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DPP# 94 "In which we talk JAWS and SPOOKY"

Don's Pinball Podcast (regular feed)·podcast_episode·40m 37s·analyzed·Jan 6, 2024
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Analysis

claude-haiku-4-5-20251001 · $0.034

TL;DR

Deep dive on Jaws pinball mechanics, pricing tiers, and production delays; Venom retrospective.

Summary

Don provides an extensive breakdown of newly revealed Jaws pinball assets from Stern, analyzing Pro/Premium/LE variants and their mechanical differences, while discussing production timelines and supply chain constraints. He also reflects on Venom's lifecycle and his renewed appreciation for the game after extended play.

Key Claims

  • Keith Elwin finished Jaws months ago and is already working on his next project plus the one after that

    high confidence · Direct quote from Don citing Elwin interview: 'not only was his next game, this one, done, but he was already pretty much almost finished with his follow-up to that'

  • Jaws LEs sold out or sold through well across distributors; premiums are scarce

    high confidence · Direct distributor report from Mad Pinball: 'LEs are gone. The premiums are gone. Plenty of pros are available.' Don confirms 'everywhere I'm checking LEs did sell out'

  • Pro Jaws will ship first in strong supply, followed by LEs this month/next, premiums delayed to end of February/March

    high confidence · Don reports: 'pros will be made here pretty quickly, followed by the LEs going into this month and the next month. And then premiums they were talking about the end of the month of February into March'

  • Next premium Jaws production run is not until June (significant delay)

    medium confidence · Don states: 'what I'm hearing from the distributors is if I want to get a premium, the next run of these isn't until June'

  • Stern is blaming Chinese New Year/supply chain for premium delays, but Don questions whether a specific component is actually constrained

    medium confidence · Don: 'they're blaming supply chain for the shortcoming for the premiums' and 'they were blaming the Chinese New Year' but questions what part could affect premiums and not pros

  • Initial Jaws design concept included shooting ball into shark's mouth (like a vuck), but was rejected by Keith Elwin

    medium confidence · Don reports: 'they did have the concept that you could shoot the ball into jaws's mouth but then it was functioning basically like a vuck and he doesn't like that'

  • Fin drop target on Jaws playfield was originally a physical fin but was changed to sticker due to ball control issues

    medium confidence · Don: 'they were mentioning that initially this fin drop target was actually a fin. It's a sticker of a fin, but apparently the ball was flying crazily off of it'

Notable Quotes

  • “this is the big silvery glistening fish edition let's talk about all the jaw stuff”

    Don @ opening — Sets tone for Jaws-focused episode; uses playful language to introduce main topic

  • “looking at this play field from above, you know, a view that you're never going to be looking at it at, it looks like a smiling manatee”

    Don @ playfield analysis — Humorous observation about shark sculpture aesthetics from overhead angle; notes disconnect between design intent and overhead view

  • “Pro is going to play much faster...because that shark bash toy is not going to be coming up and down”

    Don @ pro analysis — Key distinction in gameplay speed between Pro and Premium/LE variants

  • “I would think they'd be having 1,500 premiums in two weeks out of that new factory, have all lines running and fill these premium orders”

    Don @ production analysis — Skepticism about stated supply chain constraints; implies potential artificial limitation

  • “the sense that this is a game that would tend to hold its value...Venom LE for $9,500...Foo Fighter LE for probably somewhere right around there”

    Don @ LE value assessment — Predicts strong secondary market value for Jaws LE based on comparable games

  • “I hated it at first. I didn't hate it. It's a pinball machine. Let's keep some semblance of perspective here.”

    Don @ Venom retrospective — Self-correction on initial Venom criticism; establishes measured evaluation approach

  • “this is going to be a whole lot better...the code was so early it was such a stress going through the licensing”

    Don @ code quality comparison — Compares Jaws licensing process favorably to Bond; implies better launch code quality

  • “LEs are gone. The premiums are gone. Plenty of pros are available.”

    Jeff (Mad Pinball distributor, via Don) — Direct distributor confirmation of allocation scarcity; highest reliability source

Entities

Keith ElwinpersonJawsgameStern PinballcompanyGeorge GomezpersonDonpersonZach SharppersonVenomgame

Signals

  • ?

    community_signal: Expectation of immediate community mod activity: 3D-printed barrels already appearing pre-release, fin sculptures in progress, Amity billboard topper likely incoming; community iterating on designer choices

    high · Don: 'I'm already seeing people have, like, finished Jaws yellow barrels that are already painted' and 'I'm sure people are going to make that Amity billboard'

  • ?

    competitive_signal: Don achieved 350M+ score on location Venom Pro through character progression and multiball stacking (character multiball leveled to 3, Carnage/Toxin sequencing), demonstrating deep strategic engagement despite Pro's stripped-down spec

    high · Don: 'I got myself up to 350 million points...I built it up to three and then went ahead and cashed in...went right into a Carnage multi-ball, then right into a Toxin team-up'

  • ?

    design_philosophy: Jaws fin drop target was originally physical fin sculpture but redesigned as sticker due to ball control/airballing issues; expectation that community will 3D print replacement fin sculpture with different chaos characteristics

    high · Don: 'initially this fin drop target was actually a fin...the ball was flying crazily off of it' and comparison to Godzilla community modifications with 3D prints

  • ?

    design_philosophy: Keith Elwin rejected original shark-eating-ball vuck mechanic in favor of shark eruption/bash sequence; indicates preference for kinetic/explosive toy interaction over ball-capture mechanics

    medium · Don: 'initially they did have the concept that you could shoot the ball into jaws's mouth but then it was functioning basically like a vuck and he doesn't like that'

  • ?

Transcript

groq_whisper · $0.122

0:00
buckle up for this is the big one this is episode number 94 but this is more importantly is the big silvery glistening fish edition let's talk about all the jaw stuff that's come out but not only that we got surprise topper dropped right into our hearts from spooky pinball i've got some views on it let's get into it how is your friday friends and uh and and acquaintances come on gather around come down of the carpet square man let's sit and talk because there's a whole ton to go over man we are at the end of this shark week marketing launch push we we knew it was coming it was rumored to be coming and then uh january 2nd we got teasers and then from then it just kept coming coming coming uh official uh word uh leaks preceding that uh video footage and screen captures captured on a potato hopefully it was one of them idaho russets but here we are now we've got the assets have been revealed george gomez has done his talk let's sift through like what's actually going on where we are in the world of jaws pinball they're representing stern pinball 90 of the market as they say zach sharps out there doing uh live stream interviews on youtube with other video game people for some reason it's crazy it's crazy cats chasing dogs sharks swimming up to our peers um what do you think of this game man right um you know so we knew this was coming uh we knew who was making it We knew that he'd been done with it for what seems like six months, but big boy Elwin was talking about an interview sometime months ago that not only was his next game, this one, done, but he was already pretty much almost finished with his follow-up to that, which leads me to believe that this guy has an insane work ethic, man. Man, a few words on interviews and in public, but man, does he crank out him some games, right? We saw him do Avengers Infinity Quest. Godzilla had time to stop and do Bond's 60th and now right back here with Jaws plus his next project plus he's already probably working on the one to the follow-up of that and that leads me to believe is part of the reason why Stern is making some of the decisions that they have revealed regarding you know not doing the LEs anymore but Jaws man you know this license you know classic movies was it 70s 80s when this came out it affected the whole nation man people weren't safe to go into the ocean after watching this thing bloodthirsty monster on the hunt uh but not just a monster movie a character study movie too an atmospheric fun guys on an adventure what's gonna happen timmy's gonna be barfed out of a shark on a pier you know and and all this all this other nonsense it's it spawned uh you know terrible video games it spawned merchandise amusement and theme park rides and now it's here so uh we finally got our views of like what is in the pro what is not in the pro um what does the premium art look like and then we have like better resolution of that le images so i've got an image up in front of me i figured this is a good way to kind of go over it let's talk about the pro because it's kind of been ignored up until now and uh did you guys see man this screenshot of the play field over the top um i'm on kinetesis because it was easier to navigate than stern site but the the jaws puppet i don't even it's probably the same sculpt that's found in the premium le but it's just this angle is weird because it's coming straight out of the shark cage towards of the player, but looking at this play field from above, you know, a view that you're never going to be looking at it at, it looks like a smiling manatee. It's so weird, like his eyes are beady and just spaced really wide apart. It's just very strange looking. It looks like that shark man from Suicide Squad. Just look at him. He looked like a marmaduke version of a shark, but I guess it's threatening when viewed from the correct angle, but from top, man, that's nuts. So the other thing I like about the Pro, I'd say it's going to play much faster. I'm sure of it. With the upper playfield missing, you can see, like, the full art package to the back of the playfield that's really missing. You know, you get the fisherman's hut on the right in both versions, right? There's a ramp that goes up through it, back to the back of the box. Bickety, bickety, back of the box. But there's a lot of art on the other side showing the rest of Amity Harbor. I dig it. What I don't see, oh, we do have the seashore down there towards the bottom. Okay, that's cool. So the upper playfield blocks that back corner. But on the Pro, you do get that. So plus one for the Pro. Otherwise, in the back there, it's kind of barren. There's no orbit shot that's back there at all. You know, what would be the orbit shot is this double backing shot. I think this is the harpoon shot they're calling it, you know, where you can kind of feed it through the spinner and then have it race around to the left to go feed back to the left in lane. Or it looks like you can, no, you can't shoot up that left part of it lower, but you can cross field shot it off the little flipper on the right, the right upper flipper, through the harpoon shot, and then it looks like it'll careen up. And I guess depending on how far it goes up, that's how much your multiplier is awarded. So that's kind of cool. I like that's a different shot that I don't see everywhere. I think it would have been cool if he threw that figure eight shot from about 60th over here because that's kind of in that same real estate. But I think that'll be a fun little shot over there. Now let's talk about this wave shot, right, because this is the big one. This is the one that looks like it's repurposing that bookcase ramp from Venom, only it's cocked out about 37 degrees or something to the left.

  • Jaws LE will include 3D glasses and 3D video mode (throwback to Jaws 3D film)

    medium confidence · Don: 'the LE is going to ship with some 3D glasses' and 'they're talking about the 3D video mode first ever in pinball'

  • Stern has assets from four different Jaws movies available for the game

    high confidence · Direct quote: 'George Gomez is already out week one talking about they got assets for four different Jaws movies'

    • @ distribution update
    Mad Pinballcompany
    Bond 60thgame
    Godzillagame
    Foo Fightersgame
    Kinesiscompany
    Gonzo's Pinball Flipperamaperson/content
    District 1event
    Orcagame_element
    Amity Harborgame_element

    licensing_signal: Stern has secured assets from four different Jaws films; 3D video mode references Jaws 3D film as throwback concept; clips released in trailers already included licensed footage, indicating approval was pre-secured rather than delayed

    high · Don: 'George Gomez is already out week one talking about they got assets for four different Jaws movies' and 'clips that they're released so far...those clips were in it so I can't wait until we get that'

  • $

    market_signal: Jaws LE sold out/sold through quickly across distributors; Don predicts strong secondary market value retention based on comparable games (Venom LE $9,500, Foo Fighters LE ~$9,500); value preservation attributed to expression lighting integration and cosmetic quality

    high · Don: 'everywhere I'm checking LEs did sell out...This is a game that looks like it's going to hold on to its value for those reasons'

  • ?

    community_signal: Keith Elwin maintains exceptionally high output across multiple concurrent projects (Avengers Infinity Quest, Godzilla, Bond 60th, Jaws, plus next two projects already in progress), suggesting design pipeline innovation or unsustainably compressed timeline

    high · Don: 'he was already pretty much almost finished with his follow-up to that, which leads me to believe that this guy has an insane work ethic'

  • ?

    product_strategy: Jaws Pro/Premium/LE tiers differentiated by shark eruption toy, upper playfield, expression lighting, custom armor cuts, mirrored backglass, and foil artwork — premium features more integrated into code/effects than typical cosmetic differences

    high · Don detailed each variant's mechanical and cosmetic differences; expression lights synchronized to game modes and music; custom hardware integration required for expression lighting

  • ?

    product_concern: Don questions whether Stern is artificially limiting Premium production to prioritize LE/Pro volumes or push secondary market sales, given strong demand for major license cornerstone release in softer market

    medium · Don: 'this is the game that would sell...I would think they'd be having 1,500 premiums in two weeks...So I don't know why they would artificially limit the supply'

  • ?

    product_strategy: Stern planning Pro Jaws in strong supply immediately, LE production this/next month, Premium production end Feb/early March with next run not until June; suggests 2-3 month production cycles with potential bottleneck in Premium assembly or specialized components

    high · Don: 'pros will be made here pretty quickly, followed by the LEs going into this month and the next month. And then premiums they were talking about the end of the month of February into March'

  • ~

    sentiment_shift: Don's Venom sentiment evolved from initial frustration (stuck at level 99 fighting Null, linear progression) to appreciation after extended play; spent hundreds of games learning shot sequences and unlocking characters, enabling exponential enjoyment increase

    high · Don: 'I hated it at first...As I played I got better...And then when I did beat Null and started unlocking characters Each subsequent time was easier And exponentially more fun'

  • ?

    supply_chain_signal: Stern citing Chinese New Year and supply chain issues for Premium Jaws delays (end Feb/early March production, June next run), but Don questions whether specific constrained component actually exists and suggests possible artificial limitation to push LE sales

    medium · Don: 'I'm trying to decide like what part would be held up in the supply chain that would affect the premium and not the pro' and 'it may just be a clever cover for the fact that they want to push people into LEs'

    • 5:34
    At least they put a sticker on the top of it so it does look like a wave cresting. But I mentioned this on the Patreon last night. This would be a nice opportunity to just go ahead and unbolt this part from the game, go get an aqua blue powder coat and put it back in there so you don't have these spot-weld marks on there just glaring at you. Or maybe tilt graphics can come through with like an overlay or something. So it looks like the crest of that wave. I think that would be awesome. But for sure, this wavy shot, which, you know, I guess it functions the first half like an orbit, so it can carry a lot of speed, and it's going to have to to make that 180. But then it goes right into the wire form and then feeds back right to that right upper flipper that you can trap up on behind the pier pilings, underneath the pop bumper. I kind of dig that whole little area, like that vibe that he's going with there. And then it looks like, you know, off the tip of that flipper, you can just make it through that gate into that harpoon shot across the field. So that'll be fun. Definitely not something that's necessarily repeatable unless you can hit that shot from the left flipper. I don't know. That looks pretty tight. We'll have to see with gameplay. But first impressions, that's going to be quick. Now, on the premium, when you shoot that shot, it's going to flip right up there, but then the ball goes through this little S curve, feeds to that flipper, slows way down. So there's going to be no repeatability at all on the premium LE because of the upper play field. But then you do get that repeatable horizontal spinner, they're calling it, with the ship's wheel up there on the Orca. and I do like how it feeds that other ramp that backfills up into that harpoon lane on the left with the premium LE. But for sure the pro is going to play fast. I think the biggest drawback to the pro, though, is you're not going to have that moment of that shark erupting from the bottom of the play field, knocking the boat out of the way, knocking that Soprano speedboat out of the way so you can bash him. Instead you get, like, you know, Jabber Jaws here staring at you through the plastic on this cage. I'm sure somebody's out there already working on a 3D sculpt to replace that plastic, so it's like a full shark cage exploding, but we can look for that. The pro does not miss the other horizontal spinner, though, the reel spinner. I dig it. Yeah, and it does look like a reel on here, too. And then that right shot that would be in orbit is that cool ramp that goes up through the fisherman's shack, back through the back box, or back of the play field. What do you call that, back plate? You know, and then coming down to feed the flipper. So I dig that. I was listening to a bit of interview or some such somewhere where they were mentioning that initially this fin drop target was actually a fin. It's a sticker of a fin, but apparently the ball was flying crazily off of it and, you know, airballing all over the place, so they went with the traditional drop target. I'm sure someone will come out with one that's, you know, 3D printed to be an actual fin, and then we'll see how it holds up. I know Captain Elwin liked the idea that when the Godzilla building would collapse, the balls would go right down the, straight down the middle, and then slowly feed back in. and then somebody went up and re-engineered that with some bolt-on 3D prints that sends them all to the flipper. And so I like that better. I have it on mine, and I get it's not what the designer intended. Maybe this could be a similar thing. Somebody can put a resin-printed fin in there so it looks more like a shark, and then maybe add some more chaos by throwing balls all over the place. Maybe that'll be fun. So we'll see. We'll see about that. I like that both versions kept the chum bucket. That was something that I was expecting to be removed on the Pro. I thought this 3D bucket that's swinging back and forth with the Newton ball and the captive ball underneath it, I thought that was going to be replaced with just a stand-up plastic. So it's cool that they kept that mechanism. So I think really the things you're missing on the Pro are the erupting shark and the upper play field. So you're going to get faster play, and you're not going to, well, you're going to get faster play because that shark bash toy is not going to be coming up and down. Otherwise, the captive ball in there, I'm sure it functions the same with three stand-up targets or stand-up areas or however that's mechanistically working. Um, did the pro come with an opto spinner? Look, yeah, it looks like there is an opto spinner on the pro as well. So that's nice. So, um, usually there's three things missing, like a major, a moderate, and a tiny thing missing on a pro, but I'm not, I'm only seeing the two. I'm only seeing the shark erupting from the play field and, uh, the upper play field part. The rest of it, um, looks like it's all intact. So yeah, not a bad pro to find. This is the one that's going to be on locations everywhere, like in a matter of weeks. Like, I wouldn't be surprised that, you know, when they're out unveiling it in CES, somebody's unboxing one either in Chicago or Madison. So that could be happening fairly quickly. I think we'll be able to get our hands on this game pretty quick. I think people will be able to have these in their barcades and then subsequently into their game rooms. I'm hearing from distributors that pros are in strong supply. There lots of allocations for the pros The premiums not so much Let talk about that next Let go over to premium Um yeah man Um there a there a lot in this premium but a lot of it is blocked with that upper left area with the upper play field. Like you don't, you can't see the Amity behind there. And actually it appears that it's actually missing because the, uh, you know, that big back of the deck where the Orca is heading straight out through the back plate. Um, yeah, it looks like it knocked out a lot of that art. So you're missing that. So that's kinda, That's kind of lame because I like that view of Amity out in the distance. But what you do get is about four different things you can do on this upper play field. So you shoot up there with the wave ramp, comes down the little zigzag, and then you can repeatedly feed that horizontal spinner, the ship's wheel up there. So that's cool. I'm sure you can spin that to build up jackpots or whatever. Just off of that, you can access that ramp. I love the entrance to it. It just kind of does a 270 and then right into the wire form that backfills up into that anchor lane. Hopefully it comes out with enough velocity that it'll spin around and go down the spinner. Otherwise, it'll feed back to the in lane. I guess either way, that's fine. What else do we get? There's a stand-up radio target just off to the extreme left of the Orca. Is that port or starboard? I want to call it starboard because usually I board on the port side, and that's the right side of the forward motion of the boat. Anyway, and then, you know, there's this little, you know, bilge area that you can drain off and just go back into the play field. You know, so that looks like a cool mini upper play field. It doesn't take up a ton of real estate. It does block that vista out into Amity, but it looks like the orca is bashing straight through the back of the pinball machine. So on balance, I dig it. I love this wave ramp idea. They very easily could have had this just lead into a Vuck and then shoot up there, which initially that's what I was thinking was going to be the way this works. But if this is engineered correctly to carry that velocity and that preservation of motion and kinetic forces, I think you'll have a nice, smooth, gliding orbit shot that will go right into that. So that should be pretty satisfying. Too bad there's not, like, a diverter or something where it could feed directly into that ramp.
    12:10
    Either way, I think this is cool. This is cool. There's a gate up there. Yeah, yeah, all right, all right. I'm on board. I like both of these big ramp shots that this game has. All right, so you get the speedboat. Speedboat's cool. It pops up. Shark comes out. you bash him he goes down doesn't eat the ball now what would that look like though because i think ellen was saying something in one of the trailers that you know initially they did have the concept that you could shoot the ball into jaws's mouth but then it was functioning basically like a vuck and he doesn't like that you know you'd have to have jaws but like missing the lower jaw so that the ball could go in there if it was like a vuck type mechanism or it'd have to be like like the magnon on alien or something where jaws stops grabs the ball and then you know a little mini shark comes out of his mouth grabs it and swallows it and then mechanistically you could have problems with that. There'd have to be a subway system to return it. So, um, you know, I think you get the same thing across. The main thing you want to see is the shark erupting from the play field. I wanted to see that. Um, I would have loved it if there was a way for the shark to come up, grab the ball and drag it beneath the play field. Um, they did, uh, they did allude to the fact that you can chum the waters and get that blood effect in the water. I like that. That's beating the chum bucket. You know, it attracts the blood, the blood attracts the shark. You hit the fin, you hit the boat and then the shark comes out and you bash him we'll see uh gameplay wise how that's integrated but um let's listen to gonzo's pinball flipperama he's got about an hour and a half just kind of talking he's been dissecting through the rules which is something i never do because there's like 75 pages of rules and nuance and without any context to hang it on to my brain just gets lost and turns to mush but he's been going through it and some of the things he's been saying like you know for the harpoon lane um you know your multiplier will depend on how far the ball goes up there. So that's kind of interesting. You know, the cleaner of a shot you get off that upper flipper, maybe the more of a multiplier you can get. That's fun. These drop targets are on the pro and premium as well. And then looking at the bottom lanes here, single out lanes, single in lanes, but up posts on both of the in lanes. So those are fun. I do like that part on, you know, Bond when you're starting a mode or something, you hit the ramp and then the ball goes in there and everything just kind of stops for a minute. So you can look up at the back box at the LCD screen and see what mode's going on and what have you. One thing that's really neat, and this is an LE feature. We can talk about the LE for a moment. I like the fact that they've really elevated what comes on the LE more than just lollipop rails, a powder coat, a badge, a shaker, an HD glass. You're also getting some custom cuts in the armor, which are always appreciated. We didn't see that with Bond. We didn't see that with Godzilla. But we are seeing it here with Jaws. So thank you for doing that. It's like an extra step. But the back box lighting I like. There's some inserts in there, so it looks like Jaws' mouth. That's cool. But back box lights, I was like, okay, cool.
    14:58
    A $50 to $90 upgrade anywhere else to get flashing lights in your back box, big deal. But they're calling these back box expression lights. And finally, when we actually got the full trailer, they were able to show the different modes of the game, a sonar mode, a hunting mode, a bounty hunting mode or whatever. There's different colors for different modes, and they kind of strobe in time with music so they're choreographed, and that level of interactivity is something that's hard to replicate.
    15:25
    That's the reason why the Godzilla topper is as impressive as it is, given that it's just plastic and the same sculpt that you find on the play field. It's the interactivity with the game, with the game's music, with the game's code, the effects are coordinated and synchronized. And that's what sets it apart from just another 3D acrylic stacked box of lights.
    15:46
    Right? Other people can do that. They can put optical sensors on flashers and things, so there's interactivity. Heck, even I can do some of that. But what I can't do is match the nuance of the game code when something happens and the higher level integration. So that's what you're getting on the LE. So you LE buyers that have secured your games, and I'm sure it's a heck of a lot of you, because everywhere I'm checking LEs did sell out. They sold through at least pretty well. There may still be some available. I haven't really been hunting for those. But my distributor, Mad Pinball, said the LEs are gone. The premiums are gone. Plenty of pros are available. So if you want to go email Jeff at Mad Pinball right now, he'll get a pro into your basement or into your barcade. There you go. There's your pluck.
    16:28
    But LE owners, you're going to get an LE that's going to be awesome. I have an idea that the sense that this is a game that would tend to hold its value. I could turn around right now and find a Venom LE for $9,500. I could get a Foo Fighter LE for probably somewhere right around there. This is a game that looks like it's going to hold on to its value for those reasons. You know, the powder coat's a step above. You get the foil-looking, you know, art on the sides. You'll get a mirrored back glass. You'll get the expression light-up lights, you know, which is just, you know, somebody may be able to crack the code on how to do that, but there's going to be some hardware involved. There's probably a code board somewhere that's going to have to go in there that would have to be made so it can access that part of the programming that exists in the game.
    17:16
    So it's just the extra little touches like that really mean. You get the shooter rod, and yeah, people can resin print and create their own ones, and you can buy it for $70 to $180 or whatever. But it's nice that it comes with it. So Stern is offering some more value. One other thing I noticed that they added to the premium, did you guys see this? There's that angled lollipop-style side rail to it. It still has the wrinkled black powder coat, but it is nice that that comes with it instead of just the standard rails. I've got a stack of them in my closet. If anybody out there needs standard stern rails, I've got a ton that I have no idea what I'm going to do with them.
    17:53
    It would be like the worst giveaway gift to do. I'll throw out a trivia question or something, and then the winner gets a stack of my old unused side armors. I wonder if I could sell them back to Pinball Life or trade them in for store credit for something useful like some LED undercabinet lighting or something. I'll put a pin in that. Speaking of which, it looks like you get the sculpt also of the barrel on the pop bumper. That's cool. Looking at the premium LE here, on the right side there's a plastic, which looks like it has a buoy on it. I can't tell if it's a graphic or a sculpt because it's also on the Pro. Here it looks like it's a sculpt. Well, if it's not, I think it will be because people are printing barrels like crazy. I'm already seeing people have, like, finished Jaws yellow barrels that are already painted, already weathered, already wrapped in burlap rope. So we're going to see, like, toppers galore here pretty soon. I'm sure people are going to make that Amity billboard. I would love to see that. That's a must-have. How are we doing with the bottom? Let's talk about apron stuff. What's on here? Cool stickers. Insider Connected, of course, it's there. There's a little harpoon gauge on the plunger rods that you can gauge for your skill shot. Where's the skill shot going to be on this? It looks like it fires the ball up towards the reel. I wonder if there's a way to plunge the ball directly into the reel. That'd be kind of cool. There's also some stand-up targets that you could hit with some finesse. So we'll have to see how Big Poppy Elwin is coding the skill shot for the Jaws game.
    19:23
    But, yeah, it's cool. I was expecting the fin to be removed on the pro, but it's nice that they left that in there. So, yeah. So there's the game. We'll find out how it shoots pretty quickly. I mean, CES is coming up in just a few days. So this will be unveiled to the public. And then I've got to imagine right now they're throwing games in boxes. They've got to be. Production schedule-wise, I have heard that the pros will be made here pretty quickly, followed by the LEs going into this month and the next month. And then premiums they were talking about the end of the month of February into March. So we still have some weeks, you know, about four to six weeks until premiums will start rolling out. Maybe between now and then we'll see some supply increase. So reportedly what we're hearing based from talking to Stern, based on talking to other distributors, is that they're blaming supply chain for the shortcoming for the premiums. So I trying to decide like what part would be held up in the supply chain that would affect the premium and not the pro I would think plastic shark puppet but they both appear to have the shark puppet unless there a different one on the premium LE They would want to, you know, use their supply as much as possible to make these LEs for people, which I appreciate. And if you're an LE buyer, you would appreciate that too.
    20:33
    You know, but, you know, the premium people would get hosed. Rightfully so. We're not paying as much. But, you know, what part is missing that would cause that? I have no idea. the boat here is this boat a full sculpt or is it just plastic it's hard to tell the little speedboat from Sopranos you know yeah because there's no like flashing node board light there's no special powder coat armor or anything you know on this that's different so I don't know if that's just a handy excuse it does jive they were blaming the Chinese New Year so to all the Cantonese speakers out there the Lunar New Year is coming up around February. But I've never heard of supply chain issues out of China based around New Year's. I mean, you know, sure, the country slows down, people on vacation, you know, travel is definitely hard to get. But, you know, it's not like a seven weeks long process or something like that. You know, and what are they not cranking out of the factory that would hold up production? I really don't know. I'm waiting for some more insight on that. Or it may just be a clever cover for the fact that they want to push people into LEs and push these pros out and maybe open up some space on the line for something else, but it's weird for a cornerstone launch like this. At the very beginning of the year, major license, game that's hugely in demand, in a state where the market is not as robust as it was one year ago, this is the game that would sell. I would think they'd be having 1,500 premiums in two weeks out of that new factory, have all lines running and fill these premium orders. So, you know, the onus seems to be on them to want to produce them. So I don't know why they would artificially limit the supply. It doesn't make a lot of sense to me. So maybe there is a supply chain issue, and, you know, maybe it has to do with a board set or special wires or something that I just don't have a way to know of. But what I'm hearing from the distributors is if I want to get a premium, the next run of these isn't until June, which seems pretty far off. I don't think that they would hold steady to that. I think we'll see some developments between now and then. We'll probably know more here going into the next month as we're getting closer to putting those premiums on the line of what's really going to happen. But if premiums aren't supposed to go on the line until the end of February, early March, and they have 1,000 LEs to make, and then 500 to 1,000 pros, what are they going to do with the rest of the time? There's got to be some more time in there for running other things. So I'd be curious to hear somebody that's got some insight into some production schedules on Stern, how their new year is shaping up. That was a lot of Jaws talk, and we're going to know more. We don't even know the code of the gameplay really yet. I haven't even had a chance to crack into the rules I probably won't until I start playing so that it'll make sense to me when I read it what else do we have Gong Hei Fa Choi, mods people are making the barrels, I got that shoot another project overhaul what? to get games start with I don't know what I wrote here anyway, do I have FOMO for this thing? I don't this is going to be in production for quite a while if I wanted a bond I could get a bond right now I didn't get a bond at launch to be honest it wasn't terribly interesting with me to be honest it wasn't terribly interesting to a lot of people because the code was so early it was such a stress going through the licensing I think this is going to be a whole lot better I like that George Gomez is already out week one talking about they got assets for four different Jaws movies I like the clips that they've released so far it's not that they had to hold back for the review trailers or release trailers because they're waiting for licensing approval because those clips were in it so I can't wait until we get that they're talking about the 3D video mode first ever in pinball. That's fun. I guess the LE is going to ship with some 3D glasses. I'm sure they're just going to be some little paper printed ones, but that's cool. I'm sure that's a feature that you can toggle on and off. I'll see what they mean by 3D, but yeah, that's fun. If that's a throwback to Jaws 3D and it's campy and it's awesome, that has the potential to be really super cool. So I'm looking forward to that.
    24:27
    The Age of Venom. The Age of Venom is done. Open and shut. Venom came out. Venom slayed, and then Venom went away, and Venom is now sitting on Pinside used for sale. In defense of the game, I grew to like it. I hated it at first. I didn't hate it. It's a pinball machine. Let's keep some semblance of perspective here. But I was getting super frustrated with it because I got to the point where I'm level 99, I'm fighting Null, and there's, like, nothing else I can do to do in the game except fight Null. And until I beat him, I'm stuck. And so I was hating that. But as I played I got better Took me hundreds of games Was able to dial my shots in And then when I did beat Null and started unlocking characters Each subsequent time was easier And exponentially more fun This was a game because of the labeling up system You had to spend some time with To get into it And once I did I had a great time I'll tell you this I was even at District 1 this week Playing a tournament and I got in on a Venom Pro Which has been completely dismissed Handedly so rightfully so by the community for being as stripped down as it is but since I know the shots and I know the code and I'm able to log in and I have my levels and I have Hulk and I have Wolverine and I've got Captain America to play as well as all the other four characters to jump in I was actually having a pretty good time on Venom Pro. I got myself up to 350 million points and that's out in public on a public location game not my game where I can adjust the in lane out lane posts to baby mode or anything. So yeah I was just slaying, man. I had the character multi-ball. I built it up to three and then went ahead and cashed in, played that, got Carnage ready to go. So as soon as I was back down to one ball, we went right into a Carnage multi-ball, then right into a Toxin team-up. I fought Grendel. It was just great. It was great. It was a fun time, even on the pro, man. So the game is fun. If you've got it and you're bummed because the price is low, you know, when you want to go sell it, you're going to be out like two to three grand, hang on to it and play it some more. If you only have 125 games on it, play 500 games on it and see if your perspective doesn't change. I miss having the little guy here behind me going up there, Why are you so bad? Your mother called. Like, I kind of miss him here in the basement. I'm not going to lie. I would like to go and play it some more. Choose your character. It was fun. It was fun. I grew to really like it. And the good thing is that now that I've sold my Venom, I've got some capital. It's probably going to go to Looney Tunes. so I'll get a new game. That's always a fun thing to do. But if I ever want to go back and pick up a Venom, even go back and pick up a Venom LE, I can easily do it, and I'm right back in the game. And since it saves my progress, I can literally be back in the game. So I think there'll be an appreciation in time for Venom and what it did and for the difference it made in the code, especially when we start seeing the best parts of that picked apart and improved upon and implemented in future games. So look for that. Look for Pokemon. I can't wait. Dungeons & Dragons leveling up system, if those rumors hold true and those games do come out and they come with Stern and they're Insider Connected and you can log in and build up your characters and unlock other characters, and then they can have the special holiday promotions where the next time you get 25 billion points in one month, you unlock another character or something with special call-outs and such. I love that. Speaking of which, the Blood Red Kiss of Elvira, I've had some time with it now. It's here in the basement. It's looking fantastic. there's some special little call-outs just unique to that version, which I really like. Basically, when you start a game, there's one of several different phrases Elvira will say as you start, and they all kind of reference, like, her blood red dress, or, you know, it's time for blood, or red's my favorite color, or something fun and campy like that. I like that sense. So if we see more of that going forward with Insider Connected, I think that's going to be great. What about with the next ElioVira edition that they release, the green red dress, The green slime dress edition. Are we going to see that? It seems like not because part of that conference call that Stern did with distros, it's leaked back that they were mentioning that they're not looking at running back into the well of antiquity and plucking out LEs to run again, which will make some people happy and kind of bum out some others. I'll talk about it in this way. The Jurassic Park 30th anniversary machine came out, $12,999, modern-day LE pricing. Priorly, it was much cheaper than that. and came out years ago, right? Four or five years ago. LE owners from back then were feeling a bit bummed that their limited edition of only 500 machines in existence in the Node universe now was doubled. There was 500 additional limited edition machines. They had a different powder coat. They had different cabinet art. They were called and branded something different, but they were a limited version of that game, whatever. So would they feel bummed that the desirability of their game took a hit? Yes. But think of the people that didn't own an LE but wanted to get one and bought one of those 30th anniversary ones and is overjoyed at it. Are they going to be happy that Stern did this? Yes. Does that cancel out? Are there probably the same amount of people bummed? Is it the same amount of people that are like, all right. It probably more favors the bummed people because the 500 had been sold out. I don't know if they fully sold the 500 or if the 500 new purchases of the 30th anniversary edition, all of them are completely stoked. Probably a lot are, but there's probably some that are like, I bought this thing, I thought it was going to be better, and then turn around and look at how cool Elvira is with its LE re-release, and then looking at Jaws' LE release that you could have for the same price. You could have that Jaws LE, which is loaded with better powder coat and custom armor and all that business, and a custom shooter rod, and the expression lighting for the same price that you got that Jurassic Park LE, which is like a doo-doo brown version of the original LE, not going to lie. Sorry, guys. So I can expect the bummage to be favoring probably more harm than good. If you the owner of a 40th anniversary Elvira you had up until the release of Black Red Kiss the best version of the game And now that took a hit and this one looks awesome and it came out at a much lower MSRP Yeah, they saw the cash on the table, and they grabbed it. For people like me that own one now, I'm super ecstatic that they did that. But for people that would have paid $20,000, $25,000 for a 40th anniversary back in the day, I could see you being bummed. So where do we fall down on that? They've been doing market analysis, I'm sure. but the word is that they're not going to reach back into the dustbin of history and pull out more LEs to release. So Black Knight, Sword of Rage LE, probably not going to happen. But at the same token, we're hearing that, yes, they are going to be dipping back into the vault to pick out games, even Dot Matrix display games, the DMDs, what I thought would never happen. We're hearing now official word coming from Stern, two distributors. That's something that they're looking at doing. So all those Ghostbuster rumors that were kind of living and then have been undead, well I guess we could wake them back up now because if they're running DMD games again I think we're looking at the biggies man, Indiana Jones Ghostbusters Lord of the Rings maybe? Pirates of the Caribbean? Probably not but yeah if they were just to turn around and be like hey guess what, season of Stern every 90 days we're going to have a new DMD come get your Ghostbusters, come get your Lord of the Rings, come get your Indiana Jones that would shock the entire world man especially the used games market for brand new productions of these older games with brand new boards, brand new equipment, brand new coil stops everything, the works I think those would sell pretty well and this may be a direct attack on Pedretti and well I would say CGC but they don't really get games out but Pedretti, if they're about to turn around and say here's your Addams Family, here's your Shadow, here's your maybe not Shadow, but you know here's your Diner, what am I missing? from Valley of Twilight Zone. Yeah. If they come out with Twilight Zone and Adam's Family, Stern could turn around and say, well, here's your Ghostbusters and Indiana Jones. What? What now? And I think that's probably what would drive it. This is why competition is so good to have in the industry because it pushes everybody to eke out something a little more. You think Stern would go back and figure out how to rerun DMD games if they weren't feeling challenged? Probably not. But since Pedretti's there and we got the coming storm of maybe an Adam's Family, maybe a Twilight Zone, maybe more classics, Maybe Stern's like, all right, we're not going to take this laying down. Let's put out some of our old games. And I'm like, yeah, let's do it. Let's get together. Put these games out there. More games, more fun, and brand new versions of them. And I know Stern's actually going to make them, and they're going to come out. If you want a Jaws Pro, you're going to get one in two to three weeks. It was just released. Put your money down. You're going to get one. You know what else you're going to get if you put your money down? A new topper for your Scooby-Doo. This came out of nowhere. This wasn't rumored to be coming out. I'd heard the boys talking before like testing the market do you think people would be interested in maybe aftermarket toppers they had to know right then when they were talking about that they were planning this but me I was just like I think it's done right I think there's a place for it now the spooky games are largely the collector's edition their top shelf they're you know a thousand dollars more than their lower ones and they come so fully loaded that that's the edition that sells the most right and they all come with toppers they all come with little acrylic toppers they look kind of cool and they're not the most robust thing, but they're free and they're included. So, yeah, they're welcome. Guns N' Roses had an upcharge plastic acrylic, single frame, single dimension, didn't even light up from Jersey Jack, right? And here's Spooky Pinball with a multi-leveled acrylic topper with lights included for free.
    34:05
    How could you be mad about that? The Halloween one had a knife that went up and down and stabbed the back box. I mean, that was awesome. The only thing I had to add was a pumpkin I bought from Spirit Pinball. Spirit Halloween and threw up there. Spirit Halloween is soon to be coming to American Pinball.
    34:21
    So it's cool that they do that already. So I don't think it was something that was necessarily needed. I don't think we were left longing in the market. But holy crap, have you seen what these boys have put together? The Spooky Pinball Scooby-Doo Topper has been, what I've seen, universally praised. Everywhere I've looked, I was really surprised. Normally, Spooky has some haters that come out no matter what they do. So, you know, quality and build issues are a lot different from the early days to even just a few years ago to where we are now. And the guys are on a definite upswing. But to see everybody saying, yeah, actually, this looks pretty good, right? You have layered acrylics. You have kind of a forced perspective scene looking down the hallway in a spooky house. You've got the photos on the wall, the paintings of the different villains in the game with LEDs behind them so they can light up as you do the modes. And then you've got a physical sculpted bookcase there with a mechanism that opens up and reveals an LCD screen. And you can look down the hallway and see the classic Scooby-Doo moment of the characters running back and forth trying to get each other. Get away from the green ghost. Run away from Andrew the robot. Get away from Captain Cutler's spooky menagerie of deep-sea diving equipment, whatever it is. And you can shoot Scooby snacks down the hall to Scooby. That's fun. When it opens up, I was watching Bugs Scream and Scream last night Scream and Stream? Jeez Like as if saying Scooby and Spooky At the same time and getting it right wasn't hard enough You know, but it was fun Watching that and as you do the character shots The characters run across the little LCD up there Just extra bits of eye candy that are up there It's not a $2,000 topper It's a $969 topper They're available now You have to go through your distributor that you bought it from If you bought the game on the second hand market They're like, no problem dude, just come to us email squirrel, we'll get one out to you. So those are available, and they're in production today. If you order one, it's going to come soon. So keep your eyes up for an unboxing. I think we're going to put a crown on top of Scooby-Doo. Other concerns people have had, how tall is this? Am I going to be able to put it on my machine? It's actually slightly shorter in total height than the CE topper. So if you have a game and you've got the CE topper at home and you're worried about height, this thing's definitely going to fit. And I think that was a good point for them to do, to not exceed the height of the topper that they had.
    36:39
    So there you go. So what are people going to do with the other topper? Well, they could sell it to the two people that bought a standard edition. Or, you know, put it up on your wall or figure something else out to do with it. Make a little diorama. I don't know, throw Scooby Snacks at it. We'll see. We'll see what the community can come up with. But, you know, you can turn it into some stacked wall art, I think, pretty quickly. What else do we have going on, man? That's a lot for this week. Gosh, my head was spinning trying to process all of this stuff. I've been deep into the production lab. I'm coming out with some new mod designs. I opened the Pinside store this week, so that's going under the name Pindon. I've got some Elvira mods out for the crypt facade. I didn't go through the LEDs, but what I did do is came up with a red filter system on the back of the deadhead crypt sign and the two bottom skulls. So when the crypt is flashing, it's red and strobed and lit up, so it has some interactivity. It's got the 3D dimensionality. And I'm just charging for my time and materials. So $60, we'll get you one of these. If you want one, go check them out. They're flying off the shelves, man. People are ordering like crazy. I'm very thankful for that. I'm taking all the proceeds from this and going right back into the mod dungeon to upgrade equipment. And I've got some new designs that I'm working on. I think I might be able to actually come out with some cool, innovative designs at great prices for people. I'm doing it the method that I've approached to the podcast, right? Some good advice that I had come across from some professional actors were don't make the content for other people. Don't try to make content that you think people would like. Make things that you like. If you make things that you like, it'll be good and it'll be genuine. When you try to fake and force it and push things out just trying to impress people, you're never going to hit the mark. And it's true. It's true in all things. the work that you do, the garden that you keep. If you make it for yourself, something you would like, chances are other people are going to like it too, and they'll appreciate the authenticity. So I'm looking at ways that I can improve machines, add cool little things that I think look awesome, things that I would enjoy. And then, you know, a byproduct of that, if nobody buys them, I'm still happy because I made something I like. But what I'm doing is I'm making them also available to other people to see what they think. and every time I do this, I learn a little bit more. Every time I go back and do another run or another revision, it comes out even better than it was before. So I think this is the way that you build up and start making some pretty sweet, cool things. So I got a listener, Danny. He's got the first Elvira topper, my production one, the same design that won Best Homebrew Topper at Expo. It's now out to its first customer. Super excited about that. He's a homie. And I've already got an order for another one that I'm putting into production here pretty soon. And then I'm looking at ramping up. So if you guys are impressed at all with the Gargoyle Topper, look for the featurette that has been filmed. They need to get it edited, and it will be up on YouTube. And if you want to get one of these things, reach out. I'm kind of looking and still feeling out pricing of where it's going to be. So chances are if you get one soon, they're going to be pretty much underpriced from where they're going to end up if they do blow up and be successful. But, again, it's something I made that I think is cool and I'm happy with. So chances are other people will too. I think that's a bit for this week, man. Hopefully I kept you through your entire commute into the weekend, through your jog around the neighborhood or your job door dashing around or something. Wave to the people. Be kind to everybody else. Go get yourself something nice. I think you've earned it.
    40:12
    All that and more as we go into the weekend. There will be some more news coming up next week too. Keep your eyes on the Patreon. I'm always dropping fun stuff that I come across that I don't quite have enough for an episode. It goes out on there. so $5 a month gets you on there and I'm adding more free things to Patreon subscribers not only can you get free stickers on demand have a little badge plate holders for your Stern machines I got them too man you got a premium? show it off for free later