Jersey Jack talks playfield Dutch Pinball Update It's game over for Houdini Hi, my name is Jonathan Houston and welcome to the Pinball Magazine and Pinball News Monthly Pinball Industry News Update Podcast and I'm here with Martin Ev from Pinball News and we're looking back at the month of August 2019. Right. And often the summer months are pretty quiet as far as pinball news and pinball information goes, but looking at our list of what's happened this month, I think you'll agree, Jonathan, it's been pretty busy. Yeah, and this is going to be another four-hour episode, I'm afraid. Yeah, so get yourself a drink, sit back, and enjoy it, because we've got a special guest appearing this time. Well, we've probably got two special guests, I expect, one of which is our regular, almost, but not quite, makes it onto the show. Yeah. But we also have a, well, we'll start with our very first story, and then we can lead into exactly what's been going on. Right. And that's, well, you want to explain what happened, Jonathan, about this interview that we got? Well, I'm not sure whether I'm the most educated on the subject, but there has been quite some, well, let's put it like this. Some people have been very vocal about playfield issues that have been occurring or popping up the last month, whether it's clipping of clear coat on playfields or the rinkling of clear coat around posts like you have on slingshots. Slingshot usually has three posts around it. And on some playfields by different manufacturers, which have different contract manufacturers providing the playfields to them. These problems apparently occurred, but there's no relation between these different manufacturers. But for some reason, apparently multiple manufacturers are facing these problems, and some people have very big issues with them. For some people, it's the most important thing in the world. Personally, obviously not being affected by all of this, since I have no game on order, I don't get that much what the fuzz is all about. But apparently on a forum like Pinsight and certain podcasters tend to spend a lot of their energy in dissecting this problem. Apparently, even if they have no interest in this whatsoever, because they don't have any of these games that are affected, but still, it's a very big issue for them. And apparently, it's such a big issue that Jack Warnieri of Jersey Jack Pinball contacted us, basically, as he appreciates what we're doing with our podcast and the way we cover news for the pinball enthusiast community, so to speak. And he wanted to speak up about the issue. And we previously recorded him commenting on the situation, so to speak. Yeah, I think that's absolutely right. Now, one of the things that I think is important to point out, as you just did, and maybe to stress it a bit more, this is not something which is unique to Jersey Jet Pimble. Other manufacturers have experienced similar issues, although it seems to be something which is not entirely understood at the moment. And as part of that understanding, it also means they don't necessarily have a solution to this problem as such. They're trying various things, some of which will work, some of which won't work, but it might take a little while for them to actually get to the root of where the problem is and be in a much clearer state of mind as to how to tackle it and move forward. But it's not a thing which prevents the game from being played and being enjoyed, but it is definitely a cosmetic issue. and so far Dirty Jack Pinball have been spending their time trying to work out what it is that's wrong with the, well it's basically the clear coat on some of these games. And let me express that it's not like it's affecting apparently all games, it's a very small minority number of games that appear to be affected. That's exactly just what I was about to say. And the important thing there is that they get the feedback and they understand what the problem is, how many people it's affecting, what the results are. And to do that, Jersey Jack Pinball, amongst others, I'm sure, have been going through, have been working with affected customers to try and resolve their issues and understand what the problems are. And that, I think, has led to some people seeing Jersey Jack Pinball as not communicating well with their customers. Whereas, in fact, they have been working sort of behind the scenes to do this. But Jack wanted to come on to our podcast and tell us all exactly what's been going on and what he and the company and the Playfield supplier has been doing to try and resolve the problems and will continue to do so with people who get in touch and report any issues they might be having. But as you say, it is a very small percentage of customers who have reported issues to them. But I guess we should hear from Jack, and he can tell us exactly what it is he has to say about the issues on the play field. Right. Here's Jack. All right. Well, first off, I just want to apologize for the delay in speaking about this matter publicly as we sorted through things internally. And we understand that some of our customers are concerned to see and hear of clear-code chipping around posts on our Willy Wonka game. the number of actual cases we have seen with true plate field shipping is extremely low and we're in the process of developing a program for anyone with documented damage and we'll work with those customers on a case-by-case basis and you know feel free to call tech support or call me directly if you feel your machine has true shipping or damage and we want you to feel confident and comfortable with your purchase, always. We want to notify customers not to take apart their machine, remove posts, etc., for the sole purpose of looking for chipping or problems under the posts. If you truly need to remove any part of the machine, we recommend contacting JJP Tech Support for instructions on how to do this properly. And for those customers who see rippling or pooling around any post, we want to urge you this does not mean your game will chip. We're diligently working with our vendor and engineers day and night on correcting any pooling moving forward. We have no reason to believe any games out there in the field are inadequate in any way, shape, or form. You should continue to enjoy and play your amazing games. Our companies put countless hours and efforts into making Willy Wonka a fun experience for you and your loved ones to appreciate for years to come. I mean, really, our people work hard every day with passion to design and create amazing games for you to play. As we always have, we will stand by our product and support our loyal customers. And I can tell you that will never change. Thank you. Okay, so there you have it, folks. Straight from the horse's mouth, although I wouldn't want to say that chest of horse. Any more direct than that. Right. At least Jack is speaking up, which can't be said for all manufacturers who are basically either, well, keeping the conversation to themselves, let's call it that. And I can understand that Jack is looking for or is judging each case on its own, which they are apparently doing. and they're not going to be very vocal about it, which I understand as well. But I think it's a good thing that he speaks up, he's not hiding, and if people have an issue, then they can contact him. Yeah, I don't think any people manufacturer would be particularly looking to broadcast the fact that there were potential problems with a small percentage of their games. But the question is, how do they deal with them, and how do they resolve the problems directly with the customers? And obviously each issue needs to be dealt with on a case-by-case basis. If somebody's got a little bit of wrinkling of the clear coat around an outlaying post, that's not going to result in the same kind of resolution as somebody who might have a large flake taken off there, an important part of the playfield along with the artwork. That could have a different solution to it. So each one will be addressed on its merits and dealt with. Yeah, and it also depends on how did this occur, because if your playfield was finding and figured like, oh, I've got to check out whether my playfield is chipping and you take your playfield apart and you ruin it that way, you sort of brought it onto yourself, I guess. Yeah, I guess so, Although I guess we're also quite, you know, with older games, we're quite used to taking posts out and cleaning the play field and putting it all back together again without the play field delaminating or the code coming off. Right. Well, many of these playfields don't have the code that we are using today. Today's code is much thicker. I don't know how long it takes for such code to completely harden out or I'm not sure what the correct verb would be. No, I don't think anybody knows how long they take to completely cure. I think that's the problem with them, that when they put all these extra thicknesses of clear on, people assume, oh, it'll just take a little bit longer to completely cure, then it'll be as hard as a thin layer. I think we're finding now that's not the case, and maybe in some cases these will never be entirely hard. I think it might very well be a case of not applying too many layers, because the more you apply, the softer the bottom layers will end up being. Yeah, I think that is. I don't think you can keep piling more and more layers of clear on and expect them all to end up being as hard as the top surface. That doesn't seem to be the case. So if you're going to put a post on it and tighten it down and start twisting it, You can expect some slippage to occur. Right. And the thing is, obviously, while they're building these games now, you can't predict what will happen to a play field in, I don't know, six months or a year. I mean, you just don't know what will happen with something that you spray on today. I mean, it's the same as walking across the street. You don't know what's going to happen. There might be a car. There might not be a car. That's true. But, I mean, from our discussions both before and after that, that kind of statement from Jack, I think we kind of got a feel for, certainly for Jack's desire to get this problem under control, and not in terms of PR, but in terms of making sure customers are happy with the way that any issues are resolved. but also that it's still very much a sort of, it seems to be, a black art when it comes to clear-coating playfield these days, with the extra layers and the higher quality finish that the higher prices kind of demand. So when you're putting this extra glossy, almost mirror-like finish on playfields, it's kind of something which has not been done much in the past, And also that it's very possible that there are changes in the composition of these coats that they're putting on due to various health and safety regulations and banning of hazardous chemicals. Right, so you basically need a chemist to figure out what's going on and how to prevent it or how to cure it. Well, even then, there's so many factors involved. What's the atmosphere when this stuff's put on? What's the wood it's going on to? What's the moisture content of that wood? What's the ink? Because bear in mind, the playfields now are almost entirely inked. So your clear coat is not bonding with the wood anymore. Your clear coat is bonding with the ink, which is bonding with the wood. So if the ink is not sticking to the wood, then it might not be a clear issue. It might actually be an inking issue. Could be. Well, obviously, there's plenty of speculation going on. But for something that apparently is not even such a big issue, We have already been talking about it for over 10 minutes. True. Okay, so Jack said what he wanted to say. If people have a problem, they can contact him. And let's discuss the other Jersey Jack pinball news of this past month. Well, yes, okay. So there has been other Jersey Jack pinball news, and they've been bringing out some, well, they've been making games as well, as well as sorting out problems. The game on the line is Willy Wonka, as people may know. And they also started shipping out limited edition games of Willy Wonka. And furthermore, the game has seen so far three code updates the past month, and the most recent one being 1.13, with various bug fixes and enhancements. and all sorts of stuff. If you have a game, then you probably are far more interested in what has been updated than I am, so I'm not going to waste any more time on that. And there was also a new code update for The Wizard of Oz. You want to chime in on that? Yeah, absolutely. Jersey Jack Pinball's first title, Wizard of Oz, got a version 7.02 update this month, which wasn't a huge thing it just added a few little bug fixes but what it did add is the feature that's been added on their later games which is where you can rather than do the ball in play scoring or count type feature where you can have the number of balls left or number of balls remaining to be played and that with it allows you to add extra players to the game beyond ball one, which is the standard if you're playing the ball in play system, which we're all so familiar with, ball one, ball two, ball three. This one says how many balls you have left, but if none of the players are on their last ball, then you can still add players to the game up to the maximum number of four. So that's something which is added in version 7.02 to the Wizard of Oz. So that could be a different way of playing the game So it's quite fun And it's good that they're going back and adding that To their very first title Right, okay Then I guess that covers Most of the Or all of the news regarding Jersey Jack Pinball Yeah, I think so I think Jersey Jack also He was on holiday For a couple of Well, a certain amount of time the past month but my guess is many people were on holiday. It's that time of year. Yeah right so oh well so then moving on to our second headline and I suggest we're not going to be discussing this in very in depth because we're going to... What is it we're not going to be discussing? Okay, Dutch Pinball sent out a new newsletter with a lot of news that we had already explained in our previous podcast. That's how informed we are, people. We already know our process. Yeah, if you listened to us last time, you'd know all this. Yes. And, well, explaining why I want to keep it short this time is, we're recording this podcast on the 30th of August, and we're looking back on, which is a Friday, by the way, we're looking back on the month of August 2019. but currently scheduled is an exclusive interview with Barry from Dutch Pinball, which will supposedly be taking place next Monday. And we're not going to wait with releasing that interview, at least that's not my intent. So the idea is there will be a special bonus episode podcast, in which Barry will basically talk us through whatever happened with the whole Dutch pinball situation, which is why I don't want to spend too much time discussing it right now because we'll be discussing that in our special bonus episode podcast with Barry of Dutch Pinball. And we'll record that Monday evening Dutch time. and I expect if it doesn't need that much editing, and hopefully it won't, that we'll be going out maybe even the same day if you're in the U.S. and else hopefully the next day. Yeah, I think hopefully Tuesday morning here in Europe. We certainly don't tend to, as you may have gathered from listening to us, we don't tend to do a lot of editing to these podcasts. Yeah, sorry about that. I am a liar. Yeah, well, you know. But it's more raw that way, and you get what we really think. We don't go back and say, oh, we shouldn't have said that. So you get everything that comes from our consciousness, which, be it good or bad. But, yes, Monday evening is our planned interview with Barry. We had hoped to have an interview before now, but Barry's just been so busy doing all the things he has been doing. We can do a little bit of an update at the moment. So what happened was... It's in the newsletter then. Oh, I don't even have it here in front of me. What I do know what happened is that I think we mentioned already in our last podcast that Barry went over to ARA, their former contract manufacturer. they have now been paid in full and Barry picked up the games that were originally built like what was it, two years ago, two and a half years ago that were ready to ship out and then this whole issue occurred and Aaron said no, you're not shipping out these games so anyway, they came to he got those out of the factory if I can interrupt there before Ara went on their three week summer vacation right technically not actually Ara closed on a Friday and I think Barry went in the next Monday but management was still there but all the regular factory workers were all off on holiday so it was just a bunch of managers doing some stuff whatever So he went in and picked up the games He still has to go back And pick up the remaining Inventory of parts And that's likely to happen Next week Right And he's going to take them somewhere Right What I understood is looking at Multiple facilities or Buildings that would become The new Dutch Bimble assembly facility, so to speak. But I'm sure he'll get into that in our interview on Monday. But the interesting thing is the games that were at our shift, they have been unboxed, checked, tested, and what have you, re-boxed, and sent to new customers. These are the ones who bought through Cointaker. Right, and I understood the games have been shipped directly to these customers, so they're not first shipped to CoinTaker and then CoinTaker is shipping them wherever they need to go. No, they went straight to whoever bought them. And these games, well not only did they ship, but they also arrived. And I think the first, they send out at least, well one batch, which was 20 games and i think another 18 games uh followed um i'm under the impression that they shipped but i'm not 100 sure so take that with a little i haven't seen that confirmed either yet yeah so um uh what else is there um well you um obviously i didn't i looked at the newsletter and there was some everything in there i already knew so i yeah but for you it was apparently what did you well no I think pretty much everything in there that Barry mentioned we'd already covered in the previous discussion I think the only thing that might have been confirmed in there was the fact that he had renewed the licence on the Big Lebowski with is it Universal I think it is for another year well actually slightly more than a year the licence was due to expire on the end of this year I think he's extended it for one more year until the end of next year, because I think that's all that they're allowed to do. That's all that Universal wants to deal with is one-year extensions. They don't want to get into long-term deals. It doesn't mean that by the end of next year the production will be done, because at the same time next year they can apply for another extension, and if Universal is happy with what's going on, then it shouldn't be any problem to extend the license further and manufacture more games. Yeah. Assuming that they will be manufacturing games. Well, I think last time we had a fairly frank discussion about the difficulties that Barry might face in setting up manufacturing, so we don't need to go into that again. And, of course, we can put all that to Barry ourselves on Monday as well, and he can tell us about his plans and how he's going to produce all these games and what that means for the early achievers. what the likelihood is of them getting machines as part of this manufacturing deal, how many early-achieving machines he thinks he can make out of the at least 100 sets of games, game parts, I should say, that he thinks he's got. But it's unclear yet exactly, unclear to us exactly, or me anyway, at least exactly what he has in his inventory and whether there really is 100 plus games worth of parts, all the parts. Right. So what I'm expecting is it's going to be an interesting, hopefully, interview with Barry next Monday. Absolutely. World exclusive, I would like to say. Not only that, but the interesting, well, the perspective is, Obviously, it's the two of us talking to Barry, where I've been accused of being a Barry's handboy. No, I've not, although I'd like to say, no, I'm not, but I'm more informed than most people on certain forums. So I know more what's going on, and that gives me a better perspective on things, which makes me believe that the outcome that Barry is looking for is very much achievable. On the same hand, I realize that you have a lot of questions, and I'd be happy to let you ask those questions because they are valid questions, and you'd like to know how things are. Yeah, I mean, I don't have the same level of, shall we say, confidence, trust, belief. I don't know, he may be confident. I want to ask the questions which everybody else who doesn't know the situation, like me, or doesn't know every detail about it, would want to ask somebody who's looking to do what Barry is looking to do. It's very difficult when you say, I mean, if you say what everybody wants to know, there are certain people who want to know details that really, seriously, those are too ridiculous. I mean, you wouldn't ask them certain details. If people are looking for details because they feel they're entitled to certain details, well, in the same situation with other manufacturers, no, you wouldn't be entitled to that info, so neither. Barry doesn't need to explain every fart that he makes. Pardon my French. No, he doesn't, but I think it would be in his interest to show the rest of the world and the pinball world in particular, that he's got a serious proposition and he has both the desire, the motivation, and the means to carry it out. And that's what I'll be exploring as well. As well as looking back at how he got into the position that we're in now. Right. So, but that's all for my mind. Yeah. So that's all for Dutch Pinball right now, but at least the people who bought recently a game received those games, and I've seen reports that everybody so far is happy. I've also seen people immediately listing it on eBay or what have you as it being a new in-box game, completely tested, and $25,000, and it's yours. So double your money, basically. Yeah, but on the other hand, if Dutch Pinball gets their act together and starts making pinballs, why would you buy that game for 25,000 if you can buy it for 12,500 or possibly even less in the future, depending on what they are planning with the production of upcoming games once they get things going? I mean, one of the things I'm curious about is, Is there going to be like a, let's call it a pro model, where they might take out the bowling mech in order to make that a cheaper game? Then again, I also saw people commenting like, yeah, they should take out the bowling mech and drop the price by $2,000. But if you take out a mech that doesn't even cost $2,000, how the hell do you expect the price of the game to drop by that much? That doesn't make much sense to me. I wanted to ask, have you actually seen a Pro and an LE game from Stern? Because the extras that you get on an LE game certainly don't add up to the cost of building the LE game. Yeah, okay, but this is reverse psychology, I would almost say. I mean the idea is that if you take out let say that BolinMac is a mechanism I just grabbing out of the sky a number But if you take out a mech you can't reduce the price of the game with $2,000. I mean, that wouldn't make sense. Well, no, that's all you do, but obviously you could change other things. You know, you say, well, with the LE, you got the rug, you'll get other things. You'll get the invisiglass, you'll get, I don't know, So maybe with the LE you get a proper back glass, and with the Pro you get a trans light, and you get, you know, you can add all the usual things that companies add to the LEs and try to justify that differential. I mean, in strictly financial terms, of course it doesn't work out, but if you want the exclusivity, you know, you can say we're only going to make 200 LEs, and everything else could be a Pro. There's another way to look at it as well. If you want to be one of those people that pay $25,000 for a Big Lebowski, now's your chance. And you'll go down in history as one of the fools who bought one. Well, you're gambling, I suppose. It depends whether you think Dutch Pinball will make any more. Yeah, but that's it. But what we don't want is a situation where people who bought a $25,000 game are now rooting for Dutch Pinball to fail, because that way their game will keep its value. Yeah, they wouldn't have any means of ensuring that Dutch Pinball failed anyway, so they can root for all they want. But it won't make any difference whether Barry can make games or not. Right, okay. Anyway, more Dutch pinball in our bonus episode. That will be recorded on Monday evening and hopefully out early next week. Yeah, I was saying we weren't going to talk about them for very long. We spent about 15 minutes talking about them. Yeah. So, yeah, moving on. We have a little bit of news from American Pinball, which was our third headline. And the basic news there is that if you wanted a Houdini pinball machine, then your chance to get one is, well, your window of opportunity is rapidly closing because they have stopped making them. And the only ones left now are the ones which are currently with distributors or, of course, private collectors. But if you want a new in-box one, distributors are the only ones who have them and they say they're not going to make any more or they have no plans to make any more. Right. Now, obviously, whether they come along and do a special edition at some point or an anniversary for a certain number of years after Houdini's birth, death, whatever, first appearance, first movie, any of that kind of stuff, they have the right to do that in the future. But they're not making any more regular production machines from now on. Right, and that also has to do with the upcoming move to the new facility, which was supposed to have been taking place months and months ago, but oh well. It's taken a bit longer, I think, because they've had issues with permits and getting the factory as well, the new building completed and fully certified and get all their certification done. but I was talking to De Waal earlier this week and he's very confident that they will certainly move into the factory this year. Not in time for a Pinball Expo tour this year but maybe next year. Right, okay. Well, speaking of De Waal who is the owner of American Pinball, he's actually coming to Europe, Germany to be more specific and I believe he's going to be talking to local distributors over there. So, we're looking, okay, I'm going to speak a little bit ahead of things, but the plan is to discuss early September with Daval the possibility of one of American pinball designers coming over to the Dutch Pinball Open, which is to be taking place the second weekend of November, November 9th and 10th, from the top of my head, obviously in the Netherlands. That will be the biggest pinball show in Europe this year. And, well, hopefully we can work out something to have some American people coming over as special guests. Yeah, still not confirmed, but you're working on it. We're working on it, and we'll be discussing this early September, probably after De Waal's visit to Germany. So anyway, so, well, see, we can discuss things briefly. That's the news for American Pinball. It is. Okay, so let's move on to what Stern Pinball have been doing in the past month, because they've been quite busy with their... They had two press releases put out by the company, the first of which was a welcome to Pablo Padilla, who is a new member of the technical support team. He's a technical support engineer working under Pat Powers, who's director of technical support. Right. So, first of all, if I may comment on that, congratulations to Paolo Padilla for landing this new job. Second, I was a bit confused, like, why would this be worthy of a press release? Because to me it's almost saying, like, our product is no good. We have people in place to support you when it breaks down. That's a very harsh interpretation. I agree, it is, but that's how it came across to me Because I was like, basically, they're telling me We need these people, and we need to send out a press release Because apparently it's news that we hire people to service our games Yeah, okay, I'm not sure I should bite with that or not I think having a good backroom support staff is vital for any company. And the more machines you sell, the more support they are going to need. You know, the things, not only with things that go wrong, but also with, in terms of developing add-ons, enhancements, mods, and advising customers and distributors as well about the current status of games and software issues as well. I'm sure the technical side also covers any bugs or any feature requests that might come in. So with the number of games they're pumping out and the number of different titles, it's not a surprise that they will need to expand their technical support department. Right. So now I don't know Pablo Padilla personally, but his last name and actually his first name as well, and I don't want to sound like a racist, but could it be that he's also hired in order to focus on the Spanish-speaking market that might need support? I wouldn't know about that. I have no knowledge, so I can't comment on that. Okay. Then we won't. But also, one thing that might actually be of interest there is the content, and could be related, is the content to the second press release, which announced that two new distributors, worldwide distributors, have been appointed. One is Cartimex in Ecuador. So maybe that's got a link, I don't know, to more technical support. and the second one is Flipper Addict who are based in New Caledonia I had to look that up because I had no idea where it was I thought everybody knew where New Caledonia is yes it's that famous part of no not Canada it's north of New Zealand and east of Australia that's the one so that little island with a population of 268,000 people Yeah, and if you're in Europe, the island is about the same size as Crete in Greece. Right. So, crying out for pinball, obviously. Oh, yeah, they're going to sell many, many games. Although you had an interesting theory, because obviously the location of New Caledonia being sort of near Australia and New Zealand, It could be that they become a supplier for New Zealand as well. We don't know. Well, or Australia. I've sort of heard various rumors over the time about, because both of those countries have one sterling distributor each, I believe, and Australia is not a small country. Maybe having one distributor is not enough. So perhaps a little bit of competition as well from a second distributor based in New Caledonia, who bear in mind that they don't necessarily need to physically have a presence in a country to be able to sell into it. They can get stuff drop shipped or indeed have an office or a contact in another country which can deal with the distribution and service issues. Right. So it might also not hurt to have a little bit of competition between distributors in that area. Oh, absolutely. Yeah. So that's just something which is just putting out there as a possibility. I don't know whether it makes a lot of sense. But, I mean, New Caledonia being as small as it is, a point to get distributed to there seems, I don't know, seems a little ambitious, shall we say. Well, if there is no distributor yet, then how are all these games going to get there? Yeah, well, I'd certainly say that Super Addict have a really nice looking arcade or game room on their premises there. So they certainly need to get the newest games. and all the states and they're not not only Stern Games they also had Jersey Jack Games from what I saw and maybe others as well but that so they are a decent size operation and maybe that alone is enough and maybe maybe you know maybe they buy enough Stern machines for their own use that they can they can justify that and reckon they can work out some some further markets that they can fill so oh I don't know Congratulations to them, Flipper Addict in New Caledonia. Carcimex is a bit of a strange one because I was checking out their company. Yeah, you did your own work. Very good. In Ecuador. And, of course, go to their website and look for Stern machines and didn't find any. In fact, they seem to be sort of almost like a sort of giant electronic computing mobile phone, cell phone routers, computers and components and retailer, general retailer. But I guess they haven't got around to putting the Stern products on their website yet. But it's certainly not a games company or a home leisure company. It's more a sort of Best Buy domestic or retail electronics company. But maybe that's a good area for Stern to work on selling the PIN. the sort of more home-orientated games and the pro level rather than the premium and the LE games. But I don't know. They're trying different things, so good luck to them. They can make inroads into the Ecuadorian market. Right. Okay. Then moving on, obviously the latest game that CERN has revealed is Jurassic Park. and the company started shipping out pro games which have started appearing in people's homes and barcades and what have you. So mostly in the US. I know that a few or I know of at least one party in Europe that flew in a game. But Other than that Most of these games have been Distributed in the US so far Yeah so In this country in the UK We were told we wouldn't be getting Any Jurassic Parks until The middle of September Which is unusual Because quite often The European games will be Shipped, literally shipped first, so they arrive here in plenty of time to coincide with the US release, but there seems to be a change in strategy this time. Right. Well, I do know that if I'm not mistaken, which is a bit of a contradiction, I realize that, but Pinball Universe in Germany apparently already has Jurassic Park on display in their showroom. So if you're in Germany, then Here's your chance to play the game And see whether it's Something that you would like to Purchase And I think that Wraps it up for the Stern Pinball news So to speak Yeah I think so They're busy producing Jurassic Park games And updating the code And it looks like it was 0.87 They're a little way away from the final version production version, but I'm sure it'll be coming along soon. Right. And the designer of Jurassic Park, Keith Elwin, first of all, congratulations to him for winning what's it called? Replay effects for Pinberg, exactly. And by again, and with a massive what you call it, advantage to the rest. He didn't even have to play the final game. I've seen that certain players don't have to play the last ball No, he did have to play the final game, he already won Yeah, he dominated that final So, yeah, huge congratulations to Keith I'm sure he won't just treat it as yet another win I'm sure every one is as important as the last But, yeah, he certainly is the master of Finberg Right, so, and he also appeared on I think the Head to Head Pinball podcast discussing Jurassic Park and a little bit of Iron Maiden as well as on a podcast made available for the Stern Insiders which I haven't heard because I am not one of those nor me so there we go but well congrats to Steve on his Pinball Queen and Keith Keith sorry about that Keith for his Hindenburg win you keep playing secret name now oh well and of course Jurassic Park being apparently received with very positive feedback so to speak other than apparently playfield issues but we won't get back into those Yeah, yeah. So, oh, well, I think we've said that enough. Yeah. Yeah, absolutely, yeah. People who, I think, first saw it had a kind of mixed opinion of the game, but once they've seen it in action and played it for themselves, I think they've definitely been swung around and become big fans of it. So, yeah, nice job to Keith, a.k.a. Steve. Yeah, yeah, yeah. Okay. So, moving on to Suncoast Pinball from California. Hmm. Yeah. They have been increasing the production on their Cosmic Carnival game, which is, I guess, good news. But they also announced that that same Cosmic Carnival game will be limited to 100 units instead of, I think, the 250. they originally announced. Yeah, I think 250 was their original target. Yeah, it's a hard sell, isn't it, in this market to be a new pinball manufacturer and come out with a brand new game, an initial game, and has it got good distribution and or strong home sales? you're going to have to temper your ambitions on the first games until you're rather well established right although I would say that we've seen in the past for certain games there was no problem to get a huge following behind the company speaking of Lebowski in this case But apparently times have changed And people tend to be more careful With buying games from New manufacturers In the sense that Yes they could be limiting The number of games to 100 but it could Okay I'll be the black sheep over here And say the elephant in the room It could also be that they might not be able to sell More than 100 games Yeah I think that's a reasonable expectation. I don't know what they have done their calculations on and how many parts they had ordered for their games. Maybe they only ordered 100 in the first place and they had to see whether it was worth after that buying another 150 to compete the run. Yeah. On the positive side the orders weren't there to make that worthwhile. On a positive note, they also indicated that they are working on games 2 and 3. It could also be that games two and three have a much bigger potential and they want to focus on that so yeah pick whichever you like yeah and now to be careful not to get you get ahead of yourself too much we've seen other companies try and do that and say well if you don't like this one then you'll like the next one and um in the end uh you know they they get overstretched because their resources are split, rather than concentrating on one machine, they're now trying to concentrate on three, and they don't know which games they're marketing, which ones are they supporting, they don't know which parts they're getting. But we'll see. I'm sure we both wish Suncoast Pinball all the very best in their future development and sales of Cosmic Carnival, which I think we all agree looks absolutely wonderful. Oh, yeah. Cosmetically, it's a very, very nice-looking game. I haven't been able to play the current software, so I don't know how much fun it is. But I'm expecting them to... Well, if this game, their first game, is a prelude of what's to come, I'm very much interested. So bring it on. Good. Yeah. Good. And I'm glad we got all the way through this part without anybody saying a phrase, hit it out of the park yet. So let's see if we can manage to get through the entire park. But now you've just said it. Oh. Oh, damn. Okay. Nobody else say it then. Okay. No. I know I shouldn't be saying it, but we might be getting a call, and you never know what Gary's going to say. Oh, well, absolutely. Well, if he does, then we'll do one of those edits that we don't do very often. We'll make an exception and edit Gary out. Oh, well, yes. No, that's not a very nice thing to say. We'll keep Gary in as soon as we get him on the phone, which is a challenge. Anybody of our regular listeners will know that it's a challenge to get Gary on the show. And believe us, we tried. Oh, many times. And who knows? Let's see how today goes, because I have a good feeling about it. But so that was Suncoast Pinball. Yeah. We should have made a bridge, actually, when we were talking about New Caledonia to Haggis Pinball, which is next on my list, but it would have made more sense earlier on. Anyway, so Haggis Pinball, Australia-based, they were supposed to refuel their Kells game at the Brisbane Masters. Guess what? They did. Pinball is hard. Harder than they thought. Yeah, and apparently they were not completely satisfied. The game was almost ready to go, but not quite. So they decided not to reveal it, and it looks like they're saving it now for Pinball Expo, which is in October. It is indeed. And I don't know, I haven't seen anything yet from Haggis which leads me to believe that they're going to be producing commercial quality pinball machines. I'm waiting to be convinced and I really want to be convinced, but everything I've seen so far has been, I don't want to say amateurish, but less than professional looking. Right, okay. So I'm really wanting to be blown away By whatever it is they produce at Expo In October because I'd like to be convinced And I can't imagine I'm alone in this Right What's your opinion of what they've shown So far, Jonathan? Well, the only thing that I can go by is The Seeing the Prototype, the white boot that they showed At the Texas Film Festival earlier In March and actually I came across a video of this guy from Haggis Pinball, I forgot his name, who was explaining in that video that instead of shipping a game to Texas, he was going to ship a whitewood and then building the game there and showing it off. And if the game is going to be what I saw at Texas, then I'm afraid your expectations won't be met. Yes, it was a long way from being anything professional. And it was certainly, he was saying very clearly that he shipped a bunch of parts and then reassembled everything in Texas the night before the show. Right, but if that was everything, then that was far from a completed game. Oh, absolutely, yeah. And I think the bar has been raised so far now that you can't sort of come along with a project game at that level and expect to be taken seriously. Well, this game was housed in a belly cabinet or similar to a total nuclear annihilation cabinet, that same style, without any ramps. But I think if we look at what happened last year with our friends from Team Pinball in the UK, If you're producing A game Without any ramps People are still expecting at least The same Level of Complexity and game rules Etc as on Total nuclear annihilation So basically people want to be blown away And impressed Even if it's a game without any ramps And That's a tough nut to crack It is if you haven't got A huge number of shots or a huge number of targets In your game Then you need to really Work what you do have And get the most from it And come up with some really creative ideas For exactly how you're going to Entertain the player Because making the shots alone Is not going to be enough And I think that's a problem And I haven't seen I know Haggis Pinball have been documenting their work very expensively through their videos. So kudos to them for doing that. But I'm not feeling like they're a serious competitor. And maybe they don't want to be a serious competitor, you know, because there are enough other companies out there. We've already looked at, what, five manufacturers so far, and we've got probably another two or so to go after this. So it's a very crowded market out there. Even more, I'm afraid. so yeah yeah so but it's a crowded market and but but the market is very segmentated or uh segmented what's the yeah yeah so um i mean it took stern 30 years to become what they are today and uh with all the respect to stern because they have their manufacturing absolutely in place They are a, well, in the Western world, they are able to get their games everywhere. That's a given. If you're a new party, or if you're new to the party, so to speak, you don't have that distributor network. And that's where companies are struggling. Yeah, as you say, the Suncoast. Yeah, well, not only Suncoast, but I'd say even American Pinball, possibly. While they do have quite an impressive network of distributors, it's not that I'm... I don't signal many of their games being here in Europe distributed. Obviously, it might be different in the US, but being based in Europe, If I go to shows, you're lucky to find one of these games. So they are still quite a rarity over here. Let's put it like that. Yes, true. It could also be that they end up with collectors who don't want to move them out of their house and move them to a show. But that's the impression I got so far. So if you don't have a distributor network in place, then it's going to be very difficult. to sell the amounts of games that you might need to make it profitable. Yeah, and I think you also need to differentiate yourself from the crowd in a number of ways. You can do that on pricing, you can do that on theme, you can do that on features, but just trying to do what companies like Stern do, but with a different title. Well, actually, thank you for this nice little bridge Because I just realized we skipped the manufacturer We forgot to talk about Spooky Bimble Yeah, we'll cut back to that Yeah, very good, very good Because what you're describing is exactly what Spooky is doing And they stick to their niche They do what they are good at They do it at their own pace And it's paying off for them It is and then they also have a few sort of less, well, I suppose more out there ideas when they come along with work with Scott Denisey on games like TNA, which probably, well, definitely doesn't fit in with their standard workflow up until that point. They were doing what they were doing based on themes, based on licenses as well, from Rob Zombie, Alice Cooper, all that kind of stuff. And that was the way they were going because they were doing a very successful job in licensing and building games at a scale which they felt they could cope with and didn want to get any bigger And then out of left field came Scott with TNA and that's proved to be a welcome disruptor, I would say, to their production schedule. It certainly delayed Alice Cooper being made, but it was a runaway success, and I'm sure they were very happy to delay it in that way and have all that extra income and manufacturing that came from TNA. And, of course, moving on to TNA, which is a natural flow into that, we could say that Scott is working on a code update, another code update to TNA. Well, speaking of the production of TNA, Charlie Emery confirmed earlier this month that we might see a new run of TNA. There's still, every week they get calls of people who are interested in buying one of those games. I might have a new in-box one, anyone interested, but it helps if you're in Europe. So the TNA 2.0, which at this point is not very certain when it will be built, but they're looking into some cosmetic updates that will differentiate the game, well, in a cosmetic way, from the first production run. But if you're looking for a TNA, give it some time, because I expect them to finish Alice Cooper first, which is expected to be around Christmas and the plan was to move on to Scott's second game although it could be and we don't know that's up to Spooky but they might decide to run a couple of TNAs first another run of I don't know 50 or whatever and then move on to Scott's second game but it all depends on how far the second game is along in the design process code updates and what have you. But, okay, we'll see how that works out. Yeah. Should give credit to Four Man's Pimple Podcast. Yeah, where Charlie was speaking. Yes, exactly. So, sorry for not mentioning that earlier, but that was indeed on the Four Man's Pimple Podcast there. I said it twice. And I said it once. And he also said that they had two more games in development, I think, after Scott's game. Yes. So, no sign of any slowing down at Spooky Pinball when it comes to developing new titles. Which is actually interesting, because it makes me wonder, if they have two more games in development, does that mean they have two more designers? Hmm, well, who knows. And especially since Charlie indicated that he is not working on a game, well, Charlie designed Elvis Cooper, So then Who is designing the other games At Spooky Pimble Yes good question Maybe Scott's doing them as well I don't know He's got a whole bank of ideas Who knows Could be That's interesting Could be that they have some new in house talent That we don't know about yet Yeah and of course Bowen's working for them as well So maybe he's come up with some ideas. Well, you might figure if Keith can do it, I can do it too. Exactly. It can't be that hard, can it? This designing pinball. It can definitely be that hard, but it helps if you have people around you that know what you're doing or what they are doing. So that gives you a little air to breathe as a designer. And if you're working with a team that is knowledgeable on what they're doing and might be able to prevent you from making some mistakes. Yes, design mistakes. Yes, and so on. So, yeah, who knows? It could be interesting. I'd be interested in seeing what Bo and Keren would come up with as a pinball design. Yeah, absolutely. We're not saying that he definitely is, but just putting it out there as speculation of where some of these new spooky pinball games might be coming from. Right. And, well, getting back to what you were leading into, Scott is working on a code update for TNA, and he's also working on an expanded edition of the TNA soundtrack. That doesn't mean that, well, Let me explain what the expanded edition includes. Yes. It's about remastered versions of the songs available on the original soundtrack, plus an extra track called Scarlet, which is also the name of the female character that's supposed to be blowing up all these reactors, which is based on Scott's wife, Sarah Rose, by the way, if you didn't know that. So, now this remastered album and the new track will be available on scottdanesey.com starting September 19th, but it will also be available on Spotify and other platforms and so on. and Scott made a comment about it, I forgot what it was, what he called it, but the opening track of the album will be sort of Leapgate version 2, which is leading me to believe that, if I recall it correctly, Scott had, if you recall the opening track or the main theme of Total Nuclear Annihilation, when you start the game, there was this high beep in there, which he turned down an octave for the album, and as well on the game, and then people started complaining that they were missing the high beep, because it was obviously lacking some high frequencies. So we might see a return of the high beep on the new expanded edition album of Total Nuclear Annihilation. Yeah, I wonder whether Any remade versions Of the TNA version 2.0 If they put that in production, whether that will feature the new soundtrack Rather than the original If there'll be any changes to it Or whether it might even have the extra Track in it Right Well, we just have to wait and see Yeah But yeah, that would be a nice Welcome, you know, I mean And obviously memory isn't a problem for pinball machines anymore. Not these days, no. So if Scott wants to update all the music in the game, then be my guest. And also it's worth mentioning that if you did buy the original TNA album, all the music from TNA, then the bonus track will be available for you to download for free from scottdonisi.com. Also from the 19th That does make me wonder How can I update my cassette? Oh Ah, yes I can't answer that one at the moment I'm sure it's all been covered And will be available In the instructions It's actually how to do it Right, okay So I was looking on Scott's website Regarding this update That he's currently working on Right What's interesting Or what I found interesting but at the same time it also made me a little bit reserved. Apparently Scott has completely reprogrammed the way the flippers are operated and the slingshots as well. Now I quite like how the flippers actually flip on a TNA, and the slingshots as well, especially as powerful as they are. So I might Obviously I own a TNA And I might be Taking a look at other people Updating their games first Whether I'm going to update mine as well Because I really like how it plays And if this is going to be affecting Gameplay In a way that I might not like it Then there's no way in going back I'm afraid Well, presumably you can download the current version of software and keep that as a backup and then roll back to it if you don't like it. But I thought... But it uses P-Rock, doesn't it? Yes. As the underlying system. Yes. So I would have thought that the flippers and slingshots would have been directly driven through... Rather than being just like a regular solenoid, they normally have a different circuit for slingshots and flippers that are much more responsive and don't require... The signal would have to go back to a host PC and then over USB and then back again, and all the delays that that entails. So I don't know how much scope there is to actually change the flippers and slingshots. My understanding is that TNA is running on this software called Skeleton Game, which is sort of the starting point where you start and so you already, if you install a skeleton game on your whitewood or whatever you have then you already have the flipper slipping and the slingshots and so on and apparently those features Scott currently is addressing so I'm curious to see how that will turn out yeah maybe he's addressing it at a lower level than the sort of regular game coding because obviously He's quite into software. So maybe he's rewritten aspects of the core code, which handle that kind of thing. My biggest fear, of course, is here that I really like how snappy the slingshots on TNA currently are, and I hate to see them turn into sort of like stern slingshots. I don't think they'll go soggy. I don't think it's going to reduce the vibrancy and the action you'll get from those. If anything, he's looking to get more out of it. Even more? Yeah. Okay. So, well, moving on to, well, let's move to Texas, our dear friend at Deep Root Pinball. Yeah, so A bit of a little movement there with The historic Side of Of their games, I suppose Going back to What happened with Zidware and John Popperduke's Company, which Deep Roots basically Bought up and took over A certain amount of responsibility For, and those Customers who bought games such as Magic Girl and Retro Atomic Zombie Adventureland. And Alice in Wonderland. And Alice in Wonderland as well as the third title, which hasn't really been addressed yet. But certainly Magic Girl and, to some extent, Retro Atomic Zombie, I call it Raza because it's a lot easier. Those people who put money into those games and didn't get anything in return, other than the enjoyment of having kept Zidware going for a number of years. Deep Root was looking to basically do a deal with them in order to settle any claims they might have had against Zidware and John. And part of that deal, as I understand it, was that the customers could either get a cash settlement or they could get a retro-atomic zombie adventure land when that game was produced. and I think, and you can correct me if I'm wrong here, Jonathan, because you probably know more about it than I do, that there was a kind of deadline imposed on when that game would be produced by Deep Root with the proviso that if the game wasn't available by a certain cut-off date, then a cash payment would be made in lieu of a game, and I think that deadline was missed, or was reached, I should say, and I think people were basically given the cash rather than a game. Right. Is that your understanding of it? Well, I understood that the people who basically opted for a cash settlement, they got paid. And the whole Raza thing that you just mentioned, I'm actually not that educated on, so I wouldn't be able to tell whether your story is the way it went down, The way I understood it is the people that asked for a cash settlement got paid. And that's all I know about it. But it's a good thing that they got paid. And if Deep Boot starts producing games and they feel like, hey, I'm happy to buy from them, then let's hope they do. I mean, it's a very ambitious adventure that they started on, and I'm highly curious to see how it will unfold. Obviously, expectations are high, and especially with the whole distribution thing that we just discussed, that's going to be also a factor for Deep Root. I mean, building games is one thing, but if you have no distribution, then what are you going to do? Well, it's very hard to convince distributors to take your product if you haven't got a product to show them yet. Right. But that will be fixed this November, at least when the first Razor games are due to be unveiled at the Houston Arcade Expo. Still as prototypes, at least that's... Yeah, absolutely. So that's the kind of thing where they can show to distributors and say, this is the kind of product we're going to be producing. when you like to get on board and be our representative. Right. So, oh, well. So it's a good thing that Deepwood is acting or, sorry, at least they're keeping up their promise and paying out whenever money is owed. Yeah, I'm not sure how, I'm not sure where that settles. I don't believe it settles all the claims against it from the people who own games. Yeah. But it's a start, I suppose. Yeah, I guess. And we'll still have to see how things develop any further. But for now, okay, kudos to Deep Root for living up to what they promised. Yeah, that's right. Yeah. So, very short news from our friends, Rennie and Chris at ColorDMD. They announced Hurricane as their 94th title. So, if you own a Hurricane, and I know a lot of people do, because I keep coming across that game at shows, shows and I actually like playing it. I think it's a fun game. I wouldn't mind having one in my collection at some point. Okay. That's probably my probably the favourite one of the sort of the Riverview coaster ride games but I'm not a big fan of Comet or what was the other one? Cyclone. Cyclone, yes, well done. Yeah, those games either, so they don't do it for me. Right. But, yeah, I think Hurricanes, as a DMD version, and having a slightly more interesting play field layout. Right. Yeah. So, for me, it's a nice and simple game, and being not that, I'm not a Keith Elwin in terms of a pinball player. Unfortunately not. And I do have a little history with that game I was in the military service And I played the crap out of it So I have a soft spot for Hurricane There I said it Right, okay, so guilty pleasure Yeah, yeah, sort of, yes Oh well So Congratulations to Randy and Chris And well Their 94th title That means They are getting awfully close to 100 Yeah, now what's the 100th title likely to be, do you think? What would be the centenary game? Well, I'd say what a very nice one would be is Damn, I forget the name We can come back to that a bit later if you like Okay Well, what do you listeners think would be a suitable number 100 to mark the first 100-colour DMDA? Well, there's not that many games. Well, yeah, that's the question. Would there be 200? Well, I don't think there's even 200 Dogmatrix games. Well, that's the question, isn't it? Even if you take the Stern Sorry, the Stern The Data Reist Small display ones Like Batman and Checkpoint and all those early games Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles Oh, we'll wait for that And who's not I mean, yeah I don't think they take it up to 200 I'm sure somebody can jump on IPDB Yeah, I could, but I don't research it right now, sorry No, perhaps we'll Perhaps we'll do a feature on IPDV Fairly soon And find out what's happening there But yeah So number 94, Hurricane, colour DMD Now Let's move on to Pinball shows for a moment Actually, how about we move on to Announce pinballs That we haven't seen in the Flash yet Okay, but we'll hopefully see pinball shows coming up fairly soon. Right. But, no, we discussed manufacturers, and there is a company that announced that they are intending to start making pinball machines, which is Pinball Adventures Technology, also known as Pinball Buzz. and you might know them as publisher of Pinball Adventures Volume 1 and 2, although I haven't seen 2 in any printed form yet, but it's available as a Kindle download for the Kindle app or anything that reads Kindle books. Right. Yeah, that's available on Amazon now. You can download. I went to try and buy Volume 2 in print. Oh, that was you. Yeah, that was me. And it said it would be available in one to three months. Now, I don't suppose that means it's being shipped from the U.S. I think it probably means it's actually not available just yet. Right. But maybe in the U.S. you can buy it, but in the U.K. there's no definite delivery date on that. Whereas the Kindle version you can download immediately. Right. So it's definitely been produced, but maybe not printed. Right. But anyway, they also announced, aside from publishing books, they also announced that they would be building pinball machines. Yes. They came up with one called Puny Factory 2520 as their first title. And they published a flyer on the website. They did indeed. which I think when they first announced the game they had a sort of vague look at what the game would or what the cabinet would look like. No details on the playfield. No, you can't see the playfield. And then they produced the flyer which actually doesn't show you any more other than the suggestion that there's a display in the backbox very much of the same size as, I'd say, the Mafia. you know, the way that their display was, and about the same place. It was like a five-inch display, something like that? I think it's a bit bigger, it's probably about seven or eight, but it's at the bottom part of the play field. But what's interesting is that this, I didn't pick up on the fact that it was called 2520 as a part of the title before, but it kind of suggests it's futuristic, because on the cabinet side, it says established Punny Factory Inc. established 2520 so futuristic it doesn't look futuristic it looks very cartoony in the way the artwork is done and they burnt sort of the laser cut 2520 into the side rail or the flipper button protector part of the side rail and also into the backbox hinges so this 2520 is obviously a thing for them. But it must be part of the backstory to the game, which is not obvious because it seemed to be about collecting things that have escaped from the punny factory and gathering them up and bringing them back again before the big boss returns. It sounds sort of fairly childish in a way. Well, they might be aiming at a different audience than the other pinball companies are aiming at. Oh, absolutely. Yeah, family-friendly titles. Nothing wrong with that. We've seen that before from various companies. Right. And on the top of the backbox is a sort of smoke stack, a couple of chimneys with what looks like smoke coming out of them, but I think it's probably sort of crepe paper or some kind of fine material, white material, which can probably be blown with a fan from inside. and above that on the flyer is a logo for a company called Interactive Smoke Stack, who presumably produce this smoke stack effect. Right. So, yeah. Okay. Well, looks interesting. It looks interesting, but nobody is holding their breath for these games to come out since the projected timeline for the publishing of the books hasn't been met. So we'll still have to see whether they will actually have a game available this year. I mean, it's already September, so... Well, that was holding a gun to their heads. They haven't set a production schedule, have they? They haven't said whether it's going to be available. They announced a game for 2019, if I'm not mistaken. But I might be mistaken, so don't take my word on it. Look on their website. I think it's pinballbuzz.com. Correct, yeah. Yeah. And I think... It's a little bit hidden. You have to go into the shop, and then there's a section called Royal Pinball Machines for some reason, and that's where you'll find the punny pinball machine. Right. So let me take a look now, because I recall that they actually had a timeline. with each game in the sense that when it would be out. So I'm trying to look that up right now. It's a very entertaining audio to listen to. Yes, absolutely. Well, it's a long description. Actually, it's a 10.1-inch display, so it's a netbook. I do have a... Actually, I have some news for you. For me? Yeah. Ooh. Ooh. Click on the, if you're on the, are you on the Pinball Buzz website as well as I am right now? Who isn't? Well, then click on Pinball Team. Ooh. And scroll down. Let's see, Team Leader and Concept Designer. No, one down. One down. It's our friends From Team Pinball In the UK Who apparently are now working for Pinball Buzz Pinball Adventures Ah That would explain The conversation I had with them A little earlier this week Ah Which was? That they are working on another title As a contract game Right Okay So I think we might have worked out What that contract game is Well not the game But at least for who they are working So congrats on landing this contract job to Team Pinball. Yeah, absolutely. It must be time for another trip down to South Wales to see how they're getting on. Yeah, okay. Well, good for them. So, yeah, interesting. So I'm looking over. They get quite a staff of people. Also, I can't wait to see whenever they are ready to launch their games. There's quite a number of people apparently working. Actually, I think everybody in the factory has a picture of this. But that's fine. So you said had to shop. Oh, this is such an interesting podcast audio. It is. Yes. Web browsing on the radio. Right. So pinball machine parts, the pony shirts. Where do I have to look for the pinball machines? Oh, right here. Royal something. I found it. I found it. There you go. Yes. It's all there somewhere. No, I got it. I got it. I got it. Well, but perhaps they will have something to show a little bit later this year then, maybe somewhere like Pinball Expo, where some other games might well be revealed. Right. Have you got any suggestions on what we might be seeing at Pinball Expo this year? At Pinball Expo? Well, I'll tell you what I won't expect to be seeing. I don't expect Jersey Jack will reveal The second game That he announced that would be Become available This year Because the year doesn't end With Pinball Expo And I think they might be holding on to their new title With Wonka Doing very well currently Their factory Is cranking out games And Obviously they might also So with the whole situation that's currently going on with the Playfield and so on, they might be... I'm not sure how that might affect production right now, but I'm not expecting Jersey Jack to reveal a new game at Expo. What we do know is that Elvira announced that her third game, to be manufactured by Stern Pinball, designed by Dennis Nordman, who was at the time not working for Deep Root since then. Once he finished his design, handed it in to Stern, and then signed with Deep Root, with artwork by Greg Freres, so the traditional Elvira pinball team, so to speak. I'm expecting Mark Wehner to be part of it as well, as he was on Cat's Diff. and he's working at Stern, so why wouldn't he? That game is expected, or is actually confirmed by Elvira already, to be available in October, so it would be very odd not to have it at Expo. Yes, you would think it would be there for, well the game would certainly be in customers homes for Halloween at the end of the month Yes So actually I find if that game would be let say announced by the end of September, that's still a very short window for Stern to actually manufacture games and have them at people's homes going through the distribution channel as it is. That's a small window. Obviously, it's an Elvira game, And so it will be fun once Halloween is over, but I can imagine that you would want to jump on the hype of Halloween as it is a hype in America, for sure. You would, yes. And, you know, timescales are going to be very tight because we're doing this now at the beginning of September almost, and so it only really gives you, you know, nine weeks before we're at the end of October. And in that time you have to, you know, announce the game, start production and ship it. And it hasn't been that long since either Stern or Jersey Jack announced their previous games. I was going to say, it's Mike Cartoon. Certainly, much more recently than Jack. But Jersey Jack announced theirs back in, what, March, was it, or April? At the Midwest and the French show at the same time that we were there. And although it's been a few months more for them, production didn't start until later. Right. So the bone companies are sort of getting really well into, you know, getting into the flow of producing their current titles, and I don't think they want to start promoting their next one just yet. Well, I'd say Jurassic Park might be cut short due to Elvira, unless Stern would have, like, two production lines where they could run both games. And so, now, I was looking in the Elvira thread last night, where I saw mentioned that, and obviously, let's take this with a grain of salt, because we don't know whether it's true. But, apparently, the new Elvira game is going to be, like, similar to the Batman model. No pro version, but, like a... It starts with a premium. It starts with a premium LE and a super LE, where it was said that the super limited edition would be sold directly by Elvira. So you could only order that probably on Elvira.com or whatever webshop she's hosting. Whether there's any truth to that remains to be seen. Obviously, the game has still not been announced. It might just be speculation. but Elvira being the business woman that she is it would not surprise me no absolutely not just looking at the Elvira.com website right now just as you say that don't get too distracted sorry what? so but yeah No, what I did understand, obviously we got to this subject since we were talking about Pinball Expo. You were asking what games are we expecting. So the Elvira game, that might be there. I'm not sure whether Chicago Gaming or American Pinball will have anything to reveal. Well, American Pinball Was certainly fitting with their timeline Because they generally announce Ad Expo That's when they've done the last two games So one game a year would seem reasonable Right For them at the moment As for anyone else I don't know Spooky? Probably not Because that would be Scott's game And that's scheduled for January So not sure whether it will be ready for a reveal at Expo. And if it is, chances are it won't be revealed at Expo, but it will be revealed at the Pinball Life Party. Yeah, true, or at least shown there. But that doesn't mean they won't have it at Expo as well. Yeah, no, that's true. And I guess that's all the major manufacturers. I mean, I don't expect Deep Root to reveal anything at Expo. No. No, they're holding off until Houston. Yes. Which they've already announced. I think they probably said they won't be showing anything until that point. Right. So, yes. And what is interesting, people who attended Expo in previous years might be familiar with the Stern Party on Saturday night. Stern-orama Right, and apparently this year The Stern party will be on Friday night Hmm And that caused Jack to Or Jersey Jack To move their party To the Saturday night So they will be closing the show Effectively Right, so that could be Well, that could be interesting I asked Jack If he had any plans and they're still working out some ideas for what they can do with the Saturday night show. But that's interesting. And one can only speculate why would Stern have to move or want to move to Friday. Because I'm not assuming that is done because Expo wanted Stern on a Friday. No, I wonder if that's the only Time that somebody Who might be part of the celebration There would be available I don't know Oh well, let's speculate on that But anyway Keep an eye on alvaro.com On a totally unrelated matter That's where she Publishes details of her Upcoming signing sessions So if you can't Make expo or want to see one of the other things that she's visiting, like the Salem Horror Fest or Days of the Dead or anything like that, then you'll find all the details of that on alvaro.com on a totally unrelated subject. Yeah. Now, speaking of Pinball Expo, this year will be the 35th anniversary of Pinball Expo. It will indeed, yeah. Very nice lustrum. and I recently talked to Rob Berg. I plan to have him on our next monthly episode, so that would be the next month. September. September, to discuss what we can expect, but what he told me so far is it's going to be amazing. Obviously, he would say that, But apparently there's going to be like over 500 games in the free play area. Wow. Which is, well, that's the text size. It's going to be huge for that show, because they've also got the Horror House Fest as well taking place in one of the halls, which was an event, I think, which was the Rocky Mountain Pinball Showdown. I featured that for the past couple of years. and Rob's tempted them to come along to Expo as well. So that's going to be a new added attraction. So I haven't seen a seminar program yet, but I'm expecting seminars to be interesting as ever. I'm afraid we're not on it. We haven't made the cut this year. We haven't made the cut. I'm still working out whether I actually will be at Expo or not, because currently it looks like I might not be due to a conflicting event. Well, if you know Rob, you'll know the fact that whether we're going to be there or not has a little bearing on whether you're on the seminar schedule or not. You know? Well, I also know... And then it's up to you to make sure you're there. I also know that the schedule that might be available today might not be the schedule that you'll see at Expo. No, all these things allow to change, of course. But it's A 35th anniversary Of Pinball Expo It sounds to me like It has to be an event that you want to be at It's Well it's Expo And it's a special anniversary one So it's bigger than ever There's also sad news regarding Pinball Expo although not slightly related But I understood that The Twin Peaks Restaurant in the parking lot closed. Yeah, I've heard rumours of that. I also heard that RAM, the other, the microbrewery across the road, is also closed. Oh my God. So the number of potential late night venues seems to have narrowed down to Spears, which is the only one that's in the parking lot outside on the corner, the one with the flame pit outside. That's about the only place that's going to be open late. Well, then you better bring drinks and let's party. Yeah, party in your room. Oh, you're not going. Party in my room then. Well, if I'm going, I might be ending up in your room, so be careful what you wish for. Okay. We'll work something out. It was disappointing. I wasn't disappointed at all about Twin Peaks. No, you were not. No, but I was more interested in Ram over the road, which is a chain, but it at least it had some interesting food and drink options, whereas Twin Peaks only had one other interesting feature about it. Right. Which are the chicken fingers. Yeah, absolutely. Yeah, I was going to say the mozzarella sticks themselves, but there you go. Each to their own. That's why they have both on the menu. Yeah. So anyway, so, yeah, I'm still looking into if I can make it to Expo, And I might be there starting Friday afternoon. I hope it will be. I'm still looking into whether that's an option. Having the most important dance music event in the world taking place in Amsterdam and me producing dance music, that's sort of a place where I have to be, especially since I will have two new singles out. if you want to read about those I'll include that in my monthly free newsletter the Pimple Magazine newsletter so make sure you're subscribed to that where you can read about all the other well the same topics as we discussed in this podcast but also briefly link to new productions that have been released by me so very good and let's go back to Expo for a moment. I will certainly be there for the entire duration and both before and after Expo and I'll be sharing... Oh, actually, is that me? Yes, it is actually. It is me. Yeah. My roommate, Gary, is calling and I'm sure he wants to discuss the arrangements for sharing the room and when we're going to be arriving. Right. So do you think I should talk to him now? I can't talk to him now. in the middle of the podcast, so I'll try and call him back, shall I? I guess that's the best thing to do. You can't plug him in, right? No. Oh, well, I can't now. He's hung up. He does it every time. I was just about to get him on air as well. Hold him up to the mic. Well, never mind. We'll get him on air anyway. Yeah. At a future date. Speaking of Gary Flower, last weekend we had the UK Pin Fest. We did, yes. But no Gary Flower. No, no, absolutely. No, it was held, the UK Pin Ball, no, UK Pin Fest is the national UK Pin Ball show, which are held at the Mercure Daventry Court Hotel in the town of Daventry in the English Midlands. You and I have both written reports about that. So on pinball-magazine.com and on pinballnews.com you can read our respective takes on the weekend's events. Right. It wasn't as big as it had been in previous years. There were no special guests or seminars or anything like that, but I think probably the most important thing was that last year it made a loss and this year it didn't. So it looks like the organiser, Phil, has worked out how to make the show work on a financial basis, which is the first thing that has to happen, otherwise we won't have a show. So from that basis onwards he can start growing the show and adding more features to it and bring in more and more guests from various aspects of the pinball business and the hobby. Right. Well, you say there were no special guests. That's not entirely true. No, there were no special guests giving any talks, I should say. Yes, because two special guests that were present were the Pinball Amigos from Rotterdam in the Netherlands. If you follow their thread On Pinsight They are building Homebrew games Let's call it that But they are really thinking outside the box Heavily inspired by Some Stuff that in other countries Is only available on prescription But No They brought their Despicable Me game and the Crazy Mansion, which is turning out to be a really crazy mansion. It is. It has a side from a backbox with the two talking heads taken from a road show game. Okay. Like Red and Ted or Rudy. I think they're two rookies, aren't they? No, no, no. It's Red and Ted. Yeah, Red and Ted. But the playfield has a part that is hinged, and moving up and down, it's the first game that has a smoke machine that blows smoke up the playfield. Yeah. And they're just going with the wildest ideas. These guys are One of them is into Fixing cars And They just think of something That they want to do and they just do it You know it's Very unlike any other Pinball designer professionally would Normally work with cat drawings And what have you And a drill And they hammer away And that's how they build their games but at the same time it's very interesting to see what they come up with so far. Yeah, they've been working on those, I don't know, three years I think, those two games at least. Yeah, they're kind of regular now at the Dutch Pinball Open Expo. Yes. I dare say they'll be back again this year. They probably will. I don't think they will be doing a seminar. I did ask, but they'd rather be on the floor talking to people. That's more comfortable for them. And, yeah, very nice lads, by the way. They gave me a ride back to the airport, so that was very nice of them. And we actually, I came up with the idea. It was bloody hot, and seriously, extremely hot. Carl Weathers-wise, which gave me the brilliant idea, let's just basically, instead of going out to a restaurant, why not buy a throwaway barbecue and some meat and have a little barbecue at the back door of the hotel near the parking lot. And I asked the Pimble Amigos whether they'd be interested in that as well and they were immediately supportive of the idea. So that's exactly what we did. And we ended up barbecuing, the three of us. We had a blast. I can't say anything else. It was really, really interesting. It's also very pleasant to have, actually, at the UK Pinfest, I think that's the only pinball show that actually closes down for an hour so that people can go and have a bite. well yes it also gives the machines a rest but that's a change over period between the general admission which finishes about 6 o'clock and then there's a 7 o'clock onwards VIP session for those who bought VIP tickets so that's a more exclusive event although it did seem that everybody was in the hall I think anyway for the VIP one way or the other not that there's a huge amount else to do around the hotel because it's in the middle of, well, no way really. But it's a nice enough hotel, but it's all right. But the show was the only reason to be there, I would say. And the people who were there, and it was very interesting. Yeah, well, with every pinball show, it's a great social event. Yeah, absolutely. And I have to give credit to Neil McRae, who hosted the Stolbol tournament. Amongst others? Yes. He did several. Yeah, I lost track of what else he was organizing, but Stolbol was new to me and very entertaining, easy to organize. And, yeah, everybody was on, especially Saturday night. I don't think you were there at that point. No, that's the point at which I discovered I hadn't got a room for the night. Yeah. After the hotel messed up my booking and only booked me in for Friday night. They asked you to leave, yes. Yes. They ring me up in my room and say, oh, when are you leaving? I said, well, tomorrow. They went, no. No, you're leaving now. No, we want you to leave right now. Yeah. So I stopped writing my report and packed everything into a bag and got out. So, yeah, so I wasn't there for Saturday night. I made other arrangements for the evening. Right. But no, the Soul Bowl... So I didn't say Soul Bowl. Yeah, Soul Bowl, if you're not familiar with the concept, I wasn't either until last weekend. Soul Bowl is where basically there is a huge queue or line of people waiting to play a game. On one machine. On one machine, in this case, the Shadow. What happens is A game is being started The first player starts playing And as soon as you shoot the ball in the area Where it's kept for a few seconds Which on the shadow could be either Behind the The sanctum lock The sanctum lock, thank you Or on the battlefield Or the kick The start hole or the Yes The con multiball. Right. So there's a few portions of the play field where you can shoot the ball, and then the idea is that the current player steps away from the game, the next player in line takes over the flipper buttons and continues to play, has to do the same thing, shoot the ball somewhere where he can step away. But if you drain the ball, you're out. So you have to step out of the line And the line continues The people who didn't train Get back In line at the end And I think we had over 60 people Playing that game On the softball session of Saturday night You think that would take long No it doesn't It was really over in like I think probably less than 10 minutes Something like that And I mean, I was in there Very unlucky I got the ball in the flings And immediately left out lane And that was it for me But it's a very fun and easy to organise Tournament And I would not be surprised if we See Stolbo showing up at the Dutch Pinball Open That's the sort of thing you can just organise Ad hoc, isn't it, and just make an announcement Over the PA that you're doing the straw ball and which machine it is and everybody just rushes to it and off you go. I was actually surprised to see that Neil was, I think the winner, got a 5G phone. An iPhone, I think. Yeah, something like that. I was like, wow. I mean, it's a free tournament to play, so... Yeah, Neil had some amazing prizes. He did another tournament which was a sort of self-scoring one where you picked 10 machines out of 15 and registered your own scores and just handed in the sheet. And, yeah, I think the main winner of that also got a 5G iPhone, and the junior winner of that got an Xbox. Wow. Yeah. Those were lovely prizes. Yeah. Okay. Well, let's hope you'll make it to the Dutch football world. Yeah. So, oh, well. So, but, okay, long story short, I had a fun time at the UK Pinfest. Always nice to catch up with my UK friends. And I'm looking forward to going back next year. Yeah, I think there's definitely going to be back. I think there's a discussion going on now about where and when is the best time to do it. This time it was held on a public holiday weekend, as it quite often is. But, no, there are swings and roundabouts to that. the traffic and sometimes the temperature as well, as he did this weekend. I mean, it was exceptional that weekend. It was the hottest August public holiday weekend we've ever had in the UK. So thanks to global warming or climate change or whatever, that is something which might be seen more of in the future. But there's also the question of whether it's student school holidays, is that a good time or a bad time, and also what other shows are going on as well. So chances are it will be back again next middle of August. Oh, sorry, middle to end of August. No, it will be the last weekend in August, actually, won't it? In 2020, probably back at the same location. So anything dramatic changes, because I think it was generally deemed to be a success. That's UK Pinfest. Okay, good. So I've got one more topic on my list. Go on. which is actually about another podcast. Oh, my God. Yeah. I was actually surprised to see that Nate Shivers from Coast to Coast Pinball started a new podcast series together with Roger Sharp, where if you're familiar with Roger Sharp, who is featured in depth in Pinball Magazine number one, Roger published his own book called Pinball in 1976 For that book he did interviews with all the major manufacturers at that time So he actually talked to people like Norm Clark, David Gottlieb I think Harry Williams and so on And the good news is Roger recorded all those interviews and still has those tapes. And what Josh Sharpe, Roger's son, said, like, Dad, you're sitting on a goldmine, and convinced Roger to digitize these tape recordings. and they found a podcast partner in Nate Chivers who had his first episode in which they were discussing the history of these tapes and they also included Roger's interview with Harry Williams. Wow, that's not somebody you're going to hear from too often. Exactly, especially hear from because this might be the only audio Left of Harry Williams And they're discussing In a cafeteria Harry's Role in pinball He talks about how he invented The tilt and Other Things in games I really recommend Everybody Listen to this because this has If you're into pinball this has great Historic value That's the Coast to Coast Yes, Coast to Coast Pinball with Nate Shivers So thank you Nate For making this series And I'm very highly Interested in seeing What other recordings are Going to be Published in the series Yes And I'm happy to see that Nate's back He stopped making his regular Coast to Coast Pinball podcast Because he's not that much into pinball due to being very busy with his work. But he is still living in Amsterdam. And I'm happy that he picked this up. So congrats to Nate. And actually, I hope to see him this year at the Dutch Pinball Open because, you know, he's still living in Amsterdam. So it's about time that he would make it over this time. Yeah, absolutely. Okay. Well, you know what? I think we've run out of topics for this particular podcast, haven't we? Yeah, I think we've covered everything Wow, okay It feels like it's been quite in-depth this time Yep, like we said, even for a slow month, lots of news Yeah, so huge thanks to Jack Guarnieri For coming on and telling us about Playfield And the issues there that not just he but other companies are having there And what Josie Jack Pimple were doing about it Right And don't forget to keep an eye on the Pimble News Facebook pages and social media and the Pimble Magazine social media, my personal social media and so on. Because, like we mentioned earlier, we have an interview scheduled for next Monday with Barry from Dutch Pimble. And we hope to publish that early next week. So look forward to a bonus episode of the Pinball Magazine and Pinball News podcast, completely focusing on the history of Dutch pinball, the court case, and the future plans. Yeah, absolutely. How Barry expects to get his company going. Basically, I think that's what it comes down to So make sure to keep an eye out for that as well Because I think it will be highly interesting It will, yep Okay, so with that We'll thank you very much for listening to this look back On the month of August August, yep, 2019 And we will see you in the bonus podcast Coming up hopefully next week And if not then then we'll see you at the end of September, looking back at that month. Right, until then, from myself, Martin Ayob, and... Jonathan Yilson of Finmore Magazine. We will say goodbye and see you next time. Goodbye.