Journalist Tool

Kineticist

  • HDashboard
  • IItems
  • ↓Ingest
  • SSources
  • KBeats
  • BBriefs
  • RIntel
  • QSearch
  • NName Review
  • +Health

v0.1.0

← Back to items

Pinball Magazine & Pinball News PINcast January 2024 recap + Gary Stern, David Fix and Dinner with Jack Guarnieri

Pinball News & Pinball Magazine Pincast·podcast_episode·2h 50m·analyzed·Feb 4, 2024
View original
Export .md

Analysis

claude-haiku-4-5-20251001 · $0.032

TL;DR

Stern Pinball Jaws launch dominates January 2024; Gary Stern discusses IC strategy and operations.

Summary

This January 2024 podcast recap covers Stern Pinball's Jaws reveal at CES and EAG Expo, includes an extended interview with Gary Stern discussing Insider Connected, licensing strategy, factory expansion, and code update philosophy, and features an exclusive dinner with Jack Guarnieri. The episode also covers American Pinball news and industry updates from the month.

Key Claims

  • 70% of Stern games are sold to home consumers; 70% of actual gameplay occurs in operator locations

    high confidence · Gary Stern stated directly in interview: exact statistical breakdown provided

  • Stern Pinball released 94 code updates in the past year across all games

    high confidence · Gary Stern: 'We did 90 code updates last year. 94.' Martin confirms: 'I think it was 90, but okay, 94.'

  • Jaws Premium and Pro versions have different shark mechanisms - Premium has shark coming from under boat, Pro has shark bursting from/into cage

    high confidence · Jonathan and Martin describe observed differences at EAG Expo hands-on

  • Insider Connected gameplay increases 50% on games with the system enabled

    high confidence · Gary Stern: 'We see 50% more play' from games attached to Insider Connected

  • Stern moved to a new 165,000 square foot factory facility in Chicago area

    high confidence · Gary Stern: detailed description of factory move and new space dimensions

  • Stern produces three 'cornerstone games' annually (Pro, Premium, LE variants)

    high confidence · Gary Stern: 'We only made two cornerstone games for two years...now we're going to go back to our policy of making three cornerstone games'

  • Venom suffered commercially because players knew Jaws was coming next

    medium confidence · Gary Stern speculation: 'I think it suffered from everybody knowing Jaws was coming next...it's going to sink to the top'

  • Jaws received coverage from 41+ consumer tech and game magazines at CES

    medium confidence · Gary Stern: 'We were born as 41 influential consumer tech type or game magazines. They covered it there'

Notable Quotes

  • “Insider Connected as a future...the baby was crawling and now it's walking and it hasn't run yet. It's got a lot more development to do”

    Gary Stern @ Interview segment — Reveals ongoing IC development roadmap and that monetization strategy is still being developed

  • “70% of our games are sold to the home, 70% of our game play is in operator's hands it's on the street”

    Gary Stern @ Interview segment — Key market split showing operators drive volume gameplay despite home sales majority

  • “I'm 78 and I don't really...I'm not the one to pick a title. That's grown past me shall we say or I've gone under it”

    Gary Stern @ Interview segment — Clarifies Gary's current role evolution away from licensing decisions toward operational oversight

  • “We did 90 code updates last year. 94...I think it was 90, but okay, 94.”

    Gary Stern / Martin Ebb @ Interview segment — Quantifies scale of post-release support and community perception of excessive duplicate updates

  • “We've always done our own distribution. always...never had a third party. And it just works best for us.”

    Gary Stern @ Interview segment — Explains Stern's vertical integration strategy vs. competitors using third-party distribution

  • “First of all, I have a lot of friends that I like to see...people want to see a continuity in the business. I'm the significant owner. You're still the face of the company.”

    Gary Stern / Jonathan Hewson @ Interview segment — Defines Gary's post-CEO role as brand ambassador and stakeholder presence

  • “The Great White can now charge directly at you...the super spinner...has been relegated from scoring one and a half million points down to only 200,000”

    Martin Ebb @ Code updates section — Jaws 0.83 balance changes indicating ongoing refinement of mode economy

  • “Seth...has just won an award for innovation with our Insider Connected...he is a gamer. That's just what we're owed.”

Entities

Gary SternpersonStern PinballcompanyJaws (Pinball)gameInsider ConnectedproductJonathan HewsonpersonMartin EbbpersonSeth DavispersonGeorge Gomezperson

Signals

  • ?

    business_signal: Stern hired Lloyd from Sega/Cyben to expand European market presence and localization efforts

    high · Gary Stern: 'We hired Lloyd, who used to be with Seabed and see Ben and is very familiar with the business...to do a better job in Europe and expand our market here'

  • ?

    community_signal: Stern running Insider Connected leaderboards at trade shows; leaderboard system becoming standard at major events

    high · Multiple references to IC leaderboards active at EAG and CES shows

  • $

    market_signal: Stern maintaining backlog of orders but at manageable levels; factory expansion enabling increased production capacity

    high · Gary Stern: 'A backlog of orders...not the tremendous backlog that we couldn't even deliver against...we're able to build more in this new factory'

  • ?

    community_signal: Gary Stern transitioned from CEO to founder/strategic advisor; maintains showroom presence but delegates operational decisions to Seth Davis

    high · Gary Stern describes current role as brand continuity and strategic input; Seth Davis handling daily CEO functions

  • ?

    announcement: Jaws officially announced and showcased at CES and EAG Expo; major press coverage from 41+ consumer tech magazines

    high · Gary Stern confirmed announcement and widespread media coverage at major trade shows

  • ?

Transcript

groq_whisper · $0.511

0:00
Interview with Gary Stern of Stern Pinball. Interview with David Fix of American Pinball. Hi, my name is Jonathan Hewson. I'm the editor of Pinball Magazine, and I'm joined by... Hi, I'm Martin Ebb, and I'm the editor of Pinball News, and we're here to bring you the very latest information, And as we look back on the month of January 2024 in our Pinball Industry News Pincast. Right. And, well, as our headlines indicated, we have two interviews and an exclusive dinner with Jack Ranieri for you to enjoy. Yes. But there's lots of other news as well. So what we'll do is the interviews will be part of when we discuss the news from either Stern Pimple or American Pimple. And the dinner with Jack Guarnieri will be all the way at the end of this episode. But it's really something interesting to enjoy, I think. Yes, it's not something we've done before. Yeah, exactly.
1:12
Yeah, and hopefully it's something we'll be able to repeat in the future. But let's see how this one goes. But let's start off then with our very first headline, which was all about Stern Pimble. And, well, it hasn't been that exciting a month, I suppose, for the biggest pimble manufacturer in the world. Wow, wow, wow. They did release Jaws. Well, that was last month. We've covered that. No, we covered it because we waited. Yes, exactly. Yes, so we covered that, but still, for them it was a big month. They revealed JAWS, they announced it. That's true. And they showcased it at CES in Las Vegas and the EAG Expo in London, where we both also were present. Yeah, that's right. At EAG they had a JAWS Premium and Pro on the ElectroCoin stand, along with Venom and Avengers Infinity Quest and 007 James Bond. That's where I line up a five. Surprisingly, no Foo Fighters. No Foo Fighters, no.
2:20
But I guess from that point of view, the older games, or the non-current games, I suppose, they probably have what they have in stock from Electrocoin, but the two Jaws machines would have been brought over especially for that show. So they probably had a Venom and an Avengers and a James Bond.

Gary Stern @ Interview segment — Endorsement of new CEO Seth Davis by company founder

Jack Guarnieriperson
Keith Elwinperson
Venom (Pinball)game
American Pinballcompany
David Fixperson
EAG Expo Londonevent
CES Las Vegasevent
Prologiscompany
Deadpool (Pinball)game
Jody Dankbergperson
Lloydperson
Evan Kirbyperson
Business Intelligence Group (BIG)organization
ElectroCoincompany
Pinball Heavencompany

product_strategy: Jaws Pro and Premium versions feature distinct mechanical differences (shark mechanism placement) and performance characteristics

high · Jonathan/Martin observe: Pro has faster flow, shark bursts from cage above; Premium has shark from under boat

  • ?

    product_strategy: Stern returning to three cornerstone games annually after two-year period of producing only two titles

    high · Gary Stern: 'We only made two cornerstone games in order to catch up...now we're going to go back to our policy of making three cornerstone games'

  • ?

    product_concern: Jaws 0.83 update addressed motor issues on thin drop target and rebalanced scoring (super spinner from 1.5M to 200K points)

    high · Martin's code update breakdown of Jaws changes

  • ~

    sentiment_shift: Venom performance impacted by Jaws anticipation; expected to recover as operators shift focus to new title

    medium · Gary Stern: 'I think it suffered from everybody knowing Jaws was coming next...it's going to sink to the top'

  • ?

    technology_signal: Code update structure questioned; community perception that bulk updates are duplicative across games rather than surgical fixes

    medium · Martin Ebb challenges update philosophy: 'Why have you got to roll that out to every single game?' Gary unable to fully explain technical necessity

    • 2:42
    But it was busy there on the stand, I have to say, all the time. A lot of interest, obviously, in Jaws. People liking to compare the Premium and the Pro, because the Pro doesn't have the upper playfield area and a different shark mechanism altogether. It doesn't come out from under the boat in the Pro. and is there above it. It's busting out of a shark cage or busting into a shark cage, I suppose. Okay. And, of course, they were running the Stern Insider Connected Leaderboard system as well, as they tend to do at all shows. I think we both made it. I made it somewhere, I suspect. I only played a couple of games, to be honest. I think you ranked fifth and I ranked tenth. Oh. On the Jaws premium, that is. Oh, right. I was trying to find where the final rankings were on the Stern Insider Connect site, on the website, but I couldn't find it anywhere. Oh, I just looked at the screen at the stand, and I have no idea whether anybody caught up with us after that. I suspect they probably did. There was a whole other day of the show, or shorter day. Yeah, I don't know. Whatever. Yeah. Anyway, it was good fun. I think we both enjoyed playing the games. It was interesting to note the differences between them. The Pro definitely had a much faster flow to it than the Premium there. But I think there's still some work to do, sort of personal viewpoint, some work to do to make the events in the game more of events. You know, like when the shark comes out from under the boat, you hardly even notice it's there. And you look up, oh, there's a shark under there.
    4:32
    It doesn't do a big light show and a big sound effect, sort of musical fanfares or anything like that going on. So I think that needs working on to, as that is such a major mechanism in the game.
    4:46
    And I think the other thing people were saying was they thought it felt a lot more stop and go than they were expecting. Those posts in the in lanes were stopping the ball a lot more than people thought it would be doing. Right. So that's a code of dating you know how it goes. Yeah, well, people will be able to blow those off once they know the game well enough. They won't have to wait for the whole mode introduction. But it did seem it stopped there, and it would do one set of awards, and there'd be another thing happening, there'd be an intro to a mode, and there'd be an intro to something else. Right. So you had to sit through all those before you got the ball back. Right. Speaking of awards. Ah, very good. I see what you did there.
    5:34
    I'll let you handle it. Yeah, yeah, yeah. Oh, okay. Well, we have to congratulate Stone Pimble's CEO and President Seth Davis on winning an award.
    5:48
    I'm not sure we have to, but we'll get to that. Well, it would be churlish not to, but we will. He won an award from the Business Intelligence Intelligence Group. So I'm not sure whether it's Business Intelligence or Business Intelligence Group, but he was one of 11 executives named in their 2024 BIG, Business Intelligence Group, Innovation Award. It doesn't actually say what the award was for specifically, just for fairly generic it says the awards recognize organizations, products and people that bring new ideas to life in innovative ways and if that's not generic enough I don't know what is so it says organizations from across the globe or around the globe submitted their recent innovations for consideration in the BIG awards and nominations were judged by a select group of business leaders and executives who volunteered their time and expertise to score submissions. Right. There you go.
    7:03
    And you get an award which is completely meaningless. That's not meaningless. It means you paid $849 to participate in it
    7:13
    and, as I say, they awarded it to 11 executives, 47 companies and 108 products. as leaders and winners in the Innovation Awards, and they run award schemes each year. Right. So basically that's a business in itself. So basically you get a participation award.
    7:35
    That's how I see it. Perhaps they should give an award to themselves. Well, if they're coming up with such an innovative award scheme. Yeah, but I'm not sure whether they would be willing to pay the $849. Oh, there is that, yes. Yeah.
    7:50
    Anyway, despite that, I'm still going to congratulate Seth Davis on winning the award. I guess it doesn't go to everybody who's entered.
    8:01
    I don't know what the award is for. That's the annoying thing. I'm guessing it's slightly connected. Yeah, that's what Gary Stern talks about in the interview that we have with Gary Stern, which will be, well, in a couple of minutes, basically. It's almost like you've listened to it. I have. I was there. Were you? Yeah. Okay. Yeah, I remember. You were asking all the questions. Ah, right. Okay. That's probably why I wasn't listening to the answers.
    8:29
    So, moving on from awards of merit or otherwise, I have to make an apology to all those people who live in the Illinois area or follow American football in my appalling pronunciation of the football team, which Stern Pinball sponsored by donating a couple of machines to their training campus. So I called them the Fighting Alini, which is absolutely not right. It is Fighting I Lie In I. There you go. So apologies to everybody In the fighting For getting their name wrong And thanks to everybody Who messaged To correct me And sent messages To tell me how it should be pronounced Thank God you took the credit for that Yes I can tell you were worried Yeah yeah I got loads of messages as well Yeah I was sick last night I think on that one Okay. Goodness.
    9:42
    So, anyway, I think we do code updates and... Well, okay, we didn't quite finish with the EIG. Oh, sorry.
    9:54
    Because there was, well, we, after our interview with Gary, which he was kind enough to give us, what, more time than we should have done because we basically walked out of the interview room and the whole of the show would close and people were being kicked out so you turn the lights off. So, okay, let me picture this. Yeah. So there's a show floor and then there is a separate area behind that, upstairs,
    10:27
    where there's a bunch of... Conference rooms, I suppose. Conference rooms, indeed, and a certain rented one. As they normally do, I think. Yes. that's where they meet with their distributors and other people representing them or buying their machines at the show that's where they meet Gaby was kind enough to take us up after he had finished all his meetings so we're at like quarter to five, something like that in the afternoon and Gaby basically indicate like, okay, I have an appointment at 5.30 and I want to get some rest so let's get this over with.
    11:18
    Sure enough, sure enough, we walk out there a quarter to six and we just finished up the interview and Gary talks for like 45 minutes. So no nap for Gary and he had to go straight into his other appointment where he had to go to, but not before running into Jack Orneri. Yes, indeed. Which was both staying on the boat hotel, which was right next to, moored up next to the EAG. Permanent mooring. But, yeah, they were staying there. I think all the Stern team were staying there, and Jack was staying there. Right.
    12:02
    Well, this wonderful moment was actually captured and I think it was Jack walking up to Gary and there's a photo on the internet going around and you can find it on the Facebook page of Pinball Heaven in the UK where you basically have Gary Stern and Jack Warnieri hugging it out.
    12:26
    Almost like you're dancing. Yes, and neither of them is trying to strangle the other one, I don't think. No, no, no, no. So, a nice... Was it a reconciliation? Was it a meeting of minds? Shared objectives? That's between the two of them. It's up to us. No, we can but wonder. But a nice scene, anyway. Yes.
    12:57
    Yes, so that was the other news, really, from EAG. Well, it's one of the other... We'll get back to the EEG when we discuss it. Yes, there's a lot more to report from there. Yes. Because there were many manufacturers, I think eight, I think, manufacturers, I think, were represented. Or was it seven? I can't quite remember. I did write a report about it. A report, you did? Yes. So you can read all about that on the Hymnal News site. But anyway, as you say, get on to the code. Yes. This is Jonathan's opportunity to find himself a pillow. But fortunately, there's not much this month. Or at least there wasn't when I checked just now. which was basically only Jaws this month, and I was not surprised, as that's their current game, and that's getting all the attention. It's up to version 0.83, and really there wasn't even a huge update to it. They fixed a few issues with the motor on the thin drop target, which was occasionally run the wrong way and run into a stop.
    13:57
    Sometimes it would trigger itself, and then they added a new video mode as well, or changed the video mode, I should say. It changed the way it works, so the Great White can now charge directly at you. If you've seen it before, then you'll know what I mean. If you haven't seen it before, then it won't mean a thing, so I won't say any more about it. The fishing reel flasher was now added to the general illumination and the super spinner, which was a real point monster, has been relegated, I suppose, from scoring one and a half million points has been down to only 200,000. So it's not the most valuable feature that it used to be. But that's basically all there is in the JAWS update, and JAWS is the only code update that we've got. So that's the end of that. Okay. Well, moving on to... I think I caught you off guard there. Oh, no, no. No, sorry. Over to the side of the room. It's time for to catch up with Gary Stern Yes, right So, like I said at the end of the second day of EAD we were able to sit down with Gary Stern Actually, I was already talking to Gary for like 10 minutes but then after that Martin joined us he sort of repeated everything that he was just telling me, so So, Gary's a little bit... I'm afraid I had been wandering around the hall doing my video while Jonathan was trying to call me and say, Gary's ready, let's do this interview. And I was wandering around doing my walk-around video and it kind of stopped in the middle of that. So, after I finished, I went up and joined them and what you will hear is our chat about, well, all kinds of things to do with Stone Pitball and the Pitball business as well. Yeah, and just as a little heads up, Gary had been giving sort of presentations to distributors and people alike all day, and he still had his sheets with him, and basically we got the same presentation, although all the sheets were mixed up. So he's occasionally looking for the right sheet, and he can't find them. and so, but basically most of the stuff you'll be hearing is actually the stuff that was taught to distributors during EAT. So, enjoy. So, how's the show been? The show's been great, absolutely great because, you know, we've got five pinball machines, four different pinball machines plus two versions of JAWS, the reception's great they're all attached to the leaderboard everybody's having a good time with it and, you know, as I've said many times insider connected as a future. I was explaining to Jonathan before you got up here that my partner and I invested a lot of money in the development of it and continue to invest a lot. And it's just barely, you know, Doug describes it as the baby was crawling and now it's walking and it hasn't run yet. It's got a lot more development to do both for the professional operator and for the player.
    17:17
    But that's the future. Every product that has a future needs to have connectivity. I can start my car with my telephone. My new washer-dryer calls me all the time, and I wish it had stopped bothering me. But everything is doing this. You leave your garage door open, and your phone's going to tell you it's open. But how do you get across, how do you get over the level of suspicion that comes with a product like Insightly Connected? that not only is it, obviously it's great now, we've got leaderboards, we've got our own personal achievements, that kind of thing, but somewhere down the line, Stern Pinball is going to want to start making some revenue from this. It doesn't pay for itself at the moment. It doesn't pay for itself. There'll always be a free aspect to it. Yeah. There will probably always be a free aspect. I can't say that for, you know, 100 years, but we currently think there'll be a free aspect to it. But right now, you know, we're just adding to it. And we added in Venom a very important feature with the leveling up. And there's a career feature in Jaws. And this allows a player to reach a particular level or accomplishment and go to the next game somewhere else in another country and continue without having to start over from scratch, which for a player like me is very important because what you guys see playing, I never see. I never get there. But now I'll have a chance to get there on some of these things. You said it yourself. You and your partner invested a lot of money in this. Yeah. You're going to want to get some return on that money. Well, part of the return is selling more games.
    19:01
    Part of the return is operating more. Yes, it sells more games. And it earns more money. you know, our game play, on the games that are attached, the game plays up 50%. These are statistics that we can get out of the game. How many of those are operators and how many of those are home users? Oh, no, no, no. Home users don't pay anything for the extra games. No, no, I didn't say they were all earning 50% more because some of them are home.
    19:30
    Well, here's an interesting stat for you. 70% of our games are sold to the home, are in the home. 70% of our game play is in operator's hands it's on the street because it's fairly obvious that more people are going to be able to play a game than in your basement do you have basements in England? not so much game room we don't have basements in LA but his country is under water so putting a basement in is probably a bad idea yeah Yeah, I went to college in New Orleans. The water table is right up there. Right. So the operators, I was just showing you some quotes from an operator, two operators who said the games are earning more money. Venom is his number one game. I can show you charts on Venom play. The leveling up was a the feature that pulled an operator in? In this case, these two cases the operator, you know, saw that his players are coming back and you know getting further and what have you. Again, we see 50% more play. We've got, you know, we've doubled the number of insider connected participants. And so in the last year, growing at a fair strength. Now that we have an app, we're going to see geographic growth, geometric growth, not geographic, geometric growth.
    21:14
    Now, it's a very important thing. And to add to that, a great game like Jaws that is just going to carry us on. We're looking, you know, we have Jaws has been very well received, It's been very well received by the press, by the Consumer Electronics Show, Fox News. We were born as 41 influential consumer tech type or game magazines. They covered it there, did good articles that we know of so far. And that's good for Pinball. It's good for us and so forth. Well, you're talking about Jaws. So tell us about the process of getting that license. And it seems like it's a timeless license. It's not something which had to come out this precise moment because it's the 50th anniversary or something like that. It is a timeless license. We've had other licenses with them. But, you know, the way we determine a license, and again, you know, I listen to Seth, our president, and Jody Dankberg, our, you know, licensing. and I'm listening to them talking besides other people in the company they're very very knowledgeable with pop culture and what's going to resonate with people and what's going on in other games not necessarily other pinball machines other games they're very very knowledgeable and I sit and I listen and I'm 78 I don't really I'm not the one to pick a title I used to do licensing stuff all the licensing at one point but you know that's grown past me shall we say or I've gone under it or whatever. Right. So we'll have a meeting. We have meetings regularly every two, three weeks. It has myself, my partner, George Gomez, who's, again, very into pop culture, Jody Seth,
    23:09
    John, who's our CRO, Mark, who runs the studio under George, for George, and, you know, talking about schedule, title, when we can do something, list of titles. But also going back and forth with other design teams. Who's going to be interested? Who's going to want to do this? This is what Keith wanted to do. Because if they don't want to do it, you're not going to tell somebody to spend a year and a half, two years of your life working on a game. Where you don't like the title. Right.
    23:47
    So, no, actually I was going to ask, like, okay, So once there is a list of okay, these are the licenses that we have available How much input does a designer have on saying like yes, I want that one. Yes Yes, and some of them give this one to someone else. Nobody wants him and and You know Then it doesn't happen Doesn't happen right. That's interesting though because you you really often names of people who are involved in the decision now. Yes, some people obviously not you but it's a huge company now it's a large number of employees working it's a big company have you seen the new factory yeah I haven't made it is the first time in my 76 year business career that I can look at a factory and say, this is really a factory. This is not, you know, this is a high building. We now have, we had our last building was 105,000 square feet or call it 10,000 square meters.
    25:01
    And it, well, our, there's a, Prologis is a good landlord in our area. They had sold it to our neighbor, which was a data center. and data center actually a lease was up we were on an extension and they actually said here's some money go away and we moved and so forth and it was quite a chore but as far as the move itself the build out was quite a chore but as far as the move itself closed on a Friday Monday a week and a half later we had people on the line a couple days later very impressive you see the video of them putting it up you see how big that building is now for example if I'm talking about a 165,000 square foot building but the parts department or the replacement part can go way up high so in a sense that part of the footprint you're doubling what you had before and it's fully air conditioned the factory part is air conditioned which in Chicago is significant and probably will become more significant with global warming you certainly get the feeling that you wouldn't want to order a part that's at the very top why? someone's got to go and get a forklift and get up there are machines that go up and down that's what warehouses do today Yeah, oh absolutely. But the point I was getting to was, all these people, all this space, all these offices, everybody is employed doing, busy creating and selling product and manufacturing product. What's your role now?
    26:57
    I couldn't have defined it before, you know, when I was CEO. I mean, you're here in London at the show. Well, yeah. So you're still going to shows. I'm still going to some shows. Yeah? I will, you know, to a major show like this. First of all, I have a lot of friends that I like to see. Yeah. And in addition, you know, people want to see a continuity in the business. I'm, you know, the significant owner. You're still the face of the company. Yes. And that's true. And in this particular case, as I was explaining, Jonathan, because you can edit in so we don't do it twice, Seth, who, by the way, is smarter than I am, has better questions than I do, understands pop culture, as I said, understands games. He is a gamer.
    27:49
    That's just what we're owed. and just won an award for innovation with our, which is, you know, Insider Connected and what have you, and great game, great game design.
    28:00
    He's taking his daughter today to start university in New York, at NYU. So that's, you know, that's why he's not here. I mean, family comes first. You have to do that kind of thing.
    28:12
    So I'm here doing a presentation he would have done to the distributors. This is room set up the way it is right now because we just, we had at our distributor meeting. I think we're pretty unique in having a distributor meeting. I started that a number of years ago, and I don't think anybody else does that. We had a distributor dinner last night in a meeting. I think everybody's got the same kind of distribution network that you have.
    28:35
    You know, that's probably true. That's probably true. Many other companies distribute to our friends at Sega or at Namco and don't do their own. We've always done our own distribution. always, you know, never had a third party. And, you know, it just works best for us. So when you get back to Del Pro Village... To help that, you know, we've, to get more familiar, to do more of the things we want to do, like launch party street team and localization, what have you. You know, we hired Lloyd, who used to be with... Seabed. and see Ben and is very familiar with the business, is very familiar with these customers that are here, so that we can do a better job in Europe and expand our market here. Right. So when you get back to Elk Grove Village and you go back to the factory, what's your order of business? What do you say? Okay, I've been to London. I've got this feedback. I am going to leave here and go immediately back to Vail, Colorado, which is where I was snowboarding this is 78 and still snowboarding this is where my official residence is so I spend part of the year in Chicago part of the year there having said that I'll be in Chicago next week and I'll be in Chicago the week after I will go in between to Vail but I'll also go to I may change my mind but right now I'm going to San Diego because the AMOA, the Operators Association, has a state board, the various states, many of them have their own AMOA chapters or boards, and they have all states meet and talk about issues. And so I'm one of the people that goes to it. Also, Evan Kirby from our company who handles coin-op commercial sales, he'll be there.
    30:38
    Right. So still keeping busy then when you're not on the sling? I'm a little too busy. But, no, I still participate in a lot of meetings. Sometimes I'm listening. Sometimes I'm participating.
    30:52
    I'll be working on what we're going to, how many yet we're going to build when of JAWS, for example. That type of thing, based on what happened today and yesterday and so forth. Right. Now, we still have, you know, let me say, we still have, you know, COVID may have lessened up. There are still parts and lead time issues.
    31:17
    We still have a backlog of games? A backlog of orders? Yeah. Yes, we do. But I will say it's not, you know, it's not the tremendous backlog that we couldn't even deliver against. You know, a year ago for two reasons. One is that we filled a lot of it. And the second reason is we're able to build more in this new factory. Yeah. And so, you know, as I said, 70% consumer, even for coin-op, you have to have some variety in stock. Our dealers, distributors need some games in stock. you can't sell in a retail business without having anything on the shelf first time buyer which is what we need comes once a game and you say ok fine 9 months well they're going to go buy something else they're going to lose interest likewise a new FEC opens and they want 6 games 6 different games well somebody's got to have 6 different games for them once again that puts us in being the company that can do it, especially because we've decided, you know, for two years we only made two cornerstone games in order to catch up. And that's part of the reason we were able to get the backlog down and to a reasonable level. And now we're going to go back to our policy of making three cornerstone games.
    32:51
    So, yeah. One of the key things that you've always been very keen on is getting games out to operators rather than straight to home buyers. Operators first. Tell us about the rationale behind getting them on the street first. More people see them and can play them and have an opportunity to say, I want the pro model. We specifically do the pro model first. But I'll tell you that there are more operators operating premium games, especially if they've got a clientele in the location that are pinball enthusiasts and are looking for it for the premium models.
    33:41
    I meet some people who operate LEs. I would do that but they do it they got money back yeah I just wouldn't want to beat up my LE but they do they know what they're doing the numbers work but this particular game Jaws is going to be I think that Venom is a great game I can show you charts It's a great earner. It's a number one earner, better than, I have a bunch of papers here, but this was from my presentation. So now they're all sold together. I'll show you some charts. But I think it suffered from everybody knowing Jaws was coming next. And I think it's going to be like Deadpool, where it's going to sink to the top. It's been a bit of a sleeper game, you think, and it'll have its moment. It is going to grow. It's going to grow. And another thing, you know, we did 90 code updates last year. 94. I think it was 90, but okay, 94. I think I quote 90 in my speech, but assume you're right. It was over 90. You're right. It was over 90. This is one of the things which I bang on about in our pin cast. Yes. Why is your software structured such that if you change one thing, you have to release a whole new code for every single game? No, there are certain things that there's an operating system, let's call it, that need to change. I mean, one of the things you have to change is some pricing schemes for Scandinavia. Okay, so then are you going to... So why have you got to roll that out to every single game? Every single game's got an update. Why don't you just go, here's an update? Because you want to have one operating system that carries forward for the future. Yeah, but it should be one update to the operating system. It should be game independent. I can't answer that part of the question. There are other things that have to do with whether it be security, which we have to be very conscious of today, especially with Insider Connected, people security. There are other things that have to be done. Now you're asking an accountant and lawyer how to write software, and I can't help you with that. But that's why we have great people who do this. I just look at your list of changes, the readme files that are published on your website for every single software update. I go, oh, that's the same as that one, and that's the same as that one, and that's the same as that one. I'm sure there are other differences, but we don't necessarily know them. There are many things. Some things are bug fixes, but many things are additions and changes to the game. It is something that brings a new excitement, a new level to the game. we find that the additions that we make just freshen the game. Oh, I see. And we will continue to have freshening updates. We cover them every single month, all the updates that you have. Yeah, we're thinking about doing a spin-off, spin-off, where we basically read the README files for the code updates. I'm sure everybody is going to want to sit and listen to you read. What you want to do is you want to do that, but you want to somehow have a two-way broadcast so that you could read in unison or read, what do you call it, in church or synagogue, where you read a line, I read a line, whatever. You're reading every other word. Yeah.
    37:19
    Well, we're thinking about it. I appreciate the suggestion. Now, I want to interject briefly on something that you mentioned just now, which was you said that you thought Venom suffered from the fact that everyone knew Jaws was coming out. Yeah.
    37:36
    Why did everybody know Jaws was coming out? It's one thing, but also, off the back of that, with Jaws in particular, there's been a number of leaks in various aspects. Yeah, yes, we're looking at that. Is that something you condone? No, absolutely not. because it's part of the strategy. There's got to be a suspicion that this is a Stern-Pimble commercial leak. And we have had, and I can tell you, I don't think there's anybody more angry than Seth is about it.
    38:11
    I'm just, you know, we're sort of beside ourselves. And so we will be changing, we'll do something, changing procedures, as I said to people, distributors, and to control. Control it. It's not helpful. I come from the day where you never talked about the next game. No, absolutely. Speaking of which.
    38:38
    But the reason you'd like to know what the next game is? Well, there's already a couple of names circulating. I can't imagine that you're focused on these jaws. Say that again? I can't imagine that your focus currently is Jaws. Yes, my focus is currently Jaws. On selling Jaws. Yeah, you know that my usual routine, you know, I love all my children, but I will go out in the factory, see what we're building, and that's the one I love the most that day. But what you're building is not necessarily the latest game all the time. It could be a game from two years ago, three years ago. Although we are going to be making jaws for, you know, solid for a little bit of time. Right. So you have several production lines, though. You don't have one. Yeah, but we're typically making, you know, using, we're doing mostly one for, you get efficiencies by doing a larger volume. Yeah. And that's, you know, one of the things that we're doing is we're, you know, we're keeping our prices flat. We're not raising our price. We hope to do that as long as we can. But, you know, Jaws is the same price as the games from last year. We didn't make a price change. We're fighting inflation, and we're having to be more efficient and buy more efficiently and build more efficiently so that we can hold that price for a while. Right. Yeah. Well, we already talked about the career feature in Jaws.
    40:18
    But one of the things that, whether it be the community or people, thought is that we wouldn't get assets. And you've seen the game. It's loaded with film assets. It's got lots of video clips from the game. It's got Dreyfus Custom Speech, John Williamstein.
    40:41
    That's hard to hear, by the way, on the show floor like this. Oh, yeah, okay. I wonder if it's balanced right. I'll have to ask about that. It's too noisy to hear any music. Yeah. And it's got some great artwork, including in the pro and the LE, Ellie Mayard pro-regular is that iconic back glass that iconic movie poster back glass and so it's you know it just speaks and one of the things which a couple of people said to me which I found surprising people said is it just based on the first movie and I said no it's based on all four well I haven't seen any assets from the other movies yeah I don't know so there's more to come well you would hope so there's always going to be more to come, but I think it's based on the first three. Three, right. Yeah. You ask what I'm, you know, you ask about my, you know, participation, what I'm doing. Yeah. Well, I don't know everything to answer you guys. You know, I don't know it all. Like I used to, and I used to do the webinars myself, and I knew that game, you know, studied it. Now I... Well, the games are a lot simpler then than they are now. Well, no. The rules and the amount of content in the games. Not the last two, three years. I was doing them up until, you know, up until... Oh, right. Usually you got a game in your apartment. Yeah.
    42:02
    You quit doing that? No, I still have Foo Fighters there. That's the last one I did. And I happen to like the game. Right. Yeah. Okay. I have a premium in the apartment. So we were just talking about doing multiple games or on various production lines doing different games. There was a statement to distributors recently about limited edition games only being run at the launch of a game You can buy our new limited edition games with confidence We gonna make any new LCD game we be and I saying LCD game for a reason we'll be one limited edition. We may come out with other versions that are premium or pro, you know, like we did Lucy on ABC. And it's a great story. You know how you level a game by getting under it and you lift it on your back? So this show, I am under the game, lifting it on my back. It's a Lucy. So you got her over me. I'm lifting her on the back. And George Petro of Play Mechanics took a picture and then sent it to me. Yeah, right. But you won't be redoing what you just did with Elvira? Oh, then. With the Blood Red edition? Yeah. There will not be limited editions redone. It's certainly on anything going forward. LCD. Yeah. If it's an LCD and we decide, there are LCD games that maybe we should make more of again. Because we weren't making as many games in the community and in the general buyer. The first-time buyer, there's just so many more buyers and people want, and they may want some of these games. LCD games, first of all, a lot of what's in there has reached last buy. You can't build everything. Has the license expired on those? Oh, no, no, I'm saying the parts and all. Oh, the license has expired. If you want to build one, you're going to have to see if the licensor wants you to build it, to do it, and to do it as special. So we might, you know, do a redo. Or an anniversary edition. Yeah, but redoing it probably with an LCD. And again, whether those, you know, how we do those. We talk about dot matrix games. Yeah, yeah. You can redo that. Pre-LCD. Yeah, pre-LCD. How we would do those and how we would package or how we would market them, because they would be different games than the original. I can't, this is far afield, far afield. But there is, you know, there is a desire for some of the games that were dot matrix games that you wouldn't make as a dot matrix today. And developing one of those, by the way, is almost like developing a whole new game. You've got to play from the layout to start with, that's all you've got to do. Yeah, you have to rework all the assets of the game, from the sound through to the graphics. So, just purely on a personal preference,
    45:26
    which pre-LCD games would you like to see to be turned into an LCD game, if you like? Oh, I would like to see the games that the customers like.
    45:38
    Again, you don't want to be... But you ask them? Have you asked the customer what they'd like? we've had some input from over the years people say why don't you make more of this or why don't you make more of that but there's no plan right now and if there was I wouldn't tell you I ask for your personal preference it doesn't have to say it doesn't have to align with any plan have you found me on the play show I've seen you Did you find it on the playfield? I haven't seen it. I didn't wait for it. That's one of the things with the distributors here. I said, who's seen me? Whoever's the first one to tell me where I am, I'm sending them a jersey or something, you know. So we had a little contest on that. Right. So now we were talking about moving to a bigger facility. We actually moved to two bigger facilities. Yes, because you have the woodworking shop in a different location. Yes, a block, two blocks away. It's very close. You know, it's walking distance. It's a long walk, but it's walking distance. But you've been in this industry for, like you say yourself, for 76 years. You've seen the highs and the lows. Yeah. I mean, even Stern Pinball at some point was down to probably less than 15 employees. and well you started out with three only with Shelly and Joe and you, you grew the business at some point unfortunately I don't think we were down to 15 but we were down because you can't run it you can't really run a real business with 15 but you must be at an all time high right now up and down a little because we do some adjustments we just got done with an inventory closed for a week plus, two weeks, to take inventory. Just operate your MRP to have a clean cut inventory. We just got the new ERP system after a lot of work and a lot of time, mostly working.
    47:56
    And we started an ERP installation before COVID. COVID comes it's really not the best time to be changing your ERP, your whole computer system and the consulting firm that we're working with went bankrupt during COVID that doesn't help me you can imagine that this was very expensive so anyway so does that change the impact on manufacturing then? having a better system and more control and more knowledge. But why are you doing that inventory? Oh, no, we stopped building games. You stopped building? Yeah, no, you're typically closed. You know, back in the day, and back in the day, I'm going to say the 70s, and, you know, my father's days at Williams or what have you, you would have a summer vacation, and that's when you would take your inventory. because the year end was in July or something like that.
    49:04
    Our year end is December 31st. That has to do with U.S. corporate and tax law. So get done with your Christmas business. Again, we're 70% consumer, home business. Get done with the Christmas business. Take your inventory and get back up to start the new season. You wouldn't close down while it's the height of summer and it's too hot in the factory. We're in condition. We are now. We're in condition. Yeah. Right. Yeah. So, but I wasn't present in the... I've never been at a facility where Data East built their games or Sega. Is this the biggest facility? Well, yeah, yeah. This is, you know, again, we are Data East, we're Sega. I know. We're the same company. We started in a couple offices in a 350,000-square-foot building that was being torn down, so we got to use a couple offices, and that was Joe Shelley and myself. And then we had a tech and what have you. We moved into 27,000-square-foot. For a while, we had a second 27, so we hit it down the street. Yeah, we did the cabling down the street. Yeah, and then we moved back to the one and into a 40,000 square foot. One of the reasons we had the second is we've launched a Sega, and we're making video games for them as a contract manufacturer. We moved into the 40,000, and we moved from the 40,000 square foot building to the 105,000. We added some of our operations on the hard-code sealing of the play fields, And that was up in another place that we rented a building, but we bought the existing supplier.
    50:56
    Now we're moving it into our woodworking. The woodworking building is about 60,000 square foot or call it 5,500 square meters.
    51:06
    And it's not all yet being utilized. And we will always have a second source for play fields, for everything. Yeah, virtually everything is second source. Second source other than yourself? Yes, almost everything is either one, you know, yes, either two outside sources or, you know,
    51:28
    like we have three places making printed circuit boards for us. Right. Would it have been ideal, I mean, I know there's an awful lot of dust and muck involved in manufacturing or cutting wood and printing papers, would it have been perfect to have it In the same building. It was in the same building when we were just doing plate books. If we keep doing more, we'll need more space. Yeah. And it is not ideal because, as you say, there's a lot of dirt.
    51:57
    So you're happy with it being in a different location, separated from the clean manufacturing. Yeah. I can sit here for another hour. I know that you have an appointment at 6. Yeah. It is 6 o'clock now. Yeah. And he wanted to take a nap before that. I'm afraid that's not going to happen. Well, when I ran into you, and then you got both of you, you know, you guys.
    52:21
    Well, thank you for taking time out and joining us, Harry. It's much appreciated. My pleasure. It's always good to talk to you, and we always learn a lot about the operations. Yeah, I hope I didn't give away any secrets. Oh, yeah, you did.
    52:35
    Well, you're still the boss here. Yeah, well, you know. It's your company. Yeah, you still don't want everybody getting mad at you, so. I'm sure you're used to that by now. but anyway thank you very much for joining us thank you appreciate it enjoy this game yeah it is a great game so a big thanks again to Gary Stern for taking time out and extended time out from his busy schedule at EAG International Expo and talking to us I hope you found it interesting and informative oh yeah absolutely yeah not you the listeners we already knew all that stuff yeah Right, okay, moving on quickly Yes, so our second headline then was all about American Pimple Because it's been, well, I wouldn't say it's been a busy month It's been an interesting time Right, yeah Not so much because they did something But more they had to debunk a couple of rumours Yeah, unsubstantiated rumors it turned out Yeah, so, well, your English is better than mine So you better address that before I say something that isn't correct Well, okay, I'll say something that probably isn't correct then instead Okay, well, there were unsubstantiated rumors that the company, American Pinball that is Was either closing down completely or being put up for sale by their parent company, Ametron Right neither of which is apparently true. Now, they posted a message, was it on Facebook? I think it was, briefly. Yes, yes. But soon withdrew it, saying, in response to some recent speculation,
    54:23
    American people would like to clarify to our valued customers, etc., etc., that the rumors regarding the company being sold or in talks of being sold are baseless and untrue. American people will continue to be owned and operated by a parent company, Ametron, and is more dedicated than ever to delivering high-quality pinball experiences.
    54:42
    Okay, and this kind of comes after there had been another notice on their website in their support section saying that they had, which is unusual, they said they had lost their service technician, like the singular, service technician. Yeah, they had one service technician. Did anybody find him?
    55:04
    Well, no, apparently not. If you listen to our interview, you'll find out. It says, we wish to inform you of a recent change to our team.
    55:11
    Our service technician has moved on from this position with us, and in the interim, our dedicated team will handle all orders and service calls. So basically, we didn't have anybody looking after the service calls since December, I think, or since Christmas, anyway. It says, we are committed to maintaining high standards of service to your country. It's great from us. We appreciate your patience during this transition. well you will hear in the interview exactly what the outcome of all that was but the general advice I think during the rounds was there's no point in them an email because they don't answer them because there's no one to answer them so the best thing to do is to give them a call and then you will actually speak to someone or someone will pick up the phone and then we'll hopefully be able to help you now I don't know whether we want to divulge what David's going to tell us I think we might as well because it's already been announced through a live Twitch stream on their new Twitch channel their inaugural stream so to speak on Hot Wheels and there's something special about that game which David Six will talk about in the interview that we will play for you as we just talked to David so but there was a very good reason for them to showcase this Hot Wheels game, which is a couple of years old, as we know. Yes. This is going to be the first of a series of regular streams of their games that they're going to be doing to help promote them.
    56:45
    Now, at the time of speaking, or recording this, that stream is not yet available for replay on Twitch or on YouTube, but apparently it's going to be very shortly, so maybe by the time you listen to this, you'll be able to find it on the American Pinball YouTube channel or on their Twitch channel? Channel, yes. So, new Twitch channel, that is. Yeah. So, are we talking about what's actually revealed in that? Well, we can discuss the news or announce the news and then we'll play the interview anyway because David talks about it very lengthy. but he also talks about the upcoming Barry Osborne game that's currently being developed and a couple of other things but the big news for American Pinball aside from debunking the rumor that the company apparently or which turned out to be not true is not being for sale so to speak is that they developed their own hardware system and they found two new technicians to step in where the other one left off.
    58:05
    Yes, that's right. They've mentioned just now about them losing their sole service technician back in December. Well, they've now got two, taken on two people to replace that, or replace them. and one of them is a chap called Morris who worked at Galloping Ghost Arcade fixing games there. Maurice Smith, that is, yes. That's right. I thought that was his surname, but I wasn't going to commit to it, but you're quite right. Yeah, Maurice Smith. And the other, I'll be honest, I spoke to David yesterday on the phone to set up the interview and find out whether there was a bigger story here that we really need to be across. But he said, oh, I've taken on two people, and I said, I bet one of them's Lloyd Olsen of SS Billiards. He went, how did you know that?
    59:03
    How did you know that? Well, because it made sense, really, because if you want somebody... Lloyd is so well-versed in doing this job that he's been online, on the phone, Support technicians for First of all for Jersey Jack Pinball And for Chicago Gaming As well Now when Chicago When Jersey Jack Pinball Got taken over They tried to They brought all that in house So Lloyd didn't have that gig anymore But he's still running the arcade He's still got Jersey Jack Games And he's still got American He's still got Chicago Gaming remake games in there as well and is still doing technical support for Chicago Gaming and it just made perfect sense to me that that's who you would ask. Also, Lloyd's a regular at Pinball Expo and David Fix, obviously, is heavily involved in running Pinball Expo. Right. So they're no strangers to each other. Far from it. And it seemed like a great fit. So when he said, yes, it's Lloyd, I thought, well, fantastic. So I think that will certainly resolve one of the major problems they've had recently. I guess they've probably got a big backlog of support issues to catch up on. I don't know how reliable their games are, but it could be, yes. Well, they've had nobody for the best part of two months now. Right. I'm sure there are plenty of issues. No, I'm sure the team there have been building things as best they can, but now they've got two people who are dedicated. And we are seeing exactly how that's going to work out, having two people running the technical support line, who's going to look after what, what's the process going to be, and are they going to have the authority and the budget to deal with all the issues. And I don't know how many there are, but any issues which may occur as far as service replacement of parts is concerned. So you'll find out all about that in our interview with David. Yeah, and there is actually a sort of a bonus for American Pinball by taking on Lloyd Olsen, and David Fitcher explains all about that as well in the interview, so I recommend us listening. Yeah, but you also mentioned about their new board system. which is developed and manufactured by their parent company, Ametron, which Ametron is a big company that makes and develops circuit boards for all kinds of different industries. Yeah, and they used to do it for Stern. And Williams, yeah. Yeah, and Belly.
    61:56
    Yes, they know the gaming industry, and they do stuff for slot machines and things like that, So they're quite versed in making systems or designing systems which work in electrically noisy environments and are getting a lot of user activity on them, shall I say. They're being banged about and having a lot of vibration running through their systems. So they know all about that. and apparently they've been working on this for many years and at one point they tried one system and it didn't really work out so well so they started from scratch with what turned out to be their current system. Right. The new system... Yeah, sorry, carry on. So for those not completely aware of what we're talking about, American pinball machines are currently run on the multi-morphic P3 or P-Rock system, P3 Rock system, to make it more complex, which is a board set that also can be used for developing your own pinball machine. But it's very reliable, so that's why American Pinball chose to for that system in their games when they started up. Now that they have manufactured a couple or put a couple of games into the market it's a natural progression to
    63:32
    develop your own board set and not be reliable on the third party absolutely yeah i mean it's uh and the fact they're owned by amtron made it really only a matter of time before that that step was taken and now uh finally they've uh they've produced this this new board system which is Bear in mind that American People games still run on a PC,
    63:57
    but all the hardware controls, the controls for the sound noise, the switches, the LEDs, that's all done through the P-Rock system currently, or P3-Rock system, for their current games, including the ones that are being manufactured at the moment. But their new board system will come in on their next game in mass production, Although, as David will tell you, you may, if you went to Pimble Lethster, you may actually already have experienced playing their new board set, but not realised it. What is interesting is that they designed it so that it will be back-to-back compatible with previous games. So it means that if your P3 Rock board system, for some reason, needs replacing, you could put in the Amtron board set as long as you replace the main controller board and any satellite boards for the driver solenoids and the switches and the LEDs. So if you do that, then that set of boards together will work with the existing wiring harnesses and the existing cables. They've actually designed it so that all the connectors are in basically the same place on the boards,
    65:21
    although the boards, the firmware and the devices on the boards are completely different, so it does need a different version of the code to run that's designed specifically for the AIM-Tron boards as opposed to the P3 boards. How about we let David Fix explain all that? Yeah, I'm sure he can do that a lot longer than I can, yes. Okay, so let's head over to David Fix, and we'll pick it up after that. Okay, so we are joined now by the Executive Vice President of American Pinball, Mr. David Fix. Welcome, David. Hello, Martin. Hello, Jonathan. How are you guys? We are great. Thank you for joining us. Thank you for coming on the show. We understand you have some news.
    66:03
    Yeah, we had some exciting news last night during our Twitch, our inaugural launch of the Twitch channel. So we were excited to bring on two people into the service department. I think that was pretty well. Martin actually called it. He kind of called me and said, I think you're going to hire X. And I'm like, how do you know? So we were happy to bring on Lloyd Olson from S&S Billiards, LTG, to help us out with the service. And then also we brought on Maurice Smith, who is a competitive player here, worked at the Alpine Ghosts, and worked on games there. So we were excited about bringing them on board and showing them the ropes and getting them to do stuff for us to help where we needed some dire help in the service department. Sure. You even put a notice on your website saying that your service technician left in December and you were asking customers to bear with you during the difficult time. Yeah. He kind of just kind of, like, didn't show up on a Monday, and we kind of reached out to him, like, are you okay kind of thing, and we got crickets. And then all of a sudden he was like, yeah, took another job, thanks, bye, and that was it, and we were, like, done.
    67:22
    Wow. And sure enough, that was a week before Christmas, so that was, like, great. So we've been scrambling ever since. So as part of this deal, you've got Maurice and Lloyd now.
    67:39
    Lloyd obviously runs a Hespadids in Hopkins, Minnesota. Is he going to be getting some American Pinball games over there so he has reference? Because he can't exactly just pop around the corner into the factory. Correct. He's getting one of each copy. And he'll probably get one of the newest ones as soon as it's available too. so right so we'll get back sorry we're going to talk about that but let's change that for now and we'll get to it in a bit we're not talking about that we've got to wait for that alright you brought it up so but that wasn't the only news we understand no no it wasn't the only other news the other news was a project that we've been working on for quite a while and that was the evolution that American Pinball now has its own board system.
    68:36
    We all know that when American Pinball came out, we used an off-the-shelf board system, which we're very happy about, and we continue to use that board system, and it's been reliable. But as the evolution of the company continues, you know, AIMTRON did build boards and made boards for WMS and Stern Pinball at one point. So it was just a matter of time. Just to clarify for our listeners, AIMTRON is the parent company of American Pinball. Correct. And they make board sets. That's correct. They make board sets. They have their own engineering department. And you're building with them as well. Yes, we do. We do. part of their facilities here. They have another building over which is the corporate offices and then we have offices overseas too. So A-Pron is this big company and then we're just a subsidiary of it. Although it's really good for a board manufacturer to have this gigantic pinball machine with all its boards sitting in it at a trade show showing off what we can build. So it's a very nice little piece for them. And one of the key features of this which you mentioned is that it has physical backward compatibility with your existing games. So if someone needs to completely replace the controller in their game, they can put your new system in. So does that mean, I mean, it's not software compatible. You have to have different code. It has different drivers for the various... Correct. On the boards. But you need to have the controller board and the driver board and the switch board, I'm guessing, as well. So you need to replace all those three.
    70:26
    But presumably that means that you actually have to have the same or at least very, very similar pinout connections on all these boards. So you don't have to replace the entire wiring on the game. You're a very smart man, Martin. Very smart. But, yes, it's an exact pinout. Basically, we just took our pinouts, okay, and we basically made the boards. Everything inside the boards is completely different, but the pinout is exactly the same. So we follow the same architecture of the pinout so that, yes, if for some reason something happens down the road, you can't get a multi-market board, which I don't see that happening anytime soon. there's nothing wrong with that but if let's say 30 years from now or 20 years from now you can't get it uh the new board system that we are making which has a newer processor you can replace the entire board system in the game uh it has to have its own code it has all its own code so the game is going to code it is the same it's not completely different the only difference is you're going to have longevity and you're going to have a substantial life to your game. So you continue to use your game and play it as much as you want, but you have to change over all the boards. Now, granted, we haven't ported it over to all the games yet. We're still working on it, but what we said in the announcement was the very first game that we started working with was Hot Wheels. and in September of 2023, or end of August, beginning of September, Interium got a little upgrade. The Hot Wheels there had all the boards switched over to the new AIMCON system, board system or American Pinball system, and we've been running it since then. So there's the steps of beta. There's a lot of beta testing. And I've shared this in many other podcasts that we use Interium as our test facilities. We test new power supplies. We'll try new coils. We'll try new shooter rods. We'll try a lot of new stuff in the game. People don't know it, but we're letting the public beat on it, right? So we wanted to put the new boards in in September. We ran through September through October. Expo came. Everybody came, played the games at Expo. And I think it's around Expo time that we upgraded the galactic tank force that was there with the new boards. So you had a new board system in that one and in Hot Wheels at that time. And then we ran them all the way. In fact, I think it was about two weeks ago, the Illinois State Championship was at Interium and had the Hot Wheels in the tournament. It was played all day long through the tournament, and no one knew a difference that the boards were actually in there. So it does take a little work on our end. So we did it with Hot Wheels. We're doing it with a couple of our other games. We're testing them out, okay? And then we're going to go backwards and go all the way back to, you know, the plan is to get all the way back to Houdini so that anybody who has a Houdini, bought a game in 2017, if something happens, say, in 2030, okay, quite a few years from now and we can't get boards, we have a new board system that can be ported back and make it available that your game will continue to run.
    74:04
    Okay, I have a couple of questions off the back of that, if I can. First of all, your existing board set from Multimorphic is a very popular one with homebrew game makers. Okay, is there any possibility that your board system will be made available to people who want to make their own game in the same way, if it works in a very similar way, or is it staying proprietary to you? It's staying proprietary for now. We have no plans for that right now. However, if a home brewer does use the multimorphic system and for us to port it over, it's possible, right? We have to do a good point of coding to do it, but we can definitely get there. and we'd work with the designer if we wanted to take a homebrew. So we didn't, you know, like I think you bring this up because we did Legends of Valhalla, which was done on the Multimortic, and we just brought that over. It was very easy. Now, can we bring it over to the new system? We probably could, but we're going to have to do some more coding and some more stuff. So we've been working on a lot of stuff in the backgrounds. Right. So there is some proprietary work under the hood there which isn't being made publicly available. The other question I was going to ask you is, what's the name of it? Do you have a name? Is it like a SAM or is it a SPIKE? What are you calling this board system? Are people going to say, oh, that's the collective tank force that's running on the AIMTRON boards, or are they going to say it's running on, I don't know,
    75:45
    on the FIX boards? No, it's not going to be called the fixed boards, no. But we currently are just referring it to as the MPU board and the driver board. We haven't come up with any kitschy names like the popcorn popper board or any of those cool names. No, the name of the system as a whole. Yeah, I know. We haven't done that yet. We might do that.
    76:09
    But right now we're just calling it the MPU. They're blue, so it might be the blue MPU. I don't know. We haven't gotten into that whole point of, like, naming yet. We should hold a competition and see if people can come up with a good name.
    76:25
    I'm afraid of what names they may come up with. A good name, I say. Yeah. So what Martin just mentioned about the HomeRoot community using a multimorphic board set, not sure whether this question makes sense but let's say someone who is into homebrew games owns an American pinball machine with a multi-mortar board set decides, you know what I'm going to order the Antron board set and I'm going to use the multi-mortar board set to build my own game and to develop that is that possible or is that locked up in some way that the board can be used for that okay you kind of danced around this you're gonna buy you have an american pinball game let's just say let's see you got a houdini or legends okay and well let's just use hot wheels because we reported that over so you have a hot wheels you're gonna buy the new board set okay it's gonna be you know okay you're gonna buy a new board it could be cheaper than another multimorphic set it could be we you know listen we're doing this hypothetically speaking could the multimortar board be used to develop your own game you're saying is the P-ROP system that you have been using up until now is that locked to American Pinball games or is it just a standard P-ROP that anybody can use got it got it No, you can always, yeah, it uses the standard P-Rock, well, I guess you would call it the hardware, but it also uses its firmware, yes, which is the firmware that American Pinball has been using has been P-Rock's firmware, which runs the boards, which does all that stuff. The new American Pinball boards has its own firmware. It has its own architecture. It has everything new in it. And it's a whole different setup. So that's completely different in the system. Right. But let's say I feel like taking a piece of plywood and designing my own game. I need a board set for that. How about I order the Amtron set for my current game, upgrade that to the latest and greatest, and use the multimodal boards to run my own game? Well, I see a lot of red and green and don't hit red, you know, maybe in the future. I don't know if that's what you're going with, Jonathan, but, yeah, you can take the boards out there if you want to do it and use it. And, you know, here's the thing. The game is going to play the same, is pretty much the same as you're already going to find on the multi-market. So it's not really, I would just go out by yourself and other multi-market boards and put it in your game. Okay. You know, I mean, why go through all that hassle ripping one out and changing it over and doing it? Now, granted, it's pin for pin, so it's very easy. But again, you know, why mess with it unless you had to, right? My whole idea and what we, the whole idea on this board set, understand, was to create a world where we can continue as a manufacturer. Let's say we want to go back and build Oktoberfest two years from now or whatever game we want to build. I'm not saying we're going to do that right now, but I'm just saying that if we wanted to go back there, we can just basically take our board set, port it over, and have it set up, and then put it over there. Have we ported all our back existing games in there? No. The plan on this was to going forward with the next game, we'll have that board set in all the games going forward. unlike other competitors who may have changed board sets and so forth, and then you're stuck with revision one or revision two, and you can't go back and you can't go this way. This is me as a collector wanting to be able to go, oh, I can go backwards,
    80:40
    take care of you, and then yet still move forward, okay? So that's just a little bit of me because, I mean, I went through that. You know, I have 150 pins, right? And I've gone through that fiasco of, you know, okay, this board,
    80:59
    this is the same company, different boards. Can't put them in there. You know, it just doesn't work. So, you know, I've got to wait and find this board or find an old game or a donor game to do it with. So I didn't like that. Right. Okay.
    81:14
    Now, so you're saying the next game will ship with the AIM from Boardset, But what about the games that are currently coming off the line? They're still shipping with the Multimorphic set? Yep.
    81:25
    Okay. Still shipping with the Multimorphic set. Okay. I have a couple of questions that come from that, if I may. First of all, for those people who get a game or want to change their game over to the Ametron board set or want a better name, is there any cosmetic or apparent difference in gameplay between the two does one behave does one give you an advantage over the other or is it purely from the point of view of longevity and being in control of the supply chain of those that's the first question absolutely it's totally the same gameplay there's no different code I mean yes there's different code but the game doesn't have any secret passages no extra points, no zippy or flippers or anything like that. It plays.
    82:19
    I mean, the whole idea was last night's stream, everybody was like, why are you playing that game from four years ago, right? There's nothing different. All the lights worked, everything's doing everything it's supposed to do. Where are we, you know, what's going on with that? So, you know, and then the whole point was you can't tell, right? Just kind of like the Alltech. You can put an Alltech board, right, which has a much faster processor than we have seen in the past. Put that in any old Bally or Stern, and you play that game, right? And you don't feel the difference. The hardware is all up-to-date, newer-style hardware that just works. And, you know, it's not like we're talking that we went from condescent bulbs to LED bulbs and trying to control the flickering. know but we're talking about you know we always use deli deep waltz right so we're using pretty much the same state-of-the-art stuff just giving you a board system that makes sense for a company of our age who's been in the business now um since 2017 with houdini still making houdinis mind you uh to bring out a game or to have our own board system just the longevity of the company basically Sure. And the second question I was going to ask, and it's something I think you may have mentioned and I didn't pick you up on it at the time, is the controller board, or any of the boards in fact, is it coded to a particular title? Or is it a generic board that can be used in any of the machines just so that you load the software up onto it in the same way that you do the software onto the PC, I guess. It's still running on the PC. there's nothing special about the board that's used in the Houdini you can take it out and put it in Hot Wheels correct so with our next game that's coming out let's say you have a problem you took that board and put it into one of our older boards it has the architecture, it has the firmware it has all that stuff already coded for American you have to download the new code for that game let's say it's Houdini or whatever, let's say it's Hot Wheels, you download it, put it on the thumb drive, stick it in, now it knows how to read the boards. The JET switches would need to be set, but, you know, everything has to be set in there, but you could get it working, yes. And understand, we will probably, most definitely, have a video come out from our service department at some point, which would go and explain how do I set the new board system up for a Hot Wheels How do I set up a new board system for a Legends of Valhalla How do I set up a new board system for a Galactic of a hollow how do i set up a new board system for a galactic tank force you know and then you basically you could click on it watch the minute two minute video watch how we go through the documentation how to hook it up take your thumb drive plug it in and download your new code and put it on there and off you go and uh enjoy your game mr operator mr home uh you know home collector and you're you're ready to go rock role. So basically what I'm saying is unlike other companies, I'm not forgetting us as collectors. And that's the key point. We're not forgetting you. You've been true to us. We're being true to you. We're the ones who are going to be keeping your games up and running for many years to come. Okay. Excellent. Now there was some speculation going on, changing this up yet completely, because I think we covered the board set. There was some speculation going on the past couple of weeks about American Pinball being available for someone who wants to buy a pinball company.
    86:18
    You addressed it in the stream of last night, but can we get a quick summary on that? Yeah. You know, here's the other thing is we didn't have to release the new board system. We didn't have to tell everybody about the new board system. But we did because we're trying to tell everybody we're in it for the long haul. We have the backers. We have the company. Nirmal was on the stream. His father is in India right now.
    86:48
    We have so many games already in the pipeline and ready for production. and we're trying, you know, we're moving forward, right? The idea was let's show a new board system that we're serious about this. If this was a company that was going to be on the chopping block and ready to go, right, would we stick hundreds of thousands of dollars in developing a new board system? Would we, you know, throw in all this? No. We're in it for the long haul to continue building games and bringing games to the public and supporting our back games. That's why we also brought on our two technicians that we've been fervently trying to find because, unfortunately, COVID was not just a problem for electronics and parts, but it's also been a very hard thing for people, personnel, right? to get personnel and companies has been not an easy thing. So, I mean, listen, if Martin was living in Chicago, he'd probably be working for American Pinball, Stern, anybody. But he's over in the UK, so the next best thing is the BBC because they can afford his big paycheck.
    88:02
    Well, it would be nice to think so. But picking up on that point about the service, where we started this interview, when will people start to see a difference in the level of service that they receive from american pinball well we've been trying as hard as we can we we have had asked for everybody to be patient with us you know and they have been you know some haven't been but you know it's to a point you know things i understand i'm a collector i need to get things done they need to get things done and we've been shorthanded uh maurice has already been uh taking calls talking to people. Lloyd would be starting as of this week also. We've got to get Lloyd his games, so those games are being shipped out, so Lloyd can start referring to it. But Lloyd can really start talking to people, because Lloyd is Lloyd, right? He can pick up the phone and say, hey, you got a, you know, this is how you undo the lockdown bar. This is how you change a coil out. This is what you're doing, blah. I mean, he doesn't have to look at a game to know the fundamentals, right? Same thing with Maurice. But it helps. So those games are getting shipped out to Lloyd right now and he'll have those and he'll be able to set them up at SNS Billiards for people to enjoy. And not only that, to refer to, right? It kind of works for us too because we do a lot of alpha testing and beta testing. Having Lloyd there as another location for testing for me, it's great because now I can send Lloyd something and say, hey, You're the service tech. You're going to be, this is your baby. You're watching these games. Put this new part in. Tell us how it does, if it's clunky, how you like it, if it doesn't. And then, you know, get the feel back. Let's see if an earnings report trips. Let's see which way things go, right? You have to look at all those numbers.
    89:56
    So we would run those with Lloyd. Right. Cool. So if, excuse me for interrupting, but if I get this correctly, if I would like to receive American Pinball games all I have to be is a tech and you send them to me and I start answering your tech calls not quite John are you looking for a European representative if you wanted to be our media consultant maybe as I've seen you do your magazines and some other stuff I have seen you try to work on games at shows, which is, I would rather let Barton work on them.
    90:41
    I don't know much about working on games at shows, but okay. Anyway, but you know, I mean, listen, Lloyd is a dedicated person who, you know, for a long time was, and he still is, he does some consulting and teching for Chicago Gaming. Okay? And Planetary. which he's like i can do american also i said okay so i'm like that's fine so we were excited to have him on um and he also does shows he'll be down here at expo uh if we can get him away from sns and uh you know we great to have him here at the plant too so we've already had some phone calls and conversations we're going to be bringing them into some meetings and so forth there's a wealth of knowledge there, right? So, you know, pinball people don't grow on trees. And it's not like you're in the Chicago area finding a technician or somebody who has worked on games. Yeah, you know, it's not easy, right? So, like I said, even COVID caused problems with personnel. So how's this going to work on a practical level? If I've got, say, I've got my Houdini, and maybe the screen on stage is a little bit flaky, sometimes it works, sometimes it doesn't. Okay, I ring up, and I speak to someone. Am I going to speak to Maurice? Am I going to speak to Lloyd? It just depends on what day I call. And then who, are they going to then take ownership of that problem? Was it going to the ticketing system?
    92:23
    And you might get called back by either of them. You know, what's the plan? It's obviously a lot harder when you've got two people effectively doing the same job. Absolutely. But here's the thing. We had stuff already in place, right? So we were able to do it before with Dave Brennan, who was a great service technician. He was remote. We did it with our last service technician who was here. So the idea is that, yes, we always ask you to put a service ticket in first. So you're going to put a service ticket in, and then you're going to, or you can call, right? Depending on the time of the day, it's either going to be picked up by Maurice or it's going to be picked up by Lloyd. If it's picked up by Lloyd, Lloyd can always just send off a quick email. Let's say your Houdini monitor is flaky, okay? It's not under warranty because it's the one from 2017. You need a new one, okay? Lloyd can send it off. Maurice is going to pick it up and say, hey, I'll put it in a box. Okay. You can buy it from the web store that we have. Here it is. Here's the link. You know, buy it, fill it out. We'll put it in a box. We'll send it. Send us back the old one. Okay. Or keep the old one.
    93:39
    It's usually what we do is if it's a warranty part, we ask for the part to come home because we want to see what failed on it. Okay. It could be anything, right? If it's a rubber ring, I'm not really worried about that. I'll send you the rubber rings. But if it's something else, right, if it's something else that broke or something that was mechanical or something, and it shouldn't have broken in that period of time, we want it back. So we can, you know, analyze it, talk it over with everybody, look at the inspection. We get your serial number. We know when it was built, what the lot numbers are, when it was built, who is the manufacturer of that part. Okay. And then we can go from there. In fact, all the coils have different names on them from the different manufacturers, so we know who made those coils too. So if there's a problem with a coil, we can find out. And again, that's why we do a lot of testing so we don't have these problems.
    94:39
    And it just helps us out in the long run. And these service technicians, they had the authority and the budget to send out spare parts as and when required and whatever's needed to get the game fixed. Particularly if it's under warranty. I mean, if it's out of warranty, then, yeah, different case.
    95:01
    I know we have, everybody's like, oh, it's 90 days. It's 91 days. It's covered, okay? I mean, everything was in reason, folks, right? I mean, listen, we build commercial equipment. The equipment is supposed to go out on location, be coin-op, and run. Okay? It's commercial equipment. It's supposed to be coin-operated and make money. It's just like a coin-op version of a washing machine, right? But it's got a lot more moving parts. So if there's a problem with it, we want to know because we have to correct it, correct it in the main fashion. We know who built it, who tested it, who missed something. So there is a reason we ask for the serial numbers. It's not like we're starting your clock and saying, oh, you're done. No, we've never done that. We always take care of our people. And, yes, Maurice and Lloyd have the budgets and the backing, right? I mean, they're the kind of people who are going to come up to me and say, hey, David, this guy, he's 110 days past, you know, into his warranty period, and the computer or this mechanism broke. Send him a new one.
    96:17
    I want the old one back, okay? That's just how we're going to run it because, you know, at the end of the day, it's a good. Now, David, this game is from 2017.
    96:27
    It's out of warranty. you know there is there is there is a matter of of of you know justification right um so we we try to take care we want to take care of our customers because that's how you get more sales more people buy and uh you know i listened to gonzo from um um england who just did a review on Galactic Tank Force, and he talked about how he had Legends of Valhalla sitting there and how that thing was like a tank. He's like, that thing is so robust. That's what we want to build. We want to build a robust game that you can beat on and make money if you're an operator.
    97:13
    Right. That's all very clear. Now, there's one topic that, well, you mentioned a couple of times, which is the next game.
    97:25
    And we know a couple of things about the next game. We know that it's going to be... Careful now. Well, yeah.
    97:37
    It's a very awesome design and we know that the name Barry is part of the title of the game. Yep. So let's talk about it for a few seconds. We're excited about it. it's Barry Ouser's last final game that he was designing.
    97:56
    He had been working with us for six months. He literally laid it all out. We were building the Whitewood and I had been on the phone with him two days earlier and we were talking about timelines and when he was going to come up to the factory spend a week with us and shoot the Whitewood. okay and we were excited about that and we had already had he had already been working with steve bowden for that six months coming up with the rule sets uh coming up with the the idea of the game right um the idea of the game that the title is a joint effort from all of us um we'll talk about that more in title later um but uh when i got cassie who called me two days afterwards to tell me that Barry passed away was like, you know, I remember I was out to breakfast in the morning when I got the call and everybody looked at me and said, you turned his way as well. So I said, Barry just passed away.
    98:57
    But it wasn't, it wasn't, it was very tough. We all love Barry. We did. So that's why his name's on the game, because we dedicated it to Barry.
    99:11
    And when it comes out, everybody's going to see this game. and go, it's Barry Osler. You know, it's Barry's game. And it's a fitting, very fitting, and I'm getting a little emotional about it, but it's very fitting for us to dedicate it to Barry. And yes, Barry's name's on it. The question that's probably on everybody's mind who is interested in playing this game and seeing this game being revealed, how big are the chances we get to play it at the Texas Pinball Festival in March?
    99:55
    Texas Pinball Festival in March. There's a possibility. Yeah. It doesn't sound very firm. It's not like we're going to be there.
    100:10
    We're not going to be there with 10 games. The game will be ready when the game is ready. So, but we are definitely, you know, listen, we've got to be careful when we plan around shows and so forth. We want to make sure we don't push things out too soon, make sure things are ready.
    100:30
    Granted, it'd be nice, but we're working on it, right? So I think we've, you know, touched on it enough to understand that, you know, goals for the team, right? And it would be beautiful to be down in Texas where Barry was last there with his wife. So, yes. A strong possibility.
    100:57
    Okay. Okay, and as we mentioned before and earlier, this isn't the only game that we know is coming out from you. probably the only game this year, but it's not the only game you're working on. You said you're working on several titles. Oh, yeah. And as you would expect for a company with a pipeline of games. Yep. So how much longer do you think the Active Tank Force is going to be the main product for the company, or the main focus of the product? the company you know so galactic is selling very well i mean it it's weird right so you know i know distributors will say you know the listeners podcast no it's not selling it's not listen unless you deal with all 160 distributors that american pinball has across the united the entire world you don't know where it's going right i will tell you that we have sold uh quite a few into Germany, right? And listen, at the end of the day, the sales numbers are actually and what we make and what we produce is American Pinball's information, right? It goes to the owners and they're the ones who deem it. Understand that that's why we, you know, they looked at the numbers from Legends of Valhalla, okay? And that's when we were deeming off the Legends of Valhalla, that we can go and start the new board set, which that started back then. It took many years to start going, and they knew that they were investing on that. And then we sold games last year, and we're selling games into this year. And we are not a charity by any means, so the company is making money. And that is, of course, the joys of the people who own the company. They know what their numbers are. They understand. So they have given us the green lights to go forward. So we're kind of excited about this. You know, we do have other games in the pipeline, as we would. We have another game from Dennis.
    103:24
    Thank you. We have a couple games from Dennis. We have games from Ryan. We have a Riot game that's been talked about, and we're putting that together as well. And there are some other people who we've talked to over the last, you know, six months to a year that we're working on some stuff for them. So it's not like we're just sitting back and not doing anything here. This company is moving quite fast.
    103:59
    Could it be better? Everything could be better. I think I said on the Super Awesome Pinball Show that my rating for the company was a C, right? Some people said I should have said a B or a B-. But, you know, listen, I'm just going to be honest with you guys. We could have been better. Personnel being a little bit more robust in the company would have helped us an awful lot. and, you know, listen, to bring out Galactic Tank Force and then trying to have the new board system coming in right after Galactic Tank Force, you're talking like, okay, so the first board iterations, designs, was hitting us sometime around May, June of 23.
    104:46
    And then July, we were looking at, you know, coding. So that was, you know, that just started zapping up software people, right? And then that delayed us on some of the GTF, right, GTF code, which we're still coming out with some updates for this. So be patient. But when you come out with a new board system, you have a, you know, it's a timeline, right? It's almost like, you know, you've got to build it into the personnel. So then, in fact, some of the coders that normally are at an expo every year were not at an expo this year. If they did, they showed up for like maybe a minute and a half. They were just, you know, they just popped in and said hello and got out because they're neck deep into coding the new board system. The firmware, the architecture, all that stuff. and then yet also doing some other stuff, which was helping out with service when service kind of imploded, right? So we took care of that, and now we're getting back into the good graces, the new board system's working. We're also coding the next game, right? So we're trying to make sure that we take care of our customers who were here first with Galactic Tank Force, and a lot of people who play the game love the game. And it goes back to what I said before. Play the game, and then tell me what you think. You don't like it after you've played it? Thank you for telling me. Okay, what did you not like? I was, you know, that kind of thing. If you've never touched the game, then okay.
    106:23
    I mean, there's something for everyone, right? I kind of just went a little off topic there, but that's kind of where the company is going with that. Sorry. Right. Just picking up on something, going backwards, if I may, just briefly. Going back to the new board system, and obviously it's an Amtron system, they're building it. How does the process work when they say, or you say, okay, we need to have a new board system?
    106:56
    They're not pinball people at Amtron, per se, so they come in and they presumably do some, they need to design it, first of all, based around the environment in which it's going. a vibration-heavy, electrically noisy pinball machine with certain requirements, power handling, switches, lights, LEDs, sound, well, sound is handled by the PC, and also, as you mentioned, the backup compatibility with existing wiring harnesses and connectors.
    107:31
    How, where do they start? Do they come in and sort of do an audit of what you have now and say, okay, we think we can do this this way, or is it a two-way thing? You tell them what you want from them, and they design it, or do they come and say, well, this is what you're doing now, and you want the same basic functionality, so we'll go away and do that?
    107:55
    Well, so there is some requirements, right? So we sat down and listed all the requirements that we wanted, and backwards compatibility was the one that I was pushing heavily. That also dictated to us, you know, what it's going to look like, how it's going to feel, and so forth. The architecture, the firmware, as you would say, is completely different, right? Now, understand, they did stuff for other pinball manufacturers, so they have somewhat of a pedigree to know what they're doing. They also make a lot of stuff for the gaming industry, right? for WMS and Aristocrat or different games like that, IGT, make the board system. So for them, they are, you know, drawing, you know, lights and coils and stuff like that. Some of those things and some of those toppers that are on slot machines are like little mini pinball machines, right? So they've seen some of this, right? They've been around. They've adjusted it. So that's the easy part. The harder part for them was getting everything to sync up with it being fast enough, right? So there's protocols. There's, you know, sending packets of data, of information between boards to board, making sure that everything is, you know, making sure that a switch, right? Like that. Sniffy and various. Absolutely. And you want to make sure that that's reporting back. back, you know, you don't want to, you know, hit a pop bumper and, you know, the coil hit the fire three seconds after the ball's already gone. It's like it didn't do anything, right? So there's a lot of that that had to be set down. So one of the things that we did as a company, you know, American Pinball, to help, we created a very simple, you know, kind of game, very small. Text fixture. Skywood text fixture, absolutely, with a lot of just weird mechanisms on it and switches and explain to them how things do. And, you know, we have a captive area where, you know, you can just throw something in there and just let it roll, right, and just test.
    110:14
    And that's what you have to do to get that to give us the results that we're looking for. Not only that, we had the architecture, the guy who did a lot of the mainframe and the firmware for the game, come to Chicago. He was here in the facility for about three to four weeks, and we're testing iterations of the game, and we're doing all this. We're putting it in the game and playing it so that people could, you know, alpha testing. So he can say, oh, this needs to be faster. Oh, that needs, you know, a lot of sleepless nights, right? So we're all looking at this going, okay, what do we need? And then, of course, it's also the processor you're using, right? Is the processor fast enough that it's going to keep up with the day-to-day of the computer? You know, there's a lot of things that can spec out on paper that look really good, but in the real world, it's a different story. So, you know, we have to go through that whole iteration also. And how tempting was it to get rid of the PC completely and put all that into an embedded system, which then would boot up instantly, wouldn't require a standalone PC, and all the issues that come with that.
    111:41
    I mean, that kind of seems like the ultimate goal, that you wouldn't have a separate PC running the show. It would be all embedded in the board set.
    111:53
    See, that goes back to, you know, when you asked me this question, that reminds me of Pinball 2000, when that came out with its first PC, which is off the shelf. We're talking about graphics cards and what is the most current up-to-date stuff and how fast is your computer and how fast is, you know. So to do an embedded computer, to build our own computer is a very expensive part, whereas getting something off the shelf that is always the newest and fastest and late-breaking and has the graphics chips and everything in it, which just kind of makes more sense to us right now as a company. I don't know. You know, using Williams, and it's funny because I keep thinking of George Gomez during the tilt, the Battle Will Save Pinball, when he's talking about software and on computers in Pinball 2000, how just port it over to the newest and fastest computer. Just continue to upgrade. Just continue to upgrade this. You know, listen, you're taking the computer off the shelf. in this case we have a very fast computer that we're getting in it's very small it works beautifully and it's just there you know we have it and to cost it out to build our own then you know it's kind of tricky it's a slippery slope martin it kind of is but for us to you know switch this computer out and then have a newer So, like, our newest computer, you can put that on our older games. We have it so that, you know, are you going to see a difference?
    113:40
    It's going to run the same, right? That's the idea, yeah. Right. But I will tell you that the graphics card and everything that we had for the newest computer that we did use for Galactic Tank Force made it a lot easier for all that picture-in-picture and high-def video that we ran in that game. And, you know, there was a lot of video assets that, you know, other games that we've made didn't have that amount. In fact, I sometimes think about how much video assets we put in that game. It's just staggering. It's over 5,000 pieces, you know. And when you look at Hot Wheels, and Hot Wheels is a nice game, it's like 2,300, 2,400 pieces. So it's like, okay, almost double, right, just for being galactic. and you have it and galactic tank forces code updates is about 16 gigs it's a big code update and it takes some good time to put that in your computer and run that so there's a lot of stuff that kind of reminds me of also um stern's game that they came out the batman right that had a lot of assets and videos and so forth when they brought that out so you know it's an industry right? We know the numbers, we run it, just do it. And last night a lot of people found out that I actually can play pinball.
    115:08
    Right. So on the subject of video assets and then with your upcoming game in mind, are you for the upcoming Barry game, using actors again for video content, or can you reveal anything about there will be cartoony stuff in there, or animated stuff, or is there anything you can reveal about the LCD content in the game? Assuming there's an LCD in there. There is an LCD in there.
    115:50
    There is video content. There are actors. Stay tuned. You'll have to wait to see, Jonathan. I know you guys are itching to see this thing, so just stay tuned. It's going to be kind of cool.
    116:09
    Yeah, well, I think we're itching to see how it turned out, having seen a couple of early revisions of it, actually, over a year apart. And hopefully the next time we'll see it It will actually be the finished game So fingers crossed And even more fingers crossed That he does make it to Texas Because we'll be there Yes I know And are you guys doing your famous trivia Of course It wouldn't be a Texas show without it So we definitely need to Again like always American will support you guys Very generous real cool gifts to give away to people that they can, who knows, maybe we'll give you a lunchbox or two that you can, oh, somebody's got some coveted lunchboxes. You know, let me touch on this for a second. It's kind of funny because I know I got kind of beat up on Thermosgate, which is kind of like, whatever. So the manufacturer, I'm just going to go on the record so everybody knows this. We originally ordered all the lunchboxes for the signatures, They came with a thermos. And then there was another lunchbox that came without a thermos. Okay. The manufacturer kind of sent us both of them. When we went to order them, they no longer made them without a thermos. So what are they going to do? Make two different kinds of things? Well, we did. We made one with a thermos with a normal graphic on it. and then one with the higher collector style, which is in the signature, which wraps the whole thermos. Very cool little thermos.
    117:55
    So, you know, I wasn't going to buy all these things and keep all the thermoses for myself and say, no, you can't have a thermos. No, that's ridiculous. You know, we're just going to make it easy on all of us, and we bought them, and we had it in there. so okay I think I must have missed thermos gate so oh yeah it's a thing everybody goes wait a minute you're now selling it with the thermos I thought the thermos was only with the signatures well the thermos is with the signatures but that's a different art package all together so I see and the funny thing is the people who bought the signatures a lot of them are buying the other version of the lunchbox so they have both so well if you're that dedicated anyway right well I guess that wraps it up unless you have some more news you would like to tell us David not really I mean listen there's a bunch of things on the horizon right we also have the 40th version of pinball expo this year which I'm taking both of you guys are coming so i hope to see you there in chicago in october truly um rob is pulling out all the stops so you guys will have to be get ready a little earlier to come to chicago as the show starts on tuesday and will be tuesday wednesday thursday friday saturday and then i'm going to go into a coma on sunday because i'm just like crazy um there will be official tours. One of the days there's an official tour of American Pinball.
    119:44
    So the bus will be coming here and giving an official tour to everybody at Expo to walk through and see the factory and everything that's going on and building the games for people. So we're excited about that. They have bought a thermos on the way out.
    120:04
    Yes. It's always good to have a thermos so you can put those alcohol, I mean, those drinks that they're not allowing you in certain places. So it's good.
    120:17
    But, no, that's the fun stuff. It's all good, guys. It's all good. Well, thanks again, David, for taking the time on this busy time for the company to tell us everything that's going on at American Bimble, or at least all the stuff he can tell us about. Yeah, and all the stuff that we couldn't talk about, that we were so eager to telling, but then again we couldn't.
    120:41
    His time will come, yes. Yes. And very much appreciated that David already indicated that he will be sponsoring our So You Think You Know Pinball Quiz at the Texas Pinball Festival in March, where you will be very likely to win, amongst other companies, also goodies from American Pinball. Yeah, always a big supporter of us and our quiz, so thank you to David and American Pinball, and we look forward to seeing those of you who can make it to Frisco in Texas at the Texas Pinball Festival in March. Right.
    121:21
    Now, let's head over to Spooky Pinball. Oh, right, okay. Yeah, well, they've got a new announcement as well, or announcement of a new team member who's joining the Spooky Pinball team. Not physically, I don't think, because they've announced that Danielle Peck, who's from New Zealand, is joining them. She's the number one New Zealand player and ranked number one as a women's player in the entire world. So no newbie to playing pinball. and she will be assisting Spooky Pimple with content creation and producing video for the Bugs Scream and Stream channel podcast and on YouTube as well on their YouTube channel I should say as well so Bugs Scream and Stream I think is a live stream and they obviously have stuff on YouTube too, and I've been recording lots of in-depth gameplay tutorials, not just on spooky games, but on all types of machines. Yeah, well she will be, the channel is currently also used for, whenever there is a code update, they play the newest code version as soon as it becomes available, so. Okay, so congratulations to Danielle anyway, just saying that on her new appointment. Right, and speaking of code updates They did release one for Scooby-Doo, Where Are You?
    123:06
    And I'm not sure whether you want to Dive into that I could mention it briefly Version 2024-0107 So 7th of January Code update, 0.12 I don't know what that relates to It added a haunted topper video mode Which we talked about last month With the topper having that video screen in it Well, there's now a video mode to go with it And there are some changes There's a new co-op mode Cooperative play mode Which is like a game start button mode Where you press and hold it for four seconds and you can pick who you're going to cooperate with and it allows various things to be synchronized between players.
    124:05
    It says things like your character's mode will not be qualified and character perks may be nerfed or omitted to prevent wolves conflicting with game-breaking situations.
    124:18
    Anyway, it's a gameplay mode that you can access from the start button. The Green Ghouls mode, I should say, which has been added to it as well.
    124:32
    And lots more laughter effects have been added, more sound effects, and also a bug fix. Not bug, as in spooky bug, but bug fix, which could cause the game to crash if you drained on the seventh villain, and that's been squished now as well.
    124:54
    A few other... That always happens to me. Oh, I know. It's such a pain, isn't it? But anyway, update your code, and it won't happen anymore. So that's the spooky Scooby-Doo, or are you, code update for this month. Right. And then probably the most exciting news, I suppose, is for people who ordered their Texas Chainsaw Massacre or Looney Tunes games. They are about to start shipping to customers this week. About a week ago they said it's going to be another week and then they start shipping out. So that's right about now.
    125:36
    Wow. That should be starting shipping in. So I expect them to pop up on locations later this week or early next week. I think I can confidently predict that we'll be reporting on some code updates for both Texas Chainsaw Massacre and Looney Tunes. Oh, yeah, probably. In the very near future. Right.
    126:02
    Like I say, there were actually, we mentioned about the Scooby-Doo code update just now, but Scooby-Doo was on the Pinball Heaven stand at the EAG International Expo show in London last month, where it got a lot of attention, and I think a lot of praise as well from people who hadn't played. I can't think of anyone on semi-public play anywhere in the country before that show. So for many people this was their first chance to get their hands on it And I think it was very well received Yeah, so to give you a little extra info EAG is a trade show for the industry But getting in there, once you register It's basically also available for people and enthusiasts and quite a few actually take the opportunity to play the latest games at the show. And I have to say, this year was probably a record year in the number of pinball machines at the show. Yeah, it was very good. There was not only stone pinball on the Electrocoin stand, as we mentioned just now. Spooky pinball, as I say, were on the Pinball Heaven stand, and Pinball Heaven had a bunch of machines from different manufacturers, who we'll be covering in a minute. And then there was a third company, Retro Arcade Specialists, who also had a bunch of machines from different manufacturers, and we be covering them too One company missing which we mention later who was who had been at the show for the past couple of years was Biktronic with their Super Hoops game It would have been nice if they were there as well and then we could have an additional manufacturer.
    127:55
    So as it was, it's a good indicator of the state of the industry at the moment, that all these different manufacturers are represented. But more on those as we get to them. Right. So, which company do we want to discuss next? Wow, okay. So, let's talk about somebody else who was on the Pinball Heaven stand and talk about Jersey Jack Pinball. Sure. Okay, because Jack Guarneri himself was there at EAG.
    128:26
    Yeah. On the Pinball Heaven stand. And there they had an Elton John Platinum edition machine and a Godfather Limited edition. and slightly disappointingly they seem to have sold the Godfather machine very early on in the show after which it was no longer available for people to play So there goes all the rumors that you don't sell games at those shows Yeah, well as you were saying it's very easy for members of the public and pinball fans to come along and just sign up either on the website or on the door and get into the show all you need to do is make up the name of a company and get your badge printed and that's it, and you're in. So, yeah, no surprise that some people want to come along and play the game. I always say I'm with Microsoft and they believe that.
    129:20
    On the basis that they'll employ anyone. Yes. Yeah, so that game wasn't available to play. It certainly wasn't on day two when we were there. That game wasn't available. I guess it was on the first day and that's when they sold it. But anyway, Jack was there to promote that And the Elton John of course Which is the current game And he was wearing his Elton John outfit Of course As you would expect And Well, I don't know if you want to say any more About his appearance at that show You already mentioned About him and Gary earlier on Right, yeah No, and well very kind and I'll just make the introduction now Jack invited us for dinner at a Chinese restaurant literally down the stairs at the venue where the EAG actually is being held yeah very kind in the company of Phil Palmer his distributor in the UK and a couple of other people well the kids of Phil were also present I believe who were teenagers and a couple of other people that I didn't know but no we were able to not only attend the dinner but we were actually able to record it and yeah indeed that means that you get to enjoy a dinner with Jack Guarnieri at EAG if you want in London. If you want, I recommend getting some Chinese food to sit down and eat along. Yeah, exactly. So, we'll do that at the end of this pin cast, but just so you know, it is coming up. And we find it, well, the food was very good, of course,
    131:19
    and, well, Jack had some very interesting anecdotes that he shared with the entire table, so, highly recommended. Yes, and if you want to know more about what's going on at Jersey Jet Pinball, they have published a short video featuring the Elton John programmer Bill Grupp, where he's discussing his take on the game and the concept behind the rules and how he approached taking a music icon like Elton John and turning that into a playable pinball machine. Yeah, so, and the only comment I would make on that video, aside from it being, I found it interesting, and also the way he addressed that the game is not giving anything away for free, so to speak, during gameplay. You have to really earn your multiple. Right, yeah. That kind of stuff. Just bash the toy three times and you're in, yeah. Yeah, so the only thing I found a bit disturbing, I would say, was that, of course, there's Elton John music in the background, but this was no longer in the background. It was rather loud that we couldn't hear Bill anymore. Oh, okay. Bad licks.
    132:46
    Yeah, either lower the volume or use a compressor to duck the music whenever Bill is talking. Or turn on the subtitles.
    132:57
    That's also an option. And then, of course, well, this is your favorite part, knock yourself out with the new Elton John code. Yes, not just one, not just two, but three code updates during January for Elton John, going from version, so I saw for version 101, then we went to 102, 103, and finally we're on 104 by the 19th of the month. So none of them huge. updates, I have to say, although the original one added sounds, graphics and lighting effects, which is very nice. The second one, version 103, was probably the most useful because it added a lot more synchronicity between the Elton John models hands and head moving and the music itself, so that was nice. Then again, more sounds, graphics, lamp effects and the Funeral for a Friend slash Love Lies Bleeding is now available in the jukebox mode, which it wasn't before, a bit of an oversight there, I think.
    133:59
    And the last update only just added a couple of display effect animations for insert coin and when you add a coin. So not a must-have for that one, but anyway, 104 is the current one, time of recording, And that was from the 19th of January.
    134:19
    And that's the code. Okay. So, just because it's on the same screen or in my screen right now, let's jump to Pedretti Gaming in Italy, who last month announced their new or renewed partnership with Planetary Pimble Supplies in becoming another manufacturer of Valley Williams remake games.
    134:49
    Not so much news this month, other than them changing their banner on their Facebook page a couple of times with pictures of potential games that they might be remaking, but we still have to wait and see. It's more like, I reached out to Andrea Podrezzi, the owner of the company, and who told me it's more like a sort of market research.
    135:20
    Although I can imagine that there's other ways to do that. Yeah, just getting to see what the response is and whether people go, oh yes, I'd definitely buy one of those and get a thousand people doing that. Then maybe that'll be their first remake title. But at the moment it's just sort of teases and ideas, so don't read too much into any of them at the moment. I think that's probably fair to say. And although the company changed their name to Pedretti Pinball, their URL for their website is still Pedretti Gaming. And their Facebook page is also still called Pedretti Gaming, but the logo says Pedretti Pinball. So we'll have to see how they are going to integrate all that.
    136:05
    Yeah, because they're still making other games, They're not entirely a pinball company. Well, they try to be a pinball company only now. But then again, if you change your URL, I mean, what's going to happen to all the emails coming in at Prodressy Gaming? Yeah, I have to forward them. But also don't forget they are part of the Euro Pinball Corporation agreement with Pinball Brothers. So that's their manufacturing now for pinball. So now we potentially have three different companies, Pedretti Games, Pedretti Pinball, and Euro Pinball. And Pinball Brothers. Yes, I was thinking, but from the Pedretti company, they have three versions of themselves now.
    136:55
    Anyway, I'm sure that's something we can all deal with. So moving on to another company. We mentioned Pedretti getting into remakes recently, but another company who are just starting up with their first title is Barrels of Fun, who we know are doing their Labyrinth game, which, as we reported last month, has been in production for a little while. It's starting to appear on location now in various places, mainly across the US. but it was also on the Retro Arcade Specialist stand at EAG International Expo in London. It only just arrived in time for the show, but it did make its debut in the UK. Absolutely, it is, yeah. Yes. They had flyers available as well, which, interestingly, were A4 size. Yes. I think I might have one somewhere. I might have a look at it a bit later while we're talking or during one of the interviews because I want to see whether it's a resized version of the American-sized flyer, the U.S. legal. Letter. Letter, yes. Letter-sized one, correct.
    138:14
    In which case you might notice some of the text being a little too close to the edge. But whether either they or barrels of fun, as either Retro Arcade Specialists or Barrel of Fun relayed out all the artwork in order to make it into an equal size. I think the artwork is the same and I don't think they even added anything about Retro Arcade Specialists or anything like that. So it could be a generic European or non-US flyer then, shall we say. Yes. Anyway, the other news about Barrels of Fun is that they received their Labyrinth Goblin toppers and they're shipping them and we speak to customers in the, mostly US at the moment I suppose so these didn't come if you already received your game the topper was about to arrive later on but you can expect it very soon now because they are not shipping Oh, great news there If you ordered a game with a topper Do they all come with toppers? I can't remember Except for the one on the The one that EAG didn't have the topper No It's the topper with the three heads Yes, that's right, yeah Yeah, which are Animated in, I don't know whether they actually The jaws move, but they Light up and I'm not sure whether they Rotate but they're certainly well synchronized with the voices and sound effects and what's happening in the gameplay. So it's good that they are being sent out, if you ordered one. Yes, okay. That rounds it up for Barrels of Fun. I think it does. So now we move on to our next company. Well, I was going to say, let's talk about Pinball Brothers then, because we were talking about toppers just now with Barrels of Fun and Labyrinth. There's some add-ons as well That have been created by Pinball Brothers or been created For them By the Art of Pinball I think The official Topper for Alien was already Showcased at the Pinball Expo In October Last year, that was a prototype In the meantime All the Elements for that topper and that's quite a few actually, have been arriving and the toppers are being put together.
    140:59
    And the Art of Pinball also redesigned a couple of scopes that are being used on the playfield. and the good news for those in North America is that those parts have arrived at the Pinball Brothers USA offices and are currently being shipped. So if you order the new, whatever you call these, plastic surroundings for your... Yeah, there's a frame that goes around the mini display. for the airlock, and there's also the xenomorph head as well, which was also done by Art of Pinball, so a new version of that, which, as they say, they both look gorgeous, and, well, I have to agree. Actually, they do look really good. So, great work from the Art of Pinball for making that happen, without all that much delay either. And I expect that Toppers will be shipping out soon.
    142:10
    I believe mid-February they'll be shipping out from the US. So at least that's the aim. So a couple of weeks and then topos are also in the hands of customers. But there's some more parts as well aren't there, which they announced.
    142:29
    I think there was a flasher of some kind as well? No, no. Oh, yeah, no. That's a completely different topic. But thank you for bringing that up. There is a... Pinball Robots did publish a video of an alien pinball with a new mini beacons and flasher kit.
    142:55
    The link for that video will be in the Pinball Magazine newsletter. It will go out, well, I tend to say in a couple of days, but it's probably going to be in a couple of weeks. It'll go out when it goes out. Right. So, demonstrating the Mini Beacons and Flasher Kit for Alien Pinball, which also worked with the new Alien version, as well as all the regular SV and LV. And, yeah, it's an interesting kit, I have to say. It adds a lot of flashing, of course, again. But, no, it looks really good. So... These are actually on the playfield, these mini beacons and flashers. Yes. I think the ones that are above the ramps and spinner and such. Great. Okay. Because previously, obviously, the main beacons were on the top of the back box as part of the topper. Yes. So it adds more flash onto the playfield. Yes. And these are available with Pimple Brothers distributors. and they are about to be shipping next week as well. So no long waiting time over there. No, very good.
    144:13
    If you want to upgrade your Alien game, this is your chance. I think so, yeah. Do you want to move on to the code? Yeah, yeah, yeah. Yeah, a big code update. Why not, really?
    144:27
    Alien, unsurprisingly, version 4.1. on the 16th of January, just had a number of bug fixes and game crash fixes. Surprising they still exist, but of course every time you update the code you run the risk of adding stuff which breaks other things. There is support for the new topper and the flashes as well in there. And there's a couple of very minor rule changes which some might only won't bother going into them. And that's basically version 4.1 of Alien Code. Get it now.
    145:01
    Especially if you've got the game. Yeah. And that rounds it up for Pinball Brothers from Sweden. Although, well, in the interview with David Fix, we mentioned the Texas Pinball Festival.
    145:18
    Do you think we might see another Pinball Brothers title anytime soon? I doubt it will be announced in... Well, there is going to be another one. It might be a different version of either Alien or Queen, but I don't think we'll be seeing a new title. But, you know, I've been wrong before many times, probably more than I've been right.
    145:45
    It'll be nice to think, but I don't want to get people's hopes up that there'll be a new Pimple Brothers game announced, unless they reach out and tell us otherwise, in which case we will be happy to report on it. And trade it. First to report on it. Yeah. Of course, yeah.
    146:02
    Anyway, so that's Pinball Brothers from Sweden. Oh, there's one more item regarding Pinball Brothers.
    146:12
    Rudiger Beckmann, Rudy for interview, he was interviewed by Goldsor's Pinball Fliparama, who was also mentioned in the American Pinball segment. And we had a 51 minute Interview with Rudy Discussing Alien And of course the company and so on So Very interesting to check that out If you're Looking for more info On the activities of Pinball Brothers It's a video And therefore it's available on YouTube So search for Gonzo's Pinball Flipperama, I'm sure you'll come across His channel there and the interview with Rudy. Right.
    147:00
    And that wraps it up for Pimble. Okay, Rudy does. Right, okay. Now, is there any news from around your neck of the woods from Dutch Pimble? Because we reported on them last month and we hinted at some upcoming announcements that will be upcoming, but they haven't been yet. So is there any news from Barry and Co.? No. Oh, well, that was easy. No. Okay, moving on. No, no. I did ask, and I got some off-the-record info that I can't share, but... Nothing public? Nothing for now. Okay. For now. Well, someone else with nothing to say is Turner Pimble, who we know are based in Texas And I have been working on the Ninja Eclipse game Which we would That is a game we would expect to see some more of In Texas At the Texas Pinball Festival in March But No news so far Right now Sorry So No news since Pinball Echo basically No It will certainly be interesting to see What they've taken on board from that Reveal there As regards Changes to the cabinet In particular And what they make available Whether they go ahead with the Thinner version And some of the other changes that they made Such as the Playfield glass cassette and things like that And the back box But I'm still interested in seeing because it was not a bad game. Oh, no, it was a good game, and it seemed to be well-programmed, and seemed to have a very positive team, a very enthusiastic team who wanted to make their impact. So let's see what they come up with next time we get to see the game. Right.
    149:09
    Yeah, we can't say that for all manufacturers, but is there any news from Pimble Adventures in Canada? No, surprisingly not. they're normally quite keen on putting out updates about having made a few games or sold a few games. But we mentioned last time that they said they were going to... or planned... They had made six games before...
    149:34
    Christmas? Before Christmas, so they were planning on making another bunch before the end of the year. So no information on whether they actually did that or not. That means they were all Polly Factory games.
    149:44
    No news on that. Nothing else about their upcoming elements game Either so Nothing to report this month from Pimple Adventures We'll obviously keep an eye on them and see how they're getting on Right so Now Multimorphic who have been Mentioned repeatedly in the American Pimple Interview with David Fix They continued Their Meet the Games campaign On social media Where they are revisiting each of their 20 available games for the P3 platform. And I think we mentioned it on our previous Pincast as well. There's rumors going around that the announced Princess Bride pinball machine might be an upcoming game kit for the P3 platform, but we don't know if there's any truth to that. No. One thing we do know is that there has been a flyer that's been sent out with orders from Pinball Life, or at least until they ran out of flyers, and promoting the game and pointing people at the Princess Bride Pinball website, which is just a sign up for more information page. The interesting thing here is with Pinball Live sending out these flyers from Pinball Live it's a very short connection to Scott Denise who is has his final resistance game with Multimorphic so there is definitely a connection there whether that is a correct connection that we're now trying to link that we don't know, and we don't speculate, but... Just leave that there for you to consider. Yeah.
    151:48
    And then when the announcement comes out of exactly who is making it, you'll know whether that was anything or nothing. Right. Okay, well, let's move on to Cardona Pinball Design, also in the US. Last month we reported that they had announced a new speaker panel artwork for their No Good Gophers Battle for the Green conversion kit for the No Good Gophers game. Well, apparently there's also a new Translight in development as well, if you want to fully rebrand your game to the Battle for the Green. Right. And James Cardona was also a guest on Jeff Scioli's Pinwall Profile, very well known. Yeah. Episode 386. you have to check out. So,
    152:39
    where James talks about both the remakes that he's done and other stuff as well. Yeah, upcoming remakes.
    152:50
    Not remakes, but version 2.0 conversion kits. Yes. Okay, so that's definitely worth having a listen to. Go to pinballprofile.com and you'll be able to listen to it there. Right, now, Sorry to have kept this for almost the end of our pin cast But probably a news that a lot of people have been waiting for to hear Coming from Chicago Gaming Yeah, absolutely Pulp Fiction is finally in production and shipping Yeah, it's almost come out of the blue that one After waiting so long with no official explanations to why it wasn't being made a lot of people involved in the game being sort of scratching their heads saying I don't know why Chicago Gaming aren't making it. But they are now. So that wait is over and production has started. They shared a video from the factory showing a, I guess after all of production had finished for the day, they showed a deserted production line with playfields in mid-production, so partially populated and ranging to fully populated, along with lots of cabinets and built games which were under test at the time. So they were there being played and making sure the switches and solid noise and everything all worked properly.
    154:17
    Now, what was interesting was they were represented, the Chicago Gaming, at the EAG International Expo show. They were not on the stand of the UK distributors for them Which is pinball heaven But they were on the stand of a big gaming supplier To the amusement industry, Bandai Namco Right Now Namco, of course you know very well from Pac-Man And other well-known video games So Bandai Namco are a huge international company and they have not only do they supply games to other operators throughout the business, but they also operate a number of their own family entertainment centres and arcades. And they had the Pulp Fiction game on their stand. Yeah. Now, apparently, Bala Namco wanted to get into the pinball business as well as doing all their other games and spoke to Doug Duber at Chicago Gaming and made an offer, and he couldn't refuse, meaning that Bandai Namco are now selling Pulp Fiction as well as Pitbull Heaven in the UK. So I guess they will be selling mainly to trade, and Pitbull Heaven will be selling mainly to homes or to smaller operators. But it is interesting that Ben and Emco think It's time to put pinball back into their arcades And this is how they are doing it Well yeah But normally A company like that Would have techs in their arcades Who know the games But they probably won't know Any much about how to fix a pinball machine Well then they start off With a game that seems to be easy to maintain Hopefully so Yeah, hopefully he doesn't need an awful lot of fixing.
    156:18
    The game only just arrived, actually, for the show. It wasn't there for the first day, which was the Tuesday, and only arrived last thing Tuesday night, and the tech on the stand had to set it up first thing Wednesday morning for the public to roll out in. So it was there for Wednesday and Thursday. But nice to see Chicago Gaming have their game there as well. So you could, again, like as we saw with Elton John and Scooby-Doo and Labyrinth, this was the first chance for a lot of people in the UK to get to play Pulp Fiction. And I think, again, people walked away impressed.
    156:59
    They probably, I think from what I heard, people weren't expecting an awful lot out of it when they saw it. It was a fairly basic-looking game. Once they actually got to play it Their minds were changed completely So that's what we're seeing Quite a few games to late beat Yeah it is, which is great I suppose it's great I suppose it doesn't get people's expectations up too high And these games turn out to be A pleasant surprise Which is always good for pinball Yeah exactly So moving on To France To pinball who is the manufacturer of Space Hunts they are apparently still building games but TV7 a French TV channel was invited by them and took up the invitation and they filmed an item about the revival of Pinball and how that resulted in the formation of Hexa Pinball and the Space Hunt game. That item has been aired already on TV, but you can also watch it on Hexas Facebook and Instagram channel, I believe. One would assume it is in French. Yes, that is what I was about to say. Ah, right. So this is your chance to polish up your French. Yeah, or look for the subtitles somewhere. Right. And that is all the news I could find for a Hexapin ball. But I wanted to mention it anyways. Absolutely, yeah. And, well, another H company then, Homepin, who is not in France, but over in Taiwan. They, we don't have any actual definite news from them, but we do have sort of second-hand news, if I should say. Because their This Is Spinal Tap game was also EAG, the Retro Arcade Specialist This is the same game that was at the UK Pinfest show in August.
    159:12
    But this is an early release that retro arcade specialists flew over, especially for the UK show, and have held on to since. And they were able to tell me that there are some changes planned to the game. Before it goes into production, They start making many more, I suppose, is probably the best thing to say. Apparently Mike Kalinowski, who runs Homepin, he plans to add a third flipper to the game on the mid-right-hand side of the playfield, which he thinks will make shooting the centre ramp a lot easier. I certainly did find it tricky to shoot that ramp from the right flipper. I don't think you can even shoot it from the left. The ball was rejected quite a lot from there. So he's going to put a third flipper At the side In a place where there currently is a spinner And that spinner is going to be moved back up Back up the game Back up the right orbit lane Which is where it sits at the moment So And there may be some other changes to the game as well But they are not yet confirmed So obviously some Feedback has come in And Mike has taken steps To try and address it And it involves adding a third flipper to the game, which will change the dynamics somewhat. So we'd love to see what else you can shoot with that third flipper. I don't want to sound negative, but I think what the game mostly needs is more fluid choreography of how shots follow up and how the software reacts to that. Yes, I think the rules and the code is exactly where it's lacking because you shoot a lot of things and nothing happens, or seemingly nothing happens. Right. Something should always happen when you make a shot, even if it's not necessarily worth all the points. You should certainly get confirmation or feedback to let you know that the game knows you've made that shot and it's done something with it. Yeah. That's what it hasn't got. Right. And, well, for the personal thing, there could be a little bit more flow on the playfield.
    161:37
    Yeah, well, as I say, I didn't find that centre ramp shot very accessible at all, and that tends to kill the ball most of the time, but I'm hoping this extra flipper's going to, and maybe they changed the entrance to it as well to make it more suitable from that side flipper. Right. Oh well, we'll just wait for official confirmation from HomePin. That's not here right now, so let's just move on.
    162:04
    How did people in Australia? Yes, no news from them, as far as I'm aware, unless you heard anything? No. Okay. I didn't either. And there was also no news from STR Pinball in Spain, or Quetzal Pinball in Spain. Or Circus Maximus. Well, I'm afraid that ship has completely sailed.
    162:32
    Yeah, I think it's starting to look that way, isn't it? I think it may be time to call that one. I don't think it's... Unless a miracle occurs, I don't think they're ever going to produce those games. Right. Too bad.
    162:50
    But if anything changes, we'll mention it, of course. And then there's a bit of other news Before we get to dinner with Jack Oh yeah, dinner with Jack Yeah, I'm feeling hungry already Just talking about it Yeah, so tickets for Pinball Expo 2024 go on sale Actually, today At the time of recording, the 1st of February And don't know whether they're going to sell out But if you listen to David Fix Or if you have listened to David Fix's interview then you will hear him talk about what they have planned for this special 40th anniversary show and all the more reason to get your tickets and get in there early. I don't know if there's any financial incentive to get an early ticket or whether any of those tours will sell out but if you want to lock in your plans go to pinballexpo.com forward slash admission and you can book up for this October's show. Right.
    163:57
    And, well, you've had some interesting bits and pieces. Yeah, well, it's sort of almost like spam, as I don't really like to encourage too much of the same to me, but it was from a company called Per Accurate, who are, I don't actually even know where they are in the world, but they are producing, well, they produce LEDs. and they are producing a specific one for retro pinballs.
    164:25
    Now, as I'm sure you know, most pinball LEDs seem to consist of one or two or more individual surface mount devices with just very small dots of light, which then either have a clear dome on the top or they have a frosted dome or one which fluoresces according to the light. Well, there's a new style of bulb come out called the retro pinball bulb, which is available in a 555 or a 44.
    164:59
    That's a wedge or bayonet base. And this uses what's called a cob LED. If you've ever seen any of those torches where you have a sort of large yellowish area, which is, you know, plain yellow, but when you turn it on, that turns out really, really bright. like the Big Larry range as well they were very good with that and you get head torches as well which are COB ones and security lights which are COB well this has two little strips of COB LEDs within the plastic enclosure which actually looks, means it will emit light in all directions so they form a little like a wigwam shape within the device.
    165:50
    So rather than being a single-pointed light, it will be quite a large area of light, natively. And, of course, being an LED, it's going to be quite low power and very low heat generation. So it might be a nice thing to put into an older electromechanical-type game. So look out for those. It says they're coming soon in 2024. for.
    166:17
    Do we know anything about pricing? No, this is from the wholesale manufacturer of these things, so it'll be down to individual retailers what they end up selling it for.
    166:27
    6.3 volt AC or DC, doesn't matter. Available with either a clear lens or a frosted lens if you prefer that. But yeah, it does look like they are a nice replacement for incandescent bulbs in older games. if they don't fall yes indeed yeah and let's talk about new products a company called New Wave Toys are well known in the arcade business and in the I would say in the miniature arcade business really because they produce a range of 1 6th scale arcade games which have two specific features about them. They are, firstly, very highly detailed in the attention they're given to the cabinets and the controls, but also they are entirely playable games. So you might have a Tetris cabinet with a little tiny joystick and an LCD screen within the cabinet, and you can press the start button and you can use the joystick and the buttons to play the game. So At What they've now done Is they've brought out their very first pinball In what they call their mini pins range And this is a 1-6 scale Gottlieb black hole So I think they've done It's still quite big actually It's quite large yeah It includes a rotating Galaxy in the back box Like the American Black holes had European ones, I don't think had that, even though the motor fitted. It has infinity lighting in the back box as well, which animates. It has a working ball shooter and a moving ball in the shooter lane.
    168:23
    It has a die-cast opening Gottlieb coin door with a removable cash box inside, OLED score displays, an upper and lower play field with track lighting and an awful lot more for $169 is the cost at the moment to buy that.
    168:44
    Unlike all their video games, there was a certain amount of disappointment that you can't play a game on this, but the ball would have been so small anyway, or it is so small, but it only goes up the shooter lane and back again, and you wouldn't really be able to play a proper game on there. But it's really an attract mode device that is semi-functional. You can open the back box, You can look at the inside You can open the coin door And get the cash box out It has a little key on the front Very very detailed That's New Wave Toys And they have a Limited order window On those games And if you want to see any more about that Either go to the New Wave Toys website Or check out the Pinball News article All about it Ah, ok There always had to be a plug in there somewhere Right, okay Well, that's fine And that runs it up All the pinball industry news That we could gather for you For January 2024 Yeah, we'll be back Start of March With our next pincast Looking back at all the events that happened Through this month of February 2024 But before we leave you We will both wish you have a fabulous February. Look forward to joining you again next month with our next regular edition, and we'll see you next month. Thanks. Bye-bye. Bye.