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Episode 17 – PAPA Goes Pump & Dump

Slam Tilt Podcast·podcast_episode·analyzed·Nov 3, 2016
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claude-haiku-4-5-20251001 · $0.032

TL;DR

Slam Tilt covers PAPA 20 format overhaul, Stern rewards expansion, and mysterious Batman LE production surge.

Summary

In this Slam Tilt Podcast episode, hosts Ron Hallett and Bruce Nightingale discuss major pinball industry news, including Pinberg 2017 dates and ticket sales, Stern's expanded rewards program for IFPA players, an unannounced 100 additional Batman Limited Edition machines, and significant format changes to PAPA 20 (April 5-9, 2017): the Papa format tournament style is being replaced with 'Pump and Dump' (play your top 6 scores), entry prices are changing, and free play will now require a $20/day admission instead of token-based play. The hosts analyze community reactions, with elite A Division players opposing the format change while lower divisions and casual players support it.

Key Claims

  • PAPA 20 will be April 5-9, 2017 and will use the 'Pump and Dump' format instead of the traditional Papa format

    high confidence · Ron and Bruce citing official PAPA announcement posted on Facebook and Tilt Forums

  • There will be another 100 Batman Limited Edition machines announced (making total 340 if including prior 30 SLEs and 240 LEs)

    medium confidence · Stern's Facebook page post by the company running the coffee table book, confirmed by Bruce; Ron could not find other sources

  • The Papa format change is due to financial unsustainability and was the lowest-rated format in player surveys

    high confidence · Mark Steinman (Replay Foundation president) quoted directly in Tilt Forums thread

  • PAPA expenses for 2014 Pinberg were $137,149 and for PAPA 17 were $146,543

    high confidence · Tim Sexton (Timmy) citing Replay Foundation's published financial records from 2014

  • Elite A Division players (Keith Elwin, Kaylee George, Adam Becker, Kevin Burrell, Carl D'Angelo) opposed the format change

    high confidence · Tilt Forums thread discussion cited by Bruce

  • PAPA 20 will now charge $20/day for free play admission instead of token-based coin drop

    high confidence · Official PAPA 20 announcement details discussed by Ron and Bruce

  • Stern expanded the rewards program eligible games list to include KISS Pro/Premium, Walking Dead Pro, WWE Pro, Metallica Pro, and Game of Thrones Pro/Premium

    high confidence · Stern's official rewards program list discussed by hosts

  • A Division entry cost structure changed from ~$25/entry to $5 per attempt or 3 attempts for $12

    high confidence · Official PAPA 20 pricing structure discussed by Ron and Bruce

Notable Quotes

  • “I think Stern needs to understand the meaning of the word limited edition. Yeah, I totally agree with you. See, limited edition means they only make so many. It doesn't mean you sell out, and then say, okay, let's make some more. You see, that's a premium.”

    Bruce Nightingale @ ~17:00 — Core criticism of Stern's approach to Batman LE production; defines the fundamental tension between 'limited' and 'unlimited' production

  • “It takes away a lot of the nuance of the full entry, like trying to play in the Papa style. You could play entries that the only reason you're playing is to try to knock other people down, to try to preserve your spot, which I thought was cool. This is more like you're just trying to get the highest score you can on every game.”

    Ron Hallett @ ~45:00 — Articulates the strategic depth difference between Papa format (consistency-focused) and Pump and Dump (high-score chasing)

  • “We've never made a change or decision that people didn't complain about. I've listened to more people crap all over the Papa format in the last several years than I can count...It's disgusting to me that after all Papa has done and given and all the money it has lost attempting to grow pinball, that it still doesn't ever get the benefit of the doubt.”

    Mark Steinman, Replay Foundation President @ ~55:00 — Direct response to format complaints; provides context for why PAPA leadership made the change despite elite player opposition

  • “He's going to be like, what? Huh? You kidding? I'm not paying $60. We're only going to be here for a couple hours. That's where I see there's going to be an issue.”

    Ron Hallett @ ~70:00 — Highlights concern about how $20/day admission impacts casual/family attendees vs. hardcore competitors

  • “I would like to see limitations of entries, not in A, B, C or D. I would like to see it in Classics...I would actually pay more for an entry in Classics, but limit each person to so many entries.”

    Bruce Nightingale @ ~80:00 — Proposes alternative solution to Classics queue issues rather than game expansion alone

  • “If Keith Elwin said he's not going, then maybe I would care, but a lot of – Yeah, or even Josh or Zach. Yes, and you know they're going.”

Entities

Ron HallettpersonBruce NightingalepersonMark SteinmanpersonTim SextonpersonKeith ElwinpersonBowen CairnspersonKaylee GeorgepersonAdam BeckerpersonKevin Burrellperson

Signals

  • ?

    competitive_signal: PAPA 20 format change from Papa (consistency-based, limited entries) to Pump and Dump (high-score chasing, unlimited entries) fundamentally alters competitive strategy and rewards different player strengths

    high · Official PAPA 20 announcement; detailed discussion of rules differences and elite player opposition on Tilt Forums

  • $

    market_signal: Batman LE production expanded from announced 240 to potentially 340+ units; undermines 'limited edition' scarcity value and collector FOMO

    medium · Stern Facebook post by coffee table book company mentioning 100 additional LEs; no official Stern clarification; prior instances of 30 SLEs becoming 80, then 240

  • ?

    product_strategy: PAPA 20 changes entry pricing structure across divisions (A Division cheaper per attempt but minimum 6 games required; B/C Division increased per-attempt costs) and adds $20/day venue admission

    high · Official PAPA 20 pricing announcement; detailed breakdown by division and entry type

  • ?

    community_signal: Clear divide in community reaction: elite A Division players (Keith Elwin, Carl D'Angelo, etc.) oppose format for strategic reasons; lower divisions and casual players support it for accessibility and gameplay variety

    high · Tilt Forums thread with multiple named elite players opposing change; separate sentiment from B/C Division players mentioned as supportive

  • ?

    business_signal: Replay Foundation's PAPA/Pinberg tournaments are financially unsustainable under Papa format; format change motivated by financial concerns and sponsorship model dependency on Pear Networks

Transcript

groq_whisper · $0.257

0:00
Yeah, I just want to know how to turn off autocomplete when I type in my password. Yes, yes. I understand your frustration.
0:07
Did you unplug your computer, ma'am? No. What does that have to do with anything? I'm sorry, I've only been working here a short distance.
0:15
How was the weather in Biloxi? How the hell should I know? I live in Cleveland. I understand your frustration.
0:23
That's cool. Coming to you from beautiful upstate New York, this is the Slam Tilt Podcast, a show about all things pinball. I'm Ron Hallett, here with my co-host, Bruce Nightingale. Yes, Mr. Number One, how are you doing? Excellent, and welcome to Episode 17, Insurrection. Star Trek, my favorite thing of all time, except for when I'm Professor X, and that'll be later on, maybe. Professor X, Xavier, yes. Well, Insurrection, which one? Okay, that's not the Borg one, right? No, it is not. That's the one after the Borg. The one after the Borg, this is Paradise, where they find Paradise. No, wait a minute. No, that was Generations. They find the Nexus. No, they find Paradise. So this is the same thing? No, it's totally different, totally different. Totally different, okay. There's a mineral on this planet that stops aging and helps human beings last longer, and they all want it, and that's where they're fighting over.
1:38
Good stuff. All right. Never seen it. Okay, great. Great. Way to work for the podcast, guys and girls. So how is everyone doing? Everyone? Everyone out in podcast world. I don't know. We'd have to ask them. Well, I'm asking. Please tell us. I'm doing fine. I'm doing fine, too.

Ron Hallett @ ~95:00 — Suggests that elite players' actual attendance matters more than their public complaints

  • “Unlike a lot of places, almost every time I went to Papa and something was wrong, it was always fixed the next year...And so they've changed things. They're going by what people are saying. So, they're appealing to the masses.”

    Ron Hallett @ ~100:00 — Defends PAPA's track record of responsiveness and context for format/venue changes

    • Carl D'Angelo
    person
    Zach Sharpeperson
    Josh Sharpeperson
    Steve Bowdenperson
    Big John Plogleperson
    Gary Sternperson
    Stern Pinballcompany
    Replay Foundationorganization
    Pear Networkscompany
    PAPA 20event
    Pinberg 2017event
    Batman (Stern Limited Edition)game
    Game of Thrones (Stern)game
    Texas Pinball Festivalevent
    Tilt Forumsorganization

    high · Tim Sexton's financial analysis of Replay Foundation's published records; Mark Steinman's quote acknowledging format was unsustainable

  • ?

    event_signal: PAPA 20 planning to implement digital queuing system via Drains Tournament Manager software to address expected queue congestion from Pump and Dump format and expanded Classics division

    medium · Bruce and Ron discussing planned queuing system implementation; reference to Carl D'Angelo's software capabilities and precedent at other tournaments like Buffalo event

  • ?

    operational_signal: New $20/day admission policy may reduce casual/family attendance at PAPA; families previously budgeting $20-30 tokens across multiple family members now face $60+ admission just to enter venue

    high · Ron's detailed scenario about family attending with multiple children; concern about door management and wristband systems

  • ~

    sentiment_shift: Named elite A Division players publicly expressed opposition to format change on Tilt Forums, breaking from typical passive acceptance of PAPA decisions

    high · Multiple named players (Keith Elwin, Kaylee George, Adam Becker, Kevin Burrell, Carl D'Angelo) explicitly opposing; some suggesting lower prize pool as alternative

  • ?

    venue_signal: Pump and Dump format expected to exacerbate queue lines at popular games; game selection (Grand Prix, Nitro Groundshaker) will drive all traffic to 4-5 machines; expanded Classics game count unlikely to solve congestion

    high · Bruce's analysis of queue behavior patterns at previous Classics divisions; prediction of queue concentration on high-scoring games regardless of game expansion

  • ?

    licensing_signal: Stern's expanded rewards program now includes KISS, Walking Dead, WWE, Metallica, and Game of Thrones licenses; indicates Stern's current active licensed IP portfolio and manufacturing priorities

    high · Official Stern rewards program eligible games list provided by Bruce

  • ?

    announcement: Pinberg 2017 officially scheduled for July 27-30, 2017; ticket sales begin December 3 (Saturday)

    high · Official Pinberg announcement cited by Bruce

  • ?

    industry_signal: Apparent communication breakdown between Stern's executive management and manufacturing side regarding Batman LE production; contact attempts by Bruce yielded only cryptic 'Really?' text response

    medium · Bruce's anecdote about reaching out to unnamed Stern contact and receiving evasive response; subsequent link sent to contact went unanswered

    • 2:04
    That was bizarre. Okay, after that, I almost prefer the number two on my face introduction after that. Oh, my. Oh, wow, yeah, that didn't sound right. No, that didn't sound right at all. Oh, no. Let's bring it back to pinball here. We've got a full doc and a crap to talk about. Oh, boy. Action-packed episode. Yes, yes, we do. So why don't you start? What do you want to talk about first?
    2:31
    Pinberg announced the dates today. Okay, and they are? July 27th through the 30th of 2017. But the more important thing is, when do the tickets go on sale? December 3rd. So everyone will be sitting at their computers. I think December 3rd this year is? Probably a Sunday. I think it's a, well, it's a Saturday. Okay. Well, what is the – did they give a time yet? Not yet. I haven't seen one yet as of 8.30 Eastern. So big news. Big news on that. Okay. Another piece of news. Stern's reward program, the eligible game list for IFPA players, has been expanded.
    3:17
    Okay. What exactly does that mean? What is the Stern Rewards Program? Oh, God. You're going to make me read a whole thing? Yeah, yeah. Well, I have no idea what it is. You don't know what it is. Wow, I'm a fail. Nope. Okay.
    3:29
    The IFPA, there's one of three ways to qualify for Stern's reward program. One is to be the IFPA announced player of the month. That player is the one who's earned the most Whopper points for that month. Okay. Number two is being one of the three biggest movers for a month. These players are who moved up the most positions in the world pinball. The biggest movers. For any given month. The players who have taken the biggest dump. Yes. I do it all the time. You should be like permanent champion or something. I am. We'll talk about that a little later on. Oh, great.
    4:05
    And number three, we both are eligible for this part, be the top 1,000 in the world Whopper rankings.
    4:14
    Okay. At the end of each calendar year. You and myself both are, plus a couple of our fans. So you get a cheaper price on a pinball machine. and you have to talk to a IFPA. They send you to a distributor that they deal with, and you get a cheaper price for the games. Now, a couple of weeks ago, the games were less than what they are now, as in not price-wise, but as eligible games. Well, they've expanded the list now, where the games that are available for this, for one of those three qualifying setups, is KISS Pro, KISS Premium, The Walking Dead Pro Now I know you're going to be interested in this one WWE Pro I know you are Okay I'm really interested Well you know brother I can't wait to get that one too Yeah Metallica Pro Game of Thrones Pro Or Game of Thrones Premium Game of Thrones Pro That would be interesting It would be So you get it cheaper because you're good at pinball Is that the idea? Yes, and to reward people who play more and everything like that who are playing pinball. So this is different than the Stern Army? Yes, this is totally different than the Stern Army. This program has been around for years, but this is the game of the list that is out now. So it's actually – it helps Stern move some pinball machines, and it gives the players who play more, more chances to buy pinball machines, which is nice. Very nice, very nice. news, a couple more things. I just showed Ron this, and Ron was actually kind of surprised by this piece of article on Facebook, Stern's Facebook page. I wasn't necessarily surprised. I just was surprised I hadn't heard about it yet. Yes, I was surprised there hasn't been a firestorm about it lately either. It's with the company that's running the thing we were critical about last week of the coffee table pinball book announced that there are there's gonna be another 100 le games that's all they state on stern's facebook page okay okay this this is for the the batman i'm assuming i have to assume they don't say it but it's the only pinball machine they didn't say it but the only pinball machine that they have not made le's for so i think stern needs to understand the meaning of the word limited edition. Yeah, I totally agree with you. See, limited edition means they only make so many. It doesn't mean you have so many, you sell out, and then say, okay, let's make some more. You see, that's a premium. Yes. You see, not an LE. I think they heard, you know, that Jack was going to make so many LEs that maybe they thought, hey, we could maybe get away with 100. I don't know what the thought process is behind it, but I don't know if it's now 240 to 340. I can't find anything else except for on Stern's Facebook page from the company that's making this coffee book stating that there's 100 more LEs out there. So there was originally 30 super LEs, and then that mysteriously became 80. And I think the first time that came out, there was an interview with Gary Stern where he just said 80. Yep. And people were like, oh, he must have misspoke. Then it was 240 LEs, which all sold out. Yep. And now I see that there's possibly another hundred of LEs, which would only be this one unless it's Ghostbusters, which they're still making a couple left, but I can't see them pissing off even more of their clients. Oh, maybe we can. So it has to be. It has to be Batman. It really does. So now there's 340 being made.
    8:01
    I don't understand it. I hope we get an answer from somebody with the no. I put my feeler out, and I got nothing back. this time. So that was kind of weird. Also, I never get nothing. He was the person when I left the voicemail, all I got was a text back saying, really?
    8:19
    And then I pointed to the, I typed in the link, you know, I copied and pasted the link and sent it to him and never heard anything back. So that was, do you ever get the feeling executive management really isn't in communication with the manufacturing side? I don't know. It just, it just was like, really? So that was a big piece of news. I was really surprised about that.
    8:41
    And as I also said, I didn't see many people talking about it. Oh, one more side note on Stern Pinball, and it was kind of funny. My wife is in accounting. She actually has a degree in accounting or something like that. And Stern also posted that they're looking for an accounts payable and accounts receivable person for working at Stern Pinball. All right. So I told her she should definitely try to do that, and she said, are we moving to Chicago? I would definitely move for that. That would be a cool gig to have my wife saying, you know, I work for Stern Pinball. That would be kind of cool. Then you'd be in the middle of, like, one of the biggest pinball scenes there is. I would be. Yes, you would. But I would miss my buddy, my brother.
    9:24
    I'd be visiting him at Expo, and that would be it. Yeah, you would have free room and board there. That's true. Wouldn't have to stay at the ridiculously overpriced Westin. Yes, you would not have to. And there's one more piece of news, but I'm going to let Ron lead with this piece of news because I have not actually been able to read all. I've only been able to read some of the comments. I'm going to let Ron take this last piece of news that I have. He knows what I'm talking about. So, Ron, take it over. Take it over. Okay. I was on Facebook and saw a post from John and Brett Plogle. Help me.
    10:03
    Yes. Big John. We'll just call him Big John. He's the one that's actually playing fishtails in the water. Yeah, yeah. If you watch any of the Papa videos, you'll know Big John. He posted this because it was on Papa's site, and he posted, like, I don't really know how I feel about this, and it was just a link. So I clicked on it, and I'm like, I wonder what he's talking about. and Papa 20, which will be April 5th through the 9th, 2017,
    10:37
    will be Papa, the World Championships, like it is every year, except it's not like it is every year. There are some big changes that have occurred. How big are they? Yes, I mean, there's two major changes. I'll get, let's get with the little changes first that mean really nothing. Well, one that will piss my dad off, but he said he was retired from tournament play, so I don't even know if he's going to Papa. Hopefully we can get him there. Due to reduced demand, no shuttle will be provided for Papa 20.
    11:10
    So he always liked that because he never stayed as late as me, and he'd just take the shuttle back. But, oh, well. Okay, so now the next story. Let's go on to the next. Yeah, the next story. All right. The big change is the format, which the format was generally known as the Papa format, which was a – One of the few places that did it. Yes. I think them and I think the Pittsburgh Pinball Open does it. And actually, back in the day, Allentown did it, back in the day. And I think Florida. I think Florida, one of the people down in Florida said they did it all. Okay. If I remember seeing that. Let's explain the Papa format. The POPL format is most – just take your A bank. We'll just do A.
    11:57
    Typical A bank you would have about how many games would you say? Twelve. So you have twelve games. You buy a entry, which was like $25, I think. Yes, this year was $25. And you get to play – is it five games? Yes, you had to play five. Play five games. and the way it worked is you were judged based upon your entry, like the entire set of games as one entry. So consistency was key. You'd be better off being saying have the 10th highest score on five games than having the highest score on two and then bombing out on the other three. Which is me. It rewarded consistency. It was probably the toughest qualifying format that you'll find. Very frustrating. But when you did qualify, very satisfying. Yes, I only qualified once in, like, I don't know, 10 years. Qualified once in B. It was wonderful. It's awesome.
    13:05
    So that was the big deal. And it's changed for all divisions. They're going to add – oh, okay. Maybe I should say what they changed it to. Yes. What it's going to change to is your classic, they call it Herb style, whatever. It's Pump and Dump. It's Pump and Dump, which if you don't know what that is, it's basically you have a bank of. Most every other tournament. Yeah. You have a bank of, say, what, 12 games. And I think they're doing the, was it six? I think it was six.
    13:34
    So there's 12 games, and you can play all of them. It really doesn't matter. But the key is it's your top six games. So you've got to play at least six. and it's just whatever your score is on that game, you have a rank. So technically, the most points you could have, if you were first place in all six games, it'd be 100 points per and you'd be 600. You have 600 points. So that's the way it works. It takes away a lot of the nuance of the full entry, like trying to play in the Papa style. You could play entries that the only reason you're playing is to try to knock other people down, to try to preserve your spot, which I thought was cool. This is more like you're just trying to get the highest score you can on every game. So you pick a game, like I know I can blow up this game, and you just keep playing it until you blow it up. Then you go to the next one, and you go to the next one. So it promotes people spending a lot of money. That's why it's called pumping and dumping. Which we've talked about a lot. Yes. And it's unlimited. There's no limit. You can play, waste as much money as you want. and that's the the big change and they the pricing the uh price package has gone down instead of like the usual 10 grand to win a division it's like seven grand now the the prices to get to actually do an attempt have have gone up in that the prices are basically for a division we'll do a again five dollars per attempt or three attempts for twelve So since you need at least six games, that means you're going to spend a minimum of $24, which for A Division, if you qualified with one set, we just played six games, you actually saved money in theory. In theory. For A. For B, it actually kind of went up. It's $4 per attempt and then three attempts for $10, so you're going to spend at least $20, when before it was $15. I think C division stayed the same D division is like $1 per attempt so you could just D is where to go man 20 attempts for $20 boom Classics they changed I believe they're going to expand the amount of games I don't remember what it was like 12 to 16 or something and it's going to be your best four scores or best four games for Classics which Classics is always mobbed, so that'll be interesting. I see a situation where, sure, they'll add more games, but people will realize there'll be five or six games that are the ones that are giving up the biggest scores and they'll all play those and end up huge queue lines for those. That's what always happens with that. It sounds good when we're going to have all these games in there, but I'm not going to play 2001 or I'm not going to play this Wood Rail with gobble holes that last two seconds. They're going to play like Grand Prix or something that they feel they have a chance. So that's one thing. I know they expanded the games, but it depends what games they put in it. If they have like eight or nine games that score pretty high or that people are confident in, that could be a good thing. It depends. It's all going to depend on the game selection for that, for Classics. But that is the major change.
    16:56
    What are your thoughts on this? Well, the funny thing is this was first posted on Facebook. Then I was waiting for it on Tilt Forums because Tilt Forums is where all your hardcores hang out, especially a lot of your tournament hardcores.
    17:10
    And sure enough, quickly the topic was started on Tilt Forums. And Bowen was in support of it, Bowen Cairns. Pretty much every other A Division player hated it. Keith Hellman hated it. Kaylee George hated it. Adam Becker, Adam Lefkoff, Kevin Burrell. they all basically hate it.
    17:34
    And some of them even said if the money is the issue lower the prize money. We'd rather have a lower prize pool and keep the format. Or another suggestion I thought was interesting if you want to do pump and dump just make a division the pop of format. And then do pump and dump for the rest of them.
    17:54
    That was the consensus for the most of the upper players But the thing is, they have to cater to a wider base than just your elite of the elite.
    18:08
    And they know better than I do the finances. But the interesting thing is in this same string, and you can go to tillforms.com, you can see all this, our own Timmy, Tim Balls himself, Tim Sexton, who was using actual facts and math in his calculations about the format. But according to his calculations, the format really was not sustainable by the cost.
    18:35
    And the thing is, since Replay Foundation, I believe is the name, who does Papa, is a not-for-profit, they have to publish their balance sheet, like all their financial records.
    18:48
    So Timmy was able to get, he got their records for the 2014 Pinberg and 2014 Papa tournaments. basically the expenses list.
    18:59
    And for example, the PINBURG 2014, which was the last time it was actually at the PAPA facility, the expenses for that were $137,149.
    19:11
    For PAPA 17, it was $146,543. And I'd heard in the past they didn't make any money. And the thing is, a lot of it is financed by Pear Networks, which is Kevin Martin's company, which makes a good amount of money. And I think that's how they were able to do that. But obviously, they didn't think that was sustainable.
    19:37
    And they also said by a lot of the feedback they got from players, which were probably a lot of like your B, C division type players, or players who continually get frustrated with the format, they wanted a change. so they decided to make the change the interesting thing is after all the complaining Mark Steinman who is the president of the Replay Foundation the head guy if you will the top cheese, the big dog he actually put a post on this thread and I'm actually going to quote this try to paraphrase it so it's not too long but this is from Mark Steinman the president of Replay Foundation, the head of the guys who run Papa and Pinnberg.
    20:25
    Basically saying, he says, we've never made a change or decision that people didn't complain about. I've listened to more people crap all over the Papa format in the last several years than I can count. It was literally one of the lowest rated formats in our surveys. I have emails from probably a dozen people in this exact thread who have privately suggested major changes over the years because they weren't happy with the format or how things had been done. These changes were enacted primarily due to both player responses and financial concerns related to the old format. And quite frankly, as a member of this community, it's disgusting to me that after all Papa has done and given and all the money it has lost attempting to grow pinball, that it still doesn't ever get the benefit of the doubt. Also, the Papa format is in some higher calling. It's a pinball format. It's been changed multiple times throughout the years for various reasons.
    21:19
    That was interesting Yeah So I mean for me well there one more change before we get into our opinions on this The other big change, and I think it's actually almost a bigger change, and hardly anyone's mentioned it, they've been focusing on the whole, the format change, is that Papa will no longer, the machines will no longer be on coin drop, on tokens. They will be free play.
    21:48
    But the catch is it will now cost $20 to get in the door, basically like any other pinball show. So it's per day, $20 per day? Yep, $20 per day. So you're already down $60 before him playing one game. That's true. But, see, again, for me, I spend probably at least that every day. So for me, that's going to be awesome. I'm probably going to play more now. Yeah. So instead of playing those seven games of Paragon in a row, now maybe I'll play 14. you know so but they're trying they're trying they're trying to get the people who just come to play yes and where i see an issue is there's a lot of locals who go to this show families yes people who go there say you got like dad bringing his uh his his son and his daughter both love pinball he's taking them to papa because he knows you know this is when they have the tournament and he takes them there every year and it's only open once a year it's only open once a year and he goes in there and he gets like $20 of tokens. He gives $10 to his son, $10 to the daughter and says, go have a blast. Have fun. Thanks, Dad. And they go and play for a couple hours and then, you know, they leave and have a fun time and it's great.
    23:02
    Now the same dude is going to come there, go in the door and they're going to be like, oh, that'll be $60, $20 a piece. He's going to be like, what?
    23:12
    Huh? You kidding? I'm not paying $60. We're only going to be here for a couple hours. That's where I see there's going to be an issue. And I'm assuming they're going to do wristbands or stamps. Then they're going to have to have somebody sitting at the door checking everybody. Which, if you've been at the front door, I mean, that thing is constantly busy. That's going to be a pain in the ass for whoever gets stuck doing that. Yeah.
    23:38
    So, I mean, maybe they'll have discounts for kids. But, I mean, the other interesting thing about that is you have a lot of players. A lot of the A Division guys, for example, like Bowen, I know for a fact, for the most part, and Sharp Brothers, they don't play any other games other than games in the tournament.
    23:57
    I mean, Bowen might play some after the tournament's over, but like the Sharp Brothers, they're playing tournament games only. When the tournament's over, they're gone. They're out of there. And a lot of the top players are like that. Like, as soon as they're done, they leave. Go for dinner or whatever. They don't come back. so for them it's like I'm spending all this money on A division entries and now I also have to pay $20 for free play where I'm not going to use it per day they did have the $5 registration fee that's another thing they waived that it used to be $5 for any division just to basically get in the tournament it was $5 but that was like a one time fee actually it's $80 because it goes Thursday, Friday, Saturday. Oh, that's right. Yeah, so $80. So that's kind of the deal there. That's the part that no one's talking about. I just see, like, the locals. But maybe, I mean, maybe they're gearing it more towards the tournament players and trying to grow tournament pinball.
    25:00
    Okay, so your opinions. I don't really mind it. I mean, I play what I play. I do some entries in B division.
    25:11
    I would never really go crazy. I only made it the one year. And I just like the atmosphere, walking around, playing all the games. Because, you know, I'm not in a pinball scene.
    25:25
    The only games I get to play are my own. So, I mean, I know a lot of these guys, a lot of the top tournament players, most of them are in big pinball areas. They can play whatever they want whenever they want, most of them. I can't. so to me, it's just cool, like, I can play all these games that I don't get to play, so for me, it's worth it for that, as far as the tournament, I mean, I'm not super hardcore, I guess you would say, I almost made it in classics, I almost made it into the playoffs, that was cool last year, but other than that, I'm rarely ever close, and I am just not gonna,
    26:02
    I mean, I treat it as my Vegas, you know, I'll bring, like, a couple hundred dollars, and this is the money I'm going to blow.
    26:09
    And that's it. I'm not going to spend thousands of dollars trying to qualify for this thing. I see three issues. Okay. They're not bad, actually. It's just I see three issues. One I would like to see is one score only counting.
    26:26
    What does that mean? So say if Keith Elwin gets $100 million, then the next game he gets $140 million. The $100 million gets blown out of the thing. because with these pump and dumps I see, you get 10 people qualifying, you know, 10 guy plays 10 times. Maybe he's got five so-so scores, but it's knocking everyone else's scores down. I didn't think that was the way it worked, though. I thought it was only your top score. I thought the pump and dump. I thought it was your top score. I hope so. I know people are playing that way, though. In certain tournaments, they do play, you know, if I get a better score, I might, you know, I might bump some, you know, I don't know. Qualifying scores will be drawn from a player's best attempts. Okay, good. That's good. So, yes, that is not – yeah. Second, I can see the cue lines being a bigger deal. It'll be longer. Especially on Saturday. I don't think it's going to favor Steve Bowden, our buddy Steve. Oh, for Steve. Yes, he won't be there until Friday night. He's going to be in lines all Friday and Saturday. Anyway, they did talk about, and they are looking into, which means it probably will happen, the queuing system. Which, for those who don't know, the software they use, oh, yeah, Carl D'Angelo. Carl did talk about it. He hated the change also. I forgot to mention him. But he's the writer of the Drains Tournament Manager, is what they use. And in that software, there is a full queuing system already in there. And that's actually, it is used at Papa, but it's only used by the actual scorekeepers. Like when you walk up, if you've been there before and you see them like put your name in and all that, that's the queuing system. And a lot of the tournaments that use Carl's software, they have it so like you're assigned, like when you were in Buffalo, I believe, did this. Like you're assigned a number. You get like a picture taken or whatever. Yes, we did it again. We did it again this past week. And you just, you can just take your smartphone and you put yourself in the queue. Yeah. And usually and I'm sure they'll do this at Papa. They'll have big screens up with like you can look at where you are or you can just check the phone and see when you're going to be up. Yeah. And when you're up, you're up. So that's that's the second thing I have a problem with. I think I'm not I don't know. And the third thing I like to see, I know it's not a happy thing to see. I would like to see limitations of entries, not in A, B, C or D. I would like to see it in classics. Okay. That's what I like to see because classics is always a mob fest. Yes, it is. It really is. And even expanding the games, I would actually pay more for an entry in classics, but limit each person to so many entries. Like what they did in Texas. Okay. Just so the lines might get a little thinner or, you know, a bulge at the end or whatever, but maybe just to thin it out a little bit.
    29:24
    That's the only thing I hate sitting and waiting. Yeah. Unless there's a queuing line, it might be a little better, but still, those lines are – sometimes you're 15, 18, 20 people.
    29:38
    That's a lot of time. That's a lot of time, and that's why I really think the games – The extra games are not going to help. Well, unless it's all about the game selection.
    29:50
    Yeah. And I see it every year. They'll be like, especially if they have like, they'll have Nitro Groundshaker and Grand Prix and, you know, that kind of game. You'll see just huge lines on those. And they'll be like, like 2001. I'll bring that up again. I always bring up that one. Or, you know, a game like that, like two-inch flipper game. I'm sure the idea is, you know, maybe someone will play that because, you know, they can really get a ton of points if they get a high score on this. You know, rankings points because hardly anyone's playing it. But no one ever does that. They always get in the lines with the games that are the least random or have the highest probability of scoring high on. And usually, even with all the games, there'll be like four or five of them, and they'll have all the lines. We've lost half our people. They're already now going.
    30:41
    Hey, this is our damn podcast. We want to talk about tournaments. We will, so bite me. I know. So I'm not going to be critical too much because, you know, to be honest, I haven't been to Papa in two years. It just hasn't been in the cards for me, not because I don't want to go. It's because of work. April is just like me and Steve. April is a very busy year for a busy time of year for us. And I'm getting prepared usually for Allentown. So that's another, you know, kink in the armor. So is it March or April this year? April. So it's even worse for me. That's why I've not gone the past year. So I'm not going to go like, oh, my God, the sky is falling. But I'm going to wait and see thing. I know a lot of people are upset about it. Give it a week.
    31:31
    See what happens. Yeah, you got the usual like, you know, well, I'm not going. Yeah, I'm not doing that. I'm not.
    31:39
    It's like, who the fuck cares, dude? If Keith Owens said he's not going, then maybe I would care, but a lot of – Yeah, or even Josh or Zach. Yes, and you know they're going. Even if they complete – there's seven grand. They're not going to like – well, it's not 10 grand now, so screw that. I'm not going. I do agree with them. If it's a part about money and some of them are suggesting less money, maybe that would help a little bit.
    32:06
    I don't know. But there's really – honestly, as one thing I will say, you never can make everyone happy. Yes. You're trying to appeal to the masses. I will say Papa knows her deal better than I do. Yep. I don't know what their numbers are, their books or anything like that. I will go with what they – Of course. I mean they – They started this whole thing. And I'll say, unlike a lot of places, almost every time I went to Papa and something was wrong, it was always fixed the next year. Yes. No matter what, like you go, I remember the one year, it's like, oh, my God, the glare is so horrible. The glare is terrible. I can't see anything in these games because they have skylights like up in the warehouse. Next year, all the skylights are covered. All the windows are covered. Like, oh, cool. All right. And there's been other things like that. People complete, you know, this is this. This is. And so they've changed things. Look at last year's Pinnberg compared to two years ago. They changed a lot in that because they listen to people. And this is what they're going by. They're going by what people are saying. So, they're appealing to the masses. If you don't like it this year, don't go or complain about it afterwards. That's the only two ways they're going to listen.
    33:18
    Yeah, because they're not changing it at this point. No, no, no. They're not. If they got comments from like 100 people who said, you know, we don't like this format, like 10 people bitching about it on Tilt Forums is not going to change their mind. No, unless, no offense, unless the top ten players said, I'm not going. And that's not going to happen for seven grand. It's still seven grand. They're not going to, like, hell. If I was that good and I had a legitimate chance to win that, and they changed the format, this sucks, but it's seven grand. I'm still going. If I have a legitimate shot at winning that, that's a good chunk of change, man. It is. One more piece of news. Piece of news, all right. This is a cheerful thing. I don't know if you saw the new app, but do you see the new app, the Pin Out App?
    34:11
    Don't worry, I'll fix that in editing. Yeah, that's what I'll say. I see what happens. I don't get edited, and then I get screwed. Well, I can't edit it now that we mentioned about editing. That's the problem. Editing, editing, editing. Well, I can edit that out. Editing, editing, editing, editing. Yes. So what's the name of the app again? I forgot already. Pin Out App. Did you see this? Okay, pin out app. So you out pin heads. No. Okay. It's based off like a Tron music, and you're shooting like a pinball game, a virtual continuous pinball game with different angles, different shots, and adding time to your thing. And it's free, which is great. That's the best kind of app you want to see. It's a free app. But it is freaking addicting. If you guys haven't played it or tried it or seen it, you'll see Steve Funwell Bonus posted about it. A lot of other groups posted about it. It is really a lot of fun. If you don't have this app, get it. It's free. If you don't like it, chuck it. But it's a lot of fun for players with pinball skills and, you know, having a good old time. You heard it here first, folks. Well, not first, but you heard it here, folks. The Slam Tilt Podcast endorses this app. Yes. Okay. So hopefully we get prizes and money and everything else.
    35:31
    Speaking of endorsements. Uh-oh. No, I would like to thank our listeners who answered the call. We mentioned on one of our previous shows in iTunes how we had the one negative comment, like it was the only comment there, like a one-star review from our first week. We said we were boring, which could very well have been true. So I'd like to think we're less boring now. But we had at least a couple of our listeners who posted five-star reviews on there. It's the new zoo review. Thank you. Coming right at you. That was awesome. It's the new zoo review. Coming right at you. Okay. I'm glad that people have, and I hope more people do. You know, that's really cool. I guess there's some deal, like, the more good comments you get, like, the more you show up on searches or something. Yeah, something like that. So we had a couple tournaments this weekend. There was actually three tournaments. Oh, really?
    36:31
    Three. Three tournaments. Okay, I know of two. What was the third? Well, you tell me what they were. Okay, first, Saturday, the lowest points possible tournament. By law. By law was the Stars Tournament. All Stars Tournament. Yes, at Levy's Funemporium. Funatorium. Funatorium, sorry. Sorry, Levy.
    36:58
    Don't worry, he doesn't listen. Yeah, he doesn't listen. But hopefully he will one of these days. The side tournament winner was David Chewy Colon.
    37:12
    Orange County's own. Orange County represent. They did represent. And then another Orange County person won the main tournament.
    37:23
    Steph. And her last name is? Let's see if you can say this right. I ain't saying it at all. You're saying it. Steph Gaida. Yes. Whose father is Frank. I want to say hi, dude, because he did give us a shout-out after I congratulated Steph.
    37:38
    You know, congratulations. Steph's been knocking on the door a lot. She's gotten really close on a lot of tournaments. Congratulations on a big win.
    37:49
    Big money. Big prizes. No points. And if you want to watch this action, which was awesome, by the way, especially the stars portion, you can go to our friend Tim Sexton's Twitch feed. Just look for Tim Balls on Twitch. He has it, and it's like the fastest finals you will ever see. It was like the top eight. I think the finals lasted less than five minutes total. It was great. It's a beautiful thing. Oh, man, it was beautiful. If all tournaments were like that, it would be so awesome. It would be. So that was the first tournament on Saturday. Okay. The second tournament on Saturday was the Buffalo Pinball, Domino's, Pinball, Party Adventure, whatever that pinball machine is. It was from 5 p.m. to 11 p.m., and then 11 p.m. was the playoffs. Was that supposed to be streamed?
    38:48
    Only the playoffs were. Oh, okay. They were. All right. Because I kept checking out Buffalo. It's Buffalo Pinball, their Twitch feed, like expecting to see it. They couldn't get a feed, so they recorded it, and they posted it afterwards, the day after. Okay, because the internet's shitty there. Yes, it is terrible.
    39:06
    They took the top eight. I got to play a lot of dominoes. I played, I think, five games. Shots, I will say, are pretty – they're fun. They actually are fun. And the graphics are getting better from when the first time the guys played it. The rules need some tweaking. The displays need some tweaking. Now, Adam, who's the one who designed the game, was there at site. He's actually from Buffalo originally. He's from East Aurora. I got to hang out with those guys for – I was only planning to go there for two hours.
    39:40
    And then, of course, I'm the first person that plays. And guess where I ended up qualifying? The first game I played, I qualified first. and it lasted until about 7.30.
    39:50
    I got taken on the third qualifying. Oh, the qualifying, okay. Yes. I thought you were saying like the finals. I was thinking of 7.30 the next morning. No, and then at 8 o'clock, I got my next time in line, and I took first qualifying over, and I qualified and finished qualifying first. So that was pretty cool.
    40:08
    You forgot the coolest part, though. You got to meet the Noid. I did get to meet the Noid. The Noid was there from about 5 to 8. I got pictures with the Noid. I got video of the Noid if you go to my Facebook page of Bruce Nightingale and look at the video. I'm also going to post that at the Slam Tilt podcast link so you can actually see the Noid playing the Domino's Pinball game and trying to beat it. It's a fun game. The shots are fun. They're satisfying, but as I said, the rules need some tweaking. Adam totally agreed with me on the rules. For the displays to be a little more informational. Other than that, it looks really nice. The build quality outside looks really, really nice. I was really impressed with that. You know, a couple tweaks. It was the first machine off the line, so you really can't say, like, oh, it's perfect. It needs, you know, it's going to get better. And it's spooky, so it will actually get built. It will get built. Very true. It was great hanging out with Adam. Me, Adam, and a couple of other guys were having a ball the whole night. uh we had free pizza 24 pizzas were delivered the top four players got the alternate translates with the noid being like godzilla those are the translates i would want i've seen those yes and uh and the top prize winner won a trophy with two noids on it well yours truly made the top eight got past the first round with Kevin Mann, Joe, and I forget the last. It's Kevin Manny, by the way.
    41:44
    It is Manny. Yes. And there's one other person. I can't remember his name, and that's my apologies. We were in the finals. I was leading until ball three. Now, the problem with the rules are the skill shot is worth more than anything else in the game. The skill shot is worth one million points. only one player scored a million points without getting the skill shot, which unfortunately was me. That took me 20 minutes to play one game, just earning 1 million points. But if, but my final qualifying score was 2.5 million. So, you know what I got two qualifying, two qualifying shots and 500,000 points.
    42:24
    I was, uh, ahead ball one. I got the call. I got the skill shot in the first ball. Kevin got on the third ball and had better balls before me so he had 1.2 million I had 1.1 going into my final ball every time I had the ball on the right hand flipper trying for that skill shot missed it to the last two ball two and ball three But I did get what was it oven multiball Oven multiball No, sorry, pizza driver multiball. Pizza driver, okay. Yes. I started that, and I drained out real fast, and that was it. I was done. And Kevin Manny won.
    43:03
    Congratulations. I turned right around. I congratulated him right off the bat. I was very proud. It was great to see, you know, a fellow. He actually was my teammate in team league for two years. Great guy. I, you know, congratulations to Kevin. Well worth it. Well, well impressed. You know, win. Good win.
    43:23
    I was really a good time had by all. I enjoyed it very much. Kathy came out. I was not. I didn't actually want to go. I wanted to go there for a couple hours support and then go home. Kathy had such a good time hanging out with everyone and, you know, hanging out with the drunks. There's a couple of guys we know who are in the Western Europe Pinball League and also in the Selfie League for Buffalo. They call themselves the Drunks or they are the Pirates in the Team League. And they hung out with everyone, had a great time. And me and Adam were talking about my escapades on some of the videos from Buffalo Pinball, some of my fun comments. But Adam does do also good donation stuff with some of the drivers for Domino's and some of the family members there. Does Adam have a last name? I cannot remember it all, but I will give it to you. No! It's Adam of Spooky Pinball. We'll just call it. No, it's not. No, I'm going to get it. I don't want to slow my internet here. Adam Spooky.
    44:22
    Adam Spookster. Adam G-A-C-E-K. Adam, I met. I've heard of him. I've talked to him, I think, once or twice before this. He actually watched me on some of the videos from Buffalo Pinball, from a couple of things. And he came up to me, and the first words out of his mouth were, oh, my God, I have to talk to you about this. And we talked about it. We all laughed. And some people cringed when they heard what we were talking about, but we had a great time. It was really nice to hear and talk to him. And another person, don't forget, he designed the game. So I have to now consider Adam a good friend, a great person, and a designer of pinball now. Maybe he'll get another chance. I hope so. It'd be great to see because he has a great love of pinball. It was great love.
    45:12
    And the third tournament was? It was the Spooky Tournament at, which is kind of confusing, in Binghamton, New York. So wait a minute. It was called the Spooky Tournament. Spooky Halloween Tournament. But you played in a Domino's tournament, which had a spooky pinball game. I'm confused.
    45:31
    But I did get, don't forget, I did get the ultimate. The top four guys got the ultimate of Translight, so guess what I got? You got Translight. No way.
    45:39
    So the noise attack, and I got a nice t-shirt. Unfortunately, it will never fit me. Ah. I grabbed the last Domino's pinball t-shirt.
    45:49
    Unfortunately, I am no medium. Oh, I am. Hello. So... Psych! Yes, I am a prick. Wow, that was pretty mean. So it's not medium?
    46:08
    It is medium. Well, then can you give it to me? Maybe, maybe, you know, I don't know. Let's see. Maybe with the purchase of something, you know. We'll talk about that later on.
    46:21
    The second tournament, third tournament of the weekend was the Spooky Tournament down in Binghamton at the Moonwalker Arcade.
    46:30
    This was on Sunday, I believe. Sunday. And somebody was supposed to be there, but... Hey, I have a job. Work. No, no, no. Tell them the truth. You stopped at 4 o'clock that morning.
    46:43
    Well, I work in IT, so we're doing some upgrades. I was at work from, I don't know, 9 p.m. to about 4 a.m., so by the time I got home, I felt like sleeping.
    46:56
    Didn't get up until noon. Fail. Sorry. I'll probably be out. I'll probably be at work even later this weekend.
    47:07
    I will say, great run tournament by Joe and the rest of the Binghamton Pinball guys. Does Joe have a last name? Joe Mahone. M-A-H-O-N. There you go. Mahone, maybe. But the games played really good. A couple issues, but they worked on them. One, thank God, the issue was really terminal because it was barbed wire that went down. Woo-hoo! I still have that.
    47:33
    They still have that. What it was was a match play event. We played match play for three hours and 15 minutes.
    47:44
    And guess who was the number one qualifier again? Kevin Manning. Nope. I mean, Keith Owen. Nope. Oh, damn. Nick Lane. Nope.
    47:57
    Okay, I don't know. I can't figure this one out. Who are you talking to? Oh, it's you. It was me, so I qualified for both tournaments in first place. You're pretty good. That's okay. You are an upstate points whore. I am a whore, but Eric Russell was there. A couple of guys from Orange County Pinball. Brian Estes. Stephanie was there. I congratulated her on her win. JT Harrison. JT was complaining to me that even though I talk about him on the podcast and never say his last name jt harrison jt harrison so harrison harrison go rangers they'll like that yeah we don't we don't talk that way here oh that's right you're a devil's fan well i'm a rangers fan so we outvote you so uh the finals was i love the finals format it was you get you played yours three and a half three hours and 15 minutes of format and then it was the top nine qualified eight and nine played each other first you know like it was almost like the top 65 and the uh final four you know those two the last teams had to play each other and then they got to play number one jt was in eighth and then another gentleman was in ninth jt moved to the eighth spot and won and played me in the first round now the good thing about this tournament I asked the rules beforehand was who picks game, who picks order, and can you stay with the same game or do you have to pick a game a different way? The rules were stated.
    49:23
    The higher seed picks the game. The higher seed even picks the order. And you can play the same game as much as you want.
    49:32
    So first round, I play JT on High Roller Casino. Oh, God, that turn. Okay. JT had me in ball three. He was up big time. Got multi-ball. Got super-duper grand champion jackpot. Came past and beat him. Eric played Joe Lane on Kiss, and Eric got $380 million on Kiss.
    50:01
    Moved on to the next round. Joe moved on. I forget who the fourth person was who moved on. Give me two seconds. I don't. Or Zlasik or something like that, his last name is. While you're looking that up, just to let our listeners know that, Binghamton is actually the original birthplace or home of Dick's Sporting Goods. The original Dick's is there. Wow. Yeah, some trivia. I did not know about that. Going to Binghamton all the time, yes. It has a completely different sign. Like, it's the old, whatever their old logo was. It's still that logo. Okay, I can't find them. Okay, I tried to cover for you. So the next round was me and Eric against, and then the other two guys, Joe and the other guy, we cannot remember, I think his name was Jay, but I can't figure it out. They played each other, and I played Eric.
    51:00
    What do you think we played again, baby? High Roller Casino. You got it. And I took, unfortunately, Eric, you know, had three almost like house balls.
    51:13
    So, and Joe won. So it was me and Joe in the finals. And Eric and the other guy, or Zlazic, I can't remember his name, played in the semifinals. I'm still looking it up. I'm still trying to find it.
    51:29
    It's actually, he's been in a couple of rows. In the semifinals, if he lost to you, was it double elimination or something? Nope, single elimination. Done, done. It was only eight, so it went to four and then to two. If you beat Eric, then how is he playing someone else for in the semifinals? In third and fourth, third and fourth. Oh, they're playing for third and fourth. Okay. Yes, because there's three trophies and money. I got you.
    51:50
    So I played Joe. Joe got an extremely lucky multi-ball right off the bat. He got it from one of the modes that you can pick and grab, and he got it. Came out to a big lead. Ball three, he had 160 million compared to my 80 million.
    52:07
    I got multi-ball. I drain my multi-ball, and I turn around and shake his hand and go, congratulations, Joe, you won.
    52:15
    Game is an ending. There's a ball stuck I didn't know about. So they freed a ball. I keep on playing. I get to $148 million and drain finally, and he takes the win. So congratulations, Joe. So I got two seconds. And as my wife says, that's normally me, two seconds. Very, very nice. Okay. So I did get a trophy and some cash for that, too. And I got cash for Buffalo, too, so that was really nice. So a good, fun weekend had by all. Two-second Bruce. I remember that. Instead of extra ball, Bruce, it's two-second Bruce. All right. Two-second Bruce. So let me scratch those off the list right now.
    52:59
    Do you want to go to repairs next, or do you want to talk about – I don't have any repairs. I have to say a certain person brought a certain game to my house. Who would that be? That would be you. And what game would this be? That would be Harlem Globetrotters. Ah.
    53:15
    First, we brought it down the stairs. At the same time, we also brought down – The Ghostbusters.
    53:24
    So both machines were brought downstairs. Steven Orzlezek. O-R-Z-E-L-E-K. Steven. There you go. So that's our – he was finished fourth. Eric finished third in the last tournament. Congratulations to everyone. Joe finished first, and I was second. So back to – And Harlem Globetrotters was not played in that tournament. No, it was not. That's a shame. So, yeah, we set it up. Well, first thing, Bruce is there. I got bad news. I forgot the key, but he didn't. The key was in the bag with the bolts in it. So the legs had some issues, but luckily I had my spare legs left over from the stars, which were actually the same legs, the same bally legs. So that worked out. Got it set up, and it physically works.
    54:15
    It definitely has some board and probably connector issues, and it has the issues of having LEDs everywhere, which look terrible. Somebody did the old color thing again where they got, like, blue LEDs in the bottom. They got orange LEDs, like, for the targets in the side. Like, all these different colors, and it looks like shit. And then they got LEDs in the head for the back glass, and that actually doesn't look that good either. So it's going to be going through the long process, the same process the stars went through. but overall the cabinet solid backless is good play field is gorgeous definitely the main strength is the play field i showed people the play field on sunday at the tournament in binghamton and matt hess saw it and a couple other people saw it eric saw it and he's they're all like oh my god he paid what for this so that's how nice it was it was incredible very nice so So we got that set up. We actually played that one. And then we brought the Ghostbusters Premium down, the one I won from the Project Pinball sweepstakes. It's been sitting there for a while. We set it up. Yeah, set it up. We did not play it. Did not play it. I went through actually yesterday and put all the protectors and all that crap on.
    55:36
    You know, all the stuff you really shouldn't have to put on a brand-new game, but you kind of have to. I put Mylar right in front of the out hole, so I'm protecting the hole. Oh, my. Yes, yes, protecting the hole. Shooter lane protector, air ball protectors or air ball preventers, put them in place.
    55:57
    Played a ton of it last night, played a bunch of it today. And I'll say I remember when it first came out, one of the opinions or one of the views I remember reading, I have to agree with completely now, and that is there's a lot of things about the game I really like. I love the artwork.
    56:17
    I love the music. Music is awesome. I like most of the shots because it's different. It plays different. Most of my games are Steve Ritchie flow fests, so this definitely plays different. I love the steep ramp, the subway ramp. I love the Newton ball thing on the side with the four balls in it that broke within five games that I had to fix ball started getting stuck because the wire form was bent over too far so I had to and of course to get at it I had to take the entire plastic off which has the building on it which has like one of the spotlight lamps on it and I had to take all that off that was fun all just so I could tap the thing back and tap it over so the balls have room. I tap both times, man. Yes, yes. So that was the only issue I had. Other than that, it worked 100%. I have the new code on there. You had a but there. You had a but. Yeah, yes, yes.
    57:21
    Going back to the original, one of the original views I heard on the game was that it doesn't play like it's software. What I mean by that, take a game it plays like iron man but has like this rule set like it's transformers or something you know like a rule set that expects you to be on the game a long time to go through a ton of modes to to you know get deep into the game yet it plays like iron man difficulty wise and i just don't think they go together i just think the rule set fails this game that's my opinion. It's like, I like a lot of the shots and I think if you had the right rule set, I don't know what rule set that would be, but something different than like, whatever, the 10 modes or whatever the hell it is in the game, I think it would be better. It would be like if you had Iron Man and the whole purpose of Iron Man was to go through like 15 modes to get to something. That would suck. You'd never get to it. I mean, the other issue, everything is linear. So you're playing the same modes over and over and over again. And it gets old really fast.
    58:32
    So, I mean, I think it's too far gone. I don't think they're going to change the basic, you know, how the software works at this point, unfortunately. And, you know, I'm going to keep it for a while, but I probably will eventually sell it.
    58:45
    I mean, maybe it'll grow on me, but just with the rule set. And it's definitely more of a rule set thing. I mean, I played, like to use one of John Trudeau's other games, Mustang, which plays hard as hell also. But I feel it has a much better rule set. It fits the game a lot better. I actually enjoy playing Mustang. This just gets really frustrating when you're playing the same damn modes every freaking time.
    59:11
    And it's a shame because I like to play if the artwork is awesome, the music is kick-ass. I love the music in this game. And it sounds good on their new spike system. They actually have stereo now. Thank you. Yes. Great concept there. It just sounds good. I just really wish that – and I'm the guy that says I'm not the rules guy. I'm more of a shots guy. But definitely in this case, I think the rule set kind of fails the game.
    59:34
    I agree totally. And that's my view. I'm not going to bash on it because I bashed on it so much, so I'm just going to listen to you.
    59:43
    But it's a shame. I really think with the right rule set, that really could have kicked ass. if it was just like more of an Iron Man or more of just something like in-your-face type rule set.
    59:54
    But I don't know. Maybe that wouldn't work with the theme of Ghostbusters because it's a comedy and it's not really this adrenaline-fueled, like, awesome, like a more Iron Man type thing. So maybe it wouldn't fit. That kind of rule set wouldn't fit with that theme.
    60:11
    I almost would like to see maybe that play field with a different theme. Who knows? But, oh, and the Scolari Brother targets fucking suck. Those things are completely useless. They don't give you, well, they don't brick because I put the new springs in, didn't get a single brick. They work 100%, but they still suck. What's the point? You don't really get any major things for hitting them, and all they do is block key shots at key times for no fucking reason. They just, it's not like, do you use some other games that have them, like Cactus Canyon where it's the cool draw, you're shooting the outlaw. Or even 24 where they're like terrorists and you're hitting them.
    60:53
    It's part of the... They're just annoying and they serve no purpose. And now I know why in the Pinball Expo tournament they had them disabled.
    61:04
    And I will probably end up disabling them on mine because they just serve no purpose. Gotcha. And that's my view. That'll cross off the Harlem Globetrotters and the Ghostbusters from my list. It was good to see Ron finally get his Harlem Globetrotters though. We now have six games of the same.
    61:21
    That's what you were counting them. Yes. But don't get the wrong impression folks. We do have enough differing opinions that keep the podcast going for several more episodes at least. At least two.
    61:34
    I want to give some plugs. Before you do the plugs, I know we're getting near the end here, but I want to say... We're not even close to the end yet. We're not close to the end yet. Oh God. No, not another two hour one. People are like... I'm going to be close. Oh, no, no, no, no, no. The tilt video. I have watched the tilt video. That's where I was going to leave next after the plug. Go ahead. Yes, it was quite excellent. I found it about as interesting as you can make the tilt. Yes, I thought it was very nice talking about how not just alone the tilt controlling everything, but actually the bob itself controlling everything. It's actually the wire form that the tilt taps onto or being centered, being properly balanced. All the different things that can screw it up, the different ways that you can. The geometry of the way to, because don't forget, on a tilt bob where it's riding on, there's only two accesses, an X and a Y, left, right, forward and back. It's always going to try to go back to that natural thing. but if the bottom ring is off centered or off tilted, that's why you get those phantom tilts towards the end. As I said, as I said the first time, I'm going to tell every person who sets up a game and has a tournament. This is the way you set up a tilt Bob, follow it, live it, love it. It's just the tilt Bob. Yep. And he has tips on getting rid of like tilt throughs, like basically making the tilt Bob kind of settle back quicker, which involves actually something I have. It involves like foam earplugs, you know, the kind that you squeeze down and put them in your ear and then they expand. Basically, you like cut the things and you put them in the – where the – not the ring, but the part that holds the bob, the actual threaded whatever you want to call it, rod, where it hooks to the top, where the hook is. one of his tips is you put like a cut off one of these foam earplugs and you put it in there and it'll expand and it'll make it so like it's still it'll still react like it does but it'll settle back to a stationary position much faster and the other thing he had at the end which i agree with and i'm probably going to start doing is especially if you're going to run a tournament disable all your slam tilts there's no point yes they serve no purpose especially in a home environment. They serve absolutely no purpose.
    64:03
    And you just going to get a situation And the funny thing is I was talking to my father about this video when he was over Saturday And we end up we playing Dracula Blah Yeah blah We're playing Dracula, the Williams one. He gets, you know, missed. The ball's going across. He misses it, of course. And he remembers the little tip about, you know, trying to get it off the magnet. So he shoves the shit out of the game and it slam tilts.
    64:31
    It's like, there's a perfect example. Because basically I lost my turn and the game was over. Okay, I loved it too. Trust me. And going back to Eric Russell, we commented when we were talking to each other at the tournament on Sunday.
    64:47
    He wasn't complaining about the way I, you know, he was complaining about how tilts are with. Well, hold on. But just for the listeners, what was Eric? What happened? I don't think we explained. And I think Eric Russell, one of our upstate pinball brethren, he had some comments to the Slam Tilt podcast that we misrepresented something he said or wasn't getting the gist of what he said. The gist of what he said truly was he doesn't like that when the tilts are too tight where you cannot nudge. He wants to be able to nudge a machine, which I agree with, and I do have a couple games that are tight enough where you really can't nudge too much. like as we talked about before, Lord of the Rings seems like it's the perfect example to make it too tight. So you can't make the game go long because it is a long playing game. There are other things to make the game harder. So you can let the, be able to nudge it a couple of times. The problem he has is always with him. It has been with my AFM where you nudge my AFM. It's going to go warning, warning tilt. And he doesn't like that. And I agreed when I said, guess what? For my tournament in two weeks, he is the master of the tilts. He can lower them, he can raise them, he can do whatever he wants. So Eric now has that responsibility.
    66:05
    Eric the Tilt. Yeah, Eric the Tiltmaster. So tonight, probably the same time we're doing this, Spooky Pinball is announcing,
    66:18
    hopefully, that Floaty is going to be the new mascot name. Tonight is the night they're going to announce it. So I hope Mr. Mike, who we've been voting for the float, vote for the float, will be the winner. And hopefully we've pushed him over the edge. He was very congratulatory towards it. He said thank you for getting it. As soon as we posted it, he saw a bump up in his float for the vote. Vote for the float numbers.
    66:45
    I will remain silent. I don't want to get involved in the float. It's the float for the ghost. I just have bad memories. It's a dark, dark day of the podcast. I don't want to relive it. No, it wasn't. It's just a float.
    67:06
    Float. The kind of float I like is a root beer float. Yes. So, plugs. Oh, plugs. Okay. Speaking of plugs, when I got to Harlem, like the first thing we noticed, you take the plug and it's like the ground prong is missing. Got to love that. Yes, that's on every game. Yes. Well, what was your comment? I have several that are like that. It's like, wait a minute. Mr. Surge Suppressor has all these games without it. I know I've been at your house before where I have, unfortunately, touched the wrong games. And you get a jingle through them. Yeah, so I'm thinking, like, okay, so he's more concerned about saving the games, Surge Suppressor, than he is about the people playing them. Shocks. Why are you touching two machines at once? Oh. Oh, so be a one machine person is what he said. Yes. That's all you can be a slut about. It just types one. Male sluts are bad. Yes. Okay. Plugs. Speaking of that, plugs.
    68:04
    Jim, our most famous listener, because he is actually has one of the two of our 26 levels of suck on the game list. 26 levels of a game. Not all of them are suck. I know. But it does sound better when you say levels of suck. he commented I was of course right on dialed in he said it's almost like he knows what Jack is thinking before Jack himself does well talks about Harlem and Glenn Harlem Globetrotters how it's a great game and he's been pin sitting one for three weeks and loves it so as he's always said Jim has great taste in pinball machines pin sitting is that an actual term? cool I'm actually going to be repairing eventually Kevin's vector. Well, you've been pin-sitting a game for five years now? Yes, five years. So here's another funny thing. We have another Eric Russell listening to us. But Eric Russell is Eric S. Russell.
    69:02
    Okay. So that's kind of cool. You know, we have two Eric Russells. He literally laughed out loud at the Kapow explanation from Ron about the party and Stern celebrating the pricing.
    69:15
    Stern banning the pinball news guy was absurd many bugs in star trek besides a five-year mission blatantly not working good threat on tilt uh ghostbusters uh center post he maybe it was maybe this is eric i don't know no it is eric it's our regular eric sorry he did it from his work email so i didn't see he's uh sorry eric eric oh my god i'm definitely not editing that out that's gonna It'd be great. You're going to get the heat for that one. I will. He agrees that a multimillion-dollar company with Kickstarter, you know, funding a book about themselves is absolutely a joke. Also agree about surge protectors. If you're buying a power strip for $10, put a surge protector. He does another thing, 1,500-plus jewels at least. It's stupid to go cheap on power strips. Very cool.
    70:06
    And the tilt to discussion we just went over. And if he ever owned a Ghostbuster Pro, he would definitely drill a hole. for a real center post and never look back or think twice. Yeah. And honestly, I've had my share of center drains, but it hasn't been anything I'd say like, oh, my God, this needs to be fixed. Maybe it's just the way I have it set up. I really only get them if they come out of the pop bumpers a certain way.
    70:30
    So sorry, Eric. Sorry, Eric. I wasn't used to the Eric S, and I thought it was somebody else, and I started. It's a long email. So I'm going to hear that from Eric. Thanks. You know, I'll be. You better edit that. No editing. Sorry. We don't edit. Fuck, fuck, fuck, fuck. Okay. For third, we have our first known listener from Australia.
    70:52
    All right. Very cool. He does zone out a little bit when we talk about competition stuff in the U.S., but he knows that's a minority here. Hobbit is awesome at 7.5 degrees, but boring at 6.5 degrees. There you go. Hopefully he hears the plug being that he's probably zoned out after the pop-up discussion. I hope not. But he also gave me another tidbit. Okay. Wizard of Oz also has the ability to award you an extra tilt warning, not just Dr. Dude. Okay. So he says, he talks about it, he goes, they've added the 6.0 firmware and only, of course, Keith Johnson new pins only have two tilt warnings per game, not per ball. Brutal. Oh, yeah. Yeah. Okay. Yes, that does sound familiar. Wizard can now award add rescue lock or add tilt warning. Added tilt warning award is an adjustment in Wizard. Mystery category can be on or off. Default is set for on.
    71:50
    So very cool. So there's two games that we know of. I still wonder when Keith Johnson saw Dialed In the first time, it's like, oh, thank God. I can finally code to a play field that doesn't suck. Yeah, I kind of agree with you on that. Oh, not that. Well, Wizard of Oz, it just has a ton of shit on it. I just, again, I just don't. I don't like the way it shoots. I mean, but at least when you look at it, it's like this thing's got a ton of crap on it. You can tell there's a ton of stuff going on here. Hobbit, Hobbit. I mean, I don't hate Wizard of Oz. I hate Hobbit.
    72:24
    Now, Kathy played Wizard of Oz when we were at Buffalo at the Pocketeer. She got 528,000 points, which is a damn good game on Wizard of Oz. I was very proud of my wife. Rough to see the wizard. The wonderful wizard of Oz. My mother has never seen that movie. Oh, my God. Yes. That's weird. Me and my father were like, really? How is that possible? I think we just got to sit her down and make her listen.
    72:53
    Oh, God. So repairs, you had none, except for just getting your game set up, right? Well, yeah, getting it set up, putting all the protector crap on, and then fixing the non-working Newton ball thing, which is another thing. I love that, the Newton ball thing on the side. Is that that? That's good.
    73:11
    Myself, I worked on nothing because I've been away again. I'm in Connecticut this week. So no Zach. No Zach help. But we did talk about him, so that's a good thing, keeping up the streak.
    73:22
    What else do you want to do? You want to do games you like, games you hate, or you just want to go right into, since we are at now almost an hour and 20 minutes. I'll do quick games I like, games you hate, as long as you have some. Of course I do. Of course you do. Okay. And I think one of these I already mentioned once before, but I'm going to start repeating stuff because there's only so many games out there that I've played. So, game I hate.
    73:45
    I'll bring this up because I just had to place an internment. Millionaire. It was just so monotonous getting the two-ball multi-ball over and over and over and over. It just got old, really. It was one of the weakest System 11s out there. Yeah. So, and then, interesting fact, though, the European version has the beacon. Yes. Which I didn't realize it was only that, because the first time I ever played a Millionaire, it was that version.
    74:12
    Oh, wow. So then when I played other, like, where's the beacon? Why is it missing? And I looked at, wait a minute, there's not even a hole for it, because I figured they just, like, took it off. And it confused the hell out of me. Thank you, IPDB, for straightening me out on that one.
    74:26
    Game I like. hopefully one day we'll be in the collection. High Speed. Can't go wrong with High Speed. I picked that because it was in the same bank of games I played in that round. It's like I had to play Millionaire, then I had to play frigging Hobbit, then I got to play High Speed.
    74:46
    Yeah. I owned one. It was great. I love High Speed also. You can't go wrong with it. Classic, you know, Star Trek, you know, shot. The first time we see the classic Steve Ritchie shot.
    74:59
    Yeah, yeah. Basically the Picard maneuver shot or whatever you want to call it. That was so good that he'd just use it over and over and over and over. Make it so. Make it so, number one. Speaking of making it so, I think it's time to pay the bills, sir. No, I still got to do mine, you fucker. What? Oh, shit, that's right.
    75:16
    Man, holy crap. Thanks, man. Push me right out of bed, why don't you? All right, all right. Game you like first. I want hate last. Johnny Numano. Johnny Numonic. The speed is great.
    75:33
    I like that you can actually do tic-tac-toe and make your jackpots triple, so you have some control of it. Of course, you've got to go for that. But the options up top, you know, where you can actually try either for 100 million points or super loops, the spinner, you know, Yuzuka, I mean, just a lot of good fun modes, fast game if you get it set up right. as one person from Western New York, actually Jim Wones, once said, if you can do four loops in a row on a fast one, you won't make a fifth.
    76:07
    Okay. Why not? Because it's going so fast, your reactions will not catch. Usually will not catch. So, great game. I've been really enjoying it a lot. I play it at Eric's, I play it at Jim's, I play a couple others. It's growing on me. Okay. bad game, Wheel of Fortune.
    76:31
    You could have had one on close-up for like $2,600. They were selling those. They were selling that in World Poker Tour, $2,600. Canadian distributor, back in the day. I'm kicking myself. I totally should have got a World Poker Tour at that price.
    76:52
    That was a fail on my part. but oh well. So why do you hate it? It's clunky. The free spin just doesn't work half the time.
    77:06
    The skill shot, it's great, but it doesn't work. You're not going to get it most of the time, so it's just like a dick tease. It's like, ha-ha, make me, ha-ha. It's just not a fun game. So you demand easy skill shots is what you're saying? No, because I dealt with it all weekend with that freaking Domino's in some ways. You don't like unique Dennis Nordman designs? I like a lot of them, but not that one.
    77:31
    And, of course, the software was never finished. Nope. That doesn't help it either, and it never will be finished. Nope, because Gary Stern was not smart again. Well, yeah, and the guy that would have finished it is no longer Stern. Yes, but he should have still been.
    77:50
    Time to pay the bills? Pay the bills. Don't forget, guys, www.pinballlifter.com. Help pay my bills. We sell lifters, tilters, helpers, rotisseries, creature from the Black Lagoon accessories and mods. Come check us out. So, Bruce, what device did we use to move the Harlem Globetrotters and the Ghostbusters the other day? we brought it down the stairs with an escalator, but we set it up.
    78:26
    We did. And did we have any problems? Of course not. Thank you very much. So let's go over events coming up. This weekend, Retro Game Com in Syracuse, New York, November 5th and 6th, Central New York Pinball will be having a pinball tournament there. Eric Russell will be running it with a couple of the other Central New York pinball guys, including Dave Cohen. And Buffalo Pinball is going to be there this weekend from the 5th and 6th in Syracuse, New York. Best thing next weekend. After that, come to my house. Come to Butthead. I have six positions open left for the Finger Lakes Open. It is now $20. You missed out on the cheaper rate. Pre-pay now. You got, when this podcast comes out, You got nine days. You can come to the door. Maybe you'll get lucky. Maybe you won't. 18 games of pin golf. How many people qualify is half of how many people come. So with 36 paid income and 18 qualify. Come check it out.
    79:35
    And also, if you happen to be in the Florida area, and not near Bruce, of course, you will see the tilt of the Slam and Tilt podcast, because I will be at Free Play Florida, which I believe is the 11th, 12th, and 13th, which I think isn't 11th a holiday? Isn't it Veterans Day? Yes, 11th is Veterans Day, which I have. It's Veterans Day, so I didn't have to actually take a day off for that. But it's the 11th, 12th, and 13th at, I'm trying to remember, I think it's the SeaWorld Hotel, something SeaWorld. Just look up Free Play. Just Google Free Play Florida. You'll find it. Yep. on the November 17th Syracuse Pinhead is pinball in Central New York from 430 to 830 7 games you get to play on good time had by all good for IFPA points come on out it's on the east side of Syracuse look up Syracuse Pinheads or either Central New York Pinball also don't forget this is the new month of Buffalo Pinball Knox Pinball, Knox Amusements Pinball, and Central New York Location Leagues for all the selfie leagues. Jump in on those. Good time.
    80:53
    November 19th, the Catskill Classic Pinball Tournament. November 19th, Saturday, 10 a.m., Howard Place. Bring a battery antenna extender.
    81:08
    And earmuffs or earplugs. If you happen to play the games that are in front of the jukebox. Also, Black Friday, November 25th at 3 p.m. at Orange County at Rock Fantasy. There will be a Black Friday tournament.
    81:26
    So check that out if you want. That's Friday the 25th at 3 p.m. And I think that's all for events for right now.
    81:35
    All the news that's fit to print. So next week we will be talking about two more tournaments. I know people are going, what? Did you say something? I'm sorry. Wake up first.
    81:53
    You'll get a report from Amsterdam about the Amsterdam Pinball Open. And this is not Amsterdam, New York, folks. This is Amsterdam, Holland.
    82:04
    And I will be there. Slam will be there. Signing autographs for free even, too. I don't charge for the autographs. And then we will get also the same next weekend, next week's show. We'll also have a show report from Tim Balls himself, Tim Sexton, about the 24 Hours of the Sanctum. Oh, that's this weekend. That's this weekend coming up. Yes. And we will get the show report from him next Thursday. Also, the week after, we will be having our special hidden guest that's been waiting for one month. I am going to double check with him this week, but I think we're going to have him on for the 17th. I can't believe we were able to get Gary Stern. Oh, crap. I thought I was on mute. No, god damn you. I had to promise your soul out for it. You had to promise to get two Super Ellies. get him off I had to promise your soul I sold my soul to Stern yes but luckily I got a super LE out of the deal whoopee that's great wow LCD screen and everything we still haven't seen of we still haven't seen any gameplay come on where's the twitch feed where's the Jack Danger from the factory thing at least get an idea of what it plays like now don't forget We want your comments. We want your criticisms. We want your compliments. We want your ideas because we'll steal them. We'll steal them and give you no credit. It's awesome. I get credit. I plug everyone. Yes, that's what I've heard about you.
    83:48
    Yes, and we'll have a good time, and we'll even talk about you. As you've seen today, we gave out four plugs. Yes, four plugs. Four plugs is more plugs than anyone else. Yes. and you'll be world famous in Amsterdam. In Amsterdam, where you'll be playing in the Dutch Open. Yes, and hopefully I see Nate there.
    84:10
    That'd be kind of cool. Oh, Nate from the Coast to Coast podcast. That'd be really cool to see him there.
    84:18
    They'd probably say, like, oh, you're with those guys? You guys suck. Damn. You are the English-speaking people over there.
    84:26
    How's that going to work? Is there enough people who speak English where you're able to get around on what the hell you're doing? Yes, they actually speak very, very, very, they speak better English than I do. Ah, that's not saying much, but okay. All right, everybody, this has been another episode of the Slam Tilt Podcast, episode 17. Insurrection.
    84:49
    All right, number one. So we are on iTunes. Just search for Slam Tilt Podcast. We are on Facebook. Just search for Slam Tilt Podcast. We are on YouTube. Again, just search for Slam Tilt Podcast. You can reach us for comments, as Bruce said, comments, criticisms, worship at SlamTiltPodcast at gmail.com. Woo-hoo! So thanks, everyone. Say goodbye, Bruce. Goodbye, Kathy.