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#14 Southern NH Pinball Club 3 strike tournament - The Classic Pinball Podcast

The Classic Pinball Podcast·podcast_episode·43m 43s·analyzed·Nov 5, 2019
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claude-haiku-4-5-20251001 · $0.027

TL;DR

Southern NH Pinball Club 3-strike tournament coverage with venue tour and match highlights.

Summary

The Classic Pinball Podcast visits the Southern New Hampshire Pinball Club for a three-strike knockout tournament with hosts George and Dave, featuring guest Eric Stone from Florida. The episode documents the tournament structure, venue inventory of 40+ machines spanning EM to modern DMD games, and matches including Eric Stone vs. Mike Schmidt on Jack's Open and Eric vs. Trainer Gauthier on Kiss. The hosts discuss game mechanics, player strategy, and venue operations while walking through the full game lineup.

Key Claims

  • Southern New Hampshire Pinball Club has approximately two-thirds old school games and one-third new school games

    high confidence · Eric Stone describing the venue mix to hosts; Dave confirms similarity to Pinball Asylum

  • The tournament featured 14-15 people and lasted approximately 1.5 hours for initial elimination rounds

    high confidence · George's direct observation and timeline discussion at tournament

  • Mike Schmidt had no strikes and led the bracket after early rounds; Eric Stone was in second place

    high confidence · George reading tournament scoreboard/tote board on-site

  • The tournament final rounds sequence was DMD first, then Solid State, then EM games

    high confidence · George's statement about final round order and expression of regret about the sequence

  • Kiss pinball features the same designer (Kevin O'Connor) as the original 1979 Kiss game and retains similar elements like pop-up caps

    high confidence · Unnamed client representative describing game design continuity

  • The Kiss code being played was a brand new update that Eric Stone was not familiar with

    high confidence · George and Dave discussing Eric's unfamiliarity with the new rules before his match vs. Trainer Gauthier

  • Jack's Open is a Gottlieb EM game with 10 drop targets and out-lane hazards that drain frequently

    high confidence · George's gameplay commentary and explanation of game mechanics during Eric vs. Mike match

  • Eric Stone uses floor stomping as a timing mechanism for live catches during drop-catch attempts

    high confidence · Eric Stone directly explaining his technique in response to George's question about stomp timing

Notable Quotes

  • “I'm going to try to get all those toilet games. I'm going to have a toilet bowl tournament just have to find all the games that have toilets in them”

    Dave @ ~mid-episode — Reveals Dave's collection philosophy and humorous tournament concept, demonstrates community enthusiasm for themed play

  • “We're a social club. All games here are owned by the membership. $30 a month to join, members have 24-7 access, and we run tournaments like this on occasion”

    Augustus (Southern NH Pinball Club representative) @ ~late episode — Describes member-owned club model and operational structure, provides context for venue sustainability

  • “He's just got to get used to how the ball lies. He just needs four more drop targets.”

    George @ ~during Eric vs. Mike match — Demonstrates understanding of game-specific physics and location-dependent play differences

  • “These were meant to make money. They weren't meant to keep you playing.”

    George @ ~during Jack's Open gameplay — Reflects on classic EM game design philosophy prioritizing revenue over player retention

  • “I stomp on the floor because I want something to time it to. I time it to the beat of my foot.”

    Eric Stone @ ~mid-tournament discussion — Expert player technique revelation that combines physical timing with metaphysical intention

  • “It's a brand new code update, so it changes things a little bit. He's not used to it.”

    Dave @ ~before Kiss match — Highlights how recent software updates affect player preparation and competitive dynamics

Entities

GeorgepersonDavepersonEric StonepersonChuck WebsterpersonMike SchmidtpersonTrainer GauthierpersonSouthern New Hampshire Pinball CluborganizationKevin O'ConnorpersonSeamusperson

Signals

  • ?

    venue_signal: Southern New Hampshire Pinball Club operates as member-owned cooperative with 24/7 access at $30/month, hosting tournaments and maintaining 40+ mixed-era machines

    high · Augustus describes club structure: 'We're a social club. All games here are owned by the membership. You know, it's $30 a month to join Members have 24-7 access'

  • ?

    event_signal: Three-strike knockout tournament with 14-15 participants completed initial rounds in ~1.5 hours; used DMD→Solid State→EM final round sequence

    high · George: 'this was a three strike tournament... 14 or 15 people in the tournament... only went like an hour, a little over an hour and a half'

  • ?

    code_update: Kiss pinball received brand new code update with rule changes that affected competitive play; at least one experienced player (Eric Stone) unfamiliar with new version

    high · Dave: 'This code is an update that he's not familiar with. It's a brand new code update, so it changes things a little bit'

  • ?

    gameplay_signal: Expert player Eric Stone employs floor-stomping as deliberate timing mechanism for live catches and drop-catch execution, combining rhythm/beat with catch timing

    high · Eric Stone: 'I always do it when I'm drop catching it because I want something to time it to. So I time it to the beat of my foot... It's both [mental and physical]'

  • ?

    design_innovation: Modern Kiss pinball (designed by Kevin O'Connor, 5 years old) maintains design continuity with original 1979 Kiss game through retained mechanical elements (pop-up caps, similar graphics) while modernizing rules

Transcript

groq_whisper · $0.131

0:00
I'm winning, I'm winning, I'm winning, I'm winning, I'm winning, and I don't intend, I won't lose in the game.
0:30
Hello everyone and welcome to episode 14 of the Classic Pinball Podcast. My name is George and I'm joined by my co-host Dave. Hello Dave.
0:52
Hello George. In this episode, we visit the Southern New Hampshire Pinball Club for a three-strike knockout tournament and have a special guest. Stay tuned.
1:10
Here we are again with our good friend from Florida, Eric Stone. Hello, Eric. Guys, by the way, Frogger this trip is 46 hits out of 85 tries. How many tickets does that equate to? Close to 25,000. Do they still have that many tickets in stock? Oh, no, they had to fill it up a few times. Did an 18-wheeler come by and load it up for you? Yeah, 22-wheeler.
1:37
Well, welcome back to New Hampshire. Unexpected, Dave gave me a call a couple days ago and said, Hey, do you want to go over to the New Hampshire, is it called the New Hampshire Pinball? Southern New Hampshire Pinball Club. Yes. There you go. Southern New Hampshire Pinball Club. And Dave wanted to play, and Eric wanted to play, so I decided to play. It didn't last long. Well, Eric has really kept texting me and texting me. It's like, all right, let me see what they got here for games. They go, okay, they got two-thirds old school, one-third new school. All right, I'm good with that. Let's try some of that. It's very similar to the Pinball Asylum. Although, I think the Pinball Asylum, where I'm at in Fort Myers, actually has more old school games. percentage wise but not by far like old school like EM or yeah like here you got 1, 2, 3, 4, 5 you got 6 serves out of what 40, 35 games right but you were lamenting Dave that you played all new games where I played all old games George Stardow played all the old school he played EM he played Target Pool then what is it no 2001 2001, something like that, Dimension. Yeah, something. 2001. Yeah, that EM. Yeah, EM. So I won on that. I tilted target pool by basically just... That's all done. By touching it. Yeah. Really? Sneeze tilt. And that's a game tilt. That's a game tilt, right? It's funny because I practiced that and I was hitting it pretty good. I did. Well, you're you and I'm me. And for me, I just said, okay, your first game is going to be World Cup soccer. Great. A ramp game. All right. So I did pretty well. I won that. Right. Then I went over to play Torpedo, another ramper, and didn't do well in that. And then finally I got to play Kiss, another ramper.
Adam Meter
person
Ron Luffsperson
John Dayperson
Augustusperson
Classic Pinball Podcastorganization
Pinball Asylumorganization

high · Unnamed representative: 'This is a Kevin O'Connor game. He [designed] the original Kiss from 1979... he kept a lot of the elements the same. The pop-up caps are the same'

  • ?

    gameplay_signal: Game-specific physics vary significantly by machine location; Eric Stone acknowledged needing to 'get used to how the ball lies' on Jack's Open despite familiarity with the title

    medium · George: 'this is not obviously Eric's home... but he does like this title, though. He just has to get used to how the ball lies'

  • ?

    design_philosophy: Classic EM games like Jack's Open were designed primarily to generate revenue rather than maximize player retention, reflected in punitive mechanics and frequent drains

    medium · George: 'These were meant to make money. They weren't meant to keep you playing'

  • ?

    collector_signal: Augustus (venue operator) collects narrowly focused on Solid State era Valley games, exemplifying collector specialization patterns within the community

    high · Augustus: 'I collect just a very narrow area of the pinball community. I collect volley games from solid state era. I love the Valley Solid States'

  • ?

    product_strategy: Kiss pinball offers conversion kit upgrade option to add TV backglass component (introduced ~1-2 years after game release), suggesting post-release hardware enhancement strategy

    medium · Dave discussing conversion: 'They still kind of have it. You actually can get a... Conversion kit of some sort'

  • ?

    operational_signal: Multiple machines at venue were non-operational or misaligned (Firepower 45° off-level, Space Shuttle not playable, Meteor not working, NASCAR non-operating), indicating maintenance challenges

    high · George noting: 'There seems to be a lot more games not working... Firepower... not working... Space Shuttle, another not-player... Meteor. That's too bad'

    • 3:21
    I lost in that. And then I finally got to play Countdown, so an old school. And then I only got to play one old school. Then now they're playing, I had to play World Poker Tour, and I had no idea what to do in that game. So it didn't do too well. Sounds like my night. Well, I lost to Chuck, too. I played Charlie's Angels, and I thought I would do okay on that game. I botched bad. I wish I had to do that, because that's my game. I sold the club that game a while ago. I sold that one in 300 a couple years ago. So I would love to play that game.
    3:54
    And then the final dagger in the back was Terminator. You got terminated by Terminator. But we weren't playing well. I mean, I don't know. I think it was my curse. I must have been rubbing off on Adam. So you voted pretty bad? Well, I did bad, and that was expected because I had never played the game before. He looked somewhat disgusted, especially after I told him I hadn't played the game. So when you said he won, you said, no, no one really won. Well, there's something about, I saw him score like a million on the plunge and then three million on a plunge.
    4:33
    Okay. What's that mean? Well, that's something you don't find in old school games. Right. I don't know the game.
    4:43
    All you need to do is I'll go to the library and get you a nice encyclopedia. Get a read up for a week and you'll figure out what's going on. No, thank you. If this is a warm up to Houston. Oh, yeah. Oh, boy. This place is probably being conned. Well, I think we should rewind. This was a three strike tournament. Yes. There's, what, 14 or 15 people in the tournament. It didn't, what time is it? It only went like an hour, a little over an hour and a half. 7.30, about an hour and a half, hour and 15, yeah. Didn't take long to get rid of me. They're still going, but we're out. Right. Well, we'll talk to, we've got a couple of people, like Chuck Webster that some people might know. We'll talk to him. We'll get Eric back online here once he gets all whooped up. That's a matter of a few minutes, and we'll see how long this tournament goes. How many people are left, a couple? We should walk over to the tote board with us.
    5:40
    So let's take a look. I don't have my glasses on. You do. Can you read them? We have one guy who has no strikes, Mike Schmidt, who I think is a regular here. That's the guy who just walked away from us. Yeah, so he's here. He gets to hear a bunch. Yes, he is. He's a member. Okay, a member. So that helps him up there. And then you've got Eric Stone in second. You've got Traynor, Gauthier, and Adam Meter. Ron Luffs. Adam's the guy I lost to on Terminator. And Seamus.
    6:08
    And that's about it. That's top seven. Okay. But Eric is right behind Mike. Are any of those seven with one more strikeout? Yeah, Chuck has one more strikeout, and so has Seamus. Okay. And so has Adam, too. Oh, okay. So this might not go too long, depending on what game. So we played what in the final rounds here? DMD? Yeah, so the final rounds are DMD first, which I really lament that. And then it's going to go to Solid State and EM. I wish they would go EM and Solid State and Ramper. We would have done probably a little bit better. I think I would have hung it a lot longer. So do we want to take a walk around here and look at all the games? Sure. Do we want to? Okay.
    6:55
    So what do we got here? Okay, we're going to go through the whole lineup like we always do? Yeah, why not? Okay, here we go. Robocop. Not familiar. Day to East game and we got a Terminator Judgment Terminator 2 Judgment Day which did me in terminated me yeah very nice game Hocus Pocus I like that game it's like an early mid 70's Valley 2 player I know I put money on that game back in the day and you got a Getaway Out of Order John Day has that game High Speed another I actually have that game that's not a fun game do you have one of those? I do have one of those ok Charlie's Angels which I didn't play very well that's my old game I sold it and a Countdown John Day has that game too It's a system one, too. That's a fun game. Yes, system one. Oh, yeah, system one. Yep. Okay, so we go over to the NASCAR, which is not operating. What's it called? Ramp car? It's called ramp car. Yeah, that's what it is. Ramp car. Ramp car, yeah. And then what's that? Metallica. Yep. A kiss.
    7:52
    Simpson's pinball party. I don't know if I've ever played that. This is Stern Row here. Sternament here. Sternament. And you've got a little poker tour for that. Yep. Simpsons, you got crushed on that, huh? No, not crushed on. Kiss I got crushed on. Oh, yeah. By a little young whippersnapper. Like a 12 or 13 or 14-year-old.
    8:13
    And then he kicked me in the shins. It was really weird. Right. Hey, they're coming. The youngsters are coming. I keep saying that. Lord of the Rings, Game Show. That's another early mid-rampers. Yeah, that's a weird game. And Torpedo Alley by JDE. I couldn't get that ball out of the bottom. It was living at the bottom of the play field. Weird, colorful game. Very fast game. That's a really nice-looking game. I think it's kind of rare. I don't think they didn't make a lot of these. But this is a really nice shape. A real nice shape. And then we've got a Lost Cause or a Lost World. Lost Cause, not a really good game, but it's on the order anyway. But it doesn't look bad. I don't want her again. And you've got a Genie. A nice System 1 wide-body Genie. Fun game. Yep, that one's okay. Okay. Okay, so that's half. We'll keep going. All right. We'll keep going. A couple more games that are not working. There seems to be a lot more games not working. A meteor. That's too bad. It's a firepower. Oh, that's a firepower. It's a firepower. It's not working. It's a little bit off-level. I'd say by about 45 degrees off-level. That fall would drain to the right all day long. All day long. Target Alpha, which I like. I like it. I like one of those, too. John's got a lot. Space Shuttle, another not-player. I can be sure. Oh, that's Argosy? Argosy, yeah, Williams-Argosy. Heard a lot about that game. Haven't ever played one. Me either. Got some targets. I got four drop targets. Okay, an EM. Yeah, got something going on. I'd give it a... I would give it a whirl if it was working. I'd give it a time of day. Jack's open. That's a fun game. That's a good one. I wish I got to play that in tournament.
    9:49
    Nope, didn't get to play that. Flight 2000, which I would have liked to have played. Yeah, left flipper's dead on that one. Okay, Apollo.
    9:56
    Wow, what's this? Not a lot going on. A Williams. With a little baguette on the back glass. They must like this game in Houston. Probably.
    10:05
    Probably. Hmm. World Cup Soccer. Did you play that? No. Did you play World Cup Soccer? I played World Cup Soccer. Okay. I did pretty well. I actually won that game. You did? Yes, I did. Okay.
    10:19
    Do you know this young person's name? I think Lucas, right? Lucas? No. Seamus. I was close. I thought by a couple letters.
    10:33
    He's the one who has the cool t-shirt. Yeah, no, he's got the slap. With the foil. No, with the. Yeah, slap shot. Yeah, slap shot with the three guys. Yeah.
    10:42
    Okay. He ran away. He doesn't want to be interviewed. Adam might, but he's playing. We've got Johnny Mnemonic. We got Fast Break We doing our podcast So we will interview you if you like and if you don like that okay too
    11:02
    Johnny and Ronick, they made, uh, what's it called? Matrix. They made a Matrix, um... That's a colorful game. Yeah, but they made Matrix out of this too, so someone did a really cool job with that. It came out great. Okay. Not this one here, of course. No, no, no. Retheme. Hotline. Never played it. Remember it from back in the day, but... It doesn't look very exciting to me. I don't know. I only remember it because it's got the guy, the oversized fisherman in the boat. Actually, the two-play version is called Coldline.
    11:31
    No. No, it's not, actually. It's a really bad joke. Target. Oh, that game. I don't like that game now. I like this game. No, it would have been good if the tilt wasn't touching the game and rocking a little bit. It's going to the right a little bit. Oh, didn't like me. Yeah. Okay, Funland. That's a fun game. Hit the spinner ducks a bunch of times. Okay. That's a fun little player. And then 2001, which I won on. That's a fun game. No, that was okay. I didn't mind that game. Lots of nice drop tarts. I like the drop tarts. Yeah, right. But again, with the little flippers, you've got to get used to that. I can do drop catches on that. That's fun to do. Okay. You can majorly baseball. Okay. They've got a pitching bat, which is cool, with a, whatchamacallit, what do you call the backless? The animated block. Yes, animated backless. Which is cool. Yeah. Hot shot. It's a cool game from early 70s. Another cool game. Yeah, very nice game. A little roached out, but not bad. Here's my 300 I sold him years ago. You sold him this one, too? I sold him a project game years ago.
    12:26
    That's a Williams, too. No, it's a Gottlieb. Okay. It looks like it's still a project game. Oh, and it's got the ball thing in the back. Yeah, it's got a ball count in the back. Oh, yeah. Okay.
    12:37
    And then... Then I got Powerball. It must have a Powerball in it, I'm thinking. The Powerball has a Powerball. Oh, they redid the back. Oh, it's got a power ball. See that? There you go. Power ball. So does that make the ball faster? Oh, yeah. A lot of fast actions. You have a lot more power on the ball, and the ball flies around a lot. I put one in my Fathom, and I put three in my Flight 2000 for extra fun. Okay. Or extra frustration, depending on how you look at it. I'm guessing they're playing. Yeah, they're playing.
    13:06
    Doodlebug? Doodlebug. That's a fun game. A lot of people have played in tournaments. Does the ball go up and down in this game? Yeah. Oh, that's right. I remember that. Was there a volley game that did that, too? Yeah.
    13:24
    Fireball 2. Right. Fireball 2 did that. Right. I thought so. Okay, Grand Prix. This is a fun game. It's a nice-looking game, too. I remember that game back in the day. I'm going to bring Arapaig over here and kick his ass for a dollar. Okay, I'll come watch that. All right. Then Blackjack. I've got a much fonder appreciation for that game than I ever had. I wish I would have bought one now. Now everybody wants big money for it. You could have bought these things back in the day for like $200 or $300. Yeah, exactly. I mean, they didn't work. I was trying to trade my Supersonic for one of these in a show. My Supersonic was in better shape, and this thing was a dog. And the guy didn't want to trade it. It's like, all right. No, it's a fun game. That was in a tournament, too, which was pretty cool. I'd say at least it would turn the LEDs down a little bit. Yeah, no. It's a little bit great. That's refrigerator, not net. Refrigerator time. Airborne. This is, oh, you know what? This is actually a ripoff of Top Gun. You think they put enough ramps in this thing? It's called Ramp Gun. Ramp Gun or Airborne, whatever you want to say. What's that thing in the back? A control tower? It's a control tower. You're supposed to buzz the tower like Tom Cruise did in the movie. It's okay to buzz the tower, and it even says buzz the tower. So it's very Top Gun-ish. That's enough.
    14:33
    And the last action hero. I'm not really grooving to the Terminator or this game with the gun as the plunger. Yeah. I like a plunger. Me too. I agree. It's got the penguin little crane thing. Penguin crane. Oh, like in Batman. Yes, penguin crane. I don't get that. I like cranes in my games and toilets in my games. You do? I do. Like Junkyard is a toilet. South Park is a toilet. It should be called Toilet Bowl. But I don't know. They should make a game called Toilet Bowl. Why not just Plumber? Or Plumber. Rotor Runer it could be a themed game sure why not so let's end it here and we'll pick up again when they get going unless you have something you want to say yeah I'm going to try to get all those toilet games I'm going to have a toilet bowl tournament I just have to find all the games that have toilets in them so if you guys know any other good toilet games I want to get a hold of those titles there's a lot of games that could go in the toilet but I don't know many with a bowl on it, but some should be put down the bowl. And flushed hard. They can flush twice. Well, that's what keeps plumbers in business. My family is a bunch of plumbers, and trust me.
    15:49
    As my father used to say, that's the sweet smell of success. Yeah, there you go. Okay, so we're getting down into the final rounds here, and Eric is playing Mike on Jack's Open, a Gottlieb EM game.
    16:16
    Yeah, Jack's Open, you're trying to get, I think, the bank of 10 drop targets, and it's tough on both the left and right foot where you've got a little spot in the out lanes there that goes right out, so you've got to be careful. You can't really try to hold your ball there. You might lose it. Is this a tilt-out game as well? Yeah, I think if you tilt, I think you lose the whole game. I'm pretty sure in this game. It's a wedge head.
    16:43
    He's got a nice, good save there. He's doing the hillbilly stomp right now. That works. I see what you were saying about that out lane. Yeah, it's tough. That lane's tough. And it's a big spot down there too, so it's hard. You can't really hold the ball. You have to be careful holding the ball. Right. and this is not obviously Eric's home.
    17:04
    Not his home turf, but he does like this title, though. He just has to get used to how the ball lies.
    17:16
    He just needs four more drop targets. He needs A, Q, King, and Jack. Good lay there. You got the Jack.
    17:35
    Cleans down, nice. So is he trying to knock all the targets down or is he trying to make a hand? He's trying to make a hand, I think.
    17:45
    Yep, nice, nice, beautiful. All right, he's held the ball. Got the 10, got the King, he's got the Jack and two Queens left. And he continues to do the Hillbilly style. You gotta do that, actually the only way to knock the game down. That's how that works. Nice. He's got the one jack. Nope, he reset the targets. Very good. He's got the out lane split up too, so at least there's something there. Very nice. He's definitely good. He's got 80. He's starting to growl. He's got ball four. He's got 92,000 ball four going to ball five. You do not want to hit that last one. No, because then it resets it off. Oh, okay. Good enough. Do not hit the club. He's got a club up top in the lane. He does not want to hit that. He said it will reset the whole thing. So he'll leave that alone. Which is good to know. Good to know.
    18:38
    That's interesting. Oh, he flipped it. He got 102. Yeah, he flipped it. 102.70. Not bad. Is that good? That's all right. That's a good game. Let's see if it holds up. 102.70. 1-0-2-0-7-0. For Eric Stone. It's a stone. Eric Stone.
    19:07
    So this is actually the replay version of Lady Luck. Lady Luck is the Adaball word. Okay, so Mike steps up to the plate.
    19:18
    He's a member here, so I'm guessing he's got a little bit of a home field advantage. There's probably a little bit of time on the game. I would think. I've been watching him. He's a very good player. He took me down kind of early in a couple games you played. Oh, he did? Oh, yeah.
    19:36
    So he just lost it there on the in lane that will hole on the side. He lost it that way too, the same way. It's tough.
    19:47
    These were meant to make money. They weren't meant to keep you playing. Exactly. There was no, what's it called, free play ball or ball save, I should say. No, I was surprised. I drained the ball on Terminator and I got a free ball. I'm not used to that. Yeah, sometimes they have it set up so you can't do that. But here you can, so that works out. Okay, so he's making a run here. We're up to 33. He's got ball three, 33.
    20:16
    Going into ball three is at 33. Oh, it's hanging on the thread there. It's on the edge of going in or out.
    20:31
    Does it go down to the flipper or does it drain? Yeah, and he tilted it. That's a game tilt, I think. That's a game tilt. He could have requested the TD come over and drain that ball for him. You are allowed to do that. Drain it where? like drain it down oh yes okay you don't have to if the ball is stuck there like on jack's open right on the corner of the out where it's right on that post yeah there's no camera it's hard to say the flipper feed lane flipper feed lane is on the very yeah on the very end you don't have to try to shake it out you can have the the tournament director take the glass off pick the ball up with his hand and put it down the middle what would you have done with it would you stomp the floor that one? No. No floor stomp for that? Dude, stomp on the floor helps my timing of when I'm doing live catches. You didn't know that? No, I had no idea. There you go, ladies and gentlemen. Now you know another Eric Stone-ology. Wow. I thought it was a little shake of the game. No, so I always do it when I'm drop catching it because I want something to time it to. So I time it to the beat of my foot. I know it sounds weird, but does it really work? I don't know. Did it work? Is it more of a mental thing or more of a physics thing? No, it's both. Okay. I mean... You won, so it works. Well, that's not... I don't know if it's a physics thing or a mental thing I don know if it a physics thing Well you know what It probably both It got to be part metal Anyway the whole story is even if a ball is on the top of the in-lane, out-lane and you don't want to risk shaking it, you can tell a tournament director and they'll drain it for you. But you're not getting it placed on a flipper. You're draining it. What about the same thing? What about the guy that just did one of these here?
    22:12
    Well, maybe he knows the tilt on this more than I do. It seemed pretty like hair triggers I wasn't going to I don't know I mean I wasn't going to You saw how I shook it When it came out there Yeah Right I wasn't going to take it On to the next Augustus was kind enough To give a quick interview About the clubhouse we're in Give me a What do you call the elevator pitch? Southern New Hampshire Pinball Club We're a social club All games here are owned by the membership You know, it's $30 a month to join Members have 24-7 access And then we run tournaments like this on occasion Where we bring in some guests You know, kind of a free wheel in place We let a lot of stuff go here Just kind of hang out, play some pinball And have some fun I had a lot of fun tonight Playing games that I've never played before But I collect just a very narrow area of the pinball community I collect volley games from solid state era I love the Valley Solid States. You have a couple here. Yeah, yeah. There's more now. Unfortunately, Lost World's out of commission. Black Jack. Black Jack's back on the floor. That's been in and out. I think that was here. I played nice. I played it earlier, and I won on it. Chuck's the master. But we have a wide swath of games here. We like to have a little bit something from every era.
    23:33
    Do you have a couple games here? I do. The Lost World's actually mine. The Valley Game Show is mine, and the Simpsons Pinball Party. Okay. As well as the Grand Prix in the other room. There you go. Terrific. Anything else the audience should know about this place?
    23:48
    We're on Facebook. That's the best place to reach us, SNH Pinball. We've got a website, snhpinball.com. Those are the best ways to reach us, or info at snhpinball.com if you want to send an email. Terrific. Thank you. Thanks, George.
    24:09
    Our plane kiss. We're playing KISS, and right now, I think we're on ball number, we're going to find the number here, ball two.
    24:19
    And we get pretty much even scoring, 23 mil to 23 mil, with Eric, and I forget who this guy's name is.
    24:29
    I'll figure it out in a minute. We'll ask him when he's done. All right, sounds good. Yeah, ball two. So I'm guessing Eric's familiar with this guy. He is, but he's not familiar with this code. This code is an update that he's not familiar with. It's a brand new code update, so it changes things a little bit. He's not used to it. They changed the rules of the game, and I don't have access to it yet, so I don't know the differences in the rules. So it all comes down to Eric's playability and his skill and his hands of stone, sheer will and determination. Well, don't you remember in the other episode, he talked about him not having access to games? Exactly. And then when he doesn't have access to games, he might not update the code as frequently. I'm not quite sure, but I think, yeah, it's one of them.
    25:09
    So he's player one or two? He's player two. Oh, okay. And so player one's got 28 right now, and Eric's got 25. Okay, so that's not a big distance. And I think this is ball two right now, so Eric's only on ball one score, so he's still got a couple balls left to play. Do you know anything about this game? I do. Actually, one of my clients has this game in their lineup. So, yeah, this is a Kevin O'Connor game. He has the same guy who made the original Kiss from 1979. Oh, I didn't know that. Yeah, that's why you kept a lot of the elements the same. The pop-up caps are the same, and some of the graphics are kind of the same. So you try to keep some of the feel and modernize it a little bit. I can see if you're a KISS fan why you would like this game. I have something that I want to interject here. Sure. I don't know why it came up on YouTube, but it was, well, yes I do. it was the interview with, do you know who Tom Snyder is? Tom? Yeah. He used to do the... Yeah, late night Tom Snyder. No one can say it. He interviewed Kiss.
    26:16
    Gene Simmons? All in makeup in the late, it was either the late 70s or early 80s. Yeah, probably late 70s. Oh, man. How'd that go? You could just see the tension.
    26:28
    They do not like, who is it, Peter Criss? They don't like him. Oh, the drummer? Oh, I don't think they like him. Or is it Ace Frehley? Well, he really was kind of a drunk. No, he wasn't kind of a drunk. Okay, he was very much a drunk. He wasn't kind of a drunk. He was a spaceman. Right, that was the one. It wasn't Peter Criss. Oh, yeah, yeah. It was him. Yeah, he was a spaceman, and he had... Oh, my God. I thought Gene Simmons was going to jump out of his costume and kill him.
    26:54
    No, I'm serious. I mean, I hadn't watched that in a long... Yeah, I hadn't watched it in a long time. I think the last... What was I watching of that? There must have been something. Maybe The Clash. That might have been something I watched with Tom Snyder.
    27:10
    I remember when they were on. That was a good one as well. Yeah, Tom Snyder. I think a lot of people didn't care for that guy. He was the Wally George of his day.
    27:20
    Oh, him and Joe Franklin, who we've talked about. Another Joe Franklin. Oh, yeah. Right, Joe Franklin on Channel 9 out of New York. And then who did we talk about? The guy, the lad now. We talked about this one other time. Oh, Morton Downey Jr. He had a big board on his face. Morton Downey Jr. Oh, yeah. Mr. Loudmouth. Remember him? Getting in people's grill? Oh, yeah.
    27:45
    Was that 90s TV or late 80s TV? Late 80s. When I owned my bar and used to close up, we used to watch that. So, Ball 2. How much is he behind? Person against Eric, 59 and a half. And on ball two, ball two, going to ball two, Eric has 26 million.
    28:07
    So is there, like, one mode that's better than the others? Basically, I think this game you want to lock the ball. You want to lock the ball in Gene's mouth. So that's how I play the game.
    28:19
    But anybody that plays these modern games more than me might have a different strategy. But I'm pretty sure locking balls is the way to go. I'm clueless. I don't know if they've even played this game. So you're just going to hit the mouth, lock the ball, keep going, shooting up his mouth, you spell demon, get demon. Right, and then all else fails, shoot the ramps. Exactly, shoot the ramps.
    28:36
    Let me ask him. I'm going to step over and ask him his name. Okay. Can I ask you your name? Sure, my name is Trainer. Trainer, okay. You're playing Eric. Yes. Are you a member of the club? I am. So you're familiar with this game? A little bit. Okay.
    28:55
    I know nothing about it. I'm just the guy holding the mic. I'm sorry. Thank you. No problem. So what's his name? Trainer, I think he said his name right. Trainer, okay. I can find out for sure. Yeah, okay.
    29:13
    He's catching up. Yeah? He's doing pretty good. Trainer Gauthier. Gauthier? Yes, there you go. Gauthier? Yeah, Gauthier. Man. Who knows?
    29:32
    He's better when he starts yelling at himself. Yeah, no, he's a talker, and he's starting to do the stomp again. And right now, if Eric can get really going here, he's going to shout it out loud like Gene Simmons. Yeah, it's too bad we can't hear anything. Yeah, it needs to be cranked up a little bit.
    29:50
    But right now, Eric's approaching 50. He's got 56 million, and the other guy's 59. trainer, so close game.
    29:59
    Eric just needs a nice big multiball here to get him up high. Demon multiball. Army combo lit. I don't know what that means, but it's probably good. He wants to spell demon. He's going to keep going. 58. He's approaching 59. He's approaching demon. Demon's demon scoring coming up in a second here.
    30:19
    And 58. Does that head? Okay, so I think it's a tie ball game here. That won't be anything like that. That's right. All right, 60, so 61 to 59 right now, going into ball three. So pretty much even game right now. One lock shot away from my multi-ball. So one lock shot away from multi-ball for Eric going into ball three.
    30:44
    And trainers up right now, he's going to pick the song Deuce. Yeah, there's the spaceman. There's the spaceman.
    30:55
    How old is this game? This game is, I believe it's five years old, I think. So this is before they started putting the TVs in the back of the back of the house. Yeah, yeah. The TV thing only happened about a year or two ago. That would have been a lot better on this game, wouldn't it?
    31:11
    Yeah, it would have been. But they still kind of have it. You actually can get a... Conversion kit of some sort. This here. Oh, here we go. Alright, so this year, 65-61, Eric is going to do too much here to take this down.
    31:26
    Detroit, Rock City, whatever that means. So all he's going to really do is just keep the ball in play for a little bit, but lock the ball would be kind of good. Get one more lock and he's happy. He's just got a million and a half. Oh no, that's on a timer. What's that?
    31:40
    That's called a, what's it called? Shoot and score thing. Eric is imitating Gene Simmons doing Demon Multiball right now. Okay, Demon Multiball... Does he get Demon Multiball? Yes, he's in Multiball. Oh, he's in Multiball, so he just beat him. Multiball. Well, not yet, he's about to. He's 62, he's still a way to go. But if he just keeps Demon Multiballing for a little while longer, he's gonna have it. 64.3. He needs another little 64.3. 64, we need to see 65. What do we need to say? We need like a, we need a ramp. 64 and a half. Need a ramper. Shoot the ramp and use the flippers. He's ramping everything. 65, 6. I think he's very close. That should probably do it, but might as well.
    32:29
    65, yep. You got it. He's got it. 66. Hand to stone took him down. All right Well the final game here comes down to Chuck Webster and Eric Stone And Eric picked Countdown Oh. And. Drainorama. 10,000 on the first ball. Not as good as it could be, but the point is one good ball in this game. So do each of these guys have two strikes? No.
    33:05
    Not sure on that one. No. Eric has his one strike. Chuck has two strikes. So. Do or die for Chuck? Yes, exactly.
    33:14
    Exactly. All right, pretty much even Stephen Gaines here. So that one's out the right out lane. So it's 10 to 12,000. First ball is a choke.
    33:24
    So he just needs to get some drop targets here and come over like this. Okay, like that? How's that? All right, there we go. And drop targets are out. You've got a green drop target.
    33:40
    I sure am. Chronicles Calling. Well now I'm going to cut that out. Okay Chuck's up. Chuck's up. 12-2. 29 to 12 right now. Brutal countdown. Oh nice save there. That was very nice.
    34:12
    We almost flip and slide. Nice! Wow! Wow, dancing dude! He's dancing with the game. Okay, can the stone go to the drop targets? Any other green drop target? Here we go, green drop target, very nice. Nice, another little slide and save, very nice. Kind of a slip and slide, a little different though.
    34:41
    Oh, look at that. We got the middle post. Oh! Okay. All right, so. Going into ball three. Chuck is up.
    34:54
    74,000 by Eric on ball three. Chuck is 15 going to ball three. Chuck needs to beat 74. at this point.
    35:10
    And let's see, Chuck is going for a green drop. Oh no! Oh, Uncle Tilty! He tilted on that one. Yeah, nice job. Thanks, my guy. You're giving me some luck tonight. Amen to that. Thanks, Chuck. Oh, I think that tilt pop would have been better. Oh, I knew it had a tilt, because I practiced on it, and it had a tilt. All right. That was fun. Eric, you're the winner. All right. Winner, winner. 35. All right. He's going to play the final game against me. I'm playing for the money for Eric. You are? Yeah. All or none? It's all or none.
    35:45
    Oh, what's he? He's getting some gloves. What are we getting here? Hold on. He gets some gloves. Hey, wait. What's going on here? He gets gloves. He gets a sign of gloves. Oh, look at that. A full sign of gloves. Oh, that's a cool idea. They say there's no love without a glove. So that's what the thing is. Oh. What is wrong with you?
    36:31
    And that concludes another episode of the Classic Pinball Podcast. I thank you for listening. But stay tuned for our next episode. Something special. Dave has been contacted by the good folks of Boston Chronicle. And they will be doing a feature on him and his business. We're looking forward to it. See you then. be good and be well I want to tell everybody keep those spinners spinning and have a blessed day and be grateful
    37:24
    I'm watching everything I've got to be Tell the future's name And I gotta say We're still the same And I'm trying to be Watching everything And I gotta say Boris Beecher Okay, so we'll do a post with Eric. Nice job, Eric. Thanks. Winning on KISS for your final... No, not KISS. Countdown. Countdown for your final game against Chuck Webster, which some of our... Everyone knows Chuck Webster. Everybody knows Chuck. The pit. He's got the Wicked Pissa Tournament.
    38:00
    Wicked Pissa Pinball Tournament. Chuck's a good guy, too. I like Chuck a lot. As they say in Boston, it's a piss-a.
    38:08
    And chow-da. Chow-da? And chow-da. It's a piss-a and chow-da. No, just don't piss in the chow-da. Don't do that. Oh, nice. The gate was always disabled. So we got money on the game here, Buck? No, we didn't put any money. I would if you wanted to. So, hocus pocus. I want to play for Frogger tickets. You know what? I'll be at Fun Spot tomorrow winning my last few.
    38:34
    I'm going to try to get 100 plays in, but I don't know if I'll be able to. Are you going home Friday? Yeah. There's a rumor going around that whenever you show up, the owner comes out and starts crying. Is that true? No, he comes out and starts watching me.
    38:49
    Or does he just come out and give you the roll of tickets and say, get out of here? No, he just comes out and says, get out of here. There is no giving me anything. Uh-oh.
    39:03
    This game actually looks like it plays pretty nice. This is a great game. I think some of the legs on some of these games are a little loose for my liking. A little loose. Give me a little something.
    39:17
    Come on, hit that. Oh, double bonus. I needed that. Eric's trying to poke my score. So is this going to be a five ball? I don't know. I think it's a five ball.
    39:30
    So he's trying to get... I think he's going to catch up to me right here, but not for long when I get back up. Not for long. Eric's going to... Gabe has a really fun way of saying, I'm going to kick your ass, and then $750,000 later. Eric will ruin the day. $600,000 later on Friday. Look, don't rain on his parade. Give him a little bit of satisfaction. You know what? I love Gabe. He's one of my favorite pinball players around. Yeah, Eric's learned a lot from me, you know.
    39:58
    I mean, I cannot tell a lie. But we're going on 20 years that we've known each other, Dave, you know that? Wow, that flew by. 1999. Wow. Where'd that time go?
    40:15
    I want that time back. Yeah, it went down just like that. There you go. All right. Drain-o-rama. And he is now taking you, Dave. Oh, wow. Look at that.
    40:27
    All right. Two games. All right. I need my favorite noise, by the way. Is what? That is a nice noise. The pregame noise. That knock noise. Especially on these older ones. It sounds like an electrified knock.
    40:40
    This is a really good game. I would love to have this game. I like this game. I don't like this game. It's got spinners. How bad can it be? Really? No. I mean, you can't beat a game that has spinners. You can't. Oh, we should. You know what we should talk about? What? A, your t-shirt. B, what all the knuckleheads on all the other podcasts are talking about. Okay. They're talking about the difference between having a drop target and a stand-up target in the game. The cost. Okay. I don't know if I heard this right.
    41:14
    Is a three-bank Stern drop target, if you were to go buy it from them, 200 bucks? That sounds right.
    41:26
    That's absolutely crazy. Well, it's highway robbery. Yes. Shoot for C. Well, they were talking about why stern. You probably could shot that. Why stern. Oh, almost you could. He's going to try to shot to C in the lane. Oh, you're back to the game. I'm back to the stern zone. That's all right. I can do both. I can walk and shoot guns. So they were talking about why, you know, these stern games and why they don't have drop targets in them. That's because they're so freaking cheap. I think because they're cheap. It doesn't cost them $200. It costs them probably $20 at maybe. Right, but they charge $200. Well, they charge $200 for when you want to replace them, like for you and I. What are you talking about? Stern Games not having drop targets?
    42:05
    They're too pricey to put in. Stern Games have tons of drop targets. Are you talking the older ones? No, no, no, no. We're talking all the new games. Well, the new games. They do it to cost cut.
    42:17
    Okay. Do you want to walk over to Stern? Kiss has a drop target on the premium. How many? One? On a premium. Right, but Valley didn't have drop targets on a lot of the 90s games.
    42:30
    No, I get it. I think it's an old school thing. Yeah, it is. I don't think it's a price thing. Yes, it is. It's all about the money. Oh, yeah, it is. Dave can tell you, you probably spend a lot of money when you repair your customers' games and have to buy pieces. Oh, yeah. Yep, it costs some dough. I must spend, I don't know, at least a couple grand a month on parts.
    42:58
    Do you have any customers with Black Knight? I do, actually, man. I'm working on one right now for a customer. Are they going to buy the Knight Head topper? I guess that thing is supposedly pretty cool. For what? The newest Black Knight? Yeah. Now, I don't get the whole topper thing. Why? Why do you need that? Well, I get it for this game.
    43:18
    No, no, I couldn't get off work. Okay. Oh, she said something. You're going with it? Yeah, I'll be there. Good game, Chuck. Thanks. Way to stay in there. Well, we both, I mean, that was really good. That was a good game for either one of us. I'm ending. All right, take care, guys. Yeah, good seeing you, Chuck. Good night.