because this is what I think people are sick of, the music of a certain generation. so now let's move over to the comics and cartoons of same generation for sure right for sure we're going right down this list did we answer lauren's question yes i think so we don't all the manufacturers do their thing and i mean they might reach out to one or two people but it's not like a a consistent thing where they're getting input no they are they're definitely their own company they all know what they're doing have their own timetables and plans more stuff from gutter ghoul oh can you should we give somebody else a chance or let's do let's uh dan the man oh i like dan the man dan the man yeah you saw him with the other day oh yeah yeah they were him and rachel were in their party and they left us a really nice note on the clipboard i love them They're the best people in the world.
    59:20
    From Dan the Man on Discord. Do you consider any cosmetic restoration before putting machines on the floor? I like that one because it's short. And do we We try not to buy games anymore that require cosmetic restoration In the past in my early days i certainly bought a lot because those were the games i could afford and i did do a lot of um you did serious restoration that was what i did before i had yeah i did do a lot of that now that is so much work and i really don't and clear coat is very toxic and i don't want to mess with that You don't want to mess with that. You did the most beautiful restoration of a stern Dracula that I've ever seen. We've got to get that back on the floor. We've got to fix some things. Yeah. It's got just one little switch that needs some adjusting. I was actually thinking about it's time for me. You don't have to worry about it. I'm going to do this for you. Oh. I'm going to spend some time in the shop. I'm going to get that thing running for you. What do you say? I love it. Give it to me. Boom. Right there. All right. You don't worry about it. I'm going to get that thing going. I love that. If I can't, I'm going to call somebody.
    60:32
    All right. Thank you, Dan. I can't. I mean, other than that, no, we haven't painted anything or anything like that. I mean, we sometimes do some powder coat just for fun. Oh, yeah, yeah. Oh, yeah, absolutely. That's true. But that's not restoration. That's jazzing up. There's a difference between restoration and jazzing, and we like jazzing.
    60:54
    Yeah, so sometimes I would do something very minor. Like if there was, like on roller games, you couldn't read the inserts. So I made it so you could read the inserts, like functional stuff. Oh, of course. If it's something like that where you can't tell what to do, that's very important. And that's cosmetic. I think that would count. Yeah. And I think this is kind of cosmetic. Like when you brought that old beater home, that free fall, the stern free fall. And I was like, what do you do with this play field is wrecked. Yeah. And so I knew I literally put a half can of wax into this play field and it kept absorbing it. This thing has been in the desert, in the middle of the desert for 40 years. I mean, wax just kept disappearing into this wood. It was like, where's it going? Rachel, you're not going to believe this. I'm literally on my 10th waxing. Yeah. But when it brought that thing back to life. So who was right there? That's cosmetic also. But who was right? You were right. That's right. I don't ever doubt you anymore. I did one time.
    62:03
    I was like, why did you buy this? You brought home that and an Andromeda. Yeah. The Andromeda is gorgeous. You were stoked about the Andromeda. The other one, you were like, this is huge. It's heavy. And it's not working. and it looks like it's been rowed into the Mad Max. And now it is a fan favorite. Okay. And I'm glad you got it. This is a good question. This is from Duplex2205 on Discord.
    62:33
    Questions for the next Batcast. And we're at the next Batcast. Hopefully we didn't miss this question. Okay, what is it? Here we are, right? uh is the resale value of the machine considered as a factor into the total earnings that the machine will have over the lifetime that it is operated for example a 7k machine is it expected to make 7k return in total coin drop post any any splits and maintenance okay before the machine is considered an earner or is it that there is an expectation that the machine will be worth 3.5k after xx time and therefore the machine is considered an earner after it is made 3.5k okay so they're asking if the game if i consider it earning after it's paid for itself or before it's paid for itself and how much resale value is a factor yes um that's a good question it is a good question and part of that question can be answered with we almost never sell machines although if you're looking for a galactic tank force um hit me up we keep coming back to gtf yeah that game is we're seriously relatively it's stable now we have the most beautiful galactic tank force uh the software is screwed up um but it's way way better than it was anyway um for the most part we don't sell machines, so I don't really think about resale. And I know at some point, and that point is probably about now, that we have to start selling machines to make room for new machines. I don't think about that part so much. But I do think about how much a game is likely to earn and how much it costs. For example, if I'm buying a classic game and I know that it's going to go on the floor for 50 cents a play, if I have to spend $5,000 or $6,000 on that game, and it has to be played 10,000 times before it pays for itself. Plus, then you've got parts and labor and all of that stuff on top of it.
    64:41
    If I have a choice between a game that's going to be 50 cents on the floor and it's going to cost me 1,500 bucks or if it's going to cost me 5,000 bucks and all other things being equal, I am, of course, going to choose the less expensive game in that scenario. I don't really think about whether games individually I mean I know whether or not they've paid for themselves or not paid for themselves but just because of the way that we do our budget there's 60 something pinball machines on the floor so all of those games work together as a team to pay the bills so the budget is set based on the earnings of every game compiled so I only do it based on kind of a gut feeling and how much I like the game and does it remotely make financial sense to purchase. Right. Do you remember the guy who asked you, why are you still charging?
    65:44
    I can't remember which machine it was, but he was like, why are you still charging to play this machine? Because certainly it had paid itself off by now.
    65:54
    You remember that dude? That is. It was like years ago. That's nuts. And we're not people. We've had people write in that have gotten the same. It is very weird. Like, well, surely you have paid this grocery store off, so these apples should be free. Right.
    66:14
    Yeah. And the answer to that is they all work as all of the machines are my little friends. They work together as a team, and they pay the bills so that we can stay open. Right. And that person is just dumb.
    66:32
    Hot take. Well, and I get it. Like, if I didn't, if I was naive and didn't understand how pinball machines worked and thought it was just like a Pac-Man, right? I could see where they're thinking like, why am I getting charged for this? This surely has paid itself off. And they don't realize that all of these little parts, I mean, like, what is it? A flipper rebuild is like 50 bucks. How much do they think my air conditioning, just our electrical bill is every month? Well, they're not thinking about all that. They're just thinking about, here is this machine. It's self-contained. It's got glass. It's like it works all the time. Every time I'm here, it totally works, so there's no problem with it.
    67:22
    It's probably made several thousand dollars over the past five years. Why do I have to pay for it? I get what that person's – it's wrong, but I get it. I get why they're asking that.
    67:36
    I don't. Yeah, yeah. I feel like a very, very basic understanding of how things work and how people are able to eat food and have electricity.
    67:53
    I got you. This is another question from Gutter Ghoul. And that was a great question. Who is that from? Duplex 2205 on Discord. Thank you. Thank you for the question. Here's some more from Gutter Ghoul. is there a time that people play the most like it's 9 p.m on a friday the bats witching hour oh i love gotta go i'm assuming the tourney blows away every other time out of the water but is it not the top if it's not the top but if it's not the top that's even more interesting um the tournament tuesday night tournaments are our busiest time barring some like halloween party type like special events but just on a weekly basis the tournament is definitely like 120 people in that arcade more than that because there's casuals that's our biggest time aside from that it varies but the times that you would think are generally the busiest usually friday saturday nights are the busiest but every once in a while We'll come in there on a Wednesday afternoon or Thursday at 4 p.m., and the arcade is packed. We have no idea why, but we're grateful for it.
    69:13
    Awesome. Yeah. I was trying to find this one. I don't know if it's a question or a comment. It's deep inside. It was actually on somebody else's.
    69:31
    It was on Joe's for the Indie Arcade Wave. Oh, okay. It was on his TikTok. And somebody commented, because we did a podcast with him. And this person obviously listens to the podcast because they said they really wish that we would have guests on that would push back on our ideas. Oh. And interesting question, but this is not a forum. But also push back on our ideas about what? That I wouldn't buy a game that caught, I mean... Well, I mean, I guess just anything. Like, I mean, there was no example. I would like an example. If that person is listening, please send me an example or push back on my ideas or find somebody that would because I'm genuinely interested. If someone can help me run my business better, geez, thanks. Please. Yeah. Please do. But it could be – this is – from judging from the name of the account, I think it was like a pinball person. And it could have been simply like, you know, do you throw away the stern pinballs as soon as you get – you know, it could be stuff like that. I don't think it was like, oh, I can't believe you're not using QuickBooks.
    70:45
    You know what I'm saying? the functionality but but if anybody wants to uh has any questions or comments you you know how to do it yeah as long as you're not like super rude i really welcome opposing ideas i i i like the rude shit i don't like send that to him there's there's this one guy that keeps giving a shit on youtube you never see this stuff i don't look at the um but he was i think he was a little angry about us given Americans such a hard time. And he said, look, I have all of Americans' games en route, and they work perfectly.
    71:24
    Is he there all the time? How would he know? I know. And you and I have both seen this, because there's a local arcade here, and we're good friends with everybody that works there. And actually, and the same thing happened with another arcade out of town. When we first had our Galactic Tank Force and had all these issues with it, we got in touch with the owners of these two arcades and they're like oh no we're having zero problems with galactic taint force it's working perfectly but then when we talked to their techs it was a whole different story yeah this is a piece of garbage that we can't wait to sell and one eventually did end up getting rid of and the one's kind of like dealing with uh yeah the issues. So a lot of times you have arcades that aren't getting the amount of plays and maybe you don't have players that know how the machine is supposed to work.
    72:28
    A lot of the issues, aside from total freezing and things like that, if you didn't know, a casual player may not understand that they're not supposed to be in multiball the entire game. Right, right, sure. You know, things like that, where the game is still technically playable. The flippers flip and things are happening.
    72:52
    I think that that's a lot of the issues that happen on route games, where the operators are not necessarily on site to see that happening. Yes, 100%. Like, most recently, Ty and I played a game. We hadn't played Galactic Tank Force in so long. And, you know, David Fix is like, oh, you know, it's working much better now. So, you know, let's put it to the test. We played a two-player game, and it did that same thing where it lost track of balls. Like I'm in a multi-ball, and one of the balls got into the scoop that feeds, well, the saucer that feeds the lock. And I finished my multi-balls and everything drained. I was like, well, what's up with that last ball? and it just ended the game and then shot that ball out and that ball drained now maybe it's supposed to do that it doesn't seem right that it takes one of my multi balls i mean it's doing basically the programming is doing the same thing it's always done and i think i think their programmers are like contract people so they don't really have people on staff they can fix this kind of stuff either way the damn thing doesn't work well um i will say that it works way better than it did before that last code update because now it doesn't just totally lock up all of the time. So it's better in that regard. But I would ask that person, whoever it is, if they happen to be listening, if they're so happy with that game, I would love for them to contact me because I will give them a very good deal on an additional one. Yes. Actually, a very, very good deal. But I think this guy's just a curmudgeon because he also complained about, you know, you know, the sweatshirts we did with Forever the Flip? Yeah. He complained about the artwork on it. Oh, he doesn't like somebody else's artwork?
    74:41
    Oh, well. Yeah. So I think this guy, it just reminded me of the times when, you know, you're trying to play Call of Duty on Xbox and like everybody screwed your mom and then they're calling you the N-word. This seemed like one of those. Oh, he's one of those people. Yeah, this seemed like he's just one of those guys. Well, good for him that his life is going so well that he's got so much spare time to do that. But back to that, I would really love some people, if they have opposing views or things, whether they want to push back on something I or you say, I would love to hear it. Yeah, I would love to. Teach me. I'm all about learning things. But I do, anytime that guy comes and kind of trolls us in the YouTube comments, I do engage with him in a very genuine manner. I don't think he likes that. Oh.
    75:35
    Oh. Okay, so before we wrap up, can you tell us what's going on at the bat? Is there anything people need to get ready for? Yes, there's a lot people need to get ready for. So get, you know, punch electric bat into your GPS now. You're going to be coming there a lot over the next two weeks. Okay. Tomorrow, we've got waffles at noon. So, tournament at noon, a tournament at 6.30 tomorrow. And then Sunday, this Sunday, Sunday, Sunday, Chewy's World Famous Bounty Knockout Tournament. Mm-hmm. And the weekend after the Saturday, after that, the 6th, July 6th, we have our John Wick launch party. Ooh. Very cool. So, those are just the near-term stuff. And we have a lot more prizes for that. Yeah, they sent us a lot of prizes, and we have some in-house prizes that we will be giving away, too. Absolutely. So at our launch parties, we like to give away most of the prizes randomly. We want to encourage participation, not just for the hot shots to win the prizes. So come on out, win some prizes.
    76:44
    Just show up at the back. Tell me your ideas. Tell me the things I'm doing wrong. I'd love to hear it. We want some pushback. We really do welcome it. Yeah. All right. Well, thank you to Marco Specialties for sponsoring the show. If you need any pinball parts, give them a call. They have A-plus customer service and just about any part you would ever need. It's a one-stop shop. Yeah. Game Room Goodies is where we get all our machines from. They've got all kinds of machines. Amazing. If you are buying a machine in Arizona or, shoot, wherever, I think they'll ship. ship anywhere yeah give uh go to game room goodies.com they have everything for your game room great customer service fantastic customer service and also stern insider connected we're always logging in yep everybody at the arcade is logging in they loved it we have two monitors that show the leaderboards and every month the top people in the leaderboard win either a trans light or a Stern Banner. And we thank you for the support, Stern Insider Connected. Yeah. And thank you for the Insider Connected kit that Roland won for that last giveaway. Yeah, that was very cool. He's enjoying that thing. Good deal. Cool. Well, I think we're going to be signing out. Do you have anything else for the audience? No. Okay, good. That's the way I like it. But it sounds like they might have some things for me. Oh, you're still stuck on that. You want some pushback. I'll tell you what. I want to hear your ideas. We should invite him on. I want to see like... You better have a good mic. I got to figure out who it was. I have to look back on there. Send us how I would run the bat. I would love to hear it because, you know, we're just... We might learn something. Yeah, I'm sure. I'm completely open. I learn things from people every day.
    78:38
    Okay. Bats out. I had an absolutely fabulous time with you. It was a real slice. That's my line. I'm learning from you. Isn't it? Okay. Thank you guys for joining us. We will catch you, I don't know, in a couple of weeks. Yeah, maybe sooner. We'll do another one of these things. Send us some questions, comments. Actually, I saved a couple of questions, so we have a few questions. But we do need the audience's help. We want to know what you want to know about. And it doesn't even have to do with pinball. It could be anything. We know about food.
    79:14
    What else? I mean, pinball would be ideal, though. Ideal. Yeah. Okay. Well, don't listen to me. Thank you, guys. We'll see you next time. We had an absolute blast. We'll see you. Bye-bye.