Journalist Tool

Kineticist

  • HDashboard
  • IItems
  • ↓Ingest
  • SSources
  • KBeats
  • BBriefs
  • RIntel
  • QSearch
  • NName Review
  • +Health

v0.1.0

← Back to items

Pinball Junk Drawer, Episode 5:. Cosmic Carnival

Poor Man's Pinball Podcast·podcast_episode·analyzed·Jan 23, 2022
View original
Export .md

Analysis

claude-haiku-4-5-20251001 · $0.032

TL;DR

Suncoast Pinball's Cosmic Carnival: design, art, manufacturing, and the company's original-IP philosophy.

Summary

Host Mal interviews John from Suncoast Arcade/Suncoast Pinball about the development and launch of Cosmic Carnival, an original-themed pinball machine. The episode features a retrospective discussion of Suncoast's failed pinball venture, highlighting design iterations, the collaboration with artist Dirty Donny, manufacturing challenges, and the company's philosophy of creating unique IP-based machines rather than licensed titles. Mal expresses appreciation for Suncoast's effort despite the ultimate failure of the pinball division.

Key Claims

  • Suncoast Arcade started about four years ago and has undergone six expansions

    high confidence · John (Suncoast) states this directly in interview

  • Cosmic Carnival development took approximately two years from concept to near-production

    high confidence · John states 'I've been working on it for two years now'

  • Cosmic Carnival code was 98% complete and ready to ship within a week and a half at time of interview

    high confidence · John: 'it's 98% coded and ready to go so it's we're ready to hit the streets in fact we're going to start shipping here in the next week and a half'

  • Suncoast planned to produce 250 numbered Cosmic Carnival machines with 75 allocated for overseas and 175 for domestic

    high confidence · John: 'we're going to set 75 of the first 250 numbered for overseas, leaving us 175 for stateside'

  • All Cosmic Carnival machines would be numbered, autographed by Dirty Donny, and feature full powder coating with metal flake purple finish

    high confidence · John describes special edition features: 'the first 250 you're going Tee'd Off be numbered and autographed by Dirty Donny' with 'full powder coating' and 'Metal flake purple'

  • Suncoast sourced off-the-shelf parts but had to commission custom manufacturing for brackets and drop targets

    high confidence · John: 'we were able to work with a couple vendors and even get some of the things manufactured just for us'

  • The original Cosmic Carnival prototype experienced an overheating/smoking incident at Freeplay Florida

    high confidence · Mal recounts: 'this machine starts smoking like fire smoking' during setup

  • Dirty Donny and Jeremy Packer were identified as the primary available freelance pinball artists at the time

    high confidence · John: 'there were really two pinball artists out there that were kind of free market. Jeremy Packer and Dirty Donny'

Notable Quotes

  • “Pinball is not easy. It's incredibly hard. It's complex. But like a lot of things, anything that's worth doing and worth doing right, it's not easy. If it were easy, everyone would be doing it.”

    John (Suncoast Pinball) @ ~1:06:00 — Core statement about the difficulty and complexity of pinball manufacturing as a barrier to entry

  • “We knew that off the bat we wanted to do an original-themed pinball machine. I mean, that's what pinball used to be. They were almost all original-themed, and it wasn't until the last 10 or 15 years that they've kind of gone the other way to all-licensed theme.”

    John (Suncoast Pinball) @ ~40:00 — Articulates the philosophical shift in pinball licensing and Suncoast's counter-strategy

  • “The pinball community can be quite harsh. They can be really critical, and I think a lot of people are really critical, and they really shouldn't be. The amount of work and sweat that it takes to get a machine on the street is phenomenal.”

    Mal (host) @ ~1:01:00 — Reflects on community gatekeeping and lack of appreciation for manufacturing effort

  • “I love this theme. This is what, to me, now everyone's like, oh, I want, everyone says they want unique IPs for pinball but then they don't sell well.”

    Mal (host) @ ~11:00 — Identifies tension between stated preference for original IP and actual market behavior

  • “What do you want? You know, that was one of the first times in the hobby. I was kind of like, what would you say you want this to be? This our our passion, our love. What do you want pinball to be?”

    Mal (host) @ ~13:00 — Expresses frustration with community's simultaneous demand for innovation and resistance to change

  • “the pinball wing of the Suncoast Arcade died in a fiery dumpster fire. As many do. But I don't, one of the good things, and I, they didn't, I don't think they wronged anybody”

    Mal (host) @ ~15:00 — Acknowledges Suncoast's failure but distinguishes it from other manufacturers accused of fraud

  • “There was a line the entire weekend. I went hoarse from talking to everybody. But one recurring thing that we heard from a lot of people was that we used a version of the Cyclone ramp, the little twisty twirly ramp.”

Entities

Suncoast Arcade / Suncoast PinballcompanyCosmic CarnivalgameDirty DonnypersonJohn (Suncoast Pinball owner)personMalpersonCyclonegameCometgame

Signals

  • ?

    product_launch: Cosmic Carnival was Suncoast Pinball's only title; production ceased around 2019. Limited run of 250 machines planned but company ceased operations before full production

    high · Mal: 'the pinball wing of the Suncoast Arcade died in a fiery dumpster fire'

  • ?

    design_philosophy: Suncoast deliberately chose original IP over licensed themes as a counter to industry trend toward licensed properties; cited 1980s-90s pinball as precedent

    high · John: 'we knew that off the bat we wanted to do an original-themed pinball machine... it wasn't until the last 10 or 15 years that they've kind of gone the other way'

  • ?

    design_innovation: Cosmic Carnival featured hand-painted 3D-printed toys and full powder coating with metal flake purple finish on all cabinet components (rails, legs, hinges, apron); positioned as premium finish compared to competitors

    high · John: 'we're doing powder coating... full powder coating... Metal flake purple... We're also doing the hinges and the apron, which normally aren't done... three hand-painted toys'

  • ?

    supply_chain_signal: Suncoast encountered parts sourcing challenges for brackets and drop targets; commissioned custom manufacturing for components needed in quantities beyond standard off-the-shelf availability

    high · John: 'There were a few parts that we couldn't get... we were able to work with a couple vendors and even get some of the things manufactured just for us... brackets like eight brackets and the three bank drop targets'

  • ?

    gameplay_signal: Early prototypes featured mirrored Cyclone-style ramps that players felt cluttered the playfield and obscured artwork; design was revised to place one ramp behind backboard with asymmetrical front-field layout

Transcript

groq_whisper · $0.105

0:00
Now who's responsible for this unwarranted attack on my person? I say, I say, I say, pay attention now, boy. This is, of course, Foghorn Leghorn presents the Pinball Junk Drawer. You all asked for it. I say, you all asked for it now. You're gonna get it. Boy, oh boy, are you gonna get it. Go, I say, go away, boy, you bother me. Oh my gosh, and we are back for big show number five of Foghorn Leghorn Presents the Pinball Junk Drawer. And slowly the horrible, bad Foghorn Leghorn imitation goes away. Each show less and less, which is a good thing, right? We all know. All right, as promised, if you listened last show, I was all like, oh, I stumbled upon an interview I did with Suncoast Arcade right when they were gearing up and producing the Cosmic Carnival Pinball Machine. This was an interview I did for a show. I have two long-running shows on RadioStPete.com. One's called The Indie Circuit, which is just independent music, and some of these style interviews. And then the second one is called Saki Bamagogo, and it's very screamy and angry and a lot more fun. but this was one where I had just I just found out about Cosmic Carnival when we had gone to Freeplay Florida and I realized how close they were in the interview I say three minutes but in reality, well, three minutes with some traffic lights in Clearwater, you know, lights can add a lot this place was literally three blocks away so I lined up the interview and again, this is one of those I'm not into gotcha journalism. I never like really mug anybody with any weird questions or stupid questions or try and put them on the spot with, oh, what were you thinking? That's not really what this is about. This is just a nice piece, local content, local producer, really rooting for them. I was kind of saddened by like so many people dogpiling on this company. you know they still make those name cabinets those uh you know 61 420 401 whatever they are well they have multiple versions and they're doing quite well with selling those uh this was just a branch that they that they made they went for it they tried it didn't work you know to be honest with you i saw the first iteration and this is kind of a funny story with what happened at free Play Florida, I always went over to Free Play Florida like the day of setup kind of. And I would kick around because you meet people, you talk to people. We were there and they set up this cosmic carnival.
2:51

John (Suncoast Pinball) @ ~50:00 — Demonstrates how playtester feedback directly influenced design iterations

  • “you can come up with some really cool art when it's new and original. You're not pigeon-toed or held into a box trying to appease the movie company or whoever owns the rights”

    John (Suncoast Pinball) @ ~1:18:00 — Explains creative freedom advantage of original IP over licensed themes

    • Jeremy Packer
    person
    Nate Sutherlandperson
    Freeplay Floridaevent
    Three Daughters Breweryvenue
    Park and Recvenue
    Radio St. Peteorganization
    Supremecompany
    Pabst Blue Ribboncompany

    high · John: 'the ramps are cool, but they're taking up too much room in the middle. They're blocking this beautiful artwork... we pushed them both kind of off a little bit to the sides'

  • ?

    product_concern: Early Cosmic Carnival prototype experienced overheating/smoking incident during Freeplay Florida setup; appears to be separate issue from later code/gameplay refinements

    high · Mal: 'this machine starts smoking like fire smoking... I ran up and I was like, Hey, Hey, Hey, your machine's on fire'

  • ?

    licensing_signal: At time of Cosmic Carnival development, Dirty Donny and Jeremy Packer were identified as the primary available freelance pinball artists; other artists were under contract or restricted

    high · John: 'there were really two pinball artists out there that were kind of free market. Jeremy Packer and Dirty Donny... I don't think that's really the case' [regarding free-range artists]

  • $

    market_signal: Tension identified between community demand for original IP and actual market receptiveness; Cosmic Carnival received critical acclaim but failed commercially

    medium · Mal: 'everyone says they want unique IPs for pinball but then they don't sell well... I love this theme'

  • ?

    community_signal: Pinball community perceived as overly harsh and critical toward new manufacturers and original designs; lack of appreciation for manufacturing complexity noted

    high · Mal: 'the pinball community can be quite harsh... The amount of work and sweat that it takes to get a machine on the street is phenomenal'

  • ~

    sentiment_shift: Host expresses genuine admiration and support for Suncoast despite commercial failure; distinguishes from other manufacturers accused of fraud or abandonment; views failure as learning opportunity for hobby

    high · Mal: 'I was kind of saddened like so many people dogpiling on this company... I wish they would have been able to make it... that would have been good for our hobby'

  • ?

    collector_signal: Cosmic Carnival promotional materials (stickers, playing cards) show signs of emerging collectibility post-shutdown; host chose not to open mint packaging in anticipation of value increase

    medium · Mal: 'I have a couple stickers of the Cosmic Carnival playfield that, you know, still mint in package. I didn't open them... well, I'm not going to open these because, ooh, they're worth money. They're collectible'

  • ?

    business_signal: Suncoast Arcade's multi-arcade cabinet business thriving (shipping nationwide daily) while pinball division failed; suggests challenging economics for boutique pinball manufacturers attempting limited runs

    high · John: 'the Suncoast Arcade side is doing very well. It's thriving. We ship all over the country every single day... pinball... it's much more complicated. It's harder. It takes more time'

    • And this was the first iteration. Like it had some like kind of almost like fur placement only arc going on. And they had turned it on and they were walking away. And me and my wife walked on the corner. And this machine starts smoking like fire smoking. And they hadn't seen it. So I ran up and I was like, hey, hey, hey, your machine's on fire. And they're like, oh, my God, thanks. And they ran back and they did whatever. Now I doubt if it was like a blazing fire. But, you know, once electronics start smoking, usually bad things follow. This was a separate incident, though, because I think this is a year later when they realized some of the shortcomings. So they understood what they were looking at, what they were trying to do. and they got a hold of Dirty Donnie. They got him in here and this art package on this theme was gorgeous. They were made for each other, Cosmic Carnival. And a lot of people were making fun of it or dogpiling on it and I was like, no, I love this theme.
    3:53
    This is what, to me, now everyone's like, oh, I want, everyone says they want unique IPs for pinball but then they don't sell well. so so they don't uh this one was like i i love this theme i totally was on board i i wanted like i love everything about like space and craziness and an evil carnival and clowns i'm like yes do it do it do it right now um it wasn't a good shooter it wasn't well received but i was still rooting for him because i'm like this is the type the first game out man of course it's not going to be great. Like people know what they want to do. Then they start doing, they're like, oh, this is a lot harder than I had anticipated. But, uh, you know, when I went through, they gave me a great tour. I got to see some of the stuff I got to see them, the CNC's making the, you know, there's people on lines making the, the main cabinets and make it, you know, make wiring them up and stuff like that. And then I got to the pinball side and they had a couple of them in various States of like the pre-production versions where they were ripping stuff apart and testing stuff. And then I saw some workstations. I saw these things being produced. And they had a bunch of them out there. I took pictures of number one. It had the plaque on it. I forget who. I think the doctor. That might be Dr. Pins. I don't know. Again, I stumbled about this. I don't remember a lot of stuff because I drink a lot. But it was neat. It was cool. I went into the room where they were doing the 3D printing for some of their various things. So although I didn't care for the shots of the layout of the game, not the layout, like it didn't feel like a polished, finished game, but that's okay. It was their first one. I wish they would have been able to make it. And then like the second one would have been a little bit better. The third one would have been a little bit better. That's good for our hobby, for our passion. We love pinball. I love, which there was a hundred makers like that, where they're just cranking, doing stuff, inventing stuff, pushing it forward. You know, competition is what made Stern kind of do some stuff and jump on it. You know, Jersey Jack kind of nudged them into a different arena, different, different way. Now they're doing some innovative stuff. Awesome. You know? So when I saw people bagging on it and making fun of it and it's stupid, oh my God, and blah, blah, blah. I was like, man, come on guys. What do you want? You know, that was one of the first times in the hobby. I was kind of like, what would you say you want this to be? This our our passion, our love. What do you want pinball to be? Just the same old people talking about the same old crap, doing the same old thing. I don't think that's what anyone wants, but try to do anything else and God help you. But so enough of that. This isn't a negative thing. Sadly, we all know the fate. You know, the pinball, the pinball wing of the Suncoast Arcade died in a fiery dumpster fire.
    7:00
    As many do. But I don't, one of the good things, and I, they didn't, I don't think they wronged anybody, you know. I don't think they took money and floated away in a hot air balloon with bags with dollar signs on them, twirling their mustaches like some others in our hobby have done. And now they're straight up just maybe bit off more than they can chew, you know. And, well, good for you for trying, man. You know, I got nothing bad to say about Suncoast Arcade at all. They tried and, okay, whoopsie doodle on you. Maybe next time. So here's the interview. Boy, long intro, huh? You're like, get to the intro. We don't care about you. So here's the intro. I'm going to listen through it, make sure there's nothing egregious I haven't shopped out. And I hope you dig it. It was a fun time. It was great meeting them. I have some playing cards from them. I have a couple stickers of the Cosmic Carnival Playfield that, you know, still mint in package. I didn't open them. I was like, yeah, cool. And then I heard them fold. I was like, well, I'm not going to open these because, ooh, they're worth money. They're collectible. to be honest I think if I had if I could find one at a what this really is kind of a price I might entertain buying it Dirty Donnie's art is gorgeous and I don't know what are you going to do what are you going to say about it so without any further ado here is the Suncoast interview Suncoast pinball interview I want to probably 2016 I don't know. Again, not keeping a whole lot of accurate records, but I did find it. I was like, oh that pretty cool So yeah let me see No no it says 2022 Oh well I mean that not what it from I like looking up the metadata on the file and it because I listened to it the other day a little bit and I was like, well, yep, that wiped that out. Oh, well. I'm sure it's in there somewhere, but I also don't do computer stuff. Don't care. Don't like it. All right. Here's the interview. I hope you enjoy it. And next week, I'll be back with stupidity. We all love that, right? Sure. Thanks for listening, everyone. Now I swear The next one of you primates Even touches me Yeah!
    9:21
    Okay, this is Mal here with the Radio St. Pete exclusive Indie Circuit I'm with John, Suncoast Pinball But it's also Suncoast Arcade, right? Is that correct? That is correct, yes Walking in, I expected to see pinball But there's all kinds of cool stuff going on here This is quite a surprise. I was at a show, the Freeplay Florida, which I told all the listeners about, and saw Suncoast Pinball, but I didn't really know where that was located, and then come to find out it's maybe three minutes from my house, and I was ecstatic because I love pinball. So tell us, how long ago did you start Suncoast Arcade or Suncoast Pinball? Sure. So Suncoast Arcade started about four years ago. We've been working on it. and we've been very fortunate to continue to grow. We're in our sixth expansion right now. And it was about two years ago that I said, you know, I really want to try pinball. Are you a pinball fan? Absolutely. So I actually started playing pinball when I was about nine years old. Family was in the restaurant business, and I started busting tables at nine years old. It's a tough living. It is. I got a quarter a table. And so every quarter I made went right back into the pinball machines and arcade machines that were in our family's restaurant. Was that down here or was that somewhere else? No, that was up in northern Indiana. Okay. So it was a little hole-in-the-wall barbecue restaurant about an hour and a half outside of Chicago.
    10:51
    The home of pinball, the mecca of where pinball is. Yeah, absolutely. So there was no shortage of opportunities to spend every quarter that I made. Nice. That's interesting. So in two years, you've come from just an idea to on the line, rolling out. They're not hitting the streets yet, but they will soon, I'm seeing from the progress I'm seeing. How much do you think – now, your business is also a lot of the multi-cades, which is very popular right now. Is that mostly what you're selling at this point? So, yeah, right now, the Suncoast Arcade side is doing very well. It's thriving. We ship all over the country every single day. So we're very excited and happy with that side of it. But really pinball, like I said, that's something that I've really wanted to do for a long time, but it's much more complicated. It's harder.
    11:43
    It takes more time. It takes better facilities. And it wasn't until we moved to our current location that we had the size and facilities really to try to pursue something as complicated as pinball. Oh, for sure, for sure. And from what I've seen, you know, the half that you have dedicated to pinball, I'm assuming is going to be overflowing as soon as the lines start going because just the people and the amount of work that it takes to build a pinball machine. Now, when I first saw it, this was in Freeplay, Florida. It was kind of an earlier version. And since then, you've kind of really blown up. This thing is just gorgeous.
    12:20
    We're talking about Cosmic Carnival. So first, where did you get that idea? Where did you come up with that theme for the machine? Sure. So, you know, we knew that off the bat we wanted to do an original-themed pinball machine. I mean, that's what pinball used to be. They were almost all original-themed, and it wasn't until the last 10 or 15 years that they've kind of gone the other way to all-licensed theme. But I like the old-school, original-themed pinball machines, and one of my favorites of all time was called Cyclone, which is a carnival theme. One of the three, the trio. Yes. Actually, I like Cyclone the most, but there was, which of the other two? There was the... Comet and Hurricane. Comet and Hurricane, but we always, Cyclone was at the local, there used to be a Clearwater strip mall, and there was an arcade in there, and it had Ride the Cyclone, and I used to go down and give that thing about $1.50 every week or so, and I loved that one. That was my favorite. That's actually, I have one in my house. That's my all-time favorite pinball. Cool. I actually have the Comet as well, and I don't have the Hurricane. That's probably what I need to pick up. But, you know, I love pinball. And so loving Carnival theme, which is, you know, one of the biggest themes. I actually sat down and said, hey, you know, what are the biggest themes in pinball? What's going to draw the most attention? And Carnival obviously came to mind, and so did Space. And Space may edge out Carnival as the most produced. It's still cool. Non-licensed, and it's very cool. So I got together with our in-house graphic designer, Nate Sutherland, and we kind of were hashing out ideas, and we decided that we're going to marry Carnival in Space. And so Cosmic Carnival was born. Very cool. Now, I know the art package has since been passed off to a famous artist, Dirty Donnie. I have some of his posters from concerts. I have an old 5678s poster he did, and I have a couple of his books.
    14:15
    My listeners will remember I dropped in one of our – right after he did Metallica, we interviewed him for about an hour, and then he was on the show. When did you – how did you get introduced to Donnie, or when did you meet him and kind of get him into the fold for your machine? Sure. So it was actually just after he went to Freeplay Florida. We took an early prototype with early artwork on there, and it was a great show for us, even though we weren't super far in development. We had a flippable pinball, but the code wasn't completely done. The art package wasn't completely done. And it was great to get feedback and kind of evaluate our pinball against a lot of others. And we said, you know what? We have a great game here. We just need to up it a little bit. Tweak it. Yeah, we need to up the graphics. We need to work on a few things. So it was right after that that me and some of our staff started looking around and found that there were really two pinball artists out there that were kind of free market. Zombie Yeti and Dirty Donnie. And Frenchie's out there, but I don't know if he's under contract or not. I don't know. I don't really know how that portion of it works. I like to think it's just free-range artists everywhere, but I don't think that's really the case. Unfortunately, that is not the case. That is not the case. So, you know, we didn't put all our eggs in one basket. We had talked to both, and we had even gotten contract with a few other artists to get some concept art. Oh, yeah, cool. And so we probably got art from about three or four other artists, and we had a couple conversations with Donnie, and then once it became clear that he was interested,
    15:49
    and we made him an offer, and we're very fortunate that he came on board. That's cool, because I know, I've always kind of said, I've talked to a lot of artists, I've met a lot of artists in my time, and once you meet Donnie, you kind of love Donnie. Yeah. He's very personal. He's cool. He's fun to work with. I can imagine the ideas that are coming out of his brain on the highest level. I have the most admiration for him. And that really made that game gorgeous. Absolutely. It struck me as I came through, because I was admiring the multi-cade business. I'm sure with the barcades popping up and the resurgence of not only people like me who have these machines in their home, It's kind of really taken a craft brew places have them, barcades have them. So those were neat, and I think you have a great lineup of those. But I came around the corner and saw the line of the Cosmic Carnivals, and it was breathtaking how beautiful they look. The chrome and the package just pops. Right, absolutely. And what have you done as far as the layout? Because I know you had said there's been numerous iterations of tweaking and changing. what has been some of the trials and tribulations with that or or you know how have you gotten to where you're at now sure so believe it or not the the basic and general layout of the machine has not changed a whole lot since the inception in fact you look at our white early whitewood um while it looks a lot different uh it is still 90 percent the exact same as it has been for about a year or actually probably even longer um so some of those early whitewoods like i said you take a look at him like it actually is the same machine we did make a couple tweaks after texas so we took it to Texas We took two machines They were prototype machines and they got just a ton of play There was a lion the entire weekend. I went horse from talking to everybody.
    17:46
    But one recurring thing that we heard from a lot of people was that we used a version of the cyclone ramp, the little twisty twirly ramp. And they thought it was really neat, but it took up a lot of room in the play field, and we just did a right and left mirror image, so they were... Asymmetrical. Yeah, and they were like, you know, the Rams are cool, but they're taking up too much room in the middle. They're blocking this beautiful artwork, and it's just a little too symmetrical looking for us. And so we sat back and thought about that, and we agreed. And when you hear the same thing over and over and over again... It's not just one crackpot. Right, yeah. It's not just one or two or ten percent. And it's, you know. You're like, okay. Yeah, so like, okay, so let's make some changes. So actually a couple of our staff said, hey, why don't we put one of them behind the backboard and bring it out through the freak show toy. I'm like, you know, I love that idea. So we sat down and we worked on a little bit of engineering and a few prototypes and got it to actually work so we knew we could do it. That's the plus. That's always the plus. Hey, look, it works. That's great. Yeah.
    18:51
    And, you know, now you can see the new ramps. We pushed them both kind of off a little bit to the sides, which really opened up the front. And then we did something a little different with the left. We also went from both PETG ramps to the left one starts PETG and then transforms or transfers into a wire form ramp in the middle of the freak show. I did see that. It comes out of the Freak Show toy, and it's back to a wire ramp, which I'm sure the aftermarket will love that because they can powder coat it and chrome it, and they're like, well, that's for you to do.
    19:27
    It's interesting. I think the modern market for pinball machines has taken on this weird life of mods and chromers and all these guys that do all this extra stuff, butter calves.
    19:40
    It's almost like it's transitioned into this custom culture, but it's not cars now, it's pinball machines. Right, yeah, there is a lot of that out there. In fact, one of our first purchasers of the pinball machine is a couple that does mods. Okay. And they said, we're going to... Beautiful, I think it's the mod couple. I have to go back and look. Yeah, I know who you're talking about because they're regulars on a couple of the shows I listen to.
    20:08
    They're actually the ones that have number one. So they came to us at Texas before we were even accepting deposits. We were just showing it off, and they just, you know, they loved it. They fell in love with the machine, and they said, we're just going to do all sorts of cool things with this. And I'm like, all right, man. Hey, whatever you do after you give me your check is your accord, right?
    20:28
    That's great. Now, do you envision a lot of these being in a home or routed or both? What do you envision? What do you see yourself giving the pinball community? Sure. I think both. Like you said, the barcade is really kind of exploding in the U.S. We've been contacted from dealers in 15 other countries, and there's a lot of excitement overseas, which is very cool. So after that, we've decided we're going to set 75 of the first 250 numbered for overseas, leaving us 175 for stateside. But overseas, it's almost all operators. They're in bars and pubs. That's awesome. And it's very cool. And stateside here, that's becoming much more popular. It's growing. In fact, we're thinking about doing kind of a launch party here in the next couple weeks. And we went and checked out a couple places in St. Pete that have pinballs.
    21:20
    Was it Three Daughters Brewery? Three Daughters Brewery. Vectors around here. Reboots around here that might be able to do something. Yeah, okay. Park and Rec was another one. That was a kind of neat place. So have you been there before? I believe I was at Park and Rec. I usually end up stopping at around the corner down on St. Pete because it has a few of the Multicades, and upstairs it has, like, the South Park. It has a few pinball machines, and I just kind of, okay, you can leave me here with my pitcher of beer for the night. Yeah, we like Parking Rock because it's very arcade, 80s, you know, pinball arcade, and they've got a bunch of arcade machines. They've got, like, three or four pinball machines. They've got a skee-ball. They've got Pac-Man decorations all throughout the mall. So, I mean, that's becoming hip and new, which is awesome for me. It's always refreshing. I know there's that one down in Delray. There's a pinball museum, a silver ball museum, I think it's called. And they have some of those rarities that you're like, I've played a Big Bang Bar. I've played the Beatles' Gold. I don't think it's the Gold, but those are few and far between because they're hoarded and in someone's basement. Sure. So I think that's going to be cool to see these out and about and get them in people's hands. Yeah. And they'll see what they got. Absolutely. everyone that's played it so far has just absolutely loved it especially now that we've got the game code in there the modes it's 98% coded and ready to go so it's we're ready to hit the streets in fact we're going to start shipping here in the next week and a half that's great you probably sigh of relief once you start getting some going and you're like yay we're moving them because I know this is not your opinion this is my opinion Mao is saying this, that the pinball community can be quite harsh. They can be really critical, and I think a lot of people are really critical, and they really shouldn't be. The amount of work and sweat that it takes to get a machine on the street is phenomenal. It's unbelievable. Absolutely. Could you even put an hour's number on what it takes to get from one end to the other end? Oh, I couldn't even try to guess. Like I said, I've been working on it for two years now. So it's unlike some other individuals who think pinball is easy.
    23:33
    That's the famous quote. We won't name any games. I will later. I don't care about it. Pinball is not easy. It's incredibly hard. It's complex. But like a lot of things, anything that's worth doing and worth doing right, it's not easy. It's easy. Everyone would be doing it. Did you run into the – now this is a question I had just thinking about this because did you run into problems with getting parts you needed either because they just didn't make them or they just didn't want to sell to somebody other than somebody that buys them by the $100,000s, or was that not a thing? So we actually were pretty lucky early on to be able to find off-the-shelf parts. There were a few parts that we couldn't get or we couldn't get in quantities that we needed. Right. So we were able to work with a couple vendors and even get some of the things manufactured just for us. So that's really cool. Yeah, beautiful couple of our you know brackets like eight brackets and the three bank drop targets They just like I said, you could get them in small quantities, but if I only need two or three that'd be great When we need hopefully, you know a couple thousand that well, that's a problem even a few hundred is a problem So we were able to get that Made for us a manufacturer for us, which is very nice So that was also the other thing I was thinking about a lot on the way down I was driving down for this interview and I was kind of like, I don't really like the state of just so many music pins.
    25:00
    There's so many themed pins. It's a movie pin. It's a music thing, which I like Metallica, but I don't know. It gets a little repetitive to me. And I was thinking about your new license or your new entity. And I was like, well, what else could you use? I was thinking like drive-in sci-fi movies or something like that, but that doesn't resonate with kids really. Like a drive-in, let me make sure they know what the heck a drive-in is.
    25:26
    So you're like, okay, 50s movies are kind of cool, some of them, but again, does it hit that market? I was thinking about the sweet spot you guys did hit with it. Everyone knows what a carnival is, and everyone knows the evil clown or the space theme. So I thought it was a real perfect marriage of those two. You said you were starting to think about some for future. Oh, yeah. Now, keep it hidden, but how many have you kind of thought of already? Are you whiteboarding like next one, next one, next one, or where do you see it going? So, sure. You know, the concept for number two is already in the works. So it's already being kind of drawn up. Concept art is being worked on.
    26:09
    Are we thinking beyond that? Yeah, of course, we're mulling over ideas of what maybe number three or four could be. And we do plan on and want to do license We just want it to be a small percentage Maybe one out of every four As long as the market will take it As long as people want this original theme because you can come up with some really cool art when it's new and original. You're not pigeon-toed or held into a box by trying to appease the movie company or whoever owns the rights to... I've heard it's a real nightmare licensing. Because you're not only licensing Metallica, you're licensing those four guys, you're licensing the logo, everything, or with movies, famously, you know, one actor won't do it, and you're like, well, that's the star of Men in Black, ain't doing a Men in Black, you know, because otherwise it's just one guy, what's the point, you know, so I know that opens up a whole different kind of problems, not problems or just taking money that isn't there. Sure, and you know, also private label has become a new thing, too, and there are a lot companies out there who have said, hey, we want our own pin.
    27:19
    Well, Supreme famously was that $100 billion pin. You're like, okay, whatever. I'm the owner of a Wonelli, and that's run of 80.
    27:29
    There's not any of them out there, but I was lucky enough to fall into one, and I really love the old style flipper, so I just grabbed one.
    27:36
    That's kind of one of those boutique, I guess they call it, say, boutique version of a pinball. Right. or private label, private branding companies like Ford and Domino's and Donnie did Cancrush with Pabst Blue Ribbon I love that it was his van in the back of it, that cracked me up too I was at a place that had a Pabst Blue Ribbon right next to the Wonelli that I bought actually and I was playing them and I was like this is crazy, this is fun I think sometimes the fun's lost when people get over analytical about it but that's just my interpretation so you know you're thinking about that you have your arcades stuff going you know it sounds really awesome I can't I'm jealous of the guy who has number one I'll tell you that much you know and in my brain as I'm walking through the line I'm like how can I get this money to get number whatever is still available but you know anything else you want to tell everyone all the listeners you know about what you're doing where you're going here you know I think just the big thing for us is kind of the value that we're putting into Cosmic Carnival and letting people know that. Some of the things that we're doing, you know, we're not doing three levels of machines. We're doing one level of machine. But for the same price point as you can get like an LE through some of our competitors, you're getting the first 250 you're going to be numbered and autographed by Dirty Donnie.
    29:00
    We're doing powder coating armor, full powder coating. I know. That's gorgeous. That's the, not sparkle. What's it called? Metal flake purple. I'm like, oh, my God. Purple with that red flake in there. Yeah, it's beautiful. It's a two-part process, so it's more expensive, but it just pops. It looks nice. And not only are we doing the standard, like the side rails and the legs and the lockdown bar, but we're also doing the hinges and the apron, which normally aren't done.
    29:25
    We're also giving you three hand-painted toys, which normally, you know. Yeah, that was incredible. When we walked into the room and you're making them, 3D printing them, and then the various levels of as you were decorating them, painting them out, because that doesn't just paint something. You have to layer it. It was intriguing and also really interesting because now you really have a one-of-a-kind when you have something like that. Yeah, absolutely. This is hand-done. This isn't grab another one out of the box that there's a thousand of. This is yours, and that's really cool. I think that's a level of kind of speciality that is not, that's often overlooked, but is really important to the people that know what they're looking at. Absolutely. So we're doing all that, and we're doing it at a very aggressive price point. We looked early on, very early on, at the market, who's in play, what are the price points, and we wanted to really stick to that entry-level price point. You're getting a lot for that, though. In your machine, I would say you're getting the full machine. You're not taking anything out. This isn't a stripped-down version. This is full-on. Because sometimes you get something, and there's stuff pulled out of it, and you're like, well, now I'm not getting the best version of my machine, so I feel bad about my machine that I just paid a lot of money for.
    30:44
    That's cool. The only thing that we'll probably do in the future is right now, because this is a new machine, we're new to pinball. We're not new to manufacturing, but we are giving you kind of that first $250, that LE at that same price point. That's one thing we'll probably do differently. Machine number two or maybe machine number three is we'll have two. We'll have a standard version where it's got all the bells and whistles, but then we'll have a limited edition. Where we do a limited run will be autographed, signed. And it's going to be 300. Once they're gone, they're gone. That's it.
    31:15
    Cool. Now, where can everyone that's listening find you? Like, are you going to be through dealers or are you going to be online and dealers? Where can they get a look at your pinball machine and also maybe pick up one of your awesome multi-keys? Sure. So initially right now you can find them just through us on coastpinball.com. You can also always come to our facility here in Clearwater, Florida. We are working with several dealers. In fact, Marshall at Little Shop of Games and Loots, he's going to be the first one to sign up. Oh, cool. We're just waiting on finalizing the dealer contract, what we just got, so we'll get that over to him. And we're going to start working through dealers. So eventually you'll only be able to get them through dealers. Gotcha. that's ease for the customer that, you know, you can go pick it up. It doesn't necessarily have to be shipped. You also have access to more people that can help you. Tech support's right there. Absolutely. We'll be here for customers, you know, if you can't get any help through the dealer. But it just gives the customers more options, more resources. It allows us to get it out, you know, nationwide quicker. Do you foresee, like, code updates? That's the other thing I was wondering. Right when you set up a coding, it's ready to go. Is it a done machine? Are you going to have updates that come around? I know that's kind of common, but... That is, in fact, it's much more common than we realized. We knew that all the big guys, you know, Stern included, they do regular updates. All the time. Yeah, it's amazing. So partly it's bug fixes, partly it's whatever. Right. So, yeah, we intend to do some updates, and there will be some fixes, and it will be very easy to do. You download the code with thumb drive, stick it in, and it updates automatically. so that process is already in the operating system of the machine but to our surprise our machine is already far further along than even the big guys when they go to go to dealers cool so we try to get it as close to 100% done as possible before we go to market this makes sense and if you know if you could visit a little shop of games up there and ask Marshall where the fun fest is because that used to be my machine he has an old fun fest that I I restored and pick stuff and stuff, and then he came down and picked it up, and now he said that's going to be sitting in his shop. He said, give it a good home. So say hi to my Fun Fest that's up there, an old 73, was it Williams? I think it was an old 73 Williams that's up there. He's a good guy. Marshall, Little Shop of Games. I usually deal with Curly from Stern, which you guys, all you listeners out there have heard me talk about. Make sure you talk to Curly at Little Shop.
    33:47
    They're the same franchise. They're both good guys to deal with. Well, thanks for your time. Make sure you all at least check out the game online. There's a lot of trailers out there. There's a lot of shows off the game. Has anyone, I guess nobody's done one of those in-depth, like the flip, the live stream kind of stuff. That hasn't hit the ground yet, has it? Not yet. We're working on that right now. So we have taken some recorded video play of it so people can see it playing.
    34:18
    Like I said, in the next couple of weeks, we'd like to do kind of a launch party. We do that locally. at a local independent bar. We're trying to see if we can get one or two of these guys to come and stream it for us. Why not? Yeah, absolutely. Cool. Well, I'll put that information out when the live party is going to be. I'll put that out on the show so all you listeners can get down there and tell them that they're awesome and you're going to buy one. All right, anything else you want to say, or are we good? I think that go online and buy a Cosmic Carnival. There you go. That's all you really need to know. You can skip to the end of this thing and just do that. All right. Thanks for your time, John. Thank you.
    35:00
    That's all, folks. That's it, man. Game over, man. Game over.