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The Pinball Show Ep 67: Zach Interviews The Spooky Pinball Team + GIVEAWAY!

The Pinball Show·podcast_episode·2h 10m·analyzed·Jul 12, 2021
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claude-haiku-4-5-20251001 · $0.035

TL;DR

Spooky Pinball leadership discusses Halloween/Ultraman sellout success and production scaling on The Pinball Show.

Summary

Zach hosts a special episode of The Pinball Show featuring the Spooky Pinball leadership team: Spooky Luke (production manager), Bug/Corwin Emery (co-owner/designer), and Charlie Emery (founder/boss). The episode covers Spooky's massive Halloween (1,250 units) and Ultraman (500 units) sellout in hours, discusses production scaling, supply chain management, and the company's philosophy on gameplay reveal strategy. Personal banter explores Luke's background, hobbies, and movie tastes, while revealing Spooky's transparent, family-oriented business approach and commitment to polished first impressions before public gameplay footage.

Key Claims

  • Halloween sold 1,250 units and Ultraman sold 500 units in hours

    high confidence · Zach: '1,250 Halloween and 500 Ultraman pinball machines sell out in hours'; Charlie/Luke confirm the sales occurred

  • Spooky Luke was hired straight out of high school and has been at Spooky for approximately 8 years

    high confidence · Spooky Luke: 'I was one of the first people Chuck hired straight out of high school. So I've been around for like eight years now.'

  • Luke runs production and has been managing the production line for approximately 5-6 years

    high confidence · Spooky Luke: 'I've been running production now for probably six years I do pretty much all the tiring firing manage the line I just pretty much run the shop now'

  • Spooky Luke bought a laser cutter to address metal parts supply chain issues

    high confidence · Spooky Luke: 'everybody was messing them up so I bought a laser and started laser cutting the steel parts'

  • Spooky Luke is in a relationship with Charlie Emery's daughter

    high confidence · Charlie Emery: 'He's been in a relationship with my daughter for several years now'

  • The 1,250 unit production limit for Halloween was decided based on what Spooky could build in 18 months

    high confidence · Charlie: 'it really came down to Spooky Luke and, you know, being the production manager, how many do you think we can build in 18 months? And that kind of decided it.'

  • Spooky used Rick and Morty capital to purchase components in bulk (e.g., 1,000 computers at once) to avoid parts shortages

    high confidence · Charlie: 'we were able to use a lot of the Rick and Morty capital to be able to buy, you know, a thousand computers at once'

  • Spooky's web store encountered traffic overload issues during the Halloween/Ultraman launch requiring multiple upgrades

    high confidence · Charlie: 'we had a little bit of trouble with the web store that day... everything was setting off alarms, and Squirrel was so busy on the phone just like, no, no, this is real'

Notable Quotes

  • “I was one of the first people Chuck hired straight out of high school. So I've been around for like eight years now.”

    Spooky Luke @ ~5:00 — Establishes Luke's long tenure and foundational role in Spooky's growth from early days

  • “His grandmother walked into my office because she runs the village desk, and she's like, you should hire my grandson. And I was like, okay.”

    Charlie Emery @ ~6:30 — Illustrates Spooky's small-town Benton origin story and informal hiring practices

  • “1,250 Halloween and 500 Ultraman pinball machines sell out in hours.”

    Zach @ ~18:00 — Announces the major sales milestone that dominates industry discussion

  • “There was definitely a switch online that we noticed that it was going to go a different way than we thought.”

    Charlie Emery @ ~20:00 — Shows Spooky's awareness of community sentiment shift 3 days before launch

  • “It shoots really well. It plays totally differently than what you'd expect just looking at it.”

    Bug/Charlie @ ~25:00 — Highlights design philosophy of creating unexpected gameplay despite visual presentation

  • “We want the absolute best code in front of you. We want the game just doing everything it's capable of. And there's still a little bit of polish that needs to be done.”

    Charlie Emery @ ~50:00 — Explains strategy for delaying gameplay reveals until code is production-ready

  • “I spent a lot of time planting food for the deer and improving their habitat on my land than anything else.”

    Spooky Luke @ ~14:00 — Reveals Luke's personal hobby of habitat management as alternative to traditional hunting

  • “My number one priority going into the office this week is fixing the bugs that I'm aware are there so that we can hopefully get a video put together for everybody very soon.”

    Bug — Commits to near-term gameplay video release contingent on code fixes

Entities

Spooky PinballcompanySpooky Luke (Luke Peters)personBug (Corwin L. Emery)personCharlie EmerypersonThe Pinball ShowmediaHalloween (Spooky Pinball)gameUltraman (Spooky Pinball)gameRick and Morty (Spooky Pinball)gameBowen Kerins

Signals

  • ?

    business_signal: Spooky Pinball achieved record-breaking sales: 1,250 Halloween units + 500 Ultraman units sold out in hours, significantly exceeding pre-launch internal projections

    high · Charlie/Luke confirm '1,250 Halloween and 500 Ultraman pinball machines sell out in hours'; Luke notes '3 days before announcement, we started realizing that this was going to go a completely different way than what we thought'

  • ?

    code_update: Spooky commits to near-term (within days) gameplay video release; Bug prioritizes bug fixes this week; collaborative approach with consultant Bowen Kerins on rules refinement

    medium · Bug: 'My number one priority going into the office this week is fixing the bugs that I'm aware are there so that we can hopefully get a video put together for everybody very soon'; Charlie: 'we've already talked to Bowen'

  • ~

    sentiment_shift: Strong positive sentiment shift occurred 3 days before Halloween/Ultraman launch; fan club membership climbed leading to launch suggesting high anticipation

    high · Charlie: 'there was a big switch... three days before announcement, we started realizing that this was going to go a completely different way than what we thought... those fan club memberships just kept climbing and climbing'

  • ?

    business_signal: Spooky demonstrates continuous production scaling: from 2 games/week built solo by Luke during AMH era, through 5-50 unit batch purchases from Pinball Life, to bulk 1,000+ component orders; reflects maturation from startup to established manufacturer

    high · Charlie: 'five years ago chuck that you were driving down to pinball life picking up batches of 50 at a time... we'd run down and we'd pick up five games worth... it's just kind of again that slow steady progression of growth'

Transcript

groq_whisper · $0.390

0:00
Warning, the following episode contains adult language and screaming goats. Listener discretion is advised.
0:11
The Pinball Network is online. Launching The Pinball Show. On this week's episode of The Pinball Show, I welcome some very special guests. A bug, a softie, and a boss. Find out how to win free stuff in this episode. We also learn a ton about the inner workings of Spooky Pinball. Halloween and Ultraman selling out in hours. Launching a new pinball machine. When we're going to see these games being played. A design by committee. Featured game mechanisms. Nerding out on code. Spooky pinball moments. Ultra who? The battle between Evil Dead and Army of Darkness. Spooky's plans for the future. Internet connectivity? Question mark. Mandalorian LE impressions. And pinball market sense. All of this and more in this jam-packed episode 67. So bounce out of that asylum, steal a station wagon, and come lurk with me, creeper.
1:18
Sonic Shakers. Pinball is a game of skill. For some, it's a passion and a lifestyle. It's time for the Pinball Show. It's pinball with personality. It's almost time, kids. The clock is ticking. Be in front of your TV sets for the horror fun. And remember to give away at 9. Don't miss it. And don't forget to wear your masks. The clock is ticking. It's almost time. Welcome back all of you fine pinball lovers to the Pinball Show episode 67. And for those of you who aren't fine pinball lovers, I don't know what the hell you're doing listening to this show. Maybe it's because I'm so damn charismatic or funny. Dennis Creasel is rolling his eyes right now. But he's not going to roll his eyes to our special co-host this week. So I thought it would be really cool if any of you guys are on Pins. You know and have visited the spooky threads out there. And there is a fella from Spooky Pinball that I find intriguing. I've never heard him talk on podcasts that I know of. He goes by Spooky Luke. We'll have a really corny, horrible nickname by the end of the show. But he goes by Luke, and I reached out to Luke and said, Hey, man, would you be willing, you represent yourself so well on Spooky Pinball on the forums, would you be willing to jump on the air and co-host a pinball show with me? And he said, because he's a freaking nice guy, he was like, yeah, absolutely. But would it be okay? Would you be open with me bringing the whole gang in? And I was like, shit, yeah. Why not do that? So we've got today a special, special episode of the Pinball Show for you. Introducing Spooky Pinballs, Spooky Luke, Corwin, a.k.a. Bug, and the boss himself, Charlie Emery. How's it going, guys? We're doing great. How about you? Woo-hoo! I'm whipping off these two because I'm the boss. The boss. I'm just going to be excited to see the people that figure out that me and Corwin aren't the same person.
@ ~52:00
person
Flippin' Out Pinballcompany
Benton, Wisconsinlocation
Pinball Lifecompany
AJperson
Fosmanperson
Zachperson
?

design_philosophy: Spooky deliberately withholds gameplay videos/streams until code is production-ready, prioritizing first impressions over early transparency; strategy informed by previous game launches showing initial skepticism later reversed through updates

high · Charlie: 'we want that best foot forward every single time you see the game being played... first impressions mean a lot... We've seen it on games like Walking Dead comes to mind, where it first comes out and people are like, oh, I don't know about this, and then it winds up being great'

  • ?

    technology_signal: Web store experienced significant traffic overload during Halloween/Ultraman launch; fraud detection systems flagged unusually high sales volume requiring manual override

    high · Charlie: 'we had a little bit of trouble with the web store that day... it literally just tripped off every trigger warning that the WebStar company had... Squirrel was so busy on the phone just like, no, no, this is real'

  • ?

    licensing_signal: Spooky faces content licensing restrictions: unable to share music clips or gameplay footage without explicit permissions; licensing hoops limit marketing flexibility

    medium · Bug: 'There's a lot of hoops that we have to jump through... I can't just grab a clip of the music and just dump that on Pinside... I'm not allowed to do that... lot of limitations, and there's a lot of times it's just not our decision'

  • $

    market_signal: Spooky uncertain about direct impact of strong secondary used pinball market on new game sales; notes vintage game pricing affects purchasing decisions but effect magnitude unclear

    medium · Charlie: 'we really didn't know how much that would affect us... we knew that, obviously, sales were really good in the industry and everything, but we didn't know how that would directly affect us'

  • ?

    personnel_signal: Spooky Luke emerged as critical operational leader handling production management, parts supply, mechanical design, and community support; hired informally via family connection while still in high school

    high · Luke hired 'straight out of high school... one of the first people Chuck hired'; Charlie: 'His grandmother walked into my office... and she's like, you should hire my grandson. And I was like, okay.'

  • ?

    product_strategy: Halloween/Ultraman designed to maximize physical content and features while maintaining reasonable bill of materials cost; strategic focus on content-per-dollar value proposition

    medium · Luke (doing BOM analysis): 'I knew a lot of the stuff that we could get at an acceptable cost... a lot of the whole strategy of this game design and everything else was just how much stuff can we get in here, but try to keep the bill of materials reasonable'

  • ?

    manufacturing_signal: 1,250 unit production limit determined by Luke's assessment of feasible 18-month build capacity

    high · Charlie: 'it really came down to Spooky Luke and being the production manager, how many do you think we can build in 18 months? And that kind of decided it.'

  • ?

    supply_chain_signal: Spooky proactively addressed parts supply constraints by bulk-purchasing components (e.g., 1,000 computers) using Rick and Morty capital, avoiding shortage issues others face

    high · Charlie: 'we were able to use a lot of the Rick and Morty capital to be able to buy, you know, a thousand computers at once and stuff like that so that we could actually get the parts we needed on time'

    • 3:24
    That's a real problem. I wasn't going to tell them any different. First off, Luke, who in the hell are you? When did you get started in Spooky Pinball? Are you part of the family? What's your story? Basically, I was one of the first people Chuck hired straight out of high school. So I've been around for like eight years now. You were still in high school? Yeah, I was in high school when I started working. Yeah. Um, I started building right away. I actually built a pinball machine before I ever played one. Wow. Was it like a machine we know, or was it your own machine, or what's the deal there?
    4:01
    AMH was actually the first machine I built, because that's what we were working on at the time. They had done a prototype, maybe one or two, and basically I came in for my first day, and Chuck was at the point where he was going to hire some people to start building, and I just started putting it together. Holy shit. It's the typical Benton story there, Zach. His grandmother walked into my office because she runs the village desk, and she's like, you should hire my grandson. And I was like, okay. So that was like a job. I've never filled out an application yet. I'm still just out here working.
    4:36
    I expect that on my desk by Monday. So, Luke, do you have like an official job title? or so over time i just kind of kept inserting myself into everything until i was just in charge so i've been running production now for probably six years i do pretty much all the tiring firing manage the line i just pretty much run the shop now for five or six years or so and try to keep everything moving so that's what that's what i think is going to be very intriguing to a lot of pinball enthusiasts out there. I didn't know that. Okay, so you're running things just like Bug and Charlie are. That's very, very cool. Charlie, do you see Luke as like a weird nephew or like a son? What's that relationship like? Well, he's been in a relationship with my daughter for several years now, so I better like him a little bit, I guess. He passed the test, certainly. Can we just call him Mr. Squirrel? I think that's it. Wow.
    5:39
    Wow. Mr. Squirrel. That's right. He has a layup for me. Squirrely. His production falls off tomorrow. He's going to be pissed at me when he hits the floor in the morning. This is really cool. So, okay, more information. I like this. So what's your typical day look like, Luke? I generally roll in about a half hour late. Okay. That's the Benton way I've heard. Yeah.
    6:04
    Mornings and me. I'm cranky. I'm kind of a toddler. No, I start, I usually check emails. Well, as you know, I do some of the tech support and everything too. I try to help out people whenever I can. Of course. I always scan the pin side. You see me there? I'm always scanning the pin side. I spend a lot of time just trying to figure out what people are looking for, what people are having problems with, what I can help them with, what I can make better. Corwin and AJ have been kind of supervising the line for about a year now. So that got that off my shoulders. so I usually go out there and bother them a little bit make sure everyone's on task put some cabinets together and you're doing everything basically and now you're helping design a pinball machine maybe mention the metal company that you yeah yeah yeah I guess halfway through I actually started uh we're having so many supply issues with metal and just getting the parts right everybody was messing them up so I bought a laser and started laser cutting the steel parts and a bunch of brakes and started doing that. And I guess a little while after that, that kind of catapulted us to start screwing around on making games and I started drawing a lot of the parts and stuff for that. So basically every ball guide, every side rail, every apron, every speaker panel, everything that you see in a spooky game comes from, again, you know, we've talked about in the past on the Spooky Fiddleball podcast and other shows that we try to keep everything local. Luke was a big part of that early on. Like you said, we had supply chain issues. He bought a laser. We solved it. He solved it. Yeah. And just basically started feeding Spooky with all our metal parts, and it's been a great relationship for all of us. That's fantastic. So you three are super invaluable to the entire process. That's great to hear. We spend disgusting amounts of time with each other at this point. It's really appalling. I get all the credit and it's really not fair to these guys because they're such a huge part of the operation there's no way Spooky is sitting where it is today without Luke and Bug and AJ and everybody else that's on the floor every single minion in there really busts their ass for this company and for you and I think people are really starting to see now what we are capable of and these kids keep wanting to grow things so I'm just kind of staying out of their way you guys are doing a fantastic job at that I think I've owned, I'm trying to think, I believe I've owned all of your main titles. I've got America's Most Haunted. I've owned that. I've owned Rob Zombie. I have owned, oh, I'm in love with Rick and Morty. I've owned TNA. I've owned Alice Cooper. I've not owned Jetsons. I've not owned Dominoes. Halloween and Ultraman. Well, speaking of, I do have a Halloween CE on order. So I'll be having that as well. Thank you. Absolutely. No, thank you. I'm ecstatic. We'll talk about that here coming up. But I'm ecstatic for a company to finally reveal and produce a truly whore-based pinball machine. I'm not like this die-hard whore. this actually is a good reflection upon the choice of Halloween. But you can go through the films. I don't know. I haven't seen all of the Halloween films. I don't know all of the obscure horror films that you guys discuss on the movie podcast or formerly on the pinball podcast. I don't know any of that stuff. But damned if I don't love film in general, cinematography, sound, lighting, setups, I'm a nut for that. And Halloween does that. It holds up not only based on the time it was done, but it holds up until today. It's one of the most terrifying, just simplistic, frightening films ever. And I was just so happy to finally hear that somebody's going to take a stab at it. It says stab. You see the stab. It's not a stab. All right. So, Luke, more about you, Spooky Lukey. All right. If you were like the closest to a famous Luke that we all know, who would it be? Would it be, A, Luke Skywalker from the space movie things, or Luke Perry from 90210, or Luke Wilson, the lesser preferred Wilson brother from old school? Cool hand Luke, maybe? Or do you think you're more famous to just a fucking squirrel named Luke?
    10:29
    So I got bad news. I haven't seen any of those movies. Oh, wow. None. Not even Star Wars I'm in a little different boat Than these guys when it comes to the movies I didn't grow up in the film Film world or anything I have some different tastes in movies What is your taste then? You've never seen Old School? Ah no I don't know I'm all over the place He loves Step Brothers though That is a good movie That is a very good movie Grotem on the drums yeah That is a fantastic film Who's the one guy you would sleep with? John Samuels What? Did we just become best friends? Yup.
    11:09
    Do you want to go do karate in the garage? Okay. Yup. So what's your favorite movie? I don't know what favorite. I like a lot of different movies, maybe like Wolf of Wall Street or 300.
    11:21
    Armageddon? But I also like, yeah, Armageddon is probably my favorite, favorite movie. Dude, if you're being serious right now, we're messing because I'm with you. I absolutely love Armageddon. I have one movie poster that Chuck got me. It's the only movie poster I have, and it's Armageddon. I've seen that movie at least 100 times. My best friend, Greg Bone, shout out to Greg Bone, straight down the middle of Louisville. I always make fun of him. I go over to his house, and he has cinema posters all displayed really nice. It's a freaking Armageddon. I'm always like, dude, he's got all these classic films like Jaws and Star, and then Armageddon. Like, what is that? But he's a big fan as well. Oh, man, I love that movie. Okay, so what's your favorite color? Oh, my God. Green.
    12:03
    Green? Okay, we'll go green. Color of his eyes. Oh. Yeah, see, all the clues are coming together, aren't they? I like the squirrel's taste here. Okay, what other hobbies do you have besides banging on metal shit? Work. Work is my priority hobby. Wow. Let it out. I like building stuff. Oh, you want to talk about it? Come on. Magic the Gathering? What do you got?
    12:28
    No, the deer hunting culture. I'm big into the bow hunting. for fun this guy literally just makes his own food plots and agriculture on the weekends his fun hobbies are harder work than most people's job hobbies so i've learned more how to in the last few years than any human being should know just by being near luke yeah i guess i don't know if i would call myself a hunter at this point i spend more time planting food for the deer and improving their habitat on my land than anything else. So I'm one of those guys now. That's so precious. Yeah, it's cute, isn't it? Wow. I thought your favorite color would be orange, but it doesn't sound like you like killing them. No, I actually haven't. When's the last time I killed a deer? It's been a while. A while, a while. I spent a lot of time looking at them, but the murder instinct is leaving my body, I think. I'm getting soft. You're settling down, man. That's what happens to all of us, Papas. It's fine. Are you a weirdo that, like, sprinkles deer piss on you and stuff like that? No, I'm not big into covering myself in deer. I actually don't like to be peed on at all. That's good to know.
    13:37
    How about that for an exclusive here on the Pinball Show? Okay, what animal besides a deer, then, would make the best pet? These are important questions, dude.
    13:50
    Well, I have a coonhound. So I always thought it would be cool to have a fox because then I could have the fox and the hound. Oh, wow. You are a softie. I love it. He looks like he's really a Disney movie on the inside.
    14:04
    Speaking of, talk about great things, Charlie. Some Disney license. Love them. Chuck tells me I'm mean almost every day. Like if I don't get through a day without being called mean, though. I've seen a picture when I looked up on Lockdown Bar. I see a picture of you all muscled out right there on the Lockdown Bar mechanism. You know, that's starting to move down to my belly, actually. How so?
    14:29
    It's the biceps are getting smaller, but my gut's starting to protrude a little bit. The good food's getting to me a little bit. Yeah. I've heard every Bentonian drinks way too much cheap beer. Is that true? No, I'm not a beer guy either. Just my neighbor, apparently.
    14:45
    Terrific. And last question, Luke. Just to make a break here. You do like Armageddon. I want to know, why is Leonardo DiCaprio such a damn great actor? He is a good actor. He served an Oscar earlier. I don't care what people say, he's a good actor.
    15:03
    I agree with you. Speaking of that, I did really like The Revenant, too. That was a good movie for nobody talking. But that was the, we're going to give him one because he's due. Yeah, 100%. Titanic fans in the crowd there? You guys like Titanic? No, it's like the one DiCaprio movie I've stayed away from, actually. Oh, Chuck, why? I think we should do a Titanic thing. I'm more into his The Departed and Wolf of Wall Street type movies. Once Upon a Time in Hollywood, to me, that's the quintessential Tarantino film. Without DiCaprio and Pitt, it would have sucked. Oh, man, there's so many great one-liners, so many great moments there. Like when he's sitting on the chair and he's acting with that little girl. Oh, fantastic. And my favorite Leo DiCaprio moment is on Django. Not a huge fan of the film, but Django, whenever he rips his hand up, hitting down that glass, and that's all for real. Like, it's not a set piece or anything. He, for real, starts bleeding everywhere, and he continues to roll. Oh, so good. Yeah, he's definitely committed to the villain role. He was really good. Love you, Leo.
    16:11
    And before we get into all things spooky pinball, I want to give you listeners an opportunity to win something. You guys like winning shit?
    16:20
    That's where you guys say, yeah, I like winning shit. Oh. See, look at that. Give us that again. No, actually, I think we're going to keep that. That's perfect.
    16:31
    That might pan out better, honestly. I want to give away, courtesy of Flippin' Out Pinball, we're going to give you guys a chance to win some cool, spooky merchandise. Like maybe you guys have some cool swag over there. Maybe a t-shirt. What about that? So here's what we're going to do. We're going to give you listeners the opportunity at three prizes. So we're going to give away three prizes. Courtesy of Flippin' Out Pinball, we are going to do some spooky mystery swag boxes. How about that? Let's do it. Absolutely. All you guys have to do is super simple. Why not? You can support Spooky Pinball. You can support the show. all you've got to do is go onto Facebook and share the link to this interview. Simple. That's it. You share the link to this interview, and you also have to say what you are most looking forward to on the upcoming Halloween or Ultraman games. You've got to put that in there. What is the feature that you cannot wait to see or get your hands on the most? Share this link to this episode, and you will be randomly drawn. We'll randomly draw three people to win these prize packs. How about that? And you know what? I'm not a tight ass. I will ship them overseas if I need to. How about it? Nicole is going to kill me. Sorry, hon. So we're going to do that with the help of Spooky Pinball. But for now, let's get into why you guys are listening.
    17:52
    All right, guys, let's jump into the news here. This past week, Spooky Pinball, the not-so-little pinball manufacturer out of Benton, Wisconsin, dominated the front page news. Listeners, you must have heard about it by now. 1,250 Halloween and 500 Ultraman pinball machines sell out in hours.
    18:12
    Take that, Rick and Morty. Guys, I've got to know. I think I know what the answer is. Did you expect this type of response? You know, leading up to it, there was a lot of back and forth of we think that this is going to be a slow seller or we think we'll get 1,000 in the first day, but that last 750 is going to take a few months. But there was a big switch. I don't know if it was just on pin side, but like three days before announcement, we started realizing that this was going to go a completely different way than what we thought it would. But we didn't want to be like too cocky going into it either. Like, our design's awesome. Our first layout is still out for sure. We didn't want to be too cocky about it. But there was definitely a switch online that we noticed that it was going to go a different way than we thought. Well, and those fan club memberships just kept climbing and climbing, leading right up to sales launch time. And the hype just kept building. And, yeah, it was a bit unexpected. We thought maybe we'd have to work this game a bit and take it to shows, which we're still going to do for fun. Sure. And kind of get it out there and actually sell it again, which we were perfectly fine with doing. And it turned out not to be the case. Yeah, we thought we were actually going to have to get it in people's hands and see. You know, it shoots really well. It plays totally differently than what you'd expect just looking at it. It's just, and we were trying to throw as much unique stuff as we could in there, so we didn't know how well it would go over. So there's just tons of speculation. We actually set the limit higher than what we thought would sell just to kind of see where everything was at. We didn't know if we were way over limiting, but we also didn't want to get in the situation with Rick and Morty where some people felt like they didn't get one and they really wanted one and they felt ripped off, you know? Yeah, I was going to ask that. How did you guys go about knowing 1750 this time around? We debated that so many times it was ridiculous. And it really came down to Spooky Luke and, you know, being the production manager, how many do you think we can build in 18 months? And that kind of decided it. Really? One, do you guys worry about, I know right now in the news, obtaining parts? There's a lot of parts delays in manufacturing, not just pinball, but in manufacturing in general. Do you guys worry about that at all? So we've been kind of preparing for that for probably six, eight months now. And we do have a lot of stuff that's trickling in slower than it used to. But we were able to use a lot of the Rick and Morty capital to be able to buy, you know, a thousand computers at once and stuff like that so that we could actually get the parts we needed on time we wouldn't be running into parts shortages and stuff like that so when we when we do get stuff in um as we get stuff in it's going to be much much larger quantities than what we've done previously so that's the assistant yeah it helps with cost and bomb too exactly which helped us on this game be able to give people so much physical content that was a big part of it while we were going because I always did the bill of materials for all the games. So with doing that, I knew a lot of the stuff that we could get at an acceptable cost, and I knew a lot of the places where we were getting burned on bill of materials and spending too much money and not getting a lot of content for it. So a lot of the whole strategy of this game design and everything else was just how much stuff can we get in here, but try to keep the bill of materials reasonable so that we can get people uh in 89.95 collector's edition you know what i mean yeah it's insane it's uh it makes me think what five years ago chuck that you were driving down to pinball life picking up batches of 50 at a time to make 50 games at a time of parts it wasn't even that yeah no it was five like that's all we could afford so we'd run down and we'd pick up five games worth and then then it went to 10 and then 15 and it's just kind of again that slow steady progression of growth that Spooky has kind of been known for at this point. And, yeah, this is just another extension of that. That's the younger generation of Spooky kind of taking over that production floor and saying, hey, we can handle this. We want to do more. And, yeah, I give them all the credit, man. It's just been amazing to watch. Yeah, I mean, for a while during AMH, we were building like two a week. And I was building two a week by myself for a while. For a while, I was our only employee. and there's just a sack of parts on the floor and we're just chuck's mom would come in and help us out and um had another part-time guy from town she brought cookies too yeah she brought a lot of cookies um that was the downfall of luke's physique yeah well and that's part of why so many people feel like they're a part of the part of the spooky family you get so much support from that because you guys are transparent you're real you're straight up with people and they feel like they're part of that family especially like the the whole small town thing um i can appreciate that growing up with just miles of cornfields or bean fields around me oftentimes my family being an agriculture business so i get that i love that thinking about the pinball market right now it's on fire there's a lot of industries especially collectible industries that are on fire right now that had to have helped as well and you guys announcing and selling out thousands of games and hours. I would have to assume that combined with just the price point compared to what used games are going for right now, we really didn't know how much that would affect us. We knew that, obviously, sales were really good in the industry and everything, but we didn't know how that would directly affect us. And the launch itself was a little bit of a hybrid between what we've seen from Spooky Pinball in the past. We got those picture teases that us enthusiasts slash nerds just die for. We get the under the play field, and then we're all dissecting it. I've spent way too much time, embarrassingly, trying to dissect what you guys were doing on top of the play field. Then you get your little sneak peeks of an art piece here or there. We love that. Then you guys have these candid videos from Charlie and Bug talking about the release and how it's going to work and numbers, pricing, features, et cetera. You have a sizzle reel for both Ultraman and Halloween that were very well done. Are you guys happy with the launch thus far of Halloween and Ultraman? Kind of hard to find something to be unhappy about.
    24:41
    You know, other things that we could have done better, absolutely. But, you know, sometimes those things are a little bit out of our control when you're dealing with outside components and everything. But we did the best we could. And the response was absolutely incredible. Yeah, I mean, I'm sure we're going to improve all that stuff going forward. Obviously, we had a little bit of trouble with the web store that day. we know we need to fix some of those things. And it literally just tripped off every trigger warning that the WebStar company had. Like, there can't possibly be this many people coming in at once. They can't be spending this much money at once. Just everything was setting off alarms, and Squirrel was so busy on the phone just like, no, no, this is real, this is happening, and having to up those numbers. And we had to do it a few times just to get it to the point where the website would flow correctly. So, you know, clearly we would like to see that improve going forward. But all in all, and again, Luke will tell you, we debated this stuff so much for so long about numbers and when and how. And it's always a bit of the seat of the pants kind of feeling when you get to those moments. But it sure worked out. We'll take it. It's hard to argue with the results that you guys have seen thus far. And listeners, you guys know that I don't do interviews.
    26:02
    I did it, like I said, in the past life as a psychologist. I did interviews every day. That's all I did. I'm not the most comfortable with this, so you may hear me ask questions that are faux pas. I don't know. This next one, I'm prefacing it, might be one of those. But you know what? Like you guys, I'm transparent. I'm blunt. And if people are wanting to know, I'm going to ask you guys regardless. us. So no gameplay videos, no streams before purchasing. A lot of enthusiasts out there have some mixed emotion tied to that or some frustration. Here I am putting down a non-refundable deposit on a game, but I don't really get to see how it's played. Was there a reason for this and or do you guys expect to have some of those gameplay videos or streams in the future? I would say that's actually a multi-part answer. There's a lot of hoops that we have to jump through, and I learned that this time because I wasn't really involved in that part before. But there's a lot of hoops and a lot of permissions we have to jump through to show anything. I mean, the other day, you know, people were asking about music and if you can just show that. And that's not something I can just grab a, you know, I can't just grab a clip of the music and just dump that on Pinside. I'm not allowed to do that. You know what I mean? I guess there's a lot of limitations, and there's a lot of times it's just not our decision. Also with that, you would hate to see people just form a negative opinion early on or something like that or try to just pick out one little tiny thing and just make that really, really big.
    27:34
    I like to see people just actually play it in person and start to get a feel for what the game really is. I think that's the best way. Well, in truth, at this point in launch time, the code is deep, but there's still things in there that Bug and I and Luke and Fosman and everybody associated with it, we want to get better, so we want that best foot forward every single time you see the game being played. And we're not concerned at all about the way this game shoots. It shoots like butter. It's beautiful. It's smooth. It's fun. Flow like the Mississippi River, I heard. Yeah, yeah. But again, you know, first impressions mean a lot. So when you're going to see him play this thing, we want the absolute best code in front of you. We want the game just doing everything it's capable of. And there's still a little bit of polish that needs to be done, and we know that, and it'll be out there soon. I've never seen a game released from any manufacturer that didn't have a little bit of polish or some finished up work that needed to be done. So I'm with you there. So when are we going to see this game being played? um soon try to get them some type of gameplay in the next few days a few days ago so we're looking at how to do that we we might actually wait until uh our programmer comes back on monday we might have him look at it a little bit and then we might try to do some over the shoulder with corwin or something like that just to give people an idea of it my number one priority going into the office this week is fixing the bugs that I'm aware are there so that we can hopefully get a video put together for everybody very soon awesome yeah I was in the office this morning playing the uh playing Ultraman with some friends from from Minnesota that were in town for the weekend and just having a blast with it but yeah you know tomorrow morning there'll be notes Buck will have them I got them Luke's got them and uh we start hammering out that little stuff so again it's always about first impressions and sometimes when pinball people don't quite you know for an industry that it's constantly about change. That code is constantly changing, and we've seen it on games like Walking Dead comes to mind, where it first comes out and people are like, oh, I don't know about this, and then it winds up being great. Well, we want you to see it at its best possible light. So it's coming very soon. And I love hearing that because I'm a big production guy.
    29:53
    The live streams scare the hell out of me, even though I've been associated with some of them. You know, we've seen the Rick and Morty stream in Madison, Deadflip. You guys did a fantastic job with that stream. But it's got to be a little bit scary because those first impressions, you're right, first impressions stick with somebody. So just hearing you guys focusing on that means the world to me as a purchaser of this because I don't want people getting hung up on stuff on a prototype machine. You know, it's going to change anyway. Yeah, I mean, that was the first thing that got brought up was, you know, everyone was like, how will the code be on this? How will the rules be on this? And everyone was, you know, well, what about this? I mean, we've already talked to Bowen. We'll still be on with the rules. I mean, him and Corwin have been on Skype together a few times. He's going to come up. He's going to play it. You know, we're going to do all that stuff. Eric is still in the Slack chat every day. He'll still be talking to Corwin about the rules and everything like that. So it's not like we're a team with all that stuff. It's not like it's just one person programming it. I mean, you've got five people playing this thing and looking at it and making suggestions. That's all we can ask for. That's awesome. So, Charlie, I heard you and Bug talking on a video about the development and the production schedule behind Halloween and Ultraman. You talked about, you know, 50 games going first to, you said, special people with distributors, getting them out there on location or getting them out there so that a mass number of people can experience them. Then you're going to alternate between Spooky 50 direct first, then Distro 50. So the question is, when do you guys anticipate seeing those first 50 games leave the factory? I know parts. The first batch of parts for the first run of games were picked up on Friday. So the rest is on these guys. Now they've got to clear the line and get set up for it. You guys talk about this. Basically what it comes down to is we'll take our time on the first ones. I don't like to, the same thing as Rick and Morty, the first 10 Rick and Mortys were on the line for three weeks. I mean, we just, I do not like rushing the first ones out the door. Like you said, the parts are in. So all the cabinets for the first 30 games will be getting put together this week. They'll sit on the line. We will, as we build them, anything we encounter, we'll go through, we'll change, we'll just fine tune it. We'll play them for a while. We'll make sure they're good I wouldn't be surprised if the first game stood on the line for a few weeks Thank you, that's good I'm glad I very glad that that going to be the case We got all this momentum going forward right now And it does come down to streaming and code and the first batch of games and all that stuff We don want to lose that We've kind of maybe rushed things a bit in the past, and we don't want to be that way, man. We're trying to improve the quality on every single thing we do. So when that first batch of games gets out there, we want you to go to those arcades and barcades and people's homes, wherever they are, and just play them and enjoy them and not have to worry about, do I need to adjust this? Do I need to tweak this? We want them perfect. Oh, that's great to hear. I'm setting up my own home flipping out studio here, a production filming studio. And Halloween, whenever I receive it, will be one of the first that I get to do something special, a special series I'm starting on just showcasing the ins and outs of pinball titles, both current and in the past. So really excited about that. So how did you guys decide, are you making Halloweens at the same time as Ultramans? It sounded like you're making them all together, but doesn't that get confusing? So they're the same physical parts. I mean, there's cosmetic changes, obviously. So what I'm going to do is, you know, for every two Halloweens we put on the line, we'll put one Ultraman there. Okay. And we're just going to try to build them in a fair, even way, you know. With the limit being 2.5 times as high on Halloween, we'll build them with that balance in mind. Okay. So they're going to be mixed in there. So would it be safe to say of the first 50 games that leave, we're going to see some Ultramans in there? Oh, absolutely. Yep. We're counting this as 1,750 games. Oh, very good. So you're seeing it as that. Okay. A lot of times, I know you guys had some internal code names for previous games, like we had Haunted House Party for Scott Denise's game. Did you guys have any internal code names for Halloween and Ultraman? We did. Charlie Brown.
    34:21
    Are you for real? That's great. Like the great pumpkin, yeah. We didn't really have one for Ultraman, did we? No, we didn't. We figured if that leaked, nobody would believe us.
    34:32
    Even though you posted up social media, what, like a year ago, in Tokyo with Ultraman Charlie and nobody. I was seeking that hard that entire trip. Like I thought, you know, we're in Japan. We're taking all these photos. were having just the trip of a lifetime, especially for Bug and myself. And P.T. was so thrilled to be over there. But I was like, we're not holding back. We're just going to put all this stuff out. Because we knew there was going to be, you know, all kinds of tokusatsu stuff we were going to be running into and kaiju films and stuff that we just love. And, yeah, so we weren't shy about it at all. And I'm kind of surprised after the fact, when we announced that it was, in fact, Ultraman, people started going back through it. They're like, oh, my God, all the warning signs were there. Yeah. Like, everybody gets, you know, we had a game wrapped up in a Scooby-Doo blanket years ago, and people were like, they're doing Scooby-Doo next. I remember that.
    35:28
    But this one they just missed. Like, it went over everybody's head. Well, I mean, and rightfully so. Ultraman is not the most prevalent, and that's why you went with the 500. I think ultimately the Ultraman probably is going to yield a really high secondary price on the market. if I'm guessing, because of the rarity there. And it introduced me to Ultraman. I had no clue what in the hell Ultraman was prior to this. So you're spreading the Ultraman love to the entire world, Charlie. Nicely done. I think that was a big part of our wanting to. I'm so happy that people accepted it for what it is. And we kind of had that effect on Rick and Morty with some pinball guys where they are not familiar. Why are they doing this cartoon-based show? So, you know, making a game on that, and they kind of started looking into it. And Ultraman is near and dear to me and Bug, obviously, and it was a passion project for us. It's something I grew up with and never really got away from, and then he did too. So it's really cool to see how people embraced Ultraman. And, you know, yesterday was Ultraman Day, so it keeps growing between Marvel and Netflix and everything that Tsuburaya is doing here stateside now. We're just happy to be a part of it. Yeah, and it's a testament to how well pinball machines can really promote the IP because I'm being totally honest, fellas. When Rick and Morty came out, I had not seen one episode. Not one. Same. Not one. So I go back, and I'm like, okay, so that's gross. I've heard of this shit. Like, okay, some people say I'll like it. So I go back because I ordered one because I get to order everything. So I go back and I start watching this series And I shit you not This is now because of Spooky Pinball Rick and Morty is my favorite Adult based animated series If not maybe not even animated series It's one of my favorite shows of all time And I've seen all of the seasons At least three to four times already I cannot get enough Rick and Morty I love love love Rick and Morty Glad we helped you out there Actually it started with AJ in the shop AJ was completely addicted. He passed it to Bug. Okay. And then on a roadside, I could hear Bug watching Rick and Morty in the backseat, and I was laughing my head off and wishing I could see it. And then when I got home, he's like, you got to watch it, Dad. So I threw it in, and that first season I was hooked. Oh, it's one of the smartest series ever made. That's so brilliant. let's dive into halloween a little bit here i've been i watched the uh the original 78 film last night my wife didn't really give two things she was like i don't want to watch it so i watched it solo and it holds up now the film follows the 1978 halloween film this is coming from, we have a resident horror extraordinaire Joshua Jacobs did Silver Bowl stories, and he he's really big into this. He's got one ordered as well, his Halloween CE. But he wanted to ask this. He said, the story of Michael Myers actually continues into Halloween 2 in 1981. Despite the reluctance of John Carpenter and Deborah Hill who wrote the sequel but never intended the story of Michael Myers to continue beyond the first film, Halloween 2 is considered canon and completes the original story. Was there any consideration during the initial concepts of the pin to try and acquire the rights for both films? There was a lot of motivation of what I wanted from that second film. I did want things from the second film in the game, and I was really hoping that we could make that a part of it. But just with how licensing is and who owns the rights to which movies, it's really hard to ever get two different properties from two different licensors. so it just wasn't quite possible for that game sadly but originally yeah I did want to pull certain things from the second film because in H78 there's the asylum play field I was hoping we could make that the hospital from the second movie because I just thought that made a lot of sense but unfortunately that's just not how things always work with licensing but it's okay I was completely content with focusing on the original classic film but yeah I understand how if I had a nickel for every person who said we need to throw some Silver Shamrock stuff in oh god everybody hated it forever but now it's apparently loved and iconic and yeah I love part 3 too but you know you focus on what you have to work with in front of you and we're thrilled with the license and we were lucky to get as much content and everything as we did and that's where we're at I think the correct decision was just sticking with that iconic Halloween film. I don't know for what it's worth. I'm a nobody, but I don't think there was any need to venture outside of that classic there. So you guys spoke recently on the Super Awesome Pinball Show, which I will heavily recommend everybody go listen to Christian Line and Christopher Franchi. They did an awesome show with Bug and Charlie here, so go listen to that. But you spoke on there about your decision to adopt a three-tier model approach to these releases. To me, it seems a bit more efficient to do that as both a hobbyist and a dealer. But given the patterns of consumer purchasing, you guys had this a la carte thing in the past that seemed like a nightmare to me. But ultimately, why and when was that decision made to go to a three-tiered model? Because it seemed like a nightmare to us and our distributors, too.
    41:07
    Okay. We were actually really nervous about doing that. We didn't want people to get upset that we were doing that higher-end model. we didn't know if they'd get mad at us for the price or anything like that. We're always nervous about making changes like that. We're just trying to streamline everything, and it makes it a lot simpler for taking orders and all that stuff. It also had to do with the numbers, because once we realized we were going to do 1,000-plus games, it was hard. It was really hard keeping up with all the cart and Rick and Morty, which was 750, and we knew if we were going past 750, then it was going to be real hard. Last friends. Plus for the second, Zach. Mom's gone. furry friends. You know, my intent was always, don't change the play experience for anybody. And, you know, Luke had to kind of twist my arm a little bit to talk me into it, and at the end of the day, it was a really good decision, and I'm glad we did it. And I think we made a lot of people happy. It was definitely the most popular model. I can just picture you guys, like, fighting and yelling in the factory, being like, Damn it, Luke! Target decals! No target decals on this one! You have no idea, man.
    42:16
    Those narrow targets, those stickers are hard to get lined up straight. Yeah. It's a lot of work. People don't realize the finishing touches that go in. I mean, just the amount of time they spend after the game is totally play tested and done, just installing interior graphics and adding all those target decals and making sure the game is cleaned up and is buffed and nice and shiny as it can be, that's a whole part of the system in itself. Yeah, and then you realize you put all the damn plastics on, and you're like, shit, those plastic protectors. Damn it. Pull it all off, Luke. It happens all the time. All the time. All right, guys, three tiers. Makes sense. A lot of people are doing it. Can you ever envision an even more exclusive model? This is the silly pimp your car thing here for me. Do you ever see a limited model to like $100,000 or less, and they sell for like $20,000 to $50,000?
    43:07
    Oh, dear mother. Why not? Sky's the limit, Chuck. I mean, I don't see it as necessary. Oh. I guess it could happen. I would rather make a bunch of people, at least 500 people happy than 100. I like to shy away from that stuff. No, I'm talking about in addition, too. Yeah, I get what you're saying. I mean, so we had this conversation about the collectors, right, when I originally said, you know, hey, man, people love being able to get their collector's editions. And I was watching on the forums, and people were, they really liked them. And they really enjoyed that they had the option to do that. Hell yeah. And I pitched it to him, and he told me absolutely not, basically, the first time. You know, and a lot of these conversations go on for months. We go back and forth, and we settle on something. But, I mean, I wouldn't say never is not going to happen, but it's not a priority. The problem would be if you start doing another model like that, say it's like 15,000 super LE, there's only 100 of them, well, then somebody's going to want the $20,000 version and there's only 50 of them and then someone's going to want a 25 of them version like it'll keep going forever and that sounds great have you guys seen what the price of toppers are selling for i mean yeah there's a market not here there's some yeah you know don't have to worry about that there we enjoy making as many people happy as we can like i said and and um you know some of that to me gets a little bit crazy and more power to everybody that's doing what they're doing, but the Spooky model is, you know, like Luke said, this was even for us to do a CE at all, we felt a little nervous about it, and in hindsight, I'm extremely glad that Luke talked me into doing what we did. I think it came out great, and again, we're not changing the play experience for any model, so no matter which game you can afford to take home, we want you to have all the fun that everybody else is having, and as long as we're in that wheelhouse, then I guess I've eased up on it a bit, but, yeah, I mean, it's important to me that nobody feels like they've got less of a game in their hands to me. It's cosmetic stuff that's one thing. If it's physical stuff, then I'm not so sure about it. And I think you guys nailed that, especially with the different options that are available. You guys can go to Spooky Social Media to see the differing options between your standard blood suckers or your collector's edition. And I've got to say, CE is kind of where it's at. It's safe to say that the majority of orders that you've received are going to be CE's. For sure. Absolutely. That's definitely our most popular model. Okay. Is there a breakdown of what we're looking at there?
    45:47
    We actually don't have it yet. Distributors are still consolidating all of their orders. You know, they go through, they double, triple check everything. Morgan's still going through and double checking all of our orders and everything. and then basically they will compile all of it into a nice ordered list all together, all organized, and it just takes a lot of communication and a lot of time. But once all the figures are there, they'll be there. But definitely preliminary estimations are vast majority. Very cool. See, that shows the market right now and what they want in these games. They want knockers. They want target decals. Thank you. Whoever's idea it was to do the colored plastic protectors, I don't know whose idea that was. That was Charlie. there oh the entire play field chuck thank you it's they're very they're very very pretty and uh how about come on now we have a topper stabbing your game it literally stabs your game oh we'll get into the topper uh we will i'm all about that topper and there's so many reasons why uh let's talk about the design the design by committee not really common in the pinball industry i say that with a caveat because behind the scenes i know i know a lot uh of what goes on behind the scenes with these different manufacturers. And believe it or not, there's never one lead on these designs of your favorite pinball machines. But this is very much touted as a design by committee kind of thing. Now, how did that team make sure that it didn't end up being too many cooks in the kitchen? What I really want to know, guys, for the listeners, is any juicy fights, breakout, or butting of heads?
    47:22
    I'm just proud of Horace Barlow. He's a great engineer and designer guy. Basically, we all spend such a disturbing, disgusting, and gross amount of time with each other that we've gotten really good at all coming to an agreement on things. Okay. Well, we know AJ and Luke started the design. Bug kind of had to finish the whole high school thing. And then you said on the Super Awesome Pinball Show that you then started. You guys kind of started with the idea of like a John Wick pinball machine. Like, oh, that's a badass thing. Let's do that. Pretty much. I mean, we actually started that in the basement of my house at the time that Corwin has now bought for me and is his house now.
    48:05
    But, yeah, we started in the basement, and we started with the intent of John Wick, but we didn't really know what would get put on it. A big thing for me was just I wanted to see a lot of people who are working on the game all get credit and built up the way they should be. I just don't like the image of one celebrity or one person because there's so much input from everyone and multiple people engineering and building things and multiple good ideas. I mean, it's a team like me and AJ started with the three play fields. But, you know, then Chuck walks by at the last minute and has a cool idea, like adding the Michael Myers behind the hedges on the left half trail, you know. And it's hard to imagine now, in hindsight, that not being in the game. there's just so many cool features that can come from everyone's mind stacked and loaded works out the best stacked and loaded where the hell did that come from i'm gonna be frank here like what the hell is that stacked and loaded it's a super dark secret that we can't share with anyone or it means absolutely nothing there's a lot of stuff in the game i know because you guys were teasing about that and i was i was the guy i was like okay stacks and loaders you know honestly i just watched tango and cash and for whatever reason the two just kind of related to each other that's awesome so i rolled with it but i mean honestly zach i mean these guys that game is it's more than 95 not charlie i mean i've got two three little things in the game that i'm you know i'm thrilled that they decided was good enough to put on their design but they kept this thing hidden from me for like six months like they were just building it on their own time that's so cool trying to see if uh you know if they came up with something decent could they show it to me and would it be accepted and when i saw it the first time we already had ultraman in locked up and i was like my god this is going to be the perfect layout for that game and uh you know we we didn't really know when it was going to hit the line how it was going to hit the line but they just impressed the daylights out of me with this thing and and then when how Halloween came around, everything just worked. It just made sense. And, you know, the blessing of Ultraman is it's kind of like an Elvira, where, yes, it's a license, but you can have some creative freedom with it. So the layout blended perfectly with the world of Halloween, and everything they came up with just worked. But we could translate it to Ultraman so well that the dual theme identity of the game just, it flowed and it worked. but again, giving these young men and women here at Spooky Pinball all the credit in the world, man, they blew me away. I honestly believe this is the best game we've ever had, and that includes my games too. So when you've got a group of young people that care enough to put that much effort into something that they never even knew if it was going to see the light of day, it's really hard to ignore how valuable that is to a young, growing company like ourselves and and you know i hope when it gets out there people kind of keep these guys under their wings and chorus barloff becomes right up there with like eric and keith and those names and you know the the young rock stars that are making really unique layouts and uh it's just it's just been great no it's it's fantastic to hear and i think you guys are already receiving the praise just by seeing this game and how loaded it is and how much of a world under glass it is and how much it did it really pulls in that world of of halloween a very simplistic horror film there's there's not a lot going on and that's what we all discussed i know my co-host dennis greasel and i what the hell are you gonna do with halloween how are you going to like it takes place in like what two places like two settings like what are you gonna do with this and then you see the video on this thing you're like oh uh well yeah well yeah of course they're going to do that oh yeah I didn't think of that and it does very much pull you in it's got to be a testament also to the growth of a company and and the developmental and the design team of having these guys and gals get together as a team and create something like this as truly a team that's going to pay dividends in the future in my opinion yeah I think that the biggest thing was is I started building the machines myself obviously and then AJ got involved me and AJ got pretty close right away and everything and he was kind of teamed up with me and we were working together for a long time and we just kind of meshed with everything and then being around Corwin I mean I'd been hanging out with him since he was how old were you oh man we started I was 11 right yeah so 19 going on 30 like he was more and then he got involved and he really jumped in and just killed it in Rick and Morty production and really took charge and just learned extremely fast. And the thing is, with me and AJ, we don't know pinball history, I guess. We don't know the typical rules. They don't know what you can't do. Yeah. So we're kind of just dumb enough to just throw something in there, you know, hey, that would be really cool, but we don't have any rules in our head as to what a pinball machine has to be. but then with with Corwin and Chuck they have all of that knowledge they can go through refine our ideas make sure they are applicable to pinball and it just ends up with a really nice balance between things that haven't been done or maybe even shouldn't be done and things that are correct and flow correctly for pinball the most common thing we run into is these guys like hey check it out Charlie come here take a look we just came up with this really cool neck and and I'm like oh yeah, that's just like what was in Whitewater. And they're like, God damn it. Yeah, that's so disappointing. So many times I've had this super unique, wonderful idea that I think is just amazing. And then he's like, yeah, that's been in three games already. It is amazing. That's why Steve Ritchie thought of it 30 years ago.
    54:10
    I need to know myself. I have to work on these things. How in the hell do the in-lane servo motors work? Like, what is going on there? Actually, really simple. There's just a rack in there, and it's actually a partial gear. Okay. So it's not a full 360-degree gear. It's a partial gear. So if you were to put that in and it goes up too high, the rack actually just falls out. Oh, okay. And if you put it in wrong and it goes too low, the rack actually just falls out. So that's how we're kind of addressing the there's no ability to bind there. You can't go too far up and hit something. and you can't go too far down and hit something, so you don't get any stress. But the ball just falls in, and it pushes the ball up in the in lane, but there's a spring steel flap on top of it. When we started out, when me and AJ started out with the idea, what we didn't like was the scoop shoots into the in lane because we're not as good at pinball. The scoop shoots into the in lane in a lot of games, and it shoots so fast that you just flail at it. So this pushes it in there with just enough speed that it's not too slow, but you can aim every single shot. So we're finding that with a really nice, consistent speed feed into both in lanes that you're able to control the shot and then also control where you're coming back to with where you're shooting to. Even if you're not a great, great player, you can really control the game and make it do what you want it to do. And it adds to kind of the magic there, too. I always love subway systems. I know my buddy Eric Minyer over at JJP, he's really into subways and where's the ball going to come out next. Do you get that in the functionality of these subway systems, Are you doing some pretty cool stuff with that? Yeah, so off of the, well, I'll reference Halloween here. So off of the asylum playfield, some people might not have noticed from the video, some would have. It actually drains into the back of the subway that the scoop drains into. So that actually, the drain off of that playfield or one of them actually feeds the right in lane. So you can theoretically shoot from your right flipper to the left hedge subway, get a clean feed to the left flipper, hit the asylum, and then drain back to the right flipper. So you can really kind of set yourself up three, four shots ahead of where you want to be. Now, is there any staging in this game? We've actually been talking about that. So that would be one of those funny cases where I say I kind of leave input from everyone. So we didn't originally set them up to stage, but they absolutely have the optos in there to stage. We wouldn't be able to stage the first ball the way Rick and Morty could shoot it out and put the ball in there. Or like a separate trough. After your first lock, we could definitely speed that up and eject one. So that's actually something we're going to be going over with the FOSMA this week. I saw it on pin side, and we just didn't think about it because they're very shallow subways, and they do travel rather fast already and get back to the flipper. So we didn't address the staging, but it's definitely a possibility in the future with code. And for me, with the in-lane lifters and stuff, the biggest thing I wanted to be sure of is we had better motors. So everything is aluminum housing, and, you know, we did a lot of research and testing on that to make sure that they were absolutely perfect. And on the engineering side, like Luke, Bug, and AJ made sure that, you know, that half gear and stuff. Again, the worst that's ever going to happen is if something gets out of position, the, what do you call it? The rack. The rack, yeah. It literally just slides out, so it's not going to break anything. It's not going to burn out the motor. And then we even made Ben Heck rewrite all the operating system stuff on the new pinnacle board. to, like, if it detects any kind of a current overload, it shuts it down. So we want these things to be as reliable as any other motor in any other game. And Luke even took it one step further because we did fight back and forth on this. Like, are we going to use a 12-volt DC motor? Are we going to use these new improved servo, you know, that we are using, obviously, in the game? He's got it. So, I mean, it's literally we can send you an entire mech at worst case and four screws and it's in. I mean, it's so easy to access. Yeah, there's nothing in the way. It's just a quick in and out and you're done and back up and running. And, yeah, I mean, they've really gone above and beyond to over-engineer some of this stuff to make sure that it's super, super reliable. I love the sound of over-engineering. Yeah, we obviously deal with Alice Cooper with having, I mean, you had to take so much stuff out to get to your servo. So one of the main focuses that we had is, A, let's get the best quality motor we can get. It's all aluminum case. I tried to actually hold onto one and not let it move. And I couldn't strip it out. I was not strong enough to strip it out. That's a great sign. I know what you're talking about there. That is a great sign. And we basically threw four of them in. They've been running for eight, nine months now. We've never had a failure, never an issue. I mean, nothing's guaranteed in pinball. You know how it is. But so far, all tests indicate that we're good to go. The nice part is I can ship you. You know, if you have one go out, I can send you the whole mech on a steel plate. You have four 516s lock nuts, and it's on a standoff. So you take the four nuts out. You pull your mech. You unplug one single plug. You put a brand new mech in that's already preset to the height that it needs to be. It's already got the rack in there. It's already got the gear. You don't have to do any adjusting, any presetting. You slam that thing in there. You tighten four nuts down and plug it in, and you're ready to play. Less than five minutes. Yeah, you take zero other parts off to get to it either. There's absolutely nothing else you have to take off to get to it. We work so hard that our playing fields and cabinets and everything else are, you know, a lot of people, and I'm not going to ever brag like that, but a lot of people say that we've got the best play fields and stuff in the business, And we just want to make sure that mechanically we're just as reliable as everything else in the game. And, yeah, man, we've fought hard to get the quality up to where we all felt we wanted it to be, too, and not just meet customers' expectations but make it easier on our guys for service and everything else. And I think that's why you guys had a lot of ears perk up, a lot of wallets open up whenever you came out and said, look, here's the things we're improving upon for this new system we're working on. We've got the Pentatar. We've got the connectors now. There's a lot of different things that you guys have added to increase the reliability of these games, and a lot of people like hearing that, and it sounds like the servo motors and the aluminum housing and all that, the easy in and out, is just one part among many of the improvements of a spooky pinball machine. Now, this thing has seven, was it seven motors? Six. Six motors, yeah. Wow. I love motors. They're all surface mount, though, like I said. So that's a big part of it. Perfect. You got three. You guys said three upper playfields.
    60:56
    There's three actually printed upper playfields, but only two of them are playable. One of them is kind of just a staging platform for mechanisms and ramps. And it's just, it was a spot where a lot of stuff was coming together and we needed a platform. But guys, are we not counting the fourth upper playfield? That left ramp. It's not staying on the playfield. There's a wooden platform. is there not?
    61:22
    Well, technically, if you count from main play field, we're up to five. I was going to say, just saying. I mean, there's a series there. When I was looking at pictures today and studying them as I do, I saw that. I was like, holy shit, that left ramp goes technically on a play field before back down through the hedge wire form. So that's kind of a – It kind of does. Yeah. Yeah, so, I mean, something not a lot of people have actually picked up yet, and I guess we didn't show enough of in the video, is at the top of the center ramp, which is an inverse ramp, it goes through the backboard and then throws the ball back on top, 180 degrees on top of it. There's a diverter right there. So if the ball is diverted to the left, it actually falls into this balcony that you can't see. It's a stainless steel balcony. And it drops it onto that left upper play field that you're talking about and rolls down the half drill. So the center ramp is actually a very long left in-lane return, but also the entrance to the house. See, I love that tricky stuff. It's a long throw shot, but it really does work well. And then you've got the center drops that are illuminated, am I correct? Yes. I love those damn translucent drops. Six drops in this game that are RGB controlled. Yeah, and we can sense which drop has actually been dropped individually, too. So we can do roaming shots and stuff like that, colored roaming shots on those triple drops, which makes it really fun. Don't give away all my sausage noodles.
    62:47
    I'm liking that. And then you access, once those three middle drops go down, can you access the upper play field through that then? They are in the way of the center ramp, so, yeah, you'll have to knock those down. But, like I said, there also is that diverter at the top that decides when you get up to the top of the ramp if you go left back to the in lane or if you go to the house. So that's just all where you're at in the game, what you've accomplished, if you're allowed to be up there yet or not. Oh, man. Two for a dirty pool shot. Yeah. If that center target is down by itself, watch the lights and see if you can pull it off. Bug has done it twice. I've done it twice. He did it way quicker than I did, though. It took me a lot of trial and error to figure it out. It's a wicked shot. Yeah. I love that. I love that you guys thought of this. I always call for them. I love when designers or design teams make you earn that ramp shot. They put a drop right in the middle there of your shot. I love that because you're earning an additional fun feature, but you're going to pay for it if you don't hit it correctly. So was there anything cut in the design phase? There had to be. Anything physical, code-wise? Anything cut that you're like, nah, we can't do it, we can't pull it off, it's too complex, or IP isn't going to allow it, or the bombs are way too high on that? You know, it was kind of funny because at one point Luke was like, Charlie, get the hell away from the game, stop adding stuff. Yeah.
    64:07
    There was never anything cut. I just had to make him stop adding stuff. We've got to build these things still. He was like, we can make Michael come up from behind the hedge. And I'm like, would it be more fun if we had three hedges?
    64:21
    And you don't know he's behind. And then he's like, and we've got this great left in-lane lifter. And I'm like, you can put one in the right in-lane too.
    64:32
    God dang it, that makes sense. But stop putting stuff in my game. Oh, yeah, I mean, efficiency is key too if you're going to crank these things out. Now, if we're talking about Halloween, it's a horror-based film. Myself, my best buddy Greg Bone, have been screaming from the rooftops for years. For a pinball manufacturer, I've said this, to create a truly horror-based scary pinball machine. My question is number one is this even possible just given the whole contradicting qualities between a horror film and that of a fast action pinball machine And number two is it even a good idea I think it's a very good idea. I wouldn't say anything is impossible in the regards of making it scary. We definitely have some tricks up our sleeves for how we're going to get people in the game. There's some things that just haven't been done before as far as scares. But intensity-wise, your heart should be thumping most of the time when you're playing this game just because of the atmosphere, the music, heartbeats, intensity of the rules and the gameplay. But it's definitely possible to make the game somewhat scary, at least to get us a shock out of people. Yeah, we definitely want to make people jump here and there, and Bug and I have discussed different ways to try to make that happen in the rules and with the video screen and various other things. But like you said, he's got a mode where basically Michael is coming for you, and you've got to move quickly. so I mean yeah I think a game can be intense and scary and suspenseful and all those things and you know like going back to older games like scared stiff when you're getting up to seven eight nine shots and you're trying to hit that tenth if your heart's not racing you know it's you're not doing it right or you're not breathing that's true and uh Bugs trying to Bugs trying to incorporate some of those kind of moments and elements into the game as well to really get you feeling it. I love that too because that was always our thought was, and code can, you still have time for code, but man, being able in a dark basement by yourself getting far enough along in the game that there be at least a moment that you're actually kind of scared to finish the damn thing because you're scared. Like you're just genuinely frightened. Whether the machine is popping off or, and that's another question, are we going to see CodeWise bug? Are we going to see the knocker be utilized more than just your free game? You weren't supposed to think of that.
    66:57
    That's all we'll say then, but I'm like, damn, that's a cool coil making it. Why not make it work? I wanted to pull like four knockers in the game in different places, like in the bottom of the cabinet, in the top of the head, just to catch you off guard wherever you're at. I want you to shock me in the flipper buttons when I make an incorrect shot. Like, that's a scary pinball machine. That was an Alice Cooper request. He wanted to shock the player, literally. Good. Good for him. That's really risk versus reward there. We haven't seen a ton of the gameplay of Halloween, but maybe, Bug, maybe you can answer this. Do you think there is what I've termed a pinball moment or something dramatic or immersive in the code that you're really looking forward to people experiencing for the first time?
    67:40
    Absolutely. The seven ball lock in the wizard mode of the game. There's a moment where you get the ball. You've locked all six before this. And this is Boogeyman wizard mode, right? Yes. Okay. And editor's note right here. This part that Bug talks about is so damn cool. I wanted to at least give you a heads up of a spoiler alert. Fast forward about 15 seconds or so if you do not want a wizard mode to be spoiled. It's that good. after you've got that six ball lock the balcony shot is lit for your seven o'clock when you shoot across that balcony and it holds it and michael myers is getting shot off the balcony by loomis and it drops that ball and starts releasing the other six all at the same time and it's just definitely a classic i don't want to say classic because it's not been seen yet but it has the potential to be an absolute classic pinball moment 10 years down the road i would say i hate that i'm such a nerd like i'm just fired up and this is great i actually almost thought it was more fun um locking the seven balls individually the way he has this set up um it's just spitting out one ball for you and you gotta put it in the exact lock that you need to and the the music's really killer in that and it just definitely a heart-pumping thing that's what i'm talking about pinball moments, man, especially staging balls. I will keep a damn game because of that ball staging. Give me... Elvira kind of does that with Gappa Angry. Makes you lock certain balls and then you go into certain... Oh my gosh. I think... What else did that? Simpsons Pinball Party did some kind of locking thing for Alien Invasion. Do you get any inspiration from other code when you're doing this bug? Or is this kind of fresh, off-the-cuff kind of, oh, that'd be cool kind of stuff? Sometimes it definitely is inspiration. I love rule sets like Monster Bash, Scared Stiff, Adam's Family. I just think those game rules are incredible.
    69:41
    And sometimes it's completely by accident that it was from inspiration. When I was talking with Bowen about that seven-ball lock wizard mode, he's like, oh, so this is a little bit similar to the Gappa Angry wizard mode. And I was like, yeah, yeah, it is, isn't it? Yeah, Eric from JJP sent me a text yesterday, Bug, and he said, nice job on the tilt warning lights. I can't for the life of me remember whose idea the tilt warnings on the play field was. I honestly can't. I knew the answers were there. Yeah. Yeah, I think it's cool. We know a good idea when we steal one.
    70:18
    Yeah, I think it's really cool. I can't wait for this rule set now, Bug. Not to put any pressure on you and everybody who follows him and stuff, but it's good to hear that Bowen, because we hadn't seen him. I was reading this week in Pinball, everybody needs to go over there, check out the deep dive they did. If you want to see all the pictures, all the information, I love, love, love what they were doing over there. But I didn't see Bowen's name in a lot of that stuff. So he is consulting and still helping with some of the code set, because what he did for Rick and Morty was probably a big reason why I'm keeping, I just love some of that rule set. Yeah, Bowen is definitely helping out a ton. I hop on a call with him pretty often these days and any ideas I have he has at least three more to build on top of it with to just make it that much better so he gives me a lot of confidence in my own rule set because just knowing I have him on my side and his input it definitely it gives me a lot of confidence so I'm feeling a lot better now than I was maybe a few months ago in the rules because I mean I didn't know I don't know what people are going to think when they see it But he definitely helps out a ton. I was super happy, too, just to go back to a little bit on the rules. The seven ball lock in Ultraman, the number seven, if you're an Ultraman fan, has a very big kind of association.
    71:36
    So, I mean, again, just another point of the rules all kind of blending and working well for both layouts.
    71:42
    And there might be a special guest hidden in the game. That's what I'm trying to say. Code is definitely the number one priority right now. The thing we've been talking about all weekend, getting everyone game planning, and we don't want to disappoint anyone with that. And it's going to be the number one thing that we're going after on this one. Again, you guys are buddies, so I can be honest with you. We were hearing in some of the forums, like, they're worrying about the rules. Like, hold up. We got Bug here, young guy. He's not a coder. Like, you've read it. So my thought, honestly, what I've been telling people behind the scenes and publicly, I've been saying, look, whenever I have my other spooky games, love them love them to death but i want to see something different and how in the hell do we know what bug's capable of so i've been like your number one fan bug saying let's give this kid a chance to see what what's in this this wicked devilish mind of his because nobody loves this film series or the genre as much as this guy so i think i speak for a lot of us in the community when i say we're behind you 100 buddy we want to see what your mind can create and what fosman's mind creating the whole team there so you've got a lot of support and i appreciate that a ton it means a lot to know that there are people out there who do feel that i can come up with some cool rules and a fun game for them and uh you know i i even do understand like people's concerns whether like this 19 year old kid's writing the rules for my expensive ass game really like i i can see where they're coming from and there's no sense in me going online and trying to argue with that or be like, no, you don't understand. You'll see, man. No, I'm just going to try my best on it and hopefully when it gets out there, people accept it and enjoy it. And as a dad, that's all I can ask for. Just give them a chance. And there's checks and balances, like we've all said, and we're going to make it great. And we all know that the rules, we want them to be, everything else is getting up there in quality. We want the rules to be just as good. And last coding question here, guys. What's the goal? What's the story, Cora? Am I helping Michael Myers? Am I helping Laurie Strode? Both? Like, what am I doing? So it's going to vary on the mode. You're always going to play as Michael Myers or Laurie Strode. You'll never be playing as anybody else. That's perfect. So your primary objective of your mode would be, I'm Michael Myers. I'm trying to escape out of the asylum in the beginning of the movie. I'm Michael Myers. I'm trying to kill PJ Souls in this mode. or I'm Laurie Strode and I'm running as fast as I can trying to do everything to get away from Michael Myers. So it's going to depend on the modes. And now one important thing of the game is that the modes are stackable. And an idea that we've been throwing around is if I stack two Laurie modes on top of each other, there needs to be more bonuses for that than if I have a Michael and a Laurie mode stacked on top of each other. That's clever. Okay. So, yeah, it's very indicative to the film. so you're going to get all aspects. You don't have to just be stuck with Michael Myers or with Laurie trying to get away from the guy with big sausage fingers. That's what I call him. We were talking about this last week. Would you rather be killed by Michael Myers by his hands or just quickly by a knife? And I said give me the knife because those sausage fingers are so intense. They're scary. He's got to have a hell of a grip. Yeah, definitely the knife. He does a lot of head squeezing, choking, throwing with his hands. and those are slow. Those ones look like they hurt a lot more. Yeah, I ain't got time for that shit. Take me out quick. I do not want agony there. I like the guy on the closet. Just give me the knife in the stomach. I'll be good. Swing me around later on and I'm fine. Well, and it's horrible, too. It's kind of a mix of when we watch these movies, it's like we want to see these creative killers and the danger looming in the darkness and what's out there. And at the same time, we want to see people escape and get away and be safe. So yeah, I think the game is doing a nice job of kind of playing off those two things, and Buzz has been really fun and creative about finding ways to do that. Well, because if you watch horror movies and you like horror movies, 9 out of 10 times you really are rooting for the killer. But there always is the one character that's like, okay, I want them to get away. So, like I said, I want Michael Myers to get all the babysitters he can, except for Laurie Strode. I want Laurie Strode to escape every time, so that's why you can play as both. Buzz is a big James A. Janisse fan, so, you know, let's go to the kid count. Yeah.
    76:07
    Well, that brings up a good point. Are you guys going to have, I've heard on the Super Awesome, you guys kind of talked about the assets that you have, the assets you don't have. The IP didn't want this just to be a running film here, but are we going to get film clips and healthy amount of film clips that we all come to love? Yeah, absolutely. Everything you need to see is in the game. Yeah, I mean, the iconic movie clips that you're going to pick out or expecting to see are in the game. I mean, and they're in their original form, just like they should be. Mr. Squirrel, all of the clips? I'm thinking of a couple. All the clips.
    76:43
    I have to turn family mode on for a couple. Yeah. That's a different subject. Yeah. Have we decided on that yet? Is there a family mode in this game, guys? You tell me. I think there should be. There probably legally is. This is Halloween.
    76:59
    Yeah. I just hope there's an adult mode. That's all I care about. That'll be there. Right now, it's all adult. Okay. All right. So a lot of our listeners, we've got a pretty decent podcast here. A lot of the listeners are collectors. They're hobbyists. They're the people that you guys probably roll your eyes at because we care about shit that we shouldn't care about. So enough is enough. I want to talk about some damn pinball toppers. I'm self-proclaimed the topper king here in this industry, and you guys are proud of this Halloween topper, as you should be. It is damn great looking. And it moves. It freaking moves. So, we heard the description of the topper on the Saps program. And it's essentially the Halloween original film poster in motion. Is that fair? Yeah. Okay. The hand is stabbing the hand. The motion is super unique, too. Actually, we didn't do as good of a job as we would have liked to, showcasing the full rotation. But when you see the full rotation of that arm that stabs in, It is just the most perfect, quirky-looking thing you've ever seen. I mean, it's fun. Whose idea?
    78:07
    Was that a Ben Heck? That sounds like something. Yeah, Ben Heck said that we needed a stab. Yeah, I think that was a mostly Ben Heck idea there. Well, why never want to be alone in a room with that guy?
    78:22
    I love Ben because he vomits 300 ideas per minute, and they might not all be good, but some of them are gold. I mean, yeah, absolutely. You were all about the knives. You've got to have knives everywhere. But we got the knives actually from Trick or Treat Studios, all licensed product and everything. And, yeah, I'm a big horror film poster nut, and I had that in my basement, and I was like, ah, yeah, I know how I'm going to do this. And I set it up to slice the pumpkin, give it a little depth, add Ben's knife in there, and just start killing the game with it. Why into the cabinet, though? Why is it going into the cabinet? Like, that's intense. So, me being, so I always have to make everything work. That ends up being on me. So everyone gets to come up with the cool ideas, and then I've got to be the one to make it work or work safely. So I'm always the Karen in the room, like, no, you can't do that. You'll damage the play field. So that's me. I'm the party killer every day. But I just needed somewhere for the night to go, and we're like, well, we could cut it off and add a linkage and stuff like that. And then we're like, no, you know what? We're just going to shove it right through the top of the head. So that's what we did. That's what was being cool. Now, is this Topper code interactive like Rick and Morty, or is it more constant motor driven? So, no, it'll be driven by a separate nano. So they'll be able to fully code the light show for that. They'll be able to code the motion, and they'll be able to integrate it into the gameplay as they go. So they should be able to add that to their modes and things like that. Yeah, so it's fully integrated, and even the strip of lights that is up there is individually addressable, just like the lights in the game. So it's capable of some incredible light shows, not just going red, green, blue. It's individually addressable, just like any insert. So any light up there can be creative, cool, and fun. Same thing with the speaker grills now. Yeah, exactly. They're all individually addressable, so you can actually run the lights back and forth red, run them in a spiral, do multiple colors at once. Yep. They look a lot better. Sorry, these are weird little questions way too deep inside baseball. I've got to know, whose idea was it to whitewater the Halloween title onto the topper? Oh, that was all Chuck there. I didn't want to see the title, you know, six inches apart. Halloween, Halloween, or Ultraman, Ultraman. So, yeah, if you're getting the standard or the blood sucker edition, the title's on the glass. If you get the collectors, it's up there on the topper. Oh, Chuck, me and you. It's like shooting a pod. I can't tell you how great of a decision that was. It's like what you have done, essentially. Not only have you made a topper a must-have. You guys do not want to know how much that topper would sell for in the secondary market. but you've made that collectible. Now you have taken a back glass that is now more collectible than its counterparts as well. And I can guarantee you didn't even know you were doing it, but it makes that back glass unique now because it's the white water effect. You don't get the name of the title on the back glass. You get it on the topper that was made for that particular model. So big kudos. I love, love that distinct detail there. Are you guys still screen printing those back glasses or are they a translate now? No, no, It's still a real back glass. Yep, real back glass. It weighs like 30 pounds. It sure does. Yeah, it does. I'm always like, every time I'm taking one out, I'm like, damn, guys. So on this game, you should never need to take it out. Now, I think you can get to everything. The only thing that you would have to ever take the back glass out for would be to replace the LED strips in the back of the head. That would be the only possible thing you could ever have to need to take your back glass out of the game. Yeah, we would rather you have people down to the coin door for you so when you update your phone, you just hold the coin door now. Yeah, and even if you did want to update directly to the PC, you should be able to reach that without taking the back glass out because we've mounted those lower. And with moving the Pinnatar to the bottom of the play field, we were actually able to move the PC and the Nano that drives the topper and the lights down to where you can actually access them without taking the back glass out. Yeah, so you get that nice little fold-down panel, and you're good to go. That's perfect. That is perfect. Now, have you guys ever considered mirrored back glasses?
    82:51
    Any consideration in a future title of a mirrored back glass? I would never say never to it, but we've tended to do what we know is sustainable. And, again, a huge percentage of what we make is done in-house, from printing to metal to plastics to pull our own ramps. We do our own powder coating. We've got our own CNCs for all this stuff.
    83:17
    A mirrored back glass is another level of technical print magic. I've seen it done. I've been a part of it before in the past at my old job. We don't necessarily have the chemicals in-house to do that safely, so we've just kind of avoided it. But, yeah, I would never say that we wouldn't make a mirrored back glass. But there's got to be a good reason for it It's got to look good, it's got to be aesthetically pleasing It's got to have a real justification to do it Other than to just have a mirrored back glass Then you guys do the additional trim kits available Spookypinball.com Was that a bug thing? America's Most Honored You can have an additional detailed trim kit Powder coat That's all bugging me Yeah, so right as I finished up online classes for college or whatever, that was the very first project that Luke got me in on was he wanted to design some metal parts for selling add-ons on the web store to all our old games for some cool armor packages. So we just sat down and we drew those out together and I picked colors and designs. And yeah, that was kind of our first project we ever really did with each other. But on this one, you don't really need that because you guys have that on the CE on this game with the hammered gold is what I call it. Correct. So, yeah, we planned on doing that for all of the games of the future, so we decided to just go back and do it for some of the past games just because we were screwing around and we saw how nice it did look. I mean, you throw, like, the AMH armor kit on, and it looks like a whole new game. It's incredible. It's really my favorite one. It looks so fantastic. That Alice Cooper spider, though, that widow, that looks good, too. Yeah, that widow with the red slipper button. It's gorgeous. Or the Rob Zombie. The Rob Zombie one's stellar. You guys did a really good job on those trim kits, and it's the collector in me that just loves the extra little things that you can add to games. All right, guys, enough of the collector stuff. With Halloween selling out so damn quick, kind of proving an apparent appetite for horror-themed pins, does Spooky Pinball intend to tackle another significant horror franchise, and do you think there's going to be kind of a competitive race now to tap that undervalued market of the horror collector? uh we're sure there will be um but we're also um we're we're also looking to cater to everyone too though we're not just going to do all horror or anything like that um rick and morty was huge yeah i know if it was if it was up to charlie we would only do horror ever um no we we're looking at a lot of a lot of the really great titles um a lot of things that people want to do and we're definitely sifting through it and i i hate when i see people they get disappointed about the release of what the title is i know it sucks that time but we might be coming with your dream theme next time you know what i mean i mean there's just so many different things that so many people love and we want to cater to as many of those as possible yeah and i would like to correct something we said on the super awesome pinball show and uh when we were asked if we would ever do a double theme ever again. We both said no. I remember hearing that, yeah. And then we started thinking, talking about some licenses and, well, never say never. Never say never. Give me a little art setup help. It won't be every time, but there's potential for one down the road again. Luke, I know that you go to the forums and you're an advocate of Spooky on those forums as well as others at Spooky Pinball, but a lot of themes were being thrown out on those forums and social media. And guys, you know, they say that pinball forum posting is hard. That's what they say. Are there any themes that kind of stuck out to you guys that wasn't Halloween? You're like, oh. And the follow-up is basically when are you guys developing that nightmare on Elm Street game?
    87:15
    You know, I guess some of the things that do speak to us, we're not going to tell you. I know, I know. So first and foremost, I see all of those Steam requests, all of them. Okay, that's what we want. We specifically asked them to be emailed to you.
    87:33
    I know, what the hell were you doing there, Luke? I can't tell you which one stuck out at all, but they did. How in the hell you asked for people to send them? I'm like, oh, God, bless that child. Like, bless that boy. Yeah, I don't mind, man. I honestly, like we were talking about even when we were designing the game, I love other people's ideas. God bless you. I also am really open to other people's suggestions, and I definitely notice a good idea when I see it, and there's a lot of those out there. I just appreciate everyone's input, and I think it's awesome. There's so many angles and different walks of life that people come from and different things that they like, and there's so many things that you can pick out of that that are just so cool. You're a better man than me, Luke. A better man.
    88:16
    Most of the time, somebody's pushing out an idea, and I'm like, guys, for real? Like, read what you just put and think about how stupid that is. That's my thing.
    88:26
    No, I love it. I mean, I have plenty of bad ideas myself, so I have that stuff. We just need to get Luke to some pinball conventions, and he's going to stop asking people that question. There's going to be volunteers to you every chance they get. Yep, there's a spray that you can use to keep us off of you. Yeah. Dennis Creasel, co-host here at the Pinball Show, So he was wanting to poke at Charlie. He's like, hey, Charlie, everybody wants Nightmare on Elm Street. Everybody wants Evil Day. What about Killer Clowns from Outer Space? He thought you might like that real niche kind of film there. Do you think that would even work? Yeah, absolutely it would work. Okay, so he's right and I'm wrong. All right, whatever. No. Okay. I'm a fan of that. There are a lot of requests for it, too. I mean, there really is. I know. So much you could do with that. All right. Okay. I get it. Now, let's break up a, there's a big controversy here, a big struggle between Dennis and I on a lot of things. I want you guys to say what camp you're in here. Are you camp Evil Dead or camp Army of Darkness? Personally, not pinball related, just personally, because I think Evil Dead is one of the greatest horror films of all time for a lot of reasons. And a lot of other people object and say they like the campiness and the fun of an Army of Darkness. Which Evil Dead?
    89:47
    One. There's only one to me. One. Oh. Really? You don't like number two? That's the horror film. Like, that's the smart, actually scary film. Hmm. The first Evil Dead, honestly, back in the 80s when we found that in our local video store, we rented it over and over again. It was so enthralling and just drug me deeper into that kind of more gory, grotesque kind of over-the-top element that some films have, but that thing just took it to a different level. They're always going to have a soft spot in my heart, but Army of Darkness is so much fun. Yeah, I know. Yeah, I would say, honestly, between the two, they both have their own iconic pieces to each of them that I'm happy with either, to be honest. Whichever. Can't lose with either. Man, I'm a big Evil Dead fan. If you're asking me which one appeals more to horror fans, Evil Dead. If you're asking which one appeals more to everybody Army of Darkness I think that's a good way to put it But I have the Evil Dead poster I don't have the Army of Darkness poster Boom, eat that Dennis Creasel Alright, if we're talking about Ultraman Charlie, I don't want to offend you but my thought first was Ultra Who?
    91:18
    I've heard that once or twice. I know. Why bother with a run of Ultraman, honestly? What was the reasoning you guys did to split this 500 run of Ultraman? Because you can? Exactly. Okay. That's what I wanted the answer to be, but I didn't know if you're trying to branch out into maybe some of the Eastern world or if there's just this, damn it, people need to know more about Kaiju or Ultraman. They need to know more about this. Or if you thought, we want to make 1750, but I'm not sure we want to run 1750 Halloween. Was there any thoughts behind that, or did Ultraman start this all off? Well, there is the aspect of we understand Halloween is an adult theme, and for some people just having a serial killer with a knife on the back glass isn't going to make it into some homes. And we know that Ultraman is very family-friendly, so it's a good counterpart to Halloween as well. Okay. But honestly, from a personal, yeah, this one was a tiny bit, it was a tiny bit selfish on my part, and it was something that was really, really, like I said, it's near and dear to Bug and I. It's something that we've loved forever since I was a kid. I used to rush home every day from school to watch Ultraman, and to get to be a small part of that company taking bigger steps here in the United States and getting their licensing issues resolved to the point where they could be here. And to throw that into a game, come on. I mean, it's just singing to Charlie right there. And, yeah, it is a little bit of a personal pet project.
    92:56
    But to see people embrace it again, like I said, who I never would have anticipated the response we got. We figured we'd sell a few hundred to the hardcore fans that knew what it was, and we'd have to go out and work it a bit and get pinball fans to give it a chance. But it definitely wasn't the case. So I'm just thrilled with the response and how it went. Well, and I think you deserve that, Charlie. And whenever you announced that, there were so many people that are just this diehard, that whole scene there that's so diehard that thought, there is no damn way I will ever see my dream theme made into a pinball machine because it's too small in the American world. It's just too small. But, man, you lit up their eyes whenever you announced a damn Ultraman pinball machine. And who can argue with Matt Frank's artwork? It was beautiful. That damn game looks unbelievable. Unbelievable. And it was very important to us, too, to be completely respectful to the source material. And, you know, it does have English and Japanese language speech. There's several lines in there that were done in Japanese specifically to, again, give it some more of that Eastern flavor here in the United States, and that's where it all comes from, man. They're the originators. They're the creators of this art form and source of entertainment that we absolutely love, but we wanted it for the games that are going to get to Japan. We wanted it to be a very big arigato to their fans as well, and we pulled that off in spades, and I think it's absolutely amazing. And, yeah, again, to everybody in the United States that embraced it, thank you. You know, it's great when you can take on something that means so much to us and have it become accepted the way it was. And it was a – I'm still kind of a little speechless over it. It's amazing. Well, and that just goes to show you that how important artwork is nowadays in pinball and pinball creativity because, damn it, when I seen that artwork, I thought, well do I want a Halloween or maybe I do want an ultra this is cool I like this and that's not to say anything about Jason Edmiston's work on Halloween because everybody knows in the horror genre in the horror circles Jason Edmiston's work I didn't think you could make Halloween pretty you shouldn't be able to make Halloween beautiful damned if he didn't knock like I thought at least give me a back glass it's beautiful he nailed that and then he took the cabinet art And with the compositions that he uses and the fading from the different screens, the color use, this thing is impeccable. It's making me think of a freaking butter cabinet. I don't need to do butter cabinets. I might on this. It's beautiful. You can see the butter cabinet. Oh, man. The butter is. Charlie. Yeah, it really is. The Halloween direct print is definitely the best direct print we've done, for sure. The opening is gorgeous, but the Halloween one is off the rails beautiful.
    95:56
    Okay. All right. Do you think we're ever getting the Armageddon dream theme? Luke and I are going to make our own damn machine in the basement. It's going to be Armageddon. I'm going to get my selfish theme. Oh, man. Animal Cracker Wizard mode. That's all I'm saying.
    96:16
    Sorry. I had to go there. All right. To finish off our discussion, you guys have been the best, but I have some general spooky pinball questions if you guys are up for them. Absolutely. Spooky Pinball has been described as kind of the everyman company, the underdog, if you will. After going through multiple periods of growth, we've seen you all as a family, grow as a family, and different production improvements. Do you guys still see your company as this underdog of the industry? In some ways. Yeah, I mean, we're still those same people just showing up every morning in Benton and doing our job. I mean, if you get down to, like, just pure facility size, team size, development budget and whatnot, we're definitely still the underdog in those aspects, I would say. Okay. That's good objective measurement there. All right. Yeah, and I think we're finding, as the company grows, again, you know, it's just because we don't have the budget maybe that some of the other companies do. That doesn't mean we can't put out a product that is just every bit as spectacular, and I think these younger guys have really done that this time around, And it a balancing act to kind of you know that family guy family company family every you know small town in America is what we are But it a balancing act to you still have to deliver period or you not going to last And I think that we've grown there. And, again, taking on bigger licenses and things like that and being true to yourself, which is a prime example of what Halloween and Ultraman was. Yeah, and I think people relate to that more than most. So we want you guys to continue being who you are. Charlie, next question, really for you specifically. We know each other on a little bit of a personal level. You know how fascinated I am with this industry. I have more passion than I probably should for pinball. I want to know, is there, and this is selfish of me to ask, but is there like a specific thought process you had or different moments that you had when you decided to say F it and you went all in on starting your own pinball company? Any moments that you can look back now and think that was kind of a defining moment there or that really helped establish confidence in moving forward with starting my own thing? I never feel entirely comfortable, ever. I think these two will. They're laughing right now. I'm one of the most nervous. No, I get that. I'm one of the most nervous, thin-skinned human beings you're ever going to meet.
    98:41
    Texas Pinball Festival, like you've seen in the Dana and Joel Reeves documentary they did on us, that was a big, big moment because it meant we were going to survive to get to do a second game. And Rob Zombie, as much flack as it takes now, at the time, it elevated us and it allowed us to build a new shop. You know, Scott with Total Nuclear coming in kind of raised our profile, and it definitely gave us a booster that we needed, and it did get a Game of the Year trophy from Pinball News. And it got us to the point where a company like Adult Swim would give us the time of day, and we could get a bigger license like Rick and Morty. and again, it's all these little relationships it's bandit tag, it's Scott everybody that's ever been a part of Spooky Pinball it's all just such a big thing but this obviously is our biggest moment to date now we've really got to deliver prior to that though, prior to even starting America's Most Haunted was there a moment you thought to yourself damn it, I want to do this or I think I might try this Is there somebody that just really pissed you off at your old job, or is there, like, something that clicks when you're like, shit, I'm really passionate about this? You know, I wouldn't say it was anything that was – we wouldn't – oh, boy. If he would have planned it, he wouldn't have done it. No, I seriously thought this out and not been a little bit impulsive. It would have been a terrible idea. And I will never forget, Ben Heck and I were spending a lot of time together and working on our pet projects. And at the same time, I was at my old job, and we had gotten our foot in the door with JJP, and it was a wonderful thing. And I was working in pinball, you know, via the safety and comfort of my day job. But at the same time, we were spending so much time and effort on our own, and I saw the potential of what Ben's game was, and he was like, you're crazy. Do not quit. We'll finish this on the side. and I knew if I did it that way as a part-time gig, it was never going to get done. So the only way to really kind of force myself to finish that game for him and to help him out and him to help me, it was to take it seriously because, you know, Ben put a lot of time and faith into what I was hoping to do and he didn't get paid a dime until the game started selling. So I didn't want to let him down and then, you know, once you start getting employees like Luke and Bug and Squirrel and KT and everybody, my whole family is riding on me not screwing up.
    101:23
    It's really good to keep chasing that paycheck. When the game ship, you get paid. And that's always been kind of our motto is like you do the work, you put it in the hours, and on the back end, you'll be taken care of. And we've been very lucky and very blessed that we've had great people and great product, and we keep getting better. Thank you for that Charlie So I'm just thrilled to be where we're at I appreciate that And listener like I said it was a selfish question Because I did that same I quit my professional career this year And went all in on pinball and arcade So there's people like you Charlie I look up to and make me feel better About my decision whether or not Are you sure that's a good idea? How many times have you heard that right? We told you not to He started explaining everything to me When I started and I was like Dude, this is dumb. What are we doing? But I'll help you.
    102:17
    I heard that all the time. My family's like, so you're a doctor, but now you're just selling pinball machines? Yeah, that's kind of what I'm doing. Speaking of Ben Heck, the new Pinnatar boards, is there a benefit, cost benefit, reliability benefit? Why move to the Ben Heck boards?
    102:36
    It's actually a Parker Dillman board. Ben is writing kind of the operating system that works on the board.
    102:43
    So Parker Dillman is the engineer on it, and Ben is doing that end of it. But it's a little bit of everything you just said. It's more cost effective. It's more simplistic. It's all in one. The P-Rock is a very, very fine system, and don't be surprised if you don't see more of that in Spooky's Future somewhere down the road. But as far as our base models and the bulk of our games and stuff, the Pinotaur just makes all the sense in the world. Luke can tell you how much wiring time and everything else is going to be saved for labor and everything else. There's a fraction of just the connection points. Well, I mean, you saw the bottom of the board picture. I mean, look at the bottom of the board picture of Rick and Morty and look at the bottom of the board on this game. Yep. I mean, it's just so much cleaner, I guess. It's a little cleaner.
    103:31
    Not as much. It's a little cleaner for the games guys, too. Now, with that being said, if we're talking board, I've got to ask or I'm not doing my job. Guys, I suck with updating these damn codes Are we going to see Wi-Fi updates at some point In spookiest future? I don't know You know, it's been discussed several times And we actually had that option All the way back on America's Most Haunted As a $25 Upgrade on the board And nobody Not a single person ordered it I didn't realize that Yeah, that was a real thing Ben was spending a lot of time on And he thought it would be great to come up and you could check your game status and everything else with your phone. You could check coils. You could check lamps. You could do all that stuff, and it just wouldn't gain any traction. We tried, and it was a $25 module to add to the board, and nobody wanted it. Ben still shows me a lot of stuff like that on the phone. Yeah, he still talks about it all the time. Internet connectivity, menu system being improved. Are we going to see any changes with that type of hardware software in the future? Like I said, Ben still shows me different troubleshooting apps, and stuff like that, that you can go right on the phone and check the Switch matrix and things like that. So I wouldn't be a bit surprised if we fully developed something like that where you can basically troubleshoot your game from the phone at some point or something. But not on this one. Oh, of course. Yeah. Do you guys see there being any benefit to having games online?
    104:56
    Yeah, no. I don't know. I'm probably the wrong guy to ask because I'm the old dude in the room. Get off my lawn. Yeah, exactly. I mean, for me and Corwin, we're obviously used to seeing it because our whole lives, all games have been online. I mean. That says a lot there. All right. You guys are fielding the tough ones here nicely done. And you've made it so that nobody else will come on my show for an interview. See, that's why I don't do interviews. I don't know what to ask and what I can't. What the hell? Okay, I'll do some other ones since this is probably the last time you'll be willing to come on. All right. I'm pretty dedicated to this industry. not only as a dealer but as a media provider yeah i said it loud and proud pinball media baby podcast streams videos whatever there's positives and negatives with media in any industry i get that what is you all's take on quote-unquote pinball media i would say it's a big influence on a lot of what we do at this point i mean like we said luke's mentioned multiple times that he checks pin side every single day i've been checking pin side every single day we like to see what people are talking about. We like to see what people are interested in, what their complaints are, what they'd like to see next. It can be very helpful. I watch a lot. I even watch the YouTube videos and stuff. Someone tell Kerry Hardy that if he doesn't post a video sooner next time, I'm going to lose my mind. I waited until almost midnight hoping that he would post something. Nothing. He was hungover, dude. Yeah, he comes home the next day and he's like, I was so drunk. and I'm like, dude, I needed you.
    106:30
    That warms my heart. It sounds like Spooky Pinball is actually a young company, young, young people in it that are jumping in to lead this thing. So that's great. Well, the cool part is we have both. Like we have as young guys and some of us, like I said, who don't know even a lot of the things that we should know, we get to have different ideas. And there's also a lot of the Chuck, he's practically a walking encyclopedia of pinball history. So if I ask him, you know, has this been done in the game or has that been done in the game, most of it he knows when games were made, how many they sold, all that stuff. And I don't know any of that, but it's nice to have both. He's the boss. Oh, yeah. I had just enough, like, help with the operators and stuff, too, that I could kind of see what worked in the past, what was reliable, that kind of stuff. So we have a little bit of insight there going into it. And, yeah, to me, the best thing I can do at this point is kind of pass on what I know and kind of help and guide these younger guys as they, like they said, try things that they don't know they can't do. And to me, that's what makes it exciting. You know, this game plays like no other game I've ever played in my life. And to me, that is as exciting as it gets, and that is the healthy balance of pinball that, you know, you can't evolve too far or people don't accept it, and you also don't want to just keep repeating what's been done before. And this is a real healthy balance on that, and it just gets me happy.
    107:55
    A neat part, too, is with Corwin, he was kind of born and bathed in the blood of pinball, I guess. So it's kind of neat because he has the perspective that me and AJ do with the age group, but he also has kind of a middle ground because he has a lot more knowledge about rules and how shots should flow and things like that, which basically that means I understand what the norms are in pinball, but I'm also dumb enough to go against them.
    108:21
    All I know is it cost me a lot of Sacagawean dollars. Okay, and people like decorating their game rooms, public locations. When are we going to see some banners or spooky pinball signage that I could have put in my game room or showroom? I want, like, the game banners. I'm trying to get some spooky home game room neon signs made now they're so dang fragile it's tough to ship them and stuff but once we can start getting back to shows and stuff yeah man I would love to get some cool kind of spooky neon signs and we've got some other stuff up our sleeve that we're kind of working that direction well yeah and like if you're doing licensing talking to the licensors about doing promotional banners and stuff I know that other companies are doing that and people We're starting to hang them on their walls and stuff, and they're really cool. Absolutely, and I understand and appreciate all that, too. And we've kind of started working in some other stuff into our licensing agreements that we are allowed to do a bit more of that. Hell, yeah. And you may see some cross-licensing, cool pinball-related stuff coming here in the not-too-distant future, and I won't say any more for now. Damn, damn cool.
    109:36
    Charlie, bug. Aw, Lukey. Mr. Squirrel. I'm so glad you came, Cecily. Mr. Squirrel. With your fogey fuzzy tail. And your love for Ben Affleck. Your love for Ben Affleck and the Animal Crackers. Thank you guys so much for coming on to the Pinball Network's The Pinball Show. I had a lot of fun. I'm not supposed to do these interview things, but you guys were gentle on me, even when I was an idiot asking stupid questions. So from the bottom of our hearts here at the Pinball Network, as well as hobbyists in general, we couldn't begin to tell you how much we appreciate what you do and what you bring to this industry and our obsession. So thank you, thank you guys so much for coming on and hanging out. Thank you a bunch for having us, man. Yeah, thank you. Those are solid questions. And, you know, make sure to remember how nice we were when you were doing your next game review.
    110:34
    I've always been sweet to spooky busy. I have another guy I can't stand. Wow. That's why you're on this show, Charlie. That's why you're on this show. I told you how much I love Rick and Morty. Scott Denise, I'm telling you, it's actually a better game than TNA. Just saying. Don't throw tomatoes at me, people. It just is. I love that game. And remember, everybody, if you want to win one of those random spooky mystery boxes, ooh, what's in there? All you've got to do is share the link to this on Facebook, this interview and this episode, and you've got to explain what feature of the new Halloween or Ultra main game that you are most looking forward to. And also maybe put, if you're down for the standard, the Bloodsuckers, the CE. I want to see what you guys got. These guys were hinting at mostly CEs, and I think that's the way it's going to go. But tell me what machine you got and where it's going to be at on location. And if you win, tell Zach what size shirt you wear, too, just to be safe, you know, in case we need information. Yeah, yeah. And Nicole's going to love me, but if it needs to go to Australia, I love you Aussie bastards over there. I'll send it to you if you win. So randomly drawn. Probably we're going to announce the winners on the next episode. Tune in next week for the pinball show on Monday. Thank you guys again. And if you have any questions, you can always email me at thepinballnetwork at gmail.com or over at flipping out at Zach, C-A-C-H, at flip the letter N out pinball.com. If people want to reach out to you guys over there at Spooky, how do you want them to do that? Social media or is there an email? Get a hold of us on pretty much anything. Yeah. Facebook, Twitter, Instagram, bugs on Twitter and Instagram. I manage the Facebooks. And, yeah, you can e-mail any of us. I know that you guys are sold out of the direct order Halloween and Ultramans, correct? We are. Okay. There still may be, maybe, you might have a little window of opportunity to buy one from one of your favorite spooky dealers. So reach out to your favorite spooky dealer there and make sure you get one of these damn games. I'm telling you, once they sell out, you're going to be pretty damn upset that you have to pay like $4,000 extra on a secondary market just to get your hands on a used one. Why? Buy, buy, buy. I know a lot of distributors are down to just a handful of games, maybe six or nine or less.
    112:50
    See? Be nice to those people. Yeah, treat your dealers nice, people. We love you. It's time for TPN Industry News.
    113:06
    Yes, I'm back from the Great White North. Hello and welcome to the Pinball Show Stern News Update. I'm Craig Bobby. Well, Mandalorian mania continues across the globe this past week as games continue to make their way to various locations and lucky LE owners. The newest game from Stern Pinball is making waves in various non-Pinball press and media outlets across the galaxy, including these exclusive Mandalorian features from Yahoo!, Old School Gamer Magazine, Oz Retro Gamer, and Shock News featuring Gary Stern and Jack Danger. The Mandalorian Pinball was also featured as one of GQ's top picks this summer, and was a spotlight on Disney's official Star Wars Father's Day gift guide. And speaking of the Mandalorian, with the first run of Pro Models finished, and LEDs also making their way out of the factory, Stern's first run of Mando Premium Editions are due up next, with the first run of these units expected to roll off the line later this month. Of course, Stern continues to churn its way methodically through the absolute mountain of backorders they have racked up during these past 12 months from increased consumer demand clamoring for their impressive lineup of titles. Wondering how Stern can produce so many of these games so quickly? Well Stern just recently posted yet another of one of their famous behind the scene production videos on their various social media pages. This time showcasing the making of the Mandalorian, interested enthusiasts and pin-curious people can see this video which highlights the Mandalorian Pro model as well as pictures of that gorgeous limited edition model also being assembled. Quite the sight indeed. more good news, the Stern launch parties are starting up again where they left off when the pandemic began, as pinball-friendly locations begin to reopen across the USA and the rest of the world. You can catch Stern launch parties celebrating the release of the Avengers Infinity Quest and Led Zeppelin at a Stern Army-supported location near you. That's all for this week. For the Pinball Show, I'm Craig Bobby. Catch you on the flip side. Well, I guess I did it there. My first official interview-ish. It still doesn't feel like an interview. It feels like I'm just hanging out with some guys talking about pinball. They were great. Thank you again so much. In other news this week, Stern Pinball. Guess what, guys? I unboxed my Mandalorian Limited Edition just a couple days ago. Had to wait until I got back from vacay, but boy, oh boy, that first night, ripped into that bad boy. And I got to tell you, the premium LE differences do matter on this one. Sure, the Pro is just phenomenal. The Mandalorian Pro is technically all you need. But the premium LE differences, they're not a deal breaker. Think like Deadpool here, right? Deadpool Pro is all you need. But like George Gomez said himself on the Pinball Network, He prefers the premium LE because those increased enhanced features. Same thing here for Mandalorian. Of course, I'll have a more in-depth review, whether it be on Straight Down the Middle or hanging out with Din Din and talking about it here on the Pinball Show. But I'm telling you right now, that 180 ramp, what that's going to offer you is a hell of a lot more control. Without it, you've got that horseshoe, which is fun. It's random. I like the chaos of it. but every once in a while, getting that 180 loop is a hell of a lot more controllable to what you're trying to do in that game. And many of you are asking, upper play field, is it too easy? Is it that much different than the Pro? I'm here to tell you, I think this is the objective. Definitively, that upper play field on the Premium LE Mandalorian surpasses and beats that of the fun you're going to have on the Pro. It's just dynamic. The damn thing shifting up and down smoothly is a showstopper. And my dumbass thought that the upper play field was going to be easy because you had two regular-sized flippers. Ooh, I'm going to change it to the lightning flippers, I said. No, try to get to stage three and keep that ball up there. It ain't happening. So much fun up there. I like the idea of the pro. You kind of nudge it and bounce it off that rubber, and you have that one flipper, and that's fun. It's a lot of fun. but damned if I wasn't wrong the upper play field on the premium le is it's it's awesome I want to play it right now and fear not premium le mandalorian buyers because that grogu magnet that everybody's like what the hell's it do hell I even thought that what's it do it's actually pretty damn cool it offers more magnet action than I've seen on a lot of games it locks that ball up there whenever you get your mystery and you think the whiplash on the iron man throws that ball around. Whoa. No. This thing jostles, flips, jostles, flips, throws. And if anybody's shitty, oh, this game has nuts. Don't fucking listen to them. This game is fun as hell. It's phenomenal. The magnet works. It's cool as hell. The upper play field's awesome. But this game is kind of a tough shooter. Not going to lie. This game is kind of an ass kicker. Yep. Yep. I don't know if it's a Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles ass kicker. I don't know If it's even a Stranger Things ass kicker, it's like right under there. It's right under there. Not as inviting as Avengers or Deadpool, but above those in difficulty shooting this game. This game's been tough for me. It's been really tough. You can go into multivol all day. That's fine. If you want to get to that wizard mode and then you're at a dead end because you're going to have to do everything else. And that's a tough shooter. The one negative I would say about my experience thus far, both on the Pro and the Premium LE that I got, is that that upper ramp diverter, I don't know. Some people on Pennside said you have to dial down the strength of the flipper because it hits that diverter and comes back. It has happened on my LE just as it happened on the Pro. Now, Joel Engelberth, he had our showroom Pro to stream, and he said he added the little foam pad on the back of that diverter. Just a little one he said cleared up 95% to 98% of any of the rejects he had. I did that on mine completely fine. You can put a little piece of foam back there or a little Velcro, anything just to slow the softening down of that. I don't think I want to turn down my flipper power. So that's what I did. Thoroughly enjoying this game. I'm not even digging in yet to what the code offers, but it's very addictive. in that back glass on the LE.
    119:45
    Trying to think the nicest mirrored back glass Stern has offered since then. You're going to have to go back to Star Trek. Remember how phenomenal that back glass was mirrored? This one is right there with it. Some say even better. Jersey Jack Pinball in the news. Did you guys see the official company merch being shown off on social media this week by Jersey Jack Pinball? Check it out. Go on to Facebook. See the Jersey Jack advertisement. of Eric Menier sporting a big, beautiful JJP logo tee, and I might add, surrounded by beautiful Industry Award crystals.
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    Nom, nom, nom, nom, nom, nom, nom. Looking good, Eric. PinballWizard.com. I think I even like the JJP logo tee better than I do the GNR JJP tee. I don't know, just personal preference there, but it looks good. Now, if only I had the muscles that Eric has. Really fill out that shirt.
    120:41
    You guys thought I was just going to do an interview on this show? No, no, no, no, no. There's time. Sure, it's running long. I don't give a shit because time stops. Space is a vacuum.
    120:53
    Everything stands still. For pinball market trends. It's here. It's not going anywhere. Come on. I think I'm going to end this show without doing the pinball market trends. You're crazy. Training up this week is spooky pinball. Low-hanging fruit. Sure. Why not? Did you guys not see what they did this last week? Sold 1,750 pinball machines in hours. Boom. Done.
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    500 of which came from a theme. I don't know what the hell it is. Ultraman. Well, Ultra Sales because those things sold and I can guarantee you they're going to be selling on the secondary market for more than what you bought them for. Flip, flip, flip. For a lot of people out there. Unfortunately, trending down this week, just a hair is the Guns N' Roses standards and elites. Collector's Edition still holding value very strongly. But finally, a little bit more coming back to reality on prices of Standards and LEs and Guns and Roses. It's not a blink-you're-going-to-miss-it kind of thing. It's going to, you know, if you hit the snooze button too long, you're going to say, okay, ah, these prices feel just a little bit better. Now you can grab you a Guns and Roses Standard and LE used right at the price of a new one. Feels so good to be back. trending up, down, dizzy. Trending dizzy this week is whitewater. Holy shit, did you guys see this last week? I mentioned I want a whitewater somewhere, and the world goes crazy. I'm mentioning it as a trending dizzy because I'm dizzy. Tons have shown up on the marketplace. Tons in this last week. It's like a viral meme-worthy kind of thing. Everyone's wanting to sell their whitewaters now. So with more on the market, one would think that the price would come down.
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    But it's not. It's still very high. The price is really high on these white waters. I want one, guys. I want one. But I don't want one if I mention it and this is what happens. Fine, I don't want one. Sell, sell, sell. I still want one. Buy, buy, buy. Minty.
    122:56
    Don't try to sell me a white water that has a creased topper. Don't do it. You know how much just a crease in that sparkly decal on that topper reduces the value of that game? Look, Frank, Jim, Susie, roll your eyes all you want. Oh, yeah, I hear that too. I only report facts here. Numbers don't lie. When you get a creased-ass topper on whitewater, you're getting at least 500 less than if it weren't. A bubble? A bubble is better than a crease. But if you got a Primo one, that's plus $1,000 right there, ladies and gentlemen. You heard it here on Pinball Market Trends. Deal of the Week this week. Save a two. Save an Avengers. An Avengers, the original. Avengers Hulk Ellie Edition. On Facebook. Pinball for sale. By a guy named Chris Hopper. Feeling froggy?
    123:53
    He's got mods on this thing. It's Primo. Looks good. I don't know how many plays it's got on there. He's got the Loki mod, which is, that's important. The Widow ramp, adjusted perfectly, thank you. The shield pop bumper caps. And the Tesseract. I can't even say that word without whispering it. Tesseract. I still like this game. I like the blue version better, the premium LE. But the Hulk version's cool. Still got the mirror back glass, still limited. This thing's juicy. $59.50? Buy, buy, buy! $59.50. You're probably talking into like $57 cash. What game are you going to find for $5,700 cash? Is this sweet and loaded? You're not going to find it. So, bye, bye, bye. Conversely, deals of the... Get it, goatee. This is Travesty. Pinside. Outside of Philadelphia, Pennsylvania. Username, 2plays25. Trying to sell a 1996 Tales of the Arabian Nights. It's been in a private collection since 98 I mean come on It's got little to no use on it Liar Playfield in excellent condition The ball plays liar No he said it's not perfect Nothing is I have not seen my ass Dimple free Everything works as it should No broken plastics Well, for $19,975, it better not be. It's better to be a brand new damn Arabian Nights in the box. Sell, sell, sell. No, not this one. Two plays, buddy. Yours has a big-ass chip at the bottom front edge of the cabinet. A chip? No. You know how much a new cabinet is? And, okay, maybe it's been a home use only since 1998, But, bruh, those external coin slots have been played out more than a...
    125:52
    Okay, that was a bit too rough. I had to beep that one in. Did you guys see the princess insert on this? Tragic! Oh, I see wood! 19,975. You know what I would give you for this game? Seven grand? Eight? Dude, your play field. Dude, your cabinet. Dude, your coin slot. Oinky, oinky, oinky. No. You're a liar.
    126:19
    Ladies and gentlemen, that was your pinball. Fucking kids. This is World Cup. Where's that fucking Star Wars comic premium again? The legs. Circus legs.
    126:32
    All right, everybody. That is the show. I want to do another special thank you to Spooky Pinball and the crew over there for each and every day that they put in to this pinball industry and all the cool stuff that they make. Thanks again, fellas. I appreciate you coming on the show and talking to our fine audience. And as a reminder, if you want to win that spooky, there's going to be cool stuff in there. I'm not going to half-ass you. We'll get some cool stuff in there. You've got to share the link to Facebook for this episode. Say it loud, say it proud, and also put in there what your favorite upcoming feature on one of those Halloween or Ultraman editions is. You going butter? You not going butter? Take a picture of it that you shared it. Submit it to the Pinball Network at gmail.com. and we'll randomly draw some winners for next week. And our sponsor plug, Flippin' Out Pinball, that's me, Nicole. Product showcase this week is an Iron Man vault. Greg Bone is babysitting an Iron Man vault edition. It's like new. If you want that, contact me, 812-457-9711, or Zach, Z-A-C-H, at Flippin' Out Pinball.com, or message me on Facebook, social media, wherever. Get your pre-orders in line for the rest of the year, because if you're going to want a pinball machine, that's what it's going to require. Man, those are coming, people. Please remain patient. Premiums are rolling off the line. Some premiums this week. I think we got Turtles Pros coming in this month. Maidens, I think, are rolling into August, into July and August. So if you got one pre-ordered from us, that's coming. Avengers Pro and Premium running this month as well. We may have a spot or two. Hot Wheels are coming. Ooh, just ordered some more Big Buck Hunter Reloaded. The closer it gets to holidays and Christmas, stuff's going to be gone. And I should have Mandalorian banners in soon. Remember the mods that they're making, the shooter rod, the art blades, the armor? They're still saying around August. And for those of you who have a pre-ordered Stranger Things topper, they're making more, I believe, production timelines said August as well. But we still have Turtle Toppers. Ninja Turtle Toppers. Buy them now. TPN, last week you're going to have to check out just another Pinball Podcast, episode 31 where my bud Greg Bone joined Joel Engelberth to talk about his history of collecting. It was a damn good episode. I'm going to give Greg Bone and Joel a big round of applause there because I listened the whole way through. I really, really enjoyed that. It was a good showing for a bony man. And this week on TPN I believe we have as an update Jeff and Marty are taking this week off and then they're going to resume next week with Final Round Pinball Podcast. we will likely get a free play this week I believe where you at Triple Drain we won another episode that wraps it up I'm no longer an interview virgin still don't know if I like interviews email us at thepinballnetwork at gmail.com let me know if that worked for you if that didn't work for you I don't know I'm still mixed but it was fun talking to the guys for Spooky Luke, Bug and Charlie I'm Zach Minney and as always practice safe pinball and animal cracker up or down. He was crawling up the peak. Man, I would be lying if I didn't say just the old heart ticking every time I see that little elephant animal cracker crawl up with Tyler's stomach.
    129:47
    Hello. I don't want to fall in my eyes. I don't want to fall because I miss him and I don't want to miss him.