Thanks for tuning in to the Loser Kid Pinball Podcast. We are in episode 93. I am Josh Roop. With me, my co-captain, as always, Scott Larson. And Scott, I feel a little deja vu today. Yeah. Can we explain to the listeners what's going on? Yeah. So we recorded a little bit yesterday. I had a pretty packed schedule yesterday since I worked overnight. And so we had to record in the morning and I, and we also, you know, I had to get kids off to school and we, so we had about 30 minutes and then we were having some recording issues. Yeah. So we, we had grainy pictures of bond and we talked about it, but we, you know, we were like, okay, well we'll just wrap it up. So 24 hours later we see some gameplay and we see a little more and we're like, you know what? We, it already sounds dated. and so we're just going to re-record and that way you get the the freshy fresh the very fresh so fresh and so clean clean as outcast was one sense yeah before we get into it though let's talk about flipping flipping the script also tied to flipping out pinball because flipping out pinball is one of the sponsors for flipping the script nicole and zach love the kids and they are donating items to our charity for kids with autism and we're so excited to have them along It's been a thrill of a ride. The pinball network has been fantastic. But if you want that new pinball machine, if you want, before prices go up, give Zach a call. He posted a list yesterday. And on that list, a bunch of brand new machines in box. You're going to want to get some of these before they go out. I know that Star Wars is the last run. Led Zeppelin is the last run. Once these are gone, they're gone. Give him a call. Give him a call. Give them a message. That's how I do it. I do it through Facebook Messenger. That's the best way for me. And get some of these games in your home before they go up in price in January. Also, give them your condolences because Zach is going in for back surgery this week. Yeah. Yes. I've only had one warranty issue with all the new in-box games I've bought, which before Zach, I'd never bought new in-box except for a Monster Bash. Yeah. And I will tell you, Zach made it easy. I had to just send a couple of pictures. It was quick. man he just he took care of me like it was his own home and it was amazing so and and the issue was all just lickety split so yeah same and and now that Greg Bone kind of taken that over um i was having issues with rush and he pulled his opto out of his rush machine to send it to me yep and so and i just barely got that and so i'm gonna send that back off to to greg um so they can repurpose that too uh but um yeah all the warranty issues that i've ever had to go through uh with zach and he's taking care of it so i gotta say the warranty issues on these games are astounding because like for how many moving parts and different things that go through manufacturing it i i found very little problem with my sterns stern and chicago gaming company seem to have that mix where they have very few issues. And I would say in the same conversation as Jersey Jack. And so I have full confidence in buying from those manufacturers. Other ones, it's a little bit more of a startup, a smaller company. You're going to expect a little bit more variation and some help from them. but uh i i i love going through a dealer because it does help out if there are any issues yes i feel like there's more communication there speaking of new sterns last time we recorded bond had kind of leaked was kind of showing not showing grainy photos and then the real photos yeah and then they're like we can't release it because of the queen even though nothing else changed but yeah okay anywho but we finally have photos and now video actual official video from pinball news of uk yeah how do you feel about this now scott um wow okay i gotta ask you did your impression go up or did it go down after after we get official reveal we get a teaser or an actual full trailer and now the video has your opinion because when we last talked yeah i was kind of down on it yeah um okay i will actually say way up okay um i i still am frustrated over the challenges with the way the reveal happened yes i'm going to assume the outlier here is the license holder yes because and there's no incentive for stern to do it the way they did or to hold off or pull back, there's no incentive. But for the licensor to put the brakes on, what can you do? They're the ones who hold the license. Correct. And we saw this before. We've seen it with the R2-D2 pinball topper. The bottom line is the people who are controlling this license, any license, they have no concept on – like they're just used to releasing things whenever they want to release them. Yeah. So they don't really have this anticipated fan base that – how many Bond people were really chomping at the bit to see a Bond pinball machine? Not many that I know of. Okay, but versus how many pinball enthusiasts were chomping at the bit? Not very many. Well, maybe. But the – but I think that just the licensure just getting involved and saying, no, we want to do it on this timeline. Yeah. Because that and I still stick to the the queen dying and then delaying it. That seems to be a good cover story. Yeah. But it doesn't seem to fit everything else. Well, and what's funny to me is listening to the Stern Insider podcast. If you haven't checked that out, I highly recommend it was George Gomez and Mike Vinikour of Stern Pinball. Don't worry, it's not behind a paywall. Just sign up for your free account. You can listen to it. But George did say that this licensor was one of the most protective licensors they've ever worked with. Right. Which is saying something because they've worked with some pretty protective licensors. Yeah. Disney, Marvel, Star Wars. Yeah. And so I actually – I'm trying to give Stern a big break on this just because I don't think that they had any control over how things happened. and I don't fault them for it. Yes. So my question to you is, now that we've seen the photos and the video, it just kind of dawned on me, one of the reasons we thought that they had pushed back the release was the licensor saw the leaked photos, got mad and was like, we're done, you push it back 10 days. Yeah, I doubt that. But I half wonder if they set it up at IAPA in Robert Englunds, the licensor was there put some time on it and realize this is bare bones because we've watched the video and the code is pretty you still playable it is very bare bones it's very bare bones and so the licensor is like this isn't even ready to show yet i just i don't know if the licensor is i don't think the licensor knows enough about pinball to know if it's a good game or not it's the same thing didn't uh when we talked to ed about rush i mean he said rush contacted him and said hey we know nothing about pinball we just want to make sure it's a good game so can you help us out yeah i mean and robert plant had no clue like why is there even like someone speaking in the pinball machine why must the pinball machine talk yeah that's what steve Yeah. So I don't I I'm I think they just are oblivious and they just don't care. They have their own timeline. Maybe. So let's go over the photos really quick. What do you think of the artwork? Because that was the original impression. It looked I'm not going to I'm not going to put nicely. It looked like a turd. I'm not going to lie like. OK, the challenge, though. Go ahead. I want I want you to give your take and then I'll give you my take. okay so originally i i was not a fan of any of this after listening to insider and realizing that a lot of the artwork is from posters from the 60s that were yellowing that they had to scan in and then artists had to make it cohesively go together doesn't make the artwork any better but it has a better appreciation for how it got put together looking at the artwork i don't mind the play field as much it's still the cabinet artwork that throws me off i'm not a huge fan of the translates i'm not a huge fan of the the cabinet uh i get that the never die twice or always die twice or whatever has bought not only live twice he only lived twice has him not even piloting the car or the the airplane whatever that was part of the the 60s shtick right right uh and that that was him smoking a cigarette as he jumped out of like a fake alligator suit with a tuxedo yeah yeah and so and that right side of the cabinet's what kills me these movie posters i don't fully understand why we're trying to make this look like the inside of a rundown movie theater um other than that though i do enjoy the art for the way they were able to make it cohesive on the play field uh but it still does remind me of 2000s stern photoshop or when we're talking about like austin powers or tron or but those games like tron and and uh well i'm going to use tron as my main example that game transcends the artwork so a lot of people who would prefer more different artwork are still fine with the photoshopiness of it so that's my take is if the game makes up for the artwork i probably even i'm gonna go you're rough to look at i still would be happy to play the game okay so what are your thoughts the art is period appropriate yes and and that is a direct reflection on what the licensor wanted because i guarantee if they wanted a new interpretation of bond poses and we've seen we've seen christopher franchi do so many of these things Yeah, he did Goldfinger. Yeah. And he was amazing. It looks great. Yes. It is. However, that is obviously not what the licensor wanted in this. They wanted to go with the very retro feel, which is why we have the retro feel. And so they went with that. And I actually don't think it's that lazy. I think it actually looks fine. I, the, uh, the left side with Dr. No. Okay. Just the picture, but on, uh, you only live twice. I think it looks kind of cool. And the, uh, Thunderball people were talking about Thunderball actually. Okay. It kind of reminds me of, of fathom, but still it looks pretty cool. I love the color. I dig the color scheme. Um, and so I, the only thing I can possibly say is this is that that wasn't Stern's direction. Like they had to do what the licensor wanted. And I actually find this fine. It feels like a 1960s feel. The Beatles has a very similar vibe and it's kind of that 60s vibe. But Franchi did such a great job on. I did. OK, but it's that, you know, it's this is what we need to remember is that the licensor is king. They they have direct directorial control over all this stuff. Yeah. And so I don't mind the artwork. At least it's not grainy. It's not like Lord of the Rings where you can barely see Frodo's face because he's so pixelated. Yeah. Well, the artist they brought in did fantastic. He was able to make it cohesive, and it all looks updated. Yeah. I'm not saying it looks – It looks like a new version. It still has that – the play field still has a little bit of that lunchbox feel. Yeah. Or if you were to buy a Bond t-shirt in Walmart or Hot Topic. Exactly. It feels like that type of stuff. And so that's what you're going to get. Now, they – so Zack and Dennis talked about this. Where is Goldfinger? He's on the play field. He's one of the villains. Yes, but that is like – Theme-wise? Yeah, that's an iconic – like seriously, you only live twice? I mean it's fine, but Thunderball, okay. But like we went through the six movies on the play field and you have Diamonds Are Forever, You Only Live Twice, Thunderball, Goldfinger, From Russia With Love and Dr. No. So why did they choose those three? And again, I can only think of why didn't the licensor go with Goldfinger? I would argue that Goldfinger is the most recognizable Sean Connery movie of the Bond series, if not the most recognizable of all the Bond movies. It's pretty much what Dr. Evil from Austin Powers was based on. Yeah. Lowfield mixed with Dr. No. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. So it's okay. So are we going to see a Catwoman edition? Are we going to see a Lucy edition? Are we going to see a premium variant art package? And it wouldn't shock me. It's up their alley in my opinion. That's where I think I'm going with this. Because the licensor has shown a willingness to deviate from standard protocol. Yeah. And standard protocol is you only release one version of the game. Yep. And that's the option. And you have three tiers. you know you have pro premium le well we do have a fourth tier we'll get into that here right but we're going to get into the fourth tier but it's like they're willing to roll the dice and saying hey we want to do something more with bond yeah so i the art i actually think looks fine uh and i i think it it will be a non-factor in the future i agree i think Lonnie D. Ropp has proven And even though his code out the gate is usually not fully fleshed out. Yeah. By the end of the cycle, it is a very desirable game. Look at guardians of the galaxy. Look at stranger things. Don't sleep on this game. Yeah. I think you watch the video and the flow on this is great Watching the shots that the person making in the video Really good i still do believe that left side is is not used to its fullest potential but there still some cool shots that orbit that goes into the ramp yeah the the missile shot the drop targets that kind of hide that missile and then that up the middle spinner not spinner sorry the up the middle it comes back around to the top flipper um i'm not a huge fan of the up kicker though uh with the sight window i just i i don't get it i i don't that whole it's on stranger things as well yeah it's just not my cup of tea um so it felt like the gameplay when i watched was this was like if deadpool and monster bash got married and had a baby yeah good point i like that it feels there's a lot of deadpool elements in this which is why i'm thinking well i mean there's there's that vibe it Deadpool felt very Spartan when it first came out yeah and if you look at that leaked photo of the uh of the whitewood and it's pretty much that and you look at the whitewood and you're like and this thing looks like nothing yeah and however it's a fun game I love I was actually playing it yesterday so it's a fun game so that is um i i think it's it's doable um the now it is it uh are there two pop bumpers three pop bumpers like i i can't tell from this i think there's three pop bumpers it's a nest up on the top right okay so you think so there's one that may be hidden underneath that uh that katana shot so i i'm willing to give it that now this is early code and you're probably going to cringe a little bit this gave me the early code um asset integration made me feel a little bit like monsters when it first came out how grandpa was always going over to the book and you were just trying to flip out of that as fast as you could because it was just such a time sink so i'm i'm hoping there's a lot more call-outs integrated if unless they get some more music in there and that bond theme just loops you're gonna get tired of it yeah and i think same with the spinner sound every time they hit i didn't notice it at first but as it went on you're hitting that spinner a lot because that that shot's part of a lock it's part of a multiball and i was like Man, that just does not sound fun. It almost reminds me of in Wayne's World when they go back in time, they go, do-do-do-do, do-do-do-do. That's what the spinner reminds me of is Garth and Wayne, do-do-do-do, do-do-do-do. So obviously there's going to be more assets to come. Even at the beginning of the video, it says this is not a final product. There's still more assets to come. I think this is still going to be a great game overall. I just think it's going to be one of those ones that has to gain traction over time. I think the initial sales hype is gone. I don't know much of it coming back either because we're still at a trickle pace of this stuff coming out. I'm nervous that we're probably another three months away from a Cornerstone release. And if these Bond Pros aren't shipping out until April, then it's going to run up against its own competition. i just overall i'm i'm excited for the bond fans i just think it's too early to to uh give a full evaluation of this game i hope these are at chicago but again i just is it a good idea to have it there with this early code they will only play on one ball yeah went from one ball right into grand champion yeah so people i think people get a feel of the shots but overall that i just don't think they're going to be happy with the end result if they're playing this early stuff they're gonna they're gonna have a negative taste in their mouth until six months down the road when these finally start getting into arcades um when they start showing up in people friends homes i don't know overall it is what it is i guess yeah and i was okay you and i had a similar vibe 24 hours ago when we talked about um maybe the sales have suffered okay i reached out a little bit today because i was curious about that to say hey is this like is there a buzz for this like from the dealer side yeah and apparently there is um this this seems a little bit of a disconnect because there's a lot of people that i know who buy almost every game. And I don't, I know one person, um, who is probably interested in getting it down the road. Okay. Um, I'm kind of interested in it, but I, I probably need to sell, uh, you know, Zeppelin or, or something to, to make that happen because I'm, I'm overstocked right now. So what do you do with that? Is it going to be a well? Am I just not enough friends with different demographics? But I think this will actually sell well and better than I think. Well, and I feel like there's so many conflicting reports. Yeah. We listened to Pinball Show and pinball show says bond selling well yeah the premiums are selling two to one if not three to one yeah and there's just a high demand for this game yeah i talked to another distributor that says sales have went off a cliff yeah barely any premium themselves most that are coming are pros and they're selling more godzillas than they are bond at this point yeah and i actually talked to another guy than I know. And I, I said, how's the interest for bond? And he said not as much as he expected. Yeah. So I'm hoping that this is just a, an anomaly because I really think that it's going to be, uh, I think it's going to be a Deadpool like situation where this is going to be a fantastic game. This'll be a big seller. This'll be a tournament darling. And it'll be a lot of fun. Maybe they may suffer a little bit in initial sales. But it's going to do fine. It really is. It's going to do fine. We're going to see a slow burn effect with this one, I think, regardless. I don't know much other than that. Let's talk fourth here. Let's talk the L one. Okay. Gomez did reveal on the Sturdy Insider podcast that there is a fourth year coming. it is limited to 500 editions and it's going to be very retro 60s it's going to be a single level so no ramps but it's got a ton of stuff packed into it's got like an odd job hat similar to the tesseract on avengers it does the spinny disc it's got 10 drop targets it's got a shot that gomez has never seen before it's got mechanical reels in the backbox that they got a gentleman from williams that used to do that as his main job he's coming to do that as well they put a mini lcd what you see on the home editions that's i don't know if it's in the play field that's what the way that they made it sound or if it's gonna be on the play field similar to star wars it better not be the home version it better be a nice version and the home version is the cheap version but this is a smaller one that's gonna be on the play field yeah similar to star wars is is my thoughts right above the right drop targets yeah i just overall it sounds like this game's pretty packed and we don't know anything by the about this besides what leaked from the official bond store yeah and even then a lot of what gomez was saying wasn't reflected in the picture that we saw so i assume it's a placeholder and we don't know we don't know anything else outside of this so i i speculated last time i was like there's no way why would they compete against themselves so i i am wrong on this i mean it's yeah they they are doing it however they're competing in a different way because this is basically an ultra sle and this has to be a test case to say okay it there's so much research and development that goes into producing any game that they have to make their money back. And usually I'm guessing, okay, their low run is not 500. Their low run is in the thousands. So a great run is 10,000 or something. So what price per game would they have to make to decide that that's worth it for them? Because if you're taking Elwynn out of rotation to do this side gig, is that going to, you know, how much money does that cost? And is it worth the return on investment? But they are definitely taking the, okay, we have the standard cornerstone that's going to be the go-to. Now we're going to try this ultra exclusive, like we're talking, we're not even talking whale market. We're talking the dinosaur market. like the the people who have so much money that they will be able to drop 20 30 000 on the game and not think about it i i don't like that idea especially with an elwynn where everyone loves elwynn it makes me nervous these are going to go into collections and a lot of people aren't going to see them outside of what's streamed or even get to play them overall though i think that it's a smart move i feel like stern is starting to make some interesting plays they're trying to play the whole market with only 100% or 100% with only $100 increase on the pro. It still makes it affordable for locations. It doesn't take it off that location. It's not anyone's favorite that it went up, but it's a lot more desirable than the $700 of the premium. Yeah, $700 of the premium now makes the gap wider from pro to premium almost by $3,000. That's a pretty substantial chunk. That's a big chunk. Yeah. A lot of people are going to start even looking at it. I look at Bond and I'm like, if I want one of these in my home, I'm going pro. I don't want the Bond on a wand. I don't care for the wrap your missile lock. And with the under the water scene, I don't care because it doesn't have anything to do with the gameplay itself. So $3,000 is not justified from the premium to the pro. And then you've got the LEs, and I've been out of the LE for at least three years at this point. But the LE is $13,000 now. That's a lot. And with Rush, I bought the LE, and it was, yeah, it was $12,500, $600, $700, something like that. But I was like, well, it has the expression light kits, which was like an add-on for some other things. And so I'm like, well, that costs money. I'd rather have those. And so I figured that that was just part of it. But this has a creature from the Black Lagoon on the upper left play field again waving at you with a light. my personal opinion it makes me nervous and i'll explain why with a hundred dollar increase on a pro i don't even know if that is enough to cover the inflation that we've seen this past year it's not it's not we're at nine percent we have been for a while yes and it just feels like we're at a bubble not just in pinball but in our economy so i feel like some of that cost that which should go to the pro has been added to the premium and the le to help relieve and help get these pros out there because that's really your promotional material is getting these out on location the problem is though if le buyers start dropping out if bond is not as successful as stern thinks it might be then this cost is going to start weighing down on their company and so do you do we see another price increase next year on the pro by five hundred dollars because we're trying to meet demand it's hard to predict the future especially with inflation but it makes me curious because we're trying to play the market by every side and like you said taking l1 not necessarily out of rotation but is it team l1 i would assume so because you've got to have l1 you've got to have rick nagle you've got to have your uh you've got to have harrison drake these are all people that work almost solely exclusively to l1 games because they're such a great team together so you've taken a full team out of rotation to make a one-off so is that why we moved Venom back is to give L1 more time for his next Cornerstone. And if that's the case, we're not going to see another L1 for at least a year. There's so many unknown factors, but going back to the whole price increase, a lot of people are tapping out. I know people, this is their dream theme, and they just can't justify it. And they're like, if we do do this, it's going to be a pro. I know three people right now. One wants a pro, but they're going to wait until Expo to see if they can play it there. One's teetering on a premium, and one person is talking about the LE, the L1 LE, not the Gomez. So it's kind of a weird market right now. And with all these unknowns still out there, I don't see Bond picking up speed anytime soon, especially with the price increase. Yeah, the price is an interesting thing, though. However, let me play devil's advocate here. Go for it. We've seen this in concerts. where you sell a ticket for a certain price, and then if people buy those tickets, and then they're able to resell them at twice to three times what they bought it for initially, then that money goes to the scalpers. And so what they have started doing is Taylor Swift, and this was attributed to her, but started raising prices like pretty precipitously until she wasn't. And she was still selling almost everything out, but not everything. There were still a few seats available. And that way it was like, OK, well, that's the market, because that means we're collecting all the money from the ticket sales. We are not sending it to the to the scalpers. And so maybe Stern's having that same philosophy where, hey, we're going to keep raising it until we find that inflection point. I think JJP found it with Toy Story. Yeah, they blew through that ceiling. Yeah, I think that was a bridge too far for that because Toy Story, I told you, $8,000, I would have bought it. $12,000, no. but you know now we getting premiums around 9 that probably what the market demands Well and I I agree with you I would rather see Stern and its distributors make the money than scalpers and flippers make the money. If we want to see this hobby grow, if we want to see this, not even hobby, this industry and this community to grow, the money needs to go towards the people making the machines, not necessarily the people that are buying them. Yeah. And so like if you – if I bought a car for $50,000 and immediately could turn around and sell it for $70,000, then guess what? The dealer should sell it for $70,000. And that's – that is – that's the capitalist economy, kids. So do we feel like we've covered enough of bond? I mean we're 30 minutes on this now. I think it's – okay. This will be a hit. I am stating it right now. this is going to be a hit i i'm waiting for the momentum to pick up but there's nothing coming out until january or february anyway and this will be a good game like it it does the layout looks really good yep it does and i actually i'm fine with the art i really am fine with the art But the sound package and the code, yeah, it needs some work. But we've seen what they've been able to do with code and sound packages with time. And Batman 66 landed like a lead balloon. But now it's some people's favorite game. And they're still making them at Stern because there's still a demand for them. Yes. Yeah, I think we've kind of hit all the bases on this Bond thing. I think I'm right there with you. with some future sight on this because of previous games, I think it still will be a hit. It's just going to need to get some more traction under it. This launch did not help it at all. I could be entirely wrong. I think the launch hurt the initial buzz, and you may have missed some people. I mentioned this before, is that the people who buy everything, you don't have to worry about. The people who are location only, you really don't have to worry about. It's those swing voters in the middle. it's you know it's like politics right most of the time they don't even focus on their main their main base what they're doing is they're trying to win over the undecided the independence that sometimes they buy sometimes they don't and that's where stern is playing that that game to figure out so let's move on from bond let's talk about a game i feel like that's gotten even less hype and it felt like it got a better reveal maybe not a better reveal but this is spinal tap a cult classic from the 80s making fun of the rock culture of that time have you seen this video scott yeah uh okay i it hurts my heart a little bit just because i try we really do try to be at least looking at the positive side of things yes uh i don't see anybody buying this unless they are a hardcore fan of spinal tap and they've never played another pinball machine well that's what's funny is like teolas everyone knows teolas from pinball profile and final round yeah die hard spinal tap fan number one theme of all time i'm pretty for sure for him and he's out he just he doesn't want anything to do with this and someone had pointed out to us if you look at the drop targets in the video they're just a little high enough that the cutoff line at the bottom yeah shows and it says home pin underneath the drop targets and that's that's quite weird another quite weird thing of this there's a dmd and there's an lcd like why do we have both forms of display do you not know how to code for a d and for an lcd like Do you know how to overlay stuff on top of the video? Yeah. Is it just too much work? I usually have the movie just playing in the background, and if you complete the movie, you get a bonus on top of that and it just starts from the front. This game is so weird. The thing that tanks this, in my opinion, the price. Have you heard the price on this, Scott? I actually don't know the price. I was looking it up right now. $9,600 US. and I'm not for sure if that includes shipping in Australian dollars remember they take what's in it's like $14,500 and I was just like when I see that I'm like I'm entirely out $9,600 would you prefer bond premium or spinal tap I'd take bond premium any day spinal tap it looks like a really high-end home pin or a sizzle maybe yeah i it's okay this looks like you know you go to the enthusiast section at the expo and they have you know like sonic the hedgehog like they have someone who's like they're they're hardcore fans of this and they're looking at like hey this will be a lot of fun but it's like well okay maybe but i i think that this looks like a home version yeah it does not look great at all the layout looks like it's trapped in the 60s it doesn't even look like it's in the 70s it it well okay maybe sorry it has that vibe on the lower play field of like you know those old those really old em type games and you look at the upper play field and it kind of looks a little bit like when when i say upper by the way i'm talking the upper half of the play field not the not an upper lower it reminds me a little bit of like flash gordon yeah you just have like a two-tiered thing where it's like what was this doing well and i do have to applaud home pit on one thing yeah thunderbirds had plastic ramps and i swear they were made out of water bottles because they were so flimsy. They probably were, yeah. At least they upgraded on this one in metal ramps. Yeah. Well, you're paying for it. Amen to that. What was Thunderbirds coming out of the gate? It had to have been five, right? It was pretty low. I don't know of anybody in the pinball community who's actually played it. It just looks painful. So does this one. Do you think that this tanks HomePin? Not tanks them, but it takes them out of the manufacturing and development and just focuses solely. Because HomePin originally just makes parts for your pinball machine. I bought one for Future Spa because I was missing a transformer with the circuit board. And the part's great. Popped it in. I haven't had a single issue with it. So I know their parts are good. This seems to be a side project where they're testing the market to see, hey, pinball's hot right now. Let's see if we can get a license, a license that we think will sell, and then maybe we can make something. But I'm not sure it worked with Jetsons. It didn't work with Domino's, even though that was a special game. These are like small, one-off type games where the theme may be okay, but the average pinball player who's interested is going to look at this and says, this is 30 years ago. Yeah. i agree it doesn't even it and you're not going to okay the the benchmark right now is a godzilla premium yeah and that's the gold standard i wouldn't say that's a benchmark yeah yeah that's the gold standard so if you have 9500 in your pocket and you're buying one game what are you gonna buy it's gonna be godzilla i'll pay if you don't own it but i don't even know if they really want to be a big player in the market and they really haven't done much with the pinball community anyway yeah so this seems to be not geared toward us overall i just i don't see a market for this i mean that's just me it may it's because of who's making it yeah these it's just it's kind of out of left field for me a little bit let's talk though pinball industry awards are coming up i assume uh they've done great every year i love my crystal so speaking of pinball industry awards there's always a game of the year through the industry awards yeah looking at 2022 it's been kind of a rough year for pinball yeah three pins yeah what what what's even in the running at this point is it rush toy story rush bond okay you don't think i'll taps weird owl uh the problem with weird al is that there's not enough of them out there this was my argument when when jj pirates of the caribbean went up against iron maiden yeah is and i made this argument like i'm gonna give you points for getting games into players hands and so iron maiden did that way more than Pirates of the Caribbean. And Pirates of the Caribbean was a more expensive game. Really, the price difference wasn't that much back then, but the demand for that was so much more. So, Toy Story, it's a solid game. Price really hurt it. And so that hampered their sales it's not a deep game and that if you are a an elite player you will destroy it so i'd probably have a lot of fun on it dude you you put yours so steep and weirdly i know i know i need i actually did lower some of them a little bit um but okay so it's going to be between rush and bond yep and i think it's going to be rush because the code has been proven to be excellent and the layout is solid even though for the love will people stop putting double inlanes in on one side i hate it so so much board and waller man that's their signature the king of bouncing it off that middle post and it going right to the out lane drives me crazy it's a solid game it's a tournament darling it the rule set is is fantastic um long term what i think that it's going to be bond or rush i think that uh bond is going to catch Rush and maybe pass it because of the theme. I think the theme is more relevant to more people than Rush is. So your hardcore competitive players are still going to love Rush. But the casual players will gravitate toward Bond. I think by time voting comes around, I don't know if Bond will be fleshed out enough for a So that's why I think Rush, because Rush came out in January, and so it's had a whole year. Yeah. And it's a solid game. It's a solid game. The only other game that might release this year is Galactic Tank Force, which keeps getting production delays and pushed back. We saw a little bit of the artwork from the Cointaker tailgate party. It looks very retro-futuristic, which sounds like an oxymoron. But I'm hearing good things about this game. I'm hearing the play field is very unique, and it's kind of a polarizing layout. But overall, I think people are going to be excited to see this game, and it might be American's best so far. Right. I've actually – I've been impressed with what American has put out there. Yeah. They really have – it is a different – it's a different feel than a Stern or a JJP. However, Hot Wheels was fun. Yeah. It's a fun game. Oktoberfest is a little bit clunky. Houdini is just too brutal for me. Oh, yes. But, you know, Legends of Valhalla, I had a blast on. I thought it was a lot of fun. Great game. It's a great game. And so they're able to make a solid game. If you have four machines, I still don't know if it breaks into that spot of your fourth game. But if you had ten machines, yeah, you could definitely put one or two of American Pinball in there, and you would be happy. So I think overall this year, Rush wins it. I think it's Rush. Even if Galactic Tank Force does come out, I don't see them actually producing games until 2023, which means it would be out of the running. It would then fall into the 2023 category. I think Art will probably – Bond is going to look better in person. It will. Than Rush? I think then the pictures. And so when you're looking straight into it. I was going to say Michael Barnard did a great job and really the only complaint of Rush is those three caricatures but that's what the band wanted there's comic books of us out there and it's like oh I guess that's what you want front and center he did a fantastic job if you're looking for that classic movie feel then you're going to go with the Bond so I think that pretty much wraps it up speaking of Michael Barnard and doing some awesome artwork. He did the artwork for flipping the script. And I would like to talk about that for a couple of minutes since we're, we're almost two weeks away from this event from pinball expo and from flipping the script. It's insane. Yeah, it's, it really has come up on us. Um, I am going to give a big, um, standing ovation to Josh for really starting this and being able to get all the people together for this and, and the manufacturers who have chipped in some really great things. Uh, I'm excited for this and I love how transparent this is, has, has been from a fundraising standpoint in that it, the funds will be, uh, this is a big deal for, um, for me because my wife is an accountant and she actually helps with the accounting for our charity surgical thing And there are things that she says if you do it this way it can be exploited If you do it this way, it's straightforward. And so the way that Josh has chosen to set it up, it's very straightforward, and the money will go to learning solutions. Well, and that's even from the beginning. I just was like, I don't want to touch the money. I don't even want to see the money. Yeah. We have set it up in a way that it will go directly to Learning Solutions. Whether you give them cash at the event, Justin Benson is going to be there joining us from Learning Solutions. He will be there to receive the money. And then also, we've set up an auction site, which we're going to reveal this week. Yeah. To answer some questions, we've had some people reach out. They say, if we don't have Facebook, can we still bid? Yes, you do not need Facebook. Originally, we were going to do a silent auction type of style and have some items available online with some items available in person. With some of the concerns that have been raised recently, we've decided to go all online. These items will still be available at Expo. You can still pick them up and everything there, but it also brings it to a wider audience. If some of these items aren't going to have shipping available on them, unless if you pay for them. and there's some pretty amazing items we have the black and white play field from attack from mars that we have posted on the facebook page and the socials uh we have confirmation from jersey jack pinball slash was nice enough to sign some some product and he's handing that over i've heard i think a play field a translate and a banner if i remember correctly uh we we have some really amazing auction items stern well in french he stepped up to french he gave us the some jaws stuff. Yes. And we'll post that this week as well. You'll be able to see all these items as of this week. We're posting it early so you can create that account and get prepared so you can auction or you can be a part of the auction that day. And also Pinshades, remember, he reached out to us. He's like, Hey, can I give you some product? And we're like, absolutely. It has astounded me how many people have reached out that want to help because they have been affected directly by autism and has had me seen a deeper part of the community that I have not seen before. This is something that really affects most lives. And I am very appreciative of those that have reached out. There has been a little drama this past week. I really don't want to go into it. My focus right now is on these children. It is on this money going to an organization, Learning Solutions, that is going to take that money and help directly those kids that have high deductibles that might not have the opportunity to get this one-on-one therapy that they need, whether it be occupational, ABA, speech. It's amazing. It's life-changing. And I personally say that. An organization is one of a kind. It's a startup in Utah that's never been done before because all the therapies are under one roof and they all work together. And as far as I'm aware, there's not like anything like that. You have to go to separate buildings. Yeah, it's usually pretty hard. and so this is very life-changing we have people moving to my hometown to the basin for this because it's such a game changer for their child please think about the kids on this one yeah yeah let's keep it classy focus on the the real uh cause which is yes george fisher amazing guy he donated his own time this past week he's gonna be donating his time he's gonna be doing all the stream. This past week he came out, he toured the facilities, he talked to the teachers, he talked to the administrators, and he got like two, three hours worth of footage. And he's like, I don't know how we're going to boil this down to like 10 minutes because it's going to be a promotional video that we're going to be using in the stream. So you can get to know learning solutions. You can be more personal. So you don't feel like it's just a phantom organization you're throwing money at. these people are amazing people making different differences, major differences in these children's lives. And I can't think of anything better than to help progress our future by helping these kids right now. Yeah. It'll be awesome. I'm really excited about it. Me too. Auction is October 20th. Mark your schedule. Yep. Central time, 10 AM to 10 PM. This will give you an opportunity. If you're at expo, let us know. if you do win the item we'll arrange to either get it to you or ship it to your home if you have any questions message us i mean come on you can always get a hold of us don't be afraid to ask questions we're trying to make this as available to everyone out there because these are some really really cool items they're amazing and it's an opportunity for the community to enjoy product that they normally wouldn't see and it's an opportunity for these kids to benefit from that product. Okay. And let's put this in context too. How many people buy a mod for their machine that is a $250 mod and they'll put it in under glass and it just creates like one little moment in a game. Okay. So if you got the money to put in a $250 mod or a shooter rod or a topper or art blades or whatever, you have money to throw this. And we didn't just have things that are only high-end stuff. There's a lot of like shirts, hats, everything like that. I'm please go. This is something that you can be a part of spooky donated like koozies and travel mugs and stuff like that. There's some very accessible items in this auction. So if you feel like you can't buy any of these items, there will be a donate button right on the website. So if you feel like just throwing five, 10 bucks, yeah, five, 20 bucks. It's fine. Yeah. Just make sure you have a PayPal account. Doesn't everyone have one of those? I know we've all bought through eBay at one point, right? Because you have to have a PayPal to buy through eBay. Okay. Do we have a Venmo set up? We do have a Venmo set up. Okay. Yes. Yeah. Because I think most people have transitioned to Venmo. I know I have. Yeah. So that's awesome. The auction site itself uses PayPal and Stripe, if I remember correctly. But we'll have Venmo and we'll have PayPal if you wanted to donate directly just to the organization. Five, 10 bucks. Just don't buy that app you were thinking about this month. Yeah. help one of these kids have a better future yeah it'll be awesome so i'm excited and i am so tired it's it has been exhausting you really have put forth an amazing effort on this and yeah i just i've tried my best and maybe it's because my kids involved i mean you always go the extra mile when it's your family right well sure and it makes sense but to those honestly we don't see the money betting thing, my family, because my family has great insurance and our deductibles it was met in less than two weeks with him going to these therapies. I mean, he, he does 20 hours a week. And, uh, when you're doing 20 hours a week with these, with these specialists, it adds up pretty quick. Yeah, no, absolutely. No, it's in a lot of times what happens is, is people have a hard time getting over that in, in, in the insurance industry, it's called the donut hole where, you know, this is why when people talk about, oh, I've met my deductible and they can just get whatever they want because they've already paid the maximum. But there's a lot of people like getting from zero to their deductible. That's a big deal. Even if the therapy costs $50,000 for the year and their deductibles, you know, anywhere from two to $5,000, well, they still have to pay two to $5,000. And there's a lot of family who they, they're not buying pinball machines because they're trying to pay for insurance. Like I said, I'm excited. I hope you're excited. We've been pushing this for almost six months now. We got some amazing guests. Just come even join the stream. It's via Facebook, via YouTube, via Twitch. This is all going to be on the pinball network. If you haven't added them on any of those socials, go ahead and do it. It's going to be great talking with Roger Sharp about his new movie, talking to Josh Sharpe about CGC and about the state of the code going into Cactus Canyon. Keith Owen's going to be there. And what kind of nuggets we're going to get out of him about maybe the 60th anniversary, if we've seen anything by then. And maybe you just see some funny stuff. I've heard some pretty interesting ideas of what the hosts are going to do with their guests. Yeah, it'll be awesome. I can't tell you how excited I am about it. This is what made me want to come to Expo this year. And it's going to be awesome. I think that pretty much wraps it up for us. I don't know. Is there anything else on the list? Queen? Queen was more revealed. I don't know if you've seen this video at all. Yeah, it kind of feels a little bit. It's a step up from what Spinal Tap was, but it feels like a mid-90s game as opposed to like a mid-80s game. I will give them this. it's not i can't have it in my house i'm sorry i've got young kids i can't have naked women hanging out yeah how are they are they full-on naked uh the girl riding the bike is oh really yeah and she's on the dmd too if you're not the dmd or the lcd when you hit that shot man she's riding that bike yeah full booty baby yeah that's yeah there are some things that you know it's just But at the same time, there's Guns N' Roses where you have the – you have some very suggestive pictures on Guns N' Roses. I'll just leave it at that. You do. You do. Yeah. Well, and it's funny too. It's like we talk about Bond, right? I heard one person's like, I don't think this can come in my home. This is a 60s vibe, and you got women in bikinis and stuff like that. And it's like – It's pretty tame. I'm sorry. Bond, it could have been a lot worse. It could have been. It could have been a lot worse. And I think they kept it campy and period-specific. And so I think they're going to get a pass on this. I think Queen does look fun to play. I do want to shoot this game. It's something that I am looking forward to. Hopefully it will be at Expo. If not, then it is what it is. But overall, it's an interesting game from an interesting company. Other than that, I think we'll wrap it up. Okay. I think we'll get one more episode out before expo. Yeah. Probably like an expo pre preview what we're planning on doing. Uh, maybe able to, to get a guest on to talk about that, but we'll, we'll see if that works better to have us talk or to get someone. Definitely. If you want to get ahold of us, we are loser kid pinball podcast at gmail.com on the socials. We are at loser kid pinball. That is Facebook, Instagram, Twitter, and Twitch. I did stream last week with George Fisher If you want to go and check that out And all the fun we had on Godzilla And the lock shots Weirding out on Godzilla On top of the skyscraper Oh yeah Other than that If you need to get a hold of us We're also posting stuff on Pinside as well Don't be afraid to follow us on there If you want to keep up to date and whatnot Yeah and oh I want to do a quick shout out Pinball Party this is a new podcast on tpn i feel nate shiver vibes from this guy jason's doing a great job okay very professional that's high praise yes very professional very uh bubbly and enjoyable i was i i've enjoyed those so far um amanda hamilton i hope you're doing okay she's been trying to keep us updated over this last little bit if you haven't talked to her heard what's going on flora's been hit by a hurricane and they're just trying to keep the lights on thankfully she i was actually checking on her because my son kept asking do we know people in florida i'm like yeah i i know amanda and mike and he's like can you message them and see if they're okay so it was really cute she sent back a message ken cromwell has officially announced that they're bringing back special when lit boom so that is gonna be awesome to hear uh miss those guys man i still talk to ken yeah we hear him there regularly so good good to see you're coming back with that and i guess he said there's no conflict with the jjp stuff so it's gonna be cool to see what we hear from them yeah uh other than that i think that pretty much wraps it up for us once again if you're looking for that new pinball machine hit up flipping out pinball if you're going to be at expo definitely check us out at the fundraiser or just message us we'd love to meet people what what should people bring to zach at expo if you're coming because it's just gonna be after that surgery we should we should tell someone we should tell them to bring something Wait, one of those skeleton shirts that has a spine on it. Like, isn't there a Spinal Tap shirt that has a spine on it? Maybe we should get them back. No, no. Ready for this? If you're coming to Expo, buy a tube of Bengay and give it to Zach. I want to see how many tubes of Bengay we can get to Zach while we're at Expo. That would be awesome. Yeah. Or Biofreeze, you know, the newer stuff. But seriously, as many tubes of Bengay as we can get to Zach at Expo. Let's do it. Yeah. that would be awesome well we'll see you guys we'll definitely talk to you before expo but if not definitely reach out we love hearing from you guys again big thanks I still am blown away that people spend time listening to us because when we record it's basically like us having a conversation about pinball with each other that we used to have anyway and so I was just saying it's I'm appreciative that people are willing to be the silent third chair in our discussion. I agree. And we appreciate those that reach out and talk to us. It blows my mind that every year I just feel like there's no way we're going to exceed the expectations of the year before. And, you know, we joked when we had Zach on last year that we're going to be 100K by Christmas. And we kind of used his fish bait, though, right? Because the rate of pinball increases. Right. We might. come to double by this Christmas. Wow. That's crazy. The listenership has just exploded over this last year. And thank you. Thank you for those that have tuned in and listened to our stuff. Yeah, appreciate it. Okay, see you guys soon. See you at Expo. Bye.