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Ep 31: We Talk TWIPY 2019 Results

LoserKid Pinball Podcast·podcast_episode·1h 19m·held·Apr 3, 2020
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Analysis

claude-haiku-4-5-20251001 · $0.033

TL;DR

Loser Kid Pinball Podcast 31: COVID-19 impacts pinball manufacturing; Twippies 2019 results highlight Black Knight Sword of Rage success.

Summary

In this March 2020 Loser Kid Pinball Podcast episode recorded during early COVID-19 lockdowns, hosts Josh and Scott discuss pandemic impacts on pinball manufacturing, code updates (particularly Iron Man), Spooky's continued operations, Stern's limited shipments, and the delayed Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles release. The bulk of the episode covers the 2019 Twippies awards results, with Black Knight Sword of Rage winning music/sound and representing an unexpected community embrace of unlicensed original-theme games. The hosts emphasize community support during isolation and thank Jeff Patterson for salvaging the virtual awards show.

Key Claims

  • Stern releases a game the Tuesday after Texas Pinball Festival, and Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles should have released on that Tuesday during the COVID-era lockdown based on a two-year pattern

    high confidence · Josh and Scott cite research on the last two years of TPF timing; they note Black Knight Sword of Rage came out two days after TPF last year, Iron Maiden two years prior

  • Spooky Pinball has plenty of parts in their warehouse and can continue working until they run out of parts or are forced to shut down due to pandemic restrictions

    high confidence · Scott references a Spooky confirmation on the The Super Awesome Pinball Show; Spooky's rural Wisconsin location gives them operational flexibility compared to Chicago-based manufacturers

  • Stern is allowed to ship games from their warehouse with only one or two workers at a time, once or twice per week, to keep business moving

    medium confidence · Josh states 'I have had confirmations that certain companies, so Stern, um, is still shipping games that are in their warehouse. They're allowed to go in once or twice a week'

  • Iron Man received a code update with new skill shots, added extra ball for completing stand-up targets, reduced whiplash targets, and shield lane improvements

    high confidence · Scott details specific code changes, mentioning he downloaded the new Iron Man code and reviewed patch notes; describes skill shot involving the up post and lane targeting for 1 million points

  • Black Knight Sword of Rage won the Twippies award for best music and sound in 2019, and exceeded community expectations despite negative sentiment about unlicensed titles

    high confidence · Josh and Scott discuss Twippies results and note that Black Knight performed well across multiple categories, defying predictions that unlicensed games couldn't succeed

Notable Quotes

  • “Either A, they run out of parts first, or B, they actually get shut down, but they're in such a small town... they can keep working until the cows come home or until they run out of pinball parts.”

    Scott Larson @ ~15:30 — Captures the operational advantage small rural manufacturers like Spooky have during COVID lockdowns vs. major city-based producers like Stern in Chicago

  • “I want Ninja Turtles. I want to go break into Stern right now and just let's take one home.”

    Josh @ ~32:00 — Humorous expression of frustration about delayed TMNT release and pent-up desire to play new machines during lockdown

  • “It's not a dip in popularity. It's in many ways people are looking forward to get back to their routine and their escape items.”

    Scott Larson @ ~38:00 — Expresses optimism that pinball demand will rebound post-pandemic as a recreational escape; distinguishes temporary economic contraction from loss of interest

  • “If you make a good game if you put your heart and soul into it and if you if you make just not the next cookie cutter design that you can still there's still demand for it there's still love for it”

    Josh @ ~1:38:00 — Reflects on Black Knight Sword of Rage's Twippies success as validation that original unlicensed themes can succeed if well-designed, countering industry skepticism

  • “Just check in on people... He's always helping everyone else. So I've never known how to help Jeff. Cause he's always helping everyone else.”

    Josh @ ~1:10:00 — Emphasizes the importance of reciprocal community support and mental health check-ins, referencing previous episode guest Jeff Rivera

Entities

Stern PinballcompanySpooky PinballcompanyAmerican PinballcompanyChicago Gaming CompanycompanyJoshpersonScott LarsonpersonJeff Pattersonperson

Signals

  • ?

    business_signal: Stern Pinball permitted limited warehouse operations (1-2 workers, once/twice weekly) to maintain game shipments; qualifies as small business for government loans under 500 employees

    medium · Josh: 'I have had confirmations that certain companies, so Stern, um, is still shipping games that are in their warehouse. They're allowed to go in once or twice a week.'

  • ?

    supply_chain_signal: Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles machines built and staged for shipment but held due to pandemic lockdowns; Australia order potentially affected

    medium · Josh: 'there should be Ninja Turtles sitting inside a stern just waiting to be flipped for people to buy. And that's what sucks is because everything's shut down right now.'

  • ?

    code_update: Iron Man received incremental code improvements including new skill shot mechanic, extra ball awards, target reductions, and mid-tier ladder rewards to enhance accessibility without breaking tournament balance

    high · Scott details specific code changes: skill shot with up post for 1M points, extra ball for stand-up targets, reduced whiplash targets, shield lane lighting during Jericho Missile Mayhem

  • ~

    sentiment_shift: Black Knight Sword of Rage exceeded community expectations, winning multiple Twippies categories despite historical industry skepticism about unlicensed original-theme games; signals market appetite for well-designed non-IP titles

    high · Josh: 'I honestly did not think black knight was going to be anywhere near the top three on anything and it blew me out of the water when it was top three in a lot of categories.'

  • $

Transcript

groq_whisper · $0.239

0:00
Thanks for tuning in to Loser Kid Pinball Podcast, episode number 31. Hey, my co-captain as always. Scott Larson. How are you doing today, Josh? Awesome. How are you doing, Scott? You know what? I think it's a strange time for me as it is for most people in the United States right now and probably in the worldwide community, not just in pinball. I certainly haven't been working as much. In Utah, we are waiting for the epidemic or the pandemic to the numbers to come up. So we have been basically in a holding pattern waiting for the onslaught.
0:46
But we're hoping that we've done a lot of social distancing and been able to limit the rise in what we're doing. But yeah, it's actually been a little weird. How about you, Josh? um it has been a little weird i mean honestly my life all of our lives have been affected i live in a rural area and out here um i don't know if it's because we only have one case and that man is uh isolated in a vacant hotel and under monitor by the cops because he was an inmate um well let's not get into that, but he was diagnosed or he was tested positive like a week and a half ago. And we haven't had any other cases come forward at that point. So life here is pretty normal, as normal as it can get under circumstances. I live on a 10 acre farm pretty much at this point. And so life is still kind of the same. We're still, it's calving season. So we're taking care of cows and babies. And we went fishing last night. I mean, I don't know. I feel fortunate Because I feel like I hear these stories of people just held up in their apartments in the major cities, and they get to walk the block if they're lucky, and that's about it. Yeah, I've heard a lot of people say that the dog is tired of being walked.
2:06
So I don't have a dog, so I can't even walk that, but I have taken my kids out on rides. So we are a little more hunkered down. My wife is taking this very seriously, and so am I. So we have really not done anything outside of our home except for going to the grocery store maybe every seven to ten days just to pick up some stuff. That's about where we're at, too.
Jeff Rivera
person
Jeff Teolisperson
Keith Elwinperson
Black Knight Sword of Ragegame
Iron Mangame
Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtlesgame
Rick and Mortygame
Texas Pinball Festivalevent
Twippiesevent
Pinsideorganization
Naomi Sheddperson
Carrieperson
Emotoperson

market_signal: Hosts predict temporary liquidation of used pinball machines as players facing financial hardship sell machines to cover mortgages/insurance; expect 500-1000 dollar discounts on high-end games, 400 dollar discounts on entry-level machines

medium · Josh: 'I would bet you would be able to pick up games for maybe 500 to 1000 less on the high end stuff and maybe 400 less on the low end stuff'

  • ?

    venue_signal: Location/casual play venues affected by lockdown restrictions; manufacturing and shipping operations in urban centers (Chicago) more constrained than rural locations (Wisconsin); implications for operator routes and machine availability

    high · Scott: 'Chicago is a big city that has a lot of inflow and outflow of traffic. And so they do not have the same luxury' as rural manufacturers like Spooky

  • ?

    machine_intel: Historical data shows Stern releases games Tuesday after Texas Pinball Festival; two-year pattern with Black Knight (2 days post-TPF), Iron Maiden (2 years ago) supports timing model for TMNT release expectations

    medium · Josh: 'Black Knight Sword of Rage came out two days after Texas Pinball Festival last year. Two years before that was Iron Maiden.'

  • ?

    design_philosophy: Black Knight Sword of Rage praised for original video game-inspired soundtrack approach (non-licensed guitar backdrop) contrasting with repetitive classic rock/metal songs on competitor titles; appeals to younger audiences

    high · Scott: 'it felt like an awesome retro 80s, it really felt more like a video game... it was not driving it, but it was your personal background soundtrack'

  • ?

    community_signal: Loser Kid Podcast episode 30 featuring Jeff Rivera discussing mental health struggles generated unexpected positive impact; listeners reported using the episode as catalyst to disclose personal mental health issues to family; community emphasizing peer support during isolation

    high · Josh: 'a person wrote into us shortly after the episode... made them feel like there was someone out there listening to them... gave this person the courage to discuss it with their family'

  • ?

    content_signal: 2019 Twippies awards show salvaged by Jeff Patterson as virtual event during COVID-19 lockdown; featured live co-hosts (Carrie, Emoto) and participant video responses; received mixed feedback balancing constructive criticism with appreciation for effort

    high · Scott: 'Jeff Patterson was nice enough to release the information to the public of percentages and whatnot' and 'Jeff did a remarkable job of salvaging what was a catastrophic situation'

  • ?

    industry_signal: Pinball manufacturers viewed as resilient despite COVID shutdowns; creative/design teams able to work remotely (rule design, artwork); assembly line work constrained; industry expected to recover post-pandemic with pent-up consumer demand

    medium · Josh: 'People are still designing at their computers. People are still working on rule sets... People are still working on artwork. There's still work to be done.'

    • 2:35
    Publicly, we're not doing much. I still have to work. People still need their hot water. People still need heating and air conditioning. It's still cold where I'm at. I know it's starting to feel good where most people are, but we had snow last week. I mean, it's kind of goofy. Yeah. But other than that, like I said, I feel fortunate.
    2:55
    I'm getting very familiar with Monsters of Rock on Monster Bash. There you go. It's a mode I had never hit until like three weeks ago, and now I've visited three or four times. And so that's pretty cool. Still haven't got back to Rule the Universe yet, though. Well, there you go. Yeah, I actually just downloaded the new Iron Man code, and so I've been playing around with that limitedly.
    3:19
    But I do see some different variations in it that I think nuances the code. Certainly, Lyman is very aware that it's a good tournament game and doesn't want to mess things up that way. But I think there were some nice tweaks on it that made it a little more interesting.
    3:35
    Can you explain to us a little bit? Because I did see that you posted the Iron Man code that came out on Monday or something like that. And it intrigues me because Iron Man is such a, I don't want to say a bare bones game, but it's a very straightforward game, especially when it comes with rules. because it's such a brutal game. Right. Well, the challenge with Iron Man is because it is a fast game and the rules are so balanced, it actually does help in that there's no way of gaming the rules. There are different ways you can approach, and each different mode will give you different points. But it's not like they're saying, you know, hit Ironmonger all day or, you know, or hit War Machine multiball or things like that, because it does allow you to try to do different things.
    4:27
    A couple of things that I thought was nice, back when Ironman came out, they really didn't have many good skill shots. So he actually added a skill shot. So it does actually take some skill. It drops the up post. and if you hit the lane just on the right side, then you get a million. If you go past it, it gets 250,000. So that's a little different and actually makes people go for the skill shot a little bit. In Ironman, a lot of people typically just bypass that, especially if they were in tournament mode because they want to control the ball faster.
    5:08
    Gotcha. They also, let's see, what was one other thing I saw? Uh, halfway through, sorry, I'm scanning the, um, scanning the notes here and I saw, yeah, let's see, there's added, uh, yeah, so added extra ball for competing the Ironman stand-up targets. That wouldn't be good in tournaments, but it's still fun for home, um, reduced whiplash targets. There's also a shield lanes, now light shield, after the lanes during Jericho Missile Mayhem, which is completed. So there's even a little bit more.
    5:49
    There's also a mid-tier. I read it, but I'm trying to find where it is. Halfway up the ladder, there's actually kind of a mid-tier reward that will allow you to get something. So that's actually nice. Okay. So just some nuances. It still feels exactly the same, but it's nice. It's nice to polish up an old favorite that has come back after it really, it was released with a thud. And generally it's come back. I think people were surprised when they put the Iron Man Vault Edition on the line. And probably that's really what's going on is that they had, Lyman had a code that he wanted to put on. So they said, well, let's pump out 50 or 20 or whatever they had. And they could put that. So that actually begs the question, when they release something like a Tron would be an easy one. We've talked about this before. As long as the license is free, it's not a very expensive game to make. They could certainly nuance the rules because it is very straightforward like Iron Man. you could take it to the next level.
    7:06
    So if Tron comes out, I fully expect them to release maybe an upgraded rule set on that. It does make it a little more challenging for Lord of the Rings just because it is so complete anyway. I'm not sure they'd be able to do much on that if the license is available and they were able to make it at a price point that they could sell. but I would anticipate the next time the vault comes out and if Tron comes out then they would have something like that yeah well I guess that's the silver lining because there was a lot of complaints of oh Iron Man really another vault but typically when they do vault these they do come out with new code so I mean Iron Man's perfect example of that I think there is room for improvement on some other games like Lord of the Rings.
    8:00
    But let's not get into that right now because I don't know where we're even going to start. You know what I'm saying? But I'm glad to see you're enjoying Iron Man. I hope a lot of people out there that do have Iron Man are enjoying the new code. Sometimes pass the time while you're sitting at home.
    8:16
    But yeah, so shall we talk a little bit of news of the little bit that we do have there, Scott? Yeah, go ahead. Go ahead. All right, let's start off with, for sure, confirmations first.
    8:30
    Spooky confirmed on the Super Awesome Pinball Show that they are still working on Rick and Morty's. They have plenty of parts sitting in their warehouse, so they're kind of to the point where it's an A or B situation. Either A, they run out of parts first, or B, they actually get shut down, but they're in such a small town. That's kind of like me being this rural area. they can keep working until the cows come home or until they run out of pinball parts. I think that's awesome. Yeah, it's nice. I think it's a good compromise because from the medical standpoint, I totally understand how they want to shut down everything, do social distancing.
    9:11
    But legitimately, there is this case-by-case basis of where do you do that and when do you do that? so in a rural environment that they really don't have much going on and they they tend to have less inflow and outflow of a rural town than they would in a big city so i think they are less at risk so i'm glad that they are able to continue working while maintaining a high level of vigilance that if something happens in the town where the the threat level elevates then yes i i'm sure they would shut down until it's safe to start back up. But I'm glad they've been able to do that. In contrast, Chicago is a big city that has a lot of inflow and outflow of traffic. And so they do not have the same luxury. I agree. But there is an interesting silver lining to this as well. Um, I have had confirmations that certain companies, so Stern, um, is still shipping games that are in their warehouse. They're allowed to go in once or twice a week. It's only one or two guys, if I remember correctly, put a couple of games on the truck and get them out because you still got to keep business moving as much as you can. And it's kind of mind-blowing at this point to think of the government's trying to help and whatnot. And they said, small businesses can take out loans. And a small business is defined like under 500 employees or something like that. Stern qualifies for that.
    10:47
    American pinball, CGC. It's kind of weird to think of. I know there's a lot of doom and gloom. I've been texting some friends and they're severely freaking out about the pinball economy. We're going to see a dip.
    11:05
    Everywhere's going to see a dip. It's just what it is. But I think you know let's keep optimistic here i i think that between government aid and some other things i think we can keep this this ball rolling i know that i've heard people say well one company's not going to make it out of this honestly you know spooky still working um i assume haggis still is down australia it's i mean they're a small team and i think it's I can't remember Damien's situation. I'm not going to lie. I think they have a place they work out of, so it's not too big of a deal if he goes into work.
    11:46
    Don't quote me on that, though. That's just, may I cut that part out. But these bigger companies that are affected by this, they're still small enough that they can get help. And so I'm very, very optimistic of the future of pinball.
    12:00
    We'll probably see prices go down, though, for a little bit because people aren't working right now. So people, you know, pinball is a luxury item. And so it's the first thing to go.
    12:12
    Yeah, there's certainly I think this is more of a dip. It's not a dip in popularity. It's in many ways people are looking forward to get back to their routine and their escape items. And so whether or not that's sports, whether or not that's pinball, whether or not that's concerts, people are going to want to get back into it. And so I'm excited to see once this is all resolved appropriately, we are looking to get back into it. Now, as soon as the economy recovers, I think people will be able to buy back the games. But I do anticipate some liquidation of games because if people need to be able to pay their mortgages or pay their insurances until they get back up and running, I would bet you would see I wouldn't say the bottom falling out of the mark but I bet you would be able to pick up games for maybe 500 to 1000 less on the high end stuff and maybe 400 less on the low end stuff yep I wouldn't doubt it so the next news slash rumor slash based off of our calculations because we're kind of shooting in the dark here so TPF was supposed to be last week but it didn't happen if no one noticed but if we go by timelines the last two years you can probably even check back further but Scott and I just did the research for the last two years Stern releases a game the Tuesday after Texas Pinball Festival like clockwork so that means Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles should have released this Tuesday and we do know that Stern is really good to have games made in box, shipping out. Like, there could be these games already in Australia because typically what they do is they build a batch of them and then Australia puts in their order and then they ship it down there, right? So unless if Australia canceled their order, there should be Ninja Turtles sitting inside a stern just waiting to be flipped for people to buy. And that's what sucks is because everything's shut down right now. And you guys know that I'm excited for this. I want Ninja Turtles. I want to go break into Stern right now and just let's take one home. You know what I'm saying? Because the little baby's not being played. We got to play.
    14:38
    But that's my thought process. By calculations, like I said, Black Knight Sword of Rage came out two days after Texas Pinball Festival last year. Two years before that was Iron Maiden. Kind of weird to think that Iron Maiden came out two years ago. Yeah, certainly they were gearing up for it, but they also want to be able to sell as many as possible when the buzz is still strong. That is the strength of Stern is that they're able to scale up and sell according to the and capture the market while the buzz is hot. So I would anticipate that whatever level they were ready to sell, whether or not it's 500 games or 700 games or whatever, whatever their threshold is to announce a game and get it out there, I would bet they would wait until that threshold is met and so they can sell them quickly and mobilize them. So they're in a position to play the waiting game until they are ready to sell the product. We have seen that buzz dies down and people are fickle and they move on. So if something is advertised too soon and they're anticipating a different game coming out, then you're at risk for losing that market.
    15:55
    I'll put this out there, Stern. I know a couple of you guys listen to us, and I really appreciate your listenership.
    16:02
    If you want total hype, tell you no. You can start selling these things again. I wouldn't mind if you shipped me one and I streamed it. I'd buy all the streaming equipment and everything. I'll keep the hype going for you for a month or two. I don't mind it at all. You're such a giver. is that is that chilling or is that i don't know you know i'm saying it's seizing the opportunity you're you're right you're a pinball profiteer exactly let's go that route i like it but other than that uh news is going to be slow and few and far between people um that that's as good as we can get you yeah we're gonna see we have been told people are still working on stuff. That is the beauty of the internet. That's the beauty of technology. People are still designing at their computers. People are still working on rule sets. I mean, we see it with Iron Maiden. People are still working on artwork. There's still work to be done. It's just, I feel bad for those poor line assembly people. You just, you can't go into work, but it sounds like the higher ups are staying busy. Not the higher ups, the creative teams are staying busy. Yeah. And sadly, this is actually common in the construction business. I was talking to one of my friends at work and his brothers in the construction business, and they are used to a little bit of ebb and flow. Now, this is an unusual ebb because it's not really due to the economy. It's due to a pandemic. But they've gone through these type of things before. These people are still trained. They're still interested in coming back to their job. And once they're able to reopen, I would bet we'd be able to get them back in very quickly. I agree. Do you think, sorry, this just popped in my head. Do you think this is an opportunity because Jersey Jack is supposed to be moving into the Chicago area with this layoff? Do you think this is an opportunity for them to snag away some line workers? maybe in many ways this is advantageous for both groups because the same people will share the same skill set and so I would bet that as one company goes up and if another company ebbs the same workers will be applying for the same jobs and so it would be the equivalent of if two hospitals were in town you're going to see staff shift shifting back and forth between hospitals. So in many ways, it's actually a big plus for the line workers in that they have options out there to be able to, to continue working if it's available.
    18:52
    I agree. I can't wait to see what the future holds. Like I said, I'm very positive about everything. I, we we've seen this happen to our economy, not recently, but we have, you know, we've seen stuff hit our economy before. America always comes back.
    19:11
    This isn't the end of the world. I guess I can't guarantee that. I'm not a fortune teller. But we're in the middle of it, so it's going to feel like the end of the world. Let's keep hopes up. It only makes it better if we pick everyone else up. Right.
    19:29
    And in all actuality, We talked about this where this is in some ways a light week, but people look forward to their entertainment. And I'm hoping that we give someone, you know, an hour's worth of entertainment every other week. And we able to at least try to keep some semblance of normalcy And so if we can keep that passion alive and scratch that itch we are more than willing to help that out even if it in a limited way Yep. Scott, let's talk about our last episode really quick. Last episode we had Jeff Rivera on. It was fantastic.
    20:07
    I was not expecting that. I was not expecting Jeff to talk as in-depth about his personal life as he did. And it was awesome. like it's a terrible situation he's in but it's awesome that we're he was able to open up and talk to us about and we got a lot of positive feedback from that um some of it we've been asked not to share but uh let's go over it scott okay yeah go ahead so a person wrote into us shortly after the episode they said that they turned it on and it wasn't what they were expecting but they loved it they really appreciated it because they were going through some similar situations in their life and they hadn't told their family yet with mental health issues and it made them feel like there was someone out there listening to them and that the situation wasn't as dire as it needed to be and so it was awesome to hear that just because jeff shared his experience it gave the courage for someone else to then discuss with his with gave this person the courage to discuss it with their family what's going on in their life yeah i think i think we've we forget that we, we're all going through outside of pinball. We have all our usual life, life roles that we're trying to fill, whether or not it's work, whether or not it's family, whether or not it's relation, you know, relationships, whether or not it's, it's just integrating into a group or a tribe or however you, however you label that, that it's most of us don't talk about this stuff. And so I was very appreciative. Jeff and I have actually had some conversations over the years, and I've always felt very honored that Jeff felt willing and able to talk to me about that because I've always felt that as, I guess, it's a vote of confidence that I am there to listen and give support and not judge for anything someone's going through. Thankfully, the brain is a unique organ in the body in that there's so much about it we don't know and how it functions.
    22:17
    But when people feel that, hey, something is wrong and I don't know how to talk about this, people are going to be more open to at least listen and be able to give support. Because in many ways, we're all going to struggle with this, whether or not it's depression, whether or not it's anxiety, whether or not it's OCD, whether or not it's addiction. There are so many different ways that we deal with this. And the more that we are accepting to say, you know, if you reach out and say, I've had a problem with X, I guarantee the person will be able to say, I've had a problem with Y, and I thought I was the only one.
    22:56
    So I felt that was exceptionally brave for Jeff to be able to get out and share that. And so many people have even just texted me and said that was unexpected, but I needed that right now. Yep. You know, one of our favorite people that we've met through the podcast, Naomi Shedd, she has been a wonderful insight on this stuff too as well. You know, just saying that it doesn't matter if it's mental health or if it may be other issues that you're going through in your life. Just know that there's people out there to listen to you. and that's the best thing that you can do for people, especially right now. You may be socially distant or socially isolated, but you can still make a call. You can still shoot a text.
    23:44
    This is the time that people are going to have the hardest time mentally, may not to the extent of what was going on in our last episode, but there are people out there that need to be heard. So just check in on your friend. And that's what I loved about talking about with Jeff. is just, he told us kind of like, just check in on people like, like him, you know, cause Jeff, Jeff in my eyes has always been the guy that's willing to help though. One that's always willing to jump the gun to get to you, to, to help you. So I've never known how to help Jeff. Cause he's always helping everyone else. You know what I'm saying? Right. Well, the, the nice thing is, uh, I say this in a loving way in, in pinball, we have such an eclectic group. I mean, we have any, anywhere from people who have your traditional families to people who are alone or people who have different relationships or just these new ways of life and the new ways of integrating. And in many ways, we all, by this current environment, we're all feeling stressed, whether or not it's emotionally, whether or not it's physically, whether or not it's financially, whether or not it's with your health.
    24:58
    So just think about it now. Who do you normally play pinball with? And just shoot them a text and say, hey, I was just thinking about you. What's going on? And it doesn't even have to be, hey, you want to talk to me about something? It's just more of a, hey, I'm thinking about you. You still matter in my life. I can't come and visit you right now, but I still want to reach out. Yep. I totally agree. so the other side of that podcast though we got just as many messages and i i swear to you the bidet is going to be reaching out to us to sponsor you scott because how many people have reached out to you about your your earth-shaking toilet experience yeah no you know the funny thing is i did buy it a little bit more of a tongue-in-cheek joke because people have said But yes, because in Europe, they're everywhere. And every time someone goes to Asia, they always say the same thing. They have these amazing toilets. The toilet seat heats up and it has a bidet and it has a water function. And I've always laughed because I was like, you know, you can buy those here, right?
    26:07
    It's not something that's only in Asia. But I did hear a factor and I can't quote. Don't quote me on this, but it was – I think it was Korea or Japan, but the overall power consumption of the country went up by 3% when everybody installed all these super fancy toilets.
    26:32
    But their toilets are like super high-end. Like, okay, we get toilets here for about, what, $200, $300. They get like five grand toilets. It's like a premium LE.
    26:44
    It's an LE toilet with all the bells and whistles. But what's funny, though, is like people were specifically reaching out to us to talk about that incident. I mean, let's let Ian behind the scenes for a second. So two weeks ago when we recorded our last episode, number 30, with Jeff Rivera, the next day we recorded with Jeff Teola. So we got on this. We got talking about the bidet. And you guys chatted back and forth. And the funny part is, is the last final round episode with him and Martin, Jeff was talking about you and him talking about bidets and which bidet to buy.
    27:22
    Well, OK. I will say my wife is also because he said, well, we thought because Jeff was talking about with his wife's like, well, we had this in the cart, but we decided she wanted a battery. And I was actually like, I actually think you just want to plug. I plug it into a GFI, just get an extension cord. And my wife looked at me and said, you are way too invested in this. Just let him get what he wants.
    27:48
    So you will be hearing about that, guys. Guys and gals, please keep an ear out for Pinball Profile. We did record with Jeff. We should be seeing that episode sooner or later here. And so he's putting out fantastic content. If anyone's putting out more content, it is Jeff Teolis right now. And it is amazing. There's a lot there to chew on. He just released one today with him in Macho Pinball. Fantastic. Just great stuff.
    28:16
    And then, you know, two weeks ago, not only did we record our podcast, not only did we record with Pinball Profile, but we also recorded our Twippy stuff. So we were kind of busy a couple weeks ago. Yeah, we were a little busy getting all set up. It was pretty fun, though. I thought that was Jeff Patterson at This Week in Pinball doing the best he possibly could of a bad situation. Yes. So really, I enjoyed the Twippies. I had fun. It would have been more fun to be there, but he really did a fantastic job. So that is a perfect segue into our last news item and pretty much the last topic we're going to talk about today. it is the Twippies and boy was there has been a mixed bag of emotions before we get into this though overall great response though before we get into this will you please do me a favor do Scott and I a favor reach out to Jeff Patterson at thisweekinpinball at gmail.com or you can just hit him up on Facebook through Messenger or honestly he responds the best through the Gmail, but hit him up. And if you'd love the show, tell him that. Tell him what you loved about the show. I feel bad for Jeff because it seems like as soon as the twippies are over, the flood of feedback comes in and it's mostly, I don't want to say it's negative, but there's a lot of constructive criticism. There's a lot of effort that goes into this. Jeff has been doing this for the last three months. And I know if I was in his shoes, I would get discouraged if the only thing I ever heard was, well, A, B, and C needs to be fixed because of point A, point B, and point C. And so if you enjoyed the show, if it made your isolation better, whatever it may be, please reach out to him and say, hey, this is what I loved about. Thank you so much for doing this.
    30:13
    Yeah, I agree. Jeff did a remarkable job of salvaging what was a catastrophic situation. and think of all the effort that he made behind the scenes to contact people, to have them record something, to compile it all together, to edit it, to put it into a show, to have Carrie, to have Emoto. They both did a great job of making it a fun evening. And so I hope that that helped out your isolation and reach out to them. Thank them. It's certainly, and he doesn't get any money for this. But I think everybody had a great time. I had a great time watching even the video responses of everybody and especially the Keith Elwin responses for some reason. Yes. We'll get into that. Okay. Love it. So what we're going to talk – Jeff Patterson was nice enough to release the information to the public of percentages and whatnot. We're not going to deep dive into all these numbers. There's just way too much here. And if you want to go check it out yourself, you can find it on pinside.com. It is the top pinned forum topic of Twippies and the percentage results. Page number seven. Go hit it up. But we're going to go over some of these. You ready for this, Scott? Yeah, go ahead.
    31:41
    So first off, actually, before we get into that, really did love Kerry and Emoto. They were fantastic together. I love the show. I loved what they were trying to do even though it felt more of a live show than a pre-recorded thing you could tell because there was a couple slip-ups but they still went with it, loved it was great first category, best music and sound the one that took this home was Black Knight Sword of Rage and I'm going to let you, I want you to go first on this Scott this was 100% appropriate this was actually I felt the best music pin out there because it didn't feel like the canned music that you have heard over and over again. In a lot of these things, you get really tired of hearing Back in Black all the time, or you get really tired of hearing Hell's Bells. And so this felt like an awesome retro 80s, it really felt more like a video game. And this is where I felt the genius of the way they approached that and that they had the guitar that brought you into it, but it felt like it was not driving it, but it was your personal background soundtrack. And so absolutely, they crushed it. And it was the first one that really felt applicable to a younger audience because it did feel a little bit more like that video game feel that people are more used to nowadays. I agree. The thing that I loved about this is I feel like ever since Black Knight has come out, it has been on its heels. And the fact that the community has always felt, okay, sorry, let me rephrase this. Not the community. There's been strong voices in the community that felt like A, Black Knight's been a terrible decision for Stern. B, that it's proof that an unlicensed title can't make it in this time and see that there's no demand for it right here it proves if you make a good game if you put your heart and soul into it and if you if you make just not the next cookie cutter design that you can still there's still demand for it there's still love for it and we saw that with this i honestly did not think black knight was going to be anywhere near the top three on anything and it blew me out of the water when it was top three in a lot of categories. So it was awesome to see that. Especially it's, it re it reiterates what we said over and over again is that you can't make the same machine every time you have to be able to look at different markets and not every machine that Stern has to sell has to sell 2,500, 3,000 or 4,000 or Metallica's. I'm sure it's up in the 5,000 category.
    34:40
    So this is just an opportunity to say, you know what, there are different areas that we can tap into. And yes, it may not be the big seller that Metallica is or the big seller that Jurassic Park will be, but it will still be an excellent game that will fill a niche. And I think that it will find a secondary market of love on the tournament circuit but especially with a pro because it's brutal, it's fast, and I think it will have the second renaissance just like Iron Man did. Yep. I totally agree. Okay, let's move on to the next category. We've got homebrew, favorite homebrew pinball machine. Deadflip took this home with his original design of Jack Danger, and Castlevania was up there along with Spaceballs. Spaceballs was right behind Deadflip. There's been a little bit of controversy behind this.
    35:34
    Here's the thing, guys and gals. This award is particular to motivate people to keep doing homebrew. And I get the circumstances, but I think it's awesome that a project that was meant to help improve and help the community to get more homebrew out there did take the top award. I do feel like there was better designed games. I'm sorry, Jack. The design was done by the community. The design drives me nuts to look at.
    36:10
    It's too weird to me. It's too out of the box. I don't know what it is, but I don't like the design of it. There, I said it.
    36:21
    But other than that, I think it's very well-deserved because it was something to help improve the community. And there's nothing wrong with touting that, in my opinion. Yeah, it's hard. Very few people have actually played these. And so you can see them on streams. But what really made Total Nuclear Annihilation happen was because it was at Texas and it had an amazing soundtrack, an amazing light show, and people were able to play it. so that was what made that the star of the show I think it's hard with homebrews just because you're rarely going to get that sort of exposure and so hey I'm just glad people are doing it and being able to try to to push push the market because we need new blood in pinball and they bringing some great designs. So I'm happy that everybody's trying something. So I, hey, I will give everybody a gold star, awesome participation, you rock award for making your own machine, because I certainly don't have the time to do it. I think the other thing too with this is the complaint has been, when do you stick a fork in a homebrew and say it's done? Because a lot of these other projects were further along than what the dead flip machine was but just like you brought up total nuclear annihilation is a great example of this i mean that game had zero artwork on it but from a gameplay standpoint it was completely done and so where do you say hey this does or doesn't deserve reward based on completion and yada yada yada i'm gonna let Patterson figured that out. He sounds like he's already on top of it, getting ready to redefine categories again for next year. But all in all, I think it is well-deserved for what it is. All right, let's move on to the next one. Best toys and gimmicks. Jurassic Park pinball at almost 40%, 39.8. You know, I have a hard time with toy and gimmicks. So help me define what is a toy and what's a gimmick?
    38:44
    A toy is something that is interactive to I want to say interactive a lot. So Black Night Sword of Rage Knight is very interactive. That is a toy to me. A gimmick would be like the Addams Family magnets underneath the play field. Yes, they're interactive, but it's more of a gimmick than it is. Well, I would say like the thing. Yes, the thing would be. So it's something that doesn't really affect much gameplay, but it's cool to look at. Maybe you could say the flying monkey, right? Or the monkey that takes the ball up on Wizard of Oz. Correct, yeah. See, that's how I approach that. And that's why I felt with Jurassic Park, where it has the truck that moves back and forth. hey I'm surprised that something so when you look at it you thinking wow that great why hasn it done before but it hasn and so the fact that Keith came up with that on his own and was able to make a design by his own admission it had to be in the center of the playfield just because of the kinetic motion of the truck. But being able to do that while not making the playfield feel like a symmetrical slog is really genius. And so I gave him bonus points for two things for him doing that and also the helicopter spinner which i thought was was genius um willie walk i haven't had as much time on uh my friend has one and i i've played it i still have a hard time connecting with it um but that seems to be a common theme with me and pat lawler i i love what he does i actually like dialed in a lot uh but for some reason it's just It's not – maybe I just don't have the patience and I like faster games.
    40:40
    And so I liked what he did there. I thought the Black Knight was awesome. And the – we'll get to the topper, which was our category. But that was just so much fun to see that because I've always felt like in Black Knight and Black Knight 2000, I always kept thinking, well, where's the knight? I was listening to the pinball show on Monday with Dennis Creasel and he was saying, because they were talking about with Jurassic Park, really what's the toy? I guess now that you've mentioned it, the truck is a toy, the Newton ball.
    41:16
    But like you can't, is it fair that something like the dinosaur that's only included on the premium and LE factors into the toys and gimmicks, even though it's not on the pro? Yeah. I think we're getting I don't know maybe we're getting too nitpicky with it I think Jurassic Park's well deserved I think that there's a lot of stuff outside the box on it we're using tried and true stuff in a different way but I really think overall Jurassic Park did deserve it but Dennis Creasel did point out games like Black Knight that do actually have the Black Knight on every game Pro all the way to Limited should have a better chance I can see that point of view and I don't disagree with it. So, but then again, we start splitting hairs again with, with categories and yada, yada. So I would even argue that the, uh, the truck, uh, design is really on par with the black night in that it really is interactive. And that is in every game. All right, let's move on to the next one. We've got favorite pinball location. Uh, congrats to Logan arcade. I've never been there. Uh, Ta-da. I don't know what else to say to this. Congrats, guys. Yeah. I'm just glad there's location pinball out there. Yep. Next one. Favorite pinball publication, writer, or article. Pinball Magazine for Newsletters took this one home. It almost hit 30%. It was very well-deserved, too, I think. Well, Pinball Magazine is more of a book, really, if you've ever seen one of those things. He puts his heart and soul into these. So calling it a magazine, that's a little bit of a misnomer because it's like a graphic novel if you're looking at the comic book analogy. So he does take it to a new level. So it's well-deserved.
    43:09
    I do think Coin Op Carnival had a really good shot at this. But hey, congratulations to Pinball Magazine. hey the um coin op carnival cannot feel bad about uh about not winning because they have a solid it's not like they were a distant uh you know a distant second it was actually pretty close and so i certainly appreciate what they're doing this one actually shocked me the next category we're going to talk is best theme which willie wonka ended up taking 30 32 percent over jurassic Park by 23. That's pretty astounding to me, especially with, I feel like Jurassic Park has been more of an influence on our culture than Willy Wonka. I do remember growing up watching Willy Wonka because it was one of my mother's favorite shows. But other than that, I don't feel like Willy Wonka has been as influential as Jurassic Park. I don't know. What are your thoughts? Yeah, I'm with you on that. I remember seeing Willy Wonka, and it feels like it's trapped in that weird 70s. I thought it was a good film, but as I've said before, it doesn't push my buttons. so I'm glad that there are people out there getting their dream theme this this was never my dream theme and so I thought they did a great job on the game and being able to integrate it it's just it's never been on my wish list so I'm hey I'm glad they got it and it it obviously means more to other people which I've said before it's good to get outside my demographic because my demographic is really the demographic they typically are building for. Next category, and one of my favorites, favorite competitive pinball player. And who took this home, Scott? You know, I think that was Mr. Keith Elwin. It was. He had a pretty good year last year, as far as I could tell, you know, winning Pinberg and getting Jurassic Park out there. I think he's an up-and-coming kid in pinball. Love the video. Kate, it was fantastic. And maybe I'm biased. I'm not going to lie. I enjoyed that our hat was in it. I love that it was a, to prove it's Keith Owen, I'm wearing the Looser Kid Pinball Podcast hat. That was fantastic. And Linus McPants, you were a stud for sitting in that pinball box all night long. Yeah, that was certainly an awesome move on the dog. So, yeah, I love that there's been a lot of fun interconnectivity with people.
    45:56
    I hope that we have been nice to people and we've given them respect. We've certainly given constructive criticism when we felt it's necessary, but we do try to focus on the positive. And it does it makes me smile when there are people who who send that that back to us. So that was that was a lot of fun. Favorite pinball convention. Oh, sorry. Really quickly. Congrats to Bone and Jack Danger for taking second and third. Awesome job, guys. And the thing is, we know all these names like this is none of these people who are on these on this list I've never heard of. And so when I'm watching a stream, it is fun that we have been able to start developing a rapport with these people. I've never understood how Keith can look like he's playing just at someone's house and just as super casual as he's blowing up every game. Everyone else looks super intense. I don't know how he approaches it, but it just seems like it's just easy for him. I know it's not, but that is the I've tried to adopt different pinball stances and the casual I'm standing up straight and just kind of glancing at the machine and blowing it up I've never been able to master, so I've adopted more of the Lyman sheets, the wrestler stance where I'm hunched down trying to look as low as I can on the play field but that's hard on your back.
    47:36
    Yes. Favorite pinball convention. No shock here. Texas pinball festival takes it home again. Replay effects within 7% of that. And then in third Chicago pinball expo. Those are the big three. Yeah. Those are the big three. And it, I'm glad that Chicago is starting to make a comeback and replay obviously has Pinberg. And so replay is very, it's a very pinberg heavy event which is great the Texas Pinball Festival it seems like it's like a festival for everybody and so that certainly is why I feel it gets that popularity bump but you know I'm glad that all three of these big ones are still out there and you know it's just like in the majors when you have tennis, you have the US Open, you have Wimbledon, you have the French. All the majors kind of bubble up to the top, and this is what it felt like for me. I agree. Best theme integration, Jurassic Park. No shocker there. Followed closely by Willy Wonka and Elvira's House of Horrors. No shocker there as well.
    48:50
    Favorite pinball website, Pinside. 41%. Second place was This Week in Pinball at 16%. Pinside blew the rest of the category out of the water. Shocked me. Well, I will say that it's the most important forum. And if you really have any questions, you will always go on to Pinside and you can just Google.
    49:14
    If you're looking for something specific, here's a little pro tip. You can just do a Google search and then put what you're searching for and then just put Pinside in it and usually finds the right post that you're looking for.
    49:29
    Yep. But they've done an amazing job of being able to. Yes, there are a lot of trolls on Pinside, and I've just learned to ignore the trolls and don't feed the trolls. But it's really great that there's that resource that is universally accepted. I agree. Well, and like with me, like I said, like, like you said, sorry, you typically don't go on the forums because of the trolls. I use Pinside daily and I can't tell you the last time I was on a forum besides looking at these percentages. I'm never on the forums between machines and market and, and messaging people. I mean, there's so much to do with that website that doesn't have to specifically do with just the forums and it's, it is amazing website for what it is. Yeah, exactly. Well, okay. But did you know this is how Brad found me? You remember that story? Yeah, I do remember that story. Yeah. I thought he knew me from the podcast and he just Googled people on Pinside and said, hey, are you around? I'd like to play pinball. Yep.
    50:33
    All right, let's move on to best animations and displays. And this one is insanely close. Willy Wonka and the Chocolate Factory took it home by 0.3% over Jurassic Park. And that's a coin flip. Really, I would say, for all intents and purposes, that's a tie, which means they both nailed it. You remember when the LCD first came out where they really weren't sure what to do with it? And so it felt a little clunky. this means they have figured out ways of stepping it up and it is, is being integrated better and better. And so, uh, and kudos to Stern and kudos to JJP for being able to elevate this and actually make it feel naturally integrated into the game. I agree.
    51:22
    Uh, next category, rookie of the year, very well-deserved. Congratulations, Tim Sexton. This is one that we've been kind of predicting for the last three, four months. Cause honestly the man deserves it. we were in this category. I do want to point out that we were the top podcast in the results. We may have been in sixth place, but out of all the podcasts, we were number one.
    51:48
    So you are now going to hear that we're going to be the number one rookie of the year podcast. In the sixth place territory. But no, like it was very awesome, very humbling to see that we were that high, especially over Chris Franchi and the Super Awesome Pinball Show. We had Lauren Gray on. She's got a wonderful show. Poor Man's Pinball Podcast. Those guys are fantastic as well. I love that everyone in this – like, you know, they always say, oh, there's so many pinball podcasts. You look at this. That is a very diverse, different group of podcasts. I mean, between us, you got Poor Man's that – let's not be around the bush. Like they say, it's the sloppiest show in pinball. and it really is i love it guys and then lauren we love what you're doing there with with the female oriented podcast that's fantastic and franchi is doing something in my opinion that hasn't been done yet in pinball podcasting so it's cool that there's a diverse group of people it's just not the same thing getting churned out well and if you look at it i yes we are the number one sixth place podcast, but legitimately 7.2, 6.8, 6.7, 4.9. We all really, we could divide that evenly. And it just says that great. You know what? This is a 31 flavors ice cream situation and everybody gets to choose their flavor.
    53:14
    Yep. So congratulations again, Tim Sexton. We don't want to pull away from your win. and also congratulations to Jack Danger and Zach Nicolmeni for that category. This is one that had had a lot of controversy around it, and Jeff has already promised there's going to be a lot more different regulations with it to help kind of tighten up that category. Sure, but can you pick anybody on that that deserves it more than Tim, though? And really, Tim came from the competitive pinball scene, and he stepped up to the plate, got teamed up with Steve Ritchie, and he really took that game to a new level and being able to make it. This one, I guarantee this Black Knight and probably the pro is going to be in tournaments for years to come because it is going to be a great tournament game. I agree.
    54:08
    So, I totally lost my spot. Favorite pinball tournament competition. No surprise here. pinberg 47.6 it's like saying what's your favorite football game uh you have the super bowl or you have everything else yeah exactly so no shocker there best call outs i think this is awesome i think it is awesome that elvira took this home and i loved the acceptance speech i thought it was very informative it was cool to get to know the guy yeah and it does actually point out too though that look at what Black Knight did and Black Knight was right up there and so they did such an amazing job on their call outs and so both of those really deserve to be recognized for being able to make call outs something interesting because you are going to hear those call outs and that's really what you're going to be hearing during playing the game one of the reasons why I still have my Spider-Man machine is because the call outs are so fantastic
    55:11
    Yep. All right. Moving on. Favorite pinball YouTube channel. And this one was fairly close. We've got Papa Pinball. And honestly, I feel like this is one of the number ones that are watched. I mean, I always go to YouTube and I type in The Shadow Pinball Tutorial or Jurassic Park Pinball Tutorial. And the first thing that usually comes up is Papa TV. and that's why I've looked up to Bowen because of this. I felt like I've learned pinball because of Bowen taking his time out to do these tutorials. And so it didn't shock me when Papa won, but it was awesome to see TNT's video as well. Well, TNT, there are three different shows. Legitimately, this is a pick your flavor.
    56:05
    Certainly, everybody watches Papa because when you buy a game, especially an older game, you're going to see, okay, what does Bowen say about it? Because he certainly has the rules knowledge and the skills to be able to show you what the game's supposed to do. Straight Down the Middle is still fun.
    56:22
    It's the streaming version of what we're doing. And in many ways, we take a lot of lead from what they have done.
    56:33
    And really, TNT, come on, Who does not love watching Todd Tucky go around and do his little thing? I agree. I will say I was a little disappointed in Todd Tucky that I talked to him about three years ago or four years ago. And I said, I'm looking for a 720. He said, yeah, they just don't come up. Well, I just saw one in his last video in the background and he didn't give me a call.
    56:59
    Come on, you creep. I know, right? Okay, yes, I know I have one dead on arrival in my garage that I still need to fix, but still. Yes.
    57:12
    All right, favorite pinball mod of 2019. Amber Jurassic Park shooter rod, 20%. No shocker here. Fantastic mod. Yeah, no shocker. It's really cool. It is theme specific, and also it doesn't really detract from the shooter. that's one of the challenges of these deluxe shooter rods is sometimes especially with a skill shot it makes it really hard to get a uh to get that feel because it's a it's a different rod um i i will say the the chest mod for jjp is really cool yeah it really is in all of these mods, I would think, yeah, you'd want those.
    57:57
    Yep. Best light show, Willy Wonka. Really not a shocker. I mean, it won by 40%. Or, not by 40%. It won with 40% of the vote. Yeah, you know what? The one thing that JJP has consistently done to a different level is their light shows.
    58:18
    So, yeah, absolutely, they, you know, it's fun. You walk into my home, and you are going to notice Wizard of Oz.
    58:28
    It's the first one you are going to notice just because they have something different. And it's not bad or good. It's just it stands out, which is really what you're looking for, especially if you get these things on location.
    58:42
    All right. Favorite pinball streamer. Deadflip took a landslide on this one. 46% of the vote, almost 47%. but there's two things I want to point out about this category. Flippin' Out Pinball took second at 12%. That might not seem like much, but let's consider this. Flippin' Out started, what, at the end of summer last year?
    59:04
    And that's pretty impressive to me. I think it's awesome. Like, when I think of pinball streaming, I think of Jack Danger. And I know there's a lot of controversy around what's been going on with all that, But you know what? Jack is good at what he does, and I feel like he draws in and builds the hobby and promotes it to the public in ways that I can't. I think this is well-deserved. The other cool part I wanted to point out Pinball Undesirables they took dead last which may not be cool but he posted on pin site after these results were posted that he felt very honored to even be in the top 10 you know one of the concerns is seeing these results and feeling discouraged and not wanting to do what you're doing anymore and if anything pinball undesirables like dude this is the coolest thing ever that i was he's like i don't expect to ever be in this category ever again because there's a lot of streamers out there now.
    60:04
    Yeah, and I will say there are different ways of looking at it. Jack is being Jack. He's having fun doing this. In many ways, Flippin' Out, it's a different show. It seems to be a little bit more like a roundtable, and they bring in people who have worked on the games, and they've been able to, you know, they had George Gomez come in. And so they've been able to do some really good things with a special WinLit crew. So I really love what they are doing. Again, it's a different show. Jack is doing a great thing, and Jack is trying to be that pinball personality that gets people excited about playing pinball. So, again, you're feeling different niches, and that's healthy.
    60:57
    Yep. I totally agree. okay let's move on to favorite pinball league congratulations to lauren gray and her pinball league bells and chimes san antonio they took home the award and that is very awesome yeah it this is this is a shout out to there's room for everybody at the table and this is you know i've said this analogy before the table is not fixed so in order for us to bring more people to the table. We don't have to kick people out. We can keep expanding the table and bring more chairs into the table. And that's the way that we bring pinball is to say, you know what? We don't care what your background is, social, economic, religious, orientation, everything. I don't care. If you want to play a game with Jurassic Park with me, come on over. We will play because we have something that we can, uh, that we can, uh, bond together on and absolutely fully aware. There are some bad actors out there that sadly get way more publicity than I'm hoping percentage wise. They are. Uh, I would like to believe that most of us are just willing to play with whomever is coming up. And this is just fun. It's fun to share a common experience with someone especially with a stranger i agree uh best rules jurassic park like no there's no chance on this one yeah when keith said that he had twice as much coding in jurassic park versus iron maiden that blew me away what'd you think i was there really like not to sound conceited or anything like that but was there really any other pinball that was going to to compete with this i mean look at the results 57 yeah i mean it's it's pretty unanimous yeah the the only thing that would probably give it a run for the money is if uh jjp pirates came out because i what eric has done with that code is completely encyclopedic as well. So I would say that that would be a closer vote if it were between Jurassic Park and J.J.P. Pirates, which I am still hoping they decide to put those back on the line because there's such a need for those right now. You know it. Favorite pinball topper of 2019. This was our category. This was closer than I thought it was going to be, actually. Yeah. Just a disclaimer, we did not know who was going to win this category. We were just essentially asked to read the parts that we did. And the funny part was, is my wife's like, man, you're really rigid. You need to like move or something. But yeah, I'm not going to go over the circumstances. I was like, we had done it multiple times. We do podcasts. We don't do videos very often. So it was very different. Well, it was a little hard too, because we were struggling because you were getting some reverb in your in your headset so yes you actually set it up a little better i just i just pulled up my podcasting rig which is why i look like i'm just talking into a microphone and you're actually trying to do a a presentation but you know it's hey it's okay we we got some shout out so that was fun yep that was awesome but black knight um honestly i'm kind of i'm kind of shocked that it did take the top uh i i'm not it's amazing That interaction is on par with what they did with the dinosaur head in the premium on Jurassic Park. And it is such a cool interactive topper. I would be terrified to put that on location just because some idiot would just try to mess with it. But it's really unbelievably cool for that one, whoever came up with that idea at Stern. I totally agree. Yeah, I kind of want a Black Knight Sword of Rage. I would lean toward the Pro because I like the faster speed of it. But if I did that, I would absolutely get the Topper.
    65:18
    Yep. All right. This is the category we're in. Favorite pinball podcast. Kaneda, three-peat, man. Congratulations. Yeah, shout out to Chris. Yep. You know what? He has a way of getting the votes, and he certainly has a following, and he is – I said it before. He's very good at being a podcaster. So he's very entertaining, and he does have a talent for getting a following. So congratulations. I don't really have anything to say.
    65:54
    I just want to point out a couple things. I think it's really awesome that this Week in Pinball podcast, a podcast that had been out for not even a year at this point, garnered almost 20% of the votes.
    66:07
    I mean, Kaneda's at 28, which is impressive, but Kaneda's been around for four years. And so between that and Special and Lit, a show that's been around for a year and a half.
    66:18
    Awesome job, guys. Top three, fantastic. I do want to point out though I find it very interesting that second, third and fifth place all those podcasts no longer exist so what's going to happen?
    66:33
    Well we've talked about this before there is some burnout to this which is why we have taken the approach where we are mostly a bi-weekly show we occasionally mix it up a little bit but because we still want to be able to maintain the fire of hey, I still want to talk about this. There are some that they have put so much effort and their lives into making the podcast that I think eventually they just run out of steam. And so that's been our approach is to, hey, we're both quite busy. We wanted to make sure that this was still fun and that we were able to still keep the fire after 100 episodes. But with the way we're doing that, that's still two years away. So I do want to say thank you. We are out of this category. We are once again, one of the top newcomer in this category. I'm very humbled by that. I mean, I respect the crap of everyone on this list for the product that they put out. And it blows my mind that we came in above slam tilt, slam tilt. You guys are fantastic. Like we might be polar opposites in how we do our shows with us being family friendly and you guys not, I don't want us to put it, but it's awesome. When you listen to Ron and Bryce, you have to laugh. I mean, come on. You do. They're fantastic. They really are. But I'm very humbled. Even at just 5% of the vote, I am shocked that 4.9% of the vote actually went towards us because I know I voted for myself. I know Scott voted for us. So I don't know who else did it. But thank you guys. Thank you for saying, you know what? Everyone else on this list, Loser Kid is my favorite out of these other, not even just these 10. I mean, how many podcasts are out there? And so thank you so much.
    68:28
    All right, let's move on. Best artwork. The Munsters. Very well deserved. Yeah. I actually think it should have been bigger.
    68:40
    You think? Yeah, I think that Munsters really was by far the best complete package out there. And when you saw the art, everybody was blown away by the artwork of Munsters.
    68:53
    And I think it suffered a little bit in that, one, it came out, it was the first of the year last year. And so people have forgotten how great the art is. Franchi has his own show now and people really I think that people undervalue what he does because he makes it look easy he makes it look like you just took some stock photos and put it together in a pretty way no, that's not really what he's doing he is re-envisioning envisioning how a good style guide should be. Because if you look at most style guides, they're actually pretty bad.
    69:44
    I love what Willy Wonka was able to do, but I think they were pretty constrained by what the style guide was.
    69:55
    I mentioned it looks like a cereal box. if you were to buy Wonka O's at Walmart, that's what you would get.
    70:05
    But Franchi has been able to, name a bad Franchi art package. You can't because they're so good. So I think people just forgot of the impact of that. And maybe it was just because it was a simpler game and so people don't have it as much in their collection. It's not in their forefront, but it really, it should have had 50% of the vote. I agree. Well, and, and honestly, I think it's awesome. Franchi, we love what you do. Art wise, super awesome pinball show wise. I think this is a situation where like he's been the bridesmaid. Like finally, it's your turn to be the bride. I think it's awesome, dude. So. Yeah. When you look at the other, the other things too, and there's some great things on here, Elvira did a great job. That's a classic. It's a classic feel that they were able to not make it feel dated, but still made it feel relevant to Elvira. Black Knight did a great job. I love the art on Black Knight because it feels the same thing. It's an updated version of an old thing. the comic book Star Wars edition. If you are into that comic book style, you are going to buy that style because it does.
    71:29
    And really, most of these are still very good. We are past the Game of Thrones days where it was a, okay, cut, paste, and move on. You know, the sticker by number situations. Yep.
    71:46
    So last two categories, I'm just going to lump them together. Best Playfield Gameplay and Layout, along with Game of the Year, both very deserved Jurassic Park. And it blew the competition out of the water with almost 50% of the vote on both categories. Yeah, I really haven't heard. And I'm sure that there are people who nitpick on things, but I haven't heard a negative thing on this. I also have an update on my quest for a Jurassic Park. I have been talking to the guy who customized my Iron Maiden, excuse me, my Iron Man and also my Tron. And Josh has played my Tron and I spent way too much money doing fun stuff to it. But if you look at our picture, that's actually Josh playing my Tron. and I talked to him over the weekend and he sent me some pictures of a Jurassic Park that he customized and it looks amazing. So I'm in the works of trying to obtain a premium so I can send it to him so he can blingify it and make it look amazing just like my Tron. So that is the update there. But I'm super excited. The pictures that he sent me on his own personal one are amazing.
    73:11
    I agree. So if you have a premium out there that you're bored of because it's an awesome game, go ahead and send it to me.
    73:22
    So that wraps it up. Congratulations, Keith, Owen, and team. That is awesome that you guys rolled out Jurassic Park and won as much as you did.
    73:34
    Not a shocker. So before we wrap this up, we do have some extra t-shirts and I want to give one of these, these bad boys away. And Scott and I discussed this. We're going to try this. I know you got some time on your hands. We want you, if you want to be submitted into this contest to get a free t-shirt, we want you to go to Zencaster.com Z E N C A S T R.com and record for us 30-second, minute-long clip of a couple. You can choose what you want to record. We want to hear either your favorite pinball story or how you got into the hobby or maybe one of your favorite moments of us on this podcast. And we're going to put that all in and we're going to submit it for the next episode so that way we can see and select someone for the t-shirt. The way you can record this is if you have an Android phone, you can record it directly from your android phone right onto the site uh if you don't want to go that complex if you want to you can just record just a voice clip on your phone send it to us loser kid pinball podcast at gmail.com or get a hold of us through facebook whatever it may be but let's do that let's let's give some of these shirts let's give a shirt away if you do want to buy a shirt i did misquote i said it was 32 for the shirt the people that made the shirts for us did misquote me. They're not that much. If you want a shirt, they're $25. So just as much as our hat, just as much as our straight beanie. Yeah. And they just add shipping on top of that. So yeah. And if you buy more than one thing, heck that's only paying shipping once. So I do have more hats. I do have more beanies. I have just a couple of shirts. I don't know if you guys saw our post a couple of weeks ago or last week, we did ship out a lot of shirts. I spent some time in the post office.
    75:30
    Other than that, I think that pretty much wraps it up for us. Scott, what do you think? Yeah, I think so. And we're hoping that this is a fun episode for you guys to think about all the positive things that are going on. Because, you know what, the economy will come back. The work will come back. The social distancing will go away. And we'll be able to resume our lives. But we're hoping that this just reminds you why you like pinball, what you're missing about it and what you're looking forward to when you come back. And let's let's try to just focus on the good things, focus on the things that we're missing, but things that we are looking forward to do again. And being, you know, being excellent to each other, being nice and being able to find that common ground and put some quarters in a machine altogether. there. Agreed. If you want to get ahold of us, whether it be for entering the contest, or if you want to just reach out and say hello, you can reach us at loser kid pinball podcast at gmail.com or on Facebook at loser kid pinball podcast, Instagram, wherever, wherever you want to go. So hit us up, send us that request, Just send us that submission or just say hello or just give us positive feedback. I don't care. You know, we want to hear from you. Like I said, we do have products still on the shelf if you want to buy a couple things. We don't have a ton, but get a hold of us. Other than that, I think that pretty much wraps it up. I hope you enjoyed the Twippies as much as we did. It was fun. I'm very honored. Thank you, Patterson, for letting us be a part of it between the videos and whatnot. And also, you know what? Congrats to everyone. That was was submitted into that thing. There's a lot and lot into this hobby now. You know, we we keep saying this is a niche hobby, but the Twippy's go to prove there's plenty of room for people to join and have fun with us. So, yeah. And I also want to give a shout out to to all the small people out there. There's a lot of boutique shops out there who are trying to sell stuff and, you know, send a few dollars their way. I actually went on Stern's website. I bought one of their awesome shirts. I actually bought two shirts. I bought a hat. I bought a key chain. Jessica DiNardo has the soft plunge. Go ahead and support her. That's her main source of what she is into right now. Things like the mod companies like Measle Mods. I'm going to put in an order for stand-up splints because my splint seems to move around. So find something that you need right now and try to send a few dollars to these people because, you know what, they will appreciate it because right now they're hurting just like everybody else. And even that $50 out there will help out immensely. So, again, reach out. Let's try to stay together, and we'll see you in two weeks. Agreed. Oh, one more thing. Support Texas Pinball Festival. It may not have happened this year, but they still got product on their store on their website. go support them as well so we can have a Texas pinball festival for next year. Yeah, absolutely. Yes, that is part of the swag that you can reach out and buy. Go ahead and do it. You know what? Well, thanks again, Scott. It's always fun, man. Yeah, thank you again. We'll see you in two weeks. See you in two weeks.
    78:56
    Shut up and sit down. Bye.