Episode 391: The Princess Bride pinball machine from Multimorphic

Pinball Profile·podcast_episode·40m 34s·analyzed·Feb 20, 2024

Analysis

claude-haiku-4-5-20251001 · $0.034

TL;DR

Multimorphic reveals Princess Bride P3 module with story-driven rules and innovative mechanics.

Summary

Multimorphic announces The Princess Bride as their eighth unique P3 module game, with comprehensive asset licensing enabling deep thematic integration. The episode features developers Jerry Stellenberg, Josh Kugler (new hire from American Pinball), and Colin McCalpine discussing rule design philosophy, innovative mechanics like left/right-handed flipper controls tied to story moments, and the P3 platform's value proposition for collectors. The game will be playable at TPF with multiple cabinets on display, and actor Cary Elwes visited the factory to preview the finished product.

Key Claims

The Princess Bride is Multimorphic's eighth unique full module game, though the platform supports 21 total games including third-party/add-on titles
high confidence · Jerry Stellenberg directly states this when discussing Princess Bride as 'the eighth unique one and full system,' later clarifying 21 total games on platform
Josh Kugler joined Multimorphic from American Pinball and previously worked on P-Rock custom pinball systems, giving him a head start on P3 software architecture
high confidence · Jerry explains Josh's prior P-Rock experience and how American Pinball used P-Rock-derived software, which informed P3's core structure
The Princess Bride and Final Resistance were developed in parallel by separate teams with shared graphics resources
high confidence · Jerry describes two parallel teams: Weird Al team led by Steven Silvers, and Final Resistance team led by Scott D'Anessi, with Rory Cernuta handling graphics across both
Cary Elwes (Wesley actor) visited Multimorphic factory during game development while on a Princess Bride Experience tour in Austin
high confidence · Colin describes reaching out to Cary, him accepting the invitation, and visiting the factory to play the game and interact with developers
The P3 platform's value proposition allows owners to purchase additional modules for 'a few thousand dollars' versus $10,000+ for new machines from other manufacturers
high confidence · Colin directly compares module add-on costs to full machine pricing from competitors
Innovative modes include 'Battle of Steel' where players control flippers differently (left-hand buttons then right-hand buttons) to mirror the story's left/right-handed sword duel
high confidence · Colin details the mechanic: left-hand stage uses left buttons for both flippers, then switches to right buttons after ball is held
'To the Pain' is a mini wizard mode with weakened flippers that strengthen as players hit shots, thematically mirroring Wesley's character arc
high confidence · Colin explains variable flipper strength mechanic tied to Wesley's weakness turning to strength in the scene

Notable Quotes

“Film-based games are perfectly suited for the P3, I would say, better than any other pinball machine out there.”
Jerry Stellenberg @ ~13:00 — Core strategic positioning of P3 platform advantage for licensed IP games
“You never, ever have to do that with Princess Bride and really all of your games... you never have to look up because while playing pinball, you're looking at the flippers, you're looking at the balls... The player himself or herself is highly focused where they need to be looking, which is right on the play field.”
Jerry Stellenberg @ ~14:30 — Articulates key P3 design philosophy: playfield-focused interface vs. backbox-dependent competitors
“The thing that Jerry commented about of the playfield versus the back box. In every game I've worked on, you spend so much time on the display stuff... and recognizing the whole time you're working on it that none of that is going to help the player.”
Josh Kugler @ ~16:00 — Josh contrasts his previous industry experience (Stern/American Pinball) with P3's player-centric approach
“So you then change, and we use the P3, so you use only the left side buttons to control both flippers when you're playing the left-handed stage of the duel. And then if you make it far enough... you get to then change over, and the ball is held, and you then change over, and now you're using the right side buttons.”
Colin McCalpine @ ~25:30 — Demonstrates innovative P3-exclusive mechanic integrating story directly into control scheme
“Carrie always showed up at the factory one day, and, man, he is an amazing guy. Super nice, down-to-earth, respectful, was excited about the game. He talked to all the developers. He talked to all the assemblers.”
Colin McCalpine @ ~44:45 — Celebrity endorsement/validation moment with original film actor visiting production
“For a few thousand dollars, I have one installed right now... And so it's really nice to be able to have multiple different machines in the form of modules that I can quickly, in just a matter of minutes, install a new one and be playing in a completely different machine.”
Colin McCalpine — Personal testimony to P3 value proposition and swappable module convenience

Entities

MultimorphiccompanyJerry StellenbergpersonJosh KuglerpersonColin McCalpinepersonSteven SilverspersonScott D'AnessipersonRory CernutapersonSteve ScheuerpersonTJ WeaverpersonCary Elwes

Signals

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business_signal: Final Resistance and Princess Bride developed in parallel by separate teams with shared graphics resource (Rory Cernuta), indicating strong production capacity and organizational scaling at Multimorphic
high · Jerry describes two parallel teams; Final Resistance led by Scott D'Anessi, Princess Bride led by Steven Silvers as creative director
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community_signal: Multiple P3 cabinets of Princess Bride and full platform library (21 games) planned for The Pinball Expo (TPF) with livestream from Buffalo Pinball on Saturday
high · Jerry confirms 'multiple machines at TPF ready to play' and '10 or 12 P3s set up with Final Resistance and Weird Al and Heist and Lexi Lightspeed, Cosmic Kart Racing'
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competitive_signal: Colin McCalpine (Pinberg winner) emphasizes balance between accessibility for casual players and competitive depth in rule design, with clear on-screen guidance for both groups
medium · Colin discusses creating graphics that engage players, present jackpot information, and encourage replays via 'try again' moments
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design_innovation: Princess Bride features story-integrated mechanics including left/right-handed flipper control modes (Battle of Steel) and variable flipper strength (To the Pain wizard mode) that directly mirror film narrative moments
high · Colin details battle mechanics where left-button controls switch to right-button controls mid-mode; To the Pain features weakened flippers strengthening as Wesley gains power in story
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design_philosophy: P3 platform emphasizes playfield-centric interface where all gameplay information appears on bottom screen rather than backbox, reducing need for players to look up during play

Transcript

groq_whisper · $0.122

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It's time for another Pinball Profile. I'm your host, Jeff Teels. You can find everything on pinballprofile.com. We're on Twitter and X and Instagram at pinballprofile. You can email pinballprofile at gmail.com. We have a great Facebook group as well. And if you'd like to show your support on Patreon, that would be wonderful. Not necessary. The show will always be free, but it is patreon.com slash pinball profile. And thanks to people like Lua W. and GME Law, Dave S., John L., and more. We appreciate your support. It's a big day. It's new pinball day. It's excitement. What was this nitrogen that Multimorphic was working on? Well, let's get to three geniuses. geniuses and when i say geniuses when you think of plato aristotle socrates morons compared to these three uh poor lost circus performers they are jerry stellenberg and we have josh kugler the newest employee and also colin mccalpine hello gentlemen hey jeff how you doing hey jeff i know you've been called worse colin but uh there was a compliment in there anyway and Definitely now, today, The Princess Bride is here. It is so exciting to see this game. It is a wonderful license, and I can't think of a format better for something like this with all the visual assets, and you've got them all for Multimorphic. Jerry, congratulations. Thank you. This has been a long process, a huge project that we are totally excited to show everyone what we've been up to. You were kind enough to release some videos. I had a chance to look at some of the gameplay, so many modes. Colin, I know you're big into the rule design, and Josh, obviously, with the assets that you have, you have everything. Talk about it first of all, Josh, what it's like for you to be able to work with everything that is The Princess Bride. This has been a tremendous project, and when I first started to talk to Jerry about it, he was like, I think you might like this one. And he knew it was a title that I had been interested in previously. I had actually talked to those folks before I had started with American Pinball. So I always thought it would be a great theme. So I was really excited about it. And then when Jerry said we have all of the assets, literally everything, I was pretty blown away by that because it really lets you bring it to life. And it's been incredible doing that. I watched the movie I can't tell you how many times before we started working on it. But just living through that every day, it's really been a lot of fun. I think many of us have watched the movie more than once, like you mentioned, Josh. I know, Colin, you are very familiar with this product, this movie, and it probably helped when it came time for the endless amount of modes and rules that you can come up with. Yeah, absolutely. It was taking all the different things that you can do with any pinball machine and coming up with rules designed around the various chapters and the stories and the characters of Princess Bride. But then we're able to do so much more because of the nature of the P3 module and concept and platform and being able to seamlessly integrate not just the physical gameplay and getting to shoot all the ramps, but then, of course, you have also the other additional physical mechanics of the walls and the scoops that we make great use of and also the screen in terms of being able to display full clips of the movie and the whole team, you know, Josh and the rest of the team, Steve Silver and Steve Shorter, just doing incredible jobs of making this story and the movie come to life before your eyes as you play the game. Well, I think that's an important aspect of what we've tried to do. When we first started on it and really spent a lot of time, There were a few weeks where we just talked about the theme and talked about the story with the whole team. What do we want to incorporate into the module and the play field? And, you know, it was how do we really bring this whole story to life? And having been shooting it of late, one of the things I love is the fact that the rules really try to incorporate all of the aspects of the P3. Tom was just mentioning the walls and the way we use that in the game just a few times. but it really pulls you into the whole story as we take you on this journey with the characters. I want to get into that kind of story mode and multi-walls, everything that this game has to offer. But, Jerry, when you look and acquire a license like The Princess Bride, now your eighth full module game, if you will. Sorry, I guess there's 21 different games that you can do on Multimorphic, but this is the eighth unique one and full system that we're going to talk about later. when you look at getting the princess bride as a license in your head being in pinball as long as you have do you kind of see okay this is going to work with the product that we have with the visual assets if we get everything as you did can you start to think okay here are the modes here are the shots here's what the upper module is going to look like is that all kind of going through your head as you're signing to get this license of course yes i mean as fans of the movie and fans a pinball and obviously creator of the P3. Yes, it's all involved. But really when we're going after a license, it's mostly what do we think will resonate with the community and what do we think will resonate with our developers? Because we have to have the passion for the project. And if we don't, we can't deliver the story and the gameplay and everything the way we need to. And this theme in particular, similarly to Weird Al that we released a couple of years ago, we have super fans of this theme on the team. Most of us are. We all love the film. So while talking about any theme, you can pretty well conceive of modes and ways to use the physical hardware and the graphical display on the machine. But film-based games are perfectly suited for the P3, I would say, better than any other pinball machine out there. That is a great point, too, because of the visual assets. One of my favorite things in any pinball machine, and Multimorphic does it to a T, I despise having to look up at the back box when I'm playing. I don't like taking my eyes off the ball. You never, ever have to do that with Princess Bride and really all of your games. Yeah, that's actually one of our mantras. We tell everyone you never have to look up because while playing pinball, you're looking at the flippers, you're looking at the balls, you're looking where the balls are going, the back box display, the scores and animations, other machines run on the back box are more for people watching, people in an arcade or people standing over your shoulder. But the player himself or herself is highly focused where they need to be looking, which is right on the play field. So having everything right there, the screen makes the experience more immersive than any other pinball experience out there. And Josh, once again, congratulations on coming on board this team. It was an exciting announcement last week when we first heard. And you, having had such a great history with whether it be video modes or certainly animations, having this platform must just be heaven for you. The thing that Jerry commented about of the playfield versus the back box. In every game I've worked on, you spend so much time on the display stuff. just a tremendous amount of time and recognizing the whole time you're working on it that none of that is going to help the player. It is for the others. And that's such a difference here when I'm working on stuff and developing things for the display. It's recognizing that the player is going to see this. These are things that are going to help them, which also raises the stakes about what you're putting on the screen. We spend a lot of time in debate around what's going on the screen and where it's going to make sure we're using it appropriately and clearly for the player. So it just doesn't become noise or just because it looks pretty. It's really important to reach that balance. But I've really enjoyed the fact that what I'm working on every day is actually going to benefit the player when they're flipping the game. Colin, you had so much to work with when it came to developing the rules for this, and we're going to talk a little bit about what you've put into this game. I've seen some of the visuals. I've seen the video play that Jerry was kind enough to send me, the story modes, the book, the map, the main screen. There's just a lot there, and there's different ways to play this game. You can do it linear, or you can do it any way as you want, almost a choose-your-own-adventure. Explain what you've done with The Princess Bride and the rules. Yeah, sure. Well, as the player, you are going through the story, and you don't have to go through it from the start to the end if you don't want to. You can use the different shots that you make to begin any sets of modes based upon the different locales within the story and on the map. So every single shot is associated with a set of modes. And so you can, for instance, shoot the amazing Cliffs mech that TJ Weaver helped to design and implement and get to watch the ball just like people might know from pinball magic, but that's actually not the ball. It's just a little plastic thing simulating a ball. This is your actual ball being taken up the cliffs by a magnet. And as you play the Cliffs of Insanity mode and make the shots, the ball continues to scale the cliffs. and if you are successful at making enough shots, then the ball gets to the top of the cliffs and you complete the mode and then you get to choose between one of the three battles. So you can choose the battle of steel, the battle of wits, or the battle of strength, depending on which one you want to do. And so that's just one of the great ways that the theme is integrated into the actual pinball gameplay and then integrated into the rules itself. So that is a really cool feature that we have in here. And then just to give everybody a little bit of a taste of some things we can do with the P3 that no other machine can do So for those big Princess Bride fans out there who are familiar with the Battle of Steel and the epic duel between Inigo and between Wesley and the Dread Pirate Roberts at the time in the story, they're dueling at first with their left hand. And then in the middle of the battle, suddenly they say, Ah, I know something you don't know. I'm actually right-handed. So you then change, and we use the P3, so you use only the left side buttons to control both flippers when you're playing the left-handed stage of the duel. And then if you make it far enough, you get to then change over, and the ball is held, and you then change over, and now you're using the right side buttons to control both flippers. So really cool, fun, thematic integration with the actual story and with the pinball gameplay that only the P3 can provide. It is pretty awesome. And don't panic. Don't worry, what, I've got to go left or right? There's time, the ball is trapped to switch over, and that is just one of the great features of all the buttons that you have on these systems. You always wondered, okay, what can you do with this? You probably were thinking the same thing when you came up with this mode idea. And, of course, you can complete the four different characters. We've got, obviously, Wesley, Buttercup, Fezzik, and Indigo Montoya. So those are your four main characters. There's story modes. There's different ways to play this. Jerry and I was watching you play it a little bit, And it's great that for me, again, as a pinball player, you're using the whole play field, the bottom, at the top. You really have to have some great skills, and it requires you to really be a bit of a sharpshooter and kind of find your way through the game. And I was watching you do it, and it looked like a lot of fun. That's the thing about a well-written rule set is you can flounder around and not hit shots but still make things happen because the ball's going somewhere, and it's going somewhere. that qualifies some kind of mode. But if you're really skillful and you can hit the shots that are lit at the right times, then you can play a sequence of things that reward you more or take you deeper into the game or do all the things that Colin-level players want to do, whereas the rest of us are just enjoying the film or seeing really cool stuff happen that we expect to happen from a film-based game but happen because we're randomly hitting other shots. So, Josh, using your skills and coming over to Multimorphic, you've got this P3 system, big changes, some big differences for you? How quickly was it for you to adapt to what you're working with now? Actually, I was able to get up to speed probably a little quicker than I expected. Some of the core concepts are pretty similar to what I've worked with. The Unity side was very new to me. And, you know, the team was great in helping pull me along on that so I could kind of figure it out and dig into it. So once I got the hang of that. Wait, wait, wait, wait, wait. Now, Josh isn't telling the full story. He was, Josh got involved in custom pinball in the early days with the P-Rock. And what they did in American Pinball was based on the P-Rock. And what we do in the P3 is based on the P-Rock. And the core software structure is kind of shared among all the frameworks that are built on top of the P-Rock. So Josh had a head start. Yeah, certainly the core concepts. And there's some things that are done differently and the language is different. So I don't learn C-sharp, which was no big deal. So there were a few challenges there, but no, we were up and running pretty quick and moving along pretty fast. And I was chasing after people pretty quickly for assets and to get us stuff. And so that was, I always like to be ahead of everybody, so that's good. And now I'm behind everybody. You say you're behind, but I have to tip my cap to you gentlemen and everyone else that's working there at Multimorphic, because we just saw a new game at TPF last year with Final Resistance. And as I mentioned, this is your eighth unique module after Weird Al and Heist and everything else that you've done. This is a pretty quick turnaround. That's a good sign. Yeah, it's a quick turnaround from the company's perspective. And from the team perspective, we were kind of running two teams in parallel for a while. We had the Weird Al team, which was led by Steven Silvers, the creative director. And then when we finished up Weird Al, he and some of the other developers switched over to this one. whereas Scott D'Anessi was leading the Final Resistance development team, and that was mostly him and Michael Ocean and Bo and Karens and Rory Cernuta. Rory, actually, our graphics guy, he's kind of our floater. He handles all the in-game graphics on all of our games, so he was shared between projects. But Final Resistance and this game, The Princess Bride, were kind of developed in parallel. I'll say I was great when Rory was pretty much finished with Final Resistance because then suddenly I was getting tons of stuff from him. And that was good. So he was the one who was the accountant. Sometimes we'd be like, nope, Rory's on that for a couple of weeks, and we'd work on whatever else we would work on. You mentioned Steven Silver, the creative director, and he had a lot to do with this game as well. Colin, when you're working with the rules on this game and coming up with the modes and stuff, I assume you're working in parallel with Steven? Yeah, absolutely. Steven and really much the entire team So with Josh and with Jerry as well And also Steve Scheuer So we're all collaborating on coming up with those rules And it's really great Because we all bring different perspectives And different ideas of what makes a great game And so it helps me So that way if I've gone way over the deep end Of trying to make something overly complex They can help reel me back in and go Oh, that never helps Everyone can hit 21 shots in a row, right?

15:44

So yeah, but we work as a team on the rules So yeah, even though, yes, I was the lead on the rules In no way, shape, or form are the rules all mine It was a team effort, and I think it shows in the game It was really fun, the creative development The team worked really well together We were all coming up with all sorts of cool stuff and then tweaking it and then in some cases realizing, oh, you know what, that really didn't work as we intended. So you go back to the drawing board, and that's what's really cool about the P3 system is that we're not limited to, oh, crap, we've got a white wood that only has these particular inserts on it, and so we can't make those adjustments or you get limited or constrained with the adjustments that you can make. And instead for us, it's like, well, nope, we can just have Rory do a little bit more work and have to change the graphics and the visuals that go along with a particular shot marker and change things up. But, yeah, definitely a collaborative effort, and I can't wait for everybody to see how it's come together. We literally did that two weeks ago. There was a bunch of people shooting the game. It was Kyle and then Steven, and the next day they said, you know, maybe we should do this, and boom, we made the change, and it was great. It was very quick and easy. And yeah, if this had been a traditional play field, that change would not have been made. We would not be happy. I like that you utilize everything that the P3 model has to offer. And, you know, you mentioned about that mode where first off you're playing left-handed, and then you switch over to the right-handed. Even other little things that I thought was pretty cool. This is the To the Pain. It's a mini wizard mode. Near the end of the movie when, you know, the big duel is about to happen. And because Wes is weak, you've actually made the flippers weak, but you can actually hit some of the shots on the side to strengthen the flippers. And Jerry showed me that demonstration. Bravo. That's a great feature. Yeah, it's one of the many ways that we can use the things like the variable flipper strength and change that on the fly as you make progress in the mode. And it was incredible theme integration. As we were sitting around thinking, what do we do with this particular scene? How do we want to make this one special and memorable? And so I think we came up with a really cool and innovative way to make it special and memorable that you have to use your weakened flippers, lower flippers, to feed the upper flippers, and then the upper flippers having more strength to make those shots. And then as you progress and hit some of those other shots, just like in the scene where Wesley is, you know, telling off Humperdinck and slowly gaining strength and freaking out Humperdinck. You get to do that as a player as you play. Other things, too, where you, again, use the uniqueness of the entire play field, the screen even, if you will, for Guide My Sword, another fun mode. Jerry, I watched you do that, and I thought that's just absolutely perfect theme integration. It is because you have this physical construct in the film that's a tree. We know that as the viewers, but the character, Inigo, while he's summoning the spirits to help guide his sword, he doesn't know where you're going or where he's supposed to go. So we turn that physical tree representation, we leverage the scoops to do the same thing, and it's really cool because we can use the virtual screen, the dynamic graphics, to show exactly where that sword is pointing. We actually have a replica model of the sword from the film in the scene. So you see that sword moving left to right as you hit shots, and you're trying to find the right scoop to shoot to find the entrance into the pit. Forget the replica one you see on the screen. Jerry, talk about the different cabinets. We wanted to do something special for this film. Super fans of this film deserve to have something very special and very unique, and we came up with something that we think delivers on that. The team is overjoyed with how those swords came out. We spent a long time trying to figure out how to build, integrate them with the cabinet, make them manufacturable, make them look realistic, and they came out amazingly. We will show some links again on Pinball Profile and all our social medias. In fact, you'll get to see the game this Saturday. You're going to be streaming it with our good friends at Buffalo Pinball, correct? Yeah, Kevin Manning is coming down coming to the Multimorphic Factory and we're going to show everyone live. That's going to be a real treat to see It one thing to see still pictures but seeing the game in motion especially because your P3 is nothing but incredible videos You know stills just sometimes don do it justice It's remarkable. When I first saw the stills, I'm like, wow. And then when you see the video, it's okay. The map, the story mode, it's all there, and it's great integration, and I love what you've done too. And I guess, fingers crossed, I've heard nothing but good things. TPF is where a lot of us are going to see this game. Yes, we will have multiple machines at TPF ready to play. We'll also, by the way, have all of our other games there. We'll have probably another display of 10 or 12 P3s set up with Final Resistance and Weird Al and Heist and Lexi Lexpeed, Cosmic Art Racing. All of the games will be there, but we're over the moon, excited, happy, ready to see people interact with this game because it's something that we believe is truly special. It's something that you just can't see anywhere else in the industry. So Colin told me a little story, and of course he's seen this from the ground up as the assets get added and the sound and the modes and everything that happens. But somebody got to see a finished product, somebody by the name of, oh, I don't know, Carrie Elwes, who plays Wesley? What happened there? So, Cary is on a tour right now of the U.S. doing a Princess Bride Experience show And we happened to see that he was going to be in Austin around the time we were finishing up the game And so I reached out to him and just offered him the opportunity to come see this really cool game And he surprised me, he accepted, he took us up on the offer Carrie always showed up at the factory one day, and, man, he is an amazing guy. Super nice, down-to-earth, respectful, was excited about the game. He talked to all the developers. He talked to all the assemblers. The guy is just amazing, and he had a great time, enjoyed the game. I would love to have the opportunity to show him the finally full-finished product. Oh, we're all excited for this, too. And once again, you see it, Colin. You see it, Josh. Jerry, you know about it. I mean, you've been banging this drum forever. The great thing about this P3 system, what you've done at Multimorphic, is the value. If you get one and then you add the modules, holy cow, can you get a lot of pinball machines for a really, really good price. As you keep adding new ones, it just keeps getting better and better. It is such a wise investment. Yeah, the value proposition just keeps getting richer and richer for those of us that have the P3 module already and for those that have one on order or are considering to get one for just a few thousand dollars as opposed to getting closer and closer to $10,000 for a brand-new machine or sometimes over $10,000 for a brand-new machine from other manufacturers. For a few thousand dollars, I have one installed right now. I have my Weird Al installed in my TV right now, and I've got a Cosmic Cart module sitting in storage just underneath the cabinet, and then I'm looking forward to putting in my Princess Bride when those get made here in the near future. And you don't have to buy, and it also works great for me in my home. I don't have endless space in my house. My wife would kill me otherwise. And so it's really nice to be able to have multiple different machines in the form of modules that I can quickly, in just a matter of minutes, install a new one and be playing in a completely different machine. and also in some cases, you know, the like Cosmic Kart Racing. I can also get on the P3 Discord and find a match and play that with somebody else online. So, so many different ways that you can enjoy the P3 experience and take full advantage of the value. The thing, Colin, you didn't even mention are the add-on games. The Eye of Heist and Dungeon Door Defender. And my brother came to visit me. He had never seen the P3 before, playing a bunch of heists. And I said, here, let me show you this. We switched to Dungeon Door Defender. And he was blown away because it was hard for him to grasp that it was the same machine, the same layout, but just a completely different game, a completely different playing experience. Nothing similar about them other than the fact that the shots are the same. And that really took me as well the first time I experienced putting that game on heist, was just how different it could be. So you don't even have to always swap a module to play something different and try something different. and I hope that we'll see more independent games like that. There's a new game out called Birdwatcher and I see that I'm very excited about because I think there's a lot of opportunity for guys out there who want to develop a pinball machine and they don't have to learn how to do everything and you can create a software-only game that can run on other modules. Hopefully that'll get more people to get a chance to bring their dreams to life. Yeah, congrats to my friend Ian Harrower on that game. I know he's quite proud of that and he's probably working on a few other ones too. I don't think I even told you this, Jerry. I was recently in Richmond at the Richmond Pinball Collective, and who was there but Nick Baldrige. Obviously know what he's done, and again, like Josh just mentioned, like anybody who owns these, they know, yeah, there's eight different modules and unique games, but really I think you're at 21 now. Yeah, this is our 21st game. To piggyback on what Josh was saying, one really cool thing that I find with the platform is because of the feature set, because of the development kit, because of people's creativity and the ability to bring new ideas to life. We see games, Birdwatcher is a great example, Drained is a great example, games that you wouldn't see on a traditional pinball machine or a pinball platform. These are just interesting, fun concepts that translate into these really cool gaming experiences that people were able to think outside the box and implement. it. It's really rewarding for me, obviously, because I created the platform. But these people are able to implement their dreams or implement their ideas or to do all these cool things that they wouldn't otherwise have been able to do. So many great games. Silver Falls, another one, too. We've mentioned a bunch here. But Colin, you might remember this. This is going way back, right there in your home of Austin, Texas, the home of Multimorphic. Jerry, it was the first time I saw these games on location at the old Bat City Open at the sadly now defunct Buffalo Billiards. You were there, Jerry. You had a bunch of games there. And in fact, I think it was the first ever tournament that had the P3 in. Back then it was Lexi Lightspeed. And I know, Colin, you were there. You probably won the tournament, if I'm being honest. But I got to drive a bus, which Colin knows means I did well in the playoffs, that I got to pick the games. And having just played it once, once, Jerry, I chose Lexi Lightspeed as my first game because I had so much fun doing it. I got it. It was intuitive. Again, I didn't have to lift up my head. It was all right there. If I didn't do well in it, it was my fault because I knew what to do by looking at that game, and that's what your games do, all of these, Princess Bride included. Yeah, that's such a great story. That's one of the things we strive for is to give you all the information you need to play the game well by putting it on the screen right where you're looking. People who play the games that they're familiar with and don't want to explore new things are missing something very cool and very exciting with the P3. Colin, I know that's important to you as one of the best players in the world and a former Pinberg winner, a major winner. When you're looking at this game as a player, you have two things in mind. I want the novice to have fun. I want them to experience good things. But this is a big investment, as all pinball machines are, and you want the game to be deep and really tell the player what to do. And again, with this screen on the bottom where kind of the apron was, all that information is right there in The Princess Bride. Yeah, it's all right there. And the team has done such a great job of creating graphics which engage the player and create excitement and help to tell you what you've done in terms of getting a jackpot or the score that you've gotten or collecting a Humperdinck hurry-up, all the different things that make you want to play it again because you'll have something that's presented to you that you're trying to complete a mode maybe and you didn't quite get it done because you ran out of time or you drained. And so we definitely have created lots of different ways that create that excitement and also that, hey, I want to play one more time. I want to press that start button again because I didn't quite finish off the shrieking eels. So Buttercup didn't escape in the game that I played because I didn't hit the shots in time. Or other things that we've done in this game to make it so that a player, maybe they've beaten the mode once, but there are ways for the player to really increase their scoring in the mode and good risk-reward trade-offs. So, yeah, we've done a lot of that for both the advanced player and then lots of stuff for the novice player too. We intentionally made a lot of the modes and the multi-balls easy to access. Now, they could be very difficult to actually successfully pull off when you get into them, but we wanted the players and everybody involved, whether they're a beginner or an advanced player, to be able to experience all the amazingness of this epic story. And we didn't want that to keep that from the players. So they're all there. The mini wizard modes are done in such a way that you just have to play the modes. You don't have to complete all the modes in order to enjoy the mini wizard modes, because like you mentioned, that To the Pain and the Fire Swamp is one of the most iconic scenes, and the Princess Bride, that's another one of the mini wizard modes. And so we wanted to make sure that players get to experience that. He said iconic scenes, and what he didn't say, and I'll say it, is that Fire Swamp implementation in this game is the best pinball mode in the history of pinball. The mode is incredible. Well, explain it. You want to explain it, Colin? Yeah, sure. So for those who aren't familiar with the scene, or for those who don't, we'll just do a quick recap. As Wesley in Buttercup, you were trying to make your way through the Fire Swamp. You running away from Humperdinck And so as you trying to get through the fire swamp you encountering different hazards And so the only pinball mode that I aware of where you are actively being thwarted by three different hazards based upon how you play it. And so we use the scoops of the P3 to, you know, pop up like fire spurts that pop up in the middle of the fire swamp. and we use the graphics and the ball detection capability of the P3. So if you roll over an RUS on the screen, now you have to deal with an RUS hazard. And then the last one is if you happen to hit into the fire sand, the lightning sand, you then have to dive down and rescue Buttercup as you're playing through the mode, all while you're trying to hit the vine shots, which correspond to making progress through the fire swamp. And so it's a ton of fun. It's very difficult, but we've designed it in a way that the player can still enjoy. You think, oh, my gosh, that sounds impossible. It's not impossible. It is difficult, and we wanted to make it that way so that everybody gets to experience it, but you're going to feel really good that first time you're able to beat fire swamp. Well, that's the nice thing about these. You've got so many different modes. You've got some simpler modes. Maybe it's a few shots here or there. But as you mentioned, there's that risk-reward where, okay, you've completed it. Here's your final kill shot, if you will. But if you want to increase the score, you can take these risky shots. It's up to you, risk-reward. And then something like Fire Swamp that just makes you, okay, we're going to give you these different elements in the mode. And it's so much fun. I mean, I was fortunate enough to see it and loved it. And Colin, you and I were talking about it. It's going to be a real treat. Make sure this Saturday, when Kevin's playing with Buffalo Pinball, you get to Fire Swamp for sure. I don't care if you have to take off the glass. You've got to show that because it's gorgeous. I think what's key about Fire Swamp and all the mini-wizards is the way we've tried to structure things to make all of those reachable. We've kind of taken the story, broken it into three regions or three areas based on how things take place in the movie, and then each one of those has a mini-wizard mode. So there's really just three modes you need to play. As Colin said, you don't have to complete the mode. You do ultimately need to complete a lot of things if you want to get to the final wizard mode, but to get to the mini wizard mode. So you can come up to the game and you don't have to be the greatest player in the world to be able to get to those mini wizard modes if you want to focus on one region or another versus jumping around or taking the narrative approach. And there's one thing we did put in there because Colin's always watching out for the tournament guys is what we call the narrative streak. which allows you to play the story in order, and you can really start any place, but as long as you go chapters in order, there's a lot of extra scoring bonus that goes along with that, which is very powerful. And then the other key place for those people who want to score points is what's called As You Wish. So in Gilder, where the three battles take place, Wits, Strength, and Steel, you have an option to turn those into a two-ball multi-ball, which makes it more challenging, but a lot more lucrative. And it's very interesting to make the choices to when to use your, as you wish, you have a limited number of them and you can earn more, but it can really allow you to accelerate your scoring, but definitely much higher risk. There is so much in this game, and you're going to see it again on the stream this weekend. You're going to see it live at TPF. Jerry, congratulations to you and the team. I know there have been some rumors out there, but I don't think anybody anticipated. Yeah, maybe they knew Princess Bride. They saw the code name nitrogen, which I'm not sure. You've got to explain that to me. But the Princess Bride, I don't think they thought, wow, they got everything you could possibly ask for with this asset and this IP. We're still pinching ourselves about that. We asked for it in the negotiation process. We worked out the deal, and we still didn't believe it until they were all delivered to us. And Steven, who's a video producer by trade, he's just like a kid in a candy store, just picking out every single scene that makes sense to use. So nitrogen, you've got to explain. All right, nitrogen. Nitrogen is the, is it the seventh element? Yeah, it's the seventh. The seventh element. So when we were developing Weird Al, we were trying to come up with a code name, and I'm a big fan of the film The Fifth Element. and the fifth element represented for me the fifth major play field for the P3. So we codenamed the fifth game, which was weird. We codenamed it Leloo, the character from the film, the fifth element. And then we started working on Final Resistance and we were trying to come up with something else created. We were like, well, this is the sixth element. What's the sixth element in the periodic table? Well, it's carbon. So we went with carbon for the six, and now we're kind of on a pattern. We're just working our way through the periodic table. Okay. Wow. 100-plus more games still to come. This is great.