Tell me how I'm not alone I never really cared until I met you And if you tell me to the moon How do I get you alone? I haven't been too long there, Lil Flip. Always great to hear from the correspondents. I think Lil Flip has just stole the correspondence segment. Oh, step your game up, fellas. Step it up. Not a heavy news week here in pinball, but we do have some fun stuff to talk about, like one of the highlights for me this year with all of the shit and crap going on in pinball. Remember months back when pinball browser was no more something was blocked i don't know all the technical stuff but needless to say all of those awesome pinball collectors hobbyists players and coders who were giving us these pinball browser updates to add custom songs and and vocals to some of these pinball machines most notably as of late the stranger things right cleveland did that it was dead it was gone but it has risen we now have a new pinball browser software fix just looking at the thread on pin side i'm not again i don't know coding i don't know any of this stuff but people seem to be excited about it everything is back with additional stuff maybe some maybe some video stuff in there as well that you can replace some video stuff so for now it is back and I can't thank the creator enough for that and I just hope that it sticks around. I'm trying to see from Stern Pinball's point of view why they wouldn't want this around and stuff but the fact remains, it's just fun. Nobody's being charged any money. There no assets that are being sold It helps customize and modify a game and listeners you guys know i always said why if i stirring pinball this is ignorance here because i don know enough about the ins and outs i get that but if i'm stirring pinball i'm kind of saving money on some of the custom call outs because there are genius people that can work that pinball browser to update and and upload mixes that include those vocals from the film or from the actual song or whatever it may be. So I just hope it sticks around. And with the idea that there's some video aspects that can be added to, I'm just thinking like Jurassic Park with some of the film. Oh, please. We know that Cleland is kind of the king of those updates, but there's a lot of other people that are updating stuff using pinball browsers. Well, Delt, the individual who shits on me any second he can get on pin side still loving for his uh for his pin browser updates though thanks delt and many other people if you guys are doing some pretty comprehensive and elaborate pin browser updates email us at the pinball network at gmail.com i'd like to hear from you about the ups and downs of doing such time-consuming but very much appreciated work pinball browsers back baby we also got the first that I know of gameplay footage of Legends of Valhalla pinball by Riot Pinball. They've only made six of these things. I think they're considered prototypes. I don't know. Buffalo Pinball and Skip Natty in particular went over to Adam Gasek's house and streamed Legends of Valhalla this past weekend. If you all have not seen this stream, you've got to go to Buffalo Pinball. Go to the YouTube page of Buffalo Pinball. Make sure to subscribe there but watch the video on demand of this because you're not going to see this very often with only six of them being made they stream this thing for nearly three hours so anything you want to see about legends of Valhalla you can check it out here I watched a good hour or more of this game it was very entertaining especially with the players there and their banter and going through this game Skip Natty's always just such a great pinball player so it's fun watching him dig into a game, but some of the notes that I've taken on this game. The first appearance, when you walk up to this machine, the artwork, the artwork's nice. It looks really good. Now, this isn't a theme. This is, it's not a licensed theme, but it is a theme that people have heard of, they know of. They know of Thor, they know of the Kraken, warriors and skulls and all of that. So, it's familiar to people. The artwork looks good. I think the individual who designed this layout and designed the game also did the artwork, so very talented there. The game features three ramps, some orbits, inner orbits, magnet use, under the flipper scoop shots, a pass-through to go back to the shooter lane. Looks like eight different modes, but of these eight modes, they can be tiered to become more difficult tier one two three etc rgb light show throughout interactive thor's hammer in the backboard you got a ball locking mechanism of the ship it's got a lot going on and based on the gameplay i can say that it is more of a flow speed type of game a mode base but flow speed type of game it's not a lot of stop and go from what i've seen and let's run down just a quick the good the bad, the questionable. I like that. The good, the bad, the questionable. The good. The game looks to shoot very, very well. The materials used, a lot of metal. A lot of us pinball players like the kinetic satisfaction of metal ramps. Although, I will say that don't poo-poo plastic. I like some smoothness of some plastic ramps as well. And it should also be noted that Riot Pinball is known for Woolly. Wrath of Olympus, the pin that started out I believe is a virtual pin and then made into an actual pinball machine. That looked like a fun game as well. You don't see those either. Other things that I love the orbits. The orbits are laser fast. So quick. I love a game that the orbits are so smooth and laser quick that often times when players first step up to it, the ball gets by the flippers before they have a chance to flip because of the speed. And there's nothing better than having a full-blown 50 mile per hour ball coming back at the flipper and being able to hit it on the fly. That feels really, really good. Something else I really appreciated was the use of the magnet. There's a kraken up in the top right of the play field. There's a little inner loop up there that you can hit with the upper flipper. There's three flippers in this game. Upper left flipper shot, side flipper. you can hit the loop um or you can hit a side ramp now what i love about the magnet use is it's right at the opening of that loop when you feed a ball up the side ramp it comes out there as well so you get a lot of interactivity with that magnet it's somewhat chaotic it makes the ball fly around everywhere and it's fitting whenever you have a kraken up there an octopus or something all bets are off we're in the water at that point the the ball is going to go a little bit wild i love the use of that unpredictability of the ball when it goes up into that area. I really like the backboard Thor's hammer, how it interacts and it slams down and you get that effect throughout the play field and the feel of the game. It's a nice sculpt back there. I'd like to see more interactivity on backboards in games. I'm always a sucker for a ramp that goes through that backboard as well. The center ramp in this game goes through the backboard and out to the right side of the backboard coming down to your right flipper. I cannot love that enough. Anytime I'm hitting it under the flipper into a scoop or in back into the shooter lane and it identifies that and awards you for some way, I really like the uniqueness of that. The speaker grill has RGB interactive speaker lighting with laser cut covers. That's a really nice touch as well. Nice big, looks like a stern sized LCD screen in the back box. And overall, this just looks like a fun ass game to play. The bad. Okay. So the bad for me would be the artwork is nice, but it doesn't scream to me, especially on the slings. The slings are a little bit, I want to see some more saturation in those sling art plastics and just the plastics in general. They look a little bit washed out. We get that with spooky pens a lot. That's something I wish Charlie over at Spooky would take some time to screen print or do something to those to make them much more rich. I don't know if it's code or not, but the center mode inserts, they're predominant in the middle of the play field. They're screaming at you. Here they are. But I don't see them light up very often. I don't know if that's a coding thing or if they're still in the beta process of code, but I don't see those lighting up very often. Some of the characters in the artwork in the background, they don't really stand out we get that main viking character up front he is he's nicely done everybody else in the background octopus is really nicely done the herringbone pattern or some of the art patterns and texture choices are are terrific as well but even the composition of the artwork with the stone with the layering of the playfield middle playfield focal point characters right there. You've got your modes down below with some stone etchings. The skull with horns down by the flippers. Even the dragon and the wolf on the slings composition wise. Excellent, excellent, excellent work there. One of the things I dislike the most in this game. This is a big one too. I don't mean to be negative but this is a big one. I don't like the exit of that ship and the exit of the ship so you can hit the side ramp with that upper flipper right and you can physically lock balls up there within that ship very cool the problem is the exit of that ball is just kind of a clunk and a thud onto your play field almost as an afterthought i need something else i need that ball coming out in a smoother way a more directional controllable way something there. Maybe you expose the magnet there and when the balls drop out, they fall lock on that magnet. Twirl around. Think Iron Man. Not the monger, but the, what's his name? Whiplash. Hit it there or even Doc Ock. Hit it there. It stops and then it throws that ball around. Because even when you're hitting that side ramp shot, you're going into the boat, right? But you don't physically lock it so it's a pass through which is fine but again the exit's just that doesn't do much for me there. That was really a disappointing exit for me. And the questionable for me would be the code. I haven't had a chance to play it. I would love a chance to play this game because it looks really really intriguing but I wonder where the code's going to go. If the code is complete. How close we are. With games like this usually you see a lot of bugs here and there. We had difficulty with some ball searches watching this stream at times. It looks like it could sell some games. I don't know how many it would sell, but I don't know. I'm second guessing when I say things like themes and intellectual property and licenses are always better than non-licensed original themes or Houdini-esque. People know what it is, but I think that a game like this for American Pinball would do pretty well. If American Pinball is wanting to stick to the non-licensed stuff, I think recreating this with working with Riot Pinball or contracting out with American Pinball, Riot Pinball could sell, I don't know, I'm guessing, I'm guessing they could sell 100 units of this if priced appropriately. I think price-wise, if I'm looking at, whatever I'm looking at right now, I would say your price point is for 100 units, $78.99. But you've got to get that code. You've got to get that code done. I don't know how much these pens ended up selling for. The six that they did have. And I think that's probably going to be pretty private. But interested to see where this game ends up. Whether it is just the six that are made. Or if it gets an increase in some production there. I can't wait to play it. Oh, and speaking of not being able to wait to play something. I want to give you guys an update on Stern Pinball's Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtle shipments. So the timeline thus far, about, I don't know, three weeks ago, a very small run of pros left the factory and went predominantly to arcades, locations, barcades, entertainment centers, etc. It was purposeful. They just wanted them to go to those establishments so that they would have them first to try to I would guess to try to boost up the location scene especially as these companies are likely struggling during this pandemic time So nicely done. Then they ran all of the LEs. I believe they're done with the LE run. Again, very nicely done. We didn't wait long at all for these LEs to pop out. And the most recent update is the plan is to run pros again, then to start running premiums then pros and premiums so on and so forth like they typically do on releases however information is now coming in that this next pro run whether it's this week or next before the end of july it's another small run that surprised me however knowing what i know about stern pinball you guys have to think uh when they shut this thing down what was it april May, June, during that time, the desire and the demand for pinball was still the same, if not higher. Distributors ran out of inventory. Stern ran out of inventory. So all of these produced titles, hell, I think there's probably 10 or more titles that Stern is producing. Those back orders continue to backlog more and more and more. Then you've got a hit with Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles. What are you to do? because as you ramp up production, you start production from this pandemic stuff, you're still not going to start like a light switch from zero games to 50 plus a day. You've got to ease into that. Precautions are being taken at Stern Pinball and all these other manufacturers for keeping distant and safe mask use as much as possible. So that's going to limit probably the efficiency of your productivity. but you're dealt with the dilemma of incredibly long list of games that need to be made elvira jurassic park pro and premium guardians of the galaxy black nine monster i mean you name it they've deadpool pros and premiums we haven't had a premium run of deadpool that was slated for before covid we're still waiting for that so they're trying to balance creating all of these pros that people are demanding and wanting. All of these back orders that people need to restock on distribution wise as well as customer wise wanting their game that they ordered months ago. So I think that's why we're seeing these smaller runs here. I don't like it. I hate it but I don't see there being anything that can be done to really help this from a production and business standpoint. I think they're probably doing it right. Doesn't make it feel any better but I think they're probably doing it right. So you're going to see another small run in the next week or so of Turtles Pro. And then we roll into August. I believe we're still going to see another big run, like the big hefty run of Turtles Pro beginning to mid-August. Patience is tough, especially for a guy like me. I just am not patient. I'd rather overpay and get something quicker. But have some patience here. Once they start rolling out this big run of pros in August, I can assure you anyone that was early on this purchase, you guys are going to have your games very shortly. So not even a month. And then you're going to see premiums start rolling. I think their first premium run is probably going to be a big hefty amount as well on the production line. So they'll be running these things pretty heavy here in August. And at least people are still getting their games. We've seen the same hold up with Hot Wheels at American Pinball. I've ordered some Hot Wheels, and I'm still waiting for my second game. I got that first game for promotional purposes and marketing purposes. I have customers waiting for games as well. Now, that's an even bigger surprise. Because they've had months. They've just had one title to prep for. Is this a parts issue? What kind of issue are we seeing here? And something tells me that as Jersey Jack Pinball is just settling into their new location and their new manufacturing plant, And that's why we didn't see a new release as soon as the Illinois guidelines let up and allowed manufacturing plants to start productivity again. They're taking their time. They're making sure everything is right. And it wouldn't surprise me if you've seen a small run of games that are not their new title over Jersey Jack Pinball. And that is very, very, very smart as well, if that is the case. because then you're getting all of the, probably the new employees on the line, you're getting them equipped, you're educating them, you're training them. They know what to look out for so that when we do have the next title by Jersey Jack Pinball, we have less hiccups, more efficiency, quicker turnaround time. And I can also confirm this. After hearing about the plant setup at the new Jersey Jack facility, they are going to be capable, if the demand is there, to probably run just as many pins per day as a Stern pinball if need be. Now that's a guess. I like money too much to gamble it away, but if I was a gambling man, I'd say they could do it. Got to get those parts though. Got to get those employees ready to go. And Chicago Gaming Company, I'm not sure where we're at. I think they're probably just still in development of their next remake. We know that Medieval Madness Royal Editions, I believe, are done. I believe they've ran those. I still get a lot of people asking for those, unfortunately. I wish I had more. But something tells me between now and the fall-winter, the next release we'll see of a remake, they're going to be making those MMR kits. I think they've probably inventoried enough Monster Bash. They're no longer making Attack from Mars. They're no longer making Medieval Madness. So I think this time between is still development of that next release as well as those accessory kits for Medieval Madness. Your topper accessory kit, your RGB lighting kit, and your enhanced XL display and speaker kit. The big question for me, listener, are we going to see a release by Stern pinball before year's end? Now, quickly, you're probably telling yourself, absolutely, we'll see one. I would think so as well. But, man, when we have this many, they are selling some damn pinball machines, y'all. They are selling a bunch of pinball machines. They're selling so many damn pinball machines that can't keep up with how many pinball machines are ordered and sold. They can't just throw another one in there right now. I can certainly tell you they're not going to throw one in there in August. September, they're still going to be stockpiled making pinball machines. October, November, we're warming up. And truly and honestly, I have no clue when they're revealing and releasing their next game over at Stern Pinball. November feels pretty warm. Q4, holiday sales. November feels good.