Spooky Pinball Upcoming Release and the Battle of Online Content For Pinball Manufacturers (Ep.58)

A Pinball Podcast·podcast_episode·20m 10s·analyzed·Jun 25, 2021

Analysis

claude-haiku-4-5-20251001 · $0.036

TL;DR

Spooky's teaser strategy and content dominance position them to sell out; smaller manufacturers face uphill battle against Stern's IP licensing advantage.

Summary

Travis Murray analyzes Spooky Pinball's effective teaser marketing strategy for an upcoming unreleased game and discusses how online content creation is becoming a competitive battleground for pinball manufacturers. He compares content strategies across Stern, Haggis, American Pinball, and Chicago Gaming, arguing that strong social media presence combined with transparency about manufacturing drives consumer loyalty and sales. Travis expresses concerns about American Pinball's planned unlicensed releases and Chicago Gaming's Cactus Canyon revival competing against Stern's dominance with relevant pop culture IP.

Key Claims

Spooky Pinball's upcoming game will likely sell out due to strong social media content, consumer goodwill from transparency, and proven ability to meet manufacturing timelines
high confidence · Travis directly states he would be 'absolutely shocked if this next game does not sell out' and provides three detailed reasons supporting this prediction
Spooky Pinball is the only major pinball manufacturer showing underside playfield teaser content on Facebook
medium confidence · Travis states 'To my knowledge, I think Spooky might be about the only one that has done this' with explicit caveat for correction
New consumers entering the pinball hobby since 2020 are primarily attracted to licensed themes in pop culture rather than classic/original IP
high confidence · Travis provides detailed analysis: 'they don't really care if this particular theme or any particular theme is brand new to pinball...These are different games that they all respond to. It's the first time that they've seen these themes'
American Pinball's next two releases will not feature licensed themes
medium confidence · Travis states 'they are looking at releasing their next, I think they said it was their next two that they're coming out with are not going to be licensed themes' with hedge language 'I think'
Cactus Canyon has lower brand awareness among newer pinball consumers compared to Attack from Mars or Monster Bash
medium confidence · Travis interviewed approximately 20-25 people across several states; only 2-3 expressed strong excitement about Cactus Canyon, receiving 'lukewarm' responses overall
Stern can sustain theme relevance across multiple years; Iron Maiden announced in March 2018 still selling in June 2021
high confidence · Travis cites Iron Maiden as example: 'we're still hearing about Iron Maidens coming out...here we are, June of 2021'
New manufacturers with pinball machines ready to ship will be revealed at Chicago Expo
medium confidence · Travis references Loser Kid Podcast episode from ~2 weeks prior where 'somebody on there from Chicago Expo...let it slip that...there's going to be, I guess, new manufacturers showing up that have the pinball machines ready to go'

Notable Quotes

“Spooky is really showing what it is to make quality online content and to connect with the consumer. And I truly believe people are going to continue responding to that.”
Travis Murray @ ~2:30-3:00 — Core thesis: Spooky's content strategy is the primary driver of anticipated market success
“I would be very surprised by this. And the reason why I would be surprised is because they have absolutely annihilated it with three different reasons...their social media content is on point...they have the goodwill of the people...they've proven that they can manufacture a game within the time frame that they put down.”
Travis Murray @ ~4:30-6:00 — Explicit framework for predicting Spooky's next game will sell out; explains manufacturing reliability as differentiator
“And that is huge. In an industry in which there's multiple companies out there in the past that have missed self-imposed timelines, this is refreshing that there is a company out there that says, hey, we're going to put out games in X amount of time, and they hit that goal.”
Travis Murray @ ~6:30-7:00 — Contextualizes Spooky's reliability against historical industry pattern of delays
“When you share your journey with consumers, when you share that you're getting manufacturing going, when you share that you're increasing manufacturing and you share different things behind the scenes, that really does, it clicks with the consumer. It gets people emotionally involved with this company.”
Travis Murray @ ~5:30-6:00 — Identifies transparency as emotional engagement mechanism driving loyalty
“I think there's a high-end risk of that [Cactus Canyon relevance]. And the reason for that is because when we really take a step back, Attack from Mars and Monster Bash, those are special themes that a lot of people that are already involved in pinball, they basically, it has damn near 100% brand awareness...I don't think I can say the same about Cactus Canyon.”
Travis Murray @ ~14:00-15:00 — Articulates competitive disadvantage of non-pop-culture IP in expanded market
“What company still has all the relevant themes in pop culture? That company is Stern. and that's what makes Stern so powerful moving forward is that these new consumers, they don't really care if this particular theme or any particular theme is brand new to pinball.”

Entities

Spooky PinballcompanyTravis MurraypersonStern PinballcompanyAmerican PinballcompanyChicago GamingcompanyHaggis Pinballcompany Jersey Jack Pinballcompany

Signals

?
business_signal: American Pinball and Chicago Gaming both face structural disadvantages: weak content strategies combined with non-pop-culture IP in market dominated by Stern's licensed themes
medium · Travis criticizes American Pinball's limited YouTube content and Chicago Gaming's 'limited much' activity; expresses concern about Cactus Canyon relevance
?
business_signal: Spooky Pinball's manufacturing reliability (on-time delivery despite COVID delays on Rick and Morty) differentiating them from competitors with history of missed timelines
high · Travis explicitly states this is 'huge' in an industry with multiple historical delays and constitutes 'a standing ovation'
?
community_signal: Spooky Pinball using transparency and behind-the-scenes content to create emotional investment and loyalty with consumer base
high · Travis: 'when you share your journey with consumers...it clicks with the consumer. It gets people emotionally involved with this company'
?
competitive_signal: Non-licensed/original IP games facing heightened competitive risk as smaller manufacturers compete against Stern's pop culture portfolio; new consumers lack awareness of classic themes
high · Cactus Canyon awareness survey of 20-25 people yielded only 2-3 expressing strong excitement; Travis concerns about American Pinball unlicensed strategy
?
competitive_signal: Stern Pinball's structural dominance driven by access to pop culture IP and ability to sustain theme relevance across multiple years; new consumer cohort indifferent to game release date vs. IP recognition

Transcript

groq_whisper · $0.061

0:00

Spooky Pinball continues to tease their upcoming release. What does this mean for all the other companies and who is winning the battle for online content? All this right now on A Pinball Podcast.

0:19

Alright, welcome back everybody to another episode of A Pinball Podcast. Thank you guys so much for being here. I greatly do appreciate it. And yes, we are finally releasing two episodes in one week. I know it's been a little here and there, a little hit and miss. I think I had maybe two episodes of this podcast for probably the past month or so. But we're going to start getting on our normal schedule a little bit better and just releasing it as the news comes in. And there is plenty of news coming in. Now, if you're watching this on YouTube, if you could so much, I'm going to shill for a second. Hit that like button. I want to see what happens. I'm kind of curious with the algorithm, what it's doing, and I've got some theories on it, but I need to see it in actual action. So if somebody could help me out on that, I would greatly appreciate it. And if you're also watching this on YouTube, you'll probably notice behind me, it's a little bit crazy back here. And the reason for that is I am completely redesigning everything here. I'm going to try to build out an actual podcast studio for myself and start releasing some other content that I'm pretty excited about that is coming down the pipeline. So that's why everything's just in disarray behind me in case you're watching and you think I've just completely lost it with having the machines turned off and everything just kind of strewn out behind me. But either way, let's get on to it because I'm sure everybody listening on audio right now is like, Travis, let's just get on with it, and we're going to do that right now. So Spooky Pinball has been just killing it lately in terms of basically showing off their upcoming release without showing off their upcoming release. Now, what they're doing is very great. You'll see some teaser videos to where, or not necessarily teaser videos, but videos in which they're updating people on their YouTube page, which is brilliant. I mean, some of these videos are obviously performing the best that any of their other videos have done thus far outside of tutorial videos or outside of actual trailers, which will always do massive numbers. But I think Spooky Pinball is really exploiting or showing, and that might not even be the right word to use. They're really showing what it is to make quality online content and to connect with the consumer. And I truly believe people are going to continue responding to that. And Haggis is also doing the same thing as well. And we will talk about Haggis here a little bit later. But Spooky is really doing well on this. And then also on their Facebook page, they've done something that I actually really do like when a pinball company does this. And to my knowledge, I think Spooky might be about the only one that has done this. If there's been another one, please, somebody out there, let me know. But I really do like when they show a teaser reveal or just a little teaser of the underside of the play field because it gets people talking. It gets people speculating. Now, I'm not going to sit here and really speculate on what I'm seeing too much just because it's just, quite frankly, I don't know. I know some parts to underneath the play field, but other parts I'm just not so sure of. I'm sure somebody will probably do that. It would shock me if somebody, if Kerry Hardy doesn't have a video on that already. I'm pretty sure he does. So I'll check on that. And if he does, I'll just leave a link in the show notes down below so that way everybody can check it out. But it does look interesting, though. It does. And I'm not so sure, just to be flat out honest, I'm not so sure how it will work in the real world. And I am a little bit worried when I do see how this play field looks, just because there's been multiple spookies that have all been on location at the location that I play at, ranging from America's Most Haunted, Rob Zombie, ENA, Rick and Morty, Alice Cooper. They've all been there. and so I'm fully expecting to be able to play this next one that's coming up but they've all had issues as well so I am a little leery of that but that's not really something that we can get into too much here because quite frankly we don't know what this machine is going to look like quite yet and we don't know how it's going to really function quite yet until we see it actually functioning now I'll come back to my point with all this that I do love the fact that spooky pinball is acknowledging these shortcomings in their videos and they're discussing ways that they're trying to fix these issues ahead of time. So I really do appreciate this about them that they are openly acknowledging it. They're getting out ahead of it and they're saying, hey, this is what we know. This is what we're trying to do. This is what we're testing out and this is what we believe will work. So to me, that's a great way to get to the goodwill of the customer. And I think because of this, because of their approach that they doing I would be just absolutely shocked if this next game does not sell out And there several reasons why I believe that this game will sell out And this is just assuming that they're doing 500, 750, or 1,000 units for their main thing, for the collector's edition. I would be very surprised by this. And the reason why I would be surprised is because they have absolutely annihilated it with three different reasons. And for one, their social media content is on point. They're doing very well with that. And they're really leaning into that niche. And they've built this up over years and years with their podcast that I think for now is a way, hopefully, maybe it will come back at some point. Two, they have the goodwill of the people just because they are being very transparent about these issues. They are being very transparent about what they plan on doing. And when you share your journey with consumers, when you share that you're getting manufacturing going, when you share that you're increasing manufacturing and you share different things behind the scenes, that really does, it clicks with the consumer. It gets people emotionally involved with this company. And I guarantee you there's going to be people out there that will be willing to put down money for their next game no matter what, simply because they are emotionally involved. And Spooky has done a great job at really touching that chord with a lot of people. And then the other big, big reason why I believe it will sell out is because they've proven that they can manufacture a game within the time frame that they put down. And that is huge. In an industry in which there's multiple companies out there in the past that have missed self-imposed timelines, this is refreshing that there is a company out there that says, hey, we're going to put out games in X amount of time, and they hit that goal. And it's amazing that they did that with Rick and Morty, even though I believe they said they had two months that they lost due to COVID. So that right there pretty much does deserve a standing ovation for a pinball company to be able to do that, to stay on top of things and keep pushing forward. That's great for them. That's great for the industry. That's great for consumers that trusted this company with their money, with their deposits, and Spooky delivered in spades. And that was great for everybody involved. And because of that, I think that they have just grabbed a new amount of loyal customers for the future. I think they really have. Now, when we talk about social media content and how much on point Spooky is, I believe that there's several other companies out there that they range from also being on point to nearly being non-existent. And I think because of this, we are going to start to see the ramifications of that play out over the course of this year. Now, of course, I've talked about it before, Stern Pinball. They do great things when it comes to PR. They obviously have somebody that helps out with PR. They obviously have somebody that helps out and manages their social media content. And they kind of bring all that together. I'm starting to see them post up some stuff with TikTok, although I'm not active on that. I see them posting up on their stories on Facebook. I know, obviously, they're active on Instagram. They're a little bit active on YouTube to a point to where they're making the behind-the-scenes videos and stuff like that. And I've kind of discussed in the past that I wish that would be more up front a little bit. And I wish that they would make their trailers kind of like that as well. But other than that, I think Stern does a tremendous job with how they present their content and how they present their products to begin with. Now, Haggis has done a really solid job at keeping people updated. And because of this, they found a solid niche by going back to old school solid states and bringing them back with Fathom, selling out of their Mermaid Edition, which is basically the LE version of that game. And I think that's a really smart idea to do. So when you combine up just using the old school solid state and then also using your content creation and you're using your content and you're utilizing your ecosystem on your YouTube page or Facebook page to reach out to the consumer, I think that's the great play to do for these smaller companies because it does build up trust. And it does build up a little bit more brand awareness as organically as you can do it. But you're also going out there and you're doing it. So I feel like that's a really smart decision by them. I hope that they continue doing that because I think you're basically laying the seeds now in 2021 and you're laying that down for what's to come in 2022 and 2023. And I think that's very important to do, especially when you consider what happened with COVID in 2020 that there were so many people on lockdown during that time And I think even today there probably a few countries out there that are still doing that Obviously the U is a little bit different nowadays but that just goes to show you that a lot of people have discovered that they can just use online even more so. It's just more powerful than even what they expected. And I think it's even more powerful for a lot of these companies out there, more than what they expected. So I feel like these pinball companies really need to focus in on utilizing that. Now, I've kind of looked at how American Pinball is doing their YouTube, and I've kind of looked at whether or not Chicago Gaming has done anything. I don't think Chicago Gaming's done much. Of course, they've got other things besides pinball, I believe. I'm honestly not too familiar with them. But when it comes to American Pinball, I know that they're trying to do some stuff on YouTube currently. it's just not very much out there. And so that's something right there that I feel like if American Pinball would start documenting stuff behind the scenes right now and start laying the foundation and kind of laying the breadcrumbs to what is coming and they would do that sooner rather than later, I think that would benefit them a lot. What kind of scares me about American Pinball right now is that they are looking at releasing their next, I think they said it was their next two that they're coming out with are not going to be licensed themes. Now, Spooky is obviously they're going to do a licensed theme, and I think that's also another reason why they will easily sell out. Now, obviously, the horror niche, that sucker's all over the place right now. There's no telling exactly what it could be. I feel like, for me, I'm not huge on the horror niche. I watch some of it. I personally am kind of hoping it's Saul, but I feel like at the same time, they're most likely going to come out with something that might be older than 30 years. I think that's kind of where they're leaning towards. But at the same time, the great thing with Spooky, there are so many other options out there that they can build on and that they can go to, whether it's Saul, whether it's Conjuring, whether it's something like Insidious maybe, or maybe The Ring. I don't know. But I think a Saul machine would be pretty dope. But coming back to American Pinball, When you're up against something like that, and you're up against spooky pinball covering the horror themes, you're up against haggis pinball redoing the old school ballets that people know and love. When you go against Stern that's just constantly putting out just theme after theme after theme. When you go against Jersey Jack that will put out a machine every 18 months with a major theme, and obviously they have Toy Story coming out as well pretty soon, that's going to be pretty difficult to go against. So if you're going to come out with something that might not be a licensed theme, then you've got to really get on point with building the awareness of it because you're already kind of behind the eight ball on something like that. And that worries me just a little bit, but who knows? Maybe they might surprise us all and there's something that none of us are expecting. Maybe it could be. It could be something that's huge that just works out and is a great design, great code. I don't know. It's just pure speculation on my part right now. But I hope that they do something great with that. And also, too, I believe, I wasn't going to mention this before, but listening to Loser Kid Podcast the other day, and I think this was released maybe two weeks ago now, that they had somebody on there. The name slips me, so apologies for that. But they had somebody on there from Chicago Expo that was discussing some of the things that are coming up. And they kind of let it slip that, I say let it slip, But they wanted it out there that there's going to be, I guess, new manufacturers showing up that have the pinball machines ready to go. And they're going to be there. So I'm going to have another video out pretty soon just about that because I really need to dive into that. And then we can get into all the speculation about what's going on there. Now, I do think moving forward, I think Chicago Gaming also might be a little bit in trouble with Cactus Canyon. Assuming Cactus Canyon is the next thing coming out, I think they might be a little bit in trouble. Now, that's not saying that, hey, they're going to close down or anything like that. That's not what I mean. I think they're running an extreme risk of Cactus Canyon not being relevant to today's consumer. I think there's a high-end risk of that. And the reason for that is because when we really take a step back, Attack from Mars and Monster Bash, those are special themes that a lot of people that are already involved in pinball, they basically, it has damn near 100% brand awareness or theme awareness to everybody that is currently in pinball. I don think I can say the same about Cactus Canyon I think it a little bit lower but when you consider the amount of new people that have entered this hobby over 2020 I promise you I talked to a lot of them They have no idea Cactus Canyon even exists.