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Pinball Magazine & Pinball News PINcast February 2021

Pinball News & Pinball Magazine Pincast·podcast_episode·1h 34m·analyzed·Mar 2, 2021
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claude-haiku-4-5-20251001 · $0.033

TL;DR

February 2021 pinball news: AP hires Hager, Hall of Fame fundraises, Deep Root delays, JJP raises prices.

Summary

A February 2021 pinball industry roundup discussing American Pinball's hiring of Jack Hager as art director, the Pinball Hall of Fame's successful $200,000 fundraising campaign with an anonymous $79,000 donation, Deep Root Pinball's production delays due to COVID and Texas weather, Jersey Jack Pinball's $1,000 price increase on Guns N' Roses, and Stern Pinball's new merchandise line including jigsaw puzzles.

Key Claims

  • American Pinball hired Jack Hager as art director, joining AIMTRON as parent/sister company

    high confidence · Jonathan Hewson and Martin Ave discussing February 2021 announcements; Hager previously worked at Teamplay under Ken Fedesna

  • Pinball Hall of Fame fundraiser reached $200,000 target with anonymous $79,000 donation after initial GoFundMe stalled at ~$130,000

    high confidence · Direct discussion of fundraiser details; grand opening planned for July 1, 2021 at new Strip location

  • Deep Root Pinball's Retro Atomic Zombie Adventureland received 130 pre-orders (70 arcade, 60 extra edition) and delayed production beyond mid-March due to COVID and Texas weather

    high confidence · CEO Robert Mueller announcements cited; ice storms and supply chain issues mentioned explicitly

  • Jersey Jack Pinball imposed $1,000 price hike on Guns N' Roses (Standard $67.50→$77.50, LE $9.5K→$10.5K) for new orders only, honoring existing pre-orders

    high confidence · Pinball News announcement; noted as ~10% increase aligned with Stern's $500 hike

  • Guns N' Roses won Pinball Industry Awards Game of the Year and is expected to win multiple Twippies

    high confidence · Jonathan Hewson and Martin Ave discussing JJP's hit game and expected tournament awards

  • Jersey Jack Pinball halted Willy Wonka production across all three models with no plans to manufacture more

    high confidence · Martin Ave observation; distributors selling out quickly after announcement

  • Stern Pinball announced jigsaw puzzle merchandise ($24.99 for 1,000-piece puzzles) including samurai design and zombie yeti artwork

    high confidence · Stern shop announcement; mentioned as part of lifestyle brand merchandising strategy

Notable Quotes

  • “No new games announced, no leaks about any upcoming games, I don't think, announced particularly. Well, maybe one... No, it has been relatively quiet.”

    Martin Ave @ Opening segment — Sets tone for slow February 2021 industry news cycle

  • “Mid-March he told us in the podcast that it was going to be six weeks from the close of orders until they'd be able to start production, well I don't think that's going to start happening it's going to take quite a bit longer.”

    Martin Ave @ Deep Root Pinball segment — Highlights disconnect between CEO ambitions and actual timelines; industry pattern of startup delays

  • “It's not like they can actually make more machines their production capability is maxed out I think at the moment they're making as many games as they can so if they want to make more money out of the game the only way they can really do that is to increase the price.”

    Jonathan Hewson @ Jersey Jack Pinball segment — Explains rationale for JJP price increases given production constraints

  • “The biggest news from Stern Pinball left me a bit puzzled... they discovered that you make the most money not from the products for which you're best known, but from selling the various merchandise based around it.”

    Martin Ave @ Stern Pinball segment — Skepticism about Stern's pivot toward lifestyle/merchandise over core game development

  • “You do merchandise to make money, and getting a fulfillment company, those are charging money too.”

    Jonathan Hewson @ Stern merchandise discussion — Pragmatic response to skepticism about merchandise strategy

Entities

Jack HagerpersonAmerican PinballcompanyAIMTRONcompanyPinball Hall of FameorganizationTim ArnoldpersonDeep Root Pinballcompany

Signals

  • ?

    business_signal: Jersey Jack production capacity fully utilized; unable to expand Willy Wonka line to capitalize on new game pricing power, forcing product discontinuation

    high · Jonathan Hewson explicitly states 'they can't actually make more machines their production capability is maxed out'; Willy Wonka discontinued to focus on higher-margin Guns N' Roses

  • ?

    business_signal: Jersey Jack Pinball price increases and Willy Wonka production halt suggest profit margin optimization and portfolio focus on highest-revenue titles

    high · JJP implemented 10% price increase on Guns N' Roses while discontinuing Willy Wonka; Guns N' Roses won Game of the Year

  • ?

    event_signal: Pinball Hall of Fame grand opening scheduled for July 1, 2021 at end of Amusement Expo trade show; relocation from Tropicana to Strip location successfully funded

    high · Tim Arnold planning July 1 official grand opening; fundraiser reached $200K target; move-out from old location planned for April 5, 2021

  • ?

    personnel_signal: American Pinball hiring spree: Jack Hager (art director), Dennis Nordman, Zafir Ryan, and at least one other position filled in February 2021, suggesting company growth and expanded capacity

    high · Martin Ave notes 'four new appointments at American Pinball slash Ametron' with Dave Fix leading hiring push

  • $

    market_signal: Multiple manufacturers implementing price increases (Stern $500, JJP $1,000) within 1-2 months, raising market sustainability questions amid production constraints

    high · Both Stern and JJP citing production capacity maxed out; price increases to maximize profit rather than expand output

Transcript

groq_whisper · $0.282

0:00
Jack Hagar joins American Pinball Hall of Fame hits fundraising target Razza Pinball delayed again Hi, my name is Jonathan Hewson, I'm the editor of Pinball Magazine and I'm joined here with I'm Martin Ave and I'm the editor of Pinball News and we are here together to look back at the month of February 2021. And discuss the pinball industry news of that month, February 2021.
0:39
So, well, usually we say it's been such an exciting month and yadda yadda yadda, you know it probably from the top of your head. In this case, it probably wasn't. Isn't that so? No, it was pretty quiet. I think no new games announced, no leaks about any upcoming games, I don't think, announced particularly. Well, maybe one, which we'll cover a little bit later on in our look to the various manufacturers. But no, it has been relatively quiet.
1:08
Let's make this our shortest episode ever. Right, and with that we'll say goodbye and we'll see you next month. No, no, no. We still have to discover, to cover some of the news.
1:22
Let's cover the news. You had three headlines, so there is some exciting news, but it's not as much as people are used from us. Not that we make the news, but still. So let's kick off with American Pinball, hiring Jack E. Hager as their art director.
1:47
That's right. A new position, I believe, for American Pinball, although not exactly a new position for Jack, who's been in the industry, the gaming and coin-op industry, for many years. Yes. A long history. Yes. And you wrote quite an in-depth article, I would say, about Jack Hager's career in coin-op, I would say, which is highly recommended on the pinballnews.com website. So please go there. It's interesting that Jack did some concept art for some pinball concept games that never saw the light of day. Yeah, that's right. He did one called Pirate Island and another one called Hay Bartender, which were the kind of themes that were going to be applied to an existing Steve Kordek playfield design, which apparently had 13 insert lights, and he needed a game title which would work with those 13 inserts. So Pirate Space Island was one which Jack came up with because he was working for Williams back then, or doing some work for Williams.
Robert Mueller
person
Jersey Jack Pinballcompany
Stern Pinballcompany
Dave Petersonperson
Jonathan Hewsonperson
Martin Aveperson
Gary Flowerperson
Steve Kordekperson
Ken Fedesnaperson
Dennis Nordmanperson
Stephen Bowdenperson
John Popaduikperson
Zombie Yetiperson
Jesse Hernandezperson
  • ?

    product_strategy: Deep Root Pinball's Retro Atomic Zombie Adventureland production pushed beyond promised mid-March target due to COVID, Texas weather, and supply chain vendor prioritization issues

    high · CEO Robert Mueller's sequential announcements showing timeline slippage from 'six weeks' to 'mid-April at least' with no firm date; weather events and vendor power dynamics blamed

  • ?

    product_concern: Jersey Jack Guns N' Roses code updates (v1.13-1.14) addressing crash bugs and family-friendly content controls; rapid bug fixes suggest active post-release development

    medium · Two code updates within 24 hours in February 2021; addressed scoreboard integration, content filters, and crash bugs in various modes

  • ~

    sentiment_shift: Industry concern about emerging pattern of startup manufacturer delays (Deep Root, prior issues at Big Bang Bar production); skepticism about ability to meet timelines becoming normalized

    medium · Martin Ave notes 'it's certainly the case with deep brew pinball' and references Gene Cunningham's similar vendor issues 15 years ago, suggesting recurring pattern

  • ?

    business_signal: Stern Pinball pivoting toward lifestyle merchandise (jigsaw puzzles, apparel) over core game announcements; influenced by investor Dave Peterson's Harley Davidson brand strategy

    medium · Martin Ave notes Stern discovered 'you make the most money not from the products for which you're best known, but from selling the various merchandise based around it'; Peterson background in lifestyle brand monetization cited

  • ?

    supply_chain_signal: Deep Root Pinball experiencing typical startup vendor prioritization issues: suppliers with larger orders deprioritizing custom lock bar and side panel fabrication; startup lacks vendor credit leverage

    high · Robert Mueller noted vendors dropping out due to inability to produce rounded corners; once payment received, startups moved to 'back of the line' behind larger orders

    • 3:07
    And then he said he heard from the industry that they were looking for more bar-related titles or themes, so he came up with this Hey Bartender, as a kind of, I suppose it would be almost like an Oktoberfest, a kind of drinking game. But it didn't go with either of those as it turned out. Yeah. I am interested in what that game actually turned into, if anything. I was wondering the same thing, and I can't think of anything, especially with Steve Kordek games. I think the latest would be like Contact, I suppose. I think it was his latest,
    3:42
    his final one, where he was actually involved in something. Well, I don't know whether it would have been, we obviously did Ticket Tacto and things like that. Yeah. Vacation America for Chicago Gaming. But I was wondering whether it might have been something like Space Mission, Space Odyssey, or I don't know, something around that era. But they were all mid-70s games, and I think this is going to be later than that. would have been 80s and didn't really do very much then, other than, I suppose, like Saucer or... I think those drawings come actually from the most troublesome era of pinball, I think like 85 or so, that was just after Space Shuttle and things were picking up.
    4:29
    Yeah, so I suppose that probably... Well, I mean, the design... I don't know whether Steve was actually designing the game or it was somebody else's design that he was helping out on, but either way we don't quite know most important one American Pinball hired Jack Hager who has worked for numerous companies in the art department the last time I saw Jack he was actually working for Teamplay which is a company that is co-owned by Ken Fedesna the former vice president of Williams Pinball so while they're not doing pinball games he was obviously the link with pinball is very short over there yeah that's right he was doing a lot of stuff for them a very successful company one of their biggest sellers was Fishbowl Frenzy which is a real staple of family entertainment centres and arcades very technologically advanced although a very simple game and some nice artwork and I think he did a topper for that as well as some of their other games so he was working over there and as you say now he's joined to be exact he's joined AIMTRON which is like American Pinball's parent slash sister company it wasn't actually stated as such but I believe that he will be doing work for AIMTRON as well as American Pinball Well, he's right as well, because if American Pinball is releasing only like one game a year or even less, I don't think being art director is a full-time position. And I understood he was hired for a full-time position. That's right, yes. So it makes sense that he would be working for Amtron as well. Well, there will be quite a lot of stuff to produce, or at least to art director, There'd be things like flyers and online presentations.
    6:35
    You know, it's quite a lot. It would be a full-time job, but if he's doing the Ametron stuff as well, then that certainly would take up his time. Right. Oh, well. And in all fairness, this news was announced like in the middle of February, and I was actually expecting Dave Fix of American Pinball to announce another hire, because he's been on a roll lately. That's right. Yeah, but so far no other hires have been announced or made public. No, that follows his own to start with, followed by Dennis Nordman and Zafir Ryan. Right. And now Jack. So that's four new appointments at American Pinball slash Ametron. Right. Okay. So, well, that's all the news actually currently from American Pinball. No, that's not the news. No, no. No, there's a little more because if anybody didn't catch the look around the American Pinball Factory from the Virtual Pinball Expo show, Josh Kugler turned up on a Hot Wheels Instagram feed from Superfly Autos and was promoting the Hot Wheels pinball machine by basically showing how it works and then doing a tour of the manufacturing area as well. So you can see Hot Wheels being built on the production line. It wasn't the best video, to be fair, because it was... First of all, it's in portrait shape because it's kind of like it's on a phone, but it's also a split screen with the two presenters of Superfly Auto's live video feed at the top and Josh at the bottom. So it's a quite small video with two people basically staring at the screen at the top, which is a bit of a waste of space. But you can still see enough out of it, and Josh is very good at explaining what goes on. And, of course, he's talking to a non-Pimble crowd here, So he's explaining the very basics of how pinball resurgence has come around with the lockdown and basically what the various parts of a pinball machine are and how they build them basically from scratch. So it's kind of beginner stuff if you're familiar with how pinball is made, but it's also interesting to see behind the scenes American pinball. So if you want to see that, go to Instagram and have a look for superflyautos, and you can watch the video there. Right, okay. Well, excellent. Hold on. I have a phone call coming in. Oh! I wonder who that could be. It's our dear friend, Gary Flower.
    9:33
    Last time, we weren't so lucky to get him on the show, so I suppose we'll get him in. Hold on. Give me a second. Well, I can't put him on hold again, I suppose. But hold on. Okay. Let's call him back.
    9:46
    Good idea. Hold on. Gary. Yes, hold on. Let me interrupt you. We just started our podcast. And is it okay if we call you back after we finished up the news of the manufacturers and then you can add your news to that? Yeah? Okay. Yes, we will call you back. And it's a rather short episode, so it shouldn't take long. We'll call you back. Okay? Thanks.
    10:11
    Good idea. So, later on in the show, Gary Flower will join us to discuss his news regarding the pinball industry.
    10:21
    And, yes, this time it's really going to happen, so we're looking forward to that. In the meantime, let's focus on the news that we said that we were going to do. Well, we got the headlines.
    10:36
    Where do you want to go first, Pinball Hall of Fame? or do you think pinball? Let's do the Pinball Hall of Fame because it's nice to have some good news. Oh, absolutely, yeah. So, as you may be familiar,
    10:49
    the move to the new Pinball Hall of Fame on the Strip was put in peril because of, well, basically because of COVID and a dramatic reduction in the income that Tim and co. were able to get from their current location on Tropicana Avenue.
    11:11
    They'd worked all the figures out, and they would be able to continue the operation there, and that would pay for the building of the new location right on the south end of the strip. But unfortunately, along came COVID, and the number of people visiting Las Vegas dived enormously, and the number of people allowed into the Hall of Fame itself was also restricted. So their income dropped hugely as well, and of course they are in the middle of, well, in the middle, they're towards the end now of building the new location and they have to pay the contractors, you know, the builders, the electricians, everybody else who needs to work on the new place. And they basically didn't have much money coming in. So GoFundMe put together to try and raise some money. Yes, and I think we covered that in our previous episode. We did indeed, yep. Well, the fundraiser, the GoFundMe was for a £200,000 target.
    12:13
    $200,000, I suppose. I'm sorry. Yes, getting a little parochial there. $200,000. And it got off to a good start. But like all these things, there's a big inrush at the start. And then the amount of coming in tails off very rapidly. and as of a little over a week ago, it was around about $130,000. Right. With a going and running until May, so there was still time, but it needed a fairly decent injection of capital to reach that $200,000 target. Right. And well, the good news was that an anonymous donor offered to make up the shortfall. Yes, and I believe the donation was $79,000 in total.
    13:09
    Right. Which is a huge amount of money. And apparently this was someone that Tim was familiar with and actually visited that person like a decade ago. but he never expected that person to be jumping in as a savior if you want to call it that no, there was a good amount of publicity for this fundraiser on national newspapers and on local TV and various YouTube channels as well, so it was good that the word got around but it was actually a blogger who was interviewing Tim who got in touch with the donor,
    13:58
    or at least the donor was made aware of it through this blogger's work, and yeah, made the offer. And that was a fantastic thing. Now, if you look on the GoFundMe website for the Pinball Hall of Fame, you will see that it's around about 140,000 on there. Right. Because the payment hasn't gone through GoFundMe. It's a direct payment to Tim. And Tim is keeping the GoFundMe going as well because he suspects there'll be other costs which will come along as a result of COVID in order to get the place open in time for their move out of the old location. I think it's April the 5th. I think that's when they'll actually have to be out of the Tropicana place. So they will be moving some of the machines over from the old location to the new, as well as taking a whole bunch out of Tim's own shed. Right. Because they need to keep the old location running so they've still got the income coming from there, and so people who go there don't turn up to a half-empty building. Right. And the intention is, according to Tim, to have a sort of official, although it probably opened earlier, have an official grand opening of the new location on the evening of the 1st of July this year, which will be, I think it's right at the end of a trade show that's being held. Yeah, I think Amusement Expo is being held around that time. That's right, yeah, which we've been to before.
    15:37
    But, yeah, I think last time it moved away to New Orleans just for a year, and then it's coming back to Las Vegas this year. And I think July 1st is the last day of that. So in the evening of that, that's the plan for the grand opening, if you're able to get there.
    15:57
    I'm not sure whether it's a smart idea to do it at the end of the trade show, because most of those people will head out of Vegas as soon as they can.
    16:06
    Yeah, I guess so, although people will be clearing away their stand. people in the trade, that is, people who are exhibiting. They will have stands and equipment and stuff they need to organize. Yeah, but even people visiting are likely to, if the trade show is over, get on a plane right away. Why would you stay in Vegas? Why spend another night in another hotel bill if you can go home? Because you can then attend the grand opening of the Pimple Hall of Fame's location. Yeah. It's plenty of time to plan that and put it on the expenses of the company. Right.
    16:46
    But, okay, good news for the Pimble Hall of Fame. And what's also exciting, and it's slightly related, in one of the update videos by Tim Arnold, he showed some of the games that he was going to place in the new location of the Pimble Hall of Fame. And one of the games that he showed was a belly skill roll. But as it turns out, a belly skill roll is a coin flip game, which has gained in popularity in recent years. But Tim actually has a prototype, which is being called Skill Roll Light a Diamond. and it has a complete different lower half of the play field and so far I believe only two of those are known to exist. So that's an extra special game that you can play in the Pinball Hall of Fame. It's not a pinball game, but it's manufactured by Bally, the pinball company.
    17:57
    And personally, I'm a big fan of skill roll myself. So whenever I get to the new location of the Pimble Hall of Fame, I'm sure looking forward to play skill roll Light a Diamond. Yeah, so the significance of that acting machine is publicized with information cards on top of it or around it to tell you just how rare it is. Yeah, and let's hope, and maybe it's taking away a little bit of the charm of Pimble Hall of Fame, but let's hope that they would go for just nicely printed cards instead of handwritten notes sticks with tape to the game or something like that a little bit more professionalism would be welcomed I think ok as you say that's that for Pinball Hall of Fame congratulations to them Now let's continue with our pinball manufacturing update. Yes, Deep Root Pinball, if we're going with the companies that have news to report, then Deep Root Pinball is certainly one of them, because many other companies actually don't. So let's start off with this upcoming manufacturer. As you might know, the story, they are based in San Antonio, Texas.
    19:27
    It's an upstart company, so to speak. They hired a bunch of talents like Barry Osler, Stephen Bowden is in charge of rules.
    19:38
    Dennis Nordman used to work for them. John Popaduik is working there. John Norris as well as a designer. and there's about a dozen different games being developed and we've been, I think it was like September last year when we got introduced to the look of the Retro Atomic Zombie Adventureland pinball machine including the new cabinet design with the special pin bar. and so on. Since then, we've basically been waiting for those games to go into production, which was supposed to be last month, or at least this month, March.
    20:27
    But there's new delays. What can you tell us about that? Yeah, well, the game went on sale earlier this year, and it was a limited ordering window. Actually, it went on sale last year and it closed January 31st. Yes, right, okay.
    20:54
    So it was limited to how many machines they would sell during that window of opportunity. And apparently, according to CEO Robert Mueller, they ordered, or buyers ordered, 70 of the arcade machines and 60 of the extra editions, which are the sort of the higher end models with the floating back box and all the bells and whistles. So, 113 in total. He announced that they were going to build 160 of these and sell the remaining models at a higher price than the pre-order price. Unclear exactly what that price would be at this time.
    21:38
    But that was last month, I suppose. Well, I think that was around February 9th that news came out. Okay, but just yesterday, I suppose, we had another update from Robert. And the short of it is, although he said mid-March, he didn't mean it. It was an ambition rather than a promise.
    22:06
    They have had delays in various aspects of production, partly due to COVID, partly due to the weather. Now, you mentioned that they were in San Antonio in Texas, and anybody who's been paying attention to the news will know some of the awful weather and so unseasonable weather they've had in Texas over the past, well, during February. Anyway, it's all warmed up now, of course, but it was absolutely freezing. There were rolling blackouts. Gas supplies were interrupted. Water had to be boiled. It was a very strange situation, but it has closed down various companies for two weeks, I think, pretty much. Although they're back now, it's caused delays in, well, anything like that causes delays in a market and in the supply chain, which is already rather fragile due to COVID.
    23:01
    So Robert said that they have had problems in getting parts. In his previous update at the beginning of February, he said that the change they made to the lock bar, the bit that you put your hands on that covers the pin bar, that's caused some of the intended vendors to drop out because they can produce the rounded corners on that as was intended But he says in the latest update that they have the lock bar part and the lit side panels the lighted side panels now sourced although they don't actually have them necessarily.
    23:44
    And he said there are other parts to come in, and small sub-assemblies as well. but all in all he can't give a guarantee of when this is going to happen the mid-March he told us in the podcast that it was going to be six weeks from the close of orders until they'd be able to start production, well I don't think that's going to start happening it's going to take quite a bit longer and they're also, they've also been waiting on getting certification done for the UL for the North American market and C for the European market. And that's been delayed by the problems down in San Antonio with the weather. So that's probably going to take about another four to five weeks, he thinks. Right. Mid-April, at least. Right. And Robert Mueller also found out, what Gene Cunningham already found out, during the production of Big Bang Bar 15 years ago. whenever you talk to a vendor he's giving you a rather ambitious timeline when they can actually deliver the parts that you ordered and as soon as you paid them they basically tell you well you're at the back of the line and we got orders coming in that are bigger than yours so piss off there's a problem for a startup company because you have no credit necessarily with them and they are probably going to want payment up front for these kinds of things rather than bill them and then bill you later and as you say that puts you at their mercy once they've got your money then you're no longer a priority case yeah which I suppose is too bad but well it's not like we've seen that for the first time around like I said Gene Cunningham experienced that as well and it comes across to me as a sort of an American type of problem because I don't recall any situation like that in Europe but then again maybe they are and I'm just not aware of it yeah anyway so the take away from all this is that it's not going to be ready to ship in mid-March and there's no exact date as to when it is going to be but it'll be ready when it's ready which is a familiar phrase in pinball at the moment and it's certainly the case with deep brew pinball. They won't rush in order to put something out there that's going to cause them problems. If they haven't got a deadline to meet now they might as well take as long as it takes to get a reliable and enjoyable product out there. Okay, well, let's hope we see some progress soon. But I suppose this might also indicate that as long as there's no deadline, there's no reason to show any progress unless there's actually some news to report. No, well, it's not like we don't know what the game looks like. We're just waiting to see some actual finished and boxed games go out to customers. And Robert has said he will produce another update at the end of this month, the end of March. so in our next podcast we'll bring you what the latest is so let's move on to Jersey Jack Pinball yeah Jersey Jack Pinball the big shocker was that they imposed a $1000 price hike on all models of Guns N' Roses right which I'd say it's sort of in line with Stern Pinball doing a $500 price hike for all models last month or as of January 1st or what have you. Now I'm not going to justify it but the $500 that Stern increased could be seen as a well, let's say roughly 10% price hike on the Pro model. Well, Jersey Jack games obviously are more expensive. So the $1,000 price hike is basically still, well, it's a little bit more than or a little bit less than 10%, I'd say, but it's sort of in line. Yeah, it is. The standard edition was 67.50 and is now 77.50, and the limited edition was 9,500 and is now 10,500, so that's a 10% increase. The difference, I think, apart from the amount of the percentage increase, is also that all existing orders are being honoured for the price that's quoted originally. Which was not the case with Stern, Finball. No, quite. It's only new orders which will pay the extra. Of course, the collector edition, that sold out instantly anyway at the old price, so there'll be no price increase on that. So it's only on the limited edition and standard edition new orders that the $1,000 price hike applies.
    29:22
    Right. So anyway, I guess the reason is that they've got so many orders for those games that they think they can afford to do it, and we won't get too many cancellations. They are a business.
    29:35
    Their job is to make a profit. It could also be, well, the game is likely, well, I think Pinball News announced it as Game of the Year. I think it won Game of the Year with the Pinball Industry Awards last month. It's also expected to win numerous Twippies, which will be handed out at the end of this month. so it's not that strange if you have a hit game like that to try to make a little bit more profit on it yeah it's not like they can actually make more machines their production capability is maxed out I think at the moment they're making as many games as they can so if they want to make more money out of the game the only way they can really do that is to increase the price right so well let's hope that they use the extra income to expand production in whatever way possible so they can speed it up and build more games, get more games out the door. Yeah, because of course they have another title waiting in the wings to come on, come onto the line. There will be several, one would say, but one obvious one which people have been talking about for a long time, and I think people are even putting in pre-orders for the collector edition of that next model now with their distributors, not even knowing what the game looks like. so they don't want to take too long before they get one out. But interesting, I did notice that they seem to have stopped selling Willy Wonka games now at Jersey Jack, or stopped manufacturing them. All three models, I don't think, are in production, and there are no current plans to make any more Willy Wonka games. So if you didn't get one, you wanted one and you didn't get one yet, then you might find yourself in a bit of trouble trying to find any distributors that got me in stock. They are selling out very quickly. On the other hand, it might not be available at the factory, but there might still be distributors that have one or more in stock. But you might have to really look for them. Yeah, that's what I'm saying. Yeah, absolutely. Yeah, I think I've seen several posts from distributors saying that they had to, but as soon as this news came out they sold out straight away and they haven't got any more they're not expecting to get any more strange but I guess Guns N' Roses at the new price is a much higher profit margin than Willy Wonka is, they might as well concentrate on making those yeah, possibly or if they do announce a new model of Willy Wonka they could use the new Gunther Rose's prices, but we'll see. I mean, it wouldn't be the first time that we would see an extra model come along after a couple of years at the Jersey Jack pinball.
    32:37
    Just put that over there. Thank you. Yes. Yes, good timing there. Our Amazon delivery driver just turned up in the middle of the podcast. I also checked to see whether it was Gary, but it wasn't. Lucky for you. Yes. We'll call him back later, though, and find out what's been going on in his world. That's Gary, not the Amazon delivery driver. No.
    33:06
    Right. So now everybody wants to know what did the Amazon delivery driver deliver? Well, I don't want to get too much off pinball, but it is the most exciting delivery of a set of batteries for a Roomba vacuum cleaner,
    33:24
    which is about 10 years old and needs new batteries before it will work. Is that to store the memory of the vacuum cleaner? To actually power it around the floor, so we can pick up the touch. Now, we haven't finished with Josie Jet Pinball though. No, not yet. So distracted by locking on the door.
    33:48
    There'll be a couple of code updates, both in this case for the newest game. Guns N' Roses, that is. That is indeed, yeah. 10th of February, version 1.13 of the software came out, which enhanced the scoreboard integration and also added some extra adjustments for adult content for those who need to, from a sensitive nature, and don't want the full-on experience. No, that's all we want. We want the full-on experience. Oh, you expect that, wouldn't you? But you can turn that down anyway, and previously you could just turn everything down, and now it has separate controls over what songs, videos, and call-outs are played if you want to make it more family-friendly. And there's a bunch of bugs fixed in various modes, really, which cause the game to crash. I wonder if the game will call you if you try to enable these family friendly settings that the game will call you a pussy or something I don't know that would actually be very funny it would yeah well anyway some other bug fixes and things that was in 1.13 which came out on the 10th of February as I said and then the very next day came out a bug fix for that one which these are on top of it yeah yeah it was found very quickly and squashed the very next day with a fix for the school bit integration, which got a bit broken in the previous update and was basically fixed. So version 1.14 is the current one as of the time of this podcast, which is the 1st of March. Right, okay. That's the code update excitement from Dirty Jack Pinball. Okay. Now, we're moving on to Stern Pinball, and I have to say the biggest news from Stern Pinball left me a bit puzzled. Hey, very good. It left me in pieces.
    35:50
    Very good one. Yeah. So what is the biggest news from Stern Pinball of this past month? The latest news from our lifestyle... Lifestyle brand. Yes, is that they, like most global lifestyle brands, they discovered that you make the most money not from the products for which you're best known, but from selling the various merchandise based around it. And rather than announcing any new pinballs, they've announced this month they're now selling jigsaws.
    36:28
    Jigsaw puzzles, that is. Yes. Yeah. Not the ones you actually cut wood with or anything like that. But, yes, there are two jigsaw puzzles available, one a samurai design from Jesse Hernandez of Urban Aztec, who is a San Francisco Bay Area artist, and another wizard puzzle, which actually uses some zombie yeti artwork, I think we've seen before, but it's now printed onto a jigsaw puzzle. I think it was available on a t-shirt or a hoodie, something like that. Yeah, I've seen that one before. I'm not sure about a samurai puzzle, but they're both Stern branded anyway. And yeah, nice pieces of artwork. A thousand piece puzzles available through the Stern pinball shop for $24.99.
    37:21
    What? Yeah. For a broken up piece of cardboard? yeah it's only what is it two cents two and a half cents per piece bargain I suppose it is you can make those into keychains or anything so anyway go to shop.sternpinball.com and you can check those two out and I don't know whether you order them directly from Stern you can certainly put them in the cart from Stern and then you have to pay international shipping. But I don't suppose that your distributors will necessarily carry those. You'll probably get them directly from Stern. And it may actually be the case, as with some of these products, that they're not shipped from Stern either. They're actually shipped from a fulfillment company or the manufacturer of the puzzles themselves. Well, I don't want to sound negative, but I wouldn't be surprised if they're just being shipped from Stern because they're too cheap to hire a company to handle that kind of shipment for them. But then again, I mean, it's all in...
    38:34
    You do merchandise to make money, and getting a fulfillment company, those are charging money too. Of course, but Stone aren't building these puzzles themselves.
    38:49
    No, okay, but... They could ship them, couldn't they? yeah so oh well we leave that up to them well you have to bear in mind that you know Dave Peterson Hegarty who came in as an investor into the company his background is in saving Harley Davidson so another company where not many people can actually afford to buy a Harley Davidson brand new machine but they can afford to buy a Harley Davidson puzzle That's right. Harley-Davidson, fridge magnets, jackets, caps, glasses, you name it. You can buy all that stuff as a lifestyle brand.
    39:34
    And there's a certain advantage to that kind of stuff. Now, Harley-Davidson, that is a brand that I would consider a global lifestyle brand. Well, yes, it's got an iconic brand and a long history, which Stern Pinball doesn't have the same kind of cachet attached to it at the moment. No. Far from it, you know. Okay, so.
    40:01
    That's kind of why, you know, they're helping to plug the 30 years of Stern Pinball, suggesting the actual brand itself had a much longer life and is more historic than having started in 1999, as it actually did. Right. Yes. Well, speaking of that, on a little side note, Zach Sharp, who is Stern's marketing manager, I think that's his official title. he was recently interviewed on camera for a video for Geekazine which is a rather interesting video I'm not sure whether I should say this but I thought it was rather amusing to see how Zach was telling the viewers that Sturm Pinball has been bringing the most fun pinball machines to the world for the past 30 years and I basically was wondering how can you say that with a straight face well there's your proof and talking of Zach he was also I believe interviewed as part of an intergame article intergame online article with the intergame zine there's him there's Michael Grant and Jack I think from Jersey Jack Pinball Let me guess, it's about the resurgence of pinball. Funnily enough, yes, it was about the way pinball has had a resurgence during lockdown, yes. Yeah, okay, so right now I'm just going to pull a stop to that. I say we're not going to discuss or talk about the resurgence in pinball unless operators on location are actually saying there is a resurgence in pinball And then we're talking about operators that are actually making money on pinball. Yeah, well, Intergame, of course, is a trade magazine. So it's a bit of a twist there. But one thing that was interesting in the article, if nothing else, was the fact that it did say one of the manufacturers, I think it may have been American Pinball, said that there had been a number of cancellations from operators in the pandemic. but of course that would be more than taken up by sales to the home yes but that's not it's not a surprise but it's the first time I've seen anybody actually admit that operator sales have declined yeah and we all know it but the industry is trying to cover it up everybody's saying like look there's a resurgence we're selling more games yes to homeowners to people having an arcade in their basement or a private game room as long as pinball on location is not going up and we're not talking about barcades or or beer caves or what have you that are that that focus on pinball yes those are there too but unless the casual operator that used to operate pinball and ditched it some time ago because of what making any money and he's not getting back into pinball there's no such thing as a resurgence yes you're selling more pinball machines to home collectors but it's not to the market that the games were intended for in the first place so i wouldn't call it a resurgence although yes the numbers of manufacturing are up there's still nothing close to what we've seen in the in the early 90s in the adam's family days no so it's a shift so so who are we kidding Well, I guess you have to compare like with like. A year ago, or slightly more than a year ago, that's the market we were looking at rather than where we were pre-pandemic. Well, ten years ago, 300 games of a production run was a big run. and then we're talking like titles like NBA and CSI. Yeah. Yes, if you look at that, then there's a resurgence. But as long as you're not getting close to 20,000 games of a certain title,
    44:33
    I don't think it's a resurgence yet. Yes, you're doing better than 10 years ago, but it's still way worse than it used to be. Yeah. Well, we have to take the gains as we find them. and you have to start from where you are and build on that. So, yeah, it is. Okay, but you also have to look at things like, okay, yes, we used to build 5,000 games of each title and then we got down to 300 and it was the same company. So if you look at where you're coming from, you came from where it was successful and yet somewhere along the line something went wrong and I'm not pointing anything as to who did something wrong, where or what, But I think it's a little bit ridiculous to speak of a resurgence when you're nothing close to what it used to be. Well, we'll have to see what happens once the locations start opening up again and operators start getting back into the market for buying games. because if they come back and buy in the quantities they were buying before the pandemic, and all those people who got in during the pandemic continue to buy new games, then the whole market as a whole has taken a big leap upwards, a big step over the past year. Right. But it might. Well, but then there's another interesting situation, because as we know, Gary Stern announced I think it was last year that they had a backlog of 5,000 games with the recent price hike I don't know where the number comes from but apparently the 5,000 number was dropped it's now only 3,000 but that basically means that Stern has a backlog of 3,000 games to produce which includes all the titles as well but that basically means that whenever the pandemic ends and operators want to buy new games, they're at the back of the list. So they're not going to, Stern can't keep up with demand. So the only companies that are going to profit from an increase in demand for new pinball titles are the ones that can deliver immediately.
    46:41
    Yes, that's true. And that rules out Dirty Jack Pinball as well, because they're obviously well behind with their Guns N' Roses game. Right. Although I can see how that would be a popular title for operators. Oh it would definitely It would do very well I sure in location But if they sold out for the next six months or more then that not going to help As you say the same problem with Stern American Pinball should be able to benefit from that because they have the capability, I think, to produce games so quickly. Well, we can rule out Spooky as well because Rick and Morty are already completely sold out and we still have to wait and see whenever they announce their new title and what happens with that? If that's a license and it goes the same route as Rick and Morty, then they're busy for the next two years. There's an opportunity there for any new company to get into the market. If they have production. The major players are log-jammed with old orders or existing orders and people want games now. Who are they going to go to? I have to agree with you there. American Pinball with Hot Wheels which everybody is saying is a surprisingly fun game have the best cards in their hands so it seems whenever operators are looking for a new game then that's probably the game that they might turn to yep and although we have actually covered American People before I should probably add that they've been doing an impressive amount of social media and promotion of locations who are offering Hot Wheels as well on their Facebook page and probably on Instagram as well, although I tend not to use that too much, unless I absolutely have to. But yeah, there have been lots of places that have been highlighted on the American Pinball Facebook page saying this location is open and they have Hot Wheels game and here's a picture of it. So basically supporting the operators who are putting the games out there. Right, okay. So sorry for the slight detour. No, that's fine. Yeah, okay, so we were discussing Stern Pinball, if I'm not mistaken.
    48:57
    Obviously, their latest game is Led Zeppelin, which did receive a code update, version 0.95. What can you tell us about it, Martin? Well, quite a big update, actually. it's obviously as you said it's the current game still fairly recent but there's been a lot of changes to it over the last few updates all have been fairly major the last one added some new modes, added a new mothership multiball mini wizard mode and a new final mode as well which consists of two stages, a six ball multiball followed by, as soon as you drain down to one ball, it goes into a second phase, which is a timed mode where you need to keep making shots in order to keep the timer going. So that sounds like quite fun. But that's all added into the latest version, 0.95, as well as some fixes to some bugs on the lighting and display and sound effects and some changes to the rules for the new top-of-the-charts mode, which we announced last month. We didn't announce it. They did. If you've been following the game closely, you'll know there's been quite a few issues with the electric magic device, which is the sort of spinner-magnet combo which rises up out of the playfield. Yeah, that's only on the Premium and the LE models. Absolutely right, yeah. There's been issues with the spinner on that getting stuck, and also the front edge of the top surface getting dented when it's hit by the ball as it's rising or lowering.
    50:45
    So there are various fixes in development for that. The spinner itself, I think, has some issues in that you can... It's possible when the thing is lowering down or rising up, if you shoot a ball at it, it can hit the spinner at the pivot point rather than at the bottom edge where it spins, so it hits it in the middle which can then bend the arms and cause the spinner not to spin properly so that's a bit of a problem A bit of a problem? It's a major design flaw I'd say Well it's something which they haven't really done, haven't really experienced before, now the ways around that which a major way would be to only raise or lower the electric magic device when the ball is not at the flippers or is in a lock. Yeah, but doesn't it lower during a multi-ball as well? I think only when you're down to one ball, I think.
    51:43
    But it could stay up. I'm trying to think of another game, but there are games where it will only move a device like that when it either senses the ball is in a lock or is in the pop bumpers or at the top of the playfield or somewhere like that, somewhere where you're not going to shoot the ball into it, basically. So that's a software fix they can do, and it's being worked on. Richie posted about it as well, saying they are working on that. Can they speed up the motor that is lowering the device?
    52:18
    I'm sure they're moving it as quickly as they can. There are obvious dangers to what happens if you're driving it too fast and you shoot the ball at it and it gets trapped. you know top level of it gets trapped on top of the ball you're going to break the whole device by doing that so you need to be quite careful it's kind of like the ringmaster device I suppose in Circus yes you only raise and lower that when you know where the ball is and you know it's not going to be shot at it so that's something they can do in software but there's plenty of other things we can get on with that so anyway we were talking about code updates, and that was the latest code update, 0.95, as you said, from the 16th of February for Led Zeppelin. There'll be more coming probably quite frequently over the next few weeks. Right, okay. So, well, continuing on the subject of code updates, I'd say we jump over to Multimorphic. Right, yes. Well, I think this is pretty much the Nick Aldrich show, really, this month, because he's been busy doing code updates for his Ranger in the Ruins game. There have been two of those. The first was right at the beginning of the month, on the 1st of February, which added a wizard mode and an end to the game, as well as adding Twitch Connect support, which is something which we've seen from Multimortem in the past, which allows people to comment and always control the game to an extent through Twitch. and that was the 1st of February and then a couple of bugs introduced to that which were fixed in version 2.001 on the 9th of February 2021 Bless you Thank you And Nick Baldrige is also working on a new game which supposedly is going to use the height playfield module and we're We're still waiting for more details on that, but that is something to look forward to. If you have the heist module and you can use it to play a different game, well, I'd say why not?
    54:38
    It will be interesting to see whether it actually has something to do with the heist theme or whether it's just using the layout but not using the city or anything like that. Yeah, it is quite heavily branded around the actual city and the various locations where the heist game takes place. But I don't think it would be that difficult to come up with a new storyline using all those same locations. So let's see what Nick comes up with. As you say, no details on when it's going to be available, but he is working on it. He's announced. Right. Okay. so that was all the news actually I could find for Multimorphic for the past month, obviously they're in Texas too so let's hope that the weather didn't get the best of them yeah I'm sure it would have impacted on travel because they're just north of Austin so that whole area has been pretty heavily impacted by the cold weather and snow but as I said earlier temperatures are way back up to where they are expected to be this time of year now. So things should be back. Fingers crossed it hasn't impacted on the delivery of existing games or the supply lines too much. Right. Now, speaking of supply lines, nice bridge to Spooky Pinball is being supplied with the multimorphic board set that they are using in their games, if I'm not mistaken. That's correct, yeah. They're using the P-Rock or P3 Rock on their game.
    56:12
    Congratulations are in order, I'd say. Absolutely. Yeah, a little late, delayed congratulations, but we can congratulate them on being eight years old as of the 1st of February.
    56:27
    Well, congratulations. Well done. Yeah, so celebrations there, but also some sad news, I suppose, regarding the thing which kick-started it all was their podcast, which Charlie and Katie and family have been doing, and started 11 years ago,
    56:51
    on which, incidentally, Jersey Jack Pimple was announced 10 years ago. Right. Well, that, unfortunately, has now come to an end as a podcast after 11 years. Exactly after 11 years.
    57:08
    Yes. it's not completely the end of it in the sense that they might occasionally do another podcast but so far they have been doing it for 11 years in a row without skipping a single month which is quite an accomplishment it is yeah future plans are to do YouTube based video or podcasts I suppose yeah which sort of makes sense because obviously the audience over there might be larger yeah but also you know people like to listen to listen to podcasts i suppose uh rather than watch them you know listen to them on the way into work uh or on their commute and don't necessarily have the ability to to watch or indeed the desire unless you've actually got something something good to show it's something which we've discussed a few times whether we could do this as a video version but uh who want to watch us yeah well oh no yeah there's plenty of people who want to definitely would want to watch us and let's not get ahead of ourselves but we have something in development oh we do? okay I'll tell you more about it later I look forward to hearing all about it but in the meantime as we said before Spooky Pinball very busy making lots and lots of Rick and Morty games and don't have the subsequent title announced yet yeah so and any upswing for the Wisconsin weather taking a hike to Texas? Was the Texas weather at Wisconsin at the same time or doesn't it work like that? I don't think so. I think I heard that in Chicago, certainly at the greater Chicago area they had very deep snow at the same time that Texas had it as well. I know they're in Wisconsin and not in Illinois, but It's, you know, they don't get that great a lake effect on that side, I don't think. So they will still be having the same kind of weather up in Benton.
    59:15
    Right. Okay. So, well, we'll see more. Sorry. Spooky Pinball yet have to come out with their first video podcast or whatever you want to call it. So we haven't seen it yet. But we obviously look forward to it.
    59:32
    Yeah. We'll wish them good luck with their future venture. So let's move something just somewhere a little closer to home, in particular closer to your home, and look at what Barry and co. at Dutch Pinball have been up to. I believe you have been paying them a visit. I have, yes. Can't talk about it. Oh, can't you? Okay, so moving on. No, no, there's probably something I can discuss about that. Yes, I visited the new facility of Dutch Pinball, which is, I think, five times the size of the location that they were in, well, basically a couple of months ago. and I was there I think two weeks ago they had, well obviously Big Tabaski is still in production and the company is doing very well they are expanding on the well in several areas I'd say, obviously they have people working on the assembly line but they have now gotten to the size where they actually also need to hire people to do the administration and all that kind of stuff yeah they need payroll and taxes and dealing with sickness and all that kind of stuff yeah and they're still looking to expand I believe so if you're fancying a job in Pimble Assembly and DutchPrim will be a good place for you to try your luck. And it shouldn't be that difficult, I suppose.
    61:27
    Would speaking Dutch be a requirement, do you think? No, I think speaking English. Wow. That should be good enough.
    61:36
    And, well, there's not much else to report, at least, well, there's plenty to report that I can't report on. So that's all the off-the-record stuff and the top secrets that they told me and showed me. And, yeah, that's all sticking with me and not telling anybody. Sure, sure. Well, we can reveal that they now have somebody handling frontline support for the company, Renz, who people, certainly on Pinside, will be familiar as a friend of Barry's and a regular, as I say, visitor to the company. He is now offering part-time support through email mainly but also occasionally on he will do it through Pinside but he would prefer that you emailed him at support at dutchpinball.com for any issues with existing the Bigabowski games. So it's nice that he'll be able to handle that and Barry can get on with doing the many other aspects of the company that we just spoke about, as well as working on development of future games and making sure that production line is up and running and well supplied and that all those early achievers who are yet to receive their games... Yeah, including myself. Including yourself, yeah, actually get to get their games in a timely manner.
    63:09
    Right, yeah. So, well, they're working on it. And, yeah, at the tip of my tongue, there's stuff that I want to say that I'm realizing was told to me off the record, so I can't say anything about it. But obviously, Dutch people, they just want to make sure that they deliver the games as quickly as possible to those who are owed a game, and on top of that to everybody else who is currently ordering games, because that's also still continuing. Yeah, sure.
    63:49
    Okay, well, talking of companies who are hoping to make games, then let's have a look at, hop back across the pond, and talk about the title called the Fun Factory, which we've talked about before, and we've seen videos and pictures and reports about, and that's from the company Pinball Adventures, and they've been putting some more media out there for people to enjoy. Can you tell us a little bit about that? I'm not sure whether enjoy is the right word.
    64:29
    Well, I'm sure they put it out for people to enjoy, whether they enjoyed it or not is another question. Yeah.
    64:36
    Fair point, I suppose. But yes, on their YouTube channel, they uploaded, I think, the past month, three new videos.
    64:52
    I think two about the rules and gameplay of Pony Factory and there's also one about engineering, the engineering of the game. um it's a um the the style of editing is a bit um too much for for my personal taste i suppose um i mean it's uh well you have to to look and see for yourself so just look up pinball adventures on on youtube you'll find their youtube channel channel and uh that there's uh these videos with the main character of the game. On one hand, I appreciate that they're trying to do it in a certain setting which is suitable to the game, and on the other hand, it's a bit painful to watch it at times, I'd say. So I said it. But obviously, I still wish them all the best. It's nice to see that Roman and the rest of Team Pinball are being introduced as the design team behind the Pani factory and what they came up with, what the goal was and so on. Yeah, and Dave Sanchez as well getting credit for the playfield design. Right. And well, we'll still have to wait and see whenever they are ready to go into production. But for now, the videos are a way to keep people informed, I suppose. Yes. I think looking on their website at the moment, on Pinball Adventures website, which is pinballbuzz.com, you can read about the journey as it is to production. And the intention is, I think, to produce at least ten or nine, maybe, videos.
    67:02
    Although the first one seems to be splitting to two. For a second, I was afraid you were going to say games instead of games. Well, there's quite a lengthy number of games as well that they've been working on or have in the pipeline almost as many as Deep Root, but not quite. But, yes, so the intention is to produce a lot of these videos and also presumably at some point actually produce some games as well. But they are quite interesting. I would say they're well produced in terms of the technical quality. but yeah I think a very love it or hate it presentational style and to me I couldn't watch any of them all the way through they just got too gritty on me which is a shame because the game is quite reasonable yeah but if the main character of the videos is also the main character in the game that might actually hurt people enjoying gameplay well it might depend on how in your face it is but with a video you've only got the pictures and the audio there can be quite grating I found whereas with a game you have a lot more to it I think than watching a video so I'm hoping the game's more enjoyable than the videos were I don't think they're doing themselves any favours with those videos but they are at least showing the amount of effort and the amount of development that goes into them.
    68:41
    If that is an indication of how well the video interaction in the game will be, then that's a good sign, I suppose. Yeah, well, they obviously have a lot of talent and a lot of effort that they're putting into the video, so hopefully that is reflected in the game as well. Right. So, trying to see, I suppose that's all the news there is from Pinball Adventures. I think it is, yeah. So, let's head off to the other side of the world and go and see what's going on with another title which we are eagerly awaiting, we're waiting delivery of, I should say, and that is with Haggis Pinball and their Celt game. Right. I think you have some news about what's been going on from Haggis. Do I? oh don't you okay and uh moving on then no i mean do i oh boy do i oh do you oh wow oh yeah well there was a uh an update from damien from haggis at the uh beginning of february um that was his first update uh this year and so far as i can see also his only one and um summarizing it comes down to that parts for production have been ordered and he was hoping to build three calz games which should be finished uh by the end of february
    70:06
    obviously that just passed but we have no idea whether they actually uh was able to build these games or whether there were some more delays hmm yeah but uh He did well obviously he looking to build more games but he didn want to put down a timeline down Yes we know what happens when people put timelines down Yeah usually that doesn work for the best
    70:36
    But that's basically it, and we're still waiting to see whether those three games were built, and if not, hopefully they're ready soon. We also have no idea how many games were actually ordered.
    70:51
    Let's hope that those three games is not the entire production. No, I doubt that. I'm sure any game is always going to have at least 20 buyers, simply for the rarity value of it, if nothing else.
    71:07
    I know games that went into production and never got to that number. What, recently? Yeah. Oh, okay.
    71:18
    Well, I don't want to discredit any company or design team or what have you. embarrass anybody. Okay. Well, I would have thought that if you know it's going to be a very short run, then there's a certain aspect to owning a rare game that gives it the extra impetus to buy it.
    71:40
    Right. But if it's a game that is not received very well, then it apparently doesn't matter how rare it is, still nobody wants it. Okay. And seriously, I'm not trying to put down anybody in particular. No, no, and I think I know who you're talking about anyway.
    71:58
    Okay, so we don't know how many haggis of pinball they're going to make, but they're continuing and they're not, well, they did put an end of February marker down in the sands, and they hope to build three by then. But, you know, no one's going to hold them to that. and the important thing is that they build... Well, the people that bought those three games might hold them to it, but... Well, yeah, it's not like they had an invoice that said we will deliver this game by the end of February or anything like that, I don't think. No, no, no, sure.
    72:35
    Now, moving from Haggis, it's... Well, let's see what's in the area going on. home pin factory um there's not much news to report actually um they've been mostly busy with with these belly transformer assemblies um that were um well they're basically being produced it's a replacement for your belly transformer and it makes me wonder like okay if you have a gang then usually comes with the transformer why would there not be a transformer but apparently there's a market for them.
    73:15
    Yeah, I wouldn't have thought transformers are the kind of things which fail very often unless they get wet or physically damaged in some way because they only consist of coils and plates in a former so there's not a lot to go wrong with them unless the coil is short out for some reason and that normally doesn't happen unless as I say they get some kind of physical damage but as you say if he's building them then there's probably a demand for them. But it's kind of disappointing in a way that since the move from China that they haven't actually started, well, don't seem to have got into building any more pinball machines, no, complete machines. So the China zombie thing was… There is some news about that, but the last time I talked to Mike, that was off-the-record info, and I haven't received an okay to make that content or that news available yet. So I know he has been working on pinball, but I can't discuss it yet. I was hoping to be able to cajole you into spilling the beans on that or at least dropping the heat, but okay, fair enough. So, anyway. The only thing, the only fear that I have is, and it's probably not a surprise, but now that they're based in Taiwan, I doubt whether the China Zombies game that they were working on is actually going to be a title that's actually going to be in production.
    74:55
    Why not? just have to well taiwan and china don't have the best relationships and um i think china is seeing taiwan as a um what you call it a state of of china or whatever yeah not sure uh whatever it is so I'm not saying it's completely let's put it like this I don't expect that game to be further developed and that's just pure what do you call that speculation not to bring out an English language version of it then you don't think yeah original plan, wasn't it? There was going to be China Zombies was going to be for the Chinese market but there would also be an English language version of it. I don't even think there's going to be a Chinese version at this point. I think that's just a title that was in development and I think they put it on the shelf and who knows it might never come off. Well, that would be a shame. Then we look forward in that case to seeing what Title 3 or production Title 2 actually is after Thunderbirds. want to see him producing pinball games come on oh yeah I agree with you and hopefully they can get to production soon so hopefully let's see if we can have if I can reach out to Mike on our next podcast yes exactly that could be interesting Yes, okay. No promises, but we'll do our best to get Mike Kalinowski on our March recap. Right. So then there is Pinball Brothers.
    76:57
    Yes. Well, obviously they are doing the Alien game, which was the Highway Pinball game before. Now, they have apparently shipped two sample games to Cointaker in the US, who are kind of like the, I wouldn't say the major distributor, they're probably the kind of the gateway for their sales into North America and, at the moment, I think the rest of the world, because they're sort of spearheading the release of the Alien game, the Alien remake. and so those two games are apparently on their way to Cointaker, probably being delayed by weather, COVID plague you name it but they will get there and they'll go in there to be evaluated and for any suggestions to be fed back to Pinball Brothers about exactly whether the game is ready to sell as it is or whether it needs some adjustments Personally, I encourage those type of testing, I'd say. Yeah, it was good news that they're not just shipping a product and saying, there it is, take it or leave it. They're saying, okay, here's what we are proposing. What do you think? And then they're open to changes. As you mentioned before, they were going to get the game manufactured in Italy. We're not sure whether that's still the case, probably is. but the invoices we talked about before with Haggis about the fact that they haven't put an absolute deadline on the invoice when the game's going to be delivered but whereas with Pimple Brothers I think the ones that they've sold so far, the Alien games sold for, seem to have a Q2 of 2021 on the invoice indicating the game would be delivered by the end of June.
    79:03
    If it's still in evaluation and in suggestion and not in production That seems very ambitious. It does seem ambitious, yes.
    79:12
    Not for the first time from Pimble manufacturers in general, not Pimble Brothers in general who have been restrained I would say so far in saying it will be ready when it's ready and not pushing it. Yeah. but also seriously fingers crossed um here we're dealing with a contract manufacturer in italy who have never ever produced pinball before so i really hope this will work out in a good way because everybody uh not into pinball production seems to think that it's not a big deal and then they find out it actually is it's the biggest deal of all of it, actually designing a game and doing the software and the assets is probably I don't know, 60% of the game all those parts but actually building it is the other 40% and it's where you live or die really by whether you can build the game if you cannot build it you have no product it doesn't matter how complete your package is the prototype is only phase one so hand building games is nothing like mass manufacturing again as everybody in manufacturing knows it's the same kind of thing that we've seen with well it's the same I was going to go back to Deeproot because they had to hand manufacture some games so they could get them submitted for CE and UL certification. But those aren't mass manufactured games. They are hand built and they will need to make some changes on that as well and that would impact on how they mass manufacture it. Don't get too bogged down in that part of it because everybody who gets into running a pinball company knows that the manufacturing is difficult part and they will be happy to explain it to you if you ask them, I'm sure. Right, okay. So, I guess this rounds up the pinball industry news as far as pinball manufacturing goes. Oh, right. Well, in that case, you know what to do. Let's get, finally, Gary Flower on the phone. Excellent, okay. Give him a call, see what happens. Well, there hasn't been much news, so I'm probably going to have a little upcoming information. Yeah, okay.
    81:49
    We're sorry, you have reached a number that has been disconnected or is no longer in service. You've got to be kidding. If you feel you have reached the supporting error, please check the number and try your call again. I do, seriously, it's the number that I am always calling him on. I mean, I only have one number for Gary Flower and this is the number that I've talked to him. He's been cut off since the audio earlier. Wow. I apologise we tried to fix this and get Gary on our next episode, I didn't expect this to happen, I'm very very sorry you tried yeah, oh well do you have other news? only really about various shows coming up now that vaccination is going out for Covid I don't want to get too medical in all this because there's not other places where you can get that kind of information. There are other shows that have a glimmer of hope that are actually going to take place.
    82:51
    The Pymtastic New England show, which was going to be taking place in, I think it was the end of the spring, that's pushed itself back now to the fall, or the autumn of 2021. They haven't actually announced dates yet, but it's starting to get a bit of a crowded times. Yeah, a full crowded calendar for the autumn of this year. Because the Southern Fry Game Room Expo has also been rescheduled and that's now the 20th to 22nd of September 2021. Obviously this is in the US. But, as is Pintastic, but in the UK we've actually got a couple of shows coming up. East Anglian Pinball Show, otherwise known as the Swasey Show, which is just, basically it's a pub. We bring along a bunch of pinball machines, stick them in the back room, drink lots of beer, play lots of pinball,
    84:00
    hold a raffle for charity, raise lots of money, have a fun weekend. That's it. Get drunk? Yeah, well, optional. That's the 2nd to the 4th of July 2021. We actually have in this country now a plan for getting out of lockdown and the 17th of May is the date where all these kind of things can reopen. It includes our pinball club at Flip Out London so we will be open from the 20th of May. That's the plan. this is all adjustable if there's another outbreak or a new variant of Covid crops up and causes problems and that may be pushed back so we have the East Anglian Pimple show and the major UK show, UK Pinfest is still scheduled to go ahead on the August 27th to 29th well that's good news yeah perhaps we'll see you over there for that well that depends on whether flying into the UK will be easy for now that's actually made rather difficult you really need to have a good reason to go there and you need to quarantine yourself I think once you get there and also when you get back so hopefully that won't be necessary no that's all kind of reliant on that kind of thing having been done and people having been vaccinated by then But, yeah, because obviously we will want to be looking to go to, well, over here in the UK, we want to be going to European shows as well. And hopefully there'll be a Dutch Pinball Open Expo this year in November.
    85:48
    But I don't know if you know anything about that. Yeah, I do. And you tell us about it. Well, the only thing I can tell you is that the organizing team have sort of reached out to each other.
    86:05
    We have this service that we use, this sort of group chat that we use. And so here in the Netherlands, we have slowly started vaccinating people. but I think at the moment it's unclear how far we'll be and whether that will allow big events.
    86:31
    In what way? We're still trying to figure out what to do. How can you be sure that the people coming to the event are vaccinated?
    86:41
    Because obviously we don't know how things will develop in that area. We're picking up the pace with vaccinations, but apparently people that have received the vaccine might still be a carrier for the virus and give it to someone who has not been vaccinated. Yeah, that's true. Yeah. We are doing pretty well in this country, I have to say, with vaccination. We haven't been very good in various other areas of COVID. But as far as vaccination goes, we've got more. Well, you did very well in the numbers. I think you were number one in Europe. Well, we have over 20 million now vaccinated.
    87:22
    That's also a number one in Europe, I suppose. Yeah, I think so, yeah. But by November, who knows what the situation is going to be? It's very difficult to say, isn't it? He obviously has a plan for that kind of thing, and that's difficult. So understand if it, as a group, becomes a conclusion that's impossible to say at this stage, or impossible to say in time, that kind of event planning, and just decide to pull the plug until next year. Well, unlike last year, last year we had an event in place that we actually had to pull the plug on. So far for this year, we have nothing in place to pull the plug on unless we decide, like, let's go for it. But we haven't decided to go for it yet. Right. Okay, fine. Well, all I can say as a blatant plug then is keep an eye on the Pinball News diary of events and as soon as I'm constantly looking out for announcements and either cancellations, postponements or new shows and they will all appear there as soon as I know about them but we also hoping I suppose to be able to get over to Pinball Expo in October if fingers crossed you know we'll, vaccinations take place, we're allowed to travel internationally. And of course, the weekend after that is the Midwest Gaming Classic in Milwaukee. And I would not be surprised if the weekend prior to that, we'll also see some big show. Well, as I say, it's getting very, very, very packed indeed. So, yeah, lots of shows heading for the sort of September-October time frame. I think there's actually another show. It might even be the grand old Gandald pinball Opry or whatever it's called show That's the same weekend As pinball expo so it's got that Crowded that shows Are already clashing But you know it does mean that If you're if you are traveling Internationally or Long distance then you can probably you know Catch a couple of shows on consecutive Weekends and that's what I think we'd be hoping to do wouldn't we with Expo and the Midwest yeah that's probably I wasn't aware of the Midwest yet but I wasn't aware I could fly into the States anyway as soon as that will be possible then I definitely look into doing two weekends in a row exciting times, pinball shows are coming back not too soon not a moment too soon let's look forward to the good times later in the year But in the meantime, I think we've kind of wrapped up what's happened through February 2021. I assume you have anything else you'd like to add, John? Well, the only thing I can mention is I keep getting requests for Pinball Magazine number six.
    90:27
    People wonder when that will be ready. Of course. All I can say is I am actually working on it. What now?
    90:36
    Well, the past month I have been working on it. most of the cover story is already transcripted or transcribed whatever the correct and it's I'm currently editing, grammarly editing, making sure that it's all correct and I still need to merge a couple of sections together and then remove the duplicate stories or phrases or that kind of stuff But I figured I'd check the grammar first and correct all that so it's more pleasant reading for me while I'm editing the whole thing and taking extra stuff out and that kind of stuff. And I can't tempt you to set a deadline for this.
    91:30
    If there's anything we've learned in pinball, it's not to set any deadlines. Yeah, it's ready when it's ready. Is that right? Well, it's always been the case with Pinball Magazine. You always try to hit major shows so you can be there and sell it. I will say that I will definitely try to have this issue available before Expo, in case Expo happens. So, as sort of a deadline, yes. And the main thing that keeping me currently from working on a pinball magazine, issue six, is a couple of major music productions that I'm involved in. And well, one of them is very well, lots of potential for a summer hit. people tell me so fingers crossed that's currently where my time is going and as soon as that's out and hopefully well of course I hope it becomes a success that everybody says it will be and if not then I have the plan is to focus more on the magazine so well I don't know whether to wish you good luck with the music or hope that it's a total flop and you can spend all your time doing Pivotland. Yeah, yeah, yeah.
    93:00
    I'm conflicted on that one, but best wishes either way, anyway, for whatever it is that really takes off. Thank you. Yeah, some things to look forward to there later in the year. But as I said, I think for February 2021, that is all that we have to bring you for this podcast. We didn't manage to get Gary this time, but I'm sure we will get him next time.
    93:22
    Well, reasonably sure. Anyway, and we will be back at the end of March, looking back at the previous month. Well, that's probably the start of April, was it? Probably April Fool, appropriately enough, when we'll be back to look at all the events that happened in this month of March 2021. So until then, from me, Martin Eyre, for Pinball News, and from my co-host... Jonathan Yousson of Pinball Magazine. We wish you a very happy March and look forward to seeing you soon. okay thanks bye bye