So listen to a word I say, the screams all sound the same. But the moment you make money this shit will carry on. Body's set to show. Sit up, sit up, sit up, sit up, sit up, sit up, sit up. Welcome everybody to Kaneda's Pinball Podcast. Another run of Big Bang Bar. Bar. Let's talk about that on this episode of Canada's Pinball Podcast. Do we need this game again? Is it worth it? Who's going to make it? The questions are lining up. As Naps Arcade has said, this rumor is happening. Now look, as a community, we've been talking about Big Bang Bar Remake ever since Big Bang Bar was remade. It's up there on the list of games like Tron Vault Edition, another run of Pirates of the Caribbean is Stern going to do a vault edition of Ghostbusters and look I think this game is going to be remade I think it's going to be remade most likely by Raw Thrills it might not be Raw Thrills but I'm telling you this right now I have confirmation and I mean it and Mr. Josh Sharpe can put a gif of him eating popcorn but Raw Thrills is getting into the pinball space. And I think what's going to happen is this. I think it's going to be a joint venture between Raw Thrills and CGC, and they are going to license games. Now look, the Big Bang Bar license is still owned by Planetary Pinball and Rick over there. So this is still a licensed game, but let's talk about this just from a macro standpoint first. Do we need more Big Bang Bars? Now look, if you love pinball and you love playing pinball and you talk to people who play a lot of pinball and if you talk to people who have jumped on a Big Bang Bar, and not everybody has, but the overall consensus is usually this. it's a beautiful pin it's a quirky looking machine it's overly sexualized and fun for men to jump on it but the overall consensus is usually it's not that good of a pinball machine and the reason why this game was always collectible is they didn't make many of them remember like this was a Capcom game and when Capcom went out of business Big Bang Bar never went into full production and then Gene Cunningham went and remade the game. It like killed the man basically. Like he took so many years to remake this game and he got it done eventually. And now here we are. And the reason why this game is still special, why do you think this game is still special? Because there aren't many of them in the world. Now, if you go and remake it and add more code, because that's the other part about Big Bang Bar is the code is very shallow. If you go and remake it, it's going to be hard to remake this game to get it to feel like a Capcom pinball machine. Now look, there are people out there that might argue the Capcom game didn't feel that well, so if you added different flipper field, maybe more like a stern, the game would play much better. There's also some people out there, I'm just going to say this, one of my friends, I'm not going to name his name, he was like, Chris, in 2023, coming out with a game called Big Bang Bar, with women or naked women sort of dancing in a pinball machine is not culturally appropriate. And I was like, look, bro, just stop. Don't go woke on pinball. If you look at the pinball buying audience and you look at like the fact that look at Elvira, for example, right, you can't get woke in pinball and then look at the Elvira machine and be like, look, we're not overly sexualizing women. And look, that's Elvira's shtick, right? Because you can't cancel Elvira because she's a woman who willingly presents herself to the world that way. And look, I don't take offense to some alien game about alien strippers on a pole. Like I'm not going to get all woke and cancel that game. And hello, Wonelly big juicy melons people are sitting in the homes of people who also have wives and daughters And I don think anyone really complaining But my point is this this game is collectible because this game is rare So back in the day I think Capcom made like 122 of them And then Gene Cunningham in 2004 took deposits on 183 more games. So there's not many Big Bang Bars in the world. And that is why this game, if you see it, it still feels like a collectible, a museum piece, and it's a sight to behold. Now, look, if you go and remake this game, you're going to destroy that sort of element of the game. And now we've got three versions of it, right? We have the original Capcom. We'll have the Gene Cunningham version. And then we'll have the new version made by, I don't know, Raw Thrills or somebody else. And so should we remake this game? And if you're going to remake Big Bang Bar, should there be a limit on how many they're going to make? Now, look, the question of whether or not this will sell, let's talk about that. Do I think if they remake Big Bang Bar in 2023, it's going to be a huge hit and sell within the pinball community? I think it comes down to a few factors. I think it comes down to how many are you going to make? Who's making them, right? What's the quality of the machine? Who's doing the code updates in the game to make it better? And also, ultimately, how much is the game going to be priced? I mean, we can't get around this now. Where would you price a Big Bang Bar at right now? because right now on the secondhand market, these machines are selling for over $20,000. I think you can get good examples of these machines now trade between like $25,000 to even $30,000. Okay, and that's because there's only like a handful in the world. And if you go and remake it, you're not going to price this game at $9,000 or $10,000. I think you've got to price it somewhere competitively within the collectible space. And what sucks about all the pinball right now, and this is why people are harping on this, if you make just 500 James Bond single level games and Stern prices it at $20,000, if you go make Big Bang Bar, a game with more pedigree within the pinball space, a game that's got more toys and fun stuff in it than James Bond, a game that arguably is much sexier and a work of art, wouldn't you price it over $20,000? But I think Stern showed everybody that they priced it too high. The game is not still sold out. You want to hear a crazy story? I know a big distributor. I'm not going to name their name. They bought 14 James Bond 60th anniversary editions. 14! And they only sold four of them. And that means they have 10 machines that they sent Stern a check for, which is $150,000 in inventory that they cannot move. This game was so overpriced and is going to go down as the worst launch in Stern's history. It just is. And everyone who buys one is going to unbox it and realize how they got hoodwinked by the Disney executives that are just going to bleed us of what we love. And it's going to happen, people. It's already happening. I love it when people say they priced it right. No, they didn't. If they priced it right, it would be sold out. Okay, so let's talk about this Big Bang Bar. So what do you price it at? I think you got to price it around maybe, I don't know, $15,000. And then how many are you going to make? I mean, that's the big question. If you're going to turn on manufacturing, it almost doesn't make sense to do a small volume manufacturing run. But if this is Raw Thrills and this is CGC working together to make this game, the other company that I think it might be, if it's not Raw Thrills and CGC, I could see American pinball making this game like and i've always said this why isn't david fix going and just making games that have more demand like why go through the effort to make a game like legends of valhalla which is fine it's an all right game it's a b minus game and you make that game you sell it for 8700 it immediately loses value nobody really wants more of them and then what did you really do? What did you put into the pinball world that really created a shift or a momentum for your company? I always believe this. A pinball company needs to make sure its portfolio has a little swagger If I had a pinball company and I was running a pinball company I would make sure that every title we come out with we super proud of That we not just throwing stuff on the line to throw stuff on the line And I think very few companies really understand the importance of protecting the master brand. Like even when I look at JJP, it's all over the place. Like Wizard of Oz, then Hobbit, then Dialed In. Really, Dialed In? You want to put Dialed In in the lineup? No, no, no, no, no. No to Toy Story 4. You can't go from Guns N' Roses, the coolest badass rock band of all time, to freaking Toy Story 4. You got to have some consistency, some swagger. Your lineup is your portfolio, and that is how cool your brand is. And if you go from Houdini to Oktoberfest to Hot Wheels to Legends of Vahal, I mean, talk about a really weird Motley Crue lineup that I would not feel proud to stand in front of. But we're not talking about that. We're talking about Big Bang Bar. So, look, here's my thing. In 2023, we now have another rumored game coming out. And here's another rumor for all of you. I am hearing that there is another pinball company that is about to throw their hat into the ring in 2023. This is a company you have never heard of before. They are making a licensed theme game. There are people in the industry that you know very well working on this game. Here's the other crazy part. They are not going to reveal this game until they have at least 200 of the machines built and in a box ready to ship to customers. They are not going to take non-refundable deposits. They're not going to play games with everybody. They are going to come out of left field. And I've heard, because I've talked to someone working on the game, I've heard from him. He said, Chris, look, 2022 was very underwhelming. I think when you see this game, he said to me, he's like, you're not going to be surprised about what it is, which is crazy, which means it's one of the themes we've been speculating on. But he said, I think you're going to be highly impressed when you see this game in the flesh or in the wood and the lights. OK, so look, this is just nuts to me. We have so many pinball companies and there's more than 12 pinball companies making products right now in the pinball space. And all I'm asking is this, and this is just me personally. I don't think we need to go back and make games from the 90s. I don't. I think what we need, we need more new games based on themes we love that are integrated mechanically, code-wise, light shows, artistically, that are integrated in a way that are just special. And that's the thing about Big Bang Bar. It's like, really, are we out of ideas as an industry? Are we out of ideas as manufacturers? If we're going to roll the dice on something, why don't we roll the dice on a new theme that hasn't been made before? I don't mean an original theme. I mean a licensed IP theme that we know people love, that we know people want. And why don't we make it as good as we can? Why don't we show people what we got as an engineering company, as an artistic venture? And that's what I'm hoping for. That is what Canada wants to see in 2023. I'm optimistic we're going to get there. I am. I really do have a lot of optimism that at these prices, these companies can't come in with just mediocrity. And look, I'm not a dreamer. I'm a realist too. If you remake Big Bang Bar, you're going to sell a few hundred of them. there's always going to be buyers who line up especially that the game is selling for so much on the used market it's a no-brainer i think if they remake it i would make no more than a thousand and when they do do that it's then gonna like saturate the market a little bit on this very rare game all of the prices of big bang bar will come back down and you will see owners who passed on people i mean there were people offering people like 30 40 000 for their big bang bars during COVID, yes, those people will be kicking themselves. And I always feel bad, not bad for collectors, like high-end collectors, when they see something like this in the news. Because think about it. You've got a Big Bang Bar. You see this Naps story. And it like now what do I do Because everybody knows like if those guys have the old game with the old code and a new game is coming out with new code and maybe even some better engineering they going to have the version of the game that no one's really going to want or not want as much. Because let's face it, you can make games better. The Chicago Gaming Company remakes are better than the originals. I will fight. I will slap fight anyone who says the originals are better. The Chicago Gaming Games look better. The quality is better. The play field is better. Everything about it is better. The toppers are better. The artwork, everything about it is just better. So if they make a better Big Bang Bar, they should call it that. They should call it Better Big Bang Bar. Just add another B and release it as the Better Big Bang Bar or the Best Big Bang Bar version on the planet. So we will see what happens. The real thing about to happen this month is Spooky Pinball is going to show us Scooby-Doo. Now look, they're doing a great job. I will commend them. They are doing a great job of showing us the cabinets, the play field, the employees, all the work going on. You know, in one week, Spooky Pinball has been more transparent than Haggis Pinball in two years. Uh-oh, Kaneda, you can't rag on Haggis. We got to support everything in pinball. I just did. Damien, Do you know how to work a camera? Do you know how Facebook works? Marty, do you know how to use social media? Come on, guys. Just share some photos. Do a factory tour. Hey, we know you're making the games. How about just do a walkthrough? So Spooky Pinball is doing what they do best. They show us behind the curtain and everyone's getting excited. But there's one thing they haven't shown us. And it is the most important part of this game. It is going to be the make break element of the game, and that is the code. The code is everything on Scooby-Doo, because you can tell. The shot layout's not that interesting. There's not that many toys in the game. It's a fan layout, right? There's a big upper play field. There's a few magnets in it. There's no pop bumpers, and the gameplay could be... Look, I think this game's going to have a lot of flow, but it also might be a little repetitive to shoot if it's just up and down, up and down, up and down. Not a lot of left to right, not a lot of randomness, not a lot of chaos, not a lot of toys to interact with. I think then the code needs to be the thing that wakes the game up and makes it exciting and gives it replay value. So we shall see. Now look, January is coming to an end and they said this thing was going to be streamed in January. So we shall see. Jack Danger is supposed to stream it. I reached out to Jack. He does not have a date from Spooky Pinball yet. So we will see. So that will be the big news item this month will be that. And then we'll start to see those James Bond 60th editions land next month. I can't wait to see these rich guys unbox it. I hope when these rich dudes unbox it, they can do like a walk around their house and their cribs. I just want to see how rich they are because you have to have so much money to see the value in this game. And I love all the rich pinheads. There's so many great guys in this hobby that have like half a million in cars. And of course, this machine means nothing. And I just want to see how much better your refrigerator is than mine. Can we do that? Can you guys share how cool your cribs are? I don't really care about the game. The game's boring to me. I'm more interested to see how expensive your toilet bowls are and your bathtubs and your stoves. Like that's more interesting to me than what's going on with James Bond 60th. Everybody, have a great Friday. This is Kaneda. Love you guys. The club membership keeps going up. Thank you so much for the support. And we're going to march into Texas with our cargo shorts on. Later. our bodies safe to shore. Though the truth may vary, this ship will carry our bodies safe to shore.