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The Aussie Pinball Podcast Ep 6: Pinheadz Podcast Reunion

The Pinball Network·video·1h 26m·analyzed·Jul 6, 2022
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claude-haiku-4-5-20251001 · $0.033

TL;DR

Pinheads Aussie podcast reunion covers collections, Stern code improvements, and competitive pinball.

Summary

The Aussie Pinball Podcast reunites the original Pinheads podcast team (Rod, Gaz, Stevie) from Canberra after a 5-year break. The hosts discuss their pinball collections, recent acquisitions, code quality improvements at Stern, and the competitive pinball scene in Australia, including updates on Rod's daughter's tournament success.

Key Claims

  • Stern now has dedicated coders for individual designers, resulting in games launching at 0.0 patch instead of 0.65-0.7 as before

    high confidence · Dr. John discusses Stern's expanded workforce and code quality improvements over the past 5 years

  • Rod's daughter was ranked Australia's number one competitive pinball player and came 4th at a recent 30-player national tournament after a 4-month break

    high confidence · Rod discusses his daughter's ongoing competitive pinball participation despite university commitments

  • The Wizard of Oz prototype was the first WJZ game to arrive in Australia and ended up in Canberra in 2013

    high confidence · Stevie recalls maintaining the prototype WJZ at a Canberra location

  • Wonka received a major rules revision/code update that significantly improved playability

    high confidence · Discussion of Wonka code updates making it 'much more playable' compared to original release difficulty

  • Stern Rush (Premium/LE version) features a lift ramp in the time machine donut that removes the dead edge shot from top flipper

    high confidence · Dr. John and others describe mechanical differences between Rush versions at Texas Pinball Festival

  • Luna Park in Sydney now has a collection of early pinball machines including rare four-player EM games operated by Greg Turnover

    high confidence · Discussion of Luna Park's EM pinball lineup including Close Encounters and Leap System machines

  • The new Guns N' Roses pinball is more complex and feature-rich than the original Data East version

    medium confidence · Dr. John compares original and new Guns N' Roses versions, noting the new one is 'much more in-depth'

  • Game of Thrones Pro version was superior to its LE variant due to ramp-focused action versus top playfield complexity

    medium confidence · Dr. John recommends Game of Thrones Pro as best Pro/Premium/LE balance among recent games

Notable Quotes

  • “It's quality, not quantity. This one's going to need to be pretty good then.”

    Rod @ Early in reunion — Self-aware humor about the 5-year podcast gap and expectation setting

  • “The 16, 17, 18, 19, 20-minute intros got more and more elaborate. As time went on. So the time that it would take us to actually do the podcast, the intro ended up taking about the same amount of time with the writing and the production.”

    Rod @ Early discussion — Explains production workload that contributed to original podcast's end

  • “I still rate it as the game with the best mode rules ever written... you have to hit a shot to start Pit Creature and then you have to then hide the ball under somewhere and there's a countdown timer that starts at 13 seconds.”

    Gaz @ Alice Cooper discussion — Detailed praise of specific mode design mechanics in Spooky's Alice Cooper

  • “So now you've got Tim Sexton and Raymond Davidson, the world number one player, on code. And then you've got Keith's games with Tanya Clice, pretty much Keith telling them what he wants as far as rules goes and Tanyo implementing them straight away.”

    Dr. John @ Code quality discussion — Identifies specific Stern coders and designer partnerships driving quality improvements

  • “I've got myself an AC/DC Lucy, which is in mint condition... Yeah, it's a bloody lemon, isn't it? A few things... just a few MOSFETs have blown up.”

    Stevie (first), then reveals issues @ Collection discussion — Illustrates quality control issues even with premium LE editions

  • “Once my daughter is playing competitive pinball and being the national number one, I'll be back there.”

    Rod @ Family/tournament discussion — References daughter's previous #1 ranking in Australia

  • “The most popular game in my home at the moment is Stars by Stern Electronics. How old is that?”

    Dr. John @ Collection discussion — Demonstrates enduring appeal of classic simplicity over complex modern games

Entities

RodpersonGazpersonSteviepersonDr. JohnpersonPinheads PodcastorganizationAussie Pinball PodcastorganizationStern PinballcompanyJersey Jack PinballcompanySpooky Pinballcompany

Signals

  • ?

    business_signal: Stern expanded workforce to support multiple dedicated coders per designer, improving code quality trajectory

    high · Dr. John: 'The volume of games in the last five years from Stern have allowed them to increase their employees... there are dedicated coders pretty much for each designer'

  • ?

    event_signal: Competitive pinball tournament with 30+ top Australian players; prize pools previously distributed internationally

    high · Rod's daughter competed in recent 30-player national tournament; reference to 2019 Jimmy Nails tournament giving away $18,000 to international competitors

  • ~

    sentiment_shift: Positive assessment of Stern's trajectory in addressing historical 'half-baked' release issues through dedicated development resources

    high · Dr. John contrasts current 0.0 releases favorably with 'five, six, seven years ago' where 'games going out half-baked from Stern' was common complaint

  • ?

    competitive_signal: Australian competitive pinball scene attracting international competitors with prize pools, creating export/import dynamic of top talent

    medium · Reference to 2019 Jimmy Nails tournament where $18,000 prize went to American players Etta/Colin Urban; current tournament includes international competitors

  • ?

    design_philosophy: Modern Stern designers using tier-differentiated feature distribution strategy to create meaningful gameplay differences between Pro and Premium/LE versions

    medium · Multiple examples (Star Wars Death Star fork, Rush lift ramp) show intentional design choices removing/adding mechanical elements based on tier

Transcript

youtube_groq_whisper · $0.260

0:00
The pinball network is online. Launching the Aussie pinball podcast. Hello and welcome to episode 5 of the Aussie Pinball Podcast. You can come to get me now, just feel the trap style.
0:44
This week I've managed to score a reunion of the original Pinheads with a Z podcast team. You're the last of me. They were the original Aussie podcasters based out of Canberra, and their podcast ran from December 2013 right up to December 2017, where they decided to have a break. I managed to drag them back into the studio on that lovely Saturday afternoon to catch up and find out what they've been doing over the past five years. Are they still keen on pinball? Are they interested in getting back into podcasting? And generally find out a little bit about what's been going on in their lives.
1:27
That background music that you can hear is a hit from about 20 years ago from a band called The Cockroaches, who are mentioned in the podcast in the music section. And today's trivia is that members of The Cockroaches went on to form a much more successful band which took on the world and conquered it. If anyone can reminisce on who they ended up becoming, I'll play this song at the end of the podcast, but you have all heard of them. Anyway, let's check into the studios in Canberra and see what Rod, Gaz and Pindex Stevie have been up to over the last five years.
2:13
This is the Pinheads Podcast. We'll just talk about the fact, you know, you're a government IT guy, you're a canvas pin technician and, you know. That's what I do for a living. Yeah, and I'm meant to know what I'm doing with talking on the radio, but ironically this podcast is made for you otherwise. It's the first episode of 2014 and it's the first time in a long time that two new pinball titles have been announced in the one month. But will Stern's 50th anniversary Ford Mustang appeal to pinball fans or will Stern have to rely upon Mustang fans? A little blast from the past there from their previous podcast episodes but now we have them live. So joining me in the studio is the original Triple Drain crew. Sorry, Travis and Tom and Joel. But these are the original threesome, the fantastic three from Canberra. That's welcome to Rod, Stevie and Gaz from the original Pinheads Aussie Pinball Podcast. How are you doing, men? Good afternoon, Dr. John. Dr. John, g'day, g'day. Good afternoon. Hello, everyone who's waiting for us to put another podcast out. It's only been five years, but you never know. It's quality, not quantity. That's the one. This one's going to need to be pretty good then. Rubbish editing this time, so it won't be as polished as the original podcast, which you were well known for at the time. How much work did you put into that editing and clipping there, Rob? Yeah, at the time I was thinking about that before we came on to chat with you, and the 16, 17, 18, 19, 20-minute intros got more and more elaborate. As time went on. So the time that it would take us to actually do the podcast, the intro ended up taking about the same amount of time with the writing and the production. But it was a passion project. We loved it. It was just us reminiscing about playing pinball as young guys and then getting really excited about the one new game that might come out that year. And here we are five years later, and I couldn't even tell you all the new games that are coming out or have come out. You know, a very different landscape, isn't it? It is. We're far. Being back there, what, 2013 was your first episode, I think? you've got a better memory is that right yeah I looked it up so 2013 so do you know what games came out that year Stevie you must have worked on them all mate 5, 4, 3, 2, 1 was a year or two after Thunderbirds yeah so that's the one that sticks in your mind Michael if you're happy that that's the one game that you can remember Thunderbirds well done we voted it in Maybe we should have voted it out. I mean, Stern was making games at the time. Correct. Give me a clue. A brand new manufacturer came out and revolutionised the pinball machine. Jersey Jack? Correct. Wizard of Oz. Yeah, right. That's when Woz started. Oh, that's right. Because we had, there was a weird situation where the first Wizard of Oz in Australia somehow found its way to Canberra. That's right. And you were trying to keep it up, Stevie, because it's the prototype. and obviously it wasn't designed to be bulletproof. It was their first game. Definitely. So the first one in Australia was here and you used to work on that. Yeah, in Canberra. That's right. Oh, good memory. There you go. Pocketed chips, so if something blew up, you could just pull out a chip and change it. Oh, what a great system. And then that all went out the window. Yeah.

  • Star Wars Pro version plays better than Premium/LE due to simpler Death Star shot access, avoiding fork trap issues

    medium confidence · Discussion contrasting Star Wars tier design philosophy between Pro and Premium versions

  • “If you want to have a quick game, do not start that game [new Guns N' Roses]. Not that it plays long, but you've got to do a lot to get into it.”

    Dr. John @ Game discussion — Describes design philosophy difference: new Guns N' Roses as complex/commitment-heavy

  • “So, yeah, they're really on top of things as far as getting games out that are a lot more complete than the old where's the code call that was coming out five years ago.”

    Dr. John @ Stern code quality discussion — Key assessment of Stern's improvement trajectory in launch-day code quality

  • “He's done an amazing thing, considering Greg didn't know much about pinball or video games or early crane stuff, and he bought all this stuff and managed to secure with Luna Park to put them all in there.”

    Stevie @ Luna Park discussion — Highlights importance of Luna Park's EM collection as access point for new players

    • Texas Pinball Festivalevent
    Luna Park Sydneyvenue
    Greg Turnoverperson
    The Basement Canberravenue
    Tim Sextonperson
    Raymond Davidsonperson
    Keith Elwinperson
    Tanya Cliceperson
    Steve Ritchieperson
    John Borgperson
    Dwight Sullivanperson
    Dirty Donny Gilliesperson
    Lukeperson
    Andyperson
    Ninoperson
  • $

    market_signal: Spooky Pinball maintaining strong collector demand; games like America's Most Haunted (150 units) and Alice Cooper (described as having 'best mode rules ever written') holding value

    medium · Gaz's retention strategy for limited production Spooky games; extended praise for Alice Cooper's rule design philosophy

  • ?

    personnel_signal: Raymond Davidson (world #1 competitive player) now working as coder for Stern Pinball

    high · Dr. John explicitly states 'Raymond Davidson, the world number one player, on code' at Stern

  • ?

    personnel_signal: Tim Sexton (formerly working with Steve Ritchie) now appears to work with John Borg on Stern code

    medium · Dr. John notes Tim Sexton 'who was working with Steve Ritchie, who's now, I think, working with John Borg'

  • ?

    product_strategy: Star Wars and other recent Stern games deliberately designed with feature distribution across tiers: Pro lacks certain mechs, Premium/LE includes additional elements

    high · Detailed comparison of Star Wars Pro vs Premium Death Star fork shot; Rush Pro vs Premium lift ramp in donut

  • ?

    product_strategy: Wonka received major code/rules revision significantly improving playability and wizard mode difficulty

    high · Discussion of Wonka code update making game 'much more playable' after initial difficulty barrier

  • ?

    product_concern: Stern games launching at version 0.0 instead of 0.65-0.7, indicating substantially more complete pre-release code

    high · Dr. John: 'games are coming out at 0.0 on release which was never... They were always about 0.65, 0.7 when they first came out'

  • ?

    venue_signal: Luna Park Sydney now operates rare EM and early solid state pinball collection under curator Greg Turnover

    high · Stevie describes Luna Park having 'Close Encounters, four-player EM... Leap System 1, Solid State stuff' with 'rare stuff normally' from that era

    • 5:54
    And the other two games that came out that year, a little one called Metallica. Oh, yeah. Oh, that's right. Because we had, to that point, all the Stern games and anyone before Metallica will remember there was this awful period where there was a lot of clip art being used in the art packages on play fields and then Dirty Donny Gillies did this full hand-drawn old school art package and that was enough for me to part with a lot of money and that was my first ever new in box I think. What a game. I still have that game of course. One of the greatest games of all time. Yep. And Star Trek. Steve Ritchie still a good game played that game where were we there was a pub in Newcastle you know what we played pinball all over Newcastle over many years anyway yeah there was we walked into this pub there was this Hounds or something the guy who used to play he played in a premiership for the Roosters I've bought a few games off him Luke had a bunch of games cited in some pub in Newcastle he had one of those it was the Hounds and something was it the something and Hounds anyway So, yeah, it was a great pub, and it made great by that game amongst others. That's right. Well, Luke's now up here, runs a location on the Gold Coast. I think as he was leaving Sydney, I bought his Iron Maiden. His Iron Maiden, the yellow one. So, I guess it's an LA, isn't it? I don't know. Or a premium. Premium. Who can keep that? Premium.
    7:23
    And just before he left, he was kind enough to sell that to me. And how's he going up there? It's good. He's got a, he puts his, normally has five LEs sitting on the site, but of course it's mainly all kiddie gambling because that's where the money is. Is that the place in Broadbeach? Yes, in Broadbeach at the Oasis Shopping Centre. Yeah, yeah, yeah, I've been there, yeah. I was up there last one. I was actually searching for a Wonka on site. You have a Wonka now? Yes, well, I had to, didn't I? Because I was quite pushing for it all the time. Anyone who listened to the podcast all those years ago, because you were the one who said, oh, this would be the dream game, and then finally it was made, but we stopped podcasting before you ever purchased one. So there's an update for old Pinheads podcast list. Yeah. So as we tangent around, did you think the new code for Wonka was a lot better than... I had Wonka originally and I ended up selling it because I would play the heck out of the machine and never get anywhere. You know, I think one game I got to three golden tickets and there was no way I could get any further. And, of course, then they did a total rules revision and made it much more playable as far as code goes. Did you find that with yours? Yeah, well, I still haven't got five either. I've got four, so that's as far as I've gone as well. But it can take you a long time to get there. But, yeah, you're right. It's a bit easier to get with the newer code. I don't know if they will do another one, because I don't know anyone that's actually got to the end yet. Is yours the ELEGOS? Yeah. What do you get on that that you don't get on the other ones? Oh, you just get the chrome, you know, nice blue legs and the blue things. You get the elevator up the back that isn't on the standard one. Right. Isn't that a cool miniaturisation screen or something on that? Yeah, there's a little screen there where you see Mike TV wandering along. And that shows you all the other stuff as well. That's cool. That's good. It's a good game. Now, so we keep bouncing around here. Let's go back. So there's Vita Game. I remember last time Rod was espousing that he had got his Rob Zombie delivered and it was in the box. Oh. Did you ever open it? No. So it sat in the garage. I don't know if I ever told the story where there was a bloke who came around to do some cleaning on the house because we were leaving the house because we were building a new home. Anyway, he finished cleaning the house, and then instead of hitting reverse, he just drove into the garage door. I didn't hear that. Right, and just on the other side was the Rob Zombie, and I was like, no. You know, because there was a big ding in the door. Anyway, so I cut the box because it was still in the box. I cut the corner of it out, checked the game. It was fine. and there was a teacher here who was a Rob Zombie pinball fan. So I sold it to him. Why did I sell it to him? I must have wanted to buy something else. So I never opened it. I sold it to you in box, which sounds absurd. So, no, I never opened it. You have one, though. Is it worth it? Should I have opened it? Yeah, well, I liked it. I mean, I like all pinballs. I'm a bit weird. It met with a lot of derision as far as was it good or not. I've owned every spooky game apart from the current two titles and it can be a little repetitive that it's very left orbit heavy, but the call-outs were the first game that had real adult-themed call-outs, great music, and I enjoyed playing it. Subsequently sold it. I mean, I'll always keep my America's Most Haunted just because it was only 150 made and I feel like it as a game. So I got that and Alice Cooper bolted to the floor because if you haven't played Alice Cooper, I still rate it as the game with the best mode rules ever written. Wow! Due in part to Bo and Keren's. Have you played Alice Cooper? No. No, no, no. Has anyone here played one of them? No, it'll be on my want to play list. Right. Is there one in Canberra? No, no, no. No, they're not that common. But unlike the normal game where you start a mode and it says shoot that flashing ramp and now shoot that flashing orbit, the most things like Pit Creature lives in a hole in the ground. So you have to hit a shot to start Pit Creature and then you have to then hide the ball under somewhere and there's a countdown timer that starts at 13 seconds. So every time you go into a scoop or a subway, the countdown timer starts to count down. Oh, I love a time mode.
    11:29
    Yeah, but the ball's got to be invisible to the pit creature and no other game does that until you get down to the zero second mark and then you get the bonus jackpot shots for the pit creature multi-ball. And Bowen writes that code. Bowen writes all the codes for the different modes and that's just one example. So all the modes, Alice Cooper, you've got to go up to the top playfield three separate times and load the guillotine, put the ball in the guillotine, and on the third time, the guillotine drops and chops his head off and the ball drops through the playfield. It's just absolutely brilliant. So if you get a chance or when you come up to visit, come and play Alice Cooper. Any old listeners of ours will know that, yes, we love an up-to-playfield and a timed mode. So that game sounds awesome. And I don't know why it's making me think a little bit of the Munsters. What's the name of the dragon? and his head pops out from the bottom of the ramp there in the middle. I've forgotten that character's name. He's a dragon. Anyway, he's like their pet dog, but he's a dragon. It feels reminiscent of that, but the rules sound very different. That's what I remember for the last episode. I always remember also Gaz's dramas with building his backyard shed as a feature that seemed to drag on like a Batman statue next week. I think the pleasure of attending the shed won... How many years ago was that now? Five? That's the last time I saw you, Dr John, in person, was in the shed. Well, you came down for the pinball conference at the basement down in Belconnen there? Yep. No, it was the time before that because you had a conference or something and then you dropped over and the shed had only been recently finished, I think. Yeah, it was pretty... Yeah, Rod came over and joined us and... Pretty proud. So what games are in the shed at the moment? You had a great eclectic mix of EMs and solid states, but now you've added Wonka. Added Wonka, yeah. Lost Ironman. that's no big consequence what was shipping about that Ironman was it autographed by someone no no that's just Spider-Man yeah that's not going anywhere extra EM I've got now Cardwhiz yeah and you're shipping one out which we've just yeah Fishtails getting a little why it's a nice Fishtail I need some room there in case something comes along with it you know one in one out when you're at capacity yeah Fishtails is it's always going to be a keeper for me in spite of the fact that motherboard for whatever reason on my fish tails. And I replaced it with a new Rotten Dog motherboard at some point. I don't know what it is. It's got a ghost in it, but I have a mistake. What's that? Rotten Dog boards. Really? Yeah. No. I gave... Problem Charles. I gave the original board to Andy, the copper. Oh, Andy, yes. And he reckons he fixed it and it's bulletproof now. That's right. I don't think I'm going to get it back because I gave it away, but fish tails is a keeper for me. No, we're just resticking it, me and Stevie. so that was the only thing really wrong.
    14:16
    They're all faded. Mine's re-decaled. I reckon if you look closely, I think the decals on my fish towels just went over the top of the last one. If you look through the fish's eyes on the side, you can see if you've got the old decals underneath the new ones. Yeah, you've got to white it out. So what games have you got at the moment, Rod? What have you got at home? I was saying to the boys, we had, because we built a new home four or five years ago and then last year we had torrential rain for a few weeks in Canberra during lockdown. So luckily the kids were home and my daughter came in out of the arcade where she was just watching TV and just said, oh, I can hear some dripping. I'm like, nah, it'll just be on the TV. And I've gone in there and the ceiling, you know, like it's a cartoon. Like it's, you know, like I'm making a visual movement. You know what I mean? Yeah, like a balloon. The ceiling is like a balloon, and it was about to explode over the top of my, speaking about re-decaling, of my fully restored safe cracker, which we all know not many of those left around. So I got a bucket and a... Lanced it with a Stanley knife. Right, with a Stanley knife, and water came out. She saved the day, though. Otherwise, this beautiful old game, there's too many of those have obviously gone to the tip in Europe predominantly. There would have been another one gone. So what is... Look, it's silly to say I don't know. I mean, all the ones that were still there. Indiana Jones, I love that. Fishtails are still there. My second Addams Family. I naively got rid of the first one and I missed it so much. This last one I've had, I've had fair. But I think the more recent ones, I got that. It's not new anymore, but to me it's a new Batman. Batman 66. 66, right? Yeah. And so the newest ones, I guess there's the Iron Maiden that we mentioned before. Got rid of the WWE, which was disappointing, but they just wouldn't update the damn code, so the thing was never finished. I saw that video of you and I unboxing that the other day, Gaz. Oh, really? All those years ago, yeah. Wow. It was exciting. Yeah. At the time. Yeah, that's right. It was a boxing match. We had to take five minutes to answer.
    16:18
    Yeah, but it was a short boxing match. And you know what? The game that I need to restore that's been sitting there for years that I got for, I don't know, like 500 bucks or something, is one of those old Merrill Munroe taxis. and I got the, they did the reproduction Marilyn Monroe play field. So it's all there. Got the new ramps, got everything, but hey, time, you know, so it's, it's budget. Like the old saga, where is your Guns and Roses? I think it's ready. It's sitting down with Nino in Melbourne. It's 65 years later. Yeah, well, you know, there was a pandemic and you know, there's obviously other things going on. So now I have to get to Melbourne. I cannot wait. Is it the Dark East version? Yes, the original. Look, I can't say the best because I haven't played the new one, which I'd like to, but... Awesome. Is it amazing? Yeah, amazing. It's not for everybody. I've sent you some... I've got it in the background of your shot. I'm looking at you here. One as well, yeah.
    17:10
    The... Is it awesome? It's complicated. So it's like Pirates of the Caribbean. If you want to have a quick game, do not start that game. Not that it plays long, but you've got to do a lot to get into it. Depends which song you pick. You can bomb out early, remember, if you don't score enough. Oh, really? Well, not really. As long as you keep the encore meter going, the song will last forever because every time you hit the required number of shots, you add a ball. So you start normally, you can just start with one if you haven't locked anything, and then hit two shots back in the scoop. You'll get a choice of catching out your jackpot, which would be very little, or keeping going. And if you keep going, it adds a ball. Then you hit your next four or five shots back in the scoop. Yes, keep going, add another ball. So you can have three balls going. So you can keep that song going until you get to the gold record, and then the song will stop if you don't cash it in on a single ball, and you go to the encore, and then you've got album mode, and all this sort of stuff, so it goes on and on. Question for you, Dr. John, when there are games like this, and you have the nostalgia connection with the original, in this case the Data East, Star Wars is another good example of the original Data East, Star Wars versus what seemed like a bunch of cool new versions. I don't know, maybe there's just a bunch of different artwork on the same game, but which is better for you with Guns N' Roses? The new one. I mean, the old Guns N' Roses, well, you see, I've been ruined a bit by competitive pinball as well, which I'm cutting back on because if you play Guns N' Roses in competition, you really only just keep building up band members, I think. Right. You need to wind a shot over and over. The new one's much more in-depth and a lot more to do, so I would go new. But having said that, the most popular game in my home at the moment is Stars by Stern Electronics. How old is that? That's as boring as... I have five of them in Canberra, and everyone just keeps passing them off to the next person. I remember I knocked back the offer of a star's... God, I don't know, 20, 25 years ago? And instead, I got Mousin around. There was a fun game. There was a crazy ramp in the middle. When those drop targets go down, and you've got to hit the three... It's almost a 360 ramp, you know, straight up the middle. But should I regret not having picked up the stars? Well, you need the variety. You see, if you've got one or two games, yes, I wouldn't get a stars because you're just doing the same thing over and over. But if you've got a game that's a resume house and then you've got a stars, you can decide, do I want a quick game or do I want to spend an hour playing this game? Yes. Answer to your question. Yes. I have just played, yes, the new Rush. Oh, yeah. Spurn's Rush. Now, that's hot news. How did it go? Awesome. What version? The new Rush from Stern. Pro or Premium LE? Pro. Yes, okay. I think, was it Pro or Premium? You can tell because if it's Premium LE, there's a lift ramp in the middle going into the donut, the time machine. Yes, it was. So it had the lift ramp, so that was a Premium LE. Yes. Much better playing game, I think, because I got to play all the versions over at Texas Pinball Festival. And the LE just shoots so much nicer with that lift ramp and not having the dead edge shot from the top flipper. Yeah, well, I didn't get it to lift up the ramp. That's why I couldn't remember. Yeah. Ah, right. And we put... Well, it's actually going down to the basement in Bell Conant. And he actually put mirror blades in it instead of the LEDs in the side rails. The expression lighting, yep. Yeah, exactly. And it looks so much better with mirror blades. Okay. The package itself, I reckon, was awesome for a first revision of software. You know, I've come across some other early ones which both you and Rod probably come across, where you've got like Batman 66. It was just the call-outs weren't there and it wasn't a nice, tidy, joined-together game. But this actual machine seems to be a good start. Good soundtracks, everything seemed to mesh nicely. Well, you're more in touch with the new games than any of us, Dr. Johnny. You're finding that the complaints of four, five, six, seven years ago of games going out half-baked from Stern, perhaps with all the competition in the market these days? Are the games arriving in the box a bit more complete? I think the volume of games in the last five years from Stern have allowed them to increase their employees So now instead of having a core of one or two coders trying to keep up there are dedicated coders pretty much for each designer So the games are coming out at 0 0 on release which was never They were always about 0.65, 0.7 when they first came out. So now you've got Tim Sexton and Raymond Davidson, the world number one player, on code. And then you've got Keith's games with Tanya Clice, pretty much Keith telling them what he wants as far as rules goes. and Tanyo implementing them straight away. Tim Sexton, who was working with Steve Ritchie, who's now, I think, working with John Borg, I'm not sure, but another top tournament player. Yeah, so they've got the staff now. Dwight, of course, don't leave out Dwight,
    22:17
    doing his complicated mathematical codes, which some people love and drive me mad, but that's because I'm bad at maths. So, yeah, they're really on top of things as far as getting games out that are a lot more complete than the old where's the code call that was coming out five years ago. Yeah, thumbs up. And so you had the evidence of that when you opened The Rush. Definitely thumbs up. Yeah, right. And that's just when he just opened it up. But not a lot of people know Rush, but I listened to it back in the 80s only because a friend of mine said, come up to my place, I've got this new music to listen to. Because he'd just come back from the States. He was in the Pink Floyd, The Wall, and he says, oh, there's this Rush. Oh, it's so good. A random record player. Yeah, and he's played me the two good songs. And I went to her. One of the two good ones. Tom Sawyer and whatever the other one was. and I'll go, oh man, that does sound awesome and then I'll listen to the whole album and I'll go, what's all the rest of it?
    23:06
    And again, I'm not stealing Dr. John's, I'm just repeating Dr. John's question. What pins do you have? Because I know you're sending me photos of gun games at the moment, which you're doing beautiful restorations on, but what's your collection look like? Okay, so I've got myself an ACD Lucy, which is in mint condition, so that's really nice. Oh, I didn't know. When did you get that? A little over a year, nearly half a year, I think. Fantastic. Yeah, it's a bloody lemon, isn't it? Yeah. What do you mean? A few things. Oh, just a few MOSFETs have blown up. All right. Hang on. So the Lucy's are premium, though, isn't it? That's the LE. Oh, right, right. Because for me, that ACDC, the base model, whatever you want to call it, the pro, and you, Dr. John, is the ACDC pro the best of the pros ever made? He's shaking his head. What is? No, absolutely not. You've got Angus's ugly face looking at you the whole time. That's right. It's really disappointing. And I don't like it as much because you've got stand-up targets on the sides rather than drop targets. So you hit a target and the ball is just instantly out of control, whereas on the Premium LE, you've got the drop targets, which will take the momentum away. Slow the ball down. Yeah, so I don't think so. I think the best pro version that's come out of all the games versus Premium LE was Game of Thrones. So you didn't have that top play field. I had the LE Game of Thrones. and I liked going up the top play field a little bit, but it wasn't that inspiring, whereas on the Pro, you just had ramp, richy action. The ball was continually moving, so it was actually a lot better. Super smart point. I think the Star Trek's the same. If you've ever played, oh, sorry, Star Wars, if you've ever played the Star Wars premium versus the Pro, that fork to get up into the Death Star shot is a nightmare. The ball's either stuck behind it or the flippers can't get up into the Death Star, whereas the Pro, it's just the Orbit, you don't have to worry about it. Good tip. Right, let's begin with the collection. What else have you got? Six-min dollar man, which I just did a whole play field. Just got to do a repaint in summertime. How's the glass? Beautiful. Mint. Got an eight-ball deluxe, brand-new back glass, really nice play field. Body was quite shabby but all touched up now. Looking good, playing beautifully. It's quite a complicated machine, actually. It's not just your normal belly, you know, $6,000 man or kiss or playboy. No, it's got quite a bit happening on it. Other pinballs, Duratron, which I'm moving on, Jungle Queen, which I've moved on. And then I'm collecting gun games. And I think I've bought five in the last five months. Where are you finding them? Well, I actually just picked up two from Luna Park. off a guy called Greg Turnover, which is running all the EMs up there, which is very exciting. He's done an amazing thing, considering Greg didn't know much about pinball or video games or early crane stuff, and he bought all this stuff and managed to secure with Luna Park to put them all in there. So for a lot of people who've never seen early pinballs, what a lineup. Really nice quality machines. So you're saying there's a bunch of EMs at Sydney Luna Park? That's right, Sydney Luna Park. Wow, right. And there's some really rare stuff, like Close Encounters, four-player EM. You don't see them at all. They've got Leap System 1, Solid State stuff. So he's prided himself on a lot of really rare EM stuff, really rare stuff, which was normally Solid State. So anyway, yeah, I picked up a couple of guns, well, four-gun games from Greg, and hope you might get him on the show sometime, John. He's on my list of interviewers to come up, because it's a fascinating world operating EMs. He would have to be the only one I know of. I know a world that operates EMs. Yep, yep, that's right. He does plan on updating some of the stuff. Hopefully he's sort of in the midst of two minds of upgrading to some later model sort of, when I say later model, I'm talking Williams.
    27:08
    Well, it's all around eating stuff. 40-year-old apart from 80-year-old, yeah, great. Yeah, Adam's family, blah, blah, blah, blah. That's sort of something that people line up for versus just doing pinball. So, yeah, that's what I've been up to. Apart from that, there's two good sites in Canberra to play pinball. One, as you know, is The Basement, which has got 10 pinball machines where Rod should go and actually play some new pinball. Yes, well, now that I live out of town, into space. No, it's right. Yeah, this is actually... You're an Indian boy now. Where are you from? I've gone north. I'm in Murrumbateman. Okay. Yeah, and it's also just the girls being six and eight now. It's just, well, you know what it's like, Dr. John. Once my daughter is playing competitive pinball and being the national number one, I'll be back there. How is your daughter? She's still playing competitive pinball? Yeah, she picks the choosers a lot now. She's just started uni this year. Right. And she won't play pinball with me anymore. Of course, she will ring me up and say, let's go and do a flip frenzy at Netherworld this Saturday. And I'll say, well, you know, you haven't played for four months. she goes okay and we were there on Saturday 30 players top ranked in Australia she came fourth so she's still got it and we've got the Richard Masters coming up in a couple of months and I'm sure she'll do well if you won't do that well because we have a number of international competitors coming over to take all our money away again you'll hear the Jimmy Nails episode of this podcast coming up next where I think he explained in 2019 they gave away $18,000 in prize money, and it all went to either Etta or Colin Urban from America.
    28:45
    But, I mean, this is the beauty of having prize pools that make it a... I mean, it is one. We've spoken about this a million times. It's one of the greatest unifiers on planet Earth. The guy who was doing the painting after, you know, the place imploded and it was the last thing that needed to be done on the insurance claim, he was... Where are the Smurfs and Tintin from? Belgium. Thank you. There you go. And he saw all the pinball machines obviously folded up outside the room that he needed to paint. He just started telling stories about his childhood. You know, they were poor, but if he could find, like, you know, a coin, that went straight into a pinball machine or a bag of towels. So it is. You're right, Dr. John. It doesn't matter where people are from around the world. If we can get them to Australia or where heading, wherever, now that the borders are back open, it's the international language. Pinball is just the greatest. Well, we've got to get you down to either the basement or there's a new place down in Woden, so if you're down the south side, called the Alby. The Alby. And there's five really nice pinballs down there. The fact that I can't even get into town, I can't even get into Canberra, let alone Dr John going to Texas. How have you gone with the borders being closed? You would have been climbing the walls. Well, you see, Queensland, I think we had four to five weeks lockdown and that's it. We had politicians every week. We had the Brisbane masses on. Last year, I think one person managed to sneak out of South Australia and one out of Victoria somehow.
    30:11
    And all the rest were Queenslanders. So we never felt it. I normally do at least one trip to America a year. So we did go a bit stir crazy. Yeah. Not being able to go across. So as soon as everything opened up in March, I zipped over to Texas, the Texas Pinball Festival again, which I tend to do every year. It was such a relief and caught up with everybody, which is wonderful. And then we'll plan on doing Indisc in January with Carl in California. So we'll head back over then. Have you been over? The bloke who snuck out from SA has still been in lockdown for the last six months since he got back. That's true. They're very strict over there. Sorry, you asked me. But do any of you ever get overseas to the shows? Well, yeah, not with COVID.
    30:52
    In the past. He's locked us out from getting up there. Oh, we couldn't even get in the state. The last time I was overseas, we were in Chicago. and we were in Chicago when my wife got pregnant with our eldest and understandably, we have not been anywhere since. But now that they're old enough, we can't wait. We can't wait to get back to the States. We're really, really excited about that. So if we can do that in the next year or two, now that the girls are at an age that they'll be able to remember it, well, what's your advice? Do you think that... But if we do it next year, we'll have a nine and a seven-year-old. Would they love it? Great age. You've got to either do California Disney but if you take the extra effort to get to the other side, I would recommend Florida. Disney World and Universal Studio. So much better, so much more modern and a lot to do. We've been there a few times and it's excellent but that's the perfect age for the Disney trip. Yeah, right. You were six years ago, you and Jazz? Yeah, something like that. It was a bit six. Well, we've been a couple of times but, yeah, we went. We were supposed to actually go to Hawaii last year but COVID put us off on that. and in the States, definitely the Florida side has the best Disney. We went to all of them, plus the Universal Studios as well. And then you've got a few of the theme parks here with the roller coasters. Oh, you're a big coaster guy. You love the roller coasters. Yes. Yeah. We'll leave my care to see through your Facebook post in the meantime, Dr. John.
    32:18
    What's the old Berry Farm? Knott's Berry Farm. You'd love that. That's great for roller coasters. Yeah, they've got a lot of old wooden ones as well. Oh, scary. Very scary. Now, I mentioned before we started recording, there has been the five-year gap since your last podcast and the extraordinary number of new people coming into the hobby that are embracing it as much as we ever did in the old days who don't know who you are. And I was remiss at the start by not introducing you formally. So just let the listeners know who didn't keep up with the old podcast where you fit into the pinball world. So, Stevie, can I get you to start? I'm a technician, been fixing machines, started off with electromechanicals and progressed into solid state and then all the late model whiz bang stuff, fixing a lot of just any coin op and jukebox stuff just because of the background in being a fitter and turner, mechanical, and then branching into basic electronics and then going self-taught from there before the internet sort of really kicked off. And that's where I've sort of been and got in contact. I was working at the place that Mitchell and Gary and I met. And then Rod, I was doing a bit of work, I think, for Rod. Well, like anyone in our region, I guess it's the same around Australia and the world, there's only one or two Stevie's pinball technicians in your spot. So, you know, when it came to us moving to Canberra, crikey, over a decade ago, like all of us here, you know, okay, who's the local tech? Stevie's your guy. and I run radio stations here in Canberra and, you know, there was an uproom in the schedule at the time for the passion project that was doing a podcast because there were a couple of podcasts back then. I think Clay Harrell did the most amazing one. He interviewed all the designers and I loved that tremendously and there was the Pitbull podcast and there was... Nate Shivers doing Coast to Coast. Nate? And when lit? But there was another one. Lock, wind, lift? No. No, there wasn't. Was there? I don't think there was. No, I don't think there was an Australian one. No. No, it was, you know, I just said to Stevie, hey, we should have a chat about pinball. And he said, well, let's get my mate Gaz along. And, yeah, we were at least one a month for a few years. And as I say, as I said before, it was just a very different time as far as, for us, for me, pinball is an escape, you know. So for us, we sat around and we really reminisced. And I think I, before I came on, I just was listening to one of your podcasts, Dr. John, and I just thought I'll just hit the, on Spotify, I'll go the, you know, you just flick up. I didn't continue because I could have kept, I don't know how deep it goes. There are so many pinball podcasts and I feel embarrassed that I haven't listened to them all. So apologies to those that are creating great pinball content. I'm sure they're all different and great and local in their own ways. But for us, yeah, we were really privileged to have a lot of Aussies and a lot of Americans listened back in the day. So if you remember the stuff we were doing, I'm humbled by that. And if you're hearing this for the first time, I always renew the domain. So they're all sitting there. It's an interesting snapshot in time of what was happening. Like remember when I paid for that Predator? Remember that? Oh, yeah.
    35:35
    It was going to be a good thing. We were excited. If you listen to the old episodes, you listen to us getting excited, and then you listen to us not talking about it for a bit, and then you listen to me reading the email saying you stole it all your money. Reading through the tears and everything. Yeah, you know, and I think, you know now, Dr. John, as far as all the small boutique manufacturers, and I guess some of them aren't even boutique now, some of them are big fish, it's another world. And how extraordinary as we entered the new millennium with Sega disappearing and Stern hanging on by the skin of their teeth. You know, had they decided, had Gary gone, you know what, we'll just call it a day. This thing we're talking about now, other than the old games that are in our collections, doesn't exist at all, you know. And I've done it. We'll never know. Thank God we don't have to worry about that. Yeah, well, we had the real passion. We had the real passion back then. You know, I could see. I mean, I've always had a deep passion, not just for pinball, but all coin-op stuff, especially rare stuff. And if you've got that, that's what drives me. And I could see when you approached me, you know, how about we do a podcast? I went, wow, somebody else is actually showing real passion. And passion is what pays. That's what I get the most satisfaction out of. And Gary was passionate. and that's why I dragged Gary into it. I said, Gary, hey, let's do this. Well, pinball, and Dr. John, you tell me if you agree, pinball actually only exists now because of passion. Because Gary Stern, you know, when you look at the lie of the land, you know, running a pinball business, if you're not passionate about it, you're not making any money, and then we see there's a lot of these different, you know, guys and girls having a go and businesses are falling over because, you know, passion obviously doesn't pay the bills, but those that can actually have some business now and are building a great product and then are fuelled by passion, Yeah, it's one of the greatest passion projects in the world, isn't it? Yeah. I think the one thing Gary always emphasised, which is quite true, as you brought up, if Stern had folded and hadn't had the investors come in and buy in, he was always aiming to make pinball relevant to the younger generation. I mean, I think it's fine for people like you, me, Gaz, Stevie to say, we love pinball, we've always loved pinball, but we're getting older. and there was no one coming through in the younger generation like my daughter Emily. She wasn't really that interested in older games but you bring the new licensed titles in like Stranger Things which they all watch on TV and Avengers and even Wizard of Oz even though it's an old theme. It appealed to people to get into the hobby and that's the most important thing that then it lives on in the next generations. Except for the price. except for the price. Yeah, that's an interesting thing, isn't it? But to be honest, they probably resisted. You know, I don't know. When I was a kid, the idea that you could have a bunch of pinball machines in your house, that was impossible because only a billionaire would have something like that. And we happened to begin collecting and restoring games at a time where they were either going to the tip or operators had forgotten that they were in the back of a shed and they were just gathering dust and we were lucky enough to get them. And then, you know, the demand wasn't particularly high, so Stern was selling them for what seemed like a lot. But I know I had a rule. I was like, I've never ever, the most I will ever pay for anything was $5,000. And I remember I knocked back a Big Bang Bar for seven because I was like, no, the rules are five. That's ridiculous money for a pinball machine. So it's all relative. And maybe it is, maybe it's probably fair income now. And it's a shame that it's not as accessible. But I don't know. Can you still find old games for under a grand that you can fix it up? Or are those days gone, Dr. John? I think they're gone. Even EMs in average condition are going for two now. A new time machine.
    39:17
    But the one thing we do need is the operators, getting the machines out on site for people to play. The one business model that's really come to the fore, I've noticed lately, are people renting out their machines for about $100 a week. So all of a sudden they're becoming accessible again. And I know in every major city on the East Coast, you can ring up and say, right, I want the latest, I want an Iron Maiden or I want a rush machine, $400 for a month. You don't have the large capital outlay. You don't have to go somewhere. And you can actually play it at home with your children. And it's becoming quite a successful way to get pinball machines into the homes. If my wife hears about this and then looks at a game that I haven't played for a year sitting in the collection and goes, you know what? That's $5,000 just sitting there. Put it in someone else's house. Anyway, let's pray that she never listens to it. So question. Dr. John, have you heard of anyone upping their price to $3 a game? Not yet. No. Everywhere I go, new modern Stearns are $2 a game, and older Belly Williams are $1 a game. I haven't seen the $3 yet. How about Canberra? I've heard that. No, Canberra's fine, but I've heard Sydney, some people are charging $3. That would only be, you know, the card that you're tapping, though. Do you know what I mean? Like when you're tapping. Maybe. When you put your $20, $50 card or whatever. You're not thinking and you're just getting excited and you're tapping away. I can see how that will be the norm in time. Getting a $2 and a $1 coin out, and I'm sure the Americans can't believe we're talking about this. I don't know how much a game over there is because whenever I've been there, you know I'm at a... Free play. Right. You're going to an expo or a convention or something like that. Do you know, Dr. John, you go into a location in America, how much, what is it, a buck? New games, $1, $1.50. Yeah, there you go. So the fact that we're talking about $3 and I don't feel surprised and you're hearing about it, Stevie, It is mind-blowing. But you know what? We don't even get 70 cents and a buck off. I don't even know if we get 60 cents and a buck at the moment off the Yates. 68.
    41:14
    68 to US. The better of day it is. When you consider having to pay off the game, like Stevie's saying, you've got double or triple the investment that you used to pay to get the game there. You're never going to pay that off at a dollar a game. No. That's right. I mean, you're talking, you know, 15,000, 16,000. or something that's really nice, and you're talking what? You've got to go 60, 40 with a site typically, or 70, 30, if you can convince them that they're high upkeep, which they are. You know, what your board blows up, it's 300 bucks to replace it because it's all surface mount stuff, it's all custom chips. You can't fix it, so you have to pay for the board. And how much are you really going to make a month? 300, 400? I think the only way, you tell me, Dr. John, the only way you'll succeed operating pinball machines in Australia is having a very good accountant who can manage you claiming back your depreciation. Exactly.
    42:13
    Because I don't know if you can ever pay it off by people putting coins in your games. Yeah. The way you pay it off is selling beer at the same time. That's right.
    42:22
    Now you've got a club as well. It's a huge hassle. Well, you nearly did that, Rod. Rod was tossing up when he was at Radio Space. and goes, should I be a barkeep or a radio station? I investigated. I didn't invest. I investigated that thoroughly. How many of us have thought how good would it be to start collecting pinball machines the next minute? Barkeep. Yeah, we should have barkeep. That's a great idea. And those have done it. The boys up in Newcastle, I think, did well with their pizza and pinball, but at a certain point they had to pull up the stubs, didn't they? Yeah. We've got Netherworld up here in Brisbane, and I've got a podcast with Jimmy Nails, who runs it coming out, so you can hear about the trials and tribulations of running it. You know, like he said, you've got to make the venue desirable and the pinball machine secondary Yeah sorry you yourself did try and set up a little shop thing at one stage did you Yeah I had a little competition centre That right I would sell food and alcohol illegally No, I just did that.
    43:24
    EYO? Again, get it upon the ship. I did with everything and chips you bought, just the chips were rather expensive. Yeah, I did that. And yeah, rent just kept going up and up to the point where it wasn't viable anymore. So you've really got to have something else making the money to support the pinball being there. And yes, you can claim them on depreciation, but you've got to have a good business model going to do that. Right. Well, there's a Back to the Future amusement centre in Goulburn. Now, he had five pinball machines in there. He's now got rid of those. I think he's got two back in. And the money's just not there. The money's just not there. No, no. So I think if you're a venue and you can use the appeal of pinball and perhaps the nostalgia to us young middle-aged gentlemen, and then, as you were saying, Dr. John, some of those different titles for younger players, if that's a draw, you're right, and you're getting them in the door, you know, come for the pinball, stay for the beer or whatever, it's part of a broader model. But you're right, if you're just dragging machines around all over the countryside, those days are probably gone. And our third member, Gaz, Gary, we haven't heard from you. Your background, so we've got the radio host, we have the technician and we have the collector. Is that how we'd sum the three of you up? Well, yes, small collector, yeah. More a player and just a lover of pinball. So when Rod suggested we do the Pinheads with a Z podcast... Beautiful, yes, thanks for looking that up. Yeah, yeah, Pinheads with a Z. So why not? We'd just get together and have a chat. It's just like we were sort of sitting around at home or in my garage or something, having a beer and talking about pinball. That always feels like when we do sit around your garage and have a beer and chat, I always go, had we recorded this, we could have got more episodes out. Yeah. But we weren't set up to record while sitting in your garage. No, and the time did take a spell. More so when it was Izzy, me and Stevie, we'd just come in and talk. But then you had to do all the hard stuff and give me production and everything. And I also changed my job and began running the stations as opposed to just announcing on the stations. and that was the challenge that I needed personally in life. It's a shame. It's regrettable that we didn't get to keep doing it, but I do like that what we did do for a few years was a snapshot of a different time. It's ridiculous only five years ago to say it was a different time in pinball, but it really was. Yeah, it's interesting. The passion was there to the point, Rod, where you actually brought a portable recorder along to one of the venues that we had. That was one of my favourite things of all time. Dr. John, did you go to that expo in Penrith? Penrith Expo. It was maybe six or seven years ago. Yeah, no, I missed that. It was, I mean, it was a group of different collectors who, by the way, all had, you know, when we talk about collections, maybe they had 100 games each or something. So we're in this giant facility with hundreds and hundreds of games, and we wandered around and just recorded it. It's a couple of episodes. It's like a two-part episode. I wish I could tell you which ones I had. I can go back to the archives. and we just wanted to reminisce about these games. Steve, you'd worked in them all from the 70s, all these EMs that went right the way up through those wacky Ataris and the Stern Electronics games and they were all there. Yeah, they were great episodes, those ones. It was true part of it. It was so big. There were so many games that we went through. I was just looking at games and talking about them. That was fun. Really cool. And we got to catch up with people down in Melbourne. There's operators. There was people like Luke selling a couple of Art Blades that Gary bought and posters and, you know, this pinball to Mark C to whoever, Minos, all these people. He said, oh, is that who they are? Yeah. Oh, right. And there was like a little, you know, they had a little table set up with things you could buy as well. So it was an awesome sort of... And it was 20, it was like 48 hours straight. So like, you know, you'd go, you know, back to the bar to refresh. Beer and pizza. Right. And then 2am back to the pinball. I guess that's what all good expos do, Dr. John. You've travelled around the world more than us. Yeah, that's what they're all about. And it's a mammoth effort to put them on. I mean, it sounds like it was a one-off event because the people who did it went, we're never doing that again. That's exactly what they did say. Four buggers. Yeah, exactly what they did say. The organization and getting all the machines there and setting it up was huge. But if they're listening to this, let me tell you, they are lifelong memories that us and anyone who was at that event will have forever. I know they haven't done it again and they've done different scaled-down versions and things like that. I think there was one at that barn that we went to a few years ago. Oh, yes. That was awesome. That was one of the... At Lee's house. There you go. Yes. And so for Lee and his mates, who put that one on a Penrith, which is just... Yeah, just know you made history. It was incredible. Did you get into his bat cave? I didn't get into his bat cave. No. So Lee's got the barn on the property outside of Penrith. I've been there probably three times, I think, for Taurus. But in the main house, he has an elevator in the middle of the house that goes down underground, and he's got this long tunnel. The thing what you're talking about? It's a high row of his sterns, and it goes under the pool, and you can look in the main game room, and you can look through the windows into the pool, people swimming, and there's all machines under there as well. It's a very special setup down there with young Lee, and we appreciate every time he opened up. The games that he had in that shed, and we played a lot of games. Dialed in. I don't know, maybe they were dialed in. We played. Dialed in. We got on that dialed in. It was the first time we played it. It was obviously a new game at the time. And I don't know. I don't know how that's regarded these days, Dr. John, but we were just into it. We had a freaking ball. We were taking photos of us. The photos are turning up on the screen. It was really cool. The Polaroid sort of. Yeah. He's a exploding one. He does that. Healthy mode. Yeah. It's because it's well, I mean, The code's come such a long way since the first game out as well now that all the modes, again, are good. It's probably the second best game as far as modes go, I think. Really? With the rules and what you do during the modes. Yeah, it's a great game. And Wonka takes a photo of you guys when you're playing. Yeah. Well, you can turn it off if you want a bit. Yeah, it takes snapshots of you. That's fun. And so the new Guns N' Roses, if you get a high score at the end, Roger, you'll be glad to know, it takes a selfie of you standing next to Slash like you held the camera there. Radical. You don't have to put beers on the high score. It's a nice flash. That's cool. If you don't want your photo, you hold the flipper button in a couple of seconds.
    49:53
    They're never flattering shots. You never know where they're going to take it. Yeah, you're looking down at the ball and it looks at you. You know what? How many people have got a photo of themselves with a flash like that in real life anyway? I think it's probably true to life.
    50:06
    So you guys are in what we colloquially love to call Canberra in the sheep paddock, which for overseas people don't understand. There was a big argument on whether Melbourne or Sydney should be the capital of Australia, so they took a ruler and went, this paddock is halfway between Melbourne and Sydney, let's put the capital here in the middle of nowhere. Interesting place to live. One thing I was always intrigued about, Melbourne's got a very active pinball scene. Canberra's always had a pretty good pinball scene as well. Sydney, very little. I don't know why. From people I've spoken to, They talk about the expense of any venue, making it nearly impossible to have pinball. But apart from Frankie's, I don't know whether you've ever been to Frankie's, which is downstairs in George Street in Sydney, there's not a lot of activity as far as pinball goes. Interesting. I don't know about you, Stevie, or Gaz. I had a couple of meets with the local pinball club here, the Vice City Players, and I had a couple of meets at my place. And the number of people that drove from Sydney, Now, I guess for those who aren't in Australia or even just in this neck of the woods, sure, if you're in the right suburb, two-hour drive, but if you're on the other side of Sydney, four-hour drive, plus to come and play some games that they didn't necessarily have up there or, you know, just wanted to play something different. Happy to sit in the car for four hours and come to Canberra. Have you had any Sydneysiders come and play at your place, Steve? Not at my place, but at the basement there's a meet every month and there's still guys that come from, like, West Wyalong areas. There you go. we would like to see some more people from Goulburn, they're only an hour away I don't know whether they're scared of us or what but there's quite a few players in Goulburn that should be coming down regularly and there's a few Simon up, Wollongong area that sort of area that will make that trip you're right since COVID everything's just starting to get back does Goulburn still have the largest testicles on the outskirts Goulburn does and they are connected to the largest merino street for those who aren't Aussies who are listening to this. And back to the arcade, which is that amusement centre I was talking about. That's in Goulburn. In Goulburn. Back to the arcade. Right, right. I know a couple of staff that actually work here and travel from Goulburn, to and from Goulburn every day. So it's not that far. No, it's only an hour. Right. From here, it's about 45, 50 minutes. Yeah. On the topic of travelling around Australia, I want holiday tips for overseas visitors on where you, individually or as a group, like to holiday that's not in Canberra. Where's your favourite holiday spot to get away to? Locally, for me, wouldn't we get there down at Mollywalk, down at the south coast, just a few weekends away. Beautiful spot down there. So nationally, I guess Gold Coast is our number one go-to spot. We're up there twice a year when we can. And internationally, we haven't been able to travel for a while, but Hawaii is a go-to spot for me. Which island in Hawaii? because we went on holiday to Honolulu my wife wanted to go and it was just like the Gold Coast honestly we need to get to a different island because it was just shopping Sea World it was just like being at home why did we come all the way here like I said for us Gold Coast is a destination for a holiday you'd live there so you already I don't know what you do, go further north or something yeah, during the lockdown period where we couldn't really get back into Queensland and we left, we just hired a camper van and drove up to Cairns and saw all of North Queensland. I used to live in Townsville, but I love up North Queensland and the Daintree Rainforest. It's just an extraordinary place to visit where you actually get the rainforest on the beach. It's just nowhere else in the world I think you can see that. And what about you, Rod? Where do you like to holiday? Speaking of Cairns, tell us, I forgot his name. I'm Mr. Homepin. Yeah, Mike. Mike! Mike Kalinowski. I remember I was in holidaying in Cairns and I'm afraid doing some work there at the same time. I put a post on one of the forums saying, I can't find any pinball. I'm suffering a withdrawal. And Mike just responded and said, come around to my house. And that's when I met Mike years before it even started the home pin business. So look, I don't know if I can give you a destination where there's great pinball, but I would just say that if you get on the forums, you might find a local who goes, well, swing by, particularly if you're an international traveller. And I've heard of Aussies going over to America. I mean, do you have evidence of that, Dr. John, where you just put a thing on the forums and locals will invite you into their home and you can play their collection wherever you are in the States? They're a good mob, the Americans. You just have to use international currency of a packet of Tim Tams and a small jar of Vegemite. They're right. Well, you can fill half a suitcase with that. But look, for me, I grew up in Melbourne, in Victoria, so our holidays were always spent on the surf coast in Torquay, which again is a different place these days, but still fantastic. And if you're going at the right time of year, you can go to the Bells Beach Easter Classic, where the best surfers on planet Earth come to compete. So if you are travelling from away, go down the Bellarine Peninsula, Torquay, Lawn, Janjak, all the way down to Apollo Bay, and see the 12 apostles, or however many apostles are left now as they're all falling over.
    55:28
    Half a dozen, yeah. It's refreshing. It's cold because, you know, it's Victoria and it's Bass Strait. It's the ocean. But, yeah, look, for me, there's obviously this tremendous nostalgia around that part of the world. And you may see a bit of old Prime Minister washed up on the beach sometime. Well, we're still looking.
    55:45
    Never know your life. At least a submarine. Somewhere. Someone once said a dingo and a submarine got him. I think this is not a joke. The swimming pool at my school was named, it was the Harold Holt Swimming Pool. It was named after him. Now looking back on it, it seems like of all the things you could name after a Prime Minister lost at sea, it wouldn't be your school swimming pool. That is a true story. You would name a brick after him or something like that because he obviously couldn't swim. Is that right? But it would be less obtuse than naming your actual pool. Anyway, true story. There you go. Stevie, where's your tip? Oh, well, I like the South Coast. That's Batemans Bay area. My brother, I was brought up down there pretty much. My brother lives down there, so I go down there. Half of it, I go trout fishing. And Lake Yukon Bean, Lake Jindabyne, and also Tumut. Tumut is one of the eight wonders of the world. I actually took my wife there after we got married. You're taking me where? She said, this is an awesome place to go. Well, there's plenty of Australians going where. I mean, as Canberrans, we know Tumut. But, right, that's your tip, huh? But for your honeymoon? I'd recommend is watch the castle, of course. Wasn't the castle in the Kerrigan's Holiday Inn area? No, it was Bunny Doon down in Victoria. Oh, that's in Victoria. It's about two hours just out of Canberra. Unless you take a dirt road, it's an hour. To Gold Toasters, it's all a very similar area.
    57:13
    It's in our backyard. So being right in the middle of Sydney and Melbourne, you can give me the unbiased opinion, which is the better Sydney? Sydney or Melbourne? Okay, we all have to say it on three. So I'll go three, two, one, and then we say it, okay? Because we've never had this discussion. Okay, three, two, one. Melbourne. Two out of three, Melbourne's. And one's wrong. Sydney's fantastic for a visitor. I wouldn't want to leave. I mean, I'm in Melbourne, but I am biased. I love Melbourne. You love Melbourne? I love Melbourne. Yeah, trams are getting around there so much easier than Sydney. Oh, Sydney's the land of the one-way street. Yeah. Dr. John, Melbourne or Sydney? Melbourne. I grew up in Melbourne. There you go. Yeah, but see, I used to like all the quirky shops as a kid. It's George Street, the old amusement park. Love George Street. My old man used to sneak me in there, and it was all dark, and there's all these dodgy-looking dudes, and the old man's saying, You're not allowed to stay in here long, son. I'm just sort of sticking my head in there, looking at a couple of machines, standing there for about 10 minutes, and just sort of sneak in a bit and sneak out a bit. It's a great... It's an awesome adventure, Sid. And all the old shops that used to have up there, like Tomo and Trout Flies and things like that, you'd go into the shop, It's like a whole IGA of old fishing stuff, like beautiful wooden glass cabinets. You just don't see that in a lot of cities. No. Well, if you go to Sydney, look at that. I doubt it's still there. Yeah, exactly. But there are some still old bits and pieces.
    58:39
    Melbourne's a good place to go and eat. There's 10,000, well, it was before COVID, 10,000 little shops. Yeah, like anywhere, it's coming back to life. Yeah, which is great. Lake Ukabee, is that the one with the town underneath the water that they flooded? I don't know. I know that Lake Billy Griffin here is the lake with the golf course underneath it. Lake Adimitibi town was flooded. Yeah, when they built the lake, they just flooded the town. It moved up to high ground. Well, Lake Billy Griffin wasn't. It's a man-made lake. Yeah. Giant lake. But I don't know about your lake. No, that's up with Stevie Holidays. And your famous Lake George, which just disappears one drive, and the next drive people are drowning in it because it's a massive lake. It's chock-a-block at the moment. The cattle don't know where to go. And you'll drive past there for years, and they'll just be grazing, and you drive past there at the moment, and they're not there. They're okay, by the way. They were moved to higher ground. But no, yeah, it's as full as you'll probably maybe ever see in your entire life. Amazing. Cool. And tell me the vote for the best Aussie movie that you've seen. No pressure, Stevie. Greatest Aussie movie of all time.
    59:49
    Greatest Aussie movie of all time. Is there one? See, we've got great Aussie directors, but they end up being Hollywood movies. Well, I guess, I don't know. Clichés. Man, that's it. Castle. The castle. The dish. Dish was good. It's a good three-archon. Chop it all down there, I suppose. Again, Hollywood film, but still, it was awesome. Yeah. Chopper. It was pretty good. With that all mentioned so far, I'm going to throw one into the mix that no one's ever talked about. Have you seen Rabbit Proof Fence? Yes. Heard of it. About four times. How many times? Is it good? I've heard of it. Yeah, four times. I think it's a must-watch. It deals a lot with Stolen Generation, deals a lot with the outback living conditions of Aboriginal people, and it's a real tear-jerker, and gives you a great insight into a side of life that most city slickers never get to see. What did you think, Stevie? You've seen it four times? Yeah, no, it was good. I mean, the reason why I'd sort of follow that is I guess when I was a kid, my father took me to see The Chant of Jimmy Blacksmith and nearly had a heart attack at eight years old, seeing an axe murderer running around on the big screen in the back of Australia. So, yeah, that's why that sort of appealed to me. You should watch Wolf Creek. It's a good Aussie movie. Favourite Aussie band? song? We'll get the radio DJ last. Well, maybe more into sort of rock, specials, rock, I guess. ACDC, Skyhooks, you know, Tittle. Skyhooks, I'm glad someone mentioned Skyhooks.
    61:30
    Rose Tattoo, and I guess later Spiderbait, and what's the name Lime Cordial is excellent how excellent yeah Lime Cordial which song we think is the Lime Cordial one that is Robbery that's Robbery is good
    62:03
    I never, I never, I never Put that to you, Steve. All right, well, I'll have to throw something really weird then, like Jojo's ever been found. Got it. Absolutely. I'm running and I'm hiding Nothing's gonna get to you Got the dick, I want it, get my loose, get my quits, get my big steps Nothing's gonna get to you I was out for making water through Does it just get so old?
    62:30
    That was pretty cool. Yeah. Yeah, apart from that, we had a big stadium here in Canberra, Steve Jones, the United Oil, the Angels, Flowers, blah, blah, blah, in the stadium, like four or five bands in one hit. We also have the ANU Reflections. Yeah. I go there, and thanks to the Phil, Steve, George, three bands, Sudoweko, blah, blah, blah. Oh, before they were, Nirvana's played there, you know, everyone's played there. That's right, it's a big venue for its time.
    63:09
    Yeah, I guess those sort of more angels and ACDCs, a bit more rock like guys. Yep. Well, this is the thing, during the 80s, Oz Rock dominated radio. Radio didn't play popular music or pop music, it wouldn't matter. In fact, Kylie Minogue was number one as far as record sales were concerned when she had that crossover, obviously, going from Neighbours to being an artist. But the radio station still wouldn't play. It was number one, selling more records than anyone else, but the radio would only play pub rock. So it is what we were brought up on, but it's bloody awesome. Excellent.
    63:48
    However, the Australian music of all these decades of our lives, just unbelievable. And the really good ones we call Australian that actually we stole from New Zealand. They're fantastic too. And I'm not talking about 20-odd foot of grunt. I'm talking about splitting. Splitting.
    64:25
    Absolutely. And in fact, Tim Finn's son, he's number one in New Zealand with a bunch of stuff. He's just, have a listen to Neil's nephew, Tim's son. He is just, like he's charting it. He'll be big in Australia in a minute now. But for me, you know, that discovery of music in your early teen years, so born in 74 growing up through the 80s and then I remember the bus trip from Melbourne to Brisbane for Expo 88 And one of the kids had got the In Excess kit cassette and that tape played all the way from Melbourne, all the way to Brisbane. And look, maybe their music still stands up today, or maybe I'm just biased as all get out. But I just think In Excess is the greatest Australian band. But again, that's a lot of stuff.
    65:17
    I've got another one for you. I bought two records in my life. One was I Got You, which was obviously... Split Ends. Yep, Split Ends. And I actually bought a Space Invaders record. Space Invaders? It is. By Player One, right, yeah. Now, that's Australian, isn't it?
    65:53
    Who actually bought that record? I don't know, but I do know that we used to play that song on our podcast. Well, exactly. And they used to actually play it on the radio back then. Yep. And that's why I bought it. Yeah, awesome. Pac-Man had his own thing, son. Yeah. Pac-Man fever. I've got that record as well. Yeah, I reckon I might have it somewhere there. Yeah, amazing. And what about you, Dr. John? Oh, I'm agreeing with all that. I'm a slight bit older than you, but I spent my time at Melbourne Uni watching each residential college there would try to outdo the other one by having live music on their formal balls at Melbourne Town Hall. So one college would have Aussie Crawl followed by Cold Chisel, and the next one would have the Angels and Old 55. So that was all my era. I just loved that Aussie rock scene. And like people said, they crafted their art playing live in pubs around Australia, and they had to be good live or they were abused. So by the time they'd have a hit record out, they could go tour America, and people were astounded at how good their sound was because they spent all those years putting up with drunk Australians if they weren't any good, and they got very good. So, yes, that's my favourite, the Aussie rock scene from the 80s and early 90s, for sure. Chuck, Hunters and Collectors in there too. I don't know. I want to reminisce. I mean, we had a lot of cover bands here. Like, you'd go to pubs and they'd just do cover songs. And that's why it was a bit sort of difficult. You'd hear Angels, ACDC, blah, blah, blah. A classic one was the Pearly Shells down in Maria, down in the south coast, near south of... The band was called the Pearly Shells. No, the Pearly Shells is where the band played, which was George Washing Machine and the Dead Ringers. And they played in Canberra. They played in Canberra. George Washing Machine? And the Dead Ringers. Of course. there's no more of you know than that I saw them probably you know at five different pub venues can I check the shout out in for Casey Chambers get around with the family bands they were real-life tips they just traveled the country playing playing music and her old man's elite in their band she had that incredible
    68:37
    Why do you see right through me? I live, I breathe, I let it rain on me We could go on, Dr. John. I definitely think the cockroaches. Oh, they're good. They are. Yeah, you know what? I don't think they lasted long enough, and whatever they did after that was just, they didn't amount to much. Multi-coloured. If you don't know that, that'll be the Googling of the episodes.
    69:11
    The chameleons of colour. Very good. Good old cockroaches. I think you're starting the podcast with their hit and seeing who knows what they went on to do. And then end with their more recent hits, which people all know.
    69:25
    So back to pinball. We had a brief touch on it earlier. What game, past, present or new, are you dying to play that you haven't had a chance to play yet? You said one before, Gaz. Well, the Alice Kip. I am, yep. What else? If I had a chance, I would play Kingpin, the Capcom one, but there's only nine machines of those. Well, what's the goal? Are they building new ones of those, Dr John? They unveiled their plans to build a new one at Texas five years ago, and it's been crickets ever since. Ah, really? Yeah. It's the sort of silly thing I would have spent money on too. I haven't learned my lesson. I'll be honest if a few of those turned up, boy oh boy I also wouldn't mind, I've seen one but it wasn't working, Houdini American Pinball Houdini It's good, it's a good game they're still available for sale at the moment, so you can buy one I don't want to buy one I just want to play one just first there isn't many around They really pack the playing field I'll put it that way, when you're trying to shoot things there's a lot of posts that you can get instead of the shot you want. And the original code was annoying because it would go into a 20 to 30 second explanation of the shots you needed for that mode. So you'd be reading the screen and go, right, left wrap, then right wrap, then right orbit, then the lit shot that's moving on the right side and be going, okay. Yeah, I like being helped to a point. Yeah, that's right. But they did improve that. You can flip through that double flip and get rid of the instructions. It's a great theme, and the game was fun. It's got a little tricky, but a very good first effort for a game that was made in less than six months from nothing to built and put on the floor at Texas.
    71:17
    Steve, a game that you haven't played that you want to play? Your holy grail, the Big Bang Bar. Yeah, I'm the same. I've never played it, and let me tell you, someone comes out, someone. Who are the mob that have the licence for them at the moment? Chicago Gaming? Chicago Gaming, yeah. Well, they haven't got the Capcom licence. That's the trouble. They've got the Bally Williams remakes. Sure. I'm not sure they've got Capcom. Yeah, but again, you believe everything you read on Pinside. I feel like they can, but if they, yeah, they only need to announce that tomorrow and I'm selling some games. You know what I mean? Like, I'm just hanging out. The other one, and you would have played this, Dr John, I'm going to guess, I tell you what I reckon looks really cool, the Big Lebowski. Did I urinate on your rug? You mean, did you personally come and pee on my rug? Hello! Do you speak English, sir? Parler, who said English? I'll ask you again. Did I urinate on your rug? No, like I said, Wu peed on my rug. I just want to understand this, sir. Every time a rug is miterrated upon in this fair city, I have to compensate the person? Come on, man. I'm not trying to scam anybody here. you know, I'm just looking for a handout like every other... I am not Mr. Lebowski, you're Mr. Lebowski I'm the dude so that's what you call me, you know that or his dudeness or duder or, you know, El Duderino, if you're not into the whole brevity thing. Well I was lucky that the first year it came out Yart bought it over from the Netherlands and the game I played with him on location at Texas, had all the original music in it. So it had the English, it had Bob Dylan. All the unlicensed songs.
    73:06
    And I said to him, you can't use these songs. We don't worry about license in the Netherlands. It is fine. And it is a fun game. I'd equate it most to playing Twilight Zone. Very similar. Stop, start, modes, top play field, but a real lot of fun. and I enjoy it and I still enjoy playing it when I see it and it's working. They're getting better at fixing it up. The carpet was always a problem and the poor old car used to get stuck in the garage on the top playfield but you're right. If you see one, play it. Bollyellies are a bit of a letdown. Oh, really? It looks so cool. It looks great. You press the button and the ball rolls three centimetres and goes, and that's it. That's the point. I didn't think about that. It's a very strong Bollyellie. get some rogue ROMs or however it's going to work these days and get those original the original soundtrack and there you go. Anything else Steve? Other than Big Bang Bark? Yeah well actually have you played Dr. John Bride of Pinbot 2.0 update which was made by the Netherlands dude. Oh yeah that's right. Yeah they had it there. I didn't bother because the game's only got three shots in it anyway so there's only so much you can do with an upgraded code. You know, the ramp, all they did was made that very left-hand blind shot do more. So you didn't just keep going up the ramp to load the ball in your eyes. Yeah, and spin the wheel. So he got the big wheel on the left. Yeah, yeah. But no, they're doing a lot of 2.0 revisions now. They had Tales of the Arabian Nights 2.0 upgrade at Texas this year. And they had the Funhouse 2.0 upgrade, if you're happy to spend about $6,000 buying the kids to upgrade your fun house. So it's the new du jour in pinball is to upgrade old rules. And, of course, Haggis in Melbourne has upgraded the rules for Fathom, which should be in my house in two weeks' time. Oh, right. So you can play the original Fathom or the 2.0 that Martin Robbins has redesigned. So I'm looking forward to that arriving. Those new Fathoms look just beautiful. I mean, that's a work of art. It's a work of art. It always was a work of art, the ballet version. But the new one, yeah, it looks very shiny. It's identical. Same drops. I don't know. Is it? It looks the same. Yeah. It's all identical layout, apart from the fact you've got the acrylic playfield top. Oh, is it? What do you mean? It's not glossed? It's wood with a sandwich of acrylic on top. So you don't get any, and the art is printed on the underside of the acrylic. It's not acrylic. It's a special plastic that's got a name. I can't remember. Yeah. Is it Macrolon? Something like that, probably. Because I put that, I put one of those on my safe bag. No, no, no. The Macrolon's the thin. Yeah. It's very thin. This is a third of the playfield thickness. Two thirds is wood. One third is this. Quarter of an inch thick or something. Yes. That's cool. And all the necks bolt all the way through. So the nut is printed on the underside. It's then bolted to the top of the wood, and it's basically unscratchable. How does the ball play, though? Is it slight? You don't know. I've got the Celts as well, which I've got on location up at Netherworld at the moment. And unless you tell people it's got that, you can't tell it's not a wood playfield. The photos look beautiful. Yeah, right. That's a good point because balls really do spin around. Correct. It depends. Like if you can kind of over-polish your games, and it's interesting with different surfaces, if your ball rolling versus skidding. And I was fearful of that with the Mackle on, but it actually played beautiful. I don't know. Yeah. Oh, yeah. My Star Trek, Stern Star Trek game, I got the slightly darker balls with the Star Trek emblem etched in them. Oh, cool. That I put in the game, and the amazing thing was the amount of spin on the ball. When you're catching on a flipper, and it's just sitting there spinning, and you go, whoa. That's exactly what I'm talking about. So you get a pattern on the ball. Yeah, right. You see a rust spot on the ball, and you see it spinning around, and you go, wow. We come back to what makes this the greatest game in the world, and that is that it's steel, plastic, rubber, mackerelon, whatever the surface is. It's all physical. No two games are the same. And if you're playing a game, a ball that's spinnier than another game, it's all part of it.
    77:24
    Again, that's what always gives you a chance, particularly in competition pinball. Yeah, there's people with a certain amount of skill, but when something wild happens, the ball's wild, then it's going back on for the rest of us. That's right. And it would be remiss with a chap called Pintex Stevie on the show. we talk about maintenance issues for new owners or experienced owners.
    77:47
    Everyone says make sure you keep the papers clean and your voice shiny. What tips would you recommend for machine maintenance, Steve, for the average homeowner? Well, the biggest thing is just to check out, obviously, clean your machine, probably whether you use a Novus or sort of appropriate polish. I don't like microfiber rags. they actually scratch. Have a good look, get an old pinball plastic, rub your microfiber on it, and you look at it, the finish and the gloss finish is gone. Sandpapas. I would not use microfiber. I just use a soft cotton T-shirt or t-shirt.
    78:25
    And one of the other biggest things I've found is physically grab, take your glass off your playfield, physically grab bits and pieces and move them around and see when things start coming loose. especially on the more complicated pinballs because it's a lot easier to tighten up a screw up in underneath the back of a playfield before it decides to shake loose with your shaker motor fall down into a crack something rotates it grabs a screw and rips your playfield etc, etc or it launches down the playfield into a kicker yeah, and you can never find it again so you see the smoke coming out of your game something's just locked on yeah, so physically grab things and same vice versa under the playfield. Turn your machine off if you're not confident, of course, so you don't get zapped, and physically grab things and you'll find wooden screws in playfields have come loose, solenoid end stops. I've had a few on late model brand new pinballs, which obviously escaped the quality control, where end stops, the flippers have just fallen off after 50 games. Oh, yeah? Yep. And you just go, who was it checked by? You just see it, you know, number 96. well who's number 96? That's true and these games have made it all the way from Chicago generally and when they land anyway one of the American guys who does the videos regularly he did an unboxing his profile name is Spider S-P-I-D-A anyway he was one of the first guys whose unboxings I've watched, he unboxed a family guy and he goes okay so before we even turn this thing on let's just get in our back box and again it's not even a thing with new games now But go through and just check that everything, all the connectors are actually pushed in, that nothing's loose. You're going to save yourself some panic and some potential problems just by checking, even when a game's travelled interstate or across town. Before you turn it on, just go through and go around them. Now, that's lovely, Rod. Now, one of the most important things is with any new stern pinball or other pinball, do not wiggle connectors when the machine is on. Danger, Will Robinson. Danger. Oh, Will Robinson. Danger. Right. Why? Williams, you know, you'd look for a sort of dodgy connection with an opto and blah, blah, blah. Right. These machines all have node boards, and they are super sensitive to this. They see a slightly different voltage, and they'll kill the node board. The node board is two, three, four hundred bucks a pop. Good tip. So you just think, oh, is the opto a bit intermittent? Wobble, wobble. and you'll just hear a click on the board and the custom chip's gone. That's a good tip, Dr. John. So someone has to do an exchange board system somewhere in Australia to help Pinball Australia and US are finding the same thing. Yeah, just be very wary of that. And the other thing is with some of this latest stuff, as you know, all these node boards are connected with CAT cables. Those are like the old telephone clear end cable, six wires or eight wires in it. make sure they're not too tight.
    81:32
    Yeah, because when they cable tie them in the factory, sometimes I've seen those connectors at literally 30 degrees half hanging out of a plug because they just have not had enough room and they've had to stretch the cable to plug it in. And then when they've cable tied it, it's pulled it across. So look out for that as well. They'll do what they need to do to save on a millimetre of cable these days. It all adds up. Perfect. I hope that helps.
    82:02
    Aren't they great tips, the ones I haven't heard before? And I'm going to take my pile of Bunnings microfiber cloth now and throw it in the bin. Oh, yeah, just in a test sample, grab an old plastic. Oh, I want to now. Yeah, and you'll see and just go, oh.
    82:15
    You're talking about people, you know, restoring machines and flame finishing the plastics to get them nice and glossy and new or brand new plastics. And then you go on microfiber and scratch it and see that swirl. Scratch them. Now stand aside, worthy adversary. Tis but a scratch. A scratch? Your arm's off. No, it isn't.
    82:35
    Thank you for that. Not happy, Jane. Cotton T-shirts, old Metallica T-shirts. If we only had one of them, we could use it. Or Guns N' Roses. There's one there.
    82:44
    Roger has looked down at his own T-shirt, yeah. That's right. He owns a Guns N' Roses one as well. Indeed I do. Good for cleaning. That's great. But again, thank you all for getting together for the reunion. Maybe there will be a Pinhead's podcast reunion at some stage as well. Everyone will welcome that if it happens, but I may have given a little prod in that direction, but thank you for your time on this Saturday. Don't be unhumbled that you invited us, mate. That was a bad ball. That was a good fun, boys. It was. Excellent that you're doing podcasts. Well done. Yes, thank goodness. Doing more than that. No worries, mate. All right, catch you later.
    83:22
    So I hope you got something out of that, and thanks again to the three wise men for joining me and reminiscing about the past, present and maybe even the future. Don't forget, any suggestions can be made, aussiepinballpodcast at gmail.com. But I'll leave you with a couple of sound clips, one being the answer to the question, who did the cockroaches end up going on to become? And of course, they are...
    83:56
    Thanks for aid Aussie export that every parent loved or hated, the Wiggles. Jeff can be seen playing the piano on the original Cockroaches film clip with Greg on guitar and his brother who became the Wiggles' manager on lead. But I'll leave you with one of Stevie's favourite songs, a number one Australian hit from 1979, Player One with Space Invaders. Catch you next time.
    84:26
    Thank you. The blood flows through the streets All back to the invaders Every kind of machine We fight to survive Running to stay alive Our bodies ain't made of time There's nowhere to hide Our covers been blown away Thanks to the ladies Space, space, baby. Oh, oh, oh, oh. They're closing in on me. Dark forest, cold and unseen. Oh, my hip hop, it's up. It's aching again. I'ma go back in and fight it out to the end. Thank you.
    86:22
    Thank you.