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Ep 25: Feeling Macho, Might Make a Podcast with Lauren Gray
59 Plays6 years ago
It's our one year anniversary episode and we couldn't think of anyone better to celebrate it with than Lauren Gray of the Backbox Pinball Podcast! We talk all things Stranger Things, TMNT, and have plenty of Macho Man Randy Savage to go around.
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Transcript
Milestones and Anniversaries
00:00:06
Speaker
Thanks for tuning in to the Loser Kid Pinball Podcast.
00:00:09
Speaker
We are on episode 25.
00:00:11
Speaker
I know it's been a couple weeks, but I've got my co-captain with me as always.
00:00:16
Speaker
Scott Larson.
00:00:18
Speaker
And today, Scott, I figured, you know what?
00:00:20
Speaker
It's our year show.
00:00:22
Speaker
It's been a full year since we started this bad boy.
00:00:25
Speaker
Let's make it special.
00:00:25
Speaker
Let's have our very first female guest on, okay?
00:00:29
Speaker
So coming from San Antonio, Texas, I view her as a pinball ambassador for women.
00:00:35
Speaker
We've got Lauren Gray on.
00:00:36
Speaker
How's it going, Lauren?
00:00:38
Speaker
Oh, thank you so much.
00:00:39
Speaker
Oh, well, happy anniversary, y'all.
00:00:42
Speaker
Thank you.
00:00:43
Speaker
You're welcome.
00:00:43
Speaker
Hey, you know, a year's a big deal.
00:00:46
Speaker
You know, there's the pod fade people, you know, you get excited and then, you know, it kind of just drifts off.
00:00:51
Speaker
But you guys made it a year.
00:00:52
Speaker
That's awesome.
00:00:54
Speaker
There seems to be two anniversaries.
00:00:57
Speaker
It's a year.
00:00:57
Speaker
So people say, okay, so you actually did it the entire year.
00:01:01
Speaker
And then it seems like the hundred episode drop off.
00:01:05
Speaker
Everybody gets to a hundred episodes and then they say, okay, I think we're done.
00:01:09
Speaker
I've said what I wanted to say and I'm out.
00:01:11
Speaker
I'm done.
00:01:12
Speaker
I'm out.
00:01:13
Speaker
I'm out.
00:01:14
Speaker
I'm moving on.
00:01:15
Speaker
Mic drop.
00:01:16
Speaker
Peace out.
00:01:17
Speaker
Yeah.
00:01:19
Speaker
but well, cool.
00:01:21
Speaker
Uh, tell us, will you please introduce yourself to everyone that may not know you from our audience?
00:01:25
Speaker
Lauren?
Lauren Gray's Pinball Journey
00:01:26
Speaker
Sure.
00:01:27
Speaker
Uh, again, my name's Lauren Gray.
00:01:28
Speaker
I am a homegrown San Antonio, Texas.
00:01:31
Speaker
Um, I was really originally from Chicago.
00:01:35
Speaker
I came into the hobby a few years ago.
00:01:37
Speaker
Um, I, you know, was told by my husband to find a hobby in a very nice way.
00:01:41
Speaker
Um, he, uh, he's an artist and he just was like, don't you have a hobby?
00:01:44
Speaker
I'm like, no.
00:01:46
Speaker
So I went through a, a,
00:01:48
Speaker
the whole collection of different hobbies, it was hysterical, it was like the year of Lauren finding herself.
00:01:52
Speaker
And I ended up asking myself what I loved when I was a kid.
00:01:56
Speaker
And the thing I came back to was pinball.
00:01:58
Speaker
I loved pinball.
00:01:59
Speaker
So I literally Googled pinball Texas, you know, groups.
00:02:04
Speaker
And I found out about this little thing called the Bat City Open.
00:02:08
Speaker
And I signed up and I went and that was like my first tournament ever.
00:02:14
Speaker
That was horrifying, but it was super fun.
00:02:17
Speaker
So from there, you know, I really got into the hobby.
00:02:20
Speaker
I met the Bells and Chimes from Houston, Texas.
00:02:22
Speaker
So I went ahead and founded the Bells and Chimes chapter in San Antonio.
00:02:27
Speaker
And we're going about...
00:02:29
Speaker
30 ladies strong.
00:02:30
Speaker
So I'm really excited about that.
00:02:32
Speaker
And then in the midst of all of this, cause you know, I went all in into the hobby.
00:02:36
Speaker
I got really into listening to all the pinball podcasts and I thought, you know, they're all great.
00:02:41
Speaker
I love listening to them.
00:02:43
Speaker
I've listened to you guys.
00:02:44
Speaker
I listened to twib special and lit pinball profile, you know, pinball players podcast, but I just didn't hear a lot of women and a lot of the kind of
00:02:55
Speaker
I don't want to say struggles, but challenges maybe that women players have sometimes at events or just in the hobby in general.
00:03:03
Speaker
So I wanted to give them a voice.
00:03:04
Speaker
So I'm like, you know what?
00:03:05
Speaker
Let's be extra niche-y and we'll have a pinball podcast about ladies in pinball.
00:03:11
Speaker
So again, I started the Backbox Pinball Podcast back in June.
00:03:16
Speaker
So it's been about six months.
00:03:17
Speaker
We've had 30 episodes so far.
00:03:20
Speaker
We've had women all across the hobby and the sport.
00:03:22
Speaker
We've had people who make their living in
00:03:24
Speaker
in pinball and we've had people who are competitive players.
00:03:28
Speaker
We've had people who do restoration, people who work for some of the larger pinball manufacturers and distributors like Crystal Gemnick.
00:03:36
Speaker
So it's just been a really fun ride and I really enjoyed it so far.
00:03:41
Speaker
I definitely see myself growing in the hobby and the sport and just enjoy all the people I've met so far.
00:03:47
Speaker
It's interesting you talked about what you liked doing when you were a kid, and you actually gravitated toward pinball.
00:03:56
Speaker
So that surprises me a little bit because when I was growing up in the arcade scene in the 80s, really I didn't see too many women.
00:04:04
Speaker
It was your stereotype, right?
00:04:07
Speaker
It was a whole bunch of 12-year-old – okay, I'm in Utah, so a whole bunch of 12-year-old greasy white dudes.
00:04:14
Speaker
And we're all trying to play Altered Beast or Donkey Kong or whatever.
00:04:18
Speaker
And so I'm curious as to like what part of when were you playing pinball?
00:04:25
Speaker
Were you playing it at like a skating center or in the arcade?
00:04:30
Speaker
And who did you go with?
00:04:31
Speaker
Because at least in my small microcosm, I didn't see too many.
00:04:35
Speaker
Right,
Nostalgia and Maintenance Challenges
00:04:36
Speaker
right.
00:04:36
Speaker
No.
00:04:36
Speaker
So we had a local arcade inside the mall, Westlake's Mall back in San Antonio.
00:04:42
Speaker
And there was this an arcade.
00:04:44
Speaker
And it was one of those things where our dad took us.
00:04:46
Speaker
He's like, this is the arcade.
00:04:48
Speaker
And my, you know, later I find out that my dad was a super big pinhead and he played pinball all day long at the bowling alley from his hometown in Belleville, Illinois.
00:04:58
Speaker
And, but what he did, he's like, Hey, this is a pinball machine.
00:05:01
Speaker
I'm like, this looks really cool, dad.
00:05:02
Speaker
How does this work?
00:05:03
Speaker
And he sat there and showed me a couple of games and I was hooked and it was a pin bot.
00:05:07
Speaker
And that was all I wanted to play.
00:05:09
Speaker
I didn't want to play gauntlet.
00:05:10
Speaker
I didn't want to play street fighter.
00:05:11
Speaker
I didn't want to play donkey Kong, whatever.
00:05:13
Speaker
I just wanted to play pinball.
00:05:14
Speaker
And of course the pins grew.
00:05:16
Speaker
This was like late eighties, early nineties.
00:05:18
Speaker
So, you know, we had pin bot.
00:05:20
Speaker
I remember many, many, many games of Adam's family,
00:05:23
Speaker
And it was just something I really loved.
00:05:25
Speaker
And then over the years, you know, you grow older, we moved away, malls went away, whenever I ran across a pinball machine, whether it be in a bar or wherever, I would always like, you know, dump some money into it.
00:05:36
Speaker
And I just remember the feeling of a kid just being so excited about pinball.
00:05:41
Speaker
I just I love all the mechanics, the lights, it just to me, it was the
00:05:45
Speaker
The tactile quality of it, I felt like I was more in control and had more money on the table when it came to pinball as opposed to a video game.
00:05:56
Speaker
And that's totally awesome.
00:05:56
Speaker
Like it's funny that that's what drew you in is, is, and I don't know if it's the parental guidance that or not, but it's, I don't know.
00:06:04
Speaker
It's just, it's really cool to me.
00:06:05
Speaker
And I grew up in an area that really didn't have pinball.
00:06:08
Speaker
And so like I talked about on our first episode, like I actually had to learn pinball from video games.
00:06:12
Speaker
And I know that's actually kind of where we're seeing it come from as well too.
00:06:16
Speaker
I know there's,
00:06:17
Speaker
plenty of people that said, well, I started out with the pinball arcade and I loved it so much.
00:06:21
Speaker
I'm like, where can I buy one of these?
00:06:23
Speaker
And so it's, it's cool to see the different backgrounds of where people are coming from getting into the hobby.
00:06:28
Speaker
So yeah.
00:06:29
Speaker
You know, and people poo-poo pinball arcade, but I love pinball arcade and I will hold the flag for them forever.
00:06:36
Speaker
I play it all the time when I'm sitting in an airport waiting for a plane or, you know, just when I'm not able to actually, you know, play a physical pinball machine.
00:06:44
Speaker
And when I started back into, you know, what is, you know, now my big time hobby...
00:06:50
Speaker
um i played a lot of pinball arcade and i still do i when they had that run when they stopped carrying the williams titles i would bought an obscene amount of pinball pinball games on pinball arcade um but yeah no i really enjoy it so don't don't be mean to pinball arcade they're awesome no i love it too and it's funny because i went in one time to at&t and was like i need to talk about my bill and they're looking at it like well you could save yourself some money if you didn't buy all these pinball tables i'm like
00:07:17
Speaker
Okay, don't look at that.
00:07:20
Speaker
I'm not talking about that.
00:07:22
Speaker
Talk about these other ones.
00:07:24
Speaker
So did you tell your spouse that you spent $250 on getting all the seasons for Pinball Arcade?
00:07:32
Speaker
At that point in time, I was still paying the phone bill.
00:07:34
Speaker
He now pays the phone bill, so I keep my purchases to a minimum.
00:07:37
Speaker
Okay.
00:07:40
Speaker
Yeah, basically I did the same thing.
00:07:41
Speaker
And, you know, I agree with you that one of the challenges with pinball has always been, especially location pinball, it is so dependent on how good of an operator you have.
00:07:54
Speaker
Yeah.
00:07:55
Speaker
Because if you go to a game that...
00:07:58
Speaker
It's not maintained.
00:07:59
Speaker
It doesn't flow very well.
00:08:01
Speaker
You're not going to put another quarter in.
00:08:03
Speaker
And so if you have like a well-functioning game, and that actually is pretty rare because pinball maintenance is actually pretty, it's labor intensive.
00:08:14
Speaker
We went to a Chuck E. Cheese and my wife said, this is when I first got into it.
00:08:19
Speaker
My wife said, hey, there's a pinball machine over there.
00:08:22
Speaker
You should go check it out.
00:08:23
Speaker
So I wandered over there.
00:08:25
Speaker
It was a Stern Pirates of the Caribbean, and it had one flipper that was completely not even attached.
00:08:32
Speaker
It was just floating free.
00:08:34
Speaker
It didn't have the rubbers on one of them.
00:08:37
Speaker
And I put some money into it because I was just so curious as to how bad it played.
00:08:43
Speaker
But that's the challenge with finding a lot of these classic games is that they really don't play very well just because...
00:08:53
Speaker
Unless you have them in a home environment or someone who is at a labor of love and they're maintaining it.
00:08:58
Speaker
But there are a lot of really janky machines out there.
00:09:02
Speaker
So that is one thing that is really great about the pinball arcade is that the machines play like they were supposed to play.
00:09:10
Speaker
I know it's not the same thing.
00:09:11
Speaker
It's an electronic simulation of it.
00:09:13
Speaker
But you at least get...
00:09:15
Speaker
probably a truer experience for what the game was intended to be by the designer than actually finding one of these beat up games in the wild.
00:09:25
Speaker
Oh yeah.
00:09:25
Speaker
So yeah.
00:09:26
Speaker
Janking machine where the rubbers have broken off the flippers and, you know,
00:09:31
Speaker
Things don't work.
00:09:32
Speaker
Yeah.
00:09:32
Speaker
No, I completely agree.
00:09:33
Speaker
I always feel bad when, you know, we go somewhere and they're like, oh, yeah, the pinball machine was broken.
00:09:37
Speaker
And I'm like, oh, we've lost another one.
00:09:40
Speaker
And I'm not talking about the machine.
00:09:41
Speaker
I'm talking about the player because it's like if you have a great location and you have machines that are taken care of, the people will come.
00:09:47
Speaker
And I'm lucky.
00:09:48
Speaker
I'm very spoiled.
00:09:49
Speaker
Our location is amazing.
00:09:51
Speaker
What's brewing?
00:09:52
Speaker
They keep the tables and the machines, you know, in pristine condition and they're always working.
00:09:58
Speaker
And if something isn't working, you know, it's off the floor like that day.
00:10:02
Speaker
If they can't get it fixed, they'll like swap it out with something else.
00:10:05
Speaker
And see, we're very fortunate to have that too.
00:10:07
Speaker
Ketos and quarters is just, the machines are always perfect.
00:10:10
Speaker
I love quarters.
00:10:11
Speaker
Quarters was awesome.
00:10:13
Speaker
It is a fun place.
00:10:14
Speaker
And we're excited for Mikey because he's already telling us he's getting one of the Stranger Things premiums in there.
00:10:19
Speaker
So I wish they just make it.
00:10:22
Speaker
That place was so cool.
00:10:24
Speaker
It was like a pinball speakeasy.
00:10:25
Speaker
You know, I'm like going down there.
00:10:27
Speaker
I have a picture of me in front of the sign.
00:10:29
Speaker
And I'm like, this place is really cool.
00:10:31
Speaker
So I had a great time.
00:10:32
Speaker
They have a great collection there.
00:10:34
Speaker
Oh, yeah.
00:10:34
Speaker
So I haven't actually been inside quarters, but I'll give you my very contracted story.
00:10:42
Speaker
We decided to get tickets to Wicked, and we had a big group, so we bought eight tickets.
00:10:49
Speaker
And we went down there, and we handed them the tickets, and they looked down and said, four of these were for Tuesday.
00:10:56
Speaker
Oh, yeah.
00:10:59
Speaker
And so we had seen it before.
00:11:02
Speaker
Ironically, we're the ones who organized the event.
00:11:05
Speaker
We had seen it before and there were two other tickets.
00:11:07
Speaker
And so everybody went into it except for us.
00:11:10
Speaker
And so we're wandering around downtown Salt Lake and just, I would say,
00:11:16
Speaker
with a black cloud kind of annoyed that we couldn't get in, couldn't get into the show that we organized.
00:11:22
Speaker
And I will say that on the positive side, we contract, we contacted the seller and she said, I'm so sorry, that was a big mistake.
00:11:28
Speaker
She, she refunded the show.
00:11:30
Speaker
It was, it wasn't a, a situation where she was trying to take advantage of it.
00:11:35
Speaker
It was just not a mistake.
00:11:37
Speaker
And so I thought, oh, and it was snowy and it was nasty and we were all dressed up.
00:11:41
Speaker
And I said, well, let's go to quarters.
00:11:43
Speaker
I haven't been there.
00:11:43
Speaker
I heard about it.
00:11:44
Speaker
So we walked down there and I realized like a block away that I didn't have my license.
00:11:49
Speaker
Oh, no.
00:11:51
Speaker
And so I said, well, we can wander there.
00:11:53
Speaker
We wandered there and they just like, yeah, we can't lift out a license.
00:11:56
Speaker
You can't get it.
00:11:57
Speaker
I'm just like, okay, one, I don't look 18.
00:11:59
Speaker
Yeah.
00:12:02
Speaker
And it's fine.
00:12:02
Speaker
I totally get it.
00:12:03
Speaker
It's the liquor license laws that if they don't follow all the rules, then someone could turn them in.
00:12:10
Speaker
But that's my only experience with quarters is that I was down there at the time and I thought, oh, I'll just go in and then I couldn't get in because I didn't have my license.
00:12:18
Speaker
But anyway.
00:12:20
Speaker
Aww.
00:12:21
Speaker
I know.
00:12:21
Speaker
Sad, right?
00:12:21
Speaker
That is very sad.
00:12:24
Speaker
So, guys, let's move into the news because I sent over the notes and I didn't think there was much that's happened.
Stranger Things Pinball Review
00:12:30
Speaker
But then I sent over the list.
00:12:31
Speaker
I'm like, there's a little bit that's happened.
00:12:34
Speaker
Just a bit.
00:12:35
Speaker
Just a tiny bit.
00:12:37
Speaker
So I got first on here.
00:12:38
Speaker
Let's talk stranger things.
00:12:40
Speaker
The premium was finally revealed at CELS.
00:12:43
Speaker
A little bit of uproar because it was in a poorly lit room for this pinball machine and everything looked washed out from the projection.
00:12:54
Speaker
But other than that, I think the game looks great.
00:12:57
Speaker
I haven't played it yet.
00:12:58
Speaker
What are your guys' thoughts?
00:13:02
Speaker
Oh, sure.
00:13:03
Speaker
You know, there are things I like about it.
00:13:06
Speaker
Overall, I haven't played it.
00:13:08
Speaker
I have not seen it in person.
00:13:09
Speaker
I've only seen that CES stream.
00:13:12
Speaker
I saw parts of the Dead Flip reveal.
00:13:15
Speaker
And then I've seen a few things on YouTube.
00:13:18
Speaker
I, it looks okay.
00:13:20
Speaker
I mean, I, there's the projection is probably the most interesting thing to me about that game.
00:13:26
Speaker
You know, but it's a lighting situation.
00:13:28
Speaker
Unfortunately, you've never been in a TV studio or just, you know, had those hot lights on you.
00:13:32
Speaker
They're very bright.
00:13:34
Speaker
So it was really kind of worked against the, you know,
00:13:38
Speaker
The game, unfortunately, I would love to see it in a more realistic environment, somebody's basement or a bar or something.
00:13:46
Speaker
I think the projection would have a bigger sell to me.
00:13:50
Speaker
It looks fun.
00:13:51
Speaker
The thing I like about it, it looks easy to understand.
00:13:56
Speaker
To me, you can see the shots, you can see the progression of what you're supposed to do.
00:14:03
Speaker
The projector does look really cool.
00:14:04
Speaker
I'm waiting to see it in person, but I like the idea that they'll have more assets to add to the projector as the code updates and as the seasons of the show update.
00:14:17
Speaker
From what I understand, they'll add more things to the projector, which I think is kind of cool.
00:14:22
Speaker
I agree.
00:14:24
Speaker
I'm always nervous with new technology.
00:14:29
Speaker
It's one of those catch-22s, right?
00:14:31
Speaker
You want something new and different in the machine, but
00:14:35
Speaker
But you also run the risk of something new and different that doesn't actually translate very well to all different environments.
00:14:44
Speaker
And it's challenging for them to find a new thing or a new gimmick that actually works everywhere.
00:14:52
Speaker
So I'm sad that the projector didn't work super well in that.
00:14:57
Speaker
And maybe they hadn't anticipated that that was going to be the situation.
00:15:02
Speaker
Another question is, well, there are other environments where you have a well lighted situation.
00:15:09
Speaker
For example, Pinberg.
00:15:10
Speaker
Pinberg is, you know, they put the Penn Stadium lights on there and they try to make sure that it's well illuminated so you can broadcast it.
00:15:20
Speaker
And if the projector is limited by creating that mood effect, it could actually affect how well you can stream this machine.
00:15:30
Speaker
Yeah, I mean, that's a really great point.
00:15:32
Speaker
I mean, there's a laser disc out there for everybody.
00:15:36
Speaker
This could be the laser disc moment, could be the projector.
00:15:38
Speaker
You know, it's that somebody has to take a step forward and develop something new.
00:15:43
Speaker
I'm just kind of not sold on it yet until I get a little more time watching it.
00:15:47
Speaker
I will say, you know, not super excited about what I've seen.
00:15:51
Speaker
But again,
00:15:53
Speaker
It was just an unfortunate happenstance.
00:15:55
Speaker
But I'm like you guys, my home place that I play at, it's a coffee shop.
00:15:59
Speaker
It's very well lit.
00:16:00
Speaker
I don't know if the projector would really work in there.
00:16:04
Speaker
Well, I want to try our new segment.
00:16:07
Speaker
I've been talking to Lauren and Scott about this for the past couple of days.
00:16:10
Speaker
We're going to do what's called the pinball scorecard.
00:16:14
Speaker
Since Straight Down the Middle and Dead Flip, they've all done their wonderful first impressions and you get to see the game, I want to do a scorecard on what our thoughts are so it gives kind of a brief synopsis of where we kind of land with the machine.
00:16:28
Speaker
And since none of us have had our hands on the machine yet, this is going to be a first impression scorecard.
00:16:34
Speaker
So let's try this out.
00:16:37
Speaker
So on my scorecard, I've got theme first.
00:16:40
Speaker
So all these categories will be out of 10, one out of 10.
00:16:44
Speaker
So let's have Lauren go first, then Scott, and then I'll do it.
00:16:48
Speaker
So Lauren, what's your thoughts?
00:16:50
Speaker
One out of 10 on theme.
00:16:51
Speaker
Theme, I'm going to give them an eight.
00:16:53
Speaker
And that is just because Stranger Things is the most popular and most watched streamed show on Netflix and I think ever.
00:17:02
Speaker
So, I mean, it's relevant.
00:17:04
Speaker
It's current.
00:17:05
Speaker
The show's still on.
00:17:06
Speaker
We haven't reached back for nostalgia, which I think is kind of something that always happens in pinball.
00:17:12
Speaker
But I think that they did a really good job on theme.
00:17:16
Speaker
And I will fully admit I have not watched the show, but I know enough about the show to see that it looked really well integrated into the machine.
00:17:25
Speaker
Is it a world under glass?
00:17:26
Speaker
Again, since I'm not a fan of the show, I couldn't really tell you.
00:17:30
Speaker
But from what I've seen and the pieces I've seen, I give it a very solid eight.
00:17:36
Speaker
Awesome.
00:17:37
Speaker
I'm going to give it an 8.5.
00:17:40
Speaker
And I say that because this is out of the wheelhouse of my demographic, which is typically where they're shooting for.
00:17:49
Speaker
They're shooting for dudes in their forties who are making their man caves.
00:17:53
Speaker
And so that's why you hear all, you know, hear all the bands from the eighties or the seventies that are coming out.
00:18:00
Speaker
And that's why you hear rumors for like a Motley Crue pin and, you know, all that stuff of when we were teenagers, uh,
00:18:08
Speaker
The challenge is with and we are benefiting from the diversification of interests that the Internet and and computers have allowed us is that there doesn't seem to be a collective experience.
00:18:26
Speaker
There doesn't seem to be a collective mega band.
00:18:29
Speaker
There doesn't seem to be a collective amazing show that everybody's seen.
00:18:34
Speaker
You're not going to see.
00:18:35
Speaker
Indiana Jones, you're not going to see ET.
00:18:38
Speaker
Maybe you could get Avengers Endgame and you could argue that at least that's something that most people have seen.
00:18:44
Speaker
You just don't have that anymore.
00:18:47
Speaker
So for them to go with Stranger Things, it's coming from Netflix, which
00:18:52
Speaker
which it's a streaming service that a lot of people have, but you have to pay for it.
00:18:57
Speaker
It's not free.
00:18:59
Speaker
And so that's where a lot of the stuff that we had, radio was free.
00:19:04
Speaker
MTV, okay, you still had to pay for a cable subscription, but still people knew about that.
00:19:13
Speaker
You have all, you know, Back to the Future, all these things that everybody did together.
00:19:17
Speaker
Again, they just don't have that anymore.
00:19:19
Speaker
So in today's era, what are you going to do?
00:19:23
Speaker
Well, you're going to find out what has the most buzz among teenagers and basically the 18 to 30-year-old crowd and
00:19:35
Speaker
A lot of them like Stranger Things.
00:19:37
Speaker
So I'm with Lauren.
00:19:38
Speaker
I actually haven't seen it, but I know enough people who do.
00:19:42
Speaker
And when I shared that Stranger Things was announced, so many people texted back and said, are you getting this machine?
00:19:50
Speaker
Because I want to play it.
00:19:52
Speaker
So it's probably about as close to a solid theme that you can get right now.
00:19:59
Speaker
So I'm going to give it a nine.
00:20:02
Speaker
And the reason being is I have seen stranger things and I'm,
00:20:07
Speaker
Stranger Things is a good show to me.
00:20:09
Speaker
It's not fantastic.
00:20:10
Speaker
It's not my top 10, but it is a theme that crosses multiple generations.
00:20:16
Speaker
I know 11-year-old girls, that's their favorite show.
00:20:20
Speaker
And I know women that are 50s, 60s, that's their favorite show because they grew up in the 80s and it's a throwback nostalgia to that time of when they were children.
00:20:31
Speaker
I think it's a win on that front.
00:20:35
Speaker
And so that's why I'm giving it a nine.
00:20:38
Speaker
All right, let's move on to play field layout.
00:20:40
Speaker
What is your thoughts on that, Lauren?
00:20:42
Speaker
You know, from the picture, it's a fan.
00:20:45
Speaker
I mean, it's just like, you know, I'm going to give it a seven.
00:20:49
Speaker
It looks fun, but at the same time, it doesn't necessarily look super exciting.
00:20:55
Speaker
I feel bad when I say that, but I just...
00:20:58
Speaker
And it's hard because I haven't played it.
00:21:00
Speaker
So I am just doing this upon like looking at videos.
00:21:04
Speaker
I'm not the biggest fan of a fan layout.
00:21:07
Speaker
I mean, they're okay.
00:21:08
Speaker
It's just not my favorite thing.
00:21:10
Speaker
But it looks well laid out and well put together.
00:21:14
Speaker
I like the shot behind the movie screen where the Demogordon, I guess that's what it's called, pops up.
00:21:21
Speaker
And then, you know, there's some other things that are kind of cool about it, but it looks fun.
00:21:25
Speaker
But I mean, it doesn't like necessarily is the greatest play field, you know, layout I've ever seen.
00:21:31
Speaker
I'm like, it's a fan.
00:21:32
Speaker
I'm like, okay, so I'm going to give it a seven.
00:21:36
Speaker
Yeah, I'm with you, Lauren.
00:21:38
Speaker
I'll give it a solid seven because it's safe.
00:21:41
Speaker
Yeah, I am.
00:21:42
Speaker
So I'm recording in my pinball basement and I'm looking at the exact layout and attack from Mars and medieval madness.
00:21:51
Speaker
And that's where I it's solid.
00:21:54
Speaker
I love those games and people play them all the time.
00:21:58
Speaker
And I know they're Brian Eddy.
00:22:00
Speaker
And it seems like I have that.
00:22:04
Speaker
And so I give it a seven because it's a solid proven layout.
00:22:09
Speaker
But there's nothing about this layout that makes me say, ooh, from the layout alone, I have to have this experience.
00:22:15
Speaker
I think I have it.
00:22:17
Speaker
I am right there with you guys.
00:22:19
Speaker
Seven for me as well.
00:22:20
Speaker
It's nothing innovative, but it's also, it will probably feel familiar and feel good.
00:22:27
Speaker
It's hard to tell for a playfield layout from just a top-down video, but I'm right there with you.
00:22:33
Speaker
It's not inspiring to me by any means.
00:22:36
Speaker
Yeah.
00:22:37
Speaker
All right, let's move on to game rules.
00:22:39
Speaker
I know this is one we're going to have to be kind of lenient on considering it's the codes barely along and whatnot.
00:22:47
Speaker
But what's your thoughts?
00:22:48
Speaker
Again, seven.
00:22:49
Speaker
I'm going to just because it seemed from what I've seen again, I haven't.
00:22:55
Speaker
I feel like I like the provisional.
00:22:56
Speaker
I haven't played it.
00:22:58
Speaker
You know, it seemed like it's got set out with very minimal code.
00:23:02
Speaker
So for me, it's going to take a long time to develop that gameplay and those game rules.
00:23:08
Speaker
You know, ask me this question again in a year when they've got much more updated code, more robust code.
00:23:13
Speaker
But for right now, from what I've seen, I'm giving it a seven.
00:23:16
Speaker
And that's just because from what I see from the gameplay on the field, it looks like it's an easy game to understand.
00:23:21
Speaker
Okay.
00:23:24
Speaker
Yeah, and I'm going to give it an undetermined grade just because, yes, the one thing this has going for it is one of the best features of medieval madness and Attack from Mars in that you have, and you could even call this play field a throwback play field for a throwback theme, in that you have the lights that are in the predictable places.
00:23:50
Speaker
And so you know how many times you've hit the orbit.
00:23:52
Speaker
You know how many times you've hit the ramp.
00:23:55
Speaker
because they have those lights that are going to light up.
00:24:00
Speaker
I don't think we don't have enough to go on to really say whether it's great or Spartan.
00:24:09
Speaker
I'm confident that they will be able to do something with it just because it'll be Attack from Mars 2.0.
00:24:19
Speaker
Yep.
00:24:20
Speaker
So I'm going to give it a seven as well, just because I think it's a good starting point.
00:24:25
Speaker
There wasn't anything that made me groan and say, hey, this is not even close to complete.
00:24:31
Speaker
I think that from here, they've got a good base and I'm excited to see where they take it from here.
00:24:37
Speaker
So, all right, let's move on to toys, which would be, what do we got?
00:24:42
Speaker
We've got the, on the pro, we've got the Demogorgon and the flip down ramp.
00:24:47
Speaker
And then on the premium would be the projector and the magnet in the back for the Hertel kinetic powers.
00:24:55
Speaker
I'm going to, you know what, I'm going to give this an 8.5 because I, it's an 8.5 with kind of a asterisk because I really want to see more of the projector just because I just feel like it, you know, like as we stated earlier with the things I've seen so far, it really hasn't wowed me.
00:25:13
Speaker
I'm like, oh, it looks cool.
00:25:14
Speaker
It's a projector.
00:25:15
Speaker
But if it's going to be, oh, well, you're not going to be able to put it in this kind of setting or this kind of setting.
00:25:21
Speaker
I'm not sure on that mechanism yet.
00:25:24
Speaker
The telekinesis 11 thing where the balls hang on the back, that's kind of cool.
00:25:29
Speaker
That little magnet back there, I think that's kind of neat.
00:25:32
Speaker
I was talking to Chris from Kaneda's Pinball Podcast, and he described the Demi Gorgon toy as an artichoke, which I now can't get out of my head.
00:25:40
Speaker
I'm like, oh, my God, it is an artichoke.
00:25:42
Speaker
But, I mean...
00:25:44
Speaker
I'm going to give it an 8.5 because I'm glad that they kind of stepped out of the box for the projector.
00:25:49
Speaker
But from what I've seen of the projector, I'm not really excited about it.
00:25:53
Speaker
So I'm kind of like a wait and see on that one.
00:25:57
Speaker
Okay.
00:25:59
Speaker
Yeah, I'll give it... I'm going to say...
00:26:02
Speaker
I'm going to downgrade a little bit.
00:26:04
Speaker
I'm going to say a 6 or a 5.5 just because when you have something in the machine, you need to be able to translate from location to location.
00:26:15
Speaker
And I am so concerned that that projector is not going to move very well.
00:26:20
Speaker
The Demogorgon, it's kind of like the... It's the Balrog.
00:26:27
Speaker
It's in the same location.
00:26:28
Speaker
It's kind of like the Balrog mixed with the ring.
00:26:31
Speaker
And so you can do that.
00:26:33
Speaker
I do think that magnets are underused in pinball, and they can be super annoying or they can be a lot of fun.
00:26:41
Speaker
And so the reason why I'll give it a 5.5 or a 6 is because...
00:26:49
Speaker
And unfortunately, I'm going to put the projector lower.
00:26:51
Speaker
But what does raise it is I find creative use of magnets in machines really fun and interesting.
00:26:59
Speaker
On my machines, one of my favorite things is, and I know it's borrowed from Twister, but it's the Magneto multiball that starts in X-Men.
00:27:09
Speaker
And it is so much fun to see that, you know, see that ball frozen there and all of them together and then spinning around and they're just exploding everywhere.
00:27:20
Speaker
So I find that would be very interesting to see to use that as a ball lock.
00:27:26
Speaker
So for me, I think the toys on this one, I'm going to give it a very solid seven.
00:27:32
Speaker
And the reason being, we're seeing innovation with something we haven't seen with the magnet, the projector.
00:27:40
Speaker
I still hold reservations, but I still think it's something very innovative we haven't seen yet in pinball besides maybe pin 2K.
00:27:47
Speaker
And so I'm excited to see if the projector works.
00:27:51
Speaker
I think if it does, it opens up a new door into pinball that hasn't been seen yet.
00:27:56
Speaker
And so, but like Scott said, like it has to translate well from location to location.
00:28:02
Speaker
But other than that, solid seven.
00:28:05
Speaker
I mean, it's a good effort for what we've been given.
00:28:09
Speaker
So I just say we skip gameplay.
00:28:12
Speaker
What do you think?
00:28:13
Speaker
Yeah.
00:28:14
Speaker
I mean, I just don't think it's been out enough.
00:28:18
Speaker
Right now, Attack for Mars 2.0.
00:28:19
Speaker
Okay.
00:28:21
Speaker
So we'll skip gameplay.
00:28:24
Speaker
Let's move on to lighting.
00:28:25
Speaker
So Lauren, if you'll give us your thoughts on that.
00:28:28
Speaker
The light show I saw looks really great.
00:28:30
Speaker
I think it looks fun.
00:28:33
Speaker
I am going to give this a 7.5.
00:28:35
Speaker
It's no TNA, but it's a nice light show.
00:28:37
Speaker
So 7.5.
00:28:44
Speaker
Yeah, and I'll even upgrade it more.
00:28:46
Speaker
I'll give it an 8, an 8.5, because it does have those dramatic colors.
00:28:52
Speaker
And it's very eye-catching.
00:28:54
Speaker
You will see this if you walk into a bar or some sort of arcade.
00:28:59
Speaker
You're going to see the light show because it is that electric 80s color palette with the lights.
00:29:08
Speaker
You're going to notice it.
00:29:10
Speaker
It feels very, you know, it's like Ghostbusters grabs your attention.
00:29:16
Speaker
I agree.
00:29:16
Speaker
I think I'm right there with you as well.
00:29:19
Speaker
I'm going to do an eight.
00:29:20
Speaker
I think the lighting is great.
00:29:22
Speaker
And it all comes down to that projector for me as well.
00:29:24
Speaker
So let us move on to artwork.
00:29:30
Speaker
So the artwork I saw.
00:29:32
Speaker
So I have to kind of provisionally also state that I am more of a fan of Zombie Yeti, Dirty Donny kind of comic style art on pinball machines.
00:29:43
Speaker
I'm not a huge fan of the hyper realism, photo realism kind of look.
00:29:49
Speaker
But I will say that the art there is well done.
00:29:51
Speaker
So I'm going to give it an eight.
00:29:52
Speaker
I mean, it looks nice.
00:29:54
Speaker
I mean, it's not it's not the kind of art package that's going to make me want to buy a machine.
00:29:59
Speaker
But it looks I mean, I recognize everybody.
00:30:03
Speaker
I see Winona Ryder.
00:30:04
Speaker
I see everybody on the machine.
00:30:06
Speaker
It looks like they really were faithful to the show and, you know, capturing all the elements of the show.
00:30:12
Speaker
I just you know, it's not an art package that wows me, but it's good.
00:30:18
Speaker
Yeah, I'm going to go with a five.
00:30:22
Speaker
It feels very, very much like a style guide.
00:30:28
Speaker
You get the assets and it feels very much like what Star Wars was.
00:30:34
Speaker
It doesn't feel very pinball-y.
00:30:37
Speaker
It feels like if you took off the art, you could see where all the shots are going because of the lights and just everything else.
00:30:47
Speaker
But then it's a, okay, here's a style guide sticker book and go ahead and put it in and use the colors we use.
00:30:53
Speaker
So...
00:30:55
Speaker
Well, I was a little dismissive of Willy Wonka because I said it kind of looked like a cereal box, right?
00:31:04
Speaker
If you went and bought Wonka-Os, that's what it's going to be.
00:31:08
Speaker
It's going to be the same Gene Wilder pose.
00:31:12
Speaker
And if you're going to get a Stranger Things backpack, this is what you're going to get.
00:31:18
Speaker
So it's fine.
00:31:21
Speaker
It's true to it.
00:31:23
Speaker
I guess it's not pinball enough for me.
00:31:27
Speaker
So I'm going to give it a seven.
00:31:28
Speaker
I think it's a better effort than what we've seen with, say, the cut and paste of Willy Wonka.
00:31:36
Speaker
But it's definitely not up to where I think pinball art should be.
00:31:42
Speaker
But honestly, it's not going to look bad in a collection.
00:31:46
Speaker
It's not like you're going to step up to it and be like, ooh, what is that?
00:31:49
Speaker
Like, arts come so far from the 90s that honestly, it's sad.
00:31:54
Speaker
It's like, this is the standard now.
00:31:56
Speaker
And the standard's fantastic.
00:31:57
Speaker
So seven's the average.
00:31:59
Speaker
So I'm going to leave it at seven.
00:32:01
Speaker
Yeah.
00:32:02
Speaker
To borrow a phrase from Nick Lane, it gets the job done.
00:32:07
Speaker
Yep.
00:32:09
Speaker
It's not bad.
00:32:10
Speaker
It's not great.
00:32:11
Speaker
It's there.
00:32:13
Speaker
So that's why I'm going to give it a five.
00:32:15
Speaker
It just doesn't feel very enough pinball for me.
00:32:20
Speaker
Cool.
00:32:20
Speaker
Let's move on to sound and music.
00:32:24
Speaker
I'm going to give them a lot of credit here because they seem to have a pretty good working relationship with Netflix and with the creators of the show.
00:32:30
Speaker
So they at least got the soundtrack from the show and a lot of the sound I did here, I really liked.
00:32:36
Speaker
So I'm going to give them an 8.5.
00:32:39
Speaker
Yeah, and I would give it a 9, even pushing up toward a 10 if I see, if I get there.
00:32:46
Speaker
This feels very much like Spider-Man in that it has the right sounds, the right, you know, it gets you emotionally into the game because of the music.
00:32:58
Speaker
And they got one of the actors from the show to voice things in it, which I think is critical to,
00:33:08
Speaker
for you to feel like you're involved with the theme.
00:33:11
Speaker
And so if you're going to go big, you do want the sound integration.
00:33:17
Speaker
So I'm glad that they made sure that was a focus.
00:33:22
Speaker
I'm right there with you guys.
00:33:24
Speaker
Nine.
00:33:24
Speaker
I really think nine is good because I think at this point in the game, if you really want to make a difference, you've got to get those custom call-outs from people from the show.
00:33:34
Speaker
The music, the assets are fantastic.
00:33:38
Speaker
I just think of Guardians of the Galaxy.
00:33:40
Speaker
Oh, my God.
00:33:41
Speaker
I was going to say the same thing.
00:33:43
Speaker
I'm like, I'm looking at you, Guardians of the Galaxy, my favorite of the Marvel movies.
00:33:48
Speaker
And you messed it up because there were no call outs.
00:33:52
Speaker
The assets on that thing were terrible.
00:33:54
Speaker
And I mean, I still want it, but I'm so hurt about the lack of call outs.
00:34:01
Speaker
I agree.
00:34:03
Speaker
And Rocket just sounds terrible.
00:34:05
Speaker
Oh, yeah.
00:34:06
Speaker
Well, when you talk about the auditory involvement on a machine, that is really the critical part.
00:34:12
Speaker
If you look at what makes TNA awesome, it's the soundtrack.
00:34:16
Speaker
It's actually getting into it and feeling like you're a dance club or you're feeling an experience.
00:34:21
Speaker
Yep.
00:34:22
Speaker
When you go and play Jurassic Park and you hit it and you get that John Williams, it's the same thing with Star Wars.
00:34:28
Speaker
With Star Wars, you get the John Williams theme.
00:34:32
Speaker
And so it's, yes, this is Star Wars.
00:34:35
Speaker
To put it in context, have you guys ever seen the cut where it shows the end of Star Wars where they're going up for the medal ceremony and it has no music?
00:34:46
Speaker
Oh, no, that sounds awful.
00:34:48
Speaker
Right.
00:34:48
Speaker
It is horrible.
00:34:49
Speaker
I don't think I have.
00:34:50
Speaker
It is.
00:34:51
Speaker
It is.
00:34:52
Speaker
You're watching this and you're thinking, can I escape this so fast?
00:34:57
Speaker
Because it proves how involved music is into the overall experience.
00:35:02
Speaker
If you really look at Star Wars in general and take out the John Williams soundtrack, that would have been a failure.
00:35:10
Speaker
a horrible failure because the music was so intrinsic to the experience.
00:35:16
Speaker
That's what pinball has become.
00:35:18
Speaker
The music is vital, which is why you feel that Guardians was kind of a miss because they didn't, you know, whether or not they didn't or couldn't, you know, there's certainly argument on to why it happened that way, but they weren't able to get
00:35:32
Speaker
Get that experience in there.
00:35:35
Speaker
And, of course, when you're getting songs from five to eight different artists, that's a minefield in itself, which is why Shrek only has All-Star.
00:35:45
Speaker
All right.
00:35:48
Speaker
Well, we're kind of talking about this already, but we have call-outs as one of the categories.
00:35:52
Speaker
So...
00:35:54
Speaker
I was going to give it a nine because they did actually get assets and, you know, actors from the show to the call out.
00:36:00
Speaker
So I'm going to give them a nine just for that.
00:36:03
Speaker
Again, kind of a rehash.
00:36:05
Speaker
If, you know, you don't have the college or you kind of get, you know, like a Deadpool's another one.
00:36:09
Speaker
I thought that the guy they got was great.
00:36:11
Speaker
I know he's the guy from the animated version of Deadpool, but I was really expecting Ryan Reynolds.
00:36:15
Speaker
I'm just, I'm just going to say it.
00:36:18
Speaker
I just feel like they did a really good job with this.
00:36:21
Speaker
And so, yeah, I'm definitely giving them a nine, a solid nine.
00:36:25
Speaker
Yeah, and it's call outs and sound package.
00:36:29
Speaker
It seems to be all one in the same.
00:36:31
Speaker
So I will say it would be a 10 if you had, you know, the Spider-Man.
00:36:36
Speaker
I don't think you can get better call outs than J. Jonah Jameson on there.
00:36:41
Speaker
I mean, he, it is great, which is why I would never buy the vault edition just because I would miss all those awesome call outs.
00:36:48
Speaker
Um, but anytime you can get an actor involved and whether or not they're pinball Lee enough, um, it certainly helps out with the experience.
00:36:58
Speaker
So you're right.
00:36:59
Speaker
Nine.
00:37:01
Speaker
Okay.
00:37:01
Speaker
Nine it is.
00:37:02
Speaker
And I, I totally agree as well.
00:37:04
Speaker
Nine, nine.
00:37:04
Speaker
Cause.
00:37:06
Speaker
I mean, we don't have enough call outs in here yet.
00:37:07
Speaker
They'll add more.
00:37:08
Speaker
But what I've heard so far and David, David Harbors, I think is his name.
00:37:13
Speaker
Just fantastic.
00:37:13
Speaker
Like, and that's all it takes is just one person from the show.
00:37:17
Speaker
I don't understand why.
00:37:18
Speaker
Like Simpsons is fantastic because we get so many voices.
00:37:21
Speaker
But seriously, like we just need one voice.
00:37:25
Speaker
If you can't, if you're going to cut, if that's where you're going to cut for your pinball machine.
00:37:30
Speaker
Just at least just get one voice.
00:37:31
Speaker
That's all I ask for.
00:37:33
Speaker
And then I know we haven't really had our hands on it yet, but quality of build.
00:37:40
Speaker
Well, I am going to give this a 7.5.
00:37:50
Speaker
I haven't heard any negative things about the mechs inside the machine.
00:37:55
Speaker
I haven't had my hands on it.
00:37:57
Speaker
I did see the pictures of the dimpling.
00:37:59
Speaker
You know, there are, you know, pros and cons to that.
00:38:02
Speaker
You know, there's the people that say, oh, it'll all even out eventually.
00:38:07
Speaker
I'm like, it looks like it needs a case of clear still on the pictures I've seen.
00:38:10
Speaker
I mean, there were just like tiny little craters everywhere.
00:38:13
Speaker
You know, when I saw that, I'm like, well, it kind of just kind of, you know, dampened me a little bit on it.
00:38:21
Speaker
So that's why they're getting like a 7.5 for me until I see more longevity to see how it holds up.
00:38:29
Speaker
You know what?
00:38:30
Speaker
I'm going to go a different way.
00:38:35
Speaker
I'm going to give it a nine.
00:38:36
Speaker
And let me tell you why I'm giving it a nine.
00:38:39
Speaker
Because of all the great manufacturers out there, the top four, I guess, you have Chicago Gaming Company, you have Stern, you have Jersey Jack, and you have Spooky.
00:38:55
Speaker
Which one's the most reliable on locations?
00:38:59
Speaker
Very true.
00:39:00
Speaker
Stern.
00:39:02
Speaker
Stern all day long.
00:39:04
Speaker
It's such a fine line to walk.
00:39:07
Speaker
Are there ways of quibbling on things?
00:39:10
Speaker
Absolutely.
00:39:10
Speaker
And I'm with you.
00:39:12
Speaker
The craters on the play field, that is a heartbreaking experience, especially when you just –
00:39:19
Speaker
You know, anywhere from six to $7,000 on this non-essential toy.
00:39:26
Speaker
Yes, I totally get what you're saying about that.
00:39:30
Speaker
It's it's part of that.
00:39:32
Speaker
However, it's.
00:39:34
Speaker
It's reliable.
00:39:35
Speaker
They always make machines that work well on location and they have redundancies built in.
00:39:41
Speaker
And so from an operator standpoint, you're going to take a stern all day long just because it can always operate.
00:39:48
Speaker
And that's the harshest environment you can be in is a location.
00:39:53
Speaker
And with the location, you should be able to plug and play.
00:39:58
Speaker
As an operator, you want to be able to say, hey, I'll be there once a week.
00:40:02
Speaker
You don't want to be tweaking it daily.
00:40:04
Speaker
And so for Stern to be able to walk that fine line, are there issues?
00:40:08
Speaker
Absolutely.
00:40:09
Speaker
Are there legitimate concerns?
00:40:12
Speaker
Cabinet build, cheaping out on things.
00:40:16
Speaker
However, it's also still one of the cheapest mass-produced machines out there, and it still is reliable.
00:40:25
Speaker
So I am going to go with just a solid seven.
00:40:29
Speaker
The dimpling's not anything new.
00:40:31
Speaker
It's not like we haven't seen this before.
00:40:33
Speaker
It's not like, you know, this is a huge issue.
00:40:37
Speaker
Yeah, I don't like looking at it.
00:40:40
Speaker
It makes me cringe because I'm right there with you, Lauren.
00:40:42
Speaker
It's like, it's just the dimpling just, ugh.
00:40:45
Speaker
But...
00:40:47
Speaker
They are reliable machines.
00:40:48
Speaker
They've stand the test of time on location.
00:40:51
Speaker
And so I think the quality of build will be just as good with these machines as it has been in the past.
00:40:58
Speaker
And I know that Deep Root has said that they're going to up their game.
00:41:03
Speaker
And so I can't wait to see if that changes anything.
00:41:06
Speaker
But as of right now, average seven for me.
00:41:10
Speaker
So if you guys are following along at home,
00:41:14
Speaker
Our scorecards end as followed.
00:41:16
Speaker
Lauren gave it a 63.5 out of 90.
00:41:19
Speaker
Scott, since he decided not to give us any thoughts on game rules, he was saying it was not applicable yet.
00:41:25
Speaker
53 out of 80.
00:41:25
Speaker
And I gave it 63 out of 90.
00:41:27
Speaker
So we're all pretty much the same.
00:41:30
Speaker
I'd say the average is probably around 7 if you look at everything.
00:41:34
Speaker
And it's actually...
00:41:37
Speaker
For a game coming out, 7 is a good starting point because you didn't feel the same way about Munsters.
00:41:47
Speaker
When Munsters came out, you thought, hey, this is fun, but for enough enthusiasts, it left them feel wanting just because they saw the Wizard Month on the second game.
00:41:57
Speaker
Yep.
00:41:59
Speaker
But at the same time, Monsters was a – if you look at the layout and everything, it's actually a pretty fun shooter.
00:42:08
Speaker
It just doesn't feel like there's enough there.
00:42:10
Speaker
So I'm hoping that having this as a solid seven, then it can go up.
00:42:18
Speaker
It's pretty unlikely it'll go down.
00:42:20
Speaker
Um, even, even on this layout, even if it has basically a fundamental rule set, and really, if you look at medieval madness or attack for Mars, it's not a deep rule set.
00:42:30
Speaker
It's a fundamental rule set.
00:42:32
Speaker
You could do something very similar with this and still it'll get the job done.
00:42:37
Speaker
Um, I I'm curious to see what they do to make it, uh, or to try to make it epic, I guess.
00:42:44
Speaker
I completely agree.
00:42:47
Speaker
So, well, I think we spent plenty of time on that.
00:42:49
Speaker
I thought the scorecard would go a little shorter than that, but Hey, it's all trying out something new and please write into us to tell us if you did like the scorecard or if you're like, eh, cut it.
00:43:00
Speaker
But, um, I'm going to see if we can't actually put this as a standalone as well.
00:43:04
Speaker
Um, we'll see.
00:43:05
Speaker
Okay.
00:43:05
Speaker
Here's the question though.
00:43:07
Speaker
So after all is said and done, initial impression, are you going to buy it?
00:43:11
Speaker
Do you want to buy it?
00:43:12
Speaker
If you had, if you had 10,000 in your pocket, would you buy this machine?
00:43:17
Speaker
For me, no.
00:43:20
Speaker
While it is a great theme for somebody who's a fan of the show, I'm not a fan of the show.
00:43:25
Speaker
And as while gameplay and game design is a drive for me, I got to connect with a theme.
00:43:30
Speaker
And Stranger Things, while great, is just not something for me.
00:43:33
Speaker
Okay.
00:43:36
Speaker
As far as me, I already own Attack from Mars.
00:43:38
Speaker
I know that's crappy to say, but I don't have a desire.
00:43:43
Speaker
If this theme spoke more to me, then I'd probably buy it.
00:43:47
Speaker
But here's the other problem, too.
00:43:49
Speaker
Everyone on this podcast knows, and they've known since July that when we released the news, that
00:43:54
Speaker
Ninja Turtles was coming out.
00:43:55
Speaker
And so I'm just, I'm waiting like a child for Christmas morning for them to unveil Ninja Turtles.
00:44:01
Speaker
So no, I'm not buying it.
00:44:03
Speaker
You can just buy a Tron and put Ninja Turtles stickers on there.
00:44:08
Speaker
Oh, no.
00:44:09
Speaker
Yeah, let's buy a fun house and put Fortnite stickers all over that.
00:44:13
Speaker
That would be fun.
00:44:14
Speaker
Yeah, I'm with you on that.
00:44:18
Speaker
Now, I will say this is double-edged because I said that one of the things that I'm impressed with is this is not my demographic.
00:44:26
Speaker
And so I'm giving them high points to say that this game is not for me.
00:44:30
Speaker
And so it is saying it's, it's branching out of the wheelhouse.
00:44:34
Speaker
I'm with you though.
00:44:35
Speaker
I, of all of the games that came out this year, I'm planning on buying Jurassic park.
00:44:41
Speaker
So that, however, again, that's still a win.
00:44:44
Speaker
If you look at the, the big picture, because if someone buys one game a year, that's actually a win for the, for the industry.
00:44:52
Speaker
So,
00:44:53
Speaker
Yeah, and I'm in your same demo, essentially.
00:44:55
Speaker
And out of all the games that came out this year, I'm in the same boat.
00:44:58
Speaker
I would have bought Jurassic Park.
00:45:01
Speaker
I love that game.
00:45:03
Speaker
Well, and I'm planning on it.
00:45:05
Speaker
I just need to wait for the thaw and to shake up my collection a little bit.
00:45:09
Speaker
But I will buy a Jurassic Park.
00:45:11
Speaker
And my friend who lives two miles away, he bought a limited edition.
00:45:15
Speaker
So I still can play it.
00:45:17
Speaker
So I know it's really cool.
00:45:20
Speaker
Well, and I've told you, Scott, over the last how long that it's seriously the hardest decision whether to go to Lord of the Rings or Jurassic Park for me.
00:45:28
Speaker
And I really think because Jurassic Park, I've played it and I just I'm so addicted to it.
00:45:32
Speaker
So good.
00:45:33
Speaker
And the code and the game, you know what Ellen's doing with that and just the gameplay on it.
00:45:38
Speaker
To me, that's the best part of that game.
00:45:40
Speaker
I mean, I just it's a great shooter.
00:45:42
Speaker
I just I love everything about it.
00:45:44
Speaker
I can't say enough awesome things about Jurassic Park.
00:45:48
Speaker
Oh, it's so good.
00:45:50
Speaker
Hey, I am with you.
00:45:52
Speaker
Lord of the Rings is one of my I will own at some point in my life themes, but Jurassic Park is my next one.
00:45:59
Speaker
So I will buy that.
00:46:03
Speaker
So let's talk.
Rumors and Speculations
00:46:04
Speaker
I want to talk about this.
00:46:05
Speaker
I don't know if you guys do, but I want to talk about some Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtle rumors.
00:46:10
Speaker
Are you guys ready for this?
00:46:11
Speaker
And if I pronounce that, someone gave me crap.
00:46:14
Speaker
They're like, you didn't say it right, but hey.
00:46:18
Speaker
We'll just say TMNT.
00:46:21
Speaker
So the most recent rumors are it's going to have diverters like Alala Shadow.
00:46:27
Speaker
And this is going to be the first machine with internet connectivity.
00:46:33
Speaker
So I don't know if that floats your guys' boat at all.
00:46:35
Speaker
But between that and Zombie Yeti, John Borg's a solid designer.
00:46:40
Speaker
Like, his stuff is good.
00:46:42
Speaker
I don't think anyone's like, ugh.
00:46:43
Speaker
Like, I don't like John Borg because it just doesn't flow or I don't know.
00:46:47
Speaker
So I'm excited.
00:46:49
Speaker
I don't know.
00:46:50
Speaker
What are your thoughts?
00:46:51
Speaker
I'm not a, I mean, I remember it.
00:46:53
Speaker
And every time somebody says Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles, I literally sing the theme song in my head, you know, Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles, heroes in a half shell, turtle power.
00:47:03
Speaker
Turtle power.
00:47:04
Speaker
And I can't help it every time, I swear.
00:47:07
Speaker
You know, the theme is nostalgic to me because I do remember the cartoon from like the 80s, 90s.
00:47:13
Speaker
I don't know if I'd necessarily buy it, but I'm excited to see it.
00:47:20
Speaker
I'll play it.
00:47:21
Speaker
I'm actually – I just sent you a picture.
00:47:23
Speaker
I'm staring at my four-player one-up Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles game that I bought over Christmas.
00:47:30
Speaker
It is.
00:47:31
Speaker
It's one of those where it's fun.
00:47:33
Speaker
It's not my – it never has been my dream theme, and I'm okay with it.
00:47:41
Speaker
It is solidly in the 80s, 90s.
00:47:43
Speaker
And so it takes you back to your childhood.
00:47:47
Speaker
Really, it's a wait and see on me.
00:47:49
Speaker
The theme is, hey, get the job done.
00:47:52
Speaker
It's something that a lot of people are interested in.
00:47:55
Speaker
And it lends itself very well to theme integration and that you have –
00:48:03
Speaker
like five or six built-in character modes.
00:48:08
Speaker
And that's like the easiest way of describing it.
00:48:10
Speaker
You could have a Leonardo mode.
00:48:11
Speaker
You could have a Michelangelo mode.
00:48:13
Speaker
You could have an April O'Neil mode.
00:48:14
Speaker
You could have a Casey Jones mode.
00:48:17
Speaker
So there's all these different ways of just having instant buy-in for the rules.
00:48:23
Speaker
So I'm...
00:48:26
Speaker
it's one of those where, yeah, it's fine.
00:48:28
Speaker
I, I'm not, I'm not an LE purchase.
00:48:30
Speaker
I, I probably will not buy the game unless it is a, um, it's a wow, but there will be plenty around to buy.
00:48:39
Speaker
So, or to play.
00:48:40
Speaker
So I'm not, you know, and Josh is going to own an LE.
00:48:43
Speaker
You'll get to play it no matter what.
00:48:45
Speaker
I, I know somebody I know is going to own it.
00:48:47
Speaker
I, I have a feeling I'm going to enjoy playing it, but you know, am I going to like,
00:48:52
Speaker
Is it something I want to run out and buy?
00:48:53
Speaker
Probably not.
00:48:54
Speaker
But I'm excited to see it because it does have that nostalgia factor for me.
00:49:00
Speaker
Well, and we get to throw another rumor into the rumor mill.
00:49:03
Speaker
You're ready for this?
00:49:05
Speaker
So there has been talk that they've gotten the voices from the old show, from the 80s show.
00:49:11
Speaker
And the source is telling me it's Rob Paulson, which if it is, that would be awesome.
00:49:16
Speaker
To those people that don't know who he is, in the original series, he was Raphael.
00:49:21
Speaker
But when they rebooted it in 2012, he came back as Donatello.
00:49:25
Speaker
So you get a twofer there.
00:49:27
Speaker
You could actually do multiple voices from two of the turtles.
00:49:31
Speaker
Okay, but he's also 30 years older.
00:49:34
Speaker
So is he like a chain-smoking turtle now with a gravelly voice?
00:49:40
Speaker
Yeah.
00:49:45
Speaker
It sounds more like he will be the dude from the big Lebowski.
00:49:49
Speaker
He'll be like an over the hill, like turtle who like didn't really apply himself and only like ate pizza and played with his nunchucks all day.
00:49:58
Speaker
And so, you know, it's a, all right, dude, like, what are we going to do today?
00:50:02
Speaker
Cause I don't have any money.
00:50:06
Speaker
No, Rob's a really nice guy.
00:50:07
Speaker
I've met him in person a couple years back.
00:50:09
Speaker
Oh, I see how you are.
00:50:10
Speaker
Yeah, okay.
00:50:11
Speaker
No, he's not a chain smoker by any means.
00:50:14
Speaker
No, he's a really cool guy because he's done a ton of voices.
00:50:16
Speaker
So he's done like Pinky, or he did The Brain from Peaky and the Brain.
00:50:20
Speaker
I think he also did Pinky.
00:50:22
Speaker
He just, he's done, you have to look at his repertoire.
00:50:25
Speaker
I think he actually holds, it's either him or I can't, now I'm on the spot.
00:50:30
Speaker
I can't remember the other guy's name.
00:50:31
Speaker
But one of them holds the record for most voice songs.
00:50:35
Speaker
voiceovers in like cartoons or something like that.
00:50:38
Speaker
And so Rob, Rob's really cool.
00:50:41
Speaker
Um, if you haven't checked these out, you should go check out, they get a script and they get a bunch of the voice actors together and then they will read the script and they'll just change the voice randomly.
00:50:51
Speaker
So it's SpongeBob one second and then it's like Ninja turtles and then it's, it's just fantastic.
00:50:56
Speaker
So,
00:50:57
Speaker
But that is the rumor.
00:50:58
Speaker
Hopefully that's true.
00:50:59
Speaker
If not, I guess we've got to apologize.
00:51:01
Speaker
But that's what our sources are telling us is Rob Polson's doing some of the custom call-outs for Ninja Turtles.
00:51:07
Speaker
Well, having a voice actor is huge because a voice actor is an extra level of – it's because they are not – okay, they're not just relying on being good looking.
00:51:20
Speaker
How many actors out there are like, okay, yeah, they're a pretty face on the screen, but really they don't bring much to the table.
00:51:27
Speaker
As a voice actor, that's all you're doing.
00:51:29
Speaker
And so you have a built-in credentials for me.
00:51:34
Speaker
Yeah.
00:51:36
Speaker
So I, I, Hey, I I'll be interested to see what happens.
00:51:40
Speaker
Same here.
00:51:41
Speaker
So, all right, let's move on.
00:51:44
Speaker
Um, I've got, Hey, there's a new podcast alert.
00:51:45
Speaker
Have I sent this to you earlier today?
00:51:48
Speaker
Did you, did you listen to this?
00:51:50
Speaker
So there's a funny story about that.
00:51:52
Speaker
So I am listening to it right before we come on to record this and my husband's sitting next to me and I'm playing it and I'm like, oh good God, I'm laughing.
00:52:03
Speaker
And my husband leans over, he's like, is that who's interviewing you today?
00:52:06
Speaker
And I'm like, oh God, no, no, no, no.
00:52:09
Speaker
This is a new show that we're gonna talk about.
00:52:10
Speaker
And he's like, you sound a little jealous.
00:52:12
Speaker
Are you jealous of the Macho Odd Pinball Podcast?
00:52:16
Speaker
I'm like, I am not jealous.
00:52:17
Speaker
He's like, you're jelly.
00:52:19
Speaker
But he did enjoy it.
00:52:20
Speaker
I will say that he's not a pinball podcast connoisseur, but he did enjoy that three minutes of the Macho Man.
00:52:29
Speaker
It's the Macho Man, Randy Savage, apparently has decided to step in the ring and give us some pinball content with the Macho Man Pinball Podcast Pinball Podcast Vlog Show.
00:52:42
Speaker
And if you haven't heard of this yet, you've got to go check it out.
00:52:45
Speaker
The episodes are a minute to three minutes long.
00:52:47
Speaker
It's not much time out of your day.
00:52:49
Speaker
I guarantee.
00:52:50
Speaker
Listen to it in the bathroom while you're hiding from everyone at work.
00:52:53
Speaker
Just do it.
00:52:53
Speaker
It's hilarious.
00:52:55
Speaker
You know, it's what it is.
00:52:56
Speaker
It's basically having a plate of Skittles, Ho-Ho's, Donuts, and Jolt Cola from back in the 80s.
00:53:06
Speaker
You know, it's just this caffeine, sugar, adrenaline rush that you're not going to be able to do anything else.
00:53:13
Speaker
And really, I am jealous of someone who has this much excitement and that brings this much to the table because that is not my personality.
00:53:21
Speaker
So I wish I were that guy.
00:53:23
Speaker
But yes, it is certainly fun.
00:53:25
Speaker
Go check it out.
00:53:27
Speaker
Yeah, I was waiting for him to yell, snap into a Slim Jim.
00:53:29
Speaker
Yeah, snap into a Slim Jim.
00:53:31
Speaker
Yeah, he was very good.
00:53:33
Speaker
It's definitely not something for the kids because there was some of it was I was like, oh.
00:53:39
Speaker
And he talks a whole lot of smack.
00:53:41
Speaker
I was like, oh, my God.
00:53:42
Speaker
I was like, please don't be mad at me, Macho Man.
00:53:46
Speaker
We can be friends.
00:53:48
Speaker
So I'm going to tell you guys a secret right now.
00:53:51
Speaker
I can actually do the Macho Man voice.
00:53:53
Speaker
You ready for this?
00:53:54
Speaker
Oh, no.
00:53:56
Speaker
Oh, yeah, this is the macho man, Randy Savage.
00:53:59
Speaker
You ready to step into the ring?
00:54:01
Speaker
Bring it in.
00:54:02
Speaker
Bring it in.
00:54:02
Speaker
The man across the screen.
00:54:04
Speaker
Yeah, I don't know.
00:54:05
Speaker
That's about as good as you're going to get right now.
00:54:08
Speaker
Okay.
00:54:09
Speaker
That is the most.
00:54:10
Speaker
That's the chai latte.
00:54:13
Speaker
That's the macho man in a Starbucks.
00:54:16
Speaker
Like talking over Nora Jones.
00:54:20
Speaker
That's pretty much.
00:54:23
Speaker
Basically, anytime you listen to the Macho Man, you're thinking, okay, that guy is a vocal cord.
00:54:28
Speaker
You're going to snap at any moment.
00:54:30
Speaker
Hey, I'm the cream of the crop, you see.
00:54:33
Speaker
Oh, yeah.
00:54:35
Speaker
Snap into a Slim Jim.
00:54:39
Speaker
Oh, come on.
00:54:40
Speaker
You know what, though?
00:54:41
Speaker
I'm going to do it.
00:54:41
Speaker
I know he's all talking smack right now.
00:54:43
Speaker
I'm calling you out, macho man.
00:54:45
Speaker
You come on the show.
00:54:47
Speaker
We're going to throw down, right, Scott?
00:54:49
Speaker
No.
00:54:52
Speaker
I am not.
00:54:52
Speaker
I am.
00:54:53
Speaker
Yeah.
00:54:53
Speaker
You stand on that island alone.
00:54:55
Speaker
Exactly.
00:54:57
Speaker
Come on, Lauren.
00:54:57
Speaker
The first male person on your podcast could be macho man, man.
00:55:02
Speaker
Oh, the bar I am setting.
00:55:04
Speaker
So, so high.
00:55:05
Speaker
The problem is if that guy came on our show, it would just be a solid beep.
00:55:13
Speaker
Oh my goodness.
00:55:14
Speaker
It was a good giggle.
00:55:15
Speaker
So, all right.
00:55:16
Speaker
It was entertaining.
00:55:18
Speaker
I will give him points for entertainment for sure.
00:55:20
Speaker
Yeah.
00:55:22
Speaker
And now Scott's crushed my voiceover dreams by saying a macho man in a chai latte.
00:55:27
Speaker
Well, okay.
00:55:28
Speaker
You're like the subdued one.
00:55:29
Speaker
You're basically the, you know, okay.
00:55:31
Speaker
So you're the, the macho man who has gotten over his hump and he's, he's hanging out with the dude in the bowling alley and you're, you're polishing your balls.
00:55:40
Speaker
You know, it's time.
00:55:44
Speaker
Oh my goodness.
00:55:45
Speaker
Okay.
00:55:46
Speaker
Let's, let's move on from this.
00:55:49
Speaker
Our friend Joe Lemire reached out and he wanted to thank us because he won his first tournament.
00:55:54
Speaker
And guess what he was wearing?
00:55:57
Speaker
Not his first tournament.
00:55:58
Speaker
Sorry.
00:55:58
Speaker
Well, he was wearing his he wore our hat.
00:56:02
Speaker
And of course, our hat propelled him to win the tournament.
00:56:06
Speaker
And so I'm I'm dubbing that the Elwin effect.
00:56:09
Speaker
You know, any anybody who wears our our hat gets magical powers.
00:56:15
Speaker
They get a competitive edge is what I told Joe.
00:56:18
Speaker
They do.
00:56:18
Speaker
And this was a very well-fought tournament.
00:56:21
Speaker
He took down Bowen of all people.
00:56:23
Speaker
Was Bowen wearing his hat?
00:56:25
Speaker
So I think that's the problem.
00:56:26
Speaker
If Bowen was wearing his hat, it would have been an even fight.
00:56:29
Speaker
But since he may not have been wearing his hat, then Joe had the edge.
00:56:33
Speaker
Yep.
00:56:34
Speaker
Yeah, you guys, I love that hat.
00:56:36
Speaker
Since it's been out, everybody talks about the hat.
00:56:39
Speaker
If they had had a Twippy for best swag, I think you guys could have had a really good run for your money.
00:56:44
Speaker
So on that hat, I love it.
00:56:46
Speaker
I know, right?
00:56:47
Speaker
I pitched that to Jeff, but he's like, no, we're not going to do pinball swag.
00:56:50
Speaker
And I was like, dude, come on.
00:56:52
Speaker
Yeah.
00:56:53
Speaker
I said this, I was talking to, I think my friend Laura Fraley and we were talking about our friend Jessica DiNardo who has Soft Plunge, which is her pinball swag company.
00:57:02
Speaker
I love it.
00:57:03
Speaker
I have like a million shirts.
00:57:04
Speaker
But I was like, if they had a swag category, you should enter.
00:57:08
Speaker
And I would love a swag category.
00:57:09
Speaker
You got hats and shirts and pins and all this stuff.
00:57:13
Speaker
You know, it's great.
00:57:15
Speaker
Yeah, I have thought about getting the soft, soft plunge booty shorts, but I think I think it would raise my wife's eyebrows a little bit.
00:57:24
Speaker
You know what?
00:57:26
Speaker
Jessica and I talked about those booty shorts.
00:57:27
Speaker
She was like, they're amazing because I was like, I think I have too much booty for the booty shorts.
00:57:31
Speaker
But she's like, no, no, it'll work.
00:57:34
Speaker
But my favorite is they have I have the Wu Tang pinball shirt, pinball rules, everything around me.
00:57:40
Speaker
And then I also have my Golden Girls pinball shirt and I wear them all the time.
00:57:43
Speaker
But yeah, y'all's hat is amazing.
00:57:46
Speaker
I love like when it comes to pinball podcast swag, y'all hands down with the hat.
00:57:52
Speaker
They totally take it.
00:57:53
Speaker
Well, we'll definitely be getting getting some hats out to you and your husband.
00:57:58
Speaker
Yeah.
00:57:58
Speaker
Oh, he would totally wear it.
00:57:59
Speaker
He's a hat guy.
00:58:02
Speaker
We might either ship it to you or we'll bring it down with you when we get to hang out with you at TPF.
00:58:06
Speaker
Yay, for sure.
00:58:07
Speaker
It's right around the corner.
00:58:09
Speaker
You know, I'm so excited.
00:58:11
Speaker
Okay, and also just an update.
00:58:13
Speaker
I know some people have reached out on beanies and the hats.
00:58:17
Speaker
Yes, we are.
00:58:18
Speaker
We're just making them now.
00:58:20
Speaker
We took a little bit of time off just because it was the holidays.
00:58:24
Speaker
And so, yes, we do have a list of people who are interested in those.
00:58:28
Speaker
And if you're still interested in getting a beanie, the beanies are awesome.
00:58:31
Speaker
I'm a big fan.
00:58:33
Speaker
And hats, too.
00:58:34
Speaker
We always have those in stock.
00:58:35
Speaker
And you, too, can win your next tournament by wearing a beanie or a hat or wearing both and get double down.
00:58:42
Speaker
I can never find my beanie because my son keeps stealing it.
00:58:46
Speaker
Like, dude, give that back.
00:58:47
Speaker
That is not yours.
00:58:50
Speaker
But yeah.
00:58:52
Speaker
So
Pinball Community Highlights
00:58:53
Speaker
I've got on here.
00:58:54
Speaker
I totally skipped over this.
00:58:55
Speaker
I don't know why.
00:58:56
Speaker
This has been the biggest talk of the town.
00:58:58
Speaker
And we've kind of talked about this.
00:58:59
Speaker
But what are you guys' thoughts on Twippies?
00:59:00
Speaker
You want to give any predictions or?
00:59:04
Speaker
Oh, my gosh.
00:59:06
Speaker
I'll predict things that aren't in our categories.
00:59:09
Speaker
I guess I'll put it that way.
00:59:12
Speaker
It's Jurassic Park's year.
00:59:14
Speaker
Oh, yeah.
00:59:15
Speaker
And so that's what it is.
00:59:17
Speaker
I think there will be a soft spot for many people with Wonka because a lot of people, that was their dream theme.
00:59:26
Speaker
But if you look at everything that Jurassic Park does, that was the juggernaut that's going to roll through everything.
00:59:34
Speaker
And so I, I imagine that being any category that that is nominated for, I think it'll win.
00:59:41
Speaker
I I'm right there with you.
00:59:43
Speaker
I don't see anything else winning.
00:59:46
Speaker
Well, it's going to take it.
00:59:47
Speaker
I mean, when you're looking at like game of the year, I mean, there were some there were some good stuff out.
00:59:52
Speaker
I mean, I liked Elvira.
00:59:54
Speaker
You know, there was Munsters, Star Wars and kind of on the fence on that one.
00:59:58
Speaker
For me, it was kind of down to Jurassic Park and Willy Wonka.
01:00:01
Speaker
And I just think as a whole package, I think Jurassic Park really takes it.
01:00:07
Speaker
This is last time.
01:00:09
Speaker
I'll let you jump in a second, Josh.
01:00:10
Speaker
And I'll summarize everything.
01:00:13
Speaker
This is where even last year when Josh and I talked about it, this is why I gave it to Iron Maiden because I'm going to give you points for getting games on location.
01:00:23
Speaker
And that really, if you look at and really, if you look at what Eric did with Pirates of the Caribbean, I don't think there is a deeper game out there.
01:00:34
Speaker
I think that it's like a the code had cancerous growth upon cancerous growth.
01:00:39
Speaker
I don't think there's any there were no limits to where that code was going.
01:00:43
Speaker
You are never going to see whatever Valinor is for that game because there's not one Valinor.
01:00:49
Speaker
There's like 95 Valinors for that game.
01:00:52
Speaker
And so what they did with that was so epic and unbelievable that I'm going to give them huge points for what they did.
01:01:00
Speaker
However, I still had to give it to Iron Maiden because they got it on location and it was reliable and they could keep doing.
01:01:07
Speaker
Jurassic Park is exactly the same.
01:01:09
Speaker
Josh, go.
01:01:11
Speaker
I'm right there with you.
01:01:12
Speaker
I think the disadvantage for the other companies are there's not enough volume.
01:01:17
Speaker
Not everyone plays these.
01:01:18
Speaker
I still haven't played Wonka.
01:01:19
Speaker
I know I've got a couple of friends that own it.
01:01:21
Speaker
I just I haven't had time.
01:01:24
Speaker
But Jurassic Park I've played for hours on end.
01:01:28
Speaker
And I've played Black Knight.
01:01:30
Speaker
I've played.
01:01:33
Speaker
Oh, crap.
01:01:33
Speaker
What's else?
01:01:33
Speaker
What's else?
01:01:34
Speaker
So we've got Black Knight, Cosmic Carnival, Munsters, Oktoberfest.
01:01:40
Speaker
See, I've played everything Stern, but that's because it's so readily available.
01:01:44
Speaker
I can hit it.
01:01:46
Speaker
I don't know anywhere that has Oktoberfest.
01:01:48
Speaker
I've never seen it at Cosmic Carnival.
01:01:51
Speaker
Well, Cosmic Carnival you'll see at shows because it was such a limited run.
01:01:55
Speaker
I played Oktoberfest and it was a – the challenge with Oktoberfest is the coolest thing in the game is watching the balls roll down that super spirally wire form.
01:02:10
Speaker
Okay, that doesn't happen enough in the game.
01:02:13
Speaker
And so that's the, like visually, that's the big thing and it's kind of far out there.
01:02:19
Speaker
So it doesn't happen enough.
01:02:21
Speaker
You kind of have to have that, that big moment every, well, when I say the big moment, the big thing in the game, you have to have it like every, every four to five games.
01:02:31
Speaker
Otherwise you're going to just not pay attention to it.
01:02:34
Speaker
Yeah.
01:02:36
Speaker
So the only other category, it kind of makes me chuckle because like I want to bring up the rookie of the year.
01:02:43
Speaker
I know we're in it.
01:02:44
Speaker
I know you're in, Lauren.
01:02:46
Speaker
We are both in it, right?
01:02:48
Speaker
I feel very awkward now in this category because like after the dropdown came out and it's like Tim Sexton on programming and I mean, Brad Albright's fantastic artwork on Led Zeppelin.
01:03:01
Speaker
I'm just like,
01:03:03
Speaker
Do we really even qualify for this category now?
01:03:06
Speaker
And it's one of those, and I know it's been talked about multiple times before.
01:03:09
Speaker
I think it's a category that needs to be redefined for the future.
01:03:13
Speaker
You know what?
01:03:13
Speaker
How about we all get participation awards?
01:03:15
Speaker
Yeah, you know, everybody gets a ribbon for this one.
01:03:19
Speaker
I agree with you guys.
01:03:20
Speaker
I, when I woke up New Year's Day and saw like what I was nominated for, I was over the moon.
01:03:25
Speaker
Like, cause I had not even considered like rookie of the year.
01:03:28
Speaker
Cause I really didn't think I would qualify for something like that.
01:03:31
Speaker
But then I saw that I was in nominated and I mean, wow.
01:03:35
Speaker
Thank you everyone.
01:03:36
Speaker
But I, I will agree with not only you guys, I, um, Dennis from Twip and several other people I've talked to,
01:03:44
Speaker
have said the exact same thing.
01:03:45
Speaker
There were no real good parameters or, you know, this category was really undefined.
01:03:50
Speaker
And I could see this being more for specifically to people who work in pinball, like the Tim Sexton's of the world, you know, that makes more sense to me than maybe, maybe podcasters, but I do appreciate being nominated.
01:04:02
Speaker
I sure do.
01:04:03
Speaker
I totally agree.
01:04:04
Speaker
And I feel bad for the people that didn't make it into certain categories.
01:04:08
Speaker
Like our friends over at Slap Save, I was really shocked when they didn't make it.
01:04:12
Speaker
I couldn't.
01:04:13
Speaker
You know what?
01:04:14
Speaker
They are so amazing.
01:04:18
Speaker
Fowler, I love him to pieces.
01:04:19
Speaker
And they do such a great show.
01:04:23
Speaker
I mean, I really did have a push.
01:04:25
Speaker
Like I wanted to be nominated.
01:04:26
Speaker
I had my own reasons for that.
01:04:29
Speaker
I was very happy to just be nominated.
01:04:31
Speaker
But the fact that they were left to me, they were left off the list.
01:04:33
Speaker
I felt really bad.
01:04:35
Speaker
I was like, they do such a great show.
01:04:37
Speaker
Oh, yeah.
01:04:38
Speaker
Their production is fantastic.
01:04:40
Speaker
And so – but other than that, I just – I want to make one statement about the Twippies.
01:04:46
Speaker
It's pinball, guys.
01:04:47
Speaker
Like, let's calm down.
01:04:48
Speaker
This is a wonderful way to congratulate the hobby.
01:04:53
Speaker
And I think that a lot of the drama –
01:04:55
Speaker
It puts a lot of bad taste in a lot of people's mouth.
01:04:58
Speaker
I think there's a lot of people out there that don't want to speak up because they don't feel like they have a place there.
01:05:03
Speaker
But like we need to calm the drama down.
01:05:05
Speaker
Just a hair.
01:05:06
Speaker
It is at a pinball award show that I have to explain to like 99% of the people who aren't in pinball.
01:05:12
Speaker
Like what do you –
01:05:14
Speaker
I'm like, it's like the People's Choice Awards for pinball, y'all.
01:05:16
Speaker
That's what it is.
01:05:17
Speaker
And people getting super salty about it.
01:05:20
Speaker
I'm like, it is an award show for pinball, y'all need to just, you know, bring, bring it down a couple of notches, have a good time.
01:05:27
Speaker
You know, I'm excited because I bought like fancy shoes that I can wear to TPF.
01:05:32
Speaker
I was like, I'm just excited about my pinball outfit.
01:05:34
Speaker
So
01:05:35
Speaker
You know, that's what I'm excited about.
01:05:38
Speaker
You know, there are some categories I'm really excited about, but I there's no reason to be, you know, hateful or mean or bitter.
01:05:48
Speaker
I'm like, it's a pinball award show.
01:05:50
Speaker
I mean, if you're getting this up in arms about that, I'm like, you know, gosh, I don't know what your life is like, but you need a hug.
01:05:58
Speaker
I'm giving you a hug.
01:06:00
Speaker
Yeah, it's this.
01:06:02
Speaker
This is the king and the queen of the prom.
01:06:05
Speaker
It's like the people who got nominated, even like I want to say campaigning, but they mentioned it.
01:06:13
Speaker
They asked their friends.
01:06:14
Speaker
They talked about, hey, this is what's going on.
01:06:16
Speaker
But again, it's not a big deal.
01:06:18
Speaker
Seriously, there are no shoe contracts on the line.
01:06:22
Speaker
Let's just take it for what it is.
01:06:24
Speaker
And we're all good.
01:06:26
Speaker
None of our paychecks are changing with this award.
01:06:28
Speaker
And so great.
01:06:29
Speaker
And if you win, and I'm not downplaying people who win, I mean, God bless.
01:06:34
Speaker
I'm glad that you are affecting people's lives for the good.
01:06:38
Speaker
And if you, if you continue to win an award, great, you're affecting someone in a positive way.
01:06:45
Speaker
So great.
01:06:45
Speaker
Let's, let's just keep going.
01:06:48
Speaker
And me personally, we know Jeff Patterson fairly well over at TWIP and just my hat's off to him.
01:06:53
Speaker
It's a lot of work.
01:06:55
Speaker
And so that's kind of the other reason I'm like, come on, guys, like, let's bring the drama back just a little bit.
01:06:59
Speaker
I know he takes a brunt of a lot of this and I just...
01:07:02
Speaker
this is a very awesome way to celebrate the hobby.
01:07:05
Speaker
And I think that that's what we should be doing is celebrating instead of at each, you know?
01:07:10
Speaker
Yeah.
01:07:11
Speaker
So let's have, let's get together and have some fun.
01:07:13
Speaker
It was just, I think just a way to celebrate the hobby and people are just taking it way too seriously.
01:07:20
Speaker
I mean, I'm excited.
01:07:21
Speaker
I'm going to stump for the categories I'm in for sure.
01:07:24
Speaker
But at the end of the day, if I lose, I'm not going to like, you know, be bitter party of one, you know, I'm like, Oh, I didn't win.
01:07:30
Speaker
Oh, well, you know, it's,
01:07:32
Speaker
You know what we can do now?
01:07:37
Speaker
All of us in this room, well, room.
01:07:39
Speaker
All of us in this chat right now.
01:07:41
Speaker
So, you know, like when Leonardo DiCaprio, when he doesn't win something, it's like Oscar nominated.
01:07:46
Speaker
Oh my goodness.
01:07:48
Speaker
I hadn't even thought about that.
01:07:50
Speaker
Twippy nominated.
01:07:51
Speaker
That is going to precede everything now.
01:07:54
Speaker
Exactly.
01:07:55
Speaker
However, if we win, I swear I will buy an airplane seat next to me and just put the award on it when I'm flying home.
01:08:02
Speaker
and just like send a picture.
01:08:04
Speaker
It's like, yeah, yeah, it's my work.
01:08:05
Speaker
They get a seat.
01:08:08
Speaker
Oh my God.
01:08:09
Speaker
I will say in like in a slightly serious tone, I was incredibly honored and excited to have my home Bells chapter nominated for League of the Year, which I thought was also kind of a weird category.
01:08:21
Speaker
But I was excited because we were the only ladies chapter to be nominated in that category.
01:08:27
Speaker
So I'm just going to, I will, out of all the things I was nominated for, honestly, this is the one that means the most.
01:08:33
Speaker
I mean, not that I don't want to win the other things, but
01:08:37
Speaker
It's not just me.
01:08:37
Speaker
It's the entire chapter.
01:08:39
Speaker
So if you don't have a horse in the race and you're looking for a chapter to support or a league to support Bells and Chimes San Antonio, we would love your vote.
01:08:49
Speaker
That would be awesome.
01:08:50
Speaker
I would love to see you up there accepting that award for on behalf of – I mean it's bells and chimes.
01:08:55
Speaker
So you can do it for the behalf of the women across the world.
01:08:58
Speaker
Honestly, when I'm like stumping for it, that's what I'm doing.
01:09:01
Speaker
I'm like this isn't just about me.
01:09:03
Speaker
This is about every bells chapter, every ladies league that's out there.
01:09:08
Speaker
And we're growing by leaps and bounds every day.
01:09:11
Speaker
More women are entering the hobby every day.
01:09:13
Speaker
And a lot of them start with bells chapters or their local ladies league chapter.
01:09:17
Speaker
So I'm, you know, I really do consider this a win if we do win for all women in pinball.
01:09:23
Speaker
So I, which is kind of like a big thing to think about, but you know, I mean, and again, it's a twippy.
01:09:29
Speaker
I mean, I'm like, you know, it's not world peace or anything, but it's, it's one of those things where this is kind of a main stage for pinball for, for the visibility of it and for a ladies league to win for me would be a really big deal.
01:09:44
Speaker
Okay, I want to hit two more notes before we wrap it up.
01:09:46
Speaker
I know we're running just a hair long.
01:09:48
Speaker
Sorry, guys.
01:09:50
Speaker
No, you're totally fine.
01:09:52
Speaker
So first note is I want to congratulate Special One Lit.
01:09:55
Speaker
Oh, yeah.
01:09:56
Speaker
That 24-hour charity, that was amazing.
01:10:01
Speaker
And that right there is what pinball is about, using your platform for something more.
01:10:08
Speaker
And it's just insane.
01:10:10
Speaker
They raised over $50,000 today.
01:10:13
Speaker
That's more than most minimum.
01:10:14
Speaker
That's more than what?
01:10:15
Speaker
Fifteen dollars an hour for people's wage for the year.
01:10:18
Speaker
It is more than the average, you know, take home pay for, you know, average America.
01:10:23
Speaker
I mean, that is a lot of money.
01:10:26
Speaker
And he did such an amazing job.
01:10:28
Speaker
I mean, hats off to you guys.
01:10:30
Speaker
I mean, that was amazing.
01:10:31
Speaker
I when I saw how much they took in, I was shocked.
01:10:35
Speaker
I mean, he did an amazing job, but that is a whole lot of money to a really good cause.
01:10:40
Speaker
Well, I will say two things.
01:10:42
Speaker
One, great, great job.
01:10:45
Speaker
Buy special one lit.
01:10:46
Speaker
What an amazing thing to do.
01:10:48
Speaker
Also, you hear it all the time.
01:10:51
Speaker
There are great people in the hobby.
01:10:56
Speaker
When people put down their flamethrowers and they try to focus on the things that are most important, then this is what's most important is actually finding a common goal that we can all say, that's a good goal.
01:11:07
Speaker
And so...
01:11:09
Speaker
I'm going to give two shout outs.
01:11:12
Speaker
One, for them for organizing it, because again, that takes a lot of effort and a lot of planning.
01:11:17
Speaker
And you're putting yourself a risk out there, because if you put yourself and you do all the effort and you earn 20 bucks, then you feel really bad.
01:11:25
Speaker
But the fact that everybody stepped up and responded to everything they did, that says a lot for the community on the whole, and that it's so easy to focus on the negative.
01:11:36
Speaker
But this is one giant positive that we can all wear around our necks.
01:11:42
Speaker
Well, not only that, like just some of the stuff that they got to like the manufacturers backing them like that, that monster bash, one of a kind play field.
01:11:50
Speaker
And I mean, just the people and the personnel that came in like Roger Sharp and just the designers.
01:11:55
Speaker
I mean, you've got Scott Denise saying next to Steve Ritchie, they're entirely two different companies.
01:12:00
Speaker
They've come together.
01:12:02
Speaker
to support this cause.
01:12:03
Speaker
And it was just, it was awesome.
01:12:05
Speaker
So hats off to you guys.
01:12:06
Speaker
I know Ken said he's probably not going to do a 24 hours again, or if someone else wants to host it, they'll, they'll find someone to host it.
01:12:13
Speaker
But I think if you host it, you've got to have it in Chicago because that's where everyone was at.
01:12:17
Speaker
Like that's what you have to do.
01:12:20
Speaker
I can't, I can't host it in Salt Lake city.
01:12:22
Speaker
It's just not going to work.
01:12:23
Speaker
Exactly.
01:12:24
Speaker
So, so we'll all fly up there.
01:12:25
Speaker
We're going to go fly and host it.
01:12:28
Speaker
Right.
01:12:28
Speaker
So, but
Inside the Pinball Arcade Segment with Lauren
01:12:30
Speaker
no, that was awesome.
01:12:30
Speaker
That was fantastic.
01:12:32
Speaker
So, and the last thing, Lauren, I don't know if you know this, but we always do a segment still when people are on.
01:12:40
Speaker
Yes.
01:12:40
Speaker
So let me, let me spin the prize.
01:12:43
Speaker
Ready for this?
01:12:43
Speaker
Okay.
01:12:45
Speaker
We've got to put that tune.
01:12:47
Speaker
No, no.
01:12:48
Speaker
20 questions.
01:12:48
Speaker
Ooh.
01:12:49
Speaker
Oh, and it's inside the pinball arcade.
01:12:53
Speaker
Hey, look, that's your segment.
01:12:55
Speaker
Surprise, surprise.
01:12:55
Speaker
How weird is that?
01:12:57
Speaker
Surprise, surprise.
01:12:59
Speaker
So for Scott that doesn't know.
01:13:01
Speaker
Hey, this is new to me too.
01:13:07
Speaker
So for those that don't know out there, Lauren on her show does inside the pinball arcade where she asks, it's eight questions, correct?
01:13:14
Speaker
Correct.
01:13:15
Speaker
And it's kind of like a get to know you.
01:13:18
Speaker
what she uses to wrap up her show and I love it.
01:13:20
Speaker
And so I just, we, we have to do this.
01:13:22
Speaker
So,
01:13:24
Speaker
So, so I, okay, so I have to kind of give you the backstory of this.
01:13:29
Speaker
So I, when I started the podcast, I was like, I have to have a segment and, you know, market trends is already taken.
01:13:36
Speaker
So what am I going to do?
01:13:37
Speaker
And I had always loved the show inside the actor's studio, like the one that was real popular in the nineties.
01:13:43
Speaker
So inside the pinball arcade is kind of an homage to that where it's like, you get to know somebody and their pinball mind.
01:13:49
Speaker
So I, the questions really kind of spun off that show.
01:13:53
Speaker
Okay, cool.
01:13:54
Speaker
So I want to ask these questions to you because I want to, I don't know.
01:13:58
Speaker
Have you asked them to yourself on your show?
01:13:59
Speaker
I can't remember.
01:14:02
Speaker
I have not.
01:14:03
Speaker
Teolis and Parsons, when they had me on, did a modified version because they had heard about the segment.
01:14:09
Speaker
So, but I've never been, every once in a while, somebody will ask me like, hey, what do you like?
01:14:14
Speaker
But I've never had them asked to me on my show.
01:14:17
Speaker
No.
01:14:18
Speaker
So let's start this bad boy off.
01:14:20
Speaker
So question number one.
01:14:22
Speaker
Okay, Lauren, tell us what game do you love on the pinball arcade?
01:14:28
Speaker
I'm keeping that in.
01:14:31
Speaker
Or should I do it in the Macho Man?
01:14:32
Speaker
Lauren, step into the Slim Jim.
01:14:35
Speaker
Which game do you crush on the pinball arcade?
01:14:37
Speaker
Okay, okay.
01:14:41
Speaker
My game that I love is Bram Stoker's Dracula.
01:14:45
Speaker
I talk about it all the time.
01:14:46
Speaker
It is my baby.
01:14:48
Speaker
I love it more than life itself.
01:14:50
Speaker
It is my favorite game.
01:14:52
Speaker
That is awesome.
01:14:53
Speaker
I would have trouble bringing that one home because of the artwork on the play field.
01:14:58
Speaker
Yeah.
01:14:58
Speaker
My wife walked by.
01:14:59
Speaker
Yeah.
01:14:59
Speaker
Yeah.
01:14:59
Speaker
Yeah.
01:15:01
Speaker
You got that in the back.
01:15:04
Speaker
Yeah.
01:15:04
Speaker
It's not for the kids, but it is it is my personal favorite.
01:15:09
Speaker
I'm a very big Barry Ousler fan.
01:15:10
Speaker
Oh, yes.
01:15:12
Speaker
And then also I vividly remember playing that game.
01:15:15
Speaker
And I just I love it.
01:15:18
Speaker
There are not there are not enough hours in the day for me to talk about how much I love that game.
01:15:22
Speaker
Have you seen the one that was made out of a coffin?
01:15:25
Speaker
Have you seen that one?
01:15:26
Speaker
Yes, I have seen that one.
01:15:28
Speaker
I think that would take it a step too far with the spouse.
01:15:32
Speaker
But I'm going to give kudos to that guy because I'm like, that looks excellent.
01:15:36
Speaker
And I love it.
01:15:38
Speaker
I have all the mods.
01:15:39
Speaker
I want to get the pin soundboard next to upgrade the sounds that are in the game.
01:15:43
Speaker
But yeah, I'm totally trying to mod it out.
01:15:46
Speaker
Do you have the 3D, the 3D, what is it, the tombstone up there?
01:15:50
Speaker
Yeah, they have a tombstone topper that's like a 3D lit up.
01:15:55
Speaker
I'm not a topper person.
01:15:56
Speaker
Like, I'm not Team Zack Many.
01:15:58
Speaker
I'm not a topper person.
01:16:00
Speaker
They're okay, but like, I'm not one of the, that's like the one mod where I'm like, eh, no, I bought like, um.
01:16:05
Speaker
different light up things and i bought like the graveyard to cover some of the switches and i bought um on pin side one of there was somebody that was selling um like a modified because the the confidant there the guy looks like uh well i've had it said before ron jeremy and it's a it's a terrible terrible like model in there it's horrible
01:16:24
Speaker
So I'm like, it was the one thing I hated about the game.
01:16:27
Speaker
So I bought a mod on Pinside where it looks like him like coming out of the coffin and like his bat, like man form.
01:16:34
Speaker
And it's very scary looking and I love it.
01:16:36
Speaker
And it lights up.
01:16:37
Speaker
So that, yeah, like I'm all about the mods, love mods.
01:16:42
Speaker
Nice.
01:16:43
Speaker
All right.
01:16:43
Speaker
Question number two.
01:16:44
Speaker
Is this the game that you hate, right?
01:16:46
Speaker
Yes.
01:16:46
Speaker
What game do you hate?
01:16:48
Speaker
Right now, it's tough.
01:16:50
Speaker
Because for me, game hatred goes a lot for like really bad competition moments.
01:16:56
Speaker
So right now I'm hating on Stargate.
01:16:58
Speaker
Stargate is a giant dumpster fire.
01:17:00
Speaker
I know it's supposed to be like the best Gottlieb ever, but I feel it's a bag full of lies.
01:17:04
Speaker
Yeah, I don't like Stargate.
01:17:06
Speaker
It kicked me out of the dang Space City Open and I hate it so much.
01:17:11
Speaker
Wow.
01:17:12
Speaker
That's fantastic.
01:17:13
Speaker
Wow.
01:17:16
Speaker
Oh, my goodness.
01:17:17
Speaker
Okay.
01:17:18
Speaker
Question number three.
01:17:19
Speaker
So what is your favorite pinball art on the pinball arcade?
01:17:24
Speaker
Ooh, you know, day glow neon aside, Randy Savage, I'm going to go with Fathom.
01:17:34
Speaker
I'm a huge fan of that period, like 70s style artwork.
01:17:39
Speaker
You know, the ladies dragging the men into the ocean set aside.
01:17:44
Speaker
It is actually one of the most beautiful art packages, I think, in pinball.
01:17:49
Speaker
And it is definitely on my must have list at some point in my collection.
01:17:54
Speaker
I totally agree.
01:17:55
Speaker
That is a beautiful game.
01:17:56
Speaker
It just, yeah.
01:17:58
Speaker
There's not enough fathoms out there.
01:18:00
Speaker
Yeah, there is.
01:18:00
Speaker
And I try to keep an eye out when I see one, but they just get snapped up so quickly.
01:18:05
Speaker
Well, in fairness, I'm not sure a fathom is a $5,000 game.
01:18:11
Speaker
I love it.
01:18:12
Speaker
It's beautiful.
01:18:12
Speaker
But when you start looking at, okay, is it like a Jurassic Park Pro?
01:18:17
Speaker
Probably not.
01:18:19
Speaker
And that's the hard thing with these, like, you know, games like Fathom or Genie or something where, you know, people really like it.
01:18:26
Speaker
It's coveted.
01:18:27
Speaker
Like, it's kind of, I put it in the, oh, God, what is it?
01:18:30
Speaker
Flash Gordon kind of category.
01:18:31
Speaker
People really love it for, like, nostalgia or art.
01:18:34
Speaker
But do I want to pay $4,500 for it?
01:18:39
Speaker
Yeah.
01:18:39
Speaker
It's tough.
01:18:40
Speaker
So I, I'm really trying to find that diamond in the rough or something that, you know, Oh, I don't know what this is.
01:18:45
Speaker
And I'm selling it at my estate sale.
01:18:47
Speaker
I'm like, keeping my fingers crossed.
01:18:50
Speaker
I just don't think that's going to work out for me.
01:18:53
Speaker
You never know.
01:18:54
Speaker
It might.
01:18:54
Speaker
It might.
01:18:55
Speaker
So, okay.
01:18:56
Speaker
Question number four, what is your favorite pinball sound?
01:19:00
Speaker
Um, so if we're going to go sound package, I'm a, I, it's the intro music to my podcast and that would be TNA.
01:19:08
Speaker
The soundtrack to TNA is amazing.
01:19:10
Speaker
And I love the music so, so much.
01:19:12
Speaker
Um, particular sound though, a mech makes is the spinner from Harlem Globetrotters.
01:19:17
Speaker
I love that dang spinner.
01:19:19
Speaker
All of them.
01:19:20
Speaker
Um, and that's just a particular sound that I love.
01:19:23
Speaker
I do love your TNA intro, but yeah.
01:19:26
Speaker
What got me hooked was those first two episodes when you did that song.
01:19:30
Speaker
How you like that?
01:19:31
Speaker
Oh, yes.
01:19:32
Speaker
Oh.
01:19:33
Speaker
That thing, I'd never heard that before.
01:19:36
Speaker
And I was just like, I had that stuck in my ear for three weeks because it just, I kept humming it.
01:19:43
Speaker
And then it's funny, I never heard it.
01:19:44
Speaker
So I'm playing your podcast.
01:19:46
Speaker
I'm trying to just sajam off my phone while playing your podcast to figure out who sings that song.
01:19:53
Speaker
It's great.
01:19:53
Speaker
Yeah, I know.
01:19:54
Speaker
The songs, How Do You Like That by Ollie Anna.
01:19:57
Speaker
And I'd heard it and I loved it.
01:19:59
Speaker
I switched over to Scott's music because of the copywriting issue because I didn't want to have any kind of issues and all that.
01:20:08
Speaker
So that's kind of why I went away from that song.
01:20:10
Speaker
But I do love that song.
01:20:11
Speaker
If you listen to the first couple of episodes, that is the intro music before I started switching over to the Denise intro.
01:20:19
Speaker
Yep.
01:20:20
Speaker
So thank you.
01:20:20
Speaker
I love that song.
01:20:21
Speaker
It's a great song.
01:20:22
Speaker
Oh, it's fantastic.
01:20:25
Speaker
The two things correlate my mind as soon as I hear that.
01:20:27
Speaker
So I'm like, hey, where's the back box podcast?
01:20:29
Speaker
Like I need to hear Lauren now.
01:20:32
Speaker
So anyhow.
01:20:33
Speaker
So, all right.
01:20:35
Speaker
Scott with question number five.
01:20:37
Speaker
Okay.
01:20:38
Speaker
Lauren, what is your favorite festival event to play in?
01:20:43
Speaker
Oh, I really have to dedicate this episode to the macho man for sure.
01:20:49
Speaker
I haven't gotten to get out of Texas as much, so this is kind of limited.
01:20:54
Speaker
But my favorite festival or event really has to be the Houston Arcade Expo.
01:20:59
Speaker
It's kind of like our local expo.
01:21:02
Speaker
I get to see all of my friends.
01:21:03
Speaker
We have so much fun.
01:21:04
Speaker
It is the party expo for a reason.
01:21:07
Speaker
It's at this Marriott, and it is just one giant party.
01:21:11
Speaker
Wow.
01:21:11
Speaker
Whereas like TPF, you know, you have the competition part and it's a lot more like a true expo.
01:21:17
Speaker
There's booths and things like that.
01:21:19
Speaker
Houston Arcade Expo, they do have the tournaments and stuff, but it is like a giant party.
01:21:23
Speaker
There's all kinds of fun to be had.
01:21:27
Speaker
Nice.
01:21:28
Speaker
Alrighty.
01:21:29
Speaker
Well, and you know, honestly, I'm excited for TPF.
01:21:32
Speaker
I've never been before.
01:21:33
Speaker
So this is my first TPF too.
01:21:34
Speaker
So I didn't get to go the last couple of years because it conflicted with my job.
01:21:38
Speaker
So this is going to be my first TPF.
01:21:41
Speaker
Very cool.
01:21:41
Speaker
Okay, just be careful when they invite you to a distributor-sponsored dinner.
01:21:50
Speaker
There may be...
01:21:53
Speaker
Let's just say there are some restaurants down there that I think the steaks are wearing more than the waitresses are.
01:22:00
Speaker
Oh, yeah, yeah.
01:22:02
Speaker
I do live in Texas.
01:22:03
Speaker
There are a collection of restaurants where I'm like, oh, my goodness.
01:22:06
Speaker
Okay.
01:22:08
Speaker
I would hope they wouldn't invite me to that place.
01:22:11
Speaker
But, you know, you never know.
01:22:12
Speaker
Yeah.
01:22:13
Speaker
One of our buddies was invited.
01:22:15
Speaker
And he walked in.
01:22:16
Speaker
He's like, oh.
01:22:17
Speaker
Turn around and walked out of it.
01:22:19
Speaker
It's like, this is not really our spot.
01:22:20
Speaker
All right.
01:22:21
Speaker
Question number six.
01:22:22
Speaker
What is your grail pin?
01:22:24
Speaker
So I consider BSD my grail.
01:22:26
Speaker
So now that I have my grail, I need to go on another quest.
01:22:30
Speaker
The two that I really want, one is, and I just think this is more of a money issue than a possibility, is Indiana Jones.
01:22:39
Speaker
I love Indiana Jones.
01:22:42
Speaker
Not the stern.
01:22:42
Speaker
The...
01:22:45
Speaker
Other Indiana Jones.
01:22:47
Speaker
But the other one is a cocktail table called Night Moves.
01:22:53
Speaker
I love that thing so much.
01:22:54
Speaker
I ran into it at a pin golf tournament in Dallas and somebody had it in the back.
01:23:00
Speaker
I'm like, this is the best thing ever.
01:23:02
Speaker
ever because it's so cheesy if you have not played it i would go google it it's on youtube it has like everybody's dressed like they're uh extra on miami vice and it has all the colors and the music is so cheesy it's the best so that's like my my big grail um they don't come up that often so i've been trying to keep an eye out all right question number seven you ready scott yes but i'm trying to look up night moves right now
01:23:30
Speaker
Oh, wow.
01:23:31
Speaker
Yeah.
01:23:33
Speaker
That person looks fierce.
01:23:37
Speaker
Have you seen the ad?
01:23:38
Speaker
Oh, yeah.
01:23:41
Speaker
It's a woman who looks like she's wearing, I don't know, it's kind of like a combination of a prom dress mini skirt with a rodeo top.
01:23:49
Speaker
Yeah.
01:23:50
Speaker
It's a look.
01:23:51
Speaker
Super fresh.
01:23:53
Speaker
You know what?
01:23:54
Speaker
She makes that her own.
01:23:56
Speaker
That is crazy.
01:23:57
Speaker
Because if you're going to do it, go big or go home.
01:23:59
Speaker
To me, it was so over the top every time I see it.
01:24:03
Speaker
And then you have to hear the music.
01:24:05
Speaker
The music is the best part to me.
01:24:08
Speaker
It's a really great – if you play it, it's a lot of fun.
01:24:11
Speaker
It actually has a pretty decent rule set for a little cocktail table.
01:24:15
Speaker
But it is 1989 wrapped up with a pretty bow.
01:24:20
Speaker
Wow.
01:24:21
Speaker
You know what?
01:24:22
Speaker
You have to be committed for that Gottlieb to be in your collection.
01:24:27
Speaker
Oh, my goodness.
01:24:27
Speaker
Yeah, I know.
01:24:28
Speaker
I love it.
01:24:29
Speaker
Okay.
01:24:31
Speaker
Okay.
01:24:32
Speaker
We're in the Starbucks now, so we're having our cherry latte.
01:24:35
Speaker
Who would you like to play head-to-head?
01:24:38
Speaker
Oh, who would I like to play head to head or share a coffee with?
01:24:42
Speaker
I would.
01:24:44
Speaker
And I've said Randy Savage, obviously.
01:24:46
Speaker
Randy is number one, of course.
01:24:47
Speaker
So number two would be Roger Sharp.
01:24:51
Speaker
I the man has an episode of Drunk History.
01:24:55
Speaker
To me, he would be like the person I most want to meet.
01:24:58
Speaker
I have his trading card that he signed that my friend Gene gave to me as a gift.
01:25:03
Speaker
Um, so I was, he's the person I most want to meet and would love to play.
01:25:07
Speaker
He's going to like totally beat me and I'm fine with that, but, but he would be the person I'd love to play the most.
01:25:14
Speaker
Okay.
01:25:14
Speaker
Now I, I have a great idea.
01:25:17
Speaker
We need to make rookie trading cards for rookie of the year.
01:25:20
Speaker
Oh my God.
01:25:21
Speaker
That would be the best.
01:25:23
Speaker
And just hand them out to everybody.
01:25:24
Speaker
Just like, no, these are, how many are in the category?
01:25:27
Speaker
Like 25.
01:25:27
Speaker
So awesome.
01:25:28
Speaker
Yeah.
01:25:29
Speaker
Yeah.
01:25:33
Speaker
should laminate them.
01:25:33
Speaker
Just, it just, maybe you just make one set and hand it to the person like as participation trophy.
01:25:38
Speaker
It's like, here's your rookie card.
01:25:40
Speaker
And we gotta be like with the pinball machine, like doing things, you know, with the rookie cards, you'd be like, you know, holding a basketball or holding a bat, you know, we have to be doing things.
01:25:48
Speaker
Oh yes.
01:25:49
Speaker
Yeah.
01:25:50
Speaker
Doing best is since it's a rookie card, we should all be standing at a machine, but awkward.
01:25:55
Speaker
Oh yeah.
01:25:56
Speaker
No, it's just awkward.
01:25:57
Speaker
Cause we don't, we haven't been in the biz yet.
01:25:59
Speaker
So we look really like, right.
01:26:00
Speaker
So we don't know how to play.
01:26:02
Speaker
It's very Ricky Bobby.
01:26:03
Speaker
I don't know what to do with my hands, you know?
01:26:05
Speaker
Exactly.
01:26:06
Speaker
Yeah.
01:26:06
Speaker
Yeah.
01:26:07
Speaker
All right.
01:26:08
Speaker
I'm putting Scott down for that.
01:26:10
Speaker
Yes.
01:26:11
Speaker
Putting you in charge.
01:26:14
Speaker
Nice.
01:26:15
Speaker
That's, that's gotta be the best idea that's come out of twit so far.
01:26:18
Speaker
Yeah.
01:26:19
Speaker
Well, yeah, I will say I also do want to get a reversible shirt that you can just take it.
01:26:24
Speaker
And one side says like winning in life, losing at pinball.
01:26:29
Speaker
And you flip it around.
01:26:30
Speaker
It says losing at pinball, winning at life or losing in life, winning at pinball.
01:26:33
Speaker
All right.
01:26:35
Speaker
We're on to the final question.
01:26:36
Speaker
What is your dream theme?
01:26:38
Speaker
Oh my gosh, this is so hard.
01:26:40
Speaker
I have many dream themes and we collect a list on the Backbox Pinball podcast just in case pinball distributors are wanting to find some really good ideas.
01:26:51
Speaker
So for me, I have, I'm going to say two.
01:26:54
Speaker
Um, what my, my number one dream theme, and I don't understand why this has not been made yet is the princess bride.
01:27:00
Speaker
Um, I am a massive fan of that movie.
01:27:03
Speaker
It's one of my favorite movies of all time.
01:27:04
Speaker
I feel that it lends itself to pinball.
01:27:06
Speaker
I feel it checks all the boxes.
01:27:08
Speaker
It lends itself to pinball.
01:27:09
Speaker
It has a story.
01:27:11
Speaker
So it would be really easy to kind of map out as like a quest style game.
01:27:15
Speaker
Um, most of the actors are still with us.
01:27:17
Speaker
Thank goodness.
01:27:18
Speaker
You could get call outs, hopefully from someone, um,
01:27:21
Speaker
Um, yeah, I just think there's just so much there.
01:27:24
Speaker
And it, you know, checks that nostalgia factor for the certain age group that they like to go after.
01:27:28
Speaker
You know, why hasn't that been made?
01:27:31
Speaker
I don't know.
01:27:32
Speaker
I totally agree.
01:27:34
Speaker
Yeah.
01:27:34
Speaker
I don't either.
01:27:36
Speaker
The other one.
01:27:37
Speaker
And I don't feel this would be made.
01:27:39
Speaker
I maybe it's too niche, but if they made Rick and Morty, I don't understand why they can't make Bob's burgers.
01:27:44
Speaker
That is my, one of my favorite TV shows.
01:27:46
Speaker
I have all kinds of Bob's burger stuff all over my office and house.
01:27:51
Speaker
I love it.
01:27:52
Speaker
And I would love to see that made into a pinball game.
01:27:55
Speaker
Okay.
01:27:55
Speaker
I watched one episode of Bob's burgers and I seriously said, what did I just watch?
01:28:00
Speaker
It's a little odd.
01:28:01
Speaker
Like I'm going to say it's a little odd and maybe not.
01:28:04
Speaker
A little?
01:28:05
Speaker
Wow.
01:28:07
Speaker
No, okay.
01:28:09
Speaker
It's like niche, niche.
01:28:11
Speaker
I know.
01:28:13
Speaker
I thought it was fine, but I just – I didn't – I guess I just didn't get it yet.
01:28:19
Speaker
But it was – the kid like shaved his head and grew a mustache like his dad.
01:28:25
Speaker
So he was like an old man and she was doing some video thing trying to find out who the phantom pooper was in the –
01:28:34
Speaker
In the school.
01:28:37
Speaker
You know which episode you're talking about.
01:28:39
Speaker
I was like, this is just so bizarre.
01:28:42
Speaker
It's a little odd.
01:28:44
Speaker
It's not the most traditional thing.
01:28:47
Speaker
I'm a huge fan of a TV show called King of the Hill.
01:28:51
Speaker
And the guy who created King of the Hill is the creator behind Bob's Burgers.
01:28:54
Speaker
So it's got a very quirky kind of mentality to it.
01:28:59
Speaker
It's not for everybody.
01:29:00
Speaker
That's why I'm like, I don't think Bob's Burgers would ever be made.
01:29:03
Speaker
It's a little too off the wall.
01:29:06
Speaker
But it's one of my favorite shows.
01:29:09
Speaker
They made a Rick and Morty.
01:29:12
Speaker
How many people actually got Rick and Morty?
01:29:13
Speaker
It's like, OK, so what is this?
01:29:16
Speaker
And then they made a mistake of watching with their kids and like, whoa.
01:29:22
Speaker
So sorry.
01:29:23
Speaker
I don't know why I totally space this.
01:29:24
Speaker
I was going to bring this back up a while ago, but I know that when your favorite shows that you talk about is Big Bang Theory as well.
01:29:32
Speaker
Chuck Lorre, the creator of Big Bang Theory, was actually the guy that wrote the Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles theme song.
01:29:39
Speaker
No way!
01:29:40
Speaker
I did not know that.
01:29:41
Speaker
Yes, that was one of his first gigs.
01:29:44
Speaker
He was like a traveling tunesman or something.
01:29:47
Speaker
They talked about this.
01:29:47
Speaker
Scott shared it with me.
01:29:49
Speaker
It's like the toys that make us.
01:29:50
Speaker
It's episode one of season three.
01:29:52
Speaker
But they talked to Chuck Lorre and he's like, yeah, everyone knows me for Big Bang and knows me for Two and a Half Men and Will and Grace.
01:29:59
Speaker
But what they don't know is I wrote this song.
01:30:01
Speaker
And it's like, that is ingrained in my memory.
01:30:04
Speaker
I just sang it a little while ago.
01:30:05
Speaker
I mean, oh my God, what a cool fact.
01:30:08
Speaker
That's really neat.
01:30:09
Speaker
I did not know that.
01:30:10
Speaker
But yes, I'm a huge fan of the Big Bang Theory.
01:30:15
Speaker
Yeah, there are a lot of people who things you don't realize, like Barry Manilow wrote a whole bunch of jingles.
01:30:20
Speaker
So
Retro Game Ideas and Closing Remarks
01:30:21
Speaker
like, like a good neighbor, State Farm is there.
01:30:24
Speaker
That's Barry Manilow.
01:30:25
Speaker
What?
01:30:26
Speaker
I did not know that either.
01:30:27
Speaker
Yeah, just all these.
01:30:28
Speaker
He was like a jingle writer.
01:30:30
Speaker
And so like all those ones that you know, it's, yeah, it's total non sequitur.
01:30:34
Speaker
But you're thinking, oh, I would not have predicted that.
01:30:37
Speaker
And now I have Mandy stuck in my head.
01:30:38
Speaker
So thank you.
01:30:40
Speaker
Mandy, you came and you gave.
01:30:42
Speaker
Yeah, no.
01:30:43
Speaker
Yeah, thank you.
01:30:46
Speaker
It could have been the Copacabana.
01:30:48
Speaker
Oh, no.
01:30:48
Speaker
Why?
01:30:49
Speaker
Why do you do this?
01:30:51
Speaker
Yes.
01:30:53
Speaker
Hey, that would actually be a great retro 70s game.
01:30:56
Speaker
The Copacabana.
01:30:56
Speaker
Oh, you know what?
01:30:57
Speaker
That would be super fun.
01:31:01
Speaker
So that wraps it up for Inside the Pinball Arcade.
01:31:07
Speaker
Sorry, sorry, sorry, sorry.
01:31:09
Speaker
You're totally fine.
01:31:10
Speaker
You're totally fine.
01:31:12
Speaker
we're gonna do karaoke after after we get off this we're going for karaoke going for karaoke yes we're doing karaoke tpf josh you come to tpf yes done done this is we're going to do nothing is more fun than sober karaoke oh my god it's like junior high dance all over again just standing in the corner
01:31:38
Speaker
I'm going to be, have you seen the video of the guy that did tequila?
01:31:41
Speaker
He just sits there the whole time.
01:31:42
Speaker
And then he's like, tequila.
01:31:44
Speaker
Yeah, that's pretty much me.
01:31:45
Speaker
It's like, I'm whatever.
01:31:48
Speaker
Okay.
01:31:49
Speaker
So Lauren, if people want to get ahold of you, promote your product.
01:31:52
Speaker
This is your, this is your moment.
01:31:54
Speaker
Tell us how we can find you and, and what do you offer?
01:32:00
Speaker
Oh, we offer all the things.
01:32:02
Speaker
I will totally improve your life.
01:32:03
Speaker
I promise you.
01:32:05
Speaker
If you would like to listen to the Backbox Pinball Podcast, we are on most podcast catchers of choice, Stitcher, Apple Podcast, you name it, we're probably on it.
01:32:16
Speaker
If you want to go directly to the website, you can visit us at backboxpinballpodcast.fireside.fm.
01:32:22
Speaker
Also there, we have a swag button.
01:32:25
Speaker
To go with your Loser Kid hat, you could get the Backbox Pinball Podcast.
01:32:29
Speaker
Yes.
01:32:29
Speaker
So, um, it, it may be not as cool as the hat, but I like it.
01:32:34
Speaker
It's a nice.
01:32:34
Speaker
It's it's that logo is, is money.
01:32:37
Speaker
That is a good logo.
01:32:38
Speaker
So.
01:32:39
Speaker
Yeah, we have a local lady, Regina Morales.
01:32:42
Speaker
She's an amazing graphic designer.
01:32:44
Speaker
And I asked her to do something on the fly.
01:32:45
Speaker
I'm like, hey, I need a logo for this podcast I'm starting.
01:32:48
Speaker
Like a day later, she gives me that.
01:32:50
Speaker
I'm like, this is a really amazing logo.
01:32:52
Speaker
And I didn't even tell her.
01:32:53
Speaker
All I said, it was like, it's a podcast and I like the color purple and it's about pinball.
01:32:57
Speaker
Go.
01:32:58
Speaker
And I get that.
01:32:58
Speaker
I'm like, all right, this is a winner.
01:33:00
Speaker
It's fantastic.
01:33:02
Speaker
Thank you.
01:33:03
Speaker
As far as us, we are the Loser Kid Pinball Podcast.
01:33:06
Speaker
If you'd like to get a hold of us, we are LoserkidPinballPodcast at gmail.com.
01:33:11
Speaker
You can send us your questions, comments.
01:33:15
Speaker
We're still going to probably do another pinball story.
01:33:18
Speaker
So if you want to share your pinball story with us so we can share it with the world, please send it in to us.
01:33:23
Speaker
And for those, like Scott said earlier, we do have –
01:33:27
Speaker
the beanies they're being made.
01:33:29
Speaker
Uh, I did get the late, the late told me on Monday, she's stitching them right now.
01:33:32
Speaker
So those that have reached out, I'm going to reach out to you this week and let you know when we can get your order to you.
01:33:38
Speaker
So other than that, Oh, Oh, Facebook and Instagram.
01:33:42
Speaker
If you want to get ahold of us, that's, those are the other two places you can get ahold of us at.
01:33:46
Speaker
So, well, I want to thank you for coming on Lauren.
01:33:49
Speaker
Like it was awesome that we were able to line this all up and have you on.
01:33:53
Speaker
Oh, thank you so much for the invite.
01:33:54
Speaker
I really appreciate it.
01:33:55
Speaker
I had a great time and I really love your show.
01:33:57
Speaker
Well, thank you.
01:33:58
Speaker
And we love your show as well.
01:33:59
Speaker
And I'm excited to come down and meet you and let's do some sober karaoke.
01:34:04
Speaker
Sober karaoke.
01:34:05
Speaker
Y'all can be sober.
01:34:07
Speaker
I'll do the drinking for you.
01:34:09
Speaker
So no worries.
01:34:10
Speaker
And then, you know what?
01:34:11
Speaker
If you end up getting on that party bus, if you guys drive through Austin, you've got to stop at Franklin's Barbecue and bring me some Franklin's Barbecue.
01:34:19
Speaker
Oh, I don't want to stand in line for eight hours.
01:34:22
Speaker
Hey, sorry.
01:34:23
Speaker
Ain't nobody got time for that.
01:34:25
Speaker
There's no food.
01:34:26
Speaker
Ain't nobody.
01:34:26
Speaker
There's no food on the planet that's that good.
01:34:29
Speaker
I'm sorry.
01:34:31
Speaker
Because we go there all the time.
01:34:32
Speaker
I'm like, I am not saying no day.
01:34:34
Speaker
No, no, no, no.
01:34:35
Speaker
But it's amazing.
01:34:36
Speaker
Everybody I've talked to literally is like the greatest.
01:34:39
Speaker
It's not that long on a weekday, though.
01:34:41
Speaker
And you guys will be driving through on a weekday.
01:34:43
Speaker
It's kind of like, now, I will say, I know that Texas Roadhouse is not really Texas barbecue and all that stuff.
01:34:50
Speaker
But it's here.
01:34:53
Speaker
It's loud.
01:34:54
Speaker
It takes forever to get into.
01:34:55
Speaker
And it's like, I'm sorry.
01:34:57
Speaker
I'm good.
01:34:58
Speaker
I don't need to wait two hours for food.
01:34:59
Speaker
We're fine.
01:35:01
Speaker
No, no, no, no.
01:35:02
Speaker
I'll take y'all.
01:35:03
Speaker
We got some good barbecue places that you don't have to wait like your entire life for when you're here.
01:35:07
Speaker
No, we'll get you some good Texas barbecue.
01:35:09
Speaker
All right.
01:35:09
Speaker
Sounds good.
01:35:09
Speaker
I'm excited.
01:35:10
Speaker
Let's do it.
01:35:10
Speaker
Deal.
01:35:11
Speaker
You pick the location.
01:35:12
Speaker
We'll buy.
01:35:13
Speaker
Woo-hoo.
01:35:14
Speaker
Woo-hoo.
01:35:15
Speaker
All righty.
01:35:16
Speaker
We'll see you, everyone.