All get around, he's on the rebound, hear the sound of our buddy, oh lordy, it's Orby, pinball now to rejoice, he's tugging pinball, craft beer and coffee, mixed with syrup and honey, he hopes to laugh with his family in a random tangent, stories of his boys, he's on the poor man's pod network, we're gonna get more listeners, Welcome back, Pinball Nerds, to episode 631 of your fifth favorite pinball podcast. My name's Orbital Albert, and I didn't expect to be doing a podcast this early in the morning, and very. very uncaffeinated. So I'm going to keep it short because I can see a coffee maker over there begging to be filled up with water and organic, delicious angry alpaca coffee. But I need to get this podcast out and I need to get it out quick. I already had planned to do a show today, but that was going to be all about Mr. Jack danger of, of course, dead flip pinball streaming, as well as renowned pinball designer for Stern pinball. but the reason that I had to get this episode out early is because Glenn the skateboarder just let me know there's he sent out the SOS he sent out the bat signal and he said woo woo woo Tim the lion man Lee tribe member of the poor man's pinball podcast tribe is has made it to a division now I'll say the same thing to him that Jeff Teola said to me when I accidentally went to a you flew a little too close to the sun, didn't you? So I'm going to give all Tim's advice in a second. I'm going to leave that to the end. That's more of a bloggy or vloggy type thing. So we're going to save that till after I'm ranting and raving and I'm going to try and, you know, it's probably good. I'm recording this on caffeinated, no energy drinks, completely sober, sober, Sally, sober, sober, sober, sober sally orby i don't like him either all right we're gonna try first of all congratulations to each and every person who managed to get themselves the hottest ticket in pinball a ticket to pemberg congratulations i hope you had a great time i saw Josh Sharpe was doing very well um sterling mascotta i got to watch him play yesterday that that young dude is just he's he's so inspirational. He's such a great player. I know Drew C. Sadola, I believe. I think I'm pronouncing it close to correct. Friend of the show, Drew. He did really well in the three strikes tournament. I think he got top four, top five in that on the three strikes the night before Pembroke started. Jason Zoller's doing incredible, I believe. Zach McCarthy. Zach McCarthy's doing incredible. Of course, there is no Keith Elwin. There is no Esher Lefkoff. A lot of my all-time favorite pinball players are not there. Raymond Davidson is not there. So, of course, you know, but there's still tons of great players. I'm having a really wild time and an exciting time watching it. The only, my only beef for today, and this has nothing to do with Pimberg or Fox Cities Pinball who's live streaming it. Make sure you go watch them there over on Twitch. But I have to be in the car today for four hours to go pick up my wife from Halifax. So I'll be, you know, I'm so glad to see her, but it'll be right in the middle of day two qualifying, right? Is it two-day qualifying? Or is today the start of the very, very, very long finals? I think, no, I think they're in their, I think they're in ABC by now. So I think the top 69 went to A Division. And then like the next, maybe it was, I feel like it was like 65 and then like 59 players went to C. I did say I want to give a quick shout out to my boy Mike Dimas I did see he didn't do that well but he was restricted to category because he didn't play super well but he went up Sean Russell did pretty well who else did well from Canada Shane Jackson did very well I saw that so shout out to all those players Julie Dorsers I think she was I don't remember seeing her near the bottom or the top I'm not sure where she was but she posted a whole bunch of pitchers and Julie and I are now friends again, which is awesome because she, you know, a couple of years ago, there was some type of minor beef. I don't even remember what it was about, but I will tell you is glad to be your friend again. She was my TD at Monday Night Pinball in London, Ontario for years. Also, we traveled together to multiple tournaments in Toronto and Hamilton and Kitchener-Waterloo. And I do think of her as one of my good pinball friends. So I'm glad that we are able to be friends and acquaintances again. That's great. So congratulations and shout outs to all the Canadians at Pemburg. But most importantly, I've got to talk about my boy, Tim the Lion Man Lee. But first, I have to give you guys some bad news. Now, I did write it down right here. I wanted to make sure that I got the wording exact. This is not something I wanted to be close on so jack danger on his live strips his jack danger on his dead flip live stream talked about from live from san diego comic-con uh what the channel is going to look like moving forward and he gave us what i would consider originally when i got this news some bad news i've had a little bit of time to mull it over let it marinate a bit give a more measured response Right. And he said the game I am in the middle of working on at Stern is my last as a designer. Wow. OK, so here's the thing. There's good and bad that comes from that. I'm going to try to be a positive Polly and think about how maybe he can do more positive being a community engagement officer and that sort of thing. I think I added the word engagement, but community liaison or whatever it is, I think maybe he can have more of a positive role in pinball. And I know certainly me personally, I'm excited to get to interact with him even more. However, that was like a dagger to my heart. I was hoping instead of him doing like one pin every year and a half or two years, he'd do like maybe one pin every two and a half or three years and kind of let us in on the design process. And although he did mention he really excited to show us some of the design process and let us in behind the walls he also going to be showing like Keith Elwin and John Borg and Brian Eddy doing you know their designing and how they would design And he going to kind of be moving into that new role as he finishes his last game So now listen, getting to work for the largest pinball company in the world and designing three pinball machines is incredible. And I don't want to take anything away from that. And if Jack Danger never designs another pinball machine past that, that's okay. And that's still incredible. And I haven't played X-Men yet. I know I'm late to the party. That is the one good thing about living in a pinball desert is that even if I have not yet played X-Men, by the time I go to play it, I could play my very first game of X-Men at Expo with X-designer Jack Danger. and that would be incredible and i don't know jack what you're going to do moving forward but i honestly that wasn't the news i thought that i didn't speak up about that like him this possibly being his last game on my last show because i didn't think that was happening and of course of course the day after i record and upload a podcast for the first time in like two weeks or something uh we end up getting the news that his current game that he's working on behind the scenes is perhaps and probably most likely his last. Now, never say never, because Jack Danger was just a live streamer who was not a pinball designer originally, and he managed to work his way through a lot of hard work. It was not from luck. It was a lot of hard work. But through a lot of hard work, he ended up deserving a job at Stern, and he's done a great job thereafter. My biggest fear, my biggest fear, I'll tell you guys the truth. and girls, everybody listening, I'll tell you the honest truth. Let me clear my throat. If, because Jack Danger did these really cool, unique, flowy, interesting, if you will, whimsical designs that definitely had a different vibe and a different feel and were so unique from these. If every other layout from Brian is like supposedly a fan layout, which I don't think that's entirely true. I don't think Stranger Things is just Attack from Mars redone. There's enough differences on Stranger Things that it's definitely its own thing. Never mind the Demogorgon and everything else. But it is arguably a lot of his designs are closer to what you would call a typical fan layout. Nothing Jack Danger's ever done or probably no design he would have ever made would have ever been a fan layout. And that's something me personally that I just really, really, really like. I'm not going to say that Keith Elwin designs our fan layouts whatsoever, but I think we can all admit like Iron Maiden is definitely more of a fan layout than say like X-Men or Foo Fighters, right? And I don't want to compare them because they don't need to be. They're both beautiful, wonderful, unique, interesting, fun, rad designers in their own right. and they both discern to be coveted as great designers. But I, listen, I could be wrong here. I'm adding a little bit of my, I'm doing as a content creator is supposed to do and really trying to read between the lines, not just of what Jack Danger was saying, but the look in his eyes and how he's turning away from the camera. And I felt like he was a little defeated, just a little. Still, there was some hope there in those eyes, okay? He was still excited about his new role, but I think he feels a little defeated. Like, hey, I think he kind of foresaw himself being a designer who got minimum 10, 15, maybe 20 designs under his belt before he was done at Stern or designing or moved to a different company or something. That's what I would have assumed. This is not from me speaking with him. This is just my best guess from seeing the same thing that any of you could see if you went over to Dead Flip and watched him. And I could be 100% wrong, and maybe I am 100% wrong. Maybe he's just excited. Maybe he's been pushing for this role for a long time. And it sounds like it is a bit of a promotion as well. He did explain that, that now he's really working for all of pinball, not just Stern. And, of course, because they are the leader in that field, it will help Stern as well. But I could see the joy and excitement as well in Jack's eyes and his face and him, like, staring right into the camera, just excited about it, saying he would get to play nice with everybody in the pool. So he would get to go over to Spooky Pinball and hang out with Bug and pick his brain about designing and pick his brain about code or rules. So maybe we'll never see Jack Danger as a lead designer at Stern again, but I hope to God we see his influence on every single design that's ever made in the future or thereafter. At Stern, at CGC, at JJP, are you listening? Are you listening, Spooky? Are you listening? every pinball company on planet earth including stern what jack danger did for pinball design and how he changed the game will never be forgotten our ip jack danger as a pinball designer at stern for now i do believe though if he does a good enough job in his role as community ambassador it could actually have more positive changes than it would just i guess i guess what i'm saying is there's more people who can design really rad pinball machines then they're likely as people who can do what Jack Danger can do for live streaming and for the community and for all the innovativeness that he's now going to bring back to bring in new people from outside of pinball into pinball and make big changes that way. So I'm excited for that as well. And two things can be true. A little tiny part of Orby's heart can be sad because I'm not going to see him in a full lead design role anymore. And at the same time, I can also be super stoked for my dude getting to be back behind the camera more, getting to be more fun. And it's not that designing is not fun, but like he said, man, it's not a job for slouching. Like no part of any part of designing is slouching. There was some hurt behind those words. There was some pain. I think that Jack gave it 110% and his outcome wasn't as good as it was expected. Now, he did bring home in the first two or three minutes of the Twitch stream that he is not done with X-Men. He's going to keep working on X-Men. He's not done with the current game he's working on. He still loves that game. There's a team that's helping transition, I think, him off it slowly. But I'm sure he's still going to be there for it. He said no game is done He never done with any game So I think still even if Jack Danger I think he just has so much integrity that even if Jack Danger didn work at Stern anymore he would still probably try to fire off or send notes for X-Men or Foo Fighters or even his new game if he thought there was something that could really make it a better game for the community as a whole and everyone who has supported Jack by buying one of his games or everyone who has supported Jack by even subscribing to him or just, you know, like me being in his corner and saying, Jack is good for pinball. Jack is good for pinball as a designer. Jack is maybe even better for pinball as a live streamer, community engager. Now, remember, there is other pinball companies out there. So if Jack moves over to this new role and he's not super digging it or not super loving it, or if Jersey Jack say, or even maybe who knows Spooky goes, hey, we really, really, really love what you do from a design standpoint, I don't think Jack's looking for that. I just know that that's a possibility down the road. If he doesn't love, maybe he will go back to live streaming. He doesn't know. I don't know. No one knows yet. When you go back to live streaming full time like that, you may or may not love it as much as you did originally. And it could be, it is going to be, it is going to be a tough tightrope to walk between being the community like the official community representative on your stern channel where you know you're not supposed to talk about like he joked around fart jokes and such right uh and then on the you know the flip side of that when he's doing his his dead flip ones he doesn't want to be too corporatey or too stiff he wants to have fun and be that jack danger who's always like has a beer and kicks back and will say a fart joke or a joke about an upper decker in a particular bathroom or something, you know, where something like that isn't necessarily frowned upon, where it would be in the corporate environment, which is completely fair. The way that I would be speaking at a pinball tournament without, you know, on a live stream, maybe swearing or talking about one time I powered back too many craft beer or had too many gummies or something. I would not be speaking that liberally. I would not be speaking that truthfully. Truthfully, I wouldn't be talking like that if I knew I was on a big live stream, say at Pemberg today and everyone was watching and listening. Or if I ever got invited to commentate and do color commentary because I don't know any rules hardly. But if I got to do color commentary for – geez, like Fox Cities Pinball would be incredible. But just for – I've never got to do commentary on – in any pinball tournament. Now, I did have my own Twitch channel, and I did a couple just for Funzee's tournaments where I live streamed, and I did do commentary on it. So I guess Elowen. Okay, Elowen just laid on the laptop, so I had to move it over here. We've got a very casual studio set up. There is no one recording. I have a dog to my left, a dog to my right, and I have not showered yet today. So this is another advantage of not recording. But believe me, when my wife gets back, we are cleaning out Orbeez Arcade and I will find my cameras from when I was doing Twitch streaming and I will be video recording them at least when it makes sense. Maybe not every single Solitaire episode. Of course, we have to enjoy the new crisp, clean microphone for a little bit without worrying about video. But I do want to start doing more video. But that's not the point today. The point today is to say to Jack Danger, everyone who loves him, everyone who hates him, and everyone in between, maybe I'm willing to concede there were some design issues and problems with X-Men. And maybe that has something to do with the fact that he's moving over to this new role. I don't know. But I'm excited to see what you did in the future, what you do in the future. I'm excited to see what game you're working on now. And I don't think that this next game from Jack will necessarily be his last. And maybe he's not going to be a lead designer, but maybe he helps, you know, make really cool flowing ramps for a design team. Or maybe he helps with rules. Or maybe in some way, shape, or form, he is helping out. And that's all I can hope for. That's all any of us can hope for. Because Jack got to do his dream job of designing pinball. And maybe now that he's done that, he realizes maybe the grass isn't always greener on the other side. And hell, just being the most innovative, exciting, fun, rad pinball live streamer on planet Earth, maybe that is also pretty rad. And if he could work at Stern and have the best of both worlds, wouldn't that be great for pinball? and isn't that what we really all want so i do hope it's not his last pin that he's designed but also i i can't wait to see what he does in his new role all right we've got to get to tim lion manly let me look at my time stamp okay i will send tim the lion manly 18 minutes in because i know that and i gotta keep this short for tim not just for you guys not just because owen's running out the door here soon i know the dogs are uh getting restless the chickens are going to need their feed and I need my caffeination station. Okay. I need my coffee. I don't like driving for four and a half hours in the car. I certainly would never do that uncaffeinated. I don't know how people do it. I guess if you drank like, what's a diet Coke have like 30 milligrams. I guess if you had like six diet Cokes, that'd be the same as like one. But then you got to stop and pee the whole way there. You know, that'd be the same as one coffee. And the one day I let myself have an energy drink is usually yes said day when I'm driving this far out of town but Tim the Lion Man Lee I'm gonna have to restamp you okay let's see all right 1906 there we go 19 minutes in Tim I'm gonna keep it simple for you brother this is your victory lap you made it the hardest part about playing at Pemberg is just getting your ticket to Pemberg the hardest part about qualifying for A at Pemburg. You did it. I don't know. You did it. You're there. You qualified. All those hours of playing in your arcade downstairs and practicing and even just going out to these smaller tournaments. I know Tim doesn't go to a heck of a lot of tournaments. So you should be extra, extra proud of yourself. There are some big, huge, massive try-hards there. And these are my friends. I even know there's incredible players that are like top 250, even maybe top 150 that didn't make it into a division at Pemberg, depending on restrictions. But there are so many incredible players. And Tim Lee, you are one of them. You made it to a division. You're going to play with some of the top players and one of the top tournaments in the world. So just enjoy it. yes there's all these just yes is it okay to look up pen tips on a pin you're completely unfamiliar with especially like you know an old em or something like that you never seen Sure Go ahead and calmly you know like take your time I think it completely okay to just enjoy the victory lap. You've done it. You got to A division. You're probably not going to win A division. You're probably not even going to make the money. You're probably not even going to make finals. Maybe you do. Maybe I'm completely wrong, but most likely just enjoy it. You're going to be playing with some of the best players in the world in one of the biggest tournaments in the world have fun enjoy it soak it all in yes it's okay to you know i know glenn was telling me that he's uh messaging tribe member rachel risto as well as well as himself for rules all the time tim don't message me for that i don't know very many rules i mean if you get on like i don't know if you get on a modern stern that you probably already know the rules of i might I know some of the rules of that as well. But if it's an old EM, I never remember rules for those. I always have to look them up myself. But just enjoy it. Maybe have one extra coffee more than you would. Or if you're a green tea guy, have one extra green tea. No, I know you're a coffee guy because you've ordered Angrel back up before. Of course you have. So, yeah, treat yourself. Treat yourself. Make sure you just do all the things you would do to feel good. So try to get your best sleep. I mean, who am I speaking to now because you're already up. But have a full breakfast, a good breakfast. Today is not the day to skip breakfast if you're not used to it especially. Make sure you eat healthy. Don't have too much sugar. You don't want to do a sugar crash. If you drink a lot of pop, try to drink diet, I guess, for at least today only, if never again. And you don't want a sugar crash because it is a very long day. I guess that would be a good tip. Don't eat anything too heavy. I heard a whole bunch of people commentating yesterday saying they had a really, really heavy dinner when they came back. So like, okay, burritos are like incredible, but don't be eating like a burrito the size of your fricking your bicep. You know, like when you got to go back and you're going to be just, you're just going to be sluggish and tired. So I would try to eat, make sure you're eating, but maybe smaller meals, snacks, that kind of thing. Think of things that give you energy if possible. So like, I don't know, like for me, I go, I go to a lot of juices. Like I'll have, I love having orange juice if I'm feeling a little bit down and out. Give me some energy, even apple juice. Man, if you can find some fresh Granny Smith juice. Okay. Listen, Tim the Lion Man Lee, you've made it here. You've done your job. And if you get on camera, you don't give a shout-out to Orby. No, no, no, no, no. I'm going to set my ego aside for a second. You give a shout-out just like I did when I was at the North American Pinball Championships representing New Brunswick. You give a shout-out to the Poor Man's Pinball Tribe, and you tell them Drew and Ian sent you. No, I'm just kidding. But, like, yeah, it would be so cool if he just gave, like, a shout-out to everybody. I don't know. What's one thing that could prove that he listened to this and then was on there? Maybe a gun's, like, where you shoot the gun and then you blow it away. Like, you go, pew. But only if you have, like, a really good ball. Right when the ball's done, I want you to do, like, a shooting motion and then blow the smoke off, the gun smoke off the top of the pistol. Okay, Tim? I don't know. I just made that up. I don't know how I came up with that. I've gone on too long, Tim. You're not going to have time to listen to this. Let's just go over it again. And obviously, hopefully last night you got a great night's sleep. If you didn't get a great night's sleep, just close your eyes. Sometimes you're going to be on an EM or a solid state or like you're not going to, you're probably not going to be in the longest playing group, even though you are in an R&A. But if you have 15 or 20 minutes between rounds, just close your eyes. If you're afraid of falling asleep, set an alarm on your phone. Just closing your eyes for 10 or 15 minutes, even if you don't fall asleep whatsoever, is really good rest and relaxation for your eyes. because when you're playing pinball for that many rounds over, what, 14 hours was the live stream or 13 hours? When you're playing pinball for that many hours in a row, you're going to have eye strain from trying to look to see where the ball is going and through the glare and just everything you're doing with pinball is a lot of eye strain and really your eye focusing and unfocusing and focusing and unfocusing and looking here and sighting and back and forth. So your eyes physically just get tired. So even just try closing your eyes. You know what I mean? Uh, what else? If you don't do energy drinks, probably not the best day to try start doing it. But if you do do energy drinks today would be the day to bring them out. You know what I mean? What else can I say other than that? And I would stay again, stay away from energy drinks with absolutely any sugar, get monster zero sugar. There's tons of those. Get yourself a rain, all of the rain or zero sugar, something like that. Don't get like, you don't want to be doing like two of the, you know, they there's 50 grams of sugar in it. And an hour later, you're just conked out, then you've got to have another energy drink, another energy drink. You want to have something that's just like, so Yerba Mate is really, really, really good for that. But that's a topic for another day. Get out there and have fun. Go enjoy yourself. I mean, you are at Pemberg. You are in A Division, but I guarantee you, especially if you're on a one-player EM, like most of the people you're playing with, if you're playing with Bowen Garens, he is not going to stop telling you the rules, whether you want to or not, right? So hopefully you get in at least one of your sessions with Bowen today. That would be so incredible. I'm assuming you went to A-Division. I don't really know, though. All right, guys, this was supposed to be a quick episode. I love you. I'm in love with you. Best of luck, Jack Danger. Best of luck, Tim the Lion Man Lee. I hope this was a fun episode for you guys. This is the end of episode 231 of your Fifth Favorite Pinball Podcast. My name is Orbital Albert, and today marks 10 episodes drama-free. okay i know it's not two years joe chervino but you know what it's about two months so that's the best i've got for you guys i hope everyone is enjoying your summer remember to get out there and support your local arcade support your local barcade get out there buy a beer get some food if they have food play in a tournament go love life go love your neighbor and go love your friends because as being a little hulk a maniac for 10 years i was pretty sad and tried to be doing upbeat show, but we lost Hulk Hogan yesterday. So I was definitely a little Hulk maniac. I had that, you know, that yellow shirt, the tank top type shirt. Oh my God. When him and Macho Man Randy Savage were fighting for Elizabeth for like two years, I remember I watched it. Was it every single Friday night? Religiously, religiously. I, you know what? I think the WWF is probably more honest and pure than most religions to be honest. And that was kind of, it was my stepdad's religion. It was my religion. My best friend, Melvis Megaphone, is a massive WWF fan. He was pretty shooken up yesterday, so I made sure to reach out to him and got to talk to him on the phone. Actually, I don't talk to people on the phone very often, but I got to do that. So to everybody, just go talk to your friends. Go talk to your family members. You never know, you know, life is a fickle thing. So go enjoy the summer. Go play at a barcade. Go have a craft beer. Go have a cheeseburger for Orby. Go have a cheeseburger and cheeseburger in paradise. Okay, I've got to end the show. I'm singing. Nothing's quite as good.