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Pinball Magazine & Pinball News PINcast December 2023 recap

Pinball News & Pinball Magazine Pincast·podcast_episode·1h 40m·analyzed·Jan 5, 2024
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claude-haiku-4-5-20251001 · $0.036

TL;DR

Jaws launches, Spooky announces dual titles, Stern expands Europe and changes LE policy.

Summary

Pinball News and Pinball Magazine editors Jonathan Houston and Martin Ayo recap December 2023 and early January 2024, covering major releases including Jaws (Stern), Texas Chainsaw Massacre and Looney Tunes (Spooky), and Pedretti's entry into game remakes. Key industry news includes Stern's new European operations manager, distributor policy changes on Limited Edition reruns, and plans to accelerate accessory release timelines.

Key Claims

  • Stern will no longer produce second runs of Limited Edition games; future reruns will only be Pro and/or Premium models

    high confidence · Jonathan Houston citing Stern distributor meeting announcement during Jaws launch briefing

  • Jaws pricing unchanged from Venom: Pro $6,999, Premium $9,699, LE $13,000

    high confidence · Jonathan Houston discussing official MSRP announcements

  • Jaws Limited Edition production limited to 1,000 units

    high confidence · Jonathan Houston reporting official specification

  • Stern performed 94 code updates across games in 2023

    medium confidence · Martin Ayo citing statistics but noting many were minor or repeated for regional pricing changes

  • Stern is exploring rereleases of older Spike 2 system games and potentially dot-matrix era games with updated LCD displays

    medium confidence · Jonathan Houston speculating based on distributor meeting information about Elder Matrix machine examination

  • Richard Dreyfuss recorded custom call-outs for Jaws pinball

    high confidence · Jonathan Houston confirming actor involvement in game

  • Stern moved factories in October 2023 and maintained operations in old facility until final moment to minimize downtime

    high confidence · Jonathan Houston reporting factory tour observations and published factory video

  • Stern appointed Lloyd Dauntant as European Marketing Operations Manager based in Amsterdam

    high confidence · Martin Ayo reporting official press release and confirmation from Doug Score at Stern

  • Spooky Pinball is using a single playfield design with artwork and insert changes to produce Texas Chainsaw Massacre and Looney Tunes as two distinct titles

    high confidence · Jonathan Houston describing Spooky's manufacturing approach following their Halloween/Ultraman model

Notable Quotes

  • “Jaws Pinball finally launched. Finally. Texas Chainsaw Massacre and Looney Tunes also launched. Finally.”

    Jonathan Houston @ Opening — Sets tone for episode emphasizing the long-awaited nature of multiple game launches

  • “from now on, if Stern is doing a rerun of a specific title, it's only going to be either the pro and or premium models.”

    Jonathan Houston @ ~8:30 — Major policy change addressing collector complaints about LE devaluation from subsequent reruns

  • “I don't think we should be looking into games prior to 2010... if they do decide to go that far, it would probably be cheaper for them to emulate the display on an LCD, so it looks like a dot matrix.”

    Martin Ayo @ ~15:00 — Speculation on how Stern might approach dot-matrix game rereleases with modern hardware

  • “It's an elevated mic on a stick... it actually drops below the playfield when you hit it, so it doesn't end up blocking any shots.”

    Jonathan Houston @ ~24:00 — Describes innovative shark fin drop target mechanism on Jaws

  • “Lloyd will be working with operators and making them more knowledgeable about Insider Connected, helping in getting more locations set up with Pinball and leaderboards... he will be creating launch party locations.”

    Martin Ayo @ ~48:00 — Details European expansion strategy for Stern through new operations manager role

  • “they're not selling out all games immediately to their fan base, but they don't need the big exposure that Stern is going for... it's still very impressive what they are doing”

    Jonathan Houston @ ~68:00 — Contrasts Spooky's business model and market positioning with Stern's approach

  • “quite a lot of those were minor updates or just rolling out generic changes to things like pricing schemes for Scandinavian countries for which they then had to roll out updates to 20 different models”

    Martin Ayo @ ~36:00 — Critiques inflated code update count metric, noting software design inefficiencies

Entities

Jonathan HoustonpersonMartin AyopersonKeith ElwinpersonJawsgameStern PinballcompanySpooky PinballcompanyTexas Chainsaw Massacregame

Signals

  • ?

    business_signal: Stern-sponsored promotional tie-in with Fighting Eleni football team generated minimal auction proceeds ($2,000 per player from two machine sales) relative to promotional effort, questioning ROI of sports partnerships

    medium · Jonathan Houston and Martin Ayo discussing auction results where Foo Fighters Premium sold for near-new pricing with three bids and Venom Premium slightly above MSRP with two bids

  • ?

    business_signal: Stern establishing permanent European operations through appointment of dedicated Marketing Operations Manager based in Amsterdam

    high · Official press release and confirmation from Doug Score regarding Lloyd Dauntant's role focusing on Insider Connected expansion, Stern Army program, and European market development

  • ?

    community_signal: Mixed reception to Jaws' light blue playfield aesthetics; historically light blue pinball machines have underperformed commercially, though mechanism implementation on Premium/LE well-received

    medium · Jonathan Houston: 'Originally, when I saw it, I didn't like the blue playfields, the light blue playfields... light blue games haven't sold, haven't appealed as much as more... the mechanism they put into the limited edition and the premium of the boat which is then pushed up by the shark rising out of the playfield looks great'

  • ?

    design_philosophy: Jaws' shark fin drop target mechanism represents novel playfield innovation with mechanical elegance (descends below playfield to avoid blocking shots)

    high · Jonathan Houston: 'moving shark fin drop target, which is a new feature... it actually drops below the playfield when you hit it, so it doesn't end up blocking any shots'

  • ?

Transcript

groq_whisper · $0.301

0:00
Jaws Pinball finally launched. Finally. Texas Chainsaw Massacre and Looney Tunes also launched. Finally.
0:14
Pedretti to start building remakes as well. Finally. Hi, my name is Jonathan Houston. I'm the editor of Pinball Magazine and I'm joined by... Finally joined by... Me, Martin Ayo, the editor of Pinball News, and welcome to this month's Pincast, where we are looking back at all the excitement that's happened throughout December 2023 and the first few days of January 2024. And we deliberately delayed this recording so we could include the events that have just taken place over the past few days, more of which shortly. Yeah, I was going to say, which events are we talking about? Well, obviously we're talking about... Let's sink our teeth in it! Oh, right, okay, I'll bite, yeah, go on then Yeah, so first of all, Happy New Year! Happy New Year to you, and Happy New Year to all our listeners Well, I was basically saying that to our listeners, but to you as well, Martin Well, I was hoping you were saying it to me Oh, my goodness. Outrageous. Yes. Happy New Year, everyone, one and all. And let's hope 2024 proves to be as positive and exciting a year in the pinball world as 2023 was. Yes. Oh, that was very exciting indeed. We had so many game launches and so many at the same time. And new manufacturers. and... Oh, yeah. If you want to catch up on that, you can listen to all our previous episodes on Spotify and other platforms as well, but we're not going to buck you with that. We're going to dive into the latest news. We're not going to do a review of 2023 like some other people suggested we might. It could be very entertaining, so I'll be listening anyway, but...
2:16
Yes, you were saying? Let's just stick with December and the first week of January, where, although Spooky Pinball was first announcing two new titles, we'll get to that in a bit, and we start with Stern Pinball, where we have a lot of news to cover, starting with the reveal and launch of Jaws, designed by Keith Elwin. Yeah, which was launched today, or yesterday is probably by the time you've listened to this, because we're recording this late into the night on the launch day. And it was, well, I don't want to say it was a chaotic launch, it was a well-planned launch program of events. Yeah. But as always happens with Stern People launches, it didn't quite go to plan. well there was uh no they stuck to the plan but there were leaks ahead of that well even then they don't because yes there were leaks uh from the moment they put out their teaser trailer which was just saying was it saying hunting soon or biting soon or something i can't remember what it was whatever the latest phrase was and um with a an announcement they would be having shark week where they would be revealing details of each of the three models of the Jaws game over a series of days throughout the week. And then, of course, when it all comes to it, they announce all the details of all the titles on the first day. Well, some images of all three models, but they will still be revealing the up-close detailed images of the Premium and the Pro later this week and the limited edition, which is the most expensive model to purchase. That was completely revealed today, including at least two videos, a trailer, and one with comments by George Gomez and Keith Elwin and a couple of other people from the design team saying how incredibly proud they are of this game, which, of course, is understandable. and it is an interesting looking game I have to give credit to Keith Elwin and his team for this game especially considering I know that Jaws has been a theme that has been suggested by pinball enthusiasts for years that pinball manufacturers should make I never thought of it as a strong theme personally and also because it's probably not my type of movie and well apparently there's more pinball machines based on movies that are really not my type but we'll get into that more later yeah I mean Jaws is a what 1975 movie I think yeah so we're looking at something that's 50 almost 50 years old will be next year well it's a classic and we had several what's the word, follow-ups. Oh, yeah, many of those, yeah. And this game is based on all of them, apparently, not just the original, based on all four Jaws movies. Yeah, or at least it has footage from all those movies. Yeah, I think, and mode names and things like that are included as well.

  • “Stern is trying to reduce the lag between a new game's announcements and the accessory launches for that same game... in some cases been over a year.”

    Jonathan Houston @ ~44:00 — Reports operational improvement initiative for accessory availability targeting

    • Looney Tunes
    game
    Lloyd Dauntantperson
    George Gomezperson
    Doug Scoreperson
    Richard Dreyfussperson
    Pedretticompany
    Venomgame
    Godzillagame
    Pinball Magazineorganization
    Pinball Newsorganization
    Fighting Eleniorganization
    CES Showevent
    EAG International Showevent

    leak_detection: Jaws experienced pre-release image leaks that negatively impacted game perception before official launch materials were released

    high · Jonathan Houston: 'leaks that took place a couple of days earlier which didn't exactly present the game in the best light possible... the actual pictures which have come out now it looks a lot better'

  • ?

    manufacturing_signal: Spooky Pinball replicating successful multi-title playfield approach (Halloween/Ultraman model) with Texas Chainsaw Massacre/Looney Tunes, using single playfield with artwork and insert variations for cost efficiency

    high · Jonathan Houston: 'they have a single playfield design with changes to inserts and things and artwork of course... to produce two different titles... texas chainsaw massacre and looney tunes'

  • ?

    personnel_signal: Lloyd Dauntant transitioning from Sieben Gaming (Belgium) sales role to Stern Pinball European operations management, indicating talent acquisition from adjacent gaming industry

    high · Martin Ayo: 'Lloyd... recently worked for Sieben Gaming which I think is in Belgium... as a sales manager slash director'

  • $

    market_signal: Jaws maintains identical pricing to Venom ($6,999 Pro, $9,699 Premium, $13,000 LE), suggesting price stabilization despite market concerns about three-tier model sustainability

    high · Official MSRP unchanged from Venom according to Jonathan Houston

  • ?

    product_strategy: Stern implementing initiative to reduce lag between game announcements and accessory/topper availability, previously spanning over one year for some titles

    high · Jonathan Houston: 'Stern is trying to reduce the lag between a new game's announcements and the accessory launches for that same game... in some cases been over a year'

  • ?

    product_strategy: Stern exploring rereleases of older Spike 2 system games and potentially dot-matrix era machines with updated LCD displays rather than original dot-matrix displays

    medium · Jonathan Houston: 'Stern also indicated that they are looking into not only Spike 2 system games but also Elder.Matrix machine from their catalogue... if they do decide to go that far, it would probably be cheaper for them to emulate the display on an LCD'

  • ?

    product_concern: Jaws code updates and feature parity across models appears solid with clear gameplay mechanics (boat rescue multiball, reel spinner, steering wheel spinner); Premium/LE feature four flippers vs Pro's three due to upper playfield

    high · Detailed mechanical descriptions by Jonathan Houston of boat mechanism, fishing reel, steering wheel spinners, and flipper configurations across model tiers

  • ?

    business_signal: Stern implementing policy to limit Limited Edition reruns, only offering Pro/Premium variants on future title rereleases to prevent secondary market devaluation

    high · Jonathan Houston citing distributor meeting statement: 'from now on, if Stern is doing a rerun of a specific title, it's only going to be either the pro and or premium models'

    • 5:48
    So, anyway, it was launched today at midday Chicago time, and as we know three models, pro premium LE limited to 1000 units I don't know I suspect they didn't all sell out straight away partly I would imagine because of the leaks that took place a couple of days earlier which didn't exactly present the game in the best light possible I think in the actual pictures which have come out now it looks a lot better and the video gameplay and the description of the game and the feature list looks far more impressive than it did originally. So, as often happens when games are leaked, this is why we don't cover leaks because... Well, we cover them, but... Well, we don't publish leaked images or videos just because they are not necessarily representative of the game. they can give you a false impression, falsely good or falsely bad. But we still report that there are leaks. Oh yeah, absolutely. That's part of the industry news. Yes, exactly.
    7:02
    So pricing of the game is unchanged compared to Spurs' previous game, Venom, which means you can get MSRPs, I should say, for Pro Edition is US dollars $6,999.
    7:22
    So I'm just going to round it off. Okay, $7,000, right? Right. So premium, $9,700. Minus one. And the limited edition you can get for $13,000.
    7:40
    Okay, so unchanged to Venom. and allow me to jump in here right away that apparently during a distributor meeting Stern indicated they will only be running limited editions at the start of a game or they will not be doing a second run of limited edition games of a specific title. Again, like they have in the past. Yes, like they have in the past. Apparently there were quite a few complaints understandably from possibly distributors as well as people who bought a game and saw them devaluate because another limited edition came out. Yes.
    8:25
    So from now on, if Stern is doing a rerun of a specific title, it's only going to be either the pro and or premium models. and interestingly Stern also indicated that they are looking into not only Spike 2 system games but also Elder.Matrix machine from their catalogue of previous games which could indicate that we might see a Wheel of Fortune Oh, at last! Yeah, for example or, I don't know. WWE? Yeah.
    9:11
    Who wouldn't want that one? But I tend to think that we don't have to look any further back than, let's say, Aerosmith, which was the first game with an LCD, I suppose, from Stern.
    9:27
    I don't see them... I don't know. I can imagine reading a Tron, for instance. Yeah, okay. Okay, let's put it differently. I don't think we should be looking into games prior to 2010. Right. I mean, ACDC I can still see, 2012, 2013, possibly Metallica. Yeah. But if they would be doing a rerun of a dot matrix game, I'm assuming they're not doing it as a dot matrix game, but they're going to put in an LCD.
    10:11
    Yeah, good question. If they do decide to go that far, it would probably be cheaper for them to emulate the display on an LCD, so it looks like a dot matrix. Right. So the same artwork. That could be an option, yeah. Okay. Well, that's what they do for the service menu, isn't it? Okay. So we're drifting off anyway. Yeah, speculation.
    10:33
    Yeah, well, yeah, speculation. And it's Shark Week. We should be talking about Jaws. Indeed, I thought we were.
    10:44
    Well, okay, yeah. And with Jaws, there's news to report that we're also reporting. Yeah. So anyway, the game itself then seems to have been well received, I think, since it has been properly released. There are some interesting mechanisms on there.
    11:02
    Obviously, the Pro model has a lot of it taken out, a lot of the best parts removed to make it cheaper and more operator-friendly and to fit with Stern's business model. But it still has the moving shark fin drop target, which is a new feature. I don't think we've seen that before on any game. It's an elevated mic on a stick. It is, but it actually drops below the playfield when you hit it, so it doesn't end up blocking any shots. Yeah. Which is a good idea.
    11:36
    I said elevated. I should say evolved. No, what's the word? Further developed. Yes, that's right. Yes, fine. Evolved, maybe. Evolved, that's the word I was looking for. Yes, thank you. Sorry, English is not my native language. No, not mine. Yeah, okay. So it's got that. Originally, when I saw it, I didn't like the blue playfields, the light blue playfields. I don't think I liked any games which have got light blue playfields. Well, they could have made it mud blue. Well, I know it's meant to be the sea, and it's a tricky one.
    12:12
    But traditionally, light blue games haven't sold, haven't appealed as much as more. How can you say no to Baywatch? Well, funnily enough, I did. but I think the mechanism they put into the limited edition and the premium of the boat which is then pushed up by the shark rising out of the playfield looks great everybody was kind of expecting the shark to shoot the ball into the shark's mouth so it would swallow it no, not the case that doesn't happen I'm sure we'll see animations of a ball a shark swallowing a ball or spitting out a ball, something like that. At least that's what you expect, right? Yeah, quite, yeah. Because, I mean, why have the shark there and then hit it with the ball if it's just going to then disappear again when you do that?
    13:08
    I'm surprised we haven't seen an image of a floating pinball, or how odd would that be with the shark below it about to eat it? Yes, that's right, yeah. yep um the and again the premium the le have have a uh an upper playfield based on the orca boat so that's got some interesting shots on it as well um keith has certainly included a couple of horizontal spinning discs one lower down next to the boat which is the fishing reel one at the top which is the steering wheel for the boat and the top one i think awards um or gives out different awards depending on where it lands which is a nice feature and also there's a lot going on it's a four flipper game on the premium and the LE, three flipper on the pro because it doesn't have the upper playfield with the flipper other than that I think most of the other reductions have been sort of fairly cosmetic like there's a house a boat shed at the back which, a boat house which is a physical model in the premium and early plastic in the Pro. One thing which did strike me when I first saw the Pro was that they've taken out the upper mini playfield but don't seem to put anything much in its place. No. It's kind of like a big plastic there that covers over that whole area. There's no other shots or anything. It's a bit of an empty corner I would say. Yeah, I think so. Well, especially if you've seen the limited edition. Yeah, you know what could be there.
    14:50
    Otherwise, it's just like drop targets being changed to stand-up targets. And there's a nice return of the ball save lane on the right-hand side, on the right-out lane. The ball can come down and hit a rubber post, or hit a rubber on a post, I should say, and bounce back in through a one-way gate into the in lane, which is a nice feature. And both in lanes have got stop posts, pop-up stop posts that hold the ball while a mode is being announced. It's quite a chance to actually look at the screen. Yeah, and this probably is the first PG shark I've seen in a while on the Pro model.
    15:31
    PG, it is a very friendly, happy-looking shark. Yeah, and that caused quite a few laws online, I see. Did it? Oh, right. Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah. Some people were really like expressing they were laughing out loud when they saw the images or the photos of the shark coming through the shark cage, which is the replacement for the center boat mechanism on the pro model. It just almost looked like a dolphin, I have to say. it looks like he's smiling at you.
    16:14
    It's probably a bit unfair. It's only from certain angles. From others, it looks more vicious. I call it PG because probably if it looks too scary, I mean, I'm not sure whether that would be family-friendly for people who have little children, you know. Well, you say that, and there's a big bucket of blood swinging around. Yeah, yeah, yeah. And we also seen Walking Dead and what have you. Well, and one of the games we're going to be reporting on a little bit later today. Yeah, exactly. This print cast. Which is a family game, by the way. Is it? Well, it's about a family. Yeah, exactly. Yeah, that's true.
    16:54
    But anyway, so yes, as far as the artwork goes, the Pro and the Limited Edition both feature the sort of fairly iconic movie poster artwork of somebody swimming along on top of the water and a shark coming up from underneath them as a back glass image, which is fairly plain.
    17:16
    I'm pleased to say the premium has a much nicer rendering of a scene from a movie where the shark is attacking the boat. And I think, generally speaking, the reactions I've seen so far have suggested that people like the premium artwork, both the cabinet and the back glass. better than either the Pro or the LE. Yeah, I can see that. Yeah, because it's custom artwork for the game rather than just being standard movie promotional stuff. Right. Then still, the standard movie promotional stuff is what the people Well, some people want it, but, yeah.
    18:02
    There'll be plenty of that on the screen, I'm sure. I'm actually surprised that with all the upgrades the limited edition has so far, Stern hasn't offered distributors or basically buyers of the game some way to customize the game with different translates or whatever, so they basically can choose whatever they want.
    18:31
    They have a few options available and pick one from those. So you can basically customize your own game.
    18:40
    Yeah, maybe that's something that will be coming along down the line. But the LE back glass, of course, is a mirrored rendition of it and has this special foil, reflective foil, printing on the side of the cabinet. And still, if people prefer other artwork, then if this becomes available as an option, then why not? I'm sure there will be plenty of third-party sellers offering alternative backglass artwork for that game, just as they do for every other game. Yeah. So it's also important to mention that one of the original actors from the movie, Richard Dreyfuss, has recorded custom call-outs. Yes, indeed. Yeah, although the game's artwork only seems to include two of the three key actors. Yeah, the other one was Ethan, right?
    19:38
    Roy Scheider doesn't seem to be on the artwork, so I don't know whether... I'm guessing he'll be in the movie clips that are on the screen, but why he's not included in the artwork, I don't know. Maybe a licensing issue there or something else. But it did seem a little bit of an omission when they got so much other stuff there. They got stuff from all four movies included in the game. Yeah. Oh, well. Okay, so anyway, this game is going to be appearing at, first of all, the CES show, which is in, I think it's in Las Vegas, as usual. Okay, that will be there in a few days' time. And Stern have their own stand there. They're not teaming up with anybody else. They're on stand number... Get ready for this. 16,254. Wow. So hopefully you don't have to go up the previous 16,253 to get to them.
    20:38
    And after that, we're hoping they're going to be at the EAG International Show in London, which is about 11 days away from the date we're recording this. Yes. And we both hope to be there. Martin will be there for sure, and I'm still looking at whether I can combine it with other private obligations that I have to address. Okay, sounds very mysterious, but okay. None of your business. Exactly, none of my business. They're private. Anyway, so that's the main news from Stern for this month and a bit. But there's so much more. There is, yeah. Well, as you know, Stern moved factory fairly recently, back in the start of October, I believe it was. And Jonathan was lucky enough to be on the factory tour for the new building. It's huge. Yeah, gave us his feedback on that in our look back at the October month. Yeah, but if you don't want to take my word for it, now you can actually take a look inside the factory yourself because Stern published a factory movie on how the move of the factory from one building to another was done. and it gives you quite a good look on how they set up the new factory. Yeah, and also kept the old factory working up until the very last minute to minimize the downtime between stopping working in one and starting working in the other. Right, and what I found interesting to see is when we had the factory tour in October, when they, well, I think they were already there for a month or so. At the beginning of, when you enter the office area, through the main entrance, so to speak, you enter an area with a lot of cubicles. They were all empty. And in the video now, they're all filled with everything. There's lots of people working there. So that was quite interesting for me to see.
    22:56
    Because I was wondering, are you getting rid of them? is or is it going to stay in and it's all in use so they got lots of uh people working in in this cubicle area now kind of makes you wonder where they all were when you were there because the old factory was closed at that point the new factory was up and running but they hadn't occupied those uh those particular desks or cubicles um yeah i have no idea well we'll try and find out what was going on there. It wasn't the only video Stern published. It wasn't? No, aside from the Jaws trailers and what have you, there's now also a making of Godzilla video. Yeah, remember that game? Yeah, I think it's designed by the same designer as Jaws. Oh, yeah. Must have been a while ago then. I wonder what took them so long to produce that video. I have no idea.
    23:50
    Oh, anyway, if you want to know how they made Godzilla, then you can go to YouTube, the Stern Pinball YouTube channel and it's also available through their website as well if you go to the game section and look at the Godzilla game. Right. Now here's a bit of news that you probably better... Yeah, we covered this in the past about Stern Pinball putting some of their games in the training area for an American football team called the Fighting Eleni who we've never heard of but I'm sure if you're in the area you probably have anyway those the games that they were playing have now been auctioned off there was a Foo Fighters premium and there was a Venom premium as well that were put in there so very recent titles I'm sure that the number of bits will indicate how popular these fighting Eleni American football teams are well maybe Maybe we could have done with a bit more publicity then because the Foo Fighters got three bids and sold for plus buyer premium plus tax bearing in mind the price of a new Foo Fighters premium is only plus tax So you're paying more than a brand new one for it having been played by the team.
    25:21
    Once. Well, I say that. We don't even know if they ever played it, but we seem to think they did. the Venom Premium only had two bids and that sold for £9,600 which is actually slightly above the new price actually I suppose £9,699 is the new price so but then that was plus buyer's premium and tax so it's going to end up costing more than a new machine so it's a waste these five minutes of your time yeah anyway proceeds from the auction benefit eight of the football players on the team as part of their name image likeness program to help empower student athletes on and off the field it says all power to you so what are we looking at like $19,000 you are I guess as a seller's premium as well so yeah probably about $18,000 ok I'm not sure and that's going to be divided over eight players. Eight players. So, we're looking at about $2,000 each.
    26:33
    Wow, that's going to take them a real long road, I suppose. I don't know. Well, that's $2,000 more than nothing, so. Sure, sure. Yeah, okay. That's a generous move by Stern, anyway. It sounds to me like a publicity stunt and I don't see what the fuss is all about. But, sorry, American Football, I'm in Europe, so not a big deal here. We never understood that game. Probably never will. No.
    27:04
    Anyway, moving on from that, before we end up getting banned. It's about the same as if we tell you that we put a pinball machine in a soccer player's locker room and now we're auctioning it off and everybody in America will be like, so what?
    27:20
    True. Well, still, it doesn't mean it didn't happen. so uh sure sure if we donated them ourselves i think we probably want to uh to mention it uh but anyway uh that wasn't that wasn't the only news from stern either because but still okay well okay well news with in inverted commas okay um because more and more important news let's go there well certainly for those of us in europe because stern have announced the appointment of lord dawnant dauntant i should say as the european marketing operations manager. And that's a position that's located in Amsterdam, not too far from yourself, Jonathan. So that means that Stern now has an office in Amsterdam. Have you thought about that?
    28:08
    Yes, although he could be working from home. It's still a Stern office? They have a permanent employee, at least. Right. So the press release says that Lloyd will be working with distributors, dealers and operators on brand new marketing initiatives including brand new pinball events. In Europe that is of course.
    28:36
    Lloyd will expand and develop pinball entertainment in new markets. And if you're wondering who is this Lloyd Dortund anyway, he recently worked for Sieben Gaming which I think is in Belgium. As a sales manager slash director.
    28:58
    So since we are journalists and we take our jobs seriously and report serious news like the news that we just reported. Serious.
    29:12
    I reached out to Doug Score, who is in charge of overseas sales, I believe, at Stern. and if I'm doing his position short, I apologize for that, Dog. But Dog was kind enough to get back to me because I was basically asked to him, like, is Lloyd Dortont reporting to you? And whether he could tell us any more. Yes, he is. He is reporting to Dogscore. His role is marketing, but Europe only. He will be working with operators and making them more knowledgeable about Insider Connected, helping in getting more locations set up with Pinball and leaderboards.
    30:06
    He's also going to build out the Stern Army program in Europe, which so far I don't think there is any. So that's easy to do. he will be creating launch party locations or if he's not creating them at least he will be teaming up with a party that's helping organize them I suppose he will be working with dealers to make them stronger in marketing Stern products build out a few pinball events and make them stronger and we have talked about this with Doug, we mentioned we had off the record meetings while we were at Primal Expo, Doug's score was one of them and we knew about how Stern is looking to expand into Europe and this is the official announcement of that and last but not least Lloyd will be on the search for locations that would make great pinball slash insider connected locations.
    31:13
    And he's still looking for large tournaments in Europe where Stern would like to present themselves to the pinball community.
    31:32
    So that's quite an extensive list of tasks for Lloyd to take on. Yeah, he's going to be kept busy with all that. He's going to be travelling a lot, I suppose.
    31:45
    Yeah, or at least getting in contact with people from around Europe. Yeah. Well, it'll be interesting to see which locations want to become part of the Stern Army programme and also host launch parties, because it would be good to have some stern backing to the launch parties that are currently being held across Europe for their new titles, including Jaws, of course. Right, yeah. And, of course, we look forward to meeting Lloyd at the upcoming EAG show in London. I suppose he will be there. You would expect him to be there, yes, absolutely.
    32:25
    So congratulations on his new position, Lloyd, and we look forward to getting acquainted. Indeed. Well, just before Christmas, though, Stern were very busy pushing their range of toppers that they have recently been producing. We mentioned about those earlier. Yeah, like Black Knight One. Yeah, indeed, and Mandalorian, House of Horrors, Avengers, Infinity Quest and Rush. They were suggesting all these toppers would be the ideal Christmas gift. for those of you with presumably thousands of dollars to give as gifts.
    33:04
    So, yeah, but nice that these toppers were all available, apparently, or were available before Christmas, and I'm sure that given what we were saying earlier about the intention to produce the add-ons for their titles in a more timely manner, we should be seeing some for JAWS fairly soon yeah so now speaking of toppers you're not jumping too far ahead are you? no no no but earlier I mentioned Stern's briefing to distributors when it comes to the release of JAWS and one of the things also mentioned was that Stern is trying to reduce the lag between a new game's announcements and the accessory launches for that same game. Absolutely, yes. Yeah, which has in some cases been over a year.
    34:07
    So they're looking to shorten that, so I suppose that's good news, and then we'll just have to wait and see how well they are able to do that.
    34:16
    Yeah, you would think they'd be able to produce it in a more timely manner. accessories also includes toppers I would say yes, toppers, custom shooter rods artwork interior artwork, side blades all that kind of stuff plenty of them to add and I'm sure they want to get in early so they can cut off third party developers from producing non-licensed or non-interactive, shall we say additions to the game Which is something we will be talking about a little bit later when we get to the spooky pinball section of this pincast. Yeah, okay. So now we get to the most interesting section. Oh, you love it! Yeah, yeah. Yeah! So now we're going into the code updates, and it will be interesting to know, I think, that over the course of 2023, Stern did 94 code updates to current and previous games and past games I should say mostly games of course in the Spike 2 system catalogue but still 94 game code updates and Martin is now going to tell you all 94 of them indeed where's my pillow I think 94 is probably if it's accurate it's misleading at best because quite a lot of those were minor updates or just rolling out generic changes to things like pricing schemes for Scandinavian countries for which they then had to roll out updates to 20 different models so they call that 20 updates well, ok, you can do but if you design your software properly you wouldn't have to do that anyway so new code this month Anyway, 21st December, James Bond 007, almost version 1, it's version 0.99, so this was quite a big update. Lots of rule changes, added Spectre perks for completing a Spectre weapon, lots of new sound effects and video displays and bug fixes. Venom, 0.97 on the 19th of December, new quick doppelganger multiball, only on the premium, of course, because they're the only games with the Doppelganger mech.
    36:44
    And a few changes to the action button, the way that works, and a bunch of fixes and more gameplay information on the screen, which is always welcome. Stranger Things, which is actually the 30th of November, but didn't come out until December. Version 1.11, minor changes to handle some of the new default settings, which didn't work properly before, but do now. then Batman 66 had two updates which were very minor, one fixed a potential reset issue and the other one fixed a lighting issue, Iron Maiden also fixed a bug so you know these are not huge updates they're just minor updates but it's a bug so you might as well install it and Munsters, yeah remember that one yes, so 12th of December there was a version 1.26 which fixed a bug which they introduced recently with the end of all bonus not displaying correctly. And finally, wake up Jonathan, version 1.57 of Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles came out on the 12th of December which fixed a bug with the reset option not appearing in the gameplay when it should have done. So, you know, not exactly groundbreaking or earth shattering are they? It was in Sleepover, that last one, yes, that kept me up so much. I was like, how can they not fix it? I know, it's awesome that they finally got to it, and it's going to change the world. But anyway, that was a software update, and I think that pretty much rounds off our news from Still and Pinball. Yeah, it does. But we're not done with new games. Far from it. Yeah, actually, we still have two more new titles to discuss, and these two were both released by Spooky Pinball from Benton, Wisconsin. and they just were announced right after we recorded our previous episode which you can still listen back on Spotify by the way if you want to but it's very inconsiderate of them not to do it before we record it would have been nice to receive a press release or something like that but apparently Spooky has a different model they have a very strong fan base where they probably will well, they're not selling out all games immediately to their fan base, but they don't need the big exposure that Stern is going for.
    39:18
    Obviously, that's two different leagues, but it's still very impressive what they are doing, don't get me wrong. Yes, so to the details they announced basically did the same kind of thing they did with Halloween and Ultraman before, where have a single playfield design with changes to inserts and things and artwork of course um to produce two different titles and this case those two titles were texas chainsaw massacre and looney tunes two more different themes i don't i think it would be hard push to find yeah very contradictory yeah exactly so um i say straight off that texas chainsaw massacre is not a theme that appeals to me in the slightest.
    40:06
    I'm aware of what it's about, and I'm not really into all these slasher horror movies. Looney Tunes, on the other hand, well, that could have been named after me, really, but it seems to have a very... I don't think a game called Martin Ayer will sell that well.
    40:25
    Well, you're just not trying, are you? I can see why they named it Looney Tunes. What kind of a defeatist attitude is that?
    40:32
    So anyway, same layout, but very different themes and very different gameplay, and indeed, very different teams working on the two. So they've got different software and artist designers working on those titles, so they will end up not sharing the same basic code base at all. Which makes me wonder, since the games are, I assume, wired the same way, um yeah the playfield is sort of identical aside from different uh inserts and so but
    41:12
    technically electronically i suppose they're uh the same yes yeah so i wonder can you run looney tunes software on a texas chainsaw massacre game you probably could yeah or or vice versa and I'm not sure what would be the beer scare.
    41:33
    Yeah, although I'm guessing there are labels screen printed onto the play field, or direct printed onto the play field, for various inserts, which wouldn't then make any sense if the software was of the other game.
    41:50
    Right. But I suspect you probably could, unless they deliberately decided to prohibit that. but you know it's certainly been done in the past hasn't it with Family Guy and Shrek you could swap the software over between those two games play Shrekly Guy or whatever if that's what you wanted to do but just a novelty that's all and in that I mean that was a licensed title two licensed titles whereas in this case you've also got two licensed titles and I suspect they probably wouldn't go to the effort of actually stopping you running the wrong code on it. Anyway, there was a maximum of 888 units of each of those models available.
    42:37
    That 888 is made up of three different levels. There's a standard edition, there's a bloodsucker edition, and there's a collector's edition. Right, and similar to previous Spooky titles, they're not limiting a certain model to a certain number. Now, the total number of games divided over those three levels is 888.
    43:03
    So that means if they sell 888 and 88 collector's editions, then none of the other models will be made because they're limited to that number or, well, basically any configuration of...
    43:18
    Yeah, any mixture of those three models totals a maximum of 888 are available. Basically, buy the model you want, and don't worry about them not being available unless they're close to the maximum. If you wanted to get any of those, then the prices of those are $8,300 US dollars for the standard, $9,000 for the Bloodsucker, and $9,700 for the collector's edition. So basically a $700 difference between each of the three levels. if you wanted to get any of those you can go through your distributor or you can go to Spooky and in order to get any of those you need to pay a non-refundable deposit of $1,000 $1,500 or $2,000 depending on which of the models you went for now launch took place in December there was, at the start of December there was a lot of media available at that time with promo videos all the feature matrices a bit lacking on photos of the games themselves the high res photos, didn't really see much out there there's some videos but and Looney Tunes particularly didn't seem to have much available at the start but that seemed to follow up fairly quickly afterwards so they caught up with that I wonder if that's maybe the least developed of the two at launch time I'm not sure but yeah I did see that Spooky at least the playfields came in or part of the playfields for both titles so they are close to starting production of the games if they haven't already started I mean there's games or cabinets set up so I think they have started yes because I think Spooky actually posted on Facebook saying that They've made a milestone in their history where they had four different titles in production at the same time, which were Texas Chainsaw Massacre, Looney Tunes, the end of the Total Nuclear Annihilation run as well, which also sold out eventually, and, of course, they're still making Scooby-Doo Where Are You games. So they had all those four in production simultaneously, which they're very proud of, and rightly so, I think. It's great that they've got an operation which can support that. Yeah, absolutely. And the most recent news from Spooky Pinball is that they revealed an interactive topper for Scooby-Doo Where Are You? Yeah. A sliding bookcase which reveals a portrait LCD monitor which shows interactive clips, special display animation, and a topper-exclusive video mode.
    46:11
    And that's all integrated into gameplay, of course. and that topper is available for 969 US dollars plus shipping and can be ordered through distributors ideally from the distributor where you bought the game in the first place yes, assuming you're still the owner of the game the original owner I should say of the game there's a bunch of features that it does, I'm not sure, should we go over those?
    46:43
    well It's worth mentioning that it's got some exclusive artwork on it, officially, of course, licensed artwork for the topper from Brad Duke. As you mentioned, the sliding bookcase and the video screen.
    47:01
    And, yeah, I don't think we need to cover all the details of it. I thought it was a very nice idea. The sliding bookcase actually reveals the LCD screen, so at first you don't see it, and then it slides open and it reveals the LCD screen, which gives you a very interactive topper, I should say. Yeah, well, it actually includes a custom video mode that's only available if you have the topper. Yeah, if you remember Shoot the Dog from Junkyard, it reminded me of that. I wasn't sure whether you were meant to shoot Scooby or avoid shooting Scooby and shoot the ghosts in the background. But either way, yeah, use the flipper buttons to fire Scooby-Saxon, I would assume, at or around Scooby in the video mode. So anyway, it's something we've seen added before into toppers, but I think it's a first for Spooky to actually have a new mode that directly ties into having a topper installed. Right.
    48:13
    Personally, I look forward very much to playing Looney Tunes, and I'll take your word for it that Texas Chainsaw Massacre will be quite as much as fun if you're into that type of theme.
    48:32
    Personally, I'm not. No offense. It's just not my cup of tea. No, quite right. Yeah, or bucket of blood. Quite right. So that covers all the news that we have for Spooky Pinball for December and the beginning of January.
    48:48
    Okay. Let's move on to Pedretti Gaming in Italy. Well, you say Pedretti Gaming, but we might have a little news on that a bit later in this pincast. But, yes, so our third headline was all about them, and the fact that they have announced, in conjunction with Planetary Pinball Supply, that they are going to be doing full remakes of existing Bally Williams titles, in the same way that Chicago Gaming have been doing up until now, and, of course, Haggis as well. Right. They've been making older ones, but we don't know whether they're going to be making more recent electronic games or older solid-state type games. Well, they could even be making electromechanical games. Electromechanical games, yeah. Yeah? Yeah, I don't want to go that far, but... Yeah, but they could. They could. They've previously been making 2.0 kits for Funhaus and Whirlwind. Right. Of course. Which we've reported on, of course. Yeah and of course they not alone in doing that because Dutch Pinball did that with the Biler Pinball 2 and Cardona who we also mentioned have done that
    50:16
    And there was somebody else, oh yeah, Mirko, of course as well, did it with the Tales of the Redbeard Knights. Yeah. So, but now they've moved up to a whole new level, and they're going to be remaking complete games. And they're going to be doing this using their combined facility that they set up with the Pimble Brothers called Euro Pimble Corporation in Italy, which is where Pedretti are based, of course.
    50:46
    But that joint venture with Pimble Brothers is going to be remaking these old Bally Williams games. Right, and that same joint venture is also building the Pimble Brothers games, currently Alien and Queen, which makes you wonder if there isn't a conflict of interest. well it is interesting that they will effectively be building games that will compete against pinball brothers games in the market and that's but then i suppose pinball brothers have been making games which kind of compete alongside padretti's kits i suppose as well that's been happening in the past already and they've got on quite well with so it hasn't been a problem.
    51:37
    I can see a potential soap opera. Yes, it's getting a bit complicated because the manufacturing company is part owned by Pimple Brothers, we believe. It's certainly a joint venture with them. So they will stand to gain from sales of machines made by Pedretti. Well, yeah, exactly. So while they're competing, they're also profiting from each other. Yes, that's right. So I don't know. I guess it will work quite well one way or the other. Now, under this new deal, Pedretti will be building the games, we say, using Euro Pinball Corp. For manufacturing facilities, they will have to use the fast pinball control system, just as they had to do with Funhouse and World in Total Chaos as part of the licensing agreement with Planetary Pinball that they use that system. They are supposedly going to be announcing one new title a year. Of course, they're announcing and making very different things, but they plan to announce a new remake title every year. The first taking place this year, well, being announced this year, And apparently they've been working on that remake throughout 2023.
    52:56
    So it should be well formed when it actually is announced. Whether they're actually manufacturing it or not, we don't know.
    53:07
    But anyway, this year we can look forward to a new remake from Pedretti Gaming, as well as potential remakes from other companies. Right. and we did discover something that could be interesting and maybe it could be nothing right so but Pedrecci is officially known as Pedrecci Gaming but six days after they made the announcement of this new collaboration with Planetary Pinball they changed their logo from Pedretti Gaming to Pedretti Pinball.
    53:52
    Yeah, it was on Facebook, I believe. I don't know if they've done it anywhere else. Not on their Instagram account. No. They didn't have their logo on anyway, I don't think. I had their World Winter Chaos game on there as their profile picture. But certainly Pedretti Pinball now seems to be a thing, whereas before it was always Pedretti Gaming. So maybe that's a new division of Pedretti Gaming, is Pedretti Pinball. As part of their licensing agreement, they will be selling a lot more Williams Valley licensed spare parts of the type that Planetary Pinball produce or license. while Planetary Pinball themselves will become a US distributor for all Euro Pinball Corporation games including Pinball Brothers titles so Pinball Brothers getting another distributor in the US out of that so yeah, sounds like quite a nice little package they've wrapped up there that makes a lot of sense but I have to wonder whether the sort of lack of games coming out of Chicago Gaming's deal with Planetary Pinball, and in particular the Cactus Canyon games, whether that's frustrated Planetary Pinball and pushed them into making deals with other companies, or they might be working on deals with other manufacturers, which I don't know about yet. Well, obviously Planetary is the license holder of Bally Williams Games. They got the license from... Scientific games, it was at the time. Exactly, I think you could. So it is basically their job, or in their best interest, to find parties to use that catalogue and build on it. Yes, there is no use licensing somebody who doesn't produce any games. Because one would assume that they get a payment per game manufactured, manufactured and if they're not manufacturing them then Planetary aren't getting any income so it's better to team up with somebody who is or can. Chicago Gaming never had an exclusive I suppose neither did Haggis and neither does Pedretti so basically there's a catalogue out there with titles that anybody can license so to speak or upgrade and release in a collaboration with Planetary if you're into that. And of course Planetary from then it introduced a little competition into the sub-licensing market because if say somebody wanted to produce, I don't know, pick a title out of the thin air, Twilight Zone for instance, then maybe Planetary could ask Chicago Gaming do you want to make this and they go yes and they ask pedretti you want to make this and they go yes and then they have the a bidding process who's going to give who's going to give the the greatest commission to planetary right in order to do that so it'd be good for them in in that regard but not so really good for uh the buyers but anyway well pimple isn't a hobby for uh poor people anyway no no it's not as we've seen and as we've mentioned earlier i mean all the numbers we've been banding around.
    57:24
    Anyway, so that's good news, anyway, and more games coming out, and a new collaboration. Yeah, so, now, while we were, and I'm going to mess up your order here, but while we were... I have an order. Yeah.
    57:39
    While we were talking about Pedretti Gaming, who is obviously collaborating with Pimple Brothers, let's see if there's any news from Pimple Brothers to report. Well, yes. I think we mentioned last month that a new version of the Alien Code would be coming out imminently. It took a few more days than we were expecting, but it came out on the 5th of December. Version 4.0, which added all the Ellen Ripley assets into the game for existing Pinball Brothers alien game owners. It doesn't roll back into the Highway Pinball game. and yeah, added a lot of audio and video throughout the game also changed a few minor other things like pop bumper scoring and some new rules for mystery awards and some changes to the test menu and bug fixes and a match sequence at the end has changed as well I mean added, I don't think it existed before but I thought it did but apparently in their release notes to say that they've added it at the end of the game. So anyway, that version 4.0, definitely worth adding to anybody who, for anybody who owns a Pimple Brothers version of the Alien game and hasn't installed it yet. Right. And that was all the news for Pimple Brothers. Yeah, I think so. They've been showing pictures of stacks of games being sent off to, I think, to Nitro Pimple in Canada. and then there's some more games being sent off to another destination. I can't remember exactly who that was at that time. But, yeah, that was all from the Euro Pinball collaboration that we've just been talking about. Games are being churned out and shipped off around the world. Great. OK. Now, back to the US.
    59:39
    Jersey Jack Pinball, obviously, building Elton John games at the moment. Yes. but their previous title, The Godfather Limited Edition Machine, was raffled off at Pinball Expo. If you were there, you probably would have seen that. And that helped raise $10,000.
    60:07
    I don't know how that compares to the price of a Godfather Limited Edition. Probably round about the value of it. And 100% of those proceeds were donated this month to the Anne and Robert H. Lurie Children's Hospital in Chicago. I think we mentioned about that taking place before and how it had a special place in the heart of the game designer Eric Meunier. Well, he was there to present them with a huge check for $10,000, which they were obviously hugely grateful. but there's some good news if you missed out on that because there'll be another machine this time an Elton John Platinum edition which is going to be raffled in the same way at the Texas Pinball Festival in March and this time the proceeds are going to the National Video Game Museum which is very close to the Texas Pinball Festival host hotel in Frisco in Texas Tickets for that are only available to purchase at the show and the winner must apparently be present to win it only if you're going to the show in that case ok there's your opportunity to win a nice Elton John right that's all I've got that's all you've got that's all I've got from Jersey Jack no there's more we mentioned EAG Expo which is next week in London and I have a good source informing me that Jack Warnieri will be present at the EAG Expo in London so yes I believe he will be on the Pinball Heaven stand Pinball Heaven being the UK distributor for Dirty Jack Pinball Games and yes Jack will be there to meet and greet and tell you all about the process of bringing the Elton John game to market. And of course you'll have the opportunity to play it as well if you haven't already. Right, okay. And that does round up our Jersey Jack coverage for December. Like I mentioned, they are busy building and selling, of course, Elton John games. And if you haven't got one then go to the Jersey Jack people's websites and find out how you can get one. Yeah. And play one first, I would say, because you probably blow your socks off, I think. Yeah, this is a game that where and now I'm just talking from a personal point of view, theme-wise you think, or I thought, eh.
    62:58
    And then you play it and you're like, wow. Didn't see that one coming. I didn't, I said it before, I'll say it again, I didn't expect that game to be so much fun.
    63:10
    Great. Well, I look forward to playing it in London in a couple of, well, less than two weeks' time. Yeah. So, now, speaking of fun... Oh, very good. Yes. It's almost like there's a script for this.
    63:27
    Barrels of fun. Of course, in Houston, Texas, I need to rectify something. In our previous podcast, as well as in the Pinball Magazine newsletter,
    63:45
    we or I reported that the Cointaker website stated that production of Barrels of Funds Labyrinth will begin in April 2024. That info is completely incorrect. and I apologize for that even though Martin found it yes but no we report that but that is incorrect I got an email from Brian Savage and David Finesse I believe and some other people from Barrels of Fun telling me the game is already in production and there's photos of the game being in production widely available on their Facebook page. So games were in production mid-December, and they continue to build them. So I apologize for, or we apologize for, that information being incorrect.
    64:51
    Yeah, I've just checked, and Cointaker's website now says production started October 2023. Right, okay. so it's good that they reached out and corrected that. And we're sorry that we interpreted that information while it was incorrect, and we thought it was correct. Yep, there you go. Don't believe everything you read. But you can believe everything you hear, which is a good thing. And if it's not correct, we'll tell you afterwards anyway. Yes, we will certainly rectify any errors we might have made intentionally. But to carry on with Barrels of Fun and the labyrinth game, there was a very nice making-of video on YouTube on Adam Savage's tested YouTube channel. It's the name of a program or a series that he produces. I can't quite remember whether Adam Savage was one of those who was going to be working on the game which was going to be following Predator yeah Masters of Danger, oh no, Experts of Danger or something like that one, Dangerous, Experts of Dangerous that was it, yeah Crackers, Dummies or stuff like that Yeah, I'm sure he was one of the duo who were presenting that. Anyway, he has his own YouTube channel and a program called Tested, where he was visiting Barrels of Fun. And he was talking with Johnny Fraser Allen and David Van Ness about the creation and the concept and development of the Labyrinth game. Yeah, highly recommended to watch that. if you're interested in seeing how the game developed early sketches and how that developed into the full game with very interesting artwork changes into what it eventually became. So have a look on YouTube for Adam Savage's Tested and I'm sure you will find the video. Otherwise I'm sure Jonathan will include it in his monthly newsletter. sign up to it if you haven't already thank you for the plug I already did it's in the December edition which actually went out mid-December I was quite late because I have other things to do as well really I'm gorgeous I know yeah sorry I have a life I can't help it well we'll soon put a stop to that now we know So let's move back to your own home country then and tell us what's been going on over at Dutch Pinball. Well, the most important news, of course, and I'm pretty sure... Yes. I'm not sure I mentioned it actually last month.
    67:56
    I think it was imminent, if you hadn't mentioned it already. For those not knowing, I had a Big Lebowski on order since probably Pinball Expo 2014. when the game was officially announced. As we all know, Dutch Pinball had a rough path getting to where they are now, causing a delay in the production of what is known as early achiever production games. But I finally got mine. It took eight years, but I got it. You did? Yeah. Congratulations. Yeah, and that also means that the early achiever run is almost done. And that's now only a matter of months. And then you can say, well, 12 months is also. But I think we're talking about, hopefully, for Dutch Pimble, two to three months, maybe four. That doesn't mean that the production of the big Lebowski is done because they're still selling the regular models. Yeah, brand new orders. Yeah, brand new orders are coming in. And they will continue building the Big Lebowski throughout 2024. I talked to Barry earlier today. Basically, I asked him if the license is expiring, are they going to renew it? And he told me the license will expire at the end of 2024. And at the moment, it's highly unlikely that they will renew that license. So if you're in the market for a big Lebowski, make sure that you order one in time so they can still build it. Before the end of the year. Yes, exactly.
    69:46
    And there's more news from this symbol that nobody knows yet. Well, so I'm not sure we should tell anybody, should we? Oh, go on then. Barry told me that, and this is quite interesting, they got a second building across the street from where they are now. I can't get into the specifics of what that building will be used for, other than it has a lot more office space, which means that all the offices from the current Dutch Pinball building will be moving across the street. The current building will be mainly focusing on production of Dutch Pinball games. You're suggesting the second building won't be. Well, they have an intention for the second building and they will be announcing or revealing that in their own time. And I respect that, so I will not be telling you that. It will be interesting though. Okay, but the second building is not all office space. No, there is also production space, yes. Right, okay. But they'll free up more production space by moving their offices out of the current building. Right, yeah. So they're basically scaling up production, but also scaling up staff, hiring more and more people. Well, as you mentioned earlier with the Big Lebowski potentially expiring, or licensed for that, potentially expiring at the end of this year, they're going to need to announce or start production of their next title. Yeah, at some point, my guess would be, and this is just a guess, I think earlier, very, or we even indicated that Dutch Piml would be announcing their next title after the summer of 2024. My guess is that's likely going to be late 2024 or early 2025.
    71:48
    Right. Right now. And that's not speculation, but that's the best way I can put it. Yeah. Okay, well, we will update that as we get more information from Barry and the Dr. Pimbal team, I suppose, as we get to see them at various points throughout the year. Yes, that sort of ramps it up for Dr. Pimbal for now, but it's not like they're not working on something. They're working on something and we can't discuss it yet. Yes, that time will come. Okay, that's fine. It will be interesting, I can tell you that.
    72:27
    I'm sure. Everything about them is. That's good. Okay, so that's... We have a whole bunch of companies where there isn't much in the way of news, but let's just stay in Europe for a moment and completely trash our order of games, which is only loosely... or companies, as I say, which is only loosely put together, and move over to France, where Hexapinball have been posting some pictures. They've shared some pictures of seven of their Space Hunt games in various stages of production. Right. Which suggests that they are manufacturing them at some speed and building seven of them, at least, at the moment. They did do a tutorial and a gameplay video as well for the game, for Space Hunt, that was, which was interesting you could see the game being played and the modes working it was in French though partly, most of it yes it did say it was in French and English, I didn't hear any particular English bits maybe cursing yes, probably and using the YouTube auto translate function only provided a certain amount of information. It's not quite up there yet, but it was interesting anyway. I'm sure you can glean a lot from it if you haven't already seen gameplay or indeed played the game yourself, The Space Hunt. So have a look on Hexapinball on YouTube, and you can catch that tutorial and gameplay video. Yeah, and the link is already in the December edition of the Pinball Magazine newsletter that Martin mentioned earlier. Fantastic. You're really on the ball. Thank you, I think.
    74:26
    Talking about new games and European manufacturers, you did mention, we've talked about STR Pinball in the past. Yeah, is that really a manufacturer? Well, not really, no, but they have been fairly daubent of late, but it does look like they are working on a new custom game with an LCD display. Really? Yeah, but there's no information yet on what the theme for that is going to be, or it hasn't been announced, I'll put it that way. But we'll keep an eye on that and see if that turns into a thing, going back to Adam's family. And if it does, we will bring you details of it in our future pincasts. Right, okay. So looking at their Oh right yeah they are apparently working on something See well I lied to you Intentionally
    75:20
    Unless I thought I could get away with it. Yes. Right, right, right. But while we're in Europe, no news from Quetzalpinball. No. Or Bitronic, for that matter, who are supposed to be taking a new Quetzal title into production. Yeah, Tokyo Perfect Drift. I think you mean, yes. That one, yeah. We're waiting for that, and I know I think we both know someone who put an order in for that a long time ago, and is still waiting for it.
    75:54
    I would say he's waiting until he's old and grey, but he already is. Oh, well. He's got nothing to lose then. Okay.
    76:04
    Hanger's Pinball Australia, also no news. Yeah. And the same goes for HomePin in Taiwan. And I'm afraid it's probably not the nicest thing to say because I wish them well. But with Chinese New Year coming up, this probably means that the next three months there's no news either.
    76:25
    Yeah, everything will be shut down. We can confidently predict that. Yeah. There was also no news from Chicago Gaming. but there was some news from Cardona Pinball that you discovered. Yes, well I'm in the middle of reviewing their Black Rose Skull and Bones kit which I will go back and finish that in a week's time and you'll be able to read all about that of course on Pinball News but they have brought out a new speaker panel decal for their No Good Gophers Battle for the Green kit So obviously that goes on in No Good Gophers game, which had a pretty plain black Williams speaker panel. So now you can get a decal for that if you happen to have the Battle for the Green kit installed. It's not just plain green in the same colour as the grass on the back last, as it basically continues? No, I think it definitely contains the characters from the Battle for the Green kit on it as well, and the title, I think, too, of the game. So if you have that kit, then that might be something that would be nice. A bit late for a Christmas present, but you can give a Christmas present, a late Christmas present to yourself in that case. Okay, so staying over that side of the room, we can give a little news, a bit of a shout-out to the team at Multimorphic, because Gerry put out a message, a end-of-the-year message, saying thanks to a mammoth effort from the production team, he said they brought their lead times on new P3 games down to just one month.
    78:12
    That is very good, because that used to be like six months already. Yeah, yeah, yeah. But they've been putting a lot of effort into getting those P3 games, the base machines, built, and he explained how they have different production queues for the individual game modules themselves, like the Heist and Weird Al and all those ones, and Final Resistance. If you buy that as a separate kit to add into your existing game, that's one line, but if you buy a base machine with that installed, that's a different line, And that's what brought down to one month lead time. And so you can basically choose to receive your P3 with any or all of the currently available games within a month now.
    79:07
    So congratulations to everybody at Multimorphic in that huge push to cut that lead time down. Yeah, and there's some unofficial rumors. well, rules are always unofficial of course that do mention Multimorphic as being the company behind the Princess Bride pinball that we we've spoken about several times and they sent out a Happy New Year emailing which I'm not sure you got Yeah, I did, yeah. Yeah, it contained a close-up picture of a playfield detail of what the game is supposed to be, apparently.
    80:02
    And I didn't dig into the rumor that much, but what I understood is that, I don't even remember who, But some people dug into the IP address from where the website or where the domain was registered, which appeared to be the same host as Multimorphic is registered or something like that. giving and making them conclude that Multimortality could be behind the Prince of Rye pinball.
    80:45
    Okay. And again, if you would like to put people or leave people with the wrong impression, what you could do is register your domain with the same host as some other pinball company does, pick one, there's plenty to choose from, and people will be thinking it might be that company and I'm not exactly sure I got it correctly right now but from what I briefly read that's how that rumor sort of started it still remains to be seen whether it is actually going to be a Multimorphic title but we do know that Multimorphic is working on a licensed title for their next game yep Well, I'm just looking at the picture that they sent with their Happy Holidays email, which is of a captive ball placed underneath a sculpted hut, it looks like, next to an artwork ramp, which is interesting, because it looks like the whole of the metal ramp is wrapped in artwork,
    81:53
    which I think would be a new feature. I don't know, I've seen that, and you have to wonder how well it will hold up to a ball being shot up it. repeatedly but but anyway it's a bit early to to jump to too many conclusions on that but uh i i thought i thought i checked out who uh who the uh domain registered to when it was first announced but uh and i thought it was up with a a sort of a masked address from a uh from the register Iceland's base oh that's right yeah yes that's right you're quite right yes but it was a hosting company who's yeah not natural I'm surprised if Multimorphic are using an Icelandic hosting company or maybe my source was completely incorrect or I misunderstood what was being said and I should have read it better wow we'll find out And if it turns out not to be the case, we will, of course, correct it. But in the meantime, it's all good fun, but just speculation. Right. So, and a rumor, as I indicated. And we don't do rumors, but we do report on rumors if they're factual, if it's a fact that there is a rumor going around.
    83:15
    Yeah, I think we've kind of got that. Okay, so no news from Turner Pinball this month. No. We do expect to see them at Texas Show in March. Yeah, it's still a couple of months away. Yeah.
    83:30
    Pinball Adventures, though, they did post on Instagram that they had six Pony Factory games in... Six? They had produced, I should say. They had made six Pony Factory games in the few days before Christmas, and we're planning to build another 14 by the end of the year. Wow. Wait a second. So they posted right before Christmas, and then there's five days left, and they expect to build 14 games in the remaining five days of the year. Well, it did seem somewhat optimistic, shall we say, to get 14 games built in that time. Optimistic seems to be the key word with Google Adventures. I don't know what the build process actually is. They might have already had all the cabinets made up and the playfields populated and just needed to put together a few bits and pieces in order to build a game. So in which case doing a 14 in, I don't know, in a week might be achievable. Just slotting playfields into cabinets and boxes. Or maybe they sent us a little help or started helping out. Ah, good. Yes. Very nice. Very seasonal. Yes.
    84:48
    Anyway, oh well. Wow. Six Pony Factory games. Woohoo! Already? Yeah, already. Hold the press. Twenty in total. There you go. That's just what they reported, anyway, on their feed. I know companies where that's a prototype run. Oh dear. Well, yes, I'm not going to say any more. Okay.
    85:15
    There was also no news from our good friend David Spix at the American Pinball. No, absolutely. He spilled the beans last month on our pin cast and told us everything there is to come. He didn't clean them up either. No, no.
    85:29
    He spilled the beans and that was it. Yeah. Hell of a mess. but yeah so no extra news this month over about what he told us last month we are expecting David Fitts sort of or we had heard rumours or he told us himself or told you I don't remember that he might be at EAG Expo we hope he will be but we'll just have to wait and see yes I think it was depending on whether people would have a stand there, and they have, so he may turn up. We'll let you know.
    86:07
    So that's... Yes, that's right. All the, well, in fact, our reports from the show, I'm sure, which will probably come out before that. But there is other news this month.
    86:19
    Not just about the people manufacturers, because a big announcement was made that Pinnberg, the huge tournament that used to be a massive part of the replay effects show in Pittsburgh before the whole thing was cancelled due to COVID and then it was permanently cancelled. Never to return. Well, it's returning. Well, Pimberg is anyway. And it's returning on the 24th to 28th of July this year. And it's going to be held at the Resonene Esports facility in Bridgeville, Pennsylvania, just outside Pittsburgh. Does that mean that it's going to be virtual? pinball? Well, you'd think with a name like that, but no. Apparently it's more like a kind of arena area where they play eSports. But that's where physical, Finberg, is going to be. It's not going to be a huge event like replay FX was. It's limited to just 120 players. And we'll have smaller cash prizes. But it's still going to be a big tournament with a series of pre- tournaments, I'm sure, at neighbouring venues. So if you go to pinburg.com slash 2024, you can find out all more details about it. When I made these notes, I checked the pinburg.com site, and it didn't have a link to the 2024 event at that time. It may have popped up by now, but if it hasn't, then just add slash 2024 on the end, and that will get you to all the details about when registration is going to open. As I said, only 120 players are going to be able to take part in it, so you want to be in there quick when registration opens.
    88:05
    Other news? Well, I hear you ask. Oh, yeah, is there more other news, Boris? I do hear you ask. Good. Yes, now, we've had this a few times, but there's going to be a new attempt to break the Guinness World Record for continuous pinball playing. It seems like more and more people are attempting Yeah, that's right I think it's more and more achievable and this one is actually coming up in just five days time six days time on January the 11th. It's taking place at the Pinball Garage in Hamilton, Ohio USA and it's being attempted by Jim Foliano Oh, right Jim is going to be playing the Avengers Infinity Quest. Normally they have two machines set up in case one breaks down so you can swap over to it but um having seen this happen before uh the current record is 62 hours 21 minutes it's held by andrew robbie shaw of lakeland in florida uh that was made um fairly recently actually in september between the september the first and third of 2023 so you will be able to watch along with jim as he attempts to break that record that will be starting on January the 11th so we will try and bring you a link for the stream of that so you can send Jim your support via messaging and see how he gets on so it's got to be 62 hours and 21 minutes so that's the best part of three days so we'll be finishing on the starting at 9pm local time so I might be dressing off a little bit here but do if people are in general so to speak attempting to break a record and not sleeping for in this case like 62 hours or more do they get drug tested?
    90:17
    you do actually sleep because as I understand it, unless the rules have changed, I think for every hour of play that you do, you're allowed five minutes of break. And you're allowed to build those five minutes up into a block, which you can then take as like an hour, once you've got 12 of them. So you're allowed breaks, and you can sleep for short periods of time. but it's still a pretty grueling endurance to undertake, I think. Right. I mean, I couldn't dream of staying up all week. Well, you wouldn't be if you were dreaming. No, well, that's true. Well, with all the traveling that I do, occasionally we hit that I'm up for 24 hours or so. and that's already taking its toll, so to speak. Yeah. Can't imagine staying up for three days. No. Well, as I say, you do get short breaks, but I guess after... My memory says it's something like five minutes for every hour, but it may not be that much. But you can put them together and maybe take an hour's sleep every day out of that. I've heard stories of people doing certain drugs and staying up for five days in a row. Oh, okay. But then again, if you get drug tested, then oh, you're cheating.
    92:00
    Yeah, well, it depends what qualifies as drugs. You know, if you're drinking lots of coffee and getting caffeined up, is that an illegal drug in this sense? Anyway, we don't know, and we will bring you news of how that world record attempt went in next month's Pinkast. And best of luck of course to Jim in his attempt and don't take any of my advice in doing this or whatever but I'm just curious like I mean I wouldn't be able to do it even if I wanted to No, no quite so it's quite an achievement if he manages it so anyway Is there more news Mark? There's a bit of news which you discovered I believe about The Who's Tommy yes actually that came in today The Who's Tommy reimagined by Pete Townsend guitar player of The Who of course and Dask McKenna will be starting a new run on Broadway in the Niederlander Theater in New York. Yeah, in New York. Preview performances will begin March 8th and the premiere or opening night is on March 28th of this year. So it might be worthwhile if we're going to Texas to do a transfer in New York and maybe catch a few burning pinball machines well I would hope no pinballs were harmed in the making of the Who's Tommy Reimagined at least if Pete Townsend is involved in how many guitars from Pete Townsend do you know that are still in one piece well most of them have been glued back together again and put on ebay but anyway but I understand what you're saying, yes has an appetite for destruction although that's a different band it is a different band, yes so anyway let me see if there's a website that you can go to I got an email so there must be some link in there let me take a quick look while I do that please do tell me all about the Pinball Awards and what have you. Well, yes, one of the things we won't be seeing when we go to Texas Pinball Festival is the annual Twippy Awards, because the ceremony for those has been dropped as part of a whole series of nonsense about people getting upset about pinball awards not being awarded, or categories being cancelled.
    95:02
    So, anyway, the Twippy Awards were dropped, then the awards show media categories I should say for the Twippy Awards was dropped were dropped and then the whole award show at the Texas Pimple Festival was cancelled then by totally unrelated coincidence the other awards the Pimple Industry Awards they've also been cancelled for this year due to lack of time and effort to make a fulsome presentation ceremony. So that's been cancelled.
    95:41
    Anyway, lots of people got upset, lots of threats and counter threats and in the end it was all a storm in a teacup and all over nothing and well, the upshot is there won't be any pinball awards presented from either the Twippies or pinball industry awards this year. so if you're looking forward to those then it's not going to happen and it also means that Jonathan and myself have got a rather large gap to fill on Saturday evening with our quiz unless we move back to the 6pm slot on Friday evening which used to be our slot anyway opening the show with our pinball quiz yeah Because there's no reason to not do it on Friday. Well, we were the warm-up act for the awards recently, but that's not happening. Well, we'll see how it fits into the Texas Fingal Festival schedule seminar, and I'm sure we'll be happy to work with Paul and the other organizers on that to make it all happen. Yeah, so. Oh, well. in the mean I did find a teaser link but that's just a downloadable video that's probably also on YouTube I didn't find a specific website for that Tommy reimagined musical but we can tell you who are the lead or the principal casting and I bet you've never heard of any of them that is indeed true yes so we have in well I wouldn't say in random order we have Ali Louis as Tom Walker that's easy for you to say we have Alison Luff as Mrs. Walker we have Adam Jacobs as Captain Walker almost sounds like a drink John Ambrosino as Uncle Ernie he's doing all the dirty stuff I think if I remember correctly Bobby Conte is Kevin yeah I'm sure you've seen all his work and we have Christina who is the asset queen Okay, that's a Tina Turner role I think we can probably stop you at that point I can happen to mention that if you go to tommythemusical.com you will see Rich's Broadway previews begin on March the 8th and there's a link to book tickets for that it's yeah, it's Monday Sunday is dark but all the other days are performances and two on Saturdays. Well, since we're press, we'll probably get an invite anyway to do a review, right? I'd be devastated if we weren't.
    99:03
    Yeah. Okay. So that, I think, kind of rounds us up for the month of December 2023 and the start of January 2024. So enjoy Stern's Shark Week while you still can. Because they will be bombing you with more images of Jaws in the upcoming days. Ain't that the tooth.
    99:27
    And apart from that, we will see you at the start of February with our next PINcast, looking back at, of course, all the fun and excitement through the first month of 2024, what's left of it. And, of course, we'll also have some news from EAG in our respective publications and in our PINcast. So I think until then, we both hope you have a fantastic 2024. And we look forward to joining you every month throughout it with our regular Pinnable Industry News Pinncast. And occasionally a bonus Pinncast with special guests. You bet. Whenever we can. So until the next one, we wish you a fantastic year and we'll see you next month. Thank you. Bye bye. Bye.
    100:18
    you