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Zen Studios Design Interview

BlahCade Pinball Podcast·podcast_episode·39m 18s·analyzed·Feb 16, 2019
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claude-haiku-4-5-20251001 · $0.034

TL;DR

Zen Studios discusses Williams mobile app strategy, design process, and licensing partnerships.

Summary

Zen Studios discusses the Williams Pinball app for iOS/Android, highlighting the balance between pure pinball physics, engagement features (challenges, multiplayer Skills), and mobile monetization. Designer Thomas Crofts explains Zen's design philosophy starting with playfield layout and core toys before visual embellishment. Licensing partnerships with IP holders have become increasingly collaborative due to Zen's proven track record. The team hints at future Skills integration expansion and potential console/PC cross-platform support.

Key Claims

  • Williams Pinball app maintains visual fidelity identical to Steam version on mobile devices while delivering smooth 60fps gameplay

    high confidence · Mel Kramer and Thomas Crofts discussing technical achievements in mobile optimization

  • Zen plans day-and-date releases for new tables across console, PC, and mobile platforms going forward

    high confidence · Mel Kramer direct response to Chris's question about release timing parity

  • The Williams app represents culmination of years of research dating back through Zen Pinball, Alien vs. Pinball, and Bethesda Pinball prototyping

    high confidence · Mel Kramer explaining evolutionary progression of mobile monetization and engagement models

  • Geographic variation in app ratings shows stark differences: France 4.4 stars, US 1.x stars, reflecting different market expectations

    high confidence · Mel Kramer citing specific App Store rating data during launch feedback discussion

  • Thomas Crofts prioritizes Twilight Zone-style Pat Lawlor catch-and-shoot layouts over pure flow tables in his design philosophy

    high confidence · Direct response to Chris's question about layout preferences and designer influences

  • Zen's Aliens table required post-RC approval revision from licensor, making it one of the trickiest licensed designs

    high confidence · Mel Kramer discussing specific licensing challenges with Aliens table development

  • IP holders now grant Zen free creative reign during development with approvals handled at end stages due to proven track record

    high confidence · Mel Kramer describing how licensing relationship evolution has reduced friction

  • Film asset changes within 2 weeks of release create design challenges for movie-licensed tables in terms of character/dialogue updates

    high confidence · Mel Kramer explaining why film licensing presents special difficulty vs IP licensing

Notable Quotes

  • “We felt like we were not really creating a cohesive package for players. We felt like it was too busy. Where does someone come into the game and like focus?”

    Mel Kramer @ early in discussion — Articulates core design challenge Zen faced in transitioning to Williams app: balancing feature richness with clarity

  • “You can't win. In France we have a 4.4 rating. In the US we have a 1 point something.”

    Mel Kramer @ monetization feedback section — Highlights painful reality of mobile gaming market fragmentation and contradictory user expectations around free-to-play models

  • “We keep full-time engineering on our pinball engine, and we have a lot of experience. Our code is super optimized because for a long time, mobile devices weren't very powerful.”

    Thomas Crofts @ technical discussion — Explains Zen's technical moat: long-standing investment in physics optimization that enables console-quality mobile experience

  • “This feels like the culmination of basically, once I maxed out the tables, I was like, I need to check out some of these other ones that you guys had on.”

    Chris Frebus @ app design discussion — User testimony validating the grinding/unlock model as engaging mechanic driving cross-table exploration

  • “There's a whole new aspect of the digital pinball-loving, like original-loving people and the really old-school guys.”

    Aikos Gercke @ community engagement section — Community manager observing how Williams release attracted a different demographic (classic purists vs Zen loyalists)

  • “Generally we're sort of looking mainly at the layout first, just to get the general sort of gameplay flowing nicely. And then at the same time, we're sort of looking at major toys on the table.”

    Thomas Crofts @ design process explanation — Core design philosophy: layout fundamentals first, toys second, visual embellishment last

  • “If we get one thousand competitive pinball players in the game, we can go to that level, and you guys will be playing for serious money.”

Entities

Mel KramerpersonThomas CroftspersonAikos GerckepersonChris FrebuspersonZen StudioscompanyWilliams Pinball appproductSkillsproductPinball FXproductFox Next / Fox Interactivecompany

Signals

  • ?

    business_signal: Free-to-play mobile monetization model proves contradictory: players requesting paid option when everything free, then requesting free when paid required; no viable solution identified

    high · Mel: 'With Zen Pinball... there's only one free table. And so with Williams, we took the approach, we're just gonna make everything free... I just want to pay. You can't win.'

  • ?

    community_signal: Community manager Aikos fielding detailed accuracy feedback from hardcore collectors noticing discrepancies in light sequences, table colors vs manuals; new demographic of classic enthusiasts engaging with Williams content

    high · Aikos: 'There's fifty, one hundred people saying, like, this isn't the right red. This isn't, like, in the manual.'

  • ~

    sentiment_shift: Positive reception to Williams app features, particularly daily challenges and Skills competitive modes; engagement and retention metrics tracking well in beta

    high · Aikos: 'They've been enjoying the challenges making their first appearance on mobile.' Mel: 'Engagement and retention in a mobile game, if you've got people actually willing to invest their time and stay there, that's like the first battle.'

  • ?

    competitive_signal: Skills esports platform shows viability for serious prize pools ($40k+ bowling tournaments) but requires critical mass of 1,000+ competitive pinball players to scale to that level

    medium · Mel: 'If we get one thousand competitive pinball players in the game, we can go to that level, and you guys will be playing for serious money... forty thousand dollar bowling tournament.'

  • ?

Transcript

groq_whisper · $0.118

0:00
this is the blockade podcast with your hosts chris and jared you are listening to the blockade pinball podcast i am your host chris frevis aka shut your trap not joining me today will be uh jared because time zones are hard when you're talking to zen studios essentially in budapest so it's early morning for me and after work for them so today joining us we have Mel Kirk, VP of Publishing we have Eikos Garke who's the community manager for All Zen and designer Thomas Crofts who has done tables such as Bob's Burger, Jurassic World, Portal, Guardians of the Galaxy Calrissian Adventures, Adventureland and my absolute favorite of all Zen tables, Aliens oh look at that Yeah, yeah. When I was looking to see what tables you did, I was like, oh, sweet. I get to grill them all about that table.
1:08
So we're going to start off kind of just with what's happening in Zen right now. or the big to-do has been with the Williams Pinball app for iOS and Google Play.
1:29
Mel, you had mentioned to me at one point that you guys were hoping to go for the best pinball experience you could have on mobile. And I was quite shocked the first time that I opened it up. and that it visually looks identical to what I was seeing on Steam.
1:53
Beyond just the visuals, you're kind of going for the whole vibe of also with pinball effects, adding in the challenges and the multiplayer and stuff. How does that whole process kind of come together of creating this madness? yeah it's been kind of mad uh i guess for a while sometimes we felt like we were uh not really creating a cohesive um package for players we felt like um it was too it was like too busy i guess is the way that i might put it um where does someone come into the game and like focus um to where if they just want to be playing pinball um is that pure experience there but we know that in order to hold people's attention, particularly on mobile, you got to have, you know, the game needs to open up and have various things for them to do. So we have a lot of things for people to do in a pinball game. It's just how do you arrange that properly? How do you make it so it's fun? And how do you, you know, in mobile, modernization is a thing, right? We need to make money so we can actually continue to making it. How do all those elements balance together? The first thing we had to focus on was the table itself had to be beautiful, gameplay, totally smooth spot on the physics obviously ultra important so that that's number one the pure pinball experience has to be excellent number two the features that we're going to wrap around it how do we how do we let people interact with those whether it's the daily challenges if it's the multiplayer environment with skills if it's just you know trying to unlock the stuff that we have in there and then you know monetize monetize around it how do we do it so it's good for players because we know a lot of pinball people just want to come in and buy tables and then there's the other 99 of the world mobile market who just never wants to spend a dime and just grind their way through something or watch ads in return for gameplay so there's a lot to it um you know we it took us a lot longer than we thought it was going to take i know we were talking with you guys about you know doing beta forever and then we finally got there and um so we appreciate you know digital uh pinball fans for helping us a lot with that but um yeah i don't Tom, do you have anything else to add with that? I mean, that's just kind of the process and the approach. I mean, for me, I've just been sort of mainly focused on the actual tables themselves. So, you know, the overall package, you know, it's not really been something that I've had much design work on. But, say, I, you know, when the beta came out publicly, you know, I downloaded it on my phone and, you know, gave it a shot, and it's really fun. Yeah.

Mel Kramer @ Skills monetization discussion — Articulates critical mass threshold for Skills viability at tournament prize levels ($40k+ range)

  • “Zen nailed the feel of the movie and got the story and the atmosphere and all that. I totally prefer Zen's version because it tells the story.”

    Chris Frebus @ Aliens table comparison — Comparative endorsement of Zen's Aliens over physical Heighway version, validating narrative/atmosphere-first design approach

    • Aliens
    game
    Heighway Pinballcompany
    Medieval Madnessgame
    Blockade Pinball Podcastorganization
    Adventurelandgame
    Pinball Arcadeproduct
    Pat Lawlorperson
    Museum of Pinballorganization
    Twilight Zonegame

    design_philosophy: Thomas Crofts's design process prioritizes playfield layout fundamentals first, toy placement second, visual embellishment last; influenced by Pat Lawlor catch-and-shoot style tables like Twilight Zone

    high · Tom: 'Generally we're sort of looking mainly at the layout first... And then at the same time, we're sort of looking at major toys on the table.'

  • ?

    licensing_signal: Film-licensed tables face unique challenge: asset changes within 2 weeks of film release requiring dialogue/character redesigns mid-development; more disruptive than traditional IP licensing

    high · Mel: 'The things that are the hardest is when you're talking about film and film assets changing all the time, even up until like two weeks before the film releases... we get that back and some of that stuff changes pretty significantly.'

  • ?

    licensing_signal: IP holders' approval process has streamlined due to Zen's proven track record; most licensing now involves free creative reign with end-stage approvals only

    high · Mel: 'They know that we're going to make a good pinball table... they're literally giving us free reign to do pretty much whatever we want. And we're just getting approval at the end.'

  • $

    market_signal: Geographic fragmentation in mobile app ratings (France 4.4 stars vs US 1.x) reveals fundamentally different monetization expectations and player behaviors across regions

    high · Mel: 'In France we have a 4.4 rating. In the US we have a 1 point something. It's so geographically driven and so segmented.'

  • ?

    announcement: Williams Pinball app officially launched on iOS and Android with day-and-date future release parity planned across all platforms

    high · Mel: 'We're planning day and date now, moving forward with tables across all platforms: console, PC, and mobile.'

  • ?

    product_concern: Williams app navigation initially confusing on mobile; issue resolved in beta but indicates UX/UI complexity challenge when balancing feature richness with clarity

    medium · Chris: 'My initial reaction was that the navigation was a little bit confusing... some of those things got corrected in the beta.'

  • ?

    product_strategy: Skills competitive platform roadmap includes table rotation feature and expanded content cadence; Zen and Skills working closely on rollout timing

    medium · Mel: 'We're working very closely with Skills to figure out what the right cadence is for new content, new modes.' Chris requesting rotation: 'I personally would hope for a rotation of tables.'

  • ?

    technology_signal: Zen migrating mobile/console pinball portfolio to unified Williams app model as new standard; previous apps (Alien vs. Pinball, Bethesda) considered prototypes, no new content planned for legacy apps

    high · Mel: 'That's exactly what happened, Chris. Bethesda and Alien vs. Pinball were kind of the prototype for the making of Pinball FX3. Now we're back to Williams... we're really focused on the future of what's going on with Williams.'

    • 4:28
    I think one of the things we already can tell is that, you know, because mobile games are all about data. We get piles and piles of data and we're constantly analyzing it. People are spending a lot of time with the game and that's awesome. Engagement and retention in a mobile game, if you've got people actually willing to invest their time and stay there, that's like the first battle and we feel really good about that. People see value and spend their time playing what they've been doing on mobile. I think ACOS is getting some of the feedback online. I was going to say, ACOS especially has got to be getting the... It's amazing how pre-release of any of these things, I'll have kind of mentally what I'm thinking about the game and be like, oh, okay, and we'll talk about it in the podcast. And then it gets released in public and I'll read comments and I'll just be like, wow, I never approached it from that angle. I never thought people would think this. And it's interesting how some people can get so heated over something and there'll be equally other people on the other side being like, no, you're all wrong. And I'm just like, oh, it's got to be madness for a community manager to try and wrangle those puppies together.
    5:31
    Yeah, but that's good. That's what I always say. When someone is mad at me or someone is really giving us the heat, that means they feel really passionate about the game. They want to play it. They want to spend time with it. So I really welcome those feedback.
    5:48
    I know that we are in people's minds there. And I've been talking to a lot of people. They've been enjoying the challenges making their first appearance on mobile, which is my personal favorite of the game as well, and did the challenges.
    6:05
    But yeah, I think we got a lot of work to do, but I think we're on a really good track right now. Yeah, there's two interesting things that stand out to me. One was Zen Pinball, which is a hugely downloaded, highly rated game from Zen. Most of the hate we get or want to start reviews is that there's only one free table.
    6:23
    And so with Williams, we took the approach, we're just gonna make everything free. There's some paying if you want to pay, but you can do it. And then we get everybody to say, I just want to pay. You can't win.
    6:34
    In France we have a 4.4 rating. In the US we have a 1 point something. I mean, it's just like, it's so geographically driven and so, you know, what players expect in different parts of the world now, it's so segmented. Wave, we're just learning a lot. We're getting a ton of feedback. We're getting our grips, our bearings, we're making some changes to the game which will be released maybe today or over the weekend. But yeah, we're on a really good start. Like we started off really solid. I got from you guys in your group was like phenomenal. It's super helpful. In Android right now, we're in an open beta phase and we're seeing similar results to iOS. So, you know, number one, is the pinball, is pure pinball experience good on mobile device? I think we nailed that. The rest will evolve over time. Like I said, for me, the most important things were visually, for instance, you know, curves and straight lines. There's no jaggies. The curves are true curves. and the plastics that are supposed to be see-through, they are. And that's hard to pull off on mobile.
    7:34
    I mean, we've seen other pinball apps with mobile and have to cut corners and kind of do things. And then the other thing was the physics of it.
    7:42
    And during the beta, I was able to get into the pro physics and pro difficulty and realized, oh man, this is like playing in FX3 in the classic arcade mode or whatever, where it was just like brutally difficult and so different from what you start the game with. So it's kind of an interesting, if you're grinding, introducing yourself to the tables at that regular difficulty. and for those of us that aren't used to playing on pinball on a mobile device because just playing with your thumbs is odd,
    8:22
    it kind of warms you up to it. And then all of a sudden you get that and you're just like, whoa, that's a totally different experience.
    8:30
    So it was kind of interesting capturing that. I did feel the – oh, go ahead. So we keep full-time engineering on our pinball engine, and we have a lot of experience. like our code is super optimized because for a long time, mobile devices weren't very powerful. And so we, you know, we learned a lot of tricks. And now mobile devices are, I mean, they're super powerful, bordering on high-end handheld gaming devices or consoles and whatnot. So we're prepared to make stuff play well and look good on mobile. my initial reaction uh was that the navigation was a little bit confusing we actually some of those things got corrected in the in the beta that were confusing me um what's funny is after playing it for a month it's now second nature to me um and i've had that same kind of experience with other mobile games where when i first get into i'm like i can't how do i even get around here and i keep on you know hitting brick walls of where i need to go and then once you're used to it, it just becomes like, well, this isn't really difficult, guys, to anybody that's new to the thing. So I kind of would just encourage anybody that trying the app for the first time give it a week of play Let yourself kind of fumble around for it for a little bit Eventually you understand why it laid out the way it is And it make perfect sense So
    9:57
    Well, cool. I'm glad you're enjoying it. I mean, yeah, there's a lot. That's the thing is there's a lot in the game. I don't know. Sometimes we maybe overcomplicate things, but then we hear from people. I want more to do with my pinball table. So I'm curious. So what happens when new tables come out on console and Steam? Is it going to be day and date with mobile, or will there still be a delay between the two? We're planning day and date now, moving forward with tables across all platforms, console, PC, and mobile. Okay.
    10:35
    And I don't know if anybody in the room knows the answer to this, So obviously grinding to earn the tables for free, you got to collect table parts.
    10:46
    In the beta when I was playing it, once you reached max table parts, you could still earn table parts, but they just kind of like, why? You didn't need them anymore. Is there going to be something implemented where it basically, once you've maxed out a table, you no longer collect those parts? so that as more and more tables come in, you're not having this giant pool of parts that you're trying to pull from. It's just purely the ones that you're missing. Or is it going to continue to be that? Or is it going to be something where maybe you could trade table parts in for other parts, you know, depending?
    11:19
    I don't know. Do you guys know we're planning on that? Okay. Our group right here doesn't know the exact answer to that. But be aware that once you max out a table, you can still earn parts on it. What do you do with those? But I don't know what the plan is to do with those just yet. Okay, because our concern is, you know, if right now collecting seven table parts, it's manageable. It's going to take you probably, I don't know, I'm guessing probably four weeks to max it out. I'm kind of keeping tabs myself as I start brand new again once the beta was over and seeing how long this takes. But once you've got, say, 15 tables, that's going to be a slow, much slower maxing out any one table. So that's why we were kind of curious what happens. You know, if all of a sudden you're a brand new player and there's, like I said, 15 tables to do, that's going to be much different than the player that started right now. So there's a constant balance going on with the game and evaluating the data and feedback that we get. to optimize the player experience. Players start getting dumped into different buckets based on their play behavior, based on what they do in the game. So the game is smart.
    12:37
    It should be adjusting. It might not be yet because we're still early. We need a certain amount of players to really get that going. But that's the idea behind mobile games. This feels like a culmination of...
    12:52
    Basically, once I maxed out the tables, I was like, I need to check out some of these other ones that you guys had on. So I checked out Alien vs. Pinball and Bethesda Pinball.
    13:01
    And it's interesting because this feels like the culmination of those two particular apps that were put out, with Aliens having the grinding to open up eggs to open up the next table kind of aspect, and Bethesda having the whole matchup aspect.
    13:19
    And now we're at this point. Is that kind of what this is, a progression? and is there any chance that those apps get revamped to look more like this app?
    13:30
    That's exactly what happened, Chris. Actually, if you look back, you know, Zen Pinball was the start, and then Alien vs. Pinball pushed us in a direction, took a little further with Bethesda, tried some new things. Bethesda and Alien vs. Pinball were kind of the prototype for the making of Pinball FX3. Oh, okay. Now we're back to Williams, what we've done at Williams. So I don't know if we're going to look back interactively and like update AVSP or Bethesda, but we're really focused on the future of what's going on with Williams because we think that we can really, we're going to have a library of content that works really well with this model, whereas Alien and Bethesda, we're kind of, you know, there's no other new tables planned for this. Right, it's tapped out. So Williams, we can really grow. And if you look at the rest of the Zen library, there's other games with a lot of tables, you know, that we could apply to. So we'll see what happens right now in Williams. But this is the culmination of years and years of work, research, trying, experimenting. It was finally, you know, this is the next step for this type of pinball game. Let's talk a little bit about the multiplayer skills aspect of this. I get addicted to this.
    14:42
    There is right now I am currently in a battle with medieval madness because darn it, I want the I want that top dollar spot of earning three bucks. and there's three of us that are just like constantly going back and forth against each other.
    14:56
    And Medieval Madness on one ball, knowing that there's a dollar amount hanging over your head is just tense.
    15:08
    Especially since the right out lane is a Hoover vacuum of drains. And so many of the scores, if you can score a million points on that, you're almost guaranteed the win because I can't tell you how many games I've had where I've had two flips and it was an outlaying drain and I only had a score of 200 grand. You're just practically wanting to throw your phone and you're like, not fair! And then the next game you have a 20 million game. It's all over the map, but it is tons of fun.
    15:39
    Right now, though, there is only limited medieval madness and the gameplay modes are not... There's only one if you're doing cash game and I'm not sure how many different options are for the practice mode.
    15:54
    Obviously, you guys have the eSports edition where you can play Epic Quest and Mars, and there's a couple of different gameplay options in that.
    16:08
    Is there going to be more added to the skills group maybe once there's more players involved, or what's the thought process beyond that? yeah this is a our first step out with the Williams app on skills integration um we're working very closely with skills to figure out what the right cadence is for new content new modes um and how we make sure that we keep uh players uh you know keep them happy the thought is if we have too much in there then it spreads out the competition too thin yeah and you want people that really try to get good at something.
    16:47
    There's going to be more. It's just a matter of what we think what the next move is. We just started out. This is the first step.
    16:56
    I personally would hope for a rotation of tables because that's eventually what I've experienced with the eSports app and Pinball Arcade also has their version called Pinball Arcade. with it. It just has the one table. But eventually, you kind of learn the tricks of how to earn the score that you need to earn. And then there'll be a few players that are exceedingly good, and then you can just never beat them. And then you stop playing the app because you're just to the point where you're like, well, I can't advance. And so if there's a rotation of tables, it kind of refreshes that excitement. And so that would be my thing. But I totally get the idea of if you have too many modes, it spreads the players too far out and then you're not playing against anybody, which again, kills the fun of the app.
    17:47
    Tom, have you started making extra money in Skills yet? Not yet. Unfortunately, yeah, not so good. The great thing with the Skills app, because I am the mobile player that hates to put money into things,
    18:01
    and I don't know if it's on if this is something skills just randomly assigns or if it's up to the developer, but by earning achievements, you can earn perks, if you will. And sometimes they even give you cash. And so at one point I had won, and this was just me doing the practice modes, I had won $3. I've since turned that $3 into $55.
    18:27
    So now I have I don't have unlimited play, but I'm having a lot more play of being able to do the cash games. and it's a lot of fun doing that way. Cool. We just need like 1,000 of you, and honestly, skills could look very different. It could look very, very good.
    18:44
    I was actually in their offices a couple weeks ago, and they were running this $40,000 bowling tournament. Oh, my gosh. $40,000. If we get 1,000 competitive pinball players in the game, we can go to that level, and you guys will be playing for serious money. See, here's the thing with the bowling apps, though, and I know this for a fact. You can program in swipe movements into your phone so that all you have to do is push a button and it automatically does that movement. So those people that are winning top dollar on bowling, they're all doing that. And that to me is kind of, I don't know, it's a level of cheating. I don't even want to, I can't compete with, let's put it that way. So at least pinball, everybody's on an even playing field, if you will. I mean, there is no, yeah, there's no pre-programming. programming in it you gotta do it yourself I mean that all there is to it Yeah but we see big potential with this We see this as you know IFPA guys are going crazy now, traveling, winning money in tournament play. This could be an extension of that on the digital side.
    19:54
    And the price pools could be much bigger, much quicker. Is there any way of getting the, say, the Steam version, having that be able to do skills on PC or is it purely an online app? I mean a mobile app.
    20:11
    There's a lot of things possible. Skills and Zen are working together quite closely so we'll see what we can do. I would love to be able to play it with a real controller.
    20:23
    That would make all the difference in the world for me. Akos, talk to me a little bit about prior to the Williams Pinball app and the Zen community that you were dealing with and then after Williams got released and having that whole new influx of input, basically those of us from Digital Pinball fans, I imagine.
    20:46
    How is that? Has there been a difference in how you've had to communicate with people? Issues you've had to deal with?
    20:54
    I don't think there's a difference on how I had to communicate, but it was a lot of fun getting to know a lot more people that I wasn't necessarily in contact with before. Because there's a whole new aspect of the digital pinball-loving, like original-loving people and the really old-school guys. One thing that was, I think it was really challenging, is to get everything just right. Because, you know, there's different manuals, different models of pinball tables, and that wasn't a problem before. but now I have people, like 50, 100 people saying, like, this isn't the right red. This isn't, like, in the manual.
    21:38
    So I juggle those communication between the team and the graphics people and the community. It was really fun.
    21:48
    Yeah, there's some hardcore people out there that will notice if a light sequence is out of order. I actually learned a lot and I've been playing a lot more pinball, I think, since we released the Williams collection. Because now I go out into the city and I see a fishtail somewhere, or a getaway, I was like, oh yeah, I know this table now. I don't have to play it, it looks much better. It's really good having Williams come to Pinball FX3. Yeah. Out of curiosity, and this is kind of open to all three of you. Is there any one Zen table, Zen original that you think could be manufactured into an actual physical table? I don't know. Tom, you start there. I think a couple of mine was sort of really physical based tables, even though they had like all the extra. Sure. You know, I the Super League football table and the aliens table. I've always been able to. I mean, the only thing that I think would be difficult on that is the the pop up aliens traveling down the field.
    23:04
    But other than that, I think it's what I noticed with when you guys did the Williams tables and you added in all these enhancements. I think that kind of shows people you could reverse engineer it the other direction from a fully enhanced Zen version into what would translate into a physical property with mechanical toys and such.
    23:29
    This kind of leads me into your design process. Let's take, for example, Adventureland. So completely original property, no license. You're having the story created, if you will, the world created in-house, and you get assigned this table.
    23:49
    What is your kind of where do you start with design? Is it starting with the layout? Is it starting with what you want to happen on the table? Where does that kind of start for you? Yeah, so I mean, generally we're sort of looking mainly at the layout first, just to get the general sort of gameplay flowing nicely. And then at the same time, we're sort of looking at major toys on the table, so you've got a Ferris wheel or whatever the particular toy is, we're always sort of trying to get those core features fixed first. And then sort of once we've done that, we go on to the concept stage with, you know, the 2D artists, you know, filling out the table with the playfield textures, the lamps, everything like that.
    24:39
    And so it's always a sort of an ongoing process of, you know, we'll put something in. If it works good, great. If it doesn't work, you know, we'll modify it somehow.
    24:50
    That's sort of generally how we start. it's not like you're starting with oh wouldn't it be cool if we had a table that had a giant ferris wheel and this looping roller coaster that's kind of that's kind of later down the stage yeah not not too late but it's it's yeah generally well when when i start on the tables it's layout i always look at first and then i'll try and fit the toys in immediately afterwards do you have a favorite kind of layout or a favorite table designer of real-world pinball that you kind of gravitate towards?
    25:27
    For me, I always sort of tend towards Twilight Zone. I always like the layout and then the little flipper at the side.
    25:38
    So yeah, that's probably my favorite go-to table. So it's more of the Pat Lawler style catch and shoot kind of tables rather than just a pure flow table.
    25:52
    Yeah. So when we do our original tables as well, it's always wide body designs as well. We go for a lot of the well, in fact, all of the narrow body tables so far have been Williams. So it's been sort of an interesting design change for us working on that as well. no interestingly you've also had a ton of work then with the purely licensed tables um i mean when i rattled off that list how is that different dealing with a licensor when designing your table um are they coming at you again are they coming at you first with ideas or are you kind of coming with ideas and then presenting it to them for approval uh yeah i mean we we generally design most of it ourselves.
    26:37
    We'll choose the characters that we want on the table and then we'll shoot off an email to them just to check out if there's any problems with that or something. The aliens table was very tricky in terms of licensing. I think we had to go on Weaver after the RC was done. It was quite a tricky table. It took a while to get her agreement done.
    27:06
    Which is interesting because I just recently was at the Museum of Pinball in Banning. Have you been there, Mel? I haven't. I saw my list of places to go. Definitely. It's only open a couple days a year though, right? Yeah.
    27:21
    Basically, the final one for the year but the final one for any stretch of time is coming right up mid-March. It's Arcade Expo. and they're doing it where they have one room is nothing but the pinball machines so over 500 pinball machines and the other room is nothing but arcade cabinets and over 500 of those so it's their giant kind of the biggest event that they do the one I was just at was for It Never Drains in Southern California pinball tournament but the reason why I was going to mention it they have Highway Pinball's alien table there And I was really excited because the odds of being able to come across that table are pretty slim considering how few were made.
    28:10
    And, of course, I'm immediately comparing it with Zen Aliens. And the thing is, it's a fun table and they do a fantastic lighting job. They black out the table multiple times. It's a lot of fun for that aspect. It's one of those machines that you definitely want to play in a dark room.
    28:28
    But it basically should have been called Colonial Marines. because it's literally nothing but Alien Tracker, setting up sentry guns, and loading into the APC, and that's it. And I was like, guy, Zen nailed the feel of the movie and got the story and the atmosphere and all that. It was just like, I totally prefer Zen's version because it tells the story. It was fun to be able to kind of do that A-B comparison and see that. So, I mean, hats off to you guys for that. Thanks You know there's all a great group of producers it's Fox Next now but it was Fox Interactive FDU and we were working with them but great you know people who know their IP very well and sometimes give you a few tips to really authenticate the experience. Yeah next up Die Hard right?
    29:23
    Little Bruce Willard This Christmas This Christmas This Christmas that be one of those tables where it like it better be carrying the heavy language label otherwise it just be no fun
    29:38
    Sorry, I just got to go stream. Oh, yeah, because it's a good stream. Me and Tom are staying with you. Okay. Well, hey, Akos, thank you so much. I know this is after hours for you guys, so I appreciate you stopping by and saying hello to everybody. it was an honor thank you I've been watching you guys for cool years see ya alright thanks so much so yeah the licensing though with some of these companies has there been some that have been much more hands on and some that have just been kind of like yeah do whatever and we'll show it to us at the end And, you know, has there been varying degrees of that?
    30:23
    I think so. I probably see it from one way and Tom sees it from another way. So, I mean, for me, it's it's been fairly similar with all the license tables I've worked with.
    30:36
    You know, I generally when I start on the project, I have pretty much free reign, you know, as long as it's within the realms of whatever I'm working on. and it's just usually towards the end where we're getting approvals for various aspects that maybe the odd issue crop up. So for me it's a fairly similar process.
    31:00
    I think in one sense now we've done so much licensed content that the IP holders trust us. They know that we're going to make a good pinball table. We've proven we've done it many times. So it's really just them reviewing that it's everything's on point on color, on character, on the end.
    31:18
    So, I mean, even with these, you know, Williams tables, you know, they're literally, you know, giving us free reign to do pretty much whatever we want. And, you know, we're just getting approval at the end and it's been fine. Yeah, they're super easy to work with. The things that are the hardest is when you're talking about film and film assets changing all the time, even up until like two weeks before the film releases. and we've been working on something that's trying to hit it within the film window and then we get that back and some of that stuff changes pretty significantly, even dialogue and character, the whole look of the character. So that's when it really gets challenging.
    31:55
    Tom, how – excuse me, losing my train of thought here. Because I thought of two things and I already know – I'm going to answer this one because I know the answer to what Mel would say. I know that Mel's dream – one of his dream licenses is Stranger Things. I'm curious to know what one of your dream licenses to be able to work on would be.
    32:13
    Mine is completely different. Even though I do love Stranger Things, actually, that would be a really cool thing to work on. One of my favorite areas is like 80s cartoons. So there's like Thundercats and Teenage Mutant Hero Turtles and Transformers and things like that. You know, I'd love to work on a table.
    32:35
    Robotech, that's all I'm going to say. Yeah, that would be fun, though. A guy at Thundercast Tale would be kind of cool, actually. I mean, that's one of those properties that is very popular and yet hasn't had any kind of a revival. So that would be... There have been a couple of attempts at redoing some of the cartoons that were sort of a little successful, but not so successful that they carried on with them. Yeah.
    33:05
    Now I finally remember what I was going to ask you originally. What I was saying is with the Williams tables, there's the whole enhanced visuals aspect that you guys are doing. And I'm curious, Tom, how involved with designing those are you?
    33:20
    Well, we pretty much design everything to do with the visual extras. Sort of like when we get the tables into play, we'll, you know, play them for a day or two. and sort of during that time we're getting you know physical you know the physical properties of the table we're you know discovering what you know how exactly they work but during that time we're also thinking of you know which characters will we have you know which objects can we use you know which are used in all of the game modes so we can you know make the best possible use out of them and so that's it's pretty much just you know us designers who of doing that stuff.
    34:05
    Mel had hinted that you guys were kind of holding back on how extreme you went with any of these enhancements, and I think we're coming close to the point where you guys feel like you can maybe go off the leash a little bit and go crazy.
    34:20
    Is there a particular table in mind that you would and this could be well down the future or whatever, but a table that you've seen out in the wild where you're just like, oh my gosh, I have just a flood of ideas that would that you can go nuts with? I mean, of course, the Indiana Jones tables.
    34:39
    You know, if we get that one, it'll be pretty wild, I'm sure. But I think I mentioned before, you know, we might have the opportunity to do like, you know, Indiana Jones, our own version as well. Right, your own versions, yeah. Yeah, that would be really awesome.
    34:55
    Yeah, a lot of good ideas for that one. particular right now that you think of uh that you can go like totally crazy in the ones we've got in the office i mean like circus voltaire is one of my favorites and i could probably think of some pretty cool things to do on that one yeah that would be that one does definitely lend itself to uh i mean just the jugglers and the menagerie and and you know i don't know whenever i sell that the the that little cage you might say with the ball inside of it i always just thought of the guy on a motorcycle going around and around uh the circuit performer kind of things oh you know why steal that one oh well it's funny because there's we've had multiple discussions over the years um prior to you guys you know the williams thing even being on the horizon but where people have gone god could you imagine what zen would do with this particular table um and so there's been multiple times where we've had that discussion with X, Y, or Z table where it's just like, oh, you could be doing this, you could have this happen, and all sorts of madness to engage with. So definitely looking forward to more of that because so far with what we've seen, I love the dragon flying around on Medieval Madness. I think that's just the coolest.
    36:17
    I know some people are like, oh, it gets in the way of the flipper. Who cares? It looks awesome. um and then you bring it back exactly and and i mean for instance the canon shot on black rose uh that's one of those where i when you're doing the rotation thing and the camera's going along with it yeah that's a little bit too much for me so yeah i just push the button go back out into wide mode because it makes it easier for me um but i'm still seeing it momentarily and yeah so easy to just hit that button and turn on and off so i love that the option is there yeah I should mention too that and I've mentioned in this previous podcast with regards to playing Black Rose just recently again and it was in this dark environment and they did black flippers with black rubber and there's not much lighting down at the flipper area anyway and it just made it brutally difficult because you couldn't see the ball yeah that would be a pain Yeah, so I mean, when we got the Attack from Mars table in as well, the first time I got the straight multi-ball, I had the lights all off then. And I could only see the balls by the flickering of the lights on top of the balls. And that was, yeah, really cool. It's a whole different experience, yeah, playing something in that. And I know some people there was a guy at at the museum who was basically about to be marketing a new product. And it was magnetically mounted light that he could put onto the front apron and light the table so that if it was a dark environment, he could have a fully lit play field. So, yeah, there's certain people out there, obviously, that they want no part of a dark table.
    38:01
    Interesting. Yeah. OK, well, I'm going to wrap things up here. because I have questions now that I want to ask that I can't ask for the general public. So I just wanted to thank you, Mel Kirk. Thank you, Thomas Cross. And thanks, although we already left, Eikos Gyorgy for stopping by after hours there at Zen Studios in Budapest. I'm still waiting for my plane ticket and room and board, but you know.
    38:31
    So, and thanks to all the listeners for listening and making some suggestions for questions that I could ask. We will talk to you guys again soon. Thanks so much. Bye, guys. Cheers, guys. Bye.
    38:45
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    39:00
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