Hey guys, welcome back to another episode of the Flipside Podcast. I'm your host Retro Ralph and today's episode we're going to talk about something that I don't usually talk about. It's pinball rumors. So I had someone come to me with a couple of rumors and they said these were from some credible sources. Now keep in mind this isn't really my wheelhouse so you got to take it with a grain of salt but the guy said, look you can't say who I am but what I'm going to drop for you is the real deal. So I don't know what that means. Maybe it's all nonsense, but it's still fun to talk about. So before we get all into that, we're just going to have a quick word from our sponsor, Flip N Out Pinball, and then we're going to get right into it. Are you looking for a new pinball machine, a used pinball machine, or to trade in your old pinball machine for something new? Look no further than Flip N Out Pinball. They can handle all your pinball needs. They ship anywhere in the United States and they will give you the best experience in the business. Check out the link to flipping out pinball in the video description for more information. Now back to the video. Okay, let's get right into this rumor stuff right now. So the rumors are for two companies. One is Jersey Jack pinball and the other is barrels of fun. Barrels of fun, you know, released Labyrinth and, you know, everyone kind of enjoyed it who played it. I actually got a chance to play it when they launched it. I think it was two. Well, it was two expos ago, so it wasn't last expo was the expo before that. And I really enjoyed it. But I'm also a super fan of the Labyrinth. I watched it a ton as a kid and they made a very good quality machine. I really haven't heard anybody say anything bad about that. So you got to think people are anticipating what could be Barrels of Fun's next release. Now, this rumor isn't said to be the next release, but it's said to be an IP that they have. So it might not be the game we see next from Barrels of Fun, but it's probably going to be the game we see after that. So keep in mind right now, the rumors that were kind of out there on Barrels of Fun, the ones that had the most, I don't know, interest was the Goonies, Dune, and the Fifth Element. Now, I think the Goonies was really one that was heated up for a while, that Barrels of Fun was doing Goonies. And maybe one of those is their next game. but what is really interesting is this rumor is gi joe so gi joe the american hero is supposedly an ip that barrels of fun has and it's something they're planning on making a game of apparently i think that is really exciting because gi joe has been one uh that i i watched gi joe as a kid i used to have this um i remember as a kid uh being in my bathtub and i had this because there wasn't really any place i could put it because it needed to be in water it was like this boat that had like depth chargers, I think that you could, you could like move this little thing and the depth charger would go into the water and I'd pretend like it exploded. And like all the GI Joe guys would be everywhere. So I remember playing with that as a kid. I also remember that a friend of mine had the base, the big base that everyone wanted. He was kind of the rich kid of the neighborhood. He lived up the street. His father was a doctor. So everyone else had like more blue collar-ish jobs, but his father was the doctor who had all the money. So he had all the coolest stuff, but he had the full base, which was really cool. So I don't know, that kind of excites me. I'd love to know what you guys think. Is G.I. Joe something that you go, man, this would be a really cool title for a pinball machine? I think it would definitely be. And if you ever watched the Electric Bat cast with Kale and Rachel, I believe it's Kale who's really into the idea of doing a G.I. Joe. So I think he's pretty hyped about that. Now, the question is, can barrels of fun do it justice and i think if you purely go off of labyrinth they did a really good job with that game so i gotta think that if they did have gi joe although i don't think it's the next game i'd be pretty excited about that and i think the majority of the pinball community would too so let me know what you think if you're watching this on the video version of it which would be um you know on retro ralph live you can comment below if you're listening to it on Spotify or Apple Podcasts, maybe head over to Retro Ralph Live. You might enjoy the video version, and you can leave comments directly to me. So that was the first rumor he gave me, and that one to me is really exciting, and I have never heard barrels of fun associated with the G.I. Joe license. So I guess you could say it was broken here first, not something I typically do, and maybe it's not reality, but I felt like this person was very confident. He was confident in the source that he had. And he said, I'm telling you, they have this license. This information needs to be out there. So I'm delivering it to you. I think it's pretty exciting. Now, the other rumor is about Jersey Jack pinball. Now, what I think is interesting about this is I don't think there's any doubt in anyone's mind that the next game, the next game from Jersey Jack is going to be Harry Potter. That's pretty much everyone feels confident. And there's been enough little clues here and there that I believe that's that's what everyone believes. So let's just go based on that being factual. But what comes after Harry Potter? We've heard about the Matrix, which, man, I would be so into the Matrix. I just, in my mind, I envision having a telephone booth and you gotta get out of the mode and you hit the ball in the telephone booth and the doors close and it sends the ball somewhere else and now you you not in the matrix you back in the real world like i don know there just i just feel like there so many cool ass things you could do with the matrix so uh that would be awesome and i'm definitely someone that really enjoyed those movies the majority of those movies so i think that would be a really cool ip but that's sort of cooled off lately so what comes after harry potter is what could it be so this this is what he said is rumored that they have access to. Number one was the Beastie Boys. Now, I love this idea because it seems like all we ever get are rock themed or metal themed pinball machines. And while I love Iron Maiden, the game is amazing. I'm not the biggest Iron Maiden fan. Like I don't love Iron Maiden music, although the game is so fun that you kind of like fall in love with the gameplay of that game and then you're like maybe mired maiden isn't so bad but i don't know it's just not not a band i grew up listening to but i definitely appreciate that game but the common thing i'm trying to go on here is that it's always a rock band it's always metallica it's always uh you know uh why can't i think of anything right led zeppelin it's rush it's always something rock related it's like let's branch out beastie boys would be a welcome change for that i think because you're talking about i don't know what genre beastie boys really is considered i i kind of them as like a rock hip hop kind of thing so that's cool but i do think maybe that would lead to if they actually do have that license and decide to make beastie boys maybe it would lead to other companies being like maybe we should make a hip hop pinball machine i mean i would be all about a dr dre and snoop dogg collaboration pinball machine you throw m&m on it too and i mean holy crap i'm in on that like i'm in on a game like that there's so many great tracks you could choose from. There's just, I don't know how you couldn't make that cool. Like to me, that would be very cool. And it would be a welcome change from all the rock. I'm a rock fan. I like rock. I like alternative rock. I like metal. I'm not a biggest country fan in the world, but I could get behind some kind of hip hop pinball machine like that, especially Beastie Boys. I think that would be very cool. I think they could do some cool things with that. So supposedly Jersey Jack has Beastie Boys. Now, the other thing that he told me that they have is Sonic the Hedgehog. Now, I grew up with the Sega Genesis. I played so much Sega Genesis down in the basement of my house where I grew up in Lincoln, Rhode Island. It was Sega Genesis all the time. And one of my favorite games would definitely be the original Sonic the Hedgehog, followed shortly after Streets of Rage. Streets of Rage and Streets of Rage 2 would be my favorite, although I don't know that you can really make a pinball. It's not probably popular enough. It wouldn't cross over enough to make sense. But hey, if someone wanted to make a Streets of Rage pinball machine, I'm buying that shit. Sight unseen. Don't care. but Sonic the Hedgehog would be really cool as well. Now, Sonic the Hedgehog, there was a homebrew that I played at Expo one year. This was when I wasn't as into pinball as I am now, so I probably didn't appreciate it as much as I would now if I played it again, but Ryan McQuaid, who was employed by American Pinball, and I think maybe they did, I think, employ him thinking they would make Sonic the Hedgehog, I think. I think that was what they were going for, but anyways, that never came to fruition, and he now doesn't work at American Pinball to my knowledge, but that Sonic Spinball homebrew was pretty damn cool. So if that gave you any idea what could be done with Sonic the Hedgehog, then I think Jersey Jack would have a very strong IP that they could release a game on because Sonic the Hedgehog to me spans generations. I mean, now with the movies out, and I think there's a new movie coming out too, if I don't remember. I think there's one more. I don't know, I'm kind of behind. I watched the first one and I enjoyed it. I thought it was pretty good night i did not see the second one i think there's a third one coming out so to me sega sonic like you can't really go wrong with that ip and what i'm wondering is like are they gonna go after ryan to maybe come work at jersey jack and finally get this guy's game made that that he you know worked so hard and i think he might have won best in show at one at one point because of that game but it was very well made and you could tell that he really thought it out and he was a fan of sonic the Hedgehog like you could just tell so again that would be really cool because so so now we have two options after Harry Potter it could be Sonic the Hedgehog it could be Beastie Boys now this next one I think could be very very cool and I think it would be a nice change from Marvel and we've got a lot of Marvel from Stern is the Justice League so he said those were the three licenses that he had confirmed with someone that they have. Sonic the Hedgehog, Beastie Boys, and Justice League. I mean, you have so many cool characters to pick from with Justice League that I gotta think that would be a winner as well. So, Jersey Jack, look, Jersey Jack needs a win. I feel like they've made good games. Like, Elton John is really fun, but it's Elton John. And I think even though Elton John is very popular, very famous, I just think like with my age group, like I'm in that, you know, 45 to 50, I don't know if we're super fans of Elton John or that we would even want an Elton John themed pinball. I almost think that and even to the older demographic I don know if that what they want I really don I don think that what people want But the effort was great The pinball machine shoots great The thing is it's still Elton John themed. So it's like they always go after these like somewhat obscure things. Like you could argue Avatar shouldn't have been obscure at all. It's Avatar. It's gigantic franchise. But I still think that, I don't know, too much time maybe has passed. and I don't think it has the original excitement as the original Avatar movies. Even though I'm sure they grossed fine at the box office, I'm sure they did great. But I just think Avatar was another one that was like, eh, it got a lukewarm response. And I don't want that for Jersey Jack. I don't want that for any of these companies. I want them to have hit games. It'd be really cool if they all had a game. It'd be so cool if we lived in an era where every single one of these companies had a game out that you had to have. You know what I mean? That'd be exciting. There's a lot of good games. I think that leaves for a lot of options for a lot of people. But I just think there's this ability for Jersey Jack to put all the pieces together with the right theme and they could make something really, really amazing that won't be niche that the majority of the community would want. And I think everyone's waiting for that. They've had a couple wins, though, in the past. I think people love The Hobbit. People love Dialed In. I liked the, when I played it, I really liked Pirates of the Caribbean. I know I said that before. But yeah, so that's what I heard. That's what he told me. So it's now out into the world. Tell me, is this complete nonsense? Is it crazy? Am I nuts? Is this guy that told me nuts? I don't even know who this guy is. He's like a mystery man. And he might be totally pulling my leg, right? He might be. But I pressed him a lot. I talked to him a lot. And I felt like what he was telling me, he truly believed to be true based on the source that he got it from. So anyways, so that covers what he told me. Now, real quick, because I don't want to make this episode too short. You guys have voicemails that you've sent me. There's not enough of them currently. I think I'm going to wait for a couple more, and then I'm going to incorporate that into the next episode. So the next episode, I'm going to take your voicemails. If you're listening to this right now, though, and you're on Retro Ralph Live, look in the link in the description. Leave me a voicemail. Like, I want to hear from you, whether it be like, what do you think about the rumors? What's your favorite game? Just tell me something. Ask me a question. We'll have some fun with it. So, you know, there's nothing like off limits. So just ask whatever you want. It could be about me personally. I don't care. Just make it something. And I think it's fun for me to be able to showcase you on the show and hear directly from you what you're thinking when it comes to pinball. So the last thing I'm just going to splatter a bunch of other rumors out there. Back to the Future is one that I've talked about before. Many have talked about it. That one was rumored. We pretty much have confirmed that Dutch Pinball has that license. They have the license to Back to the Future. Now, it makes sense because they had to work with Universal on Big Lebowski, and so now it would naturally make sense that they've gone after Back to the Future. The issue is Dutch Pinball's ability to deliver a massive quantity of games fast. They don't have the manufacturing abilities that Stern does, or even like Spooky, or even, you know, probably even Barrels of Fun. They just cannot pump out the games fast enough. CGC, I don't know about CGC, but, you know, I just, they're very slow, it seems like. but uh so it's kind of weird like i would be really bummed out if back to the future comes out and there's like it's number one really expensive and it's limited to like 500 because i think that licenses me one that a lot of people want and i don't think the original back to the future game is really that good so um it's really not i don't enjoy that game i only enjoy it because i'm a back to the future super fan and i grew up with it so it's cool to see that someone had a vision for back to the future but it just isn't the vision i think that we wanted to see and know what that game could be with all the cool things in that game. Like I want a flux capacitor on the play field. I want a full sculpt of the, you know, of the DeLorean. I want, you know, there's so many things you could incorporate the controller when he's going to 88 miles per hour, the dog, like there's so many, there's so many cool things. The clock tower. I mean, you could make an epic play field with back to the future. So one more thing that's kind of interesting. It was rumored, but then it was kind of confirmed because I don't know, American pinball. opened up the door to Don and Carrie and let them play the actual game, Cuphead. So we haven't seen a lot of video game properties turned into pinball machines in recent years. Cuphead is, it definitely exists. I don't know at this point because of the sort of fractured nature of American pinball as a company right now. It just seems like it's a very weak company at the moment. I don't think there's a lot of customer confidence in the company at the moment as well. So I don't know. This game, if it does come out, I think it's going to be tough for people to want to put their money behind American Pinball just because it's been so rocky. They've let a lot of people go. I don't know. It just doesn't seem like a company of strength. And so I would feel like, to me personally, I don't think I'd want to buy. There's other companies that I feel like are out there now that have customer confidence. You can't go wrong, I think, if you buy a game from Spooky, they're going to support the game. They're going to give you parts for the game. You know what I mean? It's going to be easy to work with them customer service-wise. American Pinball just seems so fractured that it'll be a shame because the things I've heard is that Cuphead is actually pretty fun And so that would be a bummer I not a huge fan of Cuphead but that brings me back to one thing really quick on the video game front I don remember if it was CGC I think this was a Nap Arcade rumor that CGC was going to do Halo. I think that's interesting, actually, but CGC has been so slow to deliver that that would kind of bum me out. I would be interested to play a Halo game, 100%. That would be very cool, but I don't know where that's at. So I'm going to bounce back to one last company and then, because I don't know how reputable these rumors are, but the rumors around Spooky are Beetlejuice, Gremlins, Motorhead. I think those are the major ones. Beetlejuice, Gremlins, and Motorhead. Gremlins, I could get behind, but when I think about Gremlins, I think about other movies during that time period and The Goonies comes up. I would love I feel like I want to buy a spooky game and Evil Dead looks great but I'm just not a horror movie guy and I don't think that there's that many people that want an Evil Dead pinball machine and it sucks because it's a beautiful game the artwork looks great Christopher Franchi did a great job on the artwork the design and layout look great so spooky Luke you know hats out hats off to you you did a good job I can't wait to play it at the bat because I know Electric bat's gonna have them in a couple weeks i think but man i just want them to release a game that i that i think is mainstream enough that everybody would want one and and if you look at the quality of you know if you look at the quality of evil dead if you could do that but just bring a mainstream theme like the goonies i'm i'm in i'm totally in and you could argue that it kind of has a little bit of horror maybe or adventure suspense whatever so it kind of fits their their like niche that they have so i don't know man there's this but spooky like out of those games like which ones would you want beetlejuice gremlins motorhead and the goonies i don't know because people have said the goonies could be barrels of fun or could be spooky or could be both i don't even know how that would work because i'm not a licensing guy but i don't know how both would have access to the license but that would be interesting so like what i don't know like what could we do with that i just feel like spooky's next game make it something mainstream and i think they're going to have, I think they're going to find that they're going to sell a lot more games than they originally thought. And I don't know how Evil Dead is selling, but I'm sure it's selling pretty good because everyone who's interacted with it or been around it has said nothing but good things. And I think at Pinball at the Beach, it was very much, everyone was very much interested in it. All right. So that's going to be the end of this show. I know it's a short one, but I wanted to say I am, I did get a, just so you know, I did get a Dungeons and Dragons. I traded my John Wick for it you know r.i.p john wick but i think i'll probably want john wick again at some point i enjoyed john wick i put about 600 plays on john wick so i played it a lot but ultimately i only have so much room but that is going to change because there's going to be a cool thing i'm getting a little bit more space and i it i the project just kicked off it's going to be i'm not i'm not buying a new house or anything but the garage is going to get retooled a little bit so I think I'll have space for several more games which will be good because it allows my it allows my collection to not have to cycle through so much I know people make fun of me for that but it's like I like enjoying the games at home although I do play on location at electric pad every Tuesday night during their league which by the way if you if you live in the Phoenix metropolitan area or you're flying into town Tuesday nights at the electric pad it is awesome and they just had a record night with 129 people. It's the biggest consistent on-location pinball tournament, I think, in the world. So that is pretty freaking amazing. So hats off to Electric Bat. And Kayla and Rachel are freaking amazing. The community there is amazing. So that's all I got right now. Next episode, we will talk more about the voicemails. And I just want to know what you guys think of all these rumors, because this is pretty cool stuff. I could get behind a G.I. Joe. Like this would be, these all of these titles that we've talked about would make it difficult for me like there'd be FOMO all over the place as long as the games were made well and it shoots well and you know all the things we want out of a pinball machine theme integration like that would be an epic time for pinball and I'm not even I didn't even mention Stern here because we have King Kong we have rumors of Call of Duty we have rumors of a Walking Dead uh remaster so like there's a whole bunch of other things going on on Stern, but hey, we focus a lot of attention on Stern, so this was one of the episodes where I decided not to do that. We didn't talk a lot about Stern. So hey, I think these are some pretty cool rumors. Let me know what you think. I appreciate each and every one of you watching. I kept it to 20 minutes this time. Get in, get out, fast one, because it's Valentine's Day, and you should be doing something to Valentine's Day with your significant other, and we're about to hit a plane soon, and I told my wife I would record this super fast and upload it super fast. So now I only have like 10 minutes to add the front intro and the outro. So that doesn't give me a lot of time. So I got to get this show on the road. Hope you guys enjoyed it. Hope you had a good Valentine's Day and we will see you on the flip side.