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Fossilrific Zen

BlahCade Pinball Podcast·podcast_episode·1h 0m·analyzed·Mar 2, 2018
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Analysis

claude-haiku-4-5-20251001 · $0.029

TL;DR

Zen's Jurassic Park tables praised for execution; host proposes Moon Knight tournament format improvements.

Summary

Chris and Jared discuss Zen Studios' three new Jurassic Park pinball tables (Jurassic Park, Jurassic World, Jurassic Park Mayhem), praising the voice acting sourced directly from the films and original dialogue for Mayhem. They analyze the design philosophy differences between the tables and note Zen's smart licensing strategy with Star Wars music. The episode concludes with discussion of their weekly Moon Knight tournament format and critique of older Zen tables' scoring balance and mode stacking limitations, with requests for code updates.

Key Claims

  • Jurassic Park and Jurassic World use direct voice quotes from the movies, while Jurassic Park Mayhem features newly recorded dialogue by Zen

    high confidence · Chris and Jared explicitly confirm movie quotes in first two tables and praise Mayhem's original voice work quality

  • Zen purchased Star Wars music once and has recycled it across multiple Star Wars tables because the franchise has enough iconic themes to sustain multiple tables

    high confidence · Chris explains: 'when they bought the license, they knew that they were going to do nine tables... they've been recycling the same music'

  • John Williams music was too expensive for Jurassic Park licensing, so Zen sourced alternative adventure-themed music instead

    medium confidence · Jared states 'John Williams is too expensive. That's why' regarding missing JP theme music

  • Moon Knight is from the original or early Marvel Pinball packs and lacks modern Zen features like mode stacking

    medium confidence · Chris notes 'I think it's in the original Marvel Pinball pack. If not, it was in the second Marvel Pinball pack' and discusses absence of stacking mechanics

  • Older Zen tables have low scoring balance and non-stackable modes that make them grinds compared to modern Zen table design

    high confidence · Extended discussion about Moon Knight scoring payouts and lack of mode stacking vs. modern tables

Notable Quotes

  • “So yes indeed, folks, they did pull all their quotes and callouts straight from the movie. So there's real voice actors, which was funny because somebody on Twitter was like, I don't know, I think the voice acting was kind of cheesy. And I went, it's from the movies.”

    Chris @ early in episode — Addresses common criticism of Jurassic Park table voice acting being from actual films

  • “I realized why they paid the money for Star Wars and haven't paid it for anything else. And that's because the Star Wars music can be applied to every single Star Wars table that they do.”

    Jared @ mid-episode — Explains Zen's licensing strategy rationale for music investments

  • “You don't want to turn them off. Put it that way, which on Alien vs. Predator, you really kind of do after a while.”

    Jared @ mid-episode — Contrasts quality of Jurassic Mayhem voice work with earlier Zen licensed table (AvP)

  • “I wish Zen would kind of maybe go back and do a code update. But this table would be so much fun if you could stack modes, because the point totals would just go through the roof.”

    Chris @ late episode — Main request for Moon Knight remaster focusing on scoring and mode stacking

  • “So there's a lot of things like that that Zen has—since in their more current tables—allowed that kind of thing to happen, but the older tables weren't.”

    Chris @ late episode — Identifies systemic design philosophy shift in Zen's table design over time

  • “It's kind of like playing a Jersey Jack table. Oh, look, I just got the Super Jack, but oh, it's like 10,000 points.”

    Jared @ near end — Uses JJP comparison to illustrate scoring disappointment issue

Entities

Zen StudioscompanyChris FreebuspersonJared MorganpersonJurassic ParkgameJurassic WorldgameJurassic Park MayhemgameMoon KnightgameStar WarsgameIron Mangame

Signals

  • ?

    community_signal: Flippin' Out Pinball hosts implementing custom tournament format for Moon Knight with manual scoring tracking and multi-round format to drive engagement

    high · Chris developed custom rule set with point bonuses, consistency tracking, and streak rewards; manually tracking scores on paper

  • ?

    design_philosophy: Jurassic World raptor mode on mobile platforms suffers from clarity issues due to screen size and angle; visual feedback improvements needed

    medium · Chris struggled identifying dinosaurs on Pixel XL2 until playing on Shield tablet with better visibility; suggests lens flare effects for targeting clarity

  • ?

    design_philosophy: Zen Studios intentionally uses movie-sourced voice quotes and animations over costly licensed music for Jurassic Park; contrasts with Star Wars investment strategy

    high · Chris explains Zen's licensing priorities: 'absolutely a much better idea to purchase the rights to the voice actors' over music, given budget constraints

  • $

    market_signal: Zen's strategic music licensing prioritizes multi-table franchises (Star Wars) over single-table licenses (ET) to maximize ROI on music rights purchases

    high · Discussion of why Star Wars music was worth licensing but John Williams' Jurassic Park theme cost prohibitive for single table

  • ?

    announcement: Zen Studios releases three Jurassic Park pinball tables (Jurassic Park, Jurassic World, Jurassic Park Mayhem) with varying design philosophies and licensed movie voice content

    high · Entire episode dedicated to analysis of three newly released Zen tables; detailed gameplay mechanics discussion

Transcript

groq_whisper · $0.181

0:00
this is the blockade podcast with your hosts chris and jared you are listening to the blockade pinball podcast i'm your host chris freebus aka shut your trap joining me as always halfway across the world jared morgan hello Hello. Hello. Let's go ahead and then I guess start the show. Let's start the show and talk about things. Alright, here's the main thing that we need to talk about. Zen and Pinball FX3 and this little title that they dropped on us called Jurassic Park. Just a minor franchise.
0:55
So three tables, Jurassic Park, Jurassic World, and Jurassic Park Mayhem. Jurassic Park Mayhem being the one title that is not based on anything other than the Jurassic universe, if you will. So it's just dinosaurs.
1:12
You know what it reminds me of a little bit? It's a little bit like in Safecracker how you have Assault the Vault mode. it feels a little bit like Assault the Vault with the perspective that it's still dinosaurs and it's still safe cracking but it's a completely different storyline so the first things that jumped out at me with these tables was I popped in Jurassic Park and I went boy that's some phenomenal voice acting and then I'm listening a little closer and I'm like that sounds a lot like it's straight from the movie so then I put in the Jurassic World one that sounds like direct quotes from the movies too so yes indeed folks uh they did pull all their quotes and call outs straight from the movie so there's a real voice actors which was funny because somebody on twitter was like i don't know i think the voice acting was kind of cheesy and i went it's from the movies oh what are you gonna say to that right i mean you know um and then with Jurassic Mayhem, Zen recorded their own dialogue for that, and hats off to them, because this is some of the better voice work that they've ever done, in my opinion. I'm used to the voice work that's like in Alien vs. Predator. Let's be honest, really bad. It's just horrendous. And I'm couching this also by saying for their licensed tables.
Alien vs. Predatorgame
John Williamsperson
Data Eastcompany
Taxigame
Whirlwindgame
Medieval Madnessgame
Jersey Jack Pinballcompany
  • ?

    product_strategy: Hosts requesting Moon Knight 2.0 code update to address scoring balance and implement mode stacking mechanics from modern Zen table design

    medium · Chris states: 'I wish Zen would kind of maybe go back and do a code update' and proposes remastering music and scoring on older tables

  • ~

    sentiment_shift: Hosts noting they avoid playing older Zen tables due to scoring/mechanics limitations, despite interesting layouts; modernized features would improve replay value

    medium · Jared: 'I just really don't go and play them at all. I don't play the older ones. And it's a shame because some of the layouts are actually really fun. It's just they're not fun to play.'

  • ?

    technology_signal: Older Zen digital pinball tables lack modern features like mode stacking and dynamic scoring that newer tables possess, creating gameplay experience disparity

    high · Extended discussion of Moon Knight's non-stackable modes, static scoring, and comparison to modern Zen tables with stacking capability

    • 2:36
    Because what are you going to compare? CastleStorm, it's whatever the heck Zen wanted to do. exactly right yeah but no they did it's not annoying and it fits the theme really well for what they were doing and I think they did a bang up job on that yeah they did it really does tie like the Jurassic Mayhem or the Mayhem table is good from the perspective of voice acting you don't want to turn them off put it that way which on Alien vs Predator you really kind of do after a while that is true too there's also three yeah I'd say three completely different styles of play here Jurassic Park is your Zen's been doing this a lot actually where there's no mission hole it's instead hitting a particular ramp or a lane X amount of times triggers the mode to start spelling mode I call it yeah but there's no spelling going on and so you're not having to hit the lane so many times to spell a word. It's more like a hit it three times, which a lot of the pinball machines before spelling, that was exactly it. Hit something three times, that activates, you know, whatever. The thing, yeah. So that's the Jurassic Park table is that one. Jurassic World is your classic mode hole, which that is my preference in pinball play, I do gotta say. and then Mayhem, I've not been able to figure out what the heck is going on with that one yeah you start right off the bat by selecting East Dock, North Dock Hammond's Lodge and Visitor Center, I'm not sure if there's more, and I don't understand what changes or what goals are based on those it's a little bit like the Doctor Who Doctors they add different things so they will increase the pop bumpers or they'll do something else. Or, you know, they do that type of thing, like play for modifiers, essentially.
    4:45
    So that's the only thing that they seem to do. But, yeah, I had a good go of Jurassic Park. I had a little bit of a go of Jurassic World. And, again, probably I really only say a little bit of a go of Mayhem. I think for me, Jurassic Park is the table that I seem to be gravitating towards. What about you? Well, yes, because of two factors. One, the movie quotes are more iconic.
    5:19
    I just prefer, I didn't like Jurassic World as a movie. It really wasn't great. So Jurassic Park kind of, there's nostalgia built in, if you will, even though we've never played this table there is nostalgia the other thing that I love about this table is those raptors they are little bastards and I literally laughed out loud when a mode started all of a sudden these raptors went down to the bottom near my flippers I was like oh okay that's interesting and oh I see you know lit lane gotta hit that that's why I go to cradle the ball and the raptor just bent over grabbed the ball in his mouth and mode ended and I was like hey that's not cool I actually I didn't cradle the ball with those little dudes I was going what are you guys doing down there are you supposed to be doing something I'll just keep on shooting shots but they didn't eat my ball so I'm going to have to give them the opportunity to have some steel on their diet if you cradle the ball they'll eat it if you send it down the in lane they'll eat it so you've got to avoid the in lane also oh that's interesting yeah I didn't even realise that I have to admit that, well, we'll talk more about Jurassic Park and then we'll go into Jurassic World a bit. So Jurassic Park, I like the big, long ramps. Like, the ramps are really reminiscent of the D'Aterese table, aren't they? That nice, big, long gate ramp. Well, to me, it's taxi. Yeah, it's taxi as well. But yeah, you're right, they're very long ramps. But the crossover, like from the way the ramp actually crosses over the playfield and then drops you on the right in lane, like it is almost, you can clearly tell that the table designers go, yeah, okay, if we're on Jurassic Park, that is the thing that we are going to pay homage to from the Dutter East table because it feels the same. The only thing that it isn't, it doesn't enter and exit the same way as it does on the data East table. So you don't go from a left flipper shot down to the right flipper. It's actually a right flip shot to the right flipper. Of course, the data East table is nothing more than a mirror of a whirlwind.
    7:31
    I think some people say it's actually an Addams family. No, no, it's whirlwind. You can, even the bumper placements, it's the same. very much. some people might be griping about this and I kind of went, you know what, I'd rather have the real voices if there was a choice of.
    7:58
    But through all three tables, no Jurassic Park music. Which, truth be told... John Williamson's too expensive. That's why. I think I would get really sick of the Jurassic Park theme after a while. So they found some appropriate music that kind of evokes that adventure feeling without being the actual music.
    8:23
    I realized why they paid the money for Star Wars and haven't paid it for anything else. And that's because the Star Wars music can be applied to every single Star Wars table that they do. And they've got a ton of them. Right. I mean, when they bought the license, they knew that they were going to do nine tables. Yeah. Since then, they've done more tables. since then though however they have not repurchased new music they've been recycling the same music but again there's so many iconic star wars themes that it feels like you know they're picking a different theme for each table but you know the theme all the same it's not like it doesn't sound like it's some obscure pull from you know whatever scene in the movie that you don't remember happening. Exactly. And so they really got their money's worth out of that music. But you think about it, if they had bought the music for E.T., well, that's the only table that it's ever going to be used on. And that would be prohibitively expensive. That's right. Yeah, that's actually an interesting observation. The fact that they've, or the music they've purchased, they've actually got the most legs out of the music. It's a smart move. It is a smart move. And you're right, I don't actually think not having any of the iconic Jurassic Park theme or any of that detracts from the tables. In fact, really, I didn't even really notice it, to be perfectly honest, in the Jurassic Park tables. Like, you're right, definitely the money is better spent on the voice actors because that is what you hear all the time when you're shooting things. So absolutely a much better idea to purchase the rights to the voice actors. I do wish, and this is just a side note on Xem, I wish they would go back and redo the music for a lot of their early tables. Because a lot of their early tables, the music has nothing to do with what is going on on the table. It's just a loop of music. It doesn't change beats or anything for modes. They've gotten so much better at that. Again, all you have to do is play the Carnivals and Legends pack. and you can hear that they've figured out how to do music properly. Oh yeah, definitely.
    10:39
    Emotion-based music. Yeah, I really wish that Zen would go back and if they're going to remaster anything about their tables, remaster that. And I'll touch upon another thing that I would love them to remaster when I talk about our weekly tournament that we've done something different on. But we'll get to that after we uh talk about so jurassic world what so i first installed this on my pixel xl2 so my my phone and the reason why i do that is because it's easier for me to purchase on there i can just use my fingerprint to purchase i don't have to put in a password it's great and i thought cool well i've got it purchased on here i may as well install the tables and have a go just on a phone and i've got to admit that the first mode where the raptors come out and you're trying to train them and feed them i there's two things that really confuse me with that mode while playing on the game the first thing i didn't have my um sound turned up very loud okay um and of course the problem is that um whoever the the actor is who portrays that who is the actor chris does that yeah prep That's right. So he is calling out the names of the Raptors that you have to shoot, and then you have to shoot the ball into the Raptors. Now, I didn't even get that because, again, I think the dot matrix was going a bit too fast for me, although I did notice that they changed the way they displayed the text on the dot matrix initially. So rather than firing out the ball after a preset amount of time, they will let you read the instructions up on the screen until you press the flippers. so you can leave it up there for a lot longer if you want but you just have to realize that you can so you can't flip the flippers because then it will cancel it but they give you a lot more time to read the overall goal of the mission which is really good yeah obviously they've been listening to everyone including us about how how they should actually present modes so that was the the first bit and on the phone i had a hard time working out which dinosaur was which couldn't read the name no i couldn't i really couldn't and i don't know whether it was because of the angle i had i think i play on view five which is the one that gives you a subtle bit of zooming as you play um on on the table just because it's mobile and you want to see the more detail as it goes up the upper end of the play field and i really did struggle with that mode it wasn't it wasn't until i actually fired it up on the shield tablet and played it on there going ah with the sound up all right so i'm supposed to shoot it in the order that um uh the dude tells me to okay fair enough so once i did that i went cool that was easier but it just it was tough i went oh what am i doing wrong here the modes ended but i was shooting dinosaurs what i'm supposed to do yeah you know it's funny because i had similar experience with that mode in that i read the dmd and it said uh feed the appropriate dinosaur.
    13:50
    My thought immediately was going to be, oh, the balls are going to be a different color. All four dinosaurs have a slight different coloring. I thought, oh, it's going to be a matched color ball to the color dinosaur. No regular silver ball coming out.
    14:04
    I'm like, well, shoot, I have no idea which dinosaur I'm going to shoot for. I just shot for one. Got it correct. Okay, shot for the next one. Got it correct. Shot for the third one. I don't know if I got it correct. And then I went, where's the fourth one? I couldn't find the fourth one. The fourth one was all the way at the top of the table. And so anyway, before I rattled through it, I was like, well, that wasn't too difficult. Next time I play the thing, I do the same thing. I shoot the first diamond and nothing happens. I shoot another diamond and nothing happens. I'm like, well, what's going on here? What's going on? Yeah, exactly.
    14:38
    It would be nice if they made the dinosaur glow so you know which one you're supposed to. some kind of a visual lighting cue. Like, if this was an actual pinball machine and you had a thing that you needed to hit, it'd have a flasher behind it or something like that going nuts, strobing to make sure that you knew it was the thing you had to hit. Now, the only thing they have is that, basically, the insert light underneath the dinosaur. But the thing is it obstructed by its head Yeah So they need to like that mode would have been much better if they made that with a bit of lens flare so it was flashing you know, really flashing. And then you would have gone, oh, that's clearly the one I need to shoot. Okay, cool. Because it was visually different, you know. Yeah. And that would have just helped. And that, again, goes back down to table design, right? Like a pinball machine designer would go, oh, yeah, I need the person to shoot here to complete the goal. So I need to make it very apparent. That's what I need to shoot. Yeah. Did you find the same that I found with Jurassic Park and Jurassic World I felt that they were very traditional pinball layouts Yeah they were very traditional like you could probably do the dinosaur thing with troll pop-ups like you do on you know Medieval Madness and Hobbit all those things could be achievable in real life But like there's a nice flow to the tables like you had mentioned with the ramps being an homage to the Data East table. It just felt very much like traditional pinball. Moving to Jurassic Mayhem, that one not quite so much. It's a little more odd. There's a big chunk of real estate on the left hand side of the table that is kind of obstructed. It's not an open play field, if you will. Yeah, it is. It's ramps, ramps, ramps, big object of bank targets.
    16:34
    So it's kind of weird on that. And the other thing is the ramps seem exceedingly narrow. Yeah, they are. It's not the friendliest table to shoot on. No, it's not. It's going to take me a while to dial in on that one, I think. Yeah. It seems fun because it's very different. You're essentially at survival. It's a survival table. so it's um it's a very different play style and goal set than the other ones which is very much progressed through the modes this one's sort of like oh a dinosaur will start to go nuts and you need to like do something to stop it or yeah but it'll be like oh shoot the shoot the stegosaurus's tail and you're kind of like okay i see the tail but where's the pickup yeah you know and so i'm Like, I'll just shoot for that general area, and then boom, hey, look at that. It caught it. But it's, of the three tables, it's really digital.
    17:34
    Yeah, it's very, very, very fantasy and very digital. Yeah. Whereas the other ones, you're right, they are more sort of reality. Yeah, now the funny thing about that, though, is that while the layouts are very traditional, they did do what we had hoped they would do, which is go nuts with what Zen does best,
    17:55
    adding in their digital elements. And so having the raptors be able to grab your ball, having the T-Rex come down and chase the vehicle on the treadmill, basically, that's on Jurassic Park. I'm looking forward to it, though.
    18:14
    Having the dinosaur come out of the water on Jurassic World to grab your lockball. There's all sorts of really cool elements that make it exceedingly dinosaur heavy as opposed to if you were on a real table where it'd be like, well, we can afford to put in one toy. Yeah, that's right. This is like toys popping out of everywhere. Right. Yeah, it's very, very good from that perspective because really this theme and this franchise needs dinosaurs everywhere. Like you've got to basically have fossils going around your table at every available opportunity. And it's noisy. It's all get out, too. I mean, you hear those dinosaurs roaring all over the place. So it's that also captures very much the feel of Jurassic Park again. So you don't have the music, but you know what? You got that T-Rex roar. And that's very, very iconic and very integral to the scare factor that is in that movie. Like, you know, you watch it, you even watch Jurassic Park back now, like years and years after it's been released, and you still get that sense of urgency from that bloody T-Rex chasing down the van, or sorry, the Jeep.
    19:31
    And it just, it's still good. It is still good. So, yeah, that really, I think for me, I'm going to have to force myself to go and play Jurassic World and force myself to go and play the Mayhem or the Survival Table. Yeah. Because it's, and there again, I can't really remember the name of it. So that's interesting.
    19:53
    It's Mayhem. Yeah. Mayhem. Yeah. So very interesting releases. Again, very high quality. I love the bouncy rubbers, and everything just feels really good. Right. Yeah. I think they did just a phenomenal job on this, and they've made me want to play very much. However, I've been playing something else. So let's move on, and we're going to shift gears here a little bit away from Jurassic Park. Look, folks, just go buy them. They're good. Yeah, they're good. Money well overspent. But so last week we talked about, hey, should I try my little with our weekly Zen tournament? Oh, yes. The different modes. Should we try the different modes? Yeah. So I went ahead and went, OK, let's do it. So we picked the table, which was a Moon Knight and started off with a three ball tournament. I think I ran it for three days on that. So three ball, no mods whatsoever on it. And then we moved on to one-day tournaments where we did five-minute mode and then one-ball mode. And then today, the day of recording, we're doing survival mode. And I picked and locked in the upgrades that you could do. So, for instance, with the five-minute mode, I picked slow-mo, combo ramps, and skill shot. basically because when you're doing the five minutes, when you first do the launch on Moon Knight, getting the skill shot, it's the only time you're going to get the skill shot. So if you can manage to do that, hey, why not put it into slow-mo mode so you guarantee yourself getting the proper flipper action on it? Yeah. And then why not keep the combo ramps open a little bit longer because you're going to need them while you're in five-minute mode. Then when we did one ball, I put in the rewind, which is important because if you lose that ball, just rewind it and keep on playing. And also increased ball save time and then put in the distance bonus because one ball, you earn your distance off of that one ball. So, again, I was kind of picking what the things were. For the survival mode, I put in the score booster, the multi-ball bonus, and the bumper bonus because, again, you need quick points in survival, so why not get the ones that are going to earn you the big points. and then we're going to finish off with a five day tournament with three ball whatever the heck you want to use for your bonuses because here's the thing by this point everybody should have them all maxed because we've been playing this table enough that you should have all these maxed so everybody should be on a fairly level playing play field with whatever mods they pick it's just a matter of strategy of which ones you suit your gameplay style best so while I've been playing this though now you gotta remember Moon Knight is one of the older I think it's I don't know if it was in the original Marvel Pinball Pack if not it was in the second Marvel Pinball Pack so it's old and the thing with this is not only do you have a mission hole but you also have and it's not Spellerama but you can activate side missions. It's kind of like if you're familiar with Iron Man how you had the main missions but then you also had a whole collection of other mini missions that you were able to do.
    23:33
    And so you're constantly just shooting and lighting up lanes but where it differs from how Zen would do things today is none of the modes are stackable.
    23:46
    And so your point totals are actually kind of low and I was like this is where it was I wish Zen would kind of maybe go back and do a code update but this table would be so much fun if you could stack modes because the point holes would just go through the roof everything would be lit too so you'd have just a shooting bonanza everywhere it'd be wicked it's a very slow scoring table we've it's been a grind and to get any kind of a point total going,
    24:23
    you finish a mode and the mode is only worth the first time you finish a mode is only worth, I believe, a million points.
    24:31
    And it increases the more modes you've completed, the more its total for the next mode is because it's basically adding up how many modes that you've completed. But again, if you were able to stack the modes and be able to play multiple side modes at the same time as playing the main mission mode, and then the seed point totals increase that way. That would be awesome. There's a section where you can light your ball on fire, and all that's really for is lighting. There's five torches scattered throughout the table. If you light all five, that's how you light extra ball. But it also gives you two million points immediately. and I'm not sure if it's 2 million across the table or for each of those that are lit. But you would think that if the ball was lit on fire and that then you started a mode, that maybe that mode would be worth two times scoring or something like that, but it's not. You're just playing with a lit on fire ball until it goes out. So there's a lot of things like that Zen has since in their more current tables allowed that kind of thing to happen, but the older tables weren't. and I was just like, oh, you can go back and make these so much more fun, because that is the problem. Iron Man is a grinder of a table.
    25:55
    And completing absolutely every mode, but you're completing, which I think there's eight of them in total, four main and four maybe six side missions, but you've got to do each of them one at a time. And so that's a long game in order to complete that, as opposed to, yeah, if you just had it go nuts, next thing you know you got everything completed. That'd be awesome. So in addition to Zen going back and replacing music, I would like them to also go back and revisit scoring on these tables and kind of do a code update. Do a bit of a Moon Knight 2.0. Exactly.
    26:36
    I just think it would benefit some of these older tables. I just really don't go and play them at all. I don't play the older ones. and it's a shame because some of the layouts are actually really fun it's just they're not fun to play Moon Knight's got some fun things like that crossover ramp to the moon when it reappears it's a great shot, it feels really good when you nail it the funny thing is though it's not worth much it's a major feature of the table it's a huge feature of the table you should be jumping up and down when you get that shot it should be bonkers because basically what happens with the shot that Jared's talking about it's an invisible ramp that lights up because the moon shines on it. And you shoot it once. That then activates. It lights a lane. You shoot that lane again, and you shoot across the invisible ramp one more time. That opens up, and I believe this was the first time Xen had done one of their mini playfields. Yes.
    27:34
    Which, now they do things where, like, all of a sudden the playfield will separate and reveal that there's a little tiny playfield underneath, or on, like, some of the Star Wars tables, that had the window that you could already see it underneath there. Here it just cuts to this mini playfield. God knows where it is, where it exists in reality. And it's the easiest of modes to complete. It's not a challenge whatsoever. But then you finish it, and it's worth maybe 2 million points. But again, hitting that ramp shot and across the invisible ramp, it's a task. It's a challenge. It's not the easiest shot in the world. So you want the points to be worth it. And I get to the point where I just kind of go, eh, I could care less. Yeah, and it should be like you should really go, yeah, it should be making a big song and dance when you get that ramp. The only time it's actually worth any money or points, I should say, is there's a mode called Whirlybird in which the balls go glow white hot, which makes them very difficult to aim with because they look much bigger than they actually are. so your aim is way off. But in order to collect a jackpot,
    28:47
    so there's all sorts of jackpots. I think there's at least two jackpots lit on the table. Each time you hit one of those, it raises the super jackpot. In order to collect the super jackpot, you've got to hit that far ramp to bring it up to the moon invisible ramp to hit that, and that's how you collect the super.
    29:06
    And that's the only time that it actually is a payoff of any significance. But even that, the payoff is you've been collecting, you've been collecting, you hit it, and it's all 1.7 million. And you're like, really? That was it?
    29:20
    And that's the whole table to me. Everything on it is kind of like, really? Wow. Okay. It's kind of like playing a Jersey Jack table.
    29:33
    Oh, look, I just got the Super Jack, but oh, it's like 10,000 points. if even that yeah yeah yeah it's getting that score balance right isn't it like of like the what it's how hard you had to work for it versus the amount of payback you get in points right it's got to feel satisfying even if it's balanced well enough like if all the other things in moon night when you shoot them actually don't give you that many points anyhow and these things do give you a lot of points it still doesn't feel right does it yeah yeah the only mode i have found on the table that has seemingly good payout is there a mode called Nightmare and a clock face on the table that I only recently started to understand how it interacts, but if you get it to land on midnight, it brings up this character, Midnight, separate from his own mode that you can normally activate. It's called Nightmare. He hurls balls at you that are on fire, and the balls have a mind of their own. Basically, there's crazy magnet action going on. It's a lot of fun because a ball will be coming down the in lane. You're like, oh, sweet. I'm going to flip that. All of a sudden, the ball just floats away from your flipper. You're like, I was trying to hit that. That's cool.
    30:52
    It's actually a lot of fun. That one, if you hit jackpots, the jackpots are worth $4 million. You can hit a lot of them. That's the only mode that I've come across that you can do massive amounts of scoring quickly comparatively to any other mode that's on the table.
    31:11
    That does sound like fun. It's been a lot of fun, and I came up with, because I wanted to keep people interested for all five versions of the table that we're playing. I want everybody to play as much as possible. So I came up with my own rule set, and see what you think of this, Jared. So it was score in the top 10.
    31:31
    First place will get 1,000 points. Second place gets 900 points, et cetera, all the way down to 10th place gets 100 points. Okay.
    31:39
    Everybody else, if you didn't place in the top 10, you don't get any points for the table. If you manage to land in the top 10 for all five rounds, you'll get an extra bonus of 1,000 points. Right off the bat, we lost five people. And so we've had five people that are still earning top 10 on each time. And then I also put in that if you manage to take first place in a row, like two tables in a row, or two challenges in a row, you get another 500 points.
    32:15
    So the object of this whole thing is to just see across all these modes who can be the king of Moon Knight. And what's interesting is one of the players who has yet to take first place on the table is actually in the lead because he's been very consistent about placing number two or number three or whatever. So it's kind of one of those things where it's like, fine, you're not winning the table outright in any particular week, but you're showing a consistency that is proving that you've got a mastery of the table. So that's been kind of fun to do that way. And can you do that in the confines of the app? Like, does it allow you to... No, I've got a piece of paper that I'm keeping down somewhere. Doing manually on hand.
    33:03
    That does sound very nice. Like, imagine if that was a thing you could actually do like a tournament, essentially. A weekly tournament, have six tables, each with different goals, and then have like a... Like, again, that's a really nice thing to suggest, eh? That'd be pretty good. I'm thinking about it. I'm thinking I'm going to have to write an email to Zen and be like, hey guys, can we just take it to the next level? Take it to the next level because this is a lot of fun.
    33:29
    Again, consistently we're getting 30 players playing in this. I think if they knew right off the bat that all of this would be...
    33:41
    I tried to communicate via Pimble Arcade fans and via Twitter what we're doing, but it's doesn't meet what it means when you're in the app. And especially if you've never looked at my Twitter feed or looked at, uh, the pinball arcade fans site. Uh, if you're one of those people that just happens to click on the tournament to join in, like I've done many a time when I go, Oh, Hey, that tournament's over in 45 minutes. Sure. I'll post a score. Yeah. You then, when you did that, Hey, this is going to be going on for, you know, multiple sessions. Then those people would be wanting to come back. and I would think that by the end of,
    34:19
    by the time we get to our fifth round, that by then you would have a good collection of players. So it would be nice to be able to have that carryover.
    34:27
    Yes, you're right. Something to suggest. I think you should suggest it. It sounds like a reasonable thing.
    34:35
    Yeah, and they'll be like, uh-huh, get in line. Yeah, exactly. But at least you said your piece. At least I said my piece. Alright, let's move away from Zen and move into the world of Pinball Arcade They currently have in beta the Bonsai Run table Alright I don't usually hop on it as soon as it starts but this time I did and it was funny because only the most basic of tuning had been done to the table and after playing this much Zen I was like, okay, either I've been playing way too much of Xen and have gotten used to their flipper angles, or there's something severely non-tuned on Banzai Run, and then I got confirmed, oh yeah, it's only been the most basic of tuning. I'm like, okay, thank you, because flipper angles are way wrong. The ball won't go through the flippers, but it won't shoot anywhere near like it should. Yeah.
    35:35
    So, that was kind of interesting. they've since put out another version of it for which I believe a slight amount of tuning might have taken place but I'll tell you what man, this table's a drain monster oh my gosh it is a break out the middle drain it's an out the out lanes drain it drains every which way you can possibly do it there you go, so it's fighting it's doing a classic System 11 table where it's basically vying to kill you every single time. Let me put it to you this way. The replay value on it is 1.8 million.
    36:18
    That's pretty low, but also pretty high for that era table. You know, by the time you got to and this is Pat Lawler's table, this is his first table. By the time you got to Whirlwind, you were up to a 7 million replay value. Yes. the table's not chintzy with points it's just brutal the points are there to be scored if you can manage not to drain out within the first 20 seconds of your play game fight classic system 11 I love it the brutality of the table is going to be fun to play the big question, how does the vertical play field work?
    37:01
    so the You lock the ball in the capture. You see the little motorcycle come down and grab the ball. As the motorcycle goes up, then the camera tilts up to the vertical playfield. Oh, that's nice.
    37:17
    And then once you're done with the vertical playfield and the ball drops, it does a real quick whoop down. Oh, good. So it's a scroll up and down. It's not just a cut to the other playfield. Yeah, no. We were concerned about that last week. we're going, oh, it's got to actually do that quick drop down because that's how fast the ball descends back down the table again. That being said, I did have a session today where I was playing it and the ball went through the flipper tip as you're flipping, which that used to happen quite a lot. And they're still working on collision detection and everything. So on the upper play field there's multiple flippers everywhere, but there's only one spot where there's the traditional two flipper layout. And there's a post in the between that usually is out but can also retract. Right.
    38:09
    So just as I flipped the ball, the ball went through the flipper, and then the post retracted. And so the ball clearly went down to the lower play field, but the camera never panned down with it. And then all of a sudden I got the ball over music. And I went, hey, I didn't even get a chance to flip on that. Yeah, it went too quick through the flippers. Or it didn't go down through the expected path that was triggering the camera switch. Right, right. So I put in my report about that, and hopefully that kind of thing will be taken care of. Like I said, I know that there's still some collision issues and things. There's a long list of things that PinballWiz45B has posted in the beta thread that need to be addressed.
    38:56
    But it's there. It's functioning. It's working. and so far it feels like they're on the right track.
    39:07
    Once they get the final tuning in, I think it'll be much more fun. Right now there is, you know, some rubber are bouncy, some rubber are very flat.
    39:18
    So, you know. It just feels wrong. Yeah, it just doesn't feel quite right at the moment. Yeah. I think they're waiting to get at least a minimum level of tuning in before they release it on Android beta because we haven't seen it come through yet. I'd say that it's probably going to be towards the end of this coming week, I would think, because it seems like they do a lot of the hard work on Steam now.
    39:42
    And then once they got it to a minimum level of functionality on Steam, they then port it over and build it for the other platforms.
    39:51
    Yeah. Okay. Beyond that, that was all that's all we filled virtually all of our podcasts with pinball talk that's all the pinball talk that we had it's all the pinball talk it's all the pinball talk I've been doing a bit of investigation with how to do the play field, we were talking last time that Star Race has got the clear coat of Verathane over the top now and it is looking pretty good but I found that there's this place called Super Cheap Auto here that actually has their own range of automotive clears and automotive base.
    40:32
    And I am curious because they sell the clear in both spray bomb and tins. And you can buy very small quantities of it. So you can buy, I think, 200 millilitres, 500 millilitres in one litre amounts, which, you know, if I'm just doing white and black, which is my original plan, you know, would actually be quite good. And I managed to find the other day our hardware chain here, which is a bit like Home Depot. It's called Bunnings.
    41:08
    They have an airbrush and compressor set for $98. And it's just basically, yeah, a compressor with like an airbrush on the end of it. and so I got one of them, and I'm going to have a go at airbrushing, I think. But I'm going to use – I'm going to think – I'm going to go along and have a look at this Super Cheap Auto range because they can match colors. They mix and match colors for you there as well. So it's essentially like your Home Depot paint matching paint center, but for cars or for car automotive colors. So, yeah, potentially.
    41:50
    And I figure that if I use the same system, I use the actual colour and then go with clear, there should be zero risk of bleeding. Right. And I think they actually have acrylic and enamel options.
    42:05
    So if you want to use water-based, you can. If you want to use enamel, you can. So oil-based. So it seems like they've got you covered as far as what you want to do for your touch-up and your bumper bar. so I figure well let's try it out and see what happens give it a go I do have to go and get some frisket though and that's hard to come by here there's only a few places that actually sell it so I have to it's not cheap it's like $40 or $50 a roll so I know it's really expensive so I'm tempted just to go the cheap way and use masking tape but I'm sure that even if I got really good quality masking tape I'm sure I'd regret doing that.
    42:46
    Yeah, I mean, because when I put down my first kit, I was... The only nice thing is it's clear. And therefore, with me and my razor blade, I was able to cut precision.
    42:58
    I mean, I was doing some pinstripes that were on the table. And being able to successfully cut those out, I would have never been able to do that with laying down masking tape. It never would have happened. Yeah. I think I just need to go and get a roll. Just assemble the stuff I need, get it all together, and then start going over it. What if you ordered it off of Amazon?
    43:26
    Well, I mean, there are places that do sell it online in Australia. Yeah. Like, you can get it, but you can get either a roll of it or you can get A4 sheets, so, like, letter-size paper sheets of it. So I'd be getting a roll. and then just basically using some butcher's paper to fill the voids where I don't need to actually mask and save money that way. So really it'll only be the – I'll be doing the white first and then doing the black. So it's really all the areas that will be under the plastic that I need to do first. And based on the success of that and how it looks and how it performs, then I'll probably look at maybe exploring some of the other colours. and it might be that I actually just take the entire play field over to them and get them to put them under the spectral analyzer and say, right, what color is that? And then they can match it pretty much one for one. Yeah. So it might be the clumsy way of doing it, but certainly probably the most accurate way of doing it. Right, right. So I might be able to do it like that. I don't know. All right. Well, good luck with that. I've still got to inventory all the parts I need to order and I think it's probably going to be an order placed through Pinball Resource.
    44:41
    And, of course, with that, it's a bit of a punishment for overseas customers because you've got to kind of do a small order first, and then he basically confirms it gets to you, and then you pay, and then you can do a bigger order after that. So that's a bit of a pain, but I think for what I need to order, it probably will make sense to do that. I'm going to be placing an order with him too because this week is my birthday and I need to spend some money on some pinball stuff. So what do you think you're going to get? Like I said, I need to replace all my drop targets and get new drop targets.
    45:17
    So for sure I going to be ordering that And I forget what the other thing was is that I that I wanted to Oh I I need to buy light bulbs Light bulbs. Yeah. I need to just buy a big old box of those light bulbs and, uh, and have them. Cause I have thrown away probably about, I don't know, 15 or 20 bulbs that were burned out and I just had nothing to replace them with. And so I was kind of taking them out of the back box, figuring that's the last place I need them and putting them on the table. But I'm of the mind that I just need to buy enough to replace every single one on the table and do just that.
    45:59
    Start fresh instead of waiting to see if one goes. Oh, geez. I've done that on, well, obviously, when you're doing a playfield restoration, you remove all the bulbs anyhow. But, geez, I can tell you with very high confidence that every single bulb on that table was blown. Like, every bulb. There was not one that I could salvage on it. The bummer is with 8-Ball Deluxe, it's not the, I guess they call it, bayonet style. Yeah. It's not that. It's the tapered style. Or the screw-ins. No, they're not screw-in. It tapers into a flat wedge, basically, that that's what you put in. And so removing them is a task because some of them get stuck in there and it's not like you just push in and twist and it springs out. You've got to get your fingers on them good and try and pull, but you don't want to pinch so hard that you break the bulb. And breaking bulbs, I've already broken a couple bulbs that way too. Yeah, they're a pain. They're a real pain to get out, those wedge-style connectors.
    47:09
    I think that's what I need to order that And then I need to, I believe it's Big Daddy. I forget what the rest of the, I have it bookmarked. But anyway, I need to get all the new connectors. Oh, yes. And change out all those. And hopefully, like I said, fingers crossed, if I change out all the connectors, that should hopefully solve the lights that aren't lighting, even though they used to light, but now they're not lighting. And I don't know why it's not a dead bulb. at some other... We traced it back to a particular area.
    47:44
    And like I said, I think the conclusion was that it's the connector. That's the issue. And then hopefully it also corrects... At some points, I'd get this electronic voltage hum that would go away. Hopefully it will correct that. And then also that it will correct, even though I haven't... The last couple of times I've played the table, it hasn't done it. issue that I was having where after knocking down all the drop targets and then going for the deluxe stand-up targets, if I hit the D target, it would then just start scoring over and over and over again for unknown reasons.
    48:25
    So hopefully that's all just a connector thing. And if I can... The problem is that whenever you go into the troubleshooting of these tables, the first thing everybody asks, did you change the connectors? Did you change the capacitors? Yes, exactly. All the things that I told you to do in the past.
    48:46
    It's just like, okay, fine. I'll go change all the connectors and I might even change the capacitors even though I think I was told that they were fairly new.
    48:55
    But new is relative when I know that the person that owned it previously didn't change them and he had the table for 12 years.
    49:03
    That's not new. Yeah, you know. New and functional. So anyway, yeah, so that's what I need to drop money on. Yeah. New to this millennium. That'll be my birthday present to me. Well, that's good. That sounds very good. Sounds like we've got some jobs to do.
    49:21
    Oh, yeah, I guess we do. Okay. I guess we'll take care of those jobs. All right, do we have anything else to discuss?
    49:28
    I don't think so. No? You don't want to get into mass shootings and, you know, arming teachers? Okay, good. No, no, I really don't. Well, we'll spare all of you that, and we'll say our goodbyes. Hey, make sure you check out our website. It is blockadepinball.com slash episodes. There you will find all of the past episodes that we have, as well as if you click articles, you'll see all the movie reviews that I've been writing up, and I'll be having a special one for the Oscars coming up. And also make sure you follow us on Twitter. the show's handle is at Blockade.
    50:08
    There's where we announce things like the Zen tournament, as well as when we go ahead and record this show, if you ever want to pop in and listen to it live, and not subject yourself to Jared's editing.
    50:22
    Have it raw. Have it raw, and then see our lovely faces and whatever t-shirts we're wearing. You can join us that way. otherwise you can also follow us individually Jared is at Jared Morgz I am at ShutYourTrap and I think that covers everything pretty much alright fantastic well folks we will talk to you again next week don't know about what probably just about more of what we're playing so why don't you all play some pinball too and then we'll all know what be on the same page alright until then we'll talk to you later see ya wizard amusement.com the site to visit for custom pinball shooter bugs easy to install totally unique mention blockade podcast for 10 off your order wizard amusement.com sales restoration customization don't forget to leave a review on itunes or your favorite podcast hosting service that blockade is delivered to we can't improve unless you tell us how now stop listening and play some pinball.
    51:28
    There's this guy over here on ads for a tile store, and he's called Frank Walker, and the company is National Tiles. And I'm well known at work for doing an impression of Frank Walker. He has this telltale greeting that as soon as you hear it, you know it's a National Tiles ad. And it's a bit like this, Hello, Frank Walker from National Tiles, like that. So I always walk around the office and when everyone says, hi, how are you going? I go, hello.
    52:01
    And now everyone's doing it at work. It's fantastic. It's funny how those little regional, I don't know if he's regional necessarily, but you used to have these small companies that they would have their pitch man that you would, they were wildly famous. Yeah, they were wildly famous in that particular area. But you go outside of the area, other parts of the country, and they're like, What are you talking about? He's on like every single commercial ever. Exactly. We've had a few of those here in Southern California. And the one that's still going on so many, so many years later, there is a mattress store called Sit and Sleep. And they have their the running gag has always been there's the owner, Larry, who wants to just slash prices. And then there's his accountant, and I forget what his accountant's name is, Irving, I think, who's always telling him, you're going to bankrupt us if you knock the prices down. So the end of the thing is Larry going, sit and sleep with Matt Jane. Other mattress price or your mattress is free.
    53:16
    And then his accountant's thing is always, Larry, and he's this New York Jewish sounding Bronx guy. He's always, you're killing me, Larry!
    53:36
    That's funny as. It's one of those things, you know, another thing that we always know, how to tell if you grew up in Southern California, there was a used car dealer,
    53:45
    Cal Worthington, and he had a song that went along with his thing. In Cal Worthington, it was this old guy dressed in a cowboy outfit, and he'd be walking down the row of cars going, check out this 1978 Mercury. It's got air and power steering. It's $1,600. Now, next. And he just walked down the aisle of cars, and they all had their prices. That was his car show. And then the last thing he would do would be, it was Cal Worthington in his dog's spot. Well, his dog's spot was a tiger that would always be sitting on the hood of the last car that he got to.
    54:24
    Cal Worthington had a song, and now I always altered the ending because I thought it was funnier, but I'll edit it for you guys. It was, if you need a car or truck, go see Cal. If you want to save a buck, go see Cal. If you're down on your luck and you don't give a go see Cal, go see Cal, go see Cal. That's what I always put in there.
    54:43
    The funny thing is So it was ghosty cow, right? But as a kid, that's not what I heard. As a kid, I heard pussy cow. Pussy cow. What the heck is a pussy cow?
    54:55
    And if you talk to anybody that grew up with those commercials, they'll all agree. Oh, yeah, that's totally what was being said.
    55:05
    That's hilarious. I love those old-timey pitchmen. It's crazy. Oh, yeah, the city that I live in now. So you've got to go back to the 90s when big screen projection TVs were all the rage.
    55:23
    And Mitsubishi was kind of the crown jewel of who was putting out projection TVs. And so in our city of La Habra, there was Paul's Big Screen. And Paul's Big Screen had been there forever. It was their only location, but their whole thing was, we'll deliver anywhere in Southern California. Yeah. And he is at the end of all his commercials. He'd always go, I am the king. And so one of there's there was this one camera operator who knew where I was from. And so whenever he saw me, he was like, so how's the king doing?
    56:01
    He's still there. King's doing fine or whatever. Well, the king eventually died. And so then I go into work one day. Oh, I was the king dead. Oh, oh, I'm sorry to hear that. kid you not within a year i think maybe two whole company gone really because his kids didn't want they just want to sell they didn't want to keep up with it oh wow so this family business has been going for like 20 years or so oh longer than that oh really yeah yeah it'd been going for a long time. Now, they also suffered from the plague of he died just as flat panels were really coming into their own. So the rear projections were going away anyway. So his profit margins were probably just, I mean, there's no way he could compete against your big box stores and Amazon and all that. Yeah, true. So really it was just a sign of the times when businesses just naturally decay and die a silent death. That's a real shame though, isn't it?
    57:07
    It's funny though, because all those pitchmen always said, they're crazy! Art Price is crazy! It was like, why are you all insane? I don't get it.
    57:15
    Before we start actually talking about real pinball, there's this one almost infamous ad here in, I think it's Australia or it might be Queensland because I think it's a Queensland-based chain, but it's like this rugs-a-million store. like the Persian rugs shops.
    57:36
    And these guys, they're always on sale, and they're always closing down. No, no, no. I have a theory about this. I defy anybody to find a piano store or a furniture store that is not closing. Yeah, exactly. And to the point that we even had a furniture store that – and the thing is that we're going out of business, maybe not for the next 10 years, but we're going to go out of business. That's right. Because who wants to actually walk into a piano store or walk into a furniture store unless they think, wait a second, they're closing, maybe this stuff was at a discount, I'll go in, you know. But we had a furniture store that had been threatening to close for probably five years. It finally closed. I was like, oh my gosh, it's actually vacated. A month later, a new furniture store went into it. I went, yeah, because the old furniture store was so successful in that location. But okay, fine. They went in. Not two months later, going out of business sign went up.
    58:36
    Probably the same company. And that's where my theory kind of was like, you know what? I think that's just a sales tactic. It has nothing to do with whether it's actually happening. I would actually like to go and look on one of those sales websites. You have ways to sell your business. I reckon that will be one of them. Always going out of sale tactic is actually a valuable thing.
    58:57
    Yeah, anyhow. Anyhow. You know, we never know how the show is going to start because it's just basically me and Jared, you know. Just having a chat. Yeah, just having a chat. And it always cracks me up the directions that we go. I know, I love it. Now, what I have been doing in the past is I've been in the past episode when we really were going off track with Pinball. I actually put this in a segment of the show called The Warm Up, and I put it right at the end of the show after the show notes. Yeah, because Jared doesn't trust you guys will actually sit through five minutes of banter, but okay.
    59:33
    No, so it's fun. So The Warm Up goes at the end of the show now because that's how it is. That's The Warm Up. That's the wind down. But it's okay. Sometimes we actually have a wind down also, so then you have a warm up through the wind down. That doesn't make sense. Anyway.
    59:48
    It worked last time. Well, no one complains, so that's a good sign. No one complains. Nobody praises us. You know, we're lucky if we hear anything. But, you know.
    59:58
    So there you go, folks. If you like hearing the banter that we start the show with at the end of the show, then go ahead and let us know. If you prefer the opening banter not be at the end of the show, but be at the opening, like where we record it, then let us know. And how do you let us know? by dropping an email at blahblahblockade at gmail.com.
    60:24
    Yeah. All right.