Welcome to the Collective Gamers Podcast. Today is Saturday, not Sunday, September 27th. This is episode 255. My name is Tony. I'm Dennis. Yeah. Well, we warned the people. We did. You had a trip coming up. I completely forgot that I had a trip this last week, the current week, technically, because it's still Saturday. So yours actually influenced the record time. Yeah, because, I mean, I understand. With the amount of time between our normal, like, get together and talk and then record and everything else, for me to have made my plane tomorrow, we would have had to have started at, like, 6 a.m. That would have been tough because we often go and discuss non-podcast stuff for at least an hour before we were – Yeah, it's been more – it's been an hour and a half. It's been an hour and a half. It's been an hour and a half. Yeah, I think that's about average. Yeah, that's pretty average. So what have you been doing? I have been doing like – I've got – let's see. Where's a good way to put this? Because I don't want to just talk about work. That's all I ever talk about. But outside of work, I found that a series that I read a few years ago has had a couple more books released. So I've been kind of burning through those, getting caught up on that series. It's one of those sci-fi series where the author does, here's the main story. And then at one point he did a prequel series and there were like three side series off of it. Well, now there's a sequel series that I didn't know about that. It's one of those things where he dropped two books in that series like six months apart last year. So I was like, oh, I hadn't even heard of these. So I've been reading those. And then I still continue to play World of Warships, like I talked about last time. And the other big thing, and I'll talk about this more in the video game section, is the full release out of early access for Hades 2. I saw that on Reddit. And I bought it, and I've been playing Hades 2 a lot. I really liked Hades. Hades 2 is good. I like some of the changes. Some of the new abilities and some of the changes and stuff, they're pretty cool. Cool. I guess I'll know in a year. You'll know in a year when it comes to Xbox. That's if Xbox doesn't cease to exist. Yeah, if Costco gets their way. Yeah. Everybody, there's no box. Yeah. Very sad. Well, multiple people actually submitted in after our last episode. I had made the comment in the video game section that Pinball FX didn't have real tables. That was a Farsight only thing. Nope, I'm wrong. Apparently, Pinball FX at some point started actually converting real tables to virtual. So we'll actually touch a little bit on Pinball FX in the video game section today. uh other than that otherwise in terms of what i've been doing outside of work um no single player game progress since the last episode i have been playing marvel rivals though and uh and overwatch 2 both of which have relatively recently entered new seasons well at least you're being social and you're interacting with people i don't talk to those people i judge them i judge them when they fail yesterday i did overwatch 2 i'll probably do marvel today actually after the podcast but yesterday i did overwatch 2 and it was just quick play you know just casual kick and here's the problem like but i still want them to try and two games in a row i had the same guy and he was just like there is there a nice way i don't think there's a nice way where blizzard wouldn't punish you is there a nice way to tell them to uninstall like i don't get good or be on the other team so i can win right i was just like The first game was like, he started as Hanzo. And he actually wrote, I'm learning Hanzo. And I go, he didn't learn it. Well, you can always tell him, it's like, hey, I just want to let you know you're definitely the MVP for the other team. It was bleak. And then the next game, in it again, and their widow. I never get the good widows. also I think the other widow was cheating I think they had a mouse so I reported them I don't see it as much anymore now that they put in the new it now does a better detect on people and throws them in the PC pool if they want to play with a mouse which is where they belong but sometimes they try and cheat I also report players who use a mouse and wall hacks you probably have more wall hacks than I face so anyway so that's what I've been working on so let's jump to the pinball segment there's not a lot I know it's a shock because we talked about well yeah there was a game last week we did or two weeks ago yeah we talked about it Stern Star Wars the Star Wars is what I called the episode Star Wars the Star Wars yeah that's the name of the episode it was Star Wars the Star Wars I almost went with go out and buy yourself a Star War which I think was from like that AD show or something but the or meet the Goldbergs yeah the Goldbergs the but anyway Stern Star Wars Fall of the Empire is arriving to buyers and people are very very excited to get it Those that bought it, I assume, are excited. Are they? We've had people on our Discord. We had someone say they bought it because they love the theme. I did the episode with the pinball show. It's very interesting with that. We have it on YouTube now, too. And this show is actually on YouTube. It's the audio-only version, but it's on YouTube. But I get some people that are like they like that I try and do a grounded counterpoint. And I've got other people that comment and go, he's grumpy because I didn't say just positive things. And I thought – I thought when I heard the episode, because I listened to the episode back, I was like, I thought I sounded like normal. You did not worship at the altar of the thing that they like. That means you're the enemy. Well, but I praised quite a bit of it. It doesn't matter. Did you list everything as perfect in a perfect seven out of five? Unfortunately, I did make fun of the prose artwork. I made fun of the YouTube thumbnail tracing on the – well, that's a good question. I'm not sure. You're why we can't have nice things. You know, I think maybe that might be true. Maybe that is true. What if you hurt somebody at Stern's Feelings and they don't try as hard on the next day? I may have. I may have. You know, that's an interesting question. No, I just assume they don't listen to the shows. I mean – No feelings to be hurt. I don't know. I mean, they're just – It's tough. It's a hard life. They're doing all of this work out of the kindness of their heart just to make you something you can play. They're definitely not being compensated, and it's not a job. This is love and joy and happiness. You know what actually spawned a lot of both on the pinball show, because I brought it up there, and a little bit on ours, the whole AT-AT-AT thing. That is – Oh, it's a whole thing. That is a sore point for some people. Apparently. Like someone on the pinball show YouTube had like a big old comment, like the whole history of AT-AT, like why it's called AT-AT and related to the toy commercials and stuff. Like it was well written. I was like, but. You just replied with TLDR. No, I didn't reply at all. I just read them. But someone else replied like, well, what do you say for AT-ST? And they're like, I mean, we say AT-ST. But. There you go. It's different. Yeah. Totally different. Completely different. Anyway, so that debate will be. We've got to base everything. This is the most important stuff to be concerned about is the pronunciation of a fictional device. Well, it's Star Wars. It's also on that show. We didn't bring it up here. But I couldn't remember that if Anthony Daniels was in the suit or just the voice. That didn't make people happy either. But I never. He was in the suit. You knew. But I didn't remember. Because I don't. Well, at least he was in the suit in the originals. I never cared. who I don't care about C-3PO. Right. But I'm not really a Star Wars fan in that way. But anyway, some people do care very much, and they bring it up. So fully acknowledged. So what do you think the next big thing is to come in pinball? I think it's one of two things. Spooky, I know, is getting close to revealing their next game. However, I... Which niche horror theme will this one be? You know, there are several rumors going around. However, the one I've heard the most from is, well, now that they've done Evil Dead, Beetlejuice is actually discussed quite a bit as one of theirs. I think I've heard Goonies is a possibility from them. So basically bigger stuff. Yeah. Bigger stuff. Bigger stuff. I'm trying to think if there's any others. I think Goonies would definitely be a good choice by any company. It would be. It's not a theme I'm interested in personally, but it's a theme that – and this came up on the show I did last week also. But it's a theme that deserves to be made. I think so. It should have a pinball machine. It should have. It doesn't matter what I feel. It should have one. It's like the quintessential kids adventure thing. It's like whereas, for example, a theme I like a lot more, Big Trouble in Little China, it's not big enough to really deserve a pinball machine. I agree with you there. I'm using that in quotes because whatever we want deserves to be a pinball machine. But it's not like when you go, why didn't Goonies ever get something? Why didn't E.T. ever get something? Why didn't Die Hard ever get something? I can just rattle off stuff that never had something that probably should have in the era. Right. It just didn't. I mean, Goonies is kind of – I think Goonies is more of a touchstone than Big Trouble in Little China. Yeah, it's just Big Trouble in Little China is kind of a cult following movie. Right. Like Rocky Horror Picture Show. I wonder if Rocky Horror is in the rumor list for spooky. Maybe. I'm throwing it in there. Why not? Yeah. Why not? I'll be honest. I would love a Rocky Horror machine. That would be so much fun. I don't know what the toys would be. It would be the little transfigurator thing that they use. Oh, I can't move my legs. I have no idea. I don't know. It would be fun. It could be fun. It could also suck. I mean, you've got to do it right. You would have to do it right. But here's one thing. The music would be awesome. Yes. But whether they didn't get the rights to the music. Then they shouldn't do it. My God. I guess. I'm just going to float this out there right now for anybody listening. Just so you know, if you get the rights to a license that is a musical and you do not get the rights to the music. I'm at 1776. 1976. Get ready to write. F*** off. Don't do it. No. Just no. You have to have the music if you're going to do a pen based on a musical. I mean, that's fair. Wow. As Joel would say. It's great. We got the Beatles license. Oh, what albums did you get? None. Oh. Oh, that's so awesome. We got Led Zeppelin. Oh, cool. What songs are you doing? We're doing covers by Bob's Garage Band. The hard version. Because we weren't able to get their actual. They made the license too expensive. Well, they didn't get Stairway when they did do Led. Yeah, I know. Which is like, guys, really. It's a huge band, but come on. It's their most popular. It's not my favorite song of theirs, but it is a very popular song. Right. Like it deserved to have been in the game. Like I would have walked away if you told me you couldn't give me Stairway. Right. Yeah, no. Totally. Or what's going on with Predator. It's like they – so we can't see Arnold Schwarzenegger's face. Maybe pass on it. Yeah, maybe. Maybe. No, what they'll do is it's like, oh, we can't. Oh, you know what? We're just going to make it. We're just going to make it Predator too because we were able to get Danny Glover cheap. No, they've done it. They probably should have. They probably would have. It would have gone over better. But they're like zooming in on like his polo shirt in the first one where he's like me and Carl Carl Weathers and stuff because they can't show his face. It's like, okay, I'm sure most people do know that those are Arnold Schwarzenegger's pecs. But it's like it's a little disconcerting shot. Like this looks like really bad framing. I mean, yeah. So, you know, that could be. It's like just crazy, crazy like, oh, we couldn't get the license type things. That would be hilarious to see them try. It's like, oh, man, we got the rights to War of the Worlds, but we're not allowed to show the machine. You're just seeing like fields that are burning. Fields burning and stuff. Yes. Yes. Oh, it's great. It's great. We got the fifth element. Oh, that's so great. Yeah. The only character we can show is Ruby Rot. Or no, no, no. The only character we can show is the deaf ball player guy that just shows up the one time and is like, oh, give me the gun. He like throws a rock. We didn't get the rights to anybody else. The call-outs are all done by Corbin Dallas's mom. She's just yelling at you over the phone. I might as well be dead. That might actually work for that game, actually. That might actually work. This is a great segue because Andrew D. wrote in with a discussion topic for us, which will close out the pinball segment. This is what he wrote. Okay, guys, here's a topic for you. Rank the top five worst decisions a pinball manufacturer or designer has made. Barbecue. And go. Toy Story 4. Okay. Explain to me. So that's one of yours, Toy Story 4. What? Just the whole thing? That it was the fourth? Yeah. At least do one of the popular ones. Do all of them. You can have four included. I know. I understand the reasonings. We've talked about it ad nauseum. It's just one of those things that to me would be borderline a deal breaker. It's like, oh, we can't do the others. We have to do four? Maybe. Okay. Well, I'm going to – my number one would be the instant one because we just spoke about it as well. Predator. If the license is all mucked up, and I get it. It's not about the pinball machine. It's about the license with Schwarzenegger and Predator and what's going on. You should have passed on it until that was resolved. There's just no point. Things like Alien ultimately was able to get a version out with Sigourney Weaver and fix themselves. Right, but they should have passed until he could have gotten that. I agree. So you got a second one? Let me think, let me think, let me think. I'm going to do an easy second one because we just discussed it as well. They should never have done Led Zeppelin. Stern shouldn't have, without Stairway. Okay. It was a pretty big mistake. Also, I'm going to go ahead and point out, like, the whole toy that lifted from the playfield, I felt like made no sense for that theme. Like, I'm like, I don't understand why this is here. You look at Led Zeppelin, and it does not feel like Led Zeppelin to me, other than the art. I don't understand it. But I think Stern should have passed on that license. I think they didn't do it justice at all. And it shows. yeah that'll be my second one galactic tank force shouldn't have happened so what are your is it that it was original or was it actually don't mind that it was original i just still remember it just airballing every single thing and it it wanted to be like the cheesy old like captain proton type stuff which i understand is the star trek voyager making fun of old stuff is what Captain Proton was But honestly I would have probably respected it more if they literally gotten just enough of the Star Trek Voyager license to do Captain Proton That would have been funny. Interesting. It would have sold worse, which is impressive. Yes, that would be. That would have been an impressive number, but it would have sold worse. I fully admit that. Okay. Okay. Third decision. This will be a manufacturer one old an oldie. Premier Gottlieb Premier. They should never have gotten into the gambling game business. That's what sunk them. So, well, you know, Williams ended up doing that and then deciding to go and just make slot machines. It was like the opposite effect with with Gottlieb Premier. They had a profitable, small but profitable pinball division. They tried to get into making machines, and whatever they did with the licensing or lack thereof, it just became a lodestone, and their pinball division couldn't make enough money to offset the losses that they sustained getting into that business. This is an interesting – Jon Norris shared this quite a while ago, but it always stuck with me because Gottlieb never declared bankruptcy. They shut themselves down because they saw the writing on the wall. But my understanding from people like John who were an insider with the company is if they had just stuck with pinball, they'd have been able to survive the 90s. As small as they were, it was profitable. And that would have been impressive for such a reach out to – I mean that's not the first time a company has tried overhauling. Oh, sure. And diversification that goes bad. Absolutely. But just imagine, just imagine like 1999, 2000, and you go into the new millennium with Stern and Premier, both of who were smaller manufacturers and Williams is out of it. out of it like how different is the landscape is it was would that you know from 2000 to 2010 like nothing happened people like lord of the rings and like simpsons pinball party but it was a bad era for pinball would it have would they have tried harder could they have tried harder had there been a competitor on the scene i don't know but it would have been interesting to see so i think that's a pretty good third one i don't know i think that is a good third one um I don't know. I feel like all of mine so far have just been picking on stuff. Well, they all are. This is all very – Andrew is – I opened with the whole thing about being too – we talked about being too negative with the new release and how some people don't like how grumpy it comes across. And here we are with people volunteering things where they want us to talk about the worst of stuff to hurt everyone's feelings. But we try and accommodate the listeners because we are kind. In that regard, we are kind. We are. We are kind, I guess, as we try and find. I think X-Files deserved a better game. The Sega game? Yeah. Okay. But then I think about what X-Files became later, and I think maybe it didn't. So, all right, so for your third one with X-Files, what do you wish was different? Is it the rules? Is it the layout? Is it just the toys? Is it everything? I think it's about everything. I mean, I know you love that game. I love the X-Files. I wanted to love that game, and it was just like, ah. This isn't even like ironic bad or, hey, it's got some interesting thing in it. I mean, at least Lost in Space has some silly stuff that can make it fun to play on occasion. But X-Files, I think I've played it twice, and I was just like, no. No, I'm good. Oh, you know what? Actually, and I'll grab another one real quick. Any of those rules that came from that era were something that the very end would just flip everybody's scores off of a randomizer. Oh, someone's thinking about some birthday, Bugs Bunny time. Or furry cops. Right. Yeah. No, that is some grade A just terrible idea stuff. I mean, that's up there with the playing Mario Party stuff. Yes. Where friendships are broken in because of stupid stuff. That's a good fourth one. I hadn't thought about that one. I'm going to pick on another game. So apologies if they do happen to listen to Spooky, but Rob Zombie. Oh, my gosh. Other than the cab and trans light. Very nice. Very nice. Very attractive. But here you have a company, really new, upstart company. They've done America's Most Haunted. People are rooting for them. I mean, back when this came out, you couldn't say anything bad about Spooky as a podcaster without getting – Oh, yeah. Not by the company, but just the fans were just vicious. Oh, yeah. It was bad. It was vicious. They desperately didn't want any negativity to kill off something that people just wanted to believe in. But Rob Zombie, oh, that is a bad game. It is. It's not fun to shoot. It's hard in some parts and other parts, like the little chicken bucket loop thing. It broke all the time. And we had one on location. I'd rather play WWE. That's fair. I think that is fair. In fact, Rob Zombie was such a bad experience. It left such a bad taste in my mouth. I was very nervous to buy TNA, and I loved that game. Right? Yeah. And it took TNA to get me well. Now, Spooky nowadays is in a very good place, but some of those – and it's really not just Rob Zombie. For me, Rob Zombie was just the touchstone, but that whole era with the Dominoes and the Jetsons, they just made a lot of crap that just – it wasn't fun to play. It was different, but it was different and not good. And I'm very impressed that they recovered from it, but I think they could have gotten to a better place if they had – I mean, they flirted with bad design for a really, really long time. I mean, we get into like Ultraman and Halloween. I think you're still really discussing some pretty creative but not fun design decisions. But Rob Zombie still, for me, takes the cake. It's like one of the worst modern layouts I have ever experienced. And I would be happy to never see that game again. Right. So that would be my fourth. So one more. And I know these aren't all the five worst decisions. We're just kind of picking what we think of as bad decisions. Any company trying to rehabilitate J-pop. Okay, so you've now gotten that American pinball and... Deep Root. Deep Root. Thank you. I couldn't remember. The whole Deep Root thing could be one. So why? Why do you object to the rehabilitation of J-pop? The listeners might not all know if they've not been in the hobby all that long. Very valid. But somebody who has taken so much advantage of the players and the purchasers for stuff that's not honestly as anywhere near as good as people hail it to be. I feel like the attempts to bring him back and make everything all right, make everything okay, and make him, oh, we rehabilitated him. He's better. It's like, oh, I fixed him. No. No, there's a point where all of the bridges have been burned. Please stop trying to build a rope bridge to bring it back. The bridge is burned. It is over. People have been treated poorly. People have had their money stolen. I mean, sometimes you have to just let a failure be a failure. I think that's a very fair point. I would say I had one earlier and I let it slip my mind I knew it wasn't one of the worst but I thought it was a bad decision that I wanted to emphasize so I think I'll go with another broad manufacturer one this time I'm going to pick on JJP but not a specific game like Toy Story 4 it has been the not done every time because Harry Potter is an exception to this but this like constant let's have like 5 000 limited le's and then we'll have the collector's edition so i'm doing i'm going to ding them for a couple things one i blame them because they were kind of like the first company to come out against stern like just be a different company i'm going to blame them for not deciding to be different and and not sticking with the same naming convention like you know what it's pro premium le if you want to call pro arcade instead okay but don't call your middle edition le and then your upper edition like ce it's confusing it confuses it's confuses everyone today so that was stupid uh it's stupid that when you then say something's limited edition that you do 5 000 there are sacos that don't even put out 5 000 right and for those that aren't into watches saco is notorious for calling things limited edition and putting way too many units on it for it to ever matter i have a cycle limited edition that's over 15 000 I mean, guys, come on. Let's be real here. That's what JJP is. They're like, I mean, in pinball dollars. In watches, there's 15,000 people out there. They did eventually sell them. Right. That's the thing. I'm sorry, but if you've got like, oh, we're doing 1,000 CEs and 5,000 LEs, it's like, okay, so that's 6,000 machines. do you really think you're going to sell 6,000 machines total? I mean, Potter might and other than that, Guns N' Roses may have got close and I don't think anything else ever did it's like, who knows on Woz granted they did like 20,000 editions of that, which is another thing I could throw in on JJP I could have a whole list of stupid stuff you know another stupid thing? The default tilt setup where it's tilts per game, not per ball. Why do you have to be cute? You might not know that because you may may have never tilted out a jjp game because they're so freaking heavy but but yeah it it i believe you can change it in the settings but the default is you need to remember what tilt you're on across all the balls because it's that's why so many of the mystery awards are here's an extra tilt warning because you could be after ball one you might be on two warnings you don't get any more warnings after that it's like it's not that the idea is bad per se it's you've seen the movie inception right yes all right and at the end of it there's a sorry spoilers for anyone you fast forward about 15 seconds you don't want to hear this part there's part where the guy is uh confronting his father in the dream world and he's and he says to his father he knows that you're disappointed that i i that i i wasn't you and the father replies no i'm disappointed that you tried I'm disappointed that J.J.P. tried to be different on the tilt because it's so ingrained. The warning system has been, it's not just Stern, Williams, Gottlieb. All the warnings were always per ball. What were you thinking? Why do you be different just to be different? It's insulting. That one might actually be one of the top five worst. Like all of their decisions that I just named are in the fifth one. Just absolutely ridiculous sort of stuff. Like, let us have fun. I want to have fun playing pinball. I don't want to be like, oh, shoot, I'm on a JGP. I got to remember the rules are all different. I mean, Gottlieb kind of had this in the 90s at least. Some of their games, like Hoops is a good example of this. Like, you know, you complete a shot. You hit an in lane on a Williams game, a Stern game, a JJP game. And now, you know, you go along and you're lighting them. You're lighting them. With Gottlieb, you turn the lights off. Why do you have to be different? Quit being cute. No, this is pinball. It's like everyone expects the ball lock color to be green. It's just set that way. And there have been games where they've been like, we're going to do orange for the ball lock. This is like quick play in Overwatch. Why you got to... I'm learning how to identify things for the player, and I've decided not to learn anything from the past. Wow. I'm creating my whole new system. It makes so much more sense. Oh, my God, guys. Oh, my gosh. Okay, so that's my fifth. All right, so, Andrew, I hope you appreciated all of those, because I thought we had a pretty good list. Why is Dennis so grumpy? Why is he so grumpy? He's just very unhappy. I'm like, I didn't think so. You're just a little happy little boy. I'm a little, just a little Eeyore. You're just a little unhappy little dude. I don't know why I made Eeyore sound like a donkey. Oh, yeah, because he is a donkey. Yeah, you're just an unhappy little dude. With his house made out of sticks. I always felt bad for Eeyore because his stick house always got knocked down. But his friends would help him rebuild it. Did they ever help him invest into better building materials? No. So were they really good friends? Sorry for Eeyore because... If Pooh had spared some honey, they could have used it as like glue to hold those sticks better. But Pooh Bear, who couldn't even... Who was so addicted to honey, couldn't even afford pants. You know what? Winnie the Pooh doesn't deserve a pinball machine unless they give him pants. That's an add-on. There's a bonus for you. Oh, no, Christopher Robin. Do you think Spooky's going to do Winnie the Pooh? Blood and Honey? You're like, why would they do that? No, now you know. Well, yeah, because they could do anything they want with it. I haven't seen that movie. I heard it wasn't very good, but I still kind of want to see it. It's anything you want now because it's all public domain. well speaking of the public domain we now i mean it wouldn't even have to do blood and honey they could just they could make up they could that's a lot of work to come up with your own story yeah it's a lot of work we should just repeat the same story we've repeated time and time i mean if it works nobody wants to hear something new or see something different Let's just do the exact same story. People love the original trilogy, Tony. We'll just do the exact same story. I had someone constantly give me more original trilogies. I want all of them in my game room, as many as you can make. That's fine. I want that kind of money so that I could also use money to purchase things. Yeah. I wouldn't buy that. Well, then their whole point was basically pointless then because your argument doesn't have anything to do with money. I mean, by different things. Yeah, but that wasn't what we were talking about. I would not reward them for just giving the same story over and over and over again. But it's an iconic story. Anthony Daniels was in that story. In the suit, in the story. They're all iconic stories. They're all iconic stories. I mean, kind of. Is John Carpenter's Vampires iconic? Teak. Mahogany. Now, you see, we might get that game. There you go. There's a fun one. You know what? I will say, there are John Carpenter movies that full-on deserve a pass. The Thing? The Thing. Spooky should do The Thing. That would be amazing. That would be right up their alley. That would be great. I would be sorely tempted. And I don't buy games just off of the theme, but I would really. If they could do the integration like they did with Evil Dead, it would be a visual spectacle. Oh, for sure. For sure. If they could get a little snapping pop-up out of the field, swallow ball, like, Oh, that'd be... That'd be pretty cool. And maybe they could have a little upper play field, and it's the dog pen, and you've got to knock them all down with your shotgun shots. And one of them will be the thing. And that's the one, and it'd be like a hurry-up. I think I sent it to you in our little meme chat thing the other day where someone had posted one of those capticas where you've got to pick all of the stuff. It was pick the thing. Oh, yes. Yeah. Yeah. I like that. That was good. That was good. All right. All right. So moving on to the domain of video games. going ahead and continuing to chip away at the virtual pinball item that Richard had emailed in several weeks ago This time just a brief discussion on Zen Pinball So crash course Zen Pinball is known for Pinball FX came out in 2007 Pinball FX 2 came out in 2010. These started as console things and they eventually became PC. Pinball FX 3 came out in 2017. One of those had a really good Star Wars game that wasn't based on the original trilogy. I think it was two. I think it was FX2 that came out with Star Wars. They had a really good Star Wars game that was just Star Wars-y and just used the universe without being based around it. Actually, they had several tables because there was the one that was like – there was the ship one. I didn't like that one very much. There was one that was 3PO themed. Yeah. I actually liked that one a little bit. FX3 came out in 2017. That was sort of like the merge of FX2 and everything into that game. that's where Whisper Isn't Here Yet became the Whisper Whisper Whisper Isn't Here Yet I've hit that scoop way too many times and then in 2018 apparently Zinn acquired the Bally Williams licenses and started their recreations so and I should have remembered that Zinn did that because I remember he Richard noted in his email that Zinn video pinball flair they added animations and stuff on the play field to give more life to some of those recreations I remember hearing about that I just I don't think I ever bought any of those table packs. So they've also done like a pinball M with mature themes. I wasn't familiar with that. That only has eight tables in it. But anyway, the discussion. Yes, no comment. So the so the discussion items that Richard wanted us to go ahead and cover. What do you think, Tony, that Zen pinball is doing right? That pinball arcade didn't do right. Like because they've been far more successful. Farsight's basically faded away. but Zan continues to chug along. I think it's one of those things that probably comes down to they were able to get a wide enough audience outside of just strictly normal pinball people through their integration and all of their original games, many of which had things that you literally could not do in reality in them. And they were able to get enough. As I recall, I could be wrong, but I think one of the Sin, or Zen Sin, one of the Sin, that's what they should have called their pinball M. Yep. Pinball Sin. Sinball. Oh, that's good. Sinball. That's good. um but but but i seem to recall that for at least a while some of their tables and stuff were for were available for free on like xbox's thing where you could get it and and a couple tables that were free yeah they did like a rotation and stuff with certain tables maybe was what it was well uh no pinball arcade did a rotation but like the the whisper one right did one like that was a free table that was available on the on the second one so i think you're right i think the like doing the originals and stuff gave them some breathing room uh oh man zen ball is such a good idea now i want to start sin ball pinball uh i also think zen arguably just had better engines like i don't yeah i felt like farsight never really invested in the engine and i think it started to really struggle with some stuff like what was i think we discussed it with a pinball arcade items But I've since heard or did hear for that that part of the thing with the Stern pinball arcade issue was it was struggling. It was struggling to do Ghostbusters. Like the engine just wasn't. Right, you just couldn't handle it. And Zin's just seems to have a better engine. Any favorite tables from the Zin line that you like? I think I've mentioned before Excalibur was one of mine that I liked. I liked Rome. I never could get anywhere in it. And actually, even though I make fun of Whisper not being there, I played that free table on FX so much. Yeah, I played that one a lot. That I really did enjoy it. I did like... Oh, and Aliens. I liked the Aliens one. I did play that. I did like the Star Wars Starfighter table. It wasn't great. The Star Wars table that I played a lot of was the Vader table. Oh, yes. But most of the games that I played on them were the Star Wars tables. what do you think about virtual pinball coexisting with real pinball i mean it coexists yeah i mean it's it's a thing it's some people like it some people don't like it some people don't really care one way or another richard's uh comment on that was kind of exploring the like the idea of virtual pinball being on location like dave and buster's um set it you know set up for winning tickets and stuff i think uh i think virtual has a leg up over real for things like that simply because my understanding for places like dave and busters is they don't want to have a tech who knows how to work pinball like that's a different skill set someone who can fix a video game it's a lot easier so if you just have a physical machine and it's just emulating all of the i guess again they've got devices there the racing games and stuff with shaker motors and stuff like i built a virtual tape like you can really make it feel a lot like a real one um and it's not nearly the same level of maintenance once you get it built. Right. I mean, it makes total sense because it's not all smacking into stuff. So I would 100% feel weird feeding quarters into a virtual pinball table. Well, yeah, but we are people who have played so much regular pinball. I'd rather win tickets, which is an option with real, you know, they can do that with real pinball too, but right. But physical pinball. Uh, is there anything you'd like to see Zen do in the future? Richard wishes they would get the stern license and do stern tables. I personally don't care what Zen does. I don't actively play it. Yeah, I don't. I don't think I have anything that jumps out at me. It's just not... I guess if I was to name something, I would be, I hope they continue to do some original stuff. Yeah. Like their Family Guy tables. That's fine if they want to do that. I hope they continue to exist as a company. Good for them. And he did note, like he did with Pinball Arcade, so if you wanted to go on Steam and buy all of the games, all the table games for pinball fx it's 542 and pinball m is another 38 i think there you now know why they what they did correctly versus pba that's a lot more money than when we discussed the pinball arcade stuff like i honestly for what it is i think it's way too much money when you think about it like that but uh when it's just a little one table at a time they it's the phone game strategy They've nickel and dimed their way into having a profitable company, and they've clearly reinvested it in the systems because they've continued to move from FX to FX2 to FX3. Right, and they've upgraded their engine. Yeah, no, I think they've made good choices. Okay, so that was that discussion topic. I do want to go ahead and also note Richard in a separate email had just for pinball news, virtual news, because he knows we don't normally gather that up. There were a couple of virtual pinball updates that have happened since our last episode. One is that Pinball FX has announced that they are going to sometime in mid-October, Scared Stiff will be coming out virtually through them. So I played that on Pinball Arcade. I have that in my table pack there. And then Zocaria Pinball has pushed out a big Steam update. It includes a new UI. Because it's just an update, all the tables are still available for people who have already bought them. It's going to run off a server-based system, but it doesn't require you to be online to play it. It still will support cabinet mode. They're adding some tournaments and challenges, which is something I liked in Pinball Arcade. And they're adding some more languages to the UI, plus a new table called Phoenix Deluxe. I don't know if that's an existing Zachariah from the history or if that's just an original creation. But that's it for the virtual pinball stuff. So moving into the rest of the video game items, I think, are we talking about Donkey Kong? No, we're talking about Bowser. Actually, I'm rearranging. What? I'm rearranging the order of the notes because there's something that's got a little bit of a tie-in to some of the stuff we've been talking about this whole episode. A24 who is making the Death Stranding film It has let it be known That their film is not going to be an adaptation of the game It is going to be an all original story set in the world Because that's a thing companies are allowed to do They're allowed to take a license and set an original story in the world Instead of just repeating the same thing over and over again Star Wars doesn't agree with you. I love Star Wars. I don't know what you're talking about. Star Wars is fine. I know all about Anthony Daniels and the at-at. There's so many things they could do. So many different things. They could have so many. I'm so disappointed. I wear my disappointment on my sleeve. I see that. but yes nintendo has lost their best named president and ceo for nintendo america doug bowser is no longer the big boss at nintendo america that said i don't know how important the big boss of nintendo america really is anymore since nintendo is doing so many directs that are just being worldwide distributed uh digitally and they're not doing a lot of in-person work because they just it's less you see less of that position than you than you did say 10 years ago do you ever wish you had a name that would like just make you an obvious coo for nintendo like tony toad that'd be great that'd be i'm sure that there's been tony todd now there's tony toad that I would – If you were COO of Nintendo – I'm just saying. Speaking of horror, Tony Todd, veteran of horror and Star Trek. Yeah. If you were COO of Nintendo and your name was Tony Toad, would you open the – would it come across as too arrogant or would you open the meetings with, I'm the best? Because I would be tempted to open the meetings. It would definitely be tempted. And you'd be like, the cow is not going to be on the cover of Mario Kart. It's going to be Toad. That's me. As long as they don't hire somebody whose last name is Birdo. So he comes up. It's like, oh, man, Bob got in trouble. How do you know he's got egg on his face? He's coming out of the boss's office. But no, that was one of those things that was just always a humorous thing with Nintendo of America. Dennis kind of alluded to this earlier. A continuing look at the ongoing Microsoft woes. Costco has pulled the Xbox from their online store, and they're pulling it out of their stores. is they've made the business decision to not sell Xboxes anymore. Because no one can afford them now. Nobody can afford them. They keep raising the prices, and it's old tech, and they don't have – It's old tech, and it's the least popular console of the gen. It is. They're definitely – I know they're slated for – the rumor is we're maybe two years from a new one, maybe. Yeah. I have no idea what's going on anymore. They're talking like 27, 28. Sure. It's about – we're getting near where you would expect it. But it is definitely, to actually fully remove it from your inventory is a big step. And I've heard smaller places in other countries have done the same thing where they just don't sell Xboxes anymore. Well, if they're not moving them, what's the point? Why waste the space? Why waste the space? I think it'll be interesting to see if we see this move beyond just like Costco's. but I think this does reiterate how important Microsoft's plan of spreading their licenses out, including onto non-Microsoft products, it has done very well. I mean, we talked about it a few episodes ago that, like, six of the top ten games on PlayStation are all from Microsoft products, are all Microsoft licenses. So that works out really, really well for them. I talked about it at the beginning of the show Hades 2 came out, I've been playing it it's fun it has some definite changes from the old game and I enjoyed the old game a lot too, this one has some extra abilities that I think are really fun the story is interesting what I've seen of it so far it has that same difficulty curve that Hades had but I definitely, if you liked the first Hades I think you would like this game my big thing is trying to remember the extra because you were in Hades you have your attack, your dash and then you have like a spell special attack thing. Well now you've got a different there's a fourth one now and I keep forgetting it exists until I remember and then I'm like oh yeah this creates a little box and it traps everything in it so things that are chasing me down I can lock down and shoot them from range. so i need to remember that one more often but it it's still it's uh i think it's just as well done as the original so okay good on them um borderlands 4 came out yeah i heard about it has been having some issues on pc and the the pc performance issues have not been taken well by members of the production company and developers as their answers are, well, if your equipment's not good enough, just turn it down. You don't have to run it on max settings. Yeah, and you know, they have a good point. I don't know where y'all got it in your head that you get 120 frames per second on everything that you play, but get with the time. Yeah, you've got to turn that down. You can't even see those frames. You're not getting it? Turn it down. You can't even see the frames. Yeah. I actually, my, I've had to turn down all of my frame rates on my PC just because my video card's just not handling anymore. It's ancient. So I've had to do it. I've had to do it on things. I can't run everything at maximum like I could when I originally built this PC a decade ago. So that's life sometimes, because I agree with you. I don't think, sometimes you can't run everything at max spec. Or you can't run everything at max spec when you don't have max spec hardware. Yeah. If you don't have the hardware to run it at max spec, yeah, you're not going to be able to run it at max spec. I mean, what do you want? So Gearbox is right here. Yeah, we're going to actually go with gearboxes probably on the right track at the very least. So just get the Switch 2 version if it's that hard for you. Wow. What? Wow. You shouldn't do that. Well, you can do that. I can? You sure. Someday. Oh. Not right now because something's going on and they had to delay it. And they said, oh, we had to make a delay and we don't know when it'll be ready to ship. So my guess is whatever performance issues it had on PC were way worse on the Switch 2. They're like, oh, this doesn't actually work. So there's been no update on the release date for the Switch 2 version. So Borderlands is a game that seems weird to be playing on the Switch to me anyway. But that's probably my natural bias for the type of games that Nintendo normally puts out. because I also think it's weird to play a lot of these games that are available on the Switch now because I don't ever think of them as a Nintendo game. So I'm playing Call of Duty. But if it your one console maybe that it No right and it a good choice for a console if you want a console It got all sorts of nice stuff from it In an interview the creative director for Hell Is Us said that the shadow drop of Hollow Knight Silksong it was a callous choice and that they should have known that Silksong was going to be so big that they shouldn't have just kind of sat on the date until immediately before it came out. They should have made a launch date announcement like everybody else did months in advance so people could plan around it. And they should have known that they're the 400-pound gorilla, and that game was the 400-pound gorilla of the indie scene. And it wasn't fair of them to just shadow drop it. Yeah, that's an interesting point. I mean, I guess maybe Stern should check with Spooky before they decide to launch their remaster later this year, because it might crimp their style. That was very much my thought. I'm just sitting here. It's like, why? Yeah. Why would they think that they had to? Why do they owe you? Yeah. That's the thing. They knew Silksong was such a big launch. They could have launched that game any time they wanted, and they were going to win. the only thing Silksong wasn't going to win against was like if they dropped it the same day as a huge AAA title like GTA 6 but quite frankly they still would have done fine they'd have been fine but that is that is one of those this guy doesn't sound like he's done fine no he was pretty upset he's like I don't have the exact numbers but yeah our shells were definitely lower than they should have been because of Silksong Maybe his game's crap. I don't know. I've never heard of this game. I've not played it. I've heard of it, and I've seen some stuff, and it's just not something I'm interested in. But it's like, yeah, man, maybe you should cry harder. If only you made something that was so popular and addictive, then you would have been the 400-pound gorilla. Yeah, maybe you should have renamed the game Marc Silk Is Us, and maybe some people will get confused in the translation and buy it on accident. I'm just saying. Yeah. Just saying. Mm-hmm. It's just indie game things. Netflix released their trailer for their Splinter Cell animated series. For everybody here who doesn't know what that is, Splinter Cell was a video game that happened, like, 20 years ago. Yeah, it's not been a long time. It's a stealth game. So you would think, I mean, like, Splinter Cell came out, like, when the first Metal Gear Solid came out. That's around the time. and I don't think we've seen it in like 20 years. But it was all like Tom Clancy, so you weren't like hiding in boxes. You were going around with night vision. Right, and it always had the little sound that everybody knows from that kind of thing and all that. And they were fun games, and now there's an animated series. I mean, there's no new game coming out. It's like the dead franchise of dead franchises when it comes to this kind of thing. but congratulations to people who are fans. I guess they can tell an original story. Well, they're going to have to tell an original story. I don't know. I don't know if anyone remembers the old story. I don't, and I've played them. I don't. Yeah, I've played them too, and I'm just like, I don't remember. All I remember is that it was like Hitman. I had to be really stealthy, and I'd get mad. Right, yeah. But Hitman would give me an option. It'd be like, this isn't the right way to play, but here's an M16 in case you want to go that route. it's like thank you for giving me the choice even if you judge it uh a couple weeks ago we talked about the new battle star galactica game yes coming out that is like a side story survival management roguelike we gotta hook up with battle star right right in that whole everybody has an idea at the same time or somebody hears somebody else's idea and steals it kind of thing there's a game coming out for star trek voyager oh well two fuck ever find his way home that is a survival management you get to play as two fuck you get to play as like it's full-on a a resource management game okay so it it is a resource management survival game set on voyager and it's trying to make its trip home is there my question is is is the big bad in the middle, deciding if you get to keep or kill two Vix. Oh. I was going to say, will there be an option, like, if you need to use less resources, can I evolve into a lizard? I won't need to eat as many resources. My assumption is that if you run out of food and torpedoes, the game gets real hard, and if you run out of coffee, the game ends. You know, I've only seen one episode of Voyager, and it's the lizard episode. Are you serious? Yep. yep that is like the worst episode i went and watched it explicitly because i heard it was bad and you know what it's pretty bad it's pretty bad it's it's pretty bad it's pretty bad but nope i haven't unless i caught like an occasional like one off nope i never watched voyager it is 100 the worst episode of voyager it might be the worst episode of star trek but there was that one season one TNG episode that was just like racism track? Yes. That was just... The original series had some pretty weak episodes too. It did. And that's also, you don't count the animated, original animated series, because I've not seen those. My understanding is they have a few really bad ones. They have a few really bad ones, but they also have a couple episodes that are arguably some of the best episodes of Star Trek ever made. But that has a lot to do with the writers they had writing the animated series because they got a lot of actual high-end science fiction writers to write episodes for the animated series. What would you say, what series of Star Trek do you think had the worst season finales, season finales only? Because TNG has some of the best, with the Borg one, was iconic. You don't have to think. You know the answer is Discovery. The answer is Discovery. The first two may have been fine, but after that, wow. Wow. Wow. The lizard people might be the worst thing. I'm like, I don't know. My debate is I still remember the very last episode of Enterprise. Oh, you know what? Because I didn't see the last season but i did go and see the last episode because i like to punish myself right and i was like this is almost insulting it's like yeah it's like we know our show became so unpopular let's try and next gen it and see here's the thing is i actually i liked enterprise for the most part i know you had problems i and i heard the last season was very strong but i i the whole suluban thing already pissed me off and i you know guys those of you don't didn't watch it's like it was a different time there was a lot of like trying to use the show to work through the trauma of 9-11 and that's what the sula i mean it's a playoff of taliban for a reason and it's like it was a little too on the nose in my opinion it was um it's like pleasantville on the nose yeah it's like guys come on um but anyway all right so so vital management survival management unknown if i get to be a lizard unknown if you get to be a lizard so uh the big the other big thing was we had a both playstation state of play it's and and an xbox uh stream talking about games a lot of the games are on both systems of course of course so but i grabbed just a few of the many many many many announcements and expansions on announcements just for the things that really grabbed my eyes and I thought was interesting. PlayStation finally has given a release window for Marvel's Wolverine, which they've been talking about since the first Spider-Man game came out. But they had a trailer. Wow. It is bloody. And it looks fun. He's the best at what he does. He is. He is. It seems to be covering a lot of the highlights of Logan's life and a lot of really big points that have happened over the years. So I think it looks great. I really enjoyed the original Spider-Man game and the second one. They were great. I thought they were really good games. So can I get it for Christmas? Next year. Oh, okay. Fall of 26 is what they're saying. So way out. So, yeah, we're over a year out, really. We'll see what ends up happening between now and then. But considering it was originally announced in 20 or 21. So also they are doing a remaster of Deus Ex. I've never played it. I know it's very popular. It is a super popular, very high end fandom for that game. it's a very fan popular game a lot of people consider it one of the quintessential greats I think it's alright but I think a good modernized remaster would go over well they're also making a Halloween game just like all of the other horror themed games Killer Clowns, Friday the 13th just like everything it's a 1v4 multiplayer horror game. It's literally paint by numbers. Yay! I might try this one. Well, you love Halloween. I do. That's why it's your favorite pinball machine. It's your favorite Halloween-themed pinball machine. I mean, yeah, I guess so. I'm trying to think if there was any other one that maybe did something with the holiday. I can't think of one. Okay, it's your favorite October themed pinball machine. Even Oktoberfest is better. And I hate saying that because that's one of my least favorite American pinball games, but it's a far better layout. It's your favorite Sigourney Weaver. You mean Jamie Lee Curtis. I had to say something. I couldn't think of anything. Because I don't know if she would have been in True Lies, wouldn't she? Yep. Yeah, but there's not a True Lies pinball. Is there not? No, I was thinking Last Action Hero. Yeah, she's not in that. True Lies would have been a good machine. The premium has got to have the Harrier. Yeah. I really liked that movie. That movie was definitely – It's very good. At the time, I think it was the most expensive movie. I think it had displaced – I don't know if it had displaced T2 or what it had displaced. I think it was one of the most expensive movies ever made, probably just to hire the stars. But, oh, did it turn out well? Oh, yeah. It was great. It was great. I really liked it. Dynasty Warriors 3 is getting a remaster. Oh, man. Next time you're in the van, you're going to stay in the van next time. Yeah, Dynasty Warriors 3 is getting a remaster. Dynasty Warriors 3, the reason I pulled that one out in specific is it was one of the first Dynasty Warriors that I really played. Because that was a series that had been out, but I think 3 was the first one that I really played and enjoyed. So I think that's a good call to remaster. And they gave us a bunch more info on the new James Bond, the first light game. So that one's continuing to look interesting. not interesting enough that I'll probably play it, but it's interesting to me that just like we just got the Indiana Jones game and now there's a James Bond game, there seem to be a lot of games that are giving that kind of feel and going to these older franchises. I like that. I played a 007 game before. I think it was on the 360, and it actually was pretty fun. It's been a long time. We'll see how it goes. On the Xbox side, they're doing a remake of Double Dragon. Double Dragon Revive. I played that. I don't love Double Dragon, but... That's okay. It's another one of those, hey, let's go to an old franchise and revive stuff. And here's the thing. Here's what it amounts to. What does it amount to? They can take the old game, they feed it into AI, and AI does all the work. The robots are doing this? AI does it all. And then they release it. AI's going to take my job, maybe. Maybe. Especially if your job's programming. I'm watching my back. I'm watching the computer every time I turn it on. Make sure it doesn't stab you in the back. It's going to throw a mouse around my neck and be like, you should have gone wireless, you fool. I don't want to recharge it. That's right. That's my argument, too. They're making remakes of Dragon Quest I and II. We talked about Dragon Quest last time, too. I might actually get those because I did play Dragon Quest on Nintendo. Yeah, no, they're definitely, they are original popular games. And so I think this Rumex will do really good. There's a game coming out called Mistfall Hunter. It's a fantasy extraction game. Remember like four or five years ago when extraction games became all of the big rage? So like The Division and all of those games where you go in. Yeah, yes. Yeah, there was a huge surge of extraction shooters, and Xbox decided to make one. Finally. Finally. I mean, maybe those other ones are dead now. I don't know. Yeah, it could be. I mean, and they made the, see, and I'm going to guess this was because this entire thing was at the Tokyo Game Show. They made the announcement for Forza Horizon 6. It's set in Japan, and that's it. They didn't show anything? They didn't share nothing. It was basically the Elder Scrolls VI style teaser, where they're like, Elder Scrolls VI, we know this is the game you really want, so we're going to tell you that we're working on it, and all we're going to show you is a picture that has nothing to do with the game. Aw. It is a racing game, so I guess we have a general idea. I've played a number of the Horizons. I like them better than the hardcore motorsport. Yeah, which is probably why motorsport's gone now. Right. But it's never been an immediate buy for me either because I'm just not that into racing games. Right. It will be coming to PlayStation. I put it wrong in my notes. It will be coming to PlayStation, but not immediately, which is no surprise. I'm sure they'll hold it a year before they let PlayStation have it would be my guess. Unless their sales are poor and then they'll release it earlier. Then they might release it after a quarter of a year. Yeah. It depends upon how their sales go. so and I mean those are probably the big the last big announcements going into the holiday season would be my assumption I don't know what you're talking about well if people know what they want to talk to us about they can email us at collecticgamerspodcast.gmail.com or you can go to facebook.com slash eclecticgamerspodcast you can also support the show we really do appreciate that and we have a tier as low as a dollar a month and that's over at patreon.com slash eclectic underscore gamers we're available on Twitch and Instagram at eclectic underscore gamers and we will be back in just over two weeks because we will be back to our regular schedule but until then maybe there will be more new stuff maybe there will be a new Saudi Arabian game show since I'm hearing stuff about maybe buying EA or something buying everything else so why not we'll just have to wait and see but until next time my name is Dennis I'm Tony goodbye everybody