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Episode 172 - We're Gonna Need a Bigger Sequel

Eclectic Gamers Podcast·podcast_episode·1h 20m·analyzed·Jul 24, 2022
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Analysis

claude-haiku-4-5-20251001 · $0.032

TL;DR

Pinball Brothers Queen and This is Spinal Tap analyzed; both face skepticism despite strong licenses.

Summary

Tony and Dennis discuss two upcoming pinball machines: Pinball Brothers' Queen (Champions Edition $9,295, Rhapsody LE $10,995 limited to 1,000 units) with a strong song set but underwhelming layout and artwork that compares unfavorably to competing premium titles like Godzilla; and This is Spinal Tap, delayed from May/June to September 17-18 release at Newcastle Pin Fest Australia, hampered by HomePin's reputation issues from their previous Thunderbirds game and unclear marketing strategy.

Key Claims

  • Pinball Brothers Queen Standard Edition costs $9,295 US; Rhapsody Limited Edition costs $10,995 US (limited to 1,000 units)

    high confidence · Tony citing Pinball News article

  • Queen's Standard Edition is $295-300 more expensive than Godzilla (Premium/LE)

    high confidence · Dennis calculating price differential

  • This is Spinal Tap was originally projected for May/June release but is now delayed to September 17-18 (Newcastle Pin Fest Australia)

    high confidence · Tony comparing original timeline to current announcement

  • Pinball Brothers acquired Heighway Pinball assets before the company's liquidation in a manner that protected those assets from creditors

    medium confidence · Dennis discussing legal structure and referencing Pinball News coverage of legal documents

  • Queen includes 14 music tracks from Queen's catalog

    high confidence · Tony reading track list from Pinball News article

  • HomePin's Thunderbirds game is one of the lowest rated games on Pinside

    medium confidence · Dennis stating his understanding of community reception

  • A distributor reported pre-order selling more Queen games than Legends of Valhalla of Valhalla

    medium confidence · Dennis citing hearsay: 'I have heard that one distributor...'

  • HomePin's owner Mike states distributors are responsible for marketing push, not the manufacturer

    medium confidence · Dennis describing HomePin's stated approach to marketing

Notable Quotes

  • “the art pack is just, it doesn't have any real grab to me at all. It seems bland and weak overall.”

    Tony @ Queen artwork discussion — Key criticism of Queen's visual presentation affecting purchase appeal

  • “I cannot unsee it. I cannot. It's just the back glass is so obviously different segments that were done completely separately and then layered one on top of another.”

    Dennis @ Queen translite criticism — Specific artwork flaw that affects visual appeal; references poor Photoshop composition

  • “This is going to be like a lot of other games where chances of me ever playing one are going to be pretty low... the only time I see them is at a show, and that's the only time anybody ever sees them. So there's always a line 10 people deep.”

    Tony @ Queen playability discussion — Commentary on limited accessibility affecting informed opinion on game quality

  • “does not look inspired”

    Dennis @ Queen playfield analysis — Summary assessment of playfield layout design lacking originality

  • “The information he [Mike at HomePin] shares is baffling to me. And the decisions he makes are likewise baffling to me.”

    Dennis @ HomePin business practices discussion — Criticism of HomePin's management and communication strategy

  • “it feels like pinball is baby's first business to me. Seriously.”

    Dennis @ Industry commentary on HomePin and broader pinball business practices — Critique of unprofessional business approach in pinball manufacturing

  • “Queen is an obvious one that just hasn't happened yet. I think that's going to show through, even though I don't know if Pinball Brothers ultimately moves a lot of units.”

    Dennis @ Queen licensing value discussion — Recognition of Queen's strong licensing appeal despite concerns about execution

Entities

Pinball BrotherscompanyHomePincompanyDennispersonTonypersonQueengameThis is Spinal TapgameHeighway PinballcompanyThunderbirds are Go Pinballgame

Signals

  • ?

    product_launch: Pinball Brothers officially reveals Queen pinball machine with two editions after private showcase at December pop-up shop

    high · Queen Champions Edition and Rhapsody Limited Edition announced with specifications, pricing, and feature list

  • $

    market_signal: Queen Standard Edition priced at $9,295, only $295 below Godzilla Premium at $9,000, raising value perception concerns

    high · Dennis: 'This is $295 more... than Godzilla premium. That's rough'

  • ?

    design_innovation: Queen features multiple mechanical toys including radio replica, ball locks at Wembley Stadium, piano drop targets, and jukebox kicker

    high · Flyer lists: fully lit radio replica, Red Special physical ball lock, Wembley Stadium lock, four plus three bank piano drops, jukebox kicker, magic saucer

  • ?

    product_concern: Queen's translite artwork criticized for poor Photoshop composition with visibly separate layered segments and anatomically incorrect elements (floating hand without arm)

    high · Dennis: 'the back glass is so obviously different segments... layered one on top of another... hovering hand with the completely missing arm'

  • ?

    gameplay_signal: Queen's playfield criticized for uninspired layout design with excessive drop target blocking, lacking innovation compared to competing premium machines

    high · Dennis: 'the biggest thing that stands out to me is the number of shots that are blocked by a drop target... does not look inspired'

Transcript

groq_whisper · $0.241

0:00
Welcome to the Eclectic Gamers Podcast. Today is Sunday, July 24th. This is episode 172. My name is Tony. I'm Dennis. You know, we're starting to get increasingly close to episode 200.
0:32
Do you think, this is speculative, do you think we should propose the idea of doing a shirt, finding an artist, get strung along for 18 months and then not have it happen? I mean, it's kind of on brand for us, isn't it? It would be pretty consistent. Maybe we should put out a call. If you are an artist and you're interested in being paid to do a shirt, you can reach out and we can have a discussion. We've got a long ways to go, though. Yeah. I mean, we put out an episode every two weeks. Ooh.
1:03
I sound like the Australians now. We put out an episode every two weeks, and we've got a ways to go. We do. But I'm just thinking ahead. You've got to plan these things out. We learned last time that six months isn't enough planning. Right. Now, as a – and I don't think – I know some people know who we had been in discussions with. And so anyway, just as a – again, I don't know if it's a good reminder because I don't know how much we ever really shared. We didn't really share very much at all. I'm kind of glad we didn't because I wasn't – I'm not in the – I'm not trying to throw anyone under the bus. But what happened was when we were getting close to episode 100, we reached out to some artists and we found one with a quote we were good with. And we thought, okay, these shirts might actually sell so we wouldn't lose like all of our money on it. Right. And when we contacted them, they needed – we did it months ahead of time, which was smart because the window was – we were going to basically get the shirt like I think like six to eight weeks ahead of when our episode 100 would be. And that was still – we still needed to give them like four months' notice was how that worked. So it was like we were four months' notice when we were six months away. So we thought we were okay. And then they had a project come up and they couldn't do it. And then the communication got pretty sloppy and there were more and more projects. And we just kept getting bumped because we were a low dollar project and there were high dollar projects. We got to eat too. Sure, sure. But I finally – the only thing that confused me was when it kept happening, why they didn't pull the trigger and say, I just can't do it anymore. So instead of us possibly – and we did reach out to a couple of other artists, but it was so – I mean, at that point, we had, like, no timeline. Right. And so, of course, they were like, no, I've got too many projects. You know, Dennis, it would be eight months before we could get to it.
Stern Pinball
company
Godzillagame
American Pinballcompany
Legends of Valhallagame
Joe Balcerperson
Mikeperson
Travis Mosemanperson
Aliengame
Jersey Jack Pinballcompany
Chicago Gaming Companycompany
Pinball Newsorganization
Pinsideorganization
Texas Pinball Festivalevent
Newcastle Pin Fest Australiaevent
?

product_strategy: Pinball Brothers uses cosmetic-only differences between standard and LE (illuminated artwork, shaker motor, gold cosmetics, plaque/certificate) rather than gameplay features, diverging from JJP's approach

high · LE differs from CE with illuminated artwork, shaker, different shooter rod, gold cabinet—no gameplay changes noted

  • ?

    licensing_signal: Queen represents major legendary rock band license previously unavailable in pinball; strong thematic appeal expected to drive sales despite design concerns

    high · Dennis: 'Queen is an obvious one that just hasn't happened yet... I think that's going to show through'

  • ?

    product_launch: HomePin's Spinal Tap Pinball delayed from original May/June projection to September 17-18 release at Newcastle Pin Fest Australia

    high · Tony: 'The original projection I thought was that this was going to come out around May or June. So a little bit late.'

  • ?

    product_concern: HomePin's second title (Spinal Tap) faces skepticism due to poor reception of first game (Thunderbirds are Go), which ranks among lowest-rated on Pinside

    high · Dennis: 'the reputation of Thunderbirds precedes itself. And so people are going to be, I think, highly skeptical that this game will be fun'

  • ?

    industry_signal: HomePin's owner Mike employs unconventional business practices including delegating all marketing responsibility to distributors and minimal information sharing

    medium · Dennis: 'He's made statements... he's not trying to sell them... no marketing push. It's all that's the job of the distributors. No one else does it like that.'

  • ?

    community_signal: Community response to Queen mixed: positive reception to music set, negative toward layout and artwork quality; concern about pricing relative to competing premium games

    high · Dennis summarizing online reactions: 'not too positive about the layout, not too positive about the art... No complaints about the song set'

  • ?

    industry_signal: Pinball Brothers' formation involved acquiring Highway Pinball assets before liquidation, protecting assets from creditors through legal structuring that followed letter but not spirit of law

    medium · Dennis: 'they followed the letter of the law but not the spirit of the law... creditors got less or in many cases, nothing'

    • 2:58
    And so after about a year post when we thought we would receive the design, I went ahead and formally just sort of canceled. Now, we didn't lose any money. We didn't put down a deposit or anything. Right. So it wasn't a big deal other than – Leave it a bad taste in our mouth? Yeah, and it kind of let episode one – like we didn't really do anything. No, not really. We didn't really do anything, and we had been at it for years. So I was always a little just annoyed that it couldn't have – when it became obvious that we weren't going to be a priority, I wished that they had just sort of broken everything on their end and said, I can't. I'm sorry. I have to cancel. Not, oh, you'll be after the big project. And then another big project. It'll be after the project. I was kind of like, and I'd be like, okay, thanks. I mean, I'd still be annoyed that it got canceled, but it wouldn't have been canceled a year late. Right. We'll try and avoid that in the future. If you're someone who needs to cancel all the time, don't contact us. It's too stressful. So what's been going on, Tony? What non-stressful things have been going on? Or stressful things. I guess you can do either. I mean, yeah. Do you have a walking story for the walking listeners? I have a walking story, but it's nowhere near as fun as the others. Sorry. Well, we cannot live up to gold. The cross-country people went to a new park that I'd never been to before. I didn't even know existed. And apparently it's this huge park. But they have these, like, it's got a little bit of paved trail, and it's got a little bit of, like, just soft walking trail. But coming off of that, it has, like, hiking slash mountain biking trails. I was like, well, they're going to run, like, five miles. I have plenty of time to take this little short loop thing. So I went and I went and I went onto like an actual hiking trail, hiking trail that was like, you know, rocks and trees and up and down and all sorts of stuff. And it was just very pretty and very fun. And I misread the signage on the length of the trail and it was much longer than I had expected it to be. But nothing bad. I was just very tired by the end. But it wasn't. It was in the trees. So even though we, and it was super early, it was like 7 a.m.
    5:11
    It was before 7 a.m. actually that I started. So it wasn't terrible because it's been running 100 plus every day. Yeah, I know. The last two weeks. So it's been, it has been miserable. I mean, Kansas in the summer is not a great place to be because our humidity is so high. Yeah. But it's been pretty uncomfortable. Yeah. I actually went biking Friday, and the Mill Creek Trail was closed for pavement repairs, asphalt repairs. So I didn't get to go very far, and so I went walking yesterday. But even when I waited until after 7, it had only dropped to 96 degrees. Yeah. It's just like I did about, I don't know, four and a half miles, I guess. So I was just like, I should have brought water. I didn't. Yeah. Well, that's partially where I was by the end of the trail because I was like, the way I read this trail sign, it was going to be like, I thought it was going to be like just under three miles. It was going to be like 2.75 miles. I was like, okay, this isn't a bad deal. But I forgot to add in all of the other distances leading up to and the way back from. So I ended up doing almost five total. but it was just interesting because since it's this hiking slash mountain biking trail as I'm walking on this trail and I'm sitting here going how in the world could you even get a mountain bike on some of this trail some of this stuff is I'm almost rock scrambling to get up some of these chunks because there's like it's like a layered limestone where the rock's broken away but it's layered and broken so it's almost like steps and just some really steep stuff. And there are spots where I'm just walking. I am ducking under trees, and I'm trying to figure out how somebody's going to do it on a mountain bike. No idea how. They must be much, much more impressive than anything I've ever done on a bicycle. That's for sure. It seems not plausible to me, but I guess they have a way. Maybe the bikes just grip really well. It was cool because there were spots where they had little ramps and jumps so you could be riding your bike and do little jumps and stuff. in various places. Like I said, it was a really cool trail that I didn't know existed. It apparently existed since like the 90s, and I had no idea. Okay, interesting. And like the full length of the trail, because like I took the first trail, which connected to the second loop, which is the loop I did, and then back. But halfway through that loop, it connected to yet another trail that I could have tacked another 10 miles of hiking onto this. I mean, it was huge trail network. So it was pretty impressive. Other than that, the only thing I did is last weekend, instead of going to pinball,
    7:57
    I attended a motorcycle safety course because I have not ridden a motorcycle in 15 years plus, and I wanted to get back into it, and I decided to do it the right way by attending a safety course first to kind of blow the rust off of not having touched a motorcycle in more than 15 years because I sold my motorcycle just before my oldest was born. And it took about half of the time-ish to really blow the rust off, but once I got comfortable and do it back into it, everything was good. But that course was a lot of fun, and it reminded me how much fun motorcycles are. So, yeah, well, last weekend I did pinball because you weren't there. So I thought I had a chance to win. I did not. I mean, you would have had a chance to win if I was there. Yes, but a better chance because there's one less person in my way. But no, it went about as it usually does. I did that. We actually finished class last week in time that I could have gone. But I was in but I was since I was in full gear, everything riding the motorcycle. It's like 100 degrees outside. It was hot. I was like, I really just kind of want to go home and rest for a little bit. So I went home, sat down on the couch for a couple minutes, and was woke up a little while later being told, hey, you need to wake up if you want to be able to sleep tonight. Right, right. Okay.
    9:25
    So I did that, and then this last weekend, so the Oklahoma state champion, or at least at one point, Travis Murray is trying to guide me on how to get a billion points on Godzilla because while I have broken 900 million, I've not broken a billion. So I've been playing that. My thumbs hurt. I went to Nub's yesterday for lunch. I actually played Rush, couldn't get any defense in it. And then I got like a dozen on their Godzilla Pro they have there on my first dollar I put in. So then I felt bad that I put in for three plays. And, of course, I earned a replay off of that. So I was just like, okay, well, I should have just stuck with Rush because I played plenty of Godzilla at home. Well, it is a pro. It was. The shots do need to be approached a little bit differently. And I played other stuff. I played Stranger Things. I played Harlem Globetrotters. I played the – Adam's Family. Yes, I went ahead. But only once. I only played once on it. So I did that. And then I've been trying to finish the Dune series of books. So my sister, two birthdays ago, I think, or yeah, I think so. Not my last birthday, but the birthday before. She got me the whole six book set of Frank Herbert's Dune. And I very quickly got through the first three, which you had told me the first three kind of operates as a trilogy. And then I had started book four, God Emperor of Dune, and it just drug for me. And I have been chipping away at it over a year. I finally sat down and just got through it, and now I am on Heretics of Dune, and it is so much better. And actually, last night, probably because I searched to try and remember a quote from God Emperor of Dune that I liked, I saw a review someone had written. Apparently, they have written a lot. I mean, they warned at the start of it, this review is over 8,000 words. I was like, that's like as long as that book was. No, it's not. That book was huge. but the review part was actually pretty short but they kind of this was a vibe I got from you Tony on this and I mentioned all this because we deserve a Dune video game a new one because it was one of the first RTS games and we deserve Dune pinball. There is a new Dune game it's out and the person, they didn't spoil anything on the two books I'm still working on but the way they said it was well it's not a in their view a bad book. It is the worst book of the six. And their order was basically, I believe, Chapter House, Heretics, the first Dune, Children of Dune, Dune Messiah, and then God Emperor last. So basically, six, five, one, three, two, four. I can see it. I really like six. And obviously, I haven't started six yet. I'm over three-fourths, I think, of the way through five uh first dune is great yes it's a classic uh i would say that it feels like you could tell he's a much better writer in five than he was in one kind of like if you ever go back and read like asmov's right nation or or not the redo version but you actually find an original of uh the dark tower and read the gunslinger from stephen king you can tell like okay yeah this is definitely his college years yes this is book one and then you find the stuff where it's like oh these are the cocaine years. Yeah, yeah. And then you're like, oh, wow, Wizard in Glass. This is awesome. Why didn't they make that into a movie? No kidding. It could have as a standalone. Much better than... Anyway, Idris Elba did the best he could with the material he had. Yes. There's no shame on him. Yeah, there was no shame on Idris Elba. Idris Elba was perfectly fine. Well cast for that role. I really enjoyed him in the role. It's too bad about the rest of it. Yes. But speaking of roles, we're clearly on one now. So let's go ahead and go right into Pinball. So I mentioned Dune as a pinball machine. Sorry, that's not going to be. We have a rumor corner. That's not going to be it. I haven't heard a rumor about Dune. But we've got to start with the non-rumors first. I think the most obvious thing to start with is Pinball Brothers. That is not a company we've spoken about very much on this show because all they've really been known for, by and large, is turning out Highway Pinball's Alien and sending those out. And those have been shipping and it's all been happening for quite a while now. A few months ago, we learned that they were also going to do Queen. Now, I have known since before they even were doing Alien that they had the Queen license. But we saw a little bit at a pop-up shop. I think it was around December or so. Something like that. In England. And now, it's kind of described as the reveal, even though we already kind of saw it before. So I guess now it's the real reveal. I do have a link in the show notes to Pinball News. Pinball News has an article that goes through a lot, including some some photos and stuff that people might want to turn to. But so anyway, let's just sort of talk about this because we've known about the license for a while. And just just in terms of some highlights for folks, because obviously if they're listening in the car or whatever, they probably don't have the capability to to pull this all up. But what Pinball Brothers is doing is much like we've seen with many companies. There's going to be multiple versions of Queen. There is what they call the Champions Edition, so CE, though that's their standard.
    15:06
    Allow me. I know they're all separate companies, but my God, man. I just, I just, the, all right. So this is what the Pinball News article says. The standard Champions Edition will cost $9,295 US. And then the Rhapsody Limited Edition is $10,995 US.
    15:32
    Oh, my God. So the CE is the standard, but the CE is the true limited with JJP, whereas the LE is the true limited with, like, everyone else, I guess. except CE also was classic edition with CGC, which was basically the standard with them too. So is Pinball Brothers in the right because they're aligning more with what CGC was doing or are they in the wrong because it's counter to what JJP, who cares? The LE version is limited to 1,000 units. All right, and so that's going to have some illuminated artwork, shaker motor,
    16:19
    a different shooter rod than the standard. It's going to have gold-colored metal and the cabinet's going to be gold-colored and it's going to have a plaque and a certificate. There are 14 music tracks that are included with the game. I'll just read through them real quick because Queen fans might care. A Kind of Magic, Another One Bites the Dust, Bohemian Rhapsody, Hammer to Fall, I Want to break free killer queen one vision play the game radio gaga seven seas of raw raw i don't know the song r-h-y-e ray seven seas yeah i'd say right in but i won't know how to pronounce it no matter what uh somebody to love we will rock you we are the champions and who wants to live forever so it's a really good song set like this is like outside of the flash gordon soundtrack This is like all that. Yeah. All right. So let's see. And the article notes that this hasn't really changed much from the from that pop up store version we saw.
    17:25
    And anyway, Tony, what do you think? The reactions online. Let me allow me to give the reactions online before you just give some context. Now, from what little I've read, I've not read a lot of response to this. The basic thoughts have been not too positive about the layout, not too positive about the art. No complaints about the song set.
    17:53
    There you go. Well, and it should be no shock to anybody that I'm not too positive on the layout. I'm not too positive on the art set. And quite frankly, I've said it multiple times before when we're in reference to them. I'm not too positive on the existence of pinball brothers at all. So, and we've discussed, I mean, their creation, their formation was, I won't use the word nefarious, but given how they acquired the assets before highway went through the UK's essentially equivalent of bankruptcy, it was done in a way that they put in, as I remember it from, again, I believe Pinball News actually has these pieces in the review of those legal documents. But a lot of stuff was transferred over to Pinball Brothers early on enough that when the liquidation of Highway happened, those items were protected and already owned by them. Right. Because things had been shifted magically just far enough ahead of time of the rules. It is very much one of those where they followed the letter of the law but not the spirit of the law. It's one of those where, in my view, this is my opinion. I don't know this for a fact, but in my opinion, when I saw it, I thought they knew that highway was going to have to be put out of business. And so they did everything they could to ensure that they had stuff that they could make money with after that. And my problem with that is that meant creditors got less or in many cases, nothing versus pennies on the dollar or pence on the pound or however we want to think of it. And so I just, it was like, if you knew you couldn't save it and you clear, in my view, you clearly knew you couldn't save it. You saved yourselves instead of everyone else. But of course, this is pinball, Tony. Nobody cares. I know. I mean, I have comments that I could make that is not fit for broadcast about a lot of stuff in pinball. So I will save that. So as a reminder, those are our thoughts on that. But saying that aside because we practice objectivity when we need to So thoughts about the game itself The game itself Like I said and I said this in our chat and in a couple of group chats earlier the art pack is just, it doesn't have any real grab to me at all.
    20:20
    It seems bland and weak overall. and the layout just does not have anything about it that seems to really jump out at me. But like most things, unless I play one, I'm not going to ever know for sure. But let's be realistic. This is going to be like a lot of other games where chances of me ever playing one are going to be pretty low. It'll probably come down to having to be at a show working and without too big of a line. I mean, there's a reason there's a couple games that I have an interest in playing that I've never actually played yet because the only time I see them is at a show, and that's the only time anybody ever sees them. So there's always a line 10 people deep, and I don't care enough to do that. I mean, my thought was the toy game on the play field is not bad. The little radio, the upper play field in the shape of the guitar with the flipper doesn't necessarily look to me to be particularly fun, but it looks okay. I think it looks okay. Yeah, the art package itself I'm not impressed with. But again, that wouldn't be – if I was in the market for such a game, the art package wouldn't really factor in for me, so that's not a big deal.
    21:42
    The upper play field eliminates it being a true fan layout, but I could see where people will look at the shot flow on the main play field and probably feel that this doesn't look particularly inspired. I mean, the biggest thing that stands out to me is the number of shots that are blocked by a drop target that has to be eliminated.
    22:02
    And that it's clearly in the way of particular shots. So perhaps my gut instinct is this isn't going to be as annoying as, say, Scolari Brothers on Ghostbusters sort of, you know, pop up, get in the way annoyance. But I just generally speaking, I'm not a fan of that. like I'm gonna block this it could it could be implemented well that will really come down to the rules but in terms of the mechanics of the play field this does not yeah inspired will be what I'll go with does not look inspired so I'm just not I just don't think it looks that great it doesn't look like it plays bad to me though like I don't see shots to nowhere a lot of brick stuff um you know it might be a relatively easy layout but with those drops and stuff maybe it won't be maybe it'll be rough uh the price uh so to me initially when i hear there's a limited edition i'm a little surprised that the le isn't more vis-a-vis vis-a-vis this what they price the standard at right but it also seems like they didn't really add much like it's essentially cosmetic which i which i approve of i prefer that to them it's just different from what we've seen in most of the industry as of late. Well, yeah. I mean, case in point, JJP's Toy Story 4. There's no... I mean, I know there's more like LEDs and stuff and call-outs and stuff, but I don't believe there's any gameplay features that are different between the two, but the price differential between those two was, what, $3,000? Yeah, it was enormous. So this is a lot tighter. Now, that said, looking at what this game is and then seeing that the standard edition is over not bear in mind this $295 more than I know it's unfair, but you know what? Life ain't fair. It's $295 more, $300 more than Godzilla premium. That's rough. And that's what you're going to get compared to. And I'm based off of the look of this outside of the incredible music score that they have arranged for this. The music score is amazing. Yeah, yeah. But I can stream that on Spotify at will. So given all of that, I see this and I'm like, you're going to get compared to what else is available kind of in the price range and your standard is competing with Stern Premium.
    24:24
    And da-da-da, da-da-da, da-da-da. No, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no. You know what? I cannot unsee it. I cannot. It's just the back glass is so obviously different segments that were done completely separately and then layered one on top of another. That's probably why people are so bothered. In Photoshop, and it is just done in such a poor manner. I just can't not stare at that hovering hand with the completely missing arm. It's just there. It attracts your eyes. It's just like watching a car wreck. And in their flyer on the Champions Edition, so bear in mind that's the standard. So they list the ramps and toys as fully lit radio replica. I thought that looked pretty cool. Red special physical ball lock. Wembley Stadium physical ball lock. Four plus three bank piano drop and stand up targets. Two metal ramps to Wembley with three possible exits. Jukebox vertical up kicker. Magic saucer. Three gate drop targets. Those are the ones blocking the ramps. one bicycle ride spinner and four base stand-up targets. I get where they're kind of running with this, trying to make it look like a concert. It feels like their take on GNR, though I know this has been in development for a while. They're trying to make it feel like the stage show, the live aid. Right. Is what they're going with. And these are live iterations of the songs, too. So I just, at this price, I just... I don't want to say that there isn't a market for it. There is. While Queen is an excellent license for them to go ahead and run with, I think, I believe everyone would probably agree as far as legendary bands go, especially in the realm of dad rock. Queen is an obvious one that just hasn't happened yet. I think that's going to show through, even though I don't know if Pinball Brothers ultimately moves a lot of units. I have heard that one distributor has indicated that they have already, I guess, pre-order sold more Queen games than they did American Pinball's Legends of Valhalla. Well, that's just a theme thing. That's 100% on theme. And that's where, again, theme really matters. So I think this will sell units for Pinball Brothers. Does it do better than Alien? I just don't know if it does or doesn't. I mean, Alien was a great theme, too. It was a great theme, but it was a bad game. Some people really like it, Tony. Some people really like everything. It's a very different layout than this. Yes, but some people really like everything. Some people really like swift kicks to the Johnson. No, they don't. Well, actually, you're probably right. They do.
    27:14
    You're right. Well, speaking of swift kicks, let's go ahead and kick ourselves over to Home Pin. We haven't talked about Home Pin in a while. So HomePen is making Spinal Tap. This is Spinal Tap Pinball, I think is the full formal name. All right. There's been a little bit more information on that.
    27:33
    The official release date, according to HomePen, is going to be during the Newcastle Pin Fest Australia. That's – some people might.
    27:43
    September 17th and 18th. Now, last I vaguely remember, because I do follow one of these, a thread on this on Pinside, but by follow, I mean if I see it up top and then there are messages I haven't seen, I try and remember to click on it, but I don't always, because most of the time it's people talking about how much they like Spinal Tap, which I just don't care about. But I think the original plan, this is behind. Right. I believe the original projected, behind from the projection. The original projection I thought was that this was going to come out around May or June. So a little bit late.
    28:20
    You've indicated nobody cares. I mean, Spinal Tap isn't a bad license, I don't think. It's not Queen, don't get me wrong. Right, no, it's not. It's a beloved movie, Tony. Beloved, cult. For going after one of those cult classics, it's there.
    28:39
    It's not one of my beloved cult classics, but that's kind of the point of a cult classic. I just, combining it with Home Pin is just making it way farther down on the list. There are, and for those that don't know, because again, we don't cover Home Pin all that much. So Home Pin has only got one game out so far. It's Thunderbirds, or I believe technically Thunderbirds are Go Pinball. Right. Just to be clear Which is one of the lowest rated games On Pinside I have not played it I saw it one year at Texas Pinball Festival And when I went up to it Unfortunately the ball was up on the plastics And so the game was broken I couldn't play it Though I do know some people Do like elements of the game I've talked to a couple people who really like elements of the game I've talked to a couple people who really like The game after they went through and heavily modified the game. Sure, sure. But people love their mods. Yeah, it is. And a lot of people have the nostalgia draw for Thunderbirds. The problem that Home Pit has, I think Home Pit has two main problems. Saying aside, they've chosen a cult, which I don't think, given their size, that picking a cult classic style movie is a bad choice. Oh, no, not at all. They're not in a position to produce 4,000 GNRs. Right. That's not them. The problem that I think that Home Pin is running into is, one, regardless if people played it or not, the reputation of Thunderbirds precedes itself. And so people are going to be, I think, highly skeptical that this game will be fun. Right. And not give it a chance because of that. I believe Joe Balser, who used to be with American Pinball and before that Jersey Jack Pinball and before that with other pinball manufacturers, I think he did this game. I don't know, because getting understanding what goes on at HomePen has always been a struggle for me. And part of that's probably my fault that I don't try hard enough. But that gets into my second point. Mike, the man who runs HomePen, the information he shares is baffling to me. And the decisions he makes are likewise baffling to me. So setting aside the controversies and he's had some he's about this game. He's made statements about like that. He's not trying to sell them. He's not. There's no like no marketing push. It's all that's the job of the distributors. That's one of like the running jokes in the spinal tap thread on Pennside is, oh, yeah, no. He's he said, like the distributors need to push this game and convince. It's like. No one else does it like that. What? I don't know. I don't know why you think that's the right way. I mean, I think it's perfectly fair to say that a lot of pinball companies make a whole lot of mistakes on how they approach this. Right. It's like it's it's in so many instances. It feels like pinball is baby's first business to me. Seriously. I know it's a little mean, but I feel like I'm in the Fisher Price school of starting a company a lot of the times because people just make the weirdest decisions where I think they're just driven by their own passions. So that's part of the reason why I don't know anything about Spinal Tap. It's like Homebend doesn't tell you anything about it. It's weird. And I don't even know who his distros are. We're reporting on it because it's news. He wants you to know that you need to search that information out. That shows your interest. For you to be interested. He doesn't need to put it in your face. It's such perfection that you will hunt it out, right? Well, if you're one of those people that thinks pinball companies need to be doing reveals at shows, I guess he is because that's the release date. So there you go. You know where to be to get the scoop. I will say when I saw the notes originally, I misread it. Instead of Newcastle Pin Fest Australia, I read it as Newcastle Pint Fest Australia. Yeah. And I was like, that could be fun.
    32:49
    We'll release a thing at a booze convention. Yes. Well, maybe it is. I mean, I haven't been there. I mean, it's pinball. Of course it is. I haven't been there. My passport's expired. So let's move on. Let's go stateside now. We talked about a European company, and we talked about a – HomePen kind of presents itself as an Australian company, but they're in Taiwan, which I don't think is part of Australia. No, no, not last time I checked. I mean, to be fair, where Taiwan belongs is up for debate, depending upon if you're a member of the government when you're talking about it or not. Yeah, we better not. We better not die. I mean, that's... We're touching on enough controversy this episode as it is. So, J.J.P., Jersey Jack Pinball.
    33:35
    Okay. We obviously covered the Toy Story 4 reveal. A couple of interesting things have come to light since our last episode, Tony, that I thought we might want to talk a little bit about. One is I'm hearing reports, just reports, secondhand, that these games, Toy Story 4s, are LEs, not the Cs, the LEs. So what is now, I guess, sort of the standard model, even though there is technically a cap of 5,000 units. Right. They're not moving particularly fast. Really? Yeah. No kidding. I knew it would blow your mind. So here is one. I did not hear this direct from a distributor. I heard this from someone else who informed me that they know of a distributor who, as of, and this was a few days ago at this point, as of the time of this recording, but that out of their initial order of, like, they made an initial order of Toy Story 4 LEs, probably projecting, well, obviously projecting a amount they thought they would be able to sell. perhaps based off of GNR, I don't know, or the strength of the theme or whatever.
    34:45
    They had only sold through, at the time I was told, 14% of that initial LE order. Ouch. That's bad. At 14% and the need to, of course, pay the company to have the games, to sell the games,
    35:01
    you have to wonder, like, not just the question of are they ever going to do a second order, but rather are they going to be looking at trying to get out of a portion of their first order? Right. Because if you're not even at a fourth of what you initially ordered, if it's a sizable number, that could be a lot. I mean, that's a lot of stock. On the inside, I remember seeing someone had mentioned they got a great deal on a Wonka years ago because the distributor they bought it from kind of like J.J.P. had to fire sale some of the Wonkas that they had already built. They just weren't moving. And one distributor, I guess, in particular kind of went in, made a deal with them, and scooped up a bunch of them and then sold them below MSRP ultimately to get rid of them, which all makes sense. It's fine. It all makes sense, but we don't hear that a lot. Pinball is so often a we build the amount that get ordered, and then we ship those out. It's not like the old days where they used to – there's a big desire not to stockpile.
    36:01
    Warehouse costs space. Yes. Our money. Exactly. Space Cosmos. So that's an interesting, I thought that was an interesting thing. But again, as you noted, not particularly surprising given the public reaction. People jumped on, by and large, from what we've heard, have jumped on the CEs because they were the ultra limited. Oh, at a thousand units. Okay. The LEs and the reaction to the game and the reaction to the theme. And speaking of the theme, there was a statement I read was done on Jack Guarneri of JJP was on the Super Awesome Pinball Show. I've not heard this episode. I have a link in the show notes to a NAP Arcade article about it because that's what I've read. So I cite the source that I pulled from. In the interview, according to the summary that NAP Arcade provided, Jack said that J.J.P. had the rights to do all the Toy Story movies, and they decided to focus on the fourth one and make Toy Story 4 Pinball. What are your thoughts about that decision, Tony?
    37:03
    People with young children in the room should cover their ears or now remove them. No, I won't be that bad. No, this is moronic. It's, I just, I, the mental image I have in my head, which could be completely wrong because it's just in my head, is that someone who everyone was afraid to say no to thought this was a good idea. And everybody else just jumped on the bandwagon. And anybody with any knowledge of anything should have known that this was terrible. If you're going to lock onto one thing in a franchise like this, you lock onto the most popular one. You lock onto either one. Arguments with Toy Story could be made for Toy Story 2 as well. But you lock onto one of those. You do not lock onto the just-out, unknown, oh, it's such a mistake. I think if you combine the fact that this is just Toy Story 4 with the recent changes in the economy, this is why there's people who aren't getting their games sold. I would not have been surprised if this was Toy Story 1 that it would have sold double or triple what it sold already easily. have I told you my theory about baby's first pinball company yeah I heard about baby's first pinball that's what we in the industry call foreshadowing it is such a stupid move I was thinking about that obviously when I wrote our one note up today or yesterday I was thinking about this and the word I had initially thought of as well and we've just known each other too long was moronic it's the same word and I just thought I think of that you've seen the meme on the reddits or whatever where they're sitting in the conference room and they're like what should we do to do whatever and someone says something and then the one little guy slouching on his hand would say we should just do the first toy story and then gets chucked out the window that's what it feels like and we've touched on this when the game came out so I don't want to beat a dead horse but I'm going to beat it a little bit because this has come up in this interview and it's so timely. As you've noted, it's absolutely mind-boggling. And there's stuff about the interview where Disney moved up, I think moved up Toy Story for a year. The game is still years after the movie, so I don't care. You didn't put it out when, like if it was a year later, that's when GNR came out, right? Because GNR was about a year after. We had someone who commented on our Discord where there's a link in the show notes for people who want to join the Discord. We had someone who commented after hearing that episode with the Toy Story reveal where I had made a comment about GNR being the one that came out right after Toy Story And they said actually Dennis right after was like it was a year after which I didn go back and check But yeah it was Yeah But OK so let set all that aside As you've noted, as we've seen, as the public has talked about ad nauseum at the stage, the people who are grown up now and have money. Remember Toy Story, the first one, the first CGI movie, animated movie, trailblazing, compelling story, great cast.
    40:38
    That's the one you focus on if you're focusing on one movie. Or they could have done the other decision of they had the rights to all of them. Do all four, and you still win. You still win. This is literally like if they got the rights to do Jaws because everybody wants a dang Jaws pinball machine. So, of course, they do Jaws 3D as the pinball would be the movie they pick. That's what this is. This is picking Iron Eagle 3. That's what this is. On last week's The Pinball Show over on the pinball network that I do with Zach Minney, when he was talking about that, in the same interview, I didn't put this in our notes. In the same interview, it came up that they had a license, they being JJP, and they passed on it because all they would basically get was the movie poster.
    41:26
    The movie wasn't named, but I guess in the interview, people started going, dun, dun, dun, dun, dun, dun, dun, dun, dun, dun, dun.
    41:35
    So that JJP had the opportunity to get Jaws. And Zach was talking about how it would be so frustrated to – we'll be able to just go in here in a few seconds. I'm very proud of this one. I crafted it so well. He's like, I'm naming all these cast members that I thought they could probably individually negotiate with. And Zach says, well, they're going to want Richard Dreyfuss. I'm like, Richard Dreyfuss isn't in that movie.
    42:01
    Because I just assumed this is J.J.P. that it would be Jaws 4. Officially known as Jaws the Revenge. You know, where she has the psychic link to the shark and it's in the Bahamas. and it explodes when you hit it with the boat.
    42:20
    Explodes. Like with explosives, explodes. It's hilarious. It's one of the worst. It is what killed the Vajas franchise for a good reason. It is horrid. Absolutely horrid. But after this decision with Toy Story, why would I expect anything? I wouldn't expect them to do the first. Are you kidding me? That's not the most recent. We already know that when they reveal their Godfather pinball, it's going to be Godfather 3. Sure, exactly.
    42:49
    I mean, you got it because that's the one with the whole, they pull me back in. That's the one that lines from. That's the best line, isn't it? Is it? I don't know anymore.
    43:01
    So, yeah, it's just, and I agree with you. To me, there are so many seasoned, intelligent people that work for Jersey Jack. I just cannot believe that that staff with that experience and that longevity in pinball did not know that Toy Story or the first trilogy or the whole series were all superior options to the fourth one when it came to who was actually buying. especially when you factor in the decision, also discussed, I believe, in that interview, of them dropping the standard edition, getting rid of the cheapest model, that would have been the best opportunity for locations to put the game in. Right. Because the only value to Toy Story 4, because the kids who saw Toy Story 4, in almost all instances, remain children to this day, because it was not that long ago,
    43:59
    they don't have money to buy a pinball machine. Getting them to drop quarters in one, sure. I don't know how you pull that off on a broad scale at $12,000 a pop.
    44:10
    But as you noted, Tony, if it had been Toy Story 1, the $12,000 would have been easier to swallow. It's hard. And a lot of people said that online. They're like, you know what? I think the game – some of them played it. Gameplay is good, but not $12,000 good for a theme I don't love. Right. And I said, in my head, it is somebody just said, we're doing Toy Story 4. And everybody else either just said, yes, sir, or they got smacked down if they even tried to say something else. And so, yeah, it's about the only thing I can understand.
    44:47
    I was going to say, you know, though, there are veterans. I mean, who was the person that had the strength, the force? Who knows? I mean, I still remain perplexed at American Pinball, and they're continuing at this point to double down and want to do original themes. I don't get it. It's like that's not what the industry has taught us. Yeah, obviously. How do you continue?
    45:13
    And I thought they had learned. I thought that's what Hot Wheels was, but we're going to have tanks in space or whatever. Right. And I don't know. It is weird to me. The fact that the game that I consider JJP's best game is also one of their worst selling games, if not their worst selling game, and it's an original theme, I think that explains everything you need to know. And there have been plenty of people who say, please, JJP, re-theme dialed into a theme. Yeah. But they learned their lesson, just not well enough, apparently, to go with the fourth movie. Oh, why did you guys do it? I mean, I guess they sold out their CESO with $30 million. Yeah, they were going to anyway. They were always going to sell out the CES. Yeah, that's the thing.
    46:01
    After what happened with GNR and the way the market has been, people were going to speculate on those anyway just to flip them. So that was always going to happen. The problem is there's no sustainability. There's nothing on the backside. So the question really is, if the LE sales are lower than they anticipated, were the sales of the CE, along with the very, very strong sales that they had with GNR, enough for them to last the next, what, two and a half years until their next title? Yeah, two and a half to three years for another game. That feels like them. I mean, it does feel like them. All right, well, let's go ahead and jump from Jersey Jack, Tony, to Stern Pinball. In a move that I have to give credit to Zach Minney, which he did on the last Pinball Show episode, Comic-Con revealed nothing. Nothing. That's no surprise. No, and his arguments, Zach's arguments were good. Stern doesn't ever do reveals at shows. They had Ozzy Osbourne in their booth. They had Todd McFarlane, the artist of Spawn, and Venom. So there was a lot of thoughts that Venom would be revealed. Instead, they had a, as far as I could tell from the photos, they had a big Ozzy balloon, one of them inflatable, like at a used car lot sort of things. and they had some of their existing older titles available for play.
    47:22
    Any thoughts? It's always felt like Stern, for stuff like that, they just kind of play the game and they'll do little hint things or little teasers or even trolling about stuff. But I'm not surprised for them, especially since they removed the number two game and pushed everything. it's a little early for them to be dumping what they are going to drop yet. I still don't expect to see it for another few months. So do you think it's going to be like in the – they've often had a game that gets announced and initially shipped in mid-December. Are you thinking that late, or do you think it happens? No, I'm thinking fall. I'm thinking September or October. Okay.
    48:06
    You are not alone. A lot of people seem to be suspecting that. Yeah, that would be my guess. and that because if they do it in september or october that leaves them a slot that december slot if they've got something else to drop into it do you think a boutique comes out this year like a kapow title like a batman 66 it could and if it does i think it'd be in that december slot okay interesting we will have to wait and see but what we don't have to wait and see is an email we got from emails that's right not at the beginning no this one because this one was uh this one's it's not it's almost a game so so i wanted to stick it here towards the end of the pinball segment so ben m wrote in to us with an idea for a pinball theme and you know we've had a few instances where you and i have put together themes on the fly or or discussed concepts and this very much and i don't know if ben had heard this but once upon a time we had a pinball the pinball theme that you really put that one together. I don't remember what it was. It was very jokey and kind of mean. This will be right up your alley, Ben. Here's what Ben wrote. It's somewhat long, so let me put on my Ben voice. Here is an idea for a pin side or pinball hobby themed pinball machine.
    49:28
    Now he's going to list a bunch of stuff. These are all from his email. System 3 Gottlieb flippers. Back to the Future Mode I love Back to the Future Mode Just shooting the ramp with a callout I love Back to the Future Deep Root Mode As your value increase The more points you lose Kaneda Mode Just keeps adding more balls Until you have 20 on the playfield Bland Williams Fan Layout Code that gets buggy as time goes on Every update makes the machine worse.
    50:08
    Stock clip art on the play field and plastics. Oh, it still needs to have the watermarks. Just that's my own addition. Imager. Yeah.
    50:19
    Bonus value that disappears after you drain. Trash is the player for being a newbie. Two lit spinners for 10,000 points. Don't worry about anything else. David Gottlieb Bash Toy A confused collection of pinball YouTubers and podcaster callouts That tell you the wrong thing The beep About any pinball company Mode tells us how Bad a company is by raising The meter value and cash it in When the game company goes bankrupt Guess the next theme From your local blockbuster and lose points if you're wrong.
    51:05
    Top 100 score does not change, but the machine gives the new player first place every single time. Crappy soundtrack from badly covered popular oddists.
    51:17
    MSRP at four times its actual value. Upgrading to the highest end model gets you an R package done by a room full of five-year-olds.
    51:28
    Beer drippings down the side of your cabinet. legs reinforced to keep from nudging every third word is a cuss word and swearing shots brick and end up nowhere on the play field got any suggestions on what to add thank you for your time, Ben M well thank you Ben for the email I hope I did it reasonable justice I didn't understand all of these references I don't know why we would have a bash toy of David Gottlieb specifically I'm trying to remember what the name of the guy was who ran Williams into the ground or I should say ran Williams out of the pinball business was that I don't think it was a Gottlieb it was some other guy surely not a Gottlieb over at Williams but anyway he had a lot of really clever ideas I think my favorite ones would be obviously as podcasters I liked the call outs that tell you the wrong thing because we do that a lot We get things wrong a lot. So that's fair. As Joel Engelberth of Triple J Pinball Podcast would say, that's fair.
    52:36
    I also was a pretty big fan about the one where you get to tell how bad the company is going to do and then you get everything when it goes bankrupt.
    52:49
    That's a good – yeah. What would you add? I tried to really go in the pin side. I have to be careful. That would be one there. You have to hit the shots to criticize Pinside, but you don't want to go too far or else Pinside will call you out. You've got to keep it just below.
    53:09
    Like Price is Right, you don't want to go over. You've got to get as close as you can without going over. As close as you can without going over. I really like the crappy soundtrack from Badly Covered Popular Artist because in my mind it's just like the kids bop of soundtracks.
    53:23
    You could do that with Callouts too. as we guardians our bubbly bobo. Let's see. Suggestions on what to add. I would, there should be a thing where you game the Pinside Top 100, try and push all the stuff you own up to the Top 100, and then criticize how wrong the Pinside Top 100 is also. It's kind of like a dual mode role in that mode that you need. I'd definitely do that.
    53:55
    there should also be a hurry up. Well, the tech threads are good. That's a good one for Pinside. When everyone criticizes Pinside, even people who hate Pinside, they'll always say, well, but the tech, just stay to the tech threads. Tech threads are good. So you got to have the tech thread hurry up. Tech threads are good.
    54:15
    To be fair, tech threads are good. They deserve a hurry up. Good tech threads. I guess. So got to do that. Probably, if you're really going forum-oriented, you have to have the, you've only been here X period of time, under a year, one year. It's never enough. It's kind of like, we've got to call that David Fix mode. You haven't been in the hobby enough. Because he had an early interview when he joined American Pinball. He had made some criticisms of people critiquing games and companies who hadn't been in the hobby long enough.
    54:47
    So that one's always. You understand when you're an older boy. You've got to have that. People call it the David Fix term. So you've got to have your five years or whatever David said before you're allowed to really have commentary. So I'd say put that in. You should also probably have maybe a mode about not having a heart on Pennside. If you haven't donated to Pennside, people will call you out for, I guess, not giving the money. You use it. Why don't you pay for it? Yeah, or if your heart's gone gray. Why is your heart gray?
    55:19
    Because that's when you're no longer active. but you've donated in the past, you still get recognition. But in a way, it's a badge of shame. Why aren't you still giving money? Now that we've moved away from pen side, Somebody's got to get cut. Yeah. Did more of the company mode stuff. There's definitely a, you've got to have a pick the wrong theme. Like, what will we do? Combine original with sequel equal fail.
    55:45
    Have like a choose your house, but you choose a pinball company and they give you different things. So, like, if you choose JJP, you're only allowed one multiball, period, throughout your entire gameplay because they only put out one game every several years. But you have a better light show and better sound. Where if you go with stern mode, you get a bunch of multiballs, but the light shows aren't as good, everything else is lower, point score is a little lower. You go with American, nothing makes any sense, and there's lots of alcohol references, and then it just stops working occasionally. And then when you go with spooky, parts of the play field just collapse.
    56:31
    These are very elaborate machines. I was just like imagining with spooky, it has to spray your face with hot glue. I mean, you'll be burned. You'll be burned. but thematically it's so on point.
    56:49
    With Stern, the coil stops have to quit working and your flippers have to buzz incessantly. Occasionally things are just broken. And of course, with JJP, the play field's got to chip. It's got to happen. It just has to come out of it. You only get to play one game and it's kind of like ruined after that.
    57:10
    With Pinside, there needs to be like this ultimate super uber wizard mode where as you build through the uber wizard mode of the pin side version the game just gets hotter and hotter and hotter until it finally bursts into flames and burns down your house i know well we're gonna get what what about the little like Do we put in like Pinball Brothers and stuff? I mean. Too small.
    57:40
    The boutique fans are going to be mad if we. Then you just put in a single mode that's called boutique mode, and it's got different things that you activate for the different ones. You activate Pinball Brothers, and it steals all the money out of your pocket before it starts going. You activate Deep Root, and it screams and cusses at you, and then takes Grandma's pension and collapses.
    58:02
    Grandma calls you when you play. Where's my pension? I saw her grandma at the gate and took it. It's got some really elaborate API that's tied into your bank somehow.
    58:14
    Okay. Well, thank you, Ben. I don't think we took it in the direction you wanted. We made it much worse. We did what we did. We enjoyed what you made. It was very good. So let us end with Rumor Corner.
    58:35
    Rumor Corner. Dennis Creasel's got the news before Napa Caves. Is that right, Tony? Yeah.
    58:49
    So, on this week's Rumor Corner, we have a couple. Actually, well, I have one. I say a couple because I actually have a rumor already for next. I mentioned, ever since we got the song, the rumors have been coming in. And I'm banking them. Like I'm saving rumors so that I don't have to work too hard. So we've got rumors for the slow weeks where we don't have other ones. I just keep a list of the rumors I'm hearing, and then I just start running through them. So I have a rumor for our next episode. After that, I'm going to get a little dry. So guys and gals, send us your rumors. Email it. Click thegamerspodcast.gmail.com. And just put in the subject rumor corner, and then you can put your rumor in there. And don't worry, we won't name you because it's rumor corner. We're not saying it's truth. We're saying it's rumors. So here's a rumor We've talked a bit about Jersey Jack Pinball And you're going to be able to have a field day with this one, Tony Because I am hearing a rumor That they have secured the Matrix as a license You mean Matrix 4 I do mean Matrix 4, apparently So The one where Keanu's like They're probably like We want you to be Neo again And he's like, I play John Wick now, this beard ain't going And they're like Okay, we'll somehow try and make it work I haven't seen the new Matrix. I heard it was all right, but nothing to write home about.
    60:09
    From what I heard the new Matrix is the Wachowskis were told we going to make a Matrix with or without you Are you in and do whatever you want or we do what we want So the Wachowskis came in and they made it intentionally what it is, which is not good. Okay. I had not heard that. Interesting.
    60:31
    So what do you think about? There is a Matrix pin homebrew. I think it was essentially a re-theme of Johnny Mnemonic. Which would make sense. And so, yeah, it does. And so beyond that, what are your thoughts?
    60:48
    I don't. It's such a dated license. It's not a cult classic. I don't think it has the nostalgia. The first film does. Maybe. The first film is pretty loved because it was, I mean, the first film is really, the first one is the only one I own. because to me, the Wachowskis, in my non-movie-making critical judgment, bought into the philosophical, like, we're doing something really intelligentsia here and just went way down the rabbit hole and bought into themselves a little too much. It was like when Battlestar Galactica, the reboot, was on TV, and then it was so good, and then everyone was like, this is the greatest drama on television right now. And then the showrunners were like, we are the greatest drama on television, and now we must turn this into a union dispute, and everything is going to be drama. It's just like they bought into their own crap so much. And then they had Law & Order at DSD. And so they had these interesting philosophical, like what is reality and all that, with the Matrix that people were pointing out, these philosophical questions. And then that's what the next two became, instead of just being like a cool sci-fi show with some interesting underpinnings. Right. Plus the terrible CG agent Smith's kind of ruined the next two. But that's just me. Like they got progressively worse. They did get progressively worse. The Animatrix was really good, though. So let me set that aside. But that's like a completely different thing. Anyway. The question is, if you were going to grab a movie with Keanu Reeves as the primary, is The Matrix the one you would grab? No, you'd grab John Wick. You'd have to grab John Wick, right? Yeah. I mean, it's not only – It's still current. It's current. It's super popular. It's obviously going to be one of those movies that are at least the first one, but as probably the first several that is always going to be out there. It's always going to be a reference just because what it did with the kind of sad state that the action genre had really gotten into and how it kind of course corrected for all of that in my mind. Yeah. Overall, I think Matrix isn't a bad pick, but it's not a great pick. I mean, really, would you rather have a Matrix movie or a Point Break movie? I mean... Really? I have seen Matrix more than Point Break. There's a lot of really cool things in Matrix. I just don't know how it translates in pinball, necessarily. so I mean you can't have I am an FBI agent mode in Matrix so there's that I don't know and I know it's unfair it's completely unfair well no I think it's a little fair but I can't help after Toy Story 4 but feel like J.J.P. won't do the first movie they're going to do something else they'll do the most recent they'll make a mistake you don't think they've learned their lesson I doubt I think when you have Jack going out on shows and talking about how quickly they sold out of a thousand CEs that they don't feel they had a lesson to learn.
    64:15
    I don't know. It is weird to me. My question to you isn't really whether you agree that Matrix is smart or not. It's just, are you room retained? I'm always room retained.
    64:28
    That's it for the pinball section. We can move on. Do you have joy for us? I have joy as we break into video games. There is all sorts of wonderful, wonderfulness.
    64:43
    We're going to open with one of our favorite topics, NFTs. And I wasn't originally going to put either of these in, but they're so opposite of each other that I felt like they played off each other really well. Minecraft developer Majang laid out their policy on NFTs they're not allowing them inside the game they're not allowing them adjacent to the game they put out a blog post and said and I quote to ensure that Minecraft players have a safe and inclusive experience blockchain technologies are not permitted to be integrated inside our client and server applications nor may Minecraft in-game content such as worlds, skins, persona items, or other mods be utilized by blockchain technology to create a scarce digital asset. Scarce. Scarce digital asset. I like scarce. Scarce. It's scarce.
    65:44
    Scarce. Yeah, they basically laid out their rules that doesn't even allow people to do the adjacencies because some companies were doing adjacent stuff where if you did certain things on their Minecraft server, you would receive an out-of-game NFT.
    66:07
    And they basically loaded it up and saying, like, nah, no, we're not doing that. Okay. So that's the one side. That's the one side. That's the happy side. What's the dark side? Square Enix. Do it. Square? Makers of Final Fantasy XIV? They are. They are releasing more NFTs as part of the Final Fantasy VII 25th anniversary celebration. Oh, my, why? They're putting out trading cards, which will have NFT versions that you can get. They're putting out NFTs based upon that. They're putting out fancy, expensive action figures.
    66:48
    And the deluxe versions of the action figures come with NFTs that you can get. So that if you want to look at your action figure on your phone, you can. and you know it's your exact action figure because it's your NFT. They are still talking about doing blockchain directly tied in gaming, though not for Final Fantasy XVI because it's too early and XVI is too far along. Yes, far too far. But they're saying there's a future for it. So you're saying there's a chance. They're saying there's a chance. It's just so opposite Of The Of each other It's just a beautiful balance to me I mean it's no surprise Square has been talking about this for a while It still just makes me sad though Final Fantasy 7 Is a game Where you're fighting Against the giant corporation That is Destroying the planet through how it operates.
    67:55
    And the company that put out the game about that is now putting out NFTs with a blockchain line that is saying that they're hoping to be carbon neutral by the 2030s if they still exist. So they're putting out a line of more stuff to destroy the... It's a self-fulfilling prophecy. I guess. I guess that's why on the chants with the one-winged angel guy would come out in the seven game. They would always chant, sippy block.
    68:34
    Sippy block. In a teaser every week, we've got a teaser to tease. Sippy block. crypto bros it's time to go we watch it flow environment woes okay yeah we'll see uh square is just yeah oh it's so sad i loved them so much as a ute they still have some really good stuff. They went back and saved Final Fantasy 14. They did. It's still doing great. They've got lots of hope. But then they also put out stuff like Avengers. I can see where they thought somehow that would work. They think they're going to save it because they're putting out beachwear outfits for them now.
    69:35
    Is this dead or alive? Apparently. Avengers Extreme Beach Volleyball. Yay! Boop Next they're going to put out the dating sim visual novel event Alright EA has confirmed that in addition to having removed the Russian teams from FIFA 22 after the Ukrainian crisis There is no Russian teams or clubs going to be allowed in FIFA 23 in addition to bringing in the women's clubs of FIFA into FIFA 23. Okay. So that's something fun there from EA.
    70:28
    Let's go with the, you want to call them the bad boy rock star, one of the original software developers. John Romero. Oh, that is a blast from the past. I know we talked about him several episodes ago because he's putting out an autobiography. Yes. But now he has come out and revealed that he's working on a new first-person shooter with an unnamed publisher that is going to be based on an original new IP and based upon all of his stuff since he's left id Software. We should see it sometime in 2044. This could be very exciting It's by Katana I was thinking tri-Katana Tri-Katana For those of you who don't know The video game history John Romero was one of the original developers With id Software So he worked with Doom and Quake He split off From them and started a new company and was developing a game called Die Katana that was going to be like everything. It was supposed to be the best of everything and have all these new. Yeah, this was back when, for those that weren't gaming in the 90s and the early 2000s, the technology was pushing so fast, so aggressively. like being the first to achieve things like, uh, transparent water or mirrors that would reflect your character. Like these were milestones and companies would achieve this stuff. And then they would try and do the next we've never seen before. So it's not like now where it's like we move from one gen to the next and the graphics have gotten a little better, but they're already all really good. Yeah. Like it was just, and, and Romero was him and Carmack. Like they were both like equally famous at it. and Rockstar was a fair thing he was a rockstar we went to QuakeCon in 1997 I think and I mean there was a QuakeCon this was like a mind blowing thing yeah and it was the big huge thing and that game just kept not coming out and a controversial ad campaign and all sorts of terrible issues And then eventually it came out and it was practically unplayable because the AI was incompetent. Yeah.
    73:09
    Cutting edge. AI characters that will fight with you. Well, on paper. On paper they did. In theory. In reality, they got themselves stuck and died a lot.
    73:19
    So we'll see. I just thought it was interesting for the simple fact that I've not heard about Romero in years and years and years. I thought he was retired out of this. For it to have popped up twice in the last few months, his name, it was weird to me.
    73:37
    Nintendo, we've known for a while now that they're building towards the shutdown of the eShops for the 3DS and the Wii U. And they've given us the dates finally. That'll be on March 27th of 2023. They will shut down the ability to make new purchases in those eShops. Though for the foreseeable future, the shops will remain open for those people who've made purchases to download stuff.
    74:02
    So you're not losing things that you don't have downloaded. They're just not going to let you buy anything new. And the deadline to add eShop funds to those stores is the 29th of August. So once that's done and passed, you won't be able to get anything else for those games. I mean, I haven't bought anything from either of those eShops. Well, one of them ever was used at this stage. But hey, they're giving you a warning.
    74:30
    Sony's also confirmed that their acquisition of Bungie is now complete. Bungie is now a member of the PlayStation community. Their investigation by the feds went very fast, that it wasn't a big issue. So that's done, and Bungie is now officially part of Sony.
    74:49
    And we finally have a release date for Bayonetta 3. I heard about this. Now, this was, Bayonetta 3 was one of those games that was teased when, like, shortly after, if not before, the Switch was originally released. They were talking about the Bayonetta games and Bayonetta 3. Mm-hmm. And then it kind of went radio silent. But it's back, and they have a release date for it, which is on the 28th of October this year. But they've also added to Bayonetta 3 a family-friendly mode called Naive Angel Mode.
    75:25
    And what it does is in Bayonetta, her outfits are literally her hair. So when she changes types of combat or does special magic, she becomes naked because her hair flies off of her body to change into a different costume or to do other stuff. Yes. with this family friendly version she stays clothed when all of that happens and also the other characters and demonic forms and stuff are more covered so they're slightly less risky they have modesty stickers added to them I don't know what that's going to do because quite frankly the story and the jokes in the game are pretty mature they don't put stickers on those jokes the subtitles will have stickers over them Subtitles will have the pixelated blur out. The blur mouth, too.
    76:20
    So, yeah, I don't know how much more family-friendly it's going to really be. It just means there's going to be less skin. They may be just assuming with the less skin, like, it's like, okay, aren't most people going to still understand it and be like, well, we're calling it naive ain't also. We're assuming that your child plane is relatively sheltered. Yeah. And to be fair, with some of the changes that have happened, this might be a mode that is needed because for certain regions it might be locked on.
    76:53
    Because I know there's been a big push on editing video games assets in China to have more coverage and less skin exposed. But aren't they only supposed to play like three hours a day or something like that? It affects their social scores. And yeah, but it is definitely something that could be part of the driving force to it. I'm not sure.
    77:24
    And because we had a really long pinball segment, we're going to finish up real quick here. I thought it's interesting. Nintendo issued a warning with the high temperatures worldwide the last several weeks. They issued a warning to Switch owners to play the Switch only on temperatures of no more than 35 degrees Celsius, which is 95 degrees Fahrenheit, or else you run the risk of the system's temperature safeties cutting in and dropping the machine into sleep mode to keep it protected. Because it's not necessarily the thing you want to be playing at the beach when it's 110. Yeah. I don't know why you'd be playing it at the beach anyway. I don't. Salt water and sand seem like it'd be a really bad idea. I started thinking, well, maybe people like waiting for the bus outside. Stuff like that. Well, and people, a lot of places, the heat has been really high in a lot of places where they don't normally have air conditioning. Like England. Yep. So it would be a really big deal to stuff like that. Focus on survival right now, not saving the castle or whatever you do in the Nintendo games. I mean, the princess is always in another castle.
    78:39
    But that is our video games for today. Well, then that's our show for the day. All done. We're all done. We'll say, as a reminder, you can always reach out to us. You can email us, eclecticgamerspodcast at gmail.com. Or you can go to facebook.com. There's a messenger tool there at facebook.com slash eclecticgamerspodcast that you can use. We're available on Twitch, Twitter, and Instagram as eclectic underscore gamers. Speaking of which. What are we speaking of which about? I have been considering starting to do some more, to go back to doing some video gaming and posting. Not Battletech, though I could. But a game I've talked about in the past multiple times. Not that one. Rule the Waves has its third version coming out. And it's going to be released on Steam. So it's easily accessible by other people. Yeah. So I've been considering when that version comes out in October, starting to do some more. For that game, I'd probably do recordings and editing. Oh, maybe use the YouTube then. And maybe use the YouTube.
    79:48
    Because a lot like the Battletech, it would be long sessions that has big parts. You could just play the parts faster and go...
    79:59
    Yeah, exactly. I can put all that stuff in there. But that's just a thing I'm thinking about. So if people are still here and have thoughts about that, let me know. Yeah, let them know. Until a couple weeks from now, my name is Dennis. I am Tony. Goodbye, everybody. Peace.