Journalist Tool

Kineticist

  • HDashboard
  • IItems
  • ↓Ingest
  • SSources
  • KBeats
  • BBriefs
  • RIntel
  • QSearch
  • AActivity
  • +Health
  • ?Guide

v0.1.0

← Back to items

American Pinball......Assemble.

Cary Hardy YouTube Live Streams·video·analyzed·Mar 12, 2026
View original
Export .md

Analysis

claude-haiku-4-5-20251001 · $0.034

TL;DR

American Pinball hires Rob Rath and Nick Neitzel; signals remake strategy led by Melvin Williams.

Summary

Cary Hardy announces American Pinball's major hires: Rob Rath (founder of Electric Playground toppers) as product director and Nick Neitzel (Tony Hawk Pro Skater homebrew designer) as product designer, signaling strategic expansion. AP is pursuing game remakes/reimaginings (strongly rumored to be Circus Voltaire as the first title) alongside original IP, with Melvin Williams as creative director. The Electric Playground simultaneously expands operations in St. Louis and scales staffing. Hardy discusses quality concerns with previous licensee Pedretti, Pokemon Pinball hardware issues with orbit alignment, and Spooky's upcoming unannounced title securing licensing for Jump in the Line.

Key Claims

  • Rob Rath has joined American Pinball as product director, overseeing planning, budgeting, marketing, and go-to-market strategy

    high confidence · Official American Pinball PR statement read by Cary Hardy; confirmed on Facebook

  • Nick Neitzel has joined American Pinball as product designer and is already working on an upcoming game release

    high confidence · Official American Pinball PR statement read by Cary Hardy; confirmed on Facebook

  • American Pinball's first release will be a reimagining (not an original IP), likely Circus Voltaire

    medium confidence · Cary Hardy interpretation of chat speculation and industry sources; not officially confirmed by AP

  • The Electric Playground is expanding operations to St. Louis and hiring additional staff (Michael Wangeren, Troy Oden, John Miller promoted, Dustin Howell as operations manager), bringing total team to 12

    high confidence · Official Electric Playground PR statement read by Cary Hardy

  • Rob Rath will continue as general manager of Electric Playground while serving as product director at American Pinball

    high confidence · Official Electric Playground PR statement

  • Pokemon Pinball has a hardware issue with the outer left orbit causing misalignment and ball clunking into the middle drain

    medium confidence · Chat reports and Cary Hardy's Patreon members describing the issue; not officially confirmed by Stern

  • Spooky Pinball secured Jump in the Line song licensing for Beetlejuice and will include it in the next code update

    high confidence · Announced last night (per Hardy), confirmed in stream chat; licensing negotiation was expensive

  • Melvin Williams has a good relationship with sculptor Lior and AP games will likely feature Lior-quality sculpts

    medium confidence · Cary Hardy speculation based on industry knowledge; not officially confirmed

Notable Quotes

  • “Rob Rath is joining the AP team as product director where he will oversee the planning, budgeting, marketing, and go-to market strategy for many of their upcoming titles. He will also assist with game story and rules design.”

    American Pinball Official PR@ 13:49 — Formal announcement of key hire signaling strategic product direction shift

  • “Nick Neitzel is joining the AP team as product designer. He is already working on an upcoming game release and will be involved in the development of many more to come.”

    American Pinball Official PR@ 14:03 — Confirms homebrew designer joining production; hints at active pipeline

  • “We are excited to share some major news. American Pinball is rapidly expanding their team and capabilities, and we are proud to become a key part of that growth on multiple fronts.”

    Electric Playground Official PR@ 14:41 — Signals strategic partnership deepening between EP and AP

  • “With the reimaginings getting redone, remakes coming out, that means that there is going to be a lot more parts readily available because the parts are going to be coming from Rick over there at Planetary and they are only going to be making parts if there is demand for them.”

    Cary Hardy@ 31:55 — Strategic analysis of how remakes benefit parts ecosystem and original owner community

  • “I think we're definitely going to see a good boost in what's going on with American Pinball. And it seems like right now Brian is going around and assembling his team... It's all a matter of seeing talent and snatching it before anybody else does.”

    Cary Hardy@ 22:34 — Interprets hiring spree as strategic talent acquisition mirroring Stern's approach with designers like Keith Elwin

Entities

Cary HardypersonRob RathpersonNick NeitzelpersonMelvin WilliamspersonBrian AllenpersonRickpersonAmerican Pinballcompany

Signals

  • ?

    personnel_signal: Rob Rath (Electric Playground founder) joins American Pinball as product director with oversight of planning, budgeting, marketing, and game design; signals AP is prioritizing product strategy and manufacturing coordination

    high · Official AP PR announcement

  • ?

    personnel_signal: Nick Neitzel (Tony Hawk Pro Skater homebrew designer) hired as product designer at AP, already on active project; signals strategic recruitment of homebrew talent into commercial manufacturing

    high · Official AP PR; already working on upcoming game

  • ?

    manufacturing_signal: Electric Playground expanding St. Louis operations, hiring assembly technicians and operations manager, growing team from 9 to 12; signals increased production capacity for AP partnership and custom toppers

    high · Official EP PR with specific hires named: Michael Wangeren, Troy Oden, John Miller, Dustin Howell

  • ?

    product_strategy: AP pursuing remake/reimagining strategy focused on 1990s+ games (due to CAD availability); using Planetary as parts supplier; first title strongly rumored to be Circus Voltaire

    medium · Hardy's analysis based on industry sources and chat speculation; EP topper for Circus Voltaire created

  • $

    market_signal: Potential shift of remake licensing from Pedretti to American Pinball; Circus Voltaire and possibly Theater of Magic/Circus Voltaire migrating; Hardy speculates Pedretti quality or speed concerns drove the change

    low · Hardy's speculation based on rumor and EP's Circus Voltaire topper creation; not officially confirmed

Topics

American Pinball Strategic Hiring and ExpansionprimaryGame Remakes/Reimaginings Strategy and Production PipelineprimaryElectric Playground-American Pinball PartnershipprimaryManufacturing Quality and Parts SourcingprimaryLicensing and IP Acquisition SpeculationsecondaryPokemon Pinball Hardware IssuessecondarySpooky Pinball Upcoming Title Scarcity and Distributor StrategysecondaryMusic Licensing Costs and Negotiationsmentioned

Sentiment

neutral(0)

Transcript

youtube_groq_whisper · $0.184

Tom Nitzler , Ion Mark O'Leary, Participants for NIGHT BALL SHOW contestant for Eisner & Sandbrich and Ovagohthalene buat babies engine, Jon Cross,fu bndskip, Tim Kitzrow sentthe video Cody Lanier, Johnny Ellen Schumacher, Jon Krieger Tony Laurie DeMille Leclerc, Robert Green, yükinhas producciones Helen, Terry Posner, projects facial effects creating Gamesn invoke tune patchcut when music plays. Turns out Stern was like, gotcha bitch. I just, I'm trying to wrap my head around this. Maybe they've learned something from every game and this time it'll be different. What? What the f- I gotta show everybody my wiener. Here's my wiener. Here's your wiener. I mean it's basically a Led Zeppelin jukebox with flippers. The game is going to sell. He just did a mic drop and then walked the hell out of the room. That's big dick energy if I've ever seen it. It's pinball. It shouldn't be too serious. I mean if you take pinball to a serious level, you get the Godfather. Lie back down. I know I'm gonna get some hate from those of you out there that are probably doing it, but that's what it is. The back glass says Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles right there at the top and four inches up. If that, the title's there again. That makes no sense. And I mean what's concerning to me is that through the whole build process, no one brought it up that hey, maybe we should make this a little bit better. No one mentioned it? We believe this idea to be the best course of action for us and for you, but mainly because it's gonna cost us nothing. We need to find out what these suckers will pay for a crappy product that your toddler drew for us. She draws on a first grade level. And the thing is, I know one of the people over social media has informed me that a lot of the times, at least as of three years ago, majority of the things that I would post or say to them was f***ing blocked. Why are you promoting and asking for deposits on a game that's still six months out? What's going on ladies and jelly spoons welcome to the channel where I talk and do everything pinball so if you haven't already then be sure to hit the subscribe button down below so as the title of this live states American pinball a symbol so this is what's going on the The information is literally about to drop from like their Facebook and be sent out here in the next five minutes. And I kind of want to temper your expectations. Don't think because I'm going live that this is something massive like, oh, it's a game changer for American pinball. I know it's merely because I don't have the time to actually do a recording and editing and get that all out this morning. That's just not going to happen. So we're going to do it live and we're going to just discuss, you know, the findings as feminist. I'm presidente of io.com. Before I, until hopefully, maybe not until he's elsewhere. Come on in beautiful. You done just heard the mayor of the national football championship voice iPod the Myr Pinball. businessman John Magnus 1956. Theodore Giggity Robert D.OMON ん'AL What's the best pinball game in an era? So what's going on, Sterling? So chances are, like I said, let me go to American Pinball's Facebook page. They're gonna drop it in the next couple of minutes. And even if I go a minute or two early, it's not gonna be a big deal or anything. So they haven't dropped it yet. But I think this is definitely going to be a very good add to the team on a couple of different levels. And like I said, once we go over it, then you'll understand why. I think it opens up a couple of avenues down the road for them. Can't wait for TPF. Hope to meet you there. You should see me. And I guess I can show that right now here on chat. If you find me at Texas Pinball Festival, be sure to ask for one. But I do have a limited amount. I say limited, I don't know. But I do have some Pokemon related Texas Pinball Festival hearty stickers. Now I say Pokemon related, but I'm guessing there's some Pokemon issues going on right Now that they're getting out into the public and then we can discuss that here in a bit. But I guess I'm unknown to this orbit issue on Pokemon, but I'm seeing it now. There's some rumblings going on that something needs to be fixed. Any issues with Pokemons out there? Can you send me a sticker for my phone booth? Brian, I'll set one aside for you. You've sent me a shirt. It's the least I can do is send you a sticker for crying out loud. Let me make sure I set one aside. If not, I can always order these, but my plan is for these shows that I go to, to make them one based on the show. You can see it. Well, it's crap right here, but it says Texas Pinball Festival, 2026. And then I'll try to make it themed after a certain game that is being released at that point in time as well. Kind of like what Spooky's doing with their magnetic decals for their flipper buttons. Fix is not back. I will confirm that right here and now. Let me refresh their page. Like I don't want to drop it early kind of thing, but it's just about there so we'll discuss it. I'm gonna bring up my email. It's like one minute till. Oh my gosh. He thinks I said his name back there. All right. So it's pretty much 10 o'clock guys. Let's go through this. Let's do the initial news right here. Let me bring this up. All right, bring it up, bring it up, bring it up. Open. All right. So two new people have joined American pinball guys, and you may know them. They are well known in this industry slash hobby. Thank you very much, Scott, for the $2. Let's go to my main display here. See what we got. So American Pinball has added Rob Rath as their product director. For those that do not know who Rob is, Rob is one of the main guys at the electric playground. He does the toppers. You've seen the toppers. Everybody should be well aware of that. I got some footage right here. So in case you get a better visual of who Rob is, I'm going to be bringing in, I say bringing in, but I'm going to be utilizing Some of the Dirty Pools stuff right here. So Rob is the one obviously on the right. You may have seen him at shows. He's done toppers for King Kong, the Alice in Wonderland add on, Twilight Zone was their initial first one. They've done a number of things. Rob Ratz sounds like a skateboarder's name. Funny that you mentioned a skateboarder's name because the other member has been added to their team. Any guesses? Nick Neitzel. Nick Neitzel has been very well known for creating the Tony Hawk Pro Skater homebrew and he has been working with the electric playground. I want to say for the last at least year I want to say about that maybe even longer so obviously that is the big question are they are they because that was the big you know question whenever ryan got hired at american pinball was like hey art does that mean that they're going to be doing a sonic kind of thing and obviously that turned out for the best i think I'm very happy that, you know, Jersey Jack is going to be doing Sonic because if, let's just face it, if American did have Sonic, do you think we'd have it right now? Do you think it would be coming out this year? No. So here's some footage from Doug at Cool Toy using his video right here to give you an idea of what Nick is capable of when it comes to designing a very interesting and intriguing layout on a theme that I, I love. I say love meaning it's literally the first Tony Hawk Pro Skater game which is essentially the only one that I really know. But does this mean that they will be doing Tony Hawk's Pro Skater down the road? Maybe. I honestly do not know. But it's always going to be on the mind of like are they going to be doing that? So along with that I do have some PR stuff right here because I know that a lot of you are going to have some questions. What does this mean for the electric playground? What does this mean for American Pinball or whatever? So let's cover American Pinball's PR first, if I bring it up correctly. All right. So they say we have some new team members announcements coming out. Rob Rath is joining the team at AP as product director, where he will oversee the planning, budgeting, marketing, and go-to market strategy for many of their upcoming titles. He will also assist with game story and rules design. Nick Neitzel is joining the AP team as product designer. He is already working on an upcoming game release and will be involved in the development of many more to come. Now when it comes to what's going on at the electric playground, let's bring this up. This is a lot guys. So matter of fact, while I'm reading this, let me give you something else to look at instead of my face. Let's go back to looking at the Tony Hawk Pro Skater again. So as we kick off our fourth year in business, this is a PR from the Electric Playground, by the way. We are excited to share some major news. American Pinball is rapidly expanding their team and capabilities, and we are proud to become a key part of that growth on multiple fronts. Rob Rath and Nick Neitzel will be joining the forces with American Pinball's talents, The new era we are simultaneously expanding our operations in St Louis Missouri and promoting several key team members who have been the backbone of our growth Read on for more details. So, it continues. Game Design at American Pinball. Rob and Nick are joining the American Pinball team, working alongside their new creative director, Melvin Williams, To bring a slate of remakes and original titles to life over the coming years. Rob Rath is joining the AP team as product director where he will oversee the planning, budgeting, marketing, I said this earlier, I said that earlier. Okay, future toppers for the electric playground. We aren't slowing down. We will continue to design and manufacture our toppers experiences in St. Louis for both classic games, new industry releases, and of course, various new AP releases. And now, let's keep an eye out for the first collaborative project with AP later this year. With more work on the horizon, we are scaling up to ensure our quality and speed remain top tier. So co-founder Alec is stepping into a more active role as creative and brand manager, where he will push the creative boundaries of our future topper designs. And they are pleased to announce that John Miller, who has been with the company since The team will be joined by our new production manager and Dustin Howell, who will take on the role of operations manager. Please join in welcoming our new assembly technicians, Michael Wangeren, Troy Oden, and bringing our total team count now to 12. Rob will continue to serve as general manager of the electric playground, ensuring that Our collaboration with American Pinball and our independent work on custom toppers continue to thrive in tandem. So, yeah, that is the basic. News right there in regards to what's going on with the electric playground and what's going on with American Pinball. So let me make sure I believe they probably have dropped this information on their Facebook page. Yes, it is now officially out on their Facebook page. So there we go. That is the information. Let's discuss ladies and jelly spoons. Let me, uh, expand my chat here so I can read it. Let me bring it up right here. So I want to keep looking over there. All right. I'm already out. Picks would have been better. Oh my God. Like Rob's Taubers, asking for theater of magic. You know, it's funny Scott, there's certain games that I was pretty sure that were being done by somebody else and supposedly, if rumors are correct, then American Pinball's got it. So I don't know anymore on who's got what. I think something has swayed, something has moved, whether it be an agreement with Planetary and Pedretti and American Pinball, that's all behind the scenes information that I do not and I'm not privy to kind of thing. But I know at some point in time, a certain company had particular titles, maybe including Theater of Magic, maybe including Circus Voltaire, and supposedly now American Pinball is doing Circus Voltaire. So, who knows? Let's just throw spaghetti against the wall. Let's speculate. Free to do so because I don't know the truth here. Maybe Pedretti wasn't putting out the games fast enough or up to standards and maybe Rick was like, hey, I'm pulling this and we're going to give it to AP. I don't know. Again, full speculation there. Don't take that to the bank. I mean, if I had the ability to do that, I would. I mean, I'm not trying to shit on you here, Pedretti or anything, but at least we won't have to worry about, you know, tariffs and prices and everything like that in regards to American pinball games. We need more Hot Wheels. I like it. Solid additions. Good to hire new talent, younger guys too. Centaur would be nice. I hope we can see something that sells more than 300 games from AP. Unless Bug is the best actor in the world, Spooky does not have Dungeon Crawler Carl. I'm a fan of Pinball license. Posting that on pin side now. Yeah, that's all it takes guys is a couple of like, this is what I heard. What if two companies make the same title? I don't see that as being legally possible. I think that would look poorly on two manufacturers and mainly the licensee. If the licensee puts out their IP to two different people, I think that makes it look mainly poor on them. I feel the quality from Pedretti is subpar. And this ongoing discussion when it comes to what's going on with Pedretti is that a lot of people, not just me, have played Funhaus. And although it plays very close to an original, there is a different feeling to it. And I think that feeling is substandard quality parts, whereas the originals, as well as what you're going to see from Rick at Planetary, are the standard, how it's always been, Williams. I did not say his name, but he thinks I did. Doesn't it hurts also whenever he does that, because I think that he's, it's, I don't know, just scares me when he starts talking behind me. But where the hell was I talking about? But the standard of parts is more than likely not up to snuff. And I think we're gonna see definitely an increase in quality when it comes to these reimaginings that American Pinball is gonna be doing for a couple of reasons. One, they're already located here in the States, so there's not gonna be worried about having to like, you know, imports and tariffs and prices and stuff like that. And American Pinballs had a good reputation for quality. Now, I say quality meaning the quality materials. Don't say, well, Kerry, what about barbecue? Like, no, I'm not saying the quality of gameplay. I'm saying the quality of the hardware kind of thing. And then you have Galactic Tank Force with the targets that were bending back. That was released a little too soon, I think. They should have had that bracket installed before the game released. But the bracket came in and that fixed that problem. But we have got a Melvin Williams that's on the team at American Pinball and he is anything but very like you know like about quality. He wants quality materials in his game. He doesn't want subpar stuff. And for those that are going to Texas Pinball Festival, he will be there along with I believe Rob's gonna be there, Nick Neitzel, All these new additions to AP will be there at Texas Pinball and I'm sure they're going to have a seminar discussing their future and everything in this industry. But I think we're definitely going to see a good boost in what's going on with American Pinball. And it seems like right now Brian is going around and assembling his team. And I think a good chunk of that assembling is gathering this talent that is out there. And this is something that it's not it's not unfamiliar with what manufacturers do. Stern's done this. They did this with, you know, Keith Elwin and a number of other people that they have on their team. It's all a matter of seeing talent and snatching it before anybody else does. Hoping for less visible 3D printed parts on the top side of playfield, unlike GTF. I mean, I get you. I don't think we're going to see 3D printed parts, at least on their reimagining games. I would like to hope so that we're not going to see that but the fact of the matter is 3d printing isn't going to go anywhere it's only getting better and better when it comes to what their capabilities their speed of it and the strength of it is kind of thing so if you don't like 3d printed parts and I don't know what to tell you it's gonna be more and more common in pinball because why send out for parts I refuse to speak against this until you believe it, breaks the public silence, G-igaomas, St pokemon Inc. I'm innocent. ACTION Read Gary Hart live in the room. Nearly pooped myself. Alright, well thanks for joining the chat there, Stringer, and thanks for the information. And the two dollars, obviously. Start using back alley creations for sculpts. Well, here's the thing. I don't think we're going to see back alley creations, I think, since Melvin has joined American Pinball. And Melvin has a very good relationship with Lior. I suspect, I honestly do not know for a fact here, but I suspect that if we get sculpts, they're going to be Lior quality. So there you go on that. Any other comments, questions in regards to what's going on with American Pinball and what we kind of hope to see? I mean, obviously the first game we're going to be seeing is highly rumored and strong points are pointing it to being Circus Voltaire. I can't say with 100% certainty on this kind of thing, but from what information I'm getting, it's Circus Voltaire. Now that sucks. And see, the thing is, Foolish Heartband, I have an individual on my Patreon who basically kind of says the same thing with his Funhaus. He had nothing but problems with it. And enough problems to where he was like not doing Pedretti again type of thing. Thought their first release would be an IP? No, they specified their first release was going to be a reimagining. And the reimagining is going to be more than likely Circus Voltaire, and that's going to be filling the gap while they develop and create their first IP game. I'm not sure if it's gonna be original or if it's gonna be something you know that Nick is working on or what kind of thing let me just let me just get him going so that way he'll stop thinking i'm saying his name Beetlejuice i'm gonna say it once more Beetlejuice Betelgeuse. Betelgeuse! You know, this is what I talked about when it comes to... This is what I'm talking about when it comes to the quality of the damn frickin' The Voice stuff. It's not 100%! It hears it! Betelgeuse. There we go, alright! The thing is, like, my daughter can come in here and she'll say his name three times, like, in a row. Beetlejuice, Beetlejuice, Beetlejuice. And then he just comes to life. And it's like, it's, sometimes it works flawless. And there's other times where it's just about as bad as my Alexa. Let's see here, where were we at? American Pinball is doing remakes, they're calling them reimaginings. So, I would say the reimaginings are going to be more than likely in your 90s range. And at least in the beginning, because I don't see them being able to put out an older game than that before they had CAD and everything on the computer. So I know someone mentioned earlier having Centaur. And the only reason why Haggis was even able to do Fathom and Centaur is because they had someone literally go through every millimeter of an original playfield Supp sorto Call of Duty 000 How much can you get, let's just say, a Theater Magic, a Jackpot, or a Getaway for right now? Is it... I mean, we're just gonna assume that the pricing of their games are gonna be more than likely at least 8k. I think Circus Voltaire right now is going for about 9, if not more, depending on the quality of it. He doesn't like your accent? Probably not. Cuphead leaked images look neat. Not bringing Ryan back into the fold? No, I don't think Ryan's coming back. Especially since some text messages got leaked out and what he had to say about the company. That's one of the things that you... It's bad that the messages got leaked in the first place. That shouldn't have been done. ≫ But of course that derailed the Third Amendment not just in the 1965 era but throughout theprech life go out there whether the passages go out public publicly or not it just something you shouldn do I mean, and honestly, I think a good example of this would be Tim Sexton when he left Stern. He has not like publicly bashed Stern. Now he's done a little bit of tongue in cheek stuff in his videos. They kind of go, I know what you're talking about there. So by doing these reimaginings forerie minis and other feature products and all I want for today's game today is Blast Gaddis with Blast Casualerte for this at the end of it I want to be able a beat Bruce and now 94Kestje roll because we just up to two games of way. So this is something to think about, is that with the reimaginings getting redone, remakes coming out, that means that there is going to be a lot more parts readily available because more then like the parts some of them are going to be coming from Rick over there at Planetary and they are only going to be making parts if there is demand for them and the demand is always going to be there especially when a company is making Yeah, that's what you gotta think about. It's like, uh, you can get a getaway. Like, my getaway, I might be able to sell mine for maybe six, maybe more. I don't know. I haven't looked at the market for them. I think you can get a decently used one for about four grand. But mine is, mine is, mine is what it is. So I could definitely get more for it. A revenge from Mars? I don't see us doing a revenge from Mars. We've already had an attack from Mars, but I think revenge is not one of those that has a, you know, I don't know, you would have to change a lot of things for that game to be manufacturable again. The Beatlejuice got shake the line? Awesome sauce. Did they? Is that, has that been confirmed that they got the jump in the line? What's going on, Erica? That's what I think about remakes is that they just want to restock on parts that belong to these older classics. I don't think it's just for that, but it's definitely a good thing to have. It would suck to remake a bunch of parts for a particular game and then they just sit there in stock. So it's nice to be able to remake parts, meet a manufacturer's demand, while also meeting demand of people that currently own that game. So it's like a win-win situation for Rick. It makes sense. Sweet! I was wondering if they were going to get that. I was hoping that they would. I'm a little pissed that they didn't text me that. They should have let me know. Probably because I talk shit about their Wi-Fi. Bug day last night, so it's official. Awesome sauce, that's great. That's good to hear. Good morning there, Rich Eyes. Yeah, I missed the Flip N Out stream. I literally got in there at the very end of the stream. I was like, ah, and I chimed in, threw him 10 bucks. And then I had to go through to see what his high score on Beetlejuice was because I'm curious where I stand. And I'm literally only behind Joel's score like 10 million, so I'm doing pretty decent on that. Good. I still need to do better, but I'm up in the average range of what I believe to be a better player than me, so I'm okay. It was revealed last night with Joel and Jared. Very nice. Very nice indeed. Sweet. Because that's one of the reasons why I've got jump in the line playing whenever I boot up the game is because it's not in the game. But I was hoping that they would, like in the whole development process and they were talking about how much that song in general was going to cost. I'm not sure if they came to a better like agreement or what or they were just like F it let's pay it and let's get it in the game but I know at the time it definitely was not something that was cheap so hopefully they came to some kind of like better understanding and they were able to able to like negotiate it down a little bit type of thing but that just shows you right there that spooky right there is is they They really want to immerse you into the themes of their games. They want to give you everything they possibly can. It will be included in the next update, which will be in days. All right, sweet. Looking forward to it. I think my daughter will appreciate that too. Other than AP's new hirings, I'm hearing some rumblings about Pokemon issues. What's going on here, guys? Does anybody know what's going on here? Something to do with the outer orbit? There are some rumblings in my Patreon chat about this, and evidently, let me bring it up right here. Let me scroll down. Something to do with this outer left orbit. I'm guessing it's causing some drains here. It's, I'm guessing when you hit it up there, it's clunking and then going down the middle. Oh, a playfield rail screws out offset. Man. Well, this is the good thing about the pros coming out first and on locations is that they get this and they're able to go, okay, well, let's make adjustments before they get the L.E.'s out. So hopefully this all gets worked out before the L.E. starts shipping to everybody. A reimagined Champion Pub would be a great surprise as climbing a price of late. I think if the price on the secondhand market climbs up to a certain extent, that's when they'll probably see the possibility of doing a reimagining of it. But Champion Pub? Really? Maybe! If the demand is there, you gotta have demand too, so. Leaves a big gap and clunk the ball versus bounce from the post. But yeah, I haven't played Pokemon yet. I should play that at Texas Pinball Festival, so I'll get plenty of time on it there. Undo the screw holding it in, push the lane back in line at the back. Yeah. So it's, if you're somewhat savvy and you know, pinball adjustments and adjusting lanes, it's not a big inconvenience, but it's, it's still there kind of thing. Tell them, make them re-imagine spot hunter and I will be their biggest fan. Oh man, as much as I would like to have like an all new Spy Hunter Sterling, I just don't see that happening. I don't think it's being feasible. Any rumors on what Spooky's next pin is? Since I actually know what their games are, I can't like even speculate, man. Sorry. I'm sorry, I'm not even gonna throw out possibilities or anything, you know, all I can say is chances are if you're currently not on a list with a distributor, then you're probably not gonna get one. And I did this for my patrons about a couple of weeks ago on people think that because they're on a list, then that's a guarantee that they're gonna get a game and it's just not true. It means what it means. It means that you're on a distributor's list. But the distributors do not know at this point in time how many games they're going to be getting. I don't even know for sure that Spooky knows how many of their next game they're gonna make just yet. I know they're gonna be making a little bit more than Beetlejuice. And the price is gonna go up just a little bit. But I think you're gonna see that it's gonna be well worth it. So there's gonna be no problems with people complaining about price especially when they see what this game looks like. So my advice to you is if you may want to ask your distro what position you are on their list and maybe reach out to another distributor to see if you can be on multiple lists and it's not doesn't cost you any money and And all the distros are going to do whenever the game officially gets announced is they'll find out what their allotment is and they're going to start from the top of their list and make phone calls. And then if that person can't say like, all right, I'll put a deposit in or they turn it down, they're going to simply go, all right, and they're going to move on to the next person. It's going to, it's not going to hurt your distros at all, especially with the demand. They're going to move on to the next person, move on to the next person kind of thing. So, but like I said, it's, it's going to be a high demanding title. It looks amazing. And, uh, that's really all I want to say at this point in time. It's so early in the year, guys, I don't want to start amping up something that's coming out literally like seven, eight months away from now kind of thing. All I'm saying is that I think everyone's going to really enjoy it. The game looks awesome. If not Circus Voltaire, then what? I mean, as of right now, that's what all signs and sources are pointing to, is it being Circus Voltaire. My chat just went through the roof. What happened here? I guess I'm getting caught up now. Sorry, guys. The dogs are getting let out. No. You can do that. Uh, yeah. So does Spooky really get Jim on the line? They got Jump on the line. Yes, according to what I'm being told right now, it was announced last night. Yeah, so Gomez is already addressing the issue for Pokemon on the line as we speak. So there you go. My dealer has well over 100 people on Spooky's list. Yeah, I don't know how many, like, people are getting into, like, how many machines are getting shipped to. I would assume that Flip N Out Pinball is one of the larger distros that gets shipped a surplus amount of games. Like they probably have a very long list. And Zach has already mentioned in public on chat that his list is really ridiculously long. But he still doesn't know how many games he's going to get. So just keep that in mind, guys. What about multiple positions? All about multiple positions there, Rusty. Hope is Gremlins, not Goonies. Get on a list if you can, yeah. Electric Playground has a new topper for Circus Voltaire, so that makes sense. Another bullet point of information for you right there, guys, that kind of points to it being Circus Voltaire. And I know that Brian Allen has done artwork. That was his last art package I think for a remake was Circus Voltaire. So I don't know if Brian's gonna be contributing to this next release, but I would like to think that's more than likely plausible. They may do a two-tier system like they like, kind of like Pedretti did. I don't know. Maybe. Greetings, Hellraiser and Spikes coming out of the playfield will be pretty cool. Well, there's already a home pin version of Hellraiser. And I think that was even at a pinball at the beach. The dude that made Tony Hawk homebrew is not with American Pinball. Uh, yeah, he is. The dude that made Tony Hawk pinball homebrew is not with American. Yes he is. Why would you say that? I literally have images right here with his picture and his face and an email stating that he is. So why would you say he's not with American Pinball unless you just don't know that they announced it literally half an hour ago, Blaster Pins? Can't wait to get my Beetlejuice in April, limited R, one of 80. Oh, okay. I was like, mint now. Good old typos. I was, I was like, all right. That's what I was wondering. I'm like typos can are always amazing there's a yeah especially if you do voice to text I've gotten some pretty funny text messages voice to text and I sent some to where I'm just like screw it send it send it they'll figure it out out of curiosity I'm supposed to be streaming on Twitch as well can anybody verify that for me because that is something new that I have started to do let me let me check for real quick I'll see this video was canceled click here to reload player and i don't think it can like load up it says i'm live on there and evidently that me trying to do that with twitch just caused everything else over here to I'm going to throw a fit. Oh my God. What just happened? Let me reload. Don't try to bring up Twitch whenever I'm on YouTube evidently. There we go. Okay. We're back. That shut everything down. It was like, do, do, do air as a curve. It says you're live, but won't reload. Yeah. That's, that's something I'm going to have to figure out. I'm going to probably have to do something else. I don't think it's streaming. Correct. I'm trying to stream out to multiple things at one time. So at least it out there for people to view if they want to And that includes Facebook Supposed to be able to do on Facebook but it doesn do anything It just goes eh So I sure the problem was on my end Do you think we see Tony Hawk now coming from AP It's a good question. I would like to think that they're going to try. I mean it would make sense. You've already pretty much got the layout. Now it's just a matter of getting the license and everything. I mean, everyone thought that when they picked up Ryan for American Pinball that we were going to see Sonic, and I think they tried, but Jersey Jack snatched it up before they could get it. So, do we see Tony Hawk in the future for American Pinball? I'm going to say likely. And I think when you have Melvin in the picture also to work around and mess with, you know, Nick's hardware and layout and maybe make some tweaks and suggestions, improvements here and there, I think the game is going to be even better than his current homebrew situation. It's like I would like to play more of his Tony Hawk game, but there's always a stupid line and I'm not, I don't like waiting in line. So there's that. I enjoy the uniqueness of that layout. I do not enjoy waiting in line. Yeah, the music is crucial for Tony Hawk. Yeah, you've got to have definitely a couple of songs from the game. You have to. So that's probably going to be another little thing that they're going to have to work around. But here's something else I don't think people are talking about or mentioned. And, um, when in regards to companies hiring people and potential of a game coming out, it's not been like officially announced, which I find weird. Um, and I could be wrong there as well, but I don't recall seeing an official announcement from Barrels of Fun in regards to hiring somebody. Correct me if I'm wrong, but have they hire, have they, um, announced that they hire, Thanks to all voters for your anonymous support for these episodes. And Barrels of Fun logo now as his profile picture as of February 11th. And so for those that don't know who Kyle Sperry is, he did the Big Trouble in Little China homebrew that you saw at Expo just this last year. Melvin Yes, I do believe Melvin will be a big help to American Pinball in the future, for sure. Maybe he's just a fan. That's why I kind of wonder. I'm like, it hasn't been officially announced, but that's a little strange kind of thing. I mean, because typically if you look at, I'd say almost all the employees for Barrels of Fun, their Facebook profile picture is that logo. And then you see him change his logo or his profile picture to that logo, and he is a homebrewer. He made a pretty damn nice looking version of Big Trouble in Little China. So does that mean that Barrels of Fun is going to be potentially doing a Big Trouble in Little China? Yeah, LinkedIn says he's at Barrels of Fun, so yeah, there you go. I didn't investigate. It's one of those I just kind of like saw and was like, hmm, that's interesting. Why have they not announced that? Has Barrels like not announced that? Are they just trying to keep more secrets? Now I want to reach out to David and be like, WTF? Let's see here. Jake Danzig is bringing Mutant League Hockey with one of the manufacturers also. I believe he's going with what we know the company as Ramps. They did that one game last year, something about vacation or something like that. And I believe that's going to be going through them. So we'll see how that goes. Yeah, it's been mentioned about Big Trouble in Little China going to Barrels of Fun, but I don't think it's been mentioned that Kyle has been hired though. So I'm looking at Barrels of Fun's Facebook page here. And I'm seeing nothing in regards to a new hire. I mean, they can announce what they can announce, what they want to announce, but I figured that would definitely stir up some interesting stuff. But they said, hey guys, we hired this guy. You know him from the Big Trouble in Little China game that you might have played. Because they know there's gonna draw all kinds of questions of like, hey, so is that gonna be your next game or whatever kind of thing? And the thing is guys, David's well aware that there is a demand for Big Trouble in Little China. He's well aware. Now whether or not that is one of their games that they're doing, I don't know. I honestly do not know. But I think if David has the capabilities of getting that license, then he's gonna do it. He's not gonna go, nah, let's give it to somebody else. I think if he has the ability to do that, he's gonna do it. Especially now he knows that he can sell games at a limited like 500 units kind of thing. He can make another limited run of a game like that. That's the kind of theme that the boutiques need to snatch up. Like I don't think Big Trouble in Little China would be a great seller for like Stern for what they need. I mean they need the big licenses like you know, Pokemon and stuff. And they could have done really well way back when with Back to the Future. But you have your boutiques that need the smaller, where you just need to sell anywhere between 500 to maybe a thousand of these kind of thing and we'll be fine. Big Trouble will be far away though. They had Winchester before Dune. Yeah. It's one of those things where they're cooking. They're a little slow, but they're cooking. What happened? Haven't heard anything from them since last year. I know that's a big question for me too is when regards to what's going on with Ramps. It was like, well, I thought you were making this game and I think they did some kind of release talking about I'm guessing there was a lot of basically suggestions and changes that they needed to make with the game. You know, a bunch of other excuses and reasoning why they haven't released that yet. Oh, interesting, Frankie. I would like to hear the reasoning behind this. Is not possible to license period. No one can do it. I'm interested to know why. I would like to know, is it the name in general? Is it a particular actor? Is it like a Kurt Russell thing? What's going on there? Now I can only assume, this is me assuming since I don't know the facts and I love being able to say that, but maybe Spooky did try to do it one time. Maybe they did try to do Big Trouble in Little China and there was a whole bunch of barriers in place that just wasn't going to make it possible. That's my guess and you could take my guess to the bank on that one. I don't know man why they chose Ramps it's one of those where that's that's what they wanted to do kind of thing is because they haven't really proven manufacturability so I question that as well I pre-ordered Big Trouble in France he's making a smoke screen I don't know he did it in all caps I think that means something Same problem with Friday the 13th. Impossible is a word to be found only in the dictionary of fools. Yeah, impossible equals want to pay more money? Yeah. Or want too much money? Yeah. I think that's the main thing when it comes to a lot of these is like, oh, it's impossible. I mean, unless they're just plain out saying no, it will never happen. But yeah, typically the reason why something isn't done a certain way. What's the answer to 99 out of 100 questions? The Money Ramps is heavily involved in the homebrew community. Yes they are. But have they manufactured games though? Like can they build games? I'm not doubting that they can build games. But can, do they have an assembly line? Have they proven manufacturability yet? I don't think so. It's an all the above thing. No deals with actors, lots of sticky issues. Yeah, figures. Pokemon shoots like a fan layout. The rules will make or break it. It doesn't shoot like a fan layout. It is a fan layout. It shoots like a fan layout because it is one. I think they're involved in pretty much all the playfields in the homebrew community. Okay. I don't know enough to state it as the gospel here in regards to what's going on with I just know that they had a game that they were gonna make and then they didn't make it and now they're supposedly manufacturing Mutant League Hockey so we'll see what happens there. Like I know Jake Danzig can build a hell of a game. I mean he proved that with um... Damn it. What is that? Um... I can't think of that damn game. He had a wide body of it. That old school... Dukes of Hazzard. He had Dukes of Hazzard. It didn't look like a homebrew at all. And now he's done the Mutant League Hockey, which looks like something that came off like the production floor of a big manufacturer. So I have no doubts. Big Trouble in Little China. Yeah. Oh. Was it called Duke Boys? I thought it was called Dukes of Hazzard. Are you just saying Duke Boys for just? I don't know. So for those that are joining late on this, because I've been at this for almost an hour now, the news is that American Pinball has hired Rob Rath and Nick Neitzel onto the team. Some Insurance Advice My brother, when he came over to see Beetlejuice for the first time, like looking at it in person and everything, and he's like, it almost looks too good. That's what he said. He's like, it almost looks too good kind of thing. Like, like you shouldn't play it. Like it's just supposed to be an art piece. Just let it sit there and look pretty type of thing. Frankie, have you got your Beetlejuice yet? Do you have a particular number that you're getting or what? Oh, I think I'm about to wrap this thing up anyways, guys, because I've got things to do today, so I just wanted to hop on here. I think we're getting right there on the hour mark for this live, but wanted to discuss and go back and forth with you guys on the new hires with American Pinball. So definitely curious to see where things go from here. I talked to Texas trash. Yeah. Almost looked like you're wearing a shower robe at first glance. I need to take this thing off. It's starting to warm up now. I'm a little chilly. All right, you're very welcome guys. Uh, let's see here. Let's bring it to a close right here at the one hour mark for those. But yeah, that's the news. AP is hiring Rob Rath, and along with another person that they just announced a few days ago i forgot his name was it jeff uh someone that i didn't know just by their name but someone else has joined the team as well but i think everybody is well aware of who Nick Neitzel and Rob Rath are so that's that and uh we have all kinds of other news that dropped i guess Beetlejuice got Jumpin' the Line last night or that's been announced that that song will be going into the game that was one of the things Facebook, Instagram, 2022. addressed on the line as we speak. And yeah. Alright guys. Thank you very much for joining the stream and the chat and everything. Love you long time. If you haven't already, subscribe button down below. And if you want some more information and behind the scenes stuff, and if you just want to be a supporter of being awesome, then feel free to join the Patreon. Link will be in the description of this live and future videos and everything. Love you long time guys. Peace out. And if I could find the stuff I should have had this ready to go. All right, there we go.

AP's reimagining games will likely be priced in the $8,000-$9,000+ range

medium confidence · Cary Hardy estimation based on current Circus Voltaire market pricing

  • Ryan (previous hire at AP) will not be returning; leaked text messages from him about the company derailed the relationship

    medium confidence · Cary Hardy commentary; details limited to avoid further damage

  • “Chances are if you're currently not on a list with a distributor, then you're probably not gonna get one... If you may want to ask your distro what position you are on their list and maybe reach out to another distributor to see if you can be on multiple lists.”

    Cary Hardy@ 39:47 — Practical advice on navigating supply scarcity and distributor strategy for Spooky's upcoming high-demand game

  • “I know that Melvin has joined American Pinball. And Melvin has a very good relationship with Lior. I suspect, I honestly do not know for a fact here, but I suspect that if we get sculpts, they're going to be Lior quality.”

    Cary Hardy@ 25:11 — Speculation about quality improvements driven by Melvin Williams' standards and industry relationships

  • “Circus Voltaire right now is going for about 9, if not more, depending on the quality of it... I think if the price on the secondhand market climbs up to a certain extent, that's when they'll probably see the possibility of doing a reimagining.”

    Cary Hardy@ 37:29 — Links secondary market pricing to remake demand economics

  • Electric Playgroundcompany
    Planetarycompany
    Stern Pinballcompany
    Spooky Pinballcompany
    Pedretticompany
    Circus Voltairegame
    Pokemon Pinballgame
    Beetlejuicegame
    Flip N Out Pinballcompany
    Texas Pinball Festivalevent
    Liorperson
    Keith Elwinperson
    Tony Hawk Pro Skatergame
    Theater of Magicgame
    Funhausgame
  • ?

    product_concern: Pokemon Pinball experiencing outer left orbit rail misalignment causing ball clunking and drain issues; identified in Pro units before LE production shipment

    medium · Chat reports from Patreon members and players; Gomez (Stern) reportedly addressing in real-time per Hardy

  • ?

    licensing_signal: Spooky secured Jump in the Line licensing for Beetlejuice after initially high negotiation costs; inclusion coming in next code update; signals willingness to invest in immersive IP licensing

    high · Announced last night per Hardy; confirmed by Joel and Jared (Spooky team members)

  • $

    market_signal: Spooky's next unannounced title expected to exceed Beetlejuice production with modest price increase; distributor lists already oversubscribed with 100+ waitlist entries at major vendors; advising customers to multi-list with distributors

    medium · Hardy's insider knowledge; Flip N Out Pinball has 100+ list entries per chat; distributors don't know final allocation yet

  • ?

    industry_signal: Potential licensing migration from Pedretti to AP suggests quality/speed concerns; AP positioning as domestic alternative with quality focus, avoiding tariff/import issues; mirrors Stern's talent acquisition strategy

    medium · Hardy's analysis comparing AP's domestic advantages vs Pedretti's international manufacturing

  • ?

    design_philosophy: Melvin Williams' leadership at AP emphasizes quality materials and partnering with premier artisans (e.g., Lior for sculpts); contrasts with Pedretti's substandard parts; shapes AP's remake execution approach

    medium · Hardy's commentary on Melvin's reputation and expected partnerships; speculation on Lior collaboration

  • ?

    partnership_signal: AP-EP partnership expanding with first collaborative project planned for later 2026; EP manufactures toppers, sources parts, and coordinates with AP game production; signals deeper operational integration

    high · EP PR explicitly states 'first collaborative project with AP later this year'; Rob Rath maintains dual roles

  • ?

    content_signal: Hardy aware of Spooky's unannounced next game but bound by embargo; emphasizes early-stage hype management and distributor dynamics; demonstrates media-industry relationship depth

    high · Hardy explicitly states 'Since I actually know what their games are, I can't like even speculate'; mentions briefing Patreons weeks ago