Episode 398: Ian Harrower Games

Pinball Profile·podcast_episode·analyzed·May 31, 2024

Analysis

claude-haiku-4-5-20251001 · $0.032

TL;DR

Ian Harrower discusses Blood Bank Billiards and P3 game development on Pinball Profile.

Summary

Jeff Teolis interviews Ian Harrower about his new game Blood Bank Billiards, a pool-themed title for the Multimorphic P3 platform's Drained playfield module. They discuss Ian's game development journey, the design philosophy behind Blood Bank Billiards (inspired by Target Pool with modern twists), and his previous game Birdwatcher's cross-module compatibility feature. Ian shares insights on independent game development, code updates, and the growing ecosystem of third-party developers for the P3 platform.

Key Claims

Ian Harrower released Blood Bank Billiards for the Multimorphic P3 Drained playfield module at $1.99 USD
high confidence · Directly stated in interview; Jeff confirms he played the game weeks prior
Blood Bank Billiards was inspired by Target Pool (1969) with EM-era sound and graphic design
high confidence · Ian explicitly states design direction and thematic approach
Ian Harrower modified the display system based on Jeff Teolis's feedback during playtesting
high confidence · Ian confirms changing entire display system; Jeff mentions specific feedback about ball collection feedback
Birdwatcher can be played on any P3 module with different bird variants per module
high confidence · Ian discusses unique bird experiences across Cosmic Kart Racing, Sorcerer's Apprentice, and Ranger in the Ruins modules
Third-party P3 developers include Nick Baldrige, Michael Ocean (Dungeon Door Defender), 86 Pixels/Jimmy (Grand Slam Rally), and Greg Goldie (Hooping It Up)
high confidence · Ian provides comprehensive list of third-party game releases
Ian Harrower is developing a roguelike collectible card game inspired by Slay the Spire for P3
high confidence · Ian describes advanced prototype stage but far from release
The Drained playfield module is manufactured by Nick Baldrige's For Amusement Only Games company
high confidence · Ian clarifies manufacturing relationship and purchase path

Notable Quotes

“I completely changed the entire display system based on your feedback.”
Ian Harrower @ ~19:45 — Demonstrates commitment to user feedback and willingness to modify core game systems post-playtesting
“The players are going to suffer for my deep, deep desire to have that joke in the game.”
Ian Harrower @ ~25:10 — Shows Ian's deliberate design choices that prioritize thematic coherence over universal clarity, referencing 8-Ball Deluxe/8-Ball Champ
“I can build more narrow and niche experiences. I don't need to design a game that appeals to everyone.”
Ian Harrower @ ~48:20 — Articulates indie developer philosophy of experimental game design enabled by P3 platform economics
“As an independent developer I can do things I can take risks and do things in this space that maybe you couldn't rely on someone buying an entire cabinet.”
Ian Harrower @ ~47:15 — Explains competitive advantage of P3 ecosystem for low-cost experimental titles (like time-based bird watching game)
“I think that this is something I'm enjoying. I'm challenging myself. I'm trying new skills.”
Ian Harrower @ ~42:30 — Reflects on transition from competitive player to full-time indie developer motivation
“For the price of $1.99 US, it is a great value. And I hope people will be happy with it as a complete package.”
Ian Harrower @ ~56:50 — Pricing strategy and quality positioning of Blood Bank Billiards

Entities

Ian HarrowerpersonMultimorphic P3productBlood Bank BilliardsgameBirdwatchergameDrainedproductNick BaldrigepersonTarget Poolgame Dwight Sullivanperson Jeff Teolis

Signals

?
community_signal: Growing ecosystem of third-party P3 developers with multiple released titles (Nick Baldrige, Michael Ocean, 86 Pixels, Greg Goldie, Ian Harrower) and additional games in development
high · Ian lists third-party releases and notes 'there's more games in development' and 'I hope to see more things coming out in the future'
~
sentiment_shift: Positive reception of Blood Bank Billiards from limited playtesting audience; Jeff Teolis unable to find significant criticisms despite seeking them
high · Jeff: 'I had a hard time finding any criticisms in this game'; Ian describes 'really good response from Birdwatcher and from the few people who have got to see Blood Bank Billiards'
?
design_philosophy: Ian leveraging modern game mechanics (roguelike, CCG, progression systems) and video game design patterns within pinball ruleset framework
high · Ian discusses Slay the Spire-inspired roguelike game in development; notes appreciation for Dwight Sullivan's video game mentality in pinball
?
design_philosophy: Ian deliberately includes thematic Easter eggs and design jokes (8-Ball reference call-outs) that may confuse casual players but serve deeper thematic coherence
high · Ian states 'I'm really tied to that joke' and acknowledges players will be confused but prioritizes thematic integrity
$
market_signal: Pricing strategy for P3 games: Blood Bank Billiards priced at $1.99 (likely digital download cost) vs. $6,000+ for traditional pinball cabinet, enabling accessibility for experimentation

Transcript

groq_whisper · $0.087

0:00

If you want that, you got it. It's time for another Pinball Profile. I'm your host, Jeff Teels. You can find everything on pinballprofile.com or on Twitter, Instagram, X, and, of course, a great Facebook group as well. You can email pinballprofile at gmail.com. If you'd like to show your support on Patreon, certainly not necessary. Don't you worry. The show will always be free, but I appreciate the support, and thank you for that to great people like Rodney C., Lua W., Tony V., Stefan R., Derek K., and others. There is a new game that's come out, and it's from a good buddy of mine that I've known for pretty much my 10 years of quote-unquote competitive pinball. It's Ian Harrower. Ian joins us right now. Hi, Ian. Hey, Jeff. Thanks for having me on. Well, thank you for showing me Blood Bank Billiards, your newest creation for the Multimorphic platform. And we're going to talk about that in a second. You have been a huge supporter from day one of Multimorphic, haven't you? Yeah, since the launch of pre-orders for the machine, I was sort of there in Texas when they launched Lexi Lightspeed, along with the minigames, Secret Agent Showdown, Rocks, Barnyard, and the upcoming Cannon Lagoon, which hadn't quite been ready for production yet, but I sort of jumped on that day one and have been a huge fan of the platform right from the beginning. When you say in Texas, and my memory is not the greatest, I'm sure I could check IFPA and find out, I remember seeing it at the Bat City Open at Buffalo Billiards in Austin, Texas. Is that where you saw it? So I definitely played it at Bat City Open. That was the year where Lexi Lightspeed was in the tournament. Oh, yeah. But that was sort of after it had been released. Yeah. Texas was where they debuted. They'd been bringing the prototype around for a while, but they opened up sales for the machine. I think it was in like 2017 or 2016, somewhere around there. Yeah, it rings a bell, but my goodness, have they come a long way. And, you know, I think you saw the visionary of this game because at the time, a little more expensive than the other company's machine. But the value on this machine by replacing the modules and being able to have, as you have at your place, pretty much every module because it's an easy fix. And that is a very attractive feature. Yeah, for me, it's been a great return on investment. Obviously, I'm developing for the platform now my own games. I have every module except for the Princess Bride, which I'm eagerly awaiting. And I'm out of space at home. So the fact that I can have new games and just slide the modules underneath my existing collection is a huge advantage. I've been in your basement. There's a couch there that has video game consoles. There's some room for some games there. I'm just saying. I got rid of my couch in my basement. Yeah, there is some more space. There is actually another room that we plan to get finished, and I can probably put another six in there. Oh, boy. No, you've got a great collection. But, again, we're talking about the Multimorphic platform and what Jerry has done, and really everyone else. And you are super connected to that community. In fact, I encourage you to listen to For Amusement Only, the EM and Bingo podcast, in which you were just talking to Nick Baldrige. And I know you're a huge fan of not only Nick, but his daughter, too. Yeah, he made Silver Falls with his daughter. And that was really cool that she managed to co-design the game. It was her concept, what she wanted to deliver. And there's a great, she was nominated for Rookie of the Year at the Twippies. So good recognition there. You know, it was a pleasant surprise. I was just kind of driving through, and I happened to go to the Richmond Pinball Collective in Virginia. And Nick and his daughter were there, and I'm like, oh, this is great. And, of course, what he's done since then, you've kind of used his module for Drained to create your newest creation. Tell us what you've done. So I've created a game called Blood Bank Billiards, and it is exclusively for the Drain Playfield module on Multimorphic's P3 pinball platform. And this game is very much a throwback to classic pinball games, pool-themed pinball games. The biggest inspiration of those being Target Pool. If you look at the Drain Playfield module, there is a lot of similarity and inspiration, although it is different. It's significantly different in a lot of ways, but it has a target pool kind of feel. And so I wanted to create a game that had that EM feel. You know, it's a game from 1969, so sound design, graphic design for the game very much ties back to that, but with a bunch of modern twists, some interesting effects, both trying to make it look like an EM and bringing in modern things on the use of the screen on the play field, as well as music and call-outs and other things you'd expect. Well, I'll let everyone know, Ian was kind enough to let me play this a few weeks ago, and I absolutely enjoyed it. Ian, when you're a programmer like yourself, it's nice to get the pats on the back and the compliments, but you kind of want some criticisms too, because maybe there's some good suggestions. Maybe you'll take some of them, maybe you ignore the others. I had a hard time finding any criticisms in this game. Well, you're being modest, Jeff, because I completely changed the entire display. system based on your feedback. One thing I said, there was, by the way, the call-outs are done by Glenn Wechter, our good friend from Nashville, who just did a bang-up job. I knew it was Glenn only because you told me it was Glenn. I wouldn't have known it was Glenn. And that is the best compliment you can give anybody voicing a game when you really don't recognize that voice. He did a wonderful job. The call-out you're referring to was, maybe it said, sink the seven ball or something like that. And I looked, and I thought, Well, I did sync it. It's not lit. And so you had to change things around a little bit. But you had a good reasoning. And then when you told me, I thought, ah, don't change it. So explain what happened. Yeah, so if you think back to a lot of classic games, something like Target Pool itself, I think in the back glass, it has a rack of balls. And as you sync each of the balls, it lights up the ones you have completed. And there's a number of games that do this in the play field or in the back glass where they have inserts for each of the balls and it will turn on the ball as you collect it filling the rack and i followed that same methodology in the game itself i have a 3d represent like a 3d graphics that represent the pool table and there's a rack of balls and i had originally followed the same idea and i had these ghosted balls for the ones you hadn collected and as you collected them they got placed solid in the rack and your feedback got me thinking you like it not on the table so obviously i sunk it and it really um kind of i didn want to change it and i didn want to change it because i'd already cut my trailer and i didn't want to redo it but when i started thinking about it and then after i tried it it worked a lot better it worked a lot better for the balls to be on the pool table and as you sink them they get removed from the pool table and it's sort of tied back to the theme. So, you know, feedback from people trying the game is great. I think that watching you play it and seeing what you understood and what you didn't understand was very valuable to me. I haven't had a lot of chance to see other people play the game, so it was great to have someone come in and give me feedback, and I could see which things confused you, which things made sense. There are certain aspects of the game I'll be, like, blatantly obvious. I have a running joke theme, thematic with the call-outs to really try to tie back to 8-Ball Deluxe and 8-Ball Champ. The shoot for 8-Ball kind of call-out. And it actually confuses players. And I know it confuses players. But it's funny! I'm really tied to that joke. So the players are going to suffer for my deep, deep desire to have that joke in the game. No, I got it right away. I thought it was really, really funny and even corrects himself a few times when he makes a few call-outs. And that was good. So, yeah, you mentioned Target Pool, which is a wonderful EM, maybe one of my all-time favorite EMs. And there's a lot of similarities to that. You've found a way to use that drained play field to really simulate a lot that you see on Target Pool, especially the pop bumper, too, right in the center. I mean, that's a big part of Target Pool. But you've got other things on there, too. we mentioned the name is Blood Bank Billiards. There will be blood. Yeah, so actually I'm quite proud of the blood animations, the way they came out. So when you hit the blood bank, which is the front set of targets, which are analogous to the targets, the arrow targets on Target Pool. But when you hit the flashing target, it will splatter blood across the play field. And then using the ball tracking of the P3, it also keeps track of where the ball re-entered the playfield and leaves a streak of blood as if the ball was covered by blood and putting it on the playfield. And of course, there's options to turn this off, but I think it's pretty neat. I do think it's pretty neat. It's great, and it's a nice twist, especially using this format and a great nod to some wonderful games in the past. Pool themes just make for great pinball machines, I find. Yeah, it's actually interesting to design around pool. And one of the things you notice when you think of the vast majority of the pinball-based pool games is most of them don't actually resemble the rules of pool very closely at all. And that was one of the problems I ran into is you're kind of walking this line between trying to make it like pool and trying to make it work as a pinball machine. And so it's sort of like, well, that's not how you play pool. You don't sink 14 balls and then sink the 8 ball. yeah, but that's how many targets I have. So it makes sense. No, I like it. And there are some great ones. You mentioned 8-Ball Champ, 8-Ball Deluxe, the original 8-Ball, 8-Ball Beyond, another great creation from Sean Irby, who I absolutely love that game. Q-Ball Wizard, there's just, it goes on and on. I think you had, if I recall, what was that pool game you had years ago? It was one of the first games you ever had. A pinball pool. No, there was another one. Oh, yeah, I had a... With the woman who's a pool pro. Yeah, the Jeanette Lee game.

13:06

You heard it here on Pinball Profile, full commitment, Ian Harrow. So I've started working on it. The challenge is that the presentation of the photographs within the bird book and the persistent state that gets saved in the profiles and lasts across the game, was designed to fill two pages of a book. And I'm out of space. There's no more space to collect any new types of birds. So I'm working on the visuals on how to expand the capabilities of the book. And so right now I have a prototype where I can turn the page. And so it'll open up new abilities to add more birds to the game. And I recently re-watched The Princess Bride, the movie, with the explicit focus of paying attention to anything bird-related in the movie. And have decided which bird I would do as the bird for that module if I was to hypothetically expand for The Princess Bride, which I'm not committing to. With the supplemental pages that are going to be added to the album, that movie, do you have a bird from a swamp in any of your other games? I think you do. I do. The Kingfisher is from the Florida swamplands for Lexi Lightspeed Escape from Earth So there you go I trying to think I watched Princess Bride recently and I too am looking forward to playing that game What they do. I know, again, you're close to Nick. You're close to Steven Silver and really the entire community there. It really is amazing that creators like yourself, like Nick and others, can bring these games to the public. And at a really low cost, too. Yeah, so I'll take a second to shout out everyone who's put out a third-party game. So Nick Baldrige has put out many games, which we've talked about a few of them here. Michael Ocean recently released Dungeon Door Defender. But then early on, 86 Pixels, Jimmy put out Grand Slam Rally, which was the first third-party game. And Greg Goldie released Hooping It Up as a free add-on to anyone who owns Lexi Lightspeed. so the collection of us third party developers is growing and i know there's more games in development and i hope to see more things coming out in the future and i think it gives you an opportunity to try different things and interesting things that maybe you couldn't rely on someone buying an entire cabinet no one's going to buy a time-based bird watching game and spend six thousand dollars on a new cabinet but i can experiment with that as a add-on game and do something that's a unique experience and i think that's the power of the platform you are well traveled when it comes to whether it was work life whether it was your pinball hobby you've seen a lot of different things and i find with you ian you don't form an opinion until you got some sort of experience with it. So when you look at all the different games that are out there and you have a great collection of a lot of different companies, I mean, you certainly aren't just loyal to one. You have a great, vast knowledge of each company, I find. When you look at the programming that is done from other companies and specific individuals, is this what made you say, you know what, I think it was during COVID when you made this decision to go into the Ian Harrower Games and the programming side of it. I didn't know this was in your background. I assume it's a big learning curve, but what was the driving force to say, you know what, I'm going to put both feet in here. I'm going to go for it. So it largely came from my reasons for semi-retiring, quitting my day job or kind of independent of starting Ian Harrower Games. But then Ian Harrower Games was a, what am I going to fill my time with. And so I thought I would give this a try. I'd been playing around with ideas and demos for games for myself. I developed a bunch of prototypes. It was always my intent when I got the P3 to develop for it, but I never really thought about releasing. I wasn't convinced I was going to release stuff. But doing this full time now as a developer, as an independent developer, is largely about trying to learn new things, experience new things, and fill my time. And there's been really good response from Birdwatcher and from the few people who have got to see Blood Bank Billiards. And it's really encouraging. And I think that this is something I'm enjoying. I'm challenging myself. I'm trying new skills. I know what I'm doing isn't perfect. You know, I know that the professional artists would do a better job with the illustrations than I am, but I'm proud of the fact that I did them. I'm proud of the fact that I got it out there. So I think that this is, it's fun right now. And as long as it continues to be fun, I'm going to continue to develop games, and I expect them to get more complex and have more going on, and I'll improve my skills and get better as things go. You just used the word complex. I know one of your favorite programmers and human being I absolutely adore is Dwight Sullivan, and he really puts a lot into his games. Is that the kind of game you would ideally like to make, something like what Dwight does? I love the game aspect that a bunch of Dwight's games have brought in, the level of complexity. I think he was one of the early people to bring in this kind of video game mentality, choosing your house having different power-ups different skills progressing through things and i very much enjoy the concepts of like what you can bring from video games and board games into pinball and i think that as an independent developer i can do things i can take risks and do things in this space as i said before and like one of my other game concepts that is actually very far along and very playable, but far, far, far from release, is a, you know, it's kind of, it feels like a trope now because every single video game is doing this, but it is a roguelike collectible card game in the spirit of something like Slay the Spire played in pinball. And, you know, that's an interesting concept to me. These are the types of things I want to explore, and that is really complicated. And I think that's one of the challenges is that I need to figure out how to make it appeal to more than just me on the planet. It has to be appealing to other people. But I can build more narrow and niche experiences. I don't need to design a game. I hope my games are playable from someone who would just walk up to it for the first time on location and have a good time. but I also think I can do different experiences. And I love what Stern is doing with progression now in Insider Connected, and those are the types of things that myself and Nick Baldrige have been exploring on the platform. Like Birdwatcher has persistent saved within the profile collection of your birds. You know, there are things that happen in Reindeer in the Ruins and Quest for Glory that are done through the profile system that maintains state. and when you look at things like Venom and now Jaws and John Wick, I really like that the industry as a whole is starting to push the boundaries on what pinball can be and that's really interesting. There are a lot of varieties in how you can program a game. We talked about Dwight. Certainly Keith Johnson has done some wonderful things currently with Jersey Jack but what he's done in years past before that, You know, when you talk about games like Lord of the Rings, The Simpsons Pinball Party, these deep-type games. Joe Shover has really made a name for himself recently. And even though he doesn't know the coding, Keith Elwin has his hands on the rules for his games. When these games come out a lot of times, they're certainly not even at the 1.0 code, if that is 100%. There always seem to be work in progress Do you find that when you release a game you know that there a lot left that you have to do And are you looking at what others are doing How deep can you make a game? For Birdwatcher, I definitely knew there was more work to come. It was very obvious I had promised a final resistance update. It was the decision as to how much more I put into it, how much I built the game, was kind of dependent on the feedback of the community. for blood bank billiards i don't know if there's going to be much more i like where the game is now i don't want to overly complicate it i want to see what people what the feedback is from the people who buy it and play it i do have like with my beta testers we joked about making an add a ball version of the game and a re and a replay version of the game now this is i have extra balls so this is kind of the add-a-ball version but a wow version of the game because you often in the ems had the sort of two versions within it so there was talk about that as an idea and i wasn't sure the world is ready to bring back objective based free replays but we'll see so that's an idea that i might do within the same framework i also considered the option of possibly exploring doing Nineball or some other billiards games within the same stylistic universe, but changing up the rules, you know, almost like a pool shark where you can select your game at the beginning. But I think it's a very complete game. I think for the price of $1.99 US, it is a great value. And I hope people will be happy with it as a complete package. And I'm not promising any changes here for as the games get more complicated i think that there becomes much more of a desire to get things in people's hands and then let it evolve and i'll say like as a pinball owner i loved the experience of getting the early code and then like you get that new update you put the update on the machine and you play through the changes and you rethink your strategy and i love that experience of progressing from good early code to like 1.0 as stern or jersey jack would define it and then like refining it further as you see the score balancing as how tournament players start to address it and it's like oh every single person is making this choice we need to rebalance the choices so that other paths are viable and i love that experience as an owner As a programmer, I have like 10 ideas I want to be exploring, and these games take me a long time. I think that I would rather get more new things out there than necessarily take something that I'm happy with and expand on it. Yeah, you can tinker forever and ever for sure. And like you say, you're never really done. But the variety of coming up with new things is probably a little more exciting. Although it's back to the drawing board and it's certainly a lot more work for you too. We didn't even mention in Blood Bank Billiards. There's a gobble hole. Yeah, so Drained has a gobble hole within the Drained games. Drained itself, that gobble hole is a gobble hole. Every time you go into it, you never get your ball back. and it represents killing the vampire. Within Blood Bank Billiards, it represents the eight ball. And so if you shoot the ball into the gobble hole, when you haven't sunk all the other balls, you will lose your turn. You will lose your ball because you scratched. You incorrectly pocketed the eight ball. But once you've sunk all the other balls, it opens up. and if you sync it, you get a nice big bonus for completing the rack. It resets the rack, does some other things within the details of the rules, but then you re-rack and can start over again and complete another rack. So, yeah, Gobblehole, Bell, and Physical Knocker. Those are the Drain features that are really, some of the Drain features that are really cool and throwback. And you can purchase this on the Multimorphic website, correct? So, Drained, the playfield module, you can purchase on the Drained Pinball website, because it's actually manufactured by Nick Baldrige's company for amusement-only games. There's a link from the Multimorphic website for Drained that will get you to Drained Pinball, but you actually end up purchasing it from Nick's company, not from Multimorphic. And of course, go to ianherrwergames.com. We'll post a link here on the website. Ian, you're going to be busy this summer, and I'm the one putting you to work. I want to thank you in advance, but because of all your expertise and your knowledge of rules for pinball competitions, I'll be honest, you're the guy who made me read the rules front to back, and it was the best thing I ever did because people who run tournaments should probably know the rules. Well, you are one of the best at it, and you're helping me out with the sold-out The Beast at Pocketeer Billiards in Buffalo. I can't thank you enough. We're going to have a good time there. Oh, it was a great tournament last year. I know last year I tried to do as little as possible to help you as I eased my way back into the tournament scene, but I'm looking forward to it. It's going to be exciting. We've got a lot of locals coming who are exploring the tournament world a lot more and a lot of big names coming, so it's going to be interesting and fun. Yeah, big names for sure. I've got somebody who is flying in from Australia for this, and I'm not even joking, so it'll be good the week after Pinnberg, August 1st to 4th at Pocketeer Billiards. You can find out more at pinballprofile.com. And make sure you check out the podcast For Amusement Only, the EM and Bingo podcast with Nick and Ian. They really do a nice deep dive into blood bank billiards. And you'll enjoy checking this out. I played it. Lots of fun. Great job, Ian. I'm really proud of you. Thanks a lot, Jeff. And thanks for having me on. What is this, like four or five times? Do I get a vest now? You get a sticker at the beast. Just remind me. A little gold star.