friends partners everybody gather around don garrison's pinball podcast episode number 48 is four pence coming to you from europe we're in spain what's up everybody grab some tapas pull up a little tuffet let's kickback poolside and i'm gonna regale you on all the latest happenings from let's see stern pinball how about pulp fiction i got a review i played the dang thing. Hex the pinball is on the scene and more. All coming up to you. How are you guys doing? Is your week going okay? It's Monday. How about a fresh cup of Don? What would even a fresh cup of Don even look like? I hope it will at least be a venti. Maybe like one of those unicorn dinosaur frappuccinos from Starbucks from back in the day. How you doing everybody? It's Monday. Welcome to the number one drama free pinball podcast. Hopefully my audio levels are coming through okay. I'm on the travel mixer, but notwithstanding, I'm going to bring the content straight to you. So I want to start off here with Stern Pinball, as we typically do. Big Daddy Dog Stern, right? So we got a couple of gaps in the production schedule, and there's a lot of speculation around what exactly that means. So the forecast for the next five or six months, basically throughout the rest of the year, we've got the normal rehashings of the Jurassic Parks and what have you, the Iron Maiden mediums, Iron Maiden mediums, the Iron Maiden premiums that are on the line right now, as well as the Godzillas. But coming up in September, there's that big blank hole. And that's something that we have known about. That's been speculated to be the next cornerstone drop, currently rumored to be Venom. Is it really a Spider-Man multiverse and Venom is just a codename? Any of that would be amazing. Nobody knows for sure. But it appears it'll be coming from Mr. Brian Eddy and hopefully the Zombie Yeti on the artwork. Notwithstanding, that has been planned for coming out in September as far as we know. But during the latest production updates that I've been getting from distributors, there's also a big blank hole now in November. And November was the time I believe that the Star Wars premiums were going to be rerun. So you know, some of the other games were going to be rerun, you know, in the ramp up to Christmas holidays, but now there's just a blank hole. And typically, when we see something like that on the schedule, it's because there's a game that's going to be in production there online, and it hasn't been announced yet. so that's why it's that void but if we are already anticipating venom though to be coming um you know they should have already moved to their new production facility because that's supposed to happen at the end of august so by september these venoms or whatever the next cornerstone is should be on the line and we would expect to see a run of pros followed by the limited edition run and then if there's no decal issues or whatever was holding up the uh foo fighters we should see them then run the premiums and then go back with some more pros. So have they created a gap in November so that they can run through, you know, their pros, their limited editions, and then have some time to go back and run, you know, the premiums and the rest of the pros or something so they don't have kind of the production snafu that they ran into with Foo Fighters? Or is there something else coming? Is there a second game coming this year from Stern Pinball? That's the speculation. Now, I'm not really sure how I fall on this. I think I'm about 60-40 maybe now, 40% going towards something new and different besides the next Cornerstone, taking that November spot. So look, what could we look at? A scenario where the pros and limited editions of Venom get run along with some premiums in that spot in September, like we've been speculating so far. And then when we get to the November spot, could that be the spot for the vault? I mean, Stern's moving into this new production facility. It was nearly double the size of their prior one. So can they add another line, maybe just have a line of straight vaults just coming through? I'm sure that would just print Stern money, and they don't seem to have issues with renewing licensing contracts and whatnot. So that's where the speculation is. I think I'm about 40% towards that. I think more realistically, that spot is vacant for more runs of the new Cornerstone, and they have those penciled in but cannot release it yet, hence the blank spot. Let me know what you think. We'll see what's coming up there, but that'll be in September, November. So, you know, they tend to release the new games shortly before they're going into boxes and out to customers. So I still think it's going to be late, late August, you know, or into September before we actually get the reveal. They may be, you know, a week or so into production and boxing games up before they reveal. That way when they do, people can just go ahead and get them shipped right out to them. Probably most likely, August is going to be a busy month there at Stern Pinball, with them moving to their new headquarters and production facility, plus releasing a cornerstone at the same time. I think the end of the summer, it's going to really heat and ramp up. Now, what are we going to see with November? I mean, I'm 40%. It could be a vault or some other kind of game. I think a vault would be more likely. of the vault talk i've heard a lot of rumors about tron and then metallica or be the ones that people have really been asking for i myself am waiting for a vault of stranger things i don't think it's old enough yet to be considered for vault status i think they could still rerun it you know um but uh so i guess we would look for that um with tron though and these other vaults like when they do them are they in this age of the lcd screen are they still going to come back with the dot matrix display are they going to upgrade that to an lcd but with the dot matrix graphics are they going to redo all the graphics i'm interested to see what a vault in 2023 2024 uh really would look like i mean i would like to see upgraded animations and things you know but then i think people might have a hankering more for that classic package we see we just have to wait and see um otherwise uh yeah what do you think you think they gonna they just left the the space in the production schedule for more production runs of their next game or is there a vault coming i guess we'll find out in the meantime iron maiden premiums were being run on the friday update from the factory floor factory floor fridays showing iron maiden premiums i still kind of want one i'm still kind of undecided i still don't know if i have the room we'll see we'll see what happens but if you're waiting on one of them we're waiting on a godzilla should be coming soon more godzilla more fun right hey stern get some more cash flow for you all right so i was at interium prior to my flight out here uh in chicago um it's it's a bowling arcade david buster-y kind of place and for whatever reason probably because it's a decent arcade at a well-trafficked mall right in the chicago area near where all the manufacturers are located they tend to run they tend to get new games there fairly quickly. I think when Toy Story came out, the first one that hit the floor was there. I think it was the same with Godfather. And now Pulp Fiction has landed. So is this the Pulp Fiction machine, like the actual machine that they were using on the streams? I don't know if that was a limited edition or a standard. This is a standard, but it is now the only one that I know in a public location available for play. And I put about $9 through it. I got a free game, yo. And I played it. My wife played it. I have a verdict now. Now, if people say, you know, you really shouldn't have a review of a game unless it's been out a while and you've played it a thousand times or something. So what you should call it is just a first impressions. Well, whatever. Here's my impression, which is also a review of the dang game. In short, I dig it. I totally dig this game. Um, initially when it was speculated and it was coming out, the single play field, I didn't know if I was into it. So I didn't go ahead and rush out and just gamble my money and throw it down on the LE. Now with hindsight, that looks like it would have been a good idea. Now with me actually playing the game, I think I do dig it. And I'm thinking about where I can fit this guy into my home arcade. I had a great time playing this game. I had the same fun playing this game as I did with Bond 60th, and probably for the same reason. So, you know, these classic single level games, you know, they don't play quite the same as a modern game. Of course, they shouldn't, you know, they're from the 60s and 70s. But now taking these, you know, fun gameplay design layouts, but adding modern functionality, modern flippers, flipper gaps, modern gameplay elements, you know, nudge sensitivities and things. It really adds a lot to these classic playfields. So when I was playing Bond 60th, I mean, it's a good shooting game. And by that, I mean, if you want to hit a certain target or you want to hit a certain lane or something, you can dial it in where it is on that flipper and get it. You know, it's not as, you know, clunky as like a Gottlieb would be from back in the day, let's say, you know, something that's in need of a flipper rebuild, maybe one flipper stronger than the other one, stroke distances need to be adjusted or something. None of that on these. These are brand new games, and they play fantastically. And so to be able to play like these, you know, classic point chasing type games with, you know, the spinners and the saucers and things, and you know, all the different inlanes, outlanes and whatnot, to have some precision, modern flippers to play that really adds a ton of the gameplay. I mean, you know, just getting the multiball on the Bond 60th is an accomplishment whereas you can trip backwards into most modern jjps into like six different multi balls right so you get the multiball on the bond 60th and then what you have to do is try to get the balls into the two little saucer areas and that's challenging and when you do that my friend that is very satisfying that's as satisfying as knocking the building down on godzilla that's as fun as killing ebora to me so um the one thing that was prohibitive though due to the limited nature of the 60th anniversary of Stern's Bond was, of course, the $20,000 price tag. You know, you see them going for anywhere from $15,500 to $17,000 now on the used market. So that game was definitely priced high and out of reach for most people. Now, Pulp Fiction, on the other hand, priced relatively reasonably lower, right? The $7,000 to $9,000 range, depending on which version that you want. What I appreciate, though, is between the two versions, gameplay-wise, nothing is different and thank you uh play mechanics for for designing that so you know of course with the the limited edition which is sold out you got that fancy topper and you got some little appliques for the play field um you know the back speaker had a chrome panel around it instead of just a regular metal speaker a cover and then there was a bad mother flipper uh pewter looking cast of uh of the wallet right uh jules's wallet so i mean yeah that's cool right uh but the game otherwise looks the same, the armor's the same, plays the same way. So I'm thinking now, I don't mind going on the standard edition of this game, you know, whenever it does come out. Playing it wise, though, what I did appreciate, now there was a, there's in lane drop targets, which can be the bane of my existence. These are targets that, you know, you have to hit up, you know, hit one to drop it, then hit the same lane to hit the next one. Then there's another one in a row. And once you hit all three, then you can finally hit up the lane and score something. And usually for me, by the time I get to that third drop target, I managed to drain and the whole thing resets. Well, I don't know if it was just a gameplay setting, but with this game, those inline drop targets, once you drop them, they stayed down. And then that was how you get up to lock balls for the briefcase multiball. So for me, you know, playing this game with the precision of modern flipper technology, even me, a mediocre player, was able to actually drop all those and lock balls. And out of two of my 10 games I played, I got successfully to that multiball. You know, I was actually able to do what I wanted to do in the game, and that was satisfying. Yes there no huge ramps or anything There no gigantic mechanism that crumbles and destroys with a shower of LED colors of puking every color of the rainbow But there are the callouts from Pulp Fiction which are fantastically satisfying to hear I like the integration of like the old school lights, but with the new school LED technology, this is like a great, you know, mix mash of theme design, right? You know, that classic 70s design, plus the modern tech, I just dig this thing. So you know, hitting the other drop car targets and locking into the The little basement there was fun. Getting up into that saucer into the top of the game field. Everything was fun with this game. Every time I went back to play it, I liked it. My 11-year-old, who generally doesn't think anything that I like is interesting, actually wanted to come and play. And we did a two-player game. And by ball two, she was in the lead. She was legitimately having a nice, otherwise angsty 11-year-old a good time with their parents. I don't know if part of that was that she was playing Pulp Fiction and what she knows of this theme is just the things that I've told her about it, being that it's heavily in the violence and the drugs and the adult themes and things, and she hasn't seen it. So she may just be enjoying it because it's something a little forbidden that she's not able to watch yet. But she was having some actual fun there, trapping up balls and hitting some shots and doing some celebratory things. So I enjoyed it. My wife really enjoyed it. My kid even enjoyed it. And she doesn't enjoy anything in pinball, it seems. So this game seems like a win now. These are things that I wouldn't have discovered, though, if I hadn't had bought it or played it before I bought it. If you wanted to get that limited edition, you had to be there the first day and ready to put down your money. And essentially what you're doing is gambling, right? None of us knew very much about this layout or anything. You know, the video hadn't really even come out. That great one that Flip N Out Pinball did. So you really would have had to put your money down and say, you know what? I'm gambling on the fact that I'm going to purchase this now. And this game is not going to be available at a lower price later. or what happens if I'm not really into it? And then this game's about the ship and I've got to pay the rest of it. And now I got to post an ad saying I need to off it for some reason. Oh, my wife decided I can't have it or something. So I really want it, but that's why I'm selling it. No, it's because you don't want it anymore, right? I mean, we're seeing that with the Scooby-Doo pre-sales. We're seeing that all over the place with Godfather. We're seeing it with Toy Story. So after seeing some of those and the reactions of what would happen if you would win on say a bond or went in on a Toy Story early on and then would have had a game that on the resale market wouldn't have been worth much and maybe it wouldn't have been worth much of it to you if you bought it. I was willing to hold on the gamble until I played it. I'm okay that I did. If it means I miss out on a topper, that's okay. There'll be some secondary market toppers. They're not gonna be as good, but they're gonna be available. And you know, I'll still have the gameplay. The gameplay is the same. There's no mechanisms that are missing. There's no chrome armor that's missing. So for that, I am thankful. So there's my Pulp Fiction review, right? or first impressions if review is going to trigger you. I dig the game. I want everybody to go out and play it. I have got to play this game in adult mode, though, because this game is in a family-friendly arcade. They do have, you can tell, they've muted out the swears and things from those classic lines of dialogue. I just want to be in a dark room playing this game in adult mode so I can hear all the foul language that comes from the world of Pulp Fiction. Um, so that's my take and we'll see what the future brings. I don't even know if I went in to get on a list right now, you know, how far I'd be back. We still don't know what the production schedule is going to be like for this game. I know with Chicago Gaming Company, that's been the one gripe from them. You know, their build quality is great, but it takes forever to get games. You know, if I order one now, is it going to be 2025 until I get one? Am I going to want it then? So those are things that we're waiting to find out. Um, those are things that are waiting and seeing, but I don't think I would lose anything by at least getting on a list at this point, moving forward. Hex a pinball. So Flipper Southwest just happened south of France, five hours from where I'm at right now. Couldn't tear myself away from the beach to head over there though. But there is some gameplay video footage now that was streamed. It was like a three hour stream out there of Space Hunt. So we know the song is a jam. We know what the layout looks like. And now we have a better idea of what the gameplay is. I didn't watch all three hours of this stream. I'm on vacation. I'm not going to waste time watching pinball streams, but I did watch some of it, you know, kick it back and land a bet at the end of the day. And my takeaways are the shots look like they're satisfying, right? They don't all look like, you know, rattle rejectee McGee's, right? So the gameplay looks fun. Okay. The art's okay. They said they were Scott Danesi-y inspired. You can kind of see that with TNA. This thing is very, very pink or rosé, as the French would say. I don't mind that. You know, I like the colors. The sound, now I haven't heard this game in person, But if the sound is kicking like it should be and the songs are where they're at, as for similar to what we've heard released so far, I think we're okay on a sound standpoint. What they did say that was severely lagging was the code and where the code's at. I guess the modes are pretty shallow here. There's not any call outs. There needs to be more sound integration and sound effects, probably some more music. So now those are things that are kind of soft, right? The layout, that's hard coded. That's not easy to change at all. Little tweaks may be necessary if issues develop down the road, but the code, that's what can be implemented. So what will make this game a success, I believe, is if they're able to commit still to bringing out some strong and compelling code and mechanisms and gameplay to this game and mode integration. So that we'll have to wait and see if it happens This is their first game out so you know it totally untested but it would totally behoove them to put you know all double efforts into making code updates and modes and things and really just shower us with gameplay mechanics and sounds and soundbites and callouts and such. So that's what I would wait and see. Also, the graphics, I didn't really get to see a lot of the display graphics, so I'm not sure, you know, where those are at. But I think any work that they put in now is really going to help sell this machine. What is not selling me on the machine is the price. The standard edition is coming out for the equivalent around $9,000, plus around two and a half to $3,000 for their, what do they call it, the exhibition mode or exuberant mode or exuberant version, class version, some high dollar sounding thing. It comes with the colored chrome or colored powder-cutted armor and such and other accents and things. The version that you would want if you're bringing this thing into your home. But for $12,000, really guys, you know, for your first game out now, I get it. I get it. This is kind of the price, the with import fees of what you'd expect to find in Europe and you're catering more towards your local market. And so for the local European market, that might be an adequate price point. You know, for me personally, I'm not there on this game. So I don't know that the game will sell incredibly well in the U S domestically. That's a lose for me because I would like to see the show up on location so I can play it some more. I'm hopeful that some of these make their way over so we can try maybe an expo by October still don't know where they're out in the production schedule certainly haven't seen any unboxings but I think they took a lot of feedback from the show that they were just at and they'll integrate that in the game so we'll look for more updates from them I do follow some of the French bloggers so I can look there for information and I have my feelers out I'm going to be in Paris next week so if anybody knows of one of these games that's in the greater Parisian metro area or Erandismont, please let me know because I'd love to stop by and play this game. I think the game looks great. I like the colors of the game. I like the sound. I can't comment on the build quality because I haven't held one of them. The gameplay looks okay. There's not wow me mechanisms or anything, but I think the game could still be quite fun, right? So we'll wait and see what Hex is doing. I don't know that there's going to be a lot of people jumping at the bat to get this in the U.S. where I'm at just because for the price, I mean, it's priced higher than Pulp Fiction is even, even for the limited version. I think for $12,000, you could probably get a Pulp Fiction limited on the resale market with the markup. And so I think I'd much rather go on that than me personally going on Hex's new offering, but I want to follow them and see how they do. I think that's fair. What's next? Oh, I guess that's all the news I had. Let's talk a little bit about greeting my new listeners. Thank you, everybody. I've been seeing my views, my likes, my follows. They've been doing nothing but going up, and it seems to be increasing every week. So I'm beyond humbled and thankful for that, that people care enough about listening to my voice and my views from just a normal one of y'all in pinball and following through my pinball journey. I'm doubly humbled that people are actually ponying up the $5 cash to follow me on Patreon. That is fantastic. I appreciate every one of you. Thank you so much. I'm going to continue to make some more exclusive content, whatever I can think of. I'm going to throw on there for you because I'm a giver. I'm not a passive taker here. um also i had uh my joke mod that i'd put up right so the the godzilla topper was released and of course everybody focused on the zip tie because we had two seconds of video footage and that's all we had to go off of right so the zip tie on godzilla's tail on the top or the same godzilla figure and sculpt that was in the machine that most of us took out and put something more fancy in there well i sold a i posted up inside an ad it was a joke it's a fluorescent yellow zip tie that you could replace the OEM black zip tie with. I called it the Atomic Nuclear Godzilla Zip Tie Topper Edition or something like that. I put it up there for $15, kind of like just as a joke. It tickled me. A lot of people enjoyed it. Pinside is now taking it down. I never got any messages or anything from them. I thought they would threaten me first, but they went ahead and just took it out. So I guess that's fine. They don't need people like me putting up their garbage in their marketplace and clogging it up. I totally get it. But I had to, guys. I had to. Now, my topper mod was only $15, and this included shipping. And so what I'm going to do, especially for my listeners here, I'm going to keep this modification available. I'm going to keep it available for $15, including shipping. I'm going to add, as a bonus, a free t-shirt to the order. So if you want to pay $15 and get yourself a t-shirt and my fluorescent nuclear atomic Godzilla topper mod i will include those and i'll ship them out for free just email me at don's pinball podcast at gmail.com give me your shipping address and you can venmo me or you can paypal at don's pinball podcast at gmail.com 15 you can add a tip in there if you want to or if you want to add extra to cover shipping or heck join the patreon and ask me through there i will send you a zip tie and a t-shirt i'll pick a random one just give me your t-shirt size i'll make sure it fits you and then I'll get it right out to you as soon as I get back here next week. That, I believe, is all I have for now, but I will see you all around the interwebs. Don's Pinball Podcast Facebook page. Please follow it. I'm trying to get to 1,000 follows. It unlocks a whole bunch of other crap from Facebook for me. Hit me up with a Patreon, Don's Pinball Podcast at the patreon.com slash donspinballpodcast. I keep messing that up. I'm just overjoyed, everybody. Thank you so much. Hope you enjoy this episode from the road and I'll get some more out to you when I can. Later.