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Antisocial Arachnids and Full Service Servos

BlahCade Pinball Podcast·podcast_episode·48m 21s·analyzed·Oct 3, 2016
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Analysis

claude-haiku-4-5-20251001 · $0.034

TL;DR

Blockade analyzes Doctor Who/Zen tables; discusses disappointing Bonebusters reveal.

Summary

Chris and Jared discuss Doctor Who pinball in Farsight's emulation, critiquing its shallow flipper mechanics and poor audio quality while anticipating the upcoming Doctor Who Regenerated release. They review new Zen pinball tables (A-Force, Champions, Women of Power), debate the upcoming Bonebusters table as a disappointing Halloween selection, and digress extensively into fast food chains, fuel stations, and nostalgic payment systems.

Key Claims

  • Doctor Who in Farsight emulation lacks traditional modes and relies on combo-based scoring mechanics

    high confidence · Chris describes how Doctor Who plays with combos and multiplier stacking rather than discrete modes

  • Doctor Who Regenerated is coming out next month

    high confidence · Jared states this directly; confirmed by Sven in comments section

  • Doctor Who flippers are notably shallow and difficult to trap with compared to other tables

    high confidence · Chris directly states 'Flippers sort of suck, man' due to shallow throw and catching difficulty

  • Audio compression on original Doctor Who emulation makes dialogue nearly unintelligible

    high confidence · Chris notes 'I can't understand a word that is being said' and 'sounds like it's coming from an AM transistor radio'

  • A-Force and Champions (Women of Power pack) have more consistent physics tuning than Marvel or Star Wars tables

    medium confidence · Jared notes pack 'doesn't feel radically different as far as underlying physics' while other Zen tables vary inconsistently

  • Bonebusters is the upcoming Farsight Halloween table, replacing expected Nightmare on Elm Street or Tales from the Crypt

    high confidence · Clue decoded: trumpet + trombone + Buster Poindexter = Bonebusters; community reaction was 'wild disappointment'

  • Bonebusters has significant lighting deficiencies in lower playfield areas that custom builders fixed in their versions

    high confidence · Chris describes watching TNT custom build video showing lighting added to dark lower left side missing from original design

  • Doctor Who Regenerated may be bundled as a two-pack with Bonebusters or sold separately

    medium confidence · Sven in comments suggests two separate Kickstarter tiers; hosts debate whether it's free with Bonebusters or separate purchase

Notable Quotes

  • “Flippers sort of suck, man. That's all I can say. I have discovered that balls that normally would have done a dead pass on were just going straight down the drain, just because they're not hitting where they're hitting on the flipper bat.”

    Chris @ early in episode — Direct criticism of Doctor Who flipper design and ergonomics; specific mechanical flaw

  • “I can't understand a word that is being said. I mean, everything to me sounds like... What? What was that?”

    Chris @ during Doctor Who discussion — Critiques audio clarity in emulated Doctor Who; major quality concern

  • “It's going to be a two-pack. Oh, you reckon? Well, they already said that Doctor Who Regenerated is coming out next month.”

    Jared @ Bonebusters/Doctor Who discussion — Clarifies Doctor Who Regenerated release timing

  • “You paid for Bonebusters, you're going to be playing Doctor Who Regenerated.”

    Chris @ Bonebusters analysis — Commentary on forced bundling or cross-promotion of tables

  • “It's a godly premiere. It's a godly premiere, yeah. You're already—it's already swirling the drain in my opinion.”

    Jared @ Bonebusters reaction — Expresses deep disappointment with Bonebusters as Halloween selection

  • “Don't do what I did. Don't look up that video on YouTube and then go, oh, that's not too bad, because that ain't what we're getting.”

    Chris @ Bonebusters discussion — Warns that custom TNT build improvements won't appear in official Farsight release

  • “I think they figured out a good variety. It's interesting that Zen has figured out—taken a lot of cues and lessons from mainly Bally and Williams tables, and probably modern-day Stern even to a larger extent.”

    Jared @ Zen tables analysis — Analysis of Zen design philosophy and industry influence

  • “If they were going to do a Harry Potter table, boom, there you go. That's exactly what I would have expected. They can totally reuse that for the Harry Potter table.”

Entities

Chris FrebuspersonJared MorgzpersonDoctor WhogameDoctor Who RegeneratedgameA-ForcegameChampionsgameWomen of PowergameBonebustersgameFarsight StudioscompanyZen Studios

Signals

  • ?

    community_signal: Farsight community actively discussing and comparing custom table builds against official releases via video analysis

    medium · Hosts reference watching TNT custom Bonebusters video and comparing lighting/color improvements to official version

  • ?

    design_philosophy: Bonebusters exhibits 'godly premiere' design flaws with busy backfield, poor color choices (80s pink), and insufficient lighting

    high · Hosts describe 'very busy up the back there' causing concern; note excessive pink coloring; reference TNT removal of pink as 'very good decision'

  • ?

    design_philosophy: Doctor Who flipper design fundamentally flawed with shallow throw and difficult ball trapping mechanics

    high · Chris explicitly states flippers 'sort of suck' with dead passes converting to drains; notes shallow throw prevents reliable catching

  • ?

    design_philosophy: Zen Studios incorporating design lessons from Bally/Williams and modern Stern rather than Gottlieb/Data East approaches

    medium · Jared notes Zen 'figured out good variety' in mode-start mechanics; observes consistency across Marvel tables reflecting modern design thinking

  • ?

    licensing_signal: Warner Brothers licensing costs preventing Farsight from securing preferred Halloween themes (Nightmare on Elm Street, Tales from the Crypt)

    high · Hosts directly state 'Warner Brothers was rather expensive compared to other studios' affecting Farsight's licensing strategy

Transcript

groq_whisper · $0.145

0:00
This is the Blockade Podcast with your hosts, Chris and Jared. WizardAmusement.com, the site to visit for custom pinball shooter rods. Easy to install, totally unique. Mention Blockade Podcast for 10% off your order. WizardAmusement.com, sales, restoration, customization. Hi. Are you aware that you're listening to the Blockade Podcast, hosted by myself, Chris Frebus, a.k.a. Shut Your Trap. And me, Jared Mogan.
0:40
That's right. Today we're going to be doing random acts of pinball. I have no idea what that actually means, but that's what we're doing. Hey, Jared. I'm good. How are you going, Chris? I'm not too shabby at all. last week we talked a little bit about Doctor Who we also talked a little bit about the Zen Tables I got to take a look at Doctor Who in DX11 I read through all the instructions and I can formulate a few more opinions now I will say this none of what I'm about to say is in any way Farsight's fault no just kind of observations about the table and it was kind of surprising to me considering the era of the table but there's not really modes are there there's more like combos that you're setting off in order to score the mode you might say in order to collect a doctor and it's you know hitting combos before the timer runs back out on them that's right to like boost your score basically that's how you get massive scores in this game you shoot the hand ramp build it up until you basically have maximum multiplier and then start multiball and start shooting Daleks and keep on topping up the ramp as you're in multiball to get things like Supreme Daleks and Emperor Daleks and stuff like that. Yeah, so I thought that was kind of bizarre, interesting. I'm not sure how I like that yet because, again, I haven't put in hardly any time on it.
2:10
It's tough. It's hard to keep that ramp going in multiball. Like, you've got to make a concerted decision to go, right, I'm going to trap some balls, I'm going to try and shoot hang on all the time. So you've got to trap a ball long enough that you can shoot it up the hang-on passage, so you can then shoot the hang-on ramp, and then keep that ball going while you've got another ball trapped. So it's a really big juggling act to try and get it right. Which, that's my other comment. Trapping balls? My God. Lightning sort of suck, man. That's all I can say.

Chris @ Champions discussion — Suggests Champions' Quidditch mechanic is reusable for potential Harry Potter table

company
TNT Amusementscompany
Blockade Podcastorganization
WizardAmusement.comcompany
Star Warsgame
Svenperson
Warner Brotherscompany
Gottliebcompany
Aliensgame
Cuball Wizardgame
Class of 1812game
Nightmare on Elm Streetgame
Tales from the Cryptgame
$

market_signal: Zen pricing for new tables at $6.50 AUD in Australia despite regional variation in EU pricing showing regional differentiation strategy

medium · Jared notes current exchange rate pricing and that EU is more expensive than Australian conversion, suggesting Zen 'feeling sorry' for Australian market

  • ?

    announcement: Doctor Who Regenerated confirmed coming next month with audio improvements over original emulation

    high · Jared confirms release timing; Sven in comments describes it as 'revamp not just reskin'; hosts note improved audio expected

  • ?

    product_concern: Bonebusters has significant lighting deficiencies in lower playfield areas that custom builders had to fix

    high · Chris describes watching TNT custom build showing lights added to dark lower left side; hosts note 'no lights under slingshots' in original design

  • ?

    product_concern: Farsight's audio compression on Doctor Who emulation renders dialogue nearly unintelligible

    high · Chris reports inability to understand any dialogue; audio sounds like 'AM transistor radio barely in tune'; Daleks completely incomprehensible

  • ~

    sentiment_shift: Community sentiment strongly negative toward Bonebusters as Halloween release; perceived as poor licensing choice

    high · Hosts describe 'wild disappointment' in forum; compare unfavorably to Class of 1812; note bile thrown at it by players; express it's 'swirling the drain'

    • 2:43
    I have discovered that balls that normally would have done a dead pass on were just going straight down the drain. just because they're not hitting on, I guess, where they're hitting on the flipper bat with it being slightly shorter or something. I don't know.
    2:59
    Because it's such a shallow throw on the flip itself, catching a ball is really hard. Yeah, you've got to really be concentrating. It's not just, oh, I'll just hold my flipper while another ball is bouncing around and probably one will catch. It's certainly not the crazy, godly, guaranteed catch flippers, which would trap a ball going at 800 miles an hour. Yeah, so if you want to make your head spin, go from playing... Cubole Wizard. Cubole Wizard to playing that. You're right. You're just like, ah!
    3:30
    Yeah, it's a mind-crack for sure. The other thing is, what the heck is up with the audio? I can't understand a word that is being said. I mean, everything to me sounds like... What? What was that? And God forbid if a Dalek actually talks.
    3:54
    It's very... Not Farsight's fault, but spectacular audio capture. Yeah, very, very... Well, there's a lot of speech in it, you see. Like, there's quite a bit of speech stuff in it. So they probably had to compress everything down quite a lot to fit it on the ROMs. I guess. All of it coming from an AM transistor radio that's barely got the station in tune. Yeah. It's a bit rough. It sounds better with headphones on, I think. I had headphones on. Oh, yeah. I mean, I can kind of make out what the doctors are saying, but the Daleks, it's like, good night, whatever. I have no clue what they're saying. I can understand. And especially coming off of playing the Zen Tables. It's a pretty nice audio. Yeah, I mean, it's pristine audio. So I'm very curious to see when Farsight comes along with Doctor Who Regenerated this coming month. What they've done with that. Well, because they've got their own audio. That's right. So I'm trusting that it's going to sound miles better. Yeah. And if that's the case, if it is a case that the layout is the same,
    5:09
    if the layout is the same and the gameplay is more or less the same, I mean, how can it not be, you know, there might be some slight different scoring methods or whatever, but I very well might wind up just playing the regenerated version just for the audio alone.
    5:26
    Yeah, I think so too. I think, well, It's still going to be mono because the sound won't be stereo. Yeah, I'm not concerned about the mono. I'm just concerned about the clarity. The bit rate. And the fact that it's actually audio recorded from a voice that's not then tried to be downsampled to the point where they can put it on a ROM and then play back. Right. Yeah, it's like the worst type of way to record audio, but not much you can do when you're trying to emulate old tables.
    5:56
    Not much. Yeah. I'm just going to be interested with the sound package in general I will reserve my judgement until I hear it I hope there's a lot of like orchestral music like you get in the shows I was doing my part I was wearing my Blockade t-shirt on our film set and one of the kids came up to me and was like what's Blockade? oh I know what he was doing well so I was wearing the t-shirt he kind of asked Blockade and I said oh it's a podcast and then he grabs the this kid's 11 he grabs our boom operator he grabs his boom pole and then puts the mic in front of me and he's like what do you guys talk about and so I said well here I'll do my I'll do the opening and let you hear what it sounds like and so I you know in my deep timber you were listening to the Blockade podcast and I rattled through that and impressed the socks off him, which I was like, really? My opening impressed somebody. Oh yeah, you're 11. But so anyway, then he goes, well, what do you guys talk about? I said, pinball.
    7:07
    But then what do you talk about? Anyway, well, I go, do you know about the pinball app? Oh yeah, I know about that. I go, okay, well, we talk about that and tables that are coming out and how to play. but then what and then so yeah I thought that was kind of amusing you have gotten now a chance to mess around with the new Zen Tables, thought? Yeah I have yeah I have, I've been playing both of them, I decided to give both a try down here in Australia with the current exchange rate It's about $6.50 for the pack.
    8:08
    Australian pesos, $6.50 Australian pesos. So that's fun. Although apparently when I shared, I said the costs of power in Australian dollars, and I tweeted it out to Zen and a couple of other people were going, oh, that's funny because in the EU it's actually a little bit more expensive than converted than it is in Australia. So there you go. We're getting a little bit of a cut down here. They're feeling sorry for us. so yeah I've played Women of Power and A-Force I gave both of them a go I think A-Force is probably my preferred table well Women of Power is the pack Jared so it's A-Force and Champions Champions, Champions yeah that's right so Champions, it's okay I see what you mean about the Scooby Doo running noises and all the yeah, all the Hanna-Barbera sounds. Right. It's like they've just gone, the Hanna-Barbera's left. And that's the Hanna's left.
    9:11
    I was expecting it. I really was. So, yeah, Champions, it's a very bizarre table. You can tell it's a Zoltan table. Yeah. It's like, wow, dude, there's some bizarre shot transitions in that. Like, you shoot it up one pass and it just loops around and comes out this fake wall and then back to the upper floor. It's like, what the? Like I said, habit trail hell.
    9:36
    And the thing that really catches me every single time on that table is the speed that the ball exits from the return lane wires, habit rails. Jeez, it flies off those things. It's like they don't actually have ends on them and the ball just goes straight off them without having to hit on anything before it drops down to the table. It's ridiculous speed. It's ludicrous speed.
    10:03
    That should be in Tesla table now. It should be. Tesla's have ludicrous speed buttons on them now. Did you feel that, no, I know that you have also commented that A-Force, because you've commented on your Twitter that it was very bouncy, like I already said. But did you find that with Champions that it was bouncier than at least normal for Zoltan? Absolutely. It's great. Like the amount of bounces in that table now and just the sort of slightly higher strength of pop bumpers and stuff like that. It's good. It's finally taking some cues from the other designers about what actually works in the market today.
    10:41
    And I think that's really good because both those tables as a pack, they don't feel like they're done by, like, they don't feel radically different as far as the underlying physics go. Whereas, you know, you look at a lot of the other tables in Marvel, and they're all over the place as far as physics go.
    11:02
    So, yeah, I think Aliens is also pretty consistent as well. Like, they've got the same type of tuning in that. But then you go look at, what was it, Star Wars tables. And, again, they differ between sort of the release eras that they came out in.
    11:21
    Right. Right, well, I mean, yeah, because all the movie tables are all, well, they're all designed by the same guy, so they all feel exactly the same, but you're right. Yeah, you play Masters of Force and then hop into Return of the Jedi and it's like whiplash on your head. Yeah, it is. Yeah, it's really, really hard to switch. So, yeah, it's good to have that consistency in the table pack, I think.
    11:46
    The... what was I going to say? It was about mode starting. I think I kind of like the different ways you can start the modes in a force. There's a couple of different like paths you can do to get the modes I found. That's nice. So you don have to do the same shot over and over again to get the mode started Yeah I think they figured out a good variety It interesting that Zen has figured out taken a lot of cues and lessons from mainly Bally and Williams tables, I would say, and probably modern-day Sterns even to a larger extent. I can see a lot of influence of modern-day Sterns in their tables recently, as opposed to if they were taking their queues off of a Gottlieb or Data East where it's one shot tables and that's about it. That's right. Yeah, I'm quite enjoying that. I'm still I've worked out how to start the modes in the Champions but it was going, what is that ring going backwards and forwards? What am I supposed to do with that? I guess I'll shoot it and then oh look, I'm in a warp mode. This is how you actually start a mode, it seems.
    12:59
    It's all very confusing. It's a quidditch hoop. It is. It's a quidditch hoop. It totally is. If they were going to do a Harry Potter table, boom, there you go. That's exactly what I would have expected. They can totally reuse that for the Harry Potter table. I don't know why they're not, honestly. Seriously, that would just be a gimme license, that one, as far as being able to do stuff in pinball. Maybe we should suggest that. get a call to Barbie and say, hey, once you spread the news, there is a new movie coming out. Why don't you guys get on that and then you can redo the old movie. Exactly. One table for each movie. That would not be that hard to do.
    13:41
    They would have heaps of material for each table. Yeah, they would. That'd be a really good license for them to secure, get a hold of, get into business with Warner Brothers since Farsight can't seem to get in business with Warner Brothers. They can't get a beer in a pub as far as Warner Brothers go. Warner Brothers was rather expensive compared to the other studios, which is a shame because there's quite a few Warner Brothers properties in the pinball world.
    14:14
    That kind of affected, we believe. It's been... I'm not going to say announced, but the clue was given as to what the Halloween table is going to be. And it was met with wild disappointment because it was not either Nightmare on Elm Street or Tales from the Crypt. So for those people who didn't see the clue, it was a trumpet, a trombone, and a cocktail? No, and then Buster Poindexter. That's who it was. Oh, I had no idea who that person was. You don't remember? Feeling hot, hot, hot. Oh, right. Okay. Anyway, so if you take the Bone from Trombone and the Buster from Buster Point Dexter, you get Bone Busters. Yay. Godly premiere. Yay.
    15:03
    Now, I've never played Bone Busters, so. Nor have I. Nor have I, but I can say this. It's a godly premiere. It's a godly premiere, yeah. You're already, it's already swirling the drain in my opinion. It is. Oh, boy. And then the amount of bile that was thrown at it in our forum from people that have played it saying that it's one of the more terrible guttly premieres is kind of... It can't be much more terrible than that stupid Class of 1812. That's a game that I... It's second in line from Going Nuts, that one, for me. It's just so kitschy and horrible. and the kiddie rap rubbish in it that is in there is just terrible, terrible I equate that to it's what happens when well I guess they weren't old in that era but when middle aged men that were white decided that oh the kids are into rap, let's make a rap let's make these spooks rap words and it's going to be so hip and cool daddy oh exactly yeah so I looked up some videos of Bum Busters just to see what we're in for and immediately was turned off by the color of it and then I heard some of the audio and I just kind of went godly premiere tables I want to see the travesty that we're going to be getting and you know I'm going to say this would I have rather had Freddy the Freddy Nightmare on Elm Street table no honestly because I've played that and I don't think that would be getting hardly any play for me either it didn't interest me I am with everybody being bummed that it's not Tales from the Crypt because I think that would have been a good title that would be such a good title to have but you know what folks this is what you get when you insist on Farsight always releasing a holiday or a not a holiday but a Halloween themed table because there's not that many Halloween themed tables left and geez it really is it does look like another class of 1812 I'm looking at the play field on it I'm just going oh god yep it's one of those where I looked at pictures from what people have done in visual pinball compared to the people that are actually playing the table and moving the camera. And it's one of those where the toys in the back area of the table don't seem to translate that well to a static image.
    17:57
    Yeah, it's very busy up the back there. It is very busy, and that has me worried too. Although, again, hats off to Farsight. You did a pretty dang good job on Doctor Who with the time expander. that does look well defined there's a I'm just looking at the playbook the thing that jumped out at me when I first had a look at it is that on the upper left flipper there's like a pop bumper and the pop bumper is like half a pop bumper like the skirt underneath it that triggers the pop bumper it's like a special skirt it's only half of it that area on the wait on the left and I was thinking the area on the right I don't know what this on the left I didn't take that long of a look. Yeah. It's on the left.
    18:45
    So, basically, I'll put it to you this way, folks. You paid for Bonebusters, you're going to be playing Doctor Who Regenerated.
    18:55
    Yeah. Because it's going to be a two-pack. It's going to be a two-pack. Oh, you reckon? Well, they already said that Doctor Who Regenerated is coming out next month. Yeah. That'll be a separate purchase, surely. You should choose it. It should have been a free purchase with Doctor Who. they never said they were going to make it a cyber purchase oh okay the Kickstarter always was both tables so I don't think it was a purchase at all I think instead it's just going to be I think they intended all along to have it come out with Doctor Who and I just don't think they had it prepared in time if I had to guess properly that's what I would guess hmm okay well I guess I've never played it before I should reserve my judgment about what it's going to play. It looks like it has a... It almost looks like it has up the back there, which has some sort of jumpy, rampy thing. It's got a jumpy ramp into a chair, and what it's got is a domed piece of metal that basically... So if the ball was jumping up, the metal acts as a roof to guide the ball then into the slot that it's going into.
    20:02
    So it's like a reverse loop, if you will. Okay, fair enough. Again... You only get that if you see the table from a side angle. Yeah, okay. It's also got these metal rods coming out from the chair they're calling it. I guess it's supposed to be an electric chair, maybe. I don't know.
    20:22
    It's hard to tell what that is supposed to be. But one video I watched was they did a custom Bone Busters, and he was showing all the things that they added and where they had added lights. and if you watch where they added lights compared to somebody that doesn't have those in this is a dark table the whole lower left side of the table from the halfway down it's dark there's next to no lights there's no lights underneath the slingshots yeah there's no there's nothing at all it's really weird these are things that the TNT guys then wound up putting in and I was like well that's also what you guys did too bad we're not going to get to see any of that we're never going to see this is going to be very very bad oh well let's wait and see I guess so for those of you not playing at home Sven is here in our comment section and throwing all sorts of information at us I'll just give you the highlights of what he's been saying. He says that Doctor Who Regenerated is not just a reskin, but it's also a revamp. He says that he thinks Doctor Who is two separate purchases.
    21:46
    So, because it was two different Kickstarter tiers, who knows? I guess we'll all find out. Yeah, pretty much. I think we will. And it'll be next month, apparently, which will be interesting.
    22:01
    We'll wait and see. I'm just looking at this bone busters, it's a lot of 80s pink in there. Oh, that's the other thing the TNT guys did. They removed all the pink. Oh, yes. That's a very good decision. Because, boy, it's ugly.
    22:17
    Yeah. It is ugly. Ugly. So, don't do what I did. Don't look up that video on YouTube and then go, oh, that's not too bad because that ain't what we're getting.
    22:29
    It's going to be interesting. So that's about all the pinball talk we have for you folks. So if that's all you came for, go away.
    22:42
    Warning. The following contains little to no actual talk about pinball. But if you came for what our motto is, which is pinball, movies, snacks, mostly pinball, we're not going to go into the movies route. We're going to talk snacks. Yeah, snacks. Yeah, because there's things happening a long time. There's things happening down here in Australia. we are becoming more and more like our sister country, America.
    23:06
    Well, we're sister country, are we? We may as well be. Are you guys removing the Union Jack from your flag and putting a little stars and stripes? No, what we're doing is we're going to put a big picture of Donald Trump and Hillary Clinton mashed together as one. Oh, you poor bastards. So we've got a Carl's Jr. opening. Apparently there is one already opened up at Brisbane Airport. Okay. So it's not where they're stopping, though. They're actually going to be – whoa.
    23:40
    I don't know if you can hear that, but that was loud. Thanks, Carl's Jr., for opening up a video as soon as I open your website. Good work there. So, yes, we have a Carl's Jr. at Brisbane Airport, but there are plans to branch out even further than that. So, there's one that has. So I going to express this because you probably don know this Jared Here in America Carl Jr is a western half of the United States franchise They are not completely national
    24:15
    They went ahead and bought out on the other side of the country a franchise called Hardee's. But they kept the Hardee's name on the east coast. They kept Carl's Jr. here on the western half of the United States. But they serve the same food, but they name the food differently for each location, strangely enough. so this is a fast food burger joint and Carl's is the anti McDonald's anti burger king and that they like to sell all of their burgers with a lot of sex they do I've seen the ads for them and yeah it's all about the sex of them and all about the sick burgers as well apparently the thick burgers for a while there Jared they had a campaign going on here called if it doesn't get all over the place, it doesn't belong in your face.
    25:08
    Okay. They purposely overloaded the burgers with condiments so that when you bit into them, it just squirted out of the burger.
    25:18
    That didn't last too long because people were like, you know, when I'm driving, the last thing I need is a whole glob of ketchup, mustard, and pickles dropping in my lap.
    25:29
    Well, number one, you should be eating the bloody burger when you're driving, you freaking burger in one hand, soda in the other, knee driving with the wheel.
    25:40
    You can eat your fries. No problem at all while you're driving. I mean, we do that all the time here, but a burger, I don't know, it's something that you want to actually pay attention to and give it the attention that it deserves because these burgers look good.
    25:57
    Carl's is actually my preferred burger joint for cheap burgers. for cheap burgers because you can guarantee they won't be cheap here they'll be very expensive well no well okay the thick burgers are a little more expensive but for their basic burger I find it to be way more tasty than a McDonald's burger and I like it better than a Burger King burger if I want to go step up then that's when I go to an In-N-Out but that's right for the grab it in five minutes as opposed to sitting in line at In-N-Out for half an hour yeah that is true. You do do that if you go there at peak times. It's crazy. Now, unfortunately, Carl's has natural cut fries.
    26:40
    Little bits of skin on the fry itself. They used to have the crinkle cut fries, and I'm a huge fan of the crinkle cut fries.
    26:49
    Oh, they got crisp cut fries. They do have crisp cut fries. It looks good. Fortunately for me, though, right next door to our Carl's Jr. is a Del Taco, which you have no clue about that. Either Jared. No. But Del Taco has crinkle cut fries so I'll go through one drive-thru for the burger and then I pull right into the next drive-thru and I get my fries and then I'm all happy and go home.
    27:10
    That's lovely. I love that you can just go. I don't even need to leave my car. I'll just go. Oh absolutely not. Yeah right through the drive-thru. It is America. You don't need to do anything. Do you not have drive-thrus? We have drive-thrus. Yeah but they're not usually that tightly located. We actually do have this place down in North Lakes that you can go to KFC and go and get your chicken and then you can go directly out of that one you have the Dirty Bird and you drive out of there and you can go into this Beefy's Pies place where you can get a pie and then you can drive out of there and go drive through Gloria Jean's Coffee and get a coffee to take out as well all from the country. Is Beefy's a meat pie or is it a dessert pie? I think they've got beef, like meat and sweet and savoury pies so you can get whatever you like and sausage rolls and all the good things.
    28:01
    So you can really, you can go to town. You can go and get yourself a bucket of chicken, a pie, and a skim coffee because, you know, you want to be watching your weight. Yeah, you've got to watch your weight. That's right.
    28:16
    So, yeah. So this will be really interesting. A bucket of chicken, a whole bunch of pastry pies, get the diet drink. Get the diet drink. Yeah, absolutely. Well, you don't need all that sugar. No, you don't need that much sugar. I was like, where's my Slurpee?
    28:32
    Oh, you know what? We've got sleeping news as well. So for ages here, McDonald's were undercutting 7-Eleven terribly on their frozen beverages. So you could get a large frozen Coke here for $1. And for the same size cup at 7-Eleven, it was $3. so obviously 7-Eleven usually aren't in the same places as McDonald's are so that was fairly okay but now they're launching this big ad campaign where you can go and get dollar slopeys so they're upping their game it's going to be a loss leader for them because you'll be able to go there and get most of the 7-Elevens here are actually attached to a fuel station so they're basically like the you drive and get your fuel go in and pay because they don't ever have pay at the pumps over here.
    29:23
    Because we have that in a number of locations over here. You can actually just go and put your credit card through the machine and you don't even need to step forward into the shop. Nope. Which is great.
    29:35
    So yeah, good for when you're riding a motorcycle because you don't need to take off your helmet and all that. You just basically get your fuel and go.
    29:42
    But it's bad because they don't get to upsell you, of course. But with 7-Eleven you have to go into the store. So, you know, for an extra dollar, getting a large Slurpee, it's a pretty hard sell.
    29:55
    I know that you guys got the Costco there in Australia. Yes, we do. Do you have the Costco gas? Yes, we do. That's where I get my fuel from, my gasoline. It is actually called Costco gasoline here, too. It's not called Costco petrol or Costco fuel. Oh, it's gasoline? It's Costco gasoline. Yeah, it is. They have kept the branding. And people go, well, it's not gasoline. We're in Australia. It's like, well, you know, dude, it's an American company, so build a bridge and get over it. And shut up and just enjoy the cheap fuel. Exactly. And the beauty is that you'd never get to, well, at least for us, it's totally pay at the pump. There is no quick sale there. There is no person to talk to. The only disappointing part that I find about the Costco gas experience is that they do not have the window cleaner. No, they don't even have an air pump. They don't even have an air pump or anything. It's just fuel and bugger off. Yeah. And since I go for my fuel, it gets disappointing when I'm in Salison. Like, oh, man, I can't see out my window. And then I've got to pull into a gas station and park, and I wipe my windows, and then I drive off and can see the angry look of the attendant going, hey!
    31:07
    You didn't do anything! He's like, no, I didn't. I'm just using your water and using your air. Your water and your squeegee. Yeah, that's right. Yeah, we do the same. I actually ended up buying a pump for my scooter because I went to this, one of the 7-Eleven servos here, and we call them servos here in Australia because we like to put an O on the end of everything, so the service stations, because really they're not service stations anymore. No one comes out and actually puts the fuel in your car for you anymore, so they're servos.
    31:38
    So I go to the servo and try and use the air pump, and it's one of these ones that's digital, so you tap in the number you want then it fills it up to that PSI but the thing is it was malfunctioning so instead of blowing up the tyres it took the air out of the tyres and didn't give it back to me and I went well you suck so I ended up going down to the shops and buying a bike pump which allows me to, one of those really high capacity bike pumps and it allows me to pump up the tyres as much as I want, when I want and doesn't require any power so it was a very good $40 investment.
    32:18
    How much of a culture shock would it be for you to drive into a gas station and have somebody come out and ask what kind of fuel you want, fill it up for you, check your tire pressure, pop the hood, check your oil level? That would make my head spin today, I think. There are only a couple of service stations here in Brisbane that do actually offer that service still. There's one or two that are family run and then they actually pride themselves in service. And they will actually come and, you know, fill up your car for you and you just stay in the car and, you know, they will do it all for you. But I think, I don't know how you actually pay. They must have like a portable FPOS machine now. But in the past, of course, you just give them $20 and they go and get you a change and you drive off. When I was a kid, you had the gas station only credit card, right? Oh, right. It was specific to the gas station. There was no magnetic strips on the back of your cards. It just had the numbers, you know, raised numbers. I mean, that was how all the credit cards were back when I was a young'un. And then they had the little device that, you know, you put the card in, you put the piece of paper over the top of it, and you went.
    33:26
    Oh, yes. You went across and made the carbon imprint, right? Yes. It was actually a charge card. It was a charge card. Yes. How I wanted to be a gas station attendant when I was little just so I could operate that machine. Yeah, that thing. I remember those. And then, of course, there was a time when the guy went to do it, and the paper slightly wrinkled in it and just shredded the paper. And I'd go, oh, and get all mad and have to start a new one. Yep, I remember that. Yeah, because they had to write up the bill first, and then they had to swap the card. So they basically gave you the piece of paper and said, is that correct? Right, and then they had this – well, ours had this giant cash register, if you will. But it wasn't really a cash register, but it had all these buttons on it. And they punched in the various buttons, and basically what that was doing was rotating the tumblers to stamp through the carbon. It was basically a typewriter for the carbon sheet. Essentially. And that's what printed out the form that then they ran your charge card over the top of.
    34:29
    And then they gave you that as your receipt. You kiddies don't understand what it was like growing up when we did not have the internet and we don't have cell phones in our pockets.
    34:38
    Yep. Get off my lawn. So, yes, I don't know. I think they are planning – they're getting back to Carl's Jr., of course. They are going to expand the kitchen. Oh, are we circling around? Oh, okay. Just to dovetail it. So at the moment there's one down the Gold Coast or Batteau Bay. Actually, that's like right down New South Wales, and the other one is at Brisbane Airport. So I could actually go for a drive out to Brisbane Airport and try one of these burgers. Well, enjoy yourself a Western bacon if I can recommend anything from Carl's. Let's have a look. So this is a thick burger or just a charcoal? Regular, but you can get it as a thick burger too if you'd like. Oh, a double Western bacon cheeseburger. Let's take a look at that. Oh, look at that. So you get bacon, double cheese, and onion rings on a sesame seed bun. With the barbecue sauce. With the barbecue sauce, yeah. That looks pretty good.
    35:31
    Oh, that looks pretty tasty. And I could actually go and park in the car park there. They have 20 minutes for free at the airport, so I could park, run in, get the burger and then get back on the bike and run back out again and not get to pay. Only in Australia would you actually run to the airport to grab a bite to eat. And then go away. I know. It's crazy. That's the only place you can get a car. So for the time being. For the time being, yes. So I discovered that somebody who has an even more niche hobby, well, actually, it's probably larger than ours, but it certainly seems niche to me. ham radio operators. Oh, wow. Okay. Yeah that a pretty It an even smaller subset than pinball machine lovers I don know if it is a smaller subset or not I think they better funded Yeah
    36:21
    It's certainly a popular hobby. Like there's a lot of very passionate enthusiasts out there for ham radio. Yeah. So, you know, I started talking to this guy about it, just more from the aspect of us being podcasters and wondering what it is that a ham radio operator even does other than has a giant tower in his backyard with an antenna or a customized license plate that says what his handle is.
    36:47
    And I was like, oh, are you able to broadcast music or do people do shows? And he looked at me with this strange look on his face like, what the hell are you talking about?
    36:58
    I'm like, I'm not a moron, I swear. And he was like, no, it's illegal to broadcast music and nobody has a show. He says people will talk with each other, but he goes, and then I could tell that he didn't look too fondly upon those people. He's like, they just like to yak. Like, I'm not much of a yakker.
    37:18
    So what do you do with your radio then? That's what I was wondering, right? Because, I mean, they spend thousands of dollars on this gear and equipment. And he had been doing it for 25 plus years, maybe 30 or whatever. And he starts telling me, oh yeah, you've got to take a test to get your license, and then after so many years, you can go from a six-letter call sign down to a four-letter call sign, but in order to get that, there's only so many of those that are even existent, so basically you have to wait for somebody to die before you can even get one of those. And so there's so many years that you have to be able to have been a ham radio operator, and then you have to go take this test. I was like, what kind of test is it? It's technical jargon beyond belief.
    38:10
    It's all about how many ohms are passing through cables and what kind of antennas you've got to set up and what's your radius and distance.
    38:19
    He said he spent a month studying hardcore for this test because it only pops up once a year in anyone's area.
    38:30
    Again, because it's such a niche hobby. Right. I want to be doing these every month. I was like, well, then what do you do? He's like, well, then you make contact with other radio operators.
    38:43
    But you don't want to yak. Right. So I said, okay, and then what? And he goes, well, Dennis, you fill out a log and that person sends you a card and that verifies that you made contact with them.
    38:56
    Hooray! And then you talk about how big your tower is. No, then you know that you're done. That's it. That's the extent of it. And I thought there's got to be more to this hobby than that, right? Well, there is. But it reminds me a lot of people that do geocaching. Yeah, yeah. Walking around and finding the little capsules with stuff in it. Yeah, that seems like a fun hobby. So it turns out that every place on the earth has a designated signal, you might say, or a designated location.
    39:38
    And what people do is they go to these – the more remote, the better, in their opinion, basically. They go to these remote locations and set up an operating site and then contact them.
    39:53
    And that's when they send out their little cards or whatever. And then they'll close up shop and leave. Right. Because it's some desolate island that nobody inhabits.
    40:01
    And in order to even be get on to these islands, you've got to follow your government filings. And then you've got to you only have X amount of time you can be there. And so basically you're mounting an expedition. and you've got to secure all your transport, you've got to secure all your power, you've got to secure your temporary housing, all this stuff, you've got to ship it to the location, build it, set it up, start firing out your signal, have people contact you and then break it all back down, put it on the boat and drive away. So it's very much, it's kind of like an adventurer's thing, more or less. And like I said, the more remote the location, the more people get excited about it, apparently. and it becomes as a site operator the challenge is to filter out the mass amounts of people that are trying to contact you because you have to have a clean contact with every single person so then it becomes a matter of how many contacts can you do in X amount of period of time so you got those people that want to do the expeditions and then you got the other people that are trying to make the contact and so the thrill for them is to make these new contacts and see if they can dial it in, essentially. And then he said there's an even third subset, and those people are people that just like jamming other people's signals. Right. Which I thought was pretty funny that every hobby has those people.
    41:26
    That is really, really strange. So it's almost like, you know how we say, Pixar didn't happen here. For the ham radio community, it's cards or it didn't happen.
    41:37
    Pretty much. That's pretty much. so it was one of those things where it's like you know a lot of times when i tell people that i'm into pinball they just kind of give me this look and they're like oh well that's interesting you know i haven't thought about pinball in years you know but the ham radio operator man you see them all the time you know you see people with their the towers in their backyards and stuff i just never understood what exactly it was they did and i kind of thought oh i bet podcasting is you know the internet has killed a lot of this. And it's like, nope.
    42:08
    Not in the least. This is an analog-ish subset. I actually found out, I'm looking at the Wikipedia article, as I do, and I thought that HAM might actually stand for something, like an acronym or initialism, but it's not. The term HAM radio is first a pejorative that mocked amateur radio operators with a 19th century term for being bad at something, like ham-fisted or ham-actor. it had already been used for bad wired telegraph operators so a ham telegraph operator was a crappy one so the community said hey that's pretty funny let's just use that and they just ran with it so there have been other explanations for the name but really that is the canonical reason because it was just some ham operator ham radio operator as the old TV logo used to say the more you know.
    43:03
    I know that's completely lost on you, Jared, but anybody here in America knows exactly what I'm talking about. You did.
    43:13
    We heard of a story here of some construction worker. That made it over to you, didn't it? Yes, it did make it over to us. Some construction worker went to the bathroom in a Port-A-John and went to the sit-down variety at which point a spider bit him on the weenus.
    43:37
    That's right. Yes, that's the shriek of my wife in the background because she loathes spiders and she also knows how big these spiders in Australia are. He was able to capture the spider and take it with him to the hospital at which point I forget what the type is but it's basically for us here in America a cousin of the Black Widow. Called a redback spider, which he basically liked to play. There was swelling. There was pain.
    44:04
    And it didn't fall off. It didn't fall off. And, no, nobody had to suck out the poison. Yeah, so that was the first time. Yes, that was the first time. So then it turns out the guy goes back to work, doesn't use a port-a-john for the next, you know, like six months. Finally, he's like, I really got to go. goes back, checks the seat, looks around, nope, doesn't see any problem.
    44:32
    Goes to his business, bam, gets bit again. In almost the exact same spots. Same spider, likes to taste the sausage.
    44:43
    Yep. So with which we were just like, what are the odds of that actually happening? The radio hosts that were telling the story, they were like, maybe he just missed the limelight and made up the story so he could get back in the limelight. Yeah, well, the article suggested that he didn't actually sight the spider, but he knew it was a spider bite. So it may not have actually been a redback that bit him again, but it was certainly another spider that got him in the same place. So, yeah.
    45:15
    Lesson learned, poo at your house. Yeah. Or lesson learned, take a big can of Mortina spray, the bejeebers out of the bowl. So don't bring your air freshener into a portable. Bring more tea. Bring your can of Raid with you. Fast knockdown. And then watch all the spiders go from underneath the toilet. And don't forget the flush when you see them all coming down.
    45:41
    Oh boy, yeah. Well, this show just took a decidedly wrong turn, and with that we're going to end it. So, if you would like to follow us on Twitter, why don't you do that. The show is at Blockade. I am at Shut Your Traps. He is at Jared Morgs. Or you can go to our website, blockadepinball.com. Hey, if you go there, you can see every single podcast we've ever done, download them, listen to them, share them with a friend, bump up our numbers, because that would be fun.
    46:15
    Yeah. You could always, if you feel like flying the flag of the t-shirt like I did on set, you can go ahead and do that. Go to represent.com forward slash blockade slash shirt.
    46:30
    Blockade dash shirt. I was about to say t-shirt and I realized it's not t-shirt, it's just shirt. Or take a look at the show notes because we have links that you can click on for your convenience. It is so much more convenient that way than actually trying to type this stuff in. Verbalize it. Yeah.
    46:48
    So that's our show for this week. Next week there's a high likelihood we'll be talking about pinball maybe less sausage loving spiders I'm sure there'll be a lot less sausage loving spiders oh I did want to highlight one other thing last week I'd mentioned the TV show The Exorcist that I had not watched it I went ahead and watched it last week and that was the surprise for me pretty dang good oh yeah? yeah so I think that's a safe bet for viewership if you want to get up on that very good I am warning people off MacGyver I have heard horrible horrible horrible things about that so yes I'm staying far clear away from that yeah me too do not want alrighty well that's enough blathering on our part thanks for listening everybody talk to you soon see you later
    47:47
    wizard amusement.com the site to visit for custom pinball shooter runs easy to install totally unique mention blockade podcast for 10 off your order wizard amusement.com sales restoration customization don't forget to leave a review on itunes or your favorite podcast hosting service that blockade is delivered to you can't improve unless you tell us how now stop listening play some pinball
    48:17
    you