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Ep 96: Talking TWIPys with Will Oetting
77 Plays3 years ago
TWIPy pre voting is here and Will Oetting is on with us to talk about all the changes that TWIP and TWIPys are going through.
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Transcript
Introduction to Episode 96
00:00:06
Speaker
Thanks for tuning in to Loser Kid Pinball Podcast.
00:00:09
Speaker
This is episode 96.
00:00:10
Speaker
I am Josh Roop with me, my co-captain as always.
00:00:14
Speaker
Scott Larson.
00:00:15
Speaker
Man, we're getting up there in numbers, aren't we, Scott?
00:00:17
Speaker
I know, we're getting long in the tooth, so we need to start our exit strategy because most podcasters go to 100 and then poop out.
00:00:25
Speaker
Yeah, something like that.
Flipping Out Pinball's Service
00:00:28
Speaker
But you know who hasn't pooped out yet that is great to get a pinball machine from?
00:00:31
Speaker
Who hasn't pooped out, Josh?
00:00:33
Speaker
Flipping out pinball.
00:00:34
Speaker
And I know that Nicole and Zach do a great job at getting your product.
00:00:39
Speaker
Our friend Julie, she came to Expo with us.
00:00:42
Speaker
She was awesome.
00:00:43
Speaker
She got her very first pinball machine ever.
00:00:47
Speaker
She got a Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles Pro.
00:00:51
Speaker
I love Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles.
00:00:52
Speaker
It's a great game.
00:00:53
Speaker
It's kind of brutal for a first game, but hey, put it on 12 ball because you can team up with the four turtles and then take on Shredder.
00:01:01
Speaker
Now, it is brutal, but the Pro is definitely the way to go.
00:01:06
Speaker
I thought the premium got in the way of the fun.
00:01:09
Speaker
But hey, that's the beauty is you can get whatever you want.
00:01:12
Speaker
And I know they have those things in stock.
00:01:14
Speaker
And so if you want those or if you want to get on a waiting list for Godzilla, go ahead and let him know.
00:01:20
Speaker
Or if you want that sweet Mandalorian topper, he will be able to hook you up.
00:01:24
Speaker
Also, if you want to get in before the price increase, which is January 1st on everything that isn't Bond because Bonds are got a price increase.
00:01:32
Speaker
Hit up Zach.
00:01:33
Speaker
Avoid that $700.
00:01:35
Speaker
He's got Rush in stock.
00:01:36
Speaker
He's got Mando in stock.
00:01:38
Speaker
I think he's got a couple other titles that are all premiums.
00:01:41
Speaker
It all applies to the premiums.
00:01:43
Speaker
He has a new in-box Lord of the Rings that he's willing to... No, okay, maybe not.
00:01:50
Speaker
So yeah, if you need a pinball machine, it's coming to be becoming Christmas time and whatnot.
00:01:54
Speaker
Hit up Flippin' Out Pinball.
Welcome Mr. Silverball Swag
00:01:56
Speaker
Scott, we've got a special guest on today.
00:01:59
Speaker
We do have a special guest.
00:02:00
Speaker
This is this gentleman's first time ever being on a podcast, and he's coming on Loser Kid.
00:02:05
Speaker
I don't know if that's a good thing or a bad thing.
00:02:07
Speaker
I think it just says that he asked about 10 other podcasts, and they are no longer accepting interviews.
00:02:14
Speaker
But either way, you know, I'm glad to know we're at least on the list.
00:02:18
Speaker
Exactly.
00:02:19
Speaker
This is Mr. Silverball Swag himself, Will Otting.
00:02:22
Speaker
Yeah, thank you very much.
00:02:23
Speaker
I appreciate you having me on.
00:02:25
Speaker
Well, and you have become more of a public figure here in these last couple months because my email is starting to see that there is new content coming out from this week in pinball, and you have something to do with that, right?
00:02:36
Speaker
Yeah, recently I've been doing the Monday posts, and I'm trying to
00:02:42
Speaker
you know, keep up with what's going on.
00:02:44
Speaker
I'm definitely not putting the effort in that Jeff always did because he always talked about doing over 40 hours just on Twip a week.
00:02:54
Speaker
And I can't do that.
00:02:55
Speaker
I can't afford that.
00:02:56
Speaker
But I'm trying my best and getting that content out there.
00:03:00
Speaker
Okay.
00:03:01
Speaker
So what begs the question is, are you taking over this week in pinball?
00:03:07
Speaker
Is Jeff still involved or is it a partnership?
00:03:10
Speaker
How does that work?
Transition at This Week in Pinball
00:03:13
Speaker
So at the moment, I am doing pretty much everything for this weekend pinball.
00:03:18
Speaker
I actually came on and I've been working with Jeff for a while with TWIP.
00:03:24
Speaker
It was, I think, about four years ago that I reached out to him and just said, hey, you know, I can do website maintenance.
00:03:32
Speaker
So do you need any help?
00:03:34
Speaker
And so ever since then, I've been behind Jeff and I, and I think you probably know, Jeff kind of is always trying to stay behind the scenes.
00:03:42
Speaker
And so I was behind Jeff being behind the scenes.
00:03:46
Speaker
So I was trying to be out of the way as much as possible.
00:03:50
Speaker
But yeah, he is definitely kind of stepped back.
00:03:52
Speaker
He's working on his career.
00:03:54
Speaker
He got a good promotion.
00:03:56
Speaker
So that's his focus.
00:03:57
Speaker
And so yeah,
00:03:59
Speaker
So that twip doesn't die off and doesn't leave.
00:04:02
Speaker
I have stepped up and are continuing that work at this point.
00:04:07
Speaker
So I would say it's fair to say that Jeff has stepped away and you're you're you're driving the bus now.
00:04:15
Speaker
Yeah.
00:04:15
Speaker
And that is also part of the reason I'm working on the Twippies more as well.
00:04:19
Speaker
So.
Silver Ball Swag's Origins
00:04:20
Speaker
Okay, so first off, we'll get to the Twippies, but what I want to know more about is tell me about Silver Ball Swag because you are basically the contact for so many options.
00:04:36
Speaker
I will say I have put some stuff in my cart before, and then I kind of forget about it, but there are some things that I'm really looking for.
00:04:47
Speaker
I really still want my right a pinball hat.
00:04:49
Speaker
So I want to get that silver ball Chronicles hat would be awesome.
00:04:54
Speaker
And Josh, didn't you get a triple drain t-shirt right now?
00:04:59
Speaker
I got two.
00:05:00
Speaker
I got dehydra and then I got just the logo.
00:05:02
Speaker
So.
00:05:04
Speaker
The Hydra is awesome.
00:05:05
Speaker
I had to get the baseball style of the Hydra with the triple drain.
00:05:09
Speaker
Even though there's some inside jokes before I made with the triple drain guys, but which we can't talk about any of those on this show right now.
00:05:17
Speaker
But no, it's a great, I love the design.
00:05:19
Speaker
I'm slightly jealous, man.
00:05:21
Speaker
It was still family friendly.
00:05:23
Speaker
We just,
00:05:23
Speaker
ribbed yeah but i'm slightly jealous there's a sweet design this i mean this the triple drain looks like almost monster bash i i love it it just it looks it looks clean and i gotta say well the the print on these shirts are wonderful it feels quality good it feels like it's not going to fade out over time i'm enjoying the product i bought from silver brawl swag since you guys have started so that's awesome i'm glad to hear that thank you and you can even get your this weekend pinball swag that's part of the options here
00:05:51
Speaker
Definitely is.
00:05:53
Speaker
And that's kind of how we started.
00:05:55
Speaker
You know, Jeff and I, well, originally I was looking for a shirt when I was getting into the hobby and couldn't really find something that matched what I wanted.
00:06:06
Speaker
You know, double danger was kind of the options out there.
00:06:09
Speaker
And I did buy from them, but we thought there were a bigger thing.
00:06:15
Speaker
community of pinball enthusiasts that kind of had different tastes.
00:06:19
Speaker
And so part of the reason we started was for that.
00:06:22
Speaker
And part of the reason we started was because Twip, you know, needed the service to be able to provide merchandise.
00:06:29
Speaker
And so that's the direction we went with kind of reaching out to other pinball content creators and seeing if they needed that same service and see if we could provide it for them.
00:06:41
Speaker
So that's the direction we went.
00:06:45
Speaker
That's pretty awesome that you guys came up with that.
00:06:47
Speaker
It's pretty amazing how many people have been able to do it.
00:06:50
Speaker
And the nice thing about this is how customizable it is.
00:06:55
Speaker
And it seems like every different one you select, it actually has many different options, which is pretty cool.
00:07:03
Speaker
Yeah, so we actually do have some products that you can actually customize the text that gets put on the product.
00:07:10
Speaker
So Joel Engelberth with Just Another Pinball Podcast, he has a couple options out there where he has stuff like Just Another Pinball Kid or Just Another Pinball Dad.
00:07:25
Speaker
And you can actually change that text, that kid or dad, to say whatever you want to say.
The Twippy Awards Overview
00:07:31
Speaker
kind of gives you some more freedom to do to make your own shirt or make your own products.
00:07:37
Speaker
Can you make one on the triple drain site that says, which one is your favorite?
00:07:42
Speaker
Like team Travis, team Joel, team Tom.
00:07:45
Speaker
Sure.
00:07:46
Speaker
Sure.
00:07:46
Speaker
We could.
00:07:47
Speaker
Yeah.
00:07:50
Speaker
All right.
00:07:50
Speaker
Okay.
00:07:51
Speaker
That's cool.
00:07:51
Speaker
What, what has been your biggest seller?
00:07:55
Speaker
Oh, geez.
00:07:57
Speaker
Biggest sellers.
00:08:00
Speaker
You know, we did for a short period of time.
00:08:04
Speaker
We sold Canada shirts.
00:08:06
Speaker
Okay.
00:08:06
Speaker
Those were big sellers.
00:08:08
Speaker
Okay.
00:08:09
Speaker
But then, of course, as usual, you know, we had an issue and he took his stuff off of our site.
00:08:16
Speaker
We also are one of our first products that was huge was back when Twips still had the did still did their podcast with Zach.
00:08:26
Speaker
Right.
00:08:26
Speaker
And, you know, he had a we did a Dennis one.
00:08:32
Speaker
And I can't remember what it said, but it was essentially like all their sayings in a cloud bubble of like of what was supposed to look like Dennis like face palming himself.
00:08:47
Speaker
Yes.
00:08:47
Speaker
I actually have that shirt.
00:08:48
Speaker
Everything that's entering.
00:08:52
Speaker
That's a great shirt.
00:08:54
Speaker
You have so many options on here and you can find, I know our friends at super awesome pinball show.
00:08:58
Speaker
They're on there.
00:08:59
Speaker
Like there's ever, I mean, really, I, I'm going to list off a few of the, just the ones that we've talked to black back box, Carrie Hardy.
00:09:06
Speaker
Don't panic flip.
00:09:08
Speaker
You know, flipping off cancer.
00:09:10
Speaker
I just, just go through macho pinball.
00:09:12
Speaker
It's all you can find your stuff here.
00:09:16
Speaker
So that's the bottom line.
00:09:18
Speaker
You need, you need swag, silver ball swag with, with Jeff stepping back and you taking more of the forefront.
00:09:25
Speaker
Well, what's the new direction of twip?
00:09:27
Speaker
Are you going to, is it going to be same old, same old, or are you guys going for a new direction with the site and everything?
00:09:32
Speaker
Yeah, so I mean, my focus is not really anything new.
00:09:38
Speaker
To me, TWIP is still going to be what TWIP has been.
00:09:41
Speaker
It's just that focus on the weekly content from either like manufacturers or other content creators or any, you know, anything out there that's kind of spreading pinball and giving people one place to go and kind of see it all wrapped up for the week.
00:10:00
Speaker
I think that's always going to be the focus of this week
Challenges in Twippy Voting
00:10:03
Speaker
in pinball.
00:10:03
Speaker
We do have other things out there.
00:10:06
Speaker
We do have the Pinball University that's out there that we're still adding content to.
00:10:12
Speaker
And that focus is kind of bringing in new people to the hobby and getting them up to speed and giving them a place to go and find info, as well as we do the deep dives.
00:10:24
Speaker
So that's still going to go forward.
00:10:26
Speaker
I actually have an interview that I,
00:10:29
Speaker
I'm working on with a homebrew, a creator of a homebrew that recently was at Expo.
00:10:36
Speaker
So I have that to post here fairly soon.
00:10:40
Speaker
So, you know, it's the focus, I think, has not changed too much.
00:10:45
Speaker
The only difference is that I am trying to push that content and Jeff isn't.
00:10:51
Speaker
It seems like you guys get the information so quickly.
00:10:56
Speaker
So it seems like you have, at least you have, once they announce the product, it seems like they're able to get some information to you because you are a good promotional tool for them.
00:11:09
Speaker
Yeah.
00:11:09
Speaker
Yeah.
00:11:09
Speaker
And that, I mean, that, that, that's our hope.
00:11:13
Speaker
And Jeff is definitely, he, especially the last deep dive, he's still been in connection with the manufacturers.
00:11:19
Speaker
So I'm still kind of relying on him on some of those connections.
00:11:23
Speaker
Hopefully those will trickle over to me and we can move that forward so that Jeff can definitely step out of that, that arena.
00:11:31
Speaker
So we also have the Twippy awards coming up.
00:11:35
Speaker
We do.
00:11:35
Speaker
Yeah.
00:11:36
Speaker
So this voting starts this week.
00:11:38
Speaker
Okay, so pretend like I know nothing about pinball.
00:11:43
Speaker
How are you going to describe this to me?
00:11:47
Speaker
Gotcha.
00:11:47
Speaker
Yeah.
00:11:47
Speaker
So the Twippy Awards are a people's choice awards.
00:11:54
Speaker
You know, it's kind of the chance for folks that are in the hobby or have some connection or desire to be able to express their, their favoritism for things in the pinball hobby to go out and vote and kind of give some appreciation to the manufacturers that produce the games and to the content creators that are
00:12:16
Speaker
They're pushing out anything from websites to streams to podcasts.
00:12:24
Speaker
That's another category.
00:12:25
Speaker
So it's a chance for folks to vote on their favorites.
00:12:28
Speaker
And so the Twippy show itself is at Texas Pinball Festival in March.
00:12:34
Speaker
We've been there for the last, well, we were there last year and then COVID kind of took us back into virtual for a while, but
00:12:44
Speaker
Texas Pinball Festival is kind of our home for the show.
00:12:48
Speaker
And that's our chance to celebrate those favorites that people voted on.
00:12:54
Speaker
Part of the reason...
00:12:57
Speaker
you know, I wanted to get on here was to talk a little bit about our expectations, our people's expectations for the show.
00:13:04
Speaker
You know, we've had some talk of it being, and I know in the beginning there was some focus on making it a high end, like fancy presentation.
00:13:17
Speaker
It's getting compared to the Golden Globes.
00:13:19
Speaker
And so some of the reason I did want to talk to you guys is kind of set that expectation for the show, the Twippy show going forward.
00:13:25
Speaker
Okay.
00:13:27
Speaker
Because like I said, it is a people's choice award.
00:13:31
Speaker
And so that we want to kind of reflect real pinball people.
00:13:36
Speaker
Okay.
00:13:37
Speaker
We're not the Golden Globes.
00:13:38
Speaker
You know, we are not a fancy gala show.
00:13:43
Speaker
So, you know, but I, I mean, I say that, but people are definitely welcome to dress up and there, and there will be presenters there that do dress up and, and kind of make it the event they want it to be.
00:13:55
Speaker
But, you know, in the same, we're just kind of a celebration.
00:13:59
Speaker
You know, we are, we're there to kind of show how much we appreciate everything that, you know, all these hardworking folks have done to make this pinball hobby what it is.
00:14:11
Speaker
So that's what the show is about.
00:14:14
Speaker
And I just kind of want to make sure that everybody had that expectation going forward.
00:14:19
Speaker
It sounds like a party celebration.
00:14:21
Speaker
Yeah, exactly.
00:14:22
Speaker
I would say that now there are anytime you have a, anytime you have a voting that's open to anybody, there's always going to be challenges with that.
00:14:35
Speaker
Sure.
00:14:36
Speaker
Because and these are these are things that have been voiced before.
00:14:41
Speaker
Is that well, OK, so what prevents someone from getting grandma to vote for them?
00:14:47
Speaker
They don't really have a connection to pinball or they have some sort of forum that there's like, hey, go and vote for me, even though, you know, you don't really know what I do in pinball.
00:14:56
Speaker
Or, hey, we really like this game, so maybe you should do it.
00:15:00
Speaker
So how do you take all that into account in doing something like this?
00:15:07
Speaker
Because you can vote regularly.
00:15:12
Speaker
Yeah, yeah.
00:15:13
Speaker
And we will even tell people, if you decide you want to change your vote, go ahead and vote again.
00:15:20
Speaker
Because one of the things we do do is we go through and remove all the duplicates.
00:15:24
Speaker
We check to see, you know, did, you know, this email get used again?
00:15:29
Speaker
Or are there IP addresses that are similar?
00:15:33
Speaker
And we have other, we check several other fields and data points to just kind of look at and see, you know,
00:15:40
Speaker
what's going on with the voting and is there something questionable going on?
00:15:45
Speaker
And we get rid of quite a few votes every year.
00:15:49
Speaker
So we do go through that.
00:15:51
Speaker
We go through that as a committee.
00:15:53
Speaker
We talk it through.
00:15:55
Speaker
We look at those through and definitely...
00:15:59
Speaker
You know, put some attention to that to make sure we have the best data.
00:16:03
Speaker
Now, I mean, it is a favoritism contest.
00:16:07
Speaker
I mean, there are going to be people asking, you know, their grandma to vote for them.
00:16:12
Speaker
That's not something we can definitely, you know, we can't stop that and we don't necessarily want to.
00:16:21
Speaker
So part of it is we kind of feel like there's a balance, right?
00:16:25
Speaker
We have to make sure that the voting is easy, that everybody gets a chance and they don't have problems doing it.
00:16:33
Speaker
And it's something that they can enjoy and feel part of because they're part of the Twippies when they vote.
00:16:40
Speaker
But at the same time, we do have to...
00:16:43
Speaker
Make sure that we don't get a big surge of the same vote over and over again from the same IP.
00:16:51
Speaker
We definitely take both of those into account and try to balance it out.
00:16:56
Speaker
Well, the one thing that you brought up is you said that you go through a lot of the votes every year, and there are some that you have to discard.
00:17:02
Speaker
What makes you determine that?
00:17:03
Speaker
Can you share what you saw as a certain amount of votes that you're just like, okay, these are obviously fakes.
00:17:10
Speaker
How do you determine that?
00:17:11
Speaker
Yeah, because I would say there's always the suspicion on any, not Twippies per se, but for any sort of email voting system, there are programs out there and services that would like to take your money to provide you with votes.
00:17:29
Speaker
We do.
00:17:29
Speaker
I mean, there are several data points that we look at.
00:17:33
Speaker
You know, we probably don't want to give you all that information.
00:17:36
Speaker
Sure, which is fine.
00:17:38
Speaker
Come on, Will.
00:17:39
Speaker
I want to know how to game the system.
00:17:41
Speaker
Come on now.
00:17:42
Speaker
But it's, I mean, obviously email address is one of them.
00:17:46
Speaker
But even an email address, I mean, everybody can have multiple email addresses, right?
00:17:50
Speaker
So part of that is timing.
00:17:54
Speaker
You know, did we see...
Ensuring Vote Integrity
00:17:56
Speaker
three votes come in quickly and their email address is a similar or they're from the same IP, you know, all of that is taken into effect.
00:18:06
Speaker
And like I said, we kind of, we gather that up and we sit down as a committee and kind of go through it and point it out and discuss it.
00:18:14
Speaker
And so, you know, sometimes we just lean to like, hey, this is too questionable, but we don't know if it's right or not.
00:18:21
Speaker
We're just going to get rid of it and not worry about it.
00:18:25
Speaker
Part of that too, though, is that the more data we have, the more people voting, the more accurate our results will be.
00:18:34
Speaker
Right.
00:18:34
Speaker
So absolutely.
00:18:36
Speaker
The more data points you have, it's that's statistics that your end power goes up.
00:18:42
Speaker
Right, exactly.
00:18:42
Speaker
So that is part of it.
00:18:44
Speaker
So we do hope to get as many people voting.
00:18:48
Speaker
We want to know what people's favorites are.
00:18:53
Speaker
And part of that is also we do use a ranked choice voting system.
00:19:00
Speaker
So if you don't know, you have a couple of choices.
00:19:04
Speaker
With the write-ins, this pre-vote, you only have two options.
00:19:08
Speaker
You can vote for your favorite, and then you can essentially pick your second choice or your second favorite for these items.
00:19:16
Speaker
The pre-vote is only there to pick nominees for the final vote.
00:19:20
Speaker
So we're just trying to get that top list.
00:19:23
Speaker
And that top, you know, the top number of nominees is kind of dependent on the category.
00:19:28
Speaker
Some categories like maybe homebrew, we might not get enough.
00:19:32
Speaker
You know, we might not get 10.
00:19:35
Speaker
We're often shooting for the 10 nominees, but sometimes we don't get that many.
00:19:40
Speaker
But the rank choice gives you kind of the option to say, hey, I have a favorite, but I want to give credit to somebody else.
00:19:49
Speaker
So you can then have them as their second choice.
00:19:53
Speaker
And so the more first and second choices, those points add up and kind of weed out in our minds what a favorite is in that category.
00:20:04
Speaker
Speaking on that, so speaking of the categories and whatnot too, I
00:20:10
Speaker
let's just put it out there.
00:20:10
Speaker
I feel like a lot of the drama comes from the content creators, uh, sub categories.
00:20:17
Speaker
I don't, I don't want to hear at the end of when everything's said and done, the chips are down, the twippies have been placed out.
00:20:23
Speaker
No one last year was like, you know, Halloween got ripped off because Godzilla is not that good.
00:20:28
Speaker
I didn't hear that.
00:20:28
Speaker
Godzilla got robbed.
00:20:29
Speaker
Yeah.
00:20:30
Speaker
Yeah.
00:20:31
Speaker
Yeah.
00:20:31
Speaker
You know what I'm saying?
00:20:32
Speaker
Yeah.
00:20:33
Speaker
It usually comes down to complaints of content creators.
00:20:36
Speaker
Does that, has that become such a headache in your guys's, in your field that you feel like maybe it's not worth your time having content creators in with something like as professional as the pinball industry?
00:20:48
Speaker
Because,
00:20:49
Speaker
You've got these people making million-dollar products, million-plus dollars that they've spent 18 months on, and then you have – I'm just going to use us.
00:20:57
Speaker
Yeah.
00:20:57
Speaker
Me that – you've seen the quality of the podcast tonight.
00:21:01
Speaker
We've only dropped off three times tonight.
00:21:03
Speaker
Yeah.
00:21:04
Speaker
Yeah, and I don't know if I would consider myself as quality of product as maybe a Stern Godzilla or even a spooky Halloween.
00:21:11
Speaker
So category-wise, I mean, some of what the, you know, what TWIP, I was explaining a little bit about TWIP and what the TWIPies are, is that we do want to promote and kind of push the content creators to,
00:21:27
Speaker
and show that they are a vital part of the community and the hobby.
00:21:33
Speaker
So celebrating them as well, I think, is just part of what we are looking to do.
00:21:39
Speaker
Yes, they at times can be a little difficult and cause problems.
00:21:44
Speaker
And even we did kind of throw around in the TWIPI committee recently, we did kind of throw around just kind of mashing them all into one category.
00:21:54
Speaker
But we kind of felt that that would
00:21:57
Speaker
really limit who we were able to celebrate and who we were able to to kind of give credos to and all their hard work because I mean as you guys know I'm sure that it's not I mean it takes work it takes hard dedicated work to get that stuff out there and to give us something to listen to and something to kind of look forward to so we didn't want to lose that
00:22:18
Speaker
Okay, and the one thing I do want to point out, so I pulled it up while we were talking, and the write-in categories, so these are the ones you settled on.
00:22:28
Speaker
Favorite Pinball Streamer, Favorite Pinball Podcast, Favorite Pinball YouTube Channel, Favorite Pinball Website, Favorite Pinball Mod of 2022, third-party mods only, Favorite Homebrew Pinball Machine,
00:22:47
Speaker
Favorite Pinball Location, Favorite Pinball Convention Slash Event, and Favorite Pinball Topper of 2022.
00:22:57
Speaker
Now, this is obviously in addition to Best Art Package, Best Rules, Game of the Year, correct?
00:23:04
Speaker
Correct.
00:23:05
Speaker
Yeah, these are not the game categories.
00:23:07
Speaker
These are essentially the ride-ins that we need to whittle down to get our nominees for the actual final vote.
00:23:15
Speaker
Most of everything else is the game categories.
00:23:17
Speaker
And you'll notice that from that list, that is a shorter list than we had last year.
00:23:23
Speaker
We've eliminated several of the categories.
00:23:27
Speaker
We've actually merged the convention event.
00:23:31
Speaker
There used to be a tournament, favorite tournament.
00:23:35
Speaker
We've kind of merged that all together under favorite pinball convention event.
00:23:40
Speaker
Sure.
00:23:41
Speaker
And some of the reason for that is to kind of simplify things for us.
00:23:48
Speaker
We wanted to focus a little bit more on quality of the show come TPF time.
00:23:55
Speaker
And so making fewer categories kind of makes it easier for us to create the video and get presenters and kind of focus on the show itself.
00:24:07
Speaker
We have some other changes to the show that we're discussing through as well.
Twippy Awards Committee Insights
00:24:13
Speaker
But just wanted to point out that those categories are fewer than last year.
00:24:17
Speaker
So.
00:24:17
Speaker
Okay.
00:24:18
Speaker
You keep speaking of a committee too.
00:24:21
Speaker
How many is on the committee and can you talk about them a little bit?
00:24:25
Speaker
Is it just people from the industry?
00:24:26
Speaker
What is it?
00:24:27
Speaker
Yeah.
00:24:27
Speaker
So we have the committee's the same as what it was last year, minus Jeff, of course.
00:24:34
Speaker
So yeah, there's what?
00:24:35
Speaker
Eight of us?
00:24:36
Speaker
No, seven of us now.
00:24:38
Speaker
So Lloyd Olson from SS Billiards is on it.
00:24:43
Speaker
Steven Bowden from American Pinball, fun with bonus.
00:24:46
Speaker
Emoto Harney.
00:24:48
Speaker
From Marco and Emoto Arcade, Joel Reeves, who's a pinball enthusiast, Josh Sharp with IFBA, and Lauren Gray are all from Backbox Pinball Podcast.
00:25:00
Speaker
So that is our committee members.
00:25:02
Speaker
They were the committee last year as well.
00:25:05
Speaker
So they've decided to continue on and keep helping us get the Twippies going this year.
00:25:10
Speaker
That's a really solid group.
00:25:13
Speaker
Yeah.
00:25:14
Speaker
Yes.
00:25:14
Speaker
Very diverse too.
00:25:15
Speaker
Yeah.
00:25:16
Speaker
That's our hope.
00:25:17
Speaker
Yeah.
00:25:17
Speaker
No, I, that actually really impresses me that you have that many, that many contributors.
00:25:23
Speaker
Cause I was completely unaware of that.
00:25:25
Speaker
Oh yeah.
00:25:26
Speaker
Yeah.
00:25:27
Speaker
Yeah.
00:25:27
Speaker
And they're, and they're all very involved both in the voting process, the, the meetings and in the show itself.
00:25:34
Speaker
So they're very helpful.
00:25:36
Speaker
We couldn't do it without them because doing it alone is not going to happen.
00:25:41
Speaker
Well, I know that when we originally talked about having you on,
00:25:44
Speaker
You talked about having Emoto with you too.
00:25:46
Speaker
I assume she does.
00:25:48
Speaker
She plays a bigger part in the Twippies as well.
00:25:50
Speaker
Yeah.
00:25:50
Speaker
Yeah.
00:25:51
Speaker
She is.
00:25:52
Speaker
She is definitely kind of the second part of the kind of leadership of the, of the Twippies.
00:26:00
Speaker
Yeah.
00:26:01
Speaker
Unfortunately she is busy.
00:26:02
Speaker
She's heading home from the Houston arcade show.
00:26:05
Speaker
So she wasn't able to make it this time, but.
00:26:09
Speaker
Yeah, definitely.
00:26:10
Speaker
And, and definitely a big part of producing the show all over.
00:26:14
Speaker
So big part of it.
00:26:17
Speaker
Yeah.
00:26:17
Speaker
So if there's, if there's anything that I would, so we went to last year's ceremony.
00:26:22
Speaker
It was great.
00:26:23
Speaker
We were, Josh and I were able to produce, I believe we did art package.
00:26:28
Speaker
Um, yes.
00:26:29
Speaker
And the, the one thing, if I were to give a suggestion that I heard, yeah.
00:26:34
Speaker
Yeah.
00:26:34
Speaker
Okay.
00:26:35
Speaker
We all know, like, especially in all the game categories, right.
00:26:40
Speaker
It may be nice to have just a quick sizzle reel of all of them, like at the beginning.
00:26:47
Speaker
Sure.
00:26:48
Speaker
And not have to do it every category time.
00:26:50
Speaker
Right, right.
00:26:51
Speaker
For last year, it was like, okay, it's Godzilla and it's Mandalorian.
00:26:57
Speaker
And obviously, they're going to be, especially this year, there's not going to be a lot of games.
00:27:03
Speaker
So it will be it will be very focused.
00:27:06
Speaker
So if I were to give a suggestion that I heard is do a nice sizzle reel at the beginning just to get to know you on all the games.
00:27:13
Speaker
And then you can have like a quick award sizzle for the winner.
00:27:21
Speaker
Yeah, that is definitely a good suggestion.
00:27:23
Speaker
We've actually already talked about that a little bit.
00:27:27
Speaker
And then probably for every category, not doing a full review of the games in that category, but just give a quick slide of the top three or the top two or so before showing the winner for that category.
00:27:42
Speaker
Yeah, that's definitely a great idea.
00:27:44
Speaker
And that'll speed up the show and just make it a little smoother.
00:27:50
Speaker
So that's a great idea.
00:27:51
Speaker
Well, my other thought process too, I know last year when we presented, we kind of were just dropped in there.
00:27:58
Speaker
We were sending an email saying, hey, we need you here at this time for the ceremony.
00:28:04
Speaker
And there was never like a dry run.
00:28:07
Speaker
I didn't know.
00:28:08
Speaker
Is that something you guys are considering this year as well?
00:28:10
Speaker
Yeah, we are definitely considering a dry run.
00:28:12
Speaker
And we've, even besides that, one of the things we're talking about doing is kind of setting up a
00:28:19
Speaker
here's your presenter guidebook, you know, like, here's what we expect.
00:28:23
Speaker
Here's where we want you to walk.
00:28:25
Speaker
Here's, you know, what we wanted you to say for a particular port or, you know, here's how you hold the mic or even, you know, even some mic tips when you get up there.
00:28:36
Speaker
I know last year too, we had an issue because we didn't have a mic at the podium.
00:28:40
Speaker
So we're going to resolve that as well.
00:28:44
Speaker
But yeah, definitely more focus on having a dry run through,
00:28:49
Speaker
being able to practice it more and making sure our presenters have an idea of what to expect and what to do.
00:28:55
Speaker
Like, you know, they need to know what's expected of them as well.
00:28:58
Speaker
So yeah, definitely something we're working on.
00:29:02
Speaker
So tell me about, obviously, you know, these are all the content creators.
00:29:07
Speaker
So what are the, like, what are the main categories for the games this year and which games are really being considered so far?
00:29:17
Speaker
So the categories for the games, we haven't gone through and haven't decided upon yet.
00:29:23
Speaker
So I don't have an answer for you on that one.
00:29:26
Speaker
We have started to go through and kind of pick games that are eligible.
00:29:32
Speaker
We do on our website already have, there's a 2022 page up and running.
00:29:38
Speaker
And it does list the game nominees as of now.
00:29:41
Speaker
Now, the eligibility for games, though, is through 12.1.
00:29:46
Speaker
So there's a couple other games that we're kind of watching that might end up.
00:29:53
Speaker
So the eligibility is that games have to start shipping within the year between 12-1 to 12-1 of the current year.
00:29:59
Speaker
So 12-1 of
00:30:04
Speaker
2021 to 12-1 of this year, 2022.
00:30:09
Speaker
And right now, do you want me to go?
00:30:12
Speaker
I can list off the games that we're currently looking at.
00:30:15
Speaker
Yeah, yeah, go ahead.
00:30:16
Speaker
Yeah, let's do it.
00:30:18
Speaker
So at the start is Cactus Canyon Remake by Chicago Gaming Company.
00:30:23
Speaker
We also have Funhouse 2.0 Rudy's Nightmare by Prodretti Gaming.
00:30:27
Speaker
Now, I know that's not a full game, so that won't be in every game category.
00:30:32
Speaker
It'll be limited to
00:30:34
Speaker
Right now, I think it's art and call-outs and display and animations.
00:30:39
Speaker
But of course, like I said, we don't have our categories decided yet, so it's hard to say what it's going to be in.
00:30:46
Speaker
Then we do have Rush by Stern.
00:30:50
Speaker
Nick Baldridge did a game for P3 called Flipper Foxtrot Rhythm Explosion.
00:30:56
Speaker
That'll be in some categories.
00:30:58
Speaker
We also have Super Hoop by Bictronic.
00:31:02
Speaker
Weird Owl's Museum of Natural Hilarity by Multimorphic.
00:31:05
Speaker
Toy Story 4 by Jersey Jack Pinball.
00:31:08
Speaker
And the last one as of now is James Bond by Stern.
00:31:13
Speaker
But like I said, we're looking at, I know Queen may be close by Pinball Brothers.
00:31:19
Speaker
And then what's the other one that's currently...
00:31:25
Speaker
Oh, this is Spinal Tap is the other possible that we're kind of watching and seeing if they get it in.
00:31:30
Speaker
Have they started shipping those?
00:31:34
Speaker
I'm not aware that they have started shipping.
00:31:38
Speaker
That's such a niche game then.
00:31:40
Speaker
It may not.
00:31:40
Speaker
I don't know how many pinball enthusiasts will buy it as opposed to Spinal Tap fans.
00:31:47
Speaker
Right, right.
00:31:47
Speaker
Yeah.
00:31:49
Speaker
Okay, that's actually a much more complete list than I was anticipating.
00:31:55
Speaker
Legitimately, off the top of my head, I was like, I can think of like three, but man, you filled it out.
00:32:00
Speaker
Yeah, that's eight at this point.
00:32:02
Speaker
And it's kind of interesting.
00:32:04
Speaker
You mentioned Godzilla being such a runaway last year.
00:32:10
Speaker
There doesn't seem to be a runaway at this point when I look at this list.
00:32:16
Speaker
So it's going to be an interesting competition this year.
00:32:20
Speaker
Yeah, I think so.
00:32:22
Speaker
Yeah, I don't think there's a clear-cut winner at this point.
00:32:25
Speaker
At least one that I can put my finger on and say, yeah, they're going to take all the votes from the people.
00:32:30
Speaker
So it's going to be a very interesting year.
00:32:32
Speaker
You're going to want to vote.
00:32:33
Speaker
Especially all those Rush fans out there like Tom Braff.
00:32:39
Speaker
Yeah.
00:32:42
Speaker
Yeah, actually, I'm going to say for the best like third party mod, I'm like those speaker light things that do like the spinny things.
00:32:51
Speaker
I'm going to get those for my rush game because that looks awesome.
00:32:55
Speaker
And so here's the categories, at least the eligibility for next year.
00:33:00
Speaker
And these may or may not change, but best theme, best animations and display, best light show, best toys and gimmicks, best theme integration, which is definitely different than best theme, best music and sound effects, best call outs, best rules, best play field, gameplay and layout, best artwork and game of the year.
00:33:20
Speaker
That's that that's a pretty solid list.
00:33:24
Speaker
Yeah.
00:33:24
Speaker
Yeah, definitely a good list.
00:33:28
Speaker
Like you said, I have no clue what of that will come through.
00:33:31
Speaker
I assume the majority of it will be the same, but there are changes possible.
00:33:36
Speaker
Sure.
00:33:36
Speaker
It's a work in progress.
00:33:38
Speaker
It's a work in progress, yeah.
00:33:40
Speaker
So another change to this year's Twippies is you're going with new hosts.
00:33:45
Speaker
It was Jack Danger and Moto that seemed to be doing it the last couple of years.
00:33:49
Speaker
What's the change of direction for, and why are we going with new hosts?
00:33:54
Speaker
Well, I mean, so really it's just a change of feeling of the show.
00:34:01
Speaker
You know, things get older.
00:34:03
Speaker
We want to change things up.
00:34:04
Speaker
So we're looking for right now, really tell you the truth.
00:34:09
Speaker
Emoto is planning to be one of the co-hosts.
00:34:13
Speaker
So you can probably look forward to that.
00:34:16
Speaker
But we are looking currently for her co-host to, to,
00:34:20
Speaker
that's a good analog to her to kind of help push the show.
00:34:25
Speaker
So, right.
00:34:27
Speaker
Cause that's not easy.
00:34:29
Speaker
No, like hosting a live show is not easy.
00:34:31
Speaker
Cause you have to keep up with the pace.
00:34:33
Speaker
You have to keep up.
00:34:34
Speaker
You have to like, that's a big deal.
00:34:38
Speaker
Yeah, definitely a big deal.
00:34:40
Speaker
But I do need to kind of say, though, we are considering as a TWIPI committee some of our issues or some of the issues
00:34:51
Speaker
some of the challenges from the previous years are making sure we have a live stream show going along with the live show there at TPF.
00:35:00
Speaker
So we are considering, um, not doing the stream at the same time as the show at TPF and just doing a recorded playback later of the show.
00:35:11
Speaker
So, um,
00:35:14
Speaker
You know, that the hope there is to kind of focus on that TPF audience to give them a good experience and, and have them get something exclusive since they're there and they kind of see the awards getting presented.
00:35:30
Speaker
And then still being able to get that information out to the rest of the public as soon as we can, probably on YouTube later on.
00:35:38
Speaker
Yeah, I think that would actually really help out.
00:35:42
Speaker
Yeah, I mean, it really will relieve some of the stress on us to kind of, you know, being able to perform to two audiences at once is not easy.
00:35:51
Speaker
So, you know, if we have one problem on the stream and that's not visible to us at the show, that makes it hard and vice versa.
00:36:01
Speaker
So this way we get a chance to focus really in on being able to celebrate with everybody there.
00:36:08
Speaker
Well, it's hard too because I was talking about this last episode and it's not just Texas.
00:36:13
Speaker
There are other conventions have this issue, but if you're using the sound at the convention, it's not the best for streaming and for the live.
00:36:23
Speaker
And there's a lot of variable factors that go into the sound equipment provided by Texas Pinball Festival or if it's the hotel itself.
00:36:33
Speaker
And so I agree.
00:36:34
Speaker
That's a good idea of...
00:36:37
Speaker
recording it and then editing it down to the way that you want it for a presentation on YouTube.
00:36:43
Speaker
That's, I think that's pretty reasonable.
00:36:46
Speaker
Well, I, I, I agree.
00:36:48
Speaker
And I hope others agree with that as well.
00:36:51
Speaker
So they actually get to see a good, you know, actual quality video presentation.
00:36:56
Speaker
So, so for voting, how does one vote?
Participating in Twippy Pre-Voting
00:37:02
Speaker
So right now, pre-voting doesn't open until Wednesday, the 16th.
00:37:06
Speaker
It'll open up at early in the morning and they'll go just need to go to twippies.com.
00:37:17
Speaker
There'll be a link over from there to the pre-voting ballot page.
00:37:22
Speaker
And that's where we allow you to do the write-ins for all those categories we listed before.
00:37:27
Speaker
So twippies.com, T-W-I-P-Y-S.com.
00:37:31
Speaker
That is correct.
00:37:31
Speaker
Yes.
00:37:32
Speaker
Twippies.com.
00:37:34
Speaker
And then the final voting won't start until January 1st.
00:37:38
Speaker
And that'll include all the categories, all the nominees from the write-ins and all the game categories.
00:37:43
Speaker
So that's, that's our big one.
00:37:45
Speaker
That's where we need as many people to vote as possible.
00:37:48
Speaker
So you went over some of the qualifications that the games have to go through to meet criteria for this Twippy year.
00:37:55
Speaker
But what is some of the qualifications for the content creators and the other categories that you're going to be working with?
00:38:01
Speaker
Sure, sure.
00:38:03
Speaker
um it obviously all depends on the category um that we have an eligibility document that we post and it's on the 2022 page currently already so everybody is welcome to go and review and look at that um so some of the things and it's also on this week in pinball i'm looking at it right now oh yeah yeah it is on the post from this week in pinball for this week yeah
00:38:28
Speaker
And some of the things are like streamer.
00:38:32
Speaker
We say they at least need to have five streams in the current year.
00:38:37
Speaker
And that year always goes from 12-1 to 12-1.
00:38:41
Speaker
And I think podcaster and YouTube is similar.
00:38:45
Speaker
There's so many videos or podcasts that need to be out there.
00:38:49
Speaker
And then there's like mod streamers.
00:38:54
Speaker
Some of the things we look for in mod is to make sure it's a third-party mod.
00:38:58
Speaker
It's not produced by a manufacturer.
00:39:00
Speaker
Not like Insider Connected or something.
00:39:02
Speaker
Correct.
00:39:03
Speaker
Yeah, not like Insider Connected or...
00:39:07
Speaker
Yeah, our art blades that are done by Stern won't be in that category.
00:39:12
Speaker
But we also need to make sure that they are not violating intellectual property rights.
00:39:17
Speaker
So, you know, we can't have... Right, like fan art.
00:39:20
Speaker
Like you can't do Sonic as the, you know, the third party mod of the... Right.
00:39:26
Speaker
Because that's considered a homebrew, a fan piece.
00:39:29
Speaker
Right, exactly.
00:39:30
Speaker
Yeah, and then we also only let them be eligible for one year.
00:39:35
Speaker
So if, you know, let's say if color DMD won a year, we don't then include color DMD for the next year.
00:39:47
Speaker
Now, there are times, especially like color DMD, that there may be
00:39:52
Speaker
You know, they may come out with a new color DMD for a particular game that hasn't been done yet.
00:39:59
Speaker
And if the folks that are voting put in that specific game, like color DMD, I don't know, Ghostbusters or, you know, something specific.
00:40:10
Speaker
Sure.
00:40:11
Speaker
We will include that if it hadn't been included before.
00:40:13
Speaker
So as long as they're specific about it, we're good with that.
00:40:17
Speaker
Well, and the other follow-up question I have then too, because obviously you've had Canada that's won the last five years.
00:40:23
Speaker
And some of the concerns I've heard is because his show is behind a paywall and not public, he's now concerned about releasing five episodes in like the next week just to even be considered a nomination.
00:40:38
Speaker
Is that a concern?
00:40:39
Speaker
That seems like we're splitting hairs because he's still producing pinball content.
00:40:45
Speaker
yearly it just isn't readily available to the public because of that paywall yeah and i don't so we haven't i haven't gone and looked to see what he's produced that's not behind the paywall um we also don't have anything specifically that says you know there's a there's a paid instance or not like if you have to pay for the product that or not um
00:41:10
Speaker
That's probably something I'm assuming he'll probably get nominated.
00:41:13
Speaker
But, you know, once he's nominated, that's something we would go over as a TWIPI committee and say, hey, here's, you know, here's the five podcasts I found from him or from, you know, whoever is producing the content and talk through that and see, you know, what our thoughts are on that and how it meets our eligibility.
00:41:33
Speaker
What are you looking forward to most about this year's?
00:41:36
Speaker
So this being my first year at the realms, I am looking forward to getting through it at this point.
00:41:48
Speaker
I just hope it's something that the pinball community can appreciate and enjoy and that it provides
00:42:02
Speaker
You know, provides something that kind of just boosts up and does kind of bring out the best in the games and all the write-in categories.
00:42:14
Speaker
I would say I like how you basically boxed it and saying, look, this is a People's Choice Awards.
00:42:22
Speaker
And so you're going to get all the great things that happen with the People's Choice Awards and the challenges associated with that.
00:42:29
Speaker
But everybody can participate in this.
00:42:32
Speaker
Right.
00:42:33
Speaker
Yeah.
00:42:34
Speaker
Yeah.
00:42:35
Speaker
It is a community, right?
00:42:36
Speaker
I mean, that's part of what we're trying to come together and do.
00:42:43
Speaker
we might as well award and celebrate that as a community.
00:42:48
Speaker
I agree.
00:42:48
Speaker
It's certainly been great when I've been able to go, and I'm planning on being there this year.
00:42:52
Speaker
Awesome.
00:42:54
Speaker
Looking forward to having you.
00:42:56
Speaker
Yeah, I was excited.
00:42:57
Speaker
I was all ready to go, and then we had some stuff come up.
00:42:59
Speaker
Had to back out.
00:43:01
Speaker
I will not be in Texas this year, sadly.
00:43:04
Speaker
But I'm excited for you guys.
00:43:06
Speaker
Yeah, and I'm looking forward to ordering some shoes from Silver Ball.
00:43:10
Speaker
Yeah.
00:43:11
Speaker
Yeah.
00:43:12
Speaker
Awesome.
00:43:13
Speaker
Also, also a friendly reminder to those, to the after party.
00:43:16
Speaker
If you order pizza, you make sure you hide that stuff.
00:43:20
Speaker
Will, did you hear about that last year?
00:43:22
Speaker
I did not know.
00:43:24
Speaker
So, okay, Josh, did you order the pizza?
00:43:27
Speaker
Who ordered the pizza?
00:43:28
Speaker
I ordered the pizza.
00:43:29
Speaker
Okay.
00:43:30
Speaker
So we were hanging out with the triple drain guys.
00:43:32
Speaker
And I think, uh, I think Zach and Nicole were there and Monica, Travis, his wife was there.
00:43:39
Speaker
And Dennis was also Dennis and Tony.
00:43:42
Speaker
And so we just, or cause we were starving after the Twippies and we, I don't know, you, you got like three or four boxes of pizza, right?
00:43:50
Speaker
I mean, we, yeah, something like that.
00:43:53
Speaker
And we're talking and like some rando dude, like walks down the hall, takes a look at the pizza box, opens it up, takes like three slices of pizza and then just keep walking.
00:44:05
Speaker
Yeah.
00:44:07
Speaker
Like right in the middle of our group, too.
00:44:09
Speaker
We all kind of like looked at him like, what are you doing?
00:44:13
Speaker
We don't want to be that guy.
00:44:15
Speaker
That guy who's yelling at someone for taking a pizza.
00:44:18
Speaker
I'm like, I'm kind of impressed by his boldness.
00:44:21
Speaker
Yeah, that is a bold move.
00:44:22
Speaker
I guess it worked out for him.
00:44:25
Speaker
Three slices of pizza.
00:44:26
Speaker
He kept walking.
00:44:27
Speaker
I was like, you know what?
00:44:28
Speaker
That is a confident man right there.
00:44:30
Speaker
If you do decide to keep going with this in the future with a live event and then the recorded afterwards, do you think you'll keep it at Texas just because of the time of year it is, the event that it is, and it's a big gathering of people that love the hobby?
00:44:48
Speaker
Yeah.
00:44:48
Speaker
I mean, so far it seems to definitely worked out well to have it at Texas and, and Ed Vanderveen is, is great to work with and very helpful and helping us promote the Twippies and, you know, keep it running.
00:45:01
Speaker
So I don't see a reason to do anything different at this point.
00:45:05
Speaker
TPF has pretty much become the home.
00:45:08
Speaker
So definitely.
00:45:10
Speaker
All right.
00:45:10
Speaker
Well, let's do a final plug.
00:45:14
Speaker
So this is the executive summary part.
00:45:19
Speaker
So what is it you want people to know about Twippy?
00:45:21
Speaker
How do they get involved and where can they watch it?
00:45:25
Speaker
The main point for the Twippys is just a celebration of what pinball has to offer within that year.
00:45:34
Speaker
from manufacturers, content creators, and those that are spreading the love of pinball.
00:45:38
Speaker
So it's a chance to vote on your favorites for multiple categories.
00:45:43
Speaker
And you can do that at twippies.com.
00:45:47
Speaker
You also will see information on TWIP about the TWIPies because they're closely connected.
00:45:53
Speaker
But to see the show later on or are definitely come to Texas Pinball Festival to watch the show live and in person to get that exclusive.
00:46:02
Speaker
But we will definitely post that video in its polished state later on on YouTube on the TWIP YouTube channel.
00:46:12
Speaker
OK, so, Will, I'm going to ask this standard question.
00:46:16
Speaker
Yeah, which is fine.
00:46:17
Speaker
How long have you been?
00:46:19
Speaker
How long have you been a pinball collector?
00:46:22
Speaker
Pinball collector.
00:46:23
Speaker
I think I started like in 2017 ish.
00:46:29
Speaker
Um, so what five or so years I've been collecting.
00:46:33
Speaker
And what is, what is in your collection right now?
00:46:35
Speaker
Oh, so right now I have a stars.
00:46:39
Speaker
I have a genie.
00:46:41
Speaker
Um, I have a spider man.
00:46:45
Speaker
I have, um, an iron maiden pro, a, um,
00:46:53
Speaker
Deadpool Premium, an Earthshaker, and the last one is a Harlem Globetrotters.
00:46:59
Speaker
That's my collection at the moment.
00:47:02
Speaker
That's a pretty diverse collection.
00:47:04
Speaker
Yeah.
00:47:05
Speaker
Which one are you playing the most right now?
00:47:08
Speaker
Um...
00:47:09
Speaker
Probably, I mean, Iron Maiden really gets a lot of my attention.
00:47:13
Speaker
Because you love the music?
00:47:16
Speaker
Well, not necessarily.
00:47:20
Speaker
But, you know, it's the old standard.
00:47:24
Speaker
I definitely enjoy the music more than I did or than I even knew.
00:47:30
Speaker
It's probably one of my kids will now sing the music, which is probably not good around the house, but
00:47:37
Speaker
Actually, so as an Iron Maiden fan growing up, the lyrics are actually quite intelligent.
00:47:47
Speaker
It's non-intuitive because when you think heavy metal, you think, well, okay, you probably think a lot of hairband stuff, right?
00:47:56
Speaker
Right.
00:47:56
Speaker
But the lyrics are really well thought out.
00:48:00
Speaker
So I'd be totally fine with my kids listening to Iron Maiden.
00:48:03
Speaker
Yeah.
00:48:04
Speaker
So I would rather have them sing Iron Maiden as opposed to like warrant cherry pie or something.
00:48:12
Speaker
So what drew you into pinball, Will?
00:48:15
Speaker
I, so my father-in-law had a traumatic brain injury a while back.
00:48:21
Speaker
Um, and then he, so he had a relative that actually owned pinball and it was kind of one of his things that he had always looked forward to, like being able to play pinball.
00:48:35
Speaker
And after his, his injury, um,
00:48:39
Speaker
you know, he needed to kind of help out his hand eye coordination.
00:48:43
Speaker
So I was, I started searching for some game, um, some pinball machine that I thought he might enjoy.
00:48:51
Speaker
And he's definitely a big Western fan.
00:48:53
Speaker
So I found him a bounty hunter, um,
00:48:57
Speaker
pinball machine that I had fixed up for him and given to him.
00:49:02
Speaker
And, you know, while I was fixing up and had it at home, I had gotten a chance to play it.
00:49:07
Speaker
And of course, once you have one, you kind of, I not having it anymore made me want something else.
00:49:14
Speaker
So I started collecting from that point on.
00:49:17
Speaker
Yeah.
00:49:17
Speaker
They multiply.
00:49:18
Speaker
They definitely multiply.
00:49:19
Speaker
They get into your blood or something.
00:49:22
Speaker
Yeah.
00:49:23
Speaker
Something like that.
00:49:24
Speaker
It's, uh, yeah.
00:49:26
Speaker
And they multiply quick.
00:49:27
Speaker
I found what's on your wish list.
00:49:31
Speaker
What are you on the hunt for?
00:49:33
Speaker
Um, well, I am actually trying, I'm actually going to go see Jeff pretty soon and I am trying to get his Godzilla premium from him.
00:49:44
Speaker
So that's my, that's my next hope to grab.
00:49:48
Speaker
Um,
00:49:50
Speaker
Other than that, I kind of like some of the early classic Stearns.
00:49:55
Speaker
I actually just picked up a Trident that I need to fix up.
00:50:02
Speaker
But I don't know if you guys have seen, there's...
00:50:07
Speaker
I forgot his name, but there's a guy that's been doing some new code for some of those classic Sterns.
00:50:13
Speaker
So he's got a, what he's calling the Trident 2020 version.
00:50:17
Speaker
Really?
00:50:18
Speaker
Yeah.
00:50:19
Speaker
So you, I think it's just, you, my understanding is you have to get a Raspberry Pi and connect it.
00:50:25
Speaker
He has a connection to the board.
00:50:27
Speaker
Okay.
00:50:28
Speaker
And then you just load his new code and you're playing a new version of Trident.
00:50:35
Speaker
And he's put new sounds and new music to it.
00:50:40
Speaker
It's pretty interesting.
00:50:42
Speaker
So that's one of the reasons I wanted to grab that and try that out.
00:50:46
Speaker
Okay.
00:50:48
Speaker
That is really cool.
00:50:49
Speaker
Yeah.
00:50:50
Speaker
I mean, the 2.0 versions of the games is kind of becoming pretty popular.
00:50:56
Speaker
And it's working.
00:50:57
Speaker
So Josh and I were talking to Aaron from Fast Pinball, and that was basically what they were doing, especially with the 2.0 kits, is basically putting a new rule set on an existing game and changing it, changing the vibe, changing the feel.
00:51:13
Speaker
Yeah.
00:51:14
Speaker
Yeah.
00:51:14
Speaker
And that's definitely, I think that's pretty interesting because we know there's layouts that are out there that are classic and, and, you know, really good layouts.
00:51:24
Speaker
But sometimes they just miss some of the depth that we enjoy.
00:51:27
Speaker
So, and there are some games that are, that are completely unbalanced.
00:51:32
Speaker
They're a one trick pony.
00:51:33
Speaker
I mean, it's like, just shoot that.
00:51:35
Speaker
Yeah, exactly.
00:51:36
Speaker
Yeah.
00:51:38
Speaker
before we wrap this up, I want to do a quick update on flipping the script on autism.
00:51:42
Speaker
I also want to do a quick update that I have been trying to get to the post office, but I will try to get tomorrow.
Charity Effort Success
00:51:49
Speaker
I actually threw in an extra shirt and some extra stuff for the guy who bought the loser kid pinball hat.
00:51:54
Speaker
So it's coming.
00:51:56
Speaker
It's coming.
00:51:57
Speaker
I'm just a little behind.
00:51:59
Speaker
Tim Lee, you should hit up Scott.
00:52:01
Speaker
You hear this?
00:52:02
Speaker
He gives out extra stuff to the other hat person.
00:52:05
Speaker
You've been supporting us for so long.
00:52:07
Speaker
Okay.
00:52:09
Speaker
I'll buy Tim a pizza or some meat at TPF.
00:52:17
Speaker
So it sounds like everything has went through the board.
00:52:19
Speaker
They have approved.
00:52:20
Speaker
When we originally did this, it was 31 families that we were helping.
00:52:24
Speaker
Since then, it sounds like another family has been added to the list.
00:52:27
Speaker
And because we were able to raise...
00:52:31
Speaker
$27,000.
00:52:31
Speaker
We have a little extra and that will go to the last family on the list.
00:52:36
Speaker
And so thanks to all those that participated.
00:52:39
Speaker
Thank you again to all those that have been very patient, keeping updated with me and whatnot on your items.
00:52:46
Speaker
It sounds like everyone's received their items except for what Scott hasn't shipped out.
00:52:51
Speaker
But all of Stern's stuff went out last week, and I got a message from a couple of people that they've already received their Stern stuff as well.
00:53:01
Speaker
I think it has been a win, win, win for everyone.
00:53:04
Speaker
It's been amazing.
00:53:06
Speaker
The cool part too is the, the Hot Wheels banner that was stolen sadly was not signed by Joel Balser because he's no longer working at American pinball, but they got everyone else on there.
00:53:16
Speaker
Now they got like Dennis Norman and, and just all other people that worked there at American.
00:53:22
Speaker
So it's really cool.
00:53:23
Speaker
Like it's one of those silver linings, right?
00:53:25
Speaker
Like it sucks that the cloud was there, but,
00:53:28
Speaker
In the end, I think a lot of people ended up getting more than what they bargained for.
00:53:33
Speaker
And even the funny part was, is someone that bid on the koozie got their koozie, but Spooky like jam packed the box full of other stuff.
00:53:40
Speaker
It was like beanies and koozies and a travel mug.
00:53:44
Speaker
And so they're like, we weren't expecting this.
00:53:47
Speaker
We only paid for our koozie.
00:53:49
Speaker
I'm like, well...
00:53:50
Speaker
Cool.
00:53:50
Speaker
So good on Spooky.
00:53:52
Speaker
Spooky.
00:53:54
Speaker
Spooky.
00:53:55
Speaker
They're great guys, right?
00:53:57
Speaker
And they are.
00:53:57
Speaker
Yes.
00:54:00
Speaker
it's certainly a small company that is worth supporting, but yes, there, that does not surprise me at all.
00:54:07
Speaker
If you're looking for a new sweet shirt, hit up silver ball swag, go check out our friends, triple drain.
00:54:13
Speaker
They've got some awesome stuff that they just dropped on there in the last couple of weeks.
00:54:16
Speaker
It was just right before pinball expo.
00:54:18
Speaker
If you don't have one of these shirts, I highly recommend the baseball shirt.
00:54:21
Speaker
I like it.
00:54:21
Speaker
It's comfortable.
00:54:22
Speaker
It hangs a little, it's a little longer.
00:54:24
Speaker
So you don't have to worry about like bending over and showing off your butt crack, I guess.
00:54:27
Speaker
Yeah.
00:54:29
Speaker
It is what it is.
00:54:30
Speaker
That's our first world problems, right?
00:54:33
Speaker
But seriously, go check out some of the swag.
00:54:36
Speaker
It's some great product.
00:54:37
Speaker
I haven't had an issue with any of mine.
00:54:39
Speaker
It's awesome.
00:54:40
Speaker
Well, thank you very much.
00:54:42
Speaker
I want to appreciate all that you guys do for the community and putting out this great content.
00:54:49
Speaker
And thank you for having me on.
00:54:51
Speaker
Will, if someone wants to get a hold of you, how do they do it?
Contact Information
00:54:54
Speaker
Um, you can probably the easiest would be emailing me at will at this weekend pinball.com.
00:55:00
Speaker
Easy enough.
00:55:02
Speaker
If you want to get ahold of us, we are loser kid pinball podcast at loser kid pinball podcast at gmail.com.
00:55:07
Speaker
We're also on Facebook, Twitter, Twitch, and Instagram all at loser kid pinball.
00:55:13
Speaker
Uh, it seems like we've been, people are finding us now on the socials.
00:55:16
Speaker
So, uh, if you want to get ahold of us best ways through Facebook messenger, we appreciate everything.
00:55:21
Speaker
I do apologize.
00:55:22
Speaker
I've been a little slow on the emails, but there's been more emails in the last two weeks to the Loser Kid Gmail account than we've had in the four years we've been doing that.
00:55:34
Speaker
Well, because of the flipping the script stuff and whatnot.
00:55:39
Speaker
It's pure insanity.
00:55:40
Speaker
Yes.
00:55:40
Speaker
We're up to 10.
00:55:43
Speaker
Oh, yeah.
00:55:44
Speaker
Yeah, sure.
00:55:45
Speaker
That's that's what the number is, right?
00:55:48
Speaker
I'd be happy if it was just 10 at this point.
00:55:50
Speaker
Holy crap.
00:55:52
Speaker
But no, thank you.
00:55:53
Speaker
Thank you for the support.
00:55:54
Speaker
Thank you for all the kind words.
00:55:56
Speaker
Everyone is awesome.
00:55:58
Speaker
Thank you.
00:55:58
Speaker
Thanks again, everybody.
00:56:00
Speaker
And I guess we'll see you two weeks, maybe soon.
00:56:19
Speaker
Shut up and sit down.