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The Pinball Show Ep 115: For Just The Cost Of 400 Cups Of Coffee + Tax, Shipping, & Electricity

The Pinball Network·video·1h 48m·analyzed·Oct 25, 2022
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TL;DR

Stern's $2K Mandalorian topper with holographic display and DLC-style code features sparks dealer and collector debate.

Summary

The Pinball Show episode 115 covers the 2022 Chicago Pinball Expo, with primary focus on Stern's newly announced Mandalorian topper priced at $1,999. Hosts discuss the topper's advanced holographic display, integrated gameplay features (Mandalorian Madness mini-wizard mode, Beskar Bonanza progressive), deep code integration by designer Dwight Sullivan, and its potential to displace the Black Knight topper as the industry's most advanced accessory. They also address Expo logistics changes, vendor electricity charges, code updates for Godzilla and Rush, and community reactions to the high price point.

Key Claims

  • The Mandalorian topper is priced at $1,999 plus shipping

    high confidence · Host Zach confirms this pricing multiple times during the discussion about the topper's announcement

  • The topper uses 3D holographic display technology (Pepper's Ghost effect) that works 'superbly' in person

    high confidence · Zach describes seeing 4-6 units at Expo and confirms the holographic effect works well; Dwight Sullivan designed it

  • The Mandalorian topper includes a mini-wizard mode (Mandalorian Madness) that can only be accessed by purchasing the topper

    high confidence · Zach explicitly states this feature and questions whether this is a good design decision; confirmed in gameplay features discussion

  • Beskar Bonanza is a progressive mode that requires approximately 200-300 games to achieve all foundry upgrades

    high confidence · Zach reports Dwight Sullivan's explanation of the progressive mechanics during personal walkthrough at Expo

  • Stern did not give dealers advance notice of the Mandalorian topper announcement

    high confidence · Zach states 'no, dealers didn't get a heads up on this one' and describes learning about it via video announcement while driving to Expo

  • The initial allotment for dealers is approximately one-third of their typical total order volume

    medium confidence · Zach states this is based on his personal business metrics and notes it differs by dealer size

  • Chicago Pinball Expo 2022 charged vendors $300 for electricity

    high confidence · Zach (TPN vendor) reports receiving an electricity bill of approximately $300 at Expo; notes this was the most expensive vendor cost of any dedicated pinball show

  • Stern announced the Mandalorian topper without official photographs, forcing dealers to screenshot from promotional video

    high confidence · Zach describes pulling over to crop images from YouTube video because 'Stern didn't have official photos'

Notable Quotes

  • “Zach, what's going on? Explain the impeccability timeline for me”

    Dennis Creasel@ 9:33 — Sets up discussion of Stern's surprising organizational efficiency with topper release timing

  • “I'm the topper king. I got a hundred people. You can't give me an allotment. I am the allotment. Yeah I'm driving this damn market. What do you mean?”

    Zach Sharpe@ 11:47 — Captures the shock and frustration of a major topper dealer learning about allotment-based distribution rather than fulfilling existing demand

  • “It's a great way to sell toppers. That's true.”

    Dennis Creasel / Zach Sharpe@ 20:11 — Acknowledges the commercial strategy of gating gameplay features behind topper purchases

  • “This topper has sold better than other manufacturers games. I've sold so many of these damn toppers or pre-sold so many of these damn toppers that I'm left kind of in awe of the response of a $2,000 topper from a game that was released over a year ago.”

    Zach Sharpe@ 27:01 — Indicates unexpectedly strong market demand for the expensive accessory despite aging game title

  • “The hologram thing. The reflective thing. Looks like the image is floating. So we get that.”

    Zach Sharpe@ 15:12 — Describes the core visual innovation (Pepper's Ghost optical effect) that distinguishes the topper

  • “I wouldn't be in the market for it. No stopper. Even though I think it's extremely cool.”

    Dennis Creasel@ 20:30 — Industry insider (co-host) demonstrates price resistance despite acknowledging the topper's quality

Entities

Zach SharpepersonDennis CreaselpersonDwight SullivanpersonCraig BobbypersonChuck ErnstpersonJerry ThompsonpersonEric MinyerpersonPeter Dornperson

Signals

  • ?

    product_launch: Stern officially announced Mandalorian topper with $1,999 price tag, holographic display, and integrated gameplay features at 2022 Chicago Pinball Expo

    high · Zach received announcement via video at Expo, followed by email confirming pricing and November 2022 production start; multiple demo units present at Expo

  • ?

    design_innovation: Mandalorian topper features 3D holographic display using Pepper's Ghost optical effect with spatial objects creating 3D cockpit scene; described as visually superior to previous toppers

    high · Zach confirms seeing 4-6 units at Expo and 'holographic effect in person works superbly'; Dwight Sullivan designed complex code integration with RGB lighting exceeding game LCD

  • ?

    code_update: Mandalorian topper includes Mandalorian Madness (mini-wizard mode), Beskar Bonanza (progressive mode requiring 200-300 games), competition mode displaying all scores, and Insider Connected integration

    high · Zach describes features from personal walkthrough with designer Dwight Sullivan; confirms progressive mechanic pace and integration with main game's Insider system

  • ?

    product_strategy: Stern positioned Mandalorian topper as non-limited product with high price point ($1,999) to manage demand and avoid secondary market FOMO, contrasting with limited R2-D2 topper strategy

    high · Zach explicitly states topper is not limited; discusses Stern's messaging that more will be made; notes first-run allotment approach (November production); pricing decision attributed to complexity and licensing

  • ?

    supply_chain_signal: Stern implementing allotment-based distribution for initial run (November 2022), with dealer allocations at approximately one-third of typical total order volume

Transcript

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0:00
Warning, the following episode contains adult language and screaming goats. Listener discretion is advised.
0:12
The Pinball Network is online. Launching the Pinball Show. This week Dennis and I bring you the goods as we talk the most anticipated accessory release of the year. The 2022 Chicago Pinball Expo. Getting my hands on James Bond 007, Magic Girl, and Queen. As well as discussing homebrews. How the script was flipped on autism. Dennis' trending popularity. The 2022 Twippies. Pinball market trends. And gaining new friends. There's also a bit about applesauce for those into that kind of stuff. Welcome to episode 115 of the Pinball Show. Pinball is the game of skills. For some, it's a passion and a lifestyle.
1:17
It's time for the pinball skill. It's pinball with personality. Hey, what's going on, everybody? This is the Pinball Show. Sorry for the voice. Little horse. The pony thing is... It's Dennis Creasel and I here on the Pinball Show, episode 115, post-Expo. Dennis, where in hell were you at? I was not there. I was at peace. I actually had a work conference right up against... This is not why I didn't go to Expo, but I'm using it as a nice, convenient shield. Okay. Because I had, yeah, last week, Monday, Tuesday, Wednesday, I had my annual meeting. I was at another organization's annual conference, which we kind of piggyback on. And so I was just like, you know what? I'm glad I'm not going to two conferences in a week. Expo is notoriously, I was like, now I'm doing the, allow myself to introduce myself. Expo is notoriously known. I don't like saying it like that. But Expo is notoriously known as the worst of the big shows. And I went last year and I hated it. Hated it. Zach, there's nothing to do. It was a lot different. I heard that there were a lot of changes coming in. And I did receive feedback from people about, sounds like the, maybe not for the vendors, but for a lot of the attendees, the change in the hours so that you weren't just cut off into the free play area for vast portions of the show did make a big difference. People did like that. I heard the vendors weren't big fans of the fact that now they're charging for electricity. Oh, that's a thing that we'll talk about. My spies tell me about that. Man, you've got good spies. And my sources indicate that the tournament area was moved. I don't think anyone really had a problem with where the tournament area was, like, logistically. Yeah, it looked nice. It was in a big conference room where, you know, all the competitive people hung out and stayed. I've seen them here and there. Tom Graff or Travis Murie would come out into the vendor hall before going back in. But, yeah, most of the turtles stayed in that shell over there. I guess you survived it, so congratulations. I survived. My back survived. My voice, somewhat shaky. But, overall, it was a very successful expo. A lot better. It was what I'm... I don't think it's derogatory, but I would call the year 2022 for Chicago Pinball Expo Texas Light. Okay. So it was formatted in a very similar Texas Pinball Festival manner, not as hosed elbows, as people say, as Texas is. Texas is crowded, overly crowded. Yeah, you're almost waiting in line just to get to different parts of the vendor areas. So it was spread out. It was nice. I think even more can go in in the following years. They're honing in on what needs to be done for future years. I don't know if having the show open until 2 a.m. into Sunday morning makes sense, because most of us vendors were breaking down at 11, 30, 12 o'clock. We're like, no. We've been on our feet since 10 a.m. I think we're good. And the electricity thing was a smack in the face after being told that the Internet was going to cost $1,500 a day for five megabytes. Oh, gosh. Everyone laughed at that and said, piss off. So I was like, okay, no internet. We get a hotspot. That's fine. We set it all up. And damned if somebody didn't say, I mean, this is my big downside of Expo. Everything else was great. They said, hey, you want to go check in over there, the electricity? And I was like, okay, I guess they just want to know what we're running for their data, maybe. So Nicole went over there and she came back. She was like, sweetie, they're charging us for electricity here. And I'm like, what? What do you mean? they're charging for electricity. Yeah, every booth has to pay for electricity, and there's watts, and there's... And I giggled and I said, okay, tell them that at the Pinball Electronics Show, we will actually need electricity, so sign us up. And that bill was about $300. Jeez.

  • More than 100 customers were on Electric Playground's interest list for a Mandalorian topper over nearly two years

    high confidence · Zach mentions bringing physical paperwork with him to Expo representing this demand

  • Zach has pre-sold more Mandalorian toppers than Black Knight toppers, potentially due to the Mandalorian game selling more units overall

    medium confidence · Zach speculates this may be a title sales effect rather than topper quality comparison

  • “They're just not making those anymore. Now, what do you mean? You're not making, no, we're just not making those anymore.”

    Zach Sharpe@ 25:09 — Highlights Stern's unpredictable topper discontinuation patterns that drive FOMO among collectors

  • “If I had to guess, the second run production of these toppers for Mandalorian will probably fall into 2023. Q1 of 2023.”

    Zach Sharpe@ 30:07 — Dealer prediction about production timeline based on industry patterns (later revised by co-host to Q2)

  • “I think this will probably displace [the Black Knight topper] because the integration, the holographic effect just visually is more interesting in and of itself coupled with the expanded code”

    Zach Sharpe@ 28:09 — Assesses whether the Mandalorian topper achieves its stated goal as 'Black Knight Topper Killer'

  • “They didn't call it a space plane, Zach. Space ship.”

    Dennis Creasel@ 14:51 — Humorous aside about the Razor Crest vehicle terminology during topper description

    • Bill Webb
    person
    Steve Beattieperson
    Courtney Bowmanperson
    Nicoleperson
    Brian Eddyperson
    The Pinball Networkorganization
    Stern Pinballcompany
    Electric Playgroundcompany
    Chicago Pinball Expoevent
    Flip N Out Pinballorganization
    Star Wars: The Mandaloriangame
    Black Knight: Sword of Ragegame
    Godzilla (Stern)game
    Rush (Stern)game
    James Bond 007game
    The Pinball Showproduct

    medium · Zach reports receiving allotment of one-third of normal order; notes fielding customer inquiries about whether they made first run; indicates dealers hunting for units from other distributors

  • ?

    leak_detection: Rumors about Stern developing holographic topper technology for specialty accessories (prior 1-2 years) confirmed by Mandalorian topper announcement

    high · Zach states 'the rumors over the last, I don't know, year or so were true' regarding holographic display technology implementation

  • $

    market_signal: Mandalorian topper generating unexpectedly strong pre-order sales at $1,999 price point despite game being over a year old; pre-sales exceed Black Knight topper numbers according to dealer

    high · Zach reports pre-selling more Mando toppers than Black Knight toppers despite premium pricing; expresses being 'in awe' of response; receiving continuous FOMO-driven customer inquiries

  • ~

    sentiment_shift: Industry recognition shifting from Black Knight Sword of Rage as canonical best topper toward Mandalorian topper as potential successor based on holographic innovation and code depth

    medium · Zach states Mandalorian topper 'may displace' Black Knight as industry benchmark; notes it's 'made to be the Black Knight Topper Killer'; describes broader feature set vs. Black Knight's animatronics

  • ?

    event_signal: 2022 Chicago Pinball Expo implemented format changes including adjusted hours (opening until 2 AM Sunday), separated tournament venue, and new electricity charging policy for vendor booths

    high · Zach describes changes as 'Texas Light' format (spread out); notes vendors charging $300 for electricity; reports tournament moved to separate conference room; confirms format improvements from prior year

  • ?

    business_signal: Chicago Pinball Expo charging vendors for electricity ($300+ per booth) making it the most expensive vendor venue in dedicated pinball industry; previously charged $1,500/day for 5 Mbps internet

    high · Zach reports $300 electricity bill at Expo; calls it 'most expensive place to be a vendor in the pinball industry for a dedicated pinball show, by a long shot'; mentions prior internet pricing dispute

  • ?

    operational_signal: Stern did not provide advance dealer notice of Mandalorian topper announcement; dealers learned via public video announcement; no official photos provided at launch, forcing dealers to source images

    high · Zach explicitly states 'dealers didn't get a heads up'; describes scrambling to screenshot from YouTube video during drive to Expo for website content; received official photos within 1 hour after announcement

  • ?

    content_signal: Flip N Out Pinball Twitch stream team organized Expo tailgate party featuring creators, designers, and coders; regular Monday-ish streaming schedule supporting pinball community

    high · Zach thanks organizers (Bill Webb, Steve Beattie, Courtney Bowman) for tailgate event; describes heated garage venue with 20+ machines, trailer with audio/video/food; highlights designer Dwight Sullivan participation

    • 5:31
    I mean, conferences gouge left and right. Yeah, they sure do. I'm just a little, given the, you know, given the general need, almost universal need for tables to go ahead and have electricity for phone charging at the low end to running pinball machines at the high end, I'm just a little surprised that wasn't embedded into the initial vendor price package. I did go back and look, and it should have been, because Expo is almost like the Internet thing where you ask about it and they're like, oh, that's, you know, it's a secondary company. That's part of, you know, you need to talk to them. We have nothing to do with that. And I'm like, well, you kind of do, though. So I went back and looked, and you can see there is a line. And, of course, I didn't pay attention to it because it says electricity not provided. So I didn't think that I'd have to run my own line. So they did declare it. Okay. Yeah, it was in there. It was in there.
    6:26
    The lesson learned. Lesson learned. And Expo in Texas, just for those who actually care, booth-wise for vendors, They are the priciest of the booths because of the large metropolitan areas and the size of the shows, I would anticipate. So we're used to paying a little bit more per booth rental in those arenas. But, yeah, wasn't expecting electricity. So with electricity, it makes it the most expensive place to be a vendor in the pinball industry for a dedicated pinball show, pinball arcade show, by a long shot. Interesting. Are those 10x10 booths, or what's the size? The standard is a 10x10. Okay. Flipping out to the 30x10, including TPN.
    7:11
    Oh, we're back, though, Dennis. Yeah. There was a Craig Bobby sighting at the Chicago Pinball. Oh, really? First time I've met him in person, felt like a brother. He was truly one of the highlights of the entire show for me, because he's fucking Craig Bobby. He was great. He truly is a great soul and a great human being. I enjoyed spending time with him, but I think he's probably, he had a lot of fun, so he's probably recovering. I don't think we have a top stories from him right now. I don't anticipate that happening. And thank you, Dennis, for doing this wild, off-the-cuff, late recording session with me during your work time period breaks. Thank you for doing that. You lucked out this week. I usually am driving at this time. Yeah, and usually you're a man of principle, and you don't like changing those times if you don't have to. I like consistency. Yeah, once the train leaves the depot, I'm shit out of luck. What do you want to talk about, Dennis? What are we going to jump into? Well, you know, let's wait a little bit in terms of going over Pinball Expo, because obviously there's a lot of, well, I don't know if I'd consider it strong news, but there's a lot of news that sort of is related to Pinball Expo. I think the big announcement that's happened since the last time we recorded is actually a topper of all things.
    8:30
    You know how many people ask me about this? It would pain me to say that. So many people ask me about this. Of course they did, because you're the topper king, trademark pending, all rights reserved. Yeah, this last week, the timing of Stern is so impeccable. I'm not saying that sarcastically. What is? You know what? I'm going to interrupt here. As the listeners know, I'm often fond of interrupting. So what is going on with Stern right now, Zach? It's so weird. Like everything, you know, the impeccability, as you've noted. I have never seen such precision out of them in my entire time in this hobby. This is just like two years we've wasted. Toddlers have taken over the market. I don't get it. It's weird. They're tripping over each other's feet, and they're fighting over their milk. Who's going to get the milk? And I'm just like, what's going on? Zach, what's going on? Explain the impeccability. Timeline for me was we have been taking not pre-orders, but an interested list, a very interested, interested list of people for the last nearly two years, spanning over 100 different customers wanting a Mandalorian topper. If it comes out, we didn't know pricing, we sure as hell didn't know timeline. We know that licensing was a hang-up for a substantial portion of time. We also know that Stern Pinball has announced and has been struggling getting parts for the dedicated toppers, whether it be an Iron Maiden rerun, a Mandalorian, a Godzilla rush, whatever it may be. So I thought to myself, right before going to Expo, I'll take my paperwork with me, because I'm a physical paperwork kind of guy, it's just how it works, and I have a big stack of those interested parties for a Mandalorian topper, and it was cramping my style in my stern backpack, so I pulled those all out, and I put them on my desk. I don't need those. It's a Mandalorian topper. Thirty minutes into our drive, my phone starts going ding, ding, ding, ding, ding, ding. Now, were you driving, or was Nicole driving? At this point, I was driving. Okay. I'm just trying to have a visual picture. I'm driving, and I'm like, okay. I'm like fucking Kermit the Frog here. Moving right along. And I'm going to the fucking expo, right?
    10:52
    And I get these dings and I'm like, oh, shit. What did Kaneda do to threaten me this week? That's the first thing you thought of. That's usually what I do. Oh, God. How did he try to take out my business? So I look at my phone and I see the video preview of this. Did you check out this topper? I will want. and it was the video promotion by Stern Pinball for Star Wars The Mandalorian Topper. I thought, great. Oh, shit, that's wonderful, Stern. So, no, dealers didn't get a heads up on this one. They just, we waited a couple years. I saw the video, I guess, after a lot of people saw the video. Nicole was watching it as I was driving. And then we got an email saying, hey, here's what we're selling. We're going to start making these in November. You're going to get an initial allotment run of them Which, again, I was driving She was reading I freaked out Because I'm like, what do you mean I'm going to get an allotment? I'm the topper king I got a hundred people You can't give me an allotment I am the allotment Yeah I'm driving this damn market What do you mean? And so I make calls to Stern and all of that And they're like, chill out now It's just the first run We're going to make more In April? We don't know That was the other thing It's a callback. We don't know. It also came with a, so we were not prepared, to say the least. Stern didn't have official photos, so I was like, Nicole, sweetie, I'm sorry. We're going to have to pull off. You're going to have to drive. I have to now find a way to get this on the website, start marketing it. Stuff that I would probably do prior to. They have no official photos, so I'm snapshotting pictures from the video so that I have something for the website and cropping it and cleaning it. This is my life. My fucking life, man.
    12:45
    All the while, this topper is $1,999 plus shipping. And I'm balancing those messages as well. They're fucking mind. I'm going to spend $2,000 on a topper. They're crazy. They've lost it. and I'm responding to these customers, I can understand your frustration. This is a lot of money on the topper. I want to fill the wizard mode. I've got to get this for a wizard mode.
    13:15
    So I'm doing that, taking orders, cropping pictures from a YouTube video. I will say shortly after, within half an hour, an hour, we did get official pictures, so I was able to update those. So the story is we get a Mandalorian topper, and we get one hell of a topper. is that the Black Knight topper killer? We'll have to wait and see. There are a lot of things to discuss on this topper, one being the price. That's the one that's big. I'm a stern dealer, but even I'm like, okay, that's a lot of money for a pinball topper, an accessory, right?
    13:51
    Yes. Okay. Even though we know that some of these toppers, which are not even close to being this fucking cool, are selling on the secondary market way over $2,000. So they're finding their, they're finding the price and trying to figure it out. This is not a limited topper, listener. This is a, I think an open-ended, you know, run what they want. So we're not looking at the Star Wars R2-D2 limited edition topper.
    14:17
    Visually, the topper itself spans the entirety of the back box, or the majority of that. And it looks as if you're in the cockpit of that Razor Crest vehicle. Is it a vehicle that flies? Yeah, ship. Okay, ship. So ships fly, but vehicles don't. So weird. Well, no, it's a vessel. I mean, I think vehicles are okay, too, if you want to call it that. You can't call it an airplane, though, right?
    14:43
    Does it? It's a spaceship. What's the difference between a spaceship and an airplane? One goes into space.
    14:50
    Oh, spaceship. They didn't call it a space plane, Zach. Space ship. So it's the Raid Express. Lego movie quote. The big thing here is it's using a 3D holographic display in vivid color. And then the also, so we get that Pepper's Ghost or whatever, the Ghostbusters Octogoggles, the Pinball 2000. The hologram thing. The reflective thing. Looks like the image is floating. So we get that. So the rumors over the last, I don't know, year or so were true. We get a holographic effect here. I also get new gameplay features. including Mandalorian Madness, which is an embedded mini-wizard mode. Uh-oh. DLC-ish? Yeah. I mean, kind of like the Jurassic Park topper. Mm-hmm. Until later they ran it on Insider Connected forever. Yeah, well, we don't talk about that because it has no point to the argument we're making. And then they also have Beskar Bonanza, a progressive mode that awards all upgrades in the Foundry. Mm. Okay. Well, you're going to need a lot of Beskar to get this topper, so that's fitting. We're going to need a bigger Beskar wallet. I was able to hang out with my buddy, Dwight Sullivan, who designed, programmed. This was a big project for him that he'd been working on, which I appreciate, because there are some titles that come out, listener, that the toppers are not designed by any of the creators. They're just, you know, if there's a coder around or somebody codes it, somebody does the live show integration, et cetera. He was very well invested into this topper and wanted it to be one of the greatest ever. So much so that that's why you see that code integration so deep. I think I looked at this thing. It has more RGB lighting than the actual game itself, which was pretty cool. It has spatial objects within the topper that makes it look 3D, even the physical items within that cockpit. it, it's a fucking beauty. It really is a gorgeous, beautiful, beautiful topper. There's no one that can argue that. The holographic 3D effect in person, they had four to six of these at Expo. It works superbly. It is a beautiful, beautiful topper. And it's a functional, what I'd call an interactive functional topper. It is doing something. It is giving you information that may be readily available within the menu system or the screen of the main LCD, but things come up there that are helpful. Not to the player per se, because you're not going to look up there unless you trap up, but to bystanders and such. It even has a competition mode that will display all four scores, I think Dwight said, at the same time. So if this game is being used in competition, it has this topper, or even loosely competition. If you're playing with buddies or something, you can more easily see maybe the scores and stuff up there. So he was giddy, hung out with him at the Flippin' Out Expo tailgate party. We'll talk about that. And then he gave me a personal walkthrough at Expo of this topper and all of its features. It's badass. But wait, there's more, Dennis. Not only if you buy this topper, but if you then integrate it with the Insider connected on your Mandalorian machine, there's more features that open up, which is probably a first with Sturm Pinball. The player's username and icon will be up there. They'll display the player's lifetime encounter. Mini playfield accuracy percentage pops up there whenever you're Insider connected. That's pretty cool. Lifetime Beskar collected for all games played while you're logged into that. Just stuff like that information up there. If we go back to the progressive Beskar Bonanza, Dwight was like a kid in a candy store on this one. So it displays the Beskar that you're gaining throughout the game. And this is progressive across all players. And this is set almost like a slot machine progressive where you see it at all times, but it's going to take maybe 200, 300 games in order to achieve this Beskar, or the progressive mode that's going to give you all the foundry items. I found that really clever. It's a novelty. Again, the stopper enables then the user something else to kind of look forward to. What do you think about a progressive mode or a progressive achievement or reward that spans that far out? Yeah, it seems awfully far to me. Okay. Given that I think part of, I don't know. It is a large achievement, though. You're getting every foundry item immediately. Right, right, right. You know, I get it. I get why the decision was to pace it out that far. And, I mean, so homeowners are the ones that are going to invest in this sort of thing. So, yeah, it's just, I mean, 200 plus plays is a lot of plays. I don't know. I mean, it wouldn't have been my decision to do, but. What do you think about the topper enabling a mini wizard mode that can only be reached with the purchase of this topper? It's a great way to sell toppers. That's true. Visually, did you see the promo video of this? Yes. Yeah, it looks cool. I don't think there are going to be very many people that will look at this and go, you know what, this looks terrible. Yeah. What do you think about the price? It's high, obviously. It is high. If I owned a Mandalorian, I would not be in the market for it. No stopper. Even though I think it's extremely cool. Even though you have a ceiling that can handle it. Let's just assume I did. Let's assume I had the space and had the game and had the premium or an LE already even, so I'm a total Mando. And it's just like, no, $2,000 for an add-on. I mean, I've never even considered $1,000 for an add-on. I just wouldn't do it. I'm not surprised they went $2,000 here because if they are struggling to get parts for accessories such as this, it makes sense that they're going this high up because they see secondary prices on like Beatles toppers or things that are substantially less complex as this product. And what happens if you can't build products fast enough? We've seen it from manufacturers. You increase that price. You've called it more than anyone I've heard, Dennis, saying, hey, if you can't make them fast enough and you're pissing off people, raise that price so that you can slow down some of that production and catch up. Do you think that's what they may be doing here? Or do you think just with the licensing and everything like that, $2,000 is what it's going to have to be regardless if they sold one or 10,000? Right. Well, I do think part of it's probably trying to deflate a little bit of the air out of the secondary market. I don't think this is necessarily to try and deal with the issue that we've discussed about difficulty in getting parts, even though they've been transparent about that aspect. Given that they, you know, the other way they could deal with that is something that they've done before, R2-D2 topper as a case in point, and actually put a firm limit on the topper, which would have helped, quote-unquote, justify the pricing, and they've chosen not to do that. So that's another thing that undermines the secondary pricing is they're basically threatening to continue to build these forever. So given that, and I don't think once the supply chain issues are resolved that this price goes down, it would upset the initial buyers anyway, even though we know in other industries it is not unusual for an older product to start to see price cuts as time goes by. But saying all that aside, I just think that a lot of it's probably driven by the complexity behind it, The depth of the code, the time investment that you mentioned, Dwight, is done. Coupled with the visual spectacle of it, I think those two things combined are where they're deriving the price from. I don't think they're doing it based off of the supply issue. Yeah, because these are new animations. You've got to get Chuck Ernst and the team to be doing that as well. And you make a lot of really great points. I'll also say that when Stern released the Star Wars R2-D2 topper, and they did put that LE on that, and they did have, at that time, an elevated price compared to their other products. I think that price was somewhat reflective of licensing and the limited nature of that product, which is why they did limit it. Hey, if we limit this, then we can push the price up to this point. It's a limited product. So I think they learned from that and said, oh, well, people are going to pay this regardless of its limited nature. They kind of shot themselves in the foot limiting that product because if you asked Stern Pinball and they were being completely honest with you, they would love to make more R2-D2 toppers, but they can't. So I think they learned their lesson there, and they were like, you know what? We're going to put a price tag on it that we need to that makes sense for us and our distribution network, and we don't need to limit it because they're selling and they're going to sell. The non-limit also could help with the supply issue. So rather than them necessarily adjusting the price to try and combat getting a whole surge of orders because they're putting the price really high, I could see more so that they would take the strategy of saying, okay, well, we're going to really stress that this isn't limited because we know instances, you and I know, Zach, of instances where people, like, have gone and bought the Black Knight topper and they don't have a Black Knight, but they're so worried they won't be able to find the topper that they're buying it preemptively in the hopes of eventually getting the game used down the line. This avoids the need for that. Stern's basically saying, if you want to get a Mandalorian topper, don't fret. We're going to be doing these for a long time. So there's not this, people that don't have the Mando right now don't need to feel like, oh, I've got to buy the topper right away because I'll never get it. The first run's the only run. That's been the Stern topper way. Logically, you're right. But for some reason, people are still kind of doing that. I'm getting so many messages, man, that are like, hey, do you have any of the toppers left? I don't want to miss out on this. And I think they are a little bit gun-shy because Stern has, when it comes to toppers, all of a sudden they're like, no, we're not making those anymore. And you're like, what? There was no last call. There was no, what do you mean? You're not making, no, we're just not making those anymore. Now, do you think those messages you're getting are from people that don't own Mandalorian? Or do you, I mean, Mandalorian was a big seller. Yeah, they are people, the majority is people, hey, I'm kind of interested in that game, but I don't want to miss out on this topper.
    25:24
    Do you think I need to buy it? Like, what's the deal there? Well, in which case, then, if it was what I thought, which was Stern saying all this to try and prevent a run on them, then it's not working. The other thing that Stern is doing, and I don't know if this is out of necessity or if this is a marketing thing, but they're giving allotments for a first run in November. Now, these allotments, and this is a personal number based on my business, But I can say that the allotment that we're receiving for our first run, quote-unquote, we're going to receive a lot more than maybe somebody that doesn't buy as many toppers. But it's one-third of what our overall order would be. So percentage-wise, not bad. But still, I'm getting, I'm spending a lot of time answering people, am I in the first run? If not, I need to find it elsewhere. Oh, yes, the first run. Because then they got to, as you noted, they got to hunt. They got to call every discro. Yeah, yeah. So that's tough because, yeah, those toppers are long gone. The thing that surprised me, I saw this and I was like, oh, fuck, this is badass. All the topper nuts out there are going to go nuts like me. Even with a $2,000 price tag, it is what it is.
    26:43
    It'll be a moderate seller. You know, the game itself has kind of softened interest-wise. Those games are not flying off the shelves like they were, and it's a pretty normal thing. Whenever a game comes out, it softens over the course of time, just like any other title will. Mostly any other title will So that didn surprise me if I didn get as many This topper has sold better than other manufacturers games I've sold so many of these damn toppers or pre-sold so many of these damn toppers that I'm left kind of in awe of the response of a $2,000 topper from a game that was released over a year ago. So I'm beyond – I'm happy, of course, but I am very shocked.
    27:35
    I'm not too surprised. It is very – I mean, to a lot of people looking at it, and again, visually, and the quote-unquote DLC that's coming along with it, does seem to be the most advanced of any manufacturer-related topper that I'm aware of. So it's just a step up is what I'm saying. Obviously, it's a step up in price, but it's a step up visually because we all know the case in point, the pinball manufacturer's best regarded topper in the history of toppers is the Black Knight Sword of Rage topper. Arguably.
    28:07
    Yes, that's what I'm arguing. But now, I think this will probably displace that because the integration, the holographic effect just visually is more interesting in and of itself coupled with the expanded code, you know, the Beskar Madness, which you've also got the score stuff and all the other displays, the lifetime stats. It's doing a lot more than telling you you don't know how to play. That's a fantastic point. It may not be the visual animatronics that people always long for, but yes. Man, it's battling. It's apples and oranges almost, the style of these two toppers we're discussing, but it was made to be the Black Knight Topper Killer. And whether it succeeded, we'll see. But I've sold, I've probably sold more Mando Toppers than I did Black Knight Toppers. Maybe that's a title thing. I also was told that Mandalorian have sold a lot of units. The game itself have sold a lot. I'm saying a lot of units. Yeah, no. Well, that is a super hot license. and I think, you know, as unfair as it was, a lot of people I think were more receptive to the layout and how different it looked from Brian Eddy than his Stranger Things layout. So I think there's some people that were kind of like, oh, I don't want to see, you know, the same thing we've been seeing. You know, I don't want to see the Attack from Mars Brian Eddy. I want to see something like the Shadow Brian. And, of course, Mando isn't that, but it's also not. It's also not like Medieval Madness and Attack from Mars. There were just a lot of things. I honestly thought that Mandalorian was going to be game of the year until Godzilla came out. Yeah. And then it was like, oh, okay, well, that's not going to happen. We still haven't seen that topper. We still haven't seen a Rush topper. We still haven't seen a James Bond topper. I don't know what to make of all of it. We've sold a shitload of them. We continue to sell a lot of these. I don't know when the second run is going to be. If I had to guess, the second run production of these toppers for Mandalorian will probably fall into 2023. Q1 of 2023. That's what I would guess. I'm going to guess Q2.
    30:19
    Start of Q2. April. April 2023. Aren't you a QT? April. April again. Just saying. When those bond pros are gone. I'm just... Hey, look. I only report the facts when I report the opinion. And this is in the opinion realm. Oh, my God. But also from Stern Pinball, there's been code updates for Godzilla and Rush, both now at V1.01. I need to turn my Godzilla on and install it then. That's right. I haven't played it in two weeks. Oh. Busy, busy. I'm a busy little bee. So you said, Zach, that the Mando topper was at Expo. What else happened at Expo? That was kind of one of the big releases at the Chicago Pinball Expo. We rolled into Wednesday, kind of setting up the booth, and we jumped over to the Flippin' Out Expo tailgate party, hosted by Bill Webb and Steve Beattie, Courtney Bowman. They're the stream team for us every Monday-ish night on Flippin' Out Twitch stream. I can't thank them enough for setting this all up. They always have pinball creators, designers, coders there. They bring, Beattie has a nice, you know, a nice collection of 20-plus pinball machines and a heated garage. They got the big trailer full of the TVs and the music and the bratwurst and the hot dogs and cheeseburger. It was a damn great time. And they did that all for the pinball people. It was a blast. And I got to hang out with Dwight. I got to hang out with Jerry, like some of my favorite Stern people, Jerry Thompson.
    31:53
    Eric Minyer from JJP, Peter Dorn, Kiefer, some Keith Johnson. Did you get to hang out with anyone you hate? Anyone I hate?
    32:02
    No. You know what? No. I didn't hate anyone there. So it was nice. I can't say thank you enough. And then we rolled into the show and the big, you know, everybody wanted to know about James Bond, 007. Got my hands on that, the pro-ambring.
    32:20
    How's the code looking? Well, so I will say that the highlight was the shots. It shot really good. You see what I'm doing there? Yeah, well, the shots look, I did catch the tail end of the dead flip gameplay reveal stream. And the shots, yeah, they looked kind of like we thought from the photos. They looked fun. Oh, yeah, they did have that Stern stream, I believe. And this was my opinion, and the opinion, though, of others that saw more of the game than me, were kind of like a, why are they showing it in this code state? And there was some speculation that, well, maybe the code would be updated by Expo.
    32:53
    Yeah, that's interesting. You know how it is when you go to the show. You can't hear. You're not really going to get into the game much. So, yeah, I'm not savvy enough to be able to pick up on that code. So it's hard for me to say. But I did go back and watch that reveal Stern Stream, and the code did seem very bare. It seemed very bare.
    33:18
    And so that's probably the same way at the expo. I was starting multi-ball, starting modes. They didn't have the one-ball bird. They didn't have what we call European rules. Baby's first multi-ball. Where we let you do one ball lock and get the ball. So that seemed very normal There was plenty of animations There was plenty of video clips The animations, that kind of stuck out to me I was like, oh, that looks really good I like the style they're going with there It was just a clean game So, yeah, I think it's going to be a big hit for them In person, the cabinets looked really good The art looked really good There was no complaints there Maybe not as beautiful as we would like But, yeah, they look cool and it shot fun, it shot really, really damn good, especially the right side of the play field. That missile one area, it's fine, especially on the premium. It's nice because you at least have some ball locking going up there. But feeding that third flipper was done so on multiple shots, so I can appreciate that. So anytime you hit that missile, it is feeding that upper flipper for an additional shot. The only thing I didn't really like about the layout, I thought it was going to be that side ramp shot. That thing was fine. It was smooth as hell. It's the little creature pit. So you know what I'm talking about, the left side under the third flipper? Oh, where the diver thing is? Yes, yes. Okay, yes. So that was just kind of weird because you hit it in there, and I guess maybe because when it kicks it out, it kicks it out to the same spot, which is the stand-up target in front of that tank, but then you're really out of control. It's like I don't even want to go in there unless points are there, and less progress is there. But no, the code did seem like it's going to lend itself to multiple stacking opportunities. That's one thing that stood out to me. Whether they were coded in there or not, I thought, damn, okay, you're going to be having three or four things going on at the same time on this game, which a lot of people, a lot of hobbyists love. Okay. Interesting. Diamond spinner shot was awesome. Left orbit was freaking awesome. It flows really good. We'll have to see. Dude, until I get to, and that's what I told George Gomez. Who was I telling that to? I need to get it home. Same thing with, like, all these other games I played. Queen, Magic Girl, I won't get that at home. But I can't tell anything on these games until I sit down by myself and actually get some good play on them. See, I'm not a very good reporter, are I? No, but you used a lot of words to get us to the same place of nothingness that we started at. It's stern. It shoots phenomenally. If you like James Bond, it's a no-brainer. Well, you mentioned Magic Girl, so did you get an opportunity to play the working Magic Girl? That was another big highlight of this pinball expo. Whoa, some say it was the only reason to go to expo. Who in the hell said that?
    36:13
    Rumors are, these are rumors, so they may be totally untrue. Rumors are that Magic Girl was the highlight of the show. It was a highlight for a lot of people because that kept a line. Granted, it was only one machine, but it kept a line the entire show. It was kind of roped off to by itself, isolated as much as you can isolate within that show floor. But it always had a line on it. I did step in a line to play with some buddies and with my other buddy, Bug, from Spooky Pinball. He and I kicked around some Magic Girl, and it worked. Well, yeah, but they said it was working. I don't know. That's why it's there. Well, but I wasn't excited. It worked. It was real. They weren't lying. Yeah, but, okay, so I told people, they were like, oh, it works. I'm like, it works-ish. I don't know if it's working in the intended design fashion that it was created.
    37:11
    They did some workarounds because John Papaduke's design and engineering was incomplete. So they filled in the blanks and it didn't crash per se or it didn't get hung up in spots where there was just no engineering or design capable of doing what it was supposed to be. They fixed all those issues. The animated code and stuff, when I watched it on stream, looked bare. Those were cleaned up a little bit. It was a John Papadu game. That's what it was. It played like Totem and Circus Voltaire, for better or worse. Okay. A lot of plastic. So would you have been more comfortable if they had said instead of calling it a working Magic Girl That it was a functional Magic Girl? I think that would be more accurate Okay, well They did their best I would say that the perception or the feedback that I received talking to people that played Magic Girl All of them said, whether it's true or not, all of them said the same thing first They all said, probably the most beautiful pinball machine ever made They all said that then they went into okay well how does it play how does it rules wise 90's Bally Williams rules probably a little less than that because of the holes that were left in the code initially and them trying to fix that it plays just like a John Papaduke game so my fucking idiot ass liked it of course because you're a huge J-pop fan and I feel horrible I suspect you still think Yep, and I may be wrong, and you can correct me because you're on the show, obviously, but I've often suspected you still would like a manufacturer to give him another chance. That I can publicly say they would be ignorant and stupid to ever give that man another chance to design a pinball machine. Even as much as I like his designs or his team's designs when he was on them, no. Unequivocally, no. If you want to have an unsuccessful business that goes into the fucking hole, go ahead and hire him. I did, and the reason I'm strong on that, Dennis, and I will not say the manufacturer, but there was a manufacturer that was trying to pitch me. I don't know if they were playing devil's advocate. They were trying to pitch me the idea that maybe they could make it work. John Popper said it.
    39:34
    And that was my response. I said, if you want to fucking go bankrupt, then yeah, you should do it. Because you're actually doing good right now. So, yeah. Oh, so this is an established manufacturer. This is a manufacturer that has made at least one machine. Okay. And I said, no, what the fuck are you, like, maybe they were just trying to get me fired up. Yeah, I mean, yeah, it's, well, I don't want to read too much into it. But pinball is full of, let's say, confident, very confident individuals, especially a lot of the manufacturers. And I would say to a fault, because I think that pinball is essentially a, you know, and I mean this in the most optimistic, fun way, almost a barren wasteland of manufacturing failures. So that they would all think that they could do it doesn't surprise me, but we've seen people trip over less large boulders than this. So, you know, it strategically doesn't seem like it's worth the risk. And there were some shots in there that, I mean, I really liked the style and the design of that game. I did. And I didn't get to enable the mid-level Twilight Zone magnets. What do they call that in Twilight Zone? The power? The power. So he has designed something very reminiscent to that mid-play field where you get it in a buck and it goes up to the top. I didn't get to see that work because I just simply didn't get that far into it. But it locked balls physically. It released them upon multi-ball. I played it. I thought it shot like a John Papaduke, which I enjoy. I like it. It was a fucking specter to look at. It was beautiful. Even that stupid, goofy-ass cabinet that John Papaduke did with the whole Zidware thing, that was a good design concept. It really works and still looks like very much a pinball machine. I hate sitting here talking positive about it, but I'm just being honest. it. Honestly is all we can ask. It works in a lot of ways. That's all the listeners want. It worked. But the reason I've lost all faith and hope in anything John Papaduke moving forward is because of that shit that was Retro Atomic Zombie Adventureland. That was all him, Dennis. And that was fucking atrocious. I could have designed a better pinball machine and I have no experience designing anything. That was trash. and I never played it. Some people liked it. There's no way. No, I knew one person liked it. I remember hearing them because they were a pinball media person. There was nothing in there to shoot. I lost all my faith in John Papaduke on that release.
    42:13
    Well, that's sort of sad. It makes me sad. Let's get fired up. It doesn't. I'm not sad. I don't care. Pinball Brothers made a big deal. Yeah, so they had Queen there, you said. They had a number of Aliens LVs. Ooh, that's a pretty machine. Damn. You know, I so wish I liked how Alien played because it's one of my favorite themes, but I just don't. Oh, that's a good point we'll discuss right now. They did have two Queen machines. The Queen machines are a standard body, not a wide body. And Pinball Brothers, damn it.
    42:42
    And I've talked to them for a long extended period of time. The two actual Pinball Brothers were there. Oh, they were there? They were there. Okay. One of their, so yeah, and they were very nice people, and they seem normal-ish.
    43:00
    What does this mean? Because I can't. I thought they were going to be like aliens, man. I meet some weird people in pinball, especially some of the manufacturers that make bad decisions at times. So I'm always anticipating, like when I see a lot of bad decisions coming from a company, I anticipate the person making those bad decisions are off a bit. So they were normal-ish. And I say ish because I didn't spend enough time with them to. Well, then you don't know. Maybe they're really weird and you just didn't get to experience it. I'm pretty good at picking up some red flags early on. No, maybe they've learned to wear those masks. If they can mask me, then I'll give them credit. I mean, okay. You're a bit rusty. I mean, you've become a pinball salesperson. No, this was going to the pinball expo. That was a good refresher course right there. Very good refresher, of course. But no, they were nice. I think one of their sons was there. His name was Simon. He was, I give Simon some credit, he was so into the company that he was a good spokesperson. He was very well versed into the code, into the mechanisms, so he was explaining things. Okay, so I'm assuming he's older then. Yeah, he was, I would guess, probably in his 20s. Okay, I'm sorry. I have no context. So when you said it, I just imagined a five-year-old. Going around telling you how maybe you could go and fix your Deadpool in your boot. Freddie Mercury rocks. Ha!
    44:32
    Tell another one about your dad. I remember hearing all these songs on Teen Bop. Kid Bop. Whatever it's called. Kid Bop.
    44:41
    Here's the issue with Pinball Brothers being at the show. And this is the ish part of it. What's the ish? They're normal. You said they're normal. You know, these Queen games that were physically fully functional. Every mech worked. Every shot worked. Everything worked. Like Magic Girl. But the code was problematic. And they even said that. They even told people the code is buggy. So they were honest. They were honest. But they were like, hey, to let you know, you know, this thing has crashed a couple times. We're having to reset it. Or, hey, we don't have that enabled because it caused a crash earlier. So we disabled the kickback, the ball kick. So they were honest, but the code was a bit messy.
    45:28
    So why, I don't know, why even bring it? If you're going to give the first impression, a hands-on experience for people potentially buying this product. That was the only issue I had, not only as an enthusiast, but one that carries and sells these products. I'm like, why are we doing this? It was set on two ball, which, again, I don't know if that was a decision to get people moving. Probably. That's pretty typical from other manufacturers that I've heard as well.
    45:56
    JJP's done that. So that was weird. That was really weird. Well, but I mean, it turns out showing James Bond and its codes pretty, I mean, not needing recess, but basic. I would probably guess that it made that code set look complete. And didn't this happen at that Aussie show with the Spinal Tap game? Like, it was crashing. Oh, I don't know because I do not follow that. Was Spinal Tap there? No, I didn't see it. Oh, okay. I didn't see it. So, Queen overall, that code was messy as shit. That's too bad. Here's the thing that, again, damn it, of course people are going to call me a shill. It was still fun, man. It was still fun. Wow. Look, I went back. I played this more than Bond. Dude, that's because it was in line because it kept crashing, man. I went back in line four or five times to play this. I don't know if it's because that was a two-ball thing and it left me hungry, but it shot really well, really, really well. It shot better than Alien, and maybe that's just the wide-body, standard-body thing. The wide-body is going to hurt Alien, yeah. It shot phenomenally well, especially given the design elements in it. A lot of stand-up targets, a lot of drop targets. Drop targets, blocking shots, which I'm okay with, but when that's kind of all you have, an upper play field that was more stand-up targets. Like, I don't know. It just shot really well. Very smooth. That's the number one thing, the feedback I gave them. I said the one big surprising thing to me is how smooth this game shoots. like that little faux buck that pops it up through the, you know what I'm talking about? Not really. It pops it up through the ramp flap and then it comes back down. It looks really odd. That works phenomenally. The orbits were freaking buttery. The right shot that then turns into a wire form may be the best feeling of any shot similar to that with other games. The music was awesome. Even if it was the live stuff, it was phenomenal. It got me toe-tapping. It got me playing. I wanted to come back for more. I didn't play much of the upper play field, though, and that's okay because there's not really much up there. The physical magnet diverter in the back for multi-ball, it all freaking worked. That was kind of my takeaway of the expo. I was like, Queen's actually kind of good. I'm okay with it. I don't know what the code's going to do, but I would own one. I'd definitely own one. But my caveat to that listener would be keep in mind I'm not a big music pen guy at all. I fucking love Queen music. I love, love, love, love Queen music. So that helped out immensely. I don't think it's going to fly off the shelves. The design's not cool enough. But, yeah, that was my little dirty little secret was Queen.
    48:57
    But now the secret's out. Yeah, and I'll give fucking flames for it. Yeah. Chill, chill, chill. Whatever. But I don't own an alien, and I will own a queen. I thought you had an alien. I did. It didn't last long. So you owned an alien. I owned an alien. I don't know. Like, LV is just gorgeous, but the theme's awesome. It was funky shooting. I wish they could have made that into a standard body somehow. So was JGP there? JGP was there. They had a phenomenal booth. really, really beautiful, spectacular booth. Stern had a phenomenal booth as well. The big guys were, you know, they held their own. Technologically, one of the prettiest booths in there, if not the best booth. They were smart. Let me give a shout-out to Cam Cromwell. They were really smart with what they did. So they had Guns N' Roses. They had the Toy Stories. But they also had, like, the crane game or the claw that you could, like, they had an interactive booth more so than other people. So you can win one of the little aliens if you qualified something to play the alien game. They had influencer Gavin Free in. Oh, the slow-mo guy? Slow-mo guy was there playing and had a show appearance there and signing autographs and playing with people. So that was really smart. I've heard rave reviews about the tour. People really were talking about that tour a lot. So people love, love, love that damn tour, especially with the, I guess, the luxury buses and stuff. So J.J.P. had a really good showing, and a lot of people, I did get a lot of people come up, this is, I don't know, good or bad, but a lot of people just came up and were like, hey, dude, you weren't wrong about Toy Story. Like, it's actually a really good game. And I'm like, well, yeah. So I think a lot more people were able to play it.
    50:46
    They're still not going to buy it, Zach. Well, that's what I mean. Like, I don't know if it's a good thing because they came up like, yeah, it's not a total piece of shit. So, I don't know how I was going to sell it, but people, I don't know why they came up to me feeling like I'm the, well, that's because I do like the game. I opened up a Toy Story 4 CE that was my own for the show. Didn't even get to play it yet. I haven't even played my own damn game. So, J.J.P. had a good showing. CGC had a normal showing. They had Cactus Canions. They did have some production LEs there, but they still haven't shipped out a production LE. There were rumors that they might have, there was only a might, and of course there was a rumor, so who knows, that they might have had a new game there, an original game. But they didn't. I did hear that rumor. They did not. You know rumors, they're often not true. I tried to poke around. I'm like, two things. When are we going to see the Ellies come from the factory? They told me maybe as early as this week they may start getting some out. don't hold them to that because it's freaking CGC. And I did hear some rumblings about a new game. Rumble, rumble, rumble. I did hear some rumblings. So I think it's pretty safe to say that we may see something from CGC before the end of the year. Okay. Well, that was another rumor I heard was that the Expo was very up in the air, but that there was a lot more confidence that they may reveal at the end of the year. Yeah. So that was cool. American Pinball was there. They had a booth, a bunch of their games. Now, was Magic Girl in their booth? It was not. It was within the vicinity, but no, it was not. Magic Girl was by itself. American Pinball, nothing new. No tanks? No lunchboxes? No lunchboxes. I mean, there was an opportunity to strike that iron whilst hot, and I fear that it may have passed. I told Dave Figgs, I said simply, you're welcome. TGF!
    52:48
    It's like, shit, dude, we're lobbing you up here somehow. Oops. The old media. I still don't think we're going to see it this year, I guess. I don't. Based off of some statements, I recall reading it. It sounded like they were positioned to not. And I really doubt it, especially given they decided to announce that third iteration of Legends of Valhalla, the classic, to replace the old classic, which is the deluxe, which has replaced the deluxe, which is now the limited deluxe. I'm sure you recall that discussion. What a mess. Oh, yeah, we got some feedback. Oh, really? People like that. I talked to Dave Fix. He was excited. He was Dave Fixy.
    53:28
    He always smiles, always a happy guy. Told me, you know, stuff's a-coming, stuff's a-coming. We did hear about they did get Scorebit integration or at least a partnership with Scorebit moving forward for American Pitball Games. Yeah, I heard about that. I heard about Nordman, I guess, at the seminar. They said Norman, two original titles coming from him. So we got GTF, rumored. Rumored, right. GTF. And one of them is going to have a new redesigned cabinet. I think that was probably just because the next one is going to have a new redesigned cabinet. So ideally, maybe both of them will. But I guess Norman still there I talk to Josh Coogler a lot ex Josh Coogler Oh is he with anyone or is he just at the show I didn ask him I didn't know. Is that tacky to ask? I guess that would have been appropriate.
    54:22
    You know what? I don't. I guess it depends if you know someone or not. But I, you know, professionally, I don't. With what I work with, we have people who move jobs all the time, but usually stay in the field. So it's not unusual to say, hey, are you with the state still? Oh, no, I'm working for a city now. It's like, oh, okay. He was really transparent with me. We had a good chat. He is very, very much into pinball, loves it, loves it. It's his passion. He even told me about a really cool little Easter egg in Houdini. He was like, nobody really caught on to it. And sorry, Coogler, but I've got to tell people because it's fucking brilliant, like the little details. So, you know the start button that flashes? Yes. He said nobody noticed or never said anything, but if you look at the – I'll give this. If you look at the start button flashing for Houdini, it's irregular. It's because it's flashing in Morse code. Morse code, yeah, yeah. And he said there's a thing with Houdini and his wife and just, yeah, the guy's passionate. A lot of good stuff from him. Now, I think just before the show, the AP lost someone else. They did. Thank you for bringing that up. It was announced that their, I don't know if he's lead tech, but Dave Brennan was their, man, he's so freaking good, too. That's the thing is I had a couple people actually message me, like, directly and saying, oh, Dave is leaving AP.
    55:53
    You know, he's really helpful, and he knows his stuff. Yeah. He would always make me feel good when a customer is having issues. Like, that's no problem. I'll contact him. We'll walk through everything until we figure out what's going on. And then if we need a part, I'll walk them through installation of the entire part. Like, that's the kind of tech he was. And I don't know how they lost him because it was his decision to leave. And I think he's going back into an industry familiar to him. And I don't want to even talk about why he left because I don't know. but that's a big loss in my opinion. I know that they got Barry Engler that came over from JJP, who was originally with American Pinball, and he's good. But you don't lose Dave Brannon. That dude was freaking – anybody that's got a collection of their own machines of some of the rarest games and he can restore and work on them himself, he can figure out an AP game. He can figure out a modern game. I would have snatched him up. Maybe he's too pricey. I don't know. I would have snatched him up if I'm a manufacturer. Maybe his old industry. Yeah, I haven't heard any motivations or anything. Maybe his old industry just was able to offer him significantly more money. It could be that simple. Yeah, possibly. But I'd hate to see him go. But he said he'll still be streaming and stuff. I think he was streaming for part of Buffalo Pitbull. Yeah, I thought so. Didn't he used to sometimes be on the TurboGrafx stream? Yep. That's where I think I know him from. Yeah, so fantastic guy. I got to chat with him. There was a fathom revisited in the fathom. Now, you own that, though. I haven't unboxed it yet, but I do know it. You still? I still haven't. It's been like over a month. I want to so bad. Apparently not. I do. I'm too busy. No, you're not. Make Nicole do it. I know. Don't you have like five kids? Have them do it. Oh, that could be a good straight down the middle that blur their faces because we want child exploitation. That's okay. I'll exploit myself. No, okay. Well.
    57:46
    All men love another ball. Yeah, have them say, give them all like each of their own ratchet wrench and say, all right, you guys, I'm going to time you. I'll give them all mermaid fins. Do your thing. Do a hopping around.
    58:00
    I want your two sons to hop into the frame and go, merman, and then hop out, and that's it. Don't drop the game on your torso there, Fletcher.
    58:11
    Daddy's got a bad back. He can't lift it off you. Have it look like the back box is like Pindy or Youngest, and just have him go, beauty. This is a piece of fitness.
    58:22
    I'm telling you, this could be a lot of fun. I got this all alone. Oh, man. Help, help, help. A whole herd of flipping mermaids. Cool. See? We got to work out this stuff before we unbox things. But, man, this pinball machine was gorgeous. It gave me a bony from across the room. I'm like, look at that shit. It's a pretty game. I didn't get to play it, though. Didn't play it. Didn't want to wait in line. But she was a looker. It looks just like it does in the videos. But the cabinet is what got me. It's like a different. It's weird. It's like a Metallica, but it's different than the other manufacturer's Metallica stuff. That's going to be a winner. You're going to see that game. Dennis, mark my word. You're going to see that game, even if it is expensive as it is. It's like $10,000 plus shipping, which is fucking crazy. It's going to go even higher than that. That's always going to be a hot game. which gives me faith that other of these little remakes, older games, can work.
    59:24
    And speaking of whether a game can work or not, the homebrew section, I visited that. Okay. Yeah, I remember last year they had a pretty substantial homebrew section.
    59:34
    Okay. So like eight games or so, I think, last year. There wasn't really a big tout for the American Dream. I was going to ask you about that. So was there any? Who was the winner? I don't know. Who won? I don't know who won. I didn't see a banner that said, you know, be the next top model. I don't know.
    59:54
    Here's what happens when you're in media, Dennis, and you know this all too well. You get in a position where there's an olive branch, and you get in a position where things are easy, right? Prices are too much money. Homebrewers are great. There's like these little things that if you get behind them, whether you believe them or not, you'll get support from people, right? You know what I'm talking about? I think I know where you're coming from. There are easy arguments in Pimple. The tougher thing is to tell the truth. Uh-oh. I could come in and say... Uh-oh. Yeah. Uh-oh. I know. Are you telling me I shouldn't do this? No, go ahead and do it, because they'll blame you and not me. Oh, shit.
    60:37
    Go ahead. I could come in here and say... Let me... I'm sorry to cut in. I know what's going to happen. Let me position it in a way that's going to get less blowback. Thanks. How many, roughly, do you recall, how many homebrews were there in the homebrew row or whatever? At least 12. Okay. Out of those, what percentage were good? I didn't play them all. Out of those, what percentage do you think were good? I looked them all in a different lens because of my own upcoming projects. So I was looking very much at details and design and operating systems, and I was looking in a different lens specifically. I'll say that. Okay. And which one of them looked good? Which one of them? Which one? How many looked good? What are we going for is good, though.
    61:37
    My point being, Dennis, is that. I don't know what your point is. My point being that. My easy question. My point being that I could say that these homebrew people are fantastic. They are the future, all being true. I'm supportive of them. I think it's fucking awesome, and I do. I believe all of this stuff. I'm just saying that a lot of them, like, I don't get it. I guess I don't get the design, some of it. I don't get the rush. I mean, some of these things were just so fucking sloppy. Oh, that's where I'm going to get in trouble.
    62:19
    Slop. I don't. When you make a homebrew and you work that diligently and you plunge the ball and you shoot a couple shots, if that already sucks, then why are you spending time on anything else until you get that figured out? That's what I'm saying, I guess. If you can't figure out the plunge or the flippers or just basic places to put a ball, I don't know. Well, maybe they don't. It's coming from someone ignorant that's never designed a pinball machine. Well, we'll be fair, as we like to be. So they might not be aware, and part of that could be a lot of people. How? Well, all right. They never play pinball? Well, they play badly. Okay, that's fine. I mean, there are people out there that like Champions Pub, Zach. And all it is is a theme. All it is is the best world under glass that we've ever seen. But it's a clunk monster, and it's not fun. And that's obviously just my opinion. But there are badly, however we might think pinball should play, there are badly existing manufactured versions out there. Here's what I think. I think what happens is, with homebrew especially, with anything small, we see this even with small manufacturers, but homebrew even more so. People don't want to hurt anyone's feelings, so they don't actually give honest feedback about what is or isn't working. And in the designer's head, they might not even be honestly all that focused about the shots. I think a lot of homebrew people get caught on the idea of the theme and how much of the theme they can cram into the game, and that's what excites them. It's cramming in every little reference that they can get, and then if it means the game doesn't play very well, The focus was, oh, you love this movie. I'm trying to think of a movie. I'll use Event Horizons. All right, let's say I was doing an Event Horizon Humber because I don't think there's an Event Horizon Humber that exists. Now I'm like, I'm going to put in, you know, where we're going, we don't need eyes to see. I'm going to have the folding space drive, and I'm going to have the weird green light circuit board tunnels, and I'm going to have the airlock with Mama Bear, Baby Bear, and I'm going to have the surgery table, and I'm going to have the explosive linked bridge between the two ships and Nebuchadnezzar. You like to play too much this game or that movie. So my point is, by the time I've put in just those elements I've just rambled off, I've already put in too much into the game. Okay. But you could see where if I'm like, if Aunt Rosa needs to have a game, that's what you're going to get. I'm just going to vomit movie all over this thing, and I'm going to fit things in where I can to make it playable, but the goal isn't to make it fun. The goal is every time you do something, you get that dopamine injection of remembering the movie. That's what I think a lot of it is. And bear in mind, a lot of these people have no desire to be professional designers. I remind myself that too. It's just a project. It's a fun project because they can. They figured it out. And that I'm jealous of because there's a lot more expertise and skill and craft than I'll ever have probably. I'll point out I think I saw this on Pinside once it wasn't directed at me or anyone specific but I remember someone just sort of I think they were talking about podcasts and they just sort of lamented how there wasn't coverage of the homebrew scene and again I don't listen to all that many I've heard that before too well because it's not news I mean that's why I don't cover it because the only time you get to experience a homebrew is like at a show and almost none of them are ever going to be made in production capabilities So there are groups like on Facebook and stuff, I'm a member of some of them, where you can go and relish the homebrew scene. But the homebrew scene is not, let's not overly elevate it into something that it's not. I'm a flat channel. Yeah, I'm with you. It's an amateur area of people, and there are a few within it that might be using that to develop some bona fides to land a job. Perfectly said. It would be really cool to see a company like American Pinball or Stern go and see, like what we saw with Scott with Total Nuclear Annihilation, and be like, that game is so good, it deserves to be made. But remember, Scott didn't want to be a permanent designer. He's done one other game on contract. He works for Pinball Life, and he loves what he does. He wasn't trying to become a designer. He wasn't shooting for it. And a lot of them, I think, are just doing it for fun. And so that's why I don't feel the desire to judge them one way or another. And I've never been overly harsh with any particular homebrew I've played because it's an amateur doing an amateur project for the passion of it. And I have no interest in judging it because I'm not trying to take someone's money. You articulate it better than I ever could. Well, that's what I'm here for. Thank you for doing that. Yeah, I was just, I don't know, just wasn't that impressed. No, I honestly. Maybe my lens was different than it was. Everyone that I think, I played a few last year and I was like, they had a lot of them and I didn't get to play Sonic Spinball, which was like the one everyone was loving on. And once I played, like all of them had really cool concept that I liked. Oh, yeah. But I didn't have enough time to like take the whole layout and be like, And if I did, I'd probably be like, you know what, I'd rather, like, you have the one cool shot, and then everything else is kind of, like, built around it. Yeah, what I thought would be cool is to pick one, because there is always one feature on each of these machines. I'm like, oh, shit, that is super, super clever. But to take one, at least one element from all of those 12 or 15 or however many were there, and then to put them in a game. Like, let's work as a team. All of you guys work as a team to create one. But that's a more interesting idea to me because there's some great creative minds there. But individually, it's a tall task to create a pinball machine. And I was more impressed with there was like this original design maybe pinball machine in the fast booth that was right by, sorry, listener, I don't know what the name of it was, but it was right by Fathom. That was impressive to me. I'm like, this could actually, that layout could do something. Very classic. single level. That was a cool game. It wasn't the Norse one, was it? No, I did see the, what was it, like Norse gods, Greek gods or something like that. Well, he has that. I don't know if anyone's built it yet, but that. And I'll mispronounce it because it's the French thing. It's like Champs-Élysées, the cycling one that he did. It's a true street level, a true premier style street level. The Norse one. Yeah. Yeah, yeah, yeah. I didn't think anyone had built it yet. I think he's been working on actually making one, but he's based on the plans and stuff. But, of course, he's a professional designer. I really wanted to highlight that fast booth because they have come a long way. And if I was jumping into homebrew stuff, I think I'd focus there. They had a whole lineup of games that were running off of the fast board, even games that we know well, the manufactured games. that were still running off of Fast Software, and I was thoroughly impressed with that booth and with what they are doing in pinball. I think that's an up-and-coming riser. It's already big in our industry, but that's one to look out for there, that company. Yeah, it was. I mean, historically, like, because without taking old boards and doing something with an existing older board set, I've only really been aware of two major options. It's multimorphic, of course, as their P-Rock, P3-Rock boards, which is what a lot of homebrewers turn to. And then I'd also heard, this was years ago, that some people were using Fast and doing the Fast Board stuff. And I think Fast is starting to get more general public attention now that they have that arrangement with Planetary. And so, so many of the, like, Rudy's Nightmare kits and stuff are using Fast. So, I think more and more people are seeing, and Fathom revisited using Fast. And so, like, I think a lot of people are now seeing, oh, yeah, you can do stuff with it. modern stuff with them. I don't know if people ever really thought about it much because again, and maybe it was just the circles I run in. I know more people that had worked with P-Rock stuff.
    70:25
    Just very interesting. I thought also interesting and oddly, a lot of the expo had a video game section or an arcade section bigger than I thought it ever would be even with vendors selling used video games and stuff. They had a... Well, I can't remember. They had a fairly big in the free play area last year, like console game setup. I wonder if they were doing tournaments or something.
    70:52
    And that was here again this year, but because everything was blended within one another, maybe that was surprising because it was sectioned off more so in a corner. I mean, strategically, it could make sense if they were trying to up the foot traffic to put more of a video game focus because the broader public is more familiar with video games. Especially home video games, not arcade. Also, like, maybe trying to get more stuff on the floor and just saying, you know, you can bring this stuff in and earn a pass or whatever. Again, I don't know. This is all speculation. Yeah, and it was odd because I'm like, this isn't NGC. You know, this is Pinball Expo. This isn't a gaming classic. This isn't a, but interesting. I'm a little surprised that they would do much on the home video game. Arcade makes a little more sense because they were often in tandem. Operators usually routed both, arcade and pinball together. Distributors sell both, yeah. Yeah, yeah. And they did have that. Chris Menier at Kingpin had all the Royal Thrill stuff. So that was different and fun, too. They had the flip-out tournament. I don't know much about it. I don't know who won because I was traveling, and everybody seemed to be having fun in the flip-out tournament. Good job, winners. Sorry, guys. No, we praised them. flipping the script on Autism Happen. That was a big event. That was a lot to talk about there. A lot of people donated. Thank you to all of those people who donated and took time to donate items, such as yourself, Dennis. Thank you. Your Creso Clone shirt went for... That got bid on and won and went for good money. Did it go for more than that sheet music? The sheet music really did. Did you see how much that damn thing went for? Not ultimately, no. Wow. I never thought it would go in the 2000s, I think, if not more. Oh, wow. It really went for a lot of money. We had a friend of the show, Steve Jablonski, who's the composer. Has he written in yet and said which of us he likes more? I don't want to do that because I'm afraid of the answer. That's not a – Steve, if you're listening, tell us. I'm with Drayvone. I don't want – no. No. Go ahead and say Zach, Steve. It won't hurt my feelings. Just assuming maybe he's a fan of mine. But no, he was phenomenal. He donated that. And then he donated a Transformers album or CD or something to put on top of that. That was the biggest item of the entire thing. So thank you. Oh, more than that attack from Mars. Yeah, it flew past that. Flew past it. So thank you, Steve. And thank you, Michael Bay, for signing that and doing custom messages and stuff. Steve, can you give me the Event Horizon score? I don't know if you worked on that or not. I wonder who did the event harassment score.
    73:41
    But he showed up huge, and he's a fellow pinhead, so we have him to thank for the flip in the script. I heard that they did reach that very, I felt, very ambitious goal of $25,000. They sure did, with a special thank you. You know who you are out there for coming in and making a very, very large and generous anonymous donation. Oh, so there was a Well, how do you know who they were, Zach? They were anonymous Yeah, Zach, how do you know? They reached out to get some help with how to go about doing it Ah, interesting Okay, well, yes, thank you That's very generous An anonymous whale Yeah A lone cry We can't identify what type of whale it is From its cry That whale was awesome, thank you Thank you, thank you Did you see, it was kind of surreal seeing all of the different, the Keith Ellens, the Roger Sharps, just a slew of creators and historical figures in pinball coming in and helping that cause coming together. It was awesome. Unfortunately, I could not watch a lot of it, so I'll say what I did see. So I saw a part where Scott and Josh with Loser Kids Pinball Podcast, that were really, you know, Josh was really trying to organize this event together. They were on with Steve Bowden from American Pinball. Okay. And spent a lot of time actually talking about the Pinball Dictionary that Steve Bowden has hosted for years. So I thought that was a really fun discussion. It's a clever idea. Really, really deep in the weeds pinheads would like. And then I also caught the tail end of when you and Mark Silk were talking. Oh, yeah, yeah. And he was trying to get you to do your Scooby-Doo voice, and you're all like, oh, shucks. I'm such a bashful. He was just framing me, and yeah. Yeah, that was a good little shtick we had. So those are the parts I saw. And I did not realize I saw the commercial for the learning solutions there. Yeah, in between the – I didn't realize George Fisher did that with Don't Panic Flip. Freaking humble. That whole event could not have happened without George Fisher. I mean, I was going to switch away because they stopped, and I'm like, oh, wow, wait. This commercial was like what I see with the Prevent Cancer Society and Dr. Borders when Games Done Quick. And that's, Games Done Quick is a super professional thing. But the whole stream setup was incredible. It really was. So I'm going to give a special Dennis shout-out to George Fisher. I was extremely impressed with how well it looked and how well it was managed from what parts I did see. Is it a gold star that you're giving? What would you give? Well, I don't have any physical gold stars to extend.
    76:22
    Because, you know, I wrapped them in 24-karat gold foil and you can't touch them. You can't touch them. They're really just for toppers. Gilded. Gilded toy.
    76:32
    Yeah, it was a wonderful event, and he did. He filmed, directed, and produced that entire thing, and I was giving him credit just as a brand. I was like, dude, oh, my God, like you did that? And he focused on the stuff. He's like, well, the audio levels weren't that great because the children were loud, but that's part of the production. It's wonderful, but it was hard to really isolate that audio. I'm like, dude, no. What are you worried about? This is fantastic. Do you think Steve could get me George's score from the commercial? Jablonski can do anything. Okay. Have you not heard his work? I mean, it will bring tears to your eyes. I have seen Transformers, so I'm sure I've heard his work. Everybody go listen to the piece called Tessa.
    77:16
    I mean, overall, that was Chicago Pinball Expo. My own selfish shout-outs. I wanted to give a shout out to Haley and Dan Rosenstein. Boy, oh boy, making my heart flutter. Did you hear the story of the dad and his daughter who came to Expo with a picture book? Did you hear about this? No. I think I saw a photo of a picture book that you posted, but I didn't know if that's related to this or if it was something else. Yeah, so Dan brought his daughter Haley to this event. I think they're from the west, northwest, and he created a picture book of all the people that he's accustomed to watching or listening to, the creators, the George Gomez, the designers of the world, the coders of the world, the personalities, the Zach Minnies and Greg Bones and Amanda Hamiltons, you know, streamers, podcasters, video creators, such and such. So he created this little book like you do at Disney World, and you go and get the little autograph. So it gave Haley something to do throughout the show, like, you know, find this person here and let's have them sign. And she was a big pinball fan, too. So he did this. And darn if they just didn't make my day because Haley came over and wanted me to sign the book where I was. And she even put Nicole in, which is awesome. And so it was just a fun interaction with little Haley. And Greg Bone wasn't there. So I was like, oh, do you like that? Greg never does anything. I asked because she had a spread of Greg and I, and I said, are you probably like Greg more than me? And she gave me the look, the little shit. She gave me the look as if she did. So you know what I did, Dennis? What? I said, well, sweetheart, he's not going to be able to sign your book because he's not here. Does that mean? You broke her little heart, Haley. And then I proceeded to make her giggle and snicker as I then took Greg Bone's picture, drawing a mustache and black eyes. Oh, no. Black tears. No. Yeah, missing teeth. No, not his teeth. His teeth.
    79:21
    Yeah. I was appropriate, though. Didn't want to mess up Loyola's book, so she got a kick out of that. And then Amanda Hamilton kept, boy, look at the first picture in the book. I was like, look, young gun, you got a quarter of a picture, and I got a full two-page spread, so sit down. Sit down. Was it the picture of you in your Jurassic Park Ian pose? That would have been awesome.
    79:55
    Me and Greg got the centerfold. It was awesome. And I also want to shout out to the Sharp Family Singers. I met new friends, Dennis. They came up, and the Sharp Family Singers were a group on the TikToks and the Facebooks and the YouTubes, and they're viral. They're huge. They make tons of gobs of money because they're uber talented. They've been an America's Got Talent and all that crap. But they're big pinball people, the whole family. Even mom's a big pinball person. It was just dad and son that were there, and they were awesome, beautiful-looking people. He played in, like, Les Mis on Broadway and stuff. Phenomenal talented people. But shout-out to the mom, who's apparently a huge Zach fan. So they came up, and they're into pinball. They're fresh into pinball, but they have a ton of machines. and we had fun. My family now watches their family's videos and stuff, so you've got to go check out Sharp Family Singers. We've got something planned that we're going to be doing some video stuff with them in the future. Wow, just lovely, lovely people, the Sharp Family Singers. That's neat. That's really neat. Sharp Family Mom, write into the pinballnetwork.gmail.com and say if you prefer Dennis or Zach. Oh, no, no.
    81:07
    You can say Zach. It won't hurt my feelings. We're going to keep mining for war here, though. until we find something We going to find well I asked for him Dwight Sullivan I invested so much time into our friendship and he still prefers you What No I don Dwight, write in to him on that work and tell Zach that you actually like Zach better because he needs that. I do need it because he told me at the expo thing. I'm like, you're still a dentist thing over me, right? And he was like, Zach, I'm not going to lie to you. I'm your friend, but why would I lie? I can imagine him saying this. There's no reason to lie. Like, Dennis is just something special. And I'm like, flipping out booth helpers, thank you so much. Each and every one of you guys that helped set up and break down because I felt like a schmuck. I couldn't lift anything because of the back thing. So I tried, and then people would be like, stop it. Can't do that. And the biggest shout-out to Nicole for, well, she's like a thing with the flipping out. She sends everything out. She's a huge part of flipping out. I think sometimes people think that you say this like she's only like, oh, yeah, I'm, you know, we own it. Like a token part of it, yeah. Yeah, yeah. But no, like everything, because Zach sends me stuff sometimes. Like everything from Flippin' Out is sent by Nicole. It goes through her. Every product that we're excited, it goes through her. Nicole is the only reason why I have my T-shirt money. You did, yes. Yes, I did get it. T-shirt money. I did get it. Woo-hoo. So, yeah, bibu bibu, thank you. Big shout out to her because I couldn't do anything, but she could do things, and she was directing people and helping people. And a lot of people would come up to her and talk to her over me, which is new, and I'm good with that, I guess. She is very pleasant. She was. It was the cutest thing in the world. I look over, and I see her and Craig Bobby playing Big Buck Hunter together and, like, laughing and having the best old time. And I had to go take a picture with them, too, because I'm like, these two are so precious. but yeah she was having a lot of fun and she's like into it which is weird for me Nicole write into gmail.com and say who prefers Zach or Craig she does she probably prefer both of you guys because she's frustrated with me she's met me I think I've probably worn it a little thin she's bummed I'm great in small doses is how I would generally describe myself I think that's fair I'm good in small doses. Though, she says this, and if she hears it, which is fine. It is a little odd because she's, like, the last time, she's like, Dennis, you just remind me so much of my son. Yes. And I'm like, I don't know how to take that. That's odd to me. Well, it's one of the most important people in her life, so. And she likes that person better than me, so.
    83:58
    I take it positively, my friend, but I couldn't do anything. Well, and it makes her feel any better. I'm my mom's favorite, too. Oh, you're both just kidding. I'm just kidding. Don't be mad. Don't blame her. Don't blame mom. She can't take it right now. There's too much stress. Let's think about it. I mean, dad's got to have a favorite, so maybe by default.
    84:25
    All right, so that was my thank you. Oh, thank you to the medical staff at our booth who embarrassed the hell out of me. Of course, Amanda Hamilton's a freaking behind-the-profile nurse, and then we got Scott Larson's a freaking anesthesiologist. And Nicole, she had to freaking tell him that my sight wound was swollen a little bit from the drive, and it was getting a little weird looking. So, of course, we told Amanda, and then Amanda was like, asked for a consult with Scott. My back was being shown in the center of a public play. I'm like, guys, this is bad. I don't want you guys looking at my wound. Please. I didn't tell them to fuck off. It was like time and place. And they were like, shut up. We got to make sure you're okay. They don't. They hear that whole, I'm fine, too much. There's no. Those medical people have zero tolerance for that. So she took a Sharpie and put it around my swelling area. We're going to check with you tomorrow. And then Scott Larson's sending pictures to random stranger neurosurgeon he knows. And I'm like, I love you guys, but this is embarrassing. And when I looked in the mirror, because she circled around the wound, it looked like a big old butthole. So I had a butthole in my back all week. But thank you, guys.
    85:44
    I think that's about it. I mean, Dutch Pinball's got some new Big Lebowski code we can talk about. Yeah, they finished the wizard mode. Yeah, version 1.00. It's done. The dude abides now. and of course this dude already sold his machine so that sucks Spooky Pimble a lot of chatter about Spooky releasing a game possibly this year. Other than the TNA 2.0? Other than the TNA 2.0 Okay because I hadn't heard any rumors on this Yeah I was I had a couple people coming up to me hey man I've been talking to people and I think we might see another game this year they're about done with all the other stuff so awesome same with CGC same with oh last one, this is a big old nugget here before we drop the bomb. Oh, I love chicky nuggies.
    86:27
    2022 Twiffies are coming, right? Right. And I saw a post, Jeff Tealas was saying that he was asked to host which he was grateful for, but he turned him down and stuff, but I, because it's my baby, it's my child, it's my brother, I won't do it. I fucking can't let it go. I'm still bitter and sad. So I reached out and I wanted more info about this because I'm like, what is going on here? So come to find out, Jeff Patterson, one of the original co-creators of the Twippies, is out.
    86:58
    He will not be a part of this year's Twippies for the first time in the show's existence. Hmm. That is, I didn't know. Okay, well, interesting. Yeah. So, and Jeff and I are good speaking terms, and I spoke with him a little bit about it. And it's not like he was like, oh, don't tell him anything. He's like, yeah, lately he's kind of been out of pinball and a lot of work responsibilities. And he just said he doesn't even – he's not even on the committee. So if a committee doesn't have any part of any of this. Well, you know, again, and for those that didn't know, because, again, it's like the sausage making. You know, with the Pinball Industry Awards, you didn't do the committee this last year. Yep. You were willing to host. And we had you and Greg host, but you weren't a part of the playing. So, I mean, it's not unheard of is what I'm saying. So he's not going to be winning a part of it. He didn't go to Expo. He said I don't think he's going to TPF. He doesn't run This Week in Pinball anymore. I heard Will was doing the posts now for This Week in Pinball. So I suppose that Will O'Wedding is going to be running this year's Twippies, and I'm assuming that they are. Well, they have a committee, so. Yes, yes, yes. So that probably – I mean, when you – you didn't know, Zach, when you didn't participate on the committee, well, it sucked because I had to do a ton more work. But we did have a team. So we had a team. Yeah, you guys kicked ass doing that.
    88:23
    I think the only reason you hosted that, though, was you heard all of our ideas that we were talking about, and you were like, oh, my God, this is going to be like a third grade. I should have just turned it all over to George Fisher. Yeah. Because he was on the committee, and after seeing what he did with flipping the script, I was like, we would have been fine. Yes, we would have been fine. But no, Zach came in and was like, you guys want me and Greg? We can do it, but it's on our terms. We construct the entire show. You know what? Absolutely. Full creative control. We'll find all the disclaimers. We're going to do like webcam stuff.
    88:58
    I could feel his blood pressure rising. I hope that these changes have helped lower Jeff's blood pressure. I'm not going to home-prew you. Yeah, I was terrified what you were about to do to that thing. So, yeah, I jumped in. And this terrifies me as well with Jeff Patterson being out. I'm not going to lie. Because although I'm not by my choice, but I'm not part of the Twippies, it's still part of me and terrifies me each and every year, especially after whatever the hell that was last year. Oh, wait. They got to be doing something. Well, obviously, that's why I'm sure Jeff Teolis was contacted. And I think they said last year that they weren't going to do the same hosts. It comes to that. We were talking about it. Greg and I were talking about it, because he was a co-creator as well. I don't think he ever reported this publicly. They reached out to Greg Bone to co-host with Emoto, I believe, two years ago. Hmm. Okay. And he turned it down. Well, everyone does like Greg more, so. I know. So, yeah. It does. Okay. Well, interesting. He just said he couldn't do it without me, so it was nice. It was nice. I was like, aw. Aw. That was nice of him. Fucking Greg Bone. I'd have just done it.
    90:12
    Man, oh man, woman, oh woman, and girl, oh girl, and boy, oh boy! My voice is gone. Pinball Expo took it out on me. Pinball Expo's big this year. The Mando Topper of Stern brought some heat this year. Other manufacturers, newcomers, they were huge. But they all pale in comparison. At least 20, 30 people at this expo had to come up and sing their praises for one podcast segment and one podcast segment alone. ladies and gentlemen with a shit voice it's pinball market trends how many of you came up and said bye bye bye or you know what I was able to replicate the screaming goat once and I think that's why my voice is now jacked up a lot of you patted me on the back and said your right numbers don't lie many of you said it's true you only report the facts hell even I was able to hang out with Chris Franchi. And while he didn't admit that pinball market trends is superior than any segment he's ever done on his most super awesome pinball show, even he would probably say that he loves him some CTF, but also some Zach. Side note, like, I saw him and I came up to the backside, gave him a little tickle, random tickle. Giddy, giddy, giddy, giddy.
    91:37
    I don't know how amused he was later we were bulls in and hanging out and having fun and i was like what do you think about that random day he was like would probably be the weirdest damn thing ever if it wasn't from you he and i brainstormed some ideas for an exorcist pinball machine that would be fantastic wouldn't it be awesome but we got a lot to get to trending up this week i've got to do it it's stern pinballs mandalorian topper dwight sullivan you did it big man mando topper is a certified hit in the last three days I've received just as many emails about the availability of the first run Mando topper as I have emails about Godzilla Premium. And that should tell you a lot. Wait more than a year to release the topper. Prevent it from being a limited run. Price it at $2,000. And many of you want so bad for this to be trending down. But listener, I'm not going to homebrew you. Numbers don't lie. I only report the facts. And the fact is that the Mando topper just flew past the galactic tanks. GTF hype was so September, the season of Pepper's Ghost begins. Pull out that best car and buy yourself a cardigan. This is the pumpkin spice flows. So to do, so to do, so to do, the extra features that come from this topper. Holograms and dedicated mini wizard modes and progressive foundry overload. Whoa! Idiot, she fires! This stopper's got it Even if you don't have a Mando game I know you won't Also training up this week Again, I've got to do it Game recognizes game In this week's Pinball Market Trends And that's George Fisher The guy's a saint Without George Fisher, that flip in the script I'm just going to say it The fundraiser event wouldn't have happened He made the in-between feature at promo video At Learning Solutions He ran the entirety of the stream that he and, a special shout out to his partner slash girlfriend, Danelle, but those two were incredible, incredibly important. He produced the stream. He directed the stream. He organized the interview segments, and he did so with no need for recognition. He did so with not one complaint. I did not hear one complaint. I did not see one eye roll. He was humble. He is not only one of the largest streaming assets in our industry, he is one of the most critical and needed members of this industry. He reached another level with me, and I'm forever grateful for his time, his eye, and his dedication. All streaming up this week is my Deadpool LE pinball machine. I put a price tag on that thing at Expo, y'all, and by the end of the show, I wasn't going to sell it. I'm not really like I don't get really starstruck over celebrities and stuff especially pinball celebrity like what like you design machine you go to machine like I'd rather be a great friend of yours and collaborate and talk about our love than fanboying out over you I just really don't care that much but it was surreal seeing some of the most respected people in this industry do that flipping the script interview and then proceed to walk around into the flipping out booth to play my Deadpool Ellie that held up like a tank, you know, training up because that damn thing, my homie Gomi George Gomez, dude, game held up like a tank talk about galactic that is the galactic tank that I think is one hell of a force to be reckoned with and then pull the glass on that damn thing and it was a beast but back to the story It was freaking surreal looking over and seeing Keith Elton playing that game, and she's seeing it all in the most haphazard-like, aw, shucks, whatever, casual way possible. To see Roger Sharp jamming out on Deadpool in his most iconic stance and ferocity. Eric Menier playing that game. I don't think I can get rid of this game. So that Deadpool Ellie, she was the belle of the ball. And based on the note description on the head of that game, she was Greg Bone's mom approved.
    96:05
    Fod, everything can't be applesauce and brand new kicks. It's right. You know what that means? Who doesn't love applesauce though, right? I eat, oh my gosh, best combo ever. Not necessarily mixed together, but in a tandem as two little mini courses there. Applesauce, preferably one all-natural, organic, no sugar. I don't need any of that. You can add a dash of cinnamon if you want to, but applesauce and macaroni and cheese. I don't know why, but it works so well as like a little meal. Don't mix it. You get a really cold and a really hot, but applesauce and new kicks. Who doesn't love new kicks? But anyway, trending down this week is not applesauce. No, it sure as hell isn't new kicks. It's electricity. You heard us talking about it. Rob Burke, stay fixed. Come on. We've got to figure out something with... You're going to charge me for electricity where no other pinball conventions charge for electricity as a subcharge? Do me a solid and at least integrate that cost into the booth. so I just think it's a crazy booth price. More so than electricity.
    97:20
    What's next? Are you going to charge me for the concrete that I'm walking on? Maybe the air that surrounds the area. No. Last year was the internet.
    97:30
    This year it's the electricity. We're getting close, guys, but damn, that was a punch in the stomach. All screening down this week is one of you son of a bitches out there with sticky fingers. You know who you are. Sadly, there was someone or someones that may have picked up some of the autism charity auction items for themselves. Flippin' Scripts was breaking down. Flippin' Out was breaking down. A couple items went missing. We had Brian Cosner. I think he had a hat or something else. He had a couple things of his own personal items. Those are gone, too. Turning down this week. Who's going to steal shit from a pinball convention? It happened at Expo a handful of years ago. I remember Franchi had some shit jacked. Come on, people. You know what sticky fingers are? They're tacky. Listen, PMT, on a brighter note, for those of you who attended the Expo, special shout-out to the Poor Men. Poor Men's Pinball Podcast. They've got a tribe that's weird and cultish and they carry around coins because they're also part of a local AA chapter, so they get their coins. You had a lot of weird people in that group. But what they did for their booth was maybe the best brand integration of that whole show. It was a flea market. It was a highway vegetable stand. It was dirty. It was strange. But it was poor man's. and I loved it so much. Let's be honest. I can't trend it up. No, no. There's no way to trend that damn thing up, that booze, whatever the hell that was.
    99:21
    I... Drew set up a canopy, like those pop-up tent things. It was a 10x10, so he set up a canopy. It was just so fucking poor, man. So I asked him, I said, he didn't put the top on it yet it was just like an accordion you know the pop up metal canopy but he didn't have the cover on it and I said do you need help getting the cover on it or like what he's like he looked at me with a straight face and he was like I didn't plan on putting it on there cause it's not rainy he's just using it to hang like a couple banners from it's like the banners like wrinkled and zip-tied it's just like shit oh my god there's some shit that people couldn't give away. There's some real treasures in there, though. They had an old table full of booze that they were drinking on. Lord knows I have no clue how they didn't get in trouble for, but it truly was a highlight. And they were, of all Expo, they were the funnest to party with. I've partied with so many of the poor men's tribe, and their fearless leader, Drew, with a cameo by Ian. They don't need any more promotion, but damn it, they nailed their booth and brought a lot of fun to the expo. But there wasn't a more fun, proud, beautiful group of people than the tribesmen and women that were hanging out and partying. I shared more laughs and laughing tears in that area than probably any other expo experience. So I'll never be part of the tribe, thank God, but that doesn't mean I won't support the hell out of everything that they're doing. What a group. No deals of the week this week, no WTFs, and we're closing out the pinball bounty on Dolly Parton. At the moment, I tentatively have a, ooh, ooh, ooh, gives me the downstairs tingles, how nicely restored. I have a lead on one that's coming my way, so we're in the shipping process. once heading here, so no need for a Dolly Parton. Thank all of you for looking out for me for that one. I think next week we may be announcing a new pinball bounty. Amy like bounty. And as always, people, I'm just here reporting the facts because numbers don't lie on the largest pinball podcast in the world and its sexy little bastard child segment, Pinball Market Tricks. Dennis, where can people catch you, man? They can always reach out to EclecticGamersPodcast.gmail.com or go to Facebook.com slash EclecticGamersPodcast Use the Messenger tool and those I check regularly. Patreon people sign up! Well, we don't have a Patreon. You can sign up for the EGP Patreon. I have new ones. I always thank them by first name or handle at the start of the episodes and Tony and I are trying to generate more stuff for just the Patreon folks. No promises. There's going to be a new baby's first care at the start of April. I'm a Patreon follower and a subscriber, and I got a nice little nugget that you sent this weekend to your Patreons. Yeah, some of the stuff I think, you know, it's like, I'll just drop nuggies. I'll just drop my chicken nuggies on the Patreon. This is easier. Oh, it's good stuff. I'm glad I'm a Patreon. So definitely go become a Patreon because not only are you getting cool stuff exclusive from EGP, but you're supporting them and all the work that they put in for year after year after year. So definitely do that. Dennis and I are still talking about whether or not we're going to dip our TPS toe into the above ground pool of Patreon. So we'll see. We'll see. You can reach out to me at the pinball network at gmail.com. Please go over. You guys showed so much love in person at the expo for straight down the middle of video series on YouTube covering pinball and all things fun. Please make sure you're following, liking, subscribing to social media. as we are entering another phase on flipping out and straight down the middle on social media. We're getting ready to start launching that in the coming months. So be following now on the social medias, even the TikToks and the Instas. Speaking of flipping out, Pinball Product Showcase this week is a Mandalorian topper. Order yours and buy, buy, buy now. Buy, buy, buy! James Bond 007 Pro and Premium Pre-Order is still taking a list for that, as well as a list for the limited edition 60th anniversary James Bond by Keith Elwin. No info came from Expo about that, to my knowledge. And George Gomez still hyping it up. I still think we were talking with some buddies. I'm still guessing about 25K is what these things are going to come in at. But we'll have to wait and see. Remember that flipping out pinball vault? Pending sale. Elvira, number 40, 40th anniversary. Tentatively leaving this week. It's gone. About a week or so ago, we did add the Black Knight Sword of Rage limited edition vinyl record. So go check that out. Also, just then, this week, we got a Halloween pre-owned that we're going to sell cheap. We got a Rick and Morty with a butter cap. Uh-oh, that one's going to go quick. People are going to want that. We also got an Ultraman Nguyen box that we're going to sell cheap. And what else? Oh, Toy Story 4 LE in stock. Cactus Canyon Remake SE in stock. Rush Pro Premium in stock. Star Wars Pro Premium in stock. Oktoberfest in stock. Mandalorian Pro and Premium in stock. Talk about a game that's going to start selling more. Mandalorian right now because of that topper. TMNT Pro and Premium coming this month with the last run. We've got spots available. G&R LE, both new and used at Flippin' Out Pinball. We're taking queen pre-orders still. It's a dark horse there, people. A lot of accessories, a lot of toppers, CGC shakers, banners, escaleras. We've got a lot of stuff. We've got a lot of inventory. Help us help you get what you're looking for next at Flippin' Out Pinball. Or email me at Zach, Z-A-C-H, at SlippinOutPinball.com, or you can text me at 812-457-9711. TPN last week, just another pinball podcast, episode 34, What's Expected Expo with Josh Rupp. That one's not going to age well. Silver Ball Chronicles, episode 26, The Architect, George Gomez, part two. That one will age nicely. Pinball Party Podcast, episode eight years ago. Jason's still on vacation. They got a lot of compliments this last week about adding the pinball party. Last week also was that Slip in the Script charity stream. You guys can find that on YouTube, the video on demand. That was a ton of fun. Mark Silk and I just bringing the gold. Go watch that as well as Roger Sharp, Keith Elwin, Eric. Man, there's so many people on that. So much fun. Go tune into that. Also, this week at TPN, everyone's recovering. I don't know what we're going to bring you, but we'll keep it coming each and every day on the industry-leading media provider, the Pinball Network. Before we fade out, I do want to give my dedicated thoughts, prayers, to Kerry Hardy, who lost his younger brother a week or so ago. He still found the strength to come to Expo and hang out and provide a smile for all of his followers. I know that was probably damn near impossible to do. I couldn't imagine losing my brother, so Kerry, we're thinking about you, bud. and no words can help or anything, but just know a lot of people love you, and we're here if you, no bullshit, if you ever need. For Dennis Creasel, I'm Zach Manning. And folks, because so many of you try, if you want me to go to Expo, there are certain rules that have to be met, okay? Because, oh my gosh, people were messaging me. So, first of all, I have to have a hotel room on site, and I don't jump through hoops for it, okay? Easy enough, okay. It needs to be arranged. Alright, so that's rule number one. Rule number two of this year, I need to see that the actual free play area was respectably populated. Okay. And I don't want official photos. I need this Stern style. You need to go in, 720p video, take screen grabs, and send them to me. We call that the Mando effect. And then I might still say no, because I don't want to draw. And always practice safe pinball. And homebrew up. Yay.
    108:04
    Everybody's raving about this piece of shit game. Oh, it was so bad. I'm like, no. Couldn't pay me to play this turd. I played it, but it was bad.
    108:22
    Let you know.