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Episode 137 - Dark Days of Avengers

Eclectic Gamers Podcast·podcast_episode·54m 15s·analyzed·Mar 22, 2021
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Analysis

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TL;DR

Pinball market shows healthy demand but unhealthy manufacturer execution.

Summary

Dennis and Tony discuss the pinball industry's paradoxical state: record demand, price increases, and sold-out games (notably Guns N' Roses), yet manufacturers except Stern appear to be struggling with production, customer service degradation (JJP's pivot from free playfield swaps to refunds only), and delayed releases (CGC's Cactus Canyon, American Pinball's Hot Wheels). The hosts suspect supply chain and parts bottlenecks as primary causes, drawing parallels to their own industries, but express concern about manufacturer financial health and the overall viability of the niche market, citing closures like ReplayFX and underfunded initiatives like Pinball Hall of Fame.

Key Claims

  • Stern had a backlog of 5,000 games at one point

    high confidence · Dennis cites this from reports by Gary Stern; presented as fact from official statements

  • Guns N' Roses CE sold out, making it only the second CE ever to sell out after Pirates

    medium confidence · Dennis states this as established fact from sales data; specific claim about CE sales history

  • Guns N' Roses prices increased by $1,000 across all models

    medium confidence · Dennis references previous podcast discussion of price increases

  • Stern boutique pins (Batman 66, Elvira) prices increased by $500

    medium confidence · Dennis references previous coverage; presented as established fact

  • Jersey Jack historically offered free unpopulated playfields, then shifted to refund-only policy

    high confidence · Dennis provides detailed timeline of JJP policy changes; cites recent report on policy shift

  • Chicago area has 'draconian' COVID regulations limiting manufacturer production capacity

    medium confidence · Tony speculation about regional regulatory impact on manufacturers; not independently verified

  • ReplayFX closed without attempting to adapt or continue operations

    medium confidence · Dennis observes closure and characterizes it as failure to fight; community knowledge but not independently sourced here

  • Pinball Hall of Fame nearly failed to reach $200k fundraising goal without a $79k single donation

    medium confidence · Dennis references recent fundraising campaign; specific donation figure mentioned

Notable Quotes

  • “What is going on? Because I don't know what's going on anymore, Tony. I don't understand this hobby anymore.”

    Dennis @ ~18:30 — Thesis statement for the entire 'Dark Days of Pinball' segment; frames the central tension of record demand vs. manufacturer struggles

  • “It seems like despite all this demand, I have this taste in my mouth that like two companies are about to go out of business.”

    Dennis @ ~24:00 — Expresses existential concern about manufacturer viability; running prediction they've made repeatedly

  • “They might not be getting the parts they need to build the machines. They might be building the machines as fast as they get the parts.”

    Tony @ ~30:00 — Key hypothesis for supply chain bottleneck explanation; grounded in Tony's professional experience with industrial parts delays

  • “With the chipping and stuff, we can't afford to give away free. Even though we've raised prices, even though there's so much demand, even though we could raise prices again, and people will buy our stuff because they're so desperate.”

    Dennis @ ~38:00 — Identifies JJP's policy change as signal of financial constraint despite apparent market strength

  • “JJP looks to me like they're more uncomfortable with all the demand than they would be if there was less demand.”

    Dennis @ ~52:00 — Counterintuitive insight that high demand may be destabilizing rather than beneficial for struggling manufacturers

  • “If we're that weak, if we as a hobby are that weak, I'm nervous.”

    Tony @ ~50:00 — Reflects community anxiety about pinball's niche status and vulnerability; response to ReplayFX closure discussion

  • “Pinball is the smallest by far. Right. By far. And it's just, yeah, I don't know.”

    Tony @ ~48:00 — Contextualizes pinball against other niche hobbies; acknowledges industry's fundamental smallness relative to demand perception

Entities

Jersey Jack Pinball (JJP)companyStern PinballcompanyChicago Gaming Company (CGC)companyAmerican PinballcompanyDeep Root PinballcompanyGary SternpersonJack GuarneripersonDennispersonTonyperson

Signals

  • ?

    business_signal: Multiple manufacturers (JJP, CGC, American Pinball, Deep Root) appear to be struggling financially despite record demand, characterized by inability to meet delivery timelines, policy reductions in customer support, and delayed product releases

    high · Dennis: 'It seems like despite all this demand... I have this taste in my mouth that like two companies are about to go out of business.' JJP policy shift from free playfield swaps to refunds only. CGC Cactus Canyon over 1 year delayed with no communication. American Pinball over 1 year past Hot Wheels with no new releases.

  • ?

    business_signal: Pinball Hall of Fame nearly failed fundraising campaign, requiring $79,000 single donation to reach $200,000 goal; symbolic of broader industry funding challenges

    medium · Dennis: 'Look at a pinball hall of fame. How lucky they were to get that $79,000 donation from one person. because otherwise I really didn't think they were going to hit that 200,000.'

  • ?

    event_signal: ReplayFX tournament/expo closure cited as indicator of pinball hobby weakness; venue chose to close entirely rather than adapt to pandemic conditions

    medium · Dennis: 'If we're that weak, if we as a hobby are that weak... of any show, though, of any tournament, surely Pinnberg could have endured. And they didn't even try. They just closed.'

  • ?

    competitive_signal: Stern Pinball appears to be only manufacturer successfully executing on demand despite price increases and wait times; all others struggling with production, communication, and customer support

    high · Dennis: 'With maybe the exception of Stern, [manufacturers] seem to be struggling despite all of this... It seems like despite all this demand... that aside from Stern... I'm not sure that [others] have the capital to keep going.'

Transcript

groq_whisper · $0.163

0:00
Welcome to the Eclectic Gamers Podcast. Today is Sunday, March 21st. This is episode 137. I'm Tony. I'm Dennis. Wow, we made it to the big 137, Tony. I know, this is a very special milestone It's amazing And to celebrate it, I know we're going to have a number of topics in the video game segment At least, which is good Because there's yet still no mention of Pinball I've got a few things for us to I've got something for us to explore with that So I think we'll have some fun with it But before we do that, we'll do our normal What's been happening over the last couple weeks So, what's been happening?
0:58
Well, I have started playing Valheim. I'll talk about it more in the video game section for those people who are interested in it.
1:07
But the TLDR is, I really like it. I can understand why people thought I would like it, because they know me. They know you're a love of Vikings.
1:18
Yeah. In addition to that, totally rearranged my personal area at home. I don't know if I'd go so far as to call it a man cave because it's just kind of a part of one of the rooms.
1:37
So I moved my campus queen and have it in a better place that opens the area up a lot more. And I was able to bring a couch in and all of that. And then we had all that rain last week and the float on my sump pump got stuck. Mmm. So, I had to take a day off last week to work on getting the seven inches of water in my basement pumped out, and my water heater working again, and my furnace working again, and... Ah, joys. And it's all better.

“The ultimate hobby will survive no matter what, even if there were no manufacturers, they'll still be a pinball hobby.”

Dennis @ ~53:00 — Balances pessimism with long-term resilience; clarifies that concern is about commercial ecosystem, not hobby survival

ReplayFXevent/organization
Pinball Hall of Fameorganization
Project Pinballorganization
Guns N' Rosesgame
Elviragame
Cactus Canyongame
Hot Wheelsgame
Batman 66game
Pirates of the Caribbeangame
Willy Wonkagame
  • ?

    licensing_signal: Project Pinball (charity) conducting 'Two Weeks of Translites' fundraising auction for art/components; indicates continued community support for pinball infrastructure despite manufacturer challenges

    medium · Dennis: 'Project Pinball... they're running a fundraising event... Two Weeks of Translites... they have obtained a bunch of sort of art related items for pinball... and they're auctioning them to raise funds.'

  • $

    market_signal: Guns N' Roses CE sold out (only second CE ever to sell out after Pirates), representing record demand and successful price increase ($1,000 across all models)

    high · Dennis: 'Guns N' Roses sold out all of their CEs and an amazing record. In fact, other than Pirates, it's I think the only CE that has ever sold out.'

  • $

    market_signal: Multiple price increases ($1,000 on Guns N' Roses, $500 on Stern boutique pins) despite production constraints; Stern maintaining premium pricing while extending delivery times to 8+ months

    high · Dennis: 'Manufacturers have been doing price increases. We've talked about the Guns N' Roses going up a thousand dollars on all models. We've talked about how the boutique pins Batman 66 and Elvira from Stern went up $500.'

  • ?

    product_strategy: American Pinball over one year past Hot Wheels release despite public claims of 2-3 games per year production capability

    high · Dennis: 'American Pinball is busy talking about every single hire they have and how they're going to have two to three game releases a year. We're a year, we're over a year past Hot Wheels now. What's going on?'

  • ?

    product_strategy: Chicago Gaming Company's Cactus Canyon remake over one year delayed with no communication or update; playfield layout reportedly complete but game not released

    high · Dennis: 'Chicago Gaming Company where the Cactus Canyon remake... it's not like someone sitting there doing the layout. It done. I don't understand. Why hasn't that come out? What's going on?'

  • ?

    product_concern: Jersey Jack Pinball experiencing playfield chipping and damage issues affecting customer satisfaction; response escalated from problem denial to free unpopulated playfields to refund-only policy

    high · Dennis: 'We've gone from, oh, hey, we'll send you a populated playfield that you can plug and play, to, hey, we'll send you an unpopulated play field so that you can fix it up yourself to, screw you, we don't care.'

  • ~

    sentiment_shift: Community experiencing anxiety about hobby viability; despite demand signals, hosts express nervousness about industry fundamentals and niche market vulnerability

    high · Tony: 'If we're that weak, if we as a hobby are that weak, I'm nervous.' Dennis: 'I don't understand this hobby anymore.'

  • ?

    supply_chain_signal: Parts and component supply chain constraints cited as primary bottleneck limiting manufacturer production capacity; delays ranging 1-3 months common across industries

    medium · Tony: 'One of my 5 million gallon pumps that has been out waiting for parts to be delivered... since the 3rd of November because the parts just aren't coming in.' References European parts delays affecting industrial equipment.

    • 2:19
    It's all, everything's good now, so, what have you been up to? But mostly work-related stuff, all this new federal money coming for the American Rescue Plan and everything related to COVID. So a lot of discussions on that ongoing work-wise. So I've been having to pull a lot of extra hours, at least. It's just been very busy during the day, which I'm more than fine with. And then on the gaming front, I am still working on Assassin's Creed Odyssey. In fact, I was playing it this morning before we started recording. Oh, my gosh. There are too many quests. There are too many quests to begin the training. Do all the quests, side quests, every side quest. Do them all. They're like all in my list. The list has become too cumbersome to scroll properly. It's very frustrating. And the problem is, a lot of these quests, they have recommended levels on them. So these are all like double my current level.
    3:15
    Oh, so you're just saving them for when you get there. I don't know what level they are until I have them in the list, and then I can't drop them. So it's like, hey, look, here's a quest on a ship. Okay, I'll take the ship quest. No, level 40. I'm 16.
    3:31
    I'm 16. So this morning I was going around on my horse, just riding around the Greek isles, activating the fast travel points.
    3:43
    Even in the areas where one hit will kill me. I'm just like, nope, I'm a pro gamer. I can do this. I almost died to a lion, but otherwise it worked pretty well.
    3:55
    Roar. Yes, it did. It roared and then chased me for like 50 miles. It was terrible. But I had a horse. I call it my horse War Pony.
    4:04
    It's like the old Final Fantasy 14 days trying to get to... Oh, crud. What was the name of that? Oh, in 11. Yeah, in 11. Oh, gosh. Where would... Oh, on the Chocos?
    4:19
    Yeah, but before you got to that point when you were... Oh, you mean when we were on foot. When we were on foot doing the runs through to get to the main city area. You'd have to run through dunes if you wanted to go from Sandoria to, what was it, Bastok? Yeah, it starts with Juno. Oh, Juno. Yeah, that was the main city. Because everywhere around Juno was high level. You wanted to be there, but if you were low level and you didn't have the point, you had to run it. Yeah, no. I remember when we were, I think you were playing at the time. I remember going once and discovering that Wind Elemental's aggro to magic.
    5:00
    I was walking and there was this thing and it looked really cool and it didn't seem aggressive. And then I cast a spell, not an offensive spell. I just cast a spell and then it got mad. and it was like run away run away i don't kill you i think it did it was very easy to die if i see 11 i remember that yes it was i remember the dunes parties dunes xp parties and then because in a lot of zones they had a range of levels and so at the periphery of dunes was the lower level but in the middle of dunes was the higher level which of course the problem was when the higher level parties were starting to lose they would run to zone out of the area and then And all of a sudden, you and your little simple party are attacked by these high-level monsters. Because as soon as they zoned out, those things don't just reset. They look around and go, hey, look, lunch.
    5:53
    They try and find something. Well, it's just like that's the same area where Black Mages would always get their first AoE attack spell. And they always wanted to use it as soon as they got it. And then suddenly, yeah. Oh, I made I made back before memes were a thing. I made memes making fun of black mages in that game.
    6:16
    Oh, gosh, there's those in there. They're mana burn parties that they would form at the higher levels and stuff. Easiest class to play the black mage. Also easiest to screw up. But anyway, it was what it was. So let's go ahead and start in pinball. I do have a few items, as I noted. We'll end with the fun one. So first thing, though, I wanted to note, and I do have a link in the show notes to this auction, but Project Pinball, which is the charity that sites pinball machines in children's hospitals and at Ronald McDonald houses, they're running a fundraising event. It's called Two Weeks of Translites. It's not just translates, but it seems to be mostly translates. So they have obtained a bunch of sort of art related items for pinball. I think there's some side blades and such, but there are also a number of signed translights, and they're auctioning them to raise funds. So anyway, as I noted, link in the show notes. So if anyone is interested in participating in those auctions, you can follow the link and take a look at all that stuff and decide what you might want to bid on. uh second item which will kind of lead into our our discussion item is and you're aware of this one because we were having some discussions with people in pinball about this but the report on that jjp jersey jack pinball has dropped doing their hey you have a damaged play field a chipped play field we'll send you for free an unpopulated play field so you can do a swap and instead Instead, they're going to just say, well, if you don't like what you got, we'll refund you the game. You can return the game and we'll give you your money back. Or you can wait until the end of the run and then we'll sell you an unpopulated playfield at cost. So we've gone from, oh, hey, we'll send you a populated playfield that you can plug and play, to, hey, we'll send you an unpopulated play field so that you can fix it up yourself to, screw you, we don't care.
    8:21
    Kinda. And I say kinda because that's, you're right if you blend all the manufacturers together into a delicious queso dip. Which is delicious. Yes. So, and people can write in, at collectorgamerspodcast.gmail.com if and where I am incorrect on this, but here is my understanding.
    8:42
    Stern has, at points, done populated playfield swaps for some of their games. I'm thinking specifically Ghostbusters. If there was enough ghosting, and that was where the clear was separating from where some of the inserts were, so they looked really cloudy, they were doing populated playfield swaps if it was egregious enough. To my knowledge, Jersey Jack has never done a populated playfield exchange. Now, they were doing this current approach. I don't know about the game refund, but the, hey, you can buy a blank playfield, unpopulated playfield at cost. That was their initial solution when people were complaining about issues with the clear and chipping and such with Pirates of the Caribbean and early on in Willy Wonka's run. and then Jack Guarneri with Jersey Jack came out and said, hey, we're changing that. We're now, we'll do an exchange. If you have sufficient damage, we'll do an exchange. You can have a, you can have a, well, maybe it wasn't even an exchange. It was a, you'll get a free blank play field. That's the part I remember. Free unpopulation. There was a hard time. So they were, they did have the policy of, no, you have to buy it. And then it shifted to, no, okay, there's a way to get one for free. And now it's like they've shifted back again, but they've also clarified that, hey, If you're not happy with your purchase, we do have a solution for you. It is you can have your money back and you can give us the game. Yeah. So the solution is if you're not happy with your purchase, screw you. We don't want you as a customer anyway. The way I view it as a, hey, look, demand's so high. Hey, if you're unhappy because you have some chipping around a scoop, we'll give you your money back, and we know we can sell this to someone else who isn't going to throw a hissy fit about it. That's how I took it. but I want to use that as a springboard into our third and final area, the fun topic, Tony, that I've titled in our show, in our internal show notes as Dark Days of Pinball. I've sort of stolen that because there was once upon a time, I can't remember if it was when Pirates came out, but someone on Pinside had this, it was an awesome title post. It was like The Darkest Day of Stern or The Darkest Night of Stern or something like that. And it was kind of – that was when Stern had their launch of the – people were remembering how Batman 66 was rolled out, and it was so – like you couldn't even play it at Expo. And by comparison, Jersey Jack had a really good launch of whatever title it was. And people were talking about it, whether it was the – this was the low point for Stern, which it turned out to not be the case. But hey, it was a great topic. Looking back on it, that's hilarious. Yeah, but at the time, there was a lot of logic behind it. A lot of people really agreed with it. It was one of the most upvoted threads on Pennside. Anyway, so Dark Days of Pinball is like my sequel to it. And here's how I want to sort of frame the discussion, Tony.
    11:40
    It's around one question. What is going on? Because I don't know what's going on anymore, Tony. I don't understand this hobby anymore. Here's where I'm struggling. So I know from speaking with distributors, speaking with collectors, and seeing what's happening with pinball pricing, that there is record demand right now. In a lot of ways, it makes sense for people, those that are still employed, those that still have funds coming in, especially when they were trapped at home with COVID, having something to do at home. I get it. I get it. And this is tying to like the reports where Gary Stern had noted that at one point Stern had a backlog of 5000 games that they needed to build. We know that Guns N' Roses sold out all of their CEs and an amazing record. In fact, other than Pirates, it's I think the only CE that has ever sold out.
    12:33
    So on top of that, we also know that manufacturers have been doing price increases. We've talked about the Guns N' Roses going up a thousand dollars on all models. We've talked about how the boutique pins Batman 66 and Elvira from Stern went up $500. But here's where I go with my title of Dark Days of Pinball and my question of what is going on. It seems like, with maybe the exception of Stern, that they're all really, like, manufacturers still seem to be struggling despite all of this. And I don't get it. I don't understand what's going on. So we talked about here with our segue, JJP, the playfield issues, and then going to a, I think it's fair to say, more draconian, less customer-friendly solution.
    13:20
    I use the phrase cheaping out now and say no we not going to accommodate despite their price increases despite their record demand they not going to accommodate We still sitting Chicago Gaming Company where the Cactus Canyon remake What is going on The game it not like someone sitting there doing the layout It done. I don't understand. Why hasn't that come out? What's going on? American Pinball is busy talking about every single hire they have and how they're going to have two to three game releases a year. We're a year, we're over a year past Hot Wheels now. What's going on? Deep Root, Still nothing out. What's going on? It seems like even though there's all this demand for pinball in the home market, that aside from Stern, which again, with their price increases and people still having to wait possibly eight months, it's not the healthiest thing for customers. I mean, it doesn't leave you a lot of goodwill when you call your distributor and say, hey, I want an Elvira. And they tell you, oh, I can put you down for fall. but it's like, I don't, what's, I don't, maybe you can answer my question, Tony, because I can't. What is going on? It seems like despite all this demand, I have this taste in my mouth that like two companies are about to go out of business. We've been talking about companies disappearing every year for as long as we've been doing this podcast. So at this point, I don't know when a company's going to drop out. We have to be right at some point. We have to be right. I honestly think that they just don't have the production, either because of the COVID rules and regulations where they are, and most of them are in the Chicago area, which has pretty draconian rules,
    15:09
    compared to some other areas, that they just can't get the levels of production out that they used to. I don't know if they've dropped staffing. I don't know what the cause directly of it is, but it has to be a production bottleneck of something. And part of the problem is because of the sheer number of subcontractors that provide them with parts, the problem might not even be with them directly. and with the sheer issues getting parts from anything i'll use my job as an example we have very large pumps to move water i've got some pumps that can move 5 million gallons of water in a day i've got some pumps that can move 15 million gallons of water in the day i've got one of my 5 million gallon pumps that has been out waiting for parts to be delivered so that it can be repaired since the 3rd of November because the parts just aren't coming in. And these aren't parts coming out of China or something. These parts are coming out of Europe, but they're just parts in a lot of situations are hard to come by. And I'm coming across this more and more at work and it's starting to get real bad where we have things that if there are not spares setting on a shelf ready to go out the door of a warehouse nearby, we might be waiting anywhere from one to three months for parts. So it is entirely possible that none of this is directly on the manufacturers themselves. They might not be getting the parts they need to build the machines. They might be building the machines as fast as they get the parts. And I could completely see it and understand it because it's a problem we're running into in other industries. And it's something that I don't think is as visible as you would think it is because there's still enough stuff coming in. But there for a while during the lockdowns, there were a lot of places that everything was normal during the lockdowns because they were burning through their stored replacement parts and they were burning through the parts that are in the warehouses. and now that they're gone, they're on massive backlogs to get said parts. So it could completely be that they can't build anything. They've got the bare minimums they need to build machines and they're building them as fast as they can without it being directly related to their line.
    17:52
    And I agree that that's definitely part of it. The production is lower. We know the production is lower because of COVID, be it COVID spacing controls, you know, the social distancing, or like you're noting, actually accessing the supplies. But if it's getting the parts, like Deep Root has acknowledged that they are having a challenge getting all of the parts that they need. I don't understand why that's the problem that others are having, that they're not specifying, oh, well, we're just waiting, you know, we have bottlenecks on the parts supplies, coupled with that Stern is still putting out games. If they can get parts, why can't everyone else get parts? We know JJP is sending out games, and they've raised their prices.
    18:37
    And yet they still make a move that suggests that they are not able. This is what it says to me. I'm not saying it's true, but this is what it said to me. That, hey, with the chipping and stuff, we can't afford to give away free. Even though we've raised prices, even though there's so much demand, even though we could raise prices again, And people will buy our stuff because they're so desperate that we can't afford to do what we used to do to make things right when people have damaged product.
    19:06
    And that, to me, it's like I just it confuses me. Likewise, I could totally understand if CGC could not put out Cactus Canyons at the rate because of parts, bottlenecks and all that. It's like, why isn't that game done, though? Like, why isn't it being sold? I'm not It's It isn't about people Not being able to get a monster bash That they want It's like the company Isn't doing anything That's what it feels like They're not saying anything It's been over a year They might just be Setting on it They might be playing The game that it Even though there seems to be A lot of demand From what we're hearing And from what they're saying They might just be saying Hey We're not going to put it out now With the chance of a loss Or we're not going to put it out now with no guarantees that we can get it built like we want it built, they might just be holding on to it. They might be holding it in their hip pocket. And maybe they're selling stuff. You see that? And that's the other thing. I know Stern and JJP are selling stuff. Right. Is American Pinball selling stuff? Here, I'll give you – you used your pump example. This is one I touch on on TPS from time to time. One of my other hobbies I dabble in is on wristwatches. Okay. And that's a very dabble dabble. Yeah, I doubt I've seen your Instagram. Yeah, I dabble a little bit. And so that's a that's a market that's very obviously depends on the manufacturer, but it's very European heavy. And obviously, Europe has been heavily hit by COVID. And so but it's all behaved like you would expect. So the sales are greatly down because production was greatly down. but what would happen you would think did happen prices went up especially on the used market as people would try to get these things they're not in they're not in authorized dealers because they're just not i mean like for example i believe it's been confirmed rolex's production was down 20 because they just they were shut down for months right so they just made less watches but they still sell them like they still they're still making the company's still making money they just they had to sell less watches because they built less watches the same for omega is the same for like all of them that were swiss was the same thing and so given that there's still the demand though even though they're having trouble getting parts and stuff it just meant they made less watches it doesn't when you look at them and the sale through of what they have you're you don't get the impression that the industry is unhealthy but when i look at american pinball and CGC. Obviously, we know what's going on with Deep Root. I don't get the same feeling for Pinball, except for maybe Stern. I'm not sure that they have the capital to keep going with the rate that they're doing. I mean, maybe they do. I just don't know. It feels weird to me. And I don't think you're wrong, but I think part of the difference might be the fact that none of those companies were healthy before COVID. We know JJP has had new backers come in and they move. We know Americans had issues. We know none of these companies were like just super. I mean, they are not Omega or Rolex or any of those. They're out there. But the truth of the matter is, is pinball is just a small enough niche market. that when times get tough, they can't honestly support multiple large manufacturers. And a lot of these manufacturers, when times were good, were struggling. So when times are bad, even if there's a lot of people who want it and who want machines and there's orders out there and there's all sorts of demand for the home market, a lot of those people are probably picking their games up used. That makes sense. And you have a good point. about how the health of the manufacturers even before the pandemic and which ones were red flags. And I do want to expand beyond the manufacturers. This is not just the manufacturers, even though that's clearly what I built all my lead in about this dark days of pinball. We know we've covered a few of just a handful of the vast amounts of arcade, barcade-esque style businesses that have gone under during the pandemic that took their operation based pinball with them. so that's not something that's just going to recover at the snap of a finger this ain't no thanos we can't just bring this back or take you know it doesn't all happen like that i don't see when and how that's going to recover i i can imagine it does but it's going to take years and then you know there are the other warning signs as well like i've just how despite all the demand it feels like pinball's so weak right now look at replay fx i remember how we would joke or at least I would joke when we would talk about the Twippies. And it's like, why was there a favorite tournament? It was always going to be Pinnberg. I guess we can have that award category now. Yeah, because it's not going to be them anymore. Of any show, though, of any tournament, surely Pinnberg could have endured. And they didn't even try.
    24:22
    They just closed. And it's just, I mean, if we're that weak, if we as a hobby are that weak, I'm nervous. Yeah. No, I mean, I'm not going to disagree with you because I think you're right. And I think that's been always the issue in pinball is as big as pinball is to us and to those of those listening. When you get down to it, when you get inside, it's a very niche market to the point where I can think of hobbies that I'm sure a lot of people have never even heard of. that I honestly think reliably have more people doing them on a daily basis than pinball does. Oh, sure. Oh, in fact, of like anything else I'm involved with, pinball is the smallest by far. Right. By far. And it's just, yeah, I just don't know. I mean, look at a pinball hall of fame. How lucky they were to get that $79,000 donation from one person. because otherwise I really didn't think they were going to hit that 200,000. I just didn't think they were going to. I don't see how they possibly could have. I thought it was a lost cause. Yeah. I'm glad he tried because it worked out, and that's where at least they put up a fight. But I just don't know. Anyway, I just thought I get this weird, I have this weird like sinking feeling with, I mean, ultimately the hobby will survive no matter what, even if there were no manufacturers, they'll still be a pinball hobby. So I don't want to overstate things. And I don't think all the manufacturers will go away. As we've noted, Stern's sales output, like they're still producing. They're still, they just, they can't keep up. They say they can't keep up with the demand. But, and we're seeing the price increases and stuff and people are still buying. So, you know, there are all these signs that the market is healthy, yet there are all these signs that the market isn't healthy because it doesn't seem like any of the manufacturers other than perhaps Stern are exhibiting you know, largesse based off of all of this demand. It just, if anything, it's like it put them more in a bind. It's like JJP looks to me like they're more uncomfortable with all the demand than they would be if there was less demand, which to me is funny. That is. But I think, again, part of that applies to the fact, like you said earlier, that there's demand. But when you're looking at a point of not being able to answer that demand for eight months or, or more that amount of demand starts to be damaging because it gets to the point where you losing customer confidence Sure and that an excellent point because this is true in any hobby I ever been involved with No one wants to sit there and just wait for something that they already bought to come. It's not fun. I mean, there have been running jokes about, you know, with things involving vaporware and stuff where people have pre-ordered. It doesn't matter what the dollar amount is. We're talking, you know, people who pre-ordered video games. I remember seeing someone who had scanned their receipt from when they had pre-ordered the Duke Nukem, which turned into Duke Nukem Forever originally. Right. And it's just like, think about just how grating it is to sit there with money down or an intent to get something and just be strung along. But there's also a big difference between pre-ordering a $60 game and pre-ordering a $10,000 game and still having it in a massive weight.
    28:01
    I mean... Yes. Yeah. The dollars do make a difference as well. If I pre-order a video game, it's not as shrug. But it's also that because those games are at that price, I can buy other games. Whereas if you've tied up, imagine if you bought, you wanted an Elvira pinball, Tony, and you had all that money tied up and you didn't have it.
    28:28
    Like, how viable is it for you to go, well, while I wait, I'll just buy another pinball machine? Right. And for some people and for a lot of people in the hobby, especially the hardcore collectors, that is entirely viable. But there's also people out there who do the exact same thing with sports cars. Sure. or classic VWs. But the thing is, and I assume this is probably the case for a lot of people with things like vehicles and such, is unlike a lot of video games where you can find a lot of stuff within the same genre, for example, if you wanted an Elvira and I told you, well, you can't get an Elvira but I can get you a Hot Wheels or I can get you a Guns N' Roses, those games are totally different. They play totally different. So I think a lot of people aren't like, okay, I want a pinball. It's more like, I want this pinball and I can't have it. Right. It's like going in and saying, hey, I want to buy a 69 Dodge Charger, and they tell you, well, I can get you an 83 Cavalier. Yeah. Or, yeah, we'd say, and again, in watches we see this. So people will be like, oh, I want the Omega Snoopy-themed Speedmaster. Well, they're all sold out. You want a Seamaster instead? Did I say I wanted stupid waves on my dial? No. Hey, hey, hey, hey, hey, hey, hey. Don't hate on a Seamaster.
    29:53
    They're actually pretty cool. Seamaster's my favorite of many. I'll never own one. Why not? But Seamaster's my favorite of many.
    30:01
    Because they're... Get yourself a Bond edition from the Pierce Brosnan years. Oh, yeah. I got all... I only need one kidney. I'll sell the other one. They're cheaper than pinball. They are cheaper than pinball. I will freely admit that. And I 100% see me having a better chance of getting a Seamaster than I could some of the pinball machines I would like, just because of the cost factor. Well, they do make a lot more, so that helps keep the price control.
    30:35
    Well, speaking of Seamasters, I think it's time for us to sail on over into the video game segment. That is a very good time to go. Thank you. I'm sailing away Oh, sorry That's my Dennis DeYoung impression There's nothing but good news In video games, obviously Well, then I guess we're not talking about Activision Blizzard Yeah, I know I was being sarcastic Yeah Activision Blizzard Man, these guys are just Here's the interesting thing It's Bobby I'm sorry go on I don't know why I'm being such a because he deserves it we talked about it back in 19 when it happened when they laid off like a thousand people while having you know their best year ever and then they laid off more people in 20.
    31:44
    Then this year, already, they've laid off 190 people, including 50 in the esports division here in the U.S.
    31:55
    And on top of that, it's now come out that they're planning on closing all of their publishing offices in Europe. So that's looking to be another 800 people. But, they're still making huge money. their stock is so high the good old CEO Bobby Kotick is up to be getting his 200 million dollar bonus due to the stocks doing so well but they've got to lay off a whole bunch of people and close an entire division and what's interesting is in their call with their investors in February, they were talking about how good they were doing, and they're looking at, over the next several years, hiring about 3,000 people.
    32:49
    After they lay a whole bunch of people off and give Bobby a $200 million bonus. Because their numbers are so good.
    33:00
    I've never understood this. Maybe if I had studied business administration, I'd have a better sense of this approach. I think that's part of it is I'm sure this all makes sense. And this is part of his contract. Don't get me wrong. His contract says that if the stocks stay above a certain price for 90 days or something like that, he gets this bonus.
    33:27
    And that's fine. Okay. Good on him for signing a contract like that. But I can't believe there was a contract signed like that anyway. But, sure, it is what it is. Now, the interesting thing, because they like to show, Activision Blizzard does, that they're good people, even when they're laying people off.
    33:55
    That the people laid off in the U.S. from the esports division, they did get severance. They got 90-day severance. Okay, that's actually decent severance. That's solid. That's good severance. And even better than the severance, they got to finish out the year with health insurance. Okay, that's nice. So that's really, really good.
    34:21
    And what's even better than that? 100% sincerity. But even better than all of that, they got a $200 gift card to Battle.net. So while they're sitting at home with their severance pay and no job, they can buy themselves some Warcraft time or buy a bunch of loot boxes for Overwatch and give that $200 back to the company that just laid their asses off. Give it right back to Activision.
    34:55
    That's great. I love it. We just laid you off. Here's $200 to give back to us. It's the electrolytes of Activision. Clans love it.
    35:08
    I just... Oh, man. That's just so... So mean, but... So... It's so Activision of them. It is.
    35:20
    Yeah. Given how good the overall package is, I'll let it slide. But still, maybe don't... Maybe just give a $200 Visa gift card next time. Right. Or just don't give anything.
    35:37
    The severance package, at least for the people in the U.S., because that's the only ones I have notice for, isn't bad. Give them all the Homestand Overwatch hoodies that you're not going to need now.
    35:50
    Like, everyone gets a swag. Everybody gets a hoodie. But you know what isn't real bad, Tony? Valheim. It's not. It's so good. It's so Viking. And it's very Viking much wow.
    36:04
    I've been playing it a lot. Not battle tech insanity levels, but that's mainly because it requires me to actually... I can't just get up and walk away from it because it's one of those active worlds.
    36:22
    So I have to actually log out. If I have to get up and go take care of the dogs or the kids or go do something, I have to actually log out of the game or else my character is going to sit there and eventually somebody is going to walk up and bash my skull in. No, no. It's like those AFK hero games. Yeah. It's just like that. Or XP while you're putting the dog out. Yeah. so uh but I've still put nine hours into it since I started playing it uh after the last episode and um it is definitely a game that is one of those hey uh shouldn't you have been asleep a while ago type games uh for me and it's one of those games that like when I first started playing Fallout 4.
    37:19
    By the time I got to the third or fourth main quest story, the one where you're supposed to go to Diamond City. Yes. It's like the very beginning quest line. Yes. Yeah. And I had almost 200 hours in the game and my character was in the 40s. and I went in with high-end weapons and power armor because I can't see a shiny, oh, shiny, walk away, go do side quest type stuff. In Valheim, I literally, when I stopped playing, had just beaten the first boss because I got sidetracked for about four and a half hours because I was hunting for materials. Specifically, I was hunting deer hide and leather scraps, and I was being very annoyed because there's so much brush and it's hard to see and get shots on. So I decided that I was going to clear out all of the low brush in about a day's walk around my camp.
    38:38
    Because it was annoying. So, on my personal server, when you go into it, all over the place are stacks of 50 lumber from where I cleared huge swaths of the small trees out in the areas where deer and boar were common. to make my hunting easier.
    39:02
    I have a problem. And I enjoy every minute of it. I was at a point where I was carrying three axes on me so that one broke. I just switched to another one and keep going.
    39:23
    But honestly, it's a lot of fun. Its survival system isn't as hardcore annoying as some of these survival games where it's like you have to eat continuously, constantly. I mean, you have to eat, but it's not hard to find food.
    39:40
    The first time I got to the point where it's like, hey, you should probably eat, I'd already found like 30 raspberries and some mushrooms. It wasn't a problem. the interesting thing is you have a I'm hungry baseline of like health and stamina and all that and then if you eat that all goes up so but it's been very enjoyable for people who like kind of those open world survival ish games I highly recommend it It has the nice combination of being easy without being so deep that it gets to be a pain. Because I played some survival games and some creation games where they get to be a real It almost gets to be a hassle where some of the mechanics get in the way of what makes the game fun And I haven had that issue with Valhalla Okay.
    40:50
    And it could be interesting to see because I've not played on a live findable server or played with anybody, and that's something you can do, and I can see where that could be really interesting and fun. I'm not a huge multiplayer person for stuff like this but I can definitely see where it'd be a lot of fun to have a couple people together sitting on a discord voice chat just kind of building areas and working together hmm and I figured out that you have to make sure that if you're going to put a fire inside your house your house has to be tall enough and have enough areas to let the smoke out that you don't kill yourself. Yes, that would be bad.
    41:36
    I got the black lung pop. So, yes, for everybody who's been asking about Valheim, I'm greatly enjoying it. I'm going to be spending a lot more time in it. I'm actually actively rotating between it and Battletech and a couple other games depending upon the amount of free time I have right then and the interest I have at the second that I sit down to play. So, let me bring up. So the last thing we're going to go into is Square Enix Presents. I'm kind of liking this, by the way, with E3 being gone.
    42:26
    And, I mean, we don't know that they're gone, gone yet. You sounded pretty sure Nobody cares about E3 I like that all the companies Doing their own thing just kind of spread out Randomly throughout the year But our hit E3 episode I know I greatly enjoyed The E3 episodes But at the same time it's nice to just get Something thrown out that's not Okay we're going to have a six hour Episode where we talk about 400,000 Things that came out from every major person. I guess, you're right. But Square Enix had theirs.
    43:06
    It's where they talked about their upcoming games. I've got a list of the major stuff. There's literally, I think, a couple things that I don't have in this list, but I wanted to go over them because several of them are kind of interesting to me.
    43:25
    First is Life is Strange True Colors. It's the third game in the Life is Strange series. Have you ever played Life is Strange? Only the first one, but I did enjoy it. Yeah, that's all it's saying to me. I only played the first one. I did enjoy it, but I never got the second one. This one will not be episodic. Hmm. Where the first two, that was part of their thing, is they were released episodically, kind of like the Walking Dead games from Telltale, and all the games from Telltale. There was episodic releases.
    43:56
    This one is going to come out with everything at once. They're also doing a remaster of the first two Life is Strange games that will be included with the Ultimate Edition of True Colors and be available for standalone purchase.
    44:13
    I'm assuming for those people who haven't really gotten into the series yet and want to do a whole run, or who just want to have everything upgraded and running on more modern systems. But it looks interesting. All the Life is Strange games have been interesting. They're not necessarily the type of game that grabs me, but I enjoyed the first one. Yeah, it was an interesting story concept. The gameplay doesn't particularly stand out. Right.
    44:46
    They also talked about their Project Athia, which they now have a name for, Forspoken. Or Forsaken. I think it's Forsaken. Forspoken is funnier. Forspoken is funnier, but I think it's Forsaken and I just misspelled it. So.
    45:09
    But it looks, it's too early to tell if it's going to be any good. Let's be honest. Dragons. It is Forspoken. Huh. Okay.
    45:20
    Yeah, it's interesting because it's kind of got the, it's got dragons and large creatures and it has a very modern slash post-modern feel to some of it.
    45:36
    But there are definite magical powers from the trailers and it has one of those movement systems that seems very fast, magic-y parkour type movement. At least from the trailers, that's what it looks like. Or at least she has a lot of speed lines as she jumps around and go straight up vertical cliffs and stuff. We'll see what it turns into. We know how these things go when you see something this early. It could be anything. And let's be honest, this is Square. This game isn't far enough along to not be canceled yet.
    46:12
    Scale bound. The next game actually comes out on April 1st, so I'm going to guess that is too far along to be canceled, but looks really good is Outriders. Have you seen the Outriders trailer? I think so. It's been a while. I know I've heard about Outriders. It looks pretty good. It's a third-person shooter with some co-op stuff.
    46:38
    It's from People Can Fly, who used to be part of the Epic Games Group, and they were involved with Gears of War and Bulletstorm and those style of games. Yeah, I played Bulletstorm. And it feels like it from looking at the stuff. It's got to feel like that. But it's kind of an RPG third-person shooter with character classes, and you've got a big, cool RV, and it looks really interesting to me. It doesn't look so cool that I'm going to go buy this game when it comes out. But I'll see what the reviews look like, because there's been several other games that look really cool and then end up being absolute trash. Anthem. Ah, poor Anthem No poor Anthem, Anthem's dead That's true They killed Anthem last time And then they also showed some videos from Balan Wonderworld which is a 3D platformer very cutesy looking What's really interesting to me the fact is the director and artist for this game. I'm going to get these names wrong. I apologize. I always do. The director is Yuji Naka, who would be better known as being the director of all of the Sonic games in the 90s. And the artist is Naoto Oshima, who created Sonic. He did the original art for Sonic. So we'll have to go fast in Balan Wonderworld. So it has old school platformer roots from inside of it. So it'll be interesting to see how it goes. I don't like to play platformers anymore. I haven't played platformers very much in years. I must have liked something really special. But I know my kids love platformers.
    48:40
    And Balan Wonderworld is going to be available on everything. Outriders is going to be on everything except Switch I think I mean it's even on Stadia that's still a thing yeah Stadia is not quite dead yet it was on Stadia PS4, PS5 Xbox One Xbox Series X Windows so yeah no it's going to be everywhere too. And the last thing I wanted to talk about was the... I almost feel bad poking fun at them. No, this is your favorite game to talk about from Square.
    49:28
    Marvel's Avengers. Yeah! Marvel! The latest release that was going to do so much hasn't really gone over very well from everything I've read. Their numbers haven't moved up much. There was a bump, but it's not been the, hey, we are saved bump. It probably doesn't help that the brand new character they introduced, that everyone was waiting for, Hawkeye, is literally a reskin of the previous Hawkeye that was already in the game. No one likes Hawkeye. Well, I know. They should have done Falcon or Winter Soldier. That would have tied in really well. See? This character was supposed to have been out in October of last year. And it's March. Or Wanda Maximoff.
    50:20
    I got oodles of Marvel characters I could suggest that are better than Hawkeye. Like all of them. Especially since they had a previous Hawkeye. They did have a... Because they had the Hawkeye that took over from Barton Hawkeye. The one who he trained. Was already in the game. So, the new Hawkeye just uses her moveset.
    50:47
    But where she uses magic to get around, he uses a grappling hook to do the exact same thing. That's great.
    50:56
    The big talk and a lot of the complaints was that PlayStation was getting Spider-Man as an exclusive PlayStation character. We don't have to worry about that. Spider-Man's never coming. No! I mean, he's still in production.
    51:13
    There are still people, the line is, there are still people working on it. But they don't have a release time for him.
    51:22
    And the release date for Spider-Man, who was promised when the game started, has been pushed back to sometime after the next big release character, who will be Black Panther, who might be out in late summer, probably before 22. Wow.
    51:43
    At this point, it's become, I just want to see how long Avengers goes on before they just snap it away. They need to snap this thing out of existence. They just need to snap it. How long are they going to keep pouring money into Avengers? Just give up. Sometimes we have to quit in life. There's a morality tale here somewhere. They need to learn from it. Yeah.
    52:11
    The Anthem was given a full year. To almost a full year to be resurrected. We'll see if they give Avengers that. I mean, I know what they want. They want to be one of those games that comes back better and stronger and suddenly becomes hugely popular a year or two after it was released.
    52:39
    But for a living game like this, I have a hard time seeing it happen. Yeah, I just don't get it. It almost would require a dramatic rework. I don't think throwing in more characters is the problem. Right. and throwing in more characters and doing different adjustments to the story and everything, I just don't think it's going to be enough.
    53:04
    I think that this is one of those games that is going to limp along until they finally just shut it down. I agree with you. But it gives me plenty of stuff to laugh about. Yes. It's just so bad. And we're all about having fun. At their expense.
    53:23
    Well, I guess for those that had fun listening to this episode, or not, you can always reach out to us, eclecticgamerspodcast.gmail.com, or over at facebook.com slash eclecticgamerspodcast. We're available on Twitch, Twitter, and Instagram as eclectic underscore gamers. We don't have Dennis' watch pictures on that Instagram. No, I don't put them there, because that would be inappropriate.
    53:46
    Totally inappropriate. Inappropriate. Now, what will be appropriate is in two weeks, if there is yet more Marvel Avengers news, we will touch on it. But there probably will be. I think we'll finally have a break. I think there should be a break now, I would assume. I thought there was going to be a break after, other than the ultimate failure of their ultimate failure. But until then, I am Dennis. I'm Tony. And I will say so long for now. See ya.