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Harry Potter Pinball with Eric Meunier

LoserKid Pinball Podcast·podcast_episode·1h 3m·analyzed·Jun 10, 2025
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claude-haiku-4-5-20251001 · $0.033

TL;DR

Eric Meunier reveals Harry Potter pinball design secrets, production timeline, and fast-paced playfield philosophy.

Summary

Eric Meunier, lead designer of Harry Potter pinball, discusses the game's development, design philosophy, and production status in an interview with Loser Kid Pinball Podcast. He details how he integrated all eight films into a single machine using core thematic elements (Hogwarts staircase, Quidditch, Death Eaters), incorporates 90+ mini-modes organized by movie, and employs fast-flowing playfield mechanics influenced by his earlier work on Godfather. Production is underway with 100+ units already boxed and shipping to distributors and customers.

Key Claims

  • Harry Potter is the most anticipated license ever released in pinball

    high confidence · Scott Larson states this directly; Josh Roop corroborates with distributor reports

  • Four distributors report this is among their top 3 game sales in two decades, with one reporting triple-digit unit sales

    high confidence · Josh Roop cites direct reports from distributors

  • Harry Potter covers all eight films, with the first six as main modes and final two as wizard modes

    high confidence · Eric Meunier confirms directly in response to Josh's question

  • The game contains 90+ mini-modes (30 seconds each) organized across six movies as main modes, with 15-18 mini-modes per movie

    high confidence · Eric Meunier provides specific breakdown of mode structure

  • Eric Meunier has been living in the Jersey Jack factory for six weeks to oversee production quality

    high confidence · Eric states directly: 'This is where I've been living for the past like six weeks'

  • Over 100 units have already been boxed and customer games have been delivered

    high confidence · Eric Meunier states at time of recording that production has shipped units to customers and distributors

  • John Williams' Hedwig's Theme required a separate licensing agreement beyond the base Warner Brothers license

    high confidence · Eric explains complex licensing: 'That's a whole separate agreement with a whole separate group with a separate royalty'

  • Every character from all eight films was licensed, with only one minor character excluded

    high confidence · Eric states: 'Every actor's rights were included with the contract... Every actor down from the Golden Trio down to background students were acceptable'

Notable Quotes

  • “This is the most anticipated license that's ever been released in pinball. This is also one of those licenses that is relevant. It connects with people and bridges beyond pinball.”

    Scott Larson @ ~2:00 — Establishes Harry Potter's market significance and cross-cultural reach beyond pinball

  • “I've been pursuing this license forever, and when it finally became more than just 'Oh yeah, it'd be nice to have'... I'm the guy who has to do it. No one will do it the way that I can do it because I live and breathe this thing.”

    Eric Meunier @ ~18:00 — Reveals Eric's personal connection to the IP and Jersey Jack's confidence in his fit for the project

  • “I taught myself how to play that song on my saxophone in high school just by ear. It's important that it be a part of the game. And yes, every Potter fan would agree to that. Of course you need the song. That's not included. That's not a part of what Warner Brothers owns and licenses.”

    Eric Meunier @ ~26:00 — Illustrates licensing complexity and Eric's passion; Hedwig's Theme required separate deal beyond WB agreement

  • “Assembly line starts at 7 a.m., and I got to be here to make sure they're doing everything they need to do to make these games perfect. The baker's always in early to make sure the ingredients are ready, right?”

    Eric Meunier @ ~8:00 — Demonstrates Eric's hands-on manufacturing oversight and quality control commitment

  • “My number one drive was to make sure every fan had what they were looking for – had the character they were looking for, had the scenes that they remembered, had that sense of wonder when they walk up to this the same sense of wonder they had when they read the books and watched the films.”

    Eric Meunier @ ~22:00 — Reveals design philosophy centered on fan satisfaction and emotional resonance with IP

  • “Almost every shot in the game can be stopped if we choose to stop it through software... We can choose to hold the ball lots of times if we want to. So we do that where we think it's appropriate to help the player understand the rules, but not do it so much that we interrupt the flow of the game.”

    Eric Meunier — Technical insight into accessibility design balancing casual and experienced players

Entities

Eric MeunierpersonJosh RooppersonScott LarsonpersonHarry PottergameJersey Jack PinballcompanyWarner Brotherscompany

Signals

  • ?

    community_signal: Loser Kid Patreon supporters given opportunity to submit interview questions for Eric Meunier; indicates podcast-community collaboration model

    medium · Josh: 'We actually gave them the opportunity to ask some questions to Eric and they submitted some of these. We want to thank Mike, Alan, and Jason for submitting some questions.'

  • ~

    sentiment_shift: Widespread positive community perception of Harry Potter pinball quality and design; social media comments praising team passion and execution

    high · Josh Roop: 'I'm seeing comments on Facebook, on YouTube saying, You can tell that there's passion for this, from you, Eric, and from the team. And it's wonderful'

  • ?

    content_signal: Game integrates all eight Harry Potter films with 90+ mini-modes (30 seconds each), organized as three 'school timelines' (fall/spring/final exam) per movie, containing 15-18 modes per film

    high · Eric: 'there are over 90 mode-based objective mini-modes... Every one of these movies has 15 to 18 mini-modes that you play through'

  • ?

    design_innovation: Harry Potter features nearly universal software-controlled shot diversion capability (magnets, posts, staircase rotation) enabling shot flexibility and accessibility without compromising flow

    high · Eric: 'Almost every shot in the game can be stopped if we choose to stop it through software... We can choose to hold the ball lots of times if we want to.'

  • ?

    design_philosophy: Eric Meunier employing fast-flowing, speed-heavy playfield design philosophy emphasizing continuous ball motion over trap-and-shoot mechanics; evolution from Godfather design approach

Transcript

groq_whisper · $0.190

0:00
thanks for tuning in the loser kid pinball podcast we've got an exciting episode today i'm josh roop with me my co-captain as always scott larson and harry potter has officially revealed flipping out it's ready to take your orders these games are amazing you better get on that list though because i hear these things are selling like hot cakes what about you scott I think they're selling better than hotcakes because the demand is huge. And I know that this is the most anticipated license that's ever been released in pinball. This is also one of those licenses that is relevant. It connects with people. And this bridges beyond pinball. It's the biggest license. So absolutely get your pinball machine in and get your order in because this is going to be a forever piece in your collection. What do we have? like four distributors say that like this is the best game sales wise they've had in like two decades or in the top three. And one even said triple digits on sales. That's insane. Yeah. With us, we're going to stop talking about this because, because Eric's here with us. Eric, our first interview ever when he did Pirates of the Caribbean. This man's now a legend on your fourth official game. If I remember correctly, this is my fourth official game as lead designer. It just, each one keeps getting better and better. And I got to tell you, it's great to have you on, Eric. We appreciate you finding the time because it's apparently chaos. You've been there almost 12 hours now, and it's only at our time. It's like 6 o'clock there. It's 6 o'clock here, yeah. So it's been a little much.
1:43
Assembly line starts at 7 a.m., man, and I got to be here to make sure they're doing everything they need to do to make these games perfect.
1:51
Baker's always in early to make sure the ingredients are ready, right? You got it. You know it. We've got a ton of questions. This came out out of the pipe looking amazing. I just, I think everyone is very well pleased. I think there was a super high bar already with it being Harry Potter. Everyone's like, this is a dream thing. How's it going to get screwed up? You know, people articulate and speculate, well, this is what's going to happen or this is what's going to be amazing. This comes out first off the mechs and this looks amazing. And I don't know how you put, in the trailer it says six movies, right? Six movies into this game? It covers all eight. There's eight movies. The main modes you play through are the first six movies. Gotcha. And the final two movies are the wizard modes. Oh my goodness. I don't know. Okay, how do you approach a game like this, a theme this big, and you say, hey, we're going to shove 24 hours of constant right continuous footage into one game you have to do it in a way where you can use play field elements for every film right so you have to come up with what are the rocks upon which all of the films are based and not specialize environments encounters or scenes that only happen in one film. So starting from that concept, I tried to build objects or ideas that carry across all eight films. So obviously Hogwarts carries across all eight films, so the main central mechanism is the Grand Staircase. Hundreds of scenes in the films are filmed in Hogwarts and exploring the different elements of the castle. Another major mech is the Death Eater. You know, fighting villains and overcoming the adversity of the bad guys is something that carries through all of the films. Quidditch is a big part of most of the films, and flying on broomsticks is a part of all of the films. So having that Quidditch upper play field certainly lends itself to being usable in not just a single mode, a single specific scene, but across dozens of scenes throughout the course of the eight movies.
@ ~52:00

  • “I would say that I started this approach of faster games with Godfather. It's a really quick game. It's a really speed-heavy game. And I think I pushed it a lot farther now with Potter.”

    Eric Meunier @ ~65:00 — Confirms playfield philosophy evolution across Eric's design career

  • “We already put over 100 games in boxes. Every one of our distributors has a game on their showroom floor... Customer games have already been delivered... And right now it's my job to be here with the assembly line and course correct.”

    Eric Meunier @ ~75:00 — Confirms production timeline and distribution strategy; indicates robust demand fulfillment

    • Steve Ritchie
    person
    Pat Lawlorperson
    Godfathergame
    Pirates of the Caribbeangame
    Ashley Meunierperson
    Retro Ralphperson
    John Williamsperson
    Flippin' Outcompany
    Loser Kid Pinball Podcastorganization
    Jackperson

    high · Eric: 'I would say that I started this approach of faster games with Godfather... And I think I pushed it a lot farther now with Potter' and description of high-speed ball returns to flippers without interruption

  • ?

    licensing_signal: Complex multi-party licensing required for Harry Potter; Hedwig's Theme necessitated separate licensing agreement beyond base Warner Brothers deal with distinct royalty structure

    high · Eric Meunier: 'That's not a part of what Warner Brothers owns and licenses. That's a whole separate agreement with a whole separate group with a separate royalty that gets paid.'

  • $

    market_signal: Exceptional sales performance reported by multiple distributors; four distributors cite top-3 sales performance in two decades, one reporting triple-digit unit sales

    high · Josh Roop: 'Four distributors saying this is the best game sales-wise they've had in like two decades, or in the top three? And one even said triple digits on sales. That's insane.'

  • ?

    personnel_signal: Eric Meunier maintaining direct oversight of manufacturing quality; residing in factory for six weeks during production ramp-up to ensure game specifications met

    high · Eric: 'This is where I've been living for the past like six weeks. And we've already put over 100 games in boxes... And right now it's my job to be here with the assembly line and course correct and verify.'

  • ?

    announcement: Harry Potter pinball officially revealed and available for order through Flippin' Out distributor; production underway with 100+ units boxed

    high · Eric Meunier confirms: 'We've already put over 100 games in boxes. Every one of our distributors has a game on their showroom floor. Customer games have already been delivered.'

  • ?

    product_strategy: Harry Potter available in multiple editions including Pro, Premium, Collector's Edition, Arcade ($9,999), and Wizard models; CE and Arcade models generating particular hype

    high · Eric: 'The CE game is on the line right now. There's a lot of hype around that model. There's also a lot of hype around the arcade model – the $9,999 model – and we're building quite a few of those next.'

    • 4:10
    Now, I want to know, what is your connection to Harry Potter? Because it seems like everybody has been involved at some level of our connection of connection with Harry Potter. So I want I want you to tell me about what draws you to this thing.
    4:28
    Oh, man. You know, it's it it's that. You know, having a. quote, like tough childhood, right? Where like I grew up working for my parents every night, weekend, summer, not a lot of time. Goofing around and just like chilling out was not a thing that we did because we ran a family business. We had to all of us be involved and be a part of the business all the time. So, you know, this concept that there's a whole hidden world out there that you could be invited to um to take you away from you know with with harry and the dursleys right he's in a miserable situation my situation was nothing like that i had very loving parents they just liked to work really hard and instilled that in their children um but this you could get a letter one day and suddenly you'd be in this magical place where you're you're defying gravity and you're flying on broomsticks and you're learning spells and charms like that, that idea that you could be transported to a whole different world because you got a letter was something that, you know, as a, let's see, the first book came out when I was eight years old, you know, and I read that first book when I was eight years old and it's just like captured the essence of like childhood dream. Like this could be, this could be me i could be harry you know where's my letter from hogwarts um and continuing to get the books as they come out and read through them and you know grow up at a very similar age to harry as they were coming as the books were coming was just a very endearing and like brought me close to the franchise um so yeah it's it's cool it's a it's a series that i fell in love with as a kid and it's just, it's now it's part of me. Well, and one thing to point out too, shout out to Retro Ralph. He did a wonderful job on the featurette with you and your team. You also talked about this wonderful story with you and your wife. Yes. I love that. Why don't you just give us a little synopsis?
    6:51
    So book number five, The Order of the Phoenix came out when I was 16. My wife was, sorry, my high school girlfriend at the time. Her name is Ashley. She has now been my wife for 13 years. We've been together for 20 years.
    7:11
    So we were kids, and we were waiting for this book to come out, and she read the books as well. And so I asked her parents if we could drive to the midnight release, just her and me. I'm a responsible young man asking to take their daughter out past curfew, well past curfew, so that we could go wait in line for a book.
    7:36
    Thinking now as a parent, it's like, yes, of course. If you guys are going to go get a book together, that's the sweetest thing I've ever heard. So now take me back to when I was 16. We drive to the nearest bookstore that had a midnight release, which was over an hour drive away. because we grew up in very rural Wisconsin.
    7:58
    We wait in line for the midnight release. And there are hundreds of people here waiting at this Barnes & Noble in Madison, Wisconsin.
    8:07
    And so we get in line, and we get there at like 10 o'clock and get hundreds of people. We finally get through the line around 1230. And we get in the car, and we turn on the passenger overhead light and actually reads the first chapter out loud as we're driving back home.
    8:26
    And it's a, you know, I think it can be described as a core memory, right? It's like that's something that I'll never forget.
    8:34
    And it's great. I'm like, that's a memory that's a part of me, and it has to do with Potter, and it has to do with the love of my life. You know, now we're happily married. We have two kids who are also obsessed with Harry Potter, and they've been reading it, and they've been, you know, playing the game before anyone else in the world has. and providing their feedback. And it's a really cool thing. That's awesome. And I love it because you're coming from a place, it's not just a license, right? It's a part of a passion that you bring to the table and an understanding of the franchise that maybe not the normal person would have in pinball. And so I think that has definitely oozed through looking at this game. I think everyone can see it, right? I'm seeing comments on Facebook, on YouTube and saying, you can tell that there's a passion for this, from you, Eric, and from the team. And it's wonderful because we know that that's going to ooser into the project, right? Mm-hmm. Absolutely. I got to ask, how long has this been in development? And were you one of the first ones to be like, hey, it's me. I want it.
    9:38
    I've been, and I think I've said it a couple of times on different podcasts, how Potter would be my dream theme, right? All the way back to when I was first starting games. Harry Potter would be just a fantastic pinball machine and I would love to be the person at the helm because I live and breathe this I used to be able to quote you could read a sentence from one of the books and I could tell you what part of the story that was what book it was from, what chapter it was from I was obsessed, still am obsessed so we've been pursuing this license forever and Jack was at the helm of pursuing that license and when it finally became more than just oh yeah, it'd be nice to have it's more like, Eric, this is happening and you're the guy who has to do it and yeah, absolutely, I'm the guy who has to do it no one will do it the way that I can do it because I live and breathe this thing so tell me about is there any trepidation if it's such a dream theme and i would put it this way um for me it would be something like rush where uh you know i've i've been involved in the band my entire life and it would be hard for me to separate the things that would be most important or not important, or Star Wars for me, or something along those lines. But is it hard to separate you as the fan and the personal connection versus you as the practical pinball designer who knows that you have to pick and choose what you're going to put into the game?
    11:26
    Yeah. I mean, it's super intimidating when you approach something that the entire world has a connection to. Right. And I'm exaggerating a bit, right? There are some people who've never watched a Potter film or read a Potter book, but most people of my generation grew up with this. They have a connection to this story. They have a connection to some or most of the characters, right? and my number one drive was to make sure every fan had what they were looking for, had the character they were looking for, had the scenes that they remembered, had that sense of wonder when they walk up to this, the same sense of wonder they had when they read the books and watched the films for the first time.
    12:20
    I couldn't leave anything behind. And I knew that the franchise song, Hedwig's Theme by John Williams, that song is iconic. You know Potter when you hear that song. I taught myself how to play that song on my saxophone in high school just by ear. I figured it out and I would play it all the time, just like doodling around in the band room.
    12:54
    It's important that it be a part of the game. And yes, every Potter fan would agree to that. Of course you need the song. That's not included. That's not a part of what Warner Brothers owns and licenses. That's a whole separate agreement with a whole separate group. that has a separate royalty that gets paid, and that's all extra on top of the original licensing fees and costs and negotiations that we had to go through in order to bring this project to the level that it needed to be brought.
    13:36
    Did you have any challenges with, okay, because the cast is so immersive, I would argue this is very similar to The Lord of the Rings where there are a core element of people who are going to be in every film. However, there's going to be those one-off characters who are in one film or another film and trying to incorporate them all into it. That has to be a challenging negotiation with all of these actors and all of their respective things. However, I would suspect that they all like being associated with it. And so maybe that greased it a little bit. But can you talk a little bit about incorporating all the characters you wanted into the game? Sure.
    14:29
    So Warner Brothers and the way that things have worked with Warner Brothers with pinball and the way that we've licensed things in the past is we've had access to all of the characters. so in the Hobbit when we did that we had full access to every character in the films unless there was a very special overrider that went on top but for Hobbit we didn't have any issues for Wonka there was I think one or two characters that couldn't be included like the teacher from the classroom, that character wasn't allowable by the license agreement that we have with Warner Brothers for this license I'm going to say almost because there's one character specifically that I don't even want to mention they are a minor character but outside of one minor character who plays a minor role in one film there was not a single character off the table every actor's rights were included with the contract in this agreement. So we were able to use Radcliffe and Grint and Watson without any issue access to their on presence as well as their voice and every character down from the Golden Trio down to background students were acceptable and usable in the game.
    16:01
    So how do you build a game around the Golden Trio that ends up aging through these movies? Is it very much you separate them all and distill down into their own individual movies? Or is it you – because you have to tie the theme all together, right? Like it's a big package. How do you tie that all together, especially when there's so much age difference from beginning to end? Right, yeah. When someone goes through puberty, basically, on screen, there's a vast difference in how they look. So there's a couple different things that we did to help with that. The first was we did hand-drawn artwork. which allows you to smooth out some of the edges. You're like, well, are they 15 in that? Are they 18 in that? It's a hand-drawn artwork style. So age kind of, you can smooth it out a bit.
    16:54
    One of the other things we've done is, for example, Golden Trio Multiball. There's an intro scene for Golden Trio Multiball. Actually, there's two intro scenes. There's one where the kids are like 11 slash 12, and there's another one where they're like 16, 17. Because whichever film you're currently playing, while you queue up Golden Trio, when you start Golden Trio, whichever film you're currently in, it's like, well, which age group is it? Oh, it's the younger age group. It's movie one, two, and three. Use the younger showcase versus it's movie four, five, or six. Well, use the older showcase for that intro scene. So we try not to show a lot of jarring age differences in the film clips that we use. from scene to scene.
    17:40
    Another way that we helped with that is when you are playing a movie, it's specifically you are locked into that movie. You're not playing a scene from movie one and then a scene from movie five and then a scene from movie two. No, it's like you select year one at Hogwarts and you're playing all of the Philosopher's Stone.
    18:01
    And then you can change to a different movie where you're, okay, now you're playing year four. You're playing all of the Goblet of Fire, so you're not seeing the characters' ages jump around or be on screen in front of you. Sure, we use a couple of clips when we're blocking a ball for multi-ball or the extra ball scene, where it's a single clip that's great when used in context, where there's a slightly different age. But for the most part, we try to keep that continuity of the film that you're playing through, as set in age.
    18:39
    So to connect with that, I did notice that, yes, you have all of the, you know, all of the movies. So when you're selecting, say like your example, The Goblet of Fire.
    18:52
    So are there like six different modes for that movie? Or like, how does that work? Because that almost seems like you are, you're engineering six different, like six different uh code like sets because each movie is so well okay each movie or book you could absolutely write a complete pinball machine for each of those books yes yes we could So the way we made that work is by breaking each year into three school timelines. I'm going to call it that. So when you start a year at Hogwarts, you play through the fall term. And the fall term is the first five iconic scenes from that movie, from the first half of that movie. Then you play through the spring term, which is the next five important or iconic scenes from that movie. And then, finally, you take your final exam, which is the finale of that film.
    20:08
    So each of those three chunks has at least five different scenes. and the scenes in order to complete a scene you have to make two to four shots in the scene so it's like each one of them is their own little mini mode where the continuity for the mode is mode shots are always flashing the Gryffindor colors it's always crimson and gold on the insert so anytime you see an insert flashing red and yellow, crimson and gold um that's your movie shot or target or objective. So you hit that shot or those shots, and you progress the scene into the next scene. So you make it, you complete it, you get a reward of movie asset completion, some sort of scene that you will remember that ties into the scene you're currently playing, and you continue through. So, yes, there are a lot of scenes. Every one of these movies has 15 to 18 mini-modes that you play through. So, yeah, there's over 90 mode-based objective mini-modes that are each 30 seconds. what I really wanted to do was make this approachable from for casual players as well as experienced pinball players one of the one of the ways of doing that is if you have a mode shot that is maybe more difficult than a different mode shot I'm not going to lock you into that where you have to shoot this and if you don't shoot this well too bad you're never going to move on movie modes are based on your 30 seconds to complete this scene and if you don't complete this scene oh well we move on anyways you don't get the completion bonus for it but you move into the next scene anyways so what i've noticed is that casual players will start a movie, not necessarily focus on it, but they're still seeing the scenes from the film go past, even though they're not completing those movie scenes. They still get to experience the movie.
    22:35
    So the movies are kind of like their own contained modes. And when you say mini modes, you're essentially, you do have a mode, but it's only a couple of shots. So it's not like... Correct. Because I think that was one of the one things, when I heard 96 modes, mini modes, I was like, hold on now. the typical game has like, you know, anywhere from six to 11. Yeah. You know? And so when you're in 96, you're like, hold on, what do I got to do now?
    23:01
    So that, that makes it a little easier. So it sounds like it's more of like, would you say probably, probably about 10 to 15 shots. You got to complete a movie. It sounds like with all the movies and everything.
    23:14
    No, I would say you're closer to 30. Okay. to 40 shots to complete a movie. Okay. I think of a specific mode like Blue Cornish Pixies. That's a scene out of the second film. Okay.
    23:32
    All of the shots light up blue because there's pixies flying around. You hit one pixie, two pixie, three pixies and then the end of the scene is you hit the Hermione targets and you see her shout, and she shoots her wand up in the air and all the pixies freeze. and then it moves on to the next scene. So it's like, yeah, there's four shots in that mode, but it's not difficult to make those three shots and then hit the Hermione targets. Correct. So it's more of a... I assume all this is going to be linear, right? Like when you start a movie, you're starting from the beginning and working through the movie. Correct. When you start that movie, you progress linearly through that movie. That was one of the points that I had to spell out multiple times to the non-pinball people that are behind the Potter franchise.
    24:29
    Believe me, you don't want, I don't want, the fans don't want to play Harry Potter and the Philosopher's Stone every single time they hit the start button. That is not fun. Believe me, it's not fun. It's not interesting. It gets old. it gets repetitive, and it will not be successful for this game.
    24:51
    So we made it so when you shoot into the scoop, first, it's semi-random, meaning that before you go into the scoop, every flipper flip that you make is moving which mode is currently lit. And we've done that a couple times in previous games as well, like dialed in, for example, switches the mode before you shoot into the scoop based on your flipper hits. But then, because there are, of course, players who don't understand that, see that, know that they can trap up, offset by one, and shoot the scoop in order to get the mode they want, we also make it selectable. When you shoot into the scoop, you can choose which movie you want to play, hit the action button, and choose that film.
    25:36
    Nice. Now, looking at the bottom play field, I am a little curious because it looks like you resurrected the bottom play field that you had in Pirates. Now, the difference is Pirates is a wide body. This is your standard body. And so did that cause any challenges? challenges because you if you have you know an out basically you have an in lane an out lane and an in lane does that limit the the shot geometry because you you are narrowing the focus that you can hit from the bottom flippers um well i cheated a little bit right and the way i cheated is my shooter lane comes up and over the right return. I did notice that. It hovers above that right, yeah. So I eked an extra inch and a quarter out of a normal standard body because I'm using that shooter lane to act as my right return, one of the right returns.
    26:46
    That concept was something, yes, I started, I did that in Pirates, and what made it really interesting is how smoothly the ball feeds when it goes to the outermost lane and rolls through and you can see I kind of capitalized on that concept here when so every shot that returns to the lower flippers it doesn't It doesn't ride down a wire ramp, come to a hoop, hit the end of the hoop, stop, drop through the hole, slowly roll down to your flipper guide, and then slowly roll to your flipper. Right? This constant return with speed to the flippers is very different than most other games. It's extremely fast. I have seen really good players, the first time they walk up to this game, completely whiff because the playfield is so quick. They're not used to the ball feeding your flippers so quickly. And I warn everyone, you will miss the second time the ball comes to your left flipper. Because the first time, we put up a post, we flap the flipper so that you understand it's coming down the left lane and then feeding to your flipper.
    28:17
    It's definitely a different feel. you can get used to it, but it does not provide that ability to immediately trap up from every return to the flipper and then aim your shot. It encourages more of a quicker combo based on the fly flowing sort of shooting game.
    28:40
    And with that speed, it does, at least from physics, it does open the side shots a little bit more. You have to time it better, but if you have some velocity going down to the flipper, if you hit the flipper, then it's going to go lateral farther if you get the outer inner lane versus the inner inner lane. Yep. And so I'm assuming you're leveraging the geometric aspects of that to get different areas of the play field. Because I think it almost seems like that sorting shot, you need to hit the outer left inner flipper to get the velocity to get over to the right. You can make that shot from a standstill, but it's a lot harder than making it on the fly. right like it's it's a smoother shot on the fly than from a standstill because it is like a hair's breadth above the right slingshot in order to make that can you ski jump over to the other flipper or is there no gates on the other sides to block from going there are gates um there are one-way gates to prevent rollbacks and live catches and drop catches from from rolling out But even ski jumps, if you don't time your flip or drop perfectly, you're ski jumping into the slingshot because the ball is coming so quickly. It's like you dink and then it's chaos.
    30:05
    What made you decide – I mean this is obviously more of a younger generation-oriented theme. And I know that games in the past that have been geared towards the younger generation have gotten slack for being hard, quote-unquote. So I guess how do you go about making a game that, I guess, perception-wise might be you should coddle the player a little bit more? Right.
    30:30
    One of the design decisions was to make it so almost every shot in the game can be stopped if we choose to stop it through software. So almost every shot, and I say almost because I think that sorting hat shot is not technically stoppable by programming.
    30:52
    But every other shot is. We can grab it with a magnet, divert it to the vertical up kicker. We can put up a post. We can rotate the staircase so that it feeds an area where we can stop the ball. So we can choose to hold the ball lots of times if we want to. So we do that where we think it's appropriate to help the player understand the rules, understand their objectives, but not do it so much that we interrupt the flow of the game.
    31:28
    How many magnets are in this game? Well technically every solenoid is a magnet Oh okay But let see That you expect movement from the magnet engaging to affect the trajectory of the ball
    31:47
    Only two. I've got a big pancake magnet in the orbit that allows me to grab the ball from the orbit shot, from the center shot, from the upper loop shot, and drop it into the vertical up kicker at the back of the game. And then there's a magnet after that, that allows me to divert the ball to the top of the staircase.
    32:09
    There are no other magnets embedded in the playfield or under the playfield, but using those two as diverters allows me to, again, position the ball and change the ball's end point from the same entrance. So I can send a shot so many different places, even though it's shoot up the right orbit and it can go a ton of different places because of those two magnets and the staircase.
    32:39
    Now, piggybacking on that, you now have, when you first started, you didn't have a lot of veterans helping for, for example, but now you have someone who is known for speed. Well, you have some, okay. But now you have Steve Ritchie who is known for faster, free-flowing games, which admittedly is different than someone like Pat Lawler, where Pat Lawler was kind of known for, hey, you have to trap up and it's like a shooting gallery. You need to get control of the ball and shoot it. This seems to be more influenced by a Steve Ritchie philosophy in having the ball move. So was it an asset to have Steve there so you could talk to him about, hey, what have you done in the past to keep the ball moving? Or are you guys on parallel paths? I'm just curious as to how collaborative the process is.
    33:39
    Generally, game designers don't collaborate on ideas. but game designers will absolutely play the game and give feedback on the game after they've played it. But you're generally not sitting in the office with them as we're drawing lines and circles and going through stuff like that.
    34:03
    I would say that I started this approach of faster games with Godfather. It's a really quick game. It's a really speed-heavy game. and I think I pushed it a lot farther now with Potter, and it's a really fun way of making a game where the Pats method of shooting gallery, lots of stop-and-go action, because of the way I put diverters in my games and where I can alter almost every shot in the game to go a different place, it allows me to have software make it a super fast flowing game or a stop and go game based on what we currently need the play field to do so definitely evolved more from The Godfather which had a lot of diverters but not quite as many as this one so just a really quick shout out to our Patreon. We want to thank them for supporting us. We actually gave them the opportunity to ask some questions to Eric and they submitted some of these. We want to thank Mike, Alan, and Jason for submitting some questions. Mike wants to know, do you know if any of the actors or if J.K. Rowling will be getting a game themselves?
    35:29
    I do not know if any of the talent or Rowling will receive a game. We didn't directly interact with Rowling or any of the talent while we were creating this. We worked directly with Warner Brothers and any questions that had to go beyond them they handled.
    35:52
    Okay, and then one of the other questions too is there's a lot of hype for this game. There are a lot of people that want this game. First off, can you give us kind of a timeline of when these games are going to start? I assume they're already being built but when we're going to see kind of different models roll out. Let's see. Oh, you're in the factory. I'm in the factory right now where our stage is, and this is where I've been living.
    36:18
    We thought you were in Hogwarts. There's a bed back there, too, underneath the staircase. Yeah. This is where I've been living for the past, like, six weeks, and we've already put over 100 games in boxes. Every one of our distributors has a game on their showroom floor. We'll be getting one tomorrow or the next day. Customer games have already been delivered. so the CE game is on the line right now there's a lot of hype around that model there's also a lot of hype around the arcade model the 9999 model and we're building quite a few of those next we're interspersing the models so that we can feed some out to every group of people who wants that model and you know right now it's my job to to be here with the assembly line and and course correct and verify and just check that the game is coming out exactly as i designed it and it's coming together really well uh the team is really getting into the groove and they're putting out putting a lot of games in boxes uh every day so it's it's great so i mean this has been super successful and Scott and I have been to the factory before I mean you guys have pretty much limited the previous games to like 5500 between 500 CEs and 5000 LEs but this is an unlimited production how are you guys going to keep up are you planning on scaling up or is it just we're making potters till we don't make potters anymore I know what my vote is keep making it forever and mainly because this is going to be one of those titles that is going to maintain the popularity. People who come into pinball in four or five years are going to say, wait, there's a Harry Potter machine and be able to get into that. And I'm going to piggyback with Josh's question. So it's limited but not completely unlimited. Like for the CE, you guys are setting it up so everybody who wants one within a certain time frame can get one. I think that's genius because there doesn't seem to be a feeding frenzy of, hey, I need to get one of these limited 100 or 250 or something like that. It allows people to get the model of game they want as long as they're willing to, okay, this is the one I'm going to commit to. They can get that. I think it's genius. I love that approach. but I'm going to throw it back to you so you can tell me more about the division of the line and what people need to do if they want this. Right. So our assembly line and the way that kind of this entire factory has been laid out and designed and the industrial engineering that goes behind laying out an assembly line is that it's very scalable. Right. We have stations that workers normally occupy. We have stations where a worker would do two. They'd do station three and station four, and they'd spend 15 minutes on this station and then 15 minutes on that station. And that way they're working through their stations. We can easily drop people in so that we can output more games. we have a smaller assembly line where we could staff up and build more of these games and the demand is there where we are growing our factory where we are adding more people to get these games built faster and still with the quality that we require all of our games to go out the door with so scalability is really important um for all areas of the factory right our cabinet line is scalable our back box line sub-assembly main play field mating testing final testing like all of that has multiple stations where sometimes those stations are are you know one person works two stations. But when the need arises, when we first launch a game or when we have unprecedented demand, we push more employees into those stations and are able to build faster.
    40:46
    Can you tell me about the decision on the art package? So if people like the movie assets, and they're going to choose the arcade or the wizard edition. Now, tell me about the collector's edition, because it seems that you're going more in the book art package if you're going with the collector's edition, because it's hand-drawn art. It's not pictures from the movie, which I really like. I think it gives it a distinct look, and it feels a little more I'm into the books as opposed to the movies, but why don't you tell me a little more about the philosophy on the art package?
    41:29
    So the collector's edition art package was drawn by a group of graphic artists known as Mina Lima. And yes, Mina Lima, since 2020, has released three of the Potter books, you know, fully illustrated with included paper craft designs. They have fold-out and movable objects like a marauder's map where the feet move as you slide a piece of this paper craft up and down. But the way MinaLima got started, and everyone who's ever seen a Potter film knows MinaLima's art, they just don't know they do. MinaLima is the graphic arts team behind every single Potter film ever made, including the Fantastic Beasts series. So every piece of graphical art you see in the films was designed by Team MinaLima. So what that means is the candy boxes and the banners that hang in the school and the wanted posters and the storefronts and all of the graphical arts you see in every film were designed by Eduardo and Mira, Team MinaLima. they are the movie artists but they've gone and they've also made art for books I approached them because of their level of skill and their involvement and their adoration by the Potter fandom I asked them to create me an art package that wasn't solely focused on the character art but more the objects and items of interest in the different movies, and to tell the story of the movies through the objects by going around the cabinet, starting in the lower left-hand corner. Movie 1 and then Movie 2 is on the left side near the back of the game. Movie 3 is the left-back box. Movie 4, 5, 6 is the right-hand side of the cabinet, and then Movie 7 and 8 is the right-side back box. So they took all of these components and objects and items of interest and creatures, and they illustrated all of those to create a cohesive story of Harry Potter movies 1 through 8 in the art package.
    44:00
    The treatment of the art, meaning the physical treatment using foil, using a matted printing process with spot-glossing different elements of it. It really adds some of that mystique of... It does have a certain book style embossing, it almost feels like, when you see it. It doesn't always come across in video, but in person, the gold, the way it looks, it's pretty incredible. it definitely appeals more and I will agree with this, it appeals to the Harry Potter fans more so than the casual movie Harry Potter fans right, they, the Harry Potter the hardcore Harry Potter fans know who Eduardo and Mira are when so back in May there was a new theme park that opened in Orlando the new universal epic universe and there's a Harry Potter world there, which is like the 1900s Paris.
    45:13
    Eduardo and Mira are the team that created all of the art you see in the theme park. Everything, you walk past the posters and the storefronts, and inside the mosaics and the ceiling artwork, everywhere is all Eduardo and Mira's art, and their team, of course. They are the directors of MinaLima now. They used to be the only artists, but they've grown their team quite a bit.
    45:41
    MinaLima are the ones that created all of that artwork there. And I am lucky enough that they invited me to this VIP opening of Universal, Epic Universe. And I got to experience the Harry Potter park with them as they experienced it for the first time.
    46:04
    And they couldn't walk five feet without someone stopping them for selfies or signatures or conversation because they are the rock stars of the Harry Potter world. I mean, it was astounding to see how well loved and received they are by the Potter community. And walking through the universe that they helped build was truly inspirational. It was really cool to see. so I know them being part of this game was the right decision and they made an art package that is not what you see on every other pinball machine but I think it's a work of art that's going to be hard to beat. It truly is a collector's edition artwork it's amazing and what's cool is like we've been talking about this for almost an hour now like you've had the impression it's put an impression on your life it's almost came full circle right now you've left your impression on the wizarding world as well yeah i think are they going to put one of these at universal or whatnot are any of these games going on on location like that they so a lot of the staff was there that night and they're like we're definitely getting one of these in the park even if it's in our private back room where we could have it but there are arcades at universal um we are in discussions with the operators that run those arcades making sure that such an iconic universal intellectual property should be represented in their arcades, and let's make sure we get games there so people can experience them and see them. Now, you've gone back to the three-model option. However, there seems to be very little play differences between all three. So why don't you lead me through, by the way, I think that's the right decision because it makes Jersey Jack pinball more accessible to the home collector who doesn't happen to be the elite collector. I love that it gives people, especially something so iconic as Harry Potter,
    48:15
    the concern that I had originally is that this is going to be so expensive. this is going to be cost prohibitive for many of the fans who have this but you actually went the different way so why don't you talk to me about bringing back the arcade edition but also keeping the playability the same between arcade wizard and collectors I mean you hit the nail on the head there Scott I didn't want a Harry Potter game that could only be played by the pinball elite and only be played by millionaires who can see a game and and can buy it no questions asked right i think about friends of mine family members of mine that are not independently wealthy that a pinball machine you know ten thousand dollars is a significant investment of their income and when you you know think about the story of Potter and it's a kid who doesn't have a great home life and a lot of people connected to that. The idea of making it only available to the elite or the wealthy and cutting out people who couldn't afford the game was not something that I wanted to do. So I wanted there to be a lower cost model, a sub $10,000 model so that people could put this in their house, right? $15,000 is exceptionally expensive. $10,000 is also expensive.
    49:59
    But what could we not include that could lower our bill of materials enough that that game would still be good for our company? The other big push behind that was to get our games into operated arcades. Operators straight up look at cost versus real estate versus return on investment.
    50:26
    And when you can buy a competitor's game for $5,000 less than our game, that's a tough sell to an operator. But now when it's like, well, this is the biggest IP you're ever going to see. and when it comes down to it, it's not much more expensive than the competitors' games.
    50:46
    Why wouldn't you put one in your arcade? You know it's going to earn. And it has all of the stuff that makes the game great and what's left on the table are art things that an arcade doesn't care about anyways. So get the game in the door, let people play it, but them experiencing it and show operators that Jersey Jack games will earn on location.
    51:14
    Well, realistically, a $300 difference between competitors mid-tier versus your guys' bottom tier, and it's just as packed as the mid-tier and stuff like that. It's an easy sell, and it's Harry Potter. Like you said, you get it in the door, they're going to make that $300 in the first week. Like, it's not. Oh, yeah. He's right.
    51:33
    It's interesting because even for me, I do have some higher-level games, But I've also – I'm cost-sensitive to figure out what I want to put in my house.
    51:43
    When it first came out, my gut reaction is, oh, okay, maybe I'll just get the arcade because it has the same playability. Looking at it, I'm like, well, maybe I should go for the – so it does actually motivate me as a collector to say, hey, right now, I'm debating between the wizard and the collectors. because it seemed – and I don't think you can go wrong. That's the beautiful part of the way you've set it up. This was my criticism of some other pinball releases where one is so much superior and also exclusive. The way that you have it set up, I like that you can say, actually, it really depends on which way you're going to go, But really, you are going to be made whole on all three editions because the bottom line is the biggest thing people are going to see is the play field and making sure it's consistent between the plays. That is actually the sweet spot of being able to say, hey, are you in it for $10,000? Are you into it for $15,000 or $12,000? either way you're going to get a solid machine that doesn't feel like you're you're missing out on the playability aspect of it right yep i gotta say eric it is amazing that what you're you and your team has put together with this i was just counting on pin side and they don't ever get everyone that's involved but there's 18 people directly involved with this legends like yourself David Thiel on sound. I'll argue to that. Gameplay is key, right? Software is awesome, but sound. Like you said in the featurette, you can be sitting across the bar having a beer and hear someone playing the game and know exactly what they're doing and the moment they're having right then because of sound. I think David Thiel, he did an amazing job with you on Pirates and to bring him back for this, I think was genius.
    53:45
    Even like Jerry Thompson, who said at Expo last year, he has figured out some amazing things and helped progress pinball in a way with sound that was just amazing. He's a legend hands down.
    53:59
    John Paul DeWin doing his stuff. You have so many great names on this title. You guys threw the kitchen sink at this and everything else. Congratulations. Really great team to work with. Everyone, you know, I felt like there was never a time when anyone on the team said, I don't think it's worth it or I can't make that happen. Everyone's like, yeah, and then what? What else can I put in? What else can I put into this where I can get my fingerprints on this and make it pour a little bit of extra?
    54:34
    Tell me the window that people have if they want to get in on the CE ordering window. Tell me how long that is and what's the best way for people to do it. I'm obviously ordering from Zach and Nicole, but there are other ways too. The premier dealer of JCP. Yes.
    54:52
    Our distributors are taking orders now. These are going to be made to order for a time period, and we have not announced when that time period will end.
    55:09
    But the long and short of it is I want anyone who wants a CE to be able to get a CE, and I don't want them to have to pay more than $15,000 to get it. And that was what's happened on a lot of games over the past 10 years or so. You'd have such a limited supply of the high-end game that you'd have people who don't give a shit about pinball buying these things just to flip them. And that just makes me a bit frustrated. Well, the challenge is – and this is what I've always argued – if there is a margin that's available for the secondary market, then it makes sense for the company to make it available to as many people as possible at that price because that basically eliminates the secondary profiteers, the war profiteers. And this allows people to say, hey, this is the price. We can get it and you can get that. And so so right now it is available, which is great because in in many in great pinball machines, in great movies, they're they actually grow from week to week. In an average movie, a lot of times the first week it's really hot and then then it cools off. OK, it's significant that way as people get their hands on these machines. I'm anticipating that they're going to get their hands on them and play them and then say, oh, wait. OK, now I need to make a decision. Which which option am I going to have? And so they they they at least have some time that they don't feel like they need to immediately regret their decision that they've made. They have a little bit of time to get their hands on the machine.
    56:58
    Mm hmm. so Eric I gotta ask one final question before we start wrapping this up you know there's the infamous story with you talking to Slash and the you know Paul McCartney story right is there any cool stories that you have with Harry Potter where it was just like something that stood out that comes to mind when you were making this game yeah I mean for me that pinch me moment was when I reached out to MinaLima. When I sent them a message and we'll be putting out some content in the next couple weeks where I asked the question to them on camera. They came here and they sat in front of this stage and they got to tour the factory and all that.
    57:49
    But I asked them how they felt when they got a random email from some crazy American pinball designer asking them to be a part of it. And they responded in the best way. They responded such that we could feel the passion you had for what you do, and it aligns with the passion we have for what we do. And that's when it really clicked that creative people that care so much about what they do, when they can get together, they can make something better than some of its parts. And I really feel that's what happened with this game.
    58:32
    I'm excited to play this. When's the next time they can play this? What's the next show you guys are heading to? We are taking a dozen games Southern Fried, which is June 20th. That's 11. Oh, crap, that's 11 days. All right, I got some more.
    58:48
    Sorry to ruin your day. Yeah, you're not getting any sleep under the staircase anytime soon. Yeah. No. And then, you know, you can go to your local distributor and you can put up games right now. Like I said, almost every distributor in the world has a collector's edition on their showroom floor.
    59:10
    So you can find your local distributor, go over there and play it, and reach out to me and let me know what you think. And, you know, I've gotten so many positive messages over the past couple days of people who were so excited about this and how their significant other or their kids are really excited about this game and they can't wait to play it together as a family. And that's one of those, you know, I'm really lucky sometimes for what I get paid to do. like I get paid to make a game and then the icing on top is people tell me how much they love the game and what it means to them and what it means to their family and that's a very rewarding part of this job well we certainly are excited for it and we can feel that Jersey Jack definitely does not hold back on being able to put out the best version of their product which is so great now you said that you're actually getting collector's editions out earlier than you have for previous releases on this. And so if people want to jump in and get a collector's edition, they're not going to have to wait. Well, okay. They don't have to wait until the end of the run. You're going to be simultaneously manufacturing all three. And so people are going to be able to get a hold of this, which is great because if people want the highest quality option, they don't want to wait. They want it now. Right, right. speaking if you want people to message you Eric how do you want them to message you after they've played your amazing game generally I can be sent messages on Facebook and then if you reach out to Jersey Jack on Facebook I can get those messages as well talk to me at a show, come up and say hi introduce yourself, I love meeting new members of the community old members of the community.
    61:13
    I'm trying to go to as many shows as possible all over the world so that I can meet fans and just talk about pinball and how fun it is and what a wild ride this has been. I got to laugh, too. Every time we're talking, someone walks up because they know you like to have a beer, right? They all want to have a beer with you.
    61:35
    So if you have to be picky, which beer are you requesting if someone walks up with one? Man, whatever beer it is, just any beer that's cold is good for me. Generally. However, there are, you know, generally sour ales are better when they're slightly warmer or room temperature. They have more flavor.
    61:56
    I am really into beer, really into craft beer, right? I don't generally drink beer to get hammered. I drink beer for the flavor. So I love all types. I love trying local beers wherever I'm at. And, yeah, if you want to come and share a beer with me, you know, by all means, I'm happy to have a beer and talk pinball.
    62:21
    That's awesome. If you want to get a hold of us, we are Loser Kid Pinball Podcast at gmail.com. Get a hold of us on all the socials at Loser Kid Pinball. That's YouTube, Facebook, all that jazz. If you want some silver ball swag, silverballswag.com slash Loser Kid. also like we said earlier if you want to help support us on patreon you're more than welcome to do that and we do cool stuff like you get to ask questions to eric or you get to chill with us on media days or stuff like that scott give us our final words okay definitely go out play harry potter and i'm curious to see which which one our fans are going to be ordering because i really i'm kind of i'm torn between wizard and the collector so so reach out tell me what you're going to get and it's a great release congrats eric and thanks again for listening
    63:04
    Bye.