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The Super Awesome Pinball Show - Special Report

The Super Awesome Pinball Show·podcast_episode·36m 12s·analyzed·Nov 20, 2020
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TL;DR

Replay Foundation/Papa shutting down after pandemic halts revenue; Pinberg tournament and game collection to be liquidated.

Summary

A special report from The Super Awesome Pinball Show covering the November 2020 shutdown of the Replay Foundation, which operated Papa (Professional and Amateur Pinball Association) and hosted Pinberg, the largest pinball tournament in history. Hosts Christopher Franchi and Christian Line interview Josh Sharp (IFPA president) and Zach Sharp (IFPA vice president and Stern Pinball director of marketing) about the financial collapse, community impact, and future of competitive pinball in the wake of COVID-19 pandemic closures.

Key Claims

  • Replay Foundation announced closure on November 18, 2020, ceasing all events and liquidating assets

    high confidence · Host introduction and Josh/Zach Sharp confirmation; directly confirmed by guests

  • Pinberg attracted approximately 1,000 competitors annually and is the largest pinball tournament in history

    high confidence · Multiple hosts and guests reference '1,000 people compete in this tournament' and 'largest pinball tournament in history'

  • Replay Foundation had never been cash-flow positive and lost over $100,000 running ReplayFX annually

    high confidence · Josh Sharp states foundation's publicly available 501c3 records show they 'lost over $100,000 running replay effects'

  • Kevin Martin (Replay Foundation leader) personally poured hundreds of thousands of dollars into competitive pinball out of his own pocket

    medium confidence · Josh Sharp acknowledges 'the hundreds of thousands of dollars he has poured into competitive pinball out of his own pocket'

  • Papa survived a 100-year flood in 2004 that destroyed 232 pinball machines, recovered within a year for Papa 8 championships

    high confidence · Hosts detail '232 pinball machines and rare arcade games' destroyed; Josh Sharp references recovery for 'Papa 8 World Championships'

  • Papa was founded in the 1980s by Roger Sharp (Josh's father) and Steve Epstein from Broadway Arcade in New York

    high confidence · Christian Line and Josh Sharp confirm founding; Josh notes his father's involvement directly

  • Steve Epstein, co-founder of Papa, passed away earlier in 2020; had registered for Pinberg as tribute

    high confidence · Josh Sharp states 'he got in and then unfortunately you know passed away at the uh earlier this year'

  • Stern Pro Circuit contains 20 events on calendar, with Pinberg as the largest single event

    high confidence · Zach Sharp: 'Pinberg was just one event of the 20 events on the Stern Pro Circuit calendar. Well, granted, it was the biggest tournament on the calendar.'

Notable Quotes

  • “Taking Pinberg away from pinballers is like taking away the Super Bowl from football fans or the Stanley Cup away from hockey fans”

    Christopher Franchi / News Report @ opening — Sets emotional context for Pinberg's significance to competitive pinball community

  • “Papa survived a 100-year flood. I think they'll survive a 100-year pandemic.”

    Zach Sharp @ mid-discussion — Expression of optimism about Papa/Replay Foundation recovery despite current crisis

  • “I am extremely confident that this is this is not the end of papa right... I just know deep down just the resolve of our community that we haven't seen the last of the Replay Foundation or Papa in general.”

    Josh Sharp @ mid-discussion — Direct statement of belief in community resilience and future recovery

  • “I think it's going to be baby steps... you probably have like a 173 players [at next major tournament], and then it just grows from there.”

    Zach Sharp @ future-looking discussion — Realistic expectation-setting for post-pandemic tournament recovery

  • “If we treat it like 72 twice, it's like we could accommodate 144... I don't know if there's a version of Pinberg where it's like, hey, we're not doing 1,000 players. We'll do 100 players 10 times. Like, I wouldn't do that.”

    Josh Sharp @ IFPA event scaling discussion — Illustrates operational constraints preventing IFPA from quickly scaling up tournament infrastructure

  • “What's eaten in Pinberg stays in Pinberg.”

    Josh Sharp @ lighter moment — Humorous aside about Pinberg insider culture and camaraderie

  • “Winning it the first time it was at the convention center for the first replay effects, what was really special was it was the first Pinberg that we got our dad to come.”

    Zach Sharp @ memory segment — Personal significance of involving Roger Sharp in competitive pinball legacy

  • “You can't, it's like Kevin Bacon, you can't get there without my dad or Steve in six steps or less every time.”

Entities

Replay FoundationorganizationPapa (Professional and Amateur Pinball Association)organizationPinbergeventReplayFXeventJosh SharppersonZach SharppersonRoger SharppersonSteve Epsteinperson

Signals

  • ?

    business_signal: Sustainability crisis for event-driven nonprofits in pinball; personal funding models (Kevin Martin's $hundreds of thousands) are not scalable or reliable long-term

    high · Josh Sharp contrast: 'Kevin, can you write us a check for like, I don't know, $2 million? Maybe that'll get us to the other side of this... I'm very thankful that so far Eugene [Rothwell] answers yes to that... I don blame John Bitt with all that he done... if he don't want to continue to do that'

  • ?

    business_signal: Replay Foundation financial collapse reveals unsustainable nonprofit model; organization never cash-flow positive, lost $100k+ annually running ReplayFX

    high · Josh Sharp: 'their expenses have always exceeded what they've brought in from year to year... their primary fundraising is through running events' and publicly available 501c3 records show 'they lost over $100,000 running replay effects'

  • ?

    community_signal: Replay Foundation closure creates existential crisis for competitive pinball community; significant controversy around Kevin Martin's personal funding burden and expectations that foundation should continue operations indefinitely

    high · Josh Sharp's comments on 'weird sense that like the community is somehow owed his continued... doing this for us' and Facebook responses questioning why Kevin doesn't simply fund recovery again as he did post-2004 flood

  • ~

    sentiment_shift: Mixed sentiment: devastation at tournament loss tempered by optimism and belief in community recovery; emphasis on Pinberg's role as gathering/social event beyond competitive play

    high · Josh/Zach describe Pinberg as epitomizing community bonds ('people and just spending time and going and drinks with with all these people') and assert multiple times 'this is not the end' despite acknowledging difficulty

Transcript

groq_whisper · $0.109

0:00
Hello, Pinball Land. This is Dwight Sullivan. I'm currently deep in my lair, underground, working day and night to save pinball from a pandemic. And the last thing I want to do while I'm down here is listen to that super awesome pinball show. Those guys are fuckers. Laters!
0:21
This is a special report from the Super Awesome Pinball Action News. The death of Pintastic The pinball world says goodbye to pop-off and replay effects And now the super awesome news crew Christopher Franchi Christian Line And special guests Josh and Zach Sharp
0:53
Papa Gone Replay effects gone And Pinberg gone What happened? Could this have been a shining example of a call to arms To bail out one of pinball's top organizations and attractions? The game collection is to be liquidated And a halt to any further organized tournament play Taking Pinberg away from pinballers Is like taking away the Super Bowl from football fans Or the Stanley Cup away from hockey fans And the best part of Pinberg was that it was like a Stanley Cup playoffs you could actually play in Now we all mourn another victim taken by COVID-19. What happens now and what's next for the Replay Foundation, Papa, and Pinberg? We discuss that today with the president of the IFPA, Josh Sharp, and the vice president of the IFPA, Zach Sharp. Christian, truly a sad day in pinball. It really is, Chris. And I think that we wanted to do this episode both because we wanted to just go over what all of these things mean. Like, what is the effect of this for us and for the people of the hobby? just to kind of celebrate Papa and ReplayFX a little and go into they are and what they've done over the last few years, just so that people out there who may not know get a little bit of a better idea for why this is such a big deal. 2020 has been really hard for a million reasons, but yesterday, 11-18, people got hit with a really crushing blow as the Replay Foundation announced that they would be ceasing all events and liquidating their assets. It's such a big loss for so many people because to really understand why this is such a big deal and why it's such a big loss, we wanted to look a little bit into what Replay and Papa have done for our hobby. Yeah, if you don't know, Papa stands for Professional and Amateur Pinball Association, and it was founded in the 1980s by Roger Sharp, and we all know who he is, and Steve Epstein from the world-famous Broadway Arcade in New York. These guys helped to invent competitive pinball, and they ran a number of world championships. Yeah, Roger and Steve basically started the whole thing, and they ran with it for a long time. And then they passed the torch eventually to a gentleman named Kevin Martin in 2004, and he's helped run it ever since. And it hasn't been easy for Kevin. He's overcome a lot of challenges, including a flood in 2004 that basically destroyed 232 pinball machines and rare arcade games. If you haven't seen these pictures, it's the most devastating thing you can see as a pinball fan. It's just all of these old and rare games under about five feet of water. So those were all basically unsalvageable. But just within the year, he got about 277 more pinball machines from volunteers and donors for the 2005 Papa 8 World Championships. Yeah, that's like faces of death for pinball fans. It is. I've seen the pictures and it's horrifying. And then you have to fast forward to 2012. Papa and all of their games were donated to the Replay Foundation, which is a 501c3 nonprofit. Papa became the brand name of the Replay Foundation, and from 2012 onward, they've worked to support all things pinball. Yeah, Pinball Streaming Channel, there was a website with hundreds of tutorial videos and written guides for pinball competitions, tournament schedules, and tons more. Yeah, that and they have donated many thousands of dollars to pinball and non-pinball-related charities, including Humane Societies, Pittsburgh Food Banks, Aubrey's Angels, and the Path of Play Foundation. foundation they set up games at various locations to help grow the love of pinball and recently worked with stern to create the stern pro circuit series of tournaments one of the biggest reasons why there was a shock wave of grief yesterday across the hobby was because the replay foundation also manages replay effects and replay effects is a combined pinball and video game festival held every year in pittsburgh pennsylvania the main event there at replay effects for pinheads is pinberg and like you were saying in the intro that's kind of like the super bowl of pinball It's the largest pinball tournament in history. It's gotten bigger every year. It's gotten better every year. And I think a thousand people compete in this tournament. It's incredibly fun. It is so well run. And that's why, you know, so many people were just crippled by the news yesterday. Yeah, sadly, yesterday, Replay announced that they were closing down all of these events. They mentioned that they have never brought in more revenue than expenses, and the pandemic has hit them so hard, not allowing public events that generate income that they really need to keep the foundation going. Right. I mean, it looks like the Replay Foundation itself is not going to go away entirely. They're keeping their online presence, Papa Learning Center, and that's where they have tutorials and pinball resources. But their assets, including their huge collection of games, are going to be liquidated to pay off some of these debts. Yeah, I'm not sure how they're going to keep up their tutorials if they liquidate their games. Yeah, I talked to Chris Stevens today, who's also a big part of Papa, and I was asking him, I was like, you know, is there hope that Papa is still going to have the streaming channel and the tutorials and that sort of thing? And he said, well, you know, there's always hope, but it's going to be difficult because with liquidating all the assets, there's really nothing to stream and there's nothing to do tutorials for. Not that that can't come in the future, but they are trying. People out in Pittsburgh that are part of Papa and the pinheads out there are trying to keep as many of the games that they're liquidating in Pittsburgh. Yeah, the more we talk about this, the more you realize just how widespread this tragedy is. That's really unfortunate. And, you know, because neither one of us are really experts on this, we asked two guys who are experts to come on and talk a little about what happened, their thoughts and feelings on how they're dealing with this and how this might impact things in the competitive world moving forward. So please welcome Josh Sharp, CFO of Raw Thrills Incorporated and the president of the IFPA, and his brother, Zach Sharp, director of marketing at Stern Pinball and the vice president of the IFPA. Welcome to the show, guys. I know that this has been really hard on a lot of us, but Papa has always been a part of both of your lives in so many ways, personally, professionally, and with the IFPA. Did you guys both know that this was coming, and how are you holding up? No, and not well.

  • Josh Sharp cannot discuss competitive pinball hurdles due to restriction from talking to Christopher Franchi

    medium confidence · Josh Sharp cryptically states 'I've been told i can't talk to chris franchi about that' regarding IFPA competition restart plans

  • A movie about Roger Sharp (Josh's father) is in development with multiple production companies involved

    medium confidence · Josh mentions movie announcement, references production companies and recent 'Drunk History' segment, but no script yet

    • Josh Sharp @ Papa history section — Emphasizes foundational role of Roger Sharp and Steve Epstein in all competitive pinball pathways

  • “I've been told i can't talk to chris franchi about that”

    Josh Sharp @ competitive pinball future section — Cryptic hint at unspecified discussions/restrictions regarding competitive pinball restart, involves Christopher Franchi

  • “There is still competitive pinball going on. You got the ICR challenges. You got Carl's pin class streaming battles. We did the Turtles heads up invitation over Stern.”

    Zach Sharp @ closing discussion — Evidence of community adaptation to pandemic restrictions through alternative competitive formats

    • Kevin Martin
    person
    Christopher Franchiperson
    Christian Line (Dr. Pin)person
    Stern Pinballcompany
    IFPA (International Federation of Pinball Players)organization
    Stern Pro Circuitevent
    Carl (Indie Disc organizer)person
    Mark Steinmanperson
    Broadway Arcadecompany
    Raw Thrillscompany
    Drunk Historymedia
  • ?

    community_signal: Pinball community adapting to pandemic through alternative competitive formats: ICR challenges, Carl's Pin Class streaming battles, Turtles heads-up invitations via Stern

    medium · Zach Sharp: 'There is still competitive pinball going on. You got the ICR challenges. You got Carl's pin class streaming battles. We did the Turtles heads up invitation over Stern.'

  • ?

    event_signal: Pinberg discontinued; largest pinball tournament in history ceases operations; leaves void in Stern Pro Circuit calendar

    high · Official Replay Foundation announcement on 11/18/2020; Zach Sharp confirms 'Pinberg was just one event of the 20 events on the Stern Pro Circuit calendar. Well, granted, it was the biggest tournament on the calendar.'

  • ?

    historical_signal: Papa/IFPA positioned as foundational to all competitive pinball; Roger Sharp and Steve Epstein characterized as unavoidable ancestors to any player's pinball journey

    high · Josh Sharp: 'You can't, it's like Kevin Bacon, you can't get there without my dad or Steve in six steps or less every time'

  • $

    market_signal: COVID-19 pandemic eliminates primary revenue source (live public events) for event-dependent organizations; two-year closure of major tournaments compounds financial crisis

    high · Zach Sharp: 'with 2020 gone and you know the likelihood that running something with 50,000 people in it probably isn't likely for 2021. That you know that's two years of your main revenue source'

  • ?

    operational_signal: Tournament scaling faces hard limits: game logistics, volunteer capacity, tournament director burnout; IFPA comfortable operating at 72-144 player scale, not 1,000+ scale

    high · Josh Sharp detailed breakdown: 'if you're averaging two malfunctions per round and you quadruple the number of games and people, like now you're dealing with eight malfunctions per round... you're left begging for more and more volunteers'

  • ?

    community_signal: Roger Sharp (Papa co-founder) was planning in-memoriam participation in final Pinberg using Steve Epstein's entry spot as birthday tribute, now impossible

    high · Josh Sharp: 'we reached out to the papa guys about... can he play in Steve's spot as sort of this in memoriam?... He was still thinking about it... he doesn't have to think about it anymore'

  • ?

    personnel_signal: Josh Sharp restricted from discussing competitive pinball restart plans; cryptic reference to conversations with Christopher Franchi suggests undisclosed negotiations or strategic planning

    medium · Josh Sharp statement: 'I've been told i can't talk to chris franchi about that' regarding IFPA hurdles for resuming competition

  • ?

    rumor_hype: Biopic of Roger Sharp in development with multiple production companies; early-stage project gaining momentum after Drunk History segment

    medium · Josh Sharp: 'there was a movie announced about your dad... outside of the number of production companies, of phone calls that either my dad or Zach or I have gotten... sounds like they've made a bit more progress than i probably uh assumed'

    • 6:35
    Yep, I found out from Josh. He messaged me. I was watching my son, and it's like, did you hear about replay? And it was just like, uh, nope. It sucks. I don't know how else to put it. Yeah, there were no red flags or anything from any of the people that you guys know in the organization that this could potentially happen? I mean, I know, you know, as someone who's been around since, you know, Kevin took over Papa and before that, like it was clear when they moved things to the foundation, like there was a plan for the foundation to be like self funding. right as much as uh you know kevin doesn't get nearly enough praise for like the hundreds of thousands of dollars he has he has poured into competitive pinball out of his own pocket that we have all been the gracious beneficiaries of and i think there's this weird sense that like the community is somehow owed his continued you know like doing this for us right and i see it You know, now with people's response of like, why don't you have you guys thought of this? I think, you know, making making the foundation need to sort of carry its own pail of water up the hill was something that, you know, it's a metric that's easily like met or not met. And, you know, at least in their statement that they said, you know, their their primary fundraising is through running events. Right. So I don't know. I dare compare it to like Rothwell's right now. You know, we have overhead and insurance and rent and salaries and whatever, and we're in the primary business of selling arcade equipment to operators. At some point, you know, if Replay can't run shows and we can't sell arcade games, there's no revenue. So, you know, you're left with, hey, Kevin, can you, you know, just write us a check for, like, I don't know, $2 million? You know, maybe that'll get us to the other side of this. Right. And Van Rothwell is left asking, hey, Eugene, do you think you, you know, maybe like 10 million? Just, you know, keep us going. And, you know, I'm very thankful that so far Eugene answers yes to that, the 15th and the 30th of the month. And you know I don blame John Bitt with all that he done you know over the past 20 years to you know if he doesn want to continue to do that I don want this to be completely I an eternal optimist So it like I don want to only harp on like the negative like this is done and over I feel like, yes, they need to do what they need to do to survive, you know, selling off assets and whatnot. But it's like, I just know deep down just the resolve of our community that we haven't seen the last of the Replay Foundation or Papa in general. I just can't see that. So I just want to put that out there into the ether, into the atmosphere, that I know this isn't the end of their saga. It's just a little bump, a big bump in the road. I think you have to hope that there's some positive that may come of this in the future, even though it seems so bleak. Yeah. Well, nobody knows what the future holds. When things like this happen, I guess you just kind of tend to think that that's the way it's going to be forever. But this thing's going to go away and things are going to change. Papa survived a 100-year flood. I think they'll survive a 100-year pandemic. Well, that's the thing. They lost so many games then, too. I mean, there's over 200 games I think were lost, and they bounced back within a few months for Papa 8, I believe. So, Christian, why won't Kevin just do this again? Yeah. Asshole. Why can't we do this? Come on, man. No, I think a lot of people were saying that on Facebook and in their frequently asked questions on the replay page, they addressed it. I mean, I feel like this is a huge amount of money and they said their expenses have always exceeded what they've brought in from year to year. Yeah, and all those records, they're publicly available because they're a 501c3. So I think the last numbers from replay that are publicly available, they lost over $100,000 running replay effects. you know that that all all that sweat equity to pull that off and and they paid out of pocket to do it for us you know i think that with the hope being at some point you know they would draw a big enough crowd that they would be able to be you know cash flow positive on it and you know it's like most businesses you know you you start up and it's like hey if we can be profitable in three years you know then the next 10 are going to be great and you know i know you're on the path i Talking with Mark Steinman over there, they were definitely on the path to where, you know, when he started everything at the convention center, like there was a path to success. And look at the sponsorships. Yeah, I mean, it was incredible. And unfortunately, with 2020 gone and, you know, the likelihood that running something with 50,000 people in it probably isn't likely for 2021. That, you know, that's that's two years of your main revenue source that you're going without. that's just i mean that's that sucks you can't sustain it yeah and continued expense as well yeah so yeah well your dad helped co-found papa in the 80s we were wondering if he was involved in on did these guys talk to uh your dad about anything leading up to this decision they made to shut everything down no they uh my dad called me about an hour before i jumped out here and was like hey did you hear about papa i heard something oh yeah i forgot to call you yeah they shut it all down yesterday so how did what did he say josh what was his take on it obviously he's he's not happy but yeah i mean for him it's like you know the the like and and i think sort of what zach mentioned like i am extremely confident that this is this is not the end of papa right i mean there's a whole difference between the logistics of what it it took to run replay effects the show and pinberg the tournament and you know there's other things that that papa can do besides running you know their championship but you know papa tv all the other things that they do that they can still continue to do i think once they kind of find out where they're going to land that right my dad's biggest concern was like he's really hoping that the legacy of papa lives on and then and uh you know i told him that if i was him i wouldn't be worrying about it it's they're in really good hands with you know doug and the crew over there i think everyone understands you know my my dad and and steve being a steward of that association for whatever 25 30 years and and kevin and his crew now what 16 years in since they got the rights from steve right like they're you know they've now developed their own you know sense of of legacy with that organization that uh i'm hopeful it's as important to them as it is for you know us absolutely and Yeah, and they said that replay, the foundation isn't going away per se, and the Papa online resources and that sort of thing are still going to be around. Not sure how much they're going to actually add to them moving forward. But, Zach, you had said you run the or help run the Stern Pro Circuit, and that was something that kind of transitioned over to Stern while Papa was, you know, in the competitive world and running out tournaments. How is that going to be affected now, do you think, by replay kind of shutting down to a point? I mean, I think it's independent. I mean, the Stern Pro Circuit will pick up and continue. I mean, when you look at the broad spectrum, you know, ReplayFX hosted Pinberg, and Pinberg was just one event of the 20 events on the Stern Pro Circuit calendar. Well, granted, it was the biggest tournament on the calendar. It was, you know, there'll be a void there until, you know, I think in the future there will be a future pinbird. I don't know what that will look like. But in terms of the Stern Pro Circuit, I mean, it's just like the IFPA right now with no sanctioned events. It's kind of just on permanent hiatus until we kind of get through this. So, I mean, who knows what's in store for the future and what that looks like. But, I mean, we'll definitely still have collaboration with the Papa Crew and, you know, their portion of the Stern Pro Circuit. So, again, like what Josh is saying, it's like they're not just like poof, gone away, like in a finger snap. I mean, they're still around and involved. We have a responsibility list for the Stern Pro Circuit team. You know, there's a list of stuff that my organization is responsible for. There's a list of things that Stern is responsible for. And there's still today a list of stuff that the Papa guys are responsible for. So I look forward to continuing to hold them to those responsibilities and hope that, you know, that they're still excited to be a part of it. Right. Do you think like other large pinball tournaments like InDisc might consider changes to compensate for the lack of pinbird? I'm sure Carl would get chest pain thinking about holding more than once a year. But, you know, there is a void now that someone could fill. I mean, I don't I think and Zach and I run a lot of shit. right like like we i i have no interest and i've told the pot like i could not do pinberg you know i like i could i could be a tournament director and run it but logistically i could not do everything else besides making rulings that has to do with that event without putting a gun in my mouth so i i think it's gonna be and and hopefully we see this bit with people that uh maybe fly too close to the sun and burn out on this hobby that that people don't like Carl. I would hate to lose Carl because he stretches himself too far to try to, you know, fill these voids. You know, I think there's a lot more people coming into the hobby, you know, every day that, you know, there's a next I mean, I saw it compared to 20 years ago, 10 years ago, five years ago, the number of people that are organizing events is still continuing to grow that given time you know like what zach mentioned there's going to be teams that are ready and willing and have the passion and aren't jaded assholes like zach and i have become that they're going to be excited to want to do this once and then probably never again because they'll feel like that was god awful why did we do this sure from the 80s till now it's been a long time where this has slowly evolved to what you know the behemoth that it was just recently so if someone does pick up you know the the coattails and runs with this obviously it's not going to be a thousand person tournament right away but you guys you guys keep saying that you don't think that this is the end like what do you where do you see the next step possibly being or is it just impossible to guess it's i think it's impossible to guess, but I mean, you just go back to the first like bigger Pimberg and it's like, oh, 173 players. And it's like, you just, I mean, it's probably going to be baby steps, you know? I mean, I know that there's other tournaments that try to encapsulate what that match play that is. I mean, you've got City Champ in San Francisco. I know California Extreme did Babers, you know, it was kind of like their West Coast version. And I think it's just, I think everyone is just looking forward to the day where it's like, you know, vaccine and we can actually semi get back to normal and just kind of pick up the pieces and just take it one day at a time, one tournament at a time. Right. Would you guys, I mean, you both said that it would be such a huge undertaking and you obviously have a lot of irons and other fires but would the IFPA ever consider you know putting out a tournament I sorry did I hesitate Wait, no, you know what, go ahead, finish your ass, Christian, go ahead.
    18:14
    So would the IFPA ever consider doing anything in any semblance of a tournament that would run similar to Pinberg? Fuck off. I think, you know, like all the events that we run tend to, and I mean, Pinmasters has kind of stretched us as far as I think we're comfortable going. And that's 144 players, but we only have to deal with 72 at a time. That, you know, Nationals and Women's combined was somewhere in that low 70 player count. That's about as much as like Zach and I and Adam and the other people that we have on our team. We want to know like this is a level that we're extremely comfortable with that we know we can run the highest quality event on the planet. And when you stretch to, you know, even Pinmasters, it was like it was a little bit of a risk of just like, you know what, if we treat it like 72 twice, it's like we could accommodate 144. And I don't know if there's a version of Pinberg where it's like, hey, we're not doing 1,000 players. We'll do 100 players 10 times. Like, I wouldn't do that. But there's ways to make something manageable for the team that's trying to embark in that enterprise. And I know for us, like, as you know, the number of games you need goes up. You know, if you're averaging two malfunctions per round and you quadruple the number of games and people, like, now you're dealing with eight malfunctions per round. It's all just math. And at some point, it gets out of control, and you're left begging for more and more volunteers. And for us, we've always worked with sort of our core group that we know we have on the volunteer side rather than relying on, hey, guys, you know, we could do this, but we're going to need 15 more volunteers. Anyone interested? Like, you know, for us, we sort of have our core, and we scale our events based on that core that we know we have. Right. It seems to me like if they ever run anything like this, it would just be impossible not to have it at a major city where there's a lot of pinball presence because you need so many volunteers. And that's part of what made Pinberg so special is that they had so many and they were all so good at it that it ran like a well-oiled machine. So I can't imagine how hard it is to get all those people to not only volunteer but then not play in the biggest event of the world. Yeah, I think the biggest hurdle is the games, personally. like games games in space yeah the the the people i think and i've been i've been super impressed at every year you know as pinberg has grown there the number of people volunteering that they've needed has grown and the number of people that are offering to volunteer is growing faster than even that need so community is you know for everyone that that thinks you know competitive pinball is shit and too serious and nobody has any fun and like to me it's like i think it's one of the best communities within sort of like the subset of the hobby as a whole like it's you know it brings me joy and i know it brings so many other people that same level of joy that for the people that aren't in it that are looking in and then they catch a clip of you know i don't know eric stone knocking a game over or something and then describing that to like oh my god these all like you guys are all crazy assholes right everyone they're so angry and it's like it's really not that at all you're right and then pinberg was kind of the epitome of that in the sense that it was such a community and everybody loved going not only for the pinball but also for the people and just spending time and going and drinks with with all these people who are into the same things that you are that's the biggest for me that's the biggest law i mean zach we have our group uh our level of zach's friends and my friends and and mr nate shivers who has joined our clan over the last five years but a little crew we have a group text that we that we start you know a week before every pinberg well usually a week before pinberg registration because that's probably more uh stressful than the pinberg itself is getting into pinberg but you know zach hit up everyone in our text last night with the news and and usually that text is filled with people's lunch orders and dinner orders and hey i got a space at the bar after session five and and it's like cool i'm heading over there now cool zach's on the last gate i mean all of that that activity that didn't involve playing pinball i might actually miss more than the playing of the pinball all right no doubt yeah do you guys have like specific memories that you really remember at any particular uh pinbird that uh you'd care to yeah i can answer for both of us for me it's not winning and for Zach it's probably winning.
    22:54
    Josh said it. Second place, right? Losing the last game versus winning the last game of Pimberg. I think for mine, not as a humble brag, but winning it the first time it was at the convention center for the first replay effects, while that was cool, what was really special was it was the first Pimberg that we got our dad to come. So he was there in person to see my first major victory and we had a little panel discussion with nate shivers afterwards and it was just a spectacle because that was the first time that pinberg was truly outside of the old papa building so it was it was new territory for everyone so it was special for you know many reasons i heard the food was quite delightful we don't talk about that we don't share where we eat that is top secret what's eaten in pinberg stays in pinberg that's how about you josh was there one thing that really stood out as as the the one memory that you always yeah man not fucking winning oh man like finishing second and having to smile and having to talk to fucking jeff teolan all right well let's let's talk about happier stuff so on the on the um the text chain that we're on you had mentioned josh something about i hope you're i hope you feel comfortable sharing this because it's a really nice tribute and unfortunately we're now not going to get a chance to see it but can you tell us what your dad was planning on doing this year at pinberg oh yeah do we do we even end up asking him yet zach yeah no we asked him oh yeah that's right was it his birthday think about it was it his birthday yeah it was his birthday present yeah so yeah unfortunately you know steve epstein passed away my dad's sort of brother from another mother partner in crime for this uh i call both of them the the two godfathers of competitive pinball They are, no matter what tree trunk or tree branch you follow in everyone's sort of path to finding this game as a sport, everything eventually falls back to those two guys. You know, you can't, it's like Kevin Bacon, you can't get there. My dad or Steve in six steps or less every time.
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    My dad, after last Pinberg, you know, he went a couple times ago, like the first time he played really well. and he went last year at Steve's first Pinberg and I think uh you know Steve played awful my dad didn't want to go back like played awful but my dad was like devastated that his skills were not nearly I think where they they are in his mind so it was you know it's too much walking around I'm too old you know he was kind of done which was fine you know it's a it is grinding it is it is a grueling you know two days of play right and uh so he did not register during the frenzied one and a half seconds of uh registration steve etstein however who played like crap really loved it and wanted to get a chance to come back and do better so he registered or we registered him and and he got in and then unfortunately you know passed away at the uh earlier this year and uh we zach reached out to the papa guys about you know we we hadn't done anything with Steve's entry. It was just sitting there and brought up the idea of, hey, our dad, you know, doesn't want to play, which is why I didn't register. But if you guys are open to it, can we can he play in Steve's spot as sort of this in memoriam? And they were totally supportive of that. So we eventually approached my dad for his birthday. He was still thinking about it, I think, until, you know, he doesn't he doesn't have to think about it anymore. As I'm sure we would have convinced him to do it. It's a really nice tribute that he could have done. I know that they basically, as you said, they started the whole thing, so it would have been a really nice thing to see. Recently, sort of off subject a little bit, recently there was a movie announced about your dad. Do you guys have anything to do with cooking that up, or what's going on with that? Because there hasn't been many details. I mean, outside of the number of production companies, of phone calls that either my dad or Zach or I have gotten I know at some point you know my dad was approached by these people and asked me what i thought and i like sure sounds great it gonna go nowhere like every other thing that goes nowhere so whatever you know humor them and they'll do their investigation and then they'll try to pitch it and nobody will buy it because nobody buys anything that has to do with pinball and uh sounds like they've made a bit more progress than i probably uh assumed that they could so i think I think drunk history put it over the edge like, oh, wow, you know, we got to top this. Right. Yeah. I mean, that was such a great clip from that show. Everyone in pinball obviously loves it. So to see a full, full movie, especially with a comedic kind of twist to it, which will be interesting to see. You guys haven't seen a script or anything. No, it's earlier than that, I think, in the process. Okay. The other thing I want to ask you guys is just, you know, we'd be remiss not to ask you about the competitive world at this point obviously is is non-existent um but you know what what does the ifpac is you know the hurdles that we still need to get over before we we get some competitions going i've been told i can't talk to chris franchi about that i mean one of the hurdles the hurdles are the same as everything else in the world right now right like you know it's likely like vaccine probably you know for anything to be back to any kind of significance for us to you know we lean on our outside of illinois i kind of don't follow you know where the restriction levels are at you know county to county state to state country to country so we lean on our state reps and our country directors to to keep me in the loop of how terrible it is in their neck of the woods and i mean it's not even close right now i mean it would to no surprise it's right I will chime in. I will chime in being the glass half full optimist. There is still competitive pinball going on. You got the ICR challenges. You got Carl's pin class streaming battles. We did the Turtles heads up invitation over Stern. So we're getting creative and the pinball community is very adaptable at creating fun engagements. so I don't want to say competitive pinball is dead right now but in terms of like official world rankings it's on hiatus right Zach has two less kids than I do so he's far more optimistic you guys have been quite as beaten down yeah I understand and I mean the the stuff that we've seen with the escape from Nublar challenge like the the Raymond Davidson clip the other day was phenomenal mind-blowing insane and you know you guys work directly or I mean I know Zach you you do more than Josh, but you're working with Keith and with Raymond and Tim Sexton and all these other guys who are big, big time pinball players. How have they all, you know, responded to this? And are they, I don't know what, have you talked to them since, since they found out that Pember wasn't going to happen this year or? No, I mean, not really like at that level. I mean, it's mostly, I mean, we're so busy with work that it's not like any kind of personal dialogue with like, man, that sucked. It's like, I know that we're all bummed. I mean, there's no question. And I'm sure, you know, it's like a lot of people, it almost feels like you really lost a loved one in the sense that, you know, there's this yearly gathering that you might not talk to people throughout the whole year, but you can guarantee when you see them at Pembroke. I mean, it was such a social environment. And for me, it was such a fun time because unlike Papa or other world championships where it's a very solitary experience, you're qualifying by yourself. You're just sitting by yourself and stewing on all of your bad balls. At least with Pimberg, you're engaging and you're playing against different people round to round. And just that social aspect is unmatched. Right. Well, we can't thank you guys enough for coming on. I know your time is precious and you're with your family. So thank you guys. We'll keep it at that. We'll probably have this episode out tonight, Chris, do you think? Yeah, about 9 o'clock. That's quick. Who does the editing? He's a ninja. He's a ninja at this. All I have to do is edit Zach out and we're good to go. Perfect. I like it. I can't confirm or deny.
    31:26
    You take Zach out. This is a much darker conversation. Yeah. Okay. Yeah, we need to send him. I appreciate it. All right. Thanks, guys. Thank you, guys. Take care. All right. See you. Thanks again. Yep. Bye. Well, Chris, hopefully we'll look back on this as more of a setback for the Replay Foundation and not the end. Yeah, we really appreciate Josh and Zach joining us today on such short notice. It definitely added to the conversation because of their knowledge of the tournament play, and we really appreciate it. So thanks, guys. Thank you guys so much. You know, for me and many others, Pinberg was the best pinball tournament in the world. It showcased competitive pinball in the best way. It brought so many new people into our hobby. It was Pinball Christmas, Pinball Summer Camp, the best tournament ever, every year. and I know it was the highlight of the year for a lot of people. Replay and Papa have created amazing memories and positive publicity for us and everyone involved in pinball, and they should really be proud of what they've done for the hobby. I think the loss of Pinberg, but also all of the shows and pinball events have helped us really realize how important these events are to everyone, but especially how much time, effort, and money go into making these things happen. I know I speak for all fans of pinball and members of our hobby when we give a truly sincere thank you to Roger Sharp, Steve Epstein, Kevin Martin, Mark Steinman, Elizabeth Cromwell, Doug Polka, Bowen Cairns, Petey and Virginia Hendricks, Fred Cochran, Brian Dye, Brett Berkman, Dan Hall, Steve Eckert, Nick Jaquay, Aytan Goldman, and Chris Stevens. So many other people to thank in addition to that, including all of the volunteers and people who donate their time to making Pinnberg and all the other tournaments that Papa put on in the past run so smoothly. Thank you to Kate Martin for bringing the Women's International Pinball Tournament, or WIPT, to Replay FX. It was really a fantastic tournament, and I hope that continues as well. All in all, it's a sad day. I hope that there is some hope for the future, and I'm going to pass it over to you, Chris. Yeah, Christian, you know, I was talking to Chris Marquette, one of our sponsors from Cointaker, about this this morning, and tried to explain to him, as someone who's never gone to Pinbird, my first Pinbird was going to be the one that was held this year, and since that got canceled, it would have been the one that was held next year. which was obviously also canceled. And I said to him, you know, it's kind of like dying without ever getting the chance to go to Disneyland. You know, something classic and so big and so part of America and everybody's life, something so huge, and it just gets taken away. You know, it's like, I don't know how to explain it any better than that. It's just I really regret that I never went, and now I'm never going to get that chance. So, you know, anybody who's been there and is feeling the remorse of not being able to go again, And just know that the people who never win, we're right there with you. Yeah, that's a great point, man. I hope that at some point, whether it's not Pinberg, there is some equivalent tournament out there or something that eventually can reach that point for all of us who are so into just hanging out with our friends and playing some pinball on a grand scale. Yeah, pinball's had a successful year, and hopefully people will give back. Once this is cleared up, you know, there's got to be opportunities for us to get back together and do this again. And it will come. And, you know, life's not over. This isn't over. This pandemic is not going to last forever. And let's just look forward to the future and what that's going to bring, though we don't know what that is. It's going to be fun one way or another. So anyway, hope you enjoyed this special episode. And just want to let you know that in the next coming days is our next episode, which is going to be a regular full episode. and we have a special guest co-host and we also have an interview with the guys from Paperplock who did the Stern 30th Anniversary book, which is a very telling interview. I'm sure you're going to enjoy it. So until then, we'll see you later. Thanks, everybody. See you next episode.
    35:06
    If you'd like to drop us a line or ask a question, we can be reached at superawesomepinball at gmail.com. Questions or comments may be read on the air. The original content of this podcast is copyright 2020 Asshat Radio Productions.
    35:18
    For commentary and opinions here by the cast and guests do not necessarily reflect the opinions of the sponsors coin taker chicago gaming company and back alley creations their sponsorships of this show only serve to add to their continuing support of the pinball community okay okay show's over bye-bye Bye-bye. Hey, your fucking chalupa sucks, dude.
    35:54
    Is that good enough for you? Woo. It was very satisfying.