Cause I'm just a teenage dirtbag baby, yeah I'm just a teenage dirtbag baby. Listen to Iron Maiden, baby, will you be? I'll sit, I'll sit, I'll sit, I'll sit, I'll sit, I'll sit, I'll sit up. Alright everybody, welcome to Ginnadious Pinball Podcast, happy Wednesday! It was a very good day yesterday, it seems, for Gerry Stellenberg and the team over at Multimorphic. I'm in the thread. Lots of positivity here, and I think Jerry's learned a really important lesson over the last two titles, or maybe the last, like, three titles. I think it's really weird, Al, and the Princess Bride, that showed this man that people just want licensed themes, right? All those years of making stuff like Cosmic Kart Racing and Lexi Lightspeed and Heist, that's not what people want. I bet Jerry sold more the Princess Bride machines yesterday than he did over the first five or six years of this company. And so how many did they sell, right? Order banks opened up and all you had was like a three minute video. You haven't seen much of the game in action and order banks opened up. And the way Jerry does his orders is somewhat interesting. I want to talk about it because I want to give Jerry some marketing advice. I think he's really good at engineering. I don't think he's great at marketing, but I am happy that they picked this theme. I will say this. I went out last night and I was just hanging with friends and I'm like, what's going on? What's new in your world, Chris? And I was like, oh yeah, you know, there's a new pinball machine I'm covering, The Princess Bride. And people's eyes do light up with this theme. I think it's just a feel-good movie. And if you don't like this movie, and I know some people find it boring, I don't know. You have to go watch it. I mean, this movie is a lot of fun. And for many of us, this movie is all about childhood. And when you were that young boy and you used your imagination and it just had it all. So I think this is a really good theme for pinball. And I think when we see on Saturday, how they integrate the first ever movie integrated into a multimorphic P3 platform. We're going to see how it integrates. And I think it's going to be a lot of fun. I think we're going to see a lot of clips. I think the clips look like they're synced up with the video. Are you listening, Jersey Jack? You can't make a movie anymore in modern pinball times and not have the actors and the voices synced up. Like Jaws is all synced up perfectly with Stern's machine. We're done. We're done with these like muted clips. Like they don't work. Either you get it done or you don't do it at all. I think we're going to see the theme integration done really well in this game. So how many of these games do you think they sold yesterday? And the way Jerry does his ordering, it's like first come first serve, regardless of what edition you order. So people are like waiting for the order banks to open and people are like, oh man, if I miss it by 45 seconds, I'm going to wait another four months. From people's order numbers, it seems like they sold around maybe 300 or more of the Princess Bride machines in just one day with just a three-minute video. That just goes to show you the power of the theme, especially with this movie, people, because we all know that Multimorphic hasn't been the most attractive package over the years. but if you really want this theme this is the only platform you can play it on so look I do want to give them credit where credit is due I've said it before I think the princess pride is a great theme for pinball would I've liked this to be a standalone game a standalone game with a wood play field and have stuff up on a normal LCD screen you know let's wait until we see how they do this. I would be a jerk if I just said, nope, I don't want any good theme on this platform. I think anyone who says that is prematurely being a jerk. And the reason why is, I don't know, right? I don't know how a movie is going to translate onto this platform. We haven't seen it before. And from what I've seen and knowing the modes in this game and knowing the scenes from the movie with the call-outs and all the actors, it might be a lot of fun. And it might be the first time in a long time or the first time in forever where we actually walk up to a multimorphic machine and actually have an amazing time playing pinball in a way that also connects with us emotionally. And that's always been my thing with this platform is like, you just didn't care about any of the games. You just don't care. Like you walk up to a game like Heist and you bring nothing to it. You walk up to a game like Cosmic Kart Racing and you bring nothing to it. Like you want it to be Mario Kart or you want it to be Grand Theft Auto, right? It just doesn't work. These generic themes just didn't work well for Jerry. But that's all in the past, people. That's all in the past. If he can start to get some momentum around this platform, he could start to reach a little bit of a tipping point. Now, look, here's the other thing, too. I think it's hard to kind of gauge like how many people ordered yesterday and how popular this game really is. Even when you go on the Pinside thread, it's a brand new game, right? It's a popular theme with this target demographic. There only like 12 or 13 pages of discussion around this game on Pinside If this was a Stern game we be at page 120 by now If it was a Jersey Jack game same thing So there still is not the same amount of people that are even in the market for a multimorphic machine. And then what happens is all it takes is like 20 guys talking back and forth to each other and you start to think like, oh my gosh, like this thing's taken off, it's on fire. Like everyone's wanting a Princess Bride. People are waiting for the order banks to open. And then you realize, well, maybe it's just 20 dudes. It's not that many people. Now, here's Jerry's big mistake. He should not be making these games in order of payment. All right, that is ridiculous. He should be making the CEs first. Get the highest margin games out the door first. The people who pay the most amount of money, $13,750. And that's why he's not even selling that many collector's editions because there's no real reason to buy it right now. And he's already said, I'm going to make 500 CEs and 700 or 750 limited edition games. And that's 1,200 games. They're not sold out. They're not even close to being sold out. But Jerry, listen to me. All I'm reading in the thread is all of this confusion around when I will get my machine if I order it right now. And Jerry, I'm sorry. but the people who spend the most money get on the plane first. And also from a manufacturing standpoint, this makes no sense. You have three different versions of the game. You know, wouldn't it be easier to just run them all at once? Like run 200 CEs at once, then do another 300 LEs, then do the standards. I get why he's doing it the way he's doing it. And also manufacturing, I guess the Multimorphic is different than any other game out there because it's really just sticking on magnetic decals as the artwork. So you've got that. But those Inigo Montoya swords that are on the side of the CE cabinet, surely those have to be made a little bit differently than the rest of the games. They're making also the brass plated armor. And then you just can't have a normal assembly line, right? Because what happens if you get a CE order and then the next order are like three standards and then the next order is like four LEs, then two CEs. Are you really going to be jumping back and forth? Like, wouldn't it be much easier? Like if a dude just knows, all right, I've got 200 parts for brass plated CE games I need to make over the next month or two. It just doesn't seem to make much sense. And I think what Jerry's just trying to do is create some urgency and FOMO to order right now, order right away. But he's not getting the orders for the collector's editions. And even as I was watching people on Pinside, even my own poll that I put up, almost nobody's ordering the collector's edition of the game. And that's not what you want, right? You want to make one less than you can sell when you think about the collector's edition. And remember, everybody, Weird Al was only 227 LEs. That was it, right? There was no CE. There was nothing else. And so this is a humongous addition to that volume. I mean, he's basically saying we're going to make a thousand more sort of special additions of this game than Weird Al. Now, the next question around this game becomes how many are they going to make a week? Jerry is in the thread saying they are going to get to an even better place than 10 games a week. And people are going to be surprised at how much more efficient they are in the manufacturing process. my response to that is I'll believe it when I see it. Everyone always says this. You know, everyone always wants to give you ETAs on when you're gonna get their game and then some unforeseen delay happens and then all of a sudden it doesn't work out. You know, I could just see it right now. The Inigo Montoya sword. We're waiting months to get the swords for the sides of the cabinets. There's a parts problem with those swords. But overall, it's a good day for this company. They're still very small. They're still very tiny. do I think Multimorphic is going to be able to make as many games in a year as Spooky Pinball? Probably not. Are they going to make as many games in a year as Barrels of Fun? Probably not. But here's what excites me about any boutique company being successful. I think so many of us out there just want something different than the next Stern machine. And I can feel that. You know, I can feel it. I feel like Jaws is not selling as well as Godzilla did. And I think at these prices, if you're going to go in on a game, you kind of just want to go in on something that's a little bit different. Now, look, Jaws got a huge code update yesterday and it looks phenomenal. All the stuff they put into the new code. And I think Jaws owners are going to be very happy. If you love the theme, I think you're going to love Jaws pinball. Did Stern cut corners on the mechs? Absolutely. Is Stern overcharging us for what's in their games? Absolutely. Are you going to get an amazingly coded game? Of course you are. Because that's where Stern is putting most of its effort, into the software. Their software department is so big. I bet Stern has more people in its software department than almost every other pinball company combined when you add up all of their software engineers. And so Stern Pinball is going to do it right. The team that works with Keith Elwin always does it right. Now does that mean Jaws is going to be a masterpiece Jaws is going to be amazing I don know you know all of these Sterns are starting to blend together And over time we going to get used to Keith Elwin designs He's not always going to be able to wow you. It's the same way with art. When Zombie Yeti came onto the scene, it blew you away. Now we've had so many Zombie Yeti games, it no longer has the same impact. The same is true of Keith Elwin. Because what Stern doesn't have over there, They don't have any mechanical engineering people that are wowing us. Like each new Stern release, there's just not a lot of magical stuff happening on the physical game itself. And it's all artwork, it's all software, and it's all theme. And that's where Stern wins, right? But now there's more competition. And at this much money, I think a lot of you are running out of room. And if you're going to put something new into your game room, or even if you're new to the pinball hobby, You might not want to have what everybody else has. And that's sort of what Stern signifies for me now. It's the game that everybody's going to have. Everybody's going to have Stranger Things. Everybody's going to have Godzilla. Everyone's going to have this. Everyone's going to have that. But not everybody's going to have Elton John. Not everybody's going to have The Princess Bride. Not everybody's going to have Pulp Fiction. Not everybody's going to have Looney Tunes. Not everybody's going to have Texas Chainsaw Massacre. So I do love the variety in pinball. And as I've said for the longest time over the last few months, I think Stern Pinball has to be a little bit nervous. Because I do think at these prices, the future of pinball is going to be boutique. That is where the success will lie. Companies like Barrels of Fun. Companies like Spooky. And I think Jersey Jack's in that middle ground. Like they're not a boutique, but they're not a Stern. I do think the future of pinball is going to be games that come out and they only make about a couple thousand of them and that's it. Like they're not going to just flood the market with every single game they make. Like I don't want to see Jersey Jack do what they did with Guns N' Roses. I don't want there to be 6,000 in the world and then none of them feel special. And I think Jersey Jack, if they were smart and if they did this with Elton John, it would be a smart move to just say we're only going to make 2,000 or 2,500 of each game and that's it, Jersey Jack. Why do you keep resisting this? You don't want to make 5,000. You don't want to sell too many Bentleys and Bugattis and Daytona Rolexes every year. You've got to put a limit on your games and your limit is way too high. And if you did that, it would start to make every one of them feel special. You know, for people who buy the Labyrinth, it's nice to know there's only going to be what? There's only going to be 1,100 of those games ever in the world. Looney Tunes, 888. Texas Chainsaw Massacre, 888. No more, no less, and it just makes everybody feel good. And because there's so many themes now and there's so many companies, there's enough games to go around. because when you add up all of these manufacturers now, and even if each of them is just making a thousand games a year, that's a lot of games though, especially at this price. Now we all know that not all these companies are gonna survive. We all know that 2024 is gonna be a thinning out of pinball companies that don't have their act together. And either you get games in boxes or you're in big trouble. I didn't even mention Haggis Pinball, But you best believe that people are not going to be patient anymore for companies like that, that mislead you. Did you know that Haggis sent out notices to people in January, asking them to pay in full for Centaur in January? And then a few weeks later, now they need to recapitalize. This company has been misleading people for so long. And the Rob Peter to pay Paul business model is not going to work. And I don't mind being the only pinball podcast that is truly calling these guys out. I mean, heck, Marty was on a podcast last week and I heard that he didn't even mention this. Imagine that. This is his company. And he goes on an hour show and doesn't even mention that his own pinball company is in the process of recapitalizing itself. I mean, look, this is why Canada's Pinball Podcast is necessary because you're either going to face the world that's in front of you and take the red pill or you can take the blue pill and just live in this fantasy land in which all your friends just interview you and nobody wants to bring up the truth. But you don't care about haggis, right? Because there's too much positive energy around companies that are doing it right. Look how happy everybody is that Chicago Gaming Company is getting Pulp Fiction out into the world. The game looks great. The game's going to do phenomenally well. And those games look so beautiful. And when those L.E.'s hit the line, it's going to be a glorious day. The only problem is we don't know when they're going to hit the line. So we've got that. That's positive momentum. Spooky pinball. Man, that Looney Tunes is gorgeous. I don't even care about Texas Chainsaw Massacre when I see Looney Tunes next to it. It looks so much more fun. I'm all in on Looney Tunes. I'm not getting one, but I'm all in on Looney Tunes. It just looks so good. So it's nice to see Spooky Pinball making these beautiful machines. Family run company. Everything's going well. Barrels of fun. I got sent a letter from David David Van Es to its customers. When you order a game from them they send you a beautiful letter saying how happy they are to have you as a customer They include a flyer of the game It little details like that that speak volumes They know what they're doing. And Labyrinth is making its way out there. It's a beautiful game. I can't wait to play one. Positive vibes happening over there. Jersey Jack Pinball has its best shooting game to date. It's just struggling with how to market this Elton John game to the pinball world. It's a phenomenal game. the more time you spend on an Elton John, the more you're going to want one and you know it. And I don't care what anybody says, I will die on that hill. It is the most enjoyable Jersey Jack game to play to date easily and simply because of the way it shoots and the music fits pinball perfectly. So good stuff happening over at Jersey Jack. And look, they're going to ride that momentum of Elton John being such a fun game into the next game, which is going to be Matrix. And then we got Dutch Pinball. Dutch Pinball is now about to finish all of its EA orders. I mean, that is a glorious day in pinball. They're on the line right now. Barry told me the last four to five games will be done probably this week. And then Dutch Pinball will owe everybody nothing except future great games. Alice in Wonderland is coming. Back to the Future is coming. It's great. There's so much great stuff happening in pinball. It all is very expensive. You can't buy everything. And I noticed this, like for some of us out there, you got to learn some restraint. You got to learn some patience. I know the distributors want you to buy everything. I know these companies want you to order when the order banks open, but I still encourage each and every one of you to wait and play the game before you buy it. Like at least wait, you're not going to have a hard time getting a freaking The Princess Bride ever. And here's what's going to happen. You're going to be able to cut the line because we all know that once these games start being made, by the time The Princess Brides are rolling off the line, The Matrix is going to be out. We're going to be a few months away from Back to the Future. Stern's Metallica is probably going to be out. Stern's next Cornerstone game will be out. So as much as you want it today, the bad news is You can't have your princess bride today. It's going to be a few months from now. And so there's always so much cooking up in the pinball world. And I love being your go-to pinball podcaster to cover everything happening in the hobby. I'm feeling good about pinball. I don't like the prices. And if I'm going to spend this much money, it's got to check a lot of boxes. And we're going to keep everybody honest here. But we're going to give credit where credit is due. Jerry and team, good job on the theme. I can't wait to see the Buffalo Pinball stream of this game on Saturday. I think that's actually going to sell them more games than the three-minute video we got the other day. Look, and I think most of you are not going to jump in on this platform right now. And that's okay because you're going to get to play the game at Texas Pinball Festival and have some fun on it there. Now, some unfortunate news. I will not be able to go to Texas Pinball Festival this year. I know. Heartbreaker. I miss hanging out with my fans at Perry's Steakhouse. That's always my favorite time of that show. And then also the Twippies were canceled. Now it's not me not going because the Twippies were destroyed by you know who. The reason I'm not going, I can't go because of work. So Texas Pinball Festival this year, it falls on the same weekend as St. Patrick's Day. Now I have a really big Jameson activation that just kicked off yesterday. We are doing something with Colin and Michael from Saturday Night Live, and we're doing an event called St. Patrick's Eve. This was the idea that came from my team, that because of leap year, it screwed us. Leap year bumped St. Patrick's Day from a Saturday to a Sunday. We're going to start celebrating St. Patrick's Day on Saturday night and make it a countdown. Just imagine like New Year's Eve meets St. Patrick's Day, and we're calling it St. Patrick's Eve. and we're going to do an event in Times Square and it's Saturday night. And so I can't be in Texas and be here. I need to be at that event for work. It's going to be a lot of fun. But look, everybody have a great time in Texas and maybe next year we'll get the Twippies back and we'll kick that clown to the curb who destroyed the award shows. We need to figure something out. There's too much to celebrate in pinball where we're going to hand the best award show over to such a clown and now we don't have it. We're going to get it back. Don't worry. I wonder how much it costs to buy this weekend pinball. What do you think he spent? Like five bucks? Maybe seven bucks? And looking at the site these days, it's worth nothing. I would unsubscribe if I were all of you. Everybody, we'll talk to you soon. Kaneda out. What? She's a grass scraper.